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Not everyone is born with a name written upon their skin.
Egashira Ryusei was born with two.
For as long as he can recall, the people of his village have marvelled over the foreign names of his soulmates. They are plainly exposed on his forearm for all the world to see — Hythlodaeus, reads one of them. Hades, the other.
They are what drive him to leave Yanxia. To see the vast world, to meet all of its peoples. To learn just what sort of person might bear one of those names.
But it is his own sense of justice, his own wish to protect those in need, that leads him beyond the Rift, that sees him fight for a world not his own, that fills him with a burning primordial Light that threatens to tear him apart at the seams.
And it is the whims of an utterly infuriating Ascian that place him in line for a visitor’s pass at a long-forgotten bureau in an eerie, beautiful recreation of a long-dead city.
When the most recent spike of painful Light fades, someone is there with him. One of the Amaurotine shades gazes down at him with that implacable face and speaks in that alien voice. “May I?”
Ryusei can only shrug, not trusting himself to speak just yet.
The shade takes a seat beside him. Ryusei expects that’s all. A phantom out of time awaiting an appointment that already passed many thousands of years ago.
But they turn their head toward him and speak again. “You, I think, are from a time beyond ours. Have you followed in the wake of Emet-Selch?”
Ryusei looks up at them in shock. “What, are you with him?”
“Nay, there is no cause for alarm,” they reply. “I am simply a shade. Here and not here. I know only that my name…” They pause and seem to tilt their head. “No, it’s curious, but I cannot seem to recall it.”
“There’s something to recall?”
“I once abided here in Amaurot. We all of us did.” The shade glances around at their fellows. “These others seem unaware of their pale existence, but I wonder if Emet-Selch’s mind was distracted when it came to my reconstitution. A stray thought would have been enough. ‘That one will realize the truth,’ for example. We were close friends once, you see.”
“I see.” But he doesn’t. Emet-Selch seems not the type to have any close friends.
The shade goes on to speak at length. Are they lonely? To be the only truly conscious being in this twisted recreation of one’s home must weigh heavy, Ryusei realizes — and at the same time, the shade says,
“Emet-Selch is not a man to bear his burdens lightly. In fact, I imagine they have only grown heavier with every passing century. ’Tis truly a terrible weight he has chosen to carry.”
Ryusei grimaces and looked away.
“Ryusei Egashira?”
He looks over to the clerk’s desk. The shade standing there, playing its part as they all do, is gazing right at him.
“It seems your turn has come,” Ryusei’s chatty companion says. “Pray do not let me keep you.”
He gets to his feet and makes the perilous dive from the enormous bench to the floor, and starts the long walk toward the clerk’s desk.
“…Ah, there was one last thing,” the shade calls after him. “You walk with another at your side, yes?”
Ryusei stops. Beside him, Ardbert’s shoulders tense. “You–”
“Nay, I see no definite form,” the shade continues, “just the faintest suggestion of a second soul. I doubt it visible to anyone but me. Otherwise, I assume only you can see and hear this ethereal companion?”
Ryusei nods. “Do you want to stay and chat with them some more?” He smirks at Ardbert. “I’d not begrudge you.”
“Oh, piss off,” Ardbert huffs.
The shade lifts a hand to their mouth and… are they giggling? Is that what that strange, ethereal sound is? “Your connection is hardly a coincidence. In our time, the two of you were one ─ the color of your souls tells the tale. A hue that distinctive cannot be mistaken, no matter how thin the soul is spread.”
Ryusei just stares. “He and I…?”
“The world was sundered, as was every life on it,” Ardbert mutters. “If that’s the case, then… I never thought of it like that before.”
“Hah!” the shade laughs. “This is just the kind of fate I might expect for one such as he. Surely Emet-Selch has recognized the hint of him in you?”
“You’re saying Emet-Selch knew the person I was?” Ryusei demands. “The person who bore my— our soul in that distant past?”
“Ryusei Egashira?” the clerk calls again. He glances over to them.
“Fare you well, my new old friend,” the shade at the bench says. “May you find what it is you seek.”
“Wait a second—” But when Ryusei turns back toward them, they’re gone.
This time, the clerk’s voice sounds almost impatient. “Ryusei Egashira?”
Ardbert sighs. “Let’s not keep that bastard waiting.”
It would be nice to say the conversation weighs heavily on him, but he scarcely has time to think about it. Not when Emet-Selch insists on sending Ryusei and the other Scions through his painstaking recreation of Amaurot’s final days.
Fire raining from the skies has a way of putting all else out of one’s mind.
And there, at the end of the world, awaits Emet-Selch.
When the other Scions are down for the count and the Light becomes too much to bear, Ardbert offers up his all. The Light bursts forth, blinding, and Ryusei finds he yet has the strength to stand.
“This world is not yours to end!” His voice and Ardbert’s are as one. “This is our future — our story!”
And the way Emet-Selch looks at him— “It can’t be…” His face sets, grim. “A trick of the light. You are a broken husk, nothing more. How can you hope to stand against me alone?”
“It ends this day.” Ryusei’s fists clench in determination. “One way or another, it ends.”
Emet-Selch scoffs. “Very well. Let us proceed to your final judgment. The victor shall write the tale, and the vanquished become its villain!”
Ryusei can feel Ardbert still within him, rolling his eyes at the Ascian’s theatrics even now.
“Let us cast aside titles and pretense, and reveal our true faces to one another!” Emet-Selch’s brand flashes over his face. A wave of darkness billows off of him. “I am Hades! He who shall awaken our brethren from their dark slumber!”
And even when Emet-Selch stands there in that great, horrific transformation, all Ryusei can do is stare up at him.
The Warrior of Light and Darkness both is victorious, as he always is. (The Crystal Exarch’s summoning spell doesn’t hurt.) And when Hades’ transformation fades away and he collapses to the ground, Ryusei marches up to him and grabs him by the wrist.
“What… what do you think you are doing, hero?” Hades scoffs. “Yes, you are the hero of this tale, and I, the deposed villain soon to fade—”
“Shut up.” Ryusei pushes up the sleeve of Hades’ robe, and there it is, plain as day. The script is unfamiliar, but the Echo bridges the gap. Hythlodaeus, reads one of the names. Egashira Ryusei, the other.
Hades lets out a strangled noise of some sort. He looks away. “…remember,” he says after a long moment. “Remember us. Remember that we once lived.”
Ryusei tries to snort derisively. He can’t quite manage it. “How could I ever forget?”
Hades seems satisfied with that. His eyes flutter closed and he relinquishes his hold on his corporeal aether. He goes to dust.
And so does his name.
The Scions are eager to return to the surface, but Ryusei insists that they get some rest first.
In truth, he has an ulterior motive. There’s someone he has to see first.
“Ah, my new old friend.” The self-aware shade is there once more at the Bureau of the Secretariat, just as Ryusei had hoped they might be. “I am glad to see you well.”
“Even if it means Emet-Selch is gone?”
The shade hums thoughtfully. “I am not so glad of that, no. But there was only ever one way this would end.” They look up at the distant ceiling. “There is naught left for me but to wait for his enchantment to disperse.”
“Hythlodaeus.”
They look back down at him.
“You didn’t forget, did you?” says Ryusei. “Why would you say you did?”
“You had more important things to worry about. Knowing my name would only have been a distraction.”
“His name vanished once he died.” Ryusei looks down at his arm. “Why does yours yet remain? If you’re just a shade–”
“I expect that the true Hythlodaeus yet lives,” the shade muses. “Knowing the sort of person I once was, I’m sure I was among those who helped to bring forth Zodiark.”
Ryusei looks down at the vast marble floor. There was only ever one way that was going to end, too. He is, after all, the Warrior of Light, the great weapon of Eorzea, slaughtering all who stand in his path.
He stays until the others come looking for him. He turns his head in the direction of their calling voices. When he looks again, Hythlodaeus is gone once more.