EVE'S HEART

[aprettygirl]

A dark veil slips over you, obscuring your vision; it’s cool and clinging, and blocks out all outside sensation. You drift downward . . . as you do, you grow more and more aware of the pulse of your own heartbeat, until it’s a ringing, unpleasant throb in your ears.

. . . after some time, it’s interrupted by a soft splash, and you feel solid rock underfoot.

((Please join #fleshbloodbone. All your character’s skills are on and uncapped; they will also have access to any items they carry normally!))

Comments

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

And there's no way to change the system or anything?

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"We're...trying. It's not very..."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

Not an easy thing to do, yeah... Still, seems weird that it even wound up getting set up like that in the first place? Usually those kinds of things don't really last too long.

[Since... you know, eventually the one person that runs everything dies and then everything collapses.]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"This one has lasted nine hundred years."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

nine hundred years and there's still no sign of finding another way of doing things, huh...?

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"It's complicated. The Empress cannot simply die."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

But the Empress can't do everything. That just doesn't work.

[That's just asking for a breakdown. Trust me, I'm very knowledgeable about breakdowns.]

Still, 900 years is a long time...

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"What do you think she should do?"

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

Well, in the first place, isn't the problem that she's taking too much work, so she doesn't have time for anything else?

A leader doesn't have to be doing everything, just be able to keep track of things and know where to bring people so that they can get the job done. If the leader's doing everything for them, then people just get worse.

[Delegation is important, but I don't quite know the word for that...]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"And how would you introduce that concept to a people who might not be ready to accept it...?"

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

Slowly, but there's a lot of time, isn't there? But, let's see...

The first thing is that she needs people she can count on, because if she could count on them, she wouldn't have to do everything herself in the first place... The next step would be giving them the authority to be able to do their jobs in public. Like, aren't there ministers of stuff, so like you would have someone who's the minister of education whose job is to make sure people are being educated and stuff?

[It's the first example that came into my head, okay?]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"There are ministers and nobles, yes."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

Then shouldn't they be doing their jobs? Or does she still have to do everything even with them doing their jobs?

[I'm sorry, I know nothing about ruling or management.]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"Mm, I think I'm explaining this badly. Perhaps a memory would help."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

If you think it would help...?

[As it is, we're kind of not going anywhere, are we?]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

Something white is offered to you: a pale mask that gleams in the moonlight, made of something hard and polished.

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

...Is that the thing that's been brushing past me all the time?

[Well whatever, if it's being offered, I'll touch it, I guess?]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"No...that was me."

You gain the memory of a conversation with a red-haired girl in a hospital bed (Read from this page until page 4 of the next chapter.)

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

[...Do you want my opinion on this? Do you really want my opinion on this?]

That's... so stupid. That's not coexistence, you even said so yourself. That's just turning people into things on both sides.

[It's probably a good thing that I don't know that the antagonist in my series's goal was to make a 'paradise where everyone is happy', or I might have even stronger objections.]

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

She's silent; possibly because she has already stated that her opinion on it matches yours.

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

Then, with that kind of situation... Nothing's going to get better while the empress is around, but things will get even worse if the empress leaves?

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"War and destabilization, at this point."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

[...You really worked yourself into a hole, didn't you? How am I supposed to figure out a way out...]

No matter how you look at it, the basic rule behind it all has to go, but...

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[aprettygirl]

"Mmm . . . it's a tangle."

Re: blood (by nightlight)

[mirroredvalue]

[...You know I can't think of any way to fix that either. I really hope you're not expecting me to have some sort of revelation there.

I mean, I'll try anyways, but...]

Nnn....