Step 2: Vacation

[High_On_Math 399]

Spoiler

 

 

 

"You are weak, Luthriel  Because you are ready to simply wear that amulet of gold. To simply let those who stand before you as your lads, suffer fates impure. To let those who we could have aided, fall to cruel fates."

 

Step 2: Vacation

 

An elfess lounges in the undead-infested lands of Sakuragakure, on a Pamphilos-mandated vacation to clear her troubled mind.

 

 

Dear Remon, 

     I’m so sorry for not saving you.  I know you didn’t care.  But I know you might care now that you’re hurting.  I wish I was able to be stronger.  To fight the An Gho for your mind.  I should have cared more.

 

“If you are asking what I would do if I were you, I would pray for him, just as I pray for the living and the dead every day, Luthriel.”

God gives us strength. It’s not our own. If we are weak, it’s ok. In the end, he’ll make everything all right.  But does he even see us?

 

Dear Remon,

     I met a bishop, and I think I trust him.  We both know God isn’t what we thought He was.  But the Bishop told me to pray for you.  So I have been.  I don’t know if that makes you feel any better.

 

The ideal warrior is someone capable of controlling their emotions, utilizing them as necessary to promote their desired outcome.

“Think of it.  If you had grabbed your old llir that one time when I had told you to, perhaps we too could have brought him pure.  Think on this, and think which will be the bigger folly. To club a friend over the head and try to aid, or let them slip away from the camp with the deceiver.”

 

Dear Remon,

     I wanted to let you know that I really cared.  I still do.  I thought that you died because I didn’t care enough to save you, but that’s not true.  I cared so much it made me sick to my stomach and paralyzed me. 

 

“The first thing you must do is hold no expectations. You yourself have come to me, to a degree of despair or frustration, because you think you are failing to convince them. Why do you hold such weight? . . . You are indeed upon the Saintly path, but you are mistaking selflessness for yearnings. You have adopted children, and provided to them hearth and home . . . But you cling to the expectation that they would feel the same way, or that they would live as you desire for them. . . If your compassion was truly, TRULY, selfless . . . Then you would yearn for neither the child's praise nor the affection and redemption of your loved one. You would do the right thing, purely, because it is the right thing.”

 

 

I know what I’ll do.  I need to not need what I need.  And what I need is the love and approval of others.  Of course I still want to help, but I don’t need to help in a way that gains me fame or love or honor.  There is no need to be a hero- battles are won by ammunition supply and the footman’s sacrifice, and that’s what I can give.  A vacation from seeking significance.  A time of honest work.

Edited December 11, 2023 by High_On_Math

[SteppeNomad 1552]

"Hail the truth so long expected! Hail the day of FULL release!" Pamphilos smiled, as he worked on his tan near the oasis of the blasted wasteland. Indeed, has he already clubbed another two fine new lliran to bring them to purity. But he laments that such interruption comes when he could instead be eating peaches and enjoying the fine rice wine of the hidden village! He smiles in watching Luthriel finally seek her true vacation

[satinkira 5920]

In his final moments, Remon had considered - was he right to die? Should he simply turn to Luthriel once more, look to Pamphilos, find redemption in the Blessed Waters? 

 

No. Remon and Luthriel both knew that Remon did not deserve redemption, did not deserve another chance. The sins he had committed, albeit under the lead of the An-Gho, were too great to be wept, confessed, and hugged away. And though it would surely pain Luthriel, Remon knew that Luthriel would likely hurt more if he returned, if she saw the truth of how frail, how hollow his mind and soul had become - how no fake body could fix the simple fact that Remon should have died years ago, that even in flesh he was more dead than alive. Maybe, over the course of decades, centuries, he could have found peace, but the things he had seen, the agonies he had endured, the crimes he had committed would fray anyone unto emptiness.

 

The lessons never ended. The truth was always hidden. Remon had spent his last moment praying to the beauty of the world - no doubt he thought of the rising sun over the cliff he had been seated on, but primarily he thought of Luthriel. Of an indomitable hope, of a truly pure and blessed soul.

 

Who was he to tarnish such a thing?