Timestamp: Summer, 501 AV
Location: The Aperture
Purpose: Initiation into Monkhood - The Final Test
Location: The Aperture
Purpose: Initiation into Monkhood - The Final Test
He knelt naked on the stone alter, quietly praying, until it was time. Lynk would come and get him, for certain, so Shade worked on quieting his mind as his patron had taught him. The life he chose was going to be a violent one, and in all truth that would be a slightly difficult path for Shadekas to travel. Oh, he knew how to fight and didn't mind a good brawl, but deep inside himself, Shade nurtured a quietness and a piousness that was almost out of place in Nyka - or so he thought.
A bell passed.
Monks where thugs. Their violence was explosive. But when Lynk had found Shade, he'd recognized something of the same qualities in the boy as the boy himself recognized in Lynk. There was a deep abiding inner passion that rose to a fever pitch only in the presence of their work. An altercation on the street couldn't get Shade's heart racing faster than the most perfect cut of a gemstone. It only took one absolutely and utterly flawless trim to draw out a deep abiding inner beauty that was blinding to the monks Shade worked with. Lynk had named his place for the passion that blinded him at times. Shade understood it, even if others else rarely did.
Two more bells passed.
In fact, it was on Xannos and the deep heavily included gemstones that Shades' mind turned too when he wanted to feel inner stillness in order to succeed in a world that routinely turned violent. He visualized the biggest gemstone he could. The type would change depending upon what the situation and what stone properties he needed to attune too. Then he'd visualize himself entering the stone, becoming one with it, exploring its inclusions and becoming of its same material. His meditations grew even deeper than that that for when he was truly on his mark, he'd quiet himself for hours and simply study a gemstone as if to learn its properties, crafting a physical representation of it only in his mind. He knew the stone's song, its texture, what its scuff looked like and even some of its secret powers. He was the stone. He was the absolute epitome of what rock was. He'd need to be, to survive his final test.
Another bell passed.
So as Shade waited for Lynk to fetch him the young man didn't worry about not being violent enough to survive the monkhood. He did not worry about death in the Aperture. Death would come in Nyka anyhow. Today, tomorrow, a hundred tomorrows after. No one grew old here. It was beneath him to even consider it. He instead focused on being a combination of marble and granite mixed with gypson and bedrock. If he assumed Semele's properties with Xannos' design in order to integrate himself into a likeness that crafted him as the same stuff of the Aperture, he might very well survive. His mindset was that if he was like it enough, he'd be indistinguishable to it.
Two more bells passed.
Lynk had warned him. There would be a test of mind, body, and soul within its depths. The test would come in many forms, for each it revealed itself differently. There was no telling what his test would be. It was going to be what it was and Shade understood that. So he knelt, praying, preparing, meditating knowing that he would survive or he would not, but regardless he wanted to be ready.
The door opened.
Lynk approached, a white robe draped over his arm. He walked up to Shade and slide the garment over his body. Shade rose to his feet and adjusted the fall of the robe before turning to Lynk. Then, pulling out a canteen Lynk had tucked under his arm he offered it to Shade who slung it over his head and placed one arm through its strap so it crossed his chest and hung out of the way at his hip.
"Are you ready?" Lynk asked, looking thoughtful.
Shade nodded. "Readiness has yet to be seen, but I am willing to make my attempt. I know the timing is right. I am of the stone, part of Semele's body with Xannos' design. I am nothing if not eager to walk within Her today." Shade commented, his voice slightly dry and he and his mentor exited the building and headed towards the rope ladder that would be lowered soon enough. Others would be there as well. But Shade's fight would be with himself and there'd be no one to watch his back or to fight by his side. In this he was alone. His test. His trial. The two mens walked side by side, headed towards the Aperture, one a Monk and one on the cusp of finding out if he indeed had what it took to be one as well.
