[CLOSED]

[aionpcs]

WHO: Gray, Meteion, Childe, Silco, Makoto, Kaeya, Luo Binghe, and Eustace.
WHAT: The Regent review some memories.
WHERE: The Regent's throne room.
WHEN: The early days of Visoseri (June).
WARNINGS: N/A

It's in the early days of Visoseri that the Kenoma who witnessed the Innocence Entity will begin to be summoned by the Regent to share with them their memories of the events that transpired within Venera. They've been called upon, they'll be told by the servant sent to retrieve them, because Xishen's report included word that they witnessed the being infecting the city first hand. The Regent will meet with them in their throne room, and there is no room for delay. They are to come immediately, the moment the servant finds them.

Upon passing through the grand doorway to the Regent's hall, they will find the Regent sitting at their throne. Beyond that singular presence, the room is alarmingly empty. While the Kenoma that were first to arrive may remember the dinner tables that were set up in the center, now there is nothing but the throne, which is not even particularly large or attention grabbing. It could be that this sense of emptiness is the point, given what the Kenoma represents. The Regent themself is nearly unreadable, wearing a silvery, faceted mask and flowing robes of black, their body of a height that seems just a bit taller than yours. The only way to know they've even seen you is the way they raise their chin, ever so slightly.

"Come," they will say, beckoning you forward with a wave of their hand. "There is no need to explain. Your memories will do the talking."

Provided you acquiesce, you will feel the Regent begin to probe your thought with a touch of their frigid, clawed hand. If not, you best have a good explanation as to why you are refusing.

[These threads will be done in summary unless a more direct conversation ends up being needed. Please tag in with how cooperative your character is being. Each interview will be done separately from the others. If they have any questions before or after submitting themselves, they may also ask those now.]

Comments

[affal]

It's a summons that Makoto has been expecting since his return to Achamoth and one he has been trying to prepare himself for. He had gathered his thoughts and formed his own conclusions from what had happened and transpired afterwards, but as he makes his way through the Citadel to where he would find the Regent upon their throne, he decidedly... clears his mind of expectation. He can't afford for any assumption he makes to be incorrect, so he tries to make none of them, whittling down the preoccupation of his mind into a vague apprehension. It's as good as he could hope for as he passes through the huge doors and into the hall.

The mien of the demon is wary and reserved as he does as they bid and approaches, coming to a halt what he believes is a respectable distance from the throne itself. Given how much the Regent seemed to know of all of them, this particular method doesn't seem shocking; part of him is relieved he won't have to recount with words, but the rest —

He doesn't speak, instead dipping his head in acquiescence after a brief hesitation. The Regent will find that the mind proffered recoils like a startled snake to the alien touch, though it's less to do with the memories themselves and far more to do with how averse he is to something like this in general. My memories are my own, he had told Emet-Selch when asked to present the self-same recollections to his peers, but... that was different, wasn't it? He forces down the instinctual reaction and does everything he can to make the memories as open and available to inspection as he can — at least, until the point where his falling unconscious sharply curtails them.

( ooc: makoto is cooperating to the best of his ability! he will also have some questions about his newfound "affliction," when given the chance to ask them. )

[aionpcs]

Fortunately for him, they seem able to enter his mind no matter how uncomfortable it makes him. As they reviews his memories, they will flinch slightly as they reach the part where the entity strikes him, knocking him unconscious. They are very still for a moment afterwards.

"Then that is what I smelled on you," they will eventually say.

[affal]

Weathering something unpleasant isn't anything new to him, either personally or professionally; he does his part to be as pliant as he can, even as the tension from doing so coils in his shoulders. Tension that he only releases as a short sigh once the external probing retreats. He lifts his head, pale gaze searching the faceted mask for context it will not find, surprised and fascinated in equal measure.

He had been so careful not to build expectations, but — for the Regent to react so sharply?

"Your Excellency," he speaks with the eager rawness of someone finally presented with the opportunity for answers they've been ravening after for days, "Can you tell me what that thing was? What - it did to me?"

[aionpcs]

They remain silent at first, in no rush to choose their words or give Makoto the answer he so desperately craves. They do seem to be in thought, though, from the way they position themself.

"It's an entity born of the Innocent's Legacy," they eventually say. "Evidently, it's used its power to infect you with its aspect. The Legacies are able to shape the world around them, when allowed to gain sufficient power. That includes anyone woeful enough to fall into their clutches."

[subsist]

When the servant knocks on Kaeya's door and explains that he is being summoned, it doesn't surprise him that the Regent is calling upon him now. After all, he's the one who witnessed the encounter with the entity from start to finish, without any unnecessary interruptions. He hesitated to share all that with the rest of the Kenoma, if only because he's had enough of people looking into everything he's wanted to hide, but he isn't about to refuse the Regent themself.

He might be one of the first few Aions to arrive. The rest of those summoned are the ones he expected to see, but there are others — like Childe and Silco — that makes him wonder how they fit into all of this. He doesn't say anything out loud, even if there are many things running through his mind. There's always a time and place for everything.

For now, he waits until the Regent is done speaking before he allows them to do what needs to be done. His heart is pounding wildly. He exhales slowly, willing the familiar coldness of frost to smoothe over his apprehension. It's not like he has anything to hide, and should the Regent find something that requires inquiry, he'll answer for it one way or another.

It's after the deed is done that he finally speaks, once it is granted to him.

"If I may," he starts, cautious and neutral as ever. "I have something I'd like to ask. We've been told that we are to help usher this existence to its end, so that we may help shape the one that follows it." He chooses his next few words carefully, because he doesn't think this is something that will net a straightforward answer, but he wants to hear what the Regent will say.

"What becomes of us, after this is all over?"

( ooc. kaeya will be fully cooperative! and he'd only ask the question once the regent grants him permission to speak, so i hope this is okay. )

[aionpcs]

The Regent reviews his memories of the event without much reaction. Maybe they've seen it before, or maybe it's just very difficult to surprise them; either way, they seem to deem what he's offered them as acceptable. Acceptable enough that he would probably be free to leave, if he didn't have his own follow up questions.

The Regent seems to stare at him, despite the hidden nature of their gaze.

"...You will live on as a god in the cosmos you've created," they say, as if that answer should have been obvious. "Fascinating though it is that you were prepared to follow this path regardless."

[subsist]

It should have been obvious, maybe, but when Kaeya finally receives the answer he'd been looking for since he'd first learned about their purpose here, he's not sure why it leaves him at a loss for words. What's more is that the Regent follows it up by saying he was prepared to walk down this road regardless of what happens to him, and that causes him to breathe in sharply.

Is this what people meant when they said nothing can get by the Regent?

He thinks back to what he witnessed in that all-encompassing darkness, that expansive void of the cosmos where he felt the loss of the city he grew to love, the loss of those he cared for even if they didn't know about the truth of who he is. There hasn't been any time to process any of that. Being with the Kenoma has made sure of it, but it's only now that he understands why it's slowly becoming easier to accept the role they'll play in this story.

With a hand over his heart, he offers a half-bow, signalling that's all he wanted to know. "... What happens to me hardly matters, if the end result is all the same."

The end will always justify the means, after all.

[zauneyete]

After he'd offered his debriefing to Xishen, Silco had assumed the time would come that he would have to offer his information to the Regent themselves. He's prompt, when summoned, with no dallying. Not normally one to... "submit" to his "betters", but it's more than that. It's about power, Silco's entire philosophy boiled down to that word, that concept, and at his core, it's the only thing he truly understood. It's what motivated him to come to the Regent before, about Howl, and it's why he came this time as well. Power came to those who would do anything to grasp it, and Silco would always reach out with his fingers and take it.

He moved through the doorway, and there's a slight motion to defer to the Regent -- half a bow, before he moved forward, to where he felt was appropriate. He hopes, of course, that he doesn't have to relive the experience now. He disliked the touch of the innocent, the way its fingers tried to silence and quell the churning waters that were ever-present in a man like Silco. He hated the feeling, and even now, with his stump of a hand -- the crystals slowly forming into something closer to the size of his own hand -- he wanted to tighten his hands, in something close to anger. It had tried to touch him, use his own memories against him, pull him into a faux peace, drowned under the water.

"Regent," he said, another dip of his head. "Hopefully what I experienced will allow you to eradicate that thing."

If one could punctuate by consonants, Silco did it, each one a picture into his anger at the entity's audacity.

[ ooc; silco will be compliant of course c: He will ask afterward if the Regent has a way that they can completely kill the entity, if it rises again. ]

[aionpcs]

Unfortunately for him, it does involve reliving it to some degree, though thankfully without the sharpness of it being freshly experienced. Instead, flashes of it pass through his mind as they are reviewed by the Regent, giving him some idea of what they've seen.

They lean away afterwards, making a puzzled sound that comes across as entirely theatrical.

"How stranger, that Childe neglected to include this encounter in his report."

Though they are completely willing to answer that question, they are curious to see Silco's reaction to this statement first.

[zauneyete]

Silco had honestly had no idea that Childe had withheld the information, and he'd been given no word to keep it under wraps. Childe's instinct later, that Silco would have sold him out in a heartbeat is at least accurate. After all, telling someone that a secret is important, or should be withheld, is powerful.

He instead held a hand to his chest, in almost mock-surprise. "Isn't it curious, how many people seem to think they can withhold information from you, Regent?"

First How, now Childe? Why, if the Regent didn't have Silco's willingness to sell out his fellow Kenoma, perhaps they would have never known?

Silco didn't believe that, of course. He suspected the Regent knew plenty about them, and could likely figure these things out on their own, through some other method. He was too cautious himself to not believe that, but he was familiar with this old song and dance.

[gravings]

Gray will be exactly as cooperative as she's directed to be and little more. She hangs behind her taller companions up until she can't, and her hooded gaze is low as she tries to avoid the Regent's undue attention. Even though she's abundantly layered in clothing, the tension in her body is clear to see. She's dizzy with fear as the Regent's hand descends upon her.

Nevertheless, she submits to their mental probing. A small part of her wills her memory to blur, if any such thing could be possible; she feels no need to obscure her own actions, but she prays that the Regent won't take too much notice of Meteion's impassioned attempt to connect with the Innocent entity. It shouldn't have been a crime in itself, but Gray thinks vaguely that the Regent must be as spiteful of the entity as it was of the Kenoma.

[aionpcs]

As the Regent enters her mind, there is the sensation as if they are bearing down harder and refocusing, almost as if they've noticed the lack of clarity Gray is offering. In the end, they tilt their head at her, as if in question.

"Tell me," they say. "What did you think of this entity you encountered?"

[gravings]

It takes a moment for Gray to focus away from the intensified pressure of the Regent's probe, her hooded head rising minutely from its hunched bend. She utterly lacks the capacity for duplicity. Her normal escape from difficult questions, silence, isn't an option now, so all she can do is answer honestly. She takes a deep breath, though it isn't quite enough to even out the arrhythmic nervousness in her voice.

"I think it must be capable of goodness. Comfort and escape... I understand why it wanted to offer those things to people who seemed to be suffering."

Having felt a bit of that comfort in moderation, when she was alone and the entity extended a simple feeling of safety to calm her fear, she has to acknowledge that she feels grateful to it.

"But... I'm afraid that it can't be reasoned with," she says close to a whisper. "Its logic is too extreme. But it won't listen to me or Miss Meteion... because of our 'darkness.'"

[vapour]

Childe arrives promptly, but while his expression and body language show little, his mind is a convoluted mess of terse conflicting thoughts.

He doesn't know who else saw the entity in the sky versus who directly interacted with it if those summoned, since there are no others present, but he gets the feeling that he's been summoned on the premise that he interacted with the entity in Venera instead of simply noticing it high in the air above the city. Which means... the Regent already knows he deliberately avoided giving information about the encounter. Silco is the only other person that could know, and so his immediate assumption is Silco sold him out; but, judging from how he was trying to blackmail Childe to keep his mouth shut about what he saw of Silco's mind, he assumes the old man would know better than to go be a snitch like this right after when completely unprovoked.

(Doesn't matter, he would have immediately come running to sell me out if I specifically asked him to avoid mentioning me, anyway. )


A resigned sigh echoes in his head when beckoned closer. There's no use in trying to avoid being scanned. It'll do nothing for of in his favor and just make things pointlessly worse.

Childe knows better than to push a lie when he's been found out, and it's not as if he really cares all that much if the Regent knows the details (beyond that mild concern of punishment that doesn't fit—at least in his opinion& mdash; his crime.) One of the main reasons he decided not to say anything with others around that had far more involved experiences is that it felt like trying too hard to get the on the Regent's good side and that it would be viewed he was giving useless contributions in hopes it would proc a rewarding response, anyway.

Childe does have some questions, though, so hopefully he can at least get those answered before whatever consequences are forced upon him.

He only holds back speaking his mind initially in case he's in real trouble, as he'd rather not be immediately told off for having the audacity to demand information when he witheld some in the first place.

Still, since the Regent is looking in his head, they most likely will come across the most pressing question that's been preoccupying his mind since encountering the entity: what is the Darkness it spoke of?

[aionpcs]

The Regent, of course, doesn't have much interest in Childe's questions; not when they have their own inquiry that takes precedence. After finishing looking through Childe's memory of the event, a weighty silence follows, as if they are wondering if Childe will speak for himself.

"What is it that drove you to conceal this, Tartaglia?" they finally ask.

[vapour]

Childe opens his mouth, intending to begin with that he didn't feel it that necessary but thinks better off it. Instead, he speaks straight, with the first reason before the subsequent ones.

"It reminds me of what my little siblings could have become in a country like mine if I didn't protect them from the surrounding reality. It was such a short encounter that when others involved had far more engagement and activity, I had little interest in being viewed as a dog searching for scraps from trivial commentary simply for attention."

There is a brief pause before Childe decides to speak further. "... Although I am now feeling that I made a mistake and that it would have been viewed as it was without any ridicule ot comparison. I apologize for making a decision that ... really wasn't mine to make, and for making an assumption that also was not mine to have."

It's hard to see to tell just how sincere the apology is, but there's certainly a sense of reluctant admittance that he made a wrong choice and is reflecting on it. None of it is out of fear, that much is clear, but he does seem somewhat disappointed in this turn of events, especially since he still fails to see any value it really provided.

"... I don't understand if I made an error in judgement because the content was indeed noteworthy, or simply because I deliberately avoided answering Xishen properly when questioned directly."

[perfectlygoodbird]

As ever, Meteion is tormented--by her own memories, by the interaction she had with her own Legacy, and with being summoned by the Regent. Still, she makes no move to drag her feet, arriving as bidden and swiftly kneeling in submission.

"I have tried to keep your words in mind...but I may have failed."

That is the only thing she says for the moment--as the Regent says, her memories will speak for her. She has no way of knowing of how Gray is trying to protect her, however. Though should the Regent take umbrage at such, Meteion would beg that they show Gray mercy. If it even comes to that.

[aionpcs]

It's impossible to read the Regent's posture as Meteion presents herself. In the end, they simply reach forward to review Meteion's thoughts without a word. As the scene unfolds, it doesn't seem to surprise them at all.

"Meteion," they say, their overlapping voices particularly crisp. "What is it you have to gain from this entity's approval?"

[perfectlygoodbird]

She considers carefully, a slight frown on her lips. But then, Meteion shakes her head.

"On reflection--and not in the heat of the moment--I think I was...more swept up by emotion. Its emotions, and my own. I wanted it to leave the Venerans alone, to stop what it was doing. Not that I think it gave any thought to what Gray or I said. Though...I suppose I should not be surprised at that."

Her words are slightly bitter at that. Was Meteion hoping to have a more persuasive effect on the Legacy? Perhaps. But in that, she definitely feels as if she's failed. But if the affliction is now passing, that's all to the good, now.

[devilmancrybaby]

Luo Binghe kneels before the Regent immediately, bowing his head to let them take what they want. There is some tension in his posture despite his compliance; he's all too aware that he didn't really distinguish himself in Venera and that the Regent is unlikely to find anything to congratulate him on in his memories, but he won't be accused of being uncooperative.

He is somewhat concerned that allowing the Regent into his mind will reveal the seditious goals he harbours, but hopefully their primary concern will be his memories of Venera, and not the thoughts he's doing his best to push to the back of his mind. Either way, he's certain that submitting, and risking his intentions being discovered, is by far the safer option than attempting to resist.

[aionpcs]

From all outward appearances, the Regent's review of his memories seems to pass by unremarkably. Then again, it can be hard to read anything to the Regent's presentation, with their masked face and cloaked body. In the end, they only ask a simply question.

"What did you think of the events that unfolded, Luo Binghe?"

[devilmancrybaby]

He keeps his head bowed deferentially as he answers.

"Answering Your Excellency, I confess I was disappointed to have missed the opportunity to smite the Aion Estinien Wyrmblood again," he says. "Although I am sure if it had been my hand instead that felled him, the creature summoned forth would have made me its target instead.

"As for the creature itself... I cannot claim any insight to its thoughts or motivations, but it seemed. Simple. More easy to persuade than I expected such a forceful entity would be."

[lockedon]

Eustace comes when summoned, pace brisk but unhurried as he followed behind the servant that guides him towards the Regent's hall, the same place where they'd all had dinner so many months ago. And, as with their very first dinner, he stands with his shoulders straight and his gaze held steadily forward, doing his best to meet the Regent head-on despite the difficulty when everything about the Regent is so nebulous and indistinct.

But despite the lack of deference in posture or action, he submits willingly to the probing of his memories when prompted, offering up everything he'd seen up to the point where his vision had been temporarily taken from him, and then everything he'd heard after that. Despite the all the communion he's engaged in within the past several weeks, the presence of another being actively sifting through his memories is unpleasant and alien, and there's a decided stiffness in the set of his shoulders by the time the Regent is done.

[aionpcs]

The Regent rests their hand on his forehead, and the only reaction he'll feel is when their hand tenses as the blinding strikes from his memories arrives. They are quiet for a moment, considering, before leaning back into their throne.

"That is all I need from you, Eustace."

[lockedon]

As good as any of a sign to go and he considers it seriously, the weight of his body already beginning to shift, but instead of silently leaving right away, he voices the one question that's been on his mind these past few days.

"Are there other...creatures like it? Manifestions of the other Legacies?"

He won't press any answers further than that but it seems prudent to ask, especially after all the havoc this particular one had wrought. Of course, whether or not the Regent willing to share what they know - or even knows anything in the first place - is a different question entirely.