hadriel | two ✤ video

[Hope still hasn't quite grasped human niceties, so he appears on the network suddenly, with no leadup and no greeting. As usual, he looks vaguely stressed and displeased.]

It has become obvious to me that I don't quite know how you creatures work. I need your hope, and unlike Fear I don't intend to bombard you with imagery just in case something sticks. Whether you like me or not, we're working together, in a way - without me, you'd all starve, without you, my power is lessened. I know you all so desperately want to go home, and without more power there's really no chance of that. So I have a proposal.

[He leans in, just a little.]

Bring me things that inspire hope in you. Place them on the altar in my temple over the next week or so, give me some idea of what it will take to draw hope out of you humans. If you can imbue them with more power - inspire hope in others with your ideas, work together, form bonds - that's even better.

As you all seem to enjoy being disagreeable, I do have more incentive then simply helping me out. Whoever brings me the thing that gives me the most power will receive my blessing. It's quite rare and valuable, it will impart to you the the ability to heal others for a certain amount of time. Since you all seem quite squishy and easily injured, I've no doubt that would be useful.

In addition, if I receive enough power, I'll waste some of it on a treat for all of you. So there's plenty of reason to help me out. Get to work.

[And that seems to be that. No farewell here, just Hope shutting the feed off. Feel free to ask him questions, if you'd like. He might even answer.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

No humans before the lot of you arrived here, no.

So we are the first to come here? That doesn't--

[ ...make much sense, but if he's never seen or encountered people like them before, then how would he know? Neria's lips press into a thin line, pondering. ]

The Door. What do you know of it? Is it possible to...approach it, study it, without anything happening?

The first of your kind.

[There's a careful stress on that. Not the first people ever. Just the first human-shaped ones.]

I know barely anything. Only that it was an artifact that we didn't truly understand, and that Fear should have stayed away from it. Others knew more.

[ Interesting. ]

No elves, then?

[ 'We.' 'Others.' ]

What others do you speak of? Were there more like you?

[A pause.]

What's an elf?

[From Hope's perspective, humans and elves are basically identical.]

There were more of us once, yes.

[ Carefully, she pulls aside her hair for a moment, making her pointed, long ears far more visible. ]

I am.

[ More of them. More...powerful creatures masquerading as entities of emotion. She wonders if they are demons. ]

What happened to them?

[He peers closer.]

Pointed ears? That's the difference?

[But that's practically no difference at all.]

They died. [His voice is flat.]

It's much more than that. Our builds are different, our cultures vastly different than that of a human's. Many elven people were enslaved, long ago, and we are still seen as second class citizens in my world. There's a host of differences I could tell you, from our history to our culture and our biology.

[ But that would be boring, wouldn't it. ]

...Died? How? Are you not--

[ Hrm. ]

What are you?

Hmm.

[They really do seem the same to him, but he supposes they might seem very different to one another.]

That would be a long explanation. We're far more different from you than you are from humans. But we can die. Everything can.

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