[Endgame: rise or DROWN]

[warpweft]

[How long have you been exploring Nessa's palace now? You've met her family, viewed her memories, learned how to fight as a witch and tried to find the source of her power and the Treasure of her palace: the Voidheart. And along the way, you've tired your best, with mixed success, to avoid the incarnation of her eldest cousin and the representation of her trauma and fear, the Nightmare of Esmau.]

[Wherever you are in the Palace right now, you feel the ground briefly shake under your feet. Little shakes here and there haven't been out of the ordinary - Esmau is trying to blow the place down to the studs, after all. But that felt different. That felt....worse.]

[Your phone beeps as you receive a message.]

Comments

[voidhearts]

WH--

[Dimitri is tackled. One of his hands briefly glows purple as he prepares to fight back. But....it quickly fades. And he goes limp underneath her.]

...

Just do it, already.

[Touching him, Sprezzatura can feel Dimitri's black hole and the feelings inside it of overwhelming...pressure. Despair. Powerlessness. A powerful desire to want to change one's fate, but the belief that it's impossible. That there's no way to avert it. No way to choose for himself. And because of that....a desire to just give up.]

[velluminous]

[ all feelings she viciously chafes against. she pushes him down into the dirt by the shoulders and straddles him on top, all whipcord tension, but without real violence. ]

Do what? Kill you? [ her voice sounds faraway to her ears ] There is black hole inside me, also, but you listen to me. I am not fucking powerless. Neither are you. These people make you feel this way for reason. They know what you will do if you taste so much as single drop of your own potential.

[voidhearts]

What the hell could you possibly know about it?

Having someone...all around you, practically inside you...

[His hand reaches up towards his black hole - where his shard is.]

Knowing they can tear you apart from the inside if they want to...?

[You feel a warmth start to build in your hand.]

[velluminous]

You—ha ha! [ this is a compulsive laugh, not very nice ] Oh, I know better than you think. I have demon inside me.

[voidhearts]

--what?

[He furrows his brow.]

Wh....why are you here, when you have something like that to worry about? Why...why fight for someone else's Heart if a demon is just going to tear you apart from the inside?!

[velluminous]

What do you expect me to do? Hm? I have no power to quell her so long as I am in this place, but this? You, Nessa—? You are what keeps hounds at bay! I do something, I do not lay down and wait to die. So neither do you! Straighten up and smarten up, boy!

[voidhearts]

Me? And...Nessa?

[He blinks twice, as if shocked to hear that.

The warmth in your hand suddenly takes shape, becoming a white, pulsing orb of light. ...and then it continues shifting, becoming an orb of Clouds! You feel a familiar memory radiating from within it...]

[velluminous]

[ these big, fat, stupid tears are starting to roll down her hooked nose even as she continues holding him down and growling at him. the Clouds are soft in her palm. feels alien. ]

You and Nessa! I chose her Void Bolt, I chose your Invoke! How dare you act like this is meaningless? How dare you let apathy and your bitch grandmother win?

[ as she pushes the Clouds against his shoulder. Sprezzatura Vaux says #fuck family ]

[voidhearts]

[The clouds press against him and he sucks in a breath as the memories go through his mind. The memory of the times they spent together in their dreams...and the knowledge of all the effort she put in just to find him in the first place.

...tears start to build in his eyes, but don't quite fall.]

....why did she put in all that effort...

...why are you putting in all of this effort....

[The clouds fade....and so does the black hole. It slowly starts to shrink, until it's gone entirely.

The haze around the two of you starts to fade...]