We're Both Misunderstood

In the face of myself from 400 years ago, I couldn't think of one of my accomplishments... but I had more questions that I wanted to fire off instead.

"I saved my friends from a man who tried to enslave us and kill us... I battled off all Seven White Stones, I fought off The Deity, I killed Providence, I stopped Quake with Avie, and I-" He cut me off with a surprised look, staring at me with a newfound curiosity.

"Avie is alive?! Oh, thank goodness! What of Umbra and Hikari?" He asked next. His intimidating tone was eliminated upon the mention of them.

"Uh well... Umbra is alive as well, but I'm not too certain about Hikari… but hey, you said that this place belonged to you... yet this is where The First Trial was. Now, why did Illya have to go ask Eirikr for it if it was yours all along?" I asked myself.

"Hm... I see, absolutely nothing. Well, that's because I was not to be woken up unless it was to house a place to train you. Eirikr and I are good buddies, after all," He told me. My jaw practically dropped there, and I couldn't help but have a dumbfounded stare.

"Y-You are...? Then, your power matches his, I assume? What am I missing...?" I asked him. I wanted to know so badly, maybe this was the secret to beating Quake!

"What are you missing...? Simple, you just aren't me," He shortly said.

"Um... okay... so how do I be you? I thought I would've been pretty close," I admitted to myself.

"You still hide from Wrath. You haven't embraced it yet, and you are very weak-minded. You still cannot possess my ability to summon this world at your will and control it to your will. You've only killed Providence because Mom weakened her, and you saved your friends from Orion's grasp because Illya interfered. Have you done anything on your own?" He asked me. I was stuck again, trying to think of a way to respond.

"Well... I... uh... I stopped my friend from succumbing to some weird entity. I don't assume you know him, do you? Or, don't tell me, he's in my head too?" I got an attitude with myself, and he reacted in a joyful way.

"Hahaha! Oh, that's too good! I like that, a lot. Hey, tell me, did you forget that I'm not in your head? You do know that you have come to me, not the other way around, right? Lost in your own memories, you found me. A part of yourself you locked away. You refuse to remember, not because you're not curious, but because you're not scared. What's so scary, anyway?" He asked me.

"Learning about myself... learning about the things you did, over the things I did. I'd hate to see myself have been a monster in my previous life... so... I never wanted to learn. I wanted to be my own person, powerful enough on my own," I confessed.

"Ah, but you use all of those abilities, shut out all of the truth... and yet, you still aren't strong enough. So, what the hell, man? Where are you going to get your strength from? A cereal box? Do you want to know about me? Go ahead, ask me," He held out his hands, welcoming an onslaught of questions.

"Okay... is it true you killed children when you saw it necessary? You killed Cole's sister, didn't you? You killed children who got in your way... you killed anybody who got in your way... you've always been a bad person, yearning for death. Is everything the people say about us true?" I asked him.

Without hesitation, he nodded his head.

"Yes. Every last ounce of it. I mercilessly slaughtered Cole's sister. She poisoned his bloodline, but his compassion was far too much for the future to continue. I killed a lot of people, probably about two billion both directly and indirectly. I don't feel bad for them, and I don't regret what I did, because, in the grand scheme of things, it saved everybody's lives, including mine. So, what do you think? Are you happy with what you've learned? Does that give you peace?" He asked me.

"Peace... to hear you're that violent? Tell me, why the hell would that give me peace?!" I shouted out to him. He shrugged. He was emotionally distant... not experiencing any emotion besides happiness.

"Let's see... you raided that place with that person who just wanted a peaceful life, you destroyed another person's rule over all people, you killed an innocent kid's Mom, and you pushed out a faction that just wanted sanctuary... doesn't that sound bad to you too?" He asked. I quickly shot back.

"No! You're taking nothing I said and explaining it right! I told you what actually happened was-" I was interrupted by his hand being raised. When he moved his hand, water blew away in a large radius around us, as if he did it super fast... but I could track his movements, perfectly, as if he was moving in slow motion.

"I took nothing you've said and explained it all wrong, you said? Do you think that I was immune to the same thing, at the time? I killed two billion people, but I saved the rest of humanity for all of Earth's existence. I killed Cole's young sister and saved both his father and his mother. I killed, and killed, and killed, but nobody talks about all that I've done that was good. I saved my friends, made sure they could live their own lives, out of Eirikr's line of sight, and I brought humanity salvation and fixed their mistakes, right up until my very death. You don't hear about that, do you?" He asked me next. I was baffled... sitting down at this point while looking up at the older version of me.

"We're... both... misunderstood...?" I mumbled, and he nodded. He lifted the ground that I was sitting on upward so that I met his eye line.