runtime-log

[stars-in-my-damn-eyes]

i think about darius and his mentorship under the prev golden guard sometimes

- originally, they started out as a mentor/mentee duo, much like amity and lilith in covention. Darius would have been an emperor's coven protege which i think is neat!

- darius was selected as an emperor's coven protege due to his skill in magic, and he gladly seized the opportunity - it would be good for his future! this was, however, also a strain on his relationship with his schoolfriends - with his mentorship, he just. Didn't have the time to hang out with alador and odalia, so they just started drifting apart.

- gg was initially very aloof during darius' training, very Proper Mentor, and was pretty strict with darius at the start of his mentorship. Darius, at this point, was trying to be very by-the-book with his abomination magic to win the approval of his mentor.

- (of course, he experiments a lot on his own time. he just keeps to Proper spellwork whilst training)

- this did.... not work. gg (from darius' whole attitude in ASiaS) values autonomy, and found darius' whole "perfectly by-the-book" attitude frustrating. Eventually, gg decides to goad darius into being more creative with his spellwork, possibly via a spar, and darius ends up using his "turn into abomination goop" move to pull a surprise attack on gg and it goes... okay. He doesn't win the spar, but gg is truly and genuinely impressed with him.

- also, darius would have learnt other types of magic from the gg given that the emperor's coven allows all types of magic! multiclassing, baby. However, it also becomes fairly apparent that darius favours abomination magic to a ridiculously heavy extent - he starts questioning whether he should be gunning for a spot in the EC at all, or if the abomination coven would be better for him. gg assures him that the EC would be better for having him in it, regardless of his personal magic style preferences

- as darius gets older and becomes more of an Older Teen as opposed to a Literal Child, he and gg's dynamic morphs from Strictly Mentor/Mentee to something more akin to an older brother/younger brother kind of vibe - there's still that professional edge to their relationship, but it's waning.

- by the time darius is nearing graduation, the two of them are basically besties, and get up to all sorts of shenanigans together that their younger selves could barely have imagined. if you'd told 13-year-old darius that he would one day be sneaking around the Emperor's Castle to pull pranks on the coven scouts with his stiff, formal mentor, he'd have called you insane.

- gg dies approximately two weeks before the emperor's coven tryouts. darius is unclear on the circumstances - he gets a harried note or two from his mentor that he's found something big, that he needs to look into it so he'll be gone for a while but he wishes darius good luck with the tryouts and can't wait to work alongside him in the coven-

- darius, in perhaps not his most rational moment, does not attend the emperor's coven tryouts. it's a move he regrets quite a bit, after the fact - a foolish impulse decision borne of grief for his mentor - but part of him is glad that he doesn't have the constant reminder of his dead mentor hanging over his head and burned onto his wrist.

- it's a moot point, anyways, a good few years down the line. he makes coven head young, and that's a step up from coven scout in most people's book, anyways. he meets eberwolf, and they become fast friends.

- in the end, he's grown past it - he's grieved and he's moved on.

- that doesn't mean he doesn't feel a pang of sorrow when he sees this kid - the emperor's nephew, he says - in a shiny golden mask, kneeling as he oh-so-proudly inherits that staff from the emperor.

- but that's neither here nor there.