Truths And Curses
Oho Ikazuchi.
Black lightning descended, its fell wrath consuming air itself with a crack that thundered beyond the realms.
Still, the boy stood.
Oho Ikazuchi.
Another strike, another valiant effort. The boy withstood the burst of energy and raised himself higher.
His right hand slowly drifted to his face as he straightened up.
Oho Ikazuchi!
She wasn't going to put a dent on him. I wouldn't allow it and she knew. Her futile attempts only showed how desperate she was growing.
OHO IKAZUCHI!
His glasses flew into the void, lost and forgotten in his pulsing frenzy.
He raised an arm, crushed my card with a clench of his fist and called my name.
Thus, I was born again.
The surge of life throbbed through my core and gave me the strength to utter my true form's first words in countless centuries.
"Thou art I, and I am thou… From the sea of thy soul, I come. I am Izanagi. The World is my arcana."
The very fabric of the space around me shattered under my command. Izanami reeled in terror, screeching and shrieking; a pained howl blasted away from her empty lungs under the force of my Will.
The boy could finally stand to his full height. He threw a quick peek behind him, where I floated.
"You've done well, Yu," I boomed inside our shared mind.
He smiled in my direction. Although I had learned by then that he was near impossible to faze, the twitches and trembles in his fingers screamed louder than any word he could have spoken.
"I can bring them back, right?" he asked.
I had taken a liking to his devotion.
"Allow me."
My spear spun between my fingers and drew a bright circle in front of me. Light emerged as soon as the tip locked into the zenith, pouring my strength and magic out of my body. A Thousand Curses were now mere whisperings of death, chills and wisps of fell magicka that jumped away from the frail and wheezing bodies of the boy's friends, scattered on the crimson ground far enough from the danger that Izanami still was to them.
They were back from the lands of the dead.
The largest, a blond male, threw a quick panicked look at his surroundings and jumped to his feet as soon as he was able to.
"—can't let that bitch go! I gotta kick that bony ass back to—what's that?" He seemed to notice my presence and leveled bulging eyes at my silhouette. "What's this? Where are we?"
Three girls stumbled together, rapid breathing interrupting vague and hazy sentences that did not form any comprehensible meaning. They were being calmed down by another boy, as well as a strange creature that wore two skins, whose minuscule legs made me wonder how it could stand at all.
A smaller boy with blue hair dissimulated under a no-less blue hat—no, not a boy, a girl—inspected her own limbs before blinking back a tear when her gaze fell upon me in understanding. She focused on my other self and gave him a firm nod as she stood proud. She was quickly joined by the entire group.
As soon as his eyes met theirs, my entire being filled with a fire that could not have been quenched by the freezing winds of Loki's Niflheim—a sensation I had last experienced with the very god I was about to decimate.
"We're with you!" the boy-girl shouted, and the whole group screamed in unison.
Yu smiled once more and turned to Izanami, determination burning white-hot inside us both.
"Ready?" he asked.
"As long as you are," I responded. "Before that, would you allow me a moment with her?"
"Do you really have to?"
"It is my last chance to."
His head slightly dropped, but I knew what was on his face; for I could see his heart.
"Go ahead," he said with that concealed smile while casting his arm forward.
Our minds soared in joined concentration, and Izanami's thousands of fleshless hands writhed under our power. The spear spun once again, and I pushed onward.
In the blink of an eye, I was mere inches from her body's top, my hand gliding over her forehead.
"Let us talk."
The power flowed through me and cast the tide of an unending wave that washed away the last traces of her influence.
The Myriad Truths struck her with three successive surges and allowed me to single her soul while the shockwave waned.
The instant my finger grazed her rotten skin, the wheels of time heeded my order and stopped their unrelenting clocks.
The boy froze under us, as did his friends. They would be safe while my spell held.
I crossed my arms and floated away from Izanami.
"The millennia have not been kind to you."
"Nor have they taught you how to speak to a god."
"A god is only a god to mortals. You have no power over me."
She clicked her tongue in annoyance. "Is this a lecture? You would be wise to get rid of me as fast as you can. My wrath will not relent."
"Even when we were mortal, that temper of yours was as abrasive as your lava."
"A goading parade it is, then? Fine, flaunt your new attire to your heart's will; I will smite you harder for every word you speak to me, worthless worm."
I dropped my arms. "I am here to apologize, Izanami."
The decomposing skeleton, whose every crack and band of red-stained wrappings struck shame into every fiber of my body, stopped its macabre and aimless roam. "What?"
Her empty face, which had fused to her putrefied incarnation, gawked at me.
"You have suffered all this time from both my negligence and my stubbornness. I did not wish for us to be separated, but we were. I should have let you go."
Her regular hands shook in apparent rage. "The gall… the sheer gall of you!" she screeched. "You? Apologize, to ME? Because of your stubbornness?! I had forgotten your taste for twisted jokes!"
"I simply wished to retrieve my wife from the depths of Yomi, but I had not thought of you and what you deserved. I am at faul—"
"SHUT UP!" Her voice had pitched up once more, but this time anger and agony were accompanied by an undertone of misery that pierced through my divine soul and seared my mortal heart. "You fled! You were disgusted by me! You left me to rot when I told you I needed you!"
"I should not have come for you in the first place. Yomi was your home, the hells your new family, and I refused to accept that."
A dull sound banged when one of her skeletal arms swung at me, parried by my spear's sharpened edge.
"You had no right to decide what my home was," she spat, the venom thick in her ethereal and disembodied voice. "You had no right to leave me behind!" Another hit came from the right. Then from the left. Up and down. "You preferred to hide my truth than see it for your own eyes!" Soon enough, every direction was submerged by clashes of steel and bone. "You gave me your back when I needed your hand! You ABANDONED me!"
"You are correct. I did. That is why that mistake cost me so much. My biggest failure, not as a god—"
"You puny…"
"—but as a man in love."
"Huh?"
I commanded my spear to freeze at my side and let her claws find my torso. The shadowy blades were repelled instantly and broke into a thousand scintillating fragments.
Her other limbs stopped abruptly, and silence fell between us.
"I couldn't let you go," I resumed. "But when I saw you, the rotting bones and crawling maggots, I understood. I had lost you. Bringing you back was no solution."
"You have always told yourself that to take away the guilt. Humans…" she muttered. "Humans prefer a soothing lie to a hurtful truth. You are no different."
"I was no different. Until I saw you."
I could almost hear her gasp. "You fled."
"I had reached the truth. You were not a part of my world anymore. You shrouded your own truth. It is time to accept it."
Izanami's frame sagged low, the red protuberance that had once been my wife dropping its arms in defeat. "Blissful ignorance. Isn't that what humans want?"
"It is what they wish for, not what they want. Some will follow their instincts. You should believe in them."
"As you did?"
"As I still do."
She writhed again. My spell was taking its toll on her. However, she straightened and slowly nodded her head towards the boy.
"Is he the one who made you understand that?"
I crossed my arms again. "What he feels for that blue-haired mortal reminds me of what I felt for you. But they managed to reach you, to reach the truth. They showed you their potential; they earned a chance."
She scoffed in clear irony. "Under your supervision?"
"Under their own."
Izanami's body started to flake off its own structure. "I… see."
For a moment, her voice had turned soft, motherly. In a spurt of memory, I recalled the times the mortal Izanagi had spent at her side, her laughs and smiles, and the kindness she had been known for.
My wife was gone, but it was in that instant that I saw her for the last time.
"I will have a word with this human of yours, then," she said.
"As you wish."
The spear's last spin broke the Myriad Truths and allowed the flow of time to pursue its course.
Izanami lowered herself to his level, and the poor boy understandably took a step back in response while his comrades a bit further held their breaths and prepared to fight. I infused his heart with confidence; Izanami wouldn't harm him.
"What's going on?"
"These are her parting words. Listen well."
"Power enough to summon the creator god and erase me from existence…" she said in that same calm voice that sounded so unnatural when coupled with her deathly form. "You have already exceeded what I thought humanity to be capable of."
Yu had never looked so much like a man before. "We are more than what lies feed us. We're not cowards."
"Indeed," she continued. "You have lifted the fog in both worlds. Whether that will lead to happiness or despair… is a burden you will have to shoulder."
The bits and pieces disintegrating off her bones were now as large as my entire body. Izanami lifted her head and threw one last look to her realm.
"The power to reach the truth is in the strength of your Will to see beyond the veils."
She turned to them.
"Children of man…"
She turned to me.
"Well done."
And she was no more.
The few moments that followed were spent in complete silence as the stupor and astonishment faded away. Then, out of the blue…
"YEAAAAAH! Alright, we did it!" the large blond boy shouted at the top of his lungs.
The group sprinted as fast as they could and threw themselves around the boy I was bound to. They took turns cradling him and holding him until he started to suffocate—an unpleasant sensation if I had to describe it bluntly.
"So, this is what your ultimate Persona looks like, huh?" the boy with the strange earrings around his neck said after stepping back, a look of serene satisfaction on his face. "It looks dapper."
"While I appreciate the compliment, I would appreciate it more if you addressed me as 'he'," I said. "I am not an animal."
The group jumped away in fear. "It talks?"
I was quickly growing annoyed. "He talks."
Yu chuckled in earnest and waved a hand towards me. "This is Izanagi-No-Okami. He's a bit different than the others."
"Does that mean our Personas can talk too?" one of the girls, the one with long black hair, asked.
"They certainly can…" I answered. "But they choose not to. They would only repeat your own thoughts."
The group still seemed stunned at each of my words.
"That sure is a deep manly voice, eh, Kanji?" the strange creature chirped.
"Cut the crap, Teddie!"
They all looked at Yu, then back at me in a synchronous nod.
"He does look incredibly cool, but... Is that a tie?" the youngest of the girls said.
"That's a tie."
"Definitely a tie."
They jested, but their hearts were still racing.
"Why are they afraid?" I asked Yu.
"You're floating over me with your arms crossed, a flying spear and that glowing red eye. You look a bit intimidating."
"Isn't that what is expected of me?"
"With bad guys, yes. These are my friends."
"Humans are complicated."
"They damn sure are. You can go now, Izanagi. I'll take it from here."
"Your wish is my command."
"Oh, and Izanagi?"
He seemed to think over his next words, forgetting that his mind was mine.
"Do not fret over her, Yu. We said our farewells and I trust she is where she belongs."
"Oh."
The blue-haired girl had been the one that showed the most restraint until now, but I could see the fidgeting and trembling induced by anticipation rattling her entire. She was waiting.
"It's time for you to go back to yours."
The boy's warm eyes filled me with pride. "Thanks for everything, Izanagi."
I nodded, and let my gaze sweep the group in front of him. These would be the last words they would hear from me.
"Good luck, children of man. Take care of him for me."
I called the heavens to the plane I stood in and lifted slowly higher into the air, relishing the thought that they were now mature enough to walk their path on their own.
The World needed them, and they would be there for it as much as it was there for them.
A/N: Just my take on the True Ending's battle and a bit of insight into Izanagi (Best Persona, btw).
Let me know what you think, I'm more than happy to discuss!
If you follow my Frozen fic and saw this notification, don't worry, next PaT chapter should be up in the coming days if everything works out. I'm terribly sorry for the huge delay, IRL has been impossible for the last few weeks and Persona has been my escape.
Thanks for reading!
Peace,
CalAm.