[Oh, it’s so difficult to dredge up anything shaped like empathy from Ardyn, even when viewing such an example of violence and betrayal set wrongly against another. He has lived so long that indifference has mixed with spite, leaving him unaffected at his core. It is why he smiles the way he does, in situations that are dire, dangerous, or inopportune for it. Very rarely does anything truly resonate with him, with the exception of the wrongs set against him ages past.
But as they are pulled along with X’rhun’s memory, there is the tiniest flicker of it. A painful remembrance, one that he doesn’t know what to do other than look on and watch. Unfurling before them, this bloody scene of betrayal. He knows the feeling — he would bet life and limb on the fact that there’s likely something cold coiling in X’rhun’s chest right this moment. Like a snake, fangs bared, tense and ready to spring. He is keeping it controlled, he knows, but Ardyn has no doubt that it’s there.
He raises a hand to adjust the brim of his hat, pushing it lower in a seemingly casual way, even as his eyes track against the scene.]
...Dreary, dreary. We needn’t stay and look on, you know.
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But as they are pulled along with X’rhun’s memory, there is the tiniest flicker of it. A painful remembrance, one that he doesn’t know what to do other than look on and watch. Unfurling before them, this bloody scene of betrayal. He knows the feeling — he would bet life and limb on the fact that there’s likely something cold coiling in X’rhun’s chest right this moment. Like a snake, fangs bared, tense and ready to spring. He is keeping it controlled, he knows, but Ardyn has no doubt that it’s there.
He raises a hand to adjust the brim of his hat, pushing it lower in a seemingly casual way, even as his eyes track against the scene.]
...Dreary, dreary. We needn’t stay and look on, you know.