Fael have mercy,

Such things should never be seen,

Light brings forth darkness.

The tree is my guiding light. The roots are my sturdy path. The sun is a lie. The darkness is a lie. The sounds are a lie. The images… they are a lie. They have to be. I know not how to describe it, but seeing… hearing… experiencing those things – it is like looking at a broken hand without feeling pain. It is like exploring a nightmare with the intention of meeting one's greatest fear, sitting down, having a chat and then feeling my navel twist into my sternum – my palm becomes my toes – my brain squeezing out my kneecaps. Such images cannot be – such thoughts and feelings are an impossibility and yet for some reason it is here. The feeling is there. The images make sense yet I cannot fathom them. The sounds have taste, the feelings have smell, the sights have feelings – my body feels numb. The tree sheds a bright light fueled by the bodies of those I have returned to its twisted and ancient roots. Bliss walks forward – I wonder if they can comprehend a single element of what is… everywhere yet nowhere. At the center of everything – every feeling, taste, sight, smell, sound and thought is dreg. Dreg wraps itself around all as a torturous cloak of ill intentions. A drape of misery. Dreg… its true purpose is here. Written in the lives of those it has taken. Each person here still has their weapon with them – a partner that they cannot give up. Langnet’s Road is the only place where curses happen? No. No I see it now. The plane of purity most definitely led me down this road but Savra is the cruel mistress that grabbed my soul and rended the very sanity from my soul. I have seen light so blinding that in comparison, how can dreg… how can humans or any mere being be anything but darkness, And dreg is the crystallization of darkness. The hardened form of misery. The purest form of evil in the world. So why do we use it as money? Why are we using a morphed abomination of ill intentions? I will never understand what I have witnessed, nor do I believe that my brain will ever be able to recover the memories yet here I stand. Or sit. Moving forward guided by a ray of light emanating from the tree. It cuts through… that. Gives me hope. Guides me to a future. What more could I want?

What is the point of everything right now?

Humanity is an evil mistake.

I beg I promise, I kneel and vow,

Dreg is evil that leaves death in its wake.

But dreg gives life, and dreg gives death. Dreg is at the center of all but it also is the cause of so much misery. Every person that has gone on this march has had an exquisite dreg weapon on their person. Why? What is the purpose of giving dreg to one who walks on this road? What is the point of letting all these criminals have their weapons? I could escape because I had a moment with my weapon and no matter the case, it would not be strong enough to walk Savra’s fine work. Fine work? After all this, I still find it in me to pay her a compliment? Why can I not stop calling her a ‘her’? This is foolish and yet, she is alive. Breathes life into my actions through each cut and must be terribly angry with me for abandoning her like that. Yet, was she not the one who abandoned me? No, I dropped her. My willpower was strong enough and now I have no real weapon. A monster attack would be much more deadly although I suppose I could always use another weapon. Another piece of dreg that could serve as – no, that defeats the purpose. I must now get to the bottom of this mystery. Why by Wol’zarath has every single person who came here appeared with their weapon is perfect form? I fear what is in the damned emergency box. Could that have returned Savra to me after all this time? I think if I were to see her again… well I don’t know. One part of me thinks it would be fine and I could just let go once more, but the other side knows that my willpower might not be strong enough to overcome her alluring form again. I cannot kill but she does so, so much more. Dah, there I go again, thinking about Savra in a positive light when she should really be known as a soul-thieving bitch. Was that too harsh? Harsh? It is a damned blade. Why would such a thing be hard at all? It is inanimate. It is motionless. It is everything but alive. So why does it feel so? Fucking dreg, it is always at the center of these types of issues. Without it, who knows what humanity might have created. What weapon of mass destruction would we have put together? What orders would we have blindly been following if not the order of ‘make money so you can live to spend money so you need to make more.’ Even when I had no soul, my soul was still bound to dreg and paying for services. Dreg is useless in almost every situation, save for the few mages that somehow are able to create their own. Mages? I recall seeing that such things exist, but who they are or what they can do is still a mystery. Perhaps one day I will be able to see whats happening in person and learn about dreg. No, I want to destroy it. I want every dreg weapon to be melted and turned into a harmless form. How does one forge dreg? How does one get it to create a new shape? In the life as Statue, there was a figure that could have given me answers but alas, that was not my life. I know not where that person would even be in the world. Dreg is a poison that only keeps spreading. It is truly its namesake – the dreg of humanity. The dregs of the world. The dregs of one’s soul. That is what must make sense, for nothing else that I have witnessed here does.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

The road continues to twist and wind. It is completely flat, eerily so. If the road starts straightening up, I might be in a dream once more. No, I cannot remember when I ever had a dream – a nightmare once more it is. A nightmare where the swirling eyes of purple return and are excited to see me. There is a faint pounding of feet walking through sludge. Laughter. Snorting. Slurping. There is a massive humanoid figure wading its way through the thick paste of bodies with a shining endless grin on its face. The grin is forehead to forehead, with eyes in the middle of its endless smile. The eyes dart around the sludge, looking for something that cannot be merely found. Its hands are huge and each have seven fingers. It has a long cloak on to hide its many impurities but I can see it for what it really it – a monster. Its teeth shine like rows of worn blades. Its tongue rolls playfully against its mouth., creating different twisted shapes and images. It stops walking and kneels. It stares at the sludge and opens its gargantuan unnatural smile. The slurping intensifies. The sludge begins to drain – it this what keeps this place in check or is it merely an illusion to keep me distracted? It matters not which, all that matters is that the body sludge has been drained – it burps. Keels over. Heaves. Barely breathes. Smiles uncontrollably. An indescribable colour dribbles down its chin – it throws up. Violently launching an oily black substance everywhere and high into the air. It splatters on the ground, walks, ceiling, and everything. Ceiling? How can there be a ceiling here and yet I can see it splattered there? It hardens. It falls from the splatter as a hard black material. Black metal. A familiar shine, it has – this is dreg. Awful, twisted dreg in its purest form. Bliss walks as if nothing is happening – as if nothing is going on. Perhaps only I can see this dark and grim reality before me, or maybe this is just a vision by the Watcher made to make me doubt everything. Regardless, I must move forward. I swear, one day I will leave this place and never return. The monster dives into the sludge and disappears. It… didn’t walk on the road. This cursed bridge of human ambition.

The clip-clopping of horse hooves has kept my sanity in place, regardless of how it tries to escape my psyche. The faintest spotlight of normalcy is being emanated by the tree, oh it is wonderful. Wait, with this creature it does beg the question: Is the dreg weapon here needed because it requires both a body and dreg for more to be made or is it merely here because that is what the Watcher wanted me to see. This all might be a lie – no, it is a lie. No truth could ever be this dark – and yet it most definitely could. What, am I about to cry about evil acts?

“Honestly Fa, there are no tricks here. I did not anticipate showing you what really happens to those who die with dreg, yet here we are.”

Hello, Watcher.

“Greetings – wow, you are so polite these days. I must say, your current position about dreg is quite… annoying. Quite irritating if I must say so myself. I am here to remind you that dreg is the strongest weapon. The most powerful material you can use. Who cares where it comes from? Wol’zarath the damned tree really does have a mind of its own.”

Tree? The one I fed?

“Yes, that one. Every time I look at it, I am disappointed – regardless, now you know your fate. You shall be transformed into a sentient monster. One that cannot kill but needs to. Has no choice but to.”

Wait… if I die, will you turn me into dreg?

“Well, that is a lot more straightforward than anticipated but yes! Suppose the proverbial cats is out the bag in some sense. You see, I truly am here for revenge and all that, but in order to do that, I have created the most wonderful trap. You shall become a beautiful weapon. A weapon that can never speak and yet can feel each moment you cut into the flesh of the innocent. Who can taste bone and bile as someone is stabbed. You will forever be there, trying to end it all but unable to do so.”

So, wait, is Savra…?

“I shall leave that up to your imagination, Fa.”

Savra… it… she… please no. What have I done?