Chapter 288: Chapter 288

Unsatisfying.

 

Forty-nine days, I have spent in the bardo. One-hundred and one floors of the dungeon, I have come to float across, pushing myself forward as if I were the ferryman for my own boat. Nobody else would have done it, it had to be me. I wonder if that is the lesson that I was meant to learn? That the only way forward is hard-work. Mind-numbing, soul-crushing, heart-breaking hard-work. Despite all of that. Despite everything. I am unrewarded.

 

It is unsatisfying.

 

Everything has been ruined. The hero has been stolen from me. I was this close. I was this close to finally beating him in a fair, honest duel and that has been taken from me, snatched from the tips of my greedy, grabby, reaching fingers.

 

Maybe that is my lesson, that not all work is rewarded. That not all life is fair. But I feel like I knew that already.

 

Yet I can think of nothing else. I can think of no other lesson for me to have been shown, as I leap back, pressing off of the surface of the glass window, flying back as the encroacher flops down to the ground and writhes, throwing a furious tantrum, having once again not gotten what it wanted. Or was there even a lesson here to begin with? Was it all just a series of ‘things’ that happened for no particular reason, other than that they did?

 

As I fly back, as I push back through the smoke and the debris that fill the air like so many screams, as I launch myself over a group of adventurers fighting a pack of skeletons with a mace-wielding champion in their midst, the last thing I see as I stare towards the great worm, is its gray, featureless, grubby face that stares around the arena in confusion, as it is unable to sense me now. Because I don’t touch the ground. A great serpent made up out of fire coils its way along the world below me and tears it all asunder as I fly over it. The great, red dragon swallows an entire pack of zombies whole and turns them into ash.

 

It is unable to sense me now, the encroacher, the horror that nobody can see but me. Between all the confusion and the anarchy and chaos, between all the screams and thrashing hearts and vibrations, now that the beacon of magical energy that is the hero is no more, as long as I don’t touch the stones, then the senses of the encroacher have been returned to the darkness. It’s hunt is unresolved.

 

It is unsatisfying.

 

I’ve lost track of everything too.

 

My boots thud against the ground, as I land between the monk and the wizard who are standing back to back, fighting the hordes that encroach upon them, neither of them having noticed that their hero is gone. There is nobody here but me.

 

The monk spins around in an instant, her leg flying my way, but before it reaches me, I leap backwards again, holding my hands out to her in an open gesture as I bestow upon them my hallow blessings, as I vanish into the darkness, cast by the fog of war. Good luck, monk. Good luck, wizard-girl. I’m glad I got to pretend to be your friend.

 

I guess this is it, guy. I guess this is our chance. Nobody is watching the gate anymore.

 

The priestess is missing and kind of an oddball. The hero is gone. The monk and the wizard, I have left them to resolve their own lives in accordance with the values they hold dearest. It’s a small party, the hero-party, with only four people. Most adventuring parties have five or six members, but I guess that’s just how they do things. Tight and efficient.

 

I land, my boots scraping against the stones as I turn into a slide. A group of adventurers that stands in a circle all around me quickly scatters, running fearfully in all directions as I land in their midst. Scamper-scampering like so many rats, as they flee in all directions, leaving me standing before the giant wall of purple fog that fills the gate. Pulsating lights flicker inside of it, as if a great thunderstorm were raging on the other side.

 

I shudder, standing on the precipice. My lance-less hand lifts itself up, my fingers just an inch away from the heavy fog that separates me from the outside world.

 

Everything, all of those terrible things that I can’t remember in vivid detail, yet still feel in my heart of hearts, lingering like a demon-miasma -

 

All of those faces who I can no longer see in my mind’s eye, yet whose voices I hear as indistinct, melodiousness whispers in my foggy memories -

 

All of those horrible sensations of the violation of my body and soul -

 

All of them have led up to this.

 

To this unsatisfying moment.

 

I hate it.

 

I hate this. I hate everything this has become.

 

I turn around, looking over my shoulder at the anarchy that I leave in my wake. Fire. Screams. Tears. Rubble. That is all that I have created. Between the raging flames that fill the room, silhouetting the dancing carnival of bodies that I can only just barely make out through the smoke, between all of that, I see nothing that fills me with joy. I see nothing that fills me with a sense of pride, with even a vague sense of satisfaction, of having earned this, of having done something heroic. Something worthwhile.

 

I feel cheated. I feel like… like I cheated. Didn’t I do my best? Didn’t I try my best? I think I did? I really do think that I did, guy, tell you what. So why does this feel so hollow? Because the hero is dead? Because I didn’t get to fight him and to fulfill that wish of mine? To be acknowledged?

 

He’ll respawn tomorrow, right, guy?

 

Yeah? I sigh in relief, knowing that you wouldn’t deceive me. Great.

 

I guess I wanted to fight him today though, I guess I wanted to stand on the highest point in the entire world and to have everyone look up at me in awe and wonder with wide, mystified eyes. Yet, for the brief second that I stood there, I saw nothing but fear and disgust and loathing. There is nothing here for me but that.

 

My hand feels cold, as the whispers of fog touch it.

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There is nothing outside for me but that as well. So what’s the point?

 

You make me take a step forward, my hand pressing into the fog.

 

I feel nothing.

 

My two eyes, despite my forward movement, never stop looking back behind me. I watch the shapeless, sloshing mass of the encroacher writhe and squirm in devastated rage, as it pushes its way through the fight. Its body compresses thin as it slips in between the impossibly small distances, between the humans and the trash-mobs fighting each other. It never touches a single one of them. Its entire presence, its entire mass, untouched as it rushes towards me, before its time runs out. Before I escape and it loses its last chance, its only chance to ever break free, as I have.

 

It screams, its thrashing heart audible even to me this far away, discernible over the noise of the chaos, over the noise of its screeching. You never had a chance, did you?

 

We take a step forward and I am not sure if I want us to. But you force me to move, despite my uncertainty in the matter.

 

You are what happens when there is nothing left to believe in, aren’t you? I say to the encroacher in a wordless ramble in my mind.

 

The encroacher bashes its way forward, pressing through an entire pack of skeletons, its feelers reaching out as it smells me, as it feels for the subtle vibration caused by my presence amidst this carnage.

 

If only you had eyes to see. Maybe you wouldn’t have become the thing that you are. If you only had eyes to see, maybe you wouldn’t have gone where you ended up. If only I had been stronger, kinder, braver, smarter, I would have seen what I see now. A hero is always too late, you know? But that excuse doesn’t make me feel better.

 

We step into the fog, my shaking, clanking metal boot striking against the rocks. The dense storm-clouds swallow the front half of my body.

 

Will you go back to the darkness once I leave? Will you go back alone to the deepest pit in the entire world and fester there, wallowing in your sadness and loneliness all by yourself? How could you do anything else, when you have no hand to hold yours and to guide you towards those first steps that you have to take? When you have no eyes to see the road that you must walk. When you live in a place that is so cold and empty and desolate, how could you even ever have a chance?

 

I can’t fight you. I can’t kill you. I can do nothing but leave you here to heal on your own, as my presence will only damage you further. Your obsession with me will only damage you further, pushing you past the point of redemption, bringing you to where I now stand.

 

Throwing down my gauntlet metal gauntlet, I lift my bony hand and I press it into my eye-socket.

 

I am irredeemable, I am bad, I am unlovable and disgusting and ugly and dumb.

 

Pressing my fingers together, I grasp my left eye. It hurts.

 

I don’t know where I took a wrong turn. But there is still hope for you. There is still a chance for you to become something better, someone better. Nobody has given you that opportunity, has given you that nudge. But why should they? It has been my responsibility all along, it has been my burden to bear and I have failed to do so.

 

As we vanish into the mist, as we are swallowed by the heavy fog that separates me from the outside world, I tear out my eye. It hurts.

 

It reaches. A dozen gray, lashing, hungry tendrils grab for the wet thing that I throw its way.

 

I hope this will help you figure out what you are. I hope this will help you see where you are and where you need to go.

 

The light swallows us as I leave the encroacher behind, as I leave the dungeon behind, just as it catches the wet eye flying its way. The real eye. An eye that can see.

 

Yet it is unsatisfying for me.

 

What about the dungeon-master? I didn’t get to say goodbye. What about the dark-lord? Will he forgive me now? What about the rat-queen and the purple-robed cult and Nichodemus? What about all the questions I still have no clear answers to? Who am I? Why am I?

 

It is unsatisfying and I hate it.

 

You make me keep walking, guy.

 

But at least I fulfilled one obligation, at least the wretched thing that I am has fulfilled one sacred duty. By giving you an eye of mine, I hope you can see what I didn’t. Don’t worry about me, I won’t need it. Besides -

 

We have always been alone, the two of us. So you'll be fine without me. Despite that however, I am your brother, it is my duty to foster my sister.

 

I leave.

 

 

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