Chapter Text
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At the last possible moment, he stopped outside the gate. Not one soul has walked through the massive carved door without their judgment passed.
He looked back at the immense landscape stretching before him, as far as the eye can see, charcoal sand beneath his feet and pale grey sky. He had been walking endlessly together with many strangers who seemed just as lost.
I am dead, am I?
He didn’t think his final journey would be like this. It was eerily quiet, not even the sound of footsteps were heard, perhaps save for the occasional wailing from a distance, or grunts from what seemed to come from the people around him. They were all walking to the same direction of an unknown destination. It was only then he realized his feet were moving on their own. His attempts at getting closer to those around him failed miserably. As he faced his body towards a different direction, the landscape shifted accordingly with him at its center, and everyone else was back where they were. Not farther, not closer.
Where am I going?
His body felt light, despite having walked continuously, his legs never gave way to fatigue.
He didn’t remember ever feeling this way. For all he knew, it had always been hard for him to move in the past ten years. It felt like he was under an intoxicating spell of drowsiness strangling him deeper into his death bed. He remembered hearing his own muffled breathing from time to time, occasional instrumental beeping mirroring his own steady but very-slow heartbeat, distant murmur of people around him saying he won’t make it, and his own body refusing to respond no matter how much he wanted to. He was just a void.
Yet, the more he tried to recall, the more he found himself lost. Everything existed as fragments, too vague for him to recognize as if they were all nothing but a metaphysical puzzle to him. The truth is his life was full of misery and he was only steps away from being free from it all.
Then, he remembered a certain voice calling him to wake up, begging him not to leave.
He thought something really bad must have happened that day, proof of the heartbreaking cry he heard back then. He had never heard someone calling his name in such a painful way.
Name? What is my name?
Then, it was finally his turn.
Intimidating pillars of golden black marble stood side by side, enough to make mere humans shrink at their sight.
To think that everyone was given the same chance to knock on heaven’s gate, everyone who has ever existed, lived, suffered and endured; at this moment all life is equal in the face of death.
The gatekeeper stood still, sapphire-golden blades emerging from the back of his body like wings of a celestial bird. Dozens of crystalline blades circled around him, calmly emanating powerful brooding air, ready to strike should any soul dare to run or revolt against their impending fate on their last stop before heaven.
Judgment was passed.
The gatekeeper freed him of his sins, and he was allowed to take that final step to eternal peace, yet he stood there reluctant.
“I want to go back.”
The gate opened before him, gusts of wind carrying pearly dusts in his way, but he stood there, eyes still fixated at his own feet.
“I want to go back, please.”
A look of pity crossed the gatekeeper’s face for a brief second, he did not want to sacrifice another good soul.
At least not today. At least not for this gentle being who stood before him only steps away from the peace he deserved.
He did not want to send this soul back to suffer in the land of the living, for he knew only a few made it back safely and sane. Only a few are allowed a second chance to knock on that gate again. Only a few made it through the second judgment.
“For what reason do you refuse your claim to be free from despair?” The gatekeeper waited for a valid answer.
He stood again in silence for a while, not sure of his own thoughts, not sure of a way to put them into words, not entirely sure of the reason behind his plea either.
“There’s something I gotta do, please let me go back. I can’t leave yet.”
The gatekeeper sighed ever slightly. The choice was his to make and it was granted before him, with only one condition.
“Noctis Lucis Caelum, know that in the path you choose to walk in, you will not be who you are, it will be a life void of life itself, your time will revolve around death, and death will give you life. Do you wish to stay?”
He hesitated for a moment, pondering the meaning behind those words, his voice trembling, but his determination stayed solid.
“But.. I’ll get to see him, right? I wasn’t there when he needed me the most. The least I could do is be there for him even for a while. I.. I just wanted him to know how I feel..” He was not sure of his own words, but he felt it in his heart. Something was holding him back, someone important, someone very dear to him, but he could not remember no matter how much he tried, like a dream soon forgotten the moment he woke up.
“Free yourself of these worldly attachments. Know that your life will no longer be yours. Your memory will serve you no more. You will only take what is demanded, and you will grant none. Do you still wish to stay, Noctis?”
“…. I.. I choose to stay.” Finally looking up to the gatekeeper from where he stood.
“Very well. Noctis Lucis Caelum, now servant of heaven and hell. You shall have your wish.”
The ground beneath him gave way, the blackness of it swallowing him like a quicksand. In an instant, he felt pain. A sensation all too familiar to him. His weak lungs desperately grasping for air as the sand clawed all around him like death all over again.
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The original artwork that inspired this fic, by Mage, Ignoct Priest/Demon AU Please visit her page =D and thank you, Mage.