What reason do we have to exist? Is it important? Is it a goal to work towards? It is an archetype to embody? Is it grand? Can we fail it? Will we be judged? Is the universe going to smite us? When we die, what will happen? Will it be nothing? Humans go off somewhere supposedly. Will we? What happens to a Divine soul?

Such are the worthless questions posed by Divinity. They have no answer by design. It is akin to asking a man “why think?” Well? Why think? Does anyone know the answer? Does anyone even want to suggest an answer? It would be sheer narcissism and pure ego speaking if one could wholeheartedly declare that they have found the true reason as to why man thinks. Even then, once the truth is discovered, there would still be those who would profess a different reason. There would be those who deny the answer and there would be those who deny thought entirely.

We think because we do. We think for the same reason we fall in love and for the same reason we dream. Simply because we do. It is a sickness in the mind that tries to rationalise such things. A Divine need to pathologize all existence with rationality and for what?

For what precisely? What can be done with such knowledge? What does it matter whether we appear from mass consciousness or whether we are made of ladybirds or if we’re just biological automatons following a preset pattern of existence. I am Baalka. I will forever be Baalka. There is nothing I can be but Baalka. Baalka is the Goddess of Disease. There is no way in the world I can change that, no matter how much I wished. Thus, there is no reason to wish. Should I now curse fate? Should I besmirch the heavens for giving me this role to play? And even if I did, would they listen? And even if they listened, would they take pity? And even then, would they even be able to do anything?

So thus there is no reason to explain or know. I do not really care why I am the embodiment of all Disease, someone had to be, it became me. I will never change that.

I care not for theories or explanations. Ask me not these questions. I do not want to ponder answers to questions I do not bother to listen in the first place. Maisara and Foundational Theory is wrong. Elassa and Perpetual Decline is wrong. Why? Because for them to be right, they need to be intellectually engaged. The game is lost the moment it is engaged with, and yet fools still think they can outwit this dismal pessimism of Goddesses that have too much time on their hands and too little work to do.

I live in the real world and I let thinkers rot in their own mental prisons. This is all that shall be said on the topic.

– Excerpt from “Memoirs of Illness”, written by Goddess Baalka, of Disease.

Arascus stepped off the plane followed by the Archmages Pillin and Yivlena. Skies needed to be cleared of clouds. Normally this job was for low-level mages and others of the sort. Olephia had sent a message that it was urgent and that she wasn’t using the newly built spyglass just to have inspiration for her paintings. There were those who would pretend at needing help for attention, Olephia wasn’t like that though. When she said something was urgent, something was truly urgent. So Arascus had rung Arcadia. Elassa sent the two archmages who were apparently her right hands at this point.

Arascus felt the wind tear at his cape and then suddenly stop as a gentle glow came from behind him. He turned to see the aged Yivlena standing tall. In that meeting, she had been nothing impressive. From the way she held her staff though, it was obvious she had a control of magic rarely seen. There was no incantation and no movement, she held the huge piece of pale wood at her side as if she was just carrying her tool without a care in the world. And yet the catalyst at the tip of her staff began to glow brightly as if it was a torch against this night. Immediately, all sound simply disappeared as it got blocked the by the shield of hardened air Yivlena conjured up.

The party of three finished their trek up the path to Olephia’s home. The weather right now was too heavy for the helicopter to come any closer. It had been like this for the past few days. Elassa had forged the lens and the rains began on the same day. And construction had not stopped even because of the poor weather. Olephia had apparently grown mad about finishing the telescope as quickly as possible.

That was worrying. Olephia was not one to panic.

So Arascus had come as quickly as when he had found time. Olephia’s mansion had been finished. It was a quaint structure, a modern house decorated in a rustic style with a huge wall of glass looking out over a terrace with a pool and a hot tub for the Goddess. There was apparently a gorgeous view from here. Arascus couldn’t see it though, the rain was too heavy and the night too dark.

Olephia was already waiting by the front door. The Goddess of Chaos, dressed in a thick black coat, leaned against the doorframe. Both her tapping foot and those annoyed purple eyes said she wasn’t in a patient mood. “I’m here.” Arascus said as he came close. Immediately, the Goddess of Chaos eased up. She had a scrap of paper she quickly stuffed away and wrote another note.

‘Come.’  Arascus read the slip as he followed Olephia into her home. It was all wood on the inside. A mortal would call it extravagant, a Divine would call it quaint. Arascus liked the feeling, it was homely. He turned to see Yivlena and Pillin still following them. The home was built for Divines and Divines only. The two humans looked as if they had been shrunk down here. Every piece of furniture was obviously twice too large to accommodate them comfortably. The seat of the chair was at neck level. Arascus turned back to his daughter after checking up on the pair of magicians.

“Is something wrong?” Olephia turned. Those purple eyes were inquisitive and almost disappointed as they stared at Arascus. Her hands quickly wrote a note down as she kept on walking through her home, from the front entrance to the rear one. The fireplace was silent and there was a bowl of sweets on the small table before it. And four wrappers from the sort of ice-creams that came on sticks.

‘Did you see the moons at the gallery in Zawitz?’ Olephia handed the note back.

“I did.” Arascus said. This time, her scrawl was even more rapid.

‘Then did you not see what was wrong?’

“No.” Arascus said. “You’re going to be more specific than that.” Olephia’s pen was practically a blur. She came to a stop before the door and kicked it with her foot. That was wordless communication which said she wanted the door to be opened. He pulled it open and turned to the two Archmages. They were pretending not to be interested in a conversation they could only listen into one half of.

Yivlena moved her staff an inch, the old witch simply bobbed it up and down, the crystal at its tip once again started to shine. And a shield of hardened air surrounded the party of four. Immediately, the wind became inaudible and the raindrops falling from the sky bounced off seemingly nothing. Olephia did not even take notice, she passed Arascus her paper and set off along the small path. It was lit up by small lights on one side and fashioned out of heavy wooden planks. Arascus read the reply: ‘The moons were different.’

Arascus stared at the note for a few moments and then looked up at the sky as he left Olephia’s home. It was a dark mess of clouds with lightning flickering inbetween them. Although it was inaudible, rain did not produce sound when it hit a magical wall of compressed oxygen and the wall was stable enough to keep sound off. “Clear the skies.” Arascus said.

“At once.” Pillin’s raspy voice answered. “Yivlena, you provide cover.”

“Course.” The witch replied. The old wizard stayed behind as the party abandoned him. Arascus paid it no mind, the man was an archmage. Elassa may have been hands-off in terms of managing her magicians, but that rule was broken when it came to archmages. It was simply impossible to get to that level and be unable to move mountains, much less stop a storm.

Olephia handed another note back. ‘I’m being dead serious, the moon has changed since then.’

“I believe you.” Arascus said seriously. He honestly did although he still thought she was over-reacting. There were explanations of course. Maybe the White Pantheon had ran tests over the years which they had not read about, maybe there had been earthquakes on the moon, maybe an asteroid had hit. Maybe it was just some magical resonance coming from Arda that had changed it.

Or maybe it was the worst case scenario that would not leave his mind and there was truly someone up there. Arascus did not let that thought have much real estate in his mind. That sort of thinking bred panic and panic was the antithesis of rational thinking. Olephia handed a reply back. ‘Thank you Father.’ Arascus smiled and came close to his daughter as Pillin began to work from behind.

A mage of a lower skill would need to fly into the air or cast some great incantation. Ritual circles would need to be drawn, enchantments would have to be prepared. Materials would have be collected for creating some great spell. But Pillin was an archmage, it was people of his level that had broken the world so long ago. The world may have changed but Elassa’s had not.

Pillin spread his arms out to either side. His own staff started to shine brightly. The white diamond at the end of the whitewood staff became a lit cigarette in the night. Then a candle. A campfire. A hearth. A lamp. A beacon. A lighthouse. A star. It pushed the night away, providing enough illumination for Olephia, Arascus and Yivlena to keep walking forwards on the wood panels. Pillin raised his staff into the air and chanted a few words in the tone of a man half his age and full of life.

The storm stopped.

Just like that, the lightning finished, the rain stopped falling a moment later and the wind silenced its howling. Yivlena dropped her barrier and Arascus heard the utter silence that always came about when a magician was controlling the weather. All the movement in the air was silenced apart from a low hum that sounded like static electricity.

The clouds split and started to move away. Slowly at first, although once the ball got rolling, they started to speed up and flee. The duvet of clouds was swept away to revealing a magnificent ceiling of dark blue smattered with white stars. And then in the middle of it was a moon so large and so bright it may as well have been a second sun. In the span of half a minute, the atmosphere on the mountain turned from a dreary night to utter, silent serenity. Yivlena dropped her shield as Arascus and Olephia followed the path to the newly built observatory.

It was a massive structure. Without any lights, it had been utterly invisible in the storm. Now, it was a black box with a spherical top that could only be seen because the nighttime sky, a deep dark blue, was brighter than the structure itself. The humming of weather magic continued as Olephia passed a note. It was so silent Arascus could hear the scratching of her pen. ‘I don’t actually know how to use a spyglass.’

Arascus smiled at the paper and put him arm around Olephia as they walked. “Don’t worry, I do.” Now that he thought about it, these structures were rare even back during the Great War. Olephia had been too busy in the Great War to actually be allowed to waste time on such trivialities.

The Goddess of Chaos and the God of Pride came close to the door. Arascus held it open for her. There was no lock or key, it was simply a great piece of steel. Decorated and carved the steel may have been, but it was still a great piece of steel. The metal was so heavy that even Arascus felt tension on his arm as he swung it open. Olephia smiled, bowed her head and passed through.

Whereas Olephia’s home had obviously been designed by her to fit her own likes, this spyglass array was built to specifications right out of the ancient manuals. It was the first time since awakening in the era of Pantheon Peace that Arascus could pull on some specific knowledge of the past and not just a habit he had nurtured within himself.  

The gears fashioned out of bronze which held up that massive lens in a precarious fashion. Back in the past, Arascus had always thought these structures were ready to collapse or explode or shatter or all three. There were simply too many parts that only barely had a connection to another part for it to seem structurally stable.

But then, he had seen these things work. Below the lens was a carved gemstone. It was obvious Elassa had made that too, there was no craftsman that would be precise enough to get a cut that clean on the stone. It pointed to another gemstone with then pointed to the wall. The mechanism was called a spyglass, but there was nothing to look into. Instead, it would project the image onto the wall.

Olephia flicked a switch and horribly bright lights in the room came on. Apart from the mechanism in the centre of the room, the rest was empty save for a few tables and a desk. “Don’t.” Arascus said. “It works better in the dark.” The lights came off. The ceilings lights gave enough light anyway.

Olephia passed a note. ‘If I knew, then I wouldn’t have installed lights in the first place.’ Arascus walked to the front of the mechanism and turned it on. Once one knew what they were doing, it was a simple thing. The dwarves always built complicated, but they always built things to be idiot proof. There was one lever to release the flow of oil and a small button which would send a spark running into a magical crystal.

And it was as if Arascus had been sent more than a thousand years into the past. The mechanism started to move. The ceiling started to open, the entire structure of the spyglass began to extend. Gears turned and twisted and pipes hissed as they were filled.

That was that, all the interaction required. The rest would be done by the machine. It extended upwards on pistons and cogs like a tree growing in real time. Olephia stood back, her purple eyes shining in awe and anticipation. Arascus smiled, he was glad he could show her this. “Did you see how I turned it on? I just press this lever to allow the piston oil to flow and this button sparks the system. To turn it off, you just pull the lever back up.” Arascus saw Olephia nod, she pointed up to the moon.

“This stick.” Arascus grabbed hold of a stick that extended from the machine. “Controls the viewing angle. You don’t look down anything, inside are mirrors that have a projection which displays onto that wall.” Arascus pointed to a dark wall. Not because it was painted in that manner, these buildings always had walls of pure white, but rather it was because already, it was projecting an image of outer space.

Arascus started to re-angle the lens using the control stick. Eventually, he found the moon. A sharp curve slowly pulled a projection of the moon onto the wall as both Divines watched with bated breath. The only thing Arascus could hear was the pumping of oil around the pistons of the spyglass, and then his and Olephia’s heartbeat. Outside, the pair of archmages were definitely working on making sure the weather stayed clear. There was not even a slither of a cloud in the sky.

Arascus found the moon. His smile dropped. He had noticed it in the painting but he rationalized the thought as Olephia testing a new style. Now though, he could see that it hadn’t been work of a style whatsoever. Olephia had been faithful. There were long, straight lines on the moon.

Arascus zoomed in.

The image slowly got sharper. Olephia held her breath. From above, it looked like structures of marble and golden in curving formations. They were clearly visible against the grey stone of the moon. A dots, too far away for even the spyglass to pick out, were moving around, visible only when they entered a crater. That must be people. Or vehicles. Or monsters. Or whatever else it was.

Arascus turned to Olephia. The Goddess of Chaos turned to the God of Pride. Her purple eyes were wide open in shock. Her mouth was slightly ajar. She pointed up to the moon and then to the wall. She couldn’t say it, so Arascus had to.

“There’s cities on the moon.”

– – – End of Arc 13: Imperial Rule – – –

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