Chapter 337: Chapter 303 – Contemplations on Life

“So long as people are alive, they are bound to repeat the mistakes the living made, over and over and over again, like a cycle without end. It is truly a pity, that only when one finally transcended life itself would one realize just how much of a folly things like greed and ambitions were. Sadder was the fact that rarely would those still living come to understand those facts.” - From a purported speech by Anduinus of the Strangling Hands, Merfolk Warchief, on the day he abdicated his position and called for peace on the Isles, circa 147 FP.

“So… if I may ask, Anduinus, what brought about your change of mind and call for peace back then?” Cal asked later in the night, after the meal when the four of them lazily lay down on the soil before Anduinus’ simple hut while they nursed their stuffed bellies. “It seemed like a rather radical change of opinion to make.”

 

Anduinus of the Strangling Hands made his way to the history books for having risen as a warchief of a small merfolk tribe in the Crystal Atoll during a time when the Isle was wrought in turmoil, as a couple other tribes from nearby isles had invaded while the locals were bogged with infighting amongst themselves.

 

From his low position as the warchief of one small tribe, Anduinus had fought his way through tribe after tribe, placing those who resisted on a pike or hanging from trees, until he butchered his way into complete control of the Isle’s locals. From there, he took the war to the foreign invaders with such savagery that those who survived fled with their tails between their legs and never bothered the Atoll ever again.

 

He then reigned over the Atoll with an iron fist, unified the many disparate tribes into one, and tolerated no dissent as they rebuilt their home. Yet for all his warlike savagery, Anduinus rebuilt his people into one of tolerance and peace, with his abdication speech advocating for more peaceful coexistence… unless their living were threatened, especially by outsiders.

 

Nobody had ever seen Anduinus of the Strangling Hands since his abdication, though amongst the local chiefs, his continued existence as an immortal, living on his small island while minding his own business, was quietly passed down by word of mouth from generation to generation, mostly kept only to a few who are in the know.

 

“Maybe it was all the bloodshed that led to it, in the end,” admitted the old, scarred merfolk to Cal’s query as he turned to face her, his mask half displaced to the side of his head. “I had little in mind during the war, other than to fight and triumph, to kill and drive my enemies away from my homeland. It was only later on, during the reconstruction, when I saw all the people who used to bicker with each other… working together for a common cause… that I got it.”

 

“They could live alongside and tolerate one another rather than bicker and fight all the time, after all,” continued the old Champion with a melancholic sigh. “It only took someone willing to butt their heads together and get rid of those too stuck up in their ways to co-exist with the rest. I was that someone who imposed my will on them. It was for our mutual survival at the time, sure, but I bloodied my hand all the same over it.”

 

“Did you regret any of it?” Cal asked with genuine interest.

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“At first, somewhat. Some memories of those you killed tend to linger and haunt you in your sleep, but as time passed and I saw those who remain work together, laugh together, and live together as one, I shed off all those regrets,” replied the old merfolk with a smile that made his scars bend in a way to make his mouth look wider. “I do still have the urge to smash heads together when some of their descendants were being dumb, but I mostly reined it in. It’s their age now, their lives to lead. They don’t need an old fossil way past his due date like me to meddle in their business.”

 

“I get what you mean,” replied Cal with a nod. While she was not an immortal - yet - she shared a similar mindset with Anduinus, as Al-Shan was an empire of mostly humans. As a Half-Elf she was bound to outlive entire generations of humans, which gave her a far different perspective on time and life.

 

What Anduinus did, to retire from the world at large and just mind his own business while pursuing other things that interested him - arts and crafts in his case, as evidenced by the masterwork quality pots and mugs he had made by hand - was not too different from what Cal herself had in mind.

 

Sure, she would still be more connected to the world at large, if she was to open a school and teach others, but for the most part, she would keep to herself as well, and just enjoy the companionship of her newfound family and friends while she did what interested her for a living.

 

The more she thought about it, the more the idea appealed to her. Inwardly Cal wondered if after a few more centuries of living she might change her mind, but she soon discarded that train of thought. The future will be whenever she gets there, not something to be worried about in the here and now.

 

Cal, Kino, and Kyara left the small island and said their goodbyes to Anduinus after they thanked him for his hospitality the next day, just before noon. The same boatsman who brought them to the island had already waited to pick them up, so they had not kept the old man waiting.

 

In Cal’s storage was a collection of tableware and some pots made by the old Champion of Mud by hand, which she bought as souvenirs for Xain. She had not paid the old merfolk in gold, and instead gave him a few barrels of good ale, handmade by Orloff Himmelsbrau in exchange. It was a trade the old merfolk was all too happy to make, to say the least.

 

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