It all began with an aborted action. Twas evidence of turmoil within, a storm of heedless emotion within a being wrought of such, framed by little more than the remembered fragments of those it had come to know.
Time swept past, the door to a realm barred even to the allies of the Dreaming God, even to his twin. A silent, unseen struggle consumed him, devouring his attention and requiring the entirety of his intent. So turned inwards was the god, its very being inverted by the tumultuous force of its own endlessly vast emotions.
Crashing waves against a stone shore, the rocks of its face jagged and torn--ever-growing moreso over time. Glassine shards of prismatic power contained within a storm of pigment, writhing like angry stigmata upon the inverted skein of the Watcher Within.
Neo-Aicheil. Os-fhireach. Aicheil.
Beyond the shores of Galbar's material world, there was a calamity, a great conflagration of the immaterial. Many dreams, thoughts, and minds thrown into a terrible conflict with themselves, plagued by the unleashed agony and wrath of the Dreaming God. Like shattered glass, like twisting fatal currents, like lightning in its suddenness and lethality, the unhinged consciousness wrought eons of suffering and ecstasy in equal measure upon any foolish enough to walk within the Great Weave for too long.
Slowly, with the boundless patience of time, the currents and shifting fractals of the Endless Dream began to calm. However, left behind by the calamity was an indelible mark, a change in the Subtle Web of Galbar's Collective Unconscious. It would go mostly unnoticed, but in the Dreaming God, this change was reflected with great potency.
Reforged once again, the shroud of the Dreaming God had been tainted by the nightmare. It was a flowing cascade of billowing pearlescent black, a sheen of red and green upon its form. Like veins, those bloody, sickly colors, they cut jagged patterns into his cloak. They were as shattered glass or fractured stone, and as the Worldweave shifted, so too did the colors, writhing and churning with dis-ease and discontent. The eyes of that most eldritch twin remained shut and tightly lidded against the world.
A low hum emanated outwards then, suffusing the Roineagan with a trembling terror. It rattled free all thoughts of peace and set alight a frightful fervor. It spread unending through his realm and past it to Galbar, and then with ease, it teased at eaves and cleaved open the threshold of his realm. Unto Antiquity, it spilled, a churning miasma of frothing sickly power. All it touched warped and curled away as if trying to escape. A mere glance could tell that the essence was a dangerous horrid thing, filled to brimming with malice and endless savage mirth.
Wrath. Revulsion. Fury. Discontent.
In the mire tread a figure, his silhouette a rift in the world, as if emptiness could somehow be given form. He pressed forth until he reached the center of that stonework domain wherein deities did dance and dally.
Upon the confluence stood the figure, his eyeless gaze turning then to roving. His attention pushed the miasma further out to encompass more of the vast colosseum where it roiled, casting its sickly sensation upon everything it touched. A subsonic vibration passed from the not-throat of that Dreaming God and pressed through the stone of the enclosure unified intent had conjured into being. It cast out, and it touched the thresholds of several realms.
Yamat’s Endless Wastes, perhaps for the first time, came to know a devouring fog. Its drifting black soot and Umbral Star burned down upon that desolate place, yet they could not entirely banish that insidious incursion. Within the roiling fog, eddies of tumorous essence grew, then coalesced into a vast figure, its eyes closed, its cloak marred, its visage once a sea of stars. Now to look upon him would invoke only a sense of emptiness or warped vision, as if a vast lightless void had devoured the nebulae of his deific form.
“Deity of Tragedy I call upon your muse,” intoned the Eldritch Twin, his voice stirring the dead air of the place into frenetic motion. Winds swept out, carrying the murky mist that was his essence. The sudden storm invoked by his trespass at first seemed aimless in its vast and trackless dance, meaningless and empty, but as the seconds ticked, something began to resolve itself in that dead-wind movement. Where before there had merely been the absence of things, devoid of life or soul, there existed now a droning noise, a deep-wind rushing sound, which was most unnatural.
As if to punctuate the presence of the dread wind, he spoke.
“Pact.”
It said alliance.
Into the Realm of Truth, a divine essence pressed, its nature most familiar. It passed through many mirrors and split a thousand-thousand times, slithering through the empty air as it multiplied. With each reflection, it grew until finally, each thread drew inwards and formed the Dreamer's form anew.
“Twin.” The presence said.
Yet the word was empty.
In its search, the vast intractable intent of the Dreaming God fell upon the Realm Between and saw in it the remnants of a struggle. The marks of claws, flashes of heat, hatred, and sorrow. Rage and jealousy.
Deep within the mire, Aicheil shed tears.
Hidden inside, Os-fhireach clawed at his cage.
Just beneath the surface, Neo-Aicheil raved and raged.
Yet, within the mist, eyes closed shut, visage starless and black, a nameless presence ruled.
“Petty,” the presence said and its words cut swaths of hateful symbols in the stone. The air screamed and fled, slamming outwards, cracking pillars, and buffeting the walls with tremendous force. Any caught between the center where the presence stood, and the walls would be beset by a terrible pressure, though no violence would befall them.
The figure turned and strode forth, the realm of Moonlight his destination.
The Dreaming God moves to leave his realm, but the action is aborted by the inner turmoil of his warring emotions as he espouses a new power--though it is yet unknown to him. The storm of his emotions infect the Roineagan and spread beyond, riling up a storm within the Endless Dream, proliferating a maddening stream of nightmares. Eventually, the Dreamer emerges from his stupor, apparently stabilized, yet something has changed. Not all is well.
Departing his realm, his form changed and his visage surrounded by a swiftly spreading mire of miasmic essence, the Eldritch Twin enters Antiquity, searches, and locates those of his siblings which he desires to entreat--in one fashion or another. He leaves behind him only a deep sense of unease as he seeks out his twin, calls upon Yamat and heads into the realm of the Moonlit Goddess, his intentions unknown.
--】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【~ Life ~】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【--
To tell the story of Myrda is to speak of three tales entwined. The sense and culture of a people--the Taryne; to speak of the mortal--Myr; and to speak of the Sorcerer himself--Myrda Sciorene. So it is that you must know of the Taryne, a people whose only place in the world could be described as desolate. Vast ravines amid a stony wasteland of brittle flora and sparse, hidden fauna. It is in these lands which no other desired that the Taryne made their home, living in deep caves to escape the harsh winds and harsher shifts in temperature. Among these far-flung people carving a niche in the wastelands of Taryn, Myr was born to a pair whose names have long since been forgotten.
The boy who would become Myrda is said to have been born touched by the spirits and so--soon after he could fend for himself--he was released into the world. It is said that he wandered for eight days eight times over, barely subsisting on the little he could forage or trap. Like many of his people, death was a friend, always walking several steps behind, waiting to catch you when you fell.
Yet, though his prospects were bleak, he never failed to catch himself and carry on. Many times was he run out of settlements, for the sight of his spirit touched eyes--like glowing amber limned with silver--told his people more than he could ever explain away. Still, a fire was in those alien eyes, and a strange droning hum had entered him, pulling him like metal to a lodestone. With time he found a place somewhere near the center of those lands.
Through near-starvation and terrible thirst over craggy hills and deep within ravines, he trudged. Eventually, he became aware again. He knew not how long he had wandered, only that he could go no further than the deep chasm before him. With the last of his flagging strength, he descended.
No one knows how far he went, nor how long he remained in that abandoned place. As no one saw him emerge, it is a mystery whether it truly was the same lad who eventually clawed his way back up from those depths.
All that is known is that someone did emerge. Someone who resembled the young man who'd once begged at the mouths of many caves, asking only for what he needed for survival.
Yet it was no starving adolescent who passed the threshold of that first cave-home. It was someone else entirely. He was a man with quiet, piercing, haunted eyes, full with a deep knowing unheard of in those lands and a strength of presence utterly unknown to the Tarynean people.
He called himself Myrda Sciorene.
In those days, he was simply a man of great presence and wisdom. He taught. He worked, and he directed. With time he came to know each of the many tribes, and with each his rapport was unmatched. Slowly over a matter of many years, he drew their leaders closer to him, and the youth of those places closer still.
With these would-be outcast children, he built his own place, and therein life grew more abundantly than anywhere else. Yet the earth remained as desolate and unforgiving as before. Nonetheless, many plants came to grow upon his land, spreading slowly. Water too seemed to spill from that place, purer than anywhere else. Its life-nourishing essence pressed out from the city. Wherever the water touched in that desolate land, it brought--with the slow patience of time--new life.
So it was that the Taryne expanded from their former homes, their small hidden settlements becoming towns, and then--in lesser number--cities as trade was established between clans. All the while, Myrda’s power, and renown grew for the people who had been his knew from where the bounty had come, even if they could not understand its nature...or its price. So, as the Taryne grow and expand, remembering age-old grudges of those who had driven them from their ancestral lands, Myrda’s power changes him, with his people none the wiser.
Dwelling now in the great edifice of Anaryd Vhana, Myrda exerts his influence over the world, remaining in shadows--only his most trusted students and confidantes allowed to enter his presence. To his people, he is Sotyras, Lightbringer, He-Who-From-Nothing-Springs-All, Wiseman, leader, and perhaps sorcerer. However, as sects of his people take up arms, thinking to conquer foreign lands to avenge their long-gone kin--those many who died in the ravaged plains of their home--he comes to be known by others beyond his ilk. Reaver, Devourer, Writhe, and to those few who witness his power directly and live: He-Whose-Shadow-Eats-The-Soul. This reveals Myrda to be a sorcerer of two natures, one who desires the betterment of humanity, his people especially. A man who is not the least bit averse to sacrifice and long arduous work. Compassionate, driven, fierce, and wise. Yet...at once, a person with a hunger behind his kindhearted gaze, a darkness behind his ferocity. A shadow...hiding in plain sight, limned by light, hovering in the center of awareness, unseen. Perhaps the Taryne are wrong to idolize him so, after all, no one knows for sure if Myr and Myrda are one and the same...or if something other wore his skin when he left that long-forgotten place.
Myrda’s power is a force from beyond, pressed out into the world; the echoing consciousness of a dark memory of ages past. It is like a slithering, skittering horde of venomous insects, harmless if left alone, dangerous if disturbed. Infectious, this power impugns upon the sanctity of the world’s natural laws, manifesting a whispering resonance that shifts the nature of things closer to its own. It can change the laws that govern the properties or nature of any substance--living or inanimate--though at a great cost. With each alteration of the world, each manifestation of Chaos’ dying hold, the unseen contagion subsumes its host--or those chosen to hold its dread influence. With every display of sorcerous might, Myrda is subsumed further by this calamitous intelligence, its nature eroding at his humanity in both body and mind. Believing firmly in self-sacrifice, as many of his people are, he accepts this cost so that the Taryne might prosper in truth; so that others might never go hungry as he did...so long ago.
Though this eldritch essence slowly subsumes its host(s), it similarly gives boons of a fashion to them, in the form of additional limbs, augmented physiology, and exceptional longevity. For as they alter the world, those twisted rules warp them in kind, causing mutations to occur even as strange anomalous properties come to inhabit the host’s vessel. In this way, though his body is frail beneath the robes and inhuman viscera, he remains a danger if confronted physically. Beyond this Myrda is an adept survivalist and scholar, studying the world, its histories, and cultures, as well as knowing how to survive in it. He understands his people, both intuitively and on a more rational level, and a good thing too...for if logic had no hold in his mind, he might already be lost.
Myrda’s parasitic power is a constant plague upon his mind, always biting at the edges of his psyche. This can make him distracted, lethargic, or temperamental at times. Additionally, should the Presence ever subsume him entirely, it will become a plague upon the world, corrupting everything in its path. Those who choose to assist Myrda in staving off this likely inevitable fate take a fragment of his power into themselves. Often...it devours them like a slow sickness, hollowing them out until they are no more than a husk of a person. If left alone, these husks will die, leaving only the other to move their vessels. They must be killed before this occurs. While alive, these people gain the barest fraction of Myrda’s power, allowing them to warp the world around them, at the cost of drastically accelerating their own demise. The corruption of Sciorene’s power works much the same on almost any living thing unless he takes on the burden of these maladies himself--or gives them unto another, who will then be doomed to a slow agonizing death bereft of any benefit or solace.
The Other claws at the edges of reality, its echo heard only by the mad and dying, its touch only by those who have given themselves to its insidious embrace. Yet, there remains hope amidst the inevitability of consumption, it is for this that Myrda grasps. Every second of every day he pursues the betterment of humanity so that others--if not he--might one day cure the blight that he bore back into the world from a foregone age.
With the sweat of his brow and many sacrifices of both flesh and mind, Myrda is a man seeking redemption in hopes that his life’s works might absolve him of crimes committed in the future. He is a man of fierce passion, tempered by the sobering truth of immortality, his appetite sated by visions of worlds beyond their own, forces neither seen nor understood, terrible things better left in the far reaches--unseen, ignored, unnoticed. Having brought such a thing to the fore, Myrda Sciorene’s greatest desires are to exploit this power for the benefit of man and to understand this thing, so that he might conquer it--if not in this life, then perhaps through those who come after.
The doings of his people are another matter, as while many have accepted peace and wish only to live and love; others remain unsatisfied, carrying grudges, desiring ever more. Myrda’s life is an endless struggle to achieve his goals while sating the needs and wants of his people, his mind ever at war with itself...and perhaps something else as well….
--】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【】▼【~ Life ~】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【】▲【--
To tell the story of Myrda is to speak of three tales entwined. The sense and culture of a people--the Taryne; to speak of the mortal--Myr; and to speak of the Sorcerer himself--Myrda Sciorene. So it is that you must know of the Taryne, a people whose only place in the world could be described as desolate. Vast ravines amid a stony wasteland of brittle flora and sparse, hidden fauna. It is in these lands which no other desired that the Taryne made their home, living in deep caves to escape the harsh winds and harsher shifts in temperature. Among these far-flung people carving a niche in the wastelands of Taryn, Myr was born to a pair whose names have long since been forgotten.
The boy who would become Myrda is said to have been born touched by the spirits and so--soon after he could fend for himself--he was released into the world. It is said that he wandered for eight days eight times over, barely subsisting on the little he could forage or trap. Like many of his people, death was a friend, always walking several steps behind, waiting to catch you when you fell.
Yet, though his prospects were bleak, he never failed to catch himself and carry on. Many times was he run out of settlements, for the sight of his spirit touched eyes--like glowing amber limned with silver--told his people more than he could ever explain away. Still, a fire was in those alien eyes, and a strange droning hum had entered him, pulling him like metal to a lodestone. With time he found a place somewhere near the center of those lands.
Through near-starvation and terrible thirst over craggy hills and deep within ravines, he trudged. Eventually, he became aware again. He knew not how long he had wandered, only that he could go no further than the deep chasm before him. With the last of his flagging strength, he descended.
No one knows how far he went, nor how long he remained in that abandoned place. As no one saw him emerge, it is a mystery whether it truly was the same lad who eventually clawed his way back up from those depths.
All that is known is that someone did emerge. Someone who resembled the young man who'd once begged at the mouths of many caves, asking only for what he needed for survival.
Yet it was no starving adolescent who passed the threshold of that first cave-home. It was someone else entirely. He was a man with quiet, piercing, haunted eyes, full with a deep knowing unheard of in those lands and a strength of presence utterly unknown to the Tarynean people.
He called himself Myrda Sciorene.
In those days, he was simply a man of great presence and wisdom. He taught. He worked, and he directed. With time he came to know each of the many tribes, and with each his rapport was unmatched. Slowly over a matter of many years, he drew their leaders closer to him, and the youth of those places closer still.
With these would-be outcast children, he built his own place, and therein life grew more abundantly than anywhere else. Yet the earth remained as desolate and unforgiving as before. Nonetheless, many plants came to grow upon his land, spreading slowly. Water too seemed to spill from that place, purer than anywhere else. Its life-nourishing essence pressed out from the city. Wherever the water touched in that desolate land, it brought--with the slow patience of time--new life.
So it was that the Taryne expanded from their former homes, their small hidden settlements becoming towns, and then--in lesser number--cities as trade was established between clans. All the while, Myrda’s power, and renown grew for the people who had been his knew from where the bounty had come, even if they could not understand its nature...or its price. So, as the Taryne grow and expand, remembering age-old grudges of those who had driven them from their ancestral lands, Myrda’s power changes him, with his people none the wiser.
Dwelling now in the great edifice of Anaryd Vhana, Myrda exerts his influence over the world, remaining in shadows--only his most trusted students and confidantes allowed to enter his presence. To his people, he is Sotyras, Lightbringer, He-Who-From-Nothing-Springs-All, Wiseman, leader, and perhaps sorcerer. However, as sects of his people take up arms, thinking to conquer foreign lands to avenge their long-gone kin--those many who died in the ravaged plains of their home--he comes to be known by others beyond his ilk. Reaver, Devourer, Writhe, and to those few who witness his power directly and live: He-Whose-Shadow-Eats-The-Soul. This reveals Myrda to be a sorcerer of two natures, one who desires the betterment of humanity, his people especially. A man who is not the least bit averse to sacrifice and long arduous work. Compassionate, driven, fierce, and wise. Yet...at once, a person with a hunger behind his kindhearted gaze, a darkness behind his ferocity. A shadow...hiding in plain sight, limned by light, hovering in the center of awareness, unseen. Perhaps the Taryne are wrong to idolize him so, after all, no one knows for sure if Myr and Myrda are one and the same...or if something other wore his skin when he left that long-forgotten place.
Myrda’s power is a force from beyond, pressed out into the world; the echoing consciousness of a dark memory of ages past. It is like a slithering, skittering horde of venomous insects, harmless if left alone, dangerous if disturbed. Infectious, this power impugns upon the sanctity of the world’s natural laws, manifesting a whispering resonance that shifts the nature of things closer to its own. It can change the laws that govern the properties or nature of any substance--living or inanimate--though at a great cost. With each alteration of the world, each manifestation of Chaos’ dying hold, the unseen contagion subsumes its host--or those chosen to hold its dread influence. With every display of sorcerous might, Myrda is subsumed further by this calamitous intelligence, its nature eroding at his humanity in both body and mind. Believing firmly in self-sacrifice, as many of his people are, he accepts this cost so that the Taryne might prosper in truth; so that others might never go hungry as he did...so long ago.
Though this eldritch essence slowly subsumes its host(s), it similarly gives boons of a fashion to them, in the form of additional limbs, augmented physiology, and exceptional longevity. For as they alter the world, those twisted rules warp them in kind, causing mutations to occur even as strange anomalous properties come to inhabit the host’s vessel. In this way, though his body is frail beneath the robes and inhuman viscera, he remains a danger if confronted physically. Beyond this Myrda is an adept survivalist and scholar, studying the world, its histories, and cultures, as well as knowing how to survive in it. He understands his people, both intuitively and on a more rational level, and a good thing too...for if logic had no hold in his mind, he might already be lost.
Myrda’s parasitic power is a constant plague upon his mind, always biting at the edges of his psyche. This can make him distracted, lethargic, or temperamental at times. Additionally, should the Presence ever subsume him entirely, it will become a plague upon the world, corrupting everything in its path. Those who choose to assist Myrda in staving off this likely inevitable fate take a fragment of his power into themselves. Often...it devours them like a slow sickness, hollowing them out until they are no more than a husk of a person. If left alone, these husks will die, leaving only the other to move their vessels. They must be killed before this occurs. While alive, these people gain the barest fraction of Myrda’s power, allowing them to warp the world around them, at the cost of drastically accelerating their own demise. The corruption of Sciorene’s power works much the same on almost any living thing unless he takes on the burden of these maladies himself--or gives them unto another, who will then be doomed to a slow agonizing death bereft of any benefit or solace.
The Other claws at the edges of reality, its echo heard only by the mad and dying, its touch only by those who have given themselves to its insidious embrace. Yet, there remains hope amidst the inevitability of consumption, it is for this that Myrda grasps. Every second of every day he pursues the betterment of humanity so that others--if not he--might one day cure the blight that he bore back into the world from a foregone age.
With the sweat of his brow and many sacrifices of both flesh and mind, Myrda is a man seeking redemption in hopes that his life’s works might absolve him of crimes committed in the future. He is a man of fierce passion, tempered by the sobering truth of immortality, his appetite sated by visions of worlds beyond their own, forces neither seen nor understood, terrible things better left in the far reaches--unseen, ignored, unnoticed. Having brought such a thing to the fore, Myrda Sciorene’s greatest desires are to exploit this power for the benefit of man and to understand this thing, so that he might conquer it--if not in this life, then perhaps through those who come after.
The doings of his people are another matter, as while many have accepted peace and wish only to live and love; others remain unsatisfied, carrying grudges, desiring ever more. Myrda’s life is an endless struggle to achieve his goals while sating the needs and wants of his people, his mind ever at war with itself...and perhaps something else as well….
An endless miasmic storm of color and experience, a maelstrom of intent and knowledge vast and endlessly expanding--compounding upon itself. The echo of the Lifeblood's mind, its essence writ into a realm--connected to the Subtle Web--wielded by the Dreaming God. Like a typhoon, its waves beat against the shores of the Endless Dream, sending swirling patterns throughout. Ripples of intent, altering consciousness, invoking madness here and there, but causing other phenomena as well.
Bleeding past the pale veil through the stars and air the essence of that Dreaming Realm it cast out beyond its shores unseen. Into minds it dripped, causing dreams and fits of maddened insight. Inspiration, intimated through cascading songs of psychic might, its source seeming forever out of sight.
Like a twisting, coiling tempest it struck against many minds, until finally through cracks and seams it spilled past mind and into the flow of space and time. Wounded, that endless expanding fabric--ever-compounding 'pon itself--it seeped out from the severed threads and pressed like blood into the world.
Yet shriven by the too-real pressure of Galbar, that endless flowing essence was shriven and cast out wide and far.
A gentle breeze, a passing cloud, birdsong in the air. A human sitting idly 'gainst a tree, using trunk in place of any chair. Calm, content, and filled to brimming with quiet happiness, that human enjoyed the world around him almost in a state of bliss. The fluttering of dewdrops against tanned, delicious skin. Flecks of water from storms now passed, the pattered onto him. Kiss of wind, and sun and sky. Leaves crumpled beneath his thigh. Eyes closed, a warmth felt from all around, and altogether a thoughtless, drifting--nature's quiet calling sound. Songs they hummed just beyond his mere mortal perspective, and though unheard eyes opened when their tune changed.
The slightest crease of brow, a slight tension in his neck, then a glance from here to there, searching for something suspect.
"Who's there," he said, his voice like a whispered shout. Yet no response came, for to him the song could not be heard--it did not exist and so its tune-filled him only with a strange, displaced doubt. A twisting knot, a grasp at leaves colored with autumn oranges, reds, and greens. The human Annheil could not hear that subtle thing.
Again it shifted, the unheard call of Worldsong's hymn, and so a greater uneasiness began to be felt by him. He rose to feet which shook beneath, though the soil was calm and stable. He raised his voice, and took a step, desiring a return to calmness if he were able.
The thunder without lightning, it shook the sky and the trees. He felt its pull, and the song struck out, pushing him down onto his knees. Shocked, stunned, and caught flatfooted he stared blankly at the ground, as finally he heard it, that fate-spun dreadful sound. It twisted its way into his ears, like slithering, sickly things. Many legs, fangs, and eyes it pressed inside his brain and reared as if to sting. Its maw opened, its claws were bared, and blades were drawn against his flesh. Yet outside his mind and in the world, he remained untouched as the Worldsong screamed at the intrusion of this strange unreal emptiness.
Slowly lights within his mind they colored from prismatic to black and sickly green, the warped, and boiled and twisted until his mind was made unclean. Annhein's eyes were filled with darkness then as if drained entirely of color, for in them one could see a thing which mortals would wish they'd not discovered.
Vile malice, hateful bile, a stinging nonsense song. It was a palid corpse, or a shadowed silhouette, hidden in forest's tangled branch-wrought throng. A figure in the night, one which haunted dreams. Images caught at vision's edge, or rhyming unheard voices, weaving song. Whispering suggestions from beings who did not exist. Hallucinations and fabrications which only to an individual had substance and truly persisted.
A breath of silence....
. . .
...it did not last for long.
Annhein rose to his feet and set out to join his kin.
He had to return to the village, after all...they were surely awaiting him.
Eyes gazed down upon creation with a maddened haze of rage, wrath unleashed unto the world, as if it were a plague. A twisting smile, a writhing hum, claws like cutting blades.
Neo-Àicheil pressed its awareness outwards and into Endless Dream he reached. Threads plucked to toneless tunes, music unheard except by one type of entity.
The Chomhlionachd.
Twisting skulls, crystal drillbits, bone, and gnarled wood. Burning flame. Oilslick skein, and minds like vast churning maelstroms, hungry and insane. Each a chimera of thoughts, bound by singular concepts, leashed to terrible hunger. Beautiful and vast, narrow in focus, but deeper than the minds of any other thing. Immortal and oft unseen.
They gathered to the presence of the Dreaming God, attracted by his eldritch song. Its melody it wove into their minds and is it did they coiled and fled back into the Dream's endless churning space-time.
Without a mouth, without a face, with only its dreaded gaze, the Eldritch Twin, the Dreaming God it smiled and laughed for an age. Slowly, its laughter receded into the aft as above it rose--prismatic gaze closed--Ѻs-fhìreach's distinctive lack. For in him madness could not swell and beneath his will though wrath did churn, its hold to him was but a far of knell.
The Dreaming God turned its weighted gaze away from his realm, a quiet smile in his soul. To the threshold, he moved so that he could pay a visit to another deity, a god who upon the world made sure Tragedy took its toll.
The Worldweave, Àicheil’s realm, is filled with the bitter rage and hurt and discontent borne of his interaction with Cadien. The Dreaming God’s mind shifts to its third identity--Neo-Àicheil--and rages beyond control. Shuddering storms cross the Endless Dream and fill its many pathways where it is near to the world’s physical aspect. The paths become overfull and so spew out essence, creating tiny wounds in its fabric. So it is that unreal essence seeps into the world, mixes with the nature of reality, and is rendered into something halfway between the two.
Astral essence is born.
Held within this essence is the maddening hymn, the terrible chorus, of Neo-Àicheil’s endless pain and rage. It sets upon a man and curses him with its power, making him a hero...and the beginning of a terrible blight upon the world.
Somewhat sated by this outburst, Neo-Àicheil withdraws its power back into the Subtle Weave and calls upon the Unfulfilled, conferring unto them the ability to manipulate the living through their connection to the Collective Unconscious.
The Dreaming God recedes then into his realm, enough of his wrath spent so that Ѻs-fhìreach can once more take hold and keep the malice under lock and key. He sets out from his realm, in search of the God of Tragedy.
Start: 4MP, 3DP
- 4MP [Discounted: Astral Portfolio] -- Causing an extreme change: Suffusing the world with Astral currents. - 2DP -- Confer an extraordinary ability: The Chomhlionachd | Madness Puppeteering (2DP towards Madness). - 1DP -- Consecrate a Hero: Annhein | Psychic Blight I (1DP towards Madness).
Psychic Blight I -- The consecrated holds within them a contagious curse of madness. While they hold it no psychic threat can harm them, for their mind remains already inexplicably--and impossibly--broken beyond repair. This taint in their consciousness spreads like an invisible miasma around them for several feet such that proximity can result in a slow contraction of the blight. This curse builds up in the afflicted over time, driving them mad not in months, but in a span of days or perhaps weeks for those strong of will and heart. When it passes on to the next person the previous carrier is no longer contagious but remains utterly mad nonetheless.
Into the coliseum of Antiquity passed the Dreaming God, eyes once more closed to the world, his face a featureless void, his form bereft now of starlight. His shroud trailed out behind him and its form seemed to tear at the atmosphere of the place as if they’d come to quarrel. Though he did not remain for long, his essence lingered in that place, and any who walked through it would feel a deathly chill.
Crossing the threshold of his realm, Ѻs-fhìreach arrived to the sight of a storm beyond anything that had ever existed. It was a tempest through-and-through, and within it, all meaning had been sundered, replaced only by mindless rage. With a careless motion of his hand, he stilled the Roineagan and silence rang out almost as if it were itself a sound.
He stopped then and raised his hand and found its starry substance marred. Absently, the Dreaming God let out a call.
"Fìrinn," it said.
Awaiting his twin, Ѻs-fhìreach observed the wound he had sustained from contact with Perfection's get. It was like a scar composed of a thousand cosmic rifts as if nebulae had ruptured and left their blazing mark upon his arm. The Roineagan stirred and he held out the hand which yet remained whole. A whirling dirge of hatred and vile, venomous malice engulfed its unmarred form and it was in that moment that a reflection's ripple grew.
Àicheil's eyes opened to bear witness to his twin.
The sound of stillness was not broken by the usual refrain--that of the simple and necessary unity that only one word could provide--but instead of a far more unusual response.
“Ѻs-fhìreach. You do not call for your Twin, but for an avenger of deific proportion. You do not call for my essence, but my aid. What has happened, One-of-Three, that this aspect of yourself dominates the others?”
The reflection-laden form of Fìrinn thus appeared within the heart of the Worldweave, its words a herald, and immediately its true form recoiled and flinched as the sensations of that maddening ripple assaulted its senses. Shortly thereafter, the effects of its twin’s scream of anguish and utter corruption of purpose reached it and it, too, let out a cry of similar sound and purpose (though lesser in magnitude, as if reflecting only its echoes).
It reached out a tender hand--its true hand--and placed it upon the still-searing wound that its twin had suffered. In this place, this close to its twin, it could actively feel the sadness and the rage. It could feel the undulating thrum of pain as it surged through each individual star and nebula within its twin’s shroud. It could feel the minds of those unlucky mortals whose consciousnesses had borne the brunt of that terrible and unintentional assault. All this, without direct attunement, was enough for the God of Truth to feel--for the very first time--what it might be like to actively fear.
Nevertheless, it pressed on with its ministration. Nothing would ever stop it from coming to its Twin’s aid, no matter how daunting or dauntless it might be--their bond was one beyond love, beyond life, beyond even perfection. Theirs was a bond that was fundamental to themselves and to the world, the very foundation of thought and imagination and understanding--it would not be so easily sundered. With an almost grim sense of determination, the lights reflecting upon Fìrinn’s almost-face dimmed, one by one, and were replaced with tenebrous clumps of starlight. It pressed forward, and it felt the searing heat of that wound upon its true form. It attuned to Àicheil, and then to Ѻs-fhìreach, and then to Neo-Àicheil. It attuned to all three at once, so that it could understand without words.
Yet with words did he reply, for though his mind was open to his twin, within it was a storm. Nonetheless, emotionless as slate, words exited the maw of his eldritch consciousness and struck themselves across every thread of Fìrinn's being.
"Cadien," he muttered.
"Path and Destination both. He is the beginning and the end," Àicheil swept out his uninjured hand, and the Roineagan shuddered at its motion and its patterns grew ever more complex. At the center of his realm, there was born a new pattern, and it twisted out and took hold of all that they perceived. For a nigh fatal instant, all sense of self or awareness blinked out. Their forms vanished, their minds stilled, and the quiet thunder-call of the Lifeblood's womb once more sung its well-known refrain.
Then emergence as the Two-as-One reclaimed their entire selves. Ѻs-fhìreach seemed unaffected by the display--though the fear which polluted his mind might speak of other things.
"To that which we emerged, we will return. This, his essence yearns to cause. Unknowing, unaware."
With an ease ne'er seen 'cept within the hold of true union of the twins, Ѻs-fhìreach spoke, a certainty in his cadence, a promise in his tone. In the far reaches of his mind and the central schema of his soul, Fìrinn would come to know a truly deadly thing. While from other gods, Àicheil had drawn only fragments of utility and meaning, from Cadien he had gained a thing most dangerous in its wholeness.
Purpose.
"This cannot be," Ѻs-fhìreach proclaimed.
Fìrinn’s reply was the suggestion of a solemn and contemplative nod. It took time to process and weigh its twin’s words carefully, allowing them to take root within the God of Truth’s infinite mind and blossom into new ideas and considerations. It drew from the reflective portal running through the Worldweave to conjure forth images it had seen and recorded and began to file through the previous interactions all mortalkind had had with their so-called Master. Each interaction with Cadien--or the idea of Cadien--that mortalkind had indulged in since their banishment played through Fìrinn’s mind, and then--through their link--that same feed of knowledge was offered up to Ѻs-fhìreach like a fresh spring of water to sup from. It was more of a precaution than anything, to not share it directly--for once, Fìrinn was quite unsure as to how its twin would react to such information. It would simply be a matter of observation until they each individually processed what had happened--and then processed it again as one.
Fìrinn’s mantle cut through the starspace around them in soft, swaying motions--its claw-tips elongated and pared out into almost wing-like razors. On an invisible wind, they flitted to and fro, their idle movements an unconscious rhythm for the God of Truth to focus upon while it processed the gargantuan amount of information it had called.
“I see him not as you did. Prideful, boastful, arrogant--destructive, and even childish… but his actions, barring those with you, do not seem to suggest a desire to return all things to the primordial womb. I know you do not lie, as to do so in my presence is impossible. I know that whatever you have glimpsed is your Truth, and thus the Truth of the world--but it is something I must come to see in my own time. It is something that the Two-as-One must agree as both Two and One.”
A flowing river of memory, gifted by his twin, fed into his mind and attempted to suffuse him. A chord was struck, deeper than the rest, and the Worldweave bent and shook, brought to great distress. Ѻs-fhìreach turned its head and gazed down upon his twin, and as Fìrinn's words reached him his hand shot out and grasped him. Tenderness had fled, agony laid bare, Ѻs-fhìreach raised his hand, and with it rose the Truthbound Seer.
The Roineagan it shuddered, and from it all color drained, as into the Dreamer's gaze, a tempest grew insane.
"Freagraíonn tú glao i ndáiríre, agus a chuspóir ar eolas agat. Ach, ag smaoineamh go mícheart, an stoirm a chuirfeá as duit?"
His voice thundered through the realm, like lightning it tore and burned, and as into Fìrinn's mind it passed--it scorched and it churned. Ѻs-fhìreach thrust his arm out and slashed his arm in disgust from his twin, tossing them away. His gaze shifted and the Endless Weave swiveled around its locus, its movements anchored to his mind more tightly than before.
With slow deliberate thought, Ѻs-fhìreach drew forth a torrid swell. Its shifting prismatic hue rose like a tsunami and then upon Fìrinn fell. A drowning cascade of emotion and endless provocation, experience and thought, intention hidden beneath facades. Each act it mirrored inside of Fìrinn's mind, it showed a darker shade of thought and intent malicious and divine. Yet outside that terror torrent, which to the Truth God did speak, Ѻs-fhìreach refocused and reached down into the deep.
Within each fragment of that maelstrom was another maelstrom--within each of those, the seed of a Truth that Fìrinn could know and understand, but not feel. As the tumultuous waves tore away its lack of understanding like so many scraps of paper before a flood, Fìrinn experienced each of those moments anew, salt-licked by the freezing sting of the emotions it had seen but not felt. It lost itself amidst those moments, the fury of its twin and the flaying influx of foreign emotion tore into and lashed against the God of Truth’s skin until it flayed that reflective outer shell from the deific essence beneath.
He grasped then Fìrinn's hand, true and mantle both, and pulled him from the deluge so that his gaze he would surely know. Drawing his twin close, Ѻs-fhìreach took hold of their connection. Where before Fìrinn had always stabilized and clarified, now the Dreaming God did so, the endless tendrils of its mind reaching deep into Fìrinn's divine soul. With slow deliberate silence, and insidious inception, Ѻs-fhìreach dissolved further, and the twins became a greater deific ocean.
Around the chaos of their united form, the Worldweave altered its endless swirling patterns. Mirror glass and shards of reflected knowledge, bound by Truth and experience became its essence and its creed. Crystals cascaded in shattering displays, and each refracted others, till to infinity they bade.
“A thread of the Great Weave, hidden beneath something one must feel to understand. I see.”
Though the state of the Two-as-One was a fundamental completeness that ameliorated and soothed Fìrinn, it pulled away from the conjoined embrace and became itself once more as soon as the understanding was upon it. As it left that state of harmony, it emitted a rippling wave of agreement and understanding--an unspoken agreement to something even deeper than speech and even deeper than unity. From mere seconds--or perhaps fractions thereof--all of the context and understanding, the imagination and the feeling, became a single thing embedded within them both.
“Cadien was cruel to you, Twin. Unabashedly, unashamedly--insularly self-involved, condescending, and haughty. I understand and I feel, and it pains me in this moment as much as it pained you then. With that in mind,” Fìrinn began, collecting itself and appearing in front of Ѻs-fhìreach in an instant. It touched his face gently, with its true hand, and locked him in an eyeless embrace.
“Never presume to direct your wrath upon me again. If there is a next time, I will cease it as it begins.”
Acknowledged, thought the Thrice-Named God, the whip of its words too much. Carefully, Àicheil pressed its injured hand upon Fìrinn's and they shared a silent moment--intimate and content. Then he withdrew, his thoughts a writhing mass of black acidic fervor. Turning from his twin, the Subtle Weave refocused and blurred against the limits of Ѻs-fhìreach's dreaded shroud. Blackest night, and darkest terror--passion's lashing tongue, love's intimate embrace, the burning flames of rage, and the venom of a threatened serpent. Each and every one bled like spilled blood into his cloak, and stained it from grey to black acid and liquid fire of silver, gold, and crimson so that when all was done it was as the god had clad himself in a nebula of wrath.
He did not repent nor apologize for the biting poison of his rage, which upon Fìrinn he had unleashed, but he kept his distance. Their auras and essences intertwined, but attunement was left untouched--unmarred by his fury and reproach, as if to keep unshed tears from falling.
"Twin," he echoed, "I will go. A council must be gathered, many others well informed." There was a pause and it was full to brimming with unsaid admissions of atonement. For though rife with rage and pain, the Dreaming God should not have harmed its twin. Nonetheless, it did not say these things, and kept them safely in.
"You will aid me."
It was a statement and a question. A thing he knew, but could not ask in earnest; for to be denied would break him more surely than any blade or Lifeblood core.
“There is no I, Twin--there is only we. We shall go, we shall reveal the Truth of this treachery to all who will listen. Truth demands it--but more than it is Truth’s desire, it is our desire. We are Two-as-One in all things--even this.” Fìrinn placed its hand upon its twin’s face, mimicking precisely the action of another against it in an era long-gone.
“I am Fìrinn, and my love for you is eternal.”
The words washed through the tightly wound consciousness of the Dreaming God, and it softened slightly the twisted knot of pain within his being. Still he was unwilling and unable--as of yet--to let his sorrow in earnest sing. So it was that Ѻs-fhìreach bobbed its head in affirmation, the skein of its form a coruscating furious, nebulous thing.
Then, its purpose met--its wrath and love renewed--that eldritch dreaming entity it swept off to do as it knew the Two-as-One must do. Without further thought or sentence pressed into the air, it passed beyond the threshold, to set upon another's lair.
Ѻs-fhìreach returns to his realm following his...encounter with Cadien, and calls upon Fìrinn--but not in the typical way. Before his twin’s arrival, he observes the damage left by his contact with Cadien and their disastrous attunement, before wreathing his unmarred limb in a fragment of the Endless Dream’s essence. Fìrinn arrives, and notices the state of his twin and is unnerved and--despite its emotionless nature--it experiences a glimmer of fear, both for Ѻs-fhìreach...and of him.
Fìrinn attempts to be diplomatic about Cadien, and the two briefly quarrel before Ѻs-fhìreach throws down his twin, drowning the Truthbound God in the entirety of his knowledge and the experience he’s just endured. Fìrinn swiftly changes his mind, but rebukes Ѻs-fhìreach. The two decide on their course forwards, and then part. Much work is ahead of them, its precise nature yet to be revealed.
Start: 5MP, 3DP.
-1MP -- Create an Artifact: lann Dhè | [Title pending].
The shifting tides of consciousness, they wove and rose and fell, and among them drifted the Dreaming God, known simply as Àicheil,
His endless mind it pondered, the many threads of meaning, and as waves rose, he shifted pose, and breathed across the endless ocean dreaming,
An exhalation of intimation, an echo of his self, it pressed outwards from his realm and sought out another's trail. Through antiquity it roved, driven by a remnant, and soon it found itself before, a gateway thought resplendent,
Àicheil's echo so entered Meliorem and found therein something which greatly unsettled its endless mind. There was a strangeness in the air, for though it moved and varied, the greater pattern was set a certain way. Shifting faintly within the air, Àicheil called out, his form a starlit silhouette.
"Cadien," he said, voice filled with trepidation.
“Hmm? Oh, a visitor!”
Moments later, a figure emerged from the gatehouse, silver-haired and armoured in gold. He waved to Àicheil with a smile on his face. “Hello there. Yes, I am Cadien. Who would you be?”
The voice stirred in his mind many memories, each an experience of this god, this Cadien. Slowly drifting downwards from its place in the sky, the Dreaming God lit himself at the base of the path that led up to the gatehouse, unsure if he wished to approach. There was silence for a time, long enough to be uncomfortable--though perhaps moreso for Àicheil than his sibling. Eventually however, Ѻs-fhìreach mustered itself and shattered that silence with a familiar invocation.
"I am Àicheil," he intoned, his voice thunderous in its meaning, but middling in volume as it pressed outwards from his eyeless form. As it washed over Cadien it would say not just the name, but two others as well.
Ѻs-fhìreach. Neo-Àicheil.
It would tell him of his most central essence.
I am the Dreaming God. The Eldritch Twin. The Thrice Named. I am the Watcher Within, that which presides over Dreams and Abstraction and Tessellation.
The sound of it, and its many meanings, gradually faded from the world, becoming immaterial as both sound and knowledge were scattered to the wind and far skies of Cadien's realm.
There was a pause then as if the Dreamer held his breath--though he did not breathe. As if--for once--he was truly unsure how to continue.
Cadien’s brow furrowed in puzzlement. “Mmm. Well, good for you, I suppose. May I ask what brings you here?”
What followed then was a breathless quiet, but it did not last for long. Taken then by a desperate need, Àicheil began to walk the path, approaching his Lifeblood-sibling. Though words did not slip between them 'pon the wind, there lay between the intimation of Àicheil's inner mind.
Confusion and discomfort. Connection, communication. A desire to understand, and in time perhaps to learn.
Across his starlight form roiled waves of shifting color, each hue evidence of an emotion or thought of specific cadence and intent. As the gap was closed to half its length, then half that again, Àicheil's voice rang out.
"Unity," he said, his voice a ringing whisper. In that word were many things, but none as clear or concise as this...
Desire. Understanding. You. Require it. Demand.
...and even it is strange.
Cadien’s eyes narrowed. “You come into my realm and make demands?” He shook his head. “No. I think not.”
Though hesitation spiked through Àicheil's aura, he did not relent in his approach, only stopping when scant feet separated the two. Àicheil raised a hand, his palm facing the sky and though his face was eyeless, there was a plea in his demeanor, as if he asked a favor of the sibling who before him stood.
I wish to understand.
Cadien’s eyes narrowed further, but then he sighed and shook his head. “Another confused god whose mind took a beating by the Lifeblood, I assume? Very well. What is it you don’t understand?”
Àicheil's hand remained outstretched, but fingers curled inwards until he simply pointed. A deep dis-ease could be felt in the Dreaming God's emotions, as they drifted upon the air.
The God of Perfection frowned. “So. I’ll be honest. This ‘quiet and enigmatic’ act isn’t doing you any favours. I can’t be the first god you’ve spoken to. Surely you know how to hold up your end of a conversation?”
A breath of wind whisked past Cadien, as if the Dreaming God had sighed, but no further sound was heard. Àicheil regarded him, tilting his head in abject consternation, for though he understood his sibling's words, he could not fathom their source. His arm fell back to his side as if he were defeated.
"Act?" He queried with innocent brevity. It said to Cadien, 'I am not doing this thing of which you speak,' it said, 'I do not understand why you would think this of me,' it asked, 'what do you mean to say?'
The air grew still once more and Àicheil's shroud began to shudder with the tension which between them built.
"You. I wish to understand," Àicheil tried, hoping against hope that--finally--his sibling might catch his meaning. Hesitantly, he lifted his hand again, as if he wished to shake Cadien's in greeting.
Contact is required for attunement to take place. Understanding is born from such a union of minds and context.
This as well his sentence said, though the words remained unspoken.
Cadien reached out his hand, and almost accepted the handshake… but then his eyes narrowed in suspicion at the last moment, so he withdrew it. “Understanding can just as easily be gained from a conversation. I have no wish for a ‘union of mind’ with someone I don’t know and have no reason to trust. Now tell me, why can’t you converse as any others of our kind would?”
Considering the query of the deity before him, Àicheil spent an ever-growing moment attempting to collate words that might explain to him the truth. This, however, was not his strength, for unanchored by the context of another, his mind was adrift in an endless sea of meaning. There were, after all, a great many reasons that the Dreaming God struggled with conversation. As this reality sifted through his mind, a memory struck true and his voice whispered out, sounding as if it came from far away. Its tone and cadence were not as they had been before, almost as if the words were spoken by another.
"...in my understanding...it is like living through the entirety of every mortal’s life all at once, seeing the infinite realities of what they could do, what they could be, what they hope and imagine and dream." A disjointed pause, then the voice echoed forth once more, "...it is like being so full of sensation that the self peels away, cast to the wind."
Another pause.
"My...nature...is to find infinite meaning in a shallow pool."
A long dirge of silence, then a sputtering of noise like static, a discomforting sensation, before the tones resolved into something clearer. This time the voice was clearly feminine, one which Cadien might recognize. It held within it light and warmth and life.
"So, how do you find the Truth of a god?"
The voice shifted, back to the one before, its tone filled with a knowing certainty.
"It is made easier by choosing to link minds with another deity, but--....requires such connections to understand the Gods...."
Static once more before the voice rang out.
"Everything that every mortal has ever seen, or thought, or felt...I see all."
Then, finally, silence leaked into the cracks in the conversation and the voice spoke no more. Àicheil took the time to compose himself, attempting to regain what few slivers of understanding he could. He had given what context he could manage and though they had not been his own words, he hoped they'd be enough to convince Cadien of his nature...and his need.
Cadien stroked his chin, with the expression of one who was attempting to piece together a puzzle. “Hmm. What you want is to form a mental link with me, so that you may see what I have thought and felt, and therefore learn more about me? Because you find it easier than having a normal conversation? Is that correct?”
As Cadien spoke, both form and mind of the Dreaming God slowly stabilized as he recalled his former state. Through force of will and memory he returned to himself, but with that return so too came the discomfort. Nonetheless, Àicheil, processed his sibling's words and shifted faintly.
"Yes," he replied simply, hoping there was little else to say.
“Hmm…” Cadien mused. “No, I think not,” he said, shaking his head. “As I said, I will not open up my mind to a stranger. Though I could simply tell you about myself instead, in mine own words, if that would suffice?”
Àicheil's hands raised briefly, but he kept from reaching out to Cadien. A ripple of movement pressed out through his shroud and repeated with inconsistent timing. Clasping his digits together, the Dreaming God sought to settle his uneasiness, and though he did not speak, an absent nod occurred as if to say.
It is worth an attempt.
Cadien clasped his hands together, and broke out into a smile. “Good! Because talking about myself is one of my favourite subjects. I am Cadien, the God of Perfection. Physical perfection, to be precise - beauty, strength, stamina… all fall within my power. I am, unsurprisingly, extremely handsome and charming. I have had a hand in creating a number of different species, and I have encouraged them all to strive to be the best versions of themselves that they can possibly be. I am quite popular both on Galbar and among the other gods, which is why I was not surprised when you knew my name. There. Does that suffice?”
Hovering forwards slightly, his aura reeking of anticipation, Àicheil devoured the many meanings held within each word the sibling god unveiled. As if desperate for knowledge, Àicheil took each word, each sentence, and enshrined them in a hallowed place bearing their origin's name. With each new speck of knowledge he leaned upon this psychic construction in his mind and--with all his focus--attempted to meld himself into its shape.
Externally his form became unstable. Impressions of a face flickered upon Àicheil's physical facade, the appearance of armor and flesh and hair as if to mimic Cadien's garb and stance and self. None lasted, but he could not give up. He needed this. He must understand, to do otherwise was to insult Cadien, to mock his memory, to reject him.
Àicheil reached out, but stopped just short of touching Cadien's shoulder. Colorless eyes opened upon his visage and within them the God of Perfection might view a war of indecision and confusion and distress. A respect, desired. Understanding sought, but not yet found.
"More," Àicheil practically begged, withdrawing his hand while the other clawed ineffectually at the air. His voice was pained and pleading. A memory of expressions and motions came upon him and he shook his head from side to side.
"Insufficient."
The word spoke of his lack. It said to Cadien many things, it told him that Àicheil was not like his other siblings, his mind was greater--more vast--but limited in other ways because of it. Where he and other gods could divine intent even without a grasp of language, emotion, or mutual understanding, Àicheil could not. He lacked this basic function, which other gods possessed. He desired it, like an obsession, it was a need.
Àicheil took two steps back and a miasma of color and sensation spread from him, painting upon the air a tapestry of meaning. Flowing images and sounds and scents, one bled into another. It showed that with attunement, Àicheil could help one realize their full potential. With attunement, the two could understand eachother in their fullness and be at peace. With a simple melding of the minds, they could speak plainly, empowered by the context of one other's central truth.
Then it showed a lack, what one lost from defying the request, what one lost by extending not even the smallest sliver of trust or compassion. It showed how people drifted apart, how misunderstanding occurred, how pain was caused in its terrible wake. It showed what ignorance had wrought already--images of Gibbou's failures--images of many mortals who had hurt others or themselves. The miasma began to fade, pressing back into Àicheil. He seemed at once both frenzied and utterly still.
He remained in place, but there was a great tension in him. Every thread of his shroud wavered almost imperceptibly. Every star upon his form grew and shrunk and shivered. In an effort to control himself, Àicheil had withdrawn his aura, and suddenly it would seem as if the air was empty and lifeless without meaning to fill it.
The eyes of the Dreaming God met Cadien's, then shut so he could focus.
"More," he said again.
"More," he whispered.
Cadien sighed, more disappointed than annoyed at this point. “Right, so… here is the root of our problem. I tell you some of what you want to know, and instead of politely requesting additional information, you just keep saying ‘more.’ ‘More.’ ‘More.’ It’s very uncouth. Could you perhaps try phrasing the request differently? ‘Could you please tell me more, Cadien’? Perhaps even ask a specific question about one of the things I have said. You see, just saying ‘more’ comes across as… well, rather creepy.”
To Àicheil, each additional word began to fade, as if each was being bled of its meaning, then washed away by the turbulent waters of his troubled mind. He’d tried to grasp at the flood of words which spilled from Cadien's lips, but he continued to fail for every time he got a hold, he lost grip upon the urges in his being.
Each time he tried, his hand moved, or a thread twitched out of place, always seeking, reaching out, to touch the god before him. He was a rope drawn too taut...waiting to snap.
Cadien let out another sigh. This one reminiscent of a weary parent dealing with a demanding toddler. He held up his hands as if to block any further advances. “Listen. I am trying to help you. Conversations will come far more easily if you learn to speak as the others do. If you are a God of Dreams, then surely you are aware that a mind is one’s last refuge? If you expect everyone you meet to open theirs up to you, you will be disappointed. Now, back away and let me resume the process of telling you about myself.”
Yet, despite the god's request, Neo-Àicheil did not move--for to do so would be to betray what little trust he had garnered. To do so would be to invite distraction. So he remained as still as could be, withholding each and every growing urge to move and touch and see.
"Impossible," he whispered, his voice full of tension and great strain. If Cadien understood, he might think Àicheil to be in pain. Alas though he did not and so in place the two remained.
“Ugh,” Cadien groaned. “Some people simply can’t be helped.” With resignation he extended his hand. “Try anything underhanded and I’ll give you what for.”
With a measured movement the Dreaming God reached out and as the distance disappeared the tension began to swiftly rout. As their divine digits met and flesh was grasped by quintessence, Àicheil's mind relaxed and beheld Cadien's essential essence. His grip tightened as if he feared Cadien might withdraw, and then attunement happened and opened was the gateway through which Àicheil always saw.
Around them blossomed a tapestry of meaning and emotions raw and true. Unified, the two minds, finally eachother knew.
Mind opened and relaxed, drained of tension's song, Àicheil touched Cadien's mind and it rang out like a strangely depthless gong.
Perfection. Body, Mind and Soul. A goal sought out, but never reached, sure to take its toll.
It was that which defined Cadien's essence, and in reply Àicheil's mind called out.
Endless infinite meaning. Consciousness unmarred. Truth, ideas, memory, concepts small and large.
The swirling storm of essence which around them coiled and entranced, it fell into silence and ceased its endless dance. Before it had grown still it was a memory all but lost. An impression of the time before, where they'd been suspended inside Lifeblood's Core, waiting to be born. It whispered and churned, twas thoughtless, yet yearned, and in it were both comfort and terror in equal measure. Still it was more than even this for within it was held every memory, emotion, thought and subtle twist that consciousness could make. Its shape was beyond beholding, yet its patterns begged and yearned for other's knowing. In its essence one might see the nature of Àicheil's seeming inability.
For his mind was a vast and endless place, unmoored from logic or perspective's shackles. It could behold and understand anyone or thing; it could sing their song, it could become or make itself belong. However, with a grasp of everything, so too was lost another facet. In that endless ocean that was his mind, Àicheil lost himself.
Then, outside the unity and understanding a separate burden was felt, for as Àicheil attuned he came upon a deadly, vile truth.
His eyes shot open wide, and a scream which held the collective terror and anguish of all things echoed out beyond the sky. It was such an utterance that it passed from the god's realm and into every other. The maelstrom around them did not calm, but its movement ceased completely and the Dreaming God recoiled.
It was as if he threw himself away from Cadien, a great violence in the motion. His gaze lay upon the God of Perfection then and in it was a deep pain. Though only a moment had passed, the sound and touch and imagery had faded out and into nothing.
Àicheil remained silent for but a moment, their mind askew, and pained. Then he rose up and Ѻs-fhìreach he became. Twisted starlight and angry nebulae, hueless light which from his eyes downwards gazed. His hands--withdrawn and discolored--raised and clawed upon the air. His shroud billowed out and expanded, splitting to threads as thin as hairs, their blade-like edges cutting at sky most unprepared.
Though mouth he lacked, the aura about him shuddered and from it Cadien could feel, a painful rage unmuttered.
"You are the Path and Destination both. The beginning and the end. You impose upon the world your desired shape, yet do not comprehend."
The God of Perfection stared at Àicheil for several long moments. Then his expression twisted into anger. “Alright, that is it!” he snapped. “You come into my realm. You make demands. You refuse to make simple conversation, and don’t even attempt to learn how. You beg me to feed your addiction. And when I do, you rage at me and act as if I am the flawed one? No. Begone from my home, churl, and do not return!”
Proud and utterly unmoved, both scant reflections of Cadien's personality, Ѻs-fhìreach gazed down upon the God of Perfection not simply with rage and pain, but with a great boundless pity. For a brief instant the colossal extent of that emotion would weigh upon the deity as if all creation had been laid upon his brow. Then it vanished. Ѻs-fhìreach let out a humorless laugh, and turned away from the ill-minded fury of his host.
As he drifted to the exit, the Eldritch Twin left behind him several solemn sentences, upon which Cadien could reflect.
"Narrow-eyed you see only that which pleases you. Narrow-minded, you repudiate all words which might lead you to redemption."
Before the threshold stopped the Dreaming God. He turned to Cadien, looking once more over his shoulder.
"Though Path and Destination you may be, through ignorance you walk, unaware and unafraid."
Ѻs-fhìreach shook its head, and a thousand-thousand thread-like blades sheared and cut the air.
There was a moment filled with pregnant silence, and in it was held a deadly thing unsaid.
Ignoring it, Ѻs-fhìreach then turned and through the portal fled.
Àicheil enters Meliorem to speak to Cadien, something having drawn him there. He is immediately discomforted by the feeling of the place for reasons he does not yet understand. Cadien greets him and asks who he is and the two exchange names and natures to some degree. A pseudo-conversation then ensues in which Àicheil attempts to get Cadien to attune with him so that they might have a proper piece of discourse, but Cadien is unreceptive, not understanding why such a thing is necessary--not to mention not trusting Àicheil, who is a stranger to him. After attempting to suss out why the Dreaming God does not wish to simply converse, Cadien finally gives up and allows Àicheil to attune.
The two do so, but in the doing Àicheil discovers a vile truth and recoils from Cadien’s Perfection, horrified and enraged with pain. He lets out a scream filled with the anguish and disgust of all consciousness and--in his fervor--unleashes a measure of divine power out into every realm and then into Galbar, striking several bystanders to madness. It seems that Cadien is anathema to the Dreaming God’s nature and so their essences do not mix. Àicheil attempts to inform Cadien of his failings--the deity takes offense and kicks him out, but not before Àicheil leaves behind far less subtle barbs.
The two part on exceptionally bad terms.
Start: 5MP, 5DP.
-2DP -- Release a maddening shriek filled with the sum of all anguish, rage and pain piercing through all realms--Galbar included--and driving several mortals mad. (2 might towards Madness port).
The influx of a tide of information it washed up upon the shores of Aicheil's mind, shifting about the arrangement of his thoughts, like sand disturbed by water. Gazing out across the Subtle Weave, the Dreaming God pondered the many things which he had come to know and understand in recent spans of time. The Love and Sorrow of the Lovebound Goddess; the dreadful sensation of air, driven to perfect stagnance; the many-minds of Klaar, ever-learning, always reaching out for more; and the avatars of many who had been borne unto the world.
As if absently, Os-fhireach reached out a shifting strand of thought, and as it passed into the Dream it faded. Still, it remained, a thread of intention, and it wove down to Galbar and touched a place of cold and desolation. It strummed the cords of consciousness and found that for many miles there was little to be had--the glacier was all but barren, no mortal minds upon its shifting sheets of ice. This displeased him, and so he reached into its center and began to work.
Lidded eyes revealed themselves and a sliver of strength slipped out, empowering his actions. The caves of glacial ice were born the sheets of frozen liquid gathered elsewhere to be prepared. Roused now from his drifting slumber, the weight of his vast and cosmic mind rested upon Galbar. His open eyes which gazed down from afar, they beckoned and so arrived his avatar.
Faireachan A-staigh dripped outwards from the Dream, entering the newly wrought caves of Khesyr's frozen glacial plains. Its form coalesced, each particle of moisture arranging itself according to its will. Shifting idly it glided forth, its silhouette humanoid in form, its gaze eyeless much like its master's former form.
The Watcher gazed about, taking in the shape of this ice wrought place, coming to know it intimately. Though these things were solid, Faireachan found them rendered as ideas, each individually reflected within the many droplets of moisture that composed it. Soon it understood and so touched by Aicheil's dreaming mind, it lit up with light divine. That prismatic glow shot out in all directions and refracted from the many flawed facets of the glacier's ice so that in scarcely moments it was blinding like the sun.
Flexing then its tremendous will, the Watcher bent the light. Thus it came to illuminate a massive gathering of ice. The great crystal rose taller than a tower, its many tips--measured end-to-end--easily wider than a house. Yet as the light then struck its form it seemed to shrink until it was no larger than a mouse. Moving then, the Watcher approached the glowing artifact and took it in their hand. It carved into the crystal's reflection an utterance most magnificent and grand.
With their blessing the crystal sang and the Watcher held it aloft, before--his work done--he vanished and was off.
That beating heart of light and ice it hung in Aicheil's mind, a gleaming testament to his power in the world. It brought to his eyes and mind a smile of great contentment. With this done his eyes shut closed and he retreated into himself.
Cutting winds tore through every layer of clothing that he had as he answered the call of madness. He'd been hearing it for weeks, months perhaps, and knew he'd lost track of time and reason. The others in his village had denied hearing it even when he'd asked and begged that they tell him the truth, and though they lied...he saw that same strange longing in their eyes. So he had set out from his small settlement unable to resist any longer.
Fèin had trudged through woodlands, across rivers and streams, as he made his way to the base of the Great Glacier. Unsure how to proceed he'd dallied a score of days before preparing a makeshift sled and gathering as much food as he could manage. That done, he'd traveled until he'd found a cave shorn of ice, which he'd promptly entered.
With only remembered songs of warmth, his hides, and his strong will had he managed to keep a light to illuminate his way. It had taken him a long time to reach the top of the glacier, but when he did so, his conjured flame--and the song which had helped sustain it--were torn away by the shrieking wind. Flecks of ice and flakes of snow battered at his hood and face. He quickly wrapped his scarf more tightly and pulled down the brim of his clothes. So he had come to traverse the barren ice of the glacier and in time he came to foster regret at his foolishness.
Yet, he knew he could not turn back, for he had not known the way, and found now that he could not recall it. At the thought, he might have frowned if his face had not been frozen in a scowl already. Against his flesh the constant gale was like a thousand blades...but like it, he would not stop, knowing that his only chance was to find whatever it was that called him. At times--when he tired--he would be lucky and would find a cave or even an outcropping of stone or ice which shielded him from the horrid wind.
Today was such a day. Settling into the dip behind a jutting blade of ice, Fèin set up a small camp and set to warming himself and some food. There was little left. Quietly--his eyes closed--he breathed and then began to hum. His song had no words, but it guided his will, and it uplifted his spirit. It was something that had been passed down from generation to generation in his family. 'Spiritsinging' his grandmother had called it, though his grandfather preferred 'hogshit' instead. The thought of their bickering elicited the smallest of smiles on his thawing features and it brought further strength into his song.
It was never quite the same, he knew, but the core of it, the emotions and the cadence always held true and after perhaps a minute or so a gentle flame was coaxed out of the cold. Working swiftly he removed a small amount of what remained of his wooden sleigh, and set it upon the fire, all the while continuing his spritely hum. As the flame began to catch he took in a breath and split his focus faintly. His iron will--stronger now than it had been before he'd begun his journey--called upon the flowing currents of energy in the world and, ever so slowly, he forced a shred of that strength into his body and the flame. Another couple of minutes passed and finally, his fire was warm and hearty, and he could feel a glimmer of warmth in his weathered flesh.
Sighing contentedly he kept up his humming and set about preparing his food--mostly salted meats now--and when he'd finished he ate. Only then did his humming stop--though the fire remained as if hoping he would continue. While he scarfed down his pitiful meal, he marveled at his luck. If he had not encountered that sorcerer all those years ago he could not have made it this far. If his family had never felt him worthy to inherit the song he could not have lived for long, not up hear in the biting, killing cold. All the little skills he'd picked up in his life...they'd served him well on his journey, and he felt blessed to have them.
The meal finished, Fèin offered up a prayer to the gods, one and all. He did not know many of their names, but he praised their spirits hoping they might hear him and know that he was grateful. When he had finished he glanced up at the sky, considered the few hours which remained, and decided he might as well hunker down for the night.
Flashes of color. Biting cold. Dancing flames, and the image of a faceless starlit facade. A great droning echo, the piercing silent scream of knowledge impossible to hold. The cold sweat of fear, then a sudden movement and images of a place not too far off, a cavern that went down into the ice...but was lit from within. The air was heavy, he could not breathe...he was suffocating, but there was air. Confusion.
He awoke suddenly and all at once, bolting upwards into a sitting position. His fire still burned, but it was pitiful and small. The sun was just coming over the horizon and a whisper of its warmth touched his face, though its light pained his hazy, sleep-dazed eyes. Fèin gathered his wits, taking deep gulping breaths, before he slowed them down, the ice biting at his lungs. It took him a score of minutes to fully calm down, and in that time he gathered what remained of his fire and tools, set them in his pack, and set out on the ice on a new tact.
In every direction, there was only blue and white, ice and snow and sleet and the clearness of the sky. He wasn't quite sure how long he'd been walking, but he knew that he would be happy when he was done. Still, something greater than simple comforts pushed him forth that day, and he discovered what soon after midmorning had passed him by. Simply put, before him was a maw of frost, with strange light emanating from within. It tickled at his senses and reminded him of song--though he was yet to hear a single note. He hesitated there for a long moment, then pressed on into the cave, assured that it led to his destination.
It wound, always down, into the glacier, but its slope was slight and he never felt that he would lose his footing and slide the rest of the way. Still, he was careful and so it was not until well into the night that he reached the unknown hidden haven. The place was beautiful, Fèin knew, for it was filled with glorious light and there was a weight in the air that he'd only heard of in stories. Though the walls were frozen, it was warm here and he felt his skin relax. As he scanned the great cavern--eyes glancing over the perfect curves from floor to ceiling--he noticed just how many caves led off and up. There must have been several hundred different caves that led to this place and at the thought, he realized something else. The place was strangely stable. Here, the ice did not creak, and though it seemed slick to the touch, it never seemed to change.
However, perhaps most strange was the tiny shining crystal that hovered in the center of the cavern, as if unbound by gravity or any other law he knew. As he stared upon it he realized he was moving, his feet carrying him forwards. With each step, tension grew and so when he touched the shining gem of ice something finally gave out.
It was pain and ecstasy in equal measure, which rolled throughout his mind as if he too were ice, and by contact alone, the divine artifact had sundered him. For seconds, or maybe years, he remained in that state and--distantly--realized he'd fallen onto his back. His eyes were filled with colors and so he could not see. His mind was filled with knowing, and so he had no awareness beyond himself.
Thus, without his notice, the Watcher lifted his mortal body and whisked him across the dream. In time they reached his settlement and upon their emergence, the people were surprised and terrified. Faireachan ignored them and laid Fèin upon the ground.
Then, without words, the avatar gestured and people retrieved the man, soon coming to recognize him, despite his beard and weathered appearance. With the passage of time, Fèin's mind would return and he would know what he must do.
So it was that the Watcher departed and Aicheil's first true hero was brought into the world.
Aicheil is in his realm, pondering what he has learned in recent times, and he absently begins to affect Galbar with his musings. He creates a set of caves by shearing away at the ice of the Great Glacier in Khesyr, gathering it for some other task. He becomes aware of his actions and focuses, creating a great cavern within the Glacier, and condensing the ice into a large formation.
The Watcher Within--Aicheil’s avatar--then arrives, so-called by Aicheil’s will, and finishes the work, creating the Heart of Ice--a small crystal that glows with the illumination and warmth of divinity. The Watcher slips back into the Endless Dream and Aicheil withdraws--though the location is consecrated as he does so.
Fèin, a man in a far off village, several hundred miles from the glacier, has been afflicted with the strange desire to venture onto the glacier. With the power of Spiritsinging passed down in his family, and an ironshod will, he makes his way from his village and finally--after a long arduous journey--to the Hall of Impetus and the Heart of Ice within it. There he comes into contact with the Heart and his mind is fractured. Having awaited the first mortal to reach the Holy Site, the Watcher Within emerges and carries Fèin back to his village and communicates--in its own way--to the village that they are to take care of him.
In time, Fèin will wake to find himself empowered.
Start: 4MP, 3DP.
-1DP [Discounted: Tessellation] -- Significantly change landscape/feature of the world: Gather ice within the Glacial Region and condense it at its center. -1DP -- Consecrate an Artifact: The Heart of Ice | Awakening I(1 Towards Astral Portfolio) -3MP -- Purchase Astral Port. -1DP [Two Free Title Weights: Astral] -- Consecrate a Holy Site: Aras Ròiseal(The Hall of Impetus) | Soulsong III -1MP [Two Free Title Weights: Astral] -- Consecrate a Hero: Fèin | Willcaster III
Awakening I -- Causes a spiritual and psychic awakening to anyone who comes into direct contact with the empowered. This awakening makes the World and Dreamsongs easier to hear, and the Endless Dream easier to comprehend. The effect damages the mind somewhat, but it heals. During the healing process, the affected cannot care for themselves and are largely lost to the world.
Soulsong III -- Casts a subtle siren call out for many hundreds of miles, calling mortals to the source. The call is more potent and difficult to resist if one is more attuned to the Worldsong or Dreamsong or the Endless Dream. Those unattuned are slower to be affected and can resist for an extended period of time, perhaps even many many years.
It seemed as though nothing had changed since the last time Neiya entered Antiquity, now that she once more stuck her head out from her own realm to give the world beyond a demure, searching peer. Slowly, the horned goddess drifted out from the irregular tear in reality that separated her bleak domain from the rest of the lifeblood’s collective prison. A finger crooked around the loop running through the shackle around her throat, resting cautiously as she hovered across the dirt-covered ground, icy blue eyes enraptured in a slow search and examination of the moving shapes milling about Antiquity yet. The voice she heard had given her renewed purpose to enter the unknown, a cause to leave the pavilion deep in her realm for but a short time.
Neiya kept to the edges of the vast, shared realm as she drifted onwards in her journey, preferring to scan the shapes she could see from a distance and occasionally glancing into realms as she passed the entryways into new and mysterious places. None of these places seemed to call to her any more than her own did, a blank canvas of divine energies. The maelstrom of emotion remained the dominant focus for her mind, pressed aside only by her determination to locate the source of the voice she’d heard.
For a brief time, she'd find that her search was fruitless, as each realm failed to draw her in. However, as she made to complete her circuit a siren song--a feeling--began to press against her mind. With each step a gentle coaxing web of intention draped her form, its intangible melody entwining with her form, guiding her. A yawning rift fashioned in a shape most curious, beckoned to her, its edges less jagged or simple than those many thresholds she had previously disregarded. It appeared intentional as if the consciousness that had bid it to exist had done so with some fey design in mind.
From beyond the opening could be glimpsed an enigmatic thing, like color and movement wrapped in shadow and silk. It shifted and fled from the foreground of her awareness as if it existed always at the edges of her vision, at the cusp between the unknown and the understood. Mere steps away, that gateway it appeared more frightening, more tantalizing than most any single thing could be.
It was dangerous.
It was home.
It was utterly unfathomable, yet unspeakably familiar.
Something, from beyond the threshold of its boundaries, called to her heart and soul and mind.
She could not help but answer.
Her hesitation was disintegrating with each step, overtaken by a building curiosity that enraptured and ensnared what wits she’d possessed prior to feeling the rift’s call. Neiya breathed a shallow breath, leaning forwards in the air to gingerly examine the vast enigma that played with her senses, cautious pale fingers extending in a searching and gentle attempt to touch the mirage. Fingers ran slowly against the edges of the rift, and icy eyes briefly pulled from their sorrowful regret beheld it with a listless concern that belied the determination with which the goddess seemed to now act, against her usual judgment.
The horned goddess breathed another quiet breath, watching the ominous rift ripple and weave in the corners of her eyes. It was a brief lull of rational thought and concern, before the siren song took full hold. Neiya drifted forwards, immersing herself in the rift, and entered the mysterious world beyond.
Like a spray of frigid fluid upon her facade, a wash of sensation struck her and it was like she had never breathed before. While some might find themselves wholly overwhelmed, she would be merely dazed for a moment. The maelstrom of feeling hidden deep in her mind had prepared her for something such as this. Even so, the realm she stepped into was nothing like that sorrowful dirge in her mind, no, for it had a music all its own.
Every emotion, every thought--some familiar, some alien and strange--sang in this place beyond the threshold. It was more than music. It was more than any sound or sensation and if she allowed herself to drift a moment--mind unfocused and unbiased--she might glimpse the barest glimmer of its Grand Design.
To perceive it was and understand was perhaps impossible, yet the longer she looked and felt and heard the more the goddess would find herself drawn into its hold. Within that embrace would be revealed a subtle pattern. Something she knew, but had never realized. A deeper intuition, beyond proper thought or rationale.
It stirred something deep within, a feeling of safety. It reminded her of those first moments of existence when there was naught but compassion for mortalkind, and a touching embrace wrapped around her. For a few moments, Neiya hovered aimlessly, motionless and lost. The maelstrom of emotions was dampened, replaced by that warm sense of security with which she had welcomed Galbar in her first few moments of life.
Her hands spun out into the void, touching at nothing yet feeling all that she desired, a return to silence - or rather, a tranquility that let her think, and her heart be still. The horned goddess remained like this for a time, content to submerge herself in the alien sensations that carried her onto new horizons without pulling her under. With it came a clarity she hadn’t felt in thousands of years. With that clarity she allowed her mind to wander, to listen and experience. Even if only for a short time.
A starlight silhouette shrouded in gray, Àicheil crossed into Antiquity and--in swift order--found an image unfamiliar crowding his mind. A confusion that did not last, a coiling serpent of interest, a bloom of curiosity. The Dreaming God crossed the stonework colosseum, passed beyond the threshold, and entered his realm anew.
With his entrance, a transient ripple pressed itself outwards and through that Dreaming Realm and with it came knowing. A tilted head, then expansion as Ѻs-fhìreach abandoned all semblance of form.
A Goddess had entered his favored place, a sibling, and she was far from the shore of sanity. Buoyed still by the stability of his twin, Àicheil pressed through his realm in an instant, emerging several strides from the drifting goddess. His awareness pressed against her skin from all directions, gentle but prying. Intrigued. With each moment his mind relaxed and so inwards fluttered a wealth of knowing. A calm chime of understanding, a subtle lantern of intent, then a ringing word. It was a name.
“Neiya.”
In that utterance was held the sum total of all knowledge of her being. A sorrowful truth. A joyous song. Monotony. Vengeance. Beauty.
In the endless dreaming design of his eldritch realm, two vast eyes opened. They blinked as if adjusting to the world--two steady glowing embers in a vast cacophony of color, gazing down upon her. A small sound, the essence of a gasp stifled, then silence once more. The pattern stilled, but that clarity she’d attained yet remained--immovable.
The horned goddess spun in place, attention drawn from her languid peace to instead focus on the changing architecture, ice-blue eyes meeting the vastness beyond with no mind to fear or worry. If one could stare defiantly into the eldritch eyes of the dreaming abyss, Neiya was not far off the mark. Once again her hand reached out, though she was uncertain as to what she truly reached for. “You know me, but I do not know you. Who are you?” came a calm query, lacking the disappointed bite that all too often tinged the love goddess’ words.
A gentle rumbling laughter, a flurry of color like a flock of loosely painted birds. Joy, amusement, then silence. For a time they remained like this, the Goddess and the formless dreamer, gazing upon one another with defiance and intrigue. He regarded her, plumbing the vast depths of boundless knowledge, perusing the infinite library of experiences for shreds of knowledge further. He grasped at these the threads of understanding and when finally he was sure, he spoke once more.
“I am the Dreaming God,” he proclaimed, and with that single statement the Worldweave shook with the thunder of his mighty voice. Through the Endless Dream his statement resounded, strumming many threads. Somewhere something shifted, unknown to his waking mind.
“I am Àicheil,” he said.
“I am Ѻs-fhìreach,” he intoned.
“I am Neo-Àicheil,” he responded.
“Welcome.”
Slowly, oh so slowly, did those newfound eyes close and as they did, the god's form resolved itself, but this time it was different.
There were fewer angles, and where before had draped a shroud, now fell strands like gray hair, their sheen a rainbow in the shifting light. A swaying step forwards, a hand raising as if the body was a mirror to her own--though without frightening edges or deadly horns. On this shared shape there were eyes, but still no mouth or nose. The cut of the face was like her own, shapely and fair, but with fewer features to adorn it. Each stride towards the Goddess was like a swaying dance, mimicking those few times she had truly walked upon the land.
The distance between them closed, her raised hand met the face of the Dreaming God, as did Àicheil's own meet hers.
Neiya’s reaction was almost instantaneous, her usually hesitant and cautious intent washed away within the confines of her renewed clarity. As her fingers began to graze the cheek of the Dreaming God, the blue in her eyes expanded like a river crashing through a dam, filling her eyes with a roiling swirl that could only begin to hint at the torrent within. As her palm caressed Àicheil’s face, so too did the love goddess impart her maelstrom upon her host.
Images, emotions and whispers all assailed the god at once, a whirling maelstrom of mortal affection and experience, all taking place at once, and in order, at the same time. A bleak and hollow landscape, in which a lonely figure walked, kept company only by her tears. A man anxiously waiting at the side of his bedridden love. The terror of abuse. The confusion of affection, and the anxious butterflies of waiting for a response. Among the onslaught of imagery were brief sanctuaries, respite in the form of joy, trust, and warmth. In the storm of hollow grief, intense sorrow and dull hatred, they were but single notes in a funeral dirge.
A gently inhaled breath, eyes 'pon hers, an image of placidity and calm. Then, her mind filled to bursting, a maelstrom the likes of which she'd never experienced, a thousand thousand thoughts, a trillion trillion feelings--broader in scope, deeper in measure. Ideas. Concepts. Knowledge. Knowing. Twisting birds made from smoke, feathers like mirror-shards, eyes like flint and soot together. People, writ as water flows. Vast shifting beasts, behemoths of thought and emotion entwined with a deep gnawing hunger. Then a voracious appetite far more vast than theirs, a desire for knowing, for creation, for context.
The swirling storm did not abate in the least, but it could not break her. Àicheil's fingers traced her jawline, the movement both hesitant and practiced in the same moment as if pulled from a lover's memory, but not so often done.
The Dreaming God stared for a time, her experiences--and all those bound up within her being, imparted by others--gently unraveling within him. A silver flare lit up behind his newborn eyes and it spread, creating a halo of light that consumed him--then pressed upon her skin as well. Glowing silver flames, dancing in unreal patterns.
With time a languid silence overtook their minds. It was a whisper of equilibrium, a promise of clarity and knowledge and truth.
Àicheil closed his eyes and listened to its song--their song.
Neiya hovered breathless before him, deep blue eyes swirling as the goddess remained entirely enraptured in this new sensation, filled with a feedback she had never imagined. Pale fingers danced over the bare features of the Dreaming God’s face, spellbound by their shared song yet ever caring and curious. So they remained, open to the experiences of one another, and that of a world beyond, the horned goddess still and accepting the flood of emotion, memory and context that barraged her previous perception.
It appeared to give her the presence of mind to alter the maelstrom, at the very least in that shared moment, to find and share those moments of peace with imbued clarity. In each part, the intensity of emotions built to a crescendo, focused and separated from the river of uncontrollable mortal suffering and happiness. A deluge of memories, of praying mortals, of Sanya and the first humans, all returned with a sharp clarity of purpose. Somewhere deep within the goddess, a spark to sort through each moment had been ignited, and in their shared peace were brief flashes of her memories as millennia of situations were aligned with new context beyond the shortsighted impulses Neiya had let control her before.
As the silence spread, the equilibrium established, her mind stilled for a time, and the love goddess resolved to do as Àicheil; simply listen and experience the woven promise ring out. Neiya was content to be a passenger, at least for a time.
In silence, did the two remain, their only company each other and the Endless Dream's refrain. In due time the quiet grew too great to bear. So Àicheil spoke, and his gentle words they drifted through her hair.
“Are you well,” he asked her, his tone a soothing thrum. Their hand, too, did its work and played across her temple and down to her collarbone. From heart to shoulder, from spike to cheek, the god's caress roamed.
There was not the barest shred of invasiveness within the motion, only mindfulness and comfort.
The horned goddess parted her lips, a hesitation to answer, as her eyes grew distant even with her new clarity to guide her. Or perhaps because of it. “No,” she eventually replied, a tranquil sorrow to her tone. Sadness, but momentary peace all the same. “Though perhaps that is alright. If I do not suffer, who will hear their woes? Rejoice with them? It cannot be defeated, only eased.”
A subtle twist of her lips, a minuscule smile of appreciation at her continued thought. “I never want them to be alone, and they never will. I will always be there to listen, and to touch their lives with meaning.”
About them wove a whisper of a smile amid a sea of many threads, each its own thought, many filled with confusion. Àicheil paused, as if appreciating her words, her form, her thoughts, and the sentiments that dwelled beneath them. In the Dreamer's eyes a question remained, teasing at Àicheil's mind, and driving them to madness.
Tilting their head, Àicheil withdrew his fingers into a fist, leaving only one upon her flesh, its tip against the hollow of her throat. Downwards was drawn a line, prismatic emotion writ upon skin, twisting within itself, creating coiling cascading patterns. A curving downwards sweep, reversing at the center to mirror along that first line which had been drawn. As the deliberate motion of that finger returned from whence it came and withdrew from her pallid skin the patterned unfurled. Swiftly, it became far more complex than its initial tracing, awash with color, filled with tranquil peace--its every aspect a memory of contented clarity.
Ѻs-fhìreach looked upon her then...and saw.
“Love and Sorrow both. From you are they borne into the world, and to you they return.”
Lightly, he tapped the center of her chest, where the heart-pattern ended.
“Find your center. Know that beyond these there dwells a vast well of emotion inside which that despair is but a delicate crystal of black ice. Distinctive, but fleeting.”
Shroud returning to its former shape, Àicheil watched her then, still unsettled and confused. For despite his words of wisdom, his grasp of her Truth remained unclear to him--its value still unknown.
For a moment, the love goddess caressed the Dreamer’s face, head slowly tilting as she appeared to grow thoughtful. The touch ceased, and the connection broke at last, her eyes slowly recovering to a calm, sorrowful demeanor.
“You speak true,” she offered. Arms slowly lifting, Neiya attuned herself further to the maelstrom raging within, dulled as it was in his realm. ”I want what they have. There is peace beyond the river. I will find it.” A brief ripple of power, screaming of intense desire and want, echoed into the endless spaces of the Dreaming God’s realm. The horned goddess lowered her arms once more, and gently moved a hand to lay it on the mark he had left on her.
“Surely the Dreaming God understands such a feeling. Dreaming for something more.”
Àicheil's head tilted at her comment, unsure of her meaning.
“More?”
The word held within its bounds confusion, but beyond even that it was laden with impressions of infinity. It was a sweeping gesture, encompassing all which surrounded them and the Endless Dream to which it was connected. It was a question, but not simply one requiring a response. It said, 'what more could there be?
The goddess’ eyes drew out over the expanse, and not long after, she scoffed quietly. Neiya began to turn away, her peace apparently sullied by his response. Her own head tilted as she paused, and her gaze returned with renewed vigor onto the Dreaming God. “Are you like the God of Truth? Unable to see beyond the horizon?” she queried with a return of the disdain she usually carried, even though it did not seem to plague her otherwise. Her features kept in a neutral, thin frown.
“You must want something, Àicheil. Otherwise, you are no better than I was. Still am. Broken.”
The Roineagan shuddered at her words, recoiling from her and the Dreaming God, its many colors twisting upon themselves and shifting to a maddened crimson hue. Bolts of lightning, black, and red, and gray shot from clouds of experiences to strike the Dreamer. Cords of flickering starlight wove across his form, warping the surface of his divine facade. These cords of twisting light, they reached his newfound eyes and pulsed like veins of rage, pumping all emotion from the Dreamer's once expressive gaze.
Threads of Àicheil's shroud wound about themselves and became like razor wire, cutting at the Worldweave and severing so many ties. Many cries of horror and fear slipped from mind-to-mortal-mind. A thread grazed across her arm but did not cut, and from fury was borne a silence that could cull all meaning from the world.
Eyes like colorless dull ice pierced her, then softened as coiling lights slowly pressed back into their form, releasing tension which from rage had been born.
“You speak of arrogance, yet presume to understand,” thundered the Thrice Named God.
“You dance amid delusion, as if broken by the burden of your nature.”
Ѻs-fhìreach swept his hand through the air like a cutting saber and destroyed the meaning of these words, insulted by their taste upon his mind.
“Though you were born with eyes, they only blind you.” The words were quieter, almost gentle, yet equally cutting as if they had inherited the blade that came before them.
Ѻs-fhìreach remained silent for a time, and that quiet moment was thick with the intensity of their attention. So full did the air about them feel, that it seemed should she speak, that she would suffocate.
Though affronted, Àicheil's temper slowly lost its edge, as did their form. Reaching out, they pressed a finger to the center of Neiya's forehead.
Àicheil's eyes closed, as if unwilling to look upon her. Before their gaze fell away, a whisper of disappointment and sadness touched them, writ as shades of dark blue and wisp-like threads of purple.
“You. Our siblings. Narrow minds.” He said this slowly, hoping to impart their true weight to her. In her mind small lights would appear, visions to correspond. “Each sees,” he continued, and the lights glowed within her, illuminating aspects of the world. Then, two new lights appeared, one a golden hue, the other a prismatic mass. “Twins,” the lights met, and where they did, blossomed something beyond any explanation. “United, we are whole. The Two-as-One. Apart…” they separated once more, “...we are ourselves. Incomplete, but whole in a way.”
He withdrew his finger.
“Your lights shine brightly. All of us Gods. Two of us, aware. You wish to call the Two-as-One shortsighted, yet your light illuminates only that held within. Ours is an infinite tapestry, growing faster than thought, building on itself.”
Àicheil shook his head and turned from her, drifting to the center of his realm. His form dissolved completely, and she might feel the presence of him upon her skin. Images were pulled from the endless tapestry of his realm. Familiar forms pulled from memory and experience. The Gods, or echoes of their essence, as perceived by her...and by the mortals beyond this place apart. Their forms shone with an inner light, each a distinct color. Slowly, as she watched, Neiya might find that these colors each existed within the Grand Design of Àicheil's realm. Then, when each color was matched to a God...she might notice that there were more colors--more sounds, more sensations and thoughts, and emotions--than there were gods.
Eyes opened and regarded her once more. Their edges limned with gold. Throughout his realm, that same aureate hue wove throughout the colors of other Gods. It sung and spun and twisted in a dance most intricate. It was part of them, but it held itself separate in a way.
“To ye who bear the fruit of only a single colour I ask: Why only one? Why only two? Within me all are made as one, and thus there is without.” He paused and shook his head.
A prismatic thread grazed her cheek. It was a memory of tenderness and peace, rippling through her mind. It was comforting, but painful--still, it left no mark.
“You are as the blind, wandering in the darkness of dreams; ignorant to your own ignorance.”
Àicheil's gaze seemed sympathetic but filled with a thing that bordered pity.
“How sad it must be. To be a vessel overfull with yearning.”
The words were soft, but they held within them a quiet venom.
How unfortunate a being. So fragile as to break when confronted by their nature. Prideful and blind. Lusting after that which they already possess--unknowing.
These words, he did not say, but she would feel them all the same.
Neiya’s eyes narrowed quickly during the Dreaming God’s retort, each word seeming to send a ripple of discontent, tranquil fury, and disgust through her very being. The maelstrom was silent now, for she was thoroughly and intensely focused on the verbal and mental assault. Still, the horned goddess held herself with a feigned grace, wafting a hand in front of her face dismissively as silence began to ring out with its presence. She spun in place, gaze moving in search for whence she came.
“I care not,” she gave with a venomous tone of her own, icy and unpleasant. “Hide and watch your tapestry grow as I paint upon it.”
As the distance grew between them, and the hold of their attunement weakened, a resounding laugh echoed through the realm, pressing itself through her form. The sound did not relent until she neared the threshold of his realm, where it was replaced by words.
“Sorrow and Love. Suffering and Peace. Like all the works of our siblings, I bid thee welcome.” Though the sound of laughter had fled, amusement remained within his voice.
Before her, he coalesced, golden light wrapped about the silhouette of his star wrought visage, its aureate hue extending outwards like threads into infinity. “One insult is traded for another. One, a query, the other a harsh reality that you deign to not accept.” He blocked the exit with his form and fell silent, hoping she might consider his words.
“The maelstrom within, it need not rule you.”
He moved aside, the motion filled with guileless grace.
“Venom and invectives, from you I drew these things. So look not upon this meeting with sour remembering.”
His form began to fade into the endless waves of the Worldweave, as his attention drifted elsewhere, but as she crossed the threshold, she felt a final whisper.
“Within a strength you do not know, A seed of power and control, So rest your blame, O' sorrow's dame, and end your lamentation,
So from seed to stalk is grown, A force which surely fills the hole, which resides inside your heart, Hurting, clawing, it tore apart, Till, by dominion's hold, you drove it to cessation.”
That seemed to give Neiya pause, head twisting to gaze backward over her shoulder. Eyes narrowed, she offered a soft, minimalist nod. With a regal tilt of her chin and a flurry of lingering experience, the horned goddess left the Dreaming God's demesne; her quiet fury turned to introspection.
Neiya is drawn in by the strange allure of a mysterious god’s realm and upon entering it is enraptured by its shifting design and the experiences it imparts to her. Àicheil, whose realm she entered, follows after and, once the two attune to one another, they have a discussion. Things are going well, until Neiya--intentionally or not--deigns to insult the Dreaming God’s Twin, Firinn, at which point Ѻs-fhireach nearly flies into a rage. Stilled only by a second attunement to her divine consciousness, Os-fhireach’s rage instead takes the form of a verbal lashing and experiential explanation of what differs between the Two-as-One and their other siblings, her included.
It is not a particularly flattering explanation.
Naturally, her heart grows cold with self-righteous fury and she moves to leave, seeking to insult him more directly. Aicheil only laughs and bids her take heed of his parting words, before allowing her to go.
The two part on somewhat shaky terms, each having learned much by their meeting--if nothing else.
The light of antiquity was nearly blinding to the little ancillary form that was also Klaarungraxus. As the small meat puppet hovered gently over the flagstone steps that led down to the center of the arena-like structure, all six eyes sucking down into the simulacra’s torso. One by one they popped back out, becoming accustomed to the light. Before Klaar was a wide-open arena, a coliseum of sorts that did little to express exactly where this was to the overmind back in Saxus.
The stink of divine presence was practically a sweet, sickly, cloying fog that hung over the entire place; it was impossible NOT to notice it. No doubt gods of all kinds were finding their way to this place, one after another. The sensory organs of the simulacrum spied the tell-tale signs of divine gateways all around the arena and in that moment Klaar felt a moment of hope; he was not as alone as he had believed. Letting out a siren call, Klaar released a signal bouncing into every portal within earshot calling to the Gods he had known in the Galbarian plane.
With a popping sensation, Klaar felt the echolocational cry ping back with immediate results. Eyes straining to see in the light, Klaarungraxus’ simulacrum soon recognized a number of visible entities hanging about inside the coliseum. Before him were a number of godling creatures, all spread out and interacting, and in that instant, a number of sensory responses from sub-minds pinged back to the overmind, a need to disguise his presence. With skin warping in color to match the arena around it, the simulacrum flopped down onto the surface to hide itself as much as possible while continuing to let out a low-frequency burst in an attempt to get in contact with more trustworthy gods.
It did not take Fìrinn long to perceive its twin--to be precise, the shortest possible amount of time--and its reaction was immediate. For two thousand years, it had gone without the ability to process the emotional impact of the mortals it had interacted with, and it knew in that moment that it would need to conjoin minds with its twin to restore itself to normalcy and Truth both. It did not move, per se, so much as it simply extended its mantle across the distance between them with claw-tips outstretched. It took only the briefest instant before it was only a few centimeters away from its twin, and it awaited that harmonious and meaning-filled instant in which Àicheil would speak the word that unified them as the Two-as-One. Their long absence would finally be over, and their divergent paths could once again lead them forward to what was meant to be.
It was not that Fìrinn had not perceived and acknowledged the call of Klaarungraxus--it eagerly awaited a reunion with its friend and ally--but this task was simply too important. All other precedents were unimportant, swept away like leaves in a strong gust of wind. Nothing else but purpose mattered or could matter to the God of Truth, and until that purpose was fulfilled it could not and would not rest.
A turning, shifting, twisting motion. Receding color, a storm of sudden indecision and anger, limned with calm and a subtle insidious detachment. Àicheil's attention narrowed, focusing intently upon the mantle of its twin. Upon the intrusion into his space, near his mind. Yet, though the Dreaming God balked at the sight of such attempted unification, another force within him had other things in mind. So it was that the smallest sliver of whimsical intention cast a single thread of substanceless essence forth and in doing so, bound together the twins.
So bloomed a silver flash between those touching points and from them spread a display most magnificent. An expulsion of color. A painted sea contained, now unleashed. Through Fìrinn's mantle spread experience unmarred, beyond understanding, without context. Utter freedom without filter, its like a prismatic sheen, a reflection more vivid than the taste or sight, the sound or sensation of the world they knew. Mirrored in Àicheil's chaotic colors was a monochrome effulgence, an eruption of silvers and blacks--grays and whites--all mixed and spreading, suffusing him.
He resisted.
Yet, even as he fought, the initial wave of unity had been brought about by one traitorous thread of his being. It had been done with will unconscious, and so before he could truly defend himself, much of his mind had already succumbed to the familiar weight of Truth. Meaning came to him then like a flood through a sorting sieve.
Logic
Àicheil's mind grew still. His form coalesced, slowly gathering, his lifeblood poured into a starlit vessel, a silhouette most familiar and preferred.
A long stretch of silence. An unspoken knowing. A renewed unity.
Stability. Àicheil spoke.
"Twin," he said.
Just as the connection begat context and understanding for one, it also qualified the two millennia of human emotion that the other had been unable to process in its time answering mortal prayers. The wave of revelation hit the God of Truth like a physical force, and though it did not stagger them the lights reflecting from their almost-face scattered in a thousand-thousand directions like shards of glass.
“Twin.”
Fìrinn took a moment to catch its metaphorical breath and composed itself, remembering in that moment the summons it heard in the language of the deep. It cast out a strand of thought, unified between the twin gods and equally present in each of their infinite minds, and bid them both towards the simulacrum of Klaarungraxus that had called to them. Its mind reached out to the flesh-puppet crafted of that divine essence and spoke to it from afar, waves of intent crashing upon the comparatively tiny proxy--and only that proxy--with the full force of their combined thoughts.
“Hail, Klaarungraxus Rux. The Two-as-One greet you as the first God to grace our senses, and the most worthy of our notice.”
The small form that was, for all intents and purposes, Klaarungraxus seemed to respond to the mental inquiries of the paired entities that presented themselves before him. Pinging back sensations of pleased success at their arrival, the little ancillary puppet removed itself from hiding. A peculiar sensory return of the paired gods gave an immediate sense of confusion to the overmind, all subminds setting about determining exactly what was now poised to communicate with his simulacra on the other side of the portal. By all rights it was as the conjoined said; Two-as-One gods, the minds of Àicheil and Fìrinn made whole. Though visually they appeared as separate, their divine light seemed most thoroughly intertwined.
”Bountiful nutrients borne in warm waters, Fìrinn-Àicheil. Your conjoined-mind is not known to the many-who-are-we, but your separate-selves are not alien to our consciousness.” Klaar’s meat puppet seemed to bubble outward, growing in size to be at least somewhat more reminiscent of his appropriate shape. ”Explain to us your current state; hath it to do with our shared predicament?”
Attention intertwined, mind awash with meaning, Àicheil regarded this their ally, the Ocean God. Remembered oaths. A faceless smile pressed out from their aura, and an eyeless gaze swept over Klarungraxus' form. Strange to see the god so small, stranger still to feel a distance between them greater than the appearance of such things.
Bizarre to hear words and understand without effort.
Though Àicheil had experienced this before, it had been some time, and even having not felt the passing of those two-thousand years, they had had an impact on him. Numerous dreaming ruminations came to him now with the clarity and context of his twin. With their power, he learned, and having done so, he spoke.
"This is our Truth," he said, and the words were perfectly clear, beautifully concise. None of the obfuscation or verbosity of his twin. Bereft of the singular depth of his own communication. It was filled only with clarity and meaning most necessary and poignant for this their reunion.
"Time. Isolation. The Voids filled," he began, the words flowing forth like intention realized, none overfull with meaning. "Àicheil..." he paused, "Fìrinn. These are merely components."
Extending both arms before him, Àicheil brought his hands together. "As we are. Truth," he pulled them apart, "as we were--a vestige of such." His arms relaxed and a gentle warmth spread from them, it was filled with companionable silence. It was rife with knowing, understanding, and an echoing resonation of respect--perhaps even admiration.
Àicheil waited, content. He had said enough. He had meant enough. There was no need to say more.
The little thing rumbled deeply, though not nearly enough to match Klaar’s usual tonal range; more like several pebbles scattering rather than the rolling of an entire undersea mountainside. It seemed the information presented was being digested by minds one too many concepts away from the here and the now. Nevertheless, one by one the little Klaar-thing seemed to respond with awareness before opening its beak with expressed understanding.
“Clarity as clear skies after storms, all that hangs laid low by scattered rains, it is We who understand most clearly. You are as I am, as many-minds-made-one. Brilliant reflections, gemstones and corals and shells of numerous colors.”
The Klaarungraxus lookalike seemed to lose interest in the topic then, suddenly blatantly aware that Fìrinn and Àicheil had simply mirrored him; whether or not this was the case, the analogy was a simple one for the whole to digest. Just as his numerous minds were separate entities thinking as one, so too were the Gods of Dreaming and Truth. What could be more simple. His numerous eyes went into overdrive devouring the sensory information of the area, looking for anything that might indicate exactly where they were. Sensory pings resulted in response-awareness of the distinct lack of anything other than the arena. Outside of its stone limitations was nothing of consequence and likely extended no further than the eyes could see; perhaps even that was a trick in of itself. They were most assuredly not on Galbar.
”This place, false is its facade, and it leaves me quite wanting; time passed yet I have no concept of this passage. When and Where must be answered and this Doom I had seen come to pass must be counteracted. My thoughts to yours, what experiences hath thine senses perceived?”
“Two thousand years have come and gone since our departure from fair Galbar and her delights. Perhaps the others of our kind have insight, but their words and experiences are not guaranteed to be as our own: Indeed, perhaps only those who foresaw the Doom might rightfully have room to indulge in exposition about its nature. We should retreat to your realm, where our senses are not assailed by the panoply of divinity that permeates this place and you might regale us with the Truth of your form once more.”
Fìrinn made a brief swinging motion with its mantle-claws, as if dismissing something in the far-off distance between them and their divine compatriots, before turning to the portal from which this proxy had emerged. As it was, conjoined with its twin and made whole, it did not need a response from the Old Growth Below’s proxy--it simply knew that its realm was the desired destination, and that its privacy would serve them well in the upcoming discussions. Fìrinn’s experience of the deities other than Klaar thus far was mostly one of naivete, wanton self-indulgence, or both--even those it could claim to have liked, in whatever way Fìrinn was capable of liking anything, were not beings it felt were suitable for the arduous task of contemplating the mysteries of the universe. Perhaps isolation had made strange bedfellows of them all in that time, but some element of distrust and numbness to emotion clearly permeated the God of Truth’s almost-face. Perhaps it was some reflection of Klaarungraxus’ innate wariness, or some element of discordance it had absorbed from its twin that had not yet dissipated--whatever it was or could be said to be, Fìrinn did not feel like saying whatever need to be said in earshot of the other gods, and so it reached out to that portal to Saxus and vanished into the aqueous realm.
Klaarungraxus presented himself in all his magnificent glory in his personal realm; with a little blop the meat-puppet back in Antiquity flopped to the ground, sitting patiently for when it was needed again. Here, in Saxus, the God of Oceans could truly thrive. Although there was an intense desire by many of the tentacle-minds to share and show the realm to his new guests, the overmind overruled them; there were plenty more important things to do than entertain the house guests. With his tentacles wrapped firmly around a number of outcropping, Klaarungraxus carried himself to the central city in Saxus where they could speak more peaceably.
”Two millenia hath passed and we remained trapped here? A most unacceptable occurrence. The reasoning for this catastrophe, though yet unknown, is irrelevant; I refuse to abandon my oceans, and though I feel them now, that voice might be snuffed at any instant by that which imprisoned us so unrightly. An option must be presented to allow this barrier to be expunged, penetrated, or ignored. Let our many-minds become as one on this, for together we can find paths to redress this injustice.”
”Two millenia hath passed and we remained trapped here? A most unacceptable occurrence. The reasoning for this catastrophe, though yet unknown, is irrelevant; I refuse to abandon my oceans, and though I feel them now, that voice might be snuffed at any instant by that which imprisoned us so unrightly. An option must be presented to allow this barrier to be expunged, penetrated, or ignored. Let our many-minds become as one on this, for together we can find paths to redress this injustice.”
The words swam through the mind of the Eldritch Twin and he drew from them meaning and purpose. Àicheil, knowing what he did, felt the tingling pulse of all minds. Reaching out, the Dreaming God gently pressed a single narrow finger against the flesh of the great Klaar. He withdrew.
Immediately, a swirling miasma of colorful meaning was unleashed from deep within the Dreamer's form. It gushed forth into the waters of Saxus like ink or paint or blood and filled it with experience. Spreading quickly, it engulfed the trio of gods and then settled into a gentle blanket of woven sensation. "Connection," Àicheil said, and in doing so, stirred and sifted the Subtle Weave which he had laid about them. His cloak billowed and split, becoming a thousand paper-thin ribbons of intention. They began to play across the power he had summoned to this place.
"Divinity," he intoned without restraint, the gravity of his word and its thunderous meaning echoing out through Klaar's realm in a resounding wave. It was a command of sorts, and the great Dream obeyed.
Resolving in the fabric of that manifested Weave there appeared a god-touched mortal. From that image there came a knowledge and every sensation. The feel, the scent, the sound of this empowered being and from this it was apparent something that they had perhaps yet to consider. Deeply ingrained into this seeming mortal there lay a spark of divinity far greater than any they may have seen before. From that once-fleeting vessel a thread of that power played across the heavens and faded from Galbar, where it vanished entirely, passing into some unknown place beyond.
"The thread. It ends here. There is nowhere else beyond my reach." Àicheil paused and tilted his head for a moment, lost in thought. Fìrinn's clarity returned to him and a deep contemplation emanated from his form, its like entwined with a gentle, thoughtful smile. "This thing. Gibbou has done it, we need only echo its design."
Fìrinn gazed upon the images put forth by its twin, studying them intently. Each mote of light shone through the abyssal depths of Klaar’s divine realm, reflected and refracted endlessly, contained effortlessly within a sphere of Àicheil’s design--a microcosm of the Dreaming God’s infinite mind. Its mantle-claws wove themselves into shears, and it made a motion as if to cut the threads of that great tapestry, severing a hole in that great design and weaving its threads anew with its own context and experience. In but a moment the entire design was overtaken by its new purpose, a billowing cloud of ink-black nothingness sweeping and shuddering across its glassine form until there was nothing but emptiness and loneliness.
But each of the three divines remained, still in close proximity to one another, and still able to commune.
“There is only one divinity greater than we three and the others--that which spawned us, from whose depths we claw’d and fought and emerged. The Lifeblood itself burns and bristles at our touch, unwilling now to drink of our presence--no other force could presume to impeach us. Yet the Mother of the Moon, ignorant to her own ignorance, has stumbled upon the means of our salvation--the Lifeblood may bar entry only to its first children. Fragments of our divinity may yet breach it, and so we must cleave from ourselves our divinity to influence sweet Galbar once more. Well said, Twin.”
Fìrinn took a moment to contemplate the nature of their conundrum before snapping its mantle-claws back into place and dispelling the dregs of that illusion which had served its purpose.
”Her little godling, Twilight, return’d to the weave. All that it is, all that it was, is reflected now through the holy Tairseach--and through the Two-as-One. She made the mistake of granting it free will, of empowering that which already exists--affording her firstborn perception beyond its Truth. To bear this fragment of our greatness as Truth, only that directly crafted by us will suffice.”
All of Klaarungraxus’ great mass seemed to roil and shake in rumination, every inch of the divine of deeps seeming to throw itself entirely into this new task at hand. The information provided to him was absorbed and disseminated across the whole of the minds at Klaar’s disposal. Awareness of what needs be done, of what repetitions were required in order to match or otherwise surpass Gibbou’s work, and of the dangers posed by the enemy of the second born gods of Galbar. A breach was required and unlike the flesh-ancible that he had created earlier, this new entity would need to be considerably more independent while still remaining distinctly Klaarungraxus. An idea pinged back and Klaar went to action.
With a terrible ripping noise that filled the depths of Saxus with a squelching, tearing roar, Klaarungraxus grabbed tightly around Right-Forward Two-Down and tore it free. There was no difficulty in the action, of course, as the limb’s flesh gladly gave way to the works of the elder deity; it was most pleased to be of service, after all, for it had been its idea. The huge tentacle, flopping vigorously in the waves, was dropped unceremoniously downwards before Klaar arrested its drop with an intonation of Deepspeak. With all six eyes focussed on the wriggling object, Klaarungraxus directed all his considerable attentions at the limb-that-would-be-free.
It shook and shuddered and writhed as new flesh grew from the torn stump, blood pouring inwards from the spilled cloud into it to form more flesh for the making of it. Meat and bone was stretched further in all directions, assisted by rock, plant matter, and coral, until an appropriate structure had been made. From the dark cloud of gore slowly emerged a jet black Vrool, the darkness of its hide so deep that light seemed to lose its war and descend into its depth in surrender. Six eyes, just as Klaarungraxus’, stared back forward somewhat aimlessly as the tentacle-mind was grown into a semi-complete overmind of its own. With that simple work complete, Klaar let a connection be made between himself and the avatar to fill it with all his thoughts and experiences even as a new tentacle was grown to replace the one that was lost.
”Right-Forward Two-Down is an inappropriate name as it will be replaced; you are Mawarungraxus,” echoed the deity as he inspected his work both superficially and deep within its mind. It seemed altogether functional, albeit with some neural pathways unique to this Mawar entity, ”You are we.”
”Yes. We are.”
Clarity endowed, words spoken to elucidate further, and a display most divine. These things Àicheil regarded, the ribbon-tendrils of his shroud drifting gently through the waters of Klaarungraxus' wondrous realm. Slowly, subtly, intent thrummed through this ribbon-thin threads, casting them in weaving patterns which caught at the edges of those cast of dreggs. Àicheil pulled them gently, threading them together absently as he observed the work of their elder with wide, muted, interest.
Without thought, beyond true intention a thing of beauty spawned, prismatic blood sifting gently from his cloak, entwining with the dregs of his dream-wrought vision. Gently, water was displaced, that essence which was Klaar's eased away from this idle toy. Yet not all of that liquid was lost, for the substance of the thing appeared in myriad shades--droplets of trapped, shifting color, held in vague union by the will of the Dreaming God.
Àicheil let forth a soothing drone. Ѻs-fhìreach spat out a chaotic thrum. Neo-Àicheil intoned with fervor and rhythm both and together the thrice-named god wove its essence into a silhouette. Yet, it defied definition. Twas but a gently shifting mass of colored particles, all aqueous in their prismatic nature. Held somewhere within them was that shorn shard of divinity, but it could not be said where precisely it was held.
There was silence for a time. Àicheil smiled. Not an echo, not a feeling, but truly a binding constellation 'cross his featureless face. It was so brief as to be missed, but it had been there.
“Faireachan A-staigh,” Ѻs-fhìreach declared. In those words there were held great meaning, and power greater still for with their utterance the haze of dreamy light did shift. From its formless facade there emerged a silhouette most vague. It was a whisper of form, a thing which might be mistaken for a human silhouette, if only from the right angle.
It kept its shape then, but there remained a fleeting sense about it as gently glowing particles pressed in and out of its visage, forming an aura of light-refracting moisture.
Satisfied, Àicheil withdrew his strength and let relax his cosmic intellect, leaving all else to his Truthbound Twin.
Noticing the conclusion of its twin’s weaving, Fìrinn set to work. From between its true hands a shard of crystal came into being, and with a gentle nudge from its mantle-claws it drank of the waters and the effulgent cosmic residue left behind by the works of the other gods. In an instant its form exploded forth, a slab of hallowed silver crystal much like that of the holy Tairseach suspended between the three. Shards of that leftover material coalesced together between the God of Truth’s mantle-claws, and from it grew another crystalline form--two blades, a deconstructed pair of shears, honed to an edge so fine they would cut even the divine. Gazing into that mirror, Fìrinn took the two blades in its mantle-claws and cut from the sunless cryst its own reflection, bidding it step forward into the murky waters and into reality.
“Faileasiar; the Behindling. Cut from mine own reflection, shaped from the sanctum of the Tairseach. In mirrors shall you find purchase; in reflections shall you find Truth.”
Its form seemed to waver and ripple, and as Fìrinn trained its godly perception upon the newly created Avatar it seemed to vanish from existence--only to be found within the mirror before it. With a nod it simply slinked away, disappearing from view, and made its way to Galbar where it was inextricably bound for all of eternity. Fìrinn gazed upon the two blades it had used to craft its avatar. Though they had lost that preternatural keenness and lustre, they would perhaps still serve a purpose as tools for mortalkind to use: instruments of Truth, to cut away that which was false and shape reality into what it was meant to be. Indeed, they could serve as tools of beginnings and endings both--an experiment, of sorts, to see what mortalkind’s perception of Truth would become had they the tools to influence it and the means to perceive it. Its mantle-claws gripped the two blades tightly and thrust them through the reflection in the mirror, holding them for just a second, before Faileasiar’s glassine claws took them for itself and vanished back into nothingness.
“This mirror shall serve as a portal to the Buaileagan Aimsireil. Manipulate it however you like, Klaarungraxus Rux, but know this: for as long as the alliance between Oceans and Reflections stands, my realm shall be open to you and yours. By our combined efforts shall Truth be aligned with reality.”
”A reflection from one realm to another? Scintillating scales and scattered light off glassy surface.” Klaar seemed to lean in, observing the object with deep fascination before returning his attention to the duod gods most reasonably called Rux and allies. A similar concept could likely be repeated and Klaar immediately set about in its creation. As Mawar watched with idle curiosity, Klaarungraxus vomited forth two rough, unhewn black pearls before nudging them through the water towards the twined gods.
”When so planted, the blackest depths of oceans deep shall be born; from that darkness, routes open. Thine passageway need only be cast in darkness for the oculus to be opened. An acceptable solution, We think.”
Klaarungraxus turned to Mawar and rumbled, eyeing the jet black Vrool with intense curiosity; never before, he had to admit, had he been able to look at himself in such a manner. An experience most fascinating, concluded the minds alongside the newly grown Right-Forward Two-Down. With that one tentacle stretched forward, tapping Mawar on the bell and enveloping the lesser graxus in darkness. As that inky blackness receded or otherwise dissipated, the form of Mawar disappeared.
”Twelve tentacles twisted, may our luck hold. We shall see from the otherside if gentle breezes or rough waves await our machinations back on the world not of our own making.”
A mirror risen, a reflection shorn, from Klaar's maw dual black pearls were torn.
Àicheil's aspect shifted faintly in the ocean tide of the great eld's realm as he observed the acts of these his allies--Fìrinn and Klaar. A small laugh trickled from the Dreaming God and danced among the waves, but he gave that humor no hold over his actions as one ribbon rose up with a current-wave. It tangled with the pearl of black and pulled it from the sea's swirling hold. Àicheil held it fast, its glossy sheen dark and bold. Upon its surface the god's attention fell, but it was merely a glancing touch. Turning, the Eldritch Twin regarded then the mirror of his twin's making.
Ribbons curled and danced about him frantically as he held that gaze, then he bade them move, and they obeyed. Flitting forth they touched the crystal's surface and around it weaved a glowing nervous gleam.
"Oceans depth and tides sweep far, a mirror's bare reflection, by Dream unmarred," the words...they seemed to hold so little of the god's myriad meanings. Instead, their nature, their purpose, it could be found by observing the many gaps left therein. They spoke of yearning. They said 'incomplete,' they declared 'I will change it.'
Ѻs-fhìreach raised a hand, and with it seven ribbons split seven times, and each in turn split seven more till threads uncountable and unseen were formed from where they'd been before. Darting wisps of intent, they flitted about the mirror, and one by one they vanished.
A flicker of sound. A dash of sweetness. A fluttering emotion in the stomach. A stirring kaleidoscope of color. A pattern vast, infinite in its scope, turned upon itself, devouring and creating in equal measure. It expanded, but did not grow as if one grew merely closer to it. A vision of countless cascades of rippling pools and pulling tendrils, grasping minds and wills cast forth to gnash against the world.
The Grand Design. Unfurling from the Truth God's mirror, a reflection writ reality sprang forth. With its crossing of the threshold bare it lost a glimmer of infinity, but it gained substance, and spread throughout Klaar's realm like ten-trillion dancing strings. They faded, became obscure, the waves pulled with fervor, and soon only a gentle shifting sheen was left within Klaar's waters--which had once been truly clean.
Ѻs-fhìreach reached forth with one long-fingered hand. It came to rest upon Klaar's shoulder-face, where tentacle spawned and outward raced.
"Dream, and you may come to my realm Ocean-Rux, Brother Klaar." The moment was a gentle affection laid bare, pure and untainted by any further goal or ambitious air.
Upon the Tairseach mirror-twin there laid now runes and sigils deep within. Its reflection had been marked. It was whole.
Àicheil turned from Klaar and--gently--withdrew from Fìrinn as well.
"Galbar awaits," he said.
"To siblings-minds I am drawn. From narrow skulls I shall exhume context. In time will we convene once more."
With a parting gesture, Àicheil's deific strength reached out and touched the mirror.
A blinding flash.
Connection.
"So bound are our realms three."
Though he bid them not farewell, within Àicheil their essences would remain. Held close to core, they'd be an anchor against his drifting nature's endless refrain. In waters both near and far they'd hold him fast against the great pull of whim and nightmarish disconnection. So from Saxus did Àicheil depart and as he passed beyond that ocean-place, there remained only an echo of his reflection.
Klaar calls out a summons, seeking out those he’s spoken to before. The Twin Gods Aicheil and Fìrinn are reunited, their minds melding. The two confer with the Ocean God, relocating to his realm for further discussion. They discuss how to counteract their imprisonment beyond Galbar. They come to a realization and act upon it, swiftly creating their avatars and casting them down to Galbar...except for Aicheil for reasons unknown. Then, as a further act of their alliance, the three link their realms. Aicheil departs seeking out others to which he is drawn.
Start: 5MP, 5DP -0 -- Create an Avatar. -XMP -XDP -- Create two artifacts (An Léiriú Siosúr: Láthair & Todhchaí) | Carve Reality III | Coerce Reality III
An Léiriú Siosúr: Láthair & Todhchaí [The Shears of Manifestation: What Is & What Shall Be] Carve Reality III: When used by an individual who sincerely believes that the removal of something physical will allow them to realise their Truth, Láthair is able to shear from reality that object or person, removing and excising them from reality completely. Their physical form ceases to exist, and their soul continues to exist on Galbar. The individual becomes incorporeal and intangible, unable to interact with the world in any way that would allow another being (other than those also in this state and deities) to perceive them in any way. This ability can only be used on beings of an equivalent of lower power level than the user--but due to the reflective surface of the shears, Faileasiar is able to manifest within them and could be willing to impart a degree of heroism upon an individual who requests aid and is truly motivated.
This ability does not come without a cost, however--the individual that cuts away what is must surrender their present to do so, causing them to immediately suffer the same fate.
The effects of this ability can be only reversed if the individual who originally performed the process touches Láthair and sincerely believes that undoing the process will make the world a place more aligned with their Truth, or through deific intervention.
Coerce Reality III: When used by an individual who sincerely believes that the creation of something physical will allow them to realise their Truth, Todhchaí is able to cut away falsehoods from within reality to create that which they desire. The object or individual that they create has no soul, is not part of the Worldsong or the Collective Unconscious, and is intrinsically tied to the individual that made them--should their creator die, they will simply vanish. In order for this ability to be successful, however, its user must sacrifice their future--over the course of one year, the soul of the user is transferred into that which they have made. The user will become a spirit that can only be perceived by other spirits created by this artifact, its twin, and deities--and what they have created will become real in their stead.
Todhchaí can only create things of equivalent power level to the being that uses them--if the being has had no might spent on them, they may only create things that could be created without a title. Additionally, they may only create something which already has a basis within reality or widely accepted story and whatever they create cannot procreate unless it is creating something that already exists (e.g. a new human can make humans, but a fantastical beast from folklore cannot procreate).
This process can only be reversed by deific intervention.
A wandering Dream thrust across Galbar's shifting sky, its aura a piercing memory, an echo of something seen and felt and heard and tasted in the hours before first light. It was a starlight figure, a silhouette of grey. A shroud of passing interest, a mind of unknownable proportions. Divinity.
Though yet unaware and uncaring of the growing tension in the world, Àicheil remained prescient to the shifting attitudes of the vast Dream, the subtle weave. Across its expanse he felt his twin, he knew their workings and he rejoiced in the strength which was granted to their prime creation, their vast Collective Consciousness. Contentment swirled within his mind and it felt as if the Dreaming God had been holding a breath for a very long time, and now he'd released it.
However, this calm could not last it seemed for no sooner had Ѻs-fhìreach made seven circles seven times about the glittering planet, the world began to darken. Àicheil stopped his drifting dance, his observation of the heavens and the earth that was Galbar. Held in place for a frozen moment, he released his hold completely.
Where there had been a form defined a swell of color and starlit black expanded like a stain of ink across the entire sky. He felt, through the Dream in that moment, a great absence, a great fear, pain, relief, suffering, distress, and a myriad of emotions left like cosmic ripples upon the minds of mortals. Àicheil breathed then, without mouth or lung, but with his consciousness, and with each breath his dark body, his grey shroud, and the storm of color held within, covered the planet's skies. Just as edge met expanding edge and all light, but those shifting clouds, was snuffed from the heavens, a dimming began.
He did not resist, he was too tired already, and in a far off place within his mind, he had known this was coming--as he knew all things. Yet, he did not understand it. Despite this lack, he did not resist. The fading starlit black, limned and suffused with prismatic color and greyish mist lost its substance. Light peered from the heavens and through his vast divine form. A whirling rage crashed against him. It was like a hurricane, like a mind unleashed, like a thoughtless thing railing against a wrongness it knew, but could not be or understand.
The Grand Design.
Mother|Lifeblood|Father
A faded vessel, a vanishing presence, a final thought, then nothing. Emptiness. An abyss without limit or direction or intent. Slowing, rising madness. Fear. Anxiety. A heartbeat of thoughts all his own, frantic. He felt, not calm or content, not serene, and yet his thoughts were placid and clear--transparent. It was a strange thing this.
It was a brief disconnection. Oh so brief. So mercifully temporary.
Reaching out, Àicheil's godly vessel stretched out through the endless, formless, thoughtless void. Free of context, free of everything, it made and unmade, harmed and destroyed and created anew. Swirling color. Smells, sights, and sensations. Pain and agony; lust and pleasure. Every experience, every thought, every piece of knowledge--none of it.
An echo. A crystallized rumination, an endless experiential malestrom--ordered, yet so vast that no one could truly grasp such. Then, seeking tendrils of thoughts, prayers, requests, emotions, sights and sounds and scents and sensations. Every single thought of him, then more beside.
A rippling cascade across his newfound realm. A coalescence of thought, a resurgence of identity, an interruption in the endless beauteous dance of past and present and future all. Unmade, but born again.
Àicheil|Ѻs-fhìreach|Neo-Àicheil
A thread of connection true. Remembrance. A tide of feeling. He longed for unity, something once forgotten, now remembered. It overwhelmed him, this Dreaming God. It overtook his mind, it swelled to bursting his emotions, as if he was a cup with limits. He cast out, thoughts drifting like gentle feeling threads against a rift in this, his favored place.
Ròineagan
Overtaken. Numb. Unfeeling. Uncaring, that Dreaming God passed beyond his domain and into the harsh atmosphere, a place of substance. A place which was Antiquity. A word leapt into his mind without reason, but with meaning, as a label. One he did not need, but remembered and held within nonetheless. As he crossed that portal threshold, all the other gods would see was a maelstrom of color. Their senses would tell them far more.
For now, with his entrance, the Dreaming God's gravitous attention, his eyeless gaze, it fell on them all, and permeated the air. He filled the space, without touching it, merely by being. His mind, here, was unrestrained. There were no mortals, there was no need. He did not care. He could not care. Not without an anchor.
The question was, after so much time, did he want one?
Àicheil wanders Galbar, gazing across the vast beauty and strangeness of creation. Then, feeling the coming change, he embraces the planet--dissolving his vessel into a swimming ocean of starlit void, prismatic churning color, and a shroud of grey mist which briefly encompasses the entirety of the planet's sky. The Lifeblood proceeds to begin banishing him. He doesn't resist and so after a minute or five, fades out of Galbar and into the void. Disconnected utterly from his twin, Àicheil feels every emotion and thought that makes him up. He becomes a mass without true identity, a mind without purpose or meaning beyond all meanings which exist. He expands, creating, and becoming, his infinite realm, shedding--for timeless millennia--his identity.
Disconnected, and Dreaming, Àicheil experiences his connection to mortality as a connections to the Collective Unconscious, the Subtle Weave. Though he does not press against the Lifeblood's forced exile like the other gods, he does reconnect--on some level--with this his most important creation. Through it he hears thoughts and feelings and prayers. He sees and experiences all dreams and wandering notions--understanding none of it.
Finally, a rift opens in his realm, it is a disturbance, but beyond it he detects others. Though he is perhaps uncaring of such things, a thread of curiousity and remembered familiarity coalesces him back into a single unified mind. He crosses the gap and enters Antiquity, but finds that...perhaps he does not wish to be anchored or unified as he once was.
In short. Àicheil has gone "full eldritch." Who knows if he'll ever truly come back.
Member
Megatron
evierose
Fallenreaper
Snowdrops
Taka
Dark Jack
Crimson Flame
Kalas
HeMandaddy
