COVER PAGE
LA MISERIÍ CORD HUMANITATÎ
image [https://i.imgur.com/PrkLmVC.png]
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Pars N –
For more than a century the Romantique Republique, based in Lavendre, had been in a state of strict self-induced isolation, along with most other states within Southern Dramaturgia and perhaps the world. No one entered; no one left. The Republique constructed a great wall around its borders to enforce this.
‘La déçenniè du solei rougèe’, as it was called, was divine punishment of some kind, so they thought. So much happened at once; the Helios turned red, stars fell from the sky, ash filled the air, and a shadow formed in the poles. Superstitions took hold; thus, it was so: no longer would the ancient concord between humanity and the Supreme Goddess of Creation be ignored; with this wall, harmony was restored.
The Supreme Goddess of Creation had ordained that all the five lands were to keep to themselves and never change; Her sentinels enforced this. Yet time changed all, and thus Théa ordained: the world was to be reset every millennium; the present would ascend, and a new incarnation would inherit the world. The current incarnation, however, had forsaken Théa’s will, and thus a thousand years beyond, there they remained: left behind to wander this dying world.
For the superstitious this was true, but reality was ever boring in its complexity.
As the world grew colder year by year, the Republique became dryer and agriculture became more unsustainable; superstitions cooled as pragmatism returned. The Republique dispatched Voyagers to rediscover the rest of Dramaturgia – the continent they called home –, and to reconnect with the other communes, map out the contemporary conditions of the continent in general – relevant strategic locations in particular.
Voyagers were equipped in traditional Romantiqan musqatér attire – cape, feathered-hat, rapier, and all – but they were not true musqatérs. They were trained in both the arcane arts of Magica and the military tactics of Brytangia, two far-away lands not their own. They were equipped with standard wrist-carried grappling hooks, Brytangian engineered not Dramaturgic; and spell-card dispensers carried on the wrist and thigh, if they preferred spell-cards over incantations. They carried specialized gasmasks and respirators designed to be easily attached to their Southern half-masques.
Indeed, those simpler days of the original musqatérs were gone.
« Quand Théa vidit quód Guevmen agirat, omne af iratad suad mundu devoratùs »
Pars I –
It had been more than two-years since the Voyagress left the walls of the Republique. Within her two-years of travel she, sine timore, had traveled much of the South reconnecting with the communes of Las Peñysulas and Centralia Orientale. Her ambition was to explore the world over, but her immediate goal was to enter the North.
Two-years and she finally reached the Great River which separated Southern Dramaturgia from her Northern sibling.
Her masque-concealed eyes gazed at the river as her automaton-driven carriage trailed it. It was the largest river in the world, once.
[This is the Great River?] the Voyagress lamented; Vræmente, çe mondé est en træn de mouríre. Truly, the world was dying.
The Great River was barren, though not completely empty. It looked more like a crack in the earth, poetic really.
Dramaturgia was the land of masques and shadow, separated by a crack: the arcane full-masque Northern tradition and the non-arcane half-masque Southern tradition. The masque was the heart of Dramaturgians and the source of their selves. Yet the North truly believed it; the South not so much. The North could read the masque perfectly and know who the heart of a person was at a glance; the South not so much. The North had arcane talents and rituals; the South not so much.
The crack between them grew and grew, leaving behind a trail of sectarian conflicts until ultimately…
The Voyagress’s thought process was interrupted. She almost did not notice it, but there it was: a bridge. Brytangian titanium seemingly; it was constructed by their Protectorate. It was large and wide, with an old railroad in the middle of what appeared to be roads.
As she approached the bridge, something began to infect her mind, though she tried to ignore it. What could possibly be causing such a burning feeling in her heart? Surely it was nothing? She knew it was not.
She dismounted; she would walk the way. She crossed the bridge, moving closer and closer to the North. Her stomach became diseased; her heart ignited; her breathes, her mind, it was all starting to collapse. She stopped and turned back, lest she lose herself.
There was so much Romantiqa had to atone for; so much Rose had to atone for; so much she had to atone for.
«Ea quejùs anima á sanguine de patribùs damnatois portatùr, resonantías véĝilantes victamarùm timet»
Pars II –
« [As of yet it remains unclear whether the Protectorate and the Minervan Symphonia will stand down; though as the situation stands, it appears the two superpowers are on the verge of total war regarding the dispute on the Neoclassican continent.] »
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« [Most of the population was exterminated as the Minervans made their advance, any survivors sold into slavery.] »
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« [Protectorate flametroopers burned the surrendering Minervans alive, in a gross violation of Providence’s will.] »
Et quand siĝillum septimum aperirat, silențía.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
A nightmare. The Voyagress awoke in a cold sweat. Voyager training stipulated the study of centuries-old radio recordings, hard not to get them stuck in the head.
When did she even set up camp? Where was she? Who was she? « Putæn de merdé, [why am I like this?] » she muttered.
It was night, she gazed her eyes up and saw it: the Supreme Eye, its spiral arms stretched across the sky. It was hard to describe how big it was; it took up the entire horizon and half the sky; so large that you’d always see some part of it no matter when or where. Opposite to it was the Lesser Eye, same shape but farther away; bigger than the moon, Cynthia, but not as bright. Squint the eyes, and behold even the Little Lesser Eye, more a smudge in the sky than an Eye.
She was a mage of the cosmic branch; the stars put her to ease. The Voyagress looked to her carriage; now was the perfect time to assemble her telescope.
The night sky was quite barren; there weren’t many stars in it aside from the Eyes. Even without light pollution, it was always like this.
The Voyagress looked at the sky, now with a telescope. She searched for her favorite star, Magentium. Unlike any of the white dots in the sky, Magentium was magenta, as the name may imply. It was a planet, apparently, but gaze for too long, with a telescope especially, tingled the eyes. It produced its own light, enough to be somewhat visible, but not enough to be bright as the sun; it wasn’t like the other gas balls that danced around Helios.
She started brooding as she stared. The sciences have made the sky more boring. The Eyes were composed of billions of stars, stars were balls of plasma, et cetera. Not gods nor divine. Providence forsaken if the sciences figure out the nature of the arcane, then humanity will have lost all that was interesting.
« Vampírais videtais dom Théa Guevminem ad terram ex astreis apportaut; ‹Qués sont?› ‹Quer huc sont?› Vampírae Théam inaurétam interrogant. »
Pars III –
The Voyagress was frustrated, her mind would not let her cross that bridge. She had learned to cast flying spells by being thrown out of an airship; she did not fear death. She knew the reason for her mind’s terror, but it was clouded in a fog. For now, she will trail the Great River west to the coast.
Days went by.
The Voyagress had not felt this rotten on the inside since...
Her mind became more aware of details she normally tuned out. The landscape was scarred and disformed; a battle had happened here. She hadn’t realized just how accustomed she was to the rusted remains of century old automatons, armored engines, and steam tanks. She also began to notice more geographical details as well; the cannel-like rivers that once filled the area were dry and empty.
Rapid glaciation in the poles had lowered global precipitation. The world’s climate was in a state of total collapse.
More days went by, and one day it began to snow. The Voyagress looked at the snow; it was the first time she saw such a thing. During times of old, Dramaturgia never snowed this far south. ‹ Commente la poegnè de l'ombre peut-elle être si bellé? › she thought. How can the shadow’s grip be so beautiful?
Days onwards, the coast was in sight, not a beach, rather a cliff. Southern Dramaturgia did not have a proper connection to the ocean; its edges were above sea-level.
The Voyagress moved close to the edge, gazing down and beyond. The ocean was gone, or rather farther back than it used to be; glaciation had dropped global sea-levels; once a shallow sea, now a salt-dune. She observed until she noticed them, people. People from the land of myth and legends: Neclassicans.
Ecke equos albos et quí vehjente com arco ad conquistam exjut.
No Dramaturgian could ever mistake the origins of those shiny-steel muscle cuirasses and dinky hoplite helmets. They could be slavers, raiders, Minervan remnants (somehow), Providence knew what else. Barbaroe sont.
She withdrew from the edge and dispensed a spell-card, Gravitational Reflection. She gazed at the card and the sigil inscribed; her eyes ignited with the Sigil of the Arcane, the mark that separated humanity and its patrons from them and it.
Her Essence flowed from her and dissolved the card, rose color by nature but the spell commanded it be the color of the cosmos; it read the spell and its encoded commands within less than a second. The glow of her eyes hidden by her masque radiated with Essence. Her Essence did as commanded; a gravity anomaly was created: light was warped to create a reflection. When angled properly, she could see the Neclassicans perfectly behind her cover.
The Neclassicans were equipped with…breechloading rifled matchlocks? Neclassican ingenuity. Why Neclassicans were straddling around the salt-dune was unknown, but the Voyagress had spells and a repeating rifle; they were no threat. Though, the Neclassicans had their own form of the arcane in the form of their gods and myths. She wasn’t going to dispatch them; perhaps she should talk to them.
She casted a mass-reduction spell and grappled down.
« Vampírae relictae voveront quod Théa de inșanite sues filíesque deștruánda. »
Pars IV –
The Neclassicans were communicative. They did not speak Rose Romantique or Standard Northern, but they spoke a similar language from Mediaevlia, the land of honor and chivalry; communication was possible with some effort. They were not native Neclassicans of Elașian or Latén creed, but descendants of refugees. The polar shadow had devoured Mediaevlia, as it had Brytangia, and moved ever southwards.
The Voyagress was pointed to something interesting, though. Deep within the salt-dune was a graveyard of dreadnaughts. She had to see it, for the sake of the Republique in theory, her curiosity primarily.
Her carriage was still on the mainland, so she traversed by foot. The salt-dune’s air was likely suboptimal to breathe, so she equipped her respirator.
Hours of walking, she realized it was too far. She casted her fly spell-card, which was scarce in her deck, and flew the remaining distance.
Ecke equos rufer et éaí quoí sedentí datùs erat imperíum ut capat paçem ex terrad.
They were pacifists, originally; their Providence ordained peace at all costs. In some ways, even after contact, they still were, just twisted.
The Brytangians hailed from the far north of the world, from the land of steam and machinations. The Grande Protectorate was the most powerful apparatus to have ever existed in Historia’s play; where they blew future’s winds, the whole world followed. The Symphonia formed in reaction, wanting to preserve the future they knew.
Now here the Voyagress was, staring at the remains of once the pride of their navy. Rusting away. She and that boat were the same in a way. Time moved onwards; the Protectorate was left behind, the Minervans too; the Northern tradition was dead, a genocide done by her grandfathers.
Quéd in terrad aĝiente stas, Viatréx?
This entire time, her mind clung on to whatever distractions it could to escape from what she needed to do. The only path was forward; lest her mind fall behind, rusting as the stages of Historia’s play moved on towards the future.
She left the dreadnaught to return to the mainland. She will cross that damn bridge.
« Quand rogante pro salvațione Guevmen Vampíras venirat, éais acĉipitùs fueront nam ipșae af Théad inșanitî derélictae ețjam. »
« [When Goffmen had come to the Vampires asking for salvation, the Vampires accepted them, for they too were abandoned by the Goddess of Madness.] »
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image [https://i.imgur.com/BKWRjWG.png]
Viĝile astra, viatréx; nos af Euis videmur