Deepwoken: Divers

Betrayal: Change

After the battle with Melodias, Faust healed up both himself and Pakki. They continued on, eventually finding Duke Erisia deep within.
The two approached him, weapons drawn.
"So you're the ones running around, tripping all my alarms. Care to explain yourselves?" The Duke said, unamused.
Pakki stepped forward. "Lord Regent sent us to retrieve the Forge."
"That thing is finally making its move, hm? I'd thought it would come personally, but the Lord Regent must see me as a mere agent's workload." The Duke replied.
"What can the Forge do? What are you doing with it?" Pakki asked, clearly thinking deeply about it's usage.
The Duke narrowed his eyes, deathly cold. "Everything I can do to stop the oncoming catastrophe, you indolent worm. With it, I turn useless fools like you into something of use... You don't know what I do for mankind."
"What the hell are you even talking about?" Pakki asked, getting annoyed.
The Duke surrounded himself with a rapidly spinning sphere of wind. "There's no real point in explaining further, as this is the end of the line. Even if you gave up on the Forge, I'm not about to let one who's seen this manor's layout roam free."

Faust took the incentive and attacked, his sword bouncing right off of the wind-shield. "Shit... We gotta get past that thing."
The Duke darted to Pakki, punching him back with a gale-empowered punch.
Faust tried to shoot fire at the Duke from his palm, but the wind-shield protected him still.
The Duke stomped on the ground, creating a wave of wind that sent Faust flying back into the wall.
He then turned around, throwing a wind-lance at Pakki, knocking his katana away.
After a few moments later, Pakki found himself stumbling up again. "Why... Am I still trying? I can't even touch him..."  He thought to himslef as he was sliced several times by wind.
"Faust's almost out cold... Kevin and Colt can't get in... Nor could any monsters... This is hopeless..." He thought as the Duke lifted him up with wind, slamming him into another wall.
Pakki squeezed his eyes shut from the pain. When he opened them again, he looked at Gwen's katana. In that moment, he got up again. "Fight! I can't give it up yet... I don't have Faust's skill... Nor Colt's smarts..." He stood up as the Duke sent more wind to knock him back into the wall again."The only thing I have left..."
Duke's eyes crossed Pakki's. In that moment, the Duke saw it in him - a fiery determination he'd have to fight off.
"...Is my will! That's my way..." Pakki, instead of merely trying to withstand the wind, stepped towards Duke. "Fight! I don't want to have to be saved like back then... Fight... That light at the end of the tunnel - I've had enough of reaching it. I'll fight to become it! For my friends' sake... FIGHT!" He took a few steps towards the Duke before grabbing onto his cleaver with both hands, swinging and sending a pressurized blast towards Duke, pushing him back and interrupting his attack.
"To give up is to lose... To lose is to die... That's why, no matter how or why.... I just can't afford to give up right now!" He said, rushing at the Duke, spinning around to slash at him.

The Duke tried to interrupt him with a lance into his already damaged eye - only for it to go right through Pakki.
Just then, Duke realized. "You're--"
Pakki, through his intangibility pushed half of his cleaver's blade through the wind before becoming tangible again, slicing a hole through the wind-shield. He stood into the same position he stood in when he first tried to fight a thresher during the breach, when he tried to rush Nathan... "FIGHT!!" ...But this time, it worked. He stabbed the blade into Duke, impaling him and running across the room with him, slamming him into the wall.
The Duke spat out blood. "Filthy... Shadowcaster..."
Pakki gripped his sword tightly, slamming Duke over his head into the ground.
The Duke quickly released a burst of energy to push Pakki away so he could recover. "You're not only ignorant... You are with them."
Pakki picked up the katana, using it in his off-hand. As the Duke tried to shoot wind at him, Faust hit their enemy with a wind-lance.
"Don't you fucking forget about me..." Faust said, gripping his sword.
Pakki rushed at the Duke, who was looking at Faust. When he spotted Pakki, he quickly focused wind in the way of his cleaver's slash, knocking it out of his hand. Before he could attack though, Faust slammed his greatsword into his back, knocking him into Pakki, who prepared Shade Bringer, slamming it into the Duke, inflicting heavy damage and knocking him back. Faust caught the Duke with an upper slice, sending him into the air.
Pakki followed him up using shadowcast, slicing him twice with his katana in the air before sending him down with a final overhead slash.

Pakki fell to the ground, barely staying on his feet. Faust lifted his greatsword, standing over the Duke.
The fallen duke stared at Pakki. "VERMIN! You seek to let Celtor repeat?!--" He yelled out before Faust bashed his head in.
They soon walked out to Colt and Kevin, who managed to clear out the rubble. As soon as Kevin saw them, he hugged them both. "DON'T do that again... You're- You're lucky to be alive..."
Faust smirked. "We'll just get out of the Depths if we die."
Colt tilted his head. "Not to be rude or anything but... Where's the Forge?"
Faust looked down the hallway into Duke Erisia's manor. "It's in there... But it's too big to just carry outta there."
Pakki just stared out into the oceans. "You guys just... go have a victory feast... I'll report back to Regent..."

A few hours later, they were back at Etris, Pakki reporting back to Lord Regent. Once he left, the first place he visited was Andros' bookstore. He walked in, grabbing a book and sitting down, clear trauma visible in his only eye.
Andros looked at him. "Err... Are you okay..? You look like you've been through a lot."
Pakki didn't look up, fastreading the book. "..Sometimes, it feels like... Like the script is written."
Andros thought for a moment. "...If something bad happened, don't blame yourself. You're just one person--"
Pakki's pupil turned tiny as he found what he was looking for. "The script is set -- I'm just the one who wrote it."