[If you didn't like where this is going, just tell and I can explain.]
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Twenty two years ago, I stood where I stand now and watched my loved ones die, betrayed by those I had called friends.
Vengeance clouded my mind. It would have consumed me, were it not for the wisdom of a few strangers, who taught me to look past my instincts.
They never preached answers, but guided me to learn from myself. We don't need anyone to tell us what to do. We are free to follow our own path. Choose your own way! Do not follow me, or anyone else.
That was the answer at the end of my journey
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Florence, Italy... November 30, 1524/
The sun was warm on my face as I sat on the bench, watching the people of Florence go about their day.
The city had changed much since I was a boy, but the spirit remained. The laughter of children, the arguments of merchants, the smell of fresh bread from the bakery down the street, these things were eternal.
My wife, Sofia, was browsing the stalls nearby, our daughter, Flavia, at her side. They were laughing about something, and the sound of it made me smile.
"Cough cough." I let out some coughs as my chest hurt badly.
I had been coughing for years now, ever since that infection in 1519. The doctors had told me it would never fully heal.
I am sixty five years old and I had lived a long life, longer than most men of my profession, so death didn't bother that much.
I closed my eyes and let the memories wash over me.
I was born on June 24th, 1459, in this very city... Florence... My father was Giovanni Auditore, a banker and a member of the Assassin Brotherhood, though I did not know that back then.
My mother was Maria, a woman of warmth and grace which I loved dearly.
I had two brothers. Federico, who was older and braver than me, and Petruccio, the youngest, who loved to collect feathers.
I missed them every day.
My childhood was privileged. I apprenticed under a banker and spent my days chasing women, drinking wine, and getting into fights.
My first enemy was Vieri de' Pazzi, the son of a rival noble family. He was always trying to prove himself better than me and provoke me, but he was always failing. Though, he gave me this scar on my lip, on the Ponte Vecchio, when he threw a stone at me.
I had Cristina Vespucci then, my first love. We spent one night together before her father found us, and then... then my world fell apart.
My father and brothers were arrested. Betrayed by Uberto Alberti, a man who claimed to be our friend.
I watched them hang from the Piazza della Signoria helplessly.
That day... it changed me.
Later I found my father's hidden blades and his robes, then became an Assassin.
I killed Uberto first, then Vieri, then the others... the Pazzi, the Barbarigos, the Templars who had conspired to destroy my family.
I was monster made out of vengeance.
Then I met a man called Leonardo da Vinci, an eccentric man of impossible genius who became my closest friend.
He helped me decode my father's secrets and build weapons that no one had ever seen.
Using those weapons, I fought alongside my uncle Mario, who taught me everything and gave his life for me in the end.
He died in my arms.
And I could not save him.
But it was not until I held the Apple of Eden that I truly understood the scope of the war I had been fighting.
The Apple was a piece of technology from a civilization that came before us, the Isu, that'swhatthey called themselves.
They were not gods, though ancient humans believed them to be. They were beings of immense knowledge and power who created humanity as a workforce... slaves.
Then they were overthrown by their own creations after decades long conflict lead by Adam and Eve.
The Pieces of Eden were Isu tools, capable of controlling minds, altering perceptions, and even reshaping reality itself.
When I first held the Apple, I saw things I could not explain.
Visions of the past, whispers of the future.
I saw the world as the Isu had seen it, a grand experiment.
I understood that the conflict between Assassins and Templars was not merely a political struggle, but a philosophical war that had been waged since the dawn of humanity.
The Templars believed that peace could only be achieved through control. They sought to use the Pieces of Eden to bend humanity to their will, to create a world without conflict because there would be no free will to conflict with. An illusion, a controlled dream.
The Assassins believed that humanity deserved to choose its own path, even if that path led to suffering. We fought for freedom, for the right to make mistakes, to learn, and to grow.
I did not always understand this.
In my youth, I fought for revenge and I wanted to kill the men who had murdered my family, but as I grew older, as I saw the faces of the men I killed and the families they left behind, I began to question what I was truly fighting for.
Then I met him, the flying eagle.
Our Mentor. The Brotherhood's reformer that globalized the creed, who wrote down the Codex which included blueprints for many modern assassin tools, and whom retrieved the Apple of Eden and sealed it away in his library.
It was Altaïr who gave me the answer.
I never met him personally.
He lived centuries before I was born, but I found his library in Masyaf, and I lived through his memories via the Isu Keys I collected.
I saw his life, his struggles, and his failures. I saw how he too, had begun with arrogance and ended with wisdom. He had been the greatest of us, and yet he had died alone, his legacy forgotten by all but a few.
When I stood in his library, looking at his bones, I understood something profound.
The Assassins and Templars were not so different.
We both sought to shape the world. We both believed we knew what was best for humanity. The difference was that the Templars sought to control, while we sought to liberate, but liberation too, could become a form of control if we were not careful.
I learned that true wisdom was not in choosing a side, it was in understanding that both sides were necessary.
Order and freedom, control and chaos... these were not opposites. They were simply two halves of the same whole.
The world needed both to function and the trick was finding the balance.
That was the lesson Altaïr had learned, and that was the lesson I learned through him.
After my enlightenment, I returned to Florence, to Sofia, to my children, and leave that past behind for good.
And now here I was, old and sitting on a bench in Florence, watching my wife and daughter shop. A young man sat down beside me and began to complain about the city.
"Florence is not what it used to be! Too many foreigners. What the hell man! Some more years and we will lose our roots." He said, which made me chuckle lightly.
"Cough cough, well, young man, change is not the enemy, stagnation is. When we cling to the past, we blind ourselves to the future." I replied calmly.
"..."
"And 'cough' when we fear the unknown, we forfeit the opportunity to shape it. The world moves forward 'cough', whether we like it or not, and choice is not whether to change, but how to change. We can resist all we want and be swept away 'cough', or we can guide and leave our mark. It's stupid to think that things would always stay the same."
The young man stayed silent, not fully convinced.
"Thanks for the advice old man, but I gotta go. I think I just saw a very beautiful girl. Bye." The young man said and ran away somewhere much to Ezio's amusement as he reminded him of his own younger days.
"Cough cough cough." A series of coughs went out as I held my mouth. My heart aching with unbearable pain.
Then I saw blood on my hand.
I knew what was going on.
"Well, I g...guess t..this is it."
I looked up and saw Sofia and Flavia in the distance who were smiling, laughing, and enjoying the day.
I loved them so much.
I wanted to call out to them, to tell them I loved them, to say... goodbye.
But...
I could not find the words, I had no strength left in me to do so. My time has finally come.
So... I just smiled.
I smiled with tears running down my face as darkness began to take shape around me.
At the last moment, Sofia turned towards me with a smile that brightened even my darkening vision. Only for her smile to disappear and shout something then run towards me.
In this world, I had done what I was meant to do.
My story has come to an end, and I have passed down my mantle for the future generation.
I have no regrets, except for not expressing my love for my family one last time.
And then the world went dark.
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Shikkotsu Forest/
I did not know how long I was asleep.
There was nothing. No light, no sound, and no feeling. Just an endless void that seemed to stretch forever. Kind of comfortable if you ask me.
Then, slowly and weirdly, awareness returned.
I felt my body? or something like my body. It was light, unfamiliar, but it felt like... mine?
I could feel my heart beating, my lungs expanding, my blood flowing.
'What??' I was confused.
Then I opened my eyes.
The first thing I saw was a woman. She was beautiful, with white hair and blue-gray eyes, a beauty mark below her lips.
Then I turned my head to see a very tall man with pinkish-red hair and a scar across his face. He had one normal eye and one red, bloodshot eye with a yellow pupil. His body was massive and muscular that radiated power.
He was looking at me with excitement, his grin wide.
In a moment of pure adrenaline, I briefly and very subtly looked around me with only my eyes, only to see another... assassin... kneeling before the muscular guy.
But I felt a gaze on me immediately which made goosebumps run down my whole body. And that gaze came from that beautiful woman.
So without much pretense, not letting my inner turmoil become visible on my face, I too... kneeled.
All of this happened in a fraction of a second.
'Wait what?! How come everything looks so... slow in my eyes?' I thought with inner shock.
It wasn't human.
This feeling, I am pretty sure this is something beyond anything I have experienced.
This isn't a dream? Why can I feel... everything.
Isu technology? Apple of Eden used against me?
Fast... I need information fast! I am so confused!
Eagle vision? No! Not yet, that woman is bad news and I don't feel very good about her, she will catch on what I am doing. The man also feels insanely dangerous and I feel kind of attracted to him, not in a good way.
What the hell is going on?
"Well well well, just look at that! Kage level?!"
They speak in... English? Or a form of it!
Damn! I am a little bad at English, just my luck.
I know Latin, French, Spanish, and Turkish. Why didn't I bother learning English more? Just because it was a useless language?
But how am I supposed to learn everything? I barely could find time, and English was a very insignificant and backwards language.
And Kage? I do not know what that word means, but from the way he says it and how excited he is, it is something significant.
Am I in Scotland? Or in some god forsaken place in England?
How am I alive?
The woman spoke next, her voice calming to ears.
"...peak genin... genin... peak chunin... elite jonin... Kage..."
Even with my broken English, I understood something.
Genin. Chunin. Jonin. Kage. These must be some sort of ranks. Military ranks, perhaps, I don't know. She is comparing me to others it seems.
I kept my face still, body relaxed, and my breathing even.
I have played many roles in my life. I know how to hide my thoughts, but this one...
This messy situation is completely different. I do not understand the language fully. I am missing words and context, so this makes everything harder.
"Right?! This changes so many things!"
I looked at the excited man, lowered my head, and with a subtle glance hidden behind my hood, I looked to the side again.
'Is that... a pig?' Yeah I am dreaming. There is no way a huge human body with a head of a pig could be something real.
What's weirder than Florence women shaving their heads and had receding hairlines? This right here. It takes the cake.
Might as well just enjoy the dream and go with the flow. Been sometime since I felt young and traveled to sight see.
"Can you speak?" Asked the muscle man.
Speak? Hmmm, I think that word is related to speech.
He asks if I can speak? Probably.
But speak what? His language? I do not know it well enough. My words would be clumsy and broken.
'What an embarrassment. At this age and after all I went through, I am struggling in front of some younglings.' I thought with amusement.
I opened my mouth, closed it, then lowered my head.
Just play mute.
If a word costs one coin, then silence costs two.
Let them think I cannot speak for now. The other young assassin not far seems to have chosen silence too. What a good lad with a head on his shoulders.
"Fuck!! He is a mute too"
Mute? Was that an insult or what? Probably related to me not being able to speak.
New word for my wrecked English dictionary.
"Wait, I don't think so."
That woman, isn't good news at all.
Then she... approached me.
Her footsteps were soft. She reached out and gently grabbed my chin. Her fingers were cool against my skin, and she lifted my head and looked into my eyes.
'What a beautiful woman.' I thought for a moment before suppressing every thought in my head.
Sorry Sofia, my wife, I promised I won't touch another woman after you. But it seems my charms are against my endeavours again. I am the one being touched.
When I wake up from this dream, I will make it up for you.
The woman was examining me, looking for something.
I did not resist and simply allowed her to study me.
"Well, I think he is just... confused?"
Confused? Another primitive word. I don't understand it.
She pinched my cheek gently.
"Huh?" Muscle man let out.
"The moment he opened his eyes, he started looking around subtly without letting you catch the movement. Then in that fraction of a second, he saw the other kneeling man wearing the same clothes as him, and in that brief gathering of information, he decided to just kneel too. And now he is playing mute in hopes he can gather more info about his situation."
I recognise that look, she absolutely saw through me. Shit. I understood only half of what she said. "Eyes... looking... clothes... kneel... mute... gather..." Enough to know she has seen through my act.
Ohh well, this is a dream. Things like this is normal. Not my first time I have been through a similar situation to this. I have interacted with many Isu technology before.
But better playing it safe... by looking innocent.
This woman though.
She is brilliant.
How come she saw through my acting? Even the muscle man couldn't see it. Is it possible that she might be some hidden master? Or maybe she possessed an Isu tool.
I really want to use Eagle Vision right now and see where I am and who these people are, but no, let's wait a little more.
Why can I sense hundreds of people behind me though? I haven't even tried Eagle Vision to know that.
The sound of their breaths are too loud.
"Well damn! That's Ezio for you!"
'Huh?' I was confused even more because apparently, this unknown man knows me.
How does he know me? I have never met him.
I know I was a famous assassin amongst the Templars and the Brotherhood, but outside those two groups barely anyone knew who I really was. And this young weird shaped hair man with an even weirder hair color who doesn't look like someone from those two groups that knows me.
On the topic of hair color, how come this beautiful young girl has white hair color? And what's up with the young man's eye and slightly greyish skin tone? That isn't normal at all.
At least compared to that pig face, it's normal. Wait! Is that a 4 meter hulking Zebra-man?!
Yeah, what a weird dream.
No wait...
As a matter of fact, I am 1000% sure I died. Finished. Over. End of Story.
Is this really not a dream? Or something created by some crazy Isu technology?
'Sighhh, I am too old for this.'
The End.
"When I was a young man, I had liberty, but I did not see it. I had time, but I did not know it. And I had love, but I did not feel it. Many decades would pass before I understood the meaning of all three. And now, the twilight of my life, this understanding has passed into contentment.
Love, liberty, and time: once so disposable, are the fuels that drive me forward. And love, most especially, mio caro. For you, our children, our brothers and sisters. And for the vast and wonderful world that gave us life, and keeps us guessing. Endless affection, mia Sofia.
Forever yours,
Ezio Auditore."