Yeah, well. He kept trying to be helpful even though his emotions were ninety percent dead. And because our rooms shared a bathroom, I ended up on the receiving end of that help more often than others.
[Junpei shrugs.]
His roommate ended up becoming my best friend. And we were all around for one another when our memories started coming back. Which was not a fun time for anybody, just saying.
[Junpei looks him up and down, then leans back on his hands, nodding thoughtfully.]
Because you're still around, too, somehow, right? [He gestures to Izunia, as if that explains anything.] Maybe not in space and time, but you're still connected to something. Events and knowledge are still something you... receive. Or perceive. Something like that.
[His hands slide apart, and he thumbs a ring that isn't there on his left hand.]
If you know anything about the Ring of the Lucii - the judgement of the Kings of Old, souls contained in the ring? That part is not to fooled around with. It's quite literal.
[HEY UH JUNPEI THAT'S KIND OF UH. HIS OTHER FAVORITE PERSON okay no let him breathe and take a gulp of cider here to calm down.]
No, keep going as you were. To answer the question, while I 'slept' through much of the two thousand years Lucis existed, I was passingly aware of a great deal, and very awake after a certain 'Chancellor Izunia' showed himself into Regis' throne room with Niflheim's terms. In fact, I was probably the most active and aware of any of the kings - not that it amounted to much.
Noct is fine! Uh, as fine as any of us are, anyway. What I mean is, he is not, as far as I know, currently dead or even "dead"-- [With air quotes.] --like anyone who dies in these things gets. Which I guess I should start explaining. ...Shit, he's like your one hundred and thirteenth great grandkid, isn't he? Wow.
[ANYWAY.]
The short version is, every week, our captors would try to give us extra incentive to kill one of our fellow captives and try not to get found out. Meanwhile, the rest of us were expected to do an investigation and then share our findings in a "trial." Of course, in a closed space like that, there's almost no way to get away with murder, but that doesn't stop people from being morons.
[He's quiet for a moment, then adds:]
Though most of the killings in our season were accidental. The other rounds weren't quite so friendly.
...Somehow, they engineered it so deaths and trials always happened on Fridays. There was never a case in which a killer went undetected. Even when it was an accident, they'd be executed. The rest of the time... we looked for a way out, or just did what we could to keep ourselves sane.
Every Sunday, we'd remember something we'd forgotten. Mostly I remembered the second life or death game I was in. Ardyn and Church--uh, his... roommate--they remembered more about... what happened to them. What they were. Yuuri--my girlfriend--she remembered things that happened to her and her friends in the zombie apocalypse. Things like that.
That might've been the hardest part, more than the deaths. We were stuck in an unlivable present, squeezed between terrible, inescapable pasts, and a future full of death. So, that sucked.
[For a moment, he imagines it - the man he was when he was the age he appears to be now, or even younger - the boy younger than Junpei, whose brother had just discovered his ability to cure a plague -
That person, suddenly uncovering the memories of the Izunia who sits here now.
The weight of his regrets seems suddenly far greater than usual. Good time to drink.]
That might be an understatement. I can only imagine - Ardyn must have practically destroyed himself all over again.
Yeah, a little. But the time with us before he remembered must've stuck hard, or maybe Church and Yuuri and I were just extra persistent--especially Church--or the break from feeling Scourgey he had about midway helped, or something... I don't know. By the end, he was resolved to get us out, even knowing everything he was and did.
We're... kind of his Glaive now. Me and Chuch and Yuuri. His Kingsglaive.
...He was never really close to anyone, save myself and his Shield. Even before he got the healing powers - magic was very rare, and so soon after the Astral War, viewed as the sort of holiness that no one wanted to get close to. Growing up, it was just us.
[Ardyn was always a friendly face, took patients and lovers both in numbers Izunia doesn't want to think about. But he wasn't close to anyone. Never had that sworn band of brothers, the way later kings would.
If Junpei watches the implications closely, he'll realize quickly enough - neither did Izunia.]
Uhh, for the good of my liver, I have to point out that downing an entire bottle this size would kill a nonmagical, normal human being my size? In a place like this, anyway. With all the spikes. Just saying.
[Junpei does not in any way, shape, or form, put the bottle back down.]
If the fifty thousand times I fell on the spikes and into nothingness or onto the fucking floor didn't wake me up, I don't know what will.
[He surveys their surroundings thoughtfully once more.]
I actually wasn't even sure I was dreaming. I mean, sure, physics are fucked and I guess this is the kind of puzzle-solving crap I'd dream about, but it felt a little... too not-me to be a dream. My subconscious doesn't typically work in dungeons.
I can't say it's especially likely to be mine, either. Aside from it being one of the few remnants of Solheim left by Noctis' era, I can't claim any particular connection to it.
[He gestures with the hand holding the bottle.]
If you'd rather, there are less oppressive surroundings.
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[Junpei shrugs.]
His roommate ended up becoming my best friend. And we were all around for one another when our memories started coming back. Which was not a fun time for anybody, just saying.
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[He distinguishes. The brother he knows, lucis caelum, from the one he doesn't.]
And... I imagine it was not. I've seen no small part of what that must have entailed, and not only the parts you would expect.
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Because you're still around, too, somehow, right? [He gestures to Izunia, as if that explains anything.] Maybe not in space and time, but you're still connected to something. Events and knowledge are still something you... receive. Or perceive. Something like that.
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[His hands slide apart, and he thumbs a ring that isn't there on his left hand.]
If you know anything about the Ring of the Lucii - the judgement of the Kings of Old, souls contained in the ring? That part is not to fooled around with. It's quite literal.
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[HEY UH JUNPEI THAT'S KIND OF UH. HIS OTHER FAVORITE PERSON okay no let him breathe and take a gulp of cider here to calm down.]
No, keep going as you were. To answer the question, while I 'slept' through much of the two thousand years Lucis existed, I was passingly aware of a great deal, and very awake after a certain 'Chancellor Izunia' showed himself into Regis' throne room with Niflheim's terms. In fact, I was probably the most active and aware of any of the kings - not that it amounted to much.
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[ANYWAY.]
The short version is, every week, our captors would try to give us extra incentive to kill one of our fellow captives and try not to get found out. Meanwhile, the rest of us were expected to do an investigation and then share our findings in a "trial." Of course, in a closed space like that, there's almost no way to get away with murder, but that doesn't stop people from being morons.
[He's quiet for a moment, then adds:]
Though most of the killings in our season were accidental. The other rounds weren't quite so friendly.
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[THIS IS AN EASIER TERM FOR ALL INVOLVED. After a bracing swallow, he simply gestures Junpei to continue.]
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Every Sunday, we'd remember something we'd forgotten. Mostly I remembered the second life or death game I was in. Ardyn and Church--uh, his... roommate--they remembered more about... what happened to them. What they were. Yuuri--my girlfriend--she remembered things that happened to her and her friends in the zombie apocalypse. Things like that.
That might've been the hardest part, more than the deaths. We were stuck in an unlivable present, squeezed between terrible, inescapable pasts, and a future full of death. So, that sucked.
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That person, suddenly uncovering the memories of the Izunia who sits here now.
The weight of his regrets seems suddenly far greater than usual. Good time to drink.]
That might be an understatement. I can only imagine - Ardyn must have practically destroyed himself all over again.
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We're... kind of his Glaive now. Me and Chuch and Yuuri. His Kingsglaive.
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[Ardyn was always a friendly face, took patients and lovers both in numbers Izunia doesn't want to think about. But he wasn't close to anyone. Never had that sworn band of brothers, the way later kings would.
If Junpei watches the implications closely, he'll realize quickly enough - neither did Izunia.]
...Thank you.
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[Junpei shrugs again.]
He takes care of us, too. Makes sure... that we're not stuck on the people we used to be 'just us' for, either.
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[Did Ardyn ever mention that he was also the poetic garbage brother?]
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[And so he does.]
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Goodness but you are his brother's child.]
For the good of your liver, I am only providing you the one bottle.
[Two thousand year old adult.]
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[Junpei does not in any way, shape, or form, put the bottle back down.]
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[Don't worry Junpei your uncle has got this well in hand.]
Assuming you don't just wake up.
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[He surveys their surroundings thoughtfully once more.]
I actually wasn't even sure I was dreaming. I mean, sure, physics are fucked and I guess this is the kind of puzzle-solving crap I'd dream about, but it felt a little... too not-me to be a dream. My subconscious doesn't typically work in dungeons.
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I can't say it's especially likely to be mine, either. Aside from it being one of the few remnants of Solheim left by Noctis' era, I can't claim any particular connection to it.
[He gestures with the hand holding the bottle.]
If you'd rather, there are less oppressive surroundings.
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[Zero Escape is a Fun Puzzle Game! :)]
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[They're lucky it's not crawling in daemons like every other ruin from the time period.
...Well mostly Junpei is lucky. Izunia would be fine.]
I'm reasonably sure if there was anything here, Noctis cleaned it out in one of his endless fits of wanderlust and delaying the inevitable.
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[He toasts the ruins of Pitioss.]
Sayonara, asshole! May two thousand years of sand get clogged in your weirdo magic gears!
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Hey kid wanna nyoom?]
Not that the scenery outside is much better, but at least Ravatogh isn't so dark. Shall we?
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Shall'st. Also, gesundheit.
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