There is no Light without Darkness. Good cannot exist without Evil, as there must be a basis for comparison. It is foolish to believe otherwise, as it is likewise foolish to believe that one can ever destroy the other. The struggle between Good and Evil does exist, but this struggle exists solely to provide balance in the world.
If the balance is upset, the world would essentially be devastated. If Good ever completely prevailed, the world would become a pristine and perfectly ordered society where there was no deviation at all. If Evil prevailed, the world would be plunged into dark chaos.
The Lord of Nightmares is Chaos incarnate, and everything she touches reflects this. L-sama frowns upon the predictable, and her favored children are those who revel in the divergent.
Such a one is Lina Inverse.
Lina-chan is unpredictable, her behavior erratic and random. She does what she pleases, never falling into the trap of expected behavior. Lina is akin to L-sama in that wherever she goes, she leaves chaos behind her; a trail of destruction and legends.
And she's so gosh-darn kawaii, ne?
I'm being serious here. Not only is she kawaii, but she's downright beautiful, you know. I'm sure right about now someone out there is shaking their head and saying, "But what about her total lack of feminine qualities? Like BREASTS?" For shame!! Wags the no-no finger Is that ALL you people can think about? Physical endowment? To be blunt, Lina is a trifle, shall we say, underdeveloped? But so what! Her other features more than make up for it! Her cute little nose, her large expressive eyes, her fiery hair. Her hair is especially nice, like flames that will not burn you if you dare to run your fingers through them. Ah, how many times have I longed to do just that? Countless, I'm sure. But I digress.
Ahem.
What was I talking about again? Oh yes! Lina-chan! (My second favorite subject. What's the first, you ask? That is a secret!) I was blithering on about how Lina is extremely desirable, yes? Mmm. She's so tiny, you know, very thin and delicate looking almost. Like gold; you can beat it so airy thin and yet it will not break. Make you wonder if Lina would break if you were to say, lead her to a giant bed one night, with crimson silk sheets and lots of candles...
Seduction is an art. The challenge of wearing down another's will, the carefully orchestrated manipulation. The temptation, the baiting, the teasing, the charming and bewitching.
Evil is better suited to seduction than Good.
Evil can be seductive because it is lacking in morals and thus has no compunctions about using trickery and bribes. Good, on the other hand, must rely on the truth, and very often people would rather believe an attractive lie than an ugly truth.
Seduction is evil. When's the last time you heard of a life of piety 'seducing' someone? The word seduction itself has some rather negative connotations, conjuring images of infidelity and dark mysterious figures. And yet, these images still intrigue and interest. There is something undeniably alluring in the idea of totally surrendering one's will to another person; of letting them do whatever they please with your body. It's part of the lure of the dark side, that potential for less-than-good that lurks within every human soul. Evil has it's own sexual, bewitching pull, and a powerful one at that. Human beings take a sort of naughty pleasure in doing things they know they should not do. Somehow, the idea of doing things that are not entirely right and good adds to their excitement. Hence why Evil is seductive, and seduction is evil.
As for the seducer..? The reward for all the effort put into this skillful dance of wills is the climactic moment when one feels the victim's resistance dissolve completely, and they belong to you in every sense of the word.
Mmm. Satisfying indeed.
Soft candlelight flickered, casting dancing shadows on the wall. The air was warm and heavy, scented with cigarettes and fur. In the ethereal glow the candles provided, two figures faced each other and sipped red wine from silver goblets.
"You intend to go through with it," purred the one. It was not exactly a question.
"Yes," replied the other. His eyes glowed amethyst in the dim light, shining with some inner glee. His mouth was hooked up at the corners in a lazy smile. "I think the distraction would prove quite... amusing, don't you agree Mistress?"
She nodded, her blonde locks tumbling about her face. "Of course. But you must tell me, is amusement the sole reason for your course of action?" She waited in silence as her minion bowed his head, obscuring his eyes with his bangs. She could still see that he was smiling, however.
"Yes, my mistress. I do this for my own amusement."
"And satisfaction, no doubt," the stately woman retorted, blowing a jet of blue cigarette smoke into the air. Her most powerful servant smiled a little wider.
"Perhaps," he said. "After all, it has been a while..." His mistress waved him off.
"I don't need to hear the details, Xelloss," she told him. The trickster nodded, still grinning. "Go on now, go play your little games. But be careful; hell hath no fury like a woman scorned and all that."
Xelloss bowed, then exited the musty room quietly. In his absence, Beastmaster Xelas Mettalium sat in her overstuffed chair, smoking thoughtfully. Could there be more to her little creation's plot than mere amusement and sexual gratification? Some hidden motive, perhaps? Could Xelloss actually care for the girl?
Beastmaster laughed. Yeah, right.
Long ago, before mortals tread the earth, there existed a lake of water so clear it was as liquid crystal. This lake was eternally surrounded by a lush forest, and at its south end there was a towering waterfall, where sparkling droplets of moisture would glisten on jutting rocks like small precious jewels. No living creature lived in the lake, and none ever ventured from the forest to drink from it."
"Why not?" Amelia Wil Tesla Sailoon asked curiously. Lina Inverse regarded her solemnly.
"The water was poison," came the reply. "Any living thing that drank it would die instantly."
"How horrible!" Amelia cried. Lina motioned for her to remain quiet.
"The lake's water was also said to possess great magical powers... if one knew how to unlock them. See, the problem was that nobody seemed to know the secret to unleashing its power, so people just kept dying in their attempts. They'd try ancient words of power, spells, lost books of lore. Nothing worked.
They would say their words or whatever, drink the water, and fall over lifeless."
At this point in the tale Zelgadis Greywers looked up from the fire. "Except once," he said.
"I was just getting to that part!" Lina told him irritably. Zel rolled his eyes. "Like I was ABOUT to say," Lina continued, casting the chimera an angry glare. "There was one exception. It is said that a great sorcerer came to the lake and called upon its spirits. He made some sort of deal with them; what is was is not clear. The end result was that he was able to drink the water, and by doing so gained immense magical power. He could control pretty much anything he wanted, and so landed himself a great castle where he lived for a number of years. From there he passed into the mists of legend."
"Wow! Where is this lake, Lina? Hmmm?" Naga was all but drooling at the idea of being able to possess intense magic and all the treasure and booze she could ever want.
Lina (who was also inwardly drooling) shrugged. "That's the thing. Nobody knows anymore. But," she added, tipping her companions a wink. "I think we may have a chance of finding it. This afternoon, while we were passing through that small village, I talked to an old man. He said that years and years ago, his great-grandfather accidentally stumbled upon the lake. He didn't drink any water, because he realized what it was. Anyway, the old man didn't know where the lake is exactly, because his great-grandfather never told anyone for fear of them poisoning themselves, but he DOES know that it exists to the North, not far from the Mountains of Dakmorgan."
"But Lina-san," Amelia interrupted. "We don't know the secret! We'll be poisoned!"
"Amelia, would you just relax? If some old sorcerer can strike a deal with lake spirits then I'm sure a great sorceress like myself can do it as well! I know what I'm talking about, ok?"
"But Lina-san," Amelia whined.
"Whoever here has defeated Shanbranigdo, raise your hand," she said. She held her own aloft, smiling. After a second of confusion, Gourry raised his hand as well. "Put your hand down, stupid!" Lina yelled.
"Ne, Lina," Gourry said in his typical perplexed fashion. "I MIGHT have defeated Shabbydingle. I don't really remember what he looked like or anything. Was he tall?"
Lina fell over, while Xelloss laughed merrily. "No Gourry," Xelloss told him. "Shabbydingle was a very short man with lots of moles."
Gourry thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. "Nope. Don't remember. I guess I didn't defeat him after all. You were right Lina! Gee, what were you doing fighting a short guy with moles?"
Xelloss continued to laugh until Lina choked off his air supply. When he had reached a satisfactory shade of purple (it matched his hair pretty nicely) Lina let go of his windpipe and turned to Gourry. "Gourry, it's Shabranigdo, not Shabbydingle! And he is NOT a short guy with moles, he's the Dark Lord of the Mazoku race!"
"Big red thing, looked kinda like a crab," Zelgadis prompted, and Gourry smacked a fist into his palm.
"Right! I remember!" He thought over it a minute longer, then looked at Xelloss. "Gee, isn't he your boss or something?"
"Or something," Xelloss agreed, smiling.
"Won't he be mad that you told us about his mole problem?"
Lina thought she might cry.
"So are we going to find this lake or what?" Naga asked excitedly. Lina nodded.
"We're going to try," she said. Zelgadis nodded.
"Good," he said. "Then we'll head towards the Mountains of Dakmorgan tomorrow, and take our chances with the water."
Amelia didn't look very convinced. "But the poison," she said in a small voice. "Zelgadis-kun, what if you drink it and you die?"
Zelgadis waved it off. "Then I die. But like Lina said, what's been done once can be done again. I can't pass up a chance like this."
Is a cure really worth dying for, Amelia was about to ask, but Naga interrupted her. "Right! And that was just ONE sorcerer! And he didn't have the fortune to be with Naga the White Serpent! Ohohohoho! Just let that water try to poison me!"
"We can dream," Zelgadis muttered. Xelloss giggled.
"We'd better get some sleep then," Gourry cautioned. "We'll want to get up early." He was really quite pleased that they were on an adventure again, since just wandering around aimlessly got very boring after a while. Absently, he wondered what he would do in a few years when he wasn't quite so young anymore. Maybe he would settle down... but what about Lina? Well, maybe she could stay with him...
And so, smiling happily (if a trifle dumbly) Gourry Gabriev, Swordsman of Light, rolled over on his side and went to sleep.
The campfire dwindled to embers, it's warmth and blazing light dwarfed by the chill of the night. Stars twinkled humorlessly in the sky, caring not at all for the troubles of the world below them. Cold and uncaring, they watched indifferently as kingdoms rose and fell and people lived, fought, and died in a never-ending cycle.
The figures laying near the dying campfire were motionless, their breath coming slowly and at regular intervals. Every once in a while a snore would break the silence, but other than that everything was still. Xelloss Mettalium watched the sleeping forms with hooded eyes, smiling. The Mountains of Dakmorgan... and beyond that the lake whose ancient name was forgotten.
Well, almost forgotten. Xelloss knew it was once aptly termed the Crone's Looking Glass, named after the dark goddess who was reputed to have spilled her blood there, creating a pool of deadly poison. If only they knew...
But of course, they never would. It was a secret.
Zelgadis Greywers was, to put in simply, a jerk. A little known fact, that. Zelgadis cared for one thing and one thing alone: finding a cure for his chimeric curse. Nothing else was really important to him. Sure he cared about his friends, Lina in particular, but if he had to he would abandon them for the chance to become human again. And yeah, he got lonely, more often than he would ever admit, but if he had to choose between love and a cure Zelgadis thought he would in all reality say "so long" to the lover in question. His quest was his life, and the idea that he could perhaps learn to live happily as a chimera had not once crossed his mind.
If this had been pointed out to him, Zelgadis would have most likely stared blankly for a second before angrily reiterating that such a notion was completely ridiculous and ludicrous, not to mention stupid. Likewise, any attempt to tell the boy that his obsessive search bore a rather striking resemblance to that of his late grandfather's would be met with open hostility and denial.
For some, an ugly truth is best ignored.
When Lina had mentioned the ancient lake, Zel had at first felt no interest. He knew the legends, and had long ago ruled out the possibility of any chance of finding the bloody place. But when the loudmouthed little sorceress had said she might know how to actually get there, well, that was entirely different. The day after receiving this little bit of information, Zel found himself feeling as he always did when setting out on a new lead; both excited and at the same time wary. He warned himself not to get his hopes up, but his hopes apparently didn't like listening to him. His hopes kept urging him to walk a little faster, to sleep a little less, and to skip a few meals in order to save time. These feelings caused Zel to have this mad desire to either run as fast as he could (which was very fast) or to quickly cast a Ray Wing spell in order to cover more distance in less time.
They also made him extremely impatient and irritable at any delays.
Too bad for Amelia, whose middle name seemed to be delay.
The young, vivacious princess of course had her soul afire with the spirit of justice, and so whenever she felt that the structure of law and order was threatened, she would leap into action. And since Amelia was hardly the most graceful person alive, these leaps of action frequently resulted in injury. And of course, the injuries resulted in a flood of tears and high pitched wailing, accompanied by sniffles and then a triumphant shout as the girl prepared to try it again. And again. And again.
After Amelia had stopped several times to attempt to restore justice to an unjust world (meaning that she butt in where she wasn't needed or wanted and succeeded in thoroughly confusing several peasants along the length of the road) and had also stopped several times to cry after tripping over her own feet and landing on her face, Zelgadis began to get a little, well, a little irked.
"You idiot! Would you do us all a favor and just shut up and walk for a change?"
Amelia stood where she was, her eyes beginning to well up with tears. Mr. Zelgadis had just yelled at her! What was a young, love-struck girl to do when the object of her affection yelled at her? The answer seemed fairly obvious to Amelia.
Said young, love-struck girl was to bawl her eyes out.
Zelgadis made an irritated noise and kept on walking, his head lowered. Good grief that girl was a nuisance! Naga, meanwhile, did her best to play the part of big sister and get Amelia to stop crying. Naga's tactic consisted of mostly insults towards Zelgadis and ear-piercing cackles. While this did nothing to staunch Amelia's flow of tears, it did cause the renowned sorceress Lina Inverse to become very, very cranky.
"Zelgadis!" she yelled, catching up to the irate chimera. "You big dumb jerk! Now you got her crying again!"
"It's not MY fault - " he began, but Lina cut him off with a sharp blow to the head.
"Not your fault my ASS!" she screeched. "Granted Amelia can be annoying as hell, but that's no reason to make her cry! Now march your stony butt over there and apologize this instant."
Zel started to protest, but Lina gave him the Look of Death, so he headed over to Amelia, muttering curses under his breath. "Amelia," he said, extremely uncomfortable and pissed off. "I'm... sorry I yelled at you. There. So will you please stop crying?"
Amelia smiled brightly, all trace of tears gone. "Sure!" she chirped. "No problem!"
Zel thought he personally might just have an aneurysm.
Nightfall brought another town, and with it, an inn. Soft, warm beds. Hot, fresh food. Big, drunken thugs.
Big drunken thugs?
The inn's dining area of course had a bar, where a group of raucous, brawny men were celebrating the impending wedding (some might say impending doom) of one of their colleagues. Ale and sake flowed like water, and slurred singing resounded throughout the air. Lina and Gourry were far too occupied with cramming dinner into their gullets to notice the atmosphere much, while Zelgadis just sat and sipped coffee in surly silence. Amelia decided to eat her dinner quietly, since noise wasn't really a violation of justice and besides, those drunk men looked pretty big; and Xelloss just sat at the table and smiled. Naga had a more exciting course of action.
If there was one thing Naga loved more than a good hot spring, it was a decent bottle of sake. Hell, any kind of liquor would do. So when she spied a group of guys who were so tanked they could hardly see, she decided that they wouldn't mind sharing with a great and beautiful sorceress like herself. Naga bellied her way up to bar, and in no time flat she was singing along in a besotted voice.
Eventually Lina felt her eyelids drooping. She yawned, then rose from the table. "I'm going to bed," she told all assembled. "Amelia? If Naga passes out, make sure she doesn't swallow her tongue." Amelia nodded, and Lina headed up the stairs.
"Goodnight Lina," Gourry called after her. Lina waved in response. At the other end of the table, Xelloss smirked. He leaned back in his chair, tilting it into the shadows, melding with the darkness, and when the chair fell forward again with a clatter, he was gone.
Only Zelgadis noticed, and his brow creased in a frown. Where had the filthy Mazoku run off to now?