Actually Writing Out This AU In Full Because Im Deciding To Be Cringe And Free

Actually writing out this AU in full because I’m deciding to be cringe and free

Also I think it would make a good writing exercise

This is a Skulduggery Pleasant AU that basically serves as a replacement for Seasons of War (although I made it up before Seasons of War). If I was an interesting person with time on my hands, I might try to actually write it out in book form, but oh well.

Skulduggery, Valkyrie, Tanith, Saracen, Dexter, and Luke (no Serpine this time) are sent to Dimension X to kill Mevolent, as goes in SoW. However, Lord Vile isn’t doing his draugr thing and Mevolent probably doesn’t have any plans for all-out war.

They end up getting involved with the Resistance, which leads to them going around and getting into fights with Mevolent’s people (in which Luke dies, because the man can’t fight for shit). Eventually, the main gang gets separated in a pretty nasty fight (Dexter, Saracen, and Tanith go one way while Skulduggery and Valkyrie end up a ways away). Skulduggery ends up being possibly killed in an explosion (Val can’t see, but explosion happened right where he was supposed to be standing) and Valkyrie, disoriented, attempts to flee.

However, Mevolent chases her down and takes her prisoner. He decides she has the potential of a good general and starts assigning her to work alongside Vile and Vengeous. Valkyrie, naturally, tries numerous times to escape and/or follow through with the mission and kill Mevolent, but he always catches her and tortures her whenever she tries something, so her will to leave dies pretty quickly. (Also, Serafina from the main dimension shows up with a shunter at some point, so now Mevolent has his wife back. She mostly ignores Valkyrie and is pretty condescending when they do talk, much like their canon interactions).

He also assigns Lord Vile to keep watch over her and make sure she never escapes, so he ends up following her around a lot. She doesn’t like him and is very verbal about this, but there really isn’t much she can do to get rid of him. Meanwhile, her knowing Vile’s secret identity (presuming that nobody else in Dimension X knows) and just knowing a whole lot about him in general leads to him becoming just slightly obsessed with her, making him even more controlling and hard to get rid of.

At this point, being tortured (formerly regularly, now on occasion) and being an active part of an oppressive regime by the man she’s supposed to kill has badly worn down on Valkyrie and she becomes borderline suicidal, but never kills herself because she keeps insisting that Skulduggery survived the explosion and will eventually come rescue her, even as Vile actively taunts her by saying that he’s dead and she’ll be here forever.

Valkyrie eventually latches on to Lord Vile as a sort of temporary replacement for Skulduggery, because it has been over a year now and she is struggling to keep going. It also makes his obsessiveness slightly less unbearable.

Now, during all this, Dexter, Saracen, and Tanith have been going around, uninvolved with the Resistance, and quick-striking and killing as many of Mevolent’s Redhoods and Sense-Wardens as possible. Is it making a dent? Not really, but they’re hiding their time until they get an opportunity to get into the palace. They know that Valkyrie has been captured and has become a general, and they also believe that Skulduggery is dead, so they really don’t have anything better to be doing.

They eventually hear about a new Resistance leader described as being similar in appearance to Lord Vile and very good at organizing the Resistance fighters, and immediately the three of them get suspicious and go over to meet the guy. It turns out to be Skulduggery (who insists an explosion could never kill him) wearing bits and pieces of his shadow armour, but not all of it. Dexter, Saracen, and Tanith are, of course, livid, because he pretty much stranded them and left Valkyrie with Mevolent for a year. They’re also angry about the whole “being Lord Vile” thing, and Tanith gets to slap him before they tentatively agree to team up with the Resistance and start doing assignments with them.

Around this time, Skulduggery starts sending Valkyrie anonymous letters through a spy network in the castle basically talking (in VERY loose language) about what’s been going on in the Resistance lately. She puts two and two together and realizes that it’s Skulduggery, which makes her suddenly much more hopeful about the future and able to keep going a little longer.

Eventually, she quietly goes out and meets up with Skulduggery in a forest somewhere to verify that it’s actually him and he says that she has the potential to be useful within the castle, but isn’t able to get into much detail before she has to leave. She’s too happy to see him to be angry at how long he left her in that castle without contacting her or trying to save her.

As it turns out, Lord Vile has seen some of the letters they were exchanging and also figured out that Valkyrie was probably talking to Skulduggery, and he goes to confront Valkyrie about it. It leads to a fight, they throw each other into the walls a few times, but Vile eventually agrees to not tell Mevolent on account of the fact that if he found out, he’d probably kill Valkyrie and then Vile would have nobody to talk to. His only condition is that Valkyrie stop exchanging letters with Skulduggery, to which Valkyrie resentfully agrees.

A week or two passes and Dexter, Saracen, and Tanith are captured by Mevolent, which leads to Valkyrie trying to find ways to sneak them out of the castle (while Vile tries to stop her). Skulduggery, now with a fully-organized Resistance, attacks the castle in hopes of getting all his friends back and killing Mevolent in a single blow, which leads to the castle becoming a chaotic war zone that ends with Valkyrie using the Sceptre to kill Mevolent (causing the explosion that allows her to absorb the katehedral crystal), Meritorious to be freed from prison by a Resistance fighter, and the Resistance getting Serafina, Vile, Vengeous, and the rest of the castle to stand down.

With their mission accomplished, the gang teams up with Professor Nye to find a shunter who can take them home, leaving . Does Lord Vile try to stop Valkyrie from leaving? Probably, but at this point there really isn’t much he can do about it now that she’s been reunited with Skulduggery.

By the time they make it back home, it’s now been close to two years and everyone has assumed they are dead. Militsa was grieving for Valkyrie and was frustrated that Val was gone for so long when she got back, but could also clearly tell that Valkyrie did not have a happy time in Dimension X. People try to get the five of them to talk about what happened and what caused them to take so long, but all of them mutually agree that nobody wants to or should discuss what happened. Instead, they make an effort to move on with their lives, rest of the series happens as normal.

Tell me a story from your childhood

(This is from the ask game for anyone who’s curious)

When I was on sixth grade, everyone had to compete in a thing called Battle of the Books (or BotB, as we called it) which was basically that we had to read a bunch of books in assigned teams and then take trivia quizzes on facts from the books to earn points for your team, which would be added up at the end (I believe that there was one quiz per week for 5-6 weeks).

There were three classes involved in BotB that year. My class, which was a grade 5-6 split, and two other 6-7 splits. Each class was divided into three teams and we were allowed to pick a name, and I’m pretty sure my team unanimously agreed to call ourselves the Losers, or something to that effect. Anyways, I loved reading but hated being restricted on what I was allowed to read or being tested on what I was reading, so I naturally hated BotB from start to finish (although I was good at it).

Lots of things happened that I will not get into the details of because they are irrelevant to this story, but my team (the Losers, remember) ended up getting first, an achievement we were all insanely proud of. One point behind us was a second team from my class, and a few points behind that, in third place? The THIRD team from my class.

All three teams of fifth and sixth graders beat all six teams of sixth and seventh graders at memorizing book trivia. While I greatly disapprove of BotB as a concept and think it’s a horrible way to motivate kids to read, that is a very proud memory for me.

Casually glitchin outside the map

I love sad nonbinary people

Shard Memory: Shattering (and lots of unhinged rambling about lore implications)

Long read ahead - some Sky: The Two Embers spoilers in the block of text toward the end.

I really wanted to get more shots but I literally clipped into Tsadi's cape and couldn't escape ;-;

Anyway, here we go:

From left to right: Sa (I assume, although this is the only figure I didn't directly get to see while there), Mekh, Lamed, Teth, Tsadi (not pictured - he's hidden behind the stone), Daleth, Ayin, and floating in the center above everyone else and directly above the shattering stone, the upside-down mask and fading silhouette of King Resh.

I got this closer shot of the mask. I should have gotten a screenshot while I was actually on it because the details don't translate from far away. The best description I can give is this: it seemed like mostly just the mask, no real substance to the head or body; the mask was two stars stacked on top of one another, the bigger being a four-pointed star with the longest point being the top (but in this case, with it being upside-down, the bottom), and the smaller star having many more points and resting directly on top of the bigger star. And in the eye of both stars is a single spot (a diamond, if I remember correctly), that looks like a small darkstone.

I find it really interesting that all of the elders were present for the Shattering. I can only assume they were there to stop it - but I wonder how much they were aware of. Darkness was already spreading through the realms for some time. The King had been corrupted. Was the Storm on the horizon? Was the stone already glowing red and showing its cracks? Could they tell what a monstrous catastrophe they were on the brink of experiencing? Or were they there simply to intervene and stop the King?

And then these guys. I know we still don't fully know what Winged Lights even are. But with the new extended preview of Sky: The Two Embers out, there's one scene in particular that this makes me think of. (I'll save hard spoilers for the end and will give warning beforehand.)

So, my take?

I think we're seeing the moment Resh sacrificed himself to save everyone. We're also seeing that it was too late.

We also know from devs that Elder cutscenes exist in a place outside space and time, but that they still have an effect on the world. I think we're seeing why. The moment this stone shattered, all those present were killed, but were also locked in their own limbo, living out their most notable moments over and over again across probably infinite dimensions (like watching the same scene over and over in the reflections bouncing off shards of broken glass). They're stuck. Not here in Sky, not in Orbit, not with The Light - but somewhere In Between. Purgatory.

But... why? How?

Well, the path to Orbit was still blocked - both by the shattered crystal itself, and by the now-demolished castle infrastructure that was previously seated on and above the mountain peak. Even aside from that, most, if not all of the Elders had already been corrupted; aka, depleted of their natural light/filled with darkness - who knows if they even had enough internal light left to participate in the natural light/life cycle, even if they had survived.

What about the King?

We also now have confirmation in the art book that, "The Ruler would sacrifice themselves to share light back into the skies, and the light souls would then return as Descendants."

With that information, I have a few theories. He was certainly corrupted, and very likely the most corrupted of all the Elders. So, my first question is, what was his act of sacrifice?

We clearly see him upside-down, seemingly disintegrating or dissolving, with nothing but his (presumably darkstone-imbued) mask remaining.

Was his sacrifice the thing that destroyed the crystal? Had it absorbed too much light, started glowing red and attracting Darkness and Storm to it, and so the crystal is what needed to be stopped?

Or was the shattering itself the cause of the Storm?

Three things we know for certain:

There was already war, darkness, corruption, and pollution before the stone shattered.

The shattering itself caused immense structural damage.

The stone was harnessing light/souls directly from the sacred migration to The Light.

So my theories are:

A) The stone itself had been corrupted and had become volatile, so the King sacrificed himself to shatter the stone and make way for light to enter back into the light/life cycle.

B) The sheer density of light/souls was too much for the stone, causing deterioration over time that eventually allowed darkness to manifest, and that structural deterioration led to the Shattering. The King sacrificed himself to try to contain it/minimize the damage.

In either case, the Elders and King would probably be able to see visual cues that warn them things are about to get bad. In situation A, it would be a change of color from blue to vibrant, violent red. In situation B, it would be the progressive chips and cracks in the stone that would probably let them know when it's close to exploding. In either case, the Elders and King are likely gathering to decide how to handle it, when the King decides that it's ultimately his mess, so he ought to be the one to deal with it. He uses the last of his power to try to destroy or contain it (in whatever way he can), and then it shatters.

And then what happened?

Well, we know that unnatural deaths leave remains, as seen in Forest, Wasteland, and Vault. There are no remains.

Natural deaths mean your light gets recycled back into the soul cycle and you cease to exist as you once did, but that's not quite right either. This certainly wasn't a natural death. We also still see the Elders - not as memory projections like the mantas in Vault and not like the Spirits of our Ancestors - but as actual, tangible Memories, just like the Shattering Memories. When we meditate at their shrines, they still visit us and give us their warnings - the same warnings - time after time.

Like I said earlier, they're stuck somewhere Between, living out those key moments over and over for the rest of eternity.

They even both take place in seemingly the same type of greyed out void space. I hesitate to call it "a void" because Void could very well be its own entity. But also, there's a real possibility this is that entity. (Something like "The Empty" from Supernatural.)

And the King?

Again, I have more than one theory.

He could be trapped in the stone. This isn't my theory, I don't know where it came from, but even this theory has two sub-theories. 1a being that his consciousness is trapped in the Eden crystal, forever shattering and killing the Descendants who attempt to free the souls trapped in the cycle; 1b being that he's the Season of Shattering crystal, that he's reliving those memories and sharing them with us in a similar limbo as the Elders. (My thought, if this is true, is that it's both. I believe the Season of Shattering stone would be the largest piece of the King's consciousness, still capable of memory, and perhaps thought, but not much else - but that that stone is still stuck in the center of the ever-shattering crystal in Eden, simultaneously experiencing the Memories and the Shattering indefinitely.)

He sacrificed himself and returned what was left of his light, and that light became the Descendants. (Also not my theory, the idea that we're fragments of the King has been around a while, I'm sure.)

HOWEVER, upon re-reading the quote, some phrasing stands out.

"The Ruler would sacrifice themselves to share light back into the skies, and the light souls would then return as Descendants."

So... who did the Ruler sacrifice? Does "themselves" refer to both parts of the Ruler (Prince Alef/King Resh)? Or does it refer to himself and the Elders, who were all conveniently present? That theory gets dark fast.

If it's the Ruler sacrificing their own "selves", it may explain the two hugging WL on top of the crystal. Two halves of a whole, re-uniting in a post-mortem act of forgiveness. But that leaves the clip from recent leaks a mystery.

Regardless, I read that hug on top of the stone as a heart-wrenching "I forgive you" moment.

Another theory that I don't know how to neatly fit into all of this text:

The quote explicitly states that the Ruler sacrifices themselves to share light back into the skies.

It does not say whose light. If it was the King's light, you'd think they would have specified that (unless they intended for it to be vague, which would also make sense.)

We know the King and Elders hoarded light. One place we know they hoarded light was the powerstones/darkstones, so it's not a stretch to consider that by sacrificing himself to shatter the massive stone, he was then sharing the light (from within the stone) back into the skies and that light became Descendants.

Another place they could have potentially hoarded light is within themselves. (What if that's the reason they're so tall compared to all other Ancestors?) Especially if they were corrupted, their bodies may act a lot like Dark Creatures in the sense that they have an insatiable hunger for light. In this case, maybe it makes sense for the King to try to sacrifice himself and all of the elders. (Then the question becomes... did they know they'd be sacrificed? Honestly, probably. I suspect they understood their role in the way events were unfolding by that point. It's another question entirely whether they all went willingly.)

And FINALLY, what about those two hugging Winged Lights??

Well, I'm sure it won't surprise you that I have more than one theory. Both include at least one of the kids being the King's "soul."

Theory 1 is that both of the kids are the king, like I alluded to earlier. Two halves of a whole, reuniting and hugging in an act of self-forgiveness. Simple. Sweet. Only a little confusing.

- Hard Spoiler Territory -

The second is based solely on The Two Embers and the scene in Orbit, where a dark child that looks like Alef hugs a golden child that looks like Hopeful Steward.

Another moment of forgiveness, but between friends who shared a common interest. They both wanted life, light, and prosperity for their world - but they had different visions. One sought prosperity through community; the other sought prosperity through power and greed. Ultimately, they both paid the price.

But why is Alef dark in the video if, in this memory, he is light?

Well, it depends.

If the first scenario is true, where it's his own two halves becoming whole again, my assumption is that his light/soul was returned from the crystal once it was shattered. If this is the case, his soul likely returned to the soul cycle and we are all little fragments of him. (Which leaves me a little salty about the fates of the Elders, I can't lie.)

That scenario may explain the split between Alef (Prince) and Resh (King). Perhaps his childish innocence and sense of self was absorbed into the stone at some point, only to be freed in the Shattering.

If it's the second scenario, a forgiveness between friends, I believe the Hopeful Steward was the one to return his light - mirroring the scene of skykids in Orbit.

And if THAT'S the case, where is the King now?

I guess we'll just have to find out. Maybe he and the Hopeful Steward merged and were reborn as the first Descendent? Or maybe his soul stayed to contain the ever-shattering crystal, while Steward's soul went on to guide Descendants in their journey.

One thing we can say for certain is that they all die. Lovely. (But we already knew that.)

And we can also see that the Steward somehow found (or made?) Aviary, that they have some authority over/relationship to the Descendants, and that other Ancestors regard Steward with a lot of respect.

I know most of this will be answered in time, but I can't help it, my mind is still reeling with all the possibilities 💭

Game of all time