#I FORGOT HELSKNIGHTS EARING

[nexahexagon]

[Protect Me] <> [SAVE ME]

…

If you haven’t yet, read Redstone and Skulk by @silverskye13 :]

Was gonna post tmr but I’m too excited

This,, was meant to be a sketch,, but I’ve been wanting to do something similar for so long,,

Not fully rendered but I’m! Scared I’ll mess it up and I like it enough as is!!

And close up + warm up sketches under cut!!

I feel like I should’ve added more to the background but oh well!! I have many many more ideas with the GORGEOUS descriptions SilverSkye has given us,, but those might stay sketches this time lol

[silverskye13]

"Do I have a hels?"

Welsknight stopped in the middle of picking a cornflower. He hesitated, separated it delicately from its stem, and dropped it in his dye basket. "How should I know?"

Rendog shrugged. He crushed his pestle against a mortar full of dandelions, staining his fingers yellow. "Well, you're kind of the authority on the hels stuff, right? You got the first one."

"Xisuma got the first one," Wels pointed out, picking another handful of cornflowers. He carefully sifted the leaves out of the bunch, scattering the summer greens around his feet.

"Huh, I kinda forgot about Evil X." Ren grabbed another bunch of dandelions to grind. "He seems a little too different from X to be a hels, doesn't he?"

Welsknight shrugged, "I wouldn't know."

"Can you ask him? Uh-- the Helsknight guy." Ren startled, like he hadn't expected to ask his question aloud. He cleared his throat and stammered, "I mean-- obviously don't if it'd be distressing. I don't want to put you in a bad place, bro."

Ren's ears twitched nervously, and it takes Wels a long moment to realize he'd been staring. He picks another cornflower. "Ask Helsknight what? About Evil X? Or if you have a helsmet out there somewhere?"

"Oh! Well, the helsmet thing, if you don't mind." Ren said, and he leaned against the table he'd been making dye on, careful to keep his hands away from anything they could stain. Not that it mattered. His beard was already streaked with yellow and orange, as was his hair. There was a bright yellow dot on his right collarbone in the shape of a fingerprint where he'd tried to wipe away some fallen dye and only managed to rub it in more. "I kinda wonder what he's like, yanno? I mean, I've done the whole evil version thing before with Grimdog, and he was mostly just me but a little more darkly dramatic."

"A hels isn't really--" Welsknight trailed off and huffed a sigh. He'd already explained this a thousand times.

"Right, I know they're not evil exactly," Ren waved a hand dismissively, and a dotting of yellow splattered on the table. "But you know, I always kinda saw myself as like, the chaotic good type. So by definition my opposite double would have to be evil, wouldn't they?"

Wels shrugged. It made sense. That's how he and Helsknight seemed to work at least. Ren shoved a handful of poppies into his mortar and started grinding, working his way towards a vibrant orange dye. "Anyway it was just a thought my dude. Like I said, don't put yourself out over it. I like my Welsknight content -- not chasing shadows. You feel me?"

Welsknight chuckled, "I feel you, Ren."

The two lapsed into silence. Welsknight went back to picking cornflowers, and Ren grabbed another handful of poppies to add to his mix of dye. It was a comfortable silence, one filled with busy hands and the rustle of wind through oak and birch trees. This kind of early season gathering was pleasant, just before all the big flower farms were made, and dye-making was more visceral and fragrant.

A cloud passed over the sun, and a breeze whipped through, scattering some of the flowers from Wels' basket. Ren shivered and glared up at the sky like it'd offended him. Then he squinted as the cloud passed over and bright sunlight glared his sunglasses.

"He said you and your hels are similar," Welsknight said, and he grabbed another handful of flowers. Wels wrinkled his nose. "He's being a dick about it."

"Well tell him I'll whoop his ass for you, brother." Ren grinned.

Wels tilted his head to the side. "He says your hels version is strong and vicious, and followed by the scent of blood and tragedy."

"I didn't know tragedy had a smell."

"I think tragedy probably smells like whatever cave spider spawners are made of."

Ren laughed. He picked up his mortar, fixing to dump the freshly made dye into his half-finished concrete mix.

Something overtook Wels then. A shadow. Dark, malicious and vindictive, and he found himself speaking in a voice that wasn't completely his. "The blood is dripping into my eyes. I can't see. I've been blinded by the violence my hand--"

There was the sound of something shattering, and whatever grabbed ahold of Wels vanished from him like a breeze. He spun to face Ren who stood over the shattered remains of his mortar, orange dye splattered in the grass. His hands, coated in a swirling of yellow and red, shook.

"You okay, Ren?"

"Fine," Ren lied rather obviously, his voice cracking halfway through the word. "I just uh... Wasn't expecting..."

Ren swallowed hard, shook his head, and knelt to pick up the pieces of his mortar. They didn't talk about hels again.

[silverskye13]

"What is Hels like?" Welsknight asked the darkness in front of him. Darkness, because he ran out of torches ages ago, and the only light he had left was the backlight of his cracked communicator. His cracked communicator, the battery of which, as fate would have it, was rapidly dying, given it hadn’t really been charged all that much when he came down here in the first place. It was still alive, actively pinging his coordinates to any hermit who came within range of the signal, an SOS software designed just for this kind of scenario. But it would die soon. Wels, practical, rational, kept the backlight screen off. The higher the chance of his signal being caught. Without its light though, and without a torch, well, it was dark in the little hole he found himself trapped in. Dark, but not lonely. No, Wels was never truly alone.

"Pathetic." The familiar voice hissed in his ear. "You've given up the fight so quickly this time."

En Garde. Wels took no opening stance. He wasn't looking for a fight today. Wels, rational, patient, never did.

"This situation is beyond my capabilities," Wels explained coolly. "Help will arrive soon. Until then, I thought you might enjoy some small talk."

"Feeling lonely, Wels?" Feint. "Are you scared no one will come for you?"

"My communicator has plenty of life for an SOS," Wels shrugged into the dark. He rested his elbows on his crossed knees, trying to make himself comfortable. It took some fumbling to actually find his knees. Much like the void, the pitch black of a darkened cave was impenetrable. For the time being, it remained a familiar pitch. "Even if it didn't, there's a thousand other ways to find someone who's lost."

The voice didn't answer. Something like frustration, frustration not belonging to Wels, made a home in his chest.

"You told me a little about Hels when we first met." Step safely, the voice in the dark bites, and Wels is sticking his hand in its mouth with every word. The frustration that isn't his seethes quietly. Wels patient, calm, let's it be. It isn't hurting him yet. "It's in the nether, right? But I've been to the nether quite a bit, and I don't think I've ever seen it before."

"You're looking in the wrong places, idiot." Lunge. Aggressive and over-extended. Once again, Wels refuses to engage. "We can add that to your list of personal failings: short-sightedness."

"You said you were a champion there."

"I am."

"Is it a fun place to fight? It's got to be fun, if you did it so much." If it’s all you ever do. Wels winces, but he can't take the thought back. He's made a mistake.

Allez!

"Better to fight than cower in a hole. No wonder they forgot you for half a season. It's your natural state to pretend you don't exist."

"I didn't mean-"

"Backpedaling already, Wels? Have I caught you off-balance? What kind of a knight are you?"

"The kind that's asking a simple question," Wels stated, doggedly pursuing the topic at hand. "I didn't think you'd be too scared to answer it, Helsknight."

The frustration in Wels' chest seethes closer to rage, and he's forced to swallow in deep breaths to keep it in. There's something palpable about the dark in front of him, and a smell like brimstone and netherack burns his nose. He counts himself lucky that for now there's no smoke.

"I cannot describe Hels to you." The voice says at last, and it snarls with sharp teeth around every word. "It is only a place that makes sense."

"That's a lot of places."

"It is the only place."

"Uh, not sure if you've looked around much buddy, but Hermitcraft makes sense." Wels chuckles. "As much as it can, anyway."

"No. It doesn't."

"Would you care to elaborate? Or are we going to sit here in the dark talking around this for an hour?"

The darkness grins, and the gaps between its teeth are unfamiliar. Wels can't tell what the grin means, or how close it is to him. The frustration in his chest that isn't his simmers.

"We could sit here in the dark talking forever. That's your choice."

"This situation is out of my control," Wels repeats dutifully. "I'm waiting for help, and it's coming."

"Why are you trapped in this hole?"

"Were you napping when it all went down or--?"

"Humor me, insufferable beast."

"Creeper went off while I was caving. Trapped me in here."

"Why?"

"I... Ran out of torches?"

"Why?"

"Is this going somewhere?"

"Faster than you are."

Wels rolled his eyes. "Uh, well, this was supposed to be a quick trip. I just needed some iron. But I didn't find as much as I liked."

"And why do you need the iron?"

Wels feels like he's been manipulated. He's being circled, sword points extended, tracking movement. But he's doing his best not to move. Refraining from engagement. That is always the best way to fight Helsknight: to not fight at all. When something only knows war, peace is a baffling and unapproachable concept. But still, he feels engaged with, in the process of cornering.

"Well I need some for the build," Wels shrugs. "And I gave all I had to Beef the other day."

"A mistake you're facing the consequences of now," the voice snarls scornfully. "Why is your communicator dying?"

"I forgot to put it on the charger." Wels pauses, and then sensing the next question before it's asked, adds, "I was busy helping Jevin yesterday, so it slipped my mind I guess."

"You deserve to be trapped here."

"I mean, it's more of just, a series of unfortunate-"

"There is a clear and directed logic to why you are here right now. Every decision you've made has led to this moment."

"You say that like this is important or something."

"It's not. It's shameful. You're an idiot."

"It's good to know you think so highly of me." There was a twist in Welsknight's chest, the previous frustration raging back to life again. He stifled a laugh.

It is now Helsknight’s turn to ignore him. “Hels is a place that makes sense. Every event has a clear and traceable lineage. Every failure or victory is well-earned and deserved.”

“Because you can track things from Point A to Point B? We just did that. By your logic, Hermitcraft makes sense.”

“It does not.”

“What’s so weird about it?”

“Tell me, why are you so sure you’re going to be rescued?”

Wels shrugs, and the movement holds stiffness in it. The smell of brimstone in the black around him has begun to fade. He still feels like Helsknight is feeling him out, searching for something. “My friends will find the SOS ping. They always do.”

“Why would they help you?”

“Because we’re… friends…?”

“What makes you so sure they’re your friends?”

“Listen, I know what this is. We’ve done this song and dance before. Just because The Power Of Friendship isn’t quantifiable, that doesn’t mean my friends secretly hate me or something.”

There are teeth close to his face. He can sense them in the dark, the grinning maw murderously close. The simmering frustration that isn’t his becomes, for a brief moment, unbearable. It feels like a claw hooked through his ribcage, pulling, pulling. Dragging towards a mouth that, since it first appeared, has craved the moment it could devour him. Wels grimaces, and his hand fumbles through the dark to make sure he hasn’t actually managed to be impaled by something. When his hand reaches his chest, he feels only cold metal.

“An old wound of yours, Wels?” Helsknight snarls.

“I mean, that was an intense fight between us,” Wels allowed, and the feeling of a hook in his chest slowly starts to ease at the admittance. “I’m still on the mend… but I am mending.”

He feels like the darkness in front of him squints, sizing him up. He lets it. It’s not like Helsknight can really do him any harm here. The space is too small, for one thing. For another, Helsknight isn’t really here. Not in any form that lives and breathes and lunges, at least. No matter how palpable he feels in the dark.

“You cannot quantify friendship,” Helsknight continues. “But you can quantify a repayment in kind. What have you done, Welsknight, that you deserve to be saved in this moment? You gave away a little iron, a little time, but what fool trades their life for a few scraps?”

“I’m not asking someone to trade their life for mine. That’d be kind of selfish, I think. All I need is someone with some gumption and a functional pickaxe.”

“You are trapped in a hole of your own making. Every decision you’ve made has led to this moment. You are a hermit. You go long stretches of time without talking to your so-called friends, or aiding them in their needs. And yet you deem two small acts of favor enough justification for a lengthy search and rescue.”

“Do you not know what kindness is, Hels?”

“Kindness is a quantifiable trait. It can be repaid in equal parts to what is given for it. Your relationships with the people on this server, they cannot be accounted for. You expect them to rescue you, you expect them to like you. You expect them to accept your time given. But what have you done to deserve these things? There is no clear measure of your worth to each other. You have fallen into a safety net of caring people, who can decide at any moment they no longer care for your presence. Would you see it coming when it happened, Wels?”

“You’re trying to make me paranoid.”

“You are paranoid. Would these thoughts exist if you hadn’t had them first?”

“See, this is also an old argument, I think? If we’re the same person technically, and I’m thinking these things, that means you’ve thought them.”

“I’ve overcome these thoughts,” Helsknight cackles, a noise that reverberates around the tiny space like a rockslide. Wels finds himself pressing against the wall behind him, feeling if its stable. “I am the greatest warrior Hels has ever seen. Every victory I have ever won was rightly and justly earned. My world makes sense. You, however- I would not be here if you weren’t the weak link in my armor. An insignificant thing that fights, and spites, and hopes, and fancies after a world that cannot be counted or measured. You trust blindly, and then you crumble.”

That hook is in Wels’ chest again, and it’s hard to breathe around it. Its less that it hurts, more that it pulls. He breathes in and struggles to breathe out again. Those teeth are near his throat, threatening him with their presence, and the frustration that isn’t his is a barely contained rage. Wels screws his eyes shut – even though in the pitch black it makes no difference – and he fervently reminds himself that Helsknight isn’t really here. That the black knight can threaten and posture all he wants, but that’s all it really is at the end of the day. That’s all it is. His hands shake as he wipes his bangs out of his eyes. He’s still blind in the dark.

“Your curiosity bears promise, however.”

The feeling of the hook in his chest once again begins to fade.

“If you wish to know what Hels is like, what a world that makes sense is like, I can show you.”

Wels is startled by the realization that, for the first time, he isn’t alone in the cave he’s trapped in. It seems to him like suddenly a presence, real, physical, blinks into existence in the dark. Or maybe the dark becomes so thick and impenetrable that it gives itself form. Either way, one minute Wels is taking solace in the fact that he’s alone here. The next, he isn’t.

“Welcome back to Hermitcraft, Hels.”

The presence that is real and unsettling, and not just vague impressions of teeth and claws, leans towards him and extends a hand.

“You hate me,” Wels reminds him. “Why should I take whatever it is you’re offering to show me.”

“Because you are my weakest link,” Hels says matter-of-factly, and it’s weird hearing his voice out loud, dying in the closeness of the space they’re sharing, instead of reverberating dark and ominous in the corners of Wels’ mind. “I desire to be stronger, Wels. That is a clear and quantifiable motivation.”

Wels can hear the smile in Helsknight’s voice. “Help yourself.”

Silence falls heavy on the both of them as Wels hesitates before the outstretched hand. The conversation weighs on him, along with the weathering gaze of his Hels-spawned double. Welsknight reaches out his hand.

There’s a resounding crack, and Wels flinches as light suddenly pours into the little cavern. Xisuma is standing there, torch in one hand, pickaxe in the other. He blinks down at Wels, mouth open with a half-formed thought, before finally landing awkwardly on, “oh… Hello Welsknight.”

Wels looks back into the little cave pocket he’d been trapped in. His arm is reaching towards an empty wall. He pushes himself to his feet, pretending he wasn’t just caught in the middle of making a dumb decision. “Hey Xisuma! Thanks for coming after me, man.”

“Ah, well, I wasn’t coming after you, actually.” Xisuma fumbles, looking a bit lost. “Evil X sent me out this way looking for something. And, well… I can’t really remember what it was now I was supposed to be looking for.”

“Oh? Well that’s… serendipitous, I guess.”

“Just a regular derp moment, I guess?” Xisuma laughs uncomfortably, and then seems to get his bearings again. “Well! Glad I could help you out anyway. Would you like me to escort you back above ground again?”

“Yeah, if you don’t mind.”

“Come along then.”

Xisuma turns and starts making his way up the cave. Wels pauses only long enough to check the hollow he’d been stuck in, nodding to himself when there’s no sign of anyone there.

Later when Wels is alone again, back in the safety of his house, he will think about the hand extended to him in the dark. He will think about what Helsknight said about a world that makes sense, where every thought and action is quantifiable, every victory and hardship wholly justified. He thinks about what it must be like to be trapped in your darkest moments, and at every turn to recognize the individual shortcoming that brought you to that place. He thinks about how cruel a world it might be, if no one rescues those trapped by their own faults.

He thinks next time Helsknight extends his hand, he’ll refuse to take it