The opening of XY

Dear diary,
I am content with my life. I have had my fair share of pain, death and loss. Yet, I try to see the good part in most of the things. Well guess what, dear diary, NOT TODAY! Today I woke up and chose to be very insufferable. I haven’t gotten a good sleep in ages so do not blame me for it. BLAME THE BLOODY WASPS. I do not require much, but from time to time, I really need a good sleep.So dear diary, do forgive me for what I am about to say, but even the brightest people have a stormy day once in a while.
Let me start by telling you what happened after the massacre that Xantinya left behind. With our last strengths, we stood up¬, gathered our last pieces of broken hope and slowly began to move on. It was a hard defeat, but the appearance of the some new interdimensionals made the day a bit easier. “They are friends of Lullaby and Bajid, I am sure they will be of great help” we all thought. Greatest joke of the day. The first time one interdimensional man appears out of nowhere and betrays your party, you can blame him. But the next time, when another six people appear out of nowhere, you’d say one would be more cautious. Not us. We love to trust and help other people. Which often it is true, but sometimes, just sometimes, some people deserve a punch in the face and a kick in their nice behinds.
 
Bad news over bad news were given to us that day. First, the Sylph left to exile, which to be honest, I do not think it’s fair at all. I know it’s her choice, but all she did was fight for the elves, she did all she could. Then, we walked through the city, trying to help those who were left alive but most of them seemed dead anyways. Then, we were called by His Majesty, King Nathanilos. At first, I thought he called us to discuss some kind of strategy he had for the future. But guess what, no. He was on his death bed and he died minutes after apologizing for what happened. To be honest this saddened me beyond you can imagine. His Majesty, King Nathanilos., compared to what I have seen before was a leader who was heart and soul near his army. He dedicated everything he had for his kingdom. And for him to die apologizing and thanking us, did not seem right. We were no more special than some allies coming to help. No one, king or soldier, on their death bed should be thanking allies, but rather they should be spending their last minutes with the people close to him, those that they loved. I only fought one battle alongside His Majesty, King Nathanilos. One single fight. But when His Majesty appeared on the battlefield, the soldiers changed. His strength became the whole army’s strength. And he did not fear, he went in front, not hesitating for one second. Watching him die, was perhaps one of the most hurtful scenes I have ever seen.
 
And despite all this continuous sadness that day, we kept trying to move on. We gathered all in one room to decide what to do next. Nixie was absolutely destroyed, she couldn’t even cry, Tallion looked as pale as a ghost, Bart and Eve were so tired they barely could stand. “Look at the bright side, Verfy, we are still alive so we can still do something” I thought myself. Probably everyone was thinking the same for no one has flinched from that table until we had made our plan. I believe Nixie suggested us to rest, but everyone was not very keen on that idea, not even herself. Before doing anything else, we went to check on Lullaby because she was absolutely heartbroken about what happened.
When we got there, the interdimensional people were already there. We made the introduction and then we began talking about more pressing matters: the opening of XY. As mentioned in my previous writing, we had two options: Open the Dimension or let Lullaby’s kid die. Hmm…An obvious choice for us, but seems like the interdimensional had other opinions. They suggested that sacrificing a child was worth saving the world. I could not see how that would have been a good choice in any way but I tried to understand that, for them ,that was the logical thing to do. Personally I have stopped believing in logic some time ago but each to their own.
 
We all draw different lines. Sometimes they intersect. Sometimes they don't. We agree on forms of evil, but judge degrees of it, saying only the worst of humanity is truly bad. And everything along the grey lines is subject to opinion. If things were approached differently, maybe we would have reached a common decision. But no. Why even listen to some people that don’t have interdimensional power, let’s just threaten them. Sure that works for me, we probably have seen worse. Oh but let’s also treat our so called “friend” like it’s a lifeless object that doesn’t hear our conversation (I take some blame for it as well). Sure, that works too, since I have done the same, I can admit it was the fault on both sides. But HOW DARE THEY tell us that “you don’t understand what it means to see thousands of people die” in front of my friends who just lost their family, friend and hundreds of others. It took all the patience I have ever mastered to not crack that Reinar’s nose and get all of us killed. Unlike others, I do understand the meaning of DISCUSSION. Congratulations to us for stumbling into the most self-important, obnoxious, pugnacious, idiots on this entire universe. (I must exclude Jevyan from this)
 
Well, I guess you cannot ask a jester to give up on being a jester. One can only do what they are good at. So did the interdimensional people. They started doing what they do best, use their powers. Of course, not for helping us but rather cutting our throats for standing in their way. However, Jevyan, suddenly unleashed his whole powers and stood between us and them. He was the only one that strongly disagreed with killing Lullaby. He was what is called a good friend. Poor Jevyan, he must have felt very betrayed by the others. “I am a necromancer that has been working for Xantinya all this time, that’s what you wanted to hear didn’t you?”. Those were among his last words before getting slashed by the others. Just how horrible of a person can you be to make a friend suffer so much and not feel any remorse from it?
 
In the meantime, we got the hint and one by one we went through the Glyph. Before Nixie and me entered, we saw Tallion flying up in the sky, ready to help Jevyan. We could no longer wait so I wanted to send Nixie first and then wait for Tallion. Before she left, Nixie made me promise that both me and Tallion would come back alive. If it wasn’t for this promise, I would have eaten that fucking glyph and the inderdimensionals could have cut me open for all I cared, but I really really wished to fight those bastards. At least they should do the whole world a favor and use those powers to make sure they have no children.
But a promise is a promise, and an order is an order, and seeing that I had no time left I went through the glyph waiting for Tallion. The moment he appeared; we destroyed the glyph. Finally, we had some time to rest. HAHAHAHA. SLEEP? NO! WE NEED DEMONS because THEY are the best cure for exhaustion. I was finally sleeping, dreaming about a very nice sunset when Nixie woke me up. Apparently, some kind of wasps were attacking us. But they were not normal wasps,no no no. They were wasps sent by a demon. To be fair I was so done at the moment, that I just started hitting those wasps. But the more I hit, the worse it got. “LET THEM COME, I don’t have anything better to do than fight demonic wasps tonight. HAHAHAHAHA!”. But the sleepless nights showed their effect and after a few shockwaves, I just gave up and went to sleep like all of the others. The buzzing and fuzzing kept going the whole night. Absolutely horrendous.
 
I woke up by Nixie’s enthusiastic screams “I beat a demon. I beat it. And I hugged an angel ”. At first, I thought she became a bit mental after all that happened, not because I wouldn’t trust her to beat a demon, but because she was screaming and jumping around like she was seeing the world for the first time. She told us about this demon named Pank.. The beginning of the dream is not very clear in my mind, I was a bit shocked. I have not seen Nixie smile so happily in such a long time! *sigh* Perhaps this morning was not so bad after all. I just came back to reality in time to hear Nixie saying how there were a lot of me falling down from the sky, and how at some point, the demon divided her in many parts and she decided to shape one of us from each body part. I must proudly say that I was half of her ass. I honestly could have not chosen a better part for myself. It appears that our dear captain has some imagination
But that’s not that important. The most important part was that SHE beat a demon! She showed that bastard Pank that she is not so weak as they thought. GET THAT, YOU BLOODY DEMONS! OUR GORGEOUS CAPTAIN KCIKED YOUR ASS ONCE AGAIN! I have never felt more proud in my life, not even at myself. And that says something. You know, I once remember Nixie as a little spoiled girl who used to gather herbs in the forest. Now, I see a young captain that hugs angels. I mean, saving her from that prison and being near her for most of the journey seems like one the biggest achievements I have. I have never cried tears of joy before but I guess it is a beginning for everything. I said it and I would say it again. There is one captain left on the world that I will follow. You know, I sometimes had my doubts, and we had our fights, but she proved times and times again that she will lead us in the right way. The demon said that he will make sure Nixie kills us. Well, jokes on him, I would find that death quite nice. Anyways,YOU DID IT, NIXIE!
 
Come to think of it, it’s the same for all the elves. From afar, they seem cold and very pompous. But once to know them, they are actually so loving. They won’t admit it, but they can’t hide it forever, can they? I mean look at all the elves we met so far. His Majesty King Nathanilos loved his people, The Great Sylph loved even the ones that destroyed her eyes, Selenis loved his daughter, and The Great Aosthen loved the fun. I remember when the first months living with them. I hated every moment of it. Most of the elves couldn’t even understand me, and the others were usually talking very cold and politely. Since Nixie and me used to train a lot, we didn’t have much time together. I was surrounded by unfamiliar cold faces all the time. Until one day, when a small little girl came to me very curious. She wanted to touch me but was very afraid that I would burn her. I wanted to scare her a bit, so I stood up and started walking like a monster. But I tripped and fell down. The little girl started laughing and came to me and patted my head. It was the first time I saw an elf, other than Nixie, that smiled at me. I would sometimes hang out with her. As time passed, I slowly started to talk with other elves as well, even made a few friends. I wonder what they are doing now… You know, I do not like to admit this in front of Nixie but losing the elves was a bit heartbreaking. I do not share their pain or pretend to understand their sorrow, but still I have felt their love and it slowly fade away.
On a brighter note, after we heard Nixie’s story, we all set down for breakfast, while Dillen and Kelly went to scout the area. It was a perfect time to talk about how everyone was handling up with what just happened, you know the basic stuff like Gilder’s betrayal, or the fight with the interdimensional or the plan for our next adventure. But to hell with that. Tallion was just about to make my day even better. When I asked them how is everyone feeling, our wizard simply replied with: “I am upset a wasp beat me”. I don’t think I have laughed like that ages. Thank you, Tallion, I really needed that. We all changed so much but some things never change, do they? Tallion still has the most random answers, Eve still says “Nevermind” every time she thinks she bothers us and Bart is still trying so hard to hide his pervert side. I can understand now why he was friends with Heron. Anyways, I was weirdly happy. I almost forgot this feeling existed.
 
I always thought that happiness is not something that can be found or understood. It is but a feeling you have, when for a split second in your head the time stops, you look around and you feel a little spark inside. And as a little spark, this feeling comes and goes at the most unexpected times. So, I never bothered searching for it. What good it would do to try to force something whose beauty lies in its unpredictability?
It’s like that time when we played “break bones” on the boat. Although I have gathered the best team (Lafk’u, the fastodans, Brunek and Heron), I still ended up losing miserably. But that is the beauty of this game, it is unpredictable. Break bones is one of my favorite games since when I was a child. I remember that I used to play it with my brothers. It was like a family tradition that after dad would come back from a fight, we would play this for him to make him proud. You see, after my dad and brothers started dying, we never played it again. You only can play it with a lot of people, otherwise it is not fun. So after a while I just gave up. One time I told Nixie about it. I was a bit sad when I told her the story but her response amused me terribly. Of course, you can’t play break bones in two people, but she challenged me to see who can throw a rock further away in the river. Whoever lost, had to wash the dishes that night after dinner. Nixie went first. Her throw was not bad, but I was sure I will beat her. But while I was throwing the rock, I have tripped on something, lost my balance, and dropped the rock near one of my feet. Up to this day, I am sure Nixie has done one of the tricks she learnt at home. But for her sake, I washed the dishes that night just because I know she did this game to raise my spirit.
 
Well anyways, back to less nostalgic stuff, it seems that Eve also had a dream. In her dream, there were two figures fighting: A wizard with a staff that had an empty circle and some sword guy. In her dream, Eve was chained, and at some point, Lullaby’s sword came straight to her.She felt that she was in control over the situation, even when chained, but somehow it wasn’t Eve’s control but someone else’s. She woke up before anything else happened. Eve recognized Sikorki in that dream, the great interdimensional that fought the other five bad guys. At the moment, we could not figure out much. We concluded for the moment, that Lullaby tried to tell us something by giving Eve a dream.
After a short “Expect to die there, we have no clue what’s going to happen” briefing from Nixie, we went to open the XY dimension. The way to the gate was no problem, we even saw something they call “a tank”. Pretty interesting machine. It took some time to figure out how to open the gate. At first, we tried to do it ourselves, but it didn’t quite work. In the end, Eve managed to talk Lullaby into opening the gate and a big key hole sign appeared in front of us. I don’t know about the others, but you open a gate that may potentially lead to the destruction of this world, you reevaluate your life choices a bit, right? “Of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are “it could have been”. I read it once in Nixie’s books, and back then I couldn’t agree more. These days I find myself thinking more and more about what how different our lives would have been. “What for?“ you may wonder. I don’t know. Many people would say that it’s a total waste of time. Still…I can’t help it. Times and times again I imagine different, more joyful scenarios in which we would have been untroubled. I know we could all have lived a peaceful life, and probably it is the most painful thing to know. For no matter how much I long for it, I still would not trade it with what we have now. I don’t know exactly why. It’s a mix about sensing a certain responsibility for what would happen, a hope that the world is not doomed, a wish to remember what was lost and a love for what we have.
So there it was. The end of the world started here, with us. And of course the hundred mivureh, and Xantiniya could not miss the moment. She came in front of us and held one of her great speeches. Xantinya, dear, we get it. The first time you had a grand speech, was frightening, even a bit intimidating. But you know, it gets old after the first few times. I was half listening to her speech but what I most remembered from it was “I am finally reunited with my all selves” . As she was saying that, she took the form of an angel of sorts. She continued her speech and then left as always. OH no, Who would have expected that? You know, times and times again, we’ve seen her grow in power, and times and times again we will probably lose in front of her. But what if we actually win?. Might as well we fight till we can no more. So do become stronger, Xantynia, shot your best shot at us. We will maybe die, but someone will remember our efforts. It is too late for you, for one person is enough to make others believe in something. And maybe that person will die as well, but the circle will never end. And in hundreds of years from now, you will still have lost. As long as one person in this entire world believes us, then we have a chance still.
 
With Xantinya gone, and the gate open, we had nothing left but to go see what is in XY. When we entered there, it was complete night. The place looked like nothing we have ever seen before. There were very long buildings all around. Quite ugly in my opinion. And we were in something that is called “The Park” or something like that. Full of nature all around, but I was surprised to not see any houses here. There were also some kind of flying big fireflies that were trying to follow us wherever we go. Maybe they were like the wasps and it was the demon’s way to follow us or something. Well luckily, it was not the case. They were just some more advanced lights. Not long after our arrival, we heard some voices. The language did not seem similar but doesn’t quite matter. When you are in a new dimension, and you hear people coming, you hide. And so, we did. The others entered the magic chest that Damaschini has, and I hid somewhere to protect it. And the plan would have worked perfectly, if not right after those people left, our party was starting debating as always in the middle of “the Park” about what we should do next. The two guards heard and came back and found us. The head of these creatures was as long as one of my hands probably, but the neck was normal sized. And they had fur on them.
After they requested some identification papers of course we did not have, they proceeded to arrest us. To be honest, very annoying. We couldn’t even fight them because they had some kind of lasers that were pointing at us. So, we tried to communicate with them. Turns out that our common language is the old language they used to have. Of course, probably by now, you know that we are neither the best negotiators nor the smartest rogues. So of course, we ended up being arrested and they took us to some kind a white room. When we arrived there, we told them the truth about the reason we came. To no surprise, they thought we are either lying or crazy. You know, the first time I heard it from Tallion, it dind’t even cross my mind that he could be crazy. Is there something wrong with us? Because ever since we have left Tallion’s place in Ionolia, everyone we tried to convince said that we have some screw loose. Maybe Kelly was right, and we have some kind of mental illness and she studies us. Or maybe I am the crazy one and the others don’t even exist. Well either way, I cannot understand why some people just cannot believe us, if not for the story itself, then just for the simple thought that a bunch of creatures that your smart-ass system does not recognize, came to you and made such a complicated story. I mean come on, just look at Xixi, Damaschini and me and tell me you would not believe us. Or at least think about it.
Apart from that, they even had a premonition that something bad will happen when a black comet would fly in the sky. Hmm what a coincidence! There was a black comet of the sky today. BUT NOOOO! Did you know, dear diary, that COINCIDENCES OF THAT SCALE ARE A THING! HAHAHAA! WHY BELIEVE A BUNCH OF “MUTATIONS”, WHEN WE CAN JUST WATCH THE BEAUTIFUL STARRY SKY TONIGHT AND ASK OURSELVES IF THE PROFFECY IS RIGHT?? NOOO,EVEN BETTER, LET’S MAKE THEM SOME KIND OF EXPERIMENTS, BECAUSE IT SURE IT’S FASTER THAN ASKING THEM DIRECTLY WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON. I swear that the common sense is somewhere hidden in a tenth dimension or something especially for the people that live in other dimensions. Seems none of them understand the concept of a DISCUSSION. Anyways after many attempts to try to reason with the long head people, we just gave up and started to focus on helping Lullaby.
 
Might as well spend our time here doing something useful. Hmmm but what could we do? I mean she was not quite sentient at that moment. Everyone was trying their best to find a solution to help Lullaby. Everyone but our beloved captain Nixie which strongly believed that we should make Lullaby see a doctor. In days like these, I don’t even bother asking Nixie what is going on inside her head. I mind my own business and I leave her thinking about whatever she does. The others seem to not mind also, everyone except Eve. I do strongly believe that we all need some good sleep. We are all a bit irascible lately. But REALLY EVE? Are you going to put on an upset face every time your dear captain choses an option that seems emotionless? Well let me enlighten you then, YOU CHOSE THE WRONG CAPTAIN FOR THAT. “Let’s stop helping Lullaby, there is nothing we can do. She is just a burden in your eyes” Eve said very angry. HAHAHAHAAA of course Eve, silly me, I don’t even know why I was trying in the first place. PFFFF IT’S DEFENETLY NOT THE REASON WE ALL CAME HERE FOR. NOOOOOO, WE CAME INTO THIS DIMENSION TO EXPLORE THIS WONDERFUL WHITE ROOM. HOW SPLENDID! IT WAS DEFENETLY WORTH HELPING XANTINYA FOR IT!
I do understand the reason Nixie would feel a bit upset at Lullaby. In the end, we all lost something, and just as her, we did not have time to mourn for it but we are still standing. Strangely enough, sadness became for us a luxury of sorts. We can afford to feel it sometimes, but never to show it. What I do not understand is why, out of all times, she decided to not get involved NOW. Why not when we had to talk with the interdimensionals, why not in literally ANY OTHER TIME? I am also biased when I do not necessarily see eye to eye with someone (Dillen can confirm) but if Dillen was in such state I would try to help in a way or another. As for Lullaby, I hope she gets well soon.
 
Finally we put all the information together, and Bart came up with the idea how to help Lullby. We should go to sleep and see if one of us dream something. Funny how we ended up sleeping just because it would help us solve a problem. Well every hour I spend sleeping, it’s an hour that will help me calm down. So I gladly accepted this idea. I did not have any kind of dream but luckily for us, Tallion did. In the dream, he was in one of the Lullaby’s memory, where she was talking with Sikorki. He was preparing to go to fight the five interdimensionals, and had one last conversation with our dear friend. Sikorki told her that she can do a lot of good things in this world and gave her the sword. Then Tallion woke up. Finally, we were getting somewhere. We gathered some ideas and came up with a decent plan. Since the sword was the only way to communicate with Lullaby, we all put our hands on it, and put it near Lullaby. We did not try to convey a certain message, but rather let the sword decide what to tell her. We just wanted to let her know it was time for her to help Rafil. Tallion managed to make some kind of connection and we followed his lead. Various memories of Lullaby was flashing in front of our eyes. Damaschini chose a special one, the one in which Rafil was created. For a slight second it worked. Was it a good idea? Probably no. Because for some reasons Damaschini was looking and Lullaby, and Lullaby at Damaschini and so on in an endless loop. So something must have happened. Well I we will talk about that when it will become a problem. In the meantime, we tried a second time, but we chose a different memory, one with Sea. Of course, it worked. Thank you Sea, you really are always with us. Then Lullaby slowly started to move and managed to help her baby. Then became a still statue again. This time though, it seems that she was able to see the movement around.
 
Since we had some time left, we proceeded to plan our next move. For the long head people to not find out, we decided to have the conversation by writing. We all gathered in a circle and started writing our opinions. In the beginning it was alright but after some time everyone started so aggressively writing. Normally I do not think I would notice this because when we talk, we all get very engaged in the conversation. But for some reasons, I was not so engaged in this conversation. Maybe because I was a slow writer and couldn’t keep up with the rest. Or maybe just the simple idea that we were in an all white room, in a circle having a conversation about the future of the world in writing, made me question my sanity. Either way, I was rather listening than saying much. At some point, it seemed more than a fighting in writing, than anything else. We started talking about other things instead of our plan. I got annoyed about the writing thing because I had things to say, but the ideas were changing too fast. Again, no need to plan something for the future. Let’s talk about something a loot more fun, right Eve? Let’s talk about how Nixie thinks it’s Lullaby’s fault for what happened. What if she did? What then? Would we spend an eternity trying to convince each other that our opinion is correct? No. Then, why is it our business in any way? Especially when we had more pressing matters to discuss: like what are we going to do when we get out of that room.
To be fair, for the first time in a while I was not quite decided which of the options would be better. One because I felt that my opinion would be biased because I am from the Continent. And two, because there were people we could help in both places. If we went to the Continent, we would help people fight the orcs and necromancers. If we stayed here, we would help people from other dimensions. Come to think of it, the Continent would be the last place we know in our world that could be helped and then we would need to spend even more time finding new places in hope of some allies. And that would take us months. On the other hand, just imagining the poor people in The Continent fighting an undead orc frightened me terribly. In the end I decided to vote for going back to the continent (despite me offering advantages most of the conversation for the other side). Well after a lot of talking and debating, the votes were in favor of staying in the dimension of Death.
 
And just in time , the long neck guys came to take us to their secret research chamber probably. They put us in a car (too complicated to explain) and took we started going. Somewhere halfway, Kelly told us to scream at her for some weird reasons. She had some kind of plan which involved her spasming on the floor again. The death dimension people came and took her, and some time later she returned. She told us that the situation is not too good. That she tried to convince them that she could be useful in any way, but did not work. So, we had to do something to escape from there. A very simple plan: Damaschini would do some of his crafty things and would somehow modify the car, we would stay in the chest, then he would take the chest and fly. While he flies, to distract the people from shooting him, he also did some kind of explosion. The plan him and Kelly made worked out perfectly. And we were out of the van in no time. Well, Damaschini seems like a nice guy for now. A new face that does not betray us is nice to see once in a while. He is very quiet though. We barely talked when we introduced ourselves. Then in the park he let us climb on his shoulders to see the city the long buildings. But apart from that, he is just quiet. Sometimes he states his opinions but I do not hear him talk with us much. Hmmm…maybe he doesn’t like us or maybe he doesn’t know what to talk about. Nonetheless, if all the people in the old party were like this, I can understand why Tallion talks so much.
When we finally got to a safe place, we got out of that chest. Sooo…what now? Oh right, we don’t know. First, we had to blend in. So, it was time for Bart and Dillen to shine. They stole some clothes, disguised themselves, went to some kind of “train”, stole some money, and got us clothes and access to something called “The Internet”. Not only now we were nicely dressed, but we could buy food and whatever else we needed. Now, about that “internet”. I haven’t figured out how it works yet, but if you ask a device nicely, they will show you all the information you need. It’s a bit more convenient than books to be fair. Dillen seemed to have the time of his life there, so did Kelly and Damaschini who seemed very curious about everything around. To be fair, I do not think I could live here, but it seems that we finally have another exciting adventure ahead. So why not? This dimension sounds fun already. They have something worse than our canibals, they have humans that eat dried bodies.
Now that we have so much information, we can decide where to go. We will probably do some more research about this world, and then be on our way. I really hope we can get some sleep soon. I managed to rest a bit in the chest, but we all need more. I am sure of it.
 
May the Almighty helps us, and give us some time to sleep. PLEASE!
P.S.: By the way, dear diary, Bart is hiding something from us. He asked Kelly if he could borrow the “internet” device for a second so he could search for something. Then he went somewhere else and when he came back, the whole search history was deleted. We made fun of him for watching some porn videos. But does he really think that I would believe he would shamelessly take he device while all of us were there INCLUDING EVE and watch such things? A few days earlier when Nixie told him that in her dream, Bart was the left boob and he kept asking Nixie to say that it was what she thought not what Bart told her, because he did not want to upset Eve. Bart could fool some of us, but if he’s planning something, he might want to be more careful.
P.S 2: We finally found a person in this world that understands what a DISCUSSION is. Bart went to the toilet to find out more about the prophecy and as he sat there, another guy entered the toilet. They calmly talked about the prophecy without threatening each other or calling each other names. GOOD JOB, TOILET GUY!