Member
Altim
T H E L I G H T O F W I S D O M I S R E B O R N
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The release of death was less like a sudden, climactic end.
Nay, life's end was more a sweet, subtle sort, a graceful fall into bliss—not unlike falling asleep.
The last thing Altim remembered was the sight of ocean-like, blue eyes and the feeling of warm, calloused hands. Those beautiful eyes and those diligent hands burned love one final time into the man as he passed from that world into the one that transcended it. In the company of his lover and his closest friends, Altim died a happy man in normal circumstances, for gone were the adventures and heroics of his past. His companions buried him respectfully at his request near the Holy Temple of Wisdom, where the man so saintly and wise took his eternal repose, and there the gods accepted the legend into the afterlife.
Clothed in white robes, he appeared in the infinite expanses of heaven and became a mere observer of time's passage. For a while, that felt right, but as the years drew longer and longer, Altim struggled to stay content with his posthumous disappointment. Not for he was impatient or entitled, but on merit of something... peculiar. There was truly something, something amiss, and after each century had ran its course, that fact became more and more apparent. The scholarly fellow came to his conclusion one night, when he gazed upon the stars that had danced in celestial splendor. The world around him grew gradually darker and colder, and Altim watched powerlessly as one by one, the burning lights in the godly sky were slowly doused. That malign entity wrought its sinful holocaust throughout the stars and brought each to its knees.
A mighty pang in the hero's heart signaled the fall of even Faerthus, the Wise, and tears stained Altim's sainted cheeks as he wept. Not even he whose wisdom was infinite could escape murder at the hands of the wretched creature. Yet the slaughter brutally continued.
Until the last god fell. Then there was nothing. All hope was lost.
A short moment of silence followed, and suddenly the world around him was damp. His eyes remained shut, but he did not need sight to know that his clothes were dripping wet and that the cosmic sensations of the heavens had been replaced by cold, timeworn masonry. His brown eyes flew open and made contact with a ceiling that seemed familiar to him to meet a relief carving, made by the hands of a famous sculptor whose name was lost to time. It depicted a scene of what were several men stricken in fear before a great light from within the forest. Vines had since grown over the carving, and although they partially obscured the text etched into the gold edges, one could still read what it had said:
Behold! That mighty light which illuminates the world is Wisdom.
All Virtue, Love, Peace, and Knowledge is enriched by it,
and from His sacred forest, the mighty light of Wisdom emanates.
Altim jolted upright in alarm and consternation. What was this? He sat in the middle of a clean pool of water. Behind him was what appeared to be stone double doors, but they must not have been doors since the space between the two slabs was very obviously closed. Outside the alcove in which the fountain lay, the room extended into a long hallway, at the end of which was a similar set of stone slabs, which comprised the true exit to the room. In the middle of the corridor, the ceiling raised to a glass dome, partially covered in overgrowth, from which light illuminated the building. The stone of the dilapidated structure had numerous cracks in it that moss and grasses sprung forth from, and the roots of a tree, in one place, broke through the ceiling in a hole that was packed tightly with dirt.
This, Altim understood, was the temple of his god, the Holy Temple of Wisdom. But how? He thought that he had died, but mysteriously enough, he felt whole. He was alive, with all of the needs and wills of the flesh. A quick look around himself gave him the answer. The state of the building was evidence enough that a whole era had passed since his last memories. Nothing was the same. At the time of his death, the temple was maintained ardently by Faerthus' disciples and Altim's students, but clearly it had fallen into disrepair.
The legend himself stood and walked across the cold, dusty floor, and he approached the door at the end of the hallway. He placed his hands upon the threshold and struggled to push the doors, but eventually the heavy slabs of marble and concrete gave way, dirt and pebbles falling onto Altim as the doors parted the soil that had blocked them. The forest outside was more or less lively as it was when he died. The birds still sang to the others, the leaves still swayed in the breeze. The temple itself was buried underneath a hill, atop which a large oak tree stood. Below the boughs of the tree, an elderly man sat. Altim's emergence from the temple stirred the new High Priest from his meditation beneath the oak, and with one eye open, the Priest asked, "What are you doing, young man?"
Altim raised a brow and pointed at himself questioningly.
"Yes, you."
The man seemed more confused by the Priest's affirmation. He was not young. In fact, he was certain that he was 137 years old if memory served right. But his body begged to differ. A quick glance down revealed that Altim wore not white but the same clothes he wore when he was a young man uniting the lands of Cynderia. "What happened to the temple?" asked the now young Altim from the foot of the small hill.
"Nothing. What ever are you talking about?"
"Nothing? The temple looks old and neglected. Its masonry is cracked. And its flame! Its flame is extinguished!"
"Of course it is old, young one. It was built in the years after Ansur established Ansus, and it is sixty-one thousand, twenty-three years since then."
That made Altim's eyes widen. He thought on it. "But is it not only fifty-eight thousand years since then?"
"What nonsense do you speak of? Surely, you are not two thousand years old!" The Priest spoke as if he were speaking to a blasphemer or a heretic. "Else you would have known the face of Altim, who saved this land from peril!"
"I am Altim!"
The Priest had a mixed look of disbelief and amusement. "You? Altim? You look nothing like the man! The true Altim was blond and had blue eyes. You have neither!"
Altim stomped his foot indignantly and scaled the hill. "Show me to Altim's violin," he demanded, a determined and fiery look in his eyes.
"And why should I do that? Your fingers are hardly deft enough to handle such a delicate instrument," the elder snappily replied.
"I need it," Altim emphasized. "And if you take me to it, I will best you with the truth of His Wisdom."
