Chapter 4
He calls himself Seath the Scaleless, the Duke of Anor Londo and the Grandfather of Sorcery, as well as the Last of the Everlasting Dragons and the Guardian of Lord Gwyn’s Kin, Cofounder of the Vinheim Dragon School of Sorcery….
Twilight tapped her quill in thought. “Ummm…was that all of the titles he stated or did I miss one?”
From where he was sorting through books, Spike looked over at the letter his friend was writing and rolled his eyes. “Think there was maybe one about ‘War Hero something or other’…I dunno, I’d stopped listening by that point.”
Twilight glowered but Spike just smiled and shrugged. Outside the door to their room there came the sound of a great mass bumping about.
Anyway, he’s from a place called ‘Lordran’, supposedly the ‘Birthplace of the Gods’ as he calls it. He’s wondering if anyone in Equestria might know of it since a lot of what I’ve told him about us bears a striking resemblance to what life is like back home. Have you, or Luna, ever heard of Lordran? For that matter does his name strike a bell with either of you?
Please let me know, and also let me know if you can stop by. He’s keen to meet the ones who’ve apparently accomplished the ‘impossible feat’ (his words again) of moving the sun and the moon. I thought a physical demonstration might convince him.
Love and Hugs from your faithful student,
Twilight paused and giggled gently to herself at her choice of words. Even after getting used to her new status, which put her on the same level as her mentor, Princess Celestia, it seemed some habits just refused to die.
Love and Hugs from your FORMER faithful student and now fellow princess,
Twilight Sparkle
Rolling the scroll up, Twilight levitated it over to Spike who duly sent it off with his flame breath. Outside a dull thud was heard as one large object collided with another.
“Think I’d better go see if he needs anything.” Twilight said as she walked over and opened the door. Peeking her head out, she managed to catch sight of a pile of books descending upon her at speed and narrowly managed to yank herself back out of harm’s way.
“You sure you want him just wandering round the castle on his own?” Spike grimaced as the pile scattered itself all over the floor.
“He said the castle reminded him of home. I want him to be comfortable while he’s staying with us.” Twilight replied as she cautiously stepped out, making sure another avalanche of literature was not about to bury her under its weight. “Besides, soon as Rarity gets here, I can hopefully make it easier for him to find his way around.”
Before her the great white dragon blindly ran his hands over her bookshelves, searching and sniffing amidst the dusty tomes while his tentacles thrashed against the smooth crystalline surface of the floor. He seemed both eased and frustrated by what his perusal of the environment told him, his wings fluttering restlessly as he kept bumping into things. This place was both a comfort and a torment in one to Seath. Every direction he faced reminded him of the Archives, of his dominion, yet none of the angles seemed familiar to him, no wall nor shelf told him of where he was. Briefly he pondered if this was as his test subjects felt after he’d worked on them, as prisoners trapped in their own bodies, able to sense the world around them yet barred from experiencing it as once they could.
“Are you doing okay there, Seath?” The alicorn asked as the white dragon exhaled a sickly purple mist.
“I fare better than I would expect, thanks to thee. Thine efforts are crude, but their function hath been served well.” He replied while flexing his jaw. His own voice sounded as unnatural to him as the act of moving his mouth to form words. For centuries he’d labored in blissful silence, having no need to converse with anyone, not even his faithful channelers. Again the horrid truth of how much the self-induced isolation had cost him descended like a great burden, crushing him with the reminder that now there was little he could do to amend anything. He lived for the present, but soon time would put an end to that, just as it had before.
Just like back in Verdite.
Seath ran his fingers down the spine of a book, tracing along the title embossed in golden letters upon it. His face tightened in concentration as if trying to read the words through touch alone, yet when he could not produce anything comprehensible he smashed his fist against the shelf and spewed an angry cloud of white breath upon it. So simple the act of reading had been before, when he’d had others to do it for him of course, and now even that was denied to him. Curse it all!
“Now must I focus on remedying this other…’issue’ that plagues me. Without my channelers I am yet again faced with the cruel tricks that fate and time conspire to burden me with!”
He swept the books to the floor, forcing Twilight to leap for the corner to avoid getting buried. In lament she looked at the mess she and Spike had spent so long meticulously organizing, though her ire was briefly abated when she noticed small clusters of purple crystal now dirtied a few of the book covers. Did Seath’s breath do that?
“I understand your…um…pain, Seath. But I mean it when I say we’ll be able to fix that shortly. Just please, if you could stop smashing my castle up till then. Please?” She asked. Seath roared and spat more of his breath into the rafters, coating them in crystal as well. Twilight instantly felt afraid, and yet also fascinated as she observed this.
“Yea…yea, unfocused is mine anger…and misapplied. T'is not thou I wish to direct it towards.” Seath lowered his head and clasped both hands over his eyes. “In the Archives my lack of sight hindered me not. Through touch and memory alone I did glide among the cases, immediately locating any reference I might need. Through the eyes of my channelers did I pour over endless pages of knowledge, passing the days in blissful study of all that the world had to offer…”
Twilight’s ire and fear slowly withdrew as Seath went from a tightly wrapped bundle of rage to a morose heap of self-pity. Though she did agree with Spike’s sentiment about how much the dragon seemed to rant, she couldn’t deny a lot of what he had said so far stoked her interest.
“Yes you keep mentioning the Archives you set up, a library unmatched by any other.” Twilight got a dreamy look on her face. “It sounds wonderful.”
Seath was momentarily brought up from his depression at the enthusiasm in his host’s voice.
“T'was a labor of love. From all across the land did my channelers collect manners of worthy material for its shelves. Those with a passion for knowledge sought it out from near and far.” Seath’s voice gained a ponderous note as he again felt among the books lining the walls. “Dare I assume thou is of a similar mindset?”
Twilight smiled. “Yeah, I’m a pretty voracious reader. Back before I had this castle I ran the Golden Oaks library in Ponyville. Hoping I can soon make an even bigger and better replacement here, once I get enough to fill all the shelves.”
Seath’s rage dipped just a little bit more. This place may not have been the Archives, but it could still pass close enough, for now, to serve as home for him, especially if such a kindred spirit was the one in charge. He still needed to see about getting back to Anor Londo…but maybe not just yet. This land was new to him, and that meant it contained a myriad of new secrets for him to research, new discoveries for him to uncover…
New means for him to pick up where he left off in his experiments…
“T'would seem I hath yet been granted a boon then. To have been rendered into the company of one who shares my interests.” He muttered. Twilight smiled wider, though her cheer was lost on the white drake. “I believe thou wast regaling me with tales of how this land hath made use of my teachings?”
Twilight was about to respond but found herself cut off by the thunderous rapping of the knocker on the castle’s front door. “Oh that must be Rarity! One moment, and then we can get back to that.”
She trotted off to the castle entranceway, tugging open the great crystalline doors to behold her white unicorn friend, dressed properly for a day out on the town with a flower wreathed summer hat, a matching saddlebag, and a fashionable pair of sunglasses perched on her petite muzzle.
“Rarity, thank you so much for coming by on such short notice!” The alicorn greeted as her friend snapped off her shades and smiled back.
“Oh think nothing of it, my darling! I was out shopping for new fabrics anyway so taking a quick detour here was hardly any trouble.” The unicorn looked around the palace with a spring to her step. “So, I’m told a most magnificent and masculine individual literally fell from the sky into your hooves. Forgive me but that almost sounds like the beginning of a romance novel…”
Twilight blushed then giggled at her friend’s subtle insinuation. “It’s not quite like that. He was in a bad state and I simply had to help him. Not to mention I think he’s a bit old for my tastes…”
Behind the alicorn Seath clumsily loomed into the corridor, wildly swinging his arms about to try and feel for any obstacle that might be in his path, along with where the ceiling was so he didn't keep bumping his head against it. Sadly his sense of direction was proving to be about as non-existent as his eyesight as he still managed to collide face first with a support column, trip over a chair that had been set up for guests waiting to be seen by Twilight, then tumbled into a side table that was host to a large and very hard ornamental vase, donated as a housewarming gift from Celestia. Twilight’s grin became very forced as Rarity stared in shock silence as the beast.
“Dear me! Are you all right?” The unicorn queried as Seath slowly picked himself up from his last fall. In response the enraged dragon reached out as if to grab Rarity and crush her in his grip…but instead his aim proved to be for the vase that had rolled next to her. Feeling the sturdy and still intact vessel with his fingers, Seath promptly encased it in a prickly shell of razor sharp crystals with his breath, then crushed it in his massive hand with a roar of pure malice.
“He’s ummm, a bit visually impaired. That’s why I wanted you to bring your glasses with you.” Twilight quickly responded. “They’re enchanted with a spell that lets you adjust the magnification of the lenses, right?”
Rarity duly turned and tried to ignore the monstrous being less than ten feet in front of her, wailing in anger and pain, while pounding at the walls with his fists.
“Well…yes of course. How else can I make sure my stitching is perfect every time? Or check to see if a swatch has any cross threads that need mending before it can be used?” She replied.
“Great, can I borrow them for a moment?” Twilight asked. From her saddlebag Rarity hastily retrieved the pair of red-framed spectacles she always wore while working on her dresses, and Twilight carefully took them in her magic.
“Seath…umm…Seath, if you could please hold still for one moment….” Twilight gently coaxed. Though his rage still burned like the flames of the soul within him, Seath nevertheless silenced his voice and ceased to smash blindly at everything around him. Taking a deep breath, Twilight levitated the glasses up onto his muzzle and adjusted them for the perfect fit.
“Okay, now I need you to tell me if your vision gets any clearer when I do this…” Twilight activated the enchantment on the glasses to increase their magnification. Seath’s breath died with his voice as he beheld the world slowly turn from a complete blur into a foggy but ever so slightly more comprehensible collection of objects.
“Is that better?” Twilight asked.
“S…Somewhat….” Seath gaped.
“Okay, how about now?” Twilight increased the magnification more, and the world became even clearer for Seath. He blinked, shook his head, and tried everything he could think of to test if this was some sort of illusion, but no, the creatures around him were actually helping him to see again!
“A little more…perhaps?” He whispered.
Twilight did a bit more fine-tuning. A shiver rocked her body as the great dragon looked down at her, no longer just following the sound of her voice but actually able to put a face to it as well. He seemed positively astounded to actually behold the world as one with a functional set of eyes could. Silently Twilight pondered just how long the poor soul had literally been living in the dark, unable to appreciate the beauty of the world around him due to the shortcomings of his body…
“Okay, how’s that?” She asked finally.
Seath looked around himself, beholding things he had not beheld for more centuries than he could care to remember. The colors, the brightness, the sheer brilliance of everything! Seen not through the ethereal link of his channelers’ helmets but for the first time, with his own eyes.
“Strange….yet, mesmerizing.” He looked down at the mess he’d made, too awed at being able to make out the details on each fragment of the shattered vase to feel any regret over breaking it. He looked to the holes he’d been punching in the walls, the fractures of crystal forming a web of unmatched beauty. “Such sights, such majesty…I had never thought I could behold it with this…clarity. Never before hath mine enamored me with such crystal clear images…”
Twilight’s blush slowly turned from embarrassment to pride as the dragon continued to feast on the aesthetics of the palace lobby. Even if it was a largely empty space that still needed to be furnished (and cleaned too) it was on par with glimpsing heaven for one who had been blind for who knows how long. To see such a being enjoying her gift to him, well it made for a very happy moment…
Which Rarity then ruined with her inability to stifle her giggles.
“Well that’s wonderful, but I think we might want to change the style a bit. The flowery red of my glasses doesn’t quite suit a male’s face…” The unicorn meeped in between choked snickers. With a good-natured sigh, Twilight summoned a case containing a much more sober and professional wire-framed pair she’d had express delivered earlier.
“Fine, just give me one moment to transfer the calibrated enchantment to these and you can have them back.”
Seath blinked as the specs were plucked from his face, then replaced with another pair. His body burned with fresh warmth, not of anger but of something more foreign as he adjusted the new pair and found they fit more comfortably on his face. Again the world flowed back into perfect sharp focus, letting him resume his gorging on sights he’d never known. Within his skin the Lord Soul fragment raged with a strange lightness to its flames, making him feel like a weight had been lifted from his body. His wings spread and slowly lifted him into the air, his mind racing to try and process what he was feeling. Could it be? Was this what happiness felt like?
Twilight and Rarity jumped as the dragon head bumped against the ceiling again, bringing him to grumble and then let himself drop onto the floor again. His momentary high was now fading to allow in a sense of rampant curiosity. The possibilities that spread open before him seemed endless with this new endowment bestowed upon him. And to think, these primitive creatures…well, ponies as he now saw, had seen fit to gift him such for seemingly no gain. Silently, Seath pondered if he in fact could trust them after all. So far they had done more for him than even the Lord of Sunlight himself, and for once he hadn’t had to betray or kill anyone to earn their grace.
“Feeling better now?” Twilight asked.
“As thou cannot imagine…” Seath mused. “In all my years of researching sorcery, never hath such a concept been conceived of, nay recognized. Thou must impart how mine teachings hath lead to this!”
The alicorn drew back from the demand in her guest’s voice. Though his enthusiasm pleased her, Twilight was a bit confused as to how to explain such a common, everyday concept.
“They’re…glasses. Meant to help those with less than perfect eyesight see as normal. Surely they must have such back where you come from?” She asked.
Now Seath had to look confused. He understood the pony’s words, but not the tone they carried. He knew of what ‘glasses’ were, however, the idea of them being combined with the magical arts to pull off a feat so brilliant as what literally lay before his eyes seemed too innovative for him to accept. Surely such masterful use of sorcery could not be a mere social standard in this land…surely…
“I recognize thine efforts, stemmed from mine own work to give my channelers the gift that alloweth me to see through their eyes…truly, pony, thou claims to not know of how thine art was made possible?” The white dragon queried.
Now Twilight was feeling uncomfortable. Really she had no idea what Seath was on about, but suggesting he might be mistaken seemed dangerous given what he was capable of when upset. Hesitantly she turned to Rarity, whom, being the most polite and socially composed of her friends, duly stepped forward and took the lead.
“Please do accept our apologies, Mr. Seath, but we were unaware you had anything to do with this branch of magic. So far as we’ve known it’s been common knowledge for years.” The unicorn replied, keeping her voice pleasant but with a humble edge that showed she and her alicorn friend simply did not have any other means of explaining what had just been demonstrated.
Seath drew back, his brow furrowing and his mind now reeling. Even in the most remote edges of the world his name was known, as was what he had made possible for society! To even entertain the possibility that sorcery was now a commonplace feature, with no respect for those that had laid its foundations...such was positively infuriating to contemplate!
Seath felt his ire rise again, burning with the urge to demand how any civilization could dare to forget the origins of what they apparently took for granted in their everyday lives. However, he took a look at the ponies, noting how both of them were now drawing back from him in fear, and he forced himself to calm down. They had done nothing to warrant his wrath, and there could easily be another explanation for this; for how he was a virtual unknown in this land. It was possible this place was not only a ‘where’ but also a ‘when’, a time so removed from his age that the ancient annals of history had simply grown too distant to be recalled. Or they’d been lost again, that too had a habit of happening.
Another possibility was that, despite the similarities, this land was simply in no way affiliated with Lordran. Such was not an impossibility after all…even Lord Gwyn himself professed to know nothing of Seath’s previous dominion of Verdite…
“Very well then, I bequeath to thee only my gratitude for this gift thou hast been generous enough to impart.” He replied. Both Twilight and Rarity looked relieved. “If thou will permit me, I wish to make use of it to explore thine literature and familiarize myself further with this domain.”
Twilight nodded with a smile. “By all means! The library is open for everypony to make use of!”
Hearing the cheer in his host’s voice, Seath found himself feeling a similar sensation return to his soul. The more he thought of it, the more he saw the appeal of his situation. These ponies knew him no better than any other common dragon, and that meant he didn’t need to fear his reputation preceding him. The tragedies and atrocities that had befallen Lordran due to his own obsessions had not reached the ears of these simple beings. Essentially he’d been given a clean slate, free to act on his own merits without the burdens of distrust and hatred from those beneath his stature. Even better, from what little he’d learned from the lavender pony, this land bloomed with new opportunities, new knowledge for him to absorb and make use of for his own ends. He could start over again, and this time, hopefully, he could succeed in his aim! The loss of the Primordial Crystal would not be his end as he feared, it would now only be a mere stumbling block in his path to immortality. He would achieve what he could not while trapped in the Archives, without the concern of undead warriors constantly barging in and trying to grab his head (or his tail) for their trophy case.
“Uh Twi? Sorry to interrupt, but Princess Celestia just sent a reply to your letter.” Spike walked into the hall bearing a scroll.
“Oh right. Um, excuse us, Seath, we’ll just be in the next room.” Twilight said, feeling her spirits lift as she heard Seath hmm in curiosity while selecting a tome from her shelves.
***
My Dearest Twilight Sparkle,
While you know nothing pains me more than to admit ignorance when you come to me with want of knowledge, I fear now is such a time. I have personally scoured the Royal Library, along with Swift Quill and all of his palace scribes, for any mention of ‘Lordran’ or this one who calls himself ‘Seath the Scaleless’ (among his many other names). Sadly there exists no mention of him or his homeland in all our annals of history. Perhaps even more tragically we found no mention of him, or any dragon, being mentioned in the chronicles of sorcery. A true pity as I would be most interested to know of another species outside ponies having a hoof in shaping the art of magic as we now know it.
With that in mind, Luna and I would welcome getting to know this Seath more as it appears he has much knowledge to impart. Please inform him we will be stopping by your castle tonight so that Luna may personally demonstrate a raising of the moon, and later I may show him my command of the sun. We are keen to see how he reacts.
We look forward to seeing you soon!
Your fellow princess and trusted friend,
Celestia
Again the lack of formality irked Twilight but she told herself to ignore the feeling. This was how things were now. She’d just have to get used to it.
“Alright, well Celestia and Luna will be here soon so I think we’re all taken care of. Do you have anything else you need to do today, Rarity?” The alicorn turned to find both her unicorn and dragon friend peering through a crack in the door with equally bemused expressions.
“Rarity?”
Spike gave the unicorn a sly arch of his eyeridge and she giggled cutely in response.
“What are you two looking at over there?” Twilight joined her friends in peering through the door, and beheld Seath in the process of multi-tasking. His head remained bowed against the miniscule book in his hands, his attention completely absorbed in what its pages were telling him, yet with one of his tentacle limbs he was busy scribbling away on a scroll he’d snagged from a nearby desk.
“So? What’s so funny about that? All he’s doing is reading. And taking down notes. And giving his full, undivided attention to the words on the page….” Twilight commented as Seath ran out of space on the scroll and swapped it for a fresh one. “And being very thorough in his note taking…”
“Yeah, and does that sound like anypony we might know?” Spike asked with thinly veiled mirth. Twilight frowned at her assistant.
“Well…so what? He did say he’s a scholar!” She argued.
“Yes…of magic, and science. Like yourself.” Spike replied while biting on his fingers. “Also he’s apparently a dragon of considerable importance, granted not quite royalty, but a duke is still in the general…”
“Okay, that’s far enough in that line of thought.” Twilight promptly cut her assistant off. “I don’t need you getting any ideas right now!”
Rarity pulled the brim of her hat down to hide the wide smirk stretching across her face. “Ideas? My darling Twilight, we were doing nothing of the sort!”
“Yeah. We were pretty much just drawing comparisons and taking cheerful note of the similarities between you two.” Spike replied in defiance of the glower that was now being cast at him. Taking the higher road, Twilight silently walked past her two friends and approached Seath as he made a start on a third scroll.
“Ahem….Mr. Seath, if I may interrupt your studies for a moment?”
The white drake grudgingly pulled himself from the world encompassing the literature in his hands.
“My fellow princesses have just informed me they will be arriving in a few hours to demonstrate what I described about their control over the sun and the moon. Until then, is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable here?”
Seath panned his eyes across the walls of books still waiting patiently to be read.
“Nay, I have plenty to occupy mineself with for now.” He stated before diving back into his book. Twilight tried not to think of how she often would do the same when in the middle of a particularly intriguing work. Instead, she focused on the tentacle that had yet to break from its frantic scribbling.
“Um…if I may ask then, what are you writing there?” She queried while leaning down to read what was on the page.
“A complete list of all experiments and projects I was either in the midst of, or planned to commence before I was so…rudely interrupted and relocated.” The dragon scornfully replied. “With thine permission there is much of my great work I wish to soon resume.”
Twilight’s eyes went wide as she studied the increasingly endless length of bullet points detailing aspects of magic she barely recognized, and some she hadn’t even heard of. The prospect that Seath apparently knew far more about their mutual specialization than she did managed to briefly override the realization that he was displaying the same manner of frantic list-making as she.
“Right, well um, just holler if you need anything. Either Spike or I will…uh…be around…” The alicorn walked back into the other room on auto-pilot, paying only a humiliated glare at her friends upon seeing they were still nattering to each other and still snickering.
“So…getting a sense of déjà vu yet?” Spike asked much to Twilight’s ire.
“He’s just studying. You know as anyone with a desire to better themselves would. The fact that he does so with the same gusto as I, or is as meticulous with his lists of things doesn’t…”
“He’s making lists too? Oh now that really is adorable!” Rarity exclaimed. Twilight bit her lip and again reminded herself that smacking your friends was generally seen as impolite among ponies.
“Look, enough of…whatever you two are thinking. I’ve got more books to organize so if you want to help me with that, follow me to the west wing!”
“Certainly, lead the way!” Spike replied with a cheerful smile. Behind him, Rarity politely waited till Twilight was out of earshot before leaning over and whispering in the drake’s ear.
“Promise me you’ll drop by the boutique tomorrow and report what’s happening. I’d give them a week tops.”
Smirking, and blushing slightly, Spike reached over and shook the unicorn’s hoof. “Done deal!”
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Cut his tail, get free Moonlight Greatsword. Should be stuck onto his back by Discord, then see how long it takes for Rainbow and Luna to run nuts.
This is interesting, and I can't wait to read more! Good work mate!
I must say, this is an intriguing idea! Only one minor suggestion: When it comes to Applejack, please don't write her words phonetically. It tends to read a bit wonky. Other than that, I must say good job, and looking forward to more quite a bit!
Truthfully I don't believe Seath would ever look back on his betrayal of the Everlasting Dragon with anything even close to regret. At least, not on his own. And the truth of the matter is I can understand why he did it. Envy is an absolutely destructive force and unlike Luna who's envy was based on her sisters popularity, Seath's was born from being born without immortality, something that all of his kin had. They never quite said how the other dragons treated him through, did they?
You mentioned that Neto would be reappearing in the story at some point. Is that Neto himself or his current reincarnation?
5861256 Truthfully I wasn't aware Nito had more than one incarnation, least not among FROM Software's games. If he does I'd love to know about it cause that'd tie beautifully in with later events as they unfold.
And while I fully agree Seath would have few regrets about what he did in the past, there was more that motivated his betrayal than pure envy. Indeed as will become apparent, part of what lead to his eventual insanity is he's not entirely sure if the choices he's made were even his own, or if he was simply acting out the wishes of another power
.
5861499 Dunno if I'll read this, but... (Dark Souls franchise spoilers ahead.)
Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2 are, according to one interpretation, set in the same location separated by an unfathomably vast amount of time; the whole deal with the four Lord Souls and the First Flame is a cycle with no end. Drangleic just happens to be the latest revolution of the cycle, and it's managed to drag things on longer than they should have. The four Lord Souls were gathered, but they were sequestered away rather than used to rekindle the First Flame. I believe the 'latest incarnation' Klue Jin was referring to is The Rotten. Upon defeat, The Rotten drops the Old Dead One Soul, which is presumably the remnants of Nito's Lord Soul.
>>Orpheus Hmmm, interesting. Also a tad embarrassing I didn't make that connection myself.
Ah, well that's why I have fellow DS fans to fall back on.
If I may just ask another spoiler heavy query: Where is it confirmed that there are four Lord Souls? I always thought there were only three (Lord Gwyn's, The Witch of Izalith's and Gravelord Nito's) plus the Dark Soul found by the Furtive Pygmy. Any other great souls/humanity in the games are just fragments of one of the above.
Honestly this is highly unlikely due to the fact that Seath is literally insane, not...whatever this is.
-1 for OOC
+1 for originality
5871087 Insanity comes in many forms, some of them more subtle than others. Seath may not be right in the head, but if his actions in-game are anything to go by, he still managed to maintain a better mental grip than the other lords (he's the only boss who thinks to use your ability to resurrect at the bonfires against you, by placing a bonfire in a locked cell in his dungeon, then cutting it off from all the other fires so you can't just teleport out).
Also Seath's now had two of the major contributors to his insanity removed (the Primordial Crystal and his self-induced exile) so he's got a chance, however slim, to try and crawl his way back to a more stable state of mind in a more welcoming and less volatile setting. Whether he'll succeed, or even make an attempt though....well, we'll just have to wait and see.
TwiSeath the ScaleLight for life!
Yeah, see, Solaire may praise the sun, but Celestia is clearly more annal retentive than he is.
(I'm so glad that pun is even possible, let alone comprehensible.)
That bit with the glasses i saw something similar in a pic. It was a porn pic of him reading while getin it on while she held pricilla.
Awesome work.
So I can expect some Twilight x Seath? Nice :3
Is kinda annoying knowing that Seath is a monster who experimented on the living and killed so many unlucky ones being treated so nicely but I'm for second chances. Still hoping for our Chosen Indead comes and save Lordran
With the teasing from both Spike and Rarity it seems that this version of Equistia is just as okay with inter-spices relations as they are Inter-tribal, interesting.
7194841 Yeah one cast iron rule I follow for all versions of Equestria in my works is that love is just love. Who it occurs between, and what gender or species they are, is irrelevant.
Seems like that'd be the doctrine both Cadance and Celestia would most likely follow.
was expecting twilight with seath when i got this far
From the author's note this time:
just not much and he's also too prideful to have done anything about it till Twilight intervened.
7326859
He JUST got there! Only shipping stories on this site do that, and in most of those, the subjects have been best friends or mentor and student, or savior and saved for a while now!
(Best Friends of course encompass the Mane 6 shippings, as well as the C.M.C. shippings)
(Mentor and Student, of course, encompasses Celestia and Sunlight, and Celestia and Twilight)
(Savior and saved, of course, is the explanation for Twilight and Luna shipping)
7326859
7605422
It might be too early to say they've been shipped (haven't read past ch4) Who's to say they don't just become good friends or maybe they get together alot further down the line after they get to know each other a bit more. You don't need to know someone your whole life to want to get to take that chance.
OH, I SHIP IT!
On yond note, 't seemeth mine own judgement wast wrong, and so I shall anon readeth this story, to see if 't be true I truly can enjoy 't.
Crime against English you can see above courtesy of this translator.
A have just a tiny complaint about Seath getting glasses... He technically doesn't have eyes...
7943152
I actually learned about that during my research, unfortunately not until I was about 9 or 10 chapters in though. By that point it was too late to change anything and no one else brought it up so I decided to keep going.
7943361
Most beings who are blind have their other senses enhanced so seath would have high sense of smell and hearing blind people can even echo locate at times
When you see Seath in game, you can see very clearly why he is blind (if you look closely). Seath just plain doesn't have any eyes. So, not only is Seath completely blind, he never had sight to begin with. I always assumed that (and you implied in the first chapter) Seath, as the inventor of sorcery and its single most powerful practitioner, that he could sense magic. This means, of course, that anything that prevents you from being seen or heard doesn't work, as all means of doing so (aside from hiding behind a crystal and not moving) use some form of magic (sorcery/enchanted ring).
Furthermore, as nearly every sorcery in the game is Soul-Magic (Soul Arrow, Crystal Soul Spear, etc), I believe that Seath can see the Soul. This explains why nothing you do can prevent Seath from seeing you, as there is no way you could hide your soul from his sight. Even if you could, you would have to use some sort of magic to do so.
In conclusion, Seath can't see AT ALL. That does not mean that he doesn't know where you are. He is more that capable of killing you, cursing you, and then killing you on loop because your health is halfed. That being said, I am by no means a concrete source of lore. The Six-Eyed Channeler's Helm says that the channelers make up for Seath's "lack of sight". This doesn't necessarily mean that Seath is blind, it could just mean that his vision is really bad, or he has really bad cataracts that blend in with his scales. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
On a side note, a while ago I found a cool theory about Seath. Specifically, that during his fight with the player, he intentionally loses. As you mentioned earlier, as crazy as Seath was, he was NOT stupid. If the Flame died, so would the Lord Souls, including all of the big chunks of Lord Soul given out by the Lords. This meant that, should the Flame die, Seath's Soul would die with it. Seath, obsessed with immortality, clearly could not let this happen. But he couldn't just give away his soul either, because he needs his soul or he would die permenantly (or, he would the next time his body died). So, being the master of Sorcery and Soul Magic that he was, he decided to build himself a new soul. That way, he can enter the cycle of reincarnation (which is confirmed to be a canon thing in DS2 by NG+ boss drops) should he "kick the bucket" before finding true immortality. Being the insane/super-confident pseudo-god he was, he decided to test out his new soul. Chosen Undead walks in, Seath makes a show of "fighting" the Chosen Undead (while putting them through some trials; if Seath is going to let himself be killed his killer needs to be at least somewhat competent/respectable). This is why Seath will break the Primordial Crystal; he didn't need it anymore, and if he can make it look like an accident than there is no harm in getting rid of it. After you "kill" him he gives you the Lord Soul Fragment so that you can go on your way, and he goes on to possess a bunch of people/creatures that actually have eyes. The next incarnation that we know about is Duke's Dear Freja, the two headed spider. That's SIXTEEN fully functioning eyes for him to work with (not to mention a spider army to replace his Channelers and a formerly bustling trading city to raid for books and people to experiment on).
Sorry about going off on a tangent, and about the REALLY long comment. And for posting this comment over two years after the chapter was put out.
5870917
In the intro cinematic of the first game, it says that there are four Lord Souls. They are:
- The Lord Soul of Life, wielded by the Witch of Izalith
- The Lord Soul of Death, wielded by Gravelord Nito
- The Lord Soul of Light, wielded by Lord Gwyn
- The Lord Soul of Dark (aka The Dark Soul), wielded by the Furtive Pygmy (Pygmies? Ringed City did some weird things to the lore)
The game does not (to the best of my knowledge) say whether that these were the only souls found at the first flame (and thus, all souls came into existence through dividing the Lord Souls) or if a ton of souls came from the first flame, and the Lord Souls were just the greatest among them. The Great Souls are only mentioned in DS2, and those are in possession of the Old Great Ones, who are being possessed by the Lord Souls (minus the Dark Soul and plus Seath). Old Iron King = Gwyn, Lost Sinner = Witch of Izalith, Rotten = Nito, DDFreja = Seath.
As for the "humanity" part of it... imagine that each of the Lord Souls is a tree the size of the Great Hollow in DS1. Gwyn, the Witch of Izalith, and maybe Nito broke up their soul by giving the people they respected and trusted a whole branch of their tree. While this is an absolutely enormous amount of power to give away, they still had the trunk and the roots, and there are hundreds of branches on a tree that size. The Furtive Pygmy, on the other hand, took his Lord Soul, and ground it up in the worlds biggest wood grinder until the entire tree was the biggest mountain of splinters the world has ever seen. He then gave one splinter to everyone who didn't have a soul of their own yet. The Pygmy may have kept a few branches for himself/themselves, but the reason why the Dark Soul is never found is because there isn't enough of it in one place for a person to find. Each of those tiny splinters that the Pygmies gave out were Humanity Sprites. (This is also why humans were hated, feared, and looked down upon during the Age of the Gods; while each human was comparatively weak, they outnumbered everyone else by such an incredible margins that, had the Gods not "sealed humans in a fleeting form" they easily could have brought down the Gods and the Ancient Dragons and the Giants and anyone else that could have possibly stood in their way all at the same time. While the Lords were at their weakest, they were all laid low by a continuous onslaught of a single human; imagine if there was a continuous onslaught of a near-infinite number of humans all attacking them in unison).
Tl:dr, The Dark Soul is the fourth Lord Soul, the Great Souls are the Lord Souls possessing some people who were already pretty powerful in their own right, and humanity is tiny slivers of the Dark Soul. Also, the title of "God" appears to be bestowed upon anyone who held a sizable chunk of a Lord Soul or was born to one of the Lords (mostly Gwyn, the Witch's Daughters were never really referred to as "Gods", though they have as much right to be called as such as Gwyn's kids)
Once again, sorry for the tangents, really long post, and for replying to your question two years later. Better late than never, I guess. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
5858546
How big is Seath compared to Ponies? The scene with the glasses would indicate that he's roughly the same size, but others imply that the size comparison of Seath to Ponies is that of Seath to the Chosen Undead.
8278346
The Intro to Dark Souls 1 is wrong.
It's altered history. That's why it has one tiny plot hole that only those who are paying attention to would catch.
Okay question, exactly how big is Seath in this story? I know the friendship castle is big but that BIG?
I’d have thought Seath would have been too large to fit inside the castle let alone through any doors. Like pony height is probably a bit over half human height and a human would be tiny in Seaths hand.
9176663
Hence the coverart?
Twilight is going to get a first hand lesson of The Farmer and The Viper.