You remember well.
You remember well the searing, slicing, piercing, cutting. The Flame of the Soul of the Lords animated in its lonely husk of armor. The thrill of a fight, of battling the last living foe in a dark and deceased world. Burning, raging, crying. The voices of what may perhaps be a thousand undead yet, amalgamated, trapped, as one.
As reward for their sacrifices, surely.
You remember well your fear and faltering.
You remember well the landing of the final strike on your person.
You remember well, even in your unkindled slumber, how your failure earned you your place in the Cemetery.
* * * * *
With aching bones and flesh, with weighty armor of stone, you rise from your cold earthen casket. You are greeted in your revival by a once-sky; a dark, cruel, cold visage replacing what once shone gold, blue, andalive. You vaguely recall your favorite color, as a child, being sky-blue. A deep forlornness gathers within you, a heavy weight in your gut, sickeningly palpable.
Two great doors of stone, large even for your size hang carelessly open. Ahead be a path. At least, you're sure there is one. It is impossible to tell for certain in this blackness.
You are rewarded for your diligence. Atop the gentle slope, precariously positioned over what you are certain to be be a bottomless pit, lay a great shrine of some sort. Two torches mark its entrance, in stark contrast to the surrounding ominous black which you have quickly grown to hate.
Your hopes are dashed as you soon discover that the inside is equally black. You recognize the empty pit of a bonfire at its center, coiled sword - the weapon of the Guardian of the Fire which had slain you - harshly shattered. The weapon's handle is missing.
This bonfire will never be lit again, of that you are certain.
Not without its sword.
Contrary to your pessimistic expectations, you do find one inhabitant within this empty shrine. An old woman, draped in red; while any other would cower at a champion of your stature, this woman merely chuckles.
Perhaps she isn't entirely mentally sound, but that isn't anything new to you, either. Though she does seem to sense your confusion and apprehension. Mercifully, she speaks straightforward to you. In the rather cramped hallway, you find yourself sitting, cross-legged, as you listen to the old handmaid's tale.
Her ramblings ofthees andthous, and other archaic nonsense, you don't much appreciate. Even in your admittedly privileged early life, you'd never appreciated the riddlespeak of those affiliated with the Old Royalty. Though through the handmaid, you come to understand the tragedy. The tragedy of the Firekeeper, mind poisoned by visions of the very dark that you now reside in - poisoned by visions granted by the gift of eyesight.
The world is dead.
The old handmaid laughs once more, her every exhale grinding horribly against your eardrums. Oh, how everything felt sowrong.You stand up in a hurry, obviously perturbed and upset by her words. You can't believe it - you won't. You had died so many times already; how couldthisbe the death? How could it be the death in which you finally, truly failed? After so many deaths before?
You should have linked the fire. You should have defeated its guardian.
But you have simply died one too many times.
Yet the old handmaid speaks once more, in that awful, cryptic manner of hers; utters tales of the tiniest of embers, awaiting the opportunity to reignite, to send the world careening back into its previous state of light and fire.
You tell her that she speaks nonsense. You had always been told that the world was always how it had been; that the light of the sun had always prevailed, and that the ever-gnawing dark would forever be kept at bay.
You had always thought that fate would ultimately control the natural order of things, that it would never come tothis. Now, you know not what to believe, and in your turmoil, the woman only laughs again. At what, you can only guess.
Perhaps she's laughing at you.
* * * * *
You sit cross-legged in the stone clearing. Chilly water surrounds your resting place in an oddly satisfying circular manner. It is silent, though the gentle waves skirting across its crystal-clear surface, encouraged by the gentlest breeze, feel calming enough.
Of course, everything about this world feels dead now. The very air stands still, coaxed into motion only by the movement of the hollows outside of your clearing, and your own breaths.
It's so crushingly dark.
You miss your old life, in a distant land illuminated by sunlight. In that life, you had worked so hard, and fought so much, in order to acquire your beloved title of Champion. When you discovered that you were undead, you merely counted it as one of the many blessings the gods had granted you, foolish and hubristic as you were. Who now, in their right mind, would consider such a thing as eternal life a blessing?
You so desperately desire your old company; your old friends, and lover, back in your homeland; the dear friends you had made during your journey to link the flame. You wonder how many,ifany, had survived to this day.
That fills you with the slightest hope, at least.
You are awoken from your meditations be the signature laugh of the woman - the toxic handmaid of the shrine. You stand to face the woman, roughly removing your treasured halberd from the stone brick beneath.
The woman is unfazed, which surprisingly plants a seed of doubt within yourself. She carries within her hands a bag. You can see, due to your vast height advantage, that numerous candles lay within.
You inquire as to how she made it past the Black Knights that so diligently guard the shrine. She responds gruffly that she was able to manage, as if the inquiry was offensive in some way. You decide now to quiet yourself, and let the woman speak her mind.
She speaks of the significance of the candles she holds. You remember now the vast collection of candles within the shrine when you'd first seen it; the handmaid's candles were the only ones lit. It stands to reason, she tells you, that a fellow resident of the shrine deserves his own candles, as well.
You are surprised by the odd and unexpected gesture of welcomeness. When asked why, the woman would only respond with a chuckle, "Thou'rt bound to this shrine like the rest of us, art thou not?"
With not much else to do, you help her arrange the candles into a circular arrangement, and light them.
The time soon enough comes, and the old handmaid, bag empty and work well done, offers you her farewell - and to your surprise, well-wishes and condolences. You do not ask why she saw it fit to say such things to you; you feel as if you understand her enough already. This time, you offer her an escort back to her residence in the shrine; you offer to fend off any attacking Black Knights. The handmaid kindly refuses the offer, and leaves through the great stone doorway.
There is a moment of quiet; a moment of reflection. Then, you approach the doors, and quietly shut them.
The gift of mind-quelling, soul-warming fire is more than you could have ever wished for. You wish to be alone, to tend to it. You figure the handmaid would understand.
You no longer miss your friends. You no longer miss your family, your lover. You know not where they are, or how they died. It's too late for them. But they still live in other ways, you reason to yourself.
After all, you're guarding this Shrine forthem.
The flames that now surround you in your meditation, kindly heating the still, dead air, fills you with a hope unending. In a world without flame, you cling to any light offered. You hope that one day, your guiding hope, your light, would return to the world.
Perhaps it would be one of these candlelights at your very feet that would be the one to relight the flame.
It would be only a matter of time, now. You are certain of it.
You will protect this Shine, and the Fire whose linking it honors, to the day you hollow.
It was inevitable that you would receive another visitor, untouched by the flameless dark.
As the undead, competent and yet unhollowed, entered your consecrated grounds, their footsteps, uncaring and clearly unknowing of the blight of the world, created the smallest splashes in the pool of water surrounding your rest. The waves nearly extinguished your most sacred candlelights, your anchors.
You know now that you should have talked. Youcouldhave.
But, even as a Champion, you had grown so fearful. You had to defend your flame. You couldn't live without it. Youcan't. You won't.
You challenged them. They met your challenge.
You remember well the searing, slicing, piercing, cutting. The soul of this lost undead thrived with will and with power in its bosom. The thrill of a fight, of battling the last living foe in a dark and deceased world. Burning, burning,burning. The voice of one undead, crushed to near-defeat by your ruthless and relentless assault.
As if destroying them would atone for your greatest failure.
It did nothing. No death would save you from this. Not even your own.
You almost relished the horrible, sickening pain, so fitting for such a failure as yourself, as the undead drove its blade through your stone armor, and into your chest.
You are the prisoner of this shrine.
When you reawoke, you returned to your consecrated grounds, only to find your candles extinguished.
You would slay countless undead since then. You would shut the great stone doors once more, preventing access to the Shrine beyond. And not a single one further would pass, with your efforts. But you would always remember the one. That one who succeeded where you had so horribly failed, that first fateful fight. Your candles are gone for it, the wax and wicks useless. The handmaid has not returned; in fact, you wish that she wouldn't. She cannot help you now.
You only want light.
You only want sun.
You only want hope.
And you now hold your hold your hope within your palms.
Your halberd is useless now at your side, carefully-tended blade now negligently buried within the stone brick beneath you and handle in air, for you now possess a coiled sword. It thrives in your hands, warm, breathing. You discovered it, deep within the untended graves beyond your consecrated grounds. Just holding it fills you with perhaps the highest form of ecstasy.
Or perhaps you're simply going hollow.
Nonetheless, you've found the solution to your problems.
All of them.
You adjust your grip on the weapon, holding the sword upside-down, its tip pointing directly downwards. Appropriate for a bonfire, you realize - though you know enough to know that you have not the means to repair the bonfire in the shrine.
Surely a failure like yourself isn't fit to do so.
Cinders burn brightly in the dark, gently drifting down to the ground, as the sword remains ever-immolated in your grasp. Taking a breath, you outstretch your arms before you, sword still firmly within your grasp.
There must be one who is strong enough to link the fire.
You shut your eyes. The visage of your helm betrays no emotion.
One stronger than you.
You plunge the coiled sword into your abdomen,deeperanddeeperanddeeper.The pain isbeyond excruciating, as if the First Flame itself isburning, smouldering, scorching, immolatingyou to cinders from the inside. You can do nothing but fall to your knee. There is no more to say, no more to do. Your true duty, you have realized not long ago, has yet to begin.
Every second is agony, now.
But the First Flame requires sacrifice.
Your thoughts are rended into nothing as soon as they formulate. You know you will soon go hollow. But, as an old friend once said, going hollow can solve quite a bit.
The one to defeat you would save the world, not you. Perhaps you never stood a chance. But in your final moments of consciousness, in your final moments prior to your hollowing, you know that your duty - as the faithful Iudex, and not the hubristic Champion - will ultimately better your world. You may even save those left, with your sacrifice.
Yes, indeed, perhaps you were always a cog in the machine. Perhaps you were never meant to link the Fire.
But the one to follow you will be.