Within the swirling Mist (IC) > Biographies
Ruminations on the Conquest of Gundarak, and its Peoples' Future
Aristocratic Barbers' Association:
[This entry is practically unreadable, black stains of something that, again, isn't ink seeming to cover the page. What text can be seen seems to lack cohesion...]
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MASTER OR SLAVE
~ O ~
which are you... ? SLAVE
is this what power feels like? A SLAVE WEARING A COLLAR OF SILVER
is this what being free feels like? DO YOU NOT SEE THAT YOU WEAR IT
Maybe you were only ever a tool, just like the others. When will she see you thrown away, discarded? she hates you just like mother did
when she gave her order, how quickly you chose to obey...
You're a barefoot servant girl. You're a glorified scullion who sold her soul away for the promise of power. You're no leader.
You're nothing, nothing at all.
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
KNOW YOUR PLACE
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Aristocratic Barbers' Association:
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ON HISTORY
~ O ~
Hope remains a curious thing. It finds us when we're at our lowest, when despair threatens to hold us in thrall and leave us with nothing left. Were I one of the bleating sheep that feels the need to lean upon organized religion for guidance, I would say that there is something to what the Church of the Morninglord loves to so often parrot: "The night is always darkest before the dawn". Of course, what they prefer we do is wait for its arrival. They would wish us to be patient. They would wish for us to take our licks and keep going, with our heads bowed and our hands bound. They would wish for us to subscribe to millenarianism, where at some point in the far distant future, things will be forever changed, every wrong will be made right, and every slight and grievance redressed.
It is not so. For things to change, we must be ready and prepared to change them and see it done.
We have been readying ourselves. We have been preparing ourselves.
History is written by the victors. Who can say for certain that the Tergs were truly the villains, in reality? Who can say that the Barovians, in their quest for freedom and the liberation of their homeland, did not engage in perfidy and treachery on the battlefield? Who can say for certain that they didn't pay a heavy moral cost as well as human for seeing their homeland freed from the so-called Goblin King Dorian's foul yoke? Was Strahd von Zarovich, First of His Name, truly so noble as the stories so often paint him as being?
History will see us vindicated. We will be hailed as a hero, as the champion of the meek and the powerless, and none will know of the dark deeds we performed to achieve our people's hard-fought victory. None will have to know. All they will know is that their sons and daughters can live a life free of the pain they felt and their forefathers felt. Already people are quick to forget of Duke Nharov Gundar's atrocities for the sake of having something to rally around. Time washes away all sins, and they will only remember what I wish for them to remember...
... and nothing else.
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Aristocratic Barbers' Association:
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ON WILLPOWER
~ O ~
I stand before my mother's grave. It is far from grand in its appearance, made for a pauper and none other. I've taken to seeing a new headstone fashioned to replace the now-rotting wooden marker that was there before. She never truly loved me, and so I doubt that she would do the same for me if cruel circumstance were to make it so I parted this world before her. It doesn't matter, however. I endeavor to be better than she ever was. I have already accomplished more in a year than she had in her entire lifetime. I used to wonder privately if she'd be proud of me and of what I've accomplished, or if she would despise me even more. What she thinks and what she would have thought doesn't matter, though. It never did.
A friend of mine just gave birth. Twins, it is said. I've yet to see them for myself. I pity them, and I pity her. She must raise these children alone, in a world as cruel and as unwelcome as the one we live in. There are others who would say it isn't my problem, but if I don't uplift those who are most in need of help and provide assistance those most in need of our support, what is even the point of our work?
It's not just about seeing our homeland liberated. It's not just about our people finally being free. It's about building a better world for all. A world where the darkness doesn't smother everything and seek always to snuff out light and shadow in equal measure. We must tear it all down to its very foundations in order to build something new. Something pure. Something lasting.
We must be willing to do all that is necessary to see our dreams be made reality, else they will remain only that. Poorly-armed peasants who've been beaten down time and again won't be able to see the Devil's dark work undone and our people freed. I will find a way, however. I will discover a means by which I will challenge the monstrous tyrant and see him and Castle Ravenloft destroyed, but I won't stop there.
She thought I wished to rule. She didn't truly know me at all.
The rest of the Old World shall burn, starting with the Grey City... and from the ashes, shall emerge the New.
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Better Dread than Dead:
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CONCLUSION
~ O ~
These screeds of mine, these ruminations put to parchment... they were all leading me somewhere, but for some reason or another, I was afraid of following the threads I briefly held onto in those passages to their logical end. I believed those things to be too extreme, despite knowing deep down that only those extreme methods I decried would accomplish what many frequently think to be impossible. I wrote and talked of a bright new future for my people, for all people from all walks of life... and yet for some reason or another, I was unwilling to do what I knew would be necessary.
Until now.
There are other instances where it is abundantly clear that I have kept myself willfully blind to the truth. Duke Nharov Gundar is in the past. Ardonk Szerieza is in the past. For some reason, I allowed myself to believe that Amalia Szathmari was something different; she is, however, a relic of a bygone era, no different from the others. Her rebellion was a failure. She is a failure. With my newfound strength of body and will, I will accomplish more now than she ever could.
I will liberate my people by transforming them into that which the Barovians most fear. My beloved Vicente was right. Shows of force and terror are the only thing that they understand or respect. I will make it so the Gundarakite people shall never be bullied by anyone, be they Barovian, outlander, or still another, ever again. They will come to know the same power that is now mine to command...
Yet I must make some difficult choices. I have foolishly let my own weakness keep me from becoming what I was meant to be, from realizing my own destiny... and I have refrained from making others choose sides... but no more. If they are not to help or assist me in my crusade, to give me what I need to depose Strahd von Zarovich, then they are my enemies.
I am the Queen-in-Shadow. I am Királynő. I am Gundarak's future. I am the sunderer of chains, the destroyer of the old order. It all will burn, and only after is all unmade will there be peace. Peace brought about by my rule.
A new Gundarak. A new world, ushered in by my hand.
Ushered in by HARASZTI ORSOLYA.
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