Fires will fade, and darkness will consume the world. Over the ages countless Lords of Cinders have risen and fallen. All of them having completed their quest: To link the First Flame.
The Unkindled One stands before the First Flame. It's just an ordinary bonfire, right? He is tired, broken, and only wants to rest.
A summoning sign appears. Thinking it is the Firekeeper, the Unkindled One reaches out for it.
What he summons, however, shocks him.
Just a one-shot that popped up in my mind while finishing Dark Souls III. The Unkindled One had been through a lot of pain and suffering. And I could only think of one pony to comfort him while he pondered over his next move.
Edited by: XIII Hearts
Chapters (2)
coulda been worse, coulda summoned her before fighting the Moon Presence
Just...
Yes.
*The fire fades, and the world is enshrouded in darkness*
Unkindled One:......Somebody light a torch! I can't see shit!
Beautiful. Have a like and a favorite.
Dark soul, a piece art just like this one shot.
Dodgesouls 3 wasnt that good. Try playing 1.
7188389 lol
7189859 Already did. Finished it dozens of times.
7189906 Have you ever done a level one run of Dark Souls 1?
A short but truley touching fic.
7190040 Yep!
*throws down VERY GOOD wood carving repeatedly*
7190163 Nice. I'm thinking about eventually doing a no-level up run for both Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3. I hope I don't get brutalized too much.
7190206 Good luck on the Nameless King with that
Once again proof that Fluttershy makes everything better...
have a like!
7190306 I considered her to be the best choice for this story. I wanted to go with Celestia first, but Fluttershy shares similarities with the Unkindled One. Thanks for the like!
This was pretty good mate! Also, what happened to your Tales of Dark Souls story?
7190560 It had to be deleted.
7190565 Oh okay.
7190579 Thanks for the watch!
Did an Abyss Watcher run.
Came to the same conclusion.
Sadly... Even then the Cycle will continue.
Eventually... the Fire will be found again.
And another foolish Lord will try to prolong his age...
Interesting take.
Personally, I don't think there's a way to break the cycle.
Whether rekindling the fire or snuffing it out, the Unkindled One only delays or hastens the cycle of decay. But they cannot stop it.
At best, the Unkindled One doing this would be just shy of snuffing the flame. At worst, if the Unkindled One does have the power to hold the cycle in check then it would stop at the point it's currently at... the cusp between Light and Dark, with the curse of Undeath at its worst. The Darksign is more prevalent, and therefore more people will be Undead and go Hollow.
A lasting world filled with legions of soulless Undead, incapable of being permanently killed, fueled only by a desire to take souls from others to fill the everlasting void that is their existence, sounds worse than a temporary world without Flame.
Remember, the Age of Dark isn't actually, strictly speaking, bad. At least based on the Lore... we've never actually seen an Age of Dark, only the start of one if you chose the "Selfish" ending to any of the Souls games, so it's hard to tell for sure.
But supposedly the Age of Dark would be the time for Humanity. The Legends, Gods and Demons of the Age of Fire would be gone and only humans would remain. A lot of Lore buffs have taken to interpret The First Flame as the source of Magic in the Souls universe, so the Age of Dark would simply be a world without a source of Magic... soooo our world basically.
Because of Gwyn's hubris, the cycle is destined to repeat.
So even if the Heir of Fire did attempt to halt the cycle, an Unkindled One will one day rise up to vanquish him, because they would do so, again and again and again, until the cycle completed.
And so, it will begin again, until the Age of Dark has its time.
But an ember always remains, and will catch flame and spread once more, and so Magic would return to the world and the cycle would begin anew, ushering in a new Age of Fire.
I think the cycle will only end when the Souls of Lords are lost forever, and the last ember of the First Flame fades, and the Age of Fire, the Age of Gods and Monsters would be done forevermore, and we'd be left with a world that looks much like our own.
Nice followup dude, I thought it was a bit better as a stand-alone, but it was still good.
7191078 Well the Age of Dark was supposed to be the age of humanity
the age where humans doesn't need any false deity to rule them, but an age where they can take their own destiny in hand.
though with Kaathe around, you'd guess he would try to use this for his plans
so we may have never seen a real age of dark but we've seen what happened in Oolacille when humans comes in contact with Dark
they turn into malformed beast for some, while others return to a state closer to the Dark soul
and we all remember how ugly got Manus.
so yeah on one side you can sacrifice yourself to keep a fake age of light going until someone else comes to take your place, on the other side, you take the first flame for yourself, and allow humanity to reach his real form so the hollows may rule.
or you can let it fade, knowing that in the dark, a new world will rise, one without Fire or Lord souls, one where everyone is free to choose his destiny.
At least that's how i see the endings in Dark soul
On a fun note, while going through Lothric castle, have you seen how many statues of Frampt you can actually find ?
To them he must have looked like either a guide or a deity, kinda fun to see that after all those years Kaathe and Frampt are still fighting each other.
More?
7191078 from what iv seen of the four endings for DS3. theres one where you let it fade and the Firekeeper says in time embers will show again across the dark as they did with Gwyn and Nito and the pygmy.
7191078 But look at New Londo. According to the lore Kaathe got those guys (And the 4 Kings Shudders with PTSD) all on the Age of Dark Hype Train and look where that got them! Personally I think there's really no "good" ending to a Dark Souls game. It's just what you think is the lesser of two evils.
On a side note the fact that the Soul of Cinder is probably all the Undead who have linked the First Flame gives DS3 such a serious sense of finality. Just the fact that you probably fought your character from DS1, and 2 along with Gwyn is fucking awesome. If they stretched out the boss fight it would've been cool to have DS3 mine your DS1 and 2 save data A-la Mass Effect and have the Soul of Cinder have phases where it fights based on your DS1 and 2 character. Though as someone who's done programming myself that would be HELLISH to program, but fucking worth it all the goddamned way.
I nearly went to relight the flame, out of a sense of duty and maybe respect for all those who went before. But after fighting the soul of cinder, something broke inside me, something broke when I heard those three piano keys, something broke when I fought Gwyn. In my eyes he was still burning, hollowed and insane. His torment had continued for countless years, and so did everyone who lit the flame suffer as long as it remained to burn. So I chose not to relight the flame, to hopefully end his pain and that of the world.
But nor could I accept Londor, to live in the world they suggested, of darkness, of the abyss. I feared a recurrence of what happened in Oolacile. Of mutation, madness, pain and death. I could not bear to see the darksign return no matter what happens, even if the world fell to annihilation I would not accept their offer. Nor did I wish to leave Vendricks attempts to prevent the dark and not relight the flame as a failure. I could not place faith in Kaathe or his messenger Yuria, so I did not sacrifice Anri of Astora and cured my darksign.
In the end I let the flame die, and maybe just maybe a new world will be born. Maybe just maybe there can be hope, and an end to this blasted cycle. A cycle of blood and fire, decay and destruction.
Although no matter what option you choose the cycle will return, linking the flame is obvious, a new kingdom, a new fall. Letting the flame die? A new first flame will appear one day from the embers starting a new cycle from the very beginning. And Londor same as letting the flame die.
7436013
We can believe the lies of an endless cycle, we can submit to the will of those who light the flame or those who worship the darkness, but, among the ravings of a mad cannibal so powerful he was made a Lord of Cinder, there is a truth. A truth, a single string of words, that brings the cycle of the Flame, the gods of Lordran, all and sundry, crashing down around the ears of those who worship, so blind in their admiration. And it is this:
THE AGE OF DEEP WATERS COMETH.
I accidentally killed the fire keeper when the world was fading out...
I wish you would continue this. I'm not really a fan of Bloodborne. It's cool and all, but I prefer dark souls. I like armor and swords and magic. Not guns and blood. Not to mention im a PC gamer, and Bloodborne is ps4 exclusive.
The canon ending is where the first flame goes out and an age of darkness begins.