Cold…

Dark…

So familiar…

So slow. Where am I?

Thought things, struggle much. Understand little, but know so much. So tiring. They no gather, small thing attempt. They attempt Something. Focus no good.

Somethings change. Need happen. Don't know. But good. Know inside. But don't. Confused. Yet everything clear soon, just wait. I know it. From where, I dont. I am just understand. Need wait. Instructions simple.

They are gathering. Things are no longer as slow. Easier to form thoughts. But not quite thoughts, weird. Understand them, know content, but no thoughts. My head hurts, but it's not my head. Too much to handle. Must wait a bit more, let them gather. Not yet time.

Once again things become clearer, more concise and easier for me to conceptualise. My ‘thoughts’ struggled to form, I can understand them and what they’re trying to convey, but I can’t express them as thoughts. It’s still tiring to even attempt to understand my current state, let alone try to gather and use my thoughts. The… things acted in small bits, shifting and changing form, attempting to build something. I know what it is, but at the same time I don’t. But what I do know is that it will help me, in one way or another, it's akin to a gut feeling, or as close as it can get inside a metaphysical body, or whatever it is that I'm currently taking the form of.

I’m able to feel something happening in this void of a place, but there are no signs of it anywhere. If I couldn’t ‘feel’ it, I wouldn’t believe that something is happening here, stirring in this empty, stagnant place. Time is not time, huh, despite change occurring, there is no way to record it, so has it really changed? After all, time is just a measurement for change. I spent some ‘time’ actively trying to aid in the gathering of the… stuff and the formation of the thing, with a lack of results to show for it.

It then just hit me, I now know why my thought’s can’t form, yet I'm still able to ‘think’, why I’m able to ‘feel’ something happening, why the activity around me was so basic yet undetectable and weird. It was Emotion, pure Emotion which transcended senses in a physical form, the building blocks of a person.

There's nothing here because it’s all in a primal form, one where material is present but there is a lack of shape or definition for it to be recognised. There’s so little activity occurring ‘around me’ because Emotion is so simple, it can only change bit by bit, but once it does, it can do so much more. It just needs direction.

And that was all it took to obtain the catalyst for change.

A deep buzz, a warm, fuzzy ‘feeling’ became present. Joy, that’s what it was, the joy of gaining the first piece of a puzzle, the start of a web of events which will eventually lead to… something. But I know that I should look forward to it, no matter what it may be.

The Emotion quickly took form under the direction of that joy, forming something great, the key to the ‘thing’. Its shape became more defined as the joy directed more Emotion towards it, eventually creating a circle in ‘front’ of ‘me’. Direction makes no sense here even if I use myself as an anchor, so for now it’s a temporary designation.

The circle did nothing, so I waited for a while. It could have been seconds, it could have been eternity, that doesn’t matter. What does is that it’s beginning to change.

Its form shifted, elongating on various ‘sides’, yet remaining unchanged in others. Streams of it started leaking inside, pooling towards the empty centre, forming another circle. But this time it was accompanied by a sense of belonging within ‘me’. By the ‘time’ it stopped, it was glowing. It has become an eye.

Light. There was finally something here which I could ‘see’ and not just feel.

Emotion started bubbling as it moved towards ‘me’, fusing itself inside, becoming a core.

As soon as it took its place as a core, a pulse of something emerged from within me, journeying into the beyond, travelling through the Emotion, whether or not it was guided by joy.

The dullness receded as lights formed from nothing, converging into threads which weaved themselves into complex chains. All of which appeared to be anchored to myself, which I could finally feel. A Symbol, that’s what this form is. It was a representation of myself, at least a part of it. While it’s not and never will be as advanced, powerful or important as a Pattern, it’s the best thing a Mundane like me could get. It's not an embodiment of my entirety and more, but it is of my knowledge, skill and power. But what I’m controlling isn’t the entire Symbol, but a part of it, one which has been designed with a goal in mind, one which I haven’t yet realised. I know that the rest of the Symbol is here, but I don’t and can’t know its exact location, just that it's beyond the ocean of light motes.

Thoughts began to form as nodes appeared on the threads, true thoughts this time, linking to a far away place. It seems that a sense of time, direction and comprehension have started to form alongside the ideas. While the chains had structure, I could see and feel some wisps of light around me drifting away, bumping into others and fusing, creating more than just thoughts. They remained in motion until they touched a node, losing their form and strengthening the link, changing it in a way which seemed to bring the things so far away closer. While this was all so fascinating to ‘watch’, the content of those links are what I'm feeling a sense of compulsion towards. So I wait once again, armed now with a sense of time but also an eager sense of anticipation, not an Emotion awaiting the catalyst for change.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Fragments are forced through the nodes which brought them, their contents were free for me to take. They were windows, yet they contained so much, so much emotion, so much feeling, so many things so much more advanced than the lights. They are my memories, information of what I am, an anchor to keep me… well me I guess. And so they all came back, the fragments, the windows in which myself is shown and made out of. Quite broken and sad if I do say so myself.

And now it’s time for the big question, what happened to me?

While many memories returned to me, there are some which haven’t appeared at the nodes. I note that these memories are appearing in a sort of order, regardless of the chaos they appear to be in, but this is a preliminary observation to begin forming ideas and a solution, so I may be wrong.

What I can notice is that the fragments arrive based on size, distance and content. The bigger the memory, the longer it takes to arrive, probably due to the size of the nodes and the threads. The larger the distance between here and the initial position of the fragments affects how long it takes to arrive, the older memories tend to be brought here later compared to the more recent ones. And that just leaves the content of the fragments; what memories are contained within them?

Even factoring the content of this into the arrival time, the content of the memories tend to affect the arrival as well. Each fragment had different memories; while some had similar contents, they were never identical. Actions, thoughts, emotions, environment. No matter how similar each memory was, there is always a difference between those factors. While all of these were linked, the main factor in arrival time seemed to be the emotion felt in the moments.

The ‘happy’ memories are quite quick to arrive, being filled with that warm feeling which I recognise as joy, with the most notable ones being when I'm with either a-Tai, Ferdi, the Blayfenats or with a few other Seekers. But the main ones which held joy were the ones with a-Tai, my boy, the protection of his happiness is my main goal in life after all. While I can’t be proud of my condition in Jikolaoiten, I can be proud to say that I did my best to raise someone right, even if my senses and standards are skewered, that I did my best to give the best to someone so that they can become a loved person instead of a broken weapon. It brought a smile to my face, once again seeing that baby and remembering the joy of finally finding someone else, even if it was unfortunate to an extreme degree to be there. But it gave joy to the defeated child that was me, and that’s all that mattered in the moment.

I let myself experience joy again for a brief period, because I know that the other fragments are arriving later because the memories within them hurt. They didn’t light a sense of warmth within me, but doused me in a waterfall of the numbing cold, the infernos of rage, and brought the plaguing pain. It seems that this will be the largest number of fragments with specific content, but it won’t be the worst. Some of the measures I’ve put into place have decided to prepare me for something by developing this weird memory return tolerance. Just how bad do my experiences get?

It turns out, they get very bad and they hurt. They hurt a lot. Death, lots of death, every time a Seeker died, it stung. Every time family was killed, my weak heart ruptured, every time a-Tai was hurt, I was too. And when Ferdi’s smile faded, so did a part of me. The grief became so bad, everything started to become numb, everything just became another item on a long, growing list. Another wish to fulfill, another chain to bind me, and another mark I must carry… another artefact to use in a crisis, no matter how much it feeds on my heart to do so.

But there was also the scary anger and the terrifying ruthlessness. The raging infernos baptised me in anguish, setting my heart alight to guide my way to vengeance. Burning everything down, making a trail of ashes to forge a vain trophy of pathetic self consolation. But the numbing cold was even worse. The rage didn’t simmer and burn, no, it became an ocean which consumed, stripping away anything which didn’t aid in the task, everything became a tool, especially myself. It was a cold killer which drowned everything with a hate which resembled emptiness, leaving a trail of bodies, all for a narrow minded goal which hurts everyone around me.

But even these weren’t the end, no, they were the tough love which was given to prepare me for these. It wasn’t a raging inferno or an all consuming, self destructive killer which resided here, no, it was far worse. Emptiness, betrayal, the unthinkable, and last but not least, the unravelling. Each one hurts in its own way, but each unique and unreplicable, as it should be, nothing should ever be experienced like these. These fragments will never arrive here, I know it, because they’re all sealed away in containment, each one kept in different places for different reasons, but all are still so damaging.

I know a general overview of some of the fragments, they are my memories after all, but even then, my existence struggled with them. Fear, that’s what I felt while thinking of these fragments, the general overview was only a simple understanding of the contents, not a full picture of the experiences I lived through. But even that haunted me, it’s inimaginable trying to to understand my state in those moment’s, it’s incomprehensible trying to figure out what happened. The only way to know is to experience it once again, even if my current self can feel the primal, desperate rejection inside me.

But these aren’t the full extent of my memories, even if I’m currently incomplete I know that there’s more to them. How dangerous are they to the point where It’s safer for me to remember and once again experience the decimation of myself in body, mind and soul? And then it clicked, what’s more dangerous than the entirety of one's erasure are the means used to do so. While I have experienced the destruction of my identity on multiple levels before, what’s scary isn't the pain and emptiness, but the ease of which it can be caused by.

Some of these fragments are completely sealed, preventing me from catching even a glimpse of them, while others I know aren’t just sealed, but purposely forgotten, only able to be accessed through the use of multiple channels and tools. They’re in my Symbol, somewhere and I know that I'm incomplete without them, but that's for the best. If even the slightest restoration of myself involved the use of those hidden memories, they might just break me down even further, removing all traces of me from both the world, its stream and the god’s which haven’t yet transcended. It would be a fate worse than the state I was in which allowed for the compulsion placed on me, to act as it wanted, directed by a manipulator to ascertain the events.

While it seems like time has no meaning here, I shouldn't dawdle and act like it’s an infinite resource, I have to treat this like I’m restoring myself before an impending war. While I should do my best to bring myself to the best state I can, I have to be ready to jump into combat at any given moment regardless of it. So without further ado, here I go.

These memories were unsurpassable in terms of the agony it brought out compared to the previous fragments. These ones didn’t break my heart and bring out my worst nightmares, no, they’re worse to the point that it was laughable, where even the slightest comparison seems like a poor attempt at comedy by a heartless bastard in the wrong moment. Reliving these memories felt like I lost more than I could ever gain. I once again went through the unravelling of identity, being stripped of anything which distinguished myself from the Qetioluy which devoured my very being. The transformation of an individual into a worthless puppet used solely for the whims of an obsessive, malformed creature. There was no life, there was no death. There were no thoughts, there was no will, no control remained of themselves from the individual, only an eternity of captivity, a prisoner in their own bodies.

Thoughts are cages and desires become their own form of torture. These were memories which made Jikolaoiten in general feel like paradise, make the void and its corruption seem full and cleansing even if these happened in there, nothing else which occurred there could unmake a person as these events could. Emptiness. That was all that was left. Desecrated to the point where not even dust remains, a perpetual white picture of nothing, where nothing exists and nothing ever will. Where nothing has meaning, so the only thing you can do is wish for escape, an end no matter the outcome. In this form, madness was no longer a ravenous ailment, but the dreams and cures of the taken.

My form was trembling, flakes of light unravelling and grounding into dust as it suffered through the returned memory. It’s understandable now, the reason why I broke, why I wanted to end myself and why I’m now here in this form. I was recovering in the best way I could, being alert and vigilant to react to any hurdle, but also preparing for the push onwards, my eternal struggle.

But now that I'm mostly functioning and able to think, it’s time that I do some checkups, fix any flaws which may have arisen in this new place, repeat the cycles, remember everything which can safely be done so, and last but not least, regain control of my body. You only live once unless you’re Ruptured afterall, I'm not eternal, the only thing I can do is take this regained chance at life and make the most out of it.