Ru considered Yew's answers. She had fought, and did not anymore... "Did a Master make you fight?" Ru asked. That was all the creature could imagine. But either way, Ru filed Yew neatly under fighter and useless. This was not a useful ally, if she was not willing to fight anymore. Ru respected that choice, but Yew was effectively worthless in a fight now.

Found it? Ru thought, looking at the cloth closely. Sometimes champions had worn armor, especially the soft-skinned ones, but rarely if ever were such things decorative. Ru mulled that over, and added opportunistic to the mental categorization of Yew.

Ah, and then came the response to the question of the hour. Ru felt vaguely disappointed. Honestly, the creature had been hoping that there would be an easy answer. Of course, there wasn't, and the burden of proof was placed back on Ru's shoulders. It was up to the Champion to decide.

Ah well. Ru looked back down at Yew. "For what purpose were you created?" And then, after a beat -- "And why haven't you asked me any questions?" That was unusual. Usually, a creature responded to Ru's interrogations in turn. This, of course, bore investigating. Everything bore investigating.


@yew

A master? Had she met one of those before? Yew couldn't... Recall. If she had ever met anyone that called themselves one of those. At least if she had they did not tell her, though Yew supposed she didn't go out of her way to ask about such things. Whispers through the caves were how she got most of her information now, and not much of those whispers traveled through Eridanus, unless someone outright told her.

"I don't think-ink ssso."

Yew had no helpful answers besides the one she already gave when it came to the gender thing. She just went with what felt right to her, but it didn't seem like the creation felt like any of them stuck? Is that what this was?She wished she had something more helpful to say, but without exploring much of the caves there wasn't many experiences she could speak on about it.

Well, Yew thought she knew why she was created. Mo- Jayberry had pushed her right into fighting after she hatched for the first time. Over time eventually, the war happened, and she fought, of course, she did, only to lose and end up captured by the group she called home. That group was gone now - Yew could not feel the plants anymore, could not find most of the remaining living members. Or the leader. It was concerning, painfully so. She'd not spoken to uncle Mercy about it yet, to ask the questions she had. It was only right for her to assume she was given life to for the purpose to help the fight. The fa- group, had seemed so keen on it.

"To fi-fight. Against-st a group that is not not here anymore-re." Came the eventual reply, Yew didn't like that purpose, but, she could change it. "But I I don't have to fuf- fulf- do that-at."

Anyone could change themselves, it was something Yew learned herself while with the Kingdom of Eridanus, it was something uncle Mercy taught her, and Yew would not waste it. She was going to do something good with herself instead of being stuck to what her Mo- what Jayberry planned for her and what did end up taking place.

The question Ru asked next pulled Yew from her thoughts.

"You were asking-ing me questionsss." It was only polite to let the other ge- creation, ask first right?

Ru's eyes lit up. Now that was useful! Soldiers being created without the input of Masters, soldiers shedding their old identities, and becoming new people. Becoming Yew, a she with a life and a thought and a purpose that she defined. Ru reassigned Yew immediately. Winner.

"You were a soldier," Ru asserted, thinking out loud. "And you have the choice to do what you want to now?" Ru had a choice, too. Vargas had asserted as much, more or less. But the problem was, Ru wasn't sure it had been earned. Why do I want to earn it? Ru wondered. Is it not enough to just take myself as I am? What is 'myself'?

Ru wondered over Yew's response as well. Uncurious, the creature added. Yew was... fascinating. Someone that Ru was intrigued by. "Did you choose your name, or did your creator choose it?" While Ru had never heard of the berry family before, the creature would have thought that the name scheme sounded quite similar to a designation.


@yew

If Yew knew what Ru was thinking about she might have said something else - she didn't know about the masters creating things, or creating soldiers for the purpose of doing whatever they did. She had no idea Ru was created only for the will of those that were fighting, Yew herself... Well... She didn't think she was created for that, but if she thought about it really hard her mo- Jayberry had sparred with her from a young age.

"I don't fight-ight anymoree." She replied with a nod.

Was... Ru trying to figure out what they were going to do? Was that what this is? It sounded like the other didn't know what they wanted to do with themselves, though Yew had no idea how long Ru had been alive. She would have told Ru to turn tail and run while they still had the chance, before they got hurt and were unable to fix it at all. Yew would have taken that chance if she had it in the past and knew what happened in the future.

"I ch-changed my name-me."

Even if it was only dropping the 'berry' part of it, she still counted it as being changed. The only part of her name tieing her to that group was the 'berry' part of her name. She was Yew, and Yew was not Yewberry.

Ru looked back towards the carvings, thinking. Ru was quiet for a while before finally saying, "They might have been soldiers." Reflective eyes flashed against the light. "The creations like you and me." And there it was. The most important categorization, and perhaps the highest honor Ru could offer someone -- to call them Champion, to call them survivor. "Created to serve the purpose of another," Ru finally clarified, because the creature had noticed Yew's change in expression upon first speaking the word, many questions ago.

"Slaves, perhaps. Architects and electricians." Eyes angled up, towards the cave lights. "Inventors, workers, and all manner of creatures." Eyes returned to Yew, now. "They are dead now. But they looked for a savior." Ru stepped closer to the carvings, and nosed lightly at the strange carving of the winged thing with the halo above it. "This one was one of their saviors, I think."

Ru sighed. "I heard that story, once. Whispers from another Trialgoer, who might have lived and might have died. It told me that there were Masters working for our freedom. To make it so that we no longer needed to run trials, so that we could go see the world. But back then, I did not know of any other world. There was only Hydra, and the idea that a Master would help us was as ridiculous then as it is now." Ru looked back to Yew again.

"I was among them, once. I was built to run. Test designs, see what worked, see what didn't. I am the product of experimentation and trials." Why was Ru telling her this--? Even the hybrid wasn't sure. Just to be known, perhaps? Pity? So that I am remembered, Ru decided. "I ran, and I survived. So many years have passed since then... now, I am trying to do what you have done. You made yourself; I do not know how."


@yew

Yew had no idea what to say at that point, soldiers? The lot of them? They must have been important for their very image to be carved into the land like this, then again there had to be hundreds of them built to fight only to perish. Yew had seen it before, even if it wasn't true death. Most of them came back in the end, now Yew could only assume they were sleeping in some part of the cave she wouldn't find. For most of them, her head would call a good riddance. Which was an unfair thought, but Yew couldn't help but think it.

Yew looked up to the lights when Ru mentioned them, they gleamed soft, warm, she wondered who put them up there. Would anyone in the caves know it? She would have to find someone to ask - like the creation talking to her. Maybe. Ru seemed to have their own questions, and Yew didn't want to stop them from asking her, so her own questions could wait for now, even if the curiosity had her one lingering ear perking with interest.

"Not everyone-one can be de- deem- deemed evil just for their title." Came the reply to that.

It was right wasn't it? Surely one of them out there was actually helping, or at least trying to. Yew knew some gembound wanted to go against the grain, and not let nature take its course, if the trials could even be considered that. From Ru's words, they seemed full of bloodshed and Yew could not support such a thing. Surely one of the Masters would be curious like some gembound were, and want to change things?

She could only feel bad for the life Ru hadn't got to live, as if her own was any better. The both of them still had time, though, all of the time in the world. Ru could do something else like Yew was doing, even if their situations were very different.

"I don't know-ow how either-er." Yew spoke up again. She was taking it in stride, going out only when she felt good enough to speak with other gembound, even if she was scared of the potential things that could come of it.

"You-ou could starttt with making-ing friends?" She was trying that, at least.

"I'll be your-r friend." a pause. "If you-u want."


@Quartz Five-Two-Four

Ru's head shook minutely. "Ah, you misunderstand me. I do not think that the Masters are evil. I do not think that they run trials out of cruelty or sadism." The creature shrugged. "We were testing designs, for bigger and better creatures. We were trying to see who could survive. For war, I think, but I was never really sure." It wasn't as though Ru had ever been told, at least not any more than rumors from other trialgoers could provide.

Ru looked back at Yew, surprised. How had she done something that she did not know how to do? Or did she mean to imply that becoming a person was more than changing your name and giving yourself a gender? One of Ru's new ears flicked. "Friends." The creature's face couldn't emote much, but it still twisted -- into what emotion, it was unclear. Ru felt... anxious at the suggestion.

Ru had favorites. Ru did not have friends.

"I have never had a friend. I don't think that I know how." It was a tentative admission. One of... weakness? No, not weakness... guilt? No, no. Not quite so strong. Anxiety. There we go.

The creature looked at Yew, who honestly was not much smaller. "... I would not mind trying," Ru finally said, as if making a confession. "But I cannot promise that I will be a very good one."


@yew

Yew wanted to know why they were testing for better creatures - what would be the purpose of it? The current gembound seemed to survive just fine without selective breeding for specific traits (if you could even call give life and give stone that). It didn't seem like Yew would be getting her answer from Ru however. They didn't seem to know the answer themselves. War was plausible, like Ru said, but surely the caves didn't need more of it? Maybe that was too flowery a thought.

Yew almost thought she couldn't understand how Ru didn't have friends, but from the questions she'd been asked Yew somehow wasn't surprised. Not knowing much about things was most likely a caveat from however Ru was raised. Yew still had questions herself, but not to the extent that Ru was asking here. Ru had quite the time ahead with all of their questions.

"That's okayyy." Yew replied to that last bit. Ru didn't seem like they would be a bad friend.

Yew looked back to the statues, and then to the winged shape. Was that one really their savior? Yew wondered if anyone was still alive that could tell the tale. Most likely not, if what Ru said gave anything away.

"Do you think-ink they were really saved-d by thatt?" A motion to the thing Yew and Ru had been speaking of previously.



@Quartz Five-Two-Four

Ru's head shook. "No." The carving -- of Tamulus, though Ru was unaware and probably wouldn't have even recognized the name -- was, to Ru, the paintings of someone desperate, mythologizing a creature who'd never come. "I do not think the savior is -- was -- real." Ru sighed. "I think that the creations of my time were desperate, and sad, and created fairy tales to help themselves. If they had been saved, their bones would not fill Canis's every inch."

Ru did not know how many creations must have lived in that time. But if the bones were anything to go by, well, it must have been a lot. "There are those I could ask," Ru admitted. "But it would not be easy for me. The Masked Merchant is an omen of death; I have only known his face during a trial." Ru grimaced. "And I have only known Master Vargas's during it."

Vargas was the grim reaper. Those who fell back, who became injured, who lagged behind -- Vargas was the one who killed them. It was mercy, sometimes, Ru knew that well -- to be left to Hydra was worse than death -- but still. To see Vargas lurking behind you...

Ru recalled a saying, a warning. "There was a saying, then," Ru mused. "If you are hiding, stay hidden, stay silent, and never trust the darkness. Master Vargas is a hunter -- he would lurk in the shadows and kill those who ran. He would follow us, during Trials. To kill the stragglers, here and there." Ru shrugged. "He was not a Master then. An Overseer, under Master Nemean. Do not trust her, either."

Finally, Ru looked to Yew. "You have been patient. Are you sure you don't have any questions for me?"




@yew

Yew hadn't realized the bones were those creations made by the Masters for trials. It... Made sense, when she thought about it long enough. Gembound had to die for their bones to be left behind, and only something big could make that many die in one place like that unless Canis was a burial ground where they brought their bodies to rest. Burying them would have been the nice thing to do, but the Masters didn't seem too nice from Ru's words. Wouldn't taking them there take too long, too? Things turned into goo when they died, there was no way all of those bodies died somewhere else and were transported there unless someone had incredibly strong magic to do so.

An Omen of death.. Yew did not want to subject Ru to something like that. Would they die if they started asking too many questions? The Masked Merchant didn't sound like a good one to talk to, if they were there only when the trials were occurring. It meant that they would have to risk their lives to even ask a simple question - Yew didn't want to make Ru go to Vargas, either. Even if she'd not met him, it just sounded safer that way.

"It's saferr for you-u to not ask-k" Came her reply, after Ru spoke.

Yew would take Ru's words to heart and keep that in mind. Maybe she should just avoid the Masters in general or anyone that seemed suspicious. It seemed like the exact thing uncle Mercy would tell her, too, if he heard the story. Besides, Yew was done with fighting, she didn't want anything to do with it anymore.

"Did you-u run away-y?" it sounded like Ru was there only to become something for the trials, and it also sounded like they didn't want to participate in them any longer. If the Masters were forcing them into the trials, did that mean Ru left without permission?