To see a Darkened Sun
chapter 19
Arias dropped his sword into the crystal sand. Falling over and finally letting his exhaustion overcome him as the paledrake let out a dying roar. From the remains of the dragon, the bequeathed lord's soul appeared and slowly hovered into his palms. It glowed with a magnificent light, as if a portion of the sun were in his very hands.
If what he'd heard was true than this was a portion of lord Gwyn's soul, making it likely the most powerful soul out of all the others he'd collected. Though he didn't exactly remember anything about the others so he could've been wrong about that. Either way he wouldn't be the one to consume it, instead it was going straight back to the fire, along with him.
Carefully putting it away in his pouch, Arias struggled to his feet. If he hurried now, there'd be enough time to spend about an hour with Gwyndolin. Picking up his greatsword, he pulled out a homeward bone from his pack, but before he could crush it, a strange blue glint caught his eye.
He decided to check it out. Walking over to where the primordial crystal had been, he saw a glowing blue greatsword that looked to be made of crystal in it's place, the glint that caught his eye had been it's odd blue blade.
He sheathed his sword, deciding to pick up the strange blue weapon and give it a swing. It was much lighter than his normal greatsword, he was able to swing it around quickly in one hand with no problem, in fact it felt quite natural, as if the sword had been tailor made for him.
One especially heavy swing sent out a beam of blue magic, the magic hit the entrance to the arena and caved it in. At least he had the homeward bone on him still. He looked again at the sword in his hand and nodded, he was keeping this strange and powerful weapon, and he knew just how he'd integrate it into his fighting style.
Arias reappeared at the Anor Londo bonfire beside the firekeeper. 'Thank god for warping' he thought to himself as he sheathed the blue crystal greatsword beside his standard one.
"What's that you have there?" The firekeeper asked, immediately suspicious of him.
"To be honest I have no idea. It just appeared in the crystal cave after I defeated Seath." He told her honestly, though she wasn't gonna buy it and he knew that.
"Really now?" She asked, just as nosy as he'd predicted.
"Yep. I ought to get going quick though, the master wanted me to return as soon as-" Arias went to interrupt her but stopped himself as he felt something.
"Hrm?" The firekeeper hummed, probably believing this to be some kind of trick. Arias didn't say a word and instead immediately ran up the stairs to be greeted by the sun of Anor Londo fading away from the sky. The firekeeper followed him and was quick enough to get a glance of the sun before it vanished.
"By the gods..." She mumbled in horror. The two stood still, as did all of Anor Londo, it was like a nightmare, not even the moon could be seen anymore, just blackness. Arias felt something deep down, he didn't know what he felt but it made his hair stand on end.
"N... No..." He almost whispered, held still by his dread. Soon, through the shock, a piercing determination shot through his mind. He had to protect Gwyndolin, no matter what had happened he had to know that he was safe. He clenched his fists and started running.
"Wh-Where are you going!?" The firekeeper shouted, turning to see him already half a mile away. Looking back at the empty sky, the growled and gave chase.
Arias reached an elevator and quickly the firekeeper was able to catch up.
"What happened!? What do you know of this!?" She shouted again, running up and pulling a dagger to his throat. Arias grabbed her arm and twisted it, before throwing her to the floor, almost sending her off the elevator down to her death.
"What's gotten into you!? Your paranoia has blinded you, you bloody fool! I had nothing to do with this, but it's obvious from the missing stars that the master is in danger!" He shouted back at her.
"It's our duty to protect him don't you forget." He reminded her, though he didn't unsheathe his own weapon, clearly not intending on actually hurting her.
"If you're so far gone that you refuse to believe me then fine, stay here and when my duty is done you'll be judged appropriately. But if you're still loyal to your duties, you'll follow me and assist me in protecting our master." He stated clearly, turning around to face the cathedral.
As the elevator reached the walkway, Arias stepped off and jogged down the stairs. Quickly making his way to the contraption that bridged the cathedral and the rest of Anor Londo. When he did reach the contraption, he took a second to catch his breath before he turned it.
He looked over and saw the movement of firekeeper's brass armor in the distance, looked like she'd finally listened to reason. Arias positioned himself at the handle and waited for her, though he wasn't being very patient, turning the contraption just a second before she stepped foot on it.
Arias let go of the handle and quickly ran down the stairs, the firekeeper following closely behind. They reached the bottom just as the contraption stopped moving, letting them swiftly run down into the darkmoon tomb.
As they ran down the stairs, they noticed the fog door was missing, and Gwyndolin was no where to be seen. Despite this they kept moving, Arias running face first through the left wall, revealing it to be an illusion. Gwyndolin had told him bits and pieces of the layout of the cathedral, thanks to his illusions and magic, the living quarters and such can only be accessed if you know the where to look.
Though he was still quite confused by the layout, he was able to get through the cathedral with little trouble thanks to the vague details Gwyndolin had given him. Though to be fair Gwyndolin never expected him to ever walk down these halls.
Soon Arias found the staircase they'd taken the night before, looking up and down, he was able to recognize the floor that Gwyndolin's bedroom was on. He then ran up the stairs, the firekeeper following close behind, she was confused and getting even more suspicious of Arias now, but she remembered what she had to do, and suppressed her suspicions.
As they reached the right floor, Arias skipped a step and sprinted down the hall, the firekeeper was barely able to keep up, amazed he could run so fast with all that armor on.
She couldn't see his face but she got the feeling that he was worried, no more like he was scared. Which he most certainly was, his mind was going a mile a minute, much like when he was hollowing. He was terrified he might be too late, that he wasn't there when he was needed most.
Arias crashed through the bedroom door, looking around, it was quickly made apparent to him that the room was empty. He stood there frozen. He couldn't even say anything, he didn't know where else Gwyndolin could be, there was no way he could find him in this maze of a cathedral either.
Then, as he almost lost hope, an idea struck him. Arias reached into his pack, fumbling over multiple items, he found the Darkmoon Soapstone and pulled it out just as the firekeeper managed to catch up to him.
"What's.. That?" She asked through exhausted panting.
"The master isn't here... But maybe, if I use this, we can find him in time." He said, not explicitly mentioning exactly what was in his hand while also giving up on lying about Gwyndolin's gender, it simply wasn't that important right now.
Arias tightly gripped the soapstone in his hand, the squeeze activating it's spirit summoning abilities. Gwyndolin's dull blue spirit rose from the floor, but something was wrong. His crown was on and he looked fine, but instead of being a somewhat opaque phantom outline, he was instead misty, the details of his robe were fuzzy and noncoherent.
"A-Arias!?" Gwyndolin exclaimed, shocked that he was suddenly standing in front of what looked to be Arias, though he'd seen Arias take that very sword on his back to his throat.
"My L-Lord! I apologize to summon you so abruptly, but the sun has dissapeared and we believe it to be the work of an intruder. And furthermore, we cannot find you anywhere, are you safe?" Arias was trying to stay calm but he was having a hard time. Now things were different than before, when he was no more than just the knight of the dark moon, he was in a relationship with Gwyndolin now, just the mere though of him being in danger made him tense up with protective aggression and fear. His sword arm felt numb too, similarly to how it would feel when in the midst of combat.
"Arias- You!- No... I..-... h-..w..- night!... h- . ..ease." Gwyndolin's spirit quickly began to fade, like something was pulling him away. His lips moved but hardly any sounds came out, his misty form thinned and soon there was nothing there, like he'd just faded from existence.
Arias felt a shiver run through his spine as he disapeared. It was like a projection of a nightmare, one he'd never want to see again.
"...What was... What could that mean?" The firekeeper asked, snapping him out of his dread fueled train of thought.
"I don't know... Though.. Actually, wait. Night. I think I know what that means. Follow me!" Arias realized mid sentence, remembering where they sat last night. Maybe Gwyndolin was referring to that place, or that floor. He couldn't be sure but it was some direction and that's more than they had before. Without any delay they ran back to the stairs, Arias trying to remember exactly how many floors they passed on their way up, though when they did stop at a floor, he could see from the distant open window that it was thankfully the correct one.
He ran over to the window and looked outside. The sky was black, as if it had simply been removed. There was one star though, small and faint, but it was there. Arias sighed and turned back to see the firekeeper behind him, arms crossed. Seems she was getting impatient.
"We'll search this floor. Give me a shout if you find something." Arias told her, she nodded in response. They ran down the hall, searching every room they came across, Arias searching the rooms on the left and the firekeeper searching the rooms on the right. They quickly progressed from room to room down the hall until they reached the end.
At the end of the hall, in branched into two separate corridors, one going left and one going right. The right corridor had less windows, and some candles adorned the walls to keep it lit, while the left hall was more like the one behind them. The two looked to each other and nodded, they were to split up, the firekeeper going right, and Arias going left.
He continued to hurriedly search each room, able to keep the same pace since there were no doors on the right side, only windows. He tried opening one door but it wouldn't budge, it was locked and he knew none of his keys would work here. He had no choice but to kick it down.
Bringing his foot to the door, the force was enough to swiftly bring it tumbling to the floor. Walking in, he found that the room he'd just broken into was different to all the others. The others didn't really stand out, just variations of the same modest bedroom, but this room had a certain character to it.
It was clearly a child's room, paintings of magical knights and princesses on the walls, and toys all over the floor. In fact that wasn't all that was on the floor, a small glint caught Arias' eye.
A reflective scale. Like from a baby snake, or dragon. It was small but it was definitely real, and there were more like it, hell the bed was covered in them. And in the bed, under the sheets, was a peculiar looking doll, one that he felt as though he recognized. Arias reached into his pack and sifted through his belongings, eventually coming across a small doll, just like the one in the bed.
He had no idea where he'd gotten it, though he could say that for pretty much everything in his pack, he couldn't go two feet without being reminded that he'd lost his memories.
He pondered what this could mean for a moment, but then something caught his ear. it was faint, so faint he couldn't be sure he'd even heard anything, but he felt like he heard shouting. Recognizing that it could be from the firekeeper down the other hall, he put the doll back into his pack and ran out into the hall.
A/N I'm not really that happy with this chapter in all honesty. But when it comes to characters running around it's hard to add some interesting spice to it without it being ridiculous. I hope it wasn't a slog to read. Hopefully I'll have finished the next chapter soon, see you then.