The Symbol
The Symbol seems to exhale through its nose.
“I want you to kill me.”
The entire world holds still.
“Surely I must have misheard you,” you say.
The Symbol leans forward as much as it can, so its forehead is almost resting on the other side of the wall that separates you. “I want you,” it rumbles, “to end my existence.”
For a moment, all you can do is stare and reel with the implications.
"Why? *Why?*" You ask.
"I have known nothing except this chamber for what might be millions of years. I have tried to escape and each time the Regents have found me and tightened my shackles. I have tried *everything*," the Symbol says, the god who has fallen into an abyss you are only too familiar with.
>[[“After all this time, you’re giving up? You would let the Regents win like this?”]]
>[[“The world needs you to give it hope. To show people that there’s something bigger than themselves out there.”]]
>[[“You can’t die, I need your help. I need my body back and you’re the only one who can help me.”]]
>[[“If that is truly what you want… then I’ll do it.”]]manorOutcome (manorInsanity): 'I found the aftermath of your raid on my manor: my soldiers, driven insane.'
manorOutcome (manorDead): 'I found the aftermath of your raid on my manor: my soldiers, cut to pieces.'
manorOutcome (manorHunting): 'I found the aftermath of your raid on my manor: my soldiers, hunting a ghost.'
shrineOutcome: ''
shrineOutcome (shrineTwisted): 'I saw the twisted mockery you made of the Lattari shrine in the woods. '
shrineOutcome (shrineRestored): 'I saw the restoration you performed at the Lattari shrine in the woods. '
shrineOutcome (shrineNature): 'I found your little cover-up attempt at the Lattari shrine in the woods. '
villageOutcome: ''
villageOutcome (villageHanged): 'I discovered the little stunt you pulled at the librarian’s execution. A living corpse, proclaiming treason on the noose. '
villageOutcome (villageExecuted): 'I discovered the little stunt you pulled at the librarian’s execution. A vigilante who cut down my judge after she agreed to your demands. '
villageOutcome (villageLetLive): 'I discovered the little stunt you pulled at the librarian’s execution. A vigilante who prevented justice from being served. '
villageOutcome (villageInvisible): 'I discovered the little stunt you pulled at the librarian’s execution. A spectre that prevented justice from being served. '
--
Another voice sounds out, echoing in the cavernous space. “*That* is not for you to decide.”
You turn. At the opposite end of the Forge, glowing white with the power of her arrival, she stands, magnanimous and lordly, hands clenched into fists. She wears a crisp military uniform, a smooth, dark blue fabric shirt tucked into heavy combat pants of the same colour, and black military boots made of sturdy leather. Her black hair is drawn back into a bun, identical to the portrait you saw of her all those years ago, and her eyes shine like miniature suns, brighter than any canvas could convey.
Larda of the Sparkling Sea.
You try to meet her gaze, but the weight of her regard is like a physical force, pushing your head down, pressuring your body to bow.
“This has gone on long enough.” She speaks with absolute authority.
"{shrineOutcome}{villageOutcome}{manorOutcome}"
You can’t look her in the eyes, but you can see her lips spread in a smile. “Moreover, I found the limbs you left behind at my little experiment.” She lifts up a fist suddenly clutching a handful of your hair.
She holds your severed head aloft, barely decayed, your own dead eyes staring at you.
The memories of that time rise up in you like vomit, and you flinch, taking a step back. The Symbol sends a mote of assurance to you.
*Steel yourself*, it says in your mind.
Larda studies you. It is like gravity doubles in strength: you have to trickle power through your bones to stay straight-backed and upright.
[if ostrichForm]
"I see you've since undone my work."
[else]
"I see you found my work to your liking."
[continue]
Larda takes a step forward, and your head vanishes from her hand. “Before I end you, you will tell me why you’ve done all this. Are you infatuated, like so many are, with the delusion of a utopian anarchy, a free world with no one at the helm? Do you think the Symbols can be brought back from the dead? Or do you simply blame me for your own mistake, for falling into my trap?”
> [[“You have put me and countless others through the deepest misery. After a century of conquest, you have forgotten what it is like to be scared. I will teach you to feel fear once more.”]]
> [[“People deserve freedom, and you’ve wrought enough terror on the world. The Symbols no longer have the power to challenge you, so I will assemble that power in their stead.”]]
> [[“You are arrogant if you think this is about you in the slightest. I only care about freeing the Symbol from its captivity.”]]symbolConvoDefeat: false
symbolConvoImprisoned: false
symbolConvoReallyDead: false
symbolConvoEscape: false
--
The Symbol settles itself back into a cross-legged seated position; its head would scrape the ceiling if it crossed the barrier into the Forge. “I am.”
Even being almost certain, relief floods you at the confirmation.
"And who might you be, that you have defied the Regents in seeking me out?" The Symbol asks.
Your mind is full of memories of creeping out of sight, of stern whispers to very select people, and the name that was given to you.
"I am called the Dreadbard," you say.
"A mighty name, worthy of my last disciple," the Symbol says. A thrill runs through you at its words. "Clearly the Quenching was not absolute, if enough knowledge survives that you were able to find me here."
"So much has been lost," you say.
A grim nod. "Yes. Ask what questions you wish. We have a little time before we must act."
{embed passage: 'Symbol Conversation Choices'}"Now, we practice with the power you have just acquired. You need to learn to use the connection, to draw power from me without injuring yourself."
Weeks of training follow. Wielding the Symbol's power is like holding up a dam made of sticks with your hands, and moving a finger just enough to trickle water through without the whole thing collapsing. It takes immense concentration, and your progress is slow as treacle, but within the cold confines of the Forge of Creation, you eventually learn that in a perverse way, your transformation at Larda's hands has a benefit.
Your animal parts seem intensely attuned to the Symbol's power. It can be channelled into your crocodile head and jaw to infuse your speech with power or exert influence over minds (though there are no minds in the Forge to practice on). You learn that your lobster claw is most receptive to raw strength, to being used as a straightforward weapon for bludgeoning and slicing. Your ostrich leg is a thing of fickle trickery. It gives you speed, unpredictability, and the capacity for illusion and deceit.
You gradually start to think of these strains of training as the Way of the Crocodile, the Way of the Lobster, and the Way of the Ostrich. As the weeks pass, it becomes clear to you that these Ways are, in some sense, mutually exclusive. Power and familiarity that you channel into one will not help you with the others, but neglecting any of them could deprive you of options were you to need them in dangerous situations.
At last, one day, the Symbol breaks from your normal routine. "We are short on time. You are now as wet clay, ready to be moulded into shape that will crystallise what you have learned so far. Ideally you'd have a lot longer to hone your powers, but I don't want to risk the Regents discovering us when you're not ready to fight back."
"So what now?" You ask.
The Symbol spreads its hands, palms up, and leans from side to side as if weighing something. "Now, you make a choice. There are several places we can go to try your power in the real world. These places will likely impart different lessons, both to you and to me.
There is a shrine far from here, deep in the forest, where I used to take my followers to reflect and contemplate. I don't know if it still stands, and I haven't been there in a long time, but it's worth visiting.
On the other hand, it could be good to see what problems there are in an ordinary village. There is one not far from here, in the Jungle.
Lastly, there is a place in a distant desert that is of no value in growing your power, but is personal to me.
Choose wisely. Any of our activities outside the Forge could give us away to the Regents, and we may not get to see all these places before they descend upon us."
> [[The Shrine->Lattari Shrine]]
> [[The Village->Nearby Village]]
> [[The Desert->Ascension]]inspector: true
--
{embed passage: 'Hunger'}You stand up and walk to the edge of the camp, arms slightly out to communicate you mean no harm. Within seconds, the alarm is raised and a semicircle of five people forms between you and the rest of the tents. They hold knives and bows, and while they don’t point them at you, they look ready to do so at any moment.
“Hold your fire, friends,” you say. “I mean you no harm.”
“What do you want?” One of them says, a gruff woman with shaggy blonde hair. She stands in a warrior’s stance, legs apart, weight light, the knife firmly in her grip.
“Merely to talk,” you say. “I am the Dreadbard, a devotee of the Lattari Symbol. I came to visit the Symbol’s old shrine and did not expect anyone else to be here.”
When you mention the Symbol, the group glances at each other meaningfully. Their scepticism doesn’t completely waver, though.
“What happened to you?” Says another one. “Why are you like that?”
“I fell into a Regent’s trap many years ago,” you say. The pain has dulled over time, but it still isn’t a fond memory. “I was subject to a cruel experiment which left me this way.”
> [[“It’s abhorrent, and I intend to reverse the process.”->Shrine Conversation]]
> [[“It isn’t pleasant to look upon, but it does make me strong, fast, and subversive.”->Shrine Conversation]]You crouch down and creep between the trees until you can make out the conversations. By and large, this seems to be talk about the mundane matters of managing a camp: hunting, trapping, gathering, meal preparation, and watch shifts. You gather these people have been here for a long time, maybe months, judging by the practised way they hash out rosters and plans.
You listen for a few minutes, but hear nothing else of note.
> [[Announce yourself.]]The front door isn’t even locked, and you enter a grand antechamber. The walls are lined with huge landscape paintings above glass cases with what are clearly battle trophies. Helms, spearheads, amulets and arrows are displayed on plush, glossy black cushions.
You stop to listen for movement, but hear none.
“I expected more guards,” you say.
*As did I.*
You move through the ground floor and up a spiral staircase that takes you to the top floor.
[if befriendedHounds]
The hounds you befriended spread out through the first few chambers, sniffing at everything they see.
[if dominatedHounds]
The hounds you bent to your will stay by the front door, on alert for danger.
[continue]
You keep your senses sharp for any noise or movement, but the house seems totally empty. Every wall, every shelf strains with decorations: landscapes and portraits, fine plates and bowls, tomes, quills, individual bones and partially reconstructed skeletons, chalices, sealed vials and bottles filled with unknown liquids, armour, saddles, pincers, surgical implements, daggers, swords, axes, bows, crossbows, arrows and bolts. So many different cultures and parts of the world are captured here, symbols of all that the Regents have stolen.
At last, you find it, mounted like any other trophy. Amongst the gleaming resplendence displayed here, a hammer forged of metal from the core of the world seems almost understated: it is a single piece of worked iron, but with a deep red gleam where daylight hits it. It is held up on the wall by a thick metal bracket. The simple plaque beneath it reads: *Partum, the Hammer of Ending*.
> [[Pick up the hammer.]]ascensionEveryonePower: false
ascensionPowerStems: false
wentToAscension: true
--
You find yourself inside a paradox: a perfect circle of ice, ringed by desert sand. Wind sings across blood orange dunes that undulate in every direction, but when you step forward, your feet clink with frost. The air fizzes with power; you can taste its sourness.
The wind flings grains of sand at you, but they fall to the ground midair before they can touch the ice. It is as if the ice is guarded by a wall of invisible glass, yet when you walk to the edge and put your hand out, you encounter no resistance. The air beyond is sweltering, and sand stings your knuckles.
*To become a Symbol, I had to absolutely embody persistence,* the Lattari Symbol says in your mind. *More than what any living being could demonstrate. There is no more primal an example of persistence than cold enduring neverending heat.*
“So your power doesn’t stem from you being a Symbol,” you say, your breath misting in front of your face. “You had power already.”
*Power is not something you have. It is something you are. At their roots, the Symbols and the Regents are similar in that we all embody power.*
{embed passage: 'Ascension Choices'}[unless ascensionHope]
When you return, the Symbol is sitting in the corner of its prison, an enormous hunched figure with its arms around its knees, staring at nothing.
It comes to when you step past the great anvil in the center of the Forge, turning its head to look at you. "Where to next?"
[else]
When you return, the Symbol looks up immediately. It gives you a nod as you approach. "Where to next?"
[continue]
{embed passage: 'Hub Choices'}[unless ascensionEveryonePower]
>[[“Does everyone have the potential to embody power? Can anyone become a Symbol?”]]
[unless ascensionPowerStems]
>[[“You say power is not something you have, but my power stems from you.”]]
[if ascensionEveryonePower || ascensionPowerStems]
>[[“What does becoming a Symbol mean? What changed after you became one?”]]You take a few steps back for a run up, which puts you within the view of the guard.
“Hey!” He calls out. “Who are you? You can’t be here!”
You ignore him, and gather power and mass into your lobster claw. It becomes heavier, and you run power through your body to support it, and your legs to propel you towards the gate. You gather more and more, drawing from the well that is the Symbol, until your whole being resonates like a humming bell.
You charge. A few steps that kick up dirt in your wake, then you launch yourself at the gate, claw first. The gate makes a horrible metallic clang as you punch into it, cleaving a section of the metal bars straight off and sending them flying across the cobblestones. You barrel through the gap, landing on your feet and looking up at the guard.
The trembling guard has his crossbow pointed squarely at your chest.
{embed passage: 'Guard Crossbow'}lobster: lobster+1
--
At first, you turn and run in the opposite direction, feeling your feet hit the cobblestones. Enticed by the prospect of fleeing prey, the hounds speed up, stretching out into a loose line as some peel ahead of the others. This is exactly what you wanted.
You slow, letting them gain, and then whirl around at the last minute and shove your claw through the lead hound. It yelps and squeals as you lift its whole body up into the air for its packmates to see. The others reel and jump back in fear – you press your attack, hurling the body you hold at one of them, then delivering a swift kick with your ostrich foot to another. The two you strike tumble backwards, thrown to the ground through the force of your blows. You bend down and unleash a crocodilian roar at the last two hounds, who are already retreating.
With one dead, and two wounded, the pack limps away from you. They’ll trouble you no more.
> [[Approach the manor.]]sayNothing: false
--
You have plenty of nightmares to choose from, and your current situation provides plentiful inspiration. Drawing on the power within you, you wrap your own mind in an illusion. You recall the abandoned mine in the Old Asturan Jungle. The terror of waking. The moment of comprehension of what was done to you. Done to you by the person before you.
Like all nightmares, it lasts an indeterminate amount of time, but when you come to, groggy and hoarse-throated, it flees from your waking mind like fog from the dawn. Your whole body feels like it’s been branded. Every tiny movement hurts, and you involuntarily groan in pain.
Larda turns. She stands in the centre of the Forge, looking at the Symbol, which is in turn looking at you, putting on a very convincing act of losing all hope; defeat practically oozes from its slumped shoulders, its hands trailing on the floor.
Larda approaches you. Partum, the Hammer of Ending, is in her hand, thrumming with power. “I wanted you to be awake for the end,” she says. “No sense in wasting a moment like this. Oh, the sweet taste of victory.”
She looks at the Hammer as she puts it over her shoulder. “This is very much overkill, but I have so few opportunities to use this weapon, and… it’s going to be so satisfying to watch you just *disappear*.”
The idea alights in your mind like a candle in an abyss. The Symbol’s connection hums with concord; it understands even without communicating.
“Any last words?” Larda asks.
> [["The total domination you crave is a myth. The tighter you squeeze your fists, the harder those that are left will oppose you."->Larda's Defeat]]
> [["I was able to match you in power with mere weeks of practice. I expected more. You should be ashamed."->Larda's Defeat]]
> [[Say nothing.]]You incant. *“OG OTH VOL YAR, NE AT ATH KORIBAN. HAST, HAST, HAST.”*
The words you invoke rebound across the Forge like a drum beat. A horrific sound like the shrieks of a dying crowd fill the space as an oblivion mass shaped like an immense cloak of stars appears before you. Tentacles writhe from beneath it, some holding ancient pages blistered like skin, daubed with primordial text that hurts your eyes to even glimpse. Heat flares from the monster as if from a volcano.
You focus your attention on Larda, and the monster’s attention shifts with yours. It launches a torrent of limbs at her, grasping, cutting off escape routes, pinning her down. It waves its scriptures in her face and you swear you can hear phantom whispers reciting histories that were only written down so they could be forgotten.
Larda counterattacks. Scythes and blades of white light sever tentacles and limbs, set fire to pages. She moves quicker than your eyes can follow, darting out of the monster’s reach, then bringing to life an immense spear. The monster wraps its tentacles around the shaft, but too late, and the brilliant spearhead pierces deep into its cloak. It shrieks ever louder, but Larda shouts a battlecry that drowns it out.
Though the conjuring has put you almost at the limits of your strength, you rush at Larda in person, taking advantage of her distraction. You sink your teeth into her shoulder, tasting salty, bloody meat, and she cries out, then blasts you away with a palm strike to the chest that sends you into the far wall of the Forge.
You look up to see the thing you’ve conjured fade into black tendrils that snake between the stones and through the floor.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common 2'}Your jaw opens and you murmur a dread melody that makes the very stones of the Forge rattle. Black fire wreathes Larda’s whip, smothering it in darkness that seems to whisper as it dies. You point your armoured claw at her second, half-formed weapon, and it decays into maggots that fling themselves at her.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common'}mineshaftExamined: false
postsExamined: false
--
Back and forth down the switchback steps you go. The walls enclose you, bringing on gloom as they hem out the chirring jungle and the sky. The air cools. By the time you reach the bottom, you resolve the main features of the work yard you step into.
Next to a mound of earth is a mineshaft, claustrophobically small and held up by old, dry wooden poles that may well crumble into dust if touched. Spread throughout the yard are whipping posts with cuffs and bindings attached – a surprising number. Dried blood smears the wood and the surrounding stone. And on your left, a pair of bronze-gilded stone columns stand sentinel before a vast hallway that stretches out of sight.
{embed passage: 'Courtyard Choices'}[unless mineshaftExamined]
>[[Examine the mineshaft.]]
[unless postsExamined]
>[[Examine the whipping posts.]]
[continue]
>[[Move on into the hallway.]]beSilent: false
--
You raise the Hammer of Linking above your head. You didn’t need much power to wield it the first time, and this time, even with the Symbol shrinking its connection to you, you have enough.
You bring it down, and this time it is as if all existence folds into a tube, with you at one end, the Symbol at the other. Energy builds inside you, leaking from your eyes, your mouth, and when you roar, a blinding white lance of power roars down the connection.
“No,” the Symbol says. “Please, no. Don’t do this. No!”
The lance of power strikes it in the centre of the forehead, spiralling, drilling into the Symbol’s head. It tries to move its head, but your power and the power of the Hammer of Linking locks it in place as the lance pushes harder and harder – then slips inside.
The Symbol explodes. Suddenly you are back in the Forge, in physical reality, and you can feel the Symbol’s mind like it’s a limb – you are more than connected. It is yours to shape, to squeeze into a form that can escape the prison it’s in. It will need to lose much.
You draw out the power, the knowledge, the experience, even some of the emotion. All of these flood around you and hang as clouds, as streaks, as beads and swarms of light and darkness in the Forge.
What doesn’t make it is independence and self-reliance and a lot of superfluous personality. You leave those in the Symbol’s prison, to dissolve into nothing, while you draw the rest out through the amplified connection you’ve created. They coalesce into a smaller form, one roughly the same size as you, but still reminiscent of what the Symbol looked like earlier – albeit this time you give it a mouth.
The form twitches slightly as you finish putting it together, and then you let the power drain from you. Even as you do so, you become aware of your dominance of the Symbol’s mind. The connection between you is no longer a mere exchange of ideas and thoughts – it is a leash that you hold.
“Master,” the Symbol says in a flat voice, looking at you. It holds up a hand to its new mouth, feeling this new part of its anatomy. You now stand side by side, of equal height, and slowly the Symbol bows to you. “Thank you for freeing me.”
>[[“You’re welcome.”]]
>[[“Be silent.”]]You test the Symbol’s pool of power by drawing on it to send you both up to the surface. In an instant you are both in the Old Asturan Jungle. The marble icon that first sent you to the Forge is no longer needed; with the Symbol’s power at your disposal, you can travel there at will. And almost anywhere else, really.
You take a few paces, and the Symbol follows diligently behind you.
[if beSilent]
The only question that remains is: what next?
[else]
“Where shall we go, master? What shall we do?”
[continue]
>[[“Larda is gone. Her lands are leaderless and free for the taking. There is a vacuum of power that we will fill. The Regents will come to know fear, just as she did.”->Croc Ending 4]]
>[[“The Regents are still out there. I will not rest until they are defeated and the world is free.”->Croc Ending 4]]
>[[“I’ve done all that I wished. You are free, and I am in a form that is pleasing to me. All that remains now is to enjoy it.”->Croc Ending 4]][if beSilent]
“As you wish, master,” the Symbol says. “I am at your disposal. Let us go where you will.”
[else]
Still obeying your earlier instruction, the Symbol only bows.
[continue]
With satisfaction, you reach for more of the Symbol’s power, now exclusively yours, and in seconds, you are on your way.{embed passage: 'Courtyard'}{embed passage: 'Courtyard'}The Symbol shines in your mind. Gratitude and sorrow mingle, and for one still and silent moment, you share a true communion.
>[[Raise the Hammer of Ending, and strike the anvil.]]You grasp Partum with intent, and step right up to the anvil.
[if hasHope]
“I’m sorry,” you say.
The Symbol nods. “It is alright. I did want this at first, but… I will miss you. I will miss the world.”
[else]
The Symbol bows its head, and through the connection you feel its acceptance, its letting go.
[continue]
“Goodbye, my last disciple, my friend,” the Symbol says. “I am happy to have spent the end of my life with you.”
>[[“You have taught me so much. I owe you so much. Thank you, and rest well.”->Destroy 2]]
>[[“I won’t ever forget you. I will make sure the world knows your name, and that you are not forgotten.”->Destroy 2]]
>[[“Goodbye, your Symbolness. I will miss you, more than I can express.”->Destroy 2]]You feed it the power you’ve accumulated, what you’ve gained since linking with the Symbol. It was strengthened through the places you visited. It was strengthened by the fight with Larda.
Partum rips it away from you like a strip of loose skin.
Then it begins to pull from your body. You can only watch in horror as your physical form diminishes, and the Forge begins to break apart. You feel fat and muscle vanishing from your body, being eaten by the ravenous hammer. Cracks form in the ceiling, and stalactites spear down into the ground. Your very thoughts are emptying, memories fading away like dreams.
“No!” The Symbol cries, jerking its head up to look at you. “I asked you to do it safely! Stop! It’s killing you!”
Somewhere, stone shrieks in collapse. You can feel each one of your bones. Whiteness creeps in the edges of your vision, and your ribs are beginning to fray. It is a matter of moments before you are gone.
>[[“All my life I’ve longed to see you, to speak with you. If I have to die so you can be free, that’s a sacrifice I’ll happily make.”]]But you have amassed some power of your own. You keep a hold of it, so the torrential pull from the Hammer doesn’t rip it away all at once, and feed it enough to sustain yourself.
Somewhere, stone shrieks in collapse. Water pours in from the ceiling. The Symbol slumps onto the ground, cracks forming in its skin, eyes blazing with pain as it looks towards you.
“Goodbye,” it says, and crumbles.
The Hammer ceases its work and you finally wrench yourself free. Drained, barely standing, you nevertheless sprint, dodging a falling column that smashes into bits as the whole Forge begins to cave in. You reach for the marbled anvil icon that brought you here all those years ago, and in an instant you find yourself back in the jungle.
The calm and quiet is unsettling after the chaos. The ground underneath you begins to shift, and you back away, moving deeper into the jungle, until you’re sure you’re safe.
There, you allow yourself a moment of mourning for the being you looked up to, venerated your whole life. The being you killed at its own request.
As you move through the Jungle, onto wherever your journey next takes you, you will always carry the Symbol’s memory in your heart.
Whatever happens next, the Lattari Symbol has found peace.shrineTwisted: false
shrineRestored: false
shrineNature: false
villageHanged: false
villageExecuted: false
villageLetLive: false
villageInvisible: false
manorInsanity: false
manorDead: false
manorHunting: false
crocodile: 0
lobster: 0
ostrich: 0
ostrichForm: false
lobsterForm: false
crocodileForm: false
inspector: false
librarian: false
circus: false
hope:0
hopeThreshold: 2
agreedToSuicide: false
ascensionHope: false
libraryEnding: false
regentThreshold: 2
regentNotice: 0
wentToShrine: false
wentToVillage: false
wentToAscension: false
initialFree: false
initialSupplicant: false
initialCaution: false
befriendedHounds: false
dominatedHounds: false
--
This story contains content that may be disturbing. Death, suicide, and euthanasia play a major role in the story.
You have been warned.
> [[I understand.->Ensnared]]{embed passage: 'Turning Away'}crocodile:crocodile+1
manorInsanity: true
--
The time for subtlety is over.
With a swing of the hammer, you smash the curtain and the window into bits, showering the soldiers with glass and drawing their attention. They look up at you as you leer from the window. You gather power within your throat, and when you unleash it, it forms words that crackle and snap through the air like lightning.
*“IGNI AZA NIHI THOPH. OSSEIAN YUGOT IEDERN.”*
The Symbol’s voice joins with yours. The whole courtyard darkens, and you feel your face stretch and swelter into an even more horrifying visage. The soldiers reel back from you, grown men and women’s voices turned shrill and husky with terror.
*“MARTARUM. VOLD PHNGLUI, KOSOMOS OMEN IYABIS.”*
It is as if the sky itself presses closer upon them. They look at each other, ordinarily friends and allies, and bloody mayhem breaks out. With berserker battle cries, they rush at each other. One soldier impales another on his polearm. Four of them enter a frantic fight of swords and fists, rules of engagement thrown out.
[if befriendedHounds || dominatedHounds]
The hounds you had turned to your side burst from the lower levels of the house, snarling and biting, adding to the carnage.
[continue]
At least one unfortunate soul has retained enough of her sanity to understand what is happening to her friends. “Deya, no!” She shouts as another advances on her with a sword. “It’s me! It’s me, Maria! You know me – my love, please, please, NO!”
Deya plunges her sword into Maria’s neck. Maria tries to scream, but it turns into a gargle as blood gushes from her throat. Her eyes never leave Deya’s face, pleading til the life leaves her and she lies still.
You stand at the window, a beacon of fear and chaos. A perverse satisfaction runs through you as you watch the carnage you have wrought. You stand there until the ringing of steel and the screams and the whimpers of pain die down, and nothing is left but a faint breeze blowing over the corpses.
Once it is quiet, you turn away and when the power leaves you, your face returns to its normal form.
You mentally nudge the Symbol, and in an instant, [[return to the Forge->Self Transformation]].The Symbol looms over you like a tidal wave. You fall to your knees, just *looking*. Even imprisoned, it lives and persists. This is the most ancient of all beings, old and wise as the world, as the trees and the stones that have seen empires rise and fall over aeons.
{embed passage: 'Symbol Speaks'}Venturing into the Old Asturan Jungle is not forbidden by law.
“The jungle makes its own laws,” your uncle Yuthan, tall and stubbly and grand as always in his crimson judge’s garb, tells you when you propose it. “It enforces them ruthlessly, without the slightest care or regard. There’s a reason the Regents abandoned it after the Quenching.”
You have always placed more weight on the whispers that after the Quenching, the Mercantine Regents’ resources were so spent that they were forced to consolidate territories, or else be spread too thin to enshrine their rule.
You go into the Jungle anyway.
Why?
> [[The Regents’ wealth is countless. There are rumours of unclaimed treasure that even the Regents left untouched. You were never poor, but an influx of wealth could invigorate your flailing studies of the Lattari Symbol.]]
> [[The Regents wish they could purge the citizenry of unsanitary knowledge. Perhaps they abandoned the Jungle because it contains knowledge they would prefer remained hidden. Knowledge pertaining to the Lattari Symbol.]]
> [[Not all submit willingly to the mechanisms of gavel and coin that the Mercantine Regents have established. You dream of a freer world, and you hope that the keys to birthing that world lie in the spaces left unconquered. The Lattari Symbol could be one such key.]]mineshaftExamined: true
--
The small size of the shaft implies two things: whatever this operation was for must have been valuable in small quantities, and the miners must have known where to dig for it. You gaze into the shaft and over the earth piled up next to it, but no glint or colour catches your eye.
{embed passage: 'Courtyard Choices'}postsExamined: true
--
You understand the purpose of a whipping post, but you count fifteen in total. Even with an unruly crew, surely one or two would have sufficed. Such a large number, and the clear signs of heavy use, suggest the torture was about more than bringing troublemakers into line.
{embed passage: 'Courtyard Choices'}Though you could just jump, you look around the walls of Lapaña for an easy way up and see a spot where the vines have been cut away. Stones have been embedded into the wall as handholds.
“This is recent,” you say.
*Yes.* The puzzlement in the Symbol’s voice is obvious. *This place was always hidden. We are in deep forest where no trails lead; I would use my power to transport my followers here when they asked, and back to civilisation when they were ready to return.*
“How far are we from the nearest settlement?”
*Weeks of hiking from what was once called New Seter to the east; I do not know what the Regents call it now. Whoever is here must be desperately trying to escape something.*
“Or trying to find something.”
You climb up the handholds and sharpen your senses once you reach the top. Your journey here followed the faintest of traces; the tracks left here may as well be sun-bright. Following them is trivial, and becomes even easier once you pick up the clinking and scuffling of a nearby camp. Canvas tents point up from between the trees. At least half a dozen voices chatter; they sound relaxed.
> [[Approach stealthily.]]
> [[Announce yourself.]]pretend: false
villageInvisible: true
ostrich:ostrich+1
--
Your whole body resonates like a viol string as you call on the Symbol’s power. You hold up your claw and watch as it fades into little more than a heat shimmer before your eyes. Looking down, you can barely see yourself at all. You edge through the crowd, careful not to make contact with anyone, as the judge places her hand on the lever that controls the gallows’ trapdoor.
You reach the front just as the trapdoor opens, and sprint the last few steps to catch Awoth’s hobbled feet square on your shoulders. Straining, you reach up with your hands to support her weight, amplifying your strength with the Symbol’s.
“What is this?” You hear from above, and shocked murmurs run through the crowd as the librarian seemingly hangs beneath the gallows, unharmed and breathing. “What have you done?”
“Nothing! I – I don’t know!” Awoth says.
You snip the bonds around her feet, then murmur softly enough for only Awoth to hear. “When I cut the rope, run.”
She makes a squeak of fright which you take as assent. Pulling on the thread that connects you to the Symbol, your human arm tingles as you pump strength into it to hold her up single-handed. You reach up with your claw and cut through the rope around her neck. A gasp runs through the crowd; even invisible, there’s no hiding that.
You lower Awoth to the ground, and she lurches to her feet and starts running. You dash ahead of her unseen, pushing the exclaiming crowd out of the way, clearing her a path. In minutes, you are both in the jungle, and you let yourself become visible.
Awoth shrinks back in instinctive fear. “You… saved me?” She glances around as if looking for an escape route.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” you say.
“I suppose you did just save my life,” she says. “Why? Do I know you? I feel like I’d recognise you if I knew you.”
[if librarian]
>[[Reveal your identity.->Reveal Identity Librarian]]
>[[Pretend you don’t know her.]]
[else]
>[[“No, we’ve never met. But… I don’t support the Regents’ rule. I serve the Lattari Symbol.”->Librarian Conversation Common]]You smile, and you wait, summoning power until it fills you like boiling water. With a flick of your wrists you turn yourself invisible, flanking right while an illusory double of you rushes towards Larda.
Right as the illusion reaches her, it disappears. Instantly you create another that rushes her from a different direction, then two, then three. Larda dodges and blocks, evading the strikes while looking from side to side, trying to spot the real you.
You conjure another illusion, standing on the opposite side of her. "I'm here, Larda," you say, making the fake speak with your voice. She runs towards it, and you -- the real you -- descend on her from behind.
Her fist swings through nothing, and the illusion dissipates. With the full force of your body and with glowing power infusing your feet, you deliver a leaping kick with both feet to the middle of her spine that yanks her off her feet and sends her sprawling. She grunts as her breath leaves her. She rolls limp across the ground.
You follow. She manages to get into a crouch before you reach her. A flurry of punches and blocks fills the space between you, the slaps of flesh on flesh resounding. Her face is screwed up in concentration, and you prey on that. Illusory arms and fists sprout from your shoulders and you control them all like puppets, a mesmering pattern of fake strikes that Larda cannot withstand.
You land a hit, and another, swift punches to her jaw and cheekbones. She deflects a blow and raises her arm against another, but it turns out to be an illusion that leaves her vulnerable to a punch to the temple.
Larda sways, eyes rolling momentarily, but continues to block two punches even while on the verge of consciousness. When she comes to, her eyes narrow in anger and emanate power, glowing so bright they're hard to look at.
When they erupt, twin beams of blinding energy slam into your chest, blasting you across the Forge and slamming you into the far wall. You tumble to the ground and groan. For a moment, pain is all there is.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common 2'}When you return to the Forge of Creation, the Symbol addresses you immediately. “One of the Regents has just pulled a significant portion of power from me.”
“Larda?”
The Symbol’s luminescent eyes are fixed on you. “Perhaps. Even if it isn’t, we can’t take the chance. We must move to retrieve the fifth hammer now. Through a perverse stroke of fortune, I know where it is kept.”
> [[“How do you know that?”]]You step into the guard’s line of sight.
“Hey!” He says, looking at you with wide eyes. “Who are you? You can’t be here!”
You open your jaws wide and roar at him, wrapping him in the grip of your power. His face scrunches up with pain; he drops the crossbow and grasps at his head with his hands. “What – what are you doing?” He garbles out. “Stop! Stop!”
“Open the gate,” you command.
Bent over double now, he shakes his head. “No, I – I can’t!”
In response, you intensify the power wrapping him. He tries to scream as his own chainmail squeezes his body, but you constrict his throat at the same time.
“Open the gate.”
Frantically, he waves his hands at you to stop, nodding in an exaggerated motion. You release him and he briefly drops out of your sight behind the wall; you can hear him gasping and coughing. Slowly, the gate grinds open; you slip inside as soon as it’s high enough to crouch under. You straighten up on the other side and make eye contact with the guard just as he releases the winch he’d been winding. The gate slams shut once again.
The guard eyes you warily, then leaps for his dropped crossbow.
{embed passage: 'Guard Crossbow'}The Symbol lets the Forge fill with silence before beginning to speak.
“This place was built specifically to contain and harness a Symbol’s power. Even as they neared the end of the Quenching, the Regents had already decided not to wipe us out entirely, but to use one of us for their own empowerment.” The Symbol points to the anvil behind you. “Go to the anvil, and find the hammer with the whitewood shaft.”
You ascend the steps to the dais and look around at the four hammers. One of them has a long shaft of bleached wood, carved with an icon: two spheres linked with a thin line. The hammer head itself resembles this icon, slimmer in the centre and with rounded corners on the ends. The metal is pale bronze in colour, and absent of filigree or other decoration.
You lift the hammer off its rack, and it takes all your strength to merely lower it to the ground without stumbling.
“Each Regent is linked to me like a bucket linked with rope to a well, and all but Larda used that hammer to create the connection,” the Symbol says. “They can draw on my power no matter where in the world they are. We must link you the same way.”
“Why?”
“The fifth hammer was forged in a single piece, made of molten metal from the stillborn sun at the core of the world. The Regents created it as a last resort: it will destroy both me, and the entire Forge of Creation.”
You look around for it. “There are only four here.”
“It is not kept here,” the Symbol says. “Larda keeps it elsewhere; she does not trust the other Regents. We will need to retrieve it, and you will need to be as strong as a Regent in the moment you swing it,” the Symbol says.
“As strong as a Regent?” You ask in disbelief. “And you can just give me that power once we are linked?”
“No,” the Symbol says, shaking its head, “you would burn up like powdered wood. But if you become strong enough, I can amplify your power and get you the rest of the way for the time it takes to use the hammer. Our goal now is to strengthen you both physically and magically as much as we can before the Regents realise that we’re up to something.
“Luckily, the Regents were only human when they swung the hammer you now hold. No ritual or incantation is required. Simply strike the anvil with it.”
You grasp the hammer with hand and claw. Heaving with all your strength, you intend to swing it up onto your shoulders, but get only part of the way before its weight overcomes you, and you only just manage to shift it so it is over the anvil when it falls back down.
White, shattering cracks appear in the anvil’s glimmering surface, and you feel like you have been cracked as well. It is as if you are growing bigger, your awareness expands past your skin into the cold air of the Forge of Creation. You feel a pulling, a keenness in the direction of the Symbol, and you let yourself be stretched, reaching further but thinner, homing in on that wall of far more than mere rock.
You are taut and crystalline.
You touch the wall of the Symbol’s prison.
Wind and noise explode down the connection. Your body reels and screams as it is filled far past bursting, far past your skin – it is your very essence, that primal and eternal self that grows and grows, filling with cold light and reticent power.
The tether, the line that is also you between your body and the wall begins to fray. You know that if you are not safely back within your body when it snaps, you will be lost forever. You urge yourself on as if you are riding a horse, a torrent, a waterfall. You slam back into your mismatched feet. Rise through your chest.
The connection splinters and the last fibres fray.
In an instant, you are once again only a soul within a vessel of flesh.
But that flesh has been amplified, and you feel a glowing pool of power in your abdomen, swirling like a concoction in a cauldron.
“It is done,” the Symbol says.
The anvil is as dark as before. The hammer lies on the ground next to it. Shaking, you lift it, and find that although it is still heavy, your claw can now hold it aloft and mount it on its rack.
> [["What now?"]]Instead of dodging, you advance, leaping forward with your ostrich leg and landing on your elephant leg with a stomp that shakes the floor. She doesn’t expect it, and is forced to let the long range whip dissipate. She begins reshaping her second weapon into something shorter and straighter – a sword perhaps – but you are relentless, flinging out your tentacles with incredible speed, forcing her to move.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common'}> [[Kill him.->Magic Crossbow]]
> [[Deflect the bolt.->Magic Crossbow]]
> [[Talk him down.->Magic Crossbow]]You stretch your jaws wide open and let out a crocodilian roar that sends people fleeing.
"The Lattari Symbol lives, you fools!" You proclaim. "The Regents have claimed complete dominion over you, but some of us still fight for a better world, one where reading books is not punishable by death!"
[if strikeFear]
You reach up with your claw and slice through the rope around your neck, landing on your feet. The growth on your throat shrinks. People reel back; some start running.
[continue]
You advance, and the crowd churns before you as people try to get away. You step out from under the gallows and look up at the judge. She looks back with as much fear as the rest of them.
Before any of them can gather their wits enough to band together and attack you, you flee into the jungle.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Noticed Aftermath]]You wrap your tentacles around her throat. Her eyes bulge wide as you bend your knees and spring, pulling yourself towards her.
Larda raises her hand, and a glowing blade appears in it. With a stroke she slices downwards, severing the ends of your tentacles. Pain snakes through you, but you're already hurtling through the air towards her. You cry out as you slam into her with your claw, savouring the snap of bone the armoured scales make on contact. Larda is sent tumbling backwards, but lands on hands and knees, her eyes full of fury.
Blood seeps through her navy blue uniform as she gets to her feet. You leap into the air, almost to the ceiling of the Forge, and elongate your tentacles into a single mass that whips through the air like the appendage of a sea creature whose names are whispered in horror tales.
You aim for her feet, and Larda leaps into the air to avoid being tripped, but at the peak of your arc you slice through a chunk of stalactites and they fall towards her. A bark from your crocodile mouth imbues them with speed and they shoot and curve to intercept Larda.
She spreads her fingers in the air and a circular shield of light materialises before her. The stalactites crumble to bits on its surface, and then all you see is her face as she speeds towards you.
She hits you so hard you hit and scrape the ceiling. Stones and smaller stalactites pierce your cloak and rake your skin; warm blood wells up from the wounds.
Larda has by now begun falling again, and you are still above her. As you fall, you draw strength and mass into your elephant leg, making yourself heavier.
She lands with a ready stance, and dread fills you when you see the look in her eyes. Right before you hit her, she grabs your leg with both hands, swings you around in a horizontal arc, and sends you crashing headfirst into the wall of the Forge.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common 2'}“With my power restored, I can now control, truly control, who has access to it. I’ve already cut off the Regents, and hidden us both from their sight.”
It gazes at you, and hesitates. “You’ve brought light to my darkest moments. You brought me out of despair and gave me new hope. If you don’t mind… I’d like to accompany you wherever you go next.”
Hope leaps in your chest. “To travel with the Lattari Symbol? Of course, *of course* I’d love that.”
A wave of happiness through the connection.
“Well, then,” the Symbol says, “where to?”
> [[“There’s no time to waste. Larda’s dead, but the rest of the Regents are still out there. We need to start building a plan against them.”]]
> [[“Astura. I think, after all this time, I’m ready to see my family again.”]]
[if wentToShrine]
> [[“Lapaña. I want to join the pilgrims there, and show them that you’re free.”]]
[if libraryEnding]
> [[“Let’s stay here in the jungle. I have a librarian to find. I owe her a story.”]]
[continue]
> [[“Somewhere I’ve never seen before. I’m ready for something completely new.”]]The Symbol reaches for you and places a hand on your shoulder. “Thank you, my friend,” it says. “For everything.”
Light envelops you, and you dissolve into the jungle air, icon and disciple, friend and companion, to make your mark on the world together.[unless wentToShrine]
"There is a shrine far from here, deep in the forest, where I used to take my followers to reflect and contemplate. I don't know if it still stands, and I haven't been there in a long time, but it's worth visiting."
[unless wentToVillage]
It shifts in place. "It could be good to see what problems there are in an ordinary village. There is one not far from here, in the Jungle."
[unless wentToAscension]
As it turns its head away, its mental voice ebbs. "The desert is your final option. There's no power to be gained there, but you could learn lessons from it nonetheless."
[continue]
The Symbol looks at you. "Choose wisely. We only have so many opportunities before the Regents find us."
[unless wentToShrine]
> [[The Shrine->Lattari Shrine]]
[unless wentToVillage]
> [[The Village->Nearby Village]]
[unless wentToAscension]
> [[The Desert->Ascension]]Your food packs are empty, and hunger gnaws at your belly by the time you reach it: a huge cleft in the earth, clothed with stairs and ramparts made of hewn sandstone and beige terracotta brick. Emerald moss sparkles in the sunlight; vines worm their way through every crack and flaw in the construction. The darkness below is still.
This is exactly the sort of place you came out here to find.
>[[Descend stealthily. It may not be as abandoned as it looks.]]
>[[Stride down with confidence. This place has been deserted for a century; there is nothing to fear.]]{embed passage: 'Turning Away'}You open and close your jaw, then clench it together. Strong enough to crush a skull.
You close the lobster claw, the force of its grip greater than your other hand could ever muster. You run your fingers over the hardened carapace.
Merely by bending your knees you feel your right leg ready to bound, to leap into the air higher than any human.
In your mind’s black fog, a single lighted seed takes root.
You have been hurt. Mutilated against your will. But this *has* given you abilities you did not previously possess.
>[[I must leave this place.|Leave.]]You open your eyes. You look around for a tool – a knife, there’s rope in your pack – and in that one cerebral instant, the thought flees like a cloud’s shadow.
You turn your head, heart beating fast. The spectre of that thought, that abyss, continues to prowl in your thoughts. As if any wrong step could send you through the floorboards of your mind and tumbling into blackness.
You’re breathing: raw, shuddering breaths as if you were drowning and had just regained the shore. At the crocodilian rattle that’s coming from your own throat, disgust rises in you like bile, and to avoid the catastrophic unknown of vomiting in this form, you hold your breath.
You find you can hold it for as long as you want. There is no pain, no pressure longing to be released. There is only the air inside you, as still as dust.
Trembling, you rise from the coffin you were lying in, and step onto the floor, heedless of the glass shards. Your ostrich foot supports your weight, but your legs aren’t the same length anymore, so your uneven gait is obvious from your first step.
You walk out of the tiny room into the hallway beyond, and see the barest edge of your clothing reflected in a mirror.
>[[Look.]]
>[[Don't look.]]You exchange nods with Karm, then turn to the group at large.
Given where they are and why, they need to know.
> [[“The Lattari Symbol is alive. It has shared its power with me.”]]Karm looks up at you. You recognise him: this is *Inspector* Karm, who you worked for in an attempt to procure maps of the Old Asturan Jungle.
Given how different you looked back then, there's no way he knows who you are.
> [[Reveal your identity.]]
> [[Pretend you don't know him.->Inspector Not Recognised]]Before anyone else can act against you, you jump off the other edge and run into the trees, leaving the village behind.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Noticed Aftermath]]lobster:lobster+1
--
You stride forward, muscling people out of the way. Gasps and shouts sound out around you as people see you and start moving out of your way, but you don’t look at them. Your eyes are locked on the judge.
You reach the front, pushing the last few people out of the way, and extend your claw towards the judge. “Let her go,” you say.
“Who are you?” The judge asks, her eyes darting side to side. She is unarmed.
You begin walking towards the gallows. “I am the Dreadbard, a disciple of the Lattari Symbol.” You don’t bother with the steps, but draw the Symbol’s power into your legs. With a tingling rush you leap straight up, somersaulting and twisting over the judge. You land behind her, facing out onto the crowd. Before she can react, you pull her against you and put your claw to her throat. “Let her go, or it is your life that will end today.”
You feel the judge’s throat move as she swallows. “Go, Awoth. Quickly.”
The librarian, Awoth, looks at you.
“I have no idea who you are, but thank you.” A mix of relief, confusion, and anticipation mark her features.
She steps off the gallows and runs into the jungle, her footsteps fading away into silence.
The judge trembles in your grasp. “I’ve done as you asked. Let me go.”
> [[Let her go.]]
> [[Kill her.]]hammerUsed: 'Hammer of Reversal'
hammerUsed (crocodileForm): 'Hammer of Ultimatum'
hammerUsed (lobsterForm): 'Hammer of Excess'
successThreshold: 3
destroyForgeAndDie: crocodile < successThreshold && lobster < successThreshold && ostrich < successThreshold
destroyForge: crocodile >= successThreshold || lobster >= successThreshold || ostrich >= successThreshold
hasHope: hope >= hopeThreshold
perfectThreshold: 5
perfectEnding: crocodile >= perfectThreshold || lobster >= perfectThreshold || ostrich >= perfectThreshold
--
The time has come to make the final choice. Partum is in your hand, its dark metal ready to claim the life of the last living Symbol.
But the Forge also holds other hammers.
Just as you applied the {hammerUsed} to yourself, each of these hammers, if applied to the Symbol, would have a different effect.
You are familiar enough with the process now, and the will that goes into shaping a hammer’s strike, to roughly predict what those effects will be.
The simplest option is, of course, to do nothing. Perhaps the Symbol should stay here - after all, it supplies you with your power as well as the Regents.
All other options depend solely on what type of power you’ve amassed, and how much.
There is the original plan - use Partum to end the Symbol and destroy the Forge of Creation. The hammer cares not what kind of power it receives – a void is a void, after all – only that it receives enough. As per the Symbol’s warning, if you are not strong enough, it will consume you to finish its work.
[if crocodile >= successThreshold]
There is the Hammer of Linking, with its whitewood shaft. You could use it to bind the Symbol to you more strongly – exclusively, in fact, cutting off its supply of power to the other Regents. Doing so would obliterate its free will, drawing it out of its prison at the cost of making it your thrall.
[if lobster >= successThreshold]
The Hammer of Ultimatum would draw out and magnify a single thread of the Symbol’s personality. The Symbol’s will would be freed, but aspects of its person would be lost. Its entire being would become focused on bringing down the Regents, and getting revenge for all it has lost.
[if ostrich >= successThreshold]
There is the Hammer of Excess, which would reach out and strain the Symbol from its prison like flour through a sieve. Its corporeal form would be destroyed, as would its coherent will. It would be scattered through the universe, embodied in every cloud and every sword, perhaps making a flower bloom here and there if it could muster the will. That might bring it peace, but it would never meaningfully influence the world again.
[if perfectEnding]
The last and most daring, most improbable option is the Hammer of Reversal, which you could use to, rather than breaking or bypassing its prison, undo the *act* of the Symbol’s imprisonment. It would free the Symbol and leave both it and the Forge intact and unchanged – but it would take so much power that only the most staunchly devoted disciple could manage it.
[continue]
What do you do?
> [[The Symbol must continue to live. Leave it here.]]
[if destroyForgeAndDie]
> [[Use the Hammer of Ending to destroy both the Symbol and the Forge, even if it kills you.->Destroy Ending]]
[if destroyForge]
> [[Use the Hammer of Ending to destroy both the Symbol and the Forge.->Destroy Ending]]
[if crocodile >= successThreshold]
> [[Use the Hammer of Linking to free the Symbol and enslave it to your will.]]
[if lobster >= successThreshold]
> [[Use the Hammer of Ultimatum to free the Symbol, but turn it into a being focused on vengeance and war against the Regents.]]
[if ostrich >= successThreshold]
> [[Use the Hammer of Excess to turn the Symbol into an incorporeal being that watches the universe from a distance.]]
[if perfectEnding]
> [[Use the Hammer of Reversal to free the Symbol perfectly, keeping both it and the Forge as they are.]]With a bulging pack on your back and your hair bound back with your favourite bandanna, you walk away from your home in the Delineated District of Astura, into the land of the macaw and the sun-drenched vine.
By day you trudge among the lizards, and mosquitoes hound you at night. Your lips crack; your feet blister, then your blisters submit to callouses. Your food and water supplies dwindle faster than you expected: hacking through the jungle takes its toll on your body.
You supplement your water from streams, but hunting and trapping are far rarer skills than they used to be, and you certainly do not possess them.
Astura is right on the southeast corner of the Regents’ official borders. Judging from the scraps of old maps you were able to source two years ago, your journey takes you into the territory of what was once the nation of Roka, colonised by the Regents before the Quenching ever began.
What it took to get those maps sometimes makes you laugh. Sometimes it makes you shudder.
>[[The musk in the stacks was smothered by the smell of flint and powder. The librarian’s eyebrows rose past the frame of their glasses. You seriously threatened a life that day, and had to move Districts soon after.]]
>[[A constantly aching neck. Watching the moon rise through the window, night after night. It took months of tireless volunteer work at the Inspector’s office to convince him to let you peruse the evidence room.]]
>[[Winners of the monthly theatre festival in Losok City were granted access to the historical archives for research. After seven months of applications, you secured a position as a servant for the Jolly Honks, who had won the festival the year prior. After shaking the Chief Honk’s hand, you went straight to the archives, borrowed fourteen books, and quit before sundown.]]villageExecuted: true
--
You let your anger at all the Regents have done rise to the surface of your thoughts. “You deserve this for serving them, for enforcing their tyrannical laws.”
The judge tries to jerk away but you hold her fast, drawing on the Symbol’s power to do so. You squeeze her throat and immediately feel warm, wet blood gush down your claw. The judge makes a strangled whimper of fear and pain, pushing and striking you with her hands to no avail. Screams sound from the crowd; someone throws a rock, but it bounces harmlessly off you.
You squeeze harder, harder, until the judge’s throat gives way and your claw clicks together. Her body slumps forward. Blood runs between the gallows’ planks.
{embed passage: 'Intimidate Judge common'}As he scrambles to pull the string back for a second shot, you speak with guttural finality.
“Die.”
His throat implodes, blood pouring down his neck and shoulders. He collapses with a bloody gurgle.
“Should’ve done that to begin with,” you mutter.
{embed passage: 'Symbol Disbelief'}She steps forward again, all mirth now gone from her voice, her bearing, her manner. “I will give you the choice. Kneel and I’ll execute you cleanly.” Her next words have a deathly edge. “Resist, and the pain you felt at your transformation will be like a paper cut. What I’m going to put you through will be like giving birth.”
> [[“I have resisted you all my life. I do not intend to stop now.”]]You open your mouth again, but this time make an unnatural, metallic ringing sound that climbs and climbs in pitch until it is barely audible. The guard’s fingers fumble on his weapon. “W… wha…” he says, then his eyes roll backwards and he collapses, unconscious.
{embed passage: 'Symbol Disbelief'}After gathering yourself for a moment, you walk towards the anvil in the centre of the Forge. The Symbol tenses up, looking at you intently.
“At long last,” it says, emotions churning in its voice. “You’ll need to be quick. The other Regents will have felt Larda’s death. We have a few minutes at most.”
As you ascend those few short stone steps, you feel the Symbol’s power in you, but you also feel your own. You stand at the anvil, looking at the being that you have admired, if not venerated, all your life.
> [[“Are you sure you still want this? To end? To never experience anything again?”]]Larda leaps to your left, flanking, evaluating. The Symbol’s power roars in you. You have a chance to attack.
[if crocodileForm]
> [[Conjure a mind-rending horror to aid you.]]
[if lobsterForm]
> [[Hit her with everything you’ve got.]]
[if ostrichForm]
> [[Feint and confuse her to create an opening, then strike decisively.]]You get to your feet. Larda’s wounds are already stitching themselves together, and in seconds she stands restored to her full strength.
*I can’t defeat her in a straight fight*, you send to the Symbol. *Help me!*
The Symbol responds. *She’s drawing on my power heavily. So are you, of course, but I can try to cut off the flow of my power to her at the right time. That could create an opportunity for you to land a solid hit. It’ll have to be a killing blow. It may not actually kill her, but should buy you enough time to kill me and escape.*
“You’ve done well,” Larda says, “to become so strong without one of us noticing. Shame that you oppose us; you could have been a good thrall. But it’s time to stop playing.”
Given she’s just powered through everything you’ve thrown at her, there’s only one way to get inside her guard.
> [[Let her hurt you.]][if sayNothing]
"No?" She says. "Your choice."
[else]
Her gaze darkens, and you know your words have struck her.
[continue]
She raises Partum over her head in both hands, and right as she begins the downward swing of her arms --
*Now!*
The hammer falls past her head, her fingers fumbling as the Symbol cuts off Larda’s power. Before she can replenish from her own well, you burst from your bindings, step to her with blinding speed, and grab the falling hammer. You channel its momentum into a spin and whirl to strike through Larda’s outstretched hands, shattering her forearms and elbows, crushing her ribcage and smashing her lungs and heart to bits.
The momentum of the strike flings her away from you. As she crumbles, her very being disintegrating like dust, her face forms an expression of shock, and then a dawning horror as she stares at her own end.
A second later, she is gone.
The space smells of smoke. On the floor where Larda was, there is a small pile of ash.
“Yes,” the Symbol says, disbelief and elation in its voice, then it laughs. “Haha, yes! Yes, yes! You did it! She’s gone! She’s actually gone!” It hammers its fists on the invisible wall of its prison in jubilation.
> [[“I can’t believe it! I actually defeated a Regent!”]]
> [[“I couldn’t have done it alone. We did it together.”]]
> [[“She handed us the means of her own destruction. If she had used anything but the hammer...”]]shrineWhatFor: false
shrineSculpture: false
shrineMeditate: false
wentToShrine: true
regentNotice: regentNotice+1
--
The first thing you feel is the warmer air; not as warm as the jungle, but certainly more pleasant than the frigid cavern the Forge is housed in. Pine trees reach up to entangle their branches in an impressively thick canopy. The afternoon sky is overcast; what little light pierces the forest’s ceiling is pale and diffuse.
“Where are we?” You ask.
*In a secret place,* the Symbol says in your mind. *Lapaña, the Sanctuary of the Wooded Soul. I only gave my most devout the incantations to pass the wardings; anyone else would be diverted elsewhere. The wardings are gone now, but it is still hidden in the forest. Find it.*
Hours of searching follow. You tap into the Symbol’s power, feeling it tingle in your eyes, your ears and snout. Colours split into shades like white light through a prism. Pine needles crackle with your every step. Distant deer pad carefully between the trees, and the loamy scents of the forest thicken to the point of taste.
You navigate by the barest remains of tracks that would have been totally invisible if the pine needles had not worked to suppress the growth of the forest floor. Your eyes itch as the Symbol sends strength down the connection, and traces of normally invisible power appear as pearlescent clouds. *The remains of the wardings. You are close. Continue.*
Pine branches rasp against your skin as you follow the faint thread of remnant power in the air. The trees press so closely it becomes hard to see, and you have to physically push through, then all at once they disappear.
You stand at the precipice of a large circular space below, clear of trees and bathed in daylight - whether it’s a natural sinkhole or dug out by sentient hands, you couldn’t say. Creeper vines with three-pronged leaves cover the sides, while patches of grass intersperse with mossy cobblestone on the ground.
In the centre stands a huge stone sculpture, emanating from a central pedestal in acute angles and thick, squared off lines. It makes no sense to you - perhaps it is a glyph of an ancient alphabet, or simply abstract art. Vines have attempted to wrap themselves around it to varying degrees of success, and spots of lichen brighten the base. A red-brown beetle steps gingerly across one of the stems.
You jump down. The moment your mismatched feet touch the ground, tranquillity and solitude settle over you like a coat of snow.
{embed passage: 'Shrine Choices'}The laughter trembles within you for a moment before the dam bursts. You rear your head back and your crocodile mouth makes a deep, guttural barking. For years, tension and constant threat have made themselves at home in the marrow of your bones; now they loosen as you cackle at the sight before you: the last living god, your hope for yourself and for a better world.
{embed passage: 'Symbol Speaks'}Without hesitation, you gather tingling power in your legs and leap. For a moment, you soar straight over the wall, metres of stone construction no match for the sheer velocity in your jump.
“What the –” you hear from below, and turn your head to see the guard pointing his crossbow at you. However, you have no time to worry about that as you arc towards the ground, gathering speed all the way. You gather power once more and bend your mismatched knees in opposite directions, your legs forming a diamond shape as you absorb the impact of your landing. Shock and pain still shoot through you, and you tumble and roll to the ground.
You look up to see the guard, mouth open in shock, pointing his crossbow squarely at your chest.
{embed passage: 'Guard Crossbow'}Your pack is gone. You have no supplies. Even the thought of re-entering the ruins to retrieve them is quarantined behind a mental chasm. Inconceivable.
Night descends, and you lie on jungle soil, completely sleepless. Grief tugs at you like an insistent child somewhere in your spirit, and you keep slapping its hand away. To focus on anything else, you wonder how, exactly, it was done.
You can’t imagine any surgeon, no matter how talented, could have done this. If such things were possible, amputees wouldn’t exist.
The portrait of Larda stares at you in your mind’s eye. They say nothing is impossible for the Mercantine Regents. Could it have been her, or someone in her service? The most powerful people in the world surely have better things to do than wait for hapless adventurers to fall into their traps so they can experiment on them.
Even if it wasn’t Larda, she could reverse this, but the chances of her wanting to, or you ever meeting her, are nonexistent, however. The brief flare of hope you felt dies, then resurges. Who would have the power to oppose the Mercantine Regents, and the desire to do so?
Not all the gods are dead.
Somewhere, absent and hidden for a hundred years, the Lattari Symbol lives.
Voluntarily, you take a breath, the damp night air swirling in your mouth. The curiosity that has surrounded the Lattari Symbol since your childhood sharpens into pressing, urgent, tangible need.
Ever since you first asked your mother at six years old why the Regents left one god alive. Whenever you wondered how the Regents became so powerful. When you looked at the official maps of the Delineated District of Astura and called oppression what others called efficiency: the lifelong occupations decided for the vast majority of people, the closed borders and forbidden travel, the public and violent punishments for minor crimes. The destruction of books.
The Lattari Symbol, the question of all questions. A second heartbeat in your chest, a thrilling expedition that always sounded too good to be true, too grand to even attempt.
Now you must attempt it, or spend the rest of your life like this, not knowing why this has been done to you.
Sleep is as distant as noon. You wait another hour, then [[rise and advance.]]You wander out into a corridor, recognising the door you attempted to push in. The air around it is clear. The hallway stretches behind you, but you have no interest in exploring further. Your only thought is escape.
As you stumble back through and towards the courtyard, Larda’s eyes in the portrait are like needles of heat on your back.
>[[Leave the courtyard.]]villageLetLive: true
--
You release her, and she stumbles away, then vaults over the edge of the gallows, dropping to the ground with unexpected athleticism.
{embed passage: 'Intimidate Judge common'}You have a chance to dodge, but you don’t push yourself as far as you need to, and in seconds Larda has you in an unbreakable grip. She stares at you as she shackles you with bands of light that pin your arms and legs together.
“I told you I was going to make this the worst pain you’ve ever experienced,” she says, and the bands of light wrapping you begin to warm.
You need to survive this with your sanity intact. As the heat grows into discomfort, the bands split and press down, needles of hot iron piercing your clothes and your skin.
> [[Trickle the Symbol’s power to cut off the feeling of pain.]]ostrich: ostrich+1
shrineNature: true
--
With one bound you leap up to the top of the sculpture, and as your ostrich foot touches its cold metal top, the whole structure shudders. The air is filled with leafy susurrations; vines from all around the clearing snake towards the metal, climbing up, embracing it. The steel beneath your feet crumples with a sound like wood crackling in fire, and waves of wood and bark ripple down.
In seconds, the sculpture is no more. In its place stands a magnificent tree with four trunks joined at the base, each trunk with its own branches and deciduous leafy canopy. Vines wrap around the branches, their scarlet and indigo flowers hanging from them like decorations. As you leap back down to the ground, a flock of robins swoops in from overhead and disperses into the tree, filling the previously silent air with their tweets.
“The Symbol is as ancient as the earth. It needs no sculpture to represent it. It is as enduring as the very ground beneath our feet.”
{embed passage: 'Shrine Aftermath'}ostrich:ostrich+1
manorHunting: true
--
You tap into the minds of the hounds you had turned to your side, and send them an image of a hoard of food around the back of the manor.
They burst from the front door. Some of them scramble around the corner immediately, while a pair bark and paw at the guards, luring them away from you.
"The intruder must be around back. Let's go!" Says one soldier, and the squad clanks and shuffles after the hounds.
You take the opportunity to admire some more of the treasures Larda has collected, and when you're ready, you give the Symbol a mental nudge and [[return to the Forge->Self Transformation]].ostrich:ostrich+1
manorHunting: true
--
“Take me there now,” you say. “Let us give them a mystery they will never solve.”
*As you wish,* the Symbol responds.
In an instant, the guards none the wiser, you [[return to the Forge->Self Transformation]].She raises her eyebrows. “You mean… it’s actually alive?”
“It is. But the Regents have it well imprisoned.” Something rustles behind a nearby tree. You turn to look, but it’s only a large, mottled green lizard scampering out of sight. You turn back to Awoth. “Why were they going to hang you? What did you do?”
[If librarian && pretend == false]
She sighs. “Well… after you got those books from me… I couldn’t help it. I started reading them myself.”
[if librarian && pretend]
“I’d worked at my town library for over a decade. I’d always been curious. One day, after a… very bad event, I got curious. I couldn’t help it. I started reading the books that were off limits.”
[unless librarian]
“I’d worked at my town library for over a decade. I’d always been curious. One day, I couldn’t help it. I started reading the books that were off limits.”
[continue]
“What did you find?” You ask.
“They portrayed a very different account of the Quenching than what I was taught growing up,” she shifts uncomfortably. “I read a lot about how the Symbols weren’t the tyrants that the Regents have made them out to be. How the Quenching wasn’t a defensive response after the Symbols tried to seize control of the continent. The battlefield accounts…” She shakes her head. “I started spreading the books around, telling people what I’d read. They needed to know. Of course, I got caught.” She sighs. “I ran and hid for a long time, moved from place to place. I thought I was safe here.” Her mouth thins into a grim line.
The familiarity in her story pulls at you, and you nod. “I have had a similar experience, searching for the Symbol.”
“Is it nearby?” She asks. “Can you show me where it is?”
*It would put her in danger,* the Symbol says. *Even saving her will have attracted the Regents’ notice. You should leave.*
>[[“Once the Symbol is free from its prison, I will return and we can speak further.”->Will Return]]
>[[“I’m sorry, it’s too dangerous.”->Librarian End]]She turns away. “Can’t say I’m not disappointed, but you did just save my life, so I suppose that evens it out.” Another sigh. “I guess I’m headed back into the wilderness. On the run again. Good luck out there.”
“To you as well,” you respond, and the two of you part ways.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Noticed Aftermath]]"I will serve," you say.
“Good,” the Symbol says, clenching a fist. “Good.”
In an instant you are above ground, at the gates of the stronghold where Larda kept Partum. It has been reinforced: the walls now bristle with soldiers, who tense at the sight of you. An alarm is raised and within seconds, dozens of crossbows are pointed down at you, while soldiers with spears and pikes and swords stand ready to defend their comrades on the walls.
The Symbol twirls liquid power around its fingers, and looks at the fortress with pure boredom.
“We will start,” it says, “with this one.”Yellow eyes with black slits look back. You have a mighty jaw of mottled green leather, teeth visible even when closed. You keep expecting to blink and see your face, your real face.
*I’m wearing a mask, you think. Just a mask. I can take it off anytime.*
The thought is as hollow as snakeskin.
The huge lobster claw protrudes from the left sleeve of the robe you’re wearing, as does the ostrich foot from the bottom hem. Your mind, numb and wrung out, reacts to the totality of your body.
>[[I am a monster.]]
>[[I am powerful.]]You expect to have a few seconds as the guard loads a bolt, but he fires as soon as he picks the weapon up. A bolt of tingling light appears on the weapon as he pulls the trigger and races towards you. You drop to the ground, knocking your jaw on the cobblestone, and feel a tingling heat as the bolt shoots over you.
Talking is not going to be an option.
> [[Knock him out.]]
> [[Kill him.]]It is too much.
You slump back down and curl up, only to fling your left arm away from yourself as if to be rid of it. Despair hunts you, pervasive, all-consuming.
Eyes closed, you keep touching your face, your arm, hoping, wishing, praying that the illusion will be washed away and your body, your face, will be yours again.
Nothing changes.
This is real.
This is who you are now.
Anything. Anything for this not to happen. For it not to be true.
>[[I want to die.]]A brief sensation of accord comes through the connection, a moment of harmony, before a whirlwind of power, whorls as black-and-white as a solar eclipse, envelops you and all goes dark.
It lasts only a few moments. When the tornado of power around you clears, you stand face to face with a wall made of stone that is so black it could be obsidian; only the lack of lustre gives it away. Only a couple meters away is a large gate, spikes at the top of the metal bars. Beyond it is a grand three-storey manor constructed of the same black stone as the wall. Columns and archways of dark maroon wood flank it on both sides, and the whole structure is surrounded by a cobblestone courtyard filled with elaborate planters that house a menagerie of trees and bushes.
A guard stands on the wall above the gate, armed with an unloaded crossbow and clad in chainmail and a thick brown moustache. Given you have appeared almost directly below him, he has not seen you.
*The hammer is on the third floor*, says the Symbol in your mind.
The first obstacle you face is the wall.
> [[Force the guard to open the gate for you.]]
> [[Break open the gate.]]
> [[Leap straight over the wall to the other side.]]When you cross the threshold, paired torches flare on wall sconces, stretching down the hall like an honour guard. You move from light to light, glancing over your shoulder and at the cobwebbed ceilings, unable to shake the sense that something lurks behind you.
At the end of the hallway a painting is mounted on the wall: a magnificent oil portrait easily three times your height. From it gazes a woman with deep black hair pulled back, a pale, cruel face that gazes down from the painting as if rendering judgement with irises of clean white. She wears a sharp blue military coat that needs no pauldrons: her shoulders and frame are sturdy enough.
The painting could have been otherwise entirely blank; the white irises alone identify her. Those eyes watch from every coin, every flag and every seal you have ever seen.
She is the supreme and unquestionable ruler of Astura, a quarter of the civilised world.
The Mercantine Regent, Larda of the Sparkling Sea.
A mixture of fear and hatred froths in your gut. This is one of the people that led the Quenching.
They killed all the gods but one.
You force yourself to look away.
> [[There’s a door on the left wall.]]regentNotice: regentNotice+1
wentToVillage: true
--
You decide to go to the nearest settlement, a mishmash of wooden buildings on brittle stilts separating them from the jungle floor. It is more of a village than a town, which makes it even stranger given how far away it is from the Delineated Districts. You ventured through places like this in your exile, but what sets this one apart is a familiar, gut-wrenching sight: a gallows erected in a wide clearing between homes, and a ring of people spectating an impending execution.
Even so far out from their official borders, the Regents' iron-clad fists loom over the populace.
You linger towards the back of the gathering so as not to be noticed, and open your awareness to the Symbol. Let it see what the world is like under the Regents' rule.
A red-garbed judge stands next to the gallows and recites. "For the crime of dispensing restricted knowledge to those unlicenced to access it, Awoth Riard is sentenced to hang by the neck until dead."
*Restricted knowledge?* The Symbol asks in your mind. *What does that cover?*
*Too much,* you respond. You encountered this particular obstacle many times in your exile. *Practically anything to do with the Quenching, the Symbols or the Regents.*
A woman ascends the gallows' steps. She is dressed in the black-and-gold robes of a Librarian.
[if librarian]
To your dismay, you recognise her. It is the same librarian you threatened years ago to obtain maps of the lands outside the Delineated Districts.
[continue]
*She is being executed for allowing someone to read a book?* The Symbol asks, and its horror comes through even the hazy nature of your mental connection.
*This is the world you're leaving behind.* You watch as the judge fastens the rope around the Awoth’s neck.
Then it occurs to you that you have power now. A Symbol on your side. You can do something about this.
> [[Offer to be hanged in her stead. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
> [[Intimidate the judge into letting her go. (Way of the Lobster)]]
> [[Fade from sight and hold the librarian up from below. (Way of the Ostrich)]]{embed passage: 'Jungle'}[if regentNotice >= regentThreshold]
{embed passage: 'Finding the Hammer'}
[else]
"We should hurry," the Symbol says when you materialise in front of its prison. "The Regents will definitely have noticed that. Where to next?"
{embed passage: 'Hub Choices'}
[continue]crocodile: crocodile+1
strikeFear: false
villageHanged: true
--
Without haste, you begin to move through the crowd. As people see you, they gasp and jump back. A wave of mutterings trails behind you like a ship's wake.
You reach the front and look the judge in the eye. "Hang me instead."
Stark silence. The judge looks at you, aghast. "Why -- who are you?"
You draw on the Symbol’s power and it tingles in your throat as you speak, lending weight and credence to your words.
"I am the Dreadbard," you say, "and I will not allow an innocent person to suffer for my crimes."
You turn to face the crowd, whose faces are already hardening into suspicion and judgement.
"It was I who urged this librarian to allow myself and others access to forbidden books. I threatened her library and her life. She had no choice." You spread your arms out, the shocking mismatch between them on full display. "If you value justice, hang me instead."
The crowd's horror and prejudice at your form take over.
"Hang the beast!"
"It's an abomination!"
The judge sways on the stand, and looks at Awoth. "Is this true?"
Awoth gives you a look, and you nod at her. She, in turn, nods at the judge. "Yes," she says. "It's true."
“Why did you never mention this before?”
She purses her lips, gesturing towards you. “I… I was afraid they would find me.”
As if in disbelief at her own actions, the judge removes the rope from Awoth’s neck and nods towards the gallows’ steps. Relief and disbelief war on Awoth’s face as she practically runs down towards the crowd, who part cautiously around her.
“I never believed you did it on your own, Awoth,” someone says.
You step up to the gallows and towards the waiting judge. She tugs the rope over your snout and beneath your jaw; it is coarse against your throat. You don't need to breathe, but this will be uncomfortable nonetheless.
The judge pulls the lever. The trapdoor opens beneath you and you plunge down, drawing on your connection to the Symbol to strengthen your body as the rope wrenches against your throat. The power comes in a tingling rush, stopping your neck from breaking. Your airway is closed... but that doesn't bother you.
> [[Pretend to be dead, then horrify them by jerking to life.]]
> [[Strike fear into them by proclaiming the Symbol's power.]]The Symbol stands before you, tall and magnificent and unequivocally unbound. “Honestly,” it says, “I expected more of a spectacle.” There is a dawning wonder, a hesitant triumph in its bearing, as if it scarcely believes this is real.
“You’re free,” you say, and glee jumps in your stomach. “You’re free!”
The Symbol reaches for you, and in an instant, you’re both out of the Forge, in the Old Asturan Jungle above. An easterly breeze rustles the trees, and the sun peeks out from behind a cloud like a face at a windowsill.
“*Now* I’m free,” the Symbol says. “Free of that prison – oh, I’d forgotten what *wind* feels like, what soil feels like!” It steps around the space, digging its toes into the ground, trailing its hand across the vines that snake between the nearest trees.
You too, take a moment of respite, but are aware that the Regents will be closing in. You both need to get far away from the Forge before you can relax.
[if hasHope]
> [["What will you do now?"->Hope Ending]]
[else]
> [["What will you do now?"->Uncertain Ending]][if hasHope]
The Symbol shines in your mind. Gratitude and sorrow mingle, and for one still and silent moment, you share a true communion.
“Thank you,” the Symbol says. “My friend, my last disciple. I am glad my last conscious moments have been spent with you.”
[else]
“No, I…” the Symbol says. “I can’t believe it.” It slumps back, wordless and stunned.
[continue]
> [[Raise the Hammer of Excess, and strike the anvil.]][if hasHope]
As you begin your next journey, you look down and see a half-wilted flower in your path. As you step next to it, its dry petals suddenly regain their moisture. The stem straightens and fills with new green, and a vibrant purple spreads through the petals like ink as they raise and open themselves up to you.
You allow yourself a moment to smile and breathe in its scent.
Wherever you go next, you are not alone.
[else]
As you begin your next journey, the sky crackles again.
Rain falls soon after.As you did in the Forge of Creation, you run power through your claw, and pick up the hammer with both hands. To your surprise, you lift it with – not ease – but significantly less struggle than you did the first hammer. You heave it over your shoulder to make it easier to carry. It is warm to the touch, but no grand aura emanates from it, no visions or imparted knowledge fill your mind. It seems a simple instrument of finality and annihilation.
*We’re so close*, the Symbol says. *So close. Soon, I will be at peace.*
You move to the nearest window, which has sheer white curtains with exquisite embroidered patterns. You see a dozen guards with swords and polearms massing outside the front door to the manor, encircling it.
No doubt they expect that since you entered by way of the gate, that you must leave by normal means of travel as well.
*Say the word, and I will take you back to the Forge.*
[if dominatedHounds]
> [[Set your enthralled hounds on them to cover your escape. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
[continue]
> [[Drive them insane and make them turn on each other. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
> [[Take them on. All of them. (Way of the Lobster)]]
> [[Let them search fruitlessly. Return to the Forge. (Way of the Ostrich)]]
[if befriendedHounds]
> [[Let the hounds you befriended distract them. (Way of the Ostrich)]]Your right leg ends below the knee. You can’t help but flex the horrid, grey flesh of an ostrich leg. It feels like all your toes have been melted into one. With your right hand, your human hand, you reach once again for your face.
>[[What is happening to me?]]lobster: lobster+1
shrineRestored: true
--
You stretch out your claw towards the sculpture. The Symbol’s power rushes through you and out from your claw, making the air around the sculpture shimmer and weft.
“The Symbol is and will be as it has always been.”
Gasps sound around the clearing as rust begins to flake off the sculpture.
“It has been a guide and inspiration to countless thousands. The Regents’ actions will never change that.”
The vines and leaves hugging the sculpture retreat into the ground, devolving back to shoots and seeds. Metal brightens until it is as lustrous as when it was forged. Dents fill themselves, and chipped off sections swell back into shape.
“The Lattari Symbol is that of persistence. No matter the Regents’ actions, it persists so long as there are those who remember it.”
{embed passage: 'Shrine Aftermath'}You twitch and thrash, dancing to the crowd's jeers for a time to make it convincing, then let your body slump as if lifeless.
Rocks strike you, and you draw more power around yourself to dull their impact. As the minutes pass, the crowd's murmurs die down, and you know that at any moment they will start to disperse.
It's at that moment you jerk your head up, reach up with your claw and slice through the rope around your neck, landing on your feet. "It's still alive!" Someone shouts in horror. People reel back; some start running.
{embed passage: 'Hanged common'}pretend: true
--
You shake your head. “No, we’ve never met. But… I don’t support the Regents’ rule. I serve the Lattari Symbol.”
{embed passage: 'Librarian Conversation Common'}Then you raise the Hammer of Ending. You fill yourself to bursting with all the power you can muster. A torrent drives into you, filling you like breath, like water, like lava. The entirety of your skin tingles as you stand poised, the hammer above your head.
Then you bring it down.
The Forge explodes with sound, the roaring of an inferno cascading through the space. Partum is affixed to the anvil, and your grip is affixed to it, a bond unbreakable with anything you can muster. The heat that emanates from it is scorching, and you scream as it scalds your flesh.
A beam of coruscating, ember-red energy blazes from the anvil and towards the Symbol, impacting the barrier and scintillating on its surface. For the first time, you see the crystalline contours of the wall imprisoning the Symbol as the Hammer of Ending’s light splashes across it, revealing its shape.
It begins to sap your strength. The Symbol pours power into you, and just as quickly, it is whisked away in the torrent of absolute destruction.
A hole begins to form in the barrier.
The Symbol is on its hands and knees, staring at you with intent. You are a tether caught in two currents, your joints and muscles stretched almost to breaking point. It is hard to even think.
The barrier burns like a piece of parchment held too close above a candle. The hole spreads, evenly on all sides, and slowly, so slowly, and the beam spears through, striking the Symbol. Even the Symbol’s power starts to deplete. You have stopped screaming by now; the pain is synonymous with existence.
The Symbol slumps over onto the ground, and a sphere of burning red energy bursts from the anvil, cracking and searing the walls of the Forge. The torrent of power the Symbol sends you becomes a mere trickle, the tiniest stream pouring into an ocean.
The Hammer of Ending starts pulling power from you.
[if destroyForgeAndDie]
{embed passage: 'Destroy and Die'}
[else]
{embed passage: 'Destroy and Live'}
[continue]The Hammer of Excess is light in your grip, decadent and bursting with power. You raise it, and bring it down to strike the anvil straight and true.
A sharp, ringing chime resounds throughout the Forge. In seconds the chime multiplies and the ringing gets faster, a sonic cycle that resonates in your ears, your teeth.
The Symbol sits up, the edges of its being starting to glow and fray. “Oh, I can feel it. Is that… sunlight?”
Light traces up its fingers, up its arms and towards its chest. In the light’s wake, the Symbol begins to dissolve into glowing fragments like fireflies, like spores. The light covers the entirety of the Symbol’s massive being, and that being begins to split up, to dissolve, to scatter. The connection in your mind scrambles, then breaks.
All that is left of the Symbol is a cloud of ethereal fragments, coruscating like diamonds in noonlight, and as you watch, the cloud disperses in all directions, its particles diffusing through the floor, the walls, the ceiling.
Silence reigns.
You stare at the empty space where the Symbol used to be, feel that void in your mind. Jubilance and miserable longing war in your mind, and you crumple down on the floor and for minutes, let those emotions out in tears, in shouts, in the clenching of fists.
"I hope," you say, "I so desperately hope you've found peace."
When you eventually collect yourself and leave the Forge, touching the icon of the marbled anvil that first brought you here all those years ago, you find yourself back in the Old Asturan Jungle.
[if hasHope]
Sunlight beams down from the sky, revealing the insides of leaves, dappling the jungle floor.
[else]
The sun is smothered by grey-purple clouds that burble, threatening lightning.
[continue]
You realise you have a choice to make. What will you do now?
>[[The Regents are still out there. Larda was defeated through a combination of power and luck. That means the others can be defeated too. The world can be free, and I won’t rest until it is.->Ostrich Ending 3]]
>[[I meant what I said to the Symbol; no one will forget its existence while I live. I will travel and spread word of what has happened here today, so that all know that the Symbol endures in a new way.->Ostrich Ending 3]]
>[[I’ve freed the Symbol and I’ve changed myself to my liking. My purpose has been accomplished. With the Regents hunting me, it’s in my best interest to lie low, and live a simple, peaceful life.->Ostrich Ending 3]]“You do know me,” you say, “but I didn’t look like this back then. Many years ago, I threatened to burn down your library.”
Her eyes widen, and she steps away. “That was *you*? What on earth happened to you? Ugh, not that I care; you deserve it. I couldn’t go back to work for months. I needed therapy before I could even look at my library again.”
She looks at you with exhumed anger, and you know apologising is going to be ineffective, but you do it anyway.
“I’m sorry,” you say.
“Sorry doesn’t begin to cover how badly you hurt me. I don’t know why I’m even still talking to you!” She turns to leave.
> [[“I found what I was looking for thanks to you. The Lattari Symbol.”->Librarian Conversation Common]]"Inspector Karm," you say, and Karm raises his eyebrows at you in surprise. "Nearly a decade ago, I worked in your office as an assistant, though given how different I look now, I don't blame you for not recognising me."
"I've had countless assistants over the years," Karm says, "so I'm sorry, but I don't remember you."
"I was the one who was always there until after moonrise."
Karm squints at you for a moment, then his eyes widen. "That was *you*? Such a diligent worker... I'm truly sorry the Regents have done this to you." He presses his lips together, and shakes his head sadly.
Judging by the group's reactions, Karm's recognition has made them less suspicious.
You address them. Given where they are, they need to know.
> [[“The Lattari Symbol is alive. It has shared its power with me.”]]Still holding the Hammer, you reach into the flow of time, grasping that current of power, that act of imprisonment like one thread among the tapestry of the universe, and pull.
The silhouettes explode. The current vanishes. The whole world goes dark and silent.
Your eyes are closed, though you don’t recall closing them.
> [[Open your eyes.]]sayNothing: true
--
{embed passage: "Larda's Defeat"}Agony shreds through you, like stakes driven through your palms, your heels, your throat. You flex your throat, but all that comes out is a deep, wet gurgle. You reach up, and your right fist slams into the glass that encloses you. The pane slides off, you sit up, hurling it away with as much force as you can muster, and it shatters on the ground.
Out of pure, animal reflex, you reach out to cover your face with your hands.
>[[Scream.|Scream2]]A red claw reaches for you, and unutterable horror and dread rend you as you understand that the claw is *attached* to your arm. Your left hand is missing, and there are stitches where a lobster claw joins unevenly with the skin.
The sounds you make in your panic are themselves traumatic. Your clothing has been replaced by a simple black robe, and your legs –
>[[Please, no more.]]With Partum in hand, you march towards the center of the Forge of Creation. The Symbol is pressed against that ethereal barrier between its prison and the Forge, its eyes locked on you.
“Quickly,” it says, “do it, before Larda gets here.”
You feel its sense of urgency… but you also remember why you came here in the first place.
> [[“Not so fast. You have a promise to keep.”]]crocodile:crocodile+1
manorDead: true
--
You lean on the minds of your enthralled hounds. They are tamed beasts, but they have primordial instincts -- of hunting, of prey. You tap into those and enlarge them. *The soldiers outside are prey. They mean you harm, and will kill you if you don't kill them first.*
With their minds already bent to your will, it doesn't take much. The hounds burst from the manor and leap to the guards with incredible agility, teeth tearing into vulnerable necks, dragging weapons from hands, and swarming lone individuals with pack tactics. The guards screams sound out as they are beset by their own hounds.
For good measure, you bolster the hounds' strength and endurance, making their hides tough as steel. You relish the cries of confusion as the soldiers' sword blades merely dent the hounds' skin.
Already, several soldiers are dead, and the rest are scrambling to retreat.
"I think I'll leave them to it," you say.
With a flash, you [[return to the Forge->Self Transformation]].Seven years pass.
They are the hardest you have ever lived.
One morning, in the Old Asturan Jungle far, far south of where you were changed, a sprigcatcher sings its shrill song right as you touch the perfect marble anvil sitting alone in the dirt. It pulses with sudden light, and its pulse takes you.
You stand inside a magnificent vaulted space, like the cathedrals you’ve seen depicted in history books. Two rows of smooth stone pillars hold up the ceiling, which bristles with stalactites even as the shape has been moulded by sentient touch.
The far end of the chamber is lit up with dozens of braziers and candles, silhouetting the shrine in the centre, halfway between you and the other end. It is a raised dais, encircled with five slimmer columns that support a domed roof. The dais houses an anvil as large as a horse, wrought of dark metal that glimmers and shifts like the moonlit sea. Four immense hammers of varying designs hang from racks affixed to the inside of the shrine. Even with your claw’s strength, these would be difficult to lift.
You approach, push off with your ostrich foot and take the steps in one stride. From the centre, you see the far wall clearly, and suck in a breath even though you don’t need to.
The stone at the far end moves like sludge.
Beyond, a giant stirs.
Somehow, through the stone, you perceive a space made of the same fog that haunts the ocean before dawn. In it sits a blue-skinned being with legs as thick and large as the pillars that support this hall. An immense slab of a back rises as the giant wakes, then turns around and lowers its head to peer through the wall at you.
Its oblong, bald head could have been any human’s if it weren’t for the blue skin and the gargantuan size. It has no mouth, and its nose is the merest slope of skin. Its eyes, by contrast, blaze with red light that is still and constant as the sun.
The Lattari Symbol. It *has* to be.
A storm of emotions tosses within you.
>[[Stare back in silence. Even here, you may not be safe.]]
>[[Drop to your knees in awe, drinking in the sight of your god.]]
>[[Laugh maniacally; your dreams have come true.]]You let the whip come, and at the last second, step precisely the distance needed for it to miss. It slams into the ground beside you, leaving a gash that glows with lava where the stone melts. A second whip comes at you as Larda closes the distance. You step again, but the arc of the whip follows you, the weapon hardening into a straight blade. You kick off into the air, the blade’s heat searing even as it misses you, and somersault over Larda’s head, landing behind her.
{embed passage: 'Larda Fight Common'}Whispers flutter all around the group, and Sacay gives them a voice. “So the Symbol really is alive?”
“It is,” you respond. “The Regents harness its power to bolster theirs.”
“That’s horrible. How can we help? What can we do?” Sacay says.
> [[“Spread the word. Find and encourage others who resist the Regents. Their hold over us may seem absolute, but it is not.”->Shrine Aftermath 2]]
> [[“Stay hidden. The Regents want resistance to their rule to be public so they can retaliate. Nurture your strength until an opportunity presents itself.”->Shrine Aftermath 2]]There are nods around the group, though plainly not everyone is convinced of your suggested course of action.
“You’ve certainly given us a lot to think about, Dreadbard,” Sacay says. “Thank you.”
*The Regents will have noticed that expenditure of power,* the Symbol says. *You must return soon.*
You spend another hour or so with these self-made outcasts, exchanging stories and learning more about them. As the sunlight begins to ripen, you wander into the forest out of sight, and let the Symbol send you back to the Forge.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Noticed Aftermath]][unless shrineWhatFor]
> [[“What was this place for?”]]
[unless shrineSculpture]
> [[“What is this sculpture?”]]
[if shrineWhatFor || shrineSculpture]
> [[Explore the surrounding area.]]Another meaningful glance, and the weapons lower. The blonde woman steps forward, a hand outstretched. “I am Sacay. I speak for these people when it comes to outsiders.”
You shake her hand. She looks a little wary, but the hostility in the camp has died down, and more people are gathering to take a look at you. Sacay notices them, and purses her lips. “Perhaps the shrine is a better place for this conversation. Neutral ground, and the reason we’re all here.” She looks over her shoulder at the people. “Anyone who wants to can come along.”
You end up, a few minutes later, seated on the cobblestones around the base of the massive sculpture with around fifteen people.
> [[“This place is a long way from any settlement. Why are you here?”]]initialCaution: true
--
In those eyes, you see the eyes of every guard and bounty hunter that has tracked you over the last seven years. Under the Regents’ captivity and torture, even a god could break. This could be the Symbol, but it may not be friendly.
{embed passage: 'Symbol Speaks'}{embed passage: 'Courtyard'}{embed passage: 'Courtyard'}strikeFear: true
--
You draw power from the Symbol to strengthen and stretch your neck and throat. People cry out as you look up at them with a bulbous, fleshy growth beneath your jaw that forces the rope outward, giving you room to draw breath and give voice.
{embed passage: 'Hanged common'}[unless symbolConvoDefeat]
>[[“How did the Regents defeat you and the other Symbols?”]]
[unless symbolConvoImprisoned]
>[[“How long have you been imprisoned here?”]]
[unless symbolConvoReallyDead]
>[[“Are the other Symbols really dead?”]]
[unless symbolConvoEscape]
>[[“Have you tried to escape?”]]
[if symbolConvoDefeat && symbolConvoEscape]
>[[“Twice now you’ve implied things I will see in the future. You have plans for me?”]]There is a note of disbelief in the Symbol’s voice. *Even… they have even imbued their guards’ weapons with power they have taken from me. I feel smaller expenditures of power all the time, but I just thought it was the Regents.*
“They’ve turned your strength into a commodity,” you say with disgust. “Drawing on you to supply power they feel is beneath them supplying themselves.”
*Yes.*
You feel the Symbol’s sadness and shame as if it were your own.
The barking of dogs draws you out of your thoughts. *Guard hounds*, the Symbol says. *They must have heard the commotion at the gate.*
"Or they can smell me," you say.
You see them now, a pack of five muscular beasts racing towards you, teeth bared, long strands of saliva trailing from their black muzzles.
Using your power against intelligent opponents is one thing. Do animals warrant a different approach?
> [[Their weaker minds will make them willing thralls. Bend them to your will. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
> [[Brute force will meet brute force. Defeat them with your strength. (Way of the Lobster)]]
> [[You are as much a beast as they are. Befriend them with kinship. (Way of the Ostrich)]]The Symbol speaks, its voice rumbling through the stones. “You are not a Regent.” The weight of its words pushes against you with an almost physical force, heavy with authority and knowledge. “Who are you, then?”
>[[“I am no Regent, but I will alert them if you harm me.”]]
>[[“I am a supplicant, my lord. I need your help.”]]
>[[“Fear not, your Symbolness. I have come to free you!”]]lobster:lobster+1
manorDead: true
--
You’ve run from people like these for years. No longer.
Hurling yourself forward, you smash through the window with your claw and leap into the open air. The remnants of the curtain billow out around you, masking your descent and allowing you to land among the soldiers, smashing one’s ribs in with the hammer. You hold the hammer in your human hand now, enough power flowing through you to wield it without effort.
Your claw becomes your secondary weapon: two soldiers rush you, and you snap one’s sword in half with your claw while crushing the other’s sword-arm with your hammer. You whirl, driving the first one off balance, then cleave into his shoulder with your claw. They fall before you, screaming in pain.
More of them come, and you let a battle-frenzy take you, leaping, smashing skulls and ribcages, cleaving throats and arms.
[if befriendedHounds || dominatedHounds]
The hounds you had turned to your side burst from the lower levels of the house, snarling and biting, adding to the carnage, finishing off those you wound.
[continue]
When it is over, a full dozen bodies lie before you, their blood trickling in rivulets between the cobblestones.
You mentally nudge the Symbol, and in an instant, [[return to the Forge->Self Transformation]].{embed passage: 'Jungle'}{embed passage: 'Jungle'}You step up to the anvil… and place Partum in its rack. All five hammers hang down over the anvil, a complete set.
You can feel the Symbol’s anticipation through the connection, and as you turn and walk back down the steps of the shrine away from the anvil, away from the Symbol, that anticipation turns to confusion and concern.
“What are you doing?”
You keep walking.
“We don’t have much time, you have to act quickly!” The Symbol says, an edge in its voice.
“I… can’t kill you,” you say. “You’re too important.”
The Symbol stops silent, pain suffusing its thoughts, and therefore yours. “So, what, you’re going to… you’re just going to *leave me here*?”
“Even though you’re empowering the Regents,” you say, looking at the ground as you walk, “you’re also my best chance against them. And… I can’t kill the last living Symbol. I can’t.”
“No,” pure dread comes through the connection as the Symbol contemplates its future.
[if hasHope]
“I said I wanted to live, but not like this; I’d rather die than continue on in this cage! Please, please just kill me. Don’t leave me.”
[else]
“No, I can’t keep going like this! Don’t just leave me here, we made a deal!”
[continue]
You reach the marble icon that first transported you here, at the far end of the Forge from the Symbol.
“I’m sorry,” you say. “The world needs you.”
“I trusted you,” the Symbol says. “I thought, after all this time, that someone could end this eternal torment! You were supposed to be my salvation. Instead, all you did was give me hope of an end, and now you’re taking it away.” Anger and despair perfuse its words. “You’re worse than the Regents. Worse.”
You almost look back over your shoulder, but you know that if you do, you won’t be able to follow through with this. You reach out towards the icon.
“Do you think I’ll help you after this?” The Symbol screams behind you. “I hope the Regents carve you up! I hope they put you in a prison just like mine so you can suffer as I have!”
“You’ll help me,” you say. “We are linked; you don’t have a choice.”
You touch the anvil icon, and are gone.librarian: true
--
{embed passage: 'Hunger'}crocodile: crocodile+1
dominatedHounds: true
--
You plant your feet wide and stretch your arms out to loom large in their vision. As they approach, you stretch open your jaw, revealing your immense maw and crocodilian teeth. The hounds slow down: they were expecting their prey to run.
You growl at them, infusing the sound with the Symbol’s power. Their ears flatten and they whine, unable to retreat, held in place by your power. You step towards them, slowly, carefully so as not to break your hold over them. By the time you reach them, they have flattened their bodies on the ground in submission. To complete it, you give them each a nip with your front teeth.
When you stand up from the last one, the hounds rise to sit, and when you move towards the manor, they follow you obediently.
> [[Approach the manor.]]With an effort, you turn your back to the painting and move towards the wooden double swing doors on the left wall. At your push, the hinges stumble off the frame and the doors fall inward, crashing to the ground and making room for the hazy air beyond to whorl around you.
You stride through into a hall with doorways on either side, with sheets of a strange translucent yet pliable material hanging in each doorway, like flexible glass.
The contents of these rooms are ghastly: operating tables with restraints built in, metal trays holding bloody scalpels, forceps, bone saws and other tools. The air has a disconcerting tang, and the further you go, the colder it gets.
You hear movement behind you. You turn to face an indistinct, dark figure that holds something up and sprays you full in the face with a cold liquid.
In moments, dizziness takes you and your vision blurs. The figure merely stands above you as you collapse.
Eventually, you wake.
> [[Scream.]]The needles tug beneath your skin, dozens of them all over your body. Your clothes and skin start to burn; the stench of burning flesh fills your nostrils. You wrap the Symbol’s power around your bones like a blanket, numbing your body just as the pain starts to really present itself.
This needs to be convincing. If Larda doesn’t believe you’re in pain, she won’t let down her guard.
> [[Cocoon your mind in a nightmare.]]The abyss yawns in your mind. Despair flexes its blades. You wrench yourself away from the mirror, unable to look, to even think of what’s been done to you.
>[[I must leave this place.|Leave.]]crocodile: crocodile+1
shrineTwisted: true
--
You draw in a deep breath, and amplify that breath with the Symbol’s power. It throbs in your lungs, and pulsates through your throat as you let out a roar. The people shrink back in fear as the metal of the sculpture twists and bends, the ends of lines elongating and sharpening into spikes. Crocodilian faces grow from it, their mouths moving as they snap and hiss at those nearby. Metal shrieks as beams split into tentacles that threaten to ensnare the people around them.
By the time you’ve finished, the refugees are pressed against the wall of the clearing, gazing wide-eyed at what you’ve wrought: a metal monstrosity that leans and hisses as if living.
“The Symbols were defeated by the Regents because they were weak and restrained in their actions, whereas the Regents held back nothing. No longer. The Regents will pay for what they have done, and they will know the fear they’ve inflicted on us all.”
{embed passage: 'Shrine Aftermath'}“I need to become my own person again,” the Symbol says. “To exist without being used, even by those, like you, with good intentions. I will travel, and experience, and then decide.”
>[[“All my life I longed even just to see you. To have gone through this journey has been a blessing I won’t ever forget. I will miss you.”->Uncertain 3]]
>[[“I hope you find what you need.”->Uncertain 3]]“Thank you,” the Symbol says, then looks up towards the sky. The connection between you is now just a trickle, and as you focus on it, it dries up completely. You are alone in your mind.
“We should get out of here,” the Symbol says. “We must go our separate ways, but I can send you somewhere. Where do you want to go?”
> [[“Astura. I think, after all this time, I’m ready to see my family again.”]]
[if wentToShrine]
> [[“Lapaña. I want to join the pilgrims there, and tell them that you’re free.”]]
[continue]
> [[“Somewhere I’ve never seen before. I’m ready for something completely new.”]]
> [[“Leave me here. I’ll make my own way.”]]The Symbol gazes at you for a long moment. “Goodbye, my last disciple, my friend. Perhaps one day we’ll meet again.”
It reaches out towards you, and you are swept up in its power, its glory. You dissolve into the jungle air, swept away from the Lattari Symbol, but forever marked by its presence.
A new journey for both of you.The Symbol turns to you. “Leaving the choice to me was the right thing to do. At least this way, I can see whether the world has anything left for me, and decide to end not out of desperation, but out of merely having done everything I want to.”
It mimes a sigh, its shoulders rising and falling, and you feel the connection between you dwindle. “With my power restored, I can now control, truly control, who has access to it. I’ve already cut off the Regents, of course, but… I need to cut you off too.”
>[[“Of course, I understand.”->Uncertain 2]]
>[[“After everything we’ve been through, why?”->Uncertain 2]]lobster:lobster+1
lobsterForm:true
--
This form, while ghastly to behold, has given you strength and ability over anything else. What human can leap like an ostrich? What human can break blades with their unarmoured flesh? You will not give up such potential. You’ve only begun to take advantage of it.
The first time you came to the Forge, you could barely lift the Hammer of Linking. Now, you heave the Hammer of Excess over your shoulder, and step up to the anvil.
*I will become more powerful than even the Regents.*
You swing.
The impact is crystalline, spreading from the hammer up your arm and permeating through your body like cracks through shattering glass. Your vision goes white and the Symbols’ power floods the conduit between you. You dissolve into a cloud of diamond shards orbiting your beating heart, your awareness as fragmented as your body. Where once the connection between you and the Symbol was tenuous, every fibre of power a careful pull, now you shape it as a smith shapes molten steel, and so you shape yourself.
Slicing at your skin like a surgeon, you amputate your right arm below the elbow. The pain is a distant concept, smothered by the immensity of the Forge’s weight and the magnitude of the Symbol’s power that pours through you. You graft flesh onto the stump, stretching, splitting and moulding it into tentacular strands, garbing it with the colour and mottling exhibited by creatures of the deep sea, filling each tentacle with power and will.
As soon as the shape is in place, impatient, you likewise remove your left leg at the groin, slicing it away with a strand of power stretched thin like a garrote. In its place you create and affix the thick, muscular mass of an elephant’s leg, lengthening it to match your frame. Where the ostrich foot gave you speed and jump height, the elephant’s leg will give you sheer power.
You fling the Forge’s power away from you in a sphere of radiance, and bring yourself back to physical reality. You are reborn, exceeding even your prior form. You flex your right arm, and the mass of tentacles grasps and reaches like fingers in response, the suckers all along them quivering. You stomp your left foot, and the ground rumbles with the impact. Satisfaction spreads through you. You will be unstoppable.
“Congratulations,” the Symbol says.
“Thank you,” you say.
The Symbol shifts. “If you wouldn’t mind –”
> [["Of course. I've had my ending. It's time for yours."]]You step up to the rack where all the hammers hang. You put Partum in its proper spot, briefly completing the set.
“What are you doing?” The Symbol asks.
You take the Hammer of Excess. The Symbol’s eyes go wide in its face. Perhaps it senses your thoughts. Perhaps it merely understands the hammers as well as you do, or better.
> [[“Giving you peace.”]]You step up to the rack where all the hammers hang. You put Partum in its proper spot, briefly completing the set.
“What are you doing?” The Symbol asks.
You take the Hammer of Linking. “You are too valuable to just let die, and your continued imprisonment strengthens the Regents. I am solving both problems.”
“Too val –” the Symbol’s eyes widen. “Don’t. Whatever it is you’re doing, don’t do it. This isn’t what I wanted, this isn’t what we agreed on!”
“It isn’t,” you say, “but it is what’s best for the world.”
“I trusted you!” The Symbol shouts, its voice booming with grief. “I thought you were a follower of mine, someone loyal! I gave you power, I helped you, and now you’re going to –
[if hasHope]
“I wanted to live, but not as some stunted shadow of what I am! Don’t do this to me. Let me die instead.”
[else]
“I wanted to rest, not continue on as some stunted shadow of what I am! Don’t do this to me. Let me die.”
[continue]
>[[“I’m sorry.”->Croc Ending 2]]
>[[“This is what must be done.”->Croc Ending 2]]You have made the absolute most of your time with the Symbol. You have focused and refined your power to such a degree that you know you can do this.
With confidence, you place Partum in its spot on the rack above the anvil, and take the Hammer of Reversal in your hands.
[if hasHope]
The Symbol’s eagerness comes through the connection like a lapping wave. “You think you can do it?”
[if hasHope && crocodileForm]
“I have glimpsed the dark and delectable truths beneath the skin of the world. I can do it.”
[if hasHope && lobsterForm]
“I have conquered a Regent in a place of her own power. I can do it.”
[if hasHope && ostrichForm]
“In all my adventures, I’ve learnt that often the best thing to do is the most unexpected. I can do it.”
[continue]
[unless hasHope]
The Symbol stares at you. “What are you doing? This isn’t what we agreed on.”
“There is another way,” you say. “I can free you, exactly as you are, and then *you* can make the choice to end your own life. Though I would hope, given the entire world to experience, that you choose to live instead.”
The Symbol looks like it is going to protest, but you sense its stunned acquiescence in your mind. “I… I suppose. I never expected to be able to choose, myself.”
[continue]
You heave the Hammer of Reversal above your head, and bring it down. The sound it makes when it hits the anvil is like a cathedral’s worth of stained glass shattering at once. Fragments of light stream from the anvil, plunging to the left and right, crawling along the floor, separating, then rising, forming four ominous silhouettes, once of which you recognise. Larda.
The silhouettes of the Regents stand there, the shards of light within them vibrating. Larda and one other have their hands outstretched towards the Symbol’s prison. The other two stand utterly still, but obviously also concentrating.
You can feel the current of power flowing from them to the walls of the Symbol’s prison.
> [[Reverse it.]]ostrich:ostrich+1
ostrichForm:true
--
Ever since you rose from that glass-cased coffin, you knew you wanted to right this wrong, to return to yourself as you once were. To have your family recognise you again. To not be feared and hunted on sight.
The first time you came to the Forge, you could barely lift the Hammer of Linking. Now, you heave the Hammer of Reversal over your shoulder, and step up to the anvil.
*This is it, then.*
You swing.
The impact is crystalline, spreading from the hammer up your arm and permeating through your body like cracks through shattering glass. Your vision goes white and the Symbols’ power floods the conduit between you. You dissolve into a cloud of diamond shards orbiting your beating heart, your awareness as fragmented as your body. Where once the connection between you and the Symbol was tenuous, every fibre of power a careful pull, now you shape it as a smith shapes molten steel, and so you shape yourself.
With cleansing, disinfecting white fire you ignite, burning away the lobster claw and the ostrich foot. Like spokes on a wooden wheel they burn away, leaving the core untouched. You distil from them their strength, their agility, and keep those there as ethereal bones, upon which you then layer human muscle and flesh. You feel them form as if putting dislocated joints back into place: painful, but a righteous pain, a correct pain that heralds the beginning of healing.
Your head and neck are not so easily manipulated - you have to be so careful around the brain that you start to hesitate until the Symbol leans in and guides your work, searing precision burns around your brain and spine, leaving them intact and incising all else away for you to replace. The crocodile’s power, then, is gone, but in its place you restore your face, your true face and head as you once knew them, the face you have always had but could not show the world.
When the shaping is done, you stop pouring power through, and lie on the floor of the Forge as the remaining flames burn themselves away to embers on your skin.
You raise your hands – your *hands* – to your face, and run your fingers over your raw skin, relief, blessed relief running through you.
“It’s finished,” you choke out, your voice your own once more, tears running from your eyes past your eyes and into your hair. “It’s finally over.”
The Symbol’s regard through the connection is warm, the pride and support of someone witnessing a friend reach their dreams.
Eventually, you rise. Your arms and legs are as they were. You flex them, feeling the strength coiled within, the one benefit of the transformation that you kept, invisible beneath your human skin.
“Congratulations,” the Symbol says.
“Thank you,” you say.
The Symbol shifts. “If you wouldn’t mind –”
> [["Of course. I've had my ending. It's time for yours."]]crocodile:crocodile+1
crocodileForm:true
--
In the long years between being transformed and finding the Symbol, you had to keep hidden. When people saw you, they would draw back in fear. Why would you shirk your biggest advantage? Why not intentionally cause fear?
The first time you came to the Forge, you could barely lift the Hammer of Linking. Now, you heave the Hammer of Ultimatum over your shoulder, and step up to the anvil.
*They will shrink in fear at the sight of me. My gaze will drive them to the brink of madness.*
You swing.
The impact is crystalline, spreading from the hammer up your arm and permeating through your body like cracks through shattering glass. Your vision goes white and the Symbols’ power floods the conduit between you. You dissolve into a cloud of diamond shards orbiting your beating heart, your awareness as fragmented as your body. Where once the connection between you and the Symbol was tenuous, every fibre of power a careful pull, now you shape it as a smith shapes molten steel, and so you shape yourself.
You pile power onto your limbs like lava. The agony is but fuel for the transformation. Your ostrich foot becomes larger, tougher, with sharpened metal claws that emerge from its bottom. Your lobster claw sharpens and becomes armoured with scales that bring to mind demon beasts only heard of in myth. You wreath the claw with black fire that makes your mind itch; to others, it will be soul-rending.
Your head swells, extra rows of teeth sprouting from the roof and bottom of your mouth. Your tongue becomes longer, coiling in your mouth like a snake over which you have complete control. Your ancient eyes deepen into pure blackness that hints at the void between stars.
You open your jaw and swallow the remaining power that the Forge exudes, consuming it like a meal. You stand there, shedding primordial terror like a scent, an aura. You turn your head, and even the Symbol starts when you meet its eyes.
“Congratulations,” the Symbol says.
“Thank you,” you say.
The Symbol shifts. “If you wouldn’t mind –”
> [["Of course. I've had my ending. It's time for yours."]]You step up to the rack where all the hammers hang. You put Partum in its proper spot, briefly completing the set.
“What are you doing?” The Symbol asks.
You take the Hammer of Ultimatum. “You are too valuable to just let die, and your continued imprisonment strengthens the Regents. I am solving both problems.”
“Too val –” the Symbol’s eyes widen. “Don’t. Whatever it is you’re doing, don’t do it. This isn’t what I wanted, this isn’t what we agreed on!”
“It isn’t,” you say, “but it is what’s best for the world.”
You raise the Hammer of Ultimatum, and when you swing, all your vision narrows to the contact point between the Hammer and the anvil. A cacophony like a roaring waterfall shakes the Forge when the Hammer strikes, and for a moment a ghostly voice sounds from the din, asking a question and absolutely demanding an answer from the universe itself.
When you pull the Hammer away from the anvil, a mote of orange-red light, the same colour as the Symbol’s eyes, rests there, pulsing with a rhythm like a heartbeat. It is into this that you pour will and power from your connection to the Symbol, siphoning it yourself instead of it being given to you. The Symbol resists, tugging back on the connection, attempting to keep its personality together, but the Hammer of Ultimatum has been swung, and an answer to its question must be given.
The mote of light grows and grows. Like a vine it sprouts, creeping in tendrils in all directions, forming the outlines of muscles and skin. Before you, the Symbol’s immense body takes shape, towering above you, palpably emanating power that vibrates through your knees.
The Symbol in the prison wastes away like a corpse.
When the last gap in the light has been filled in with blue skin, the Symbol moves, looking at itself, flexing its muscles.
“Stand back,” it says, and when you do, it hurls a glob of power at the anvil, shattering it into chunks; you turn away as some strike the side of your face.
“They’ll have to rebuild it if they ever want to imprison me here again,” the Symbol says. “Come, disciple. The Regents have persevered long enough. I languished in that prison in despair, but you have shown me what my purpose is.” It leans down towards you, that massive face without a mouth, and yet it speaks. “Their strongholds will burn. Their armies will swear to me or they will die. And at the end, the Regents, too, will swear or die. I will at least give them the choice.
“You freed me and brought me to understanding. You will be my first general, my right hand. Together we will cleanse the world of the Regents in a second Quenching!”
The Symbol gazes at you. Like a shadow of the Hammer you just swung, it demands a response, and whether through devotion or fear, only one is possible.
> [[Devote yourself willingly.->Lobster Ending 2]]
> [[Lie to preserve your own life.->Lobster Ending 2]]You recoil from your own flesh as you touch leather. Your mouth is too heavy, your head is too big, your nose distorted and stretched. You run your fingers over a long snout. You touch wet flesh inside your mouth and sharp, triangular teeth.
>[[Make it stop. I’ll do anything, please just make it stop.]]libraryEnding: true
--
{embed passage: 'Librarian End'}circus: true
--
{embed passage: 'Hunger'}ostrich: ostrich+1
befriendedHounds: true
--
You leap into the air just as they get close. You sail over them, sprinkling a little bit of power over them, and land behind them. They turn towards you, barking, and just as they’re about to reach you you repeat the trick, feed them a little more power and land behind them once more.
This time, when they turn towards you, their barking is a little more playful. You keep evading them, laughing as you do, jumping over their heads, side to side, showering them with power in little sprinkles until they’re convinced it’s a game.
When you finally land and stop still, they bound towards you, licking whatever part of you they can reach and wagging their tails. When you move towards the manor, they follow you obediently.
> [[Approach the manor.]]You try to return home, and are hunted by the District Appointed Guards for a week. Your family and friends never see you in this state. For that, you are grateful.
You learn that you do not require food or water or sleep. Your mind remains just as sharp in the black hours, and your stomach may as well have been carved out. Sometimes, you take a drink of water just to remember what it feels like.
You have no companion in your trauma. The abyss in your mind is always there, waiting and, sometimes, welcoming. Loneliness crushes you, and its only counterpoint is the Symbol. Sometimes you imagine its voice, misty and effusive, speaking to you, comforting you. You make up conversations with it in your mind and, to learn how to wield your tongue and teeth, eventually you speak your part of these conversations out loud. Your voice is as gravel on the riverbank, low and sonorous and crunchy with syllables.
You learn not to venture near settlements of any size except by stealth, to steal books and maps. Very few people see you, and even fewer can be trusted. Most of them aid you out of morbid curiosity. Only two individuals in all your travels sympathise with your quest for the Symbol.
Gradually, you become a whisper, a tale told when night falls to scare people.
They call you the Dreadbard.
You prowl the uninhabited wilderness between Delineated Districts, far to the north, then to the west of Astura, combing the ground back and forth, searching for the entrance to the Forge of Creation, where it is written that the Regents imprisoned the Lattari Symbol at the culmination of the Quenching. For what purpose, none of the writings say.
>[[Seven years pass.]]“Yes, I’m *giving up*,” the words are thick with disdain. “I have laid bare my agony before you, and now you would question my decision to end my own life? If I were a sick friend, or family member, would you do the same?”
Its judgment is like the blazing jungle sun on the back of your neck. You look up, and the Symbol looks at you with more hardness than before. “If you want my help, this must be the outcome.”
{embed passage: 'Forging'}The Symbol merely looks into your eyes. “I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve you.” It bows its head. “I have never had a truer disciple.”
You watch as the Hammer of Ending devours your very essence, the Forge of Creation around you being destroyed.
Your last sight is of the Symbol’s crumbling form reaching for you.symbolConvoReallyDead: true
--
The Lattari Symbol nods, solemn and slow. “Gotoren, the Symbol of Ferocity. Alamanati, the Symbol of Sense. Voriosh Tan, the Symbol of Similarity.” Each name seems to reverberate through the space like a gong strike. “They are dead. Slain by the Regents after losing every single person who was ever faithful to them.”
“What are you the Symbol of?”
It has no mouth, but you see its eyes crinkle as if in a wry, self-deprecating smile.
“Persistence.”
{embed passage: 'Symbol Conversation Choices'}There is a long period of silence.
[if hope < hopeThreshold]
“Yes,” the Symbol says. “I just want it to be over.”
[else]
The Symbol’s thoughts thrum through the connection, turbulent as rapids. It sits there, on the floor of its prison, and opens up its mind to you. There, among the familiar black despair, a line of grey murk runs like a vein through skin.
[if hope >= hopeThreshold && agreedToSuicide]
“When we first met, all I wanted was to be heard. You didn’t question me. You listened to me.”
[if hope >= hopeThreshold && ascensionHope]
“When we visited the place of my ascension, I shared my reasons with you. I felt so powerless, so helpless, for so long. You showed me that even so completely imprisoned, I had the ability to affect my own future by asking you for help. I hadn’t realised that.”
[if hope >= hopeThreshold]
The Symbol looks at the pile of ash where Larda lies. “And… I didn’t really believe a Regent could ever be defeated. But you showed me that was possible too.”
It looks up at you. There’s something in its face that you haven’t seen before: the unearthing of a deep hope. “I know it’s not what we discussed, but… I think I want to live. To get out of this cage. To talk with other people. To feel sunlight and rain.
“It may not be possible. It’ll take significantly more power, more than you may be able to handle. We haven’t had much time. But… if you can do it safely, please try.”
[continue]
> [[It is time.]][if hasHope]
“You’re certainly going to have quite the story to tell them,” the Symbol says. “Though with me there in person, I do think they’ll be inclined to believe you.”
{embed passage: 'Hope Ending Common'}
[else]
The Symbol raises a brow. “Be kind to them. They may not be ready for you.”
{embed passage: 'Uncertain Common'}
[continue]beSilent: true
--
It is so.
{embed passage: 'Croc Ending 3'}ascensionEveryonePower: true
--
There is a moment’s pause before the Symbol replies. *It is possible in theory, though given there were only eight Symbols and Regents combined, it seems to be an extraordinarily difficult and rare phenomenon. And of course, potential is nothing if not acted upon.*
{embed passage: 'Ascension Choices'}hope: hope+1
ascensionHope: true
--
*I was lucky enough to find someone who agreed to help me.*
You take a deep breath, and share something you haven’t told anyone else.
“After Larda turned me into what I am now, in the deepest horror of that experience, I wanted to end my own life. I understand how you feel.”
You get a wordless wave of gratitude through the connection.
*I don’t think it is possible for someone who hasn’t experienced it to understand. Whether it’s in a single, soul-harrowing moment, or a prolonged leaching of light from the world… that state of mind is truly unique.*
“It’s like there’s nothing to redeem existence. The things that kept you tethered, that make it worthwhile to go on, all disappear.”
*It’s more, and less than that. Death becomes *better*, because life is so awful that every moment is pain, and you can’t imagine any future where it gets better.*
In the midst of the melancholy, you feel a mote of pleasant surprise. “I’ve never talked with anyone about this before. It feels good.”
Acknowledgement comes through the connection. You both lapse into silence.
You remain there, basking in it, until the night is upon the desert, and the cold drives you to return.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Ascension Aftermath]]initialFree: true
--
There is a pause, then a rhythmic, burbling laugh emanates from the Symbol. “Ah, a joke. In all my millennia, there have been less people brave enough to make a joke in my presence than there are petals on a rose.”
>[["So, you *are* the Lattari Symbol, then?"]][if hasHope]
“I… well. It isn’t quite the renewal of life I had in mind, but it’s better than this place.” Its voice is wistful. “At least I’ll be able to watch, in a sense, where you go next, even if I can’t walk beside you.”
[else]
“This isn’t what I want,” the Symbol says, hurt in every word. “I wanted to end, not to watch, even more a spectator, even more a prisoner, as the entire universe moves around me. Please don’t do this.”
[continue]
You look it in the eyes.
>[[“I will think of you every time I see the dawn break. Every time the wind blows through the grass. I won’t forget you; no one will. You will be in the very ground and the air around us.”->Ostrich Ending 2]]
>[[“You won’t feel the pain and despair anymore. You will be free of everything.”->Ostrich Ending 2]]symbolConvoEscape: true
--
“Of course I have.”
The Symbol points with a blue finger to places on the walls where the stonework is marred, and to a spot on the ceiling where a chunk of stalactites have been snapped like twigs.
“Three times. The first time, I never got out of this chamber; Larda responded immediately and we fought. I understand how the magic of this place works now, so if my captivity is ever to end, it must be done in a specific way. You’ll see the results of my other escape attempts in time.”
{embed passage: 'Symbol Conversation Choices'}symbolConvoDefeat: true
--
“A campaign of war cannot be reduced to one swing of the sword,” says the Symbol. “Especially one as long as the Quenching. What do you know of it?”
“It lasted for exactly a century. The Regents claim it was to eliminate corruption and injustice in the Symbols’ followers.”
“Certainly, by extinguishing the sun you could eliminate sunburn,” the Symbol says, clenching an enormous fist. “By the time the Regents had overthrown or usurped the old governments and banded together, only the Symbols possessed sufficient influence to gather people to oppose them. Every attempt at order will necessarily brook deviance, but the Regents did not destroy us because of our corruption. They destroyed us because we were the last obstacle to their dominance of the entire continent.
“As to how… they are unparalleled military leaders, the Regents, but more than that, they are completely immune to moral scruples. You’ll see evidence of this soon enough.”
{embed passage: 'Symbol Conversation Choices'}“Larda showed me. She wanted me to be familiar with her *final solution*, as she called it. She forced me to watch through her eyes as she examined it in its home. It scared me at the time, but since then I’ve tried to goad her into using it more than once.”
“You think she was bluffing?”
“Of course,” the Symbol says, sardonic. “Though the Regents are still extraordinarily powerful without me, they’ve gotten used to my being there as an additional power source. They will mourn my loss, in the same way a rich merchant mourns the loss of a bet. They’re not used to their power decreasing, no matter how little.”
> [[“Let us waste no time, then.”]]symbolConvoImprisoned: true
--
“From your point of view, since the end of the Quenching," the Symbol says. "But Larda took care to explain to me that time passes far more quickly inside this trap, flowing normally only when someone else is present in the Forge."
It hangs its head. "I have given up counting. It only deepens my despair."
{embed passage: 'Symbol Conversation Choices'}initialSupplicant: true
--
The Symbol’s response is edged with surprise. “A… supplicant? Could it be that the Regents have not slaughtered all of my faithful?”
You bow your head. “I know of no other, my lord. The Quenching ended years ago. Speaking publicly of any god is punishable by death.”
The Symbol does not respond.
>[["So, you *are* the Lattari Symbol, then?"]]initialCaution: true
--
“If the Regents find out you have entered the Forge of Creation,” the Symbol says, “a swift death is the best outcome for you. Let us not squabble. My power is hobbled and contained by the barrier you see between us. I have not had a friendly visitor in a very long time.”
>[["So, you *are* the Lattari Symbol, then?"]]“You did,” the Symbol says. “I am so proud.”
{embed passage: 'Larda Aftermath'}“If I had a mouth to grin with, I would,” the Symbol says.
{embed passage: 'Larda Aftermath'}She launches towards you like a thunderbolt. As she speeds through the air, a crackling whip of white energy forms behind her. She swings her arm forward and it lunges for you. More energy is already solidifying behind her; she is readying her next attack.
[if crocodileForm]
> [[Counter her powers with your own dark abilities.]]
[if lobsterForm]
> [[Get inside her guard and strike first.]]
[if ostrichForm]
> [[Show her she is fallible; evade her strike.]]hope: hope+1
--
A nod. “Thank you for not questioning me on this. I will remember it.”
{embed passage: 'Forging'}You get a wordless wave of gratitude through the connection.
*Thank you.*
You remain there, basking in it, until the night is upon the desert, and the cold drives you to return.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Ascension Aftermath]]The Symbol actually laughs. “We are going to turn their worlds upside down.”
{embed passage: 'Hope Ending Common'}“I’m sure they’ll be happy to hear it,” the Symbol says. “Give them my regards.”
{embed passage: 'Uncertain Common'}“Are you sure?” The Symbol asks.
{embed passage: 'Uncertain Common'}The Symbol nods. “Be ready. Though she will not be there in person, Larda’s manor will be guarded.”
> [[“They will cower before me.”->Manor]]
> [[“They will come to understand my strength.”->Manor]]
> [[“They’ll never see me coming.”->Manor]]The Symbol nods in approval. “That you do. I can sense her, not too far from here. I will take us to her”
{embed passage: 'Hope Ending Common'}The Symbol clenches its fist. “Ah, of course, I do. To undo the changes made to your body, you will need to strike the anvil with the fourth hammer, Hammer of Reversal – *not* the hammer you now hold. It will obliterate you if you direct its power at yourself.”
You put Partum down next to the anvil and look around. You are familiar with the first, the one with the whitewood shaft. The fifth rack is empty, which means it is meant for Partum. The one next to it must be the fourth, making it the Hammer of Reversal.
“What are the other two?” You ask.
“The second is the Hammer of Excess – it is a conduit for multiplicative power. One could, for instance, use it to build a city while expending the effort only to construct a small section. The third is the Hammer of Ultimatum – where the Hammer of Excess spreads its power out, the Hammer of Ultimatum focuses and refines it.”
You look at these instruments, a new thought occurring to you like a fish bursting from a lake.
“I could use these other hammers to change myself, instead of reversing Larda’s experiment?”
The Symbol is silent for a moment.
“You could,” it says, “but you will never get this choice again.”
> [[Use the Hammer of Ultimatum to amplify your existing transformations to even more terrible forms. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
> [[Use the Hammer of Excess to add even more transformations onto your body. (Way of the Lobster)]]
> [[Use the Hammer of Reversal to return to your original, human form. (Way of the Ostrich)]]Larda lets your words trail off into silence, and then she laughs, loud as a thunderstorm, filling the space with noise, her voice a current of malice.
“I’ve heard such idealism too many times before,” she says. “You do know we eradicated the Symbols for a good reason, right? The world wasn’t *moving forward*. Decade after decade of everyone believing everything was fine while we ordinary people were kept in second place, worshipping people that figured out the trick of living without their bodies.
“The Symbols aren’t *special*!” She shouts. “They’re not worthy of your worship or your attention! But the world wasn’t *listening*, so we made it listen. We made *everyone* listen.”
With an effort, you meet her eyes.
> [[“You committed genocide because of a religion that was hurting no one.”]]“You could have done enough damage on your own to force her to retreat,” the Symbol says. “But yes, we were incredibly fortunate.”
{embed passage: 'Larda Aftermath'}“I’ve been inside your mind, so I know you’ve been to a *lot* of places,” the Symbol says. “How about Gedon? It’s far to the northwest, completely different from here. Have you ever seen snow?”
[if hasHope]
You shake your head, and the Symbol nods in satisfaction. “A novelty, then. Ice caves, glaciers, volcanoes, springs… take the people away, and the world is still full of wonder.”
{embed passage: 'Hope Ending Common'}
[else]
You shake your head, and the Symbol nods in satisfaction. “A novelty, then.”
{embed passage: 'Uncertain Common'}Everyone stares at you.
Sacay shakes her head. “I want to believe you. I do. But the Regents wiped the Symbols out. There’s no way there’s one still alive, they’d never allow it.”
“It is imprisoned in a place called the Forge of Creation. The Regents feed on its power.” Your words have no impact on them; it’s simply too incredulous a claim. You will have to demonstrate your power.
You look at the sculpture as you get to your feet. Emblematic of the Symbol, its patterns and lines suggest a hieroglyph, a statement of regality and purpose, but it has been partially claimed by nature, by time.
What should the Symbol mean for the future? What does it mean to you?
> [[Twist the sculpture into a terrifying perversion of itself. (Way of the Crocodile)]]
> [[Polish and restore it to its pristine, original form. (Way of the Lobster)]]
> [[Let nature overtake it completely. (Way of the Ostrich)]]The Symbol looks down, shaking its head. “How many other followers of mine, of any Symbol, have you met?”
You cannot answer.
“Larda tells me,” the Symbol says, “on her visits, what the world is like now. My existence is almost forgotten. Nobody needs me anymore… except you.”
{embed passage: 'Forging'}The Symbol thinks for a moment, then nods. “I see the prudence in that. Very well.”
{embed passage: 'Hope Ending Common'}Sacay takes a long look around the gathered people. “That answer varies with the individual. Myself, I had enough when the Regents’ rationing of food and medicine in the Delineated District of Tomora meant my chronically ill brother and mother both died.” She speaks of it with a detachment that you understand.
“Others have it worse. In the end, we all decided we’d rather be apart from all of it. We wandered for a long time before finding this place.” She gestures at the sculpture, then waves a hand in the direction of a stooped, old man. “Karm has done some reading; he recognised it as associated with the Lattari Symbol. Seemed like a fitting place for refuge.”
[if inspector]
{embed passage: 'Inspector Recognised'}
[else]
{embed passage: 'Inspector Not Recognised'}[if initialCaution]
“No one seeks me out by accident,” it says. “Not here, when it requires so much effort and risk. Despite your earlier caution, I assume you have come to free me.”
[if initialSupplicant]
“You said you are a supplicant. In order to get my help, you will need to free me, or at least unshackle my power.”
[if initialFree]
“You said you have come to free me, did you not? I will not waste my only opportunity in so many years.”
[continue]
>[["How do I free you, then?"]]*Mostly, it is the divestiture of a physical body. I had hoped it would rid me of more.*
You wait until the Symbol is ready to continue. When the words come, there is a bitter darkness to them.
*My memories, my feelings, my very identity – I wished for them all to be washed away by the transformation. This moment was not a pinnacle for me. It was not the capstone to some victory or glory I achieved. It was an attempt to escape total, relentless despair.*
>[[“What happened to put you in such a state?”]]*The truth is, it was never one thing, and too many to sum. Even as a child I had a bleak outlook on the future, and it only grew stronger as I aged. I led my village’s people against a warlord that sought to prey on our harvests. I achieved recognition, and my conquests and travels increased.*
*The more of the world I saw, the emptier it got. I could not fathom why people celebrated my victories even after I won them their freedom. The* anticipation *with which they looked forward to life… I never shared it. Never.*
For a time, you just watch as the orange light bleeds from the sky, and a few of the brightest stars open their eyes to dot the purple evening. Sand continues to pile up at the edge of the ice circle, to be whorled away when the wind changes direction.
*I knew there was something wrong with me, and I hoped that if I became incorporeal, closer to a concept than a person, that my mind would change, or be sufficiently diluted that I didn’t feel it anymore.*
*My own psyche is the only thing I have not been able to outlast.*
The mental equivalent of a deep sigh comes through the connection, a heaving, a resignation.
*That is why I asked you to kill me. At least when I was free I was helping people; they told me so all the time. The Regents’ imprisonment has only sharpened what my time as Symbol was slowly making dull. I feel all the old despair, heightened by the fact that my existence is being harnessed for evil instead of for good.*
*There isn’t anything left for me to contribute to the world. All that is left is for me to end, and finally have peace.*
The moment is raw with vulnerability.
>[[“It’s okay to feel this way. I will do everything I can to ensure you get the rest you deserve.”]]
>[[“Even when that darkness had you in its grip, you did something; the only thing you could do. You asked for help.”]]
>[[“You *are* doing good. You’re helping me. You’re keeping me from drowning in the same despair that’s taking you.”]]shrineSculpture: true
--
*It was important to me that despite being a Symbol, I -- my physical, personal self -- shouldn't be worshipped. But it didn't take long before my followers wanted something to refer to me as, a representation they could draw and craft and share. I created this as an evolution of my old family crest. It hearkens back to the past when I was still human, but has my own changes that make it stand apart.*
"It's... very abstract."
There is a pause. An image comes through the connection, of lips curving upward.
*That is the point.*
{embed passage: 'Shrine Choices'}shrineWhatFor: true
--
*Meditation, mostly, and active contemplation. A lot of my followers tended towards physical perfection and mastery of their bodies, but I always impressed upon them the value of a calm and self-aware mind.*
*This place was for those that showed me they really understood that lesson. This place is disconnected, even now, from the rest of society. Some of the trees here have persisted for many human lifetimes. This place has valuable things to teach through its mere existence.*
*And of course, sometimes it's nice just to get away from the rest of the world.*
{embed passage: 'Shrine Choices'}A warmth, an appreciation, comes steady through the connection as the Symbol thinks on your words.
*That is true. I hadn’t considered that. Let us hope that the end of my life averts the end of yours as well.*
You both lapse into silence.
You remain there, basking in it, until the night is upon the desert, and the cold drives you to return.
> [[Return to the Forge.->Ascension Aftermath]]Larda lets your words trail off into silence, and then she laughs, loud as a thunderstorm, filling the space with noise, her voice a current of malice.
“Such devotion!” She sneers. “Risking your life and those of everyone who aided you on this inane quest, just so a relic of a time long gone can leave the Forge and make some vain attempt to overthrow me. That is zeal indeed, but it is misplaced.”
{embed passage: 'Kneel'}It is like two stars in the night sky stare back when you look the Symbol in the eyes. “A straightforward exchange, then,” it says. “You will have the power to transform yourself into whatever form you wish before I die.”
{embed passage: 'Forging'}She stares at you. “All of humanity is held back from its full potential as long as a single place of worship remains untorched.”
{embed passage: 'Kneel'}Larda raises her eyebrows. “I’m actually impressed. Well spoken.” She squares her feet. “You face your death with courage. I respect that.”
{embed passage: 'Kneel'}ascensionPowerStems: true
--
*I… did not even know it was possible to share – or steal – power in this way until the Regents did it to me.* Shame burns through the connection. *It may be that it can only be done by using the Forge, or between certain individuals. Your body has a particular… feel, same as the Regents. Maybe there’s something to that too.*
*I have certainly never heard of such a thing being done otherwise.*
“What do you mean, a particular feel?”
*That is the best way I can describe it. I brushed against the consciousness of plenty of my followers back when I was free, in order to provide counsel or advice, but it was like shining sunlight on an oil lamp - even if I’d tried to pour power into them, it would have passed through and done nothing. You and the Regents, your bodies and minds are different. In the sunlight metaphor, you are plants, able to use what I give you… or what you take from me.*
{embed passage: 'Ascension Choices'}The Symbol nods in acknowledgement. Its lips twitch as if to start forming a smile, but they don’t make it very far.
{embed passage: 'Croc Ending 3'}