Story Three: A man's Deathbed

AN: So, my dear readers, here we meet again, with a new chapter just out of the pocket! This time, I'm bringing Lucian up, as Malleus08 had requested. I decided to go to a future-ish background, just after he confronts Thresh and finally gets his revenge. I hope you enjoy it, and feel free to review, if you want. I will always answer them, be it in a PM or in a paragraph on the "Review Reply Corner(tm)". Also, if you follow or favorite this story (or rather, these stories), I am very thankful.

But now, enjoy the story! I know I enjoyed writing it :)

It's even funny, how my life was completely destroyed by him. You'd think that the so-called "Thresh Prince" would be the one to have his whole life turned upside-down but no, it had to be me. It had to be the one last soul in this damned world who hadn't been corrupted by evil yet. The one damned soul that still was able to love all and to pity all, the one soul who still had compassion for his foes and love for his friends. He had to take the last soul that actually was good and turn it in a revenge-driven machine of a man.

He got what he had coming.

But I believe so did I.

It all started years ago. She, my wife, Senna was her name, and I, we used to be two of the Purifiers. Yes, the Purifiers, that old demon-hunting order and what not. We were part of it, and for a good reason. We wanted a better world. Somewhere a man wouldn't have to watch each of his steps out of a city, fearing to be jumped upon by an army of hungry fiends. A world where pain and misery would not be caused by the wicked beings anymore. A world where mankind was finally free of the evil born of its past sins.

We had a dream, yes. We had an utopia on our minds.

Everything seems so easy when we are young, when life hasn't spat on your face enough to make you understand how it works.

At a first moment, it was wonderful. We'd set off together, fight together, kill the monsters together, save any victims within our reach together, and then return safely to our home.

But then, the Isles rose up. Hecarim, a beast as huge as it was mighty, rode Valoran through, slicing his path through both Noxians and Demacians as if they were grass waiting to be mowed down. Mordekaiser, the Master of Metal, started appearing at seemingly random patterns, brutally murdering and then enslaving all who dared to stay on his path and all unlucky enough to be his target. Karthus, a lich who willingly died, seeking undeath, harvested souls in the middle of us.

And he also came.

Thresh.

Even thinking about him leaves a sour taste on my mouth.

All of the mighty leaders of the undead would cause suffering unimaginable and only leave broken corpses behind them, but none was like Thresh.

Hecarim had a mission, and his victims were trying to stop him. Mordekaiser had his oh-so-great plan, and a whole army of souls to build. Karthus was converting the foolish valoranian to his Cult, convincing through sheer force they shouldn't fear the reaper. Thresh had no reason. No mission, no evil plans, no religion to raise with death. He had no reason to kill, nor to torture, nor to destroy.

But he never gave his actions a second thought.

I guess he kind of had his own reason. Pleasure.

There it never was a soul with such sadism, and I hope there it never will be another.

More than once I saw the souls of the dead left behind by the Lords of the Isles. Hecarim was practical, not wasting a single movement. All of his victims would have a single, clean cut either right through their chests, through his mid-section, often leaving two pieces of what used to be one, or a cut right through the neck. Decapitation at its finest. Mordekaiser was a mistery: some of his victims seemed to have suffered no violence, neither mental nor physical, while other were the opposite: corpses truly brutalized, remains that looked hardly human. Karthus would always give his victims a quick, painless and unavoidable blow, and that would be it.

But Thresh's victims were a whole different story. Not even a single corpse was in a normal shape: Every single victim of his would be broken beyond recognition while human, and then broken even more, tortured until their last seconds.

The worst part was, it didn't even end there: All of his victims had their souls collected and encased in that unholy lantern of his. Stored, like tools or supplies. And they were supplies to him: Just a few more subjects for his sadism and cruelty. He'd do the most sick and twisted things imaginable: Torture your friends and your family before your own eyes, mercilessly cleave them to death, and then force their souls to come back together just so he could do an encore for his audience. He'd torture you until you begged death to him, and then he would comply: He'd kill you, in the most painful way possible. But wait, it wasn't over! He'd force you to revive, his torture unending.

He was pure sadism, craziness and evil, the very exemplar of a twisted mind.

He had to be taken down.

And who better to do that than the two purifiers that had never failed? The couple with the ancestral sacred weapons?

So, we, foolish youths, departed to finish his wicked existence.

It failed. Terribly.

We got the ambush part we had planned to work perfectly, but he was stronger than what we had expected.

We had the strongest anti-undead traps known back them.

We should've known it would fail; he was one of the Four Lords, not just any undead we had already faced.

I was the one to fail. He used me and my weak mind to break free. Had I resisted, Senna would probably still be here.

But I failed, and paid a price way too high.

His damned scythe, it was sharper than what it should be possible. It just was able to cut her armor through like it was paper. And he was an avid paper-cutter, never would he stop if he wasn't forced to.

Just like the hundreds before her, she was slain brutally by that demon. And, just like the thousands before her, she was captured. She was shoved in the lantern, stored for future torture.

I never got over it, I must admit. My life became vengeance. I, who used to be the kind half.

I, who was the merciful half, was corrupted into a hard, vengeful person. I, who never would harm a fly if not needed, became just what I fought. I gazed too long into the abyss. It stared right back at me.

And may God strike my soul down if I wasn't fascinated by it. I guess evil always had been the easy way. It all just is so easy when you're evil, when you use the means of the twisted. When you become one of them.

I used to be gentle, a kind soul in this accursed land. I was re-shaped in a ruthless gun-slinger, sworn to kill the beast and all who tried to stop me.

I never really killed any human, but I did many things I am ashamed of, in this mad quest for vengeance of mine. People I hurt, people I used, people I tortured, even, just because they were too afraid of the Warden to just give away the information I was seeking. I had been blinded by my rage. I used to say he killed my good half. I didn't know just how right I was.

There it is so much I would undo if I could, and yet so little time to try and cleanse myself of my sins. There it is so much to try and make right again, and so little time.

It would be easier to let my eyes close, to let Hell take me. And then, I'd meet him again there.

Oddly enough, that sounds so right, so deserved.

I guess my hands became tainted beyond repair.

I took decades to finally catch him, to finally get my chance at vengeance.

I had him cornered.

And yet, he was too strong. His scythes were too sharp, his movements too quick. What should've been a clean execution became a bloody battle.

A battle I came out on top, but once again at a price too high.

He did one final attack, just when I thought he was gone for good. I had already been hit at my limbs by those damned wepons, and I knew how hard they hurt.

But I hadn't tasted a hit at the chest.

And, now I can tell you, it was terrible. It was the pain of dying thrice and then thrice again, the pain of tasting pure evil touching you heart and trying to rip it off.

I did pull the trigger, and I did kill him, but now I too am fading away. I can feel life seeping out of my body through my chest. And, mark my words, there it never was a death so blissful as this death I am having. It is the feeling of freedom, of accomplishing what you needed.

He definitely got what was coming for him, but so did I. So did I.

AN: RIP in pepsi Luciano.

I believe I did a pretty solid job on this one. Feel free to agree or disagree with this if you do review, but I think I portrayed Lucian at least decently well.

Also, I have already decided (THE RANDOMIZER ONCE MORE HAS SPOKEN!) that the next one will be a Kat/Ashe one shot, which I will probably make sad/angsty, just because I am terrible at writing fluffy love cute thingies. It's coming up soon(tm), I Garen-tee you!

And now, grab your seat and get ready, for it's time of the GLORIOUS, MARVELOUS, THE ONE AND ONLY...

REVIEW REPLY CORNER(tm)!

Malleus08: Well, thank you for the praise! I am happy to know you were pleased. However, I now need to know if you liked this one you asked (wink, wink) You know, maybe you should review telling that to me (more winking).

After all those efforts I was doing to fish a review from you, you probably should not review and, instead, just send me a PM just to troll me out.

SO, I HOPE YOU LIKED THIS ONE I WROTE BECAUSE OF YOU. DEFINITELY TELL ME WhETHER YOU LIKE THIS OR NOT!

Redgum: Thank you, m8. I always try to take a deep look at the characters I'm going to write about, and hearing that people noticed that and liked it is great!

So, Yasuo and Riven, huh? I sent you a PM 'bout that, read it!

Also, I hope the next few stories please you as much as the previous did!

So, this marks the end of my time here. For now.

Goodbye, everybody! I've got to go!

{Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth

Mama, oh! (Anyway the wind blows)

I don't wanna die

I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all}

Meh. Maybe I should listen to less Queen. Nah, I'm good.

So, this is it, people! See you next time!