quests

Create laughter at someone’s expense, yet again. 

Volund had squinted at the mask, with its creepy wide grin and had blown out a breath along with a mutter of — “Are you some sort of deity of pranks? Is that it?” before he had shuffled off with a shudder down his spine. 

He isn’t one to create laughter, to create any sort of joy in others. He barely experiences the feeling himself. Lately, all he's felt is the itch and burn along exposed bones, and a bubbling age-old hatred down in his gut that fuels him. That, and the chase of greed as he gets closer and closer to what he wants, to what he craves. The Corruption has crawled in deep to his being, lodging against sinew and veins, pumping through him and feeding off of the ever present heat. 

Even now, as Vol walks, he leaves behind heavy steps of smoldering fire that dissipates when he's far enough, extinguished by the snowfall. 

Out here, there's no one to make laugh, not yet. But the backdrop of the winter feels nice against what skin he has left that isn't smoldering. Even now, he tries to tuck a cloak more around himself; not for warmth, but to hide his face. He's nothing but a broken man walking by the looks of it, being eaten alive by magic. To him, however, it's what he's wanted the most. It's the steps to becoming a Lich, to becoming a powerful being that had lorded over his homelands. Even now, he can remember the old stories of a skeletal thin figure with ichor dripping from their teeth. The blank eyes and broken wings, and the power to control the dead. They had been something of a horror story to some, but to Vol when he was a child? It was something of a goal. If he could become that and go back home, he could rule over everything, and keep his family under his heel, where they had so lovingly left him until he had ripped away at long last.

The titan makes his way toward the small town, peering through broken alleys to see people wandering in clusters, huddled in the cold and speaking to one another. There aren't many here that he can find, but as he makes his way toward the markets, it opens up. There are plenty of people milling about, speaking to traders and pointing out what they want, bartering. Lots of coin and gold, even jewels. Everything he's ever dreamed of owning himself sits before him, and if he weren't so hellbent on power, perhaps this would be the next place he would be. To take all this gold and add it to a hoard, but perhaps that's also a sense of power.

His lips thin, as much as they can cross his teeth, until they reach nothing, where part of his face is exposed. The bone steams in the winter's day, and he narrows his only eye as he looks at someone. Gaze falls to the patch of ice nearby, and he ponders a moment. If he can manage it, he's certain he can at least make someone slip on it, then perhaps there will be plenty of laughter. 

Should they not fall, though? Worry suddenly eats at him. If they don't fall, if he can't complete this quest, than it's squandered, isn't it? So far, he's sacrificed his dignity for this shit, stooping to play pranks. Then again, Fortune had been rather kind to him, taking even his Pact. Though he's being eaten alive by magic, he's immortal. The constant pain is nothing compared to the past where he had fallen under his father's blows repeatedly, each one different, none in the same area within a few days of each other. Always fresh wounds, never old ones. 

A breath is taken, and Vol tries to ease the panic that had reared in his mind. No. This isn't the same. Fortune wouldn't punish him for a minor failure. He would be more fucking pissed off at himself than anything else, he knows. Failure meant no power, meant no reward. He would get nothing, and that enough is what drives him forward enough to step towards someone. They skitter around him, casting a glance of fear over their shoulder at what they had seen, but it works. Their feet hit the ice, and suddenly bags fly up in the air with a yelp of shock. Their wares and purchases scatter all over the snow, and while some people look horrified, others do laugh. 

"There, Fortune. Take your laughs." A mumble under his breath, and he makes his way down an alley instead, feeling the hiss of heat and spread of it over his leg. The pain is enough to make him take a break, and all he does is reach down, fingers touching his thigh and finding --- missing flesh. Ah, so there it is. More power.

"Soon..." he breathes, his head leaning back a little to cast a glance at the sky with a low rumble of a laugh. "Soon."