Champion Encounters: The Art or Redemption
So hey. Dunno how many of these I may end up making but I was hit by the idea of some short encounters between two Champions who are not connected by lore but might have interesting interactions were they to meet by chance.
And this was the first one to come to mind...
[Note: I'm trying to match the general tone of LoL's lore department right now so this might get a little bloody at points.]
I can appreciate the time and effort spent on a production as lavish and elaborate as Noxus' invasion of my homeland. What I am less appreciative of is when the size and scope of it causes one of my own more artistic performances to be canceled.
The producer who had paid my way to this small Ionian town had wanted me to make a work of art of a political rival. Said rival had been making quite a bit of noise about a peace treaty with Noxus that had been gaining a fair amount of traction with other Senators, which my producer could not abide. I would have been glad to perform in the capital itself but instead the rival had suddenly needed to return to the mansion outside of his home town that belonged to his family. I did not know the details of why but all that mattered was that my stage was to be smaller than originally planned.
It seemed however, that irony had decided to deny me even that small stage as, before my arrival, the town had been put to the torch by a pack of Noxian Raiders and I arrived to a land of ash with smoke rising from where my target's home was nestled in the wooden hills. While far from the worst plot twist I have had to endure, it was still an annoying one.
Yet I continued on, since it was best to confirm the kill even if it was not by my hand. If I was lucky, I would still get to put on a show for an audience of one... and get paid for my efforts as well.
I may be an artist, but no need to be a starving one.
As I walked through the town, towards what was most likely a smoldering husk waiting for me in the hills given how the black fumes circled around the sun like the Wolf circling the Lamb, I saw opportunities for smaller artistic expressions and took them.
A man, his eyes still open in terror, his lower body crushed by the remains of what was presumably his home, laying in a thin pool of blood that leaked out of the pile of wood to pool beneath his head like a bloody halo, his unseeing gaze pointed up at the sky as dried tears streaked down his scratched cheeks was almost perfect.
But each cheek only had THREE scratches. Two quick swipes with a broken off piece of wood, one on each side of course, managed to save the work.
Two children, one's back riddled with throwing knives, the other slain by a single arrow, lay face down in the muck across from each other. All it took was to extend their arms, resting the hand of one over the other like friends or lovers wanting to spend what they knew was their last moments together. It did not matter if they had actually known each other or not in life. In the art of death, they would be together forever.
So I went, adjusting the position of a corpse here, closing and opening a dead person's eyes there, and while it could never equal one of my pure works of art, I could at least make these amateurs look halfway presentable.
An interesting point of note was that every body I had encountered so far had been Ionian. How did I know it was Noxian Raiders and not some form of in-fighting you ask? Much like a true artist sticks to very specific tools and their own ingrained techniques, Noxian forms of stabbing and cutting are very distinct from Ionian ones.
In any case, it meant either this had been a particularly one-sided slaughter or the Noxians had taken extra care to clean up their deceased. Given they had never shown a tendency to the latter, the former was the more likely reason.
However, things took a turn when I was finally through the town and started to head up the hill towards the mansion itself. There had been a break in the carnage and I passed the time counting my steps, making sure I kept a proper four-beat tempo. Suddenly, I came across my first Noxian corpse, a horseman split in half at the waist. His lower half was still on the horse, which had also been decapitated. His upper body was a notable distance away, with the horse's head having landed right side up on top of its rider's back, facing towards the rest of its body as if staring in disbelief at what had happened to itself.
It was a rare, wonderfully comedic work that I found myself almost unwilling to touch beyond moving the head just slightly to the right so its line of sight was fully on the rest of its body. Though as I kept examining the body, I noticed two other things.
The first was that the style of the cut on both horse and man was Noxian in its style. The second was that the two of them had been decapitated and bisected respectively by a single, continuous slash.
Interesting technique.
As I continued on I began to find more Noxian corpses, some split at the waist like their mounted fellow had been, several of the lower halves still standing as if in denial of their death while scores of upper bodies and lopped off limbs littered the ground alongside them, speaking the truth.
Again, an interesting technique... and one I was noticing all came from more than simply the same technique. It had all been delivered by the same hand.
I was more curious than ever to see what had done all this by the time I reached the mansion's gates. I stepped through the battered open doorway, the groan of the single hinge straining to hold the weight as it swung open echoing in the silence and stepped inside to find something incredible.
I must first preface what I saw and felt next with a small confession: I had never once in my life before this point truly admired the work of another artist. How could I when perfection was what I demanded from my own works? How could I respect anything that did not demand the same from itself?
Yet when I entered that courtyard, for the first time in my life, my breath was taken away by the masterpiece of another.
Sixteen torn apart bodies perfectly divided into four rows of four, two down the middle and one arching outwards to each side, lay before a kneeling woman in a mixture of Noxian and Ionian clothing. The corpses were like bloody sparks that trailed behind a shooting star, the way the smoke of the dying fire reflected the light to cast the woman in brightness while fading what was obviously her victims before her into darkness only heightening the image.
A sword, almost as large as the woman but terminating halfway up its length in a ragged, shattered end, lay by her side. The thick coat of blood on the weapon testified to its deadliness even in spite of its broken state. The woman herself was quite the sight as well, the sweat on her dusky skin shimmering, giving her an even brighter radiance that contrasted with the bits of grime and gore that had sprayed on her as a result of her efforts. Her body language showed her exhaustion and sadness so much that even her snow white hair was visibly wilting. Yet another point of contrast came when, despite her weariness, she looked up as I approached, a steely resolve mixing with the sadness in her brown irises.
She unconsciously clutched the dead man in her arms, a knife sticking out of his throat, closer to her. She obviously knew he was dead and yet her first instinct was to keep him away from me.
I had been thinking of killing her up until that moment, honoring one who had moved even me by bringing out her own inner beauty through death. Yet that motion, her positioning, it made the current work too perfect, so complete that even I could not bring myself to alter it.
The fact that the dead man was also the one I had been sent to kill soured the mood as well.
Instead, after making sure the hood of my cloak kept my face hidden, I said, "Hello, little Noxian. What's caused all this now?"
She was silent for four beats, another thing that caught my interest even if it was unintentional on her part. Eventually she said, "Deeper in the mountains there is a shrine said to help those who have... lost their path."
She looked down at the man in her arms again before continuing with, "While looking for it I stumbled on this place instead. Scared the guards pretty good but this man here managed to talk them down from a fight."
'A fight they would have lost,' I thought to myself as my eyes momentarily drank in the beautiful carnage around us one more time.
"He saw I was alone," she said, still going on with her story, "and he invited me inside. He shared what knowledge of the area he had as well as a map to help narrow my search. He even shared his food and a bed to spend the night in."
"One separate from his own, I trust?" I asked, not bothering to hide the skeptical edge in my voice.
"Yes," she replied, giving me quite the fearsome look, "And if he wanted what you're implying, he never showed a sign of it."
I raised my hands in a placating manner as I said, "My apologies. Please. Continue."
The anger drained from her face, the tired sadness returning. "Even with the information," she said, "it took me three more days to reach the place I had hear about."
The note of sorrow in her voice grew all the stronger as she added, "It had long since fallen into ruin. Either it had been looted by others long ago or simply abandoned to the elements."
"And so the wanderer," I said as I nodded in understanding, "looking to find her path instead finds ruin and then returns only to find more ruin. How... poetic."
"Poetic?!" the woman all but screamed as she placed the body down with surprising gentleness given her rage, grabbed her shattered sword and bolted to her feet, "What poetry could there be in this senseless slaughter?!"
"Do you mean the actions of your countrymen or your own?"
She did not answer, her teeth gritting as I gave her four seconds to respond before turning around, putting my hands inside of my robes. I was again tempted to reach for my gun but instead my hand slipped to the inner pocket that held my mask.
"Let me paint the scene," I said, "and please feel free to speak up if I get the details wrong."
Four more seconds passed in silence and feeling confident she would not speak because I would not be wrong, I continued.
"After the disappointment of your discovery," I began, "you decided to come back here. Perhaps for another chance to rest, to have a friendly voice to talk to, or just a moment of peace to figure out where to travel next."
I paused once again for four beats, lightly raising my right hand like a conductor harmonizing the string second of his orchestra.
"But then you saw the smoke and flames. Heard the cries and screams of those being slaughtered. Perhaps, as you began to run, you could even smell the distinctive, cloying scent of burning flesh from those who had been trapped inside the now raging inferno."
I spread open my fingers, letting hazy rays of light spill between them.
"And when your fellow Noxians first saw you, they must have greeted you cheerfully, inviting you to join the celebration of their victory."
Yet another four beat pause, yet again the woman's silence let me press on. I clenched my hand into a fist as if I were snuffing out the sun itself.
"However, you then saw the body of your new friend. Or maybe you even saw the very moment they stabbed him, his bright red lifeblood spraying out of his body along with his soul."
I heard the rattle of the metal gauntlet she wore as she tightened her grip on her sword and I smiled to myself.
"An anger gripped your body, your very soul! How DARE these people who claimed kinship with you taint one of the few moments of true peace you had known in this land!"
I used my left hand to place my mask upon my face, doing a quick turn as the hood of my cloak fell back and I brought my right arm down before sweeping it out, letting the woman get a good look at my dramatic pose as the cloak flew open to reveal my full attire beneath it.
"And then. You killed. Every. Single. Last. One."
She started ever so slightly but recovered quickly, the large broken weapon at the ready. I had no doubt that, if I had shown actual aggression and gone for my weapon, she would not have hesitated to try and cut me down then and there.
Yet instead, we once more stood in place, taking the measure of each other as her image was reflected in the sleek ceramics of my mask and mine in turn reflected on the metal of her blade.
"Actually," she finally said, "I told anyone who dropped their weapons I wouldn't chase them if they ran."
"And how many took you up on that merciful offer?"
"I only counted four."
That information I decided to keep in mind for later.
"Who are you?" she asked, "And why have you come here?"
"I've been on an... extended sabbatical so you have probably had no reason to hear my name," I replied, "but I am called Jhin."
I pointed at the body of the man she had been grieving over and added, "And to be perfectly honest, my dear, I had originally come here for that man's life. Though it seems he took his cue far too early."
"I would have protected him from you," she growled.
"Like you did from your fellow Noxians?"
She was starting to shake in fury as she bellowed, "I never had the chance to!"
"Exactly!" I exclaimed, holding my hands out for emphasis, "Think about what that means! You were not here to protect anyone and yet when it was time to kill, here you were! Why do you think that was? Why were you, someone who claims to be looking for a new path, here to perform such an exquisite work of carnage to be discovered by me?!"
"Exquisite?! There is nothing exquisite about this! A Noxian's strength is not just for causing death!"
"'Just' death?" I snorted, "'JUST' death? If that is really all you see here, my dear, you're even greener than I realized."
At her confused look, I spread out my arms to indicate the killing field around us. "Do you really not see?" I asked, "The way every body has fallen? Where the crimson lines and pools of their blood have spread into a web of creation? There is TALENT here! Raw, amateurish, unrefined talent in need of guidance but talent all the same!"
"You'll forgive me if I'm not interested in the praise of a madman who is still looking for a moment to kill me," she replied, her voice growing as cold as True Ice.
Oh, she had potential. That she could still focus on my wide, excited eyes and twitching fingers through my theatrics, not letting a flashy display distract her focus, these were all musts for a true artist.
"My dear..."
"Riven."
"Excuse me?"
"My name is Riven. I'd rather you call me that then act like you can use some term of endearment with me, Jhin."
"Fair enough... Riven."
In the distance, there was the distinctive howl of wolves. They sounded close, meaning the scene Riven and I were having was drawing to a close.
"I suppose you're going to want to bury or burn him before our approaching friends turn your works of art into a fancy feast," I said with a sigh.
"Yeah," she replied with a look that screamed of a desire to offer that mercy to all that she had slain, which was a bad habit she would need to break if she wanted to reach her full potential.
"I'll leave you to it then," I said as I turned to leave, "but think about this. I know you Noxians are obsessed with strength but artistry, true artistry, is a strength as well. It is a strength you have in spades. Don't deny it. Don't deny what your soul wants to express, Riven."
"My purpose is redemption," she replied, "Not to let myself sink further into damnation."
"True art transcends such simple concepts," I said, "but I can only play the melody, it is up to you to listen and hear the music around you."
With that, I departed, still feeling her eyes on the back of my neck, her caution never wavering until I was well out of sight.
Of course, given the lovely nature of my tools, I could still have easily killed her from here. Yet a thought stayed my hand once more.
Those two boys who had assisted in my first capture had grown. Zedd had quite literally an army of followers while Shen had that little slip of a girl and that... Yordle, that hung onto his words.
The apprentices now had apprentices and I? I was not getting any younger. I decided, then and there, I would keep an ear out for more of this Riven's exploits, see if my hunch about her was correct.
If it was, maybe it was time to consider an apprentice of my own. Someone who, while they could never truly be as good as I, could carry on my legacy and skills beyond the time I slipped from the mortal coil. Someone to ensure a whole new generation understood the wonders of the art of death.
Ah, but to plan such things was too difficult at that moment as I could feel the need to create, the need for expression, the need to KILL coursing through my veins.
Where could I find someone else to--
I stopped as I saw broken branches and the wild footprints of four sets of boots, indicating men who had run through the woods in a blind panic. Sap still lightly flowed from the broken sticks, meaning the ones who had passed through them were still nearby.
Oh, that was right. She DID say there had been four of them, had she not?
