daemonized | RECOLLE IC CONTACT.

[HONESTLY HE PROBABLY COULD what a wild ride that would be.]

to take care of my
sword
self

[He hates this so much.]

[omg no Ardyn would probably feel really weird about that, especially after what this conversation might turn out to be.]

Sorry, your what?

[Bury him in the backyard instead then because he wants to return to the earth. SAVE HIM...]

my sword self
or something
idk

i'm some kind of like object spirit or whatever i guess

[Nailed it.]

What?

[Sorry but this still... makes zero sense.]

You're a spirit of a sword?

[He knows that feeling too well...]

yeah
or something maybe
did you notice most of my cuts and bruises and stuff usually didn't last long?
the only ones that stuck around were like
idk
a reflection or something of damage my sword took

I thought maybe that was only because you healed faster than normal. It wouldn't be unheard of.

[Little did he know it was a bit more complex than that.]

The sword you used to fight the monsters? That's the one you're referring to?

i do that too

[It's just probably a side effect of nOT ACTUALLY BEING A PERSON.]

but yeah that's the one!
with the red sheath and gold
handle thing

[He's still learning...]

The wrap? The hilt?

How are you a sword spirit and you don't know your own

[his own... his own what...]

...body parts?

i'm really new to this! (;´Д｀)
it's not like i had any reason to research swords before all this retrospec junk you know
and i didn't even believe it until like
last month
also that's weird

[DON'T CALL THEM HIS BODY PARTS even if it's... possibly true...]

What's weird? Your body parts?

[IT IS WEIRD BUT IT SOUNDS ACCURATE??]

What happened last month to make you believe all of this? A memory?

yeah!(´ж｀;) it's weird! isn't it weird??
i wish it was that easy though
but no
it's more like me putting together all of the things i've been remembering since feb

Well, do you consider your sword your "true" body? If so, I honestly don't know what else to call it.

What do you make of it all, then? Do you think of yourself as still human?

i mean it's A body i guess
but it's weird to talk about it like that anyway

[ALSO THAT IS a very good question and he honestly doesn't know how to answer it anymore... Despite the people saying that they'll always be themselves - the "themselves" they'd been before Retrospec - he's remembered enough by this point that he doesn't think it's entirely true.]

idk
i mean if my memories are legit then i probably wasn't
and if what that sphynx or whatever said is true about us being rebuilt and not reincarnated then i guess i never was
but thinking about stuff like that just gives me a headache

[It's a question that needs a fair amount of consideration from everyone, even if they did not start this conversation with the intention of exploring Deep Thoughts.]

Yes, /if/ it's true.

[Doubt, hesitation. It still exists in Ardyn, though he's trying to skew his way of thinking to accept this potential reality.]

Does it not bother you? That what you knew about yourself all along might've been false? And what about the life you led up until this point? You can't dismiss that, can you?

[SUDDEN DEEP CONVERSATIONS, HIS MORTAL ENEMY--

Actually he'd normally be inclined to bail right out of these types of discussion because his flight response is immense, but... Who knows. Maybe it's the camaraderie specific to being out battling together that makes him a little more willing to talk honestly, even if it's still pretty evasive in the end.]

yeah it's all a big if
everything's been a big if for months
and who wouldn't it bother?
i don't want to think about stuff like that
all the years i've been alive are real to me too you know?
i just have a feeling it'll get harder to keep things straight in my head the more stuff i remember from before
or something

[Ardyn will gladly withdraw from these DEEP MUSINGS as soon as the other wishes to. Making him uncomfortable is not his aim, as there's a time and a place for it.

For now, though...]

The question is how you reconcile the you of now with the you in your memories. It's something I'll be struggling with for a while to come, as well.

[A pause before the next text arrives.]

Have they all been pleasant memories? If you don't mind me asking.

Edited 2017-09-15 15:15 (UTC)

[At least it helps that they're All Suffering Together, like a big questionable family! Good work, team.]

i think a lot of us will be
because a lot of us don't remember just nice things
is it like that for you?
it was like that for me anyway yeah
i mean
i'm a sword i guess
so i was in a lot of wars

[A pause.]

Not everything has been pleasant, no. But not necessarily in the way that I remember mostly unpleasant things. I merely feel them.

["Merely", he says.]

I hadn't considered that. It's still odd to think of you in that way, but I imagine that it's unpleasant regardless.

what does that mean?
you can only remember feeling things instead of the rest of the memory?

if you want to say i mean

[Because hoo boy does he know all this memory business can be touchy stuff.]

yeah though
it's pretty weird right?
but that's the way things are i guess

Both yes and no.

I remember most of the events with some measure of clarity. Many of them were innocent enough, simple conversations with others. Some a bit more complicated than that, but what bothers me are the emotions I felt at the time. They were very unlike me. Anger and spite. A willingness to [hurt others, to take pleasure in someone else's suffering] be less than kind.

Have you experienced something like that?

[Ah, yes... The Emotions™. He's heard stories from some people with starkly different ones from what they currently experience, and stories from others who don't notice much of anything unusual at all. He can sympathize with this to a degree though, even if he doesn't think his own experience is as jarring as what Ardyn is describing.]

that sounds like it'd be pretty scary tbh
but i think i kind of get what you mean
a little bit anyway
because i definitely remember just not really caring in the way a normal human being should about cutting things down

[Monsters, yeah. But also people, even if that's just a hazy recollection at this point.]

[The Emotions are quite disturbing. Especially if they are Villain Emotions™, which can indeed be a little frightening for someone who is not at all inclined to feel that way.]

It isn't pleasant, I can assure you of that.

Are you afraid of this becoming the new you? This inclination to not care as much as you should?

Edited (notices typos hours later nbd) 2017-09-18 19:22 (UTC)

[I Can't Believe My Teammate Was The Villain All Along! and other short stories, coming to a library in Recolle soon.

There's a little pause after that, either way. And then, with honesty:]

a little
especially because we're being shoved into situations that bring that kind of stuff out

[The battles and such, that is. He's not particularly glad to fight, and he's also not pleased about how familiar it all feels.]

are you afraid of it?

I am.

It isn't the person I want to be.

[And that is basically the heart of the matter. There's the fact that a few of the faces here is with whom he felt that hate and spite towards, in his memories, but he'll not share that much quite yet.]

i don't think it's possible to ever 100% become the people we're remembering tbh
since we have our own lives and memories and stuff
but i don't think it'll be as easy to separate ourselves from who we used to be as some people think either

[Or, in short, "I see your fear and that's heckin valid". Who knows how much or how little they'll take after their old selves? The more memories he regains, the more he finds his behavior and mentality slipping without him having anything at all to do with it.]

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