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angelrider13
[Bad username or unknown identity: phoenixwithahoardoflibraries]
I have to admit, I’ve been thinking a bit about how Ardyn’s status as Leviathan’s Chosen gets revealed in the Seabourne ‘verse.
And it’s. Well. I have thoughts.
(Some lines borrowed from previous conversations with you, some from a previous conversation with
sparklecryptid )
I don’t know exactly how or where or when it’s revealed. I don’t know under what circumstances it takes place exactly.
But I have just. Just the mental image.
The mental image of Ardyn talking with Iedolas in full view of the chocobros. Of Ardyn and the Emperor - disagreeing on some issue, with Iedolas growing steadily more irate as Ardyn just grows more and more amused and - almost coy, as he leans back and fully indulges in the impulses born of several decades of working for a man he loathes.
Because oh, but Ardyn hates the man. Hates how this ineffectual ruler let himself come to this, how he ignores and brutalizes his citizens, how he has ruined his country as he fuels all available resources into the war effort. Ardyn hates how prophecy and necessity (and the Astrals, one mustn’t forget them) meant that he had to support this odious little man. That he had to consort with individuals such as Bethista and Caligo and so many more, how he had to stand by and do things and support things and - well. Suffice to say, Ardyn hates the empire, both with the fervent hate of an enemy long-denied his vengeance and the petty irritation of a man who has dipped his fingers into a glass dish of candies to find a maggot hiding among the sweets.
…I can’t decide whether Ardyn quits dramatically, or if Iedolas fires him. He quits, probably - I’m not sure that Iedolas could fire him. Ardyn has made himself - too valuable to the Empire to simply dismiss offhand.
Whatever the cause, I have the mental image of Ardyn sighing to himself as he reaches up and adjusts his hat. “Well, I suppose I shall go visit my dear old mother now.”
“You have a mother?” Prompt blurts out, the chocobros staring at Ardyn as if he had suddenly sprouted a second head.
Ardyn looks at them. “Of course I have a mother.” He sniffs. “I didn’t spring out of thin air.” Ardyn is. Pointedly ignoring the metallic tramp of MTs starting to deploy in the background. “Mother will be glad to hear that I’m well rid of that obligation. She doesn’t approve of the Empire, you see - then again, she’s never cared for slavers.” And the distaste is clearly audible in his own voice.
Meanwhile, something - something tugs on the edge of Noctis’s memory. Something makes his head turn to stare at Ardyn, an almost-frown tugging the edge of his lips. Slavers. Something about slavers. Something -
Leviathan has never cared for slavers.
Noctis stares, and the chocobros follow his gaze and it’s as if they’re registering the bright, inhuman gold of Ardyn’s eyes for the first time as the ex-Chancellor meditatively speaks. “I love her dearly, my Mother.” And his eyes seem to brighten, almost glowing as he continues. “My darling Mother, who came to me when the world itself turned against me. Who wrapped me in her arms and bore me down, down, down, who held me as I screamed and sang me to sleep and wove me crowns of kelp and sea-shells and the glass scattered to the mercies of the waves.”
And Ardyn’s eyes are glowing now as he smiles at the oncoming MTs, feeling the constraints - self-imposed and otherwise - shackling his magic fall away as his voice strengthens. “The rivers are her coils, the rains her laughter. The Drowned are her children, her herald the white foam-spray.” There is power growing in the air as Ardyn seems to relax, a liquid, languid grace seeping into each muscle and movement.
“The Monarch of the Untamed Abyss, Queen of the Sea, crowned in glory upon her seat of driftwood and sharp-edged coral - by your names I call to you. Hydrean. Lady of Sand and Salt. The Serpent Who Encircles the World. My Tide-Mother, I neither beg nor implore, but simply ask - “
And the creek behind them explodes, water raging towards the sky in solid sheets of liquid wrath.
“Come.”
And the Sea has come to the heart of the Empire as Leviathan spirals towards the sky in the full force of her unshackled might, her waters towering over the armies of MTs advancing on Ardyn’s position.
My son.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWDtEuvI4nE (Only with Ardyn and Leviathan, and with considerably more collateral damage.)
(Your picture was not posted)
