CW: Explicit language, forced drug use, hallucinations, mentions of brainwashing, mentions of s*icide, gore.
The Rose Palace is a sprawling pleasure house with several private villas scattered across a large plot of land. Red lanterns lining the paths give off a soft glow, encasing the grounds in a dreamy, heady atmosphere. Unassuming by day, by night it’s the crowning jewel in the city. Not even the towering green walls are able to conceal the dazzling display within.
Carefully curated gardens and ponds serve as an exquisite respite between the villas. The main building rises over three floors with a stage and dining hall on the ground level. If the people of Hanjuyang don’t come here for the Roses or the shows, they come for the food, the menu created by arguably the best chef in the city.
Dawn paints the sky bloody when Madame Kahin and her Roses enter the grounds. The palace guards, dressed in rich viridescent as is the Madame’s colour, patrol attentively around the perimeter of the brothel. Even at this hour, the palace is bustling with guests and the few Roses left behind are hard at work, having to cover for those sent to the soiree.
Rin’s zealous guards keep their unyielding hold on him and they march after Kahin. So strong are they, not even his wild attempts at escape seem to budge them. They remain his faithful golems until they reach the Madame’s office, situated on the top level of the main building.
Here, the only access is by a private elevator, secured by four guards. It’s the first time the Rat had ever seen such an invention. Not even the Hwans had a contraption as remarkable as this. Kahin must have powerful contacts to enjoy such luxuries.
Kahin’s office is vast and dressed in sumptuous decorations. It appears moreso like an opulent bedroom than a study, with the vast canopy bed as the centrepiece. Lush green curtains drape over the tester, heavy and velveteen.
To one side of the room, there is a magnolia whitewood desk, behind which the Madame sits with her back straight and hands folded neatly upon the surface. With the blazing firelight and the warm electrical lights chasing away the gloom, her beauty is all the more stark and breath-taking. Her flawless complexion is the matted brown of a Western coneflower, with luscious black curls framing her perfectly sculpted face. The robes draped elegantly over her form is traditionally Eastern, but they are of a deep viridescence that swallows the light.
The three Roses bring Rin to stand before the desk, keeping their firm hold upon him. The one behind stands too close, his broad chest bumping into the raven’s back. Rin tries to flex the muscles in his arms and the limbs prickle painfully in response. Pursing his lips, he shoots his captors a nasty look each. None of them are even looking at him, so enraptured are they by the sight of their Madame.
He has to endure. Now that he’s in enemy territory, his chances of escaping are next to nigh.
“A bit gaudy in here, isn’t it?” Rin says loudly, casting an unimpressed look at his surroundings. “Trying to over-compensate?”
The Rose behind slams his fist into his skull and pain arcs through his head and down his spine. His knees buckle as he temporarily loses his senses. “Ow...fuck...fucking dick!” He gasps, sagging in his captors’ hold.
Kahin smiles thinly, her gaze cool and steady. “I see that you are afraid. Good.” She unfolds her hands and picks up an ornate letter opener, made from what appears to be malachite with its unique swirling patterns. “Your mother. How does she fare? Has she recovered from her chill?”
Eyes watering from the pain, Rin raises his head to squint at the blurred impression of the Madame. He shakes his head to recentre himself. “How did you know..." His spine stiffens. "Have you been spying on us?”
“I have been keeping my eye on you, yes,” Kahin says, calmly. “Who do you think sent for Iris when your mother fell ill?”
Rin’s nape prickles as uneasiness turns into alarm. He blanches, face wan even under the warm electric glow. “...but why? We’ve never even met. Why would you be interested in us?”
A pleasant, breathy laugh shakes the Madame’s form as she slides the malachite knife through an envelope. “It’s not you I’m interested in. You are an inconsequential blight I deign to rid of.” She glances at the letter with a bored sweep of her eyes before tossing it to the side. “That is, until this evening. You owe me a great debt, Rat. A debt that you cannot afford.”
“I owe you shit,” Rin spits out, scowling. “Answer my question, Kahin. How do you know my mother?”
The knife smoothly slices another envelope, cutting through a golden seal with the imprint of a lion. This missive gives her pause, a lethal glint pulsing in her eyes. She folds the letter carefully and sets it down, along with the knife.
“Madame Kahin,” she corrects him, rising to her feet. Her robes sweep the floor as she rounds her desk, luscious robes trailing at her heels. “A Rose must always address me as 'Madame Kahin' or simply 'the Madame'.” She comes to a golden trolley with several crystal bottles of what appears to be liquor. With well-practiced and elegant movements, she prepares a glass, the liquor clear like water.
“I’m not a Rose, Kahin.” The Rat squirms, eyeing that clear liquid with a racing pulse. “Look, whatever Dasom owes you, that’s her burden, not mine. I barely make enough to feed myself, let alone pay her debts as well.”
The woman laughs, her voice lilting and pleasant to the ear. “Her debt cannot be paid by you,” she says, taking the glass and setting it upon the desk. She gracefully sweeps her robes out before retaking her seat. “No, that is a private matter between her and I. What you can offer me however, is your devotion.”
His face wrinkles in disgust, the back of his neck prickling with unease. “Eurgh. Look, you may be a pretty face and all, but you’re not exactly my type.”
“Lust and devotion are two very different things,” Kahin says, black lashes slicing her gaze in half. "I require all of you. Not just the one part."
"I don't think you can handle me, pet. Last time someone tried, I ripped his throat out."
She reaches over her desk and slides the glass towards Rin. “Drink.”
“I’m not really thirsty--”
“Drink.” The word is like taut razorwire.
Rin’s silent golems force him towards the desk, jerking him along when he tries to struggle. He digs his heels into the carpeted floor, sweat stinging his eyes. “What is it? Poison? Do you really think killing me will clear my debt?”
The Madame hums through a glacial smile, reaching behind her desk to pull open a drawer. She places an object between them, within easy reach, the muzzle pointed in Rin’s direction.
It’s an ancient weapon from the Last Cycle, as rare as the electrical cars that number only in the hundreds throughout the Four Territories. Rin has only seen a gun once before in his life. When a trigger happy Minister had too much to drink and gave the patrons at Sweet Brier a live demonstration. All it took was a gentle squeeze of the trigger and the Slummer died on the spot.
Rin blanches when he sees the powerful weapon, dread gripping his heart and pulling it into the churning depths of his stomach. “So what. It’s either die by poison or by gun? That’s not much of a choice.”
“It’s not poison,” Kahin says, sliding the tip of her middle finger along the barrel of the gun. “How will you show your devotion if you are dead? But if you refuse to give me what I want, then I'll have to dispose of you. I have little time and patience to waste on those who refuse my goodwill. So drink.” She picks up the gun and cocks the hammer, aiming directly at the boy’s head. “Or don’t.”
Her apathetic face is especially loathsome. Rin has to gnaw on the insides of his cheeks to stop himself from insulting her again. The tangy taste of blood coats his tongue and his pallid face twists in anger.
He glances at the glass. And then at the gun. He looks to the stony faced Roses on either side. Finally, he brings his gaze to Kahin's inhuman, blood curdling stare.
If you want to save me, little lord, this is the time to do it.
But the only response he gets is the whitening finger on the trigger.
“Fuck.” He pants lightly, cold sweat soaking into his robes. “Fine. I’ll drink. Godsdamn it.”
With a flicker of Kahin's glinting eyes, her Roses release the Rat and step back, giving him room to move. He scowls and rubs his arms, wincing when he sees the tender flesh already blooming with hand shaped bruises.
Anticipation crowds the Madame’s burning gaze when Rin grabs the glass, clear liquid sloshing against the sides in his unsteady hand. Raising his head, he’s met with her unhinged expression, and he's unable to hear or feel anything but his own thunderous pulse.
And so, before his courage fails him, he quickly brings the glass to his lips and tosses the liquor down his throat.
***
Kahin stands before the Rat.
Pupils dilate and swallow green irises whole as she studies him intently, a strange look bordering on licentiousness sinking deep into her beautiful features. A pointy tongue flicks over her lips, moistening them.
“Describe how you feel,” she says, voice deep and hoarse. “Tell me what you see.”
“...I feel nothing.” He moves his lips, body distended, dissipated, delirious. Fragments of his cognisance disperse like wet paper, sick and starchy. The world sheds its colours, and the monotone impressions are his last tenuous hold to this reality before being cast into the drunken abyss.
“I see…”
Beyond this feeble corporeality, an apocalypse bursts forth, tidal and engulfing. The scorched lands of the Last Cycle flickers like a broken light. He's bearing witness to their anticipated destruction, rejected from the megacosm for Daejimo’s next breath.
He’s the last standing on this heaving, toxic soil. Black rain sluices the flesh from his bones and he’s bleeding from all seven holes. Foul liquids trickle down his legs.
Do you see? The voice belongs to the owner of this body and it addresses its eidolic companion. We killed ourselves with the nuclear holocaust. Look at the scars we scoured into the earth. We poisoned the air, the soil, and the seas. Now, Izayoma consumes us, but he still starves. Do you see? This is what we are. The nothing. The septic. The wasted.
"Why did this happen?" He doesn’t need a mouth to speak.
This is the Cycle. In a thousand years, we will be reborn and populate Daejimo’s domain.
"So this will happen again."
Yes. Such is the way of the Cycle.
"We will always fail. We will always be nothing."
Yes. Such is our fate writ by the stars.
"How do we break from the Cycle?"
It answers with the voices of many: End the destruction of all by the destruction of one.
The body crumples, a desiccated husk stolen by the wind, flesh turned to bone turned to fine white sand cast into the oily black sky. An inferno licks at this charcoal mess, all jagged edges with no reprieve, devouring the landscape until a new one emerges.
He knows this place very well, those rotten walls and chipped paint the same since childhood. He sees her in the belly of the fire, petrified in the torrid element with not a single flaw upon her form.
Dasom stares at him, a mirage from the stars, one eye blue, the other red.
Long white fingers plunge into the socket and pluck out the blue eye. The cacophonic underworld keens through the thin membrane beneath her feet. She kisses the eye before wrapping her lips around it, a sickening pop, her teeth snap the sclera. She chews and swallows and only the red eye remains, a flat monument to what will be.
Someone sings Izayoma's Call, the voice deep with a charming husk. Another voice joins in, light and clear. Their voices meld together intimately, without any hesitation nor waver. Goldens flash like twin suns. The warm scent of spice.
The phantasmal inferno fills his vision and whips around his form in a violent tempest, washing clear all traces of life. He’s standing in the Watchtower, standing on a platform within the shattered orb. Gusts of winter wind feed the flames, licking at his body yet causing no pain.
Hanjuyang sprawls below, the sky above filled with the thick plumes of black smoke. Something explodes in the High District, perhaps one of the mansions, and white fire splashes across the land like spilled paint. The sounds of battle reach the tower, howling winds delivering snatches of chaos - steel on steel, gunshots and cannons, deafening screams and cries.
He is the Watcher, observing the end of Hanjuyang. His beautiful, broken city. His beautiful, broken people. The end of his world and the beginning of another. Luna hangs above, serene and silent. The Watcher’s own observer, his eerie companion and friend.
And then he’s thrust from the roving terrene. He’s where he should be, with the frayed edges of reality clumsily knit together for Kahin’s purpose.
“I see..."
And he realises then, that only a second has passed. He had wandered for an eon that lasted a single breath. Within him, there's a desolate void like Izayoma's endless maw.
The face he sees has no end. He has no sense of his own edges. This person bleeds into him and he into her until they are the one and the same. Of his self, he has none, no name, no history, no presence, but this does not cause him distress. In fact, he feels nothing, nothing at all, but for whatever She feels, and in this moment, She feels elation, the perverted satisfaction of gorging Herself on the most decadent and forbidden. Another bloom to raise in Her image.
"I see...You."
And then there is Kahin.
Only Kahin.
Drug/hallucination sequences are so difficult to write.
It's during these times I wish I could just animate it instead... V_V
