#shard of azem

[chaobunnyarts]

Dive to the Heart - Amaurot

[nights-at-crystarium]

[fisherrprince]

put everything else about dawntrail away. anyone have any theories about our cup

[jeredu]

Time for some FFXIV x Tales of the Abyss

Honestly, just go scroll through my media tab on twitter because there are so many.... SO many doodles and lore bits at this point.

Anyway Cato Nocivus. All-knowing bringer-of-harm. Jade wakes up sometime after the end of the world in an unfamiliar child's body, in an unfamiliar land.

Coerthas, before the calamity.

Rather, a child wakes up one day with a lot of memories he didn't have before. Most of them belong to a man named "Jade," and some of them belong to a younger man named "Ascella."

Jade wins out, Jade has several decades more life experience than the rest of them combined. He chooses a new name, leaning into his half-Garlean heritage with bitter irony. He can't use magic. Or, he can't use magic yet. Thankfully, this child has befriended an outcast dragonet. The two of them eventually leave Coerthas in search of answers (and Cato begins to micro dose on dragon blood in an attempt to circumvent this particular aetheric handicap).

He has yet to find a single other person who remembers a place called "Auldrant."

(Things happen, plots unfold, he ends up back in Coerthas and finds a frozen hellscape. The eastern highlands are gone. He finds a body in a dark alley and picks up a sword nearly as long as his spear. He pulls Haurchefant away from danger, but not quickly enough to save his arm.)

He ends a war.

He travels to another world.

He takes in FAR too much light for his soul to contain.

(more art and spoilers for endwalker beneath the readmore)

Cato: I suppose it is appropriate… I chose this name with eyes fixed upon the past, and so created a self fulfilling prophecy.

Y'shtola [thoughtful]: Nocivus. Injurious.

Urianger [firm, scoffing]: Thou bringst 'harm' as the root breaketh barren earth.

He joins with yet another fragment of himself.

He learns the truth about Lorelei)

He sees the end of the world again, through the lens of the past. A different end, swifter and violent, barely averted.

He is thrust out of his body. He leaps into the lifestream to wrest it back, and in so doing meets its keeper again. Hades. Hades chooses to escort him, lest the final hope for this world die with him.

He is tasked with slaying the most ancient god. He fears that doing so will bring destruction, but letting it live certainly WILL.

He travels to the past. He confronts a truth he has held within himself.

He is not the right person for saving this world.

But he is the one who is here.

(did Azem know? Did Themis? )

[weatheredfailnot]

Still thinking about this optional dialogue. Yeah, I’m sure he was aware of it.

Emet-Selch didn’t just send the WOL off to clean up after the Ascians and other Ancients, he also sent us to clean up our own mess- even if it was only indirectly our fault. Our soul from another time’s fault.

[herssian]

spark

[windupkaine]

a new life - exploring a new star together

[ooeygooeyghoul]

Azem || The 14th Seat of the Convocation

Vulcan || Master of the Forge, Beastslayer, and Forbidden Keeper of the Primordial Flame. A cold and apathetic man misunderstood by the people around him. Not a single one of them knew just how deep his ambition ran. Vulcan is one of those Azems who is only vaguely similar to his shards. He and Shiun don't have a lot in common, but Shiun's construction does contain a part of Vulcan's soul.

[alluunare]

Durante and Golbez

[akirakirxaa]

“Do you regret it?” (Solus/Valeria)

[Ask prompts here! I'm so excited, this is my first ask for Valeria, I hope you like it!]

Valeria lay curled up on their plush chair before the fireplace, book in hand but not reading it as she stared pensively into the flames, lost in thought. She had long since gotten used to her husband returning late from his many meetings and duties, but rather than going to bed without him as he always insisted, she waited. Going to sleep without him always felt like she would wake the next day to it all having been a dream, and now she was back in her wretched family's attic with her stepmother screaming up that breakfast should have been ready by now. No, she didn't need those nightmares. So she waited.

She had just started to doze, curled up on the chair with her head on the arm, when she heard familiar, unhurried footsteps outside. A moment later the door to their sitting room creaked open slowly, as if he was trying not to wake her. Foolish, she always woke when he finally came to join her, if she had slept at all. At this point it felt more like a dance, just their way of greeting each other after a long day apart.

"Still awake, I see," Solus said, as if it were a surprise, as he removed his coat, leaving him in just his shirtsleeves and trousers. "How was your day, dearest?" Valeria stretched, sitting back up properly in her chair.

"Hmmm, better now that you're here," she gave a smile, gathering her dressing gown around her. He crossed their sitting room, taking one hand and planting a kiss on the back. Valeria couldn't help the heat in her face; the woman could be taken from the common citizenry but the mindset could never quite be gotten rid of. At least she wasn't quite as flustered as when they first met, the emperor of the entire country treating her like the height of royalty when she wasn't even meant to be there.

"Glad to be of service," he gave her a little crooked smile before settling on the couch, and for a while they sat in comfortable silence.

Well, almost comfortable.

Valeria dropped her book, and as she bent to get it she let her golden hair fall in her face, hiding her but not completely blocking her vision. She glanced up at her husband, and there it was. The reason she felt so pensive tonight.

For quite some time now, she noticed that any time he thought he wasn't being watched, he looked at her with a horribly sorrowful expression. It was hard to catch, and disappeared as fast as she noticed it, but she knew for sure he was hiding something from her. She settled back in her chair and thought for a long moment.

"Do you regret it?" she broached the silence, swallowing her nerves. She felt him staring at her.

"I'm sorry?"

"Do you regret it?" she repeated, meeting his bright yellow gaze. "Marrying me? A... commoner? Someone of no importance?" He frowned at her.

"Where is this coming from?"

"I see how you look at me when you think I'm not looking. You appear so sad, so I couldn't help but wonder..." she trailed off, glancing away and fidgeting with her hands. Another few moments of silence.

"Come here, my dear," he held one arm out to her, and she crossed over to him, sliding onto the sofa and into his side. He wrapped his arm around her comfortingly.

"I don't regret us, not for a moment," he tilted her face toward him gently as he spoke. "There's no one I'd rather have as my empress." She searched his face for a lie that wasn't there.

"Then why...?"

"Because I want more for you." She couldn't help the small giggle at his words.

"More? We're already royalty, in a powerful country. I have an entire palace, the best food money can buy, all the assistance I could ask for, for anything I might need, what else could I ever ask for?"

"A better world," he clarified, resting his cheek on her head. "One where there are no wars, where all nations are one, working together. One of peace." Valeria sighed, leaning more fully on his shoulder.

"Sounds like a dream," she mumbled.

"I don't think it has to be," he countered, and she felt like he was still holding something back. But before she could press more, he stood, crossed to their imported orchestrion, and put on a quiet piano piece. He turned back to her with a soft smile.

"Dance with me?" She snorted, but stood anyways, taking his hand.

"You," she accused as they swayed in a slow circle, no thought put into the steps, "are trying to distract me." He kissed her forehead, just above her third eye, and she could feel his amused grin.

"Is it working?"

"A little."

With one finger under her chin, he tilted her head back to capture her lips in a kiss, and Valeria melted into it, her hands clenching in his shirt. He nipped at her lower lip, and she let out a quiet whimper. He took her by one hand and broke away, leading her back towards their bedchambers.

"I think," his voice had dropped lower, holding her gaze as he walked backwards. "It's time for us to retire for the eve." Valeria couldn't help the girlish giggle or the blush on her cheeks as she stumbled eagerly after him.

"I was just thinking the same thing."

[adahlenan]

        “ what you are, I was; what I am, you will be ”

[sangre]

water, running down my face / water, running different ways water, like a billion waves / water, just a tear in space. ✧

for my ffxiv oc, eden mercure. prior to enw, he was not a little predisposed to world-shattering grief and causing problems bc of his weary heart. SO, when i got to elpis, it wasn't long before i decided that he was a hermes shard rather than one of azem. it's just too perfect a story.. anyway, please enjoy my love letter to him before dawntrail! and go listen to this song, it's so good

[koukouture]

Script for a comic I don't think I'll ever make LMAO

Context: This is sort of Emet Selch's monologue about Azem during Shadowbringers. Yeah. That's all you need to know.

"You don't know me at all. So shut up" that's what you said.

You were dying. I could see it- the light infecting you, seeping into your head, heart and very soul. You were no longer a distant star but a blinding supernova. Hot to the touch, dangerous, dying, faded- but in a way- beautiful.

You always did shine brighter than the rest.

So how dare you say I don't know you?

Know you?

You are my other half; I am nothing without you. You are all I know.

I knew you across thousands of years, across hundreds of incarnations, across a dozen and some worlds.

Know you?

I am you.

Everything that I am now is because of you. All of it! I traveled far and wide and every single time I cannot stray from your light. Every single road I took went back to you. Every single path, alleyway, staircase every labyrinth- you were at the end of all of them.

Sometimes we are lovers, sometimes we are friends, allies, enemies... sometimes we are strangers.

Do not accuse me of ignorance. I am under no delusion that I know you- I know you better than anyone.

And you know me too.

Don't you?

Azem

Lucifer

You know me... right?

You can feel it surely- this is fate! You know me! I'm your soulmate! Can't you feel it!? Can't you feel me!?

WHY WON'T YOU LOOK AT ME!?

okay i think that's it lolol. bye

[wind-up-thancred]

"A bit thin in the aether, but there's no mistaking it—the color of its soul is almost identical to Azem's." "The two of us can discern the color of souls, you see, and yours happens to resemble that of a friend."

[sunderedazem]

𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕜𝕟𝕠𝕨 𝕚'𝕧𝕖 𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕥 𝕒 𝕝𝕠𝕥, 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕚 𝕨𝕠𝕟'𝕥 𝕝𝕖𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕕𝕚𝕖

(Fraegeim Hezzfyrwyn, Warrior of Light, of the First)

[voidsentprinces]

Elidibus: We have gathered the Convocation of the Fourteen for a grim situation. Emet-Selch: Azem...this is an intervention. Azem: NOPE! *bail outs through the window* Lahabrea: ...we should probably bar the windows next time. Nabriales: They...are barred? Lahabrea: YES! BUT CLEARLY THE BARS AT TOO FAR APART! Loghrif: If its anything like that incident with the volcano. No opening is too narrow for Azem to go through. Entire Convocation sans Azem, obviously: Agreed.