For the Record

“o wraith mother, queen of hunger,

stripped of flesh and bone

all devour, grow thy power

and make this land thy throne.”

- Ancient children’s rhyme

***

After retraining myself on when to summon clothing and some light practice with it, I’m ready and able to move the two of us in the same way, but for some reason she refused it and now we’re just walking instead.

It will definitely be dark by the time we’re at my lair at this rate.

Nyx tilts her head at me and says, (Sure, but your bond is a whole lot less stormy now, isn’t it?)

And she’s right. While it’s sure not anywhere near as sunny as it was before the whole angry rabbit and will beatdown thing, at least that awkward pressure is gone.

Out of nowhere, she takes my hand.

***

After finally arriving at our night’s destination, my paladin changes into her pajamas (manually, since I haven’t had a chance to show her the dimensional storage trick Nyx taught me) and excuses herself to Pearl’s room to quietly chatter. The others still seem to be avoiding me, which is fine. It’s less time I have to spend trying to avoid pitfall topics or social foe paws (I have no idea why they call it that) as Abaris termed them.

Out of nowhere, I feel a pull from… somewhere. Ah, it’s that thing the angry rabbit forced on me… it feels like it’s trying to tell me something but – oh. I guess I’m on a rooftop somewhere now.

(Yeah, pretty sure you just got dimensionally shifted here. I’ll give you one guess who by the way.)

I don’t need one guess, he’s sitting right in front of me.

And sure enough, the headmaster himself is sitting cross legged. He appears to be floating an inch above the snow, which continues to fall around us.

The expression on his face is severe, though not nearly as severe as the last time I saw him. And he simply watches.

“Uh… did you want something?” I ask, thoroughly confused.

“Reach with your senses, o foolish child,” his voice booms though his lips don’t move.

I shrug and then reach around me with True Sense for signs of life around us, and find nothing. Huh. I activate Will Detection as well, and again find nothing.

“Is this a dead plane?” I ask.

The old headmaster purses his lips, but his voice booms again. “This was once a land of plenty. Life prospered, and the humans and those like them gathered here to share in the bounty. Blessed of the moon goddess, peace flourished. And then, something came.”

I stay silent, taking in his words.

“Something that should not be, and indeed did not live by the patterns laid out by the gods of old. Though this land itself was one born of shadows, a shadow darker still spread its reach. The living shadows of the land, born of the negative emotions of man, grew envious of those of warm blood, bone, and sinew. And their envy gave birth to an extant hunger and desire for destruction.”

The snow continues to fall around us. I feel it settle on me in places, patches of piercing cold despite the already cold and moonless night. And yet, it travels around my master, as though he was surrounded by an air current.

“The gathering darkness drew toward itself the shadows from which it was birthed, and by immersing them in its will, bound them to serve. And so, the wave of shadows broke upon the shores of humanity, and claimed a full half of their number before it was driven back. And yet it did not die, for what that does not live can truly be slain?”

He takes a breath and exhales steam, then turns his head to the starless sky as though looking for something in it, something far away.

“Not many have heard this tale. Most of us are long dead, but it is more relevant than you know. Far more relevant. For you see, over a thousand years, the wave of shadows battered the shore, and as all things, the shore did buckle. And with it, the spark of life consumed. So was the end of The Shadowed Plane, and the birth of The Husk. As it became, it was only good for foolish adventurers hells bent on proving their mettle, or as a test of courage for those even more foolish yet.”

The headmaster’s gaze glides down until it reaches me again, feeling as though it’s burning a hole into my core.

“Incensed by the destruction of her people and her once home, the goddess of the moon descended in the form of her beloved vessel and waged war with the full power of the night sky. And though it was wet with the blood of those who do not bleed, while facing the will that should not be, she fell. And though a god’s soul is as eternal as the rest, it was yet taken into that will and subsumed the same as her once beloved humans were. And so the will became eternal, and its awareness grew. For the first time, it saw the other planes surrounding the empty hellscape it had created, the spark of life scattered throughout the cosmos, and it envied them. Although it mercifully lacked the ability to travel between them.”

(He’s not kidding about this being unknown,) Nyx interjects, (I haven’t heard of this one, and I’m… well, I’m not young. And I’ve heard a lot of legends.)

“Some number of centuries passed, and eventually the cycle of heroes began anew. And after some deliberation, my then young master chose to free The Husk of its burden. And so we traveled, and ourselves laid siege to the shadows manifest. And by a carefully laid plan, we succeeded where the lady of the moon failed. And the stillborn queen of envy was thereby bound to the will of a mere human, and so the wave of shadows was scattered, banished to the corners of the planes to lick their wounds and prey on the weak of body and will.”

I blink, and I’m suddenly kneeling on a fine carpet, with the headmaster towering over me. He is garbed in royal furs, a heavily jeweled staff in his hand and a matching crown on his brow. Around us stand pillars of marble, and ahead of us, a throne made of bone and sinew. He levels the staff toward my face.

“You may have chosen to forget. That is the right of those reborn, and one I will never deny. But I have not forgotten you, nor will I. I will keep my vow to my master, the hero Feldspar. And I will break that will of yours again, upon the same anvil of destruction from which I drew my name, as many times as it takes for you to learn your place.”

An identification result flares unbidden into my vision, glowing a flaming crimson.

[Eternal Overlord of Rabbits – Demigod of Destruction – Usurper of the Harvest]

My eyes shoot wide.

“We will start here. I won’t let you hide what you did, or what you are.” He touches my forehead with his staff, and I’m immediately wracked with the pressure of a star, crushing my soul.

***

Some amount of time must have passed, but I’ve finally regained consciousness. I’m on the rooftop again, along with my master. I strain to call him my captor, but for some reason, I can’t seem to… to…

(Compulsion,) my Assistant says.

I see.

The old man is sitting in the same place he’d been when he first called me here. A lot of snow appears to have piled up around me, as though this entire time I’ve been here and not in, whatever weird audience chamber I’d been in.

“That is enough for now. I will call you here no less than once a week for your retraining. In time, you will see that we are no different, you and I, especially since you remain so bold as to continue using the face you stole from her as your own.” He then waves one hand as though dismissing a servant. “Begone.”

I blink, and then hit the ground at the foot of my bed in a heap, followed by a pile of snow. My sudden arrival wakes my paladin, who meets me with sword in hand before stopping and resheathing it. “Oh, it’s you.”

“Yes, it’s me.” I shake off the layer of cold and rise to my feet.

She looks at me for a moment before asking, “Where were you? Abaris said he had a message from the headmaster about night lessons…”

I sigh. “He took me to The Husk and told me a ghost story. And then he hit me on the head with a staff.”

She pauses and looks at me. For a split second, I can see fear in her eyes as well as through our bond, though she quickly controls it.

“What?”

“Your identify result. It changed,” she says quietly.

Wonderful.

“What do you see?” I ask.

“It says… ‘queen of hunger’, and ‘usurper of night’? And it’s red. ”

I pause. “Wasn’t it red before? I’m pretty sure I have a Title that made it red…”

She shakes her head. “It wasn’t, but it is now. What is a ‘true wraith’?”

Huh.

(Uh. Nemesis?) Nyx cuts in.

What?

(You should probably look at your Status.)

From what they’re both saying, I probably should, so I pull it up.

[Status]

[Name: Nemesis]

[Race: True Wraith – Queen of Hunger – Usurper of Night (She of Shattered Facets – Stolen Radiance of the Moon)]

[Domain: Control (Class)]

[Domain: Envy]

[Domain: Hunger]

[Domain: Night (Usurped)]

[SYSTEM: TYPE E – Level ??? – XP error/?0]

[Inherent Skills:]

[Consume 17]

[Control Spawn]

[Create Spawn]

[Mimic Lure 8]

[Lesser Regeneration 0]

[Planar Detachment 8]

[The Ravages of Time 4]

[Aura of the Unwound 5]

[Class: Adherent of Ananke (Initiate) – Level 0 – XP 300/1000]

[Class Skills:]

[Blood Pact 1]

[Dominate 6]

[Prophet’s Voice 7]

[True Sense]

[Verum Corpus 6]

[Will Detection 1]

[Will Surge 0]

[General Skills:]

[Dimensional Storage 4]

[Identify 8]

[Stealth 4]

[Language]

[Interplanar Common]

[Traits:]

[Abyssal Hunger]

[Bound Will]

[Brand of Darkness]

[Empty Vessel]

[Titles:]

[Autophagic Cannibal]

[Confluence of Envy]

[Godslayer]

[Planar Catastrophe]

[Primordial Manaphage]

[She Who Stole the Night Sky]

[Stigma of the End]

[Tool of the Origin]

[True Hero’s Familiar]

Haaaa so. It’s going to take some time to process this. I take a breath and try to say some words of comfort for my wife.

“So, uh. Maybe I’m supposed to be a ‘she’ after all and it's not just a human thing? Or at least I was in a past incarnation I think.”

Stunned silence is my response. Well, and the sound of Nyx’s hands hitting her face.