//------------------------------// // Memories and Escape // Story: The One Eyed Legend // by Redsummer09 //------------------------------// Walking around the convention, I marvel at all the cool costumes people are wearing. It honestly surprises me just how much people would do in order to accomplish their feats, this case being the amazing costumes around the place. Mario, Sonic, Metroid and so much more cosplay from different franchises! Honestly, just looking at all the brilliant designs is making me feel under-dressed. I myself went for a simple costume, you could say. What I'm currently wearing comprises of a tattered black T-shirt with a pair of tattered white shorts. Along my hands and forearms are wrapped bandages with the same thing from my feet up to my knees. Around my neck and over my head is a floral patterned curtain knitted and arranged to look like a hood. With the hood is a series of bandages arranged to look like a balaclava made to cover the lower half of my face. To complete this, I had my hair died into a bright grass-green, like during the times of spring. For those that don't understand what my costume is, I went to the convention as an altered Eto Yoshimura from the anime Tokyo Ghoul. I didn't particularly want to dress up like a girl (what with me being a guy and all), so I made some alterations. That being the shirt and shorts that Kaneki wore when he was being tortured by Yamori/Jason. Looking around the stalls, I surveyed what they had for sale. So far, nothing really stoked my interest, just being the standard figurine of a character in whatever pose they were made into. Before long, I had mildly convinced myself that I wouldn't find anything, right before I caught sight of one last stall. At first, nothing appeared to be really special about this one, but what caught my sight is the one manning it. Dressed up as the merchant from Resident Evil 4, the dude's appearance just screamed 'shady dealer'. Just chalking it up to paranoia and thinking he couldn't do any harm, I went over there to see what he (or she?) had, up until they saw me coming up to them. "So, what do we have here?" they said with an eerie but curious voice, the voice distinctly male. "W-well, just seeing what you got." I answered softly, having always been a bit shy around others. Majority of the time, I just stuck to myself. "Well friend, my stall is for anyone missing anything for their costume, but I don't see anything missing from yours." he told me. Thinking on it, while there really wasn't anything missing, there were some things that I would like. "Do you have anything related to Tokyo Ghoul by chance?" I asked him. Adopting a thinking pose for a minute, he suddenly went under the counter, the various shuffling noises telling me he's looking for something. After a couple of minutes, he came back up showing me two items in his hands, making me gasp in surprise. One of them was a silver-chained necklace, rather ordinary, but it was the item dangling from it that caught my eye the most; a pendant made to look like the Kakuja mask Eto has at the end of TG Root A. In terms of materials, I believe its made out of silver and maybe some rubies. The second item is a pin that clips into your shirt, but like the necklace it was the decoration that caught my eye; arranged in a butterflies'-wings pose is Hinami's Koukaku-Rinkaku chimera kagune, made out of quartz and rubies as opposed to silver. The merchant, seeing my surprised but gleeful eyes, chuckled in amusement. "So, are they to your liking?" he asked me, and I could tell he was grinning. Spurting out incoherent gibberish, I finally managed to respond accordingly. "How much for them both?" I asked with barely restrained enthusiasm. To be fair, how often was it you found the most beautiful pendants/pins relating to one of your favourite shows? Contemplating for a bit, he told me something that shocked me still. "Well, I'll gladly take 15 bucks for both, making it 30 all up. Been meaning to git rid of them anyway." he said nonchalantly. Freezing, I thought on his offer. 30 dollars for both? Being made with silver, rubies and quartz respectively? Honestly, that could be compared to walking out of here without paying?! So, I did what any sane person would do... "Done." I stated, quickly handing him the money and taking the pin and necklace. Walking off after giving him my many thanks, I put on the necklace while putting the pin just over my left peck on my t-shirt, when suddenly I felt really dizzy. Trying to get my bearings, I fell to the ground in exhaustion. Then everything went black. "Loser!" Coming out of my memories, I looked in front of me to see three boys bullying and taunting a little girl at the base of my statue. Yep, you heard me right, I've been turned into a garden statue. Deciding to focus on the children, I heard the final taunts before they left. "Seriously, why you're the princesses 'star pupil'," he said with heavy sarcasm on star pupil, the boy being the biggest of the three. "I'll never know, but don't think you're so special. You're still just a weakling." he said before walking off, the other two following him. 'Its people like you who are the reason a lot of people suffer' I thought in disdain for the kid, before hearing sniffling. Looking down as much as I could, I saw the girl was crying silently, most likely trying to remain hidden as to not cause a scene. The girl looked like a regular school girl to be real, with a light blouse with a purple skirt going to her knees. In my mind, she looks like a child who always wants to do her best. Her hair is a shade of what I can only guess is violet perhaps, with a stripe of pink/purple going through it. On her skirt and purples boots (would've missed that), is an emblem portraying a purple six pointed star surround smaller stars. Over all, she looks like a good kid. "*sniff* what did I do to them?" the girl asked herself softly. I can tell she's quite young, maybe 6 at most, with how squeaky her voice is. "Trust me kid, some people are assholes just because they are." I said in my stone prison, not believing she can hear me. Over the last 2000 years only Discord has heard me, and that's because chaos is his forte. Looking up, the girl asked something that shocked me. "Who said that? And what's an asshole?" she asked with tears on her face, but remaining curious. "C-can you h-hear me?" I asked her, hoping she can and I'm not going mad finally. "Y-yeah, why wouldn't I? And where are you?" "Turn around kid..." I said as softly as I can, not wanting to scare her. Following my instructions, she turned around to face me, being confused when facing my petrified state. I have my feet evenly spread apart to keep a firm stand, with my arms in an X position in front of my face. It was futile of me to try and defend against the Elements, but heh A for effort. "Was that you Mr?" she asked confused, looking at me with a tilt of her head. "Yep, that's me kiddo." I said, shocking her that a statue was speaking. Looking at her face, she has a rather balanced complexion, not too pale nor too tanned. Though I will admit, I was curious about the medical eyepatch. "Tell me, why were they picking on you?" truthfully, I didn't need to know as she did whimper she didn't do anything. Looking down she answered. "I don't know. I was studying in the gardens when the appeared and started picking on me." tears started streaming down her face accompanied with a sniffle. "Thing is kid, they just wanted to get a reaction out of you. That's all bullies do." thinking, I never got her name. "What's your name kid?" I asked her softly. Perking up, a happy smile appeared on her face. "My name is Twilight Sparkle, personal student of Princess Celestia." she said with eyes closed and a proud smile on her face. Twilight Sparkle, the main character for the show My Little Pony. I'm a bit disappointed that I missed the comparison between human and pony. "Hehe, well, its nice to meet you Twilight. The history books know me as 'Demise', but you can call me Joshua Eto Yoshimura, or just Joshua." she isn't able to see it, but I'm smiling right now. Its been so long since I had someone to talk to. Its honestly refreshing. "Nice to meet you too Joshua. Though that is a weird name." she said confused. Not surprising, as the naming schemes here will give some hint to their talents. "I come from a time with a different naming system. I'm curious, but what's with the eyepatch Twilight?" at first it was curiosity, now its just been bugging me. Showing some hesitation, she began to remove the eyepatch from I now notice is on her left eye. What happens next shocks me. While her right eye has the white sclera with her purple pupils, her left eye changes to have a red pupil with a black sclera. There are many people and creatures on this world with different eyes, but only ONE has that sort of eye. "One-Eyed Ghoul..." I whispered softly in shock. For so long, I thought I was the only ghoul here. I may be wrong and they're somewhere else, but I don't know. She was about to question me, right before a voice cut in. "Twilight" Looking over, we both see a worried and concerned Celestia, who immediately scoops up Twilight in a motherly embrace. Twilight tries to get a word in, but she is constantly interrupted by Celestia who takes her back to the castle. I watch them go from my stone prison, thinking on how the most important person alive is a half-ghoul. "Well, this should be interesting in later years." I said in thought. And it only got more interesting, when a certain master of chaos escaped his imprisonment.