uccellodifuoco | 10th Rise of the Phoenix ஜ Action/Voice

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10th Rise of the Phoenix ஜ Action/Voice

[Filtered from Selphie | You can probably hack this by just sneezing]

How many of you have gone to school? I don't mean studying about something specific like magic to be a sorcerer or however that's done. I mean a general school, with several classes and a lot of hours sitting on a desk doing nothing but listening to the teacher. Do that type of schools even exist in your world?

[No, he hasn't been thinking about the whole school thing since his talk with Selphie about it. No, he's not asking because she seemed to find it kind of important or at least useful. And that filter doesn't mean he doesn't want her to know that he's starting to be interested, because he isn't. Definitively.]

[After making that post and talking with whoever cared to answer, Ikki will be found wandering around town. He doesn't seem to be in a great mood, which isn't unusual but those that know him even a bit will probably notice that he seems to be in a worse mood than normal. He will be accompanied by his per, the wolf cub Hyoga, which will be running around happily and playing with him.

He will also end stalking wherever Selphie may be. As well as those he knew and the people from the "family" he got for ten days, but you won't see him bothering to go to talk to anyone unless they notice him first. Really, he had decided to pay no mind to the experiment and just throw it to his back, like everything else that bothered him. It was easier that way, to keep moving forward and not look back. Don't worry about the stalking, it's nothing serious, it's basically just that if they are outside and around Ikki will spend several minutes somewhere around them in a radius of ten meters doing virtually nothing besides being there.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Maybe it has them but they aren't known of. The wars I fight in aren't known by many except those involved.

[Chattel?]

We aren't slaves. We have been given many chances to leave after the end of our training.

[But it's not as if they have much else to do or anywhere else to go. Ikki doesn't mind that, he could still leave, but to do so without his brother. Without his brothers, his pride wouldn't allow it.]

Would you bother to ask about something you consider stupid and pointless? Honestly right now I don't care, until not long ago I had assumed I was too old for school already and had no use for it.

But as someone I know said, one can't train the whole day.

[Aka: he's bored enough to be considering peeking at the school. But he's not entirely convinced either.]

[Ikki is closer to the truth than he realizes. Terran wars are wars in all but looks - they're wars fought without guns or tanks or bombs; instead, they are wars fought with words and bribery and blackmail.

But Robert isn't trained to recognize any of that as war, and so he remains oblivious.]

... I should hope not. Something of that sort would be reported to the authorities immediately.

If you were given chances to leave, was there any reason that prevented you from doing so? Or... did you prefer it? [Uncomfortable tone, here. Robert is... barely beginning to comprehend that some people actually enjoy fighting, or at least are so used to it that they can't understand anything else (like Giles). That mindset terrifies him, but he's trying to respect the fact it exists.]

Admittedly, much of what I heard here in my first month or so in Luceti, I considered absolutely inane. Like magic... paranormal phenomena do not exist in my world, as far as anybody can tell with reasonable accuracy; but here it is scientifically provable and possible to observe. So I suppose, in a way, I have come to ask about things that at home I would have considered absolutely ridiculous. I... even have a thesis of sorts, on paranormal phenomena, now.

I would have been laughed out of the Randi Institute had I done that at home.

[Robert encourages peeking at the school, if only because learning is a good thing. Usually. It is to him anyway.]

It might be worth considering to even take small, informal classes or something... the school setting here seems relatively flexible, and will most likely try to accomodate any needs you might have.

[Ikki knows nothing of Robert's world, but from his own experience he can't help but find the comment regarding things being reported to the authorities as a stupid act of faith. But he's not going to step on that, there are things that is better to not talk about and it's not his place to question it.]

Of course there were reasons for it. Only a suicidal idiot would keep living this life without any reason, and no one would prefer it to peace. But those are fights that must be fought if we want someone in the world to be able to live in peace to begin with, someone has to do it and even if we may not have wanted to do it when we were forced into it, we don't have reasons to back off either. A peaceful live is meaningless when you know that somewhere else there's a war going on, one that decides the destiny of humanity and the whole planet, one in which you could fight to help and protect people.

[There are other more personal reasons but those are no one's business except his and maybe Athena's and the Pope if he was still alive. Ikki may be less reserved in a place like Luceti, where none of the people he wants to know those things are, but he's not going to blurt out everything in his heard to a stranger.

At least not without a glass of whiskey in front of him.]

I fight in the name of a Goddess that has reincarnated in the body of a girl of thirteen years old, fought Gods, traveled to Hell and returned from it after destroying it. There's little this place can offer me about things that I would have considered ridiculous before.

[Except for the school stuff actually.]

I suppose it would be a way to kill time at the very least.

[This concept is... well, it ties in to what Robert's been told by other people, but it is still very difficult to hear, especially in the context of a war. He makes some awkward noise.] Are wars really so necessary for other worlds...? Can there really be no alternative to them in some cases?

[And the second thing just... takes him by surprise.] Gods and goddesses... well, I have heard from others here that their worlds have gods that are real. But I have yet to meet one myself.

[And his own world doesn't have any.]

At any rate, I do recommend you at least... consider it, but of course, in the end it is solely your decision to make.

The ones I fight, yes, others done in my world aren't but I've enough with mine to try to put a stop to others. Athena does try to solve things without fighting whenever it's possible, but so far it all has only served for the enemy to pur her as a sacrifice together with the whole humanity. So unless you suggest that we sit down and accept the will of those Gods of destroying humanity and all the life on the planet, we have to fight.

They have been doing it since ancient times, so I don't see why they would suddenly decide to stop now.

[That doesn't surprise him, not many get to meet a god or a goddess in person... Or in any other way.]

You aren't really missing anything great. Except for her power she is basically like any other child out there. She's the Goddess of War but hates it and always tries to avoid us from fighting even at the cost of her life and even if we decided to fight anyway.

[Robert would have suggested it, but something about "destroying all the life on the planet" pings him, and so he doesn't. After all, Terrans fought to protect their planet - they just fought against their own foolishness, and it was a fighting that didn't involve violence or war. But fighting it was, and so he isn't sure how much he can criticize.]

...

I do hope eventually it does end, though.

No planet should have war forever... ideally not at all. But... but at least not forever.

[A goddess of war that... hates war? Huh.]

... Truly? How would that come about, something personifying war and yet despising it?

There wouldn't be a war if they weren't trying to destroy it. It's not even their position to really decide that, the ruler of the Gods left the planet under Athena's care. It should be her the one making the decision and she decides to protect it and allow life to go on as it is, so far the others mostly seemed to just want to destroy it to rebuild it as part of their domains.

[It doesn't really matter anyway, it all comes down to them trying to destroy humanity so it's the same difference for him.]

Because while she is the Goddess of War she's also the Goddess of Wisdom, so the war she represents it's one that would be fought with words and wisdom, not with weapons, blood and suffering. The God that represents that war is another one, Ares if I recall correctly. Athena only fights when there's no other solution, she only raises her hand against the opponent when reason and words have failed.

So these gods want the planet for themselves... and are destroying it in order to make it more palatable to them?

[That... that is disturbing. Disturbingly like how pre-Terran humans treated the planet.

And the next part completely floors Robert. The idea of a war being fought in any way other than with weapons is... brain-shatteringly new.]

...

That... that can be called "war"...?

... Why would it be war, then? Nobody would be... being hurt, would they? There is no violence that way.

Athena sounds like my partner. [A pacifist who only fights for self-defense.]

That's basically it. The ruler of the Gods was the one with domain over the planet, but he vanished centuries ago and left Athena in charge of taking care of it. The other Gods obviously saw it as a chance for themselves.

[Or something like that, Ikki has never particularly cared about what the Gods wanted and why. Usually he stopped caring at the part where it was clear that humanity and Athena were in danger.]

A war is a conflict, and a conflict is nothing but at least two people being in disagreement. The way the conflict is handled differs, it can be done with them fighting with punches or weapons, but it can also be handled with them talking about it until one point is accepted by both of them. The accepted point may be a balance of both ideas or just one of them, but at the end it's something that has been reached through a conflict, in other words a war. Even if no one supposedly gets hurt.

Her character isn't unique for her, thankfully. But there aren't still enough people like her.

[This? This is like taking everything Robert's been taught about war and throwing it out the nearest window. It is a mental shock to have it laid out like that. The idea that a war can be words - that a debate can be a "weapon" - completely belies anything he'd ever been taught about the potential of fighting.

He resists it for now, of course. But Ikki's words might prove the difference between Robert's bigotry evaporating sooner rather than later.]

...

It d-does seem like... such people would be good to have around...

... A-At any rate, I... I do hope this war ends soon, in your world. If it cannot be helped, at least.

It certainly would. If no one fights unless they are attacked, by logic the number of wars will go down greatly. I don't think they will ever truly disappear, it's in human nature for conflicts to arise, but they wouldn't be so vicious as they are.

[Ikki sighs heavily on his end at the last words. The war ending soon, he wonders if that's really possible. With Hades gone, with Poseidon sealed and the number of enemies in the past that Athena and her Saints had defeated, the war should have ended. Hades was the biggest threat, the most constant one, the reason why Athena kept reincarnating in time to fight him. With him gone, peace should have returned, they should have turned and focused on just keeping the Sanctuary alive, gathering new Saints -willing ones- for the future, to keep protecting the Earth in case any evil tried to attack it again.

But Seiya had been wounded, they had almost lost him to Hades and now he was stuck to a wheelchair, in a coma, ignorant of the world around him. Athena was trying to help him, to recover him, it should have been an easy mission but... Apparently someone new was after Athena's life again.]

I hope so too. That's why we won't give up until it ends, preferably with the Earth being saved rather than us defeated and it destroyed.

That is essentially how Terra came to eliminate war, I would think. Simply refusing to fight. [It's not that simple by any means - it took a good long time of self-delusion, suppression of aggression and in general turning the entire thing of violence into a horrible taboo. Is that worth the end result of no war? Good question. Robert would think it is, but then again, he's been indoctrinated for most of his life.]

Perhaps, when this war ends, more wars will be unnecessary. [Spoken like a true idealist.]

Simply refusing to fight? I find hard to believe that it would be that simple. And refusing to fight isn't the same as not wanting to start a fight.

[In all honesty he can't see it working well that way, but then again he's convinced that he can't do anything else but fight so he may be wrong.]

Perhaps. Hope is always the last thing to vanish after all.

[Didn't the myth go that way? And he had seen it with his own eyes, people dying, using their last breaths to pass on a message of hope, a wish for the future. Esmeralda, who had countless times begged him to stop training to become a Saint, in her deathbed asked him to raise his wings and let the phoenix's fire shine. Pandora, begged him to stop Hades, to avenge her and her family, telling him as much as she could about the enemies he had yet to face up to her last breath. The Gold Saints as well... It was hope what kept making the world go on after all, though many would still argue that it's one of its greater evils.]

In most Terrans' case, it is both. I myself would neither want to start a fight, nor continue it were it to be begun.

[It probably helps that they come from entirely different perspectives on this topic. Somebody trained to fight since a young age, versus somebody being trained to be a pacifist for the same period of time... Yeah, those are fairly difficult-to-reconcile positions.]

Hope... it is a fascinating mental state. Sometimes illogical, but... it can be helpful. Sometimes.

[The cynic in Robert wants to say it's most helpful as a placebo. But... he doesn't know about that quite so much, anymore. Not after Luceti.]

So you would prefer to stand there and be killed? I don't know if your world is really such an utopia or if you've just been extremely lucky to never have anywhere close to you a situation like that.

[Ikki, you have been extremely unlucky since you were born, having to see the worst of the world since ever. You can't really blame others for not being so unlucky, no matter what world they are from. There's a hint of amusement in his words though it's hard to know what is it that he finds amusing exactly.]

If it's illogical then you're saying that your comment about more wars being unneeded in my world after this one is over is an illogical one and that actually more wars will keep coming.

[Ouch. Congratulations for finding a serious flaw in Terran ideology, Ikki. Robert actually visibly flinches a bit at that; it isn't something that he has had to deal with.]

... I... suppose. But yes, that was... was what I would have done in most circumstances. Is what I would do in most circumstances.

[Expect that to... possibly change. Maybe. Eventually.

And the next part kind of gets a raised eyebrow.] Not necessarily. After all, it should hardly be dependent on hope. One can hope for better conditions, yes, but said conditions ought to arise as a consequence of planned, logical forethought.

And of course I assume you would just stand there and let the people you care about be killed rather than fight to protect them, right?

[Actually Ikki doesn't sound annoyed or judgmental. It's clear that he's against that course of action but he's not offensive about it, which is surprising. Of course it may be because he honestly doubts anyone would really stand to that, he has seen his brother get almost killed due not wanting to hurt his opponent, but he has seen him fight with nails and teeth to protect those he loved. He can't imagine anyone being so brainwashed that even such a basic instinct of protecting the people you love at the cost of your own life would be erased.]

Except that with something like a war, no matter how much you plan and put logical forethought as you said, if the other party wants to fight, there will be a fight. Or a massacre in the case of you refusing to fight back, but that still wouldn't deny the fact that it's a war.

[Another major sticking point for Robert, here. Phoenix Ikki, you're remarkably good at hitting Robert in all the weak points, entirely by accident.]

... I... I d-do not know, really.

... It, it was never a question I... encountered, before here.

[Having nobody to really care about to that extent, it was an almost irrelevant proposal - and besides, he has never had to entertain the idea of his friends really truly being in danger.

... Here it's fair game, and that scares him.

It's enough that he's hung up on that part, actually.]

[He doesn't do it on purpose or with that goal, but he has always seemed to end knowing where to hit people in those matters. It's what drove Seiya mad at him at times, that and his general attitude of "I don't care".]

Hn, that's probably the best answer there is. I've seen people claiming that they would protect someone they cared for to the cost of their lives, run away and beg to not be killed ad have their loved one killed instead when the situation arose.

If you don't know what you would do in that situation, your world must truly be ideal or you really lucky. Or you just don't have anyone you really care about, but I doubt that's the case.

[There was enough hesitation in the voice to show that, at least here, this guy may have someone he cares about to that extent.]

[It's hard to admit this to a complete stranger, but Robert says, awkwardly:] On Terra, the... general thought was that, well, violence for any reason at all was completely inethical... and that anybody who was capable of committing it was the most heinous of barbarians.

...

My time here in Luceti has... ch-changed that perspective... It was u-unfair of me to, to judge other people based on the ethics of my world, at least in this context.

...

But I still do not... understand how people can... c-can fight.

[He's really trying. He really is. It's just ridiculously hard, and he's fighting over two hundred years of taboos.]

[That something is "general" doesn't mean that it's "absolute", not in Ikki's book, it just mean that the majority think that way, are trained to think that way. But not all of them, because he thinks that is just impossible, that everyone would absolutely agree on something, no matter how much they were taught to think that way. So he assumes that Robert has really been lucky to not see the bad side of his world, or that given what the general thought is, those who don't agree with it act in a less direct way than they would in other worlds so this guy may not be able to see it even if it's right in front of him.

Ikki is a blunt person, he doesn't tend to keep quiet on what he thinks, but sometimes he knows it's better to keep it quiet. And so he shuts up regarding that.]

It's not a matter of understanding. There's no logic on it other than wanting to protect something, that's why I fight at least. Not for power or money, I don't care about those things. But there are people and things in the world that I want to protect, to see lasting as long as they can and I'm willing to fight and die to achieve that. If that makes me a barbarian that's fine with me, I don't guide myself by laws but by my personal justice.

So it's probably that I'm exactly that, a barbarian and a criminal. But I was never good at caring about what others thought of me.

[Seiya and the others though... They hadn't really thought of those things until they entered Hell, had they? Knowing them they probably thought that just because they fought for "justice" and Athena and to protect humanity, they were the good ones. The ones in the right and had no sin. Ikki had always known better, it was one of the things that Guilty taught him that Ikki coult still agree wholeheartedly.]

It may be for the better if you can't understand it. It just means you have had a peaceful life, let's just hope you don't have to ever understand it or face a situation of what you would do upon seeing someone you care about in danger due someone else.

[He's not being entirely sincere. Part of him thinks that it's better if no more people are dragged to fights and wars, it's one of the reasons why they fight to begin with. But Ikki's personality and instinct, the life he has had, makes him want to yell at this guy and shake him until it gets in his head that no matter how barbaric it may be, he has to fight, he has to be ready for it and be strong enough to win. That there's no such a thing as a utopia and that even if there is the price usually isn't worth it.

But this guy is a stranger, he doesn't even know his name yet. He's not Shun or Seiya, not even from his same world. So he holds himself, besides it sounds as if he has a hard enough time as it is, yelling may not serve for anything after all... Being stuck here really is making him soft.]

[Yes, "general" does not mean "absolute". But it does mean that it is very difficult to find dissenters. Between the overbearingness of the taboos, and the difficulty of finding like-minded individuals in a mostly homogenous culture, people like this are few and far between. But Ikki is right in that violence comes out in different ways; quiet ways, sometimes insidious ways.]

... I cannot say if it... makes you a barbarian, anymore.

I have heard that... v-vi - ... fighting [- see, he's trying to correct himself -] can be done with ethical principles in mind...

My partner t-told me so... he fights too, for, for s-self-defense, he says. He d-does not want to fight, but... sometimes he, he has to. I think.

[This is a difficult subject for Robert. If he thinks about it - really thinks about it - almost all of the people he trusts; nay, loves in this place... they could all be tried for high crimes on Terra.

... He knows Don could. Don admitted to killing people.]

... I... I have nearly been killed here before. Twice.

...

I hope that... th-that it will not happen again, but... [He is afraid. He's more afraid of it happening to Helios or Don than to himself...

He will never be strong enough to win, or so he tells himself. Even he wanted to be, he would never be. He just isn't good enough.]

I won't say that there aren't people who want to fight just for the sake of it. But from experience, most of the people who fight would prefer to enjoy a peaceful life, they just have too much pride, sense of justice or whatever to keep themselves quiet while others attack them or the ones they care about.

[Ikki notices that it's a difficult subject, and this guy is really having trouble with it. It's almost a bit disturbing, mostly because it's clear that this guy has been taught to think like this since little, that he has been trained to be like this. Makes him wonder if he comes across the same way at times, maybe not so wavering but confused and lost as well.]

Hn, sorry, but I'm the kind of person who can't say "I'm sure it will be all right" or anything positive. To a situation like this my instinct is to say that "they can't kill you if you kill them first" or that "they can't kill you if you kill yourself first". None of those options are viable though.

[He can admit that at least.]

This is a dangerous place, mostly because of the people here. Not everyone is evil but there is a lot of evil here, hoping that it won't happen again sounds like hoping that a bean will grow into a giant plant and bring you to a castle in the sky.

[... He apologized first and said that he wasn't good for this. Seiya or Shun would have probably been better.]

[It's fitting that Robert is hearing this from a relative stranger - things that he's never heard anybody say about violence before. They are weird and scary and disturbing on many levels to him - yes, Ikki comes off as indoctrinated to him too, though he doesn't exactly have that word in his mind. Still... there are points in there that he's not sure if he can automatically disqualify, and that worries him.]

... In this place, death is not even permanent, or so I have been informed...

... I have yet to see it happen, of course.

[Slowly:] ... I o-ought to... introduce myself, though, wh-what with how long we have been conversing. [Really, this is a long conversation - and a deep one - to have without knowing each others' name.]

... I am Professor Robert Alexander Hastings.

[Well, at least regarding the violence and fighting, Ikki can agree with that he has been indoctrinated. Because he has. Then again if Robert learned what Ikki teacher had really taught him he would be even more horrified, but Ikki has grown up enough to be able to decide on his own. There's still a lot of hate inside of him there always be, hate and anger that will never qualm. But he doesn't wish that to anyone, doesn't think others should be the same.

Hate, Ikki. Hate everything and everyone, no matter who it is, no matter what they did for you, you must hate! Burn with hate and use it as your strength to destroy everything in your way! Hate your teacher, hate your mother, hate your brother, hate the whole world and the gods. Just hate and destroy.]

It's not, but it's still troublesome enough to not be something to recommend.

[Ah, introductions. Ikki knows that this is a long conversation and a deep one, but he has never had problems with not knowing who the other person is. Even if in this place he has tried to take the habit of asking, but sometimes it just slips back to old habits. See? This is why he prefers to just arrive to places and say who it is and go on. Makes things simpler.]

A professor? Like a teacher?

[Well, normally he would just say Phoenix Ikki but since Robert made it the long way he will answer the same.]

I am the Phoenix Saint, Ikki.

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