“I Never Believed That You Would.” Perhaps, In Another Lifetime, Pythia Should Have Liked To Be More

End this. As if choice were a gift unto herself. No longer did such desire to see the mortal world end offer itself a decision she made on her own. A champion of those long gone who wished for only what they were owed - what was promised. Those cast into shadow, beaten down in borish effort to carve their wishes into the very seams of blasphemy itself. “Does it not ache, to want something that should be so easy, only to have it stripped away from you, Michael?” She asked, rather pertinently. “You do not wish to fight me, and yet you have never stopped. How many of us have you murdered?” The blessed had always held the upper hand. Whatever playing ground the seraphim had raged war on, the fallen never held the favor of their father and in Leviathan’s mind, it was exactly that which should have forced reason into the golden hands of the blessed. “Why? What gives you conscience enough to plead with me now? Does it weigh heavy, knowing you and you alone, have carved what could have been a menial disagreement into the beginning of the end?”

fxllenpythia​:

The presence of another seraphim breeching the otherworld didn’t surpass observation. The subtle feeling that lingered somewhere within the very marrow of her bones as he approached quickly subdued as creatures among them alerted her all the same. He was hers - to torment for however many eternities would allow them, and beyond the reproach of Michael himself, none other dared to wander too close. For whatever fate he may bring down upon them, or to avoid her own wrath; it didn’t matter. He wasn’t welcomed so much as he was lured further into the realm that now belonged to Ayi’ing and Pythia now. Shadows of the forest held her within cold embrace as she watched him call out. Repent the name in which he deserted her so easily, an embodiment that suffered the betrayal of those so willing to cast aside their own brethren for the creation of mortals. “I was wondering when I might next be seeing you, Michael.” Her voice sounds from all directions, an echo that surpasses being as she materialized some feet away from him, “Always so bold. Do excuse the mess, we’re still… renovating.” 

-

Stood before him the words that Michael wished to conjure wouldn’t come to him. The seraphim was not an expert when it came to expressing regret, or hope, these mortal conventions felt beyond him in this regard but so many of their brethren hung over his head now that he had no other recourse. To look upon Leviathan was to remember the millennia of war that they’d fought together, the cacophony of divinity that rained down upon them, dripped in blessed ichor as Michael stepped over the bodies of his own siblings to push forward. His only hope was that Leviathan was as tired of the losses as he was. Crimson divinity was seeped into Michael’s flesh, try as he might his hands would never come clean. “End this, Leviathan.” They worked with their oldest enemy now, a God responsible for the deaths of so many of their kind. “I don’t want to fight you.” 

"You're talking to the great deceiver, and foolishness has never been my downfall before." If the fact that she still stood - eons after she fell, after the plight of the old gods, the first destruction of the book. The greater demon was without a doubt, a plague upon the world of mortals and all those beyond. This was nothing new - rather, a new war, indeed. "Your concern is noted, but I sleep upon silken sheets of blood with the most wretched lovers at my beck and call - perhaps you're merely projecting." Her smile is wrought with tongue and cheek. Petty insults and proclamations do not make her waiver. "Is that what you want, Pluto - do you want to hurt me?" Again, where civil conversation cannot exist, Pythia exerts the goad in a rather childlike manner. "Agree to disagree then, shall we? Until you decide to use that bite for something other than clenching your jaw and brooding in darkened corners at least." A brow rose, defiant in nature, "I know what I want and what I deserve, that's all it comes down to."

"Don't be fooled, Pythia, words can be deceiving," and words can lead to false assumptions. Yes, he'd been all about love and loyalty, of keeping those he held dear safe, simply because of what happened to Cyra and how he'd failed her back then. Now, after the great war, technically but also not 15 years later, he saw Pythia as nothing more than an ambitious creature of immense hatred. What the world had to offer them would never be enough, what they desired would only lead to complete destruction. "I just think you need a good night's rest and get fucked nicely," he wasn't being serious, but a part of him just didn't care. "Kore's gone, I'm not opposed to hurting her allies," the original vampire shrugged. They could probably spew venom at each other for years to come, but Pluto didn't really desire to keep thinking about his captivity, his broken body and soul. "never lost it," in all honesty he was hungrier than ever, "and you? I see nothing can keep you down. How unfortunate."

The laughter that split Pythia's features was maniacal, at best. This creature before her lording his loyalty to some overwhelming standard as if she'd asked for it in the first place. "Dearest Pluto," she chided, as a mother over a petulant child, 'this has everything to do with your beloved." Tiamat - Kore. The dread Persephone, the one who pieced together the beginning of the end. "And if you truly understood all that she desires, loyalty wouldn't be part of the equation. Her will would be yours." This would be what he sought too. "You may have helped pull me from the inferno, helped pieced together the foundation of the asphodel and hold her close, but I do not need your loyalty - because I have hers."

closed starter for @fxllenpythia location: Necromanteion (pre-battle)

For once he was alone with Pythia, no guard, no other witness to their discussions. While he'd known the infamous Pythia for some time now, their relationship was superficial at best, with both of them loyal to Kore. So, while he didn't trust her practices and her personally, he was forced to play nice. Attacking the other leader was impossible, with Kore being a part of him so much had changed and he knew he had to make sure the Pythia knew just how much power resided within him. "Kore," he simply stated, his posture relaxed, almost too relaxed before a war like this. "This has nothing to do with either of us and I'll not swear my loyalty to you."

@sacrilcgiovs​ location: we’re out and about okay 

Although time didn’t exist as such a fickle imminence to Pythia, years had gone by since she’d last set foot upon the cobbled streets of Rome prior to October’s festivities. Every effort to deceive and thwart her brethren's efforts to find them over the centuries depicted the demonic fallen as little more than smoke between the fingertips of a child. And yet, every soul given over to the Necronomicon remained a connection held beyond all else. Seeking out one of the very first of the Asphodel had been akin to spotting blood on a pristine white surface, even amongst the crowd of the marketplace. Thoughts which circled his mind echoing across the void to her own until he just as surely felt her presence. “You’ve been a busy man, Kaan -- Narcissus, is it?” The playful tone in her voice just as easily menacing as she kicked out the wicker chair opposite her, hues barely flickering gesture that he sit. “Let’s catch up, shall we?”

The laugh that leaves her lips is full and warm, not nearly the sound that one might have expected of a creature like herself. And yet, just as all others, she feels the swell of amusement cut through the diminishing disappointment of those who wanted power for little more than the bragging rights that would claim it so. Too many in this modern world were after near-instant gratification, unwilling to do the work - pay the price. "Too few among us hold onto the spine they were born with, Efigenia. Too willing to reach for what they want without the desire or ability to prove they deserve to break their own fall." And in the end, all those turning their back on her - on the Necronomicon, would fall. "Come, sit." Pythia turned, offering space beside her, overlooking New Dis from the spire above. "The ritual went exceedingly well, I hear," Felt, saw - experienced right along with her, and the book. "How are you feeling? I trust the drow didn't overstep."

a gift for @fxllenpythia, location: asphodel house notes: mommies

Respect for the Pythia was one of the very few principles Efigenia garnered. It was strange, the very creature that lorded Kaan's tether to the book was the very one in which Efigenia respected wholeheartedly. They had whispered to her often in childhood, an uttered embrace that comforted a gifted child who was within solitude as she navigated the powers that offered her great prestige as she grew. She'd met them now in the flesh and despite her reverence for the greater demon, Efigenia was always purposefully upfront, "I hear many are dropping like flies as you descend upon the world. Bit off more than they could chew?" She wouldn't pretend to be oblivious to the madness that came in tandem with her signature in the book but she was not leery of it either. The Asphodel was better without those who deflected and Efi only hoped their deflection would serve as sustenance for the book; it'd need power for what she too planned to tap from it.

@sethlozano location: necro world

Little more than the corner of Leviathan's mouth gave way to the satisfaction that each night brought forth. While the senate and their forces used the night to recoup, it was undoubtedly where they fared the greatest feat of all. Nothing turned the tides worse than fear and lunacy and as Pythia finds him among her coven, she greets him as an old friend, "Once more, I find myself impressed with your progression," August's depth of knowledge had never disappointed, and when she'd instructed Tepiltzin to source one of her own for an upgrade of sorts on his vampiric existence, the seraphim knew they would not be left hoping for more. "You'll be revered as you once were soon enough, we all will."

@seraphimichael​ location: we’re in the colosseum baby.

Moonlight filtered through ruins in much the same way the cosmos scintillated the vast abyss above. Just enough to offer something beyond the premise of total darkness; a bleak, cold existence. Lithe fingertips that ghosted across crumbling echoes of a lifetime ago, Pythia felt near giddy as the dread and fear of all that lingered from the past flowed through her. The aches and pains of those that would never see beyond these walls; humans caught within the snare of their own kind and forced to cut teeth against stone to garner even a single day more.  “Michael,” the eerie drift of her voice carried across the stagnant air as if it’d been whispered upon the greatest of winds. Harrowing, the echo reverberated against the stone and kissed promise of the greatest haunting the mortal realm had ever known. “Oh, Michael..” The singsong sweetness to her tone near sickening as she slipped through the broken gate and laid onyx hues upon the one she’d avoided for so long. Not unaware of his plight to remove each of the fallen from this world like the stains he deemed them to be.  Saccharine lips turn upward and yet any who bore witness could pledge that nothing but venom would pass beyond her tongue, even as she meandered closer, not unlike a long lost sibling relegating a near stranger. “You look weary, brother.” Or perhaps rather, he felt as much. “Or perhaps it is the mundane vessel you continue to hold onto.”

"Get me Augustus' body." It's said without much thought, but neither do her plans grow too bold just yet. With her numbers dwindled - even with the souls of those beyond Rome, Pythia wouldn't strike again without having everything in check - not for the likes of being blinded once more. "Dead or alive." Undoubtedly, the archfiend held some sentimentality towards the former necromancer, but waste not want not. The ties he held were worth splintering in the same ways the Asphodel had been, "And find out where Lucrecia is hiding, I'm not nearly done with her." By choice, or otherwise; Leviathan was the very embodiment of violence; and her wrath would befall all of those who no longer served her purpose. "Kill whoever you have to."

Bastien's birth had only been for the power that his parents could garner, to create a coven where one had not been. He had been taught nothing aside from what he could do for his parents. That is, until Pythia had begun to whisper in his ear. Of the power that he could harness for himself, of the magic that lay dormant within him. It was the greater demon that had guided him to the forest, to the animals within and the visions that he could pull from the hands of the Graeae. And it was since then that his loyalty had been cemented, given over freely and without fault. Even when he had been imprisoned, when he'd been left with nothing but his visions. Even when others had fallen, had felt fear and fled from the ranks of the Asphodel. And even now, as his mind fractured, as a part of it weighed so heavily upon a certain elf, Bastien had remained with Pythia. "Ask of me anything that you wish, it will be yours freely," he affirmed, cementing his loyalty that much further to their cause. To the power that would be Pythia's, and subsequently, his own once a new book had been crafted. Once they had finalized what they had long since been working towards.