For sixty years, I served the Engine.

In that time, I stood as High Priestess and Voice of Fain; I sat upon
His Crimson Council. I served as Seditionist, Iconoclast, Mystagogue and
Heresiarch of the Nihilists; so too did I serve as the Cacophony's
Mistress of the Hall and Aois-Dana. Upon my brow is the honour of the
Cult of the Damned; so truly have I served the Engine that I was
honoured and recognized as one of those who so defined the identity of
the city - my peers have been Daevos Feyranti, Nariah d'Iasani, Aiakon
d'Murani, Linaeve d'Murani, Nymerya de la Koicei.

But as I have served, so did I come to realize the falsities within
Magnagora itself. A rot eats away at the city. I do not speak of the
Taint; the question of the effluvia of the Soulless and its identity is
a stale argument. Scholars have debated the merits and drawbacks. Wars
have been fought over the very existence. Entire races have been damned
over the very side effect of what was once a common artifact of the
Heralds of Magnora's presence within reality.

Neither do I cast aspersions upon the Patrons of Magnagora. The Divine
are as ineffible, and as distant from us, as aging parents upon the face
of the Basin. Dear reader, do think upon our purpose: we are as puppets,
amusements, and toys to the Divine, who themselves are shrinking surely
in number, decade by decade. The Immanidivinus is sealed. Dynara has
departed; Estarra lacks the ability, it seems, to manifest Deity.

The cause of the rot within the Engine lies squarely on the shoulders of
the citizens. While the young are left to dither and fall into lack of
discipline, the elders who still bear the energy to stir, recall the
glory days, but not what spawned them. The Engine produces fewer and
fewer demigods; those risen within the past two or three decades have
all but departed, or have fallen into despair and an uneasy sleep. Those
few who seek to raise the city from the ashes are at the point of a
knife they hold to their very breast - ego, inability to divorce
personal gain from the good of the city. So too can be seen the sullen,
tired exploitation of the more energetic among the citizens.

The Engine falters.

Hostility runs rampant; the Order of Fain, Himself a disinterested
player of chess upon the boards of mortality and divinity, became a
battleground of politics before it too sunk into mire. The once famed
tools of the Lord of Hatred are dulled and useless. Heirophants rise,
but find little more than maggots and dust to serve. Whither Thoros, one
asks, or Aiakon? The answer from the gilded halls is naught but silence
or a pious muttering resounding of no import.

Seven Warlords have come and gone since Daevos Feyranti vacated the
position. The last, a Nihilist, may very well be the last seated upon
the Iron Throne, having inherited a city in shambles and a group of
warriors more suited to maundering over old trophies than fighting even
a defensive action on their own planes. The last great warrior of the
Engine ascended and vanished, taking with him one million power and the
last rallying point of a crumbling city.

But even this is a symptom of the problem. The Engine crumbled within
days of the absence of its Warlord - not the sign of a healthy
organization. The Engine turns to whips to urge on the population, but
finds instead of conscripts who might be forged into dragoons, the dregs
of other cities and the communes. The rejects and traitors of other
nations have become a goodly part of the city of Magnagora. It is
perhaps fitting that Thoros d'Murani sat upon the Iron Throne; himself a
traitor to Celest, he served as Avatar of not merely Fain, but all those
lacking loyalty save to themselves.

Let us look not merely upon the Warlords of Magnagora for the failure of
the city, for they are mere figureheads. The city has become centred
firmly around a cult of personality, driven perhaps by slavish adherence
to figures elevated even above the Patrons of the city. Magnagora
worships individuals, placing them as the single pillar of support for
the city. Single figures stand as the last bastion of hope. Yet no
single Engine may be driven by a single cog. Inevitably, these cogs have
faltered and failed. So it is that Magnagora has faltered. Bit by bit,
the machinery has ground to a halt.

Let us look now upon the major cogs that have driven the Engine - not
those elevated by cult of personality, but those who have ensured
victory for the Engine. Vathael Feyranti and Chade d'Illici are perhaps
the most emblematic of these figures. Once discounted, these warriors
have been exhausted by the city, and turned to serve other purposes.
Where Vathael Feyranti was once passed over for Avatar, Ascended, and
leadership of the Legion, now he has become one of the most dire enemies
of the Engine. Chade d'Illici, once Warlord of Magnagora in his own
right, now serves the Glomdoring, and takes the hand of the very
Marshall herself. Magnagora does not merely drive the useful citizens
away, but turns them against herself.

Failure has become endemic, catastrophic. The supposed greatest virtue
of the Engine - the ability to adapt and embrace change - has become a
sham. It is notable that even as the city has failed, the Legion, who
urges transformation and evolution, has slipped into slumber, His Avatar
turning himself to serve the Glomdoring. The Priesthood of the
Ouroborous has failed in their holy mission; the city itself has become
stagnant.

And yet, Magnagora has succeeded admirably in one function - it has fed
itself into the crucible for a new change. Where the Taint was fostered
and preserved, so has it created a graveyard full of fertile earth for
new growth. As Old Celest destroyed itself in a single stroke, so does
Magnagora fester and fall apart, having little but wreckage.

Therefore, I say it is time for Magnagora to be abandoned. The body has
died; the head has yet to realize it. Citizens of the Engine, turn from
the yoke that has been cast upon you. Leave the land of the dead - your
Transformation is found in the Wyrden Woods, in the adaptation to the
shadows. Even your Demon Lords have bowed to the will of Nature - even
the Taint itself has been subsumed and consumed. Turn away from the
walls of the city that would have you willingly bend your neck to the
yoke of a wagon loaded down with immobile machinery.

You have failed. But in failing, so rises Glomdoring. Behold the glory
of the true transformation - the beauty of the Night, and the Forest of
No Mercy.


For the Transformation, I remain,
Sthai Oubliette

Penned by my hand on the 3rd of Avechary, in the year 235 CE.