[Prompt] Shadowed Heart

Lore World's End Tavern: Role-play and Fan Fiction
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Info

Inspired by a thread of mine, which was inspired by the Persona games.

Through some crazy magic, or mad experiment, you find yourself face to face with the dark thoughts of your heart. Those dark desires you keep locked away from public eye. Those feelings you stuff away as you present yourself to others. How do they manifest? Small voidlings or a shadowed version of yourself? How do you confront your dark heart?

This is meant to be a fun exercise, so there aren’t many rules. I ask that posts be limited to two or three, as much longer is more like a short tale probably befitting it’s own thread.

Prompts are fun little things meant to inspire. You don’t have to perfect match the prompt. Just let it inspire a thought.

I’m going to try and post these weekly, sometime between Saturday and Monday probably. Feedback and prompt ideas are welcome, so feel free to post them in here as well. Some prompts will be more thought provoking, some more whimsical. Respect your fellow writers.

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Raveintis stood among them once again… The same reoccurring nightmare… A classroom made of stone, his work to train those who wished to be warlocks… There were twelves students total all standing around him… Each mangled in horrific ways… A gnomish student looked as if he had been smashed into paste, another three, dark irons like Ike’s like they had cut their own throats. A few elven students stood nearby one horribly burned as if she had been lit on fire, the other looked as if he had been eaten by ravenous dogs… There were to many to count…

Raveintis sighed, every single one of these students had been killed by one of their own… His prized pupil… The horrific visages said nothing, never moved except for watching their old teacher moth agape, in terror in sadness, he didn’t protect them… He was gone when they needed him… Raveintis said nothing either, there was nothing he could say, he had failed them…

Raveintis had been gone for a few days pushing the Blackrock orcs out of the lower levels of the city, during this second war these orcs had become invasive… When he returned…

The dream changed as it always did, before them all, was a human… In his eyes was only true madness, his figure wreathed in shadows… The other students were now laying on the ground as if they had been dead for hours… The insane human laughed and cheered at his fellow students demise, he killed them all, they had deserved it! Raveintis knee what happened next… The insane student cackled until his laughs became labored and wet, his throat was now missing! Still the mad man tried to laugh as his blood spurted from his neck, he dropped with a smile on his face…

As if the dream would end, As if Raveintis could move forward, his whole class killed by a student gone mad, it didnt… The smiling corpse rose up on its two feet, the body rotted and decayed nearly beyond recognition. The student walked the earth again…

Raveintis sat up quickly in his bed his arms extended spellwork already half finished… As usual his chambers were silent, none of the dream had manifested in reality… Sleep was never easy for Raveintis after that day…

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(Kalyssa - Night Elf Huntress)

Elune, give me strength Kalyssa thought. She drew her bow back once more, another arrow for another Forsaken soldier. Her motions were fluid, and without pause. Arrow after arrow she fired upon the on-coming soldiers. Forksaken, Troll, Orc, Forsaken again. Not all arrows hit their mark, but enough did to slow their advance.

Kalyssa reached for another arrow, only to find her quiver empty. As if her captain was reaching for the same quiver, she heard the call from behind "Front Rank! Fall Back!!"

Kalyssa hesitated before she withdrew from the battlefield.

Weak.

The thought left her almost as soon as it arrived. She withdrew with the others to the nearby moon-wells where, only hours before, the High Priestess undertook a ritual to channel the Night Warrior. The High Priestess now embodied the wrath of their Goddess. Witnessing the ritual itself had been an inspiration to Kalyssa and her fellow Sentinels.

Kalyssa restocked her quiver, and replaced two of her lost throwing-knives. Thinking herself ready to return to the front, she turned… and stumbled.

Stand and fight!..Coward!..

This thought was louder than the last. Kalyssa drew one of her knives in anger, only to find her sisters at her side. Their eyes went wide for a moment, before they helped Kalyssa to her feet, guiding her to the moon-wells. She collapsed at the wells edge, and drank deeply from the well’s water.

WEAK!

The voice was clear, as if the source spoke from over her shoulder. Kalyssa turned to face her tormentor, but saw only the water.

The longer you sit here, the more of your sisters that will die!

Kalyssa peered over the edge of the well, and beheld her own reflection. The reflection bore a smile, but its eyes, its eyes were dark as night.

You have my face, but you cannot be…

I am not you, Kalyssa. the reflection cut her off. I would not leave the field of battle, because I ran out of arrows! I am a true warrior of Elune!

My orders…

The reflection cut her off again. Orders to retreat without cause, are no orders at all!

En…enough…

A true warrior would not have let her family die…

What? I… I could not find them… the fire…

A true warrior of Elune would not fear a mere fire!

Stop!… Kalyssa began to turn away from the reflection

Stop?! the reflection leapt from the water, taking Kalyssa’s head in her hands Your enemy does not stop! WHY. SHOULD. YOU?

The reflection shoved Kalyssa, and she stumbled backwards. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught movement, and launched one of her throwing knives…, which found its mark in a Forsakens shoulder. The blow did not kill the fiend, but alerted the other Sentinels. As Kalyssa readied another knife, three arrow shafts found the Forsaken’s chest, and it fell to the ground…

A voice rang clear across the camp "Rogues to the northeast!" As a number of her sisters ran to combat the threat, her captain came to Kalyssa’s side.

“Kalyssa, are you all right?” she asked. “You collapsed at the moonwell, but before we could tend to you, you struck out at that rogue…”

?I…I collapsed? Kalyssa asked "didn’t you hear…"

“Your eyes, sister” another sentinel, Adella, had cut in. "For a moment there, I swear they went dark. Just like the High Pr…”

"Enough, Adella" the captain, snapped "Return to your post!" turning back to Kalyssa she spoke gently "Rest, soldier. Take all the time you need."

As her Captain turned away, the voice returned A true warrior of Elune would not need more rest…

Without a word, Kalyssa picked up her bow, nocked an arrow, and began to trail after her sisters. She heard her captain’s voice calling her name, but paid it no heed. She was a True Warrior of Elune, and would route these invaders from Darkshore, and then Ashenvale. Her homeland would be free of this threat, even if it cost Kalyssa her life.

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I was too busy to write my own for this prompt but I wanted to say that I enjoyed reading each of yours :slight_smile:

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who says you still can’t? I kind of wish your thread didn’t die. Though I wrote Echey’Neahok here into a corner and was having some issues figuring out how to get him out of it.

Also going to post in one of your other prompts. I think the Nightmare one. It befits my tauren here as he has the same one almost every night.

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Graume stared at the figure before him, floating, skeletal… it felt just as he did, thought, just as he did. Resisted its own nature, just as he did.

Because it was him. “As long as there’s a part of you that wants this, a part of you that still desires lichdom, I will remain. We both know that you fear the final end. You can feel that chill in your heart whenever you think about it- the termination, the cessation of your being. That bronze pulled me out of you- I know not how-, to try and corrupt you. But I assure you, while one day, it may be safe for you, you may be able to embrace eternity without fear for the city, the people you love… that day is not today.”

Graume listened to the Lich, whos words felt more telepathic than physical, and sighed. He looked past the Lich, and the corpse of the Bronze in question, wracked with such necrotic curses that it could not survive. John Graume sighed. The Lich was right, this shadow of his future was right, damnit… as long as he felt that subtle fear of death… he’d always want to ascend into Lichdom. And he wasn’t ready to deny that desire, wasn’t sure if he’d ever be ready. “When?”

The Lich, Naze, let out a soft chuckle, letting itself fade back into its own timeline. “You’ll know, farm boy. Just trust those instincts of yours.”

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