Wizard's House

[wizardseason]

"Hey"

The Wizard greets the evil-allured knights the same way every night, with the same word, while casually sitting on the steps of the porch outside of her little home. The building looks handmade, like it was built by people who cared about the place they were going to live. Surrounding it on all sides are fields as far as the eye can see. Vegetables of all kinds, with fruit trees and bushes placed throughout the landscape. Closer to the home are bigger trees, willows and others, providing shade from the strange three suns above. Wherever this is, it isn't the world that the knights know.

Plunged into the ground a mere few feet away from the steps leading up to the home is a handwritten sign that states the following:

Knight Rules:
- Tell others if you want
- You can't reveal others
- The world ends this year

Comments

[wizardseason]

The Wizard's expression doesn't falter, the smirk doesn't leave her expression. She gives no indication that she's disappointed at all, instead she just nods at Haizea's decision.

"I can't make you." She sets her mug down, there's no point in convincing her is there? She doesn't give any hint that she's not convincing her though.

"Should anyone be saved?" She asks, calmly.

[sustainer]

Interesting. He glances up at the suns again, pursing his lips thoughtfully.

"What happened?" He sounds genuinely curious at least, not like he's searching for pain points that he can use against her.

[tropicalstorm]

"Everyone," Haizea replies instantly. It's her gut reaction, but even as she says it, she's second guessing herself. Should everyone be saved? Everyone on the planet? She's spent a lot of her life completely wrecking people who she considers deserve it. How can she say she'd save them now, when any other day she'd kick their heads in?

She doesn't correct herself out loud, but her face seems troubled.

[daddykong]

Garrot is not having any of this. Absolutely no coffee (they're asleep, why does he need it?!) and as much as he wants to snap at Matilda for speaking on his behalf (isn't that rude?!) things move a bit faster once the others come to. He's glad Haizea's as mad as he is, and Matilda being such a dainty doormat doesn't really surprise him either. Gyre... he's given up trying to predict that one, for better or worse. So when one Wizard becomes four the doctor tenses up, looking ready to fight, until... they start walking off.

He scowls, letting out a simple "tch" as he watches his allies divide themselves. What happened to being united against the Wizard?! Garrot knows he can't shout, because he'll just get muted again, and he can't run off and try to pull back one of them, because then this bitch could react, and- and...! He lets out a tiny little whine, his ears drooping and his scowl deepening as he stalks off towards the tomat-ish patch.

"This is insulting!" He calls out to her sounding quite disgusted, and his giantesque footfalls get louder and louder. He's following her, against all his judgment. "I mean, my father was a Princess Knight. My father who's dead because of you and your monsters. I hate you and you're literally the end of the world, so why should I even give you the time of day?!" He's pissed, but his tone shows he's actually expecting some kind of answer.

[wizardseason]

The Wizard is in the middle of inspecting one of the plants already, checking some of the little green spheres that have started popping up in bundles of three. She turns slightly as he storms towards her. She's tempted to mute him, but no. He's quite genuine as he approaches her and an answer doesn't hurt.

"No one wants to die alone." She answers, turning to face him. She somehow looks more tired than she had when she introduced the first monster.

"This is the last year that people will be made to suffer through this death."

[wizardseason]

She'll share stories until the end of time, she has many of them. She's experienced a lot in her time, and this story is one of many like it.

"It was another world destined for destruction, filled with beauty." She looks upward at the tree, bringing a hand up through its branches.

"The gamble made to save it didn't pay off."

[wizardseason]

The Wizard gives this little hollow smile, the kind of smile a parent gives a child when they say they want to bring peace to the world or give some other similar impossible dream that's out of reach for even experienced adults. Be hopeful, Matilda, there's nothing stopping thoughts like that.

"Hope for some. If it continues, so does the pain."

[wizardseason]

Sorry, Haizea, the Wizard picks up immediately on that half-determined answer. She's not one to let that kind of wishy-washiness slide, not in a thousand years.

"No." She answers immediately, first, before her shoulders sag and she looks upwards at the edge of the porch rooftop above her.

"Would you save the worst? Those who harm others? Those who harmed you?"

[daddykong]

Garrot crosses his arms, not interested in the weird dream veggieberries in the slightest. Weird dream foods from an evil extradimensional wizard who tempts people to sabotage and destroy the world? No. Not a single fuck to give.

"The last year because you're finally going to die for good. Surrounded by all of us." He sounds a little cocky when he says it, because Garrot's been waiting for the chance to posture at her. The doctor would sooner like to dislocate her jaw with his fist, but he knows she's tough. That and, well... "But that isn't what the sign says, so what's gonna happen after we kill you?" He levels a glare at her. The Wizard's been beaten 39 times so far, and after what she did to that one town years ago, it's obvious she could destroy the world if she wanted to. But she never has. It never added up to Garrot.

"What's going to end the world?"

[sustainer]

"Hm."

He follows the wizard's hand up towards the leaves, tilting his head very slightly.

"What do you mean: destined?" Wild elves don't believe in destiny, so he definitely sounds extremely skeptical, despite that he's willing to listen still.

[tropicalstorm]

"I wouldn't," she says quietly. "But. I shouldn't be the one to decide who lives and who dies. Many would say I'm not a good person, I can't be a fair judge."

She looks away and feels an uncertainty that she's only rarely felt before. "Before, you said 13. Is that... is that really the limit? Or can you save more?"

[wizardseason]

"All the more reason to trust your judgement." The Wizard answers, leaving it open-ended which part convinced her of her answer. It's the slightest reassurance masked in all this discussion of evil.

"I'll save thirteen that you ask me to." She tilts her head a little, her neck giving a soft 'pop' before she tilts it back and resumes her typical smirking expression.

[wizardseason]

"Destined." She repeats, running her hand along a branch before bringing it back to her side and locking eyes with Gyre.

"Fractured from within, and it exploded." She states, matter-of-factly. At the time, she couldn't do anything to prevent that kind of damage. The plan they'd tried hadn't even slowed it down.

"Beautiful, even in its final moments."

[wizardseason]

Garrot's missing out, then, the little treats aren't ready to eat yet but when they were... well, perhaps he'd have changed his mind. They're growing here specifically because they're delicious and like nothing else in the world.

She lets him have his little victory moment, his chance to be brave in the face of something he's afraid of. She won't steal that from him, not yet.

"If you kill me." She gives her mug a little swirl, the liquid within forming back into a little sphere for a moment.

"He'll keep it spinning for another year." She raises the mug to her lips, the steam fogging up her glasses.

"And I'll be speaking to a different set of knights."

[daddykong]

Garrot wants to bellow about how she better get ready for that, how she's going down and how she'll die as many times as it takes ti keep the world safe. But then she drops that little carrot in front of him, and so all he's doing is standing defiantly. Looking down on her like shes an animal.

"Who'll keep it spinning?" His tone is stern. "They gotta be pretty strong. Stronger than you."

[wizardseason]

He can be as defiant, confident, and standoffish as he wants here. She's just going to tell him the truth and see how much it makes him think. Some knights took it without question, others had many questions. Which would he be?

"The Protector, of course."

[daddykong]

"So he's protecting the world, big surprise." He raises an eyebrow, trying to keep his posture and movements as controlled and confident as possible. Just like the boardroom.

"You never said how the world is supposed to end this year." He huffs, glaring daggers. "Elaborate on that." If she wanted to end the world, why wait forty years? Why keep coming back? "Unless your sign is just lying?"

[sustainer]

He doesn't shy away from her eye contact, though he does frown slightly.

"Fractured because of you?" It's not accusatory. Or well, there are the tiniest hints of accusation there, but it's more because she called the death of millions beautiful, then because she's the wizard.

"Do you just got from world to world to destroy them?"

[wizardseason]

She leaves it open-ended when he asks if she fractured it or not, she'll let her next answer speak for itself. Her little smirk doesn't falter, instead staying with her surprisingly consistent poker face.

"It's no coincidence that worlds I visit are destroyed." She says it calmly, as if it's the simplest thing in the world to admit.

"One day, that will change. One day, we'll get it right."

[wizardseason]

If Garrot wants the truth, she'll give him the truth. It's not up to her if he believes it or not, it's up to him what he does with the information she's about to give him. Most likely, though, he'd think it was a lie.

"Either with him in the center being crushed by its collapse, or without him, popping like a balloon."

[daddykong]

Garrot doesn't flinch at the information. It sounds like a threat at her enemy, the Protector. He doesn't like it.

"And what are you going to be doing when that happens, laughing maniacally as you bring about the apocalypse?" He exhales, loud and deep. Garrot's fists clench, too. He mad again, and he has pegged the Wizard as the villain she is.

[wizardseason]

She observes his anger, the way he's holding himself back, the way he's keeping a straight face despite the storm he's brewed in his own head.

"Dying." She answers, as emotionless as ever.

[sustainer]

He huffs immediately, unimpressed with her vagueness.

"Are you destroying them? Or do you come to worlds that will be destroyed?" he grumbles, folding his arms and cocking an eyebrow. Answer questions you weirdo!

[daddykong]

"Is that gonna be because of us," he sports a sadistic little smile, betraying his intentions a bit. He knows this dreamspace doesn't stop him from being on the winning side. And he's gonna win.

"Or do you just die without a world to torment?" He is, surprisingly, taking the end of the world seriously despite it being spoken of by the devil herself. But then he catches himself, because he's quickly adjusting to how to deal with her cagey responses.

"Unless you die from some other thing. Like guilt." He sure had to be petty there. Couldn't stop himself.

[wizardseason]

His behavior was fairly standard for a knight, fairly standard for a hero. She's not surprised by it, and she shows no signs of being impressed, unimpressed, amused, or unamused by what she's seeing in his reactions.

Though she's pretty amused by his theories.

"His death breaks the cycle. I die when he dies."