To find for oneself the solitude for introspection often desired and rarely
accomplished is a gift so precious as to never be wasted. In touching my
fingertips to the rippling surface of the Megalith, I know, as I always do, the
boundless possibilities that await those who harness its gifts. Feeling a
flicker of a smile pass fleetingly over my lips, I step forward, passing over
the humid heat of Nil in favour of the brisk, malignant winds of the Astral
plane. It is upon these desolate, empty spheres of half-formed life that I will,
I'm certain, come to learn of myself so that I might find a sense of renewal in
embracing my purpose for living.

Ha, living. It is the progression of experiences, is it not, and little more?
Surely I am not referring to the physical acts of breathing, existing to encase
a veritable symphony, perfectly in concert, of organ function and the slow,
steady creep of blood within my veins? Oh, no. That farce has long ceased to
hold me within its mortal thrall. In embracing the antithesis of life as the
lightbearers know it, I remain unfettered by that simple acknowledgement that
'being' will one day, inevitably, end. In this knowledge is a terrible
realisation in and of itself, though - I will be as I am for eternity. It is a
long path that never reaches any destination. I wonder how much time can pass in
such a state before the act of existing is less preferable to embracing an
ages-long sleep of my own. A death, to be sure, but one of my particular
choosing.

Glancing around me, I take note of the sandy expanse of shard-strewn grit and
detritus upon Virgo. As the large, pink-tinged elephant crouches down to
retrieve his cup of tea, I feel a strange calm settle over me, and turn my
thoughts to that of my compatriots, busy and by all appearances industrious, far
below my feet upon Prime.

We struggle to bring upon the Basin the glory as we know it of the Taint and its
ability to transform. What have we accomplished? The bloated heads of those who
worship all things of Light turn stubbornly from our proffered embrace of
undeath and supremity. They live in the past - a time long since retired. They
reject the gifts of today's Basin in favour of that which can never be
retrieved. Why? I cannot even fathom from what misguided depths they conjure
these desires. What good can be brought forth from wishing for yesterday,
indeed...what good can be brought from shunning the tools and abilities of today
in favour of what once was? Glancing at a small, hideously deformed Kethuru,
tentacles carressing my facial features as though to memorise them by touch, I
take his flails to indicate agreement. Snorting softly, I pluck a piece of
errant lint from my elbow, carefully selecting the thread of my thoughts from
the tangled skein that sits in a bundle before me. Well, their ignorance is none
of my concern. It is more my seething frustration, barely tethered beneath the
surface of my consciousness, when I consider how poorly our heritage and
knowledge has been fed to those youngest of our great Engine. Aye, they'll kill
alongside us, but the reason for which this is done is attributed solely to the
carnal pleasure of destruction. There is no meaning in it, and thus our strength
is obscured beneath the singularly selfish agendas of the wise and unwise alike,
existing because they are able to do so, but taking so little meaning from it as
to make me wonder, momentarily, why I should struggle against that which is
clearly not a novel state of emotion.

I'm not content to be as they are, and I know that there are others, a very
select few, who feel the same. A revival. We need a revival of our beliefs,
thrust into our skulls with the force of a beast's trample to our temples. With
this sudden realisation comes a slow trickle of a sticky, wet substance across
my cheekbone. What meaning do the great Lords and Lady Demon hold for even those
of my own fold? Superficial tenets, drilled into our heads from the earliest of
ages, but where have our bone-deep understandings gone? They are separate, they
are apart. Lady Nifilhema relishes the purity and simplicity of pain, and
torture, discomfort of a physical sense. This is obvious enough to penetrate
without exception. What knowledge are we sharing, however, of how deep such
agony can burrow? Brow furrowing as I contemplate this, I redouble my efforts in
freeing a particularly stubborn piece of flesh. Have we given up on the
challenge of instilling in young nihilists the joys of mental warfare, where we
can manipulate with such subtlety as to wreak havoc more unbearable than the
needle-sharp feeling of pain that is known to expire when the flesh can no
longer sustain its injuries? What is torture, if not the infliction of that most
dreaded with the intent to lengthen one's exposure past any point of feeling
anything beyond its horrifying clarity? Torture is not torture until your
subject is indistinguishable in consciousness from the pain itself. I rub a
thoughtful thumb down the bridge of my nose, noting dispassionately a queer gap
where the tender flesh of my upper lip should be.

How much time has passed? Glancing away from my progress in prying loose my
smallest finger's nail from its snug, cozy bed, I cannot help but feel a
moment's despair at how unguided and reckless my thoughts thus far have been. Am
I any closer to determining what my role should be in this complex business of
existing with some semblance of meaning? Somehow, I'm rather certain I'm not.
What, then, do I require to find fulfillment? Accomplishment in the furthering
of our mighty city's interests, yes. Personal glory? No..I am a legend within my
own mind, and this confidence is sated, ego stroked, by praises I can heap upon
myself. Ah! I most certainly wish to aid in shaping tomorrow as our ancestors
have shaped today. Even in a private, unrecognised sense, I can nearly taste the
sweet nectar of control and success as it would be if I were to see even a small
initiative wrought by my own hand. That's it, then, isn't it, that sense of
control?

Gods, please, let me find that control. I lied. I want the glory, I want the
recognition, and I want the scum of the Basin to know that it was me, my hand,
my abilities, that present to them any number of facets of life as it is
experienced, then. I won't be anonymous, my ego isn't pathetic, you twits, and I
won't be enticed into looking upward into a sky grown dark with the bodies of
countless birds inducing courtship by way of their odd little dances. I will
make my vision of Magnagora and retrieve from obscurity the pride of new
clothing ..no, the pride of our entity in its entirety as a vocal, tempestuous
source of absolute domination. Those who cower from our wrath and supremacy will
do so by virtue of what we have done, and what we will do, and why. I won't
forgive them, none of us will, for their denial of the Taint and its beauty. The
feet of the fae, as well as the rest of those furry little pests, can burn in
the scorching fires of Nil for all that it matters to me. We will be great, we
will know this greatness, and I shall bring it about. Alone. Unless that duck is
more hungry than he let on, in which case I should count myself lucky to have
reached this epiphany before his queerly upturned beak has had a chance to
digest the bits and pieces of my person scattered upon the ground around me and
he turns his appetite upon what's left of my mutilated features. Tossing away a
crumbling piece of mica flecked liberally with a black ichor and bits of hair
and bone, I rise and stumble back toward the Megalith's astral incarnation, back
toward utterly anonymous immersion as a nameless serf of Magnagora.