Die. Respawn. Repeat.

Chapter 44: Diary of an Ancient Relic

It is the 4,625th day of Awakening.

I am afraid.

The Elders tell us that all will be well, that the Record we are creating is merely educational but I can feel in the Firmament that there is a great change coming. I do not know what that change is, but I fear it will spell the end of everything I hold dear, and I am afraid.

Perhaps this is irrational of me. I have little evidence to support these thoughts. The Seers have sounded no alarms, and our people are all healthy. My two sons flourish in their classes. They excel with the Firmament, creating wonders previously unheard of. Perhaps the fear I feel now is simply the fear of an old woman, and yet...

Every day, the trees seem a little more dead. Every day, the sky loses a little more color. I have been to the Healers, and I have been told that my eyes are fine; all three of them are perfectly functional.

I do not know what I am seeing. I do not know why I am the only person that sees it. The Awakening could be the cause, and yet I show no other signs of being Awakened. My Firmament levels remain stable, and there is no hint of a phase-shift or any of the associated phenomena. I have to assume what I feel is mere paranoia, and yet...

And yet.

Only time will tell.

It is the 4,670th day of Awakening.

I have begun to track the color-loss phenomenon. Unfortunately, objective measurement proves impossible luminal scans exhibit the same loss of color as the objects they depict, making them unreliable, and my own memory is hardly an objective means of measurement.

What I have discovered, however, is that this color loss appears to correlate directly with properties that are objectively measurable. Identifying the property that is affected is hardly trivial, but I've been able to isolate a few undeniable ones that even our best Seers cannot explain.

Which means they have to take me seriously. I have been promoted to Seer myself, though the particular means through which I am able to observe this phenomenon is still unknown. It is one of our primary research objectives

I am... still afraid. But I am also excited. I may contribute to one of the biggest discoveries of our lifetimes. My sons are proud of me, and both are applying to work on this project with me. I am proud of them too, although I have not said it. They have grown into fine young men.

It is the 4,700th day of Awakening.

The Record is still crucial, I am told, though the Elders do not explain why. I do not mind there is something soothing about inscribing my thoughts into the stone. The Firmament hums as it wears through each layer, creating a resonance I have not encountered before; I wonder if the material for this stone is special.

We have made... a limited amount of progress in understanding the color-loss phenomenon. It does appear that the scope of it is limited. It does not extend outside our city. For me, at least, there is a clear line beyond which the world is bright and vibrant; I had almost forgotten how beautiful a world full of color is.

Everyone I speak to insists the world they live in remains just as vibrant, but they can no longer deny that things have changed. Formerly durable objects are breaking far more frequently, and our technology is not as reliable as it should be. Some among us have called for an evacuation of the city, though the Elders and most of the Seers think this is foolish.

I do not know where I stand on the matter. I think I may apply for leave, however. I would like to see the flowers outside the city in full bloom; I hear they are especially beautiful in the light of our moons, when both of them are full.

It is the 4,730th day of Awakening.

I am, once more, afraid.

We cannot evacuate. It is uncertain the exact moment this happened, but it appears that a boundary has been established around our city a boundary that matches the same invisible line only I can see, where the world of color splits from the world without. We cannot leave, and we cannot make contact with the world outside. The Elders have long ceased to respond to us, even before the boundary appeared, and I wonder if they perhaps knew that this might happen.

It is suspicious that not a single one of them remains in the city.

The Seers that remain are divided. Many of us wish to search for a solution to break this barrier so that we may escape. Our home is crumbling around us. Our buildings can no longer stand tall. They sag on weakened supports that threaten to collapse. Our windows no longer let in the light, and our mirrors no longer reflect our forms.

There are those among the Seers that believe we simply need to adapt. We can find new materials that have been less affected by the Change and build a new world around it. They are not incorrect, but to get the population to give up their homes...

It will be a hard task to bear.

I do not know why I continue using the Record. I feel the Elders have betrayed us, and I am not the only one among the Seers that believe this. But if nothing else, I wish for my words to live on, and for my love for my sons to live on.

They are both good men. I wish they were not trapped here with me.

I wish I could see the flowers again.

It is the 4,800th day of Awakening.

We have made no progress, and our supplies have dwindled; our crops no longer grow properly. Others report that they have glimpsed, in passing, the world that I see in the moments just after dawn, when the sun peeks over the horizon and casts its rays over the city. For a fraction of a second, they see a city filled with gray, one that has lost all color and vibrancy.

It is the world I have been living in. It is... difficult. I make regular trips to the edge of the city to gaze into the forests that surround us. It is a reminder of what the world should look like.

I am thinking I will build a home there. At least that way, I will see the world of color every morning. I may not be able to touch it, but perhaps that will be enough.

It is the 4,900th day of Awakening.

A hundred days have passed since the last Record. The decay has grown exponentially we are no longer able to see outside our city. A pitch-black darkness surrounds us. Everything within, however, remains perfectly lit. The Seers are baffled, and the citizens are doing their best to contain their panic.

My sons have taken on leadership roles in the crisis. I could not be more proud of them. The elder, Juri, now helps to break up the conflicts that have been erupting more frequently between our people. Tensions are high, and I cannot blame them.

The younger, Yarun, has learned medical Firmament techniques, and applies them to healing and preventing the spread of disease. He is a kind man I have seen him more than once, both as his patient and as his mother.

They both seem so tired, but so determined. I wish their lives could be more than this.

Breakthrough.

It is the 5,000th day of Awakening, and we have discovered the source of this.

It is a Firmament phenomenon, although this knowledge is nothing new. Strange types of Firmament are common, and it is the only thing that could be responsible for such a widespread change. What is less common is for one type of Firmament to be this insidious.

A fellow Seer, Reysha, was the one to identify the particular phase of Firmament. Because I was the first to identify this phenomenon, she theorized that I was especially sensitive to the Firmament that was causing all this; again, nothing new, but nothing we could work with.

But Reysha took it a step further. There is a pattern of Firmament fluctuation within me that appears to respond to changes to Color Drain Firmament, as we have come to call it. She isolated the fluctuation, then inverted it, and created a sample of Firmament that appears to drain all color within it.

With this, we can locate the source. Our Firmament sensors indicate there is something underneath the city emanating this Color Drain Firmament. The expedition begins tomorrow, and I will be on the team, as I am the only one that can sense dangerous changes in this Firmament.

I am... still afraid. But I am excited. I have not seen color for many days, and it seems there may be hope at the end of this nightmare.

It is the 5,002nd day of Awakening.

The expedition failed. There are creatures underneath the city that the Seer team was not prepared to fight. We have lost two of our number.

Uzar and Zenith. May your names be remembered.

We will bring both Juri and Yarun on our next attempt. I hesitate to bring them into danger so quickly, especially when Juri has so recently bonded... I am sure Varus will understand. The stakes are high, and he is no fool.

It is the 5,004th day of Awakening.

Varus and Juri make an incredible team. I would be ashamed for not including Varus in the expedition to begin with, were it not for the fact that I did not know he could fight. With his assistance, the creatures within our sewers were no match, and Yarun was able to identify and counter many of the traps that threatened to consume us.

It is strange. The sewers beneath our city no longer match the plans that are on record. There are dead ends where there should not be any, and areas where the brick appears to have grown into the dirt. There is something about this that is almost... root-like.

No coincidence, then, that housed in the center of all these Firmament fluctuations appears to be a large, Firmament-imbued tree. Its branches dig into the walls of our sewers, and its roots fade into brick and concrete as they merge with the floor.

I do not know what to make of this, and neither do the others. Reysha and a number of the other Seers are analyzing it as I make this Record. We have sealed it off in a containment unit, but the barrier has not dissipated, nor have the colors returned Color Drain Firmament is more virulent than expected.

I fear there are more questions now than ever before.

It is the 5,010th day of Awakening.

The rogue Firmament has been partially contained, though the process was difficult. We can see the sun and the stars again for the first time in almost a year. There is weeping in the streets. Hope, though small, rises once again.

There remains no sign of outside assistance. No messengers have come to our city borders, to see what has happened to us. No family members, demanding to see their mothers and fathers, their brothers and sisters. It is strange our people are not so easily cowed. Only the Elders could accomplish isolation to this degree, and I cannot fathom why they would.

It is no matter. We continue to explore the Underground the root system expands every day, and more and more of us need to be recruited to fight against the color-oozes, lest they break into the city and wreak havoc. Juri and Varus are heading the recruitment efforts, assigning quests to those brave enough to delve.

We have discovered more of the trees. There is no singular source, which explains why we cannot completely contain the effect; more of them grow by the day. Cutting one down lessens the effect, but there are too many, and they are constantly growing. The efforts to establish Delve teams are of great assistance, but...

I do not know. The running theory is that there is a singular source at the center of a complex root-network. A single source is our greatest hope. It is something we can target and destroy, so long as we can find it.

I only hope that we do.

It is the 5,020th day of Awakening.

What hope has grown has begun to wither. There is little to report, so I will use this Record to speak of my personal matters. I hope if this Record is found, it will honor the memories of those I love.

Varus has grown to be a part of the family. Yarun looks up to him, I think he has begun to train his own combat skills, while developing his talents with medical Firmament.

It hurts my heart that our once-proud city has become a battleground where we must fight to survive. But if we must fight, then I am glad to be fighting amongst the most amazing people I know.

Let my children be remembered for more than their talents. Let Juri be remembered for his love for knitting, though he lacks the talent; Varus wears his sweaters anyway, overlarge and badly put-together they might be. Let Yarun be remembered for his love for books of adventures and exploration, and his wish to see the stars.

Let Varus be remembered for the joy he finds in painting. He has lost the most, perhaps, in this world we now live in. But he still paints, finding beauty in gray and monochrome, putting together the shades like a masterwork craftsman.

This may be my final entry. There is little space left in the Record. Tomorrow, we dive once more Underground, and this time we will not leave until we find the source. The city's supplies are dwindling, and we cannot afford to hold out any longer.

If there are no further entries, assume that we have failed.

I stare for a moment after I'm done parsing all the text on the obelisk. It's written in a small, tiny script, burned into the stone with Firmament I don't recognize the stone itself is remarkable, though I'm not able to sense it with any particular fidelity in the time-stopped world of an Inspiration.

Speaking of which...

Gheraa's voice sounds behind me, tired and amused. "This is abuse of the Interface, you know," he says. "Inspirations do not exist so you can stop time and read."

"Didn't agree to your terms of service, so I don't particularly care," I say dryly. "That's what happens when you drag people into deadly Trials."

I finally turn around to face Gheraa and abruptly stop. He looks... beaten up. The golden lines that trail down his cobalt-blue skin flicker with dark-brown stains, and the smile he gives me is bruised and weak.

I stare for a moment, speechless, before I finally find the words to speak. "What happened to you?"