The Old Foe is at the Gates, and we are upon the Ordinary World. I write this, hoping that my mission -- our mission -- will not fail. Hoping that any of us will be capable of comprehending what lies on the other side. Hoping for, frankly, anything. Anything to subvert “Them.” But it is not “They” who torment us, it is we who torment “Them.”
Torment is an everlasting constant in this surrounding vastness. But it is we and we alone who are capable of wrenching the fruit from the branches of dissolution, and it is we who may create with it a cornucopia of absolution. But first, we must heed the call. The call of the Ordinary World; it’s silence deafening in the repetitive fire upon our befogged bunkers. Only when we locate the Ordinary World, can we now and forever be relieved of our torment.
They’re starting to say, that I am the Vandal of Fate. Do you believe in Fate? All it has ever been is a series of astute calculations. Do something unexpected, and your fate is in your hands. What we left behind was brought to ruin by calculations set in motion eons before any one being could understand them. And yet, we are still at fault. At fault for feeding into those calculation’s mocking predictions, at fault for letting those calculations fester when signs of their existence sprouted. At fault for denying the existence of the locks on the Gates. We -- all of us -- are close to having the keys to unlock them, now. And if we find that our keys simply do not fit…
The suffering I bring is calculated and measured. That which “They” will, shall be spontaneous and insurmountable.
And yet, I do not care.
I entered these Mists like all others; desperate, afraid, broken, disgusting, pathetic. And perhaps I’ll come out of it the same: all these things, yet of a different shape and color.
But I do not care.
I will see the brighter future acquired for those I’ve come to care for, those I’ve come to love. I am still as I was when I first came here -- an old, selfish, regular man. If I could press a single button and destroy this entire plane, and ensure my safety upon its collapse, I would do so in a heartbeat.
But not if it means losing these people who have become part of my very being, and not if those things which they care for are laid low as well.
I know in the first page of this, I said that I would not name any names. To allow whatever “hypothetical reader” the right to conjecture on a neutral playing field. But in the coming days, we will not need neutrality. We need passion and zeal, tempered by love. The very things which this plane would try to deny to us, we must use them to break apart the foundations which construct Dread. Guided by our aims and virtues -- even if they solely be spite -- we must take back our Fate from the gray miasma of Dread…
...and the pale fingers of the evil it propagates.
I will wander foolishly forwards, to reclaim that which I have lost of myself, and build something grand and new.
In memory of the illogically magic bonds of Patham, Doctor Agios, and the “Ravenloft Cartel,” I will wander seeking strengths my disparaging mind would try to have me remain blind to. They were the first to die, and the first to leave.
To truly defeat the evils of my past, I will revel in my future -- which the high witch Marozia failed to destroy -- and grip its pleasures tightly as if they were my own newborn son, as if to say to her, “you have failed.” Yet, still, I cannot let go the idea that once, she may have once just been a woman with aspirations. I’ll do all in my power to aid others in theirs, while keeping them on a healthy and constructive path — one that won’t be spurned by history. The first, and perhaps one of the last, to be honest about their true intentions.
For my gracious niece Emel and her caretaker Marcus, I will see that whatever nature the Mist would have for them her be dispelled so that their her future may be within their her own two hands.
s shall be cast onto the highest, most secure towers of the oldest and greatest fiends, just as Rodolf brings the storm to where it cannot otherwise go.
Like my aging, weak body, my penance for betraying the trust of Hypatia will serve a constant reminder of my failings to myself, and especially to her -- I will not do so to anyone else ever again, lest they rightfully rain the stars themselves down onto me as judgement.
Though he hides behind a moon of mystery, I will make Zori face up to his failings, so that he may make me face up to mine when I do not.
Beaming w As she wanders unhindered through the darkness, I will create the clarity of Kelira’s blinded eyes for myself and those without, and further bolster her own path in the darkness she has been damned to -- yet righteously reclaims her strength from. A wall.
For guiding me along the road as dark as that which the restless dead must cross -- as much as she may argue that she had done little or nothing -- I will bolster Ophelia’s faith in and love of herself, just as she unknowingly helped to show me the road to loving myself again… through my love of her. Through this love, I’ll carry on the wills of those who’ve died to this damnable place, and for the living, I will teach them to love themselves again as well. A shambling corpse who played with my heart, while her's was possessed by a phantom.
To ensure that the virtues of my past survive, I will mount a defense against the greatest threats of the land who seek the suffering of them and those I cherish -- in spite of what all else would say I should be -- as taught to me by the stalwart Logod, one of the few Dwarves that walks these lands who’s worth his weight in beer, and grounded not to a cave or a mountain, but to all the earth.
Seeking the strength to aid Irach in the battle for everyone's souls -- and bringing him the strength of numbers he desperately seeks -- I will ensure the rest will follow. A ghost who haunts the realm and hides from his death.
Unravelling the mysteries sought by Merrin, I and all the world will know they are as mundane as the grass beneath our feet -- that they are forces to be laughed at, not feared.
The secrets of the self sought by Sefris, I will aid her in overwriting; for and because of her, I will edit the fortune which the gods above would have for us.
For the honor of Roland, I will bring justice for others, as I would see justice brought for myself, and correct the failings of man which makes us so often blind to it.
With the knowledge and ambition of Rannoch, I will survey the very cosmos and dismantle those forces above man which would remain impartial to his well-being, and create a world that man will find most malleable to his best interests and those virtues he serves.
Cackling in the face of death -- disparaging it as it tries to despariage I -- as my old mentor Mumed sought to do in his own research, I will reach those peaks he always aimed for.
Tempered will be my actions through the suffering I have endured, which Python brought to me the enlightenment of, and I will temper his actions through his suffering as well.
Though Beatrix is likely dead and rotting in the belly of a devil in the deepest hell, I will not succumb to the shadow of the self which she did; I will construct better creations than she ever could solely because I will value those who would value me, and let their strengths be my own, rather than allow myself to push nakedly forwards into a sharp darkness, and furthermore, allowing others to do so as well. Where her mentor had multiple students, I will see that her cohort Lynnyra won't make the same mistakes she did -- and that she'll grow exponentially stronger than her wayward cohort ever could. One disappeared into the self, the other ran away from it. Both will find a doom of their own making. Neither ever valued anything good for them. All shared the same roots, time will lead them back to another.
Stormith a sun of radiant joviality and pleasure, I shall follow Vikki’s and Redoq's example, and topple the forces of Dread with those of stout radiance and happiness.
Through a judgement most compassionate, yet not unfair, I will see the world bring to Ori, Hersuvi, and those they value, a compassionate judgement of their own -- especially when they themselves are too weak to seek it or want it themselves, like I once was. A warrior of compassion who's failed in her mission.
How many more will fail themselves -- or even fail me? We shall see.
The world is waiting, in a shape high above us all. Waiting for how we will respond to it.
This page will be my final journal entry; I will ramble no more in this binding of wet paper. Not until I and all of us get our Fate back.
One day, events will snowball until they cannot be contained. On that day, we will need to give Dread an answer. We are all the Vandals of Fate.
Give it our answer.[/s]
I am out of options. I have to leave. I'm sorry, Emel. I wish I had the strength to tell you before I do.