[fanart above by inkphobic !!! I'm behind on crediting a lot of fanartists and showing y'all a lot of fanart, so you'll be getting a lot of fanart Torva content. I'll probably be doing one per chapter until I inevitably run out.]
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"New beginnings don't always mean new people."
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A thick fog encapsulated all visible land, and soon all that could be seen was ones own hands in front of their face. The red overcame and swallowed all it encountered, destroying the breath of life that covered the land.
Or maybe it was simply replacing the life already present, anybody could tell the vine like monsters were nothing short of blistering with animation.
Vines reached like veins, latching onto all it could and taking all within its reach. Like a hive mind they moved and thought in unison, expanding the reach they had day by day. Not one soul dared to utter a word about the new life, almost fearful it could hear them.
It was alien.
Avoid.
Recede.
Avoid.
Don't touch.
Don't go near.
The vines skirted away from a certain patch of land, encapsulated by a grey border and kept safe by a spout of water. Holy water.
A white church stood strong in the center of the untouched land, purified waters guaranteeing the safety.
The holy land.
Who would win in a battle of good and evil? The holy or the damned? Who is to say what is holy and what is out for blood? What divides the two sides, is it morals or followers? And at what point do two extremes collide and create one greater evil?
Morality is something humanity has debated for as long as it has existed. Can one truly ever answer the question of good and evil? They have always said beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all.
So those who are morally blind, can they see good and evil? Do they care at all? Their existence proves people can live without the constant suffering and weight of the question 'am I a good person?'.
As an aftereffect, one can be left with a singular question, what will be our downfall? The overly conscious and worrisome, indefinitely terrified with their fate and morals. Or perhaps those who have gone beyond caring for what comes of those around them. At what point will these two extremes diverge, while those in the morally grey watch them crash and burn?
And so is the ever raging war, of good and evil, a war where the line is so blurred nobody can tell if it ever even existed.
The Gods and Goddesses will watch and laugh at the mortals foolish games, sending down their own to poke and prod at the quarrels.
Humanity has never seen true evil.
Humanity has never seen true purity.
The Angel of Death was shaking, his sword falling to the ground with a deafening echo. He had to stop a sob from ripping out of his throat, and the God's eyes wandered to his hands, shaking and coated in blue blood. Was it even blood? What did ghosts bleed?
In all of his millennia of existing, nothing could match the pain that seemed to physically hurt his frame after killing his son yet again. It didn't matter that it was his ghost, it didn't matter that he was doing it to preform a revival ritual.
It was still his sword that pierced his flesh, and he swears he could still hear the pleads and begs from the terrified brunet in his arms. What was he scared of? What has scared his son to become so petrified that he insisted that he must commit suicide via his own father?
Why did the Angel go through with it?
Phil put a blood stained hand on his mouth, covering his muffled words. Eret was at his side, the King placing a hand on his shoulder. The brunet was trying to comfort the God, though it wasn't helping much.
The man glanced to the blood soaked ground underfoot, blue seeping into the stone and the Ghost's body fading to dust. They had attempted to revive his son, though it seems the efforts weren't anything but futile. "All of the scriptures called for a totem." Philza paused his words, wings drooping slightly to show his disappointment. They all knew the ghost would return swiftly, but that didn't stop the slight mourning. "We didn't use a totem."
Phil took a step back, the man breaking from the other's hold.
The attempt had obviously been unsuccessful, even in all of Phil's existence revival has been something only spoken in rumor. Maybe he could have tried harder, done fifty things differently, but it didn't work and he can't change that. It hurt a bit, knowing he had lost his son. He wasn't present for too much of his life, but that didn't take away the sting.
He almost didn't want to wait for the ghost to return, bare the fact that he looked like his son but was so much different than the boy he had grown to care for.
Instead, something caught his eye, the same time as Eret.
They would both deny the fact that they had planned this elaborate revival plan to distract themselves from something greater. The fact that Torva had left her communicator strewn on her kitchen counter when she said it was in her pocket. It had been maybe three weeks now, Phil had lost count when Eret was probably keeping track of the hour.
Yet now both men were looking at the woman.
She was across from the crater, one she helped create side by side with Technoblade and Philza. She was far away from them but still barely visible enough to make out her features. The tall woman was holding her scythe in her palm, and she was standing firmly at a man's side.
Eret knows the man's name, Antfrost. His ears were perked up and tail at attention. Though, he seemed different than when he last saw him. "Was he always... that color, mate?" Phil was wiping off his hands, a look of discontent still on his face from his actions before. Yet both their previous plans had been utterly derailed.
Phil was right, completely disastrously right. Antfrost's fur was tinged red, and as he crouched down bright vermillion toned eyes stuck out among the rest of him. It was strange to see him so different, and Eret was plain confused on what caused it. The hybrid seemingly poured some seeds into the dirt, Torva standing over him as if she was a guard. "Look at her hands." Eret spoke breathlessly, eyes opening wide.
That's when Eret noticed more red tinge, this time not in the cat hybrid's fur. It was on her hands, stretching up her arms and covering the void tone. It was a bright red, a similar color to her hair and the same as the red vines around them on the ground.
The woman sighed, feeling the breeze rippling over the land below. She could hear it echo in the cavernous crater to her left. It created a strange emanating tone, a whistle whipping up from the dip in the earth, like an out of tune symphony. Perhaps the country created music for Wilbur even in his death. "Hurry it up, Ant." She muttered, bringing a cigarette to her lips and inhaling steadily. It was a practiced motion, and it didn't take long for her to fall back into it for comfort.
"You can't rush planting the egg's vines." The cat hybrid replied simply, standing up and brushing dirt off his hands. "You just want to go because they are watching." He accused the woman, crossing his arms after putting a small satchel of seeds back in his pocket.
"I don't want unnecessary confrontation, Captain Puffy is around here too most of the time, and she left the Egg with a type of hatred." Torva said the other woman's name with a type of malice, no longer being able to recall her in a fond manner. The sheep hybrid had been tainted in her mind, motherly gazes turned malicious in a matter of seconds.
"So then you take her and we give her to the Egg, you're stronger than her by far." Antfrost shrugged, tail whipping every which way to show his displeasure in the conversation. He obviously believed the answers were clear.
She sighed at the idiocy, "if I kill her that will alert the rest of the server and disrupt the planning stages, murder isn't an option right now."
Torva stretched, rolling her head around and hearing her neck crack. It created a chorus of pops here and there. The cat hybrid then looked ahead to the prime path, they should probably head to the next location. They had to meet up with Badboyhalo later, so they couldn't be late.
Though, Antfrost knows that if he's with Torva he can't particularly get into trouble. He's safe with the Grim Reaper as his bodyguard, and the Egg values her too much; so really anybody on her good side tends to stay in good standing with the Egg. With Badboyhalo as the impromptu leader of this group, his sister by default has moved up the ranks faster than any other. "I guess you're right, we need to go before those people come interrupt us though. The Egg said they were going to attempt a revival today." Antfrost muttered it, ears folding back after he finished speaking. The idea of Wilbur being revived wasn't a good one.
When the man passed he was manic, everybody knew that even if they happened to not be at the event. He wasn't healthy mentally, hell he wasn't well physically. It wouldn't be a good idea to bring that mania and insanity back to these lands, not with the chaos already brewing underfoot.
"Yeah, Wilbur Soot. I assume it was unsuccessful?" Torva questioned, looking back up to the revival alter, made out of lapis and gold. She could see other items placed on the valuable platform, all pertaining to the dead President.
"The Egg hasn't said anything, so I guess."
She nodded to the man, beginning to walk over to the prime path. They had to go and head to the others now, plant seeds in the other locations. She took one last inhale of the poisonous smoke, holding it for a moment before letting it waft back into the air, becoming caught in the breeze and floating away. "Bad doesn't like you smoking those." Antfrost spoke up, eyeing the dying cigarette in between her fingers, resting there like it belonged. It melded easily to her hold, practiced over probable years.
Antfrost couldn't help but wonder how difficult it might have been for her in Pogtopia. A confined space where everyone knows Wilbur Soot was constantly smoking, and with someone who had previously quit the habit in the ravine it couldn't have been easy for her to ward off urges.
She scoffed, dropping the practically finished cigarette into the grass below and snuffing it out with the heel of her boot. "Bad can suck my dick, it's my own problem."
"And be default the Egg's." Ant commented with little to no thought before speaking, not weighting consequences.
"Yeah, yeah. The Egg doesn't care about my smoking thank you very much." Her words were doused in heavy sarcasm and her face held nothing but displeasure with the conversation.
The two followers looked at each other for a moment, red meeting red, only to part with a huff from the cat hybrid. No use arguing with another member of the Egg.
The two men watched with curiosity and heavy concern, not particularly knowing what to do. "She smokes?" Out of every single question that could have possibly surfaced from what they just saw, that was the last one Phil predicted.
"She had some issues with smoking in her teens, relapsed once or twice but only when it was her last option." Phil thought it was a fairly simple question to answer, the Angel was in all honesty kind of surprised she hadn't told Eret. Though, she hasn't touched a cigarette in years to Phil's knowledge, so there probably wasn't a reason to.
Why dig up bad habits that have long since been buried?
Personally Phil thought there were much more pressing matters at hand, for example why Torva and Antfrost's eyes and general features had turned a bright screaming red. They still had to deal with Ghostbur too, should they just leave and run after them? They were caught between a rock and a hard place, to put it plain Phil was panicking.
They watched her walking away, trailing after the cat hybrid with a monotone expression.
Right as she was about to walk all the way through the mountain, through the prime path leading out of the tunnel and therefore out of the L'Manburg crater. She turned around, the two men froze when she made straight eye contact with them, only to smile and laugh under her breath. Those red eyes made both men even more off-put if that was possible. She disappeared to the other side of the path in mere moments.
Suddenly frantic footsteps filled their senses. "It didn't work!" Ghostbur shouted somehow cheerily, running up blindly to the two men. It seems he returned from his respawn point. Tommy had left along ago after Ghostbur was killed, the blond participating in the ceremony for mere moments before he got overwhelmed.
This left Philza and Eret alone cursed with the knowledge that- something- or someone- had changed Torva. Because no chance her grey eyes had turned red by any natural means. And now they had to ponder this with a nothing short of panicking ghost.
The woman on the other hand was quite content, guarding the cat hybrid as he planted seeds pertaining to the Egg once more. She got to relax, lean against her scythe and enjoy the noises of early morning. It was something to bask in, the feeling of early morning dew in the grass underfoot and sun creating gorgeous colors over the horizon.
Birds chirping also clogged her senses, there seemed to be plenty.
Huh.
She listened more closely to the seemingly strange number of birds, recognizing the caws immediately after she put thought into the calls. Crows, hidden strangely well in trees and passing caw after caw to each other. She sighed, lightly tapping Antfrost, making him stand up from where he was hunched over by Tommy's house, planting red seeds. "We're being watched." She muttered it, partially knowing it was no use and the crows would hear anyway. There could be one right next to them and they wouldn't know, The Angel of Death was sneaky.
She knew that from experience.
"By who?" Antfrost spoke clearly, either unbelieving or unbothered.
"Crows."
The man nodded in immediate understanding, pouring out the rest of the seeds and shoving the now empty satchel in his pocket. "Let's meet up with Punz then, we're still down a man since Captain Puffy left the Egg so we need to find a new member." The cat hybrid frowned, everyone had somewhat mourned the loss of their member. Captain Puffy had left their group mere days ago, the Egg felt the loss immensely. "Then we find Badboyhalo."
"I've heard of a God joining these lands, perhaps him?" The red head spoke, voice soft yet clear simultaneously. She was obviously clouded with thought, having not met the supposed Demi-god as of late.
"I've heard he isn't open to groups like ours, considers us a cult. Something about bad experiences with them."
She hummed in response, they had begun walking down the prime path back to the Egg, having to travel through the spider spawner.
If Punz was anywhere, it would probably be in the Egg's room. If anybody was ever looking for a follower of the Egg, the first place to check was the Egg's room.
Torva sighed as they began to approach the spider spawner, Puffy really did throw a wrench in their plans.
Captain Puffy wasn't stupid, she was far from it. So when she was trapped among red vines, it didn't take long for her to get her senses together. Awsamdude and her were tricked to say the least, and while being led by the Grim Reaper you didn't have much option to turn around.
The Grim Reaper was a newer addition to the what Captain Puffy would refer to as a cult. What everyone would refer to as a cult but the actual members. The second the warrior was added, things went downhill, and not for the Egg. With the new pair of hands, skilled ones with blood staining their past, it was difficult to fight off any advances of the group. There was always the tall woman looming behind them, a scythe in her palm and vines trailing at her feet.
The Egg valued Torva, and for the few days Captain Puffy was under its influence the Egg made one major thing clear.
You listen to Torva and Bad, because if you cross the siblings you cross the Egg.
Puffy would argue the pair of siblings ran the cult at this point; both of their appearances changing more drastically than the rest, and their personalities doing complete changes. They spoke for the Egg and the Egg had a grip on them Puffy couldn't see in any other members. When Puffy joined, Torva had apparently only been in the group for a week or two, that didn't stop her from taking control of the members and rising in the ranks faster than Puffy thought was plausible.
So when Captain Puffy and Awsamdude left the accursed cult, they were scared for more than one reason. First of all, they were scared somehow the Egg still had grips on their minds, even though they had doused themselves in Church Prime's Holy water, the seemingly only weakness of the Egg. Second of all, they were terrified to their wits end that this cult had gained complete control of the Grim Reaper.
Captain Puffy became paranoid, trying to form a group to combat the Egg, but failing member-wise. Nobody wanted to actively oppose the Egg, that practically put a target on your head and ended up with your name on the Grim Reaper's hit list. Nobody knows how long that list is and nobody wants to find out. The sheep hybrid opposed the cult anyway and would actively avoid death on a daily basis, red vines nipping at her heels as she walked.
What came with this paranoia was concern, she had grown to like Torva somewhat, after saving her life fighting Las Nevadas she had something to owe the woman. Torva saved her life from a bombing, Captain Puffy felt the need to save the Reaper's life from the cult.
She followed the taller lately, keeping tabs on what she was doing and where she was going. Months ago everyone had somehow lost track of the Reaper, after her apparent execution nobody had heard a single word of where she had went. Some assumed she had died and became scared of the DreamSMP, running off. But then she appeared on Doomsday seemingly unharmed, which ruined that theory as a whole.
She disappeared again, reappearing as a cult leader.
Captain Puffy wouldn't allow this disappearance again, especially while the other woman is under influence of the Egg.
The sheep hybrid slowly realized Torva was some type of guard, seemingly following Antfrost and Punz most of the time, Ponk on occasion. She would stand by the men while they did whatever tasks the Egg hung over their heads that day. Puffy can recall having to do small tasks for the object, planting seeds and observing the other people around them, trying to get new members even. Torva would simply make sure these tasks ran smoothly, no interference.
The woman was placed on a pedestal by the Egg, not one person dared challenge it.
Today, Captain Puffy had followed Torva to the crater of L'Manburg.
It was more coincidence than anything, the woman had taken Niki out on a date earlier, the two fiancées seeing Torva on their way back to their flower shop. While Niki was still iffy on Torva, Captain Puffy knew the woman supported Puffy in talking down the ever-growing Egg. So Captain Puffy allowed Niki to go to their flower shop alone, and the sheep hybrid was left to watch a dramatic scene unfold.
A ghost choking up spurts of blue blood, falling to the ground and turning to ash. The man holding the sword none other than the dead man's father, and while attention should be on the murdered ghost-
It's on the woman across the crater from the duo.
The King and the Angel seemed to be confused, so Puffy couldn't help but approach the two men, words on her lips she knew they'd need to hear.
She was interrupted by the ghost reappearing, though this didn't stop her. "King Eret." She spoke firmly, placing a hand on his shoulder.
The man jumped, heart racing and shock evident on his features. "Puffy?" The brunet asked with uncertainty, adjusting his glasses and his reaction gaining the attention of the recently respawned ghost, and finally the Angel.
The sheep hybrid sighed, looking around them and seeing red vines spanning the surrounding hills from weeks of uninterrupted growth. Nobody in these lands dared touch the plants.
So they continued festering, preying on the weak who needed a savior. They grew and took over any life plausible.
Captain Puffy didn't like that.
"I think you two have some questions I can answer."