[url=https://www.destinypedia.com/Lore:The_Forsaken_Prince]The Forsaken Prince[/url] [i]"Fanatic | Part I She's been silent too long. The whole solar system groans with the bruises of war. Uldren lives in constant suffering, a numb, scowling pain that drives him to Ether and worse distractions. He has never felt the Light this strong. He has never known pain so deep. How many centuries with his sister? And how quickly he's disintegrated without her… Why won't she speak to him? The Reef burns around him. Shattered asteroids and cracked habitats spill bright flakes of debris. There is nothing quite so stark and brilliant as sunlit wreckage in vacuum. The Reef is huge, huge, but dense too, its structures and people gathered in tight clusters against the vastness of space. Oryx and the Red Legion ripped great holes in the Reef. Oh, if only Uldren had told Petra that Trau'ug's Broken Legion was a Trojan horse; but Uldren has nothing to give to a "regent" who surrenders her people to the Traveler. She has always wanted Mara's approval, little Petra. Always wanted to ingratiate herself. But she's never understood what Mara respects; she's never been willing to take the hard road to Mara's trust. That's why Mara doesn't speak to Petra. But Mara has not been speaking to Uldren either. He kicks off the wrecked hull of the corvette. [u]He and the Kings have been raiding the Asteroid Belt, knocking out shipping headed for Earth, trying to further destabilize the Reef.[/u] Uldren has killed his own subjects, and at first that left him wretched with guilt, curled up in the hard cell where he sleeps. [u]But didn't Mara lead thousands of her subjects to their deaths for a still enigmatic greater good? How is this any different?[/u] [u]She has always intended her people for the altar. [b]The Awoken are pawns in her design.[/b][/u] It's up to Uldren to set that design back on track. "Mara!" he shouts up into the starlight. He has come too far to beg now. He's done too much. He demands her answer: "I'm not angry. I forgive you for… for sacrificing yourself to save them. But you must answer me now! Am I on the right path? Am I nearer to finding you?" He has the House of Kings as allies. His raids on the Reef have forced Petra to pull back, consolidate, focus on protecting her citizens instead of collaborating with the Guardians. But is he any closer to Mara? Has he… can he trust himself to do this? He always wanted to surprise Mara. To make her recalculate her plans. But it would help him so much to know that she foresaw a little of this—to be certain he's headed the right way… "Mara!" he cries, blinking against the persistent soreness in his right eye. "Sister, have you forsaken me?" Something answers him"![/i] ••••• [i]"Fikrul The Archon he saved is named Fikrul and he worships Uldren like a father and a god. Uldren understands, now, what brought them together. They each see a future for their broken people… a future that cannot be obtained by looking back. Fikrul tells Uldren how the Fallen have been crippled by their dependence on machines; how they have clung to tradition instead of hurling themselves into the abyss, seeking rebirth through extinction into a new species. "I feel the same," Uldren tells Fikrul, whittling a tiny model Galliot from an ingot of steel. "We say we exist on the thin line between dark and light, Fikrul. But my people have always been easily led astray." "What future do you see for Awoken?" Fikrul asks him. What future? After he finds and saves Mara? He realizes that he doesn't care. He's spent so many centuries stalking the perimeter of Awoken society, fighting off challengers, spying, sneaking, [u]doing Mara's dirty work…[/u] [b]Nothing has value except in its relation to Mara's plots.[/b] Not even himself. [u]"They can die for all I care,"[/u] he says, with a viciousness he never expected of himself. Didn't he want to save his people? No, no. [u]Mara was willing to destroy them for her purposes[b]—the Awoken have no value at all except in service of her design.[/b][/u] "If some part of them survives… it will be the worthy part." Does he wish for Awoken extinction? Is that what he truly wishes? "We have work to do," he tells Fikrul. "The House of Kings has become, ah, inconvenient to my plans. I wish to…" He wags his knife. "Divest." Fikrul looks up sharply from his own knives. Dark Ether seethes like mist around his face. "It is time? We show them the future now?""[/i] ••••• Points of focus for consideration considering the Revenant narrative arc: Uldren was tasked in destabilizing the reef, and preventing Elikisni unification. Per Mara's design. He references the Awoken civil wars that Mara started to take the throne, strongly indicating that the reef wars were fully instigated by Mara. He justifies killing Awoken leading the Scorn as "IF" they were no longer truly Awoken. Mara is the heretic... she abandoned her people the moment she spoke with the void. Mara discovered, my theory... that the Kell of Prophecy resided amongst the HoW. Upon leaving the distributary, she instigated the reef wars for plunder and resources. That's why she took Kell. This and to ensure the Elikisni never found peace, (it's going to sound really familiar), she had Uldren who created the Scorn and manipulated the Vanguard for this purpose. (Like the Amhakara) But she survives. My theory. Her father was just resurrected. My theory. To end the Scorn curse, the last wolf must kill the remaining wolves. That's where this ends in Act 3... Eido must take Kell and fufill the prophecy. That's... where this all ends in Heresy... with Mara's design finally being exposed. 😇👍💠 Edit: When was Uldren corrupted? Was this when? [i]"Free | Part I "Admit it! Admit that you trapped my sister in the Dreaming City!" "I did not," Illyn says. "She is not trapped, Uldren. She is dead." Uldren knows the truth now, and he wants things to be right; he wants it so fiercely that he knows nothing he does in pursuit of this want can be wrong. "Witch-lies," he spits, venomous. "She is alive!" Illyn measures him in silence for a while. Then: "We knew you would come," she tells him, with quiet calm defiance. "You're lost, Uldren." "You knew I'd come, but you never searched for me? My sister would take your eyes for that." "Your sister needs nothing from us now, Uldren. Not even you." The rage is almost enough to make him kill her. But he knows Mara wouldn't approve. She is with him now, she is substantial if not corporeal, and she dances at the edge of his sight. You're so close, she whispers. Free me from this place, Uldren Sov… "You've gone mad," Illyn says, with repulsive empathy. "I almost did too, when I knew she'd gone. Why do you travel with that… thing? What have you come to do?" "I've come to finish it," Uldren tells her. He even tries to smile, because he is being honest. He's telling the truth. "I've realized I was a fool to try to surprise her. [b][u]We all exist through her design[/u], Illyn. We all act only by her consent. I'm going to save her, because she needs me to save her. [u]When she needs me to die, I will die.[/u] And when she has completed her great design for the Awoken, the Awoken will die, too. It is the reward we so richly deserve, [u]for we owe everything to Mara.[/u] It would be… wrong for us to outlive our purpose. Trust me. Life without her is worse than… worse than…"[/b] He chokes on it. He can't describe it. At the edge of sight, Mara watches him with all the heartbroken concern and tender care he has always wanted from her. That evening, he surrenders himself to the Reef".[/i] Or was it right here? [i][b]"Mara!" he cries, blinking against the persistent soreness in his right eye. "Sister, have you forsaken me?" Something answers him"![/b][/i] Neither. [url=https://www.destinypedia.com/Lore:The_Dreaming_City#Riven]Riven[/url]