[PP-PT-F01] Forsaken Penance

[Mari 1]

Day had set well into the night; and rain poured from the heavens above - pelting a barely conscious Mari as she lay sprawled out amidst the mud and debris in front of the cemetery. She had tried...lords she had tried. It took years to get to this point. Mari thought she had been prepared. Mari thought she had everything she'd need to truly attempt to take it on. But she was so sorely mistaken. It's mitigation too high - her energy too low. Maybe...she should have rested more beforehand? No...she'd not be able to sleep properly knowing this was looming on the horizon. Even if she had, the outcome would have been the same. With her current build...her current skill set...even with all her upgraded armor, her levels...Mari was still one of the strongest in all of Aincrad... she still failed. So why?

It was impossible...

Mari should have known. There was a reason why there were no known accounts of people successfully completing redemption. It wasn't made to redeem anyone. It was made to kill. It was made to completely annihilate any with an orange cursor who dared to tread the path of penance. It forsook them. Dangled hope in front of them, only to cut the cancer out. If Mari continued...she knew she would have died. In the past Mari would have accepted such a fate - her name would finally join all the others that she had written upon that monument. Fitting. But she couldn't. She had too much to live for now.

At first, its hits didn't strike hard, she'd hurt herself more against its armor than its weak attack, but that was just to lull her into a sense of false security, its attacks growing more and more violent as the battle progressed. Its health bar barely dwindled even after her strongest attacks. The burning venom of her weapon did nothing to it.

A slight ringing in her ears, from messages going unanswered. From who, she was not sure. Mari had many contingencies in place - and it had been an entire day since she initially messaged people to let them know what she was doing. It was only natural people would worry. Right? Blurriness tinged the edges of Mari's vision as she struggled to lift her head up from the ground. Her entire body ached. A dull thrum of pain that dragged across her nervous system and set deep in her bones. Mari lifted a hand to open up her messaging system before it fell to the floor. Darkness took over her vision as the exhausted woman passed out.

There she lie, face down in the mud. The angry souls of the lives Mari took, high up in heaven pelting her in an unrelenting downpour. Each drop adding to the ruthless and stinging chill that set deeper and deeper into her tiny form.



Redemption, was no longer in the cards for Mari.
 

Edited 14 hours ago by Mari