Rage of a Ruined King: Zara [Echoes in the Deep]
Red light beamed through the cloudy sky, fading into the depths of the bloody sea. Thousands of fish fall slowly into the abyss, crashing into the ocean floor, where two titans be. Zara looked up at the drowned monster as the red light outlined an eclipsed silhouette. The monster stood gazing back at the ruined man with his own two bright red lights, staring at the ragged revenant as his flame and garments flowed like seaweed.
"The tides have turned yet again, old friend." The titan voiced, reverberating slowly throughout the sea.
"So they have... drowned metal?" Zara replied awkwardly. "Seriously though, a water cliche?"
"Hmm..." The nautical monument mulls. "In terms of water jokes, it seems you've hit rock bottom."
"Damn it, I was thinking of using that!" Zara fumed in frustration.
The big boy scratches the back of his massive suit as Zara vents. "Sorry?"
"Don't worry about it..." Zara sighs, continuing, "It's water under the bridge."
"Hoho, you got jokes."
"YES! I still got it. BAHAHAHA- Oof!" Zara is interrupted by the corpse of a Kraken falling on him.
"Hoho, looks like this octopus got the last laugh. He sure is Kraken me up!"
Zara's laughs are muffled by the massive octopus until he sends it flying to the surface.
"It's times like these that makes me think," Zara declares sarcastically. "This is why we died."
The giant nods in agreement, "Agreed, terrible jokes like these should remain in the depths of the sea--where nobody can hear them."
Zara let his body rest as he lay on the ocean floor. He and the monster gazed upward at the horrifying sight of fish and blood, descending slowly toward them. The titan dropped his anchor on the ground and sat on the floor with Zara.
"How was the surface?"
"About as bad as what the surface looks like now."
"Hmm... I've seen worse."
"Indeed," Zara acknowledges. "That's the point."
Zara sighs audibly as he recalls the old promise he made, "I haven't found a place for you on the surface. Hell, I haven't found a place for myself yet. Too much has changed up there. I can hardly recognize anything."
"Do not worry Zara," the massive monster reassures. "You will persevere."
"If only it were that easy." Zara differs in a grim tone. "As difficult as it is to fight the abyss, it's straightforward. Survive, that is all. However, brute strength does not solve all problems. It creates disasters."
Zara picks himself off the ground, struggling with an injured hip. "
Notorious Nautilus, that is what they call you. It peeves me so, how great the disrespect of our struggles are. Even now, they cannot understand. Yet what can I say? I am the one who crashed into their nation, plummeting into the lives of a million. Do I have any right to complain?"
The sand cloud diverges as Zara pounds the ground.
"I killed the ones I intended to protect, nothing has changed."
"You..." The monster dubbed Nautilus rose from the ground, wielding a ship's anchor. "Should die where you stand."
Zara fell to his knees. "Is that so."
His abyssal friend did not support him. "Then it's true."
"You should... but you did not." Nautilus added. "You did not die. I did not drown. We did not lose. That is what makes us immortal."
"Zara..." The iron giant wheezes a visible sigh, in the form of bubbles rising to the light far above. "This pain is unlike you."
"Pain?" asked Zara, thoroughly bamboozled.
Nautilus laid his arm down for Zara to see. When he opened his hand, rusty coins mixed with shiny new ones. Coins with various insignia, some he recognized from Zaun, others that resembled the serpentine coin that Captain was messing around with.
"This is payment..." He rummaged out all of the rusty coins so that only the shiny ones remained. "My payment."
"Huh?"
Nautilus gazed into the rays of light beaming from the surface. "In destroying the beasts down below, I protect those who dwell above. In their recognition, they offer coin for my troubles."
Zara stood conflicted. "So... That's what it was."
The stories he heard were far different from what his friend assumed. Rather than a token of gratitude, it was more like a sacrificial coin. A hero of the deep? Maybe not. Yet there is some truth in this. So, Zara did not deny it.
Scratching his shoulder in doubt, Zara asked, "What's the point of getting paid like this if you'll never use it?"
"Hoho! Hmm..." Nautilus anchors his anchor in the seabed. "Are you certain?"
Nautilus rests his giant anchor on his shoulder pointing out, "I am too dense to swim up there, but I can climb."
His giant fingers sifted through the rusty coins and picked one shiny coin to present, glistening despite the darkness that surrounds us.
"I collect coin in hope that I may buy myself a drink and a room to sleep in, once I have reached the surface."
A fleeting dream, but it is one that Zara supported.
"That's if you find someone up there who can make you human."
"Mmm..." The super-sized suit grumbled as he tilts his head down to look Zara in the flame. "Do I?"
...
"Do you? What the hell are you talking about? You do want to be human right."
"Mmm. Indeed, but do I... need to be? Man is more accommodating than you think."
That is something Zara cannot deny. Despite clearly being a ghost, he found it quite easy to walk down the streets of Zaun freely. It was one of the more shady of places, but that freedom was unprecedented in his time. Coming out of the war against the Void, then Darkin, came with the idea that all things strange were lethal. While Zara would have none of that, it was an inevitable truth for many of his people. Yet as he walked through Zaun, finding augmentations is not a rare sight. The strange was everywhere, the strange was... normal.
"I know, I will find my place on the surface one day." Nautilus gazed into the light above as the final fish fell. "Even if that day is not today. My fight is... far from over."
Zara admired his hope. Nautilus was always the more anguished of the two. It was fascinating to see how the tables have turned... or the tides as this cliched colossus would say.
"I wish I could still be as hopeful as you."
"Oh?" He reared his giant body close, inches away from Zara. "But you are."
Zara received a giant poke from Nautilus as he was booped at the heart by Nautilus's giant index finger.
"This pain you feel..." Nautilus rumbled as he leered at Zara overflame. "Is guilt. The unshakable grief that refuses your well-being."
"It is an anchor," Slammed on the ground directly behind Zara, the hook wrapping around Zara's body halfway. "And it weighs heavily on your soul."
"I know, because for the longest time..." His voice dulled in admission of submission. "That is was what kept me chained to these depths."
"You were betrayed, it was not your fault."
"That is what I told myself all the time. I still believe it to this day." Looking beyond Zara at the massive merged monster mash. "These thoughts only brought death. While this battle serves as the mark of my perseverance, sometimes I think this anchor just weighs me down."
Nautilus was despondent as he remembered his desperate struggle. "One time I came to the surface."
On that day he could not see. The world was a blur, as if taking off the ocean glasses that gave the titan sight.
"It was a dark time. Cloudy with smog everywhere. Like walking through smoke, if smoke didn't burn your eyes."
That day was a struggle, a struggle as great as the one that just transpired.
"Fighting, as usual. Fighting for survival, yet this day was much worse. These monsters were not content, sparring in the depths. The abyss was rising."
The abyss did not rise, but the fishes did conglomerate. Schools of catastrophe, without room at the bottom, swarmed upward--filling the ocean beyond the abyssal boundary, that does not contain it.
"For the first time in a long time, I did not fear for my own life. My fear was for the lives above. Beings like us can bear this burden, for all we have lost. However, those more fortunate would lose everything, becoming something even worse. No matter how brave man should be, no man should face this kind of fear."
"It takes a monster to know such horror." Zara comments.
"And a monster should be the one to drag them down..."
So he rose to the surface, swimming and climbing. Latching onto the monsters who climbed to propel himself upward, he dragged them down doing so. Repeating this until he reached the surface, witnessing a large lump that floated upon the surface.
If decades had not passed, perhaps he would have realized...
"Yet the one I brought down that day were not monsters, but men."
"No, please..." Zara was overwhelmed as he remembered the horrid cries that weeped throughout Zaun, as he fled his own apocalypse. "I'm sorry, go on."
Nautilus was even more downtrodden now as he continued, "Yes, it's true. I smashed into a damn boat. The worst way to breach sea level. The world was a blur, so I did not even know. There was so much noise, yet the world sounded smaller. Though I heard the screams of men loud and clear, I believed it was due to the presence of monsters that broke through surface. Yet..."
Nautilus drops his anchor, as he couldn't bear its weight. "No fish rose to the surface. The monster... I was the monster."
Zara was shook to the core, tripped as he was walking away--slowly falling to the ocean floor.
"I would never have known if it were not for the sailor who scoffed at me."
Nautilus reached his hand outward and clasped something as if to crush it in his palm. "I held what I believed to be a monster, but-" He let go of his strained grasp as he continued, "It was the captain, he said. My... my tithe."
The titan heard the desperate sailor dive away into that dark sea, even if he couldn't see it. He looked at his hand, clutching that blurred beast he believed and brought it close to his gleamings eyes. It was only then that he finally had his clarity. A panicked man, desperate to survive, was what he saw. He loosened his grasp as he released the man into the world beyond his vision.
Nautilus rumbled, deplored at his foolhardy negligence, uttering only two words, "I'm... sorry."
Appalled, astonished, awed, but most importantly, enlightened, they rose up from the ground they fell upon. Walking up to the Iron Giant, and laid their left hand on his suit.
"It's ok." Zara and the captain said.
Just like that, their enlightenment channeled into Nautilus himself. His determination waning, yet his mind was calmed, his fury sated by forgiveness.
Nautilus looked up above, in the blurry ocean sky. The blood faded away and the sky was cloudy and blue, in his point of view.
"I came from the abyss and brought the abyss with me. There is not much I can do, but still..." Nautilus reached until he grabbed what he believed to be the ship's mast and uprooted it, alongside the planks below it. He chopped it down to the size of a small crude raft and tossed it into the ocean.
"If you want to live, I will drag the abyss down, to where I belong: the ocean depths." Nautilus gazed into the ocean, though he could not see it, he could sense the presence of evil. "I cannot do more than this. Yet even so, I refuse to drag sailors to the deep end. Sailors sail on the surface, divers are the ones who go deep."
"He had a gun." Nautilus added. "Yet not once did he shoot a monster like me. I don't understand that to this day."
Zara didn't even ponder it for even a second when he replied, "Well, he was praying for a miracle and he got one. Why would he shoot you?"
Nautilus turned to Zara, confounded by his reasoning.
"Well, just think simply for a second," Zara began to explain. "Why do people waste coins on the water?"
"To appease The Bearded Lady."
"No, you buffoon. That's only in Bilgewater. I'm talking in general."
Nautilus fell deeper in his dumbfounded state. "Why? What even comes before that?"
Zara sighs, disappointed at the fact a docks dweller didn't know something so simple.
"It's something everyone does, even the youth: a wish. You never heard of a wishing well? You toss a coin into the well, and you pray for good luck. Is that not the same concept as tossing a coin as an offering to The Bearded Lady?"
Nautilus's mind was opened as he gained insight he never considered up until now. He pondered it more and more. The more the giant pondered it, the larger his mind opened. A universe of possibilities he never even fathomed opened before him, and all he could do was smile.
"Hah, HAHAHA! HOHO! BAHAHAAHA!" Nautilus laughed for a good long time before he finally said, "Wow! I can believe it."
...
"Hmm? What? Believe what?"
Nautilus laid his index finger on Zara's shoulder. "That I am a wish-bearer."
Nautilus peeled away from Zara and grabbed as many coins as he could carry in the palms of his hand, presenting to Zara thousands of coins.
"All these coins are wishes from the surface. Wishes for good tidings. Wishes for good catches. Wishes for safe travel. Wishes for great battle. I understand now... The Bearded Lady stopped bothering me when we kept the ocean safe. That's because even she knew, that we survivors are here as wish-bearers. Why must we move as the Lady demands?"
Nautilus hoisted the coins upward. "Because there is so much to do! Even if we want to die ourselves... The dreams of others are scattered all around us. Fulfilling those is enough reason to live, because fulfilling these wishes would take countless lifetimes."
Zara was happy, glad that his friend was glad. That even in his bitterness, he could still inspire others.
"This is why you are adored Zara." Nautilus turned to Zara with surrounding coins falling around him. "You see things others cannot. You do things others would not. The acts that people want to do, but choose not to in fear."
"Even in times where you seem to have lost your mind. There is a small, vague part of you that shines through. Anyone who sees this will immediately come to understand, because in your insanity lies the will of mankind."
The Iron Giant pats Zara's back real hard. "You might be insane, but you are humane. People look up to that devotion and hope to be a part of such greatness. That hope is a beacon that shines through dark times. The mark of a true king, fearless in the face of danger."
"You may have lost your crown, but you have not lost your light."
It was then Zara remembered something obvious, that he had forgotten: his purpose as a king. A man whose hopes and dreams lie within the pride of his people, their pride in him.
He remembered something so obvious that he felt foolish to forget. He was planning on detracting from the mistakes of succession and legacy, that kingdoms of his era had fell victim to, all for this very reason. A king that his people could not take pride in had no right to be a king, much like when he faltered at the end of his life.
Yet even so, Zara knew that it was not exactly the way his friend has perceived.
"I'm not as determined as you'd think I am." Zara humbly admits. "I do fear, but I am not afraid of fear. I am afraid of guilt. I am disgusted by those with a face full of regret and doubt. That is why I help people who panic. I am livid when I don't. It pisses me off to no end and it terrifies me."
"This was my greatest concern as a king. I want my people to be happy. I wanted my kingdom to become a place of freedom, where people could do things they couldn't before. A place where the impossible becomes possible. One where people had so many choices laid out in front of them, that they would instead be concerned with what choices to make instead of what choices are feasible."
Zara's arm shook as he clawed at his missing arm in pain.
"Yet this came with so much failure. I, stuck in a constant cycle of failure and redemption, gained an acute awareness of shortcoming. A worrisome question gnaws at me every time I think about my failure. What kind of shit will I be in when I don't know what to do about my failure?"
The iron giant's back cast a shadow over Zara as if Nautilus was gazing at something far away that Zara could not see. Yet in truth, Nautilus was staring at nothing at all. He merely looked forward, as Zara looked back.
"So, this is the folly of respect. Who knew?" The titan deliberated. Turning to face Zara, he continued, "How attentive are you when smashing a swarm of fish?"
"Quite."
"Quite aggressive at that. So should you not be attentive in all situations?"
Nautilus posed a question that Zara was asked of by a certain someone, who was very close to him in life. Yet she didn't quite give him the straight answer he was looking for, at least Nautilus would.
"Just as you look back on your problems, you should look forward to what comes next. To not acknowledge our failure is foolish. However, to not look at where you are headed, due to the shock of what was left behind... nothing is more ludicrous."
Nautilus stomped the ocean floor in his frenzy, sending shockwaves that pulsed outward throughout the ground.
"Worrying about such trifles did not get us out of this hell. It kept us bound. We may not have had favorable positions, cucked by our choices, abandoned by our past. Yet we didn't cry over our horrid situation, facing a plague of the damned fish! We did not die. We did not drown. We did not lose. What did that mean to you, Zara?"
How ironic. The iron giant used Zara's own words against him. Reiterating as if he had forgotten his own advice, Zara proclaimed, "I cannot die, I will not drown, and I cannot lose. That is what it means."
"On the endless march. We move forward, forward." Nautilus's gaze trails toward the coins scattered across the ground, and Zara's gaze followed. "Even if it takes countless lifetimes. So, long as you become your own beacon of hope. No matter how dark you past may be, people will flock toward your light."
Nautilus picks up a radiant coin in the abyss. "Even a small light, can illuminate the darkest place."
Zara paused for a while, admiring the peace among what used to be a chaotic battleground for a bit longer, realizing what he must do. Nothing could absolve him of his crimes. Not even his so called redemption that he completed in life. He realized this, yet absolving such deeds were unnecessary. They were a permanent part of the past, and bringing lives back... doesn't come easy. Zara simply needed to become an inspiration much greater than his crime. Not as a means of masking his failure, but as an attempt to acknowledge it.
"A beacon of hope... a wish-bearer I see." Zara jokingly mentions as Nautilus smirks. "Well I must say, that is something quite suitable for a king. I'll keep that in mind as I make way to my final destination."
"And that is?" Nautilus perked up when Zara had a destination in mind.
"The damned Shadow Isles."
Nautilus grew grim upon hearing the name. "Inevitable."
"Man, it'll be a pain in the ass walking there though." Zara complains childishly as the Iron Man walked toward him ironically.
"Excuse me? Walking?"
"Well yeah. I gotta get there somehow."
Nautilus slapped his head. "You do know this is a dock right?"
"Right, but they didn't let me get a boat. So it's walking for me."
"Don't you think the situation has changed now?"
"Eh, why would it?"
Nautilus banged his head on his anchor. "You literally saved all of Piltover from the fucking fish, of course things have changed!"
"Well... I didn't do that much really-"
"What the hell do you mean you didn't do shit?! Look at these FISH!" Nautilus jerked his arm so abruptly, that his anchor slipped and impaled Cthulhu in the tentacle. "We beat the crap out of them, hundreds, thousands of them! The landlubbers had hell dealing with three fish."
"Well it wasn't just three fish-"
"Compared to what we had to deal with, they didn't do shit!"
"Hey! That blimp was kinda cool though."
"It is cool admittedly... if it didn't blast sound at us while we were fighting."
"I didn't mind."
"Well, I did. It still rings in my ears. Don't you know sound is louder and travels farther in water?"
"Anyways, what the heck is your point man?"
"My point? It's obvious, ask them for a damn boat!"
The armored abomination was absolutely aggravated. His anger was clear as his eyes glared harshly, igniting his whole body in a red sheen. Steam spewed out of his suit, scorching the cold ocean much like volcanic vents. Zara didn't really mind walking the sea floor at all, since that was all he did for too many centuries. Yet he didn't have it in him, to ignore his friend's simple request over something so petty. Scratching the collar around his nonexistent neck, Zara gave into his demands.
"Well, if you insist." Zara wasn't exactly excited about facing a group of people who knew how catastrophic he truly is. It was confirmation for their biases against him, which would also be reflected in Nautilus. "Are you certain that I can get a boat so easily?"
"Well," Nautilus wheezes an exasperated sigh, punching Cthulhu in the eye as he tears his anchor out of his tentacle. "You'd be surprised."
"I guess I will be." Zara walks up Cthulhu's head and has a good look at the incredulous carnage they both carried out. "The shit we pull off always surprises me. Speaking of which, you've been doing this on your own that whole century we seperated?"
"That's right." Nautilus affirms climbing up Cthulhu's head, anchoring his face as support. "What else is there to do?"
"That's interesting," Zara laughs as he recalls a trivial fact. "They called this the Conqueror's Seas before right? That's why I decided to conquer the ocean floor to breach the surface."
"Really? Well, what about it?"
"I guess if you were here, protecting people this whole time. I guess it wouldn't be wrong to call it the Guardian's Seas."
"Hoho!" Nautilus chortled amused at the idea of being the ocean's wishing well. "Although I like the sound of that, it'll have to be when you are dead and gone."
"I'm dead already." Zara pointed out quite frankly as he sat on Nautilus's anchor. "Now, I just need to be gone."
"Well then," Nautilus swings the anchor around in a circle, with Zara still latched onto it. Employing their technique to catch the fastest of abyssal fish, Nautilus spins with tremendous torque, creating absurd centrifugal force, to launch Zara to the surface. "Get going already!"
Just as Nautilus was about to slow down, Zara flies off of the anchor, rising at the scale of 420 knots. Yet, to escape the ocean floor, it would take a hell of a lot more than that to breach the surface in good time. As the water boiled around him at such tremendous velocity, Zara broke into the ocean of mana to skip two kilometers through the ocean. Doing this five times in a row, Zara shattered the ocean surface in the span of a mere ten seconds.
Thank you so much for reading chapter 19, Echoes in the Deep! This is a prized chapter that I always wanted to work on. I'm so glad I finally got to it! Leaving that tithe business as is always bugged me, but now I made it into something that means a lot more. [galio-happy]
Zara, the Cryptic King is a custom champion I made that represents my vision of The Ruined King. The title I gave him is different to show how he overcame his horrible legacy. This chapter, is the very start of his journey to fix his name.
A long time ago, I had comments stating that The Ruined King should never have any kind of interaction between
A lot of people have problems with the tithe and believe that it chops away the depth of Nautilus core. That his drowned persona was overshadowed by
Pyke, leaving him some kind of strange legend like
Rammus. However, when I heard storytime-at-the-bar-about-Nautilus, I had a strange feeling that something was missing. That something was perspective.
We only hear the anguished perspective of that harpooner as he feared the titan that boarded the ship. Paying attention quite well, you can find that Nautilus himself doesn't have any sort of reaction. We truly don't understand the man. So, I strived for an opportunity. How can we truly embrace that fantasy of the epic man who survived the abyss despite all odds? I do it by introducing a man who had it much worse.
Since Zara doesn't just wash up at the shore somewhere and come to life, he had to walk the ocean floor for millenia just to find his way to land. It's implied, but I'll explicitly state that Zara and Nautilus spent a single century together fighting in the depths in this story. However, a long time has passed since Zara and Nautilus depart from each other, it is during this time that I decide to build up some regrets. One regret being of Zara being foolhardy in his chase for Evelynn, the other regret being Nautilus crashing into that ship in the first place.
The mood I set for this chapter is heavily influenced by a very important theme: common courtesy. This will also be the theme for the next chapter and I wanted to set this theme to remind people the purpose of such courtesy. Simple phrases such as, thank you, sorry, your welcome, no problem, excuse me, it's ok, are quite simple. Yet for as simple as they are, they convey very clear ideas.
We take this idea for granted, especially online, especially when gaming, especially when shit is getting flung left and right. One particular phrase I BARELY see nowadays is sorry. The idea of an admission of guilt, and the intent of seeking a means of redemption. This is one thing that I believe is sorely underestimated and highly taken for granted.
When people lob insults like its volleyball, saying sorry is quite the ordeal. Nobody wants to admit that one's idea is wrong since the idea was harshly insulted. People feel that apologizing is justification for further insult, when the reality is that it is the final straw for insults. It is the signal that tells you whether or not you should mute or not mute. Everyone will get peeved when they see a problem, but not everyone is actively trying to sabotage your gaming experience.
Witnessing the reaction to an apology is truly how you differentiate between who is worth listening to and who is not. If people are unwilling to forgive someone who is trying to redeem themselves, then there is no use discussing anything with such critics. These kinds of people insult for the sake of insulting rather than actively trying to improve the state of the match. Talking with such individuals is completely useless and if not detrimental.
Forgiveness is something that is seldom seen, but is ever prevalent in the game. Many times will you see people who do bad, yet they turn their game around and while people may have initially bashed them, they suddenly stop. That is the hidden form of forgiveness that people cannot see. Many people desire the acknowledgement of their efforts of trying to make the best of their situation, yet they don't get it. Even if they are forgiven by their peers, they don't understand that they were. All they know are the insults that they saw while they were doing horribly.
Sorry is a way of naturally finding that acknowledgement. You most often see it in the form of a response that goes, "no problem," "don't worry," or "it's k." While it's something that is so small, it's a very brief way of stating, "Despite that mistake you made, we're still in the clear. We still got this."
That hope is much more important than one would think as people tend to freeze up when they believe that their problems are spiraling out of control. It may not seem important, but it is what keeps those catastrophic failures in check. You know, the one where when someone fucks up, they go batshit insane and do some of the stupidest things imaginable. The kind where you want to beat the crap out of them for failing something so obvious.
As much as I am bloating this idea, in practice, common courtesy isn't really that stiff at all. Sorry in game is actually quite casual: "lolwoops," "sry," "lag." Same goes with a lot of other common courtesies: "np," "dw," "it's k," "gj," "thx." So as much as it is important, it doesn't really have to be formal at all. It's just important to understand that we are all human and to convey these ideas to others pays off.
That said, I wanted this chapter to show something important. That no matter how heavy your crime, no matter how hard you screwed up, so long as you create your own value that rivals your crime, you can find forgiveness. Even if you are not completely forgiven, that is fine. Sometimes, it's to be expected. What is important is that you did not allow your problems to prevent you from becoming someone important.
Motivational speech aside, I decided to no longer put chapter numbers in the title. What better way to fix the problem of not knowing the chapter number than to never include it in the title? I'm still going to estimate what chapter this will be in the table of contents, but this will avoid a hell of a lot of contradiction in the future.
Arc 1: Our King Returns
Arc 2: Method to the Madness 9. Dawn upon Zaun 10. Good Morning Ghost 11. Knight of the Full Noon 12. Madness of Man 13. Worries of Women 19. Echoes in the Deep
