The figure of the shadowy mass was sat, on his bench, which in this pit was the last throne for one dark prince. The Underworld a maze that was inescapable and unreliably severing his reach from the world. Of course, when given the chance-- the husk of the man, which had moved through dimensions, time, and even faces, was one that shared little mercy for the world. Even then, he was still just human-- selfish, perhaps. But morally, on a war path for things one could not fathom, except himself, as being the right answers.

When one guest, a knight, made her entrance, Erebus slightly moved his sight from the stone floor to the front of the glass encasement, which glowed eerie green with its hex seal, always spinning in the center. An anti-magical lockbox, meant for him, like the other monsters which all had their own mystical entanglements here.

"Is that still what they're calling me out there?"

His eyes first studied her hourglass figure, and her hips, as they moved from the ground under her feet to the stare placed over his robed body. Under the hood, a shadow which covered everything except a glowing yellow pupil, surely, wrapped in the shadows, one could identify the figure of a human. But the presence was far more intense, the stories and infamy an aura that must instill fear. Yet even then, the angels did not sing for this champion, and the demons snickered in contrast.

The rogue, and the warlock, in one form-- staring forth through the shadows at the warmth of the berserker. "That is not my name... I am the rogue of the statesman, I suppose I was rich, once. Maybe it was a setup, thinking back.. A test if you might figure? You can't judge an old dog for getting the paper, try to give the people their backbone, and they will eventually come to remember you as whatever they please... I never liked that King, but I guess there are worse titles his people could have chose for their dishonored champion." He echoed back to her, his words while friendly, had a venom laced behind them that you could easily pick up on. Like talking to the devil, deep and inviting. "My name is so much older, it was gift to me from which my blood came, but I grew through poverty with my mother's passing. The rest of my half-family were raised in prestigious magical academies, I didn't have those talents that they did. I was a bastard, son of a merchant, but I took the doom out of their hate, and made it my strength instead. Ambition, was my real gift."

The shaded one spoke-- enlightening her to unknown histories far removed by time and its current reality, sifting away any notion of being a mere black market salesman away, even the wealthy men who claimed to be his partners-- were nothing more than checkpoints on his way to vengeance against nobility, and throughout time-- he came to snatch and run away with their riches-- pocket change they filled his coffers with, a dark dealer in this magical world.

Yet even so, after great amounts of time in this prison, Erebus had lost so much of the communication to the outside world, that allowed his controlling hand to move over a united criminal enterprise, to dwindle into rumors and fables. His spirit was instead directed back onto the many tales and people's he had met along the way, their chance experiences meeting the dark one, and how he would add their accolades into or against his own. If he could ever just escape the hand of the Law.

Upon the wall at his neck, numberous white dashes and scratched marks littered the wall behind his head, carved into the surface of the stone at his back to allow him to track the date and time. He couldn't see light of the Moon here, but simple questions from the guards gave him the information he needed, when he needed it.

"My name is Erebus. Perhaps they'll immortalize that name." he elaborated in his foreign accent. "Or maybe it will just disappear, in the hourglass of time. Nothing we humans do really matters in the longevity of it all, you know. Not when demons live forever, and angels write of our adventures and close the book with our death. I have already lived a few different lives, stranger. Passing through the grave and the vortex to return, and still I wonder when I will rest. They say the good die young, so maybe 'Erebus' will live forever. A fantasy, isn't it?" Erebus thought back to his old master, an undead who should have lived forever. Yet still, there was memento mori; awaiting that lich, as a backdrop that often tugged Erebus into the most evil decisions. Hoping to burn this world, before he was gone.

"and what is your name?"

His words were inviting, almost as if the rogue enjoyed a good bit of company, from time to time. They also suggested that he had always been an adventurer who made efforts to grow that name-- as opposed to someone who had control over the rumors left in his wake, instead of a leader; he more closely resembled a loner.

The Don had been a Guildmaster, but it wasn't out of choice, more at the stalemate of life's everyday tragedys. In an era that was before he had taken a chair amongst the league of the strongest villains known throughout Fiore, the latter Akudama Syndicate. In some cases, Eternal Nightmare was about true ideals, and feelings. It was birthed through darkness, welcomed into life by a demon-- Zagan, but the freedom, and dignity it meant to instil was the dream left by his Lich Master, and it allowed Erebus to see the light at the end of dark tunnels. When his master died, he had retired back to the forgotten dark, and abandoned any light that interfered with his reasoning. The very reason he picked up the sword in the first place.

The Akudama's version of Erebus, was one who had lost his way, finding that his powers were too grand to contain by mere men, they gave him access to treasure, allowing him to invade the homes of other bandits and criminals, friend and foe alike so that he might expand his dark interlopers, and taking a stance that gave him a vindication which led him to robbing villages, overtaking in the black market dark network, and burning away any resistance to his affairs. The only criminals free of his anger, were others allied to him, and even some of them would betray the banner at the late days of his freedom, and early days of his incarceration.

His attention to these exploits wasn't so humble, instead, he manipulated the control of his military forces and thousands of stolen treasures. Hunting any slight and foe, taking over his lesser enemies enterprises, and building an empire on the souls of dead men. What started as aiding his apprentice & the sorceress of desierto in their experiments with Narcotics' and the profit of tech trade. Led Erebus to using the same connections between criminals to wage total domination on different continental fronts.

While they designed and experimented with their inventions, Erebus was a monster, wearing human skin. His approach took a far more violent turn where wealth and control mocked him in the promise of a warrior's death. The resources garnered by the others was something he borrowed, and alone, he was accessible to it's worldly power, at his disposal The Akudama assaulted islands, even while countries in the middle of their own wars, and fledgling nations for their magic and species. Thirteen million jewels in bounty later, and Erebus had become a devastation to the world, as well as mankind. That sin, that greed, eventually led him to the pits here, in the Hellsea Bastille. The very lowest point one could be banished, at the bottom of the ocean.

Even the name Erebus, which he bore, prophesized this ending in wicked grandiosity. Defined as the "Point of Darkness"-- the Sevenese translation of his titular legend, and his birth given name.

"I would not get so close to me, Rune Knight," Erebus warned, his lips bending into a curved at the tips of his smile, as if a forked tongue were ready to flicker from this snake's lips. "I take careful patience, in watching the seal in front of your eyes, when my chamber grows very weak, it fails to hold me in this abandoned floor." Erebus recited back to her, as he had many dead knights who failed to heed his words in the last year. "Someday, the Fates will remove this curse over my namesake. and I will break away from here-- when that happens, you will not want to be the one there standing in the way of my quest, nor departure."

"... Morningstar." Erebus repeated, remembering fondly the dark overlord who took him in, a true falsely convicted criminal who gave way to becoming exactly what people wanted him to be-- but with a secret hope that he might change the world. Someone who had freed a young rogue, called Erebus, from the nightmares of death, and sharpened him to become it, eternally.

If it hadn't been for watching those mages, those Nightmares, so far back, with such foul luck as to become the darkness of this world-- to show people why they needed heroes again, to play against this sacrificial system? Just maybe, Erebus wouldn't have taken the rebellion so close to his beating heart, so intensely. Except that for all those who listened to Odin, Erebus truly understood him, and placed his faith in those ideas. He was just someone with no direction, a dark brick road had been paved, that Erebus could dance and spin to of his own accords. He needs only do as he will, and the gate to grow would be there for him.

The young rogue gave into the world's view of him, and by now, that is what had blossomed into the many stories ladden before her now, the most infamous criminal of the day and age, even if he wasn't quite the strongest anymore. Erasing his engine of destruction, was something one could not do easily. Of those nightmare mages, he was the last of what remain now, wasn't he? The last song of the outlaw West.

He listened to this Stellan hero and where she was in her journey-- she explained that she was still searching for completion, her certified identity, he monitored her choice of words closely, as his fingers tapped the stone bench in his cell room, and he gave her an ultimatum as his other hand moved with words and he leaned in over his seat. While precarious, he spoke a truth in the darkness back to her and told the answer to his tale of misdeeds, how he walked with the guilt that would cause other men to buckle in place, this was what she wanted, her insight into that of a dark interloper.

"Figure that is where the curse starts isn't it, those like us are never satisfied... We are starved of salvation. Instead of satisfaction like you might think, I have a better revelation for you La Dorada. Answer me this. If there aren't those that can stop men like me, what makes you so sure they're ready for worse? I played a part, as Fate dictates for me always." he dwelled on that bit, leaving a chilly stillness in the air. Given them chance to continue, he further showed her the divide between reason and foulplay. "It was never about what anyone wanted, it's about what is always needed, for all those on their way will someday know. The destruction I leave in my trails, leaves for them, a firelight that can be followed, that few can put out. In that light, cast in shadow, I'll make hundreds, if not thousands, of heroes-- who can't liven themselves, without extinguishing it. It will give to them their hate. For it, a golden treasure awaits them. The distinction between fame and infamy, so very thin." Erebus described the spell he had placed over the world, so this could become very clear what his goal was, against the Void or whatever force threatened Earthland.

Rhea was like a messenger of these Gods' that she spoke of, sent here to speak to his wandering thoughts and finite questions upon life. "How warm, and welcoming to be reminded of that now." He whispered, under and between her smirks, as his own eyes peered and squinted into hers. Gazing beyond the husk, and into her very soul.

"Without Erebus, there would be more evil, to infect the ambitious, but by becoming the dark, I'll forever neglect-- less than worthy men-- from the infamy that is mine. I make these wrong things right, and save them all over again, whether they realize what horrors awaits them or not, it will be for me. When I get there, I will be one lost soul, in the place of so many more forsaken ones... They say that if there is a single God, that he removes the good early from this world, so that they cannot live to see more evil. I find the same to be true, and if it isn't; let them become mighty enough to remove it themselves. I will be here, watching... waiting."

"Perhaps you're right. and yet maybe you aren't. What do I know?" Erebus offered her, a vague and somewhat insignificant answer for all the questioning afforded to her. Except some things he didn't quite agree with, the first was a clear far cry from his disposition. The darkness hadn't consumed Erebus, something that he would normally argue with, perhaps the most interesting thing about Erebus was that he could not bring himself to care if that's what she had surmised, at this late stage.

"I'm not going to tell you where the conflict of interest begins for you. But we both know that something brought you all the way down here, didn't it Rhea. You must be very torn if your hearts brought you to seek council from a bandit. Maybe it was for a reason, or maybe it just reminds you that you are a much better person. I don't mind, I'm learning a lot about you... Hmm hmn hmn, kind of intriguing now isn't it?" Erebus stated without much concern, but with an investment into the words she had chosen and the aim she seemed to be directing with them, for her own interests. The questions themselves perplexed the illusion she was in belief of, that she truly was selfless and that everything around her wasn't. Something had made her think so, was it that the idea had been planted in her, that others like himself were so much more selfish. Or did she truly wish to lift the burden of her pain, and show the world what being messed with us really like?

Clearly, Rhea knew in her heart, that she was in a path she wasn't in control of anymore. With each step taken, she grew closer to seeing the world for it's unfairness, and it cruelty. Erebus had sensed as much. He fell silent for a long moment, those words ruminating upon the air that left his lips. "Are you happy with your place in this life?"

Allowing her too much insight into his own character was dutifully ignorant, but being so cast away, he couldn't argue that the company wasn't appreciated. He stood from his place on the bench and walked forward until his face was only a mere foot behind a pulsating green barrier, and his hood was lit up by eerie swamp-colored light.

"Your leaders will betray you, see it from my point of view. A knight is a rank, you are competing for the position that will always be beneath the corporation, not controlling it. You should trust me instead, spread your wings and see if they don't take you farther than any organization will. Avenge your father, if that's what is bothering your mental... When that time comes, you might just understand why they have named me, shamed me, before this world. If it isn't one of us, then it will be all of us, at the very least; the next person who answers only to themselves, instead of the system they put into place."

Erebus finished, and turned around. He lifted a hand up, as if to wave to her. Before his shadowy mass disappeared from the green light that had amplifyed his figure.

"I figure that we are done here, La Dorada. Good luck on your adventures, you will see me again."