As Above, so Below

"History is linear. Histories, however, are circular" Ventyr Manteks, in his On the Ael Velle
 
Dear journal,
 
This should not start with "I", as many entries here seem to do. It's supposed to be my journal, yes, but there's little room left for me, really. We are witnessing ... I don't even know what.
 
First of all, the Primordial Tree, for which we fought, fell. After all our fight, after all we did, it fell, and we couldn't stop it.
 
It kind of puts things into perspective. When I first set out on this journey, my mind was filled mostly with how badly I hated my situation, how annoying Tallion was, how guilty I felt, and less so with what was going on around us. Sure, I was worried and afraid. I believed Tallion's words. I understood what they could mean. But human minds only go so far. As we progressed, we learned more and more. We found the Place where It all began. We saw the start, we understood the motivations, perhaps, of some of the players. At least part of these motivations. Then, at first slow, then quickly, we got to learn the face of this Change, the fiery seal with which the world's book pages were to be bound. With every dragon fire, every destroyed island, every dead man or Elf, every undead army, we felt it rise, like shadows and mist in the night, but fast and engulfing like a great fire. To the point we fought behind a gigantic Beech Tree that came to life because it was actually an Essence Bearer. I kept increasing my understanding, I kept sensing more and more of this impending power.
 
I can't stop thinking about that great conflict, that great divide at the beginning of all things. As then, so now. As above, so below. And as above Earth, so below in Hell, for that seems to be their game.
 
I am sorry, dear journal, if I'm being all over the place, incoherent and generally metaphorical today. I'm tired, very, very tired. Not that I complain. I shouldn't. Well, I am tired, can't hide that. I shouldn't be, though. If I am tired, then the entire world is exhausted. If I go to sleep, the entire world might as well follow me. No, I can't go to sleep.
 
I try to motivate myself in such ways, dear journal, for these are my Nutcase ways. I almost tried to make myself smile, if only with a corner of my mouth, but to no avail. I'm sorry. We all desperately need a smile, I think. Dear Sea, I know yo... what do I mean, you're probably crying too...
 
I want to pray, but not to the Almighty. It is not the Almighty I call for now. I don't want war now, I don't want a fight. Fights will come, the war I'll continue, together with the rest, under the banner of our dear captain. I.... I need Ftheis. I need my Creator, our Creator, our beloved Creator, whom we've forsaken thousands of times in our minds, in our words, in our deeds, day by day... Who sticks with us and still loves us, and only asks of us to love back. It's us who have to believe this, yes, and hope it amounts to something. It's not that hard, on paper.
 
I bet all those people reading the simple fairytales are like: "It's not hard to be good. Just do what is common-sense".
 
I severely beg to disagree. I severely beg to disagree!!! Common-sense is pure and utter bullshit! You heard me. Bullshit! Not very ladylike, fuck that. I had enough of this. Now I'm angry! How can people believe in common-sense, rationality, logic, and other words such as these, when it comes to THIS!?
 
I have lived through this journey, somehow. People stronger than me died. They didn't deserve to, maybe, what do I know. Deserve.... As if someone arbitrarily draws tickets "you live", "you die". You don't know. All your choices get you somewhere. And then, there's the choices of others. Who might get you killed.
 
What happens when common-sense saves someone, but Good kills him?
 
That is when faith, love, hope, all that, gets thrown away into the trash, and you wonder, what in the name of Heaven, Earth and the bloodiest of Hells am I supposed to make of that!?!?! Where's Good, where's Evil? It's not like we don't see them. They're in the exact same place. But then... Why does THIS still happen? Is it rational? Logical? Common-sense?
 
What? Should we all become cold assesors of utility and fight like that? Sure, go for that. but.... where will it get you? THE EXACT SAME SPOT.
 
This is not a prayer, I know. It's a letter of revolt. Yes. I revolt. This time it's for good. I'm not a damsel upset at her slightly uncomfortable life. I'm not revolting for myself, really. Nah, to Hell with me.
 
I revolt because this is sick. This is too sick. I don't even know who the receiver is, really. Is it Ftheis? I revolt against God? Wouldn't be the first. A big shiny star did it way before me. Or anyone else. As above, so below.
 
Maybe I do. Because I believe He doesn't love us? I do. Have I lost faith in Him? I don't know that, actually. Maybe. What about hope? Hope in what? Hope needs an address, like a letter. You can't send a letter "out". What should I hope for? I hoped to save the Beech Tree, now the Tree is dead, dead, dead! I hoped that at least not saving it would come from Evil. What did it come from? The grief of Love, of all things!?
 
Is Xantinya right, is Love a weakness? I must be getting weaker then. I didn't feel like it. Despite all my ramblings in my journal, I felt stronger by the day, so no, she can't be right.
 
But I lost track. So, this is a letter of revolt. And yes, it is against... no, it is against the Almighty. Against the God who ordains us. Against this order. What order? There's no order! We have no order here! Good is Evil, Evil is even more Evil, everything is Evil! We have to choose, yes? BUT IF ALL CHOICES ARE EVIL, WHAT CHOICE DO WE HAVE LEFT?????
 
It is an illogical, irrational, outlandish in any sense and sensitivity, it is simply HELL.
 
As above, so Below! AS on Earth, so is Hell! As they rule in Hell, so Xantinya rules on Earth! Hail her Rule!
 
Why am I revolting? Why!? Remember that Beech Tree we saved, dear journal? Yea, we saved it. Then, we went to inspect something the Sylph felt in the vicinity of Legondol. We all went there, well, just us and the crew and such, and we stumbled upon a circle of weird runes. They were clearly not of Ionolian-Gavan script. I was amazed to find such a thing, unsettled, actually. Who would care such runes there? They clearly were new. I mean, there weren't any runes there before, we could assume... Someone had written them. But who writes runes in a non-Ionolian-Gavan script!? Clearly not our people, so.... We had few guesses left, and none looked alright.
 
Obviously, by the time we wanted to head back or steay back, the rune was already beneath us. We knew, then, that something incredibly bad was about to happen. I felt a very hot breath blow over us. I had sensed it only once before. I turned white. I knew, but couldn't mutter.... I didn't have to. In a second, an invisible veil was broken, and then I saw a red dragon staring right at us, a few meters in front. Surrounding us...... the entire Ikain host.
 
We panicked a bit, but braced our weapons. We were tired, exhausted actually, and many of us were heavily injured. But we were ready. We had fought until then. We had strength. We had.........
 
The dragon's head bowed, and we saw on top several figures. Some teleported immediately to the ground, leaving just a girl with yellow eyes, wielding two black scythes, breathing black fires like Damaschini's, but glowing purple, from a set of large xenatine crystals encrusted in the hilt. I've never seen such a monstrous pair of weapons before, nor have I seen a more distressfully dehumanized look on a child's face. Yellow eyes like the eyes of a shark, or cougar, not like the eyes of a man. 'Twas not their colour, but the intensity, the gaze of a huntress stalking its prey. And a hint of... madness. A purple glow to them.
 
The figures materialized before us. There were three guys I've never seen before, yeah, but in the middle, arising out of a large and incredibly white glow... Yes, a glow so white, but.... Not pure white. A white so strong, it burned you, it blinded you. Out of it emerged HER. The epitome of all we've faced, the fear we've all had, the Enemy we've been waiting and which we've been dreading. Xantinya.
 
I could tell it was her just from that light. But she struck me immediately as exactly how I should've imagined her. I couldn't have imagined her before. All attempts were futile. The real deal was exactly right. I could see that, after I saw her. She was more beautiful than any woman I've ever seen, more gracious, more refined.... Everything about her was pure beauty, haunting, mesmerising, enthralling. Her eyes glowed slightly, in their purple gaze, and I could see each irisation of her iris, like tiny xenatine crystals bundled together, piercing each and every one of us. Her smile, small and sly, hidden across a pair of full red lips, was almost playful, almost captivating.
 
But, in fact, only one feeling would coarse through your mind, only one thing you could feel: horror. Her beauty was the beauty of a desolate Iziper, her smile was a kiss of the last dying leaf falling upon winter's coarse ground, her eyes were the purple stones of a fallen crown in a feast of crows, her posture was that of an obsidian statue carved for empires long lost, her hands were strings of a violin whose song would only be heard by the dead. There was nothing she could do to emulate any kind of pozitivity.
 
It struck me then, the curse of demons. No matter how strong they are, no matter how much they try..... They respect all the rules.... All the beauty is, theoretically, there.... No... no matter how much they try, they are ugly without our Creator.
 
Good cannot be retaken, can it? I will ask You again. But now I have to tell my story.
 
We stood back. I felt the blood freeze in my veins. I looked around. Nixie might've gulped, but she met Xantinya's gaze with an equally scornful one. She didn't flinch. Bart was more serious than I've ever seen him. HE didn't flinch. Tallion, Verfy, everyone was unflinching. The Sylph herself looked unsurprised, but determined.
 
Xantinya then smiled and adressed... Damaschini, of all people. She laughed at him, for being there, all alone. I saw that yellow-eyed girl disappear off the back of the dragon. I knew she was Miyun, the one Damaschini took in as his daughter. But Damaschini had eyes for Xantinya and Xantinya alone. He faced her words with some of his own, but Xantinya didn't care about him, in the end. As she said it. Maybe all she wanted was make him feel out of place.
 
She then turned to us, but suddenly I saw her smile widen, and I got a massive tremor in my body. That smile.... It was the smile of victory. Back then, I didn't know. Now I do. She knew everything. And she was happy she saw it.
 
Because that moment Lullaby, Bajid, Gilders and Ghighi entered the rune. They had been a little delayed on the way, they came to follow us, we didn't really wait for them at first for some reason, we were in a hurry to see what the Sylph had detected. Now, they entered the circle, and Lullaby immediately drew her sword and a piercing, but bold and pleasant light invaded the circle. Xantinya signalled her "interdimensional" goons to attack us and she welcomed Lullaby.
 
I couldn't move. Xantinya materialized a three-pointed lance out of thin air, and I saw in it a power I could not foresee. I felt it. She had joked before. Her appearance, her words, it was show. Now she was serious.
 
And when she disappeared into thin air, my eyes and my mind couldn't find her. She came like lightning from the sky, hitting Lullaby, but she blocked her blow, and all of us were blown away not by winds or by shockwaves, but by the sheer will of those two.
 
I saw Ghighi engage one of the interdimensionals, and Bajid and Gilders blocked the path of another who might have tried to get involved. We were left with the third one. We tried our best, but he had a mastery over the plains of reality we didn't. Damaschini seemed to know something. Maybe Tallion also knew something, but he went in a corner and just closed his eyes. I could feel he was doing something, I couldn't tell what at the time.
 
As we were fighting, we could her Xantinya's continuous laughter. But alas, it was a bit strained, as she clashed with Lullaby several times. I could feel the sound of some effort coming from her voice, from around her words. It was an actual fight. We couldn't even intervene, there was this circle of such high spiritual power that none of us could physically move into that space. I heard Xantinya mention that Lullaby's father had not committed to the path of stopping her and the End of the World, even if he had a book that could have explained it. That he chose to die foolishly defending his country. To which Lullaby answered that by holding his ground, not fleeing, not relenting, he made it possible for her to be who she was, for her people to never bow their heads and to be free, in the end, and that she feels only admiration for it.
 
It sounded so logical back then, a few hours ago, didn't it? As she said this, she pushed Xantinya aside, and then Xantinya attacked again, but Lullaby did not flinch. She then proclaimed that Xantinya would never be queen, and I heard not one, not two, but many voices, all in one phrase, all in one spirit.
 
As I glanced towards that circle, I could see Lullaby but she wasn't just Lullaby anymore, but each fraction of a second I saw a different silhouette, even MINE! I was so shocked I almost forgot I was in a fight myself. We had to beat this weird interdimensional who rewrote rules as to catch our bodies one into the other and the such... Damaschini managed to injure him with an Elvish blade, which also had a fish's head on it. We tried our best, but he was still one step ahead of us. The Sylph in the meanwhile was wrestling the dragon. She didn't want to outright kill him, which I found interesting then. Now I just don't know...
 
We fought. We fought like lions, all of us, we gave it all. We fought, till I heard, till we all heard a wretched gunshot. Then I felt it. The Evil. Oh, yes. The Evil was so inconspicuous. We all turned around, because we all felt something horrible had happened.
 
It was Bajid. Bajid's body, falling on the ground, with blood flowing from his shot heart. And as he fell, right behind him, the Brother. Gilders. Holding his gun, with his last bullet, which he'd saved for this very moment.
 
It was again. I could see it. In the small pool by the flower fields. And also in those illustrated books on the genesis of man. The Crime. The Great Crime.
 
Histories are circular, aren't they. We all wind up in the same place. So much for choice!!!!!!!
 
Dead! Dead! AS dead as he could be! Immediately, we felt a tremor. Xantinya laughed with such pleasure, I could only feel pity, in my shock. How can someone be so evil, and exist? And breathe? And think!? She REJOICED, she was happy, so happy! She saw Lullaby turn around and run towards Bajid. In the shock, I'm sure she didn't think he was dead yet. She still tried to keep an eye behind on Xantinya, but she was too distracted. The moment she saw him closer, she probably felt that he was, indeed, dead. That second, Xantinya had it all. The runes suddenly glimmered, creating a sphere of arcanic bolts, crimson red and corrupting, which all then converged into Xantinya. This hate-filled creature then burst a huge wave, like a claw, grasping at Lullaby and breaking something within, as Lullaby cried out in a pain I could feel on my very soul, like a knife scratching deep within your body, slowly tearing you apart. She collapsed near Bajid and took a hold of him, starting to cry, for now she realised all.
 
Xantinya had just used all that power to mark her child's death. Not yet, not yet, because Xantinya wanted something. A.... dilemma of choice. Choice! Again! To choose, for Lullaby, between vengeance or death. Or, between the death of her child, and the possible end of all, the end of the world!!! The opening of xy, the last unopened dimension, the dimension where Xantinya's son awaits, with legions of Elves cursed with undeath.....
 
I knew it, I felt it, the culmination, the greatest note on the partiture, it was there. Xantinya sang it with Lullaby as her bloody instrument. I felt utter disgust. I wanted to rush in and do something, but the sheer power around Xantinya and within that circle, flowing into her, was.... immense... It was Lullaby's own soul, torn against itself, torn against her baby child, against us, torn against its very fabric and its very Creator! How could it be allowed!?!
 
Xantinya then released it all. All of it. On the Primordial Tree. And pulverised it........
 
She told Lullaby she had a choice. Go for revenge, but she wouldn't do that. Then sit there, and wait for her child to die, as her own power was used to twist the realm of death around her child so that it would die before it could get born.... Or.... go to xy, open it, sacrifice all to save her child. Lullaby was crying, but she surely listened. Then, Xantinya said "good job, Zarkuz" and threw him to someplace else. Same for Gilders. She threw Ghighi into the sky, with powers akin to that of a god rather than of a man. She then disappeared herself, laughing, ever laughing....................
 
I had little time to think then. I was still shocked and saddened. I tried to recollect. Tell someone something. But who? I wanted to say something about the Tree, but what? The Elves... they were devastated. Nixie had no glimmer left. Her defiance... destroyed. The Sylph no longer shone like waters in the morning. She was now pale and distant. Fading....................... Fading!!! The Elves had been distant, yes, Almighty, yes, but not like this! Not now when they crossed swords with humanity when all Life was threatened! What choice did they have!? I don't understand!!
 
Lullaby... I can't talk about it. It's not right. No one should endure so much pain. No one. I don't know. When you feel a lot, like... a lot! Then any suffering is increased tenfold. The same loss can be felt a tenfold by someone like this. And she is like this. Plus....... How can you tie the fate of the world to the fate of this one child you have, this one soul you're responsible for....? She had just lost so much.... and would stand to lose so much more just for the world to... to what?
 
Xantinya is winning anyway. The perversity.... The evil! The .... gross. Gross. I hate demons with all my heart. I hope they will never, ever, see any glimmer of light, of hope, of anything. They deserve pain, so much, so, so much..........
 
But this isn't about the demons. I'd expect nothing less, really, maybe I didn't have imagination, but that's on me. As for Gilders and Zarkuz and other useful idiots, I don't care about them....
 
Oh, interdimensionals who were with Lullaby showed up and saw all this and said we need to talk. Out of all, the ex-lich Jevyan seemed the only one who was actually shaken by Lullaby's suffering and Bajid's death. These guys will probably come with more common-sense and logic and rationality and Good and Evil and............
 
Why? Here's my revolt. Here it is. Why? Why do we have choices, if choices all converge into one big soup, where Good leads to Evil, Evil leads to Evil, nothing leads to Evil, something leads to Evil, where Love is transformed to kill, where Love is weak, where Hope is stupid, where Hope is treacherous, where it betrays you!?
 
Can Lullaby be guilty for trusting Zarkuz to get her here, even if it was Xantinya's plan all along? Can Bajid be guilty of it!? For what? Trying to see the Good in everyone? Wasn't it what we were supposed to be!??!!
 
Now Lullaby has nothing. I saw her. She imploded. Nothing. To save her child, probably, somehow, instinctively, she shut down. She's almost like she's dead. Nothing can get to her. If anything were, probably the emotions and pain would kill her child. But like this, she herself is... gone.... I cant' blame her. It's not like she chose anything right now...
 
It's not like we chose this, either. Isn't this our cause, God? Isn't this!? Weren't we supposed to do Good? No? Were we supposed to beat Evil with Evil? That never worked either! So, you're telling me.....
 
 
All this time....................
 
The End was always coming, and we just had to showcase some morality before it inevitably fell to Xantinya?
 
Oh, yes, we await Heaven, eh? Why? Cause our actions led to death and misery! What? Are you going to forgive Lullaby for opening XY, or us, for that matter!? What, is it a good deed or a bad deed? No? Neither?
 
Then what is this whole world about.
 
What is this whole world about!!!!!!!
 
I demand an answer! I have no right to receive it, but by damn I demand it! I will die and burn in Hell anyway, like Lullaby thinks she will. I'll join her, I guess. We all will, apparently.
 
Great design for this world, one major flaw: it can only self-distruct.
 
And most of all, instead of at least just ending it, Xantinya let us live, to mock us. Yes. Maybe I'm doing the demons' work here, revolting. Bah. Fine. I don't care what demons want me to do. I'll do it because I want to do it. I may be sinning, or being straight up evil, but why pretend. This is what I feel. Maybe one day I'll look at this with amusement and some horror. I still cling to that hope, or at least have it somewhere. Hah. I'm revolting, but I never overthrow, I guess.
 
I won't stop now, though. I am in full revolt. Antyar, or Hyan? Once again, we repeat the same question, now for us all. What are we? Why must it be so grey? Where's the truth that was supposed to be here? I don't understand. Illien the Great said God lives even in the Desolation of Iziper. But what does he know? He only failed. Like us. We repeat his cycle, and the cycle of all, from the first idiot who murdered his brother.
 
It's not that I don't feel loved or something, or that I feel that this is unfair. What is unfair? I've judged death and life according to a greater plan, to God's wish to let us choose and to help us reach our intended destination, hopefully at His side.
 
But I no longer see that road. Where is it? I wish I could take it.
 
 
 
I miss Ftheis. Where can I find Him.
 
Also, I will never speak of this to any of them. I'm not that stupid. I can't help but feel these feelings now, but if I tell them, they might feel them too, and I know they shouldn't. I will get past this, one way or another.
 
Rest in peace, Bajid, Primordial Beech. Us, we won't rest. We are doomed to keep marching. Bullshit. Utter bullshit.
 
Once again, I revolt! Strike me down with the rest of them! But I want to know what this whole shit-show is! As Above, so Below!