discordia/avaritia | monarch is typing...

[ourtomorrow]

I haven't met many of you. My name is Monarch. I struck the final blow against Esme.

[ He can say that, right? It's a fact. Lion and Ruin did so much - but the one with no choice but to do it had been Monarch. ]

By that point, she had turned into a monster. But when I hit her for the last time, I gained memories. Not mine, but hers.

Esme had a sibling. Lapis. It's Lapis we saw on screens in the Underside. Esme and Lapis were chasing a dream of stardom together, but in the end, only Lapis was chosen. Esme couldn't accept that. She'd hated Lapis since Lapis was born. Esme died full of those feelings.

One instance isn't enough to build a theory upon, but as we search for the Authority of this Layer, people should be aware this occurred. It's possible other Authorities will become monstrous when confronted and we'll regain their memories. It's also possible Esme chose to show me specifically for other reasons, but if so, that's something that might happen to others, as well.

Thanks for your time.

[ And - sent.

Those patrolling Avaritia on their quest for information may find one (1) small boy hiding in an alley spying on the business district. He keeps moving like he wants to check his phone and then stopping his hand. ]

Comments

[ourtomorrow]

[ Monarch thinks back to their encounter - further back than the parts that he keeps dwelling on lately. ]

We killed her twice. She transformed when Lion-san killed her human form.

[ Or - wait. He'd been preoccupied with his own emotions at the time, but that's not precisely how it'd gone down. More than a transformation - ]

No, her monstrous form emerged. Like it had hidden inside her.

[mementomoritz]

!!
well, that opens up some very interesting possibilities
if you got her memories from it, a parasite seems less likely.....
but maybe some kind of symbiote???
or maybe it's like the butterflies containing rei's memories, but more aggressive
a piece of her, not the whole

[ourtomorrow]

[ Rei's memories are butterflies? He will remember that. ]

I'm not sure.

Her head....

[ Monarch leaves Medic hanging while he tries to figure out how to describe what happened when Lion took care of the problem in what he gathers is a rather Lion-san way. ]

[mementomoritz]

[Yeah, he's just Like That.]

was her head where the revenant emerged from??

[ourtomorrow]

No. Her head was severed. When it hit the ground, it became slime, but we could still hear her voice.

Then the creature emerged.

[mementomoritz]

from the body?
i wonder if there was some sort of core in the torso.....

[ourtomorrow]

[ Hm. Monarch thinks about how it had looked. He has absolutely no proof for this, just a feeling....But if he's going to pursue it, he'd like the opinion of someone who isn't just going by hunches, his most of all. Those are so unreliable. ]

Maybe - an Authority's human form is just a disguise. That much pain and hatred creates a monster inside them.

That's how it feels.

[ That's how it had felt with Esme's voice reverberating.

And that's how monstrous he'd felt in his most recent memory. ]

[mementomoritz]

that's an interesting theory
the mind DOES seem to have some influence over the body, in death
i'll add it to my list of things to test!

[It's unclear how she's planning on testing that, and it's probably better not to ask.]

[ourtomorrow]

Thanks.

[ ...yeah, for once, he is starting to get the feeling some questions are better left unspoken.

Though maybe not this one: ]

May I ask why you're researching all this?

[mementomoritz]

?????
why wouldn't i???
it's so interesting!

[Yeah, she just fundamentally does not get the question here.]

[ourtomorrow]

[ Huh? She's doing it just - because she enjoys it? Not for any objective, or...

That kind of sounds nice, actually, if a little hard to wrap his head around. ]

I see.

That sounds nice. Following an interest.

[ Having....fun? ]

[mementomoritz]

it is!
i've always loved biology and medicine, there's so much to learn
now i can study a whole new kind!! :D

[She's unliving her best afterlife.]

[ourtomorrow]

Did you remember that about yourself?

[ Or are things like that just...waiting to be discovered? Either way, it's something to look forward to, weirdly. In the midst of all of this.

He might discover, someday, that he enjoys something. ]

[mementomoritz]

yep ^-^
i knew from the start i wanted to learn things and know more, but i didn't remember most of the specifics until i got my first memory back

[ourtomorrow]

[ That sounds so nice....and is, in a way, just what he needed to hear lately. Remembering isn't always scary. No life was ever all bad.

In fact, isn't that also something Authorities seem to forget, in their fixation on their own misery? ]

I wonder if we all have things like that waiting for us to uncover them. Presents from our past selves.