What is a man without his word?

[Thomas 3014]

 

“Who are you?”

“Do you know where you are..?

“Can you even hear me?”

 

Freedom. A word much simpler in sound than presence upon the realm. As one fateful being had come to learn, Freedom comes at a price, and the penny is not cheap to a man with nought but a name.

 

“What is a man without his word?”

 

 

---

 

 

Jagged rocks and spires lingered around as serrated mountains loomed in the distance. As the snow made it’s way towards the protruding surface of the stone, nightfall appeared to befall a crevice between the rock. The land was distant, cold, though littered with a flour-white and brooding arcagainst the ground. With the light from the moon above blocked by the apex of the mountain, the  fissure was flooded with darkness. Spikes of thin light impaled the snow in a bristling, moving line, offering faint illumination to the central cavity of the mountain’s fracture.

 

The silence caressed his skin like a cool winter breeze, snaking along his skin and taking away at each jagged edge to his pallid and rigid form. The storm above had ebbed to nothingness, and now the lack of sound was as pure as the wintry blanket above. Every creature was absent, their song had ended, and even the birds above had flown their last journey south. The silence was a poison to him, for in that void of sound the shallowness of his heart was laid bare. Beating against his ribcage, he stood tracked in the snow, laden with fabric from head to toe with a sight staring ahead towards the journey before him.

 

It gnawed at his insides, hanging in the air like the suspended moment before a falling glass shattered upon the ground. A gaping vacuum, needing to be filled with sounds, words.. Anything. The silence was poisonous nonetheless, cruelly underscoring how vapid his journey had become. Eerily unnatural, like a dawn devoid of birdsong, the silence clung to him like a cloud that could choke the life from him at any moment, weeping into every pore like a toxin, slowly paralysing him from speech.

 

Is this what he had become? A restless wanderer seeking retribution?

 

 

In the wasteland of the blind, the one eyed man is king; Though sight was a burden, a curse to the wayward son, and the lack of ignorance comes with a heavy cost. As the Wandered trailed through the snow, dipping and gliding through the untracked path of the rocky crevice, it was clear to his vacant stare that the path less travelled was his means of escape, escape from the world he had created.

 

“This path will not be kind, you know.”

“Nothing worth travelling ever is.”

“Why do this to yourself?”

 

The question was posed with no retort as the being traced along the rocky surfaces, scaling the nearby reach to breach its path. A funny sight, really, to see the sturdy form of a fair haired Knight soldiering through the snow, muttering to himself beneath his breath. Was he sane? Perhaps, perhaps not, the answer rest within he and he alone.

 

The mind of a Madman is a curious place, even more intriguing when the Madman himself decides to delve within.

 

“Are you always like this?”

“So.. stoic, and cold?”

“Are you hiding somethi--..”

“Oh.. I see now. You’re scared, aren’t you?”

“Fear is control.”

“It’s chaotic.”

“It’s necessary.”

 

Necessity.

 

The time had come to scale the cliff face, and the daunting task ahead was met with a gulp of his own. With one arm gently wrapped around the neck of his mount, his form bounced against the balls of his feet until his body was off the ground, soon finding himself mounted upon the steed which had seemed to trail after him in the previous months..

 

Months? How long had he been here? How many hours, days, or months have passed until he found himself in the Library of his Mind? What had felt like an eternity had passed, and the snow and the jagged surfaces around him were all that he had come to know. The night's light dipped into day, the day into night and night to day in a repeating cycle. Weeks passed, and still the wary form began to steep his way along the mountainside, the hooves of the steed beneath his thighs rose higher and higher against the snow falling down over his body, soaking the fabric of his clothing with a thin layer of frozen liquid.

 

Soon enough, he breached a snow covered plateau, each step of the horse traced through the thick white sheet beneath each and every pace. Large trees, stapled pine with snow-covered leaves along each and every branch, though one particular tree stood ghost-like, the silent observer of the snowy mountains. The only thing bigger than the range of granite peaks was the midnight sky, speckled with silver and as vast as any eye could wander. Below stood the Wanderer, made all the more tiny with his scarf flimsy in the wind. Nobody could have guessed he’d have come so far. As the sun rose into the sky and his journey prolonged, the boreal lights above acted as his guide.

 

 

His journey was long, and his journey was arduous, though soon he came about a clearing.. And the light was no less than blinding. Streams of solar rays shone down over his bedraggled form as the gelid winds brushed over him. He was wrapped up for a reason, the boreal chilled and sank through his flesh and into his bone. Despite the large scarf around his neck, the thick attire and the horse he tugged behind him, his tall and sturdy form compared minutely to the scale of the sight before him.  The Wanderer towered above people he once knew, though the sight of the the essence before him caused his pallid frame to freeze.

 

“Well isn’t that a sight.”

“Is this what you’ve been searching for?”

“Let us hope so.”

“Us? We’re an ‘us’ now are we?

“Do not get carried away with yourself, Artificer, you are a token of interest and nothing more.”

 

The Wanderer seemed to ignore the statement the voice had made, soon moving on to ask a specific question.

 

“What is that?”

“Well it’s your mind, genius, why don’t you figure it out?”

 

The sun was already high in the sky when he came into the view of the sight before him, the surrounding terrain was brought into sudden and sharp focus.  He stood in a valley ringed by snow-capped mountains, an emptied lake with a large, spherical pod resting softly above where the clear blue liquid would have once remained. In places, the layers of precipitous stone and granite came right to the basins edge, indeed, some trees had even fallen against the stone, barren of the leaves which once plagued it’s branches.

 

While the sun beamed overhead, the darkened ground declared a frigid, boreal layer, and from that arose the grey of millions of tonnes of granite, softened only by the pristine snow; at first, it lay in the jagged crevices like the lines esteemed upon the face of ancestors. Higher up not a hint of grey could peek through.. It was simply a brilliant white.

 

A slow pitter-pattering of rain began, bouncing off the cool stone and forming puddles underfoot. The cloud above has unstable emotions, it seemed. Why? Because, in one moment’s time, the glassy, smooth surface of the wet stone below can stir, move and churn. Dark, ominous clouds appeared from nowhere, rain starting in droplets, developing quickly into stinging pellets fell down over his ragged form.

 

“And who might you be?”

 

And with that, the sphere became the central focus. Looming ahead of the Wanderer and his Steed hovered a large, metallic globe. Detailed and carefully carved in with intricate designs, the edged engravings of the sphere before him were etched into the very essence of the sphere. The orb ebbed and flowed, gently rocking from side to side above a centralised pit. Before him, a vibrant light illuminated the details within the central ‘eye’.

 

“What is this?”

“No no… You know how this works.”

“Who is this?”

“Much better, my dear, much better!”

 

“You know who I am.”

“Oh my dear, yes I do... “

“Though do you?”

He remained silent at that, his stark ardent gaze spanning across the central orb.

“Would you like me to tell you?”

“You know how this works, Artificer, you know the puzzles you must solve.”

“Would you like your first test?”

“I do not believe I have a choice.

“You always have a choice.

“Silence yourself.

“You forget who is in cha--”

“I apologise for that, let us see if this comforts you more.”

 

And with that.. The voices were gone. Alvir had dissipated from his mind. Standing with no one around, the Artificer was now alone in his own mind.

 

And so, the Orb ceased its address, leaving the form alone with the giant, metallic sphere. When it comes to the fight, there's no honour; no code. All that matters is the win, and we take nothing for granted. There was no exit; nowhere to run. If only the sufferance of peace was granted, a chance to surrender to terms given across.  The shadows surrounding the sphere were already dissolving into the nighttime darkness which shot across the sky. Soon, a figure began to raise from the darkness underfoot, standing tall. Their swords gleaned in the cool moonlight, and the Artificer knew only one would walk away from this. His opponent’s sword was stained with ebon tenebrosity.

 

The Artificer shuffled to the side and awaited an attack, and possible, inevitable death. The dark figure charged with a mighty screech, and all the Wanderer could do was dodge to the side in one fluid movement. His enemy swivelled in his direction, the menacing glare of the eyeless creature glowered over him, it’s features indistinguishable. In that frozen second between the clash of blades, he say the sphere emit a gentle light. Their faces are nigh unreadable, no fear, no invitational smirk.

 

He banked on him making a mistake, though no mistake came. The Artificer was the defender, protecting his life with no reason but survival to fight.

 

“Weapons do not belong in the hands of shadows.”

 

There was no relent now; no reason to withhold. The pair drew against the ground and propelled forth. Steel parried steel as strikes were forced, dirt, stone and muddied rain spat into the air as each attack came with its defense. The Artificer’s blade was eventually knocked from his hands, leaving him unarmed and vulnerable, withered and breathing out against the cold and bitter air. He charged. With a roar like a bull, he drew his form forward and collided with the shadow itself, a blow from the shadowed blade glanced off his rib-cage, a sharp sting that faded fast.

 

His wound began bleeding openly, though his attacks would not cease. As they barrelled forward, the Artificer drew the shadow to the ground, his cold and pallid knuckles swung down to connect with it’s jaw. Again and again, he released the raw and physical exuberance of his pent up aggression released against the shadow beneath him. His blooded and muddied knuckles sank deeper and deeper into the ebon form, each strike causing a sensation of pain and fatigue along his arm.

 

In one final movement, the shadow form drove a blade through the Artificers stomach. As the life fluid drained out of him in it’s garish red, his skin took on the pallor of a darkened vessel, a gasp of exasperation escaping his figure as the metallic weapon drove through his lower portion. Oxygen became hard to take in; his breaths themselves gauged and jagged with each and every minute. His wound throbbed, and as the shadow lay defeated beneath him, the figure crouched over him, scarlet liquid which once held within his veins was clasped within his calloused figures. The congealed, cracked, dried blood which stained his wounds lay bare against the nipping winds. It was there that he remained, consciousness dipping and feigning from his body as the pain fought to control him. Soon, the feeling was too hard to bear, and the Artificer fell forth, planting to the side against the ground as the light left his eyes.

 

“What is a man without his word?”

“Is he cruel, or cowardly?”

“Or simply a man who has experienced too much to bear?”

“Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power.

“And so the wordless man can light no fires in the minds of others, and can wring no tears from the hardest of hearts.”

 

And so the orb was no longer, and neither was he. As the winds of time reversed the land, water flooded into the dried cracks of the lake, the snow-covered wastes of the land underfoot began to bloom with green, igniting the life of the wild into this once forgotten home.

 

And so what of the Wanderer, and his task through the mountains? There is no happiness without tears, no life without death, and no realm without an active mind.

 

“I rest your weary head until the morn’, my dear, for your journey has not yet won.”

“And until then, my sweet Prince, rest well, for the deed is done.”

 

For now the Artificer rests, though with the knowledge of greater challenges. Perhaps he had lost this day, though pity had been spared. Awoken with a pendent around his neck, the voice of his void-bound friend had come to return.

 

“I am a stranger in a strange land.”

“Though I have never felt closer to home.”

[SpodoKaiba 612]

Steven stared up towards the Cloud District of Haelun'or, leaning nervously against his signature shovel. His lips curled into a small frown, a small sigh passing through them. 

"I know people take long naps, but this is absurd."

[winterblood 11181]

Nemir stood in her dimly lit lab, grounding up a peculiar, rusty red plant.  The island table near her held a crate which was half filled with vials of  a blood red liquid.  Bags scarcely showed beneath her blue-gray, downcasted eyes as she crushed and twisted up the plant into a sanguine mush and paste.  Her movements her slow, sluggish.

"He'll wake up soon," Nemir promised to no one.  She was alone in the room. "He needs to wake up, or I need to gather more blood lotus..."

[Daisy 9735]

Moved to The Great Library. It shall be sorted into the appropriate category shortly.

 

If you feel this is a mistake, please contact myself or any FM and we'll restore it.