The Skulltula whom Tayro courageously decided to trample over let out a ferocious hiss and snapped at the youth as he leapt away, catching the boy’s new attire in its horrid fangs and tearing the hem. It was an unnoticeable rip, but one thing was certain. Tayro had narrowly avoided having his foot transfused with a very lethal sort of poison.

Not that it made any difference, for it appeared that the young mage had twisted his ankle upon landing, anyway. In his current state of fatigue and injury, the only factor keeping him from being pursued by the enraged spiders was the daze he had placed them under only moments before. Fortunately for him, the Oblivion Skulltulas were still bumping about in the darkness, and only moments after he had made his daring escape did the creatures regain their sight. They looked about, scurrying about the bridge in search of their runaway prey. Finding that the fresh meat had vanished, they did what any hungry, feral creature would do.

From wherever Tayro had ended up, he could likely hear the shrill screeches and hisses as one Skulltula fed on the other.

The junior mage found himself standing at the edge of a steep cliff. If he were to peer below him, he would find a long gorge reaching far into the darkness. The ground of this canyon, oddly enough, was not simply a layer of dirt and rock, but rather a long trek of stone. Upon careful inspection, one might see the hundreds of small fish bones littered about the gorge, or at least the ones that had not disintegrated with age. Tayro was standing above a connecting waterway of a once great city. The descent into the gorge would be a dangerous one, but at this point, he had few options. Behind him, the hisses and snarling of the vile inhabitant creatures of this realm had multiplied. More monsters, perhaps even more diverse than simple Skulltulas, had made their way to the bridge. If his eyes were adjusted enough to the dark, he could see the castle towering far above him, behind him and to his left. From where he stood, the only means of reaching the castle would be to backtrack into certain peril. There appeared to be silence in the direction he was facing.

At the base of the cliffs he had arrived at there was a small chest half buried in debris. If ever there was a reason to press on, it was the curiosity of what was inside that seemed to drive most adventurers. With no threats to his mortality at the moment, Tayro seemed to have earned himself a chance to rest and gather his thoughts. For now, anyway. With all the hissing going on behind him, who could tell when the scent of a fresh meal would be picked up on?

OoC: Was busy all day, and I need to leave, so this post is probably gonna be small. But after all that I've pestered you yesterday, didn't want to leave this thread unreplied to.

IC:

He just ran. A stinging pain jolting through him at every step, his eyes closed reflexively as a consequence of the pain, the boy just kept moving onwards, knowing too well that should he stop, he'd be easy prey. Only when he found himself far from his previous locations, distant from all the hissing and nearly demonic grumblings did the Hylian came to a halt. And as he opened his eyes, he found himself in a completely different location. As the kid's eyes scanned the area, he found himself besides a cliff that lead to a gorge lost in the darkness. In it, he found scattered bony remains of fish long gone and rocky formations covering the passageway. What once must have been a great waterway was now a dreary passageway for beings that should have equally passed on and now eternally linger in search for death. He stopped for a moment. Why on earth was he musing on a time like this?! Discarding his unpractical thinking, he focused on more important matters at hand - namely, the fact that even if they were not all around him, he could still hear the disgusting cries of the undead coming from behind him. Needless it was to say that he shouldn't linger around here for much longer if he intended to keep on going, and, seeing his escape route was now sealed off, it seemed like the only way now available was forward, into the darkness of the gorge and exploring the area, possibly finding a way out of this ghastly place.

But first, there were other things to consider. Mainly, even if he wanted to go on, he just couldn't keep on walking like this as pain jolted the mage into submission every time he stepped on the floor. So, having bought himself some escape time, he sat down by the cliff's edge for a few moments. Yes, he was aware sitting down right here right now would be probably a big mistake, but he made the best out of it: if any fiend approached him from behind, he'd notice the sound and then all he'd need to do is to give impulse with his hands and he'd end up down at the gorge in a straight position, ready to flee as fast as he could. And this way, he managed to actually try and make some amends to the situation. The boy glanced at the dark robes given to him by the Organization, remembering all that happened until now. Geez, driving young kids down to such dangerous places... what on earth are they thinking?! - he half-jested, as he discarded the possibility of ripping the black-hued garment. He wasn't sure what it was made of, so it was best not to try and rip it up - who knows what the result could be. As such, the Hylian just quickly raised the clothing that surrounded him a bit and, using pressure from both his hands, ripped part of his leg pant. With the Apostles' robes he wouldn't be cold anyways, so it didn't matter - he could stitch it up later. Then, removing the itch-inducing boots and the cotton sock, Tayro proceeded in using the piece of cloth as a makeshift bandage, wrapping it around his right foot. He finally decided to place the sock on one of the pockets of the robe, as cotton socks weren't exactly cheap, and to just leave the boot there. Besides, if he met up with those Apostles again (and get a damn apology from them) they'd probably have some more boots to spare.

That done, and seeing no beast had yet come out of hiding to torment him, the teenager used his weaponry of choice to help him get up into a more straight position, and then proceeded in using the Staff made out of Deku Wood as a walking cane. Incredible how it can be handy in so many ways - he remarked mentally as he gazed down at the gorge. Well, best get going.. Relinquishing the use of his trusty wooden companion as a cane, if only for some brief moments, Tayro let himself drop to the gorge, using the last ounce of magic in his veins to create a small pillow of air under him, allowing the most recent Apostle (to date) to land safely and without pain. Regaining his footing, the weapon resumed its prior job of helping the boy walk. And as he prodded the stones with it as he slowly paced forward, through the gorge...

...until he decided to look back to see if he was being followed, his eyes meeting with a half-buried chest at the base of the cliff. The petite box peaked at his interest, the boy wondered what marvels there lay within. He didn't care about material goods, but maybe it could be some uncharted knowledge or some artifact that allowed him to teleport him out of there pronto. Curiosity winning over, the decision was made. He'd halt his march once more, and check out what secrets lay under its lid. Though in such a cursed place, the boy knew better than just waltz there and open it - the likelihood of the artifact being booby-trapped or cursed was high. He wouldn't be stopped by such a predicament, though. Bending over with the help of his newly dubbed 'Walking Cane', he grabbed one of the rocks that lay on the dried waterway and, aiming at the chest, threw the rock precisely at it to see what effects it would produce. He had to get this over with quickly.

OoC: I love how I contradict myself between OoC and IC. *SHOT*

'As a Sheikah, you need not worry yourself.'

Alpha cringes at those words - a Sheikah, not needing to worry about some dark power? That is the line of thought that has led a countless number of people into the embrace of evil, entering a downward spiral that ultimately leads to naught but death and destruction - and the Shadow Folk are far from exempt from that rule. It is for us Sheikah to be creatures of shadow, a historical book he had once stumbled across recited, and so the weeping eye shall serve as our symbol. For it is fate that we of the Shadow Folk see the darkness of the heart, a realm of evil that wouldst make any man tremble and mourn.

If anything, the Sheikah, being so close to darkness, ought fear evil's touch even more than the other races do.

But that is not the only reason Alpha hesitates before following Myst's commands. There is one other factor that must be taken into consideration where the mage is concerned . . . one item that he doubts any of the other Apostles have had to consider. His throat feels dry as he subconsciously reaches upwards, letting his fingers stroke over the cursed scar marring his face. He is no fool; he has heard Myst's gift described as a curse rather than a blessing; how will it react to someone who already has been cursed . . . cursed by the greatest of all demons?

He doesn't know how this curse, Myst's Gift as it is commonly called, works . . . and, to be honest, he is frightened enough of it that he really isn't sure he wants to find out.

'How much worse could it be?'

'Do you honestly want to find out?'

'Perhaps it could work in a way that counters the beast's curse!'

'. . . do you honestly believe that possible?!'

'. . . no . . . but still! What kind of power could it grant us?!'

The voices fight back and forth in his head, curiosity warring against the caution he has learned in the days, weeks, months, and finally years since he has been marked by the blade of that demon. With this scar he has been granted power that could match years of training, and who knows what else it may hold in store, waiting? But there is also the pain that lights up within him whenever a being of utter evil approaches, as well as the fact that access to the Void is more likely to kill him one day than continue to aid his causes.

And furthermore, there is a dark sense that constantly haunts his thoughts, as if the scar is a conduit for an evil presence that is swarming around him, drawn to him by the will of the one he had once called 'Master'. Perhaps if he understood more of how the curse operated, of what dark magic had been weaved into his flesh during that dreadful confrontation, then he could comprehend the manner in which this vileness manifests itself and work to dispel it. But he can only grasp at straws when attempting to understand its hideous might; he knows that it reacts to evil, that it causes him pain when it is near, and that it can open a passageway to a realm which allows near-instant teleportation - at the price of ripping the fabric of his soul apart. The effects can be countered with magic such as the Life spell, but . . . what if there is something more going on, something that he hasn't yet realized?!

He very nearly turns away . . . he almost refuses the 'gift' that the Apostles seem to think so magnificent. And still he fears it - were Myst able to see his moist crimson gaze, doubtless he could catch sight of the haunting visions of fright playing in his eyes over and over again. But his curiosity manages to come up with one last ditch argument, one that makes caution stop cold and reconsider its stance in this inner struggle.

'And what do you do if - no, when Meridel returns?!'

He purses his lips, so that Myst will not realize that he has suddenly found himself momentarily unable to breathe. Meridel . . . the Cursed One who had approached him before. The one who knew about his identity as Wraith . . . and, unlike Maverick, who also likely understood all that the identity entailed. Few were they who realized the depth of darkness into which he had been plunged seven years ago; if any of them had been members of Carock's Apostles then doubtless he would have been slain mercilessly upon entering this dank world beneath the desert, rather than invited in to join their ranks as a friend and ally.

Meridel . . . no, probably all of the Cursed Ones understand his past to a degree that he cannot allow. If one of them was to even hint at his past . . . it could be quite catastrophic to his future. That means that they must be destroyed - by his own hand.

But he has already attempted to fight her once, a plan that had ended in miserable failure. He had escaped unharmed, and without much difficulty, but the fact remains that he requires much more power so that he may exterminate her kind completely, before his secret comes to light.

So, though it is not without hesitation, his quivering hand slowly stretches away from his scar to where the sphere rests. With a fearful gulp, he makes one last lunge forward with his hand, until he can feel his fingertips pressing up against its surface.

All the while he prays he is not making the wrong choice.

A small rockslide tumbled after Tayro as he reached the foot of his descent, and he was certainly lucky that he himself had not taken a slide of a similar sort. The crackling of rock against stone against more rock did seem to attract some unfriendlies, as Tayro could see if he were to look to where he had been standing moments before. A mystifying set of round white eyes hazed red by hundreds of tiny blood vessels that had been irritated over time was gazing down at the boy, and a row of rotted teeth showed as the creature hissed at the boy from above. It turned and disappeared into the territory beyond the cliffs, leaving Tayro to his thoughts, and more importantly, to the oddly-placed box at his feet.

The rock struck the chest and fell to the ground, the metallic echo of the impact resonating through the open space of the cavern. The stone throw had its desired effect, and the lid of the old box was forced up. In a fashion quite expected of a magical item, the contents sprang from their container and dropped to the ground. A green bottle, which if Tayro was as good a mage as he should have been would easily be recognized, now lay still and inviting on the cold stone floor of the canyon.

<center>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ </center>

Myst looked on as Alpha reached out towards the sphere, his heartbeat thumping more rapid by the second as the younger of the two made the decision to accept the “gift” of the Apostles. Of course, for that old Sheikah a rapidly accelerating heart rate would not exceed the rate of, say, a sleeping bard on a midsummer’s eve. Each beat struck at his chest like a thin but nevertheless sharp pricking of a dagger, but not one of those splintery Deku sorts. The elder’s body was indeed a frail and fragile vessel that had seen countless days of hurt and frustration. In his mind, the sooner Alpha had received his power and left his presence the better.

As the Sheikah’s fingers slid over the ethereal stone-colored orb, Myst’s expectations of what would surpass came true, and the entire room became swallowed in a terrible black nothingness. When last the Apostle had ordained this ceremony, his charge’s experience was one of great horror. Victor had spun about in this darkness, visions of death and slaughter appearing as real as they had certainly been in the past. The mysterious apparitions and blood-curdling screams of far-off murder had stirred the young son of William from his normally reserved and casual demeanor, and the passing of this power had nearly compromised his allegiance to the Apostles of Carock.

No such thing occurred as Alpha slipped into the encompassing darkness that Victor had seen momentarily before the visions had struck him like a bolt from the deities far above. He stood suspended in this silent, gloomy blackness for a moment, with no signs of an escape or even a breath of fresh air in the stale, black atmosphere. Without warning and without an identifiable source a deep, echoing voice filled Alpha’s head and the dreary space he had been confined to.

“What is hidden in the darkness... Tricks full of ill will…”

The voice paused. A strange energy overcame the Sheikah, but it was a calming one. It seemed that this was what Myst had meant when he claimed that as a Sheikah, Alpha need not worry himself when touching the orb of power. Perhaps all Sheikah were resistant to the visions that Victor and Apostles of a less shadowy race would have seen when being granted their power. The Shadow Folk had, after all, seen far greater cataclysm in the long, bloody history of Hyrule.

“You can’t see the way forward.”

This is the time at which something peculiar occurred that surprised even the leader of the Apostles. The ancient dormitory reappeared; the darkness had lifted. Before the phenomenon could be questioned, something disastrous happened before the Sheikah’s eyes.

Myst had no idea what was going on. He could not have known; could not have foreseen what the Gift would do the Sheikah; could not be held responsible for the resulting disaster, sparked the moment that Alpha pressed his palm against the smoothed surface of the orb.

But for the caped mage, once contact was made there was no doubt in his mind: he had made the wrong choice.

He was enshrouded in darkness completely from the moment he connected with the sphere, the shadows wrapping their Folk in a prison of lightlessness. But there was something more to this than the scene allowed, for his body was suddenly petrified - his muscles froze solid, forging a cage that afforded him no movement whatsoever, whether inside his body or out.

It's important to make that clarification, because otherwise there would be no explanation for why his vocal cords would not allow him to scream.

His scar was glowing - he could feel it in its most intense form. And with said form came pain bursting forth in a geyser - no, a tsunami - that ripped at his very flesh as it struggled to fulfill its purpose. And yet he could barely see the telltale glow; had he been capable of rational thought in the wake of such intense agony, this might have caused some confusion . . . perhaps, with enough time, he could have realized that something was suppressing the scar's black powers, though not in the healing manner which he longed for.

The blue light fought for a way to escape the confines of its origin, claws of brightness reaching out and ripping at the flesh of the sanctimonious blackness in a war that caught Alpha in its very center. The light was a mountain of agony being crammed into his six foot frame, burning at every nerve in his body; the darkness formed an ocean of torment rising up in a tsunami that twisted every droplet of its composition into a bombardment on his body.

And he couldn't even move his hand away from what was causing it all.

Whatever it was that occurred while the room was dark, Alpha couldn't tell. He would later recall a few words that had worked their way into his memory amidst the torrential struggle battling within him. All he knew was that his mind was being torn apart alongside his body as whatever power was at work here fought to keep him in place - battling so that Alpha might be cursed a second time; so that he might be destroyed in a manner which Alpha would have wished upon only Him.

It was when he was at his breaking point, at the point when his soul was preparing to flee his body and simply embrace death rather than endure another moment of torture, that the darkness caved, and the light of his scar succeeded in bringing the room back into focus. He had one fleeting vision . . . that of the Master standing with His back facing the Sheikah, head half turned so that Alpha could see a jaded eye glaring at him in disapproval . . .

And as the image vanished, his voice returned . . . shrieking.

His curse may have taken physical form in that instant; Alpha could not have seen it, but as his body convulsed in throes of pain and his voice emerged in a series of inhuman howls, Myst might have been able to see a new darkness gathering around the Sheikah. One by one, a quintet of fingers emerged from the black mist, scaled and clawed like the hand of a dragon. Or so it appeared; the image was faint and flickering, a mirage in this nightmarish desert.

But false vision or not, Alpha was suddenly crushed by the grip of something, and it was all of a second later that he was launched away from the sphere with enough force that his frame impacted with Myst's door and tore it from its hinges, before continuing on its trajectory and crushing the stone wall that stood beyond it. Had Myst gone to investigate (a likely course of action), he'd have found the Sheikah's mangled body writhing about in unnatural manners, muscles free to move as they wished now that most of the bones in his spine and limbs had been shattered. The only place that remained motionless was his right arm, the arm that had touched the sphere - now it lay blackened and crusted, burned into char by whatever forces had been at work within Myst's chamber.

And with malevolence evident even in its appearance, every few seconds there passed pitch black sparks between his scar and the other places of his body, akin to lightning in all but color. Any who saw the scene would be . . . well, "horrified" is simply too pleasant a term to be applied here.