Character Practice - Animator vs. Animation

Magic and Fantasy (1.5)

The Second Coming slid down a banister and smashed into a suit of armor that was decorating the lobby, knocking it over. It didn't really give him any feelings of pain.

"The Second Coming!!"

A yelp sounded from the top of the staircase. The purple person was staring in horror at the mess Second had made and quickly ran down the stairs to clean it up, making sure he was alright.

Second missed Victim. Victim was the one who would normally spend time with him, but he and The Chosen One had gone elsewhere, and Victim had left Purple to hang out with him instead.

Purple was boring and uninteresting. He wouldn't play with him, and he couldn't answer any of Second's questions about Second's purpose or even Alan. Nor did he talk much otherwise. The only interesting thing he would talk about was where he had come from. Some place called the 'Lagh-Selected' or something. Yet Purple still didn't seem to want to talk about that much either.

"The Second Coming, you need to be more careful," the violet figure chided and it was setting the armor stand back up. "You could've broken something!"

"Don't you know that you can call me 'Second'? Or did you not know that either?"

"I did know that! Er, with all due respect. It just... feels odd. Do you... want me to call you 'Second' instead?"

"Sure, I guess," he responded flatly and distantly while Purple was still cleaning up the mess.

Then Second got an idea. Why not just go find Victim? If he found him, then Purple wouldn't need to keep him company anymore.

"I'm going now. Goodbye, Purple."

Purple was almost done fixing the armor set, just trying to carefully balance the heavy helmet on its shoulders now, when he realized that Second was leaving.

"Wait- Second! You're supposed to stay with me-" Purple seemed to forget that it was still unbalanced when he turned sharply to look at Second, because it made the whole stand tilt until it fell over onto him.




Walking down various familiar halls, Second called for Victim at the top of his lungs. Eventually, his stomach growled, so he decided to take a break from his search to go to the kitchen. Or, he would've, had he not heard voices disrupt the usual quiet of the place just then.

Voices coming from behind a pair of giant double doors that he hadn't been to before.

He gave the doors a pull, trying to open them like any other door, but they didn't budge. Blinking in surprise, he tried pushing them, like some doors needed. When that didn't work either, he pulled as hard as he could, frowning in frustration when that failed too.

Then he remembered one of the lessons that Victim had taught him over the past couple of days.

"Always knock before opening a door," Victim had said. So Second did so.

The voices seemed to hear his knock, as they grew a questioning undertone. And after a moment, the doors opened.

Second waltzed into the room adorned with axes and swords with a feeling of satisfaction, before he realized that neither of the voices were Victim's. The voices just belonged to the people whose job it was to clean up around this place.

They seemed surprised to see Second too.

"Do you know where Victim is?" He asked them.

The two shared a blank look for some reason, before replying back to him. "Yes. He's down here. Where's the ambassador? Wasn't he supposed to be keeping an eye on you, sir?"

He didn't know what an 'ambassador' was, but he figured they were referring to Purple.

"Yes, but I didn't really like him so I came to find Victim."

The two shared another look, before shrugging.

"Yes sir. Cleric Victim is down that staircase right ther-" The cleaning person got cut off by a loud boom, coupled with the ground shaking.

This intimidated Second. He instinctively clutched one of the big, sturdy doors. He'd never experienced anything like this before. Though the cleaning people didn't seem that phased aside from an initial flinch, and were instead trying to keep weapons and other things from falling off their holders.

"...As I was saying, Cleric Victim is down that staircase. Once you get down there, go through the door at the very end of the hall specifically. I'd lead you there myself, but-" Another boom sounded, and the people quickly went to try and keep the items in place again.

Second understood, and started heading over to and down the stairs, being extremely mindful of the vibrating and places in the stone walls that he could cling to.

It wasn't that large of a staircase, but it took quite a little while to get to the end of it since he was being extra careful of his footing. When he did eventually get to the end, he was greeted by a really long hallway that was lined with torches, yet still managed to be somewhat dim.

The booms continued, and were even worse down here than they were from upstairs. Same went for the vibrating. He made his way to the door at the end of the hall, and opened it enough so he was able to peak through.

As if welcoming him, a blinding, fiery light happened, allied with the 'boom' sound.

He opened it the door the rest of the way and saw the other side of the room, which was separated by a pale blue transparent barrier. It was a ginormous stone plain littered with these... weird-looking, frozen glowing figures that matched the color of the barrier.

After the fire cleared away, he saw The Chosen One at where the heart of the explosion-thing was, with his cape and crown seemingly thrown to the side of the arena. 

Chosen then started attacking those weird stick figures, which came to life and started fighting back.

As Second watched in awe, he also noticed Victim sitting on his knees on this side of the barrier, holding his staff. His staff was glowing a lighter version of the barrier and figures' colors. Was this one of the special powers of the Alan-Blessed that Victim told him about?

"Victim!"

Victim's eyes snapped open and he looked at him with a puzzled look without turning his head. "Second? What are you doing down here? Where's Purple?"

"I missed you, so I came to look for you. And by now, I don't know."

Victim didn't seem to look very happy, but he didn't look angry either.

"If you'd like, you may watch, as long as you're quiet. I need to focus right now."

"Okay."

Victim gestured to a spot right next to himself. "Here, you can sit down if you'd like."

Second nodded and settled down beside him.

Giving a small smile, Victim closed his eyes again.

Second watched Victim and Chosen for a while, before a dozen questions came to his mind.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm helping Chosen train, Second."

"Okay. Is the fire Chosen's power?"

With his eyes still calmly closed, Victim nodded. "So are the explosions. His endurance, speed, and strength are also a part of it too."

"Okay. Is that wall and the glowing people a part of your power?"

"Not exactly. My innate powers are those of healing, and a special link between Alan and I that allows me to receive guidance from him. Though, I also have an immense amount of raw magic inside of me, but it's difficult for me to use that magic without something to help hone it," Victim held his staff up pointedly for a brief moment. "Not impossible, but difficult. My staff also lets me use my raw magic in ways that aren't related to my normal abilities at all, like the magic protective barrier and the apparitions."

"Apparitions?"

"The glowing people, Second."

"Okay. So what's my power?"

"Well, Alan hasn't told me exactly what they are yet, but he did tell me that they are far more powerful than both mine and Chosen's powers combined."

"Oh. Okay."

Allowing Victim to go back to focusing, Second began to watch Chosen again, who was slashing through the apparitions with his sword and fire powers. At least until Second's stomach growled again.



--



"...Second, is it true that you were being a handful while Purple was hanging out with you?"

"Yes. I don't like him."

Purple suddenly looked like he'd just gotten hurt, despite Victim currently healing his injuries from that suit of armor falling on top of him. Was the hurt look because of Second? If so, Second didn't know why. He was only stating the truth.

Victim glanced at Second patiently. "Even if you dislike him, that's not an excuse to treat him badly."

"Why not? He was being boring and that annoyed me."

"Well, think about how you would feel if you were Purple. You wouldn't like it if someone was intentionally being a handful to you, would you? Besides, I'm sure that Purple wasn't being boring on purpose."

Second hadn't really thought about it like that. Purple did look pretty miserable. But Second wouldn't have been boring in the first place because he would've talked and played a lot more.

"So, would you like to apologize to Purple?"

Purple instantly straightened up, looking horrified. "Oh- Your majesty, he doesn't have to apologize to m-"

Second had been thinking about this, and now nodded. "I'm sorry, Purple."

Seeming completely flustered and ashamed, the aforementioned Purple stuttered for a moment, before regaining a semblance of composure. "I forgive you," he mumbled.



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Here's a link to Purple's design for those who haven't seen it already --- https://sta.sh/0lfvdd2u9m8

Victim's good at multitasking lol.