victory_road | roll 10 | internet text post

[If anyone here uses the site Meowscareddit (or at least visits m/amitheasshole), a post from 'hauntedthrowaway' appears on the morning of February 4th. Huh.]

It's a long backstory but I promise it's important. When I was a kid I got a hold of this ancient artifact (I thought my father gave it to me at the time but that's another story). It turned out that this artifact was haunted by a spirit who went on to ruin my life. I didn't even know the spirit was there for years, and he kept hurting my friends and leaving me isolated until I found out about him and fought back.

After the spirit was stopped the first time, I decided to keep the artifact because I was curious about it and thought I could stop the spirit again if he tried anything. After a while the spirit told me he had turned good, and...I know it was stupid to trust a vengeful spirit after he tried to kill my friends but I wanted to think he might have had a change of heart. As you can probably guess, he was lying and using me without my knowledge again.

Now that that's explained, here's the problem. Me and my friends were trying to help an amnesiac friend uncover his memories, but we were told by a guy (I'll call him Tester) who was helping us that he had to test us for evil before we could do anything. All my friends came up as good, but I tested evil, probably because I had the artifact with me, and Tester said I couldn't help because of that. Everyone was kind of surprised at me coming up evil, but I said I was okay not helping and left the area, even though I really wanted to help and ended up crying after I got out of sight. The rest of the group then went on to help uncover our amnesiac friend's memories without me.

For a while I figured it was fine because we were in a rush and I chose to leave, but about a year ago a guy (Thief) told me it was wrong of my friends to let me be excluded at the word of a near stranger and that they should have tried harder to get me to stay and argue with Tester, especially since they knew I had kept the haunted artifact and could have guessed it would throw off the test. Thief isn't someone I would normally trust, but it's been bugging me since then, especially since I know they would have fought harder if any of them were the one to be called evil.

TLDR a haunted artifact got me deemed too evil to help my amnesiac friend and my other friends didn't try to get me to stay, AITA for keeping the artifact?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

So after the spirit tricked you again, why did you continue keeping the artifact? Were you still curious? Or was it because you thought your dad gave it to you?

I'm kinda thinking everybody's at fault here. You shouldn't have kept the artifact after being tricked again, but your friends should have stood up for you more.

It was curiosity, mostly. I wanted to know more about it and thought I had things under control since the spirit was hiding what he was doing from me. I was also really into the occult, so that didn't help.

I can see that, it was dumb of me to trust the spirit as long as I did, even if I was being tricked.]

Yeah, messing with that kind of stuff usually never turns out well.

He must have really known how to manipulate you.

He did. I had the artifact long enough that he knew exactly how to get me to do what he wanted and could easily hide what he was up to so I wouldn't question things too much.

I don't have it anymore, at least. I did get rid of that thing after I figured things out.

That's terrifying.

It's good you finally let it go. Do your friends know that?

They know, they were there when it was returned to Egypt with the other Items.

I never want to see that darn spirit again after everything he did to me and my friends! He was an awful being!

Yeah, he wouldn't be somebody one would want to have around. Is he back in Egypt with the artifact?

[don't ask how a mostly tech-illiterate guy ended up on meowscareddit, just go with it.]

that's tough. i think the situation sucks worse than any of you. it sounds like one of those no-win scenarios, you know? it would be nice if your friends had tried to back you up more. but their safety could've also been in jeopardy. which isn't to say your feelings matter LESS but. i don't know. personally my feelings would be even more hurt if i harmed my friends when it was preventable. maybe it's a good idea to let them know how you feel anyway? maybe they don't know how to bring it up to apologize. maybe it didn't even occur to them that it hurt you. never know unless you talk to them. edit: i'm supposed to say NAH right? oops

I'd love to talk to them directly but I'm actually one of the outworlders and they aren't here with me. A few used to be here, but they all vanished before I could bring myself to say anything.

But you're right that I would have been devastated if he hurt them when it was preventable. Not that being left out stopped him, since he apparently had this whole plan he'd been cooking up that required him to be uninvolved with the group efforts, so me being locked out only helped him.

[It was a true no win situation for him, in other words.]

oh. so am i. i'm sorry they're not around. i hope you get to see them again soon. in the meantime, maybe go easy on yourself? if you can't do anything about it right now, beating yourself up isn't helpful. and for the record, i don't think curiosity's a bad thing. just human nature really. unless you're not human, in which case, uh, sorry

I'm human, don't worry!

And I hope so too. They helped me out with a lot back home. A lot of people blamed me for things the spirit did since they didn't know I was being possessed, and those friends were some of the only people to figure out what was happening and help.

[Normally, Ryou would not be quite this open about what happened to people who don't already know, but internet anonymity has its perks.]

[understandably so. it definitely seems like the kind of thing one would avoid broadcasting publicly if it could be helped.

as far as what's able to be addressed right now...]

are you ok? just in general. i mean is this an ongoing problem?

I'm fine! I don't have the artifact anymore and I'm here now, so the spirit shouldn't be able to possess me anymore!

[He just also doesn't talk about it much outside of to friends who aren't here anymore and isn't admitting that the spirit did come here once, during one of those weird weekends a year ago. It's fine!]

well, hell, that's good. small mercies and all, right?

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