Cherry Blossom

[home_run_batter]

In this life, you have friends and you have foes.

By nature's very own hand, this has always been the truth.
The wolf is the foe of the hare.
The bee is the friend of the flower.

We who rule over them all, as mankind, are unique in that we
are the enemy of all nature.
We eat whatever we please, we kill whatever we see fit.
This is also true for our fell0w man.

The blade, the staff, and the fist are all weapons first and foremost 
honed to take the life of one's own kin.

To truly be human, my sweet boy, 
you have to accept this fact, and to survive as one,
you must bathe in the blood of your foes.

Humans are revolting.

Do not lower yourself so as to engage in their barbarous and petty slaughter.

You are above them, forever and always.

Soon I will die,
and you'll be alone, Alexis.

A cherry blossom, blooming amongst a sea of weeds.

Don't look so sullen... smile, because to be alone is to be special.

To be special is to be loved.

[home_run_batter]

Almost two decades ago,
there existed in the icy wastelands left behind around old Vdalion
a cult of sorts.

A gathering of the nothings and no-ones left behind by the apocalypse,
True believers that their god had not yet abandoned these lands.
This is a scrawling left behind by one of its elders.






2070 AC

Today is a blessed day.

Long has our devout sisterhood lived through strife and struggle,
pain and loss,
starvation and stagnation.

We have suffered through sacrifice, choosing to stay behind in these lost lands
in the hope that our promised day would come, and it finally has.
Our morn of salvation.

Promised by the fortunes read in a pool of our loved ones' blood,
a savior shall come one day, the son of Ymir himself.
Only once the proper sacrifice has been given,
and the requisite amount of blood has been shed,
may his birth be baptized properly.

Tonight, my only daughter has begun to show signs of pregnancy.
Praise be,
for we have not seen hide nor hair of a male in over a decade!

The promised day has come,
and I am ready.

[home_run_batter]

Heavens forgive me.

I knew not what I spoke, when I presumed the intentions of the divine.
Sacred souls of the dead, the Ten, and our Lord himself, 
pardon my boldness, but...

My Lord hath delivered unto me a demon in human flesh.



Is this further punishment from the gods,
or is it His will?

When I awoke this morning, 
as is my ordinary routine, I made the journey from the main camp to the prayer site.
The boy is always there, relishing in the praise of the sisters.
He loves their adoration,
but he has always hated discipline.

From birth, he has been recited scriptures,
taught the tale of our people and our land,
and yet he rejects it all, for he is the 'Savior,'
our Messiah given flesh.

Perhaps this is the nature of a young boy who knows no struggle.
To be ungrateful, to believe his duty is above others.
I must love him still, even for what he has done.
It is the decree of the most high.

As I entered the prayer site, I saw unspeakable things.
The snow stained red, the pit turned to rubble...
There he was in the center, lying among the bodies of...
Everyone.

His mother, his aunt, the sisterhood in entirety.
All he held was a small hunting knife... and he lie in the pool...
smiling.

When I asked why, he gave me the simple, polite answer.




"I didn't want to listen to mass today."

[home_run_batter]

The Boy killed them all,
his own mother, his sisters, and his friends.

All that is left now is me.

The Man that was built on top of the foundation the Boy left behind.

Placed under a powerful Hex, 
the Boy was set to walk the earth in a childlike daze.
As though a reset had been put on his mind.

Ignorance is bliss,

as they say.

Made to roam the land without a clue of the horrors within him,
he was taught the ways of the righteous.

Innocent and pure, brazen, yet humble.

His path was forced to veer far away from the one he originally trod.
All he seemed to want was the best for all of mankind.
It was a simple, easy life...

At least, before he began to grapple with the demon that still lived 
inside of him, tearing at the cage of his soul.

I am spoiled on the inside. Rotting.

Were my spirit corporeal, flies would hover around the sheer pestilence...

Vultures would circle overhead...

The Badger,
The Freezing Supreme,
Mortyl's Dark Messenger,

The mere sight of them drove him mad.
As he grew to understand the world, he knew exactly why.
They were just like the stories he was told as a boy.
The ones that were repeated over and over to solidify the hatred in his mind.

A hatred that nearly stoked war,
that has caused him to nearly throw away his life countless times.

They all remind him of The Pretender God.

There is only one way to erase the misgivings of my past,

to quiet the cries of the souls I have damned.

He has to die, so that their sacrifices may be made worth it.