As you arise to begin work for the day, you are informed by one of your villagers that a letter has arrived from Old Hermetia. You are advised that a copy was immediately made and couriered out to you with great speed. You stop to read the letter, and notice immediately that the writing style is intense, almost as if parts are missing, if only to spell the entire story out in haste. You begin to read...
To The Dearest Regent and His Loyal Subjects,
I will be frank with my request. I am writing to you today to request Refuge. Sanctuary, Retreat, Asylum, call it as you will. Today is the 55th day of civil war here in Aletheia, Old Hermertia. By the time this gets to you I am expecting to be either dead or desperately knocking on your borders. Things are bad here. Ever since the stone was found, we have been surviving Khaos in it's worst form - the physical form.
Please, let me go into more detail. It would not be appropriate to beg of you without good reason. At the least, should I be the last lucid person here, let this be a testament to our story, allow us to be recorded in Hermertian History. Let others learn from us where we have failed.
It all started years ago, when my Grandmother* first met another of our kind. They were friends for so long, knowing they had a connection then, as the only two left of our kind. They didn't know much more than that, but the future held no bounds and they were happy. They went on to build their future, our future, and spent many years raising families and finding supporters for their beliefs.
There were some ... events. As of now, they are historical to our people, or, well, myself. There's no one left now, at least, no one sane from what I can deduct. Nevertheless, as I transcribe here, these events may just have marked the beginning of the end for me.
My Grandmother was raised by an old man who himself came from a burning town. He fled with her and raised her as his own until his death. He taught my grandmother many things; of survival and endurance, grace and nobility, science and academics. Most important of all, he taught her of Khaos, and it's intricacies. He did not know a whole lot of it himself in the end, but he eventually confessed to her that Khaos was the reason for his town being burned. It was the reason that my grandmother strived to learn more in her life, and ultimately, it will probably be my undoing as well as it was hers.
Khaos is a funny thing you see, it draws people in with its' mysterious unboundings, yet repulses you in a single moment with the atrocities that it can fathom. And yet somehow, you just want to know more and more of it, to understand it to the very end. Perhaps curiosity is our ultimate betrayal, truly. But I am getting ahead of myself, and should continue my lore telling here.
It was long after the old man's death and meeting another of her kind that my grandmother had the First Vision. We call it that now, well, I call it that now, but at the time it was nothing more to her than an accident in the laboratory she was working in. She was creating a new type of potion you see, and something went wrong. She passed out and had that Vision and saw The Future. At the time she did not know it was such, and could only reason that it was a terrible dream, the cause from passing out. Who would wish to believe the terrible scenes she foresaw? Certainly, she did not.
Thus, our people, continued to study and endeavoured to know the powers of Khaos, and all that it held before us. Our town and our people continued to grow and expand in great numbers. And like the never-ending carrot chase for the Donkey, we relentlessly pursued the ultimate goal - finding the secrets of Khaos, and thus the source of all knowledge.
And in the end, wonderfully - yet terribly, we succeeded. Deep in the heart of a hidden Desert Temple, we discovered a Stone of Khaos. We did not know what would come next, but we jubilantly brought it home and displayed it proudly within our temple. It was our pride and joy! My oh my, it was quite a time to be alive there in the Kingdom of Aletheia, indeed. We celebrated for many days and nights, merrily drinking and dancing the times away. Eventually we settled down to studying the stone to learn of its' secrets. And many we did learn! Like the wizards of old, we studied and recorded everything we could. We experimented continually, relentlessly.
~ To be continued ~
_________________ "Not all those who wander are lost."
Last edited by neonfrontier on June 10th, 2015, 5:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
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