#eldulis

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Have you ever died in a nightmare?

Finally, someone's out there inventing the torment nexus.

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i still love the nightmare court light armor and if anyone says anything mean about his dipshit little hat i'll blow up everyone in this cavern i mean it

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i just think they're sooooooooooooo fun.

OR WHY DON'T YOU JUST GET YOU A MAN WHO CAN DO BOTH

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And also, Eldulis and Inoxiam doodle from today. Meows pathetically. I'm going to go home and by the Raven Mantle for Inoxiam, ive waited forever :')

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monday nite wip posting.... it could be real if you just believe...

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they are here on a strawberry picking date. in my imagination.

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Today I wrote more fic instead of doing my job! Yippee! pre-everything Eldulis fic. go read about my NMC guy and his suffering and his first love. :)

(Drochshúil on ao3)

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Eldulis: so basically it's a number puzzle, it looks a bit like a crossword but the purpose is to get the digits 1 through 9 into each row column and square exactly once without repeats. There are variations as well that I can show you. This one took me eight and a half minutes. See I'll show you, on this one you want to start with--

Inoxiam, trembling with fear and lust, thinking: (oh god I can't not fuck him.)

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Shitposting about Eldulis and Inoxiam (and Lacrimosen also) but also this may well be where they are during soto. Chillin.

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I'm just like, sylvariposting today. <- I do this every day so whatever.

Anyway running with the "Lala overthrew the Pale Reavers and took off with a bunch of their young recruits to make his own army" idea... I love Lala, he's not "evil" but he is a manipulative person who'll twist others and charm them any way he can to get what he wants. He claims to be a firstborn, a secondborn, whatever he can get away with to posit himself as Higher and Better Than You, somehow. He couldn't do this working with Laranthir in the Pale Reavers because Laranthir knew that was all deceit. So he started scheming behind the true secondborn's back, charming young recruits who had joined the Reavers with hopes of doing good. Well we could do even more good together, you and I. 💚 Just us together. 💚 And eventually he had so many Reavers on his side, he was able to say hey, what do we need the Reavers for, let's go build our own organization over there! ^_^ who's with me! And led some huge chunk of the snipers away like the pied piper.

He has a tendency to flirt to get what he wants. And he's genuinely charming about it, and other sylvari (saplings especially) fall for it and believe that he’s genuinely interested in them specifically, that he only has eyes for them, that he means it when he refers to them as dearheart. Naturally he has zero interest in them. Any of them. But it's so quick and easy to get them in line and doing as he bids when they all believe that he's in love with them too.

(Lychen is immune to his charms. Zero interest. He'll smack Lala to get him to stop when he's coming on too strong to a recruit. "You have to stop flirting with all the new recruits, sir. They're starting to get jealous." "What's to be jealous about!" "Two of the new snipers got in an argument over which was your dearheart, and three others overheard and joined in." "Well they're all my precious dearhearts." "Stop that.")

I'm figuring out right now what Lala and Eldulis' history together is. Eldulis is a genuine secondborn. At some point I feel he was a valiant. Lacrimosen a couple of generations later was maybe a fellow valiant. Maybe Eludlis was his mentor... I think during this time he would have been questioning the validity of the Dream, the Grove, the Pale Tree... all of it starting to look so fake and forced. He was disillusioned with his own Wyld Hunt and wasn't getting any answers from the Firstborn or their mother. He'd confided in Trahearne first that he felt his Hunt wasn't attainable, and had gotten some kind of comforting non-guidance, which had pushed him towards talking to Faolain instead. Why are we doing all of this, sister? To what end does it serve? And she did have guidance, in the other direction. I think Eldulis would have tried to sway Lacrimosen before going fully to the Nightmare Court. Come with me. You have potential in you. Lacrimosen laughed in his face and told him he had no interest in organized cults. So now to this day there's this rift between them where they both think of the other as that fool who made the wrong choice and ended up in some stupid organization that I have no interest in. Were they to actually be forced to sit down and communicate I'm sure they'd be able to be somewhat honest about missing what they once had, when they were friends, but it's something they can never return to--there will only ever be animosity from Eldulis and aggressive flirtation from Lala.

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I was also thinking about Inoxiam and Eldulis ouuugh... I've talked about it before but I have to again I think. Inoxiam is of course not a real Courtier, he's a Whispers agent trained specifically to tear down these courts from within and salt the earth so that they can't rebuild. He specializes in turning courtiers against one another and sabotaging court plans, pulling out the most important load-bearing pillars of whatever orchard or grove or copse he's stationed at and letting things burn.

He fucked up his first mission of this type. He couldn't take the cruelty he was witnessing and went off the rails, started attacking courtiers outright and blew his own cover. His Whisperskeeper had to pull him out from the burning remains, and he went back into training for 6 months before he was given another chance. It's painful, seeing the absolute torment and depravity, the things that the Nightmare Court will do to other people. He has to standby as other sylvari are tortured and killed, knowing that he can't do anything now but that if he bides his time, he may get a few out later.

He has so many secrets. And then they sent him into Lionsbane where Eldulis resides as the Duke of Torment. And he has this unique and terrifying ability to flay minds, to peel away deceit and peer into the hidden truths that people lock away. Impossible to keep a secret around, because at the first hint of suspicion he'll use his truthseeking ability to force a person to speak what is real. And Inoxiam isn't meant to catch his attention; he's still physically recovering from being tortured at Twilight Arbor, and they want him keeping a lower profile here, small acts towards a broader purpose...

But then Eldulis takes a direct interest in him. Of course he does. He can tell immediately that Inoxiam is keeping something safe, and he wants to know what, but enjoys the challenge and chase of trying to pry it out with conventional means. In other words, Eldulis courts him, trying to corner him near the edge so that he'll give himself up of his own volition. Inoxiam is strong-willed, but he can only do so much, only go for so long, and again, still recovering from Twilight Arbor. Still hurting. Still having nightmares and panic attacks. And he's so easily cornered in this state. So tired and scared of what will happen to him this time if he's found out again.

Then I think Eldulis would finally use his power to peer into Inoxiam's mind and see how terrified and hurt he is. He'd pause and consider going further, peeling to the center of his lies. But the chase is more fun. He's supposed to head to Twilight Arbor, soon. Faolain is dead and they need someone to replace her, and he wants that. He wants Inoxiam to be by his side for the Dark Vigils. So he backs out without looking at the truth, and tells Inoxiam that he'll be coming with to the Arbor.

And then I think Lacrimosen shows up and ruins everyone's plans yippee!

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4 and 16 for Eldulis and 20 for Auruim

ask game! we're getting there gamers...

4. How do they feel about their past/younger self?

Sad, mostly. Eldulis regrets what he went through as a sapling. But he knows there's no returning to any person that he was before. There will always be decades between himself and who he was as a newly awakened secondborn, and no way to shorten the distance. There's only moving forward, away from that person. I guess you could say he's accepted it, then.

16. How honest are they? To others and to themself?

I think he actually is relatively open and honest about most things. Except feelings. Feelings should always be squashed down and lied about if at all possible. :)

20. Any song(s) that you feel represent your character best? (bonus: would *they* like this/these song(s)?)

AURU SONGS TIME opens his playlist and cracks my knuckles

Poor Isaac -- I think he'd like it. It's sorrowful and angry and hurt, and it's got a lot of good noise to it.

Salt-- He'd find it too mellow... if he'd listen to the lyrics I think he'd probably find a sort of comfort(?) in them.

Curicó-- this is his #1 theme song... embarrassingly um. every time I listen to it I daydream about Auru singing it. runs outside into rain and heavy traffic. I think he'd like this one a lot.

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i deleted this right after posting it last time because it was stupid but sometimes..... things that are stupid... are funny.

(inoxiam and eldulis at the Roseate Canaries' hq for the first time, in da waiting room)

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I love Eldulis. World's most repressed Nightmare Courtier. Fucked up for new reasons. If he were to experience a feeling he would simply say no thank you and sidestep swiftly to disengage.

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I'm debating... changing some colors on Eldulis. :hear: