TO OBLIVION - The Great Dying

[acronius_ 199]

 

[A painting by artist Holvius Griya depicting a war-torn Emberrest, devoid of its autumnal hues.]

 

[!] This essay would be read aloud by hired criers wearing the colors of Viru in major cities within the Empire of Man and the High Kingdom of Idunia. The author is proudly announced at the end of each reading.

 

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“I call upon the squalid, the modest, and the noble to hear my words.

For in me lies possibilities both within and outside of our imagination.

We are worldly, and our world will die.”

 

- The Author

 

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Birth and Death

 

Nothing is permanent. As the fruit upon the tree may grow from a wonderful pink blossom, and may ripen into its perfection, then finally fall from its tree and spoil on the grass, so, too, will the world fall into oblivion. From nothing was the world brought to light, and to nothing it will eventually return. All that which exists now in the vision of God will decay and cease to exist in its current form, being the fruit of His tree. Of course, as the dead and decayed apple will lay its seeds upon the earth and bear a new tree, so, too, will this world give birth to a new world. On such a day, descendants and all else that lives on Aos will have died, and the formation of a new world will be watched only by God as He gives life to His new stage. 

 

My Place in the World

 

I find myself to be usually optimistic, so I must assume that the end of this world will not come until long after myself and everyone that I love to have gone naturally, but even so, the concept of the Great Dying is of interest to me. That is what I have decided to call the world’s end, the Great Dying, a mass extinction of all descendant-kind and their livestock, as well as all that breathes, eats, moves, and lives. This is not a common thought. The deer will never peer into the sky and wonder when it will no longer have ground to stand upon, or sky to observe. In contrast, it is the nature of mankind to think, figure out our place among the stars, and I believe such a concept’s conclusion will elude the minds of mankind until the Great Dying. On that day, all will be revealed as a final decree from God to give us closure and allow us to pass into the Seven Skies with peaceful souls. Such is my belief, rooted primarily in the grace of God to allow mankind to slip quietly into oblivion, and His love that would allow us eternal life after this Great Dying. It is His gift of thought and foresight that allows me to scrutinize and tear away the fabrics of the fog that therein overlies the vision of nothingness into what shall be seen and told. That is the purpose of mankind, to take the signs from the heavens and interpret them.

 

The Dying Days - Existential Clarity

 

There are two primary possibilities, and one minor facet of the first, available to my reasoning, and that which I may in any way comprehend. This world is prosperous even in its eternal chaos, and will continue to be as long as it is allowed to. If such prosperity is realized in the constant expansion of mankind, then by the product of Assured Destruction in Existential Clarity (that being the theory brought forth by one old Claudia Lorena Temesch, and that which I agree with wholeheartedly) will mankind find its demise. Something so overarching about our existence shall be wrought from the confines of Aos and disseminated. It would then be upon the backs of the lawmen and the clerics to quell rebellions and conflict arising from the despair or anger that will almost spontaneously appear. If such an instance of civil war (surmising that all of mankind will remain in one nation for some time, or if not, will still be connected enough for such to be true de facto) is otherwise allowed to endure or is even intensified by inaction, then the remaining races on Aos will soon feel the war as well. That will be the doom of descendants, an Aos-wide war amongst themselves, for the ground will be scorched beyond repair and the seas drained of life-giving water. God will see the failures of His children and draw the world into His hands. He will crush it, then flatten it like clay to start anew. 

 

The Dying Days - Cataclysm

 

This section is dedicated to the minor, a subset of the section preceding it. The Cataclysm mirrors much of what has been detailed before, where humanity or another group uncovers some item, some idea, something that they shouldn’t have. This may be from Moz’Strimoza, where a disturbance could mean a crashing open of the gates to the Nether where infernal forces will descend in their entirety on mankind and his brothers. In any way, this scenario describes demise as it will come in a war at the hands of some group other than descendantkind, but still as a result of its actions.

 

The Dying Days - Inadvertent and All-Encompassing

 

This world is limited, and its resources naturally scarce. Water cannot be brought forth from the Void for sustenance, as it will evaporate into its origin, and grasses cannot grow where mankind has plowed land for his farms. As humanity inevitably grows to suffocate with its sheer volume, the world will begin to die. Famine will arise from lack of proper food, and farmers hurry to plow more land, which ruins further nature. Water will grow scarcer, and grains will grow less readily, exacerbating famine. Farmers then rush to plow more land for more crops, and more nature is ruined, with water growing scarcer even yet. This is to be a catastrophic cycle, and the day will come when no water flows, and no food is grown. Such will begin the demise of mankind. Men will starve first, then their wives, and lastly their children. The last human on Aos will be a small child, held in his mother’s arms as she had withered away the night before. Away from her care, and under the sweltering heat of the sun, he will perish without his forbears. God will then speak to the child and induct him into His army for his strength. This child will be the Horen of the new Aos, an exalted warrior of millennia past, and the proprietor of the new race of Men.

 

A Perpetual Wheel

 

Even in these scenarios of the apocalypse that are so many years in the future, one thing is ever-clear; the fact that the birth and death of our known universe is a cycle. As the wheel of time turns evermore, its bellows shall inflate with the power and life that God molds from the Void with His grace, and then fall into contraction, the life being thrust outward into the fires that rewrite and destroy, for all memory will be lost. The Seven Skies cannot be infinite, as such is illogical given the finite scope of our realms. If the Seven Skies are but a mirror set in the sky, they must also have the bounds of Aos. When all is lost, so, too, will be the souls of the damned and the cleansed, alike. Our world is imperfect, as many things have been and will be wrought away from His will, and given the opportunity to start anew after these courses of the Great Dying take their toll, He, in His eternal wisdom, will simply start again.

 

Reconciliation

 

Death is inevitable. All will fall into oblivion given enough time, and time is the essence of my argument. The only beings alive today that may see the end of our Aos are the Aenguls, and a handful of Elves that will refuse to die in a normal way. This passage is speculative, a window into the natural sciences as they relate to what we know of God and His will. You and I, readers of mankind, will not live to see this day. We are far from oblivion. Yet, it is approaching for our long-awaiting descendants, and they will experience what I have written, for I believe what is inscribed here is both possible and plausible. All will be gone, yes, but we have the fortune of watching life go by from the heavens after we are long dead. That is my peace. The Great Dying will be a show, friends will return, we will be forgotten by the living, and when all finds repose we will be allowed to sleep eternally, never to reawaken. Life is chaotic, and death is peaceful, but the journey from end-to-end is a gift impossible to overstate. We will all return to the same start, beggar or noble, so it is needless to allow corporeal judgment to weigh you down. We are the same. We are all men, and of us, mankind. We must act as if we are brothers. Nothing matters, at least in the long run. You will be forgotten, and your work will be downtrodden or eroded into sand. Yet, among the living, you will make your mark. These are the people you will spend the rest of eternity with after death, so live exuberantly, for peace is that; peaceful, but boring. Life is your only opportunity to enrich the world and enrich your soul.

 

 

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“I beg of you, in life, when all will be lost, 

live loudly and brilliantly, for you will be remembered in the minds of the dead and dying for what you did, not what you didn’t do.”

 

- The Author

 

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Penned by

Ariadna Secada

de Leomonte

on the

11th of Horen’s Calling

in the

288th Year of Our Lord

 

[laugh_giggletehe 113]

Cool post, now make a dark elf.