//------------------------------// // The Last March // Story: Order and Chaos // by Tatsurou //------------------------------// As Jyggalag marched towards the castle, his Order Knights around him, he felt the leaden weight of his metal armor. He didn't want this. He didn't want to destroy this place anymore, not when he'd already cast aside what mattered to him. The endless logic, rules, and equations he'd come up with for the guidelines of Order had shown that hope did not exist...but those equations could not predict Discord. Discord, in his own way, had represented the hope that Jyggalag had long believed a fallacy. And he'd cast it aside to protect him. For the first time, he knew what self-loathing felt like. He wondered if his intentions would work when the Isles were no more. He wondered if Order needed a Prince to guide it. He wondered if anyone would miss him... A massive explosion of eldritch energies that turned seven of his Knights of Order into leprechauns in the seven colors of the rainbow banished his wondering, leaving him with a rather significant question. "...wat?" "Jyggy...I'm home!" a dangerously angry voice rang out. The palace - now that he thought about it, Sheogorath had shattered the palace when he'd banished Discord, did whoever was doing this rebuild it just to blow it up again? - exploded into a fountain of Daedric energy as the Tree of Madness shot into the sky, growing like crazy until it shaded the entire Isles. It carried up with it the Throne of Madness, and sitting upon the Throne was none other than Discord himself, a horn-and-antlered wooden staff clutched in his eagle talon, and a golden cane with what looked like a grinning unicorn head on top in his lion paw. "You!" Jyggalag gasped out, shrugging off the cane as 'Discord being Discord' as he sensed no actual power in it. "You twisted my Dad until he cast me out," Discord growled out. "You put up your obelisks in my home, called up your Knights...did you really think, once Dad wasn't looking over my shoulder, I'd hesitate to turn the powers of the land itself against you?" He hurled the golden cane down like a lance into a lake that sprang up between him and the Knights, and a swarm of narwhals leapt out of the water to shoot laser beams from their horns at the Knights of Order, driving them back with randomness as much as magical power. Jyggalag snarled under his helmet. He didn't want to fight the boy, but this was the path he had chosen. He only hoped the boy would forgive him for this. "How do you command the land?" he demanded, raising his greatsword to prepare for a strike. Discord held up the staff. "Haskill pointed me to the one who knew how to make Dad's Staff," he explained. "Though...I tweaked it a bit." With that, he vanished. Jyggalag swore silently. The Ring of Khajit! I forgot he had it! Still, he'll have a hard time blending in with these surroundings- A snarl of pain interrupted his thoughts as he felt the sting of...well, Sting across his back. "What?" "Where do you think I got the parts for the tweaks?" Discord's voice asked from all around as the eyes of the Order Knights glowed. Turning, they began to attack Jyggalag. Jyggalag staggered back, smashing his own Knights away. But Sanguine's Starlet shouldn't override a Daedric Prince's control of his own servant! Did...did this combination artifact amplify the powers of all that went into it? But still, he's using a great deal of power, he should-Padomy's nonexistent testicles, Azura's Star! He'll never run out of juice! Discord chuckled as he reappeared some distance away, watching the Chaos unfold in the ranks of Order. "It seems you're beginning to grasp just what I've got in my hands. Oh, and don't bother trying to take it from me." He hurled the staff at Jyggalag...only for the Prince of Order to hiss in pain just from trying to touch it, and for the staff to fly back to Discord's eagle talon with a snap. "It only works for me. It seems you lack a sense of humor though. None of my Jokes are working." He shrugged. "Oh well, one last thing to try." He lifted the staff towards Jyggalag. Jyggalag raised his sword to defend. He'd gotten a sense of the powers the staff could bring to bear when he'd touched it. Joke...that must be the random curse aspect from the sprig of that plant he made with Peryite. I'm immune to curses, though. But other than that, he's shown every casting power from his gifts but the Skeleton Key. What will he do- Another wave of magic hit him. He found himself staring at a massive hole in his chest and armor, his magic leaking out as his form unraveled around the staff thrust through him. Discord grinned as he reached over and plucked his helmet off...only for that grin to fall away into an expression of absolute despair and betrayal. Jyggalag snapped back to himself, filled with the fear that vision had placed in him. Anui-El and Sithis, no...I can't let that happen... As his sword dropped from his nerveless grip, Discord raised the staff and gathered a massive blast of magic before hurling it at him in a twisting, coruscating sequence of rainbow colored lightning bolts. Jyggalag made no attempt to dodge or block as the blast tore into his armor, ripping off the left side of his helmet to reveal the face beneath. The face of Sheogorath. Discord stared at his foe for a few moments, then exploded in rage. When he reformed, he had his staff leveled at his foes exposed flesh. "Why do you have my father's face?" he demanded angrily. "Because...I am your father," his foe explained. "No..." Discord gasped out as he staggered melodramatically back. "It can't be true...it's impossible!" The Prince stared at him for a time, then let out a sigh. "Search your feelings. You know it to be true. Why the hell did I just say that?" "NO!" Discord screamed out in a long despairing wail. "No..." he repeated, his voice weaker. "But seriously, explain. This doesn't make any sense, and for once that's not fun." Jyggalag sighed as he prepared to explain. "I am Jyggalag, Daedric Prince of Order. Eons ago, the other Princes feared me and the Truth I represented, and they placed a curse upon me. That curse forced me to live each Era as what I most despised...the representative of Madness. The curse created Sheogorath." "Then how come you changed back?" Discord demanded, following along with interest. "Part of the curse was that at the end of each era, I would revert and march across the Isles, erasing the madness," Jyggalag explained. "This is called The Greymarch. When the March concludes itself, I am recreated as a new Sheogorath to fill the empty throne. I retain past memories...but they are like reading from a journal. The feelings are not there. That is why Sheogorath cast you out, so you would not return and see your father not know you." "Why not tell me all this?" Discord demanded angrily. "I thought I was the heir!" "Because he did not believe you were strong enough to face me," Jyggalag explained, sticking to the Order of continuous verbage. "While it was theoretically possible that someone who sat upon the Throne of Madness could do battle with me, win, and thus end the Greymarch and take the throne to break the curse, he did not believe you could manage it. "His original plan was to have the hero that would arise in the crisis that would end the present Era come and be guided through the Isles, bonding with you as a friend to do battle with me. If successful, the new Sheogorath could act as an older brother or uncle, so you could still have a home. But because Clavicus Vile removed his power from the curse, it unraveled early. The Greymarch would both begin and end well before the beginning of the next Era, with no hero to stop it." His explanation finished, Jyggalag fell silent. Discord stared at the Prince before him for a time. "But why would..." His eyes widened in shock. "My wish...is this how...but..." He rubbed his chin for a time. "Then tell me, Jyggalag...Sheogorath was my father...but am I your son?" "You are," Jyggalag responded immediately. "I know not how it has come to pass, but I love you with all my heart, my son. It is why, when Sheogorath could not enact his plan to stop the Greymarch as it came early, I sought to use what power I had left before the End of the Era to end myself rather than forever bear witness to you seeing a father who did not know you." Discord smiled softly, floated over, and pulled Jyggalag into a full body hug. "I love you too, Dad," he whispered softly. "But you aren't you like this...and I can tell you aren't happy, either. You're still too cold, the metal too hard." Floating back, he lifted his Staff into the air. "Let's fix that, shall we?" "Discord, what are you-" Jyggalag's voice died as reality peeled away. As the hole opened, Jyggalag saw purple and blue energies endlessly interacting. He knew what it was. It was Anu and Padomy, the space where they overlapped creating Aurbis, their interactions allowing Aurbis to function and be a reality. Everything in Aurbis was a mix of the energies of Anu and Padomy, that mix being fundamental to their existence. He saw it in himself. He saw it in the Isles. He saw it his Order Knights, and the Golden Saints and Dark Seducers. He saw it in the Staff Discord held. He did not see it in Discord. Realization washed over him as he saw Discord's energy flowing into the staff. The equations that calculated the behavior of all living beings throughout Aurbis were perfect...based on what he had known. They had proven impeccably accurate until Discord's arrival, and Discord's arrival had altered all whom he'd encountered, causing them to violate those equations at every turn. And now he realized why. He had left out a variable when defining his equations, a variable that could not fully be accounted for, and rendered all his equations mere fallacies as he realized for the first time that it was a variable. 'Is the subject a native of Aurbis?' And that was when he realized...the very fact that the Chaos Discord represented could not be accounted for...showed that Order and Hope were not mutually exclusive. He could have Hope...as long as he had his son. And then Discord acted in a way that seemed to put that all in jeopardy. He leveled the Mad Psijic at the intermingling energies. The Voice of Command rang out, "STOP!" And the interaction stopped. Discord stood in timeless time in real unreality as he tried to take into account the essence of Aurbis, the shape of reality, the true nature of the entire universe. He saw the bricks in the tower before him, crumbling and shaking as he held them still in an attempt to shift just one block ever so slightly, an action that took more power than he'd ever dreamed. And as he touched the block, he described what was before him in the only way he could. "...Jenga..." And with that word, the world returned...forever changed.