Welcome to Gaia! ::

The call was not something to be ignored. Never, ever. The shrine was a safe place, usually. A place where the Goddesses lived. A place where tasks were completed. A place where things were gained and lost. She read the plaques, looked upon the statues. Not forgotten? Given what was needed? Loved?

Rhryse didn’t have time to question things. Something called to her. Pulled at her. At her heart, her very being. She needed to answer that call, needed to go…

White. She remembered white, faintly. White and nothing more. The Fog. Where she came from. This fog was different. It didn’t move, didn’t swirl, didn’t whisper. It simply was, and it was waiting. Waiting with the door.


Offer to us your Heart.

Rhryse didn’t wait, didn’t question it. She stepped through that door.

It was the same room, or the twin of the other, and there in that quiet room she looked upon the Goddesses again. Something was different, had their colors changed?

There were others, too. Shadows. Shadows with hearts. Ah, yes. She’d seen them before. Made friends some of them. She couldn’t see their faces, not then. Her eyes, her attention, it all went to their hearts. So many hearts, shimmering with so many colors. Like her own. She looked down at it, the heart in her chest. It had been red before, but now..now it was hard to pinpoint it’s color. It changes, if flowed with…feeling. Feeling and memories. They hit her hard, those memories, all at once and she gasped. What were these? Memories yes, but why did they feel so familiar? Why did she have them? They were not this world, they didn’t belong here. But they belonged to her, didn’t they? It made no sense. They were hers, they had to be… yet… She nearly choked as the word tried to escape her. It was there, close, a name she could not recall. It was an important name, but it was just on the edge of everything and she could not reach it. Rhryse sighed, letting the memories and emotions swirl, trying to catch that name, trying to figure out who she was and what she was doing—

The shaking brought her out of her head and back to the now. Something broke, cracked, and Rhryse looked up. Red. Nothing but red. Worry, dread, confusion, feelings she did not like flooded her, even as the red tried to consume her. And the voice. Painful and everywhere. She covered her ears and it did not help. It hurt and burned, the voice of this Queen, and Rhryse wanted nothing more than for it to be over. She moved, stepping forward, ready to end it, to give herself over, to make the pain stop. It will worth it, this sacrifice, it is that she has been working towards anyway---

Two more voices. A single question. The sky split. Rryse felt very small as she watched the colors intertwine, watched at the green and gold cut into the red. She hardly noticed that she had herself back, almost didn’t notice the lack of pain. She was too busy watching, too busy sighing as the torment inside her ceased.

Her name. She did not know her true name. The name she had now was not hers, not really. But then what was her name? She could not remember.

The ground changed, shifted, grew. Gates. A choice was placed before her now.

Rhryse paused.

She heard the call, and she obeyed. Her boots clicked against the floor when Skaaal entered the shrine. The statues in the middle of the room had returned. Now all three were back, but four of the podiums were still unoccupied. Soon, she thought. She stepped closer to read the plaques. The words held little meaning to her. At least for now. Maybe she would come to understand them someday. Once she had had her fill of waiting, Skaaal headed for the door. Offer to us your Heart. The idea didn’t bode well with her, but it seemed she didn’t have much of a choice in this.

When she walked through the door she found only silence, calming silence. Her eyes narrowed at the change in the statues. Sacrifice yourself to us. She bristled, but otherwise continued to stand and observe the others, take in their colors and warmth. She crossed her arms and thought to herself. These were the people whom she had made new memories and shared old ones with. In return she had glimpsed into theirs. They were more than what they had initially been now. When she looked down she could see the burning red and warm gold inside her heart. The memories inside her heart swirled innocently. She paused. Memories. Suddenly she could remember what she had forgotten, what the goddesses had taken from her. The corner of her lips twitched at the realization, but then the ground shook to reveal a large crack.

Everything turned red. The sky. The moon. Her sight. All red. She clamped her hands over her ears when an unfamiliar spoke. Return her Heart? Skaaal hissed, but forced herself to step forward as the sky was overtaken by gold and green. A sigh escaped her lips. Her head was clearer, clear enough to let her mull over her choices. So, which one? Perhaps gold would suit her.

"You do," Simmy teased, and smiling seemed just a little less difficult. "I wish I could help it make sense, 'cause I feel like I should be, but that's hard to do when nothing makes sense to me either. Maybe we could've figured it out together, if we had more--"

No. She looked at the door and tried to think about it instead.

"That's what her words said...she wouldn't lie to us, right?" That wasn't even a question, but she buried every question that she really wanted to ask beneath its unfailing clarity. It was the only way to be sure the ones she didn't want to know the answers to came tumbling out among all the rest.

"But it's okay. That you didn't find what you were looking for, I mean." She knew she hadn't either, still felt that with a persistence that she wished would go away, because every little thought of it reminded her that he wasn't what she had been missing. It made her want to hate the person she used to be, angry that she'd failed herself. "I'm glad you found me at all."

It would have felt a lot more selfish were she not so certain that she could not have made it here to see to their final request without him.

The door was waiting, but she tried to bargain for a few more seconds, staring and trying to form the clearest possible image in her mind in hopes that she (or any Simmy after her) would remember him as quickly as she could. She didn't know what waited for them, but she didn't want to forget again. She memorized that smile and answered without hesitation.

"No! I would rather stop existing. But, um, just in case...I was wondering about...I wanted to ask if..." Even when she stretched up on her toes and tilted her head, she was a tiny bit too short to reach; refusing to let that stop her, she looked at him to help her one last time to get to what she needed.

It was a strange feeling. Rusekop could hear something calling out to her. Her heart resonated with this voice, urging her to follow it to it's source.

She did not move immediately, her presence drawn to the three statues inside the shrine. The shadow couldn't quite figure out how the plaques would change every time she witnessed them. Today they all said something different. Ruin assured her she would not be forgotten; Paranoia spoke of the wall, and she shivered as she recalled it's events. Her gaze lingered on longing, her patron deity, recalling how the goddess had said those words of love to her.

Now she could not ignore the urgent calling to her soul. The shadow relented, allowing it to tug her in the right direction, towards the door that was now here. Colours lined the outside, it's make and shape hard to make out. But the words that were inscribed on the door...Nope, they were clear as day.

So, she was to offer her heart, huh?

Ruse stood there with her arms folded, re-reading the few words. There didn't appear to be any other way to do this. Already she could not venture to the other areas, and even the monsters had gone. There was nothing else to do except follow the goddesses. She could hear them now, their whispers spoke to her of what they had promised. They had said she could become a goddess, and with the thoughts of the power it could bring her, she opened the final door.

Her expectations of what were going to happen had fallen drastically short. The next room was the same as the previous, and as she walked through the door she had to wonder just what was going on. The shadow took another look, and realized there were differences. The colours, their faces, they had changed slightly.

Not to mention the plaques as well.

Her stomach clenched at the words, and she lingered on Longing's statue once more, her face saddened.

"I have to ask" She said to the statue. "Just how much you love me if you want me to die."

She didn't expect a answer, and she didn't receive one.

It was then she realized she was not alone. Others, just like her, had entered this room. So it appeared she wasn't the only one that was to sacrifice themselves. She could see their hearts as well, their colours changing and swirling just like her own. She hadn't noticed until now just how much it had changed. How much it have evolved with the new memories she had created. Not to mention the old, which came surging back to her, leaving her dizzy and confused. A name kept popping up, but for the life of her she could not recognize it.

The goddess voices echoed once more and she tried her hardest to piece together her memories, to find out this name. But she hadn't the time to do it. The floor beneath her shook and nearly toppled her, the color red blazing around. She looked up and-

What the flying ******** was that thing?!

She glared at the moon as it grinned a sinister grin back. Her teeth were bared, hands flexing as she prepared for whatever would happen. Her defiance was short lived, as it's voice drilled into her skull. She shouted in pain as she heard every world, every bit of malice burned in her mind.

The world began to change then. Ruse found herself walking towards this change, watching in awe as the sky changed colours, three of them fighting each other for dominance.

It was time for her to choose.

The shadow had seen the other colours, but she decided upon the Green. The world exploded into trees and shrubbery, a nice contrast to the red and gold of before. She was before the crown now, the crown of creation. Memories flashed before her eyes as she drove one hand into her chest, Gritting her teeth against the pain and the images she saw. With one, clean pull she wretched it out of her chest, holding it forwards.

She didn't realize how big her own heart was.

Her memories began to fade, the last of them lingering as people came at her. Friends, family, shouting her name, Her real name.

Her eyes closed for a final time.

The crown was in front of them, but Iron didn't have eyes for it.

As he struggled to separate his heart, he could feel the memories leaving him. Moments before, he'd hoped for a name, but now he couldn't hold on to the simplest emotions. He lost the memories from before, and now.

The leaves and pillars clear, and there is only red.

They embrace, and his forehead rests on ****'s collar. He pulls ****'s head closer.

A spider throws him against a wall, and there is a hand on his shoulder.

They lean against each other, out of the rain.

They are catching fragments against an abandoned car.

He sees a door...

When he holds the heart in his hand, it doesn't belong to him anymore. The person beside him is a stranger. The altar waits. Pain. It hurts, and memories hemorrhage out of him in flashes, but he can't make sense of them anymore. Destruction is accepting his offering. The heart isn't his.

Someone is calling his name...

He couldn't get it out, and it hurt to try but he had to, he had to persevere, the idea of failing and having to deal with this world without Iron behind him like all the hounds of hell. It loosened and the memories did too, and he regretted, he regretted in a way that was simultaneously familiar and strange, as if this was always how it ended, always forced to be torn apart. He'd have lived forever in that imperfect, cramped and ruined world with Iron if it meant they could just be.

Like light through a prism the heart untangled and as he pulled it through he relived those instants, possibly for the last time.


Being caught and held before he could run away.

Together. Fighting and fighting in a barren world - like a desert, why a desert? - but happy somehow.

Heart to heart. As close as they could be.


And it was out and he was no one. He gave the heart to Destruction.

And then, hearing people call a name he still didn't recognise, he faded away.

There was another door.

Goddesses and gods and heavens and hells, Koshabi hated doors.

He had went through the pomp and circumstance that was the typical silence from the divines, their only words of wisdom being carved into plaques. Of course they wouldn't be around when their little rats were scurrying around to offer their prizes.

He didn't bother with them; the large shadow of a man simply strode through the door, looked upon the chaos within, and felt, for once, comfortable. Strife, it seemed, was his natural habitat. While he knew he ought to be afraid for his own existence, knowing that he would be forced to give up his heart to these aloof but powerful women, Koshabi felt only a strange inner peace.

It was, after all, the end. Or so it seemed.

He debated for the moment, knowing he should act but questioning if he was worthy after the debacle of his tasks.