The next portion of my story is difficult to tell. This is both due to the nature of my actions, and also due to nature of my mind during this time. Reconstructing what happened, some things are clear - I had learned both of the power of the world seed that was now blood bound to me, and how to utilize that power. My wish to not be alone had formed a bond, and my wish to live brought me to a new place. My mind was broken, first by the pain of the torture, then by the pain of my near death, and finally by the absorption of something far larger than myself into my own mind. Clearly, not only was I taken to another land - indeed, I found soon enough that it was another world entirely - but I also was healed. In a moment of clarity, I remember looking down at my body - naked, scarred, but once again complete, and entirely without pain. Then a wave of... something... floods memories. It may be power, or knowledge - I cannot say for sure. In my mind's eye I see an island, full of the soft warmth of the sun, bright colors of flowers and animals. Today my heart aches for it's beauty, and in my mind then a whisper sounded, fading even as it spoke, saying "come, look at the beauty you requested. Does this not heal..."

AAAAAUUUUUUUUGGGGHHHHhhhhhhhh!

Then all I see is flames - I can remember the smells of wood and flesh burning, the feel of steam rolling in waves and scorching my skin, and through it all I can hear my own voice, both inside and outside my head screaming.

The screams continued - subjectively it felt as though it was ages. What I cannot tell you is a narrative of that time - snatches are all I have. I had learned power, so very much power, in every conceivable way. Fires licked from my left hand and pure ice from my right - the air between it whipped and cracked with power.

I remember cities burning.

I remember deserts covered in falling ice.

I remember fighting, covered in dark armor with my eyes covered, blades sweeping high and low, and savoring the smell of blood thick in the air.

I remember suns turning dark.

In it all I remember two sounds - the soft voice whispering "beauty?" and the harsh rasp of the scream, slowly becoming something else, a warcry?

Some thoughts began to gain enough power to stay rooted in the swirling of the chaos within.

What is this? Am I still myself?

Have I become an evil even greater than that which caused me?

Is there any beauty greater than this pain?

Can I end this?

Then comes the first clear memory. The seed, saying nothing, brought me to a world. As my eyes recovered from the ever-present flash, I heard no question, and sadness and the beginnings of despair came from the seed.

I wasn't alone. A man in front of me stood - even with my height. He radiated thoughts and emotions - hatred for the other choked him. His hatred for himself and his own actions was there, buried under a need to not be guilty, to not be ashamed, and it's power was such that it could not be contained in the alcohol in his system, or the memories of lust and gambling in his mind. It overflowed his artificial banks and flowed into pure, undiluted hatred of the other - a flash of ears sharper and thinner than his, a thought of delicate hands and feet, and light skin - a thing, undeserving of personhood, the cause of all his evil.

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All his hatred, all his self and other loathing slammed into me and reverberated with my own anguish and hatred - as his hand rose with a knife, I combined all destructive spells I knew together into one. This spell would have destroyed, not only this man, but the whole damned planet that could spawn such a monster - and then the seed within me pulsed.

As the waves slowly floated off of me, I saw the sun glint of the steel in the butcher's hand. And, caught in the slowness of the moment, I looked beyond the man. To the other - a boy, with blond hair and silver eyes, ears that were indeed thin and sharply pointed - he was on the ground, holding his arm up to try to ward off the blow, but in his eyes was not fear, but simple resignation. The next second dripped by as I saw the rest, the bruises, some livid beyond belief on his cheeks, some faded in layers. I saw his nakedness, and an abjection and shame deeper than even my own childhood. Suddenly, I did not desire to be alone - I wanted to hear this child's voice. I wanted to know his story, and I wanted to convince him something better could come - and a echoes inside my own head said that I could not do so - what better could I offer him? The whisper spoke up against that thought - somehow weak and strong simultaneously, and told me that I could offer him togetherness, and protection - I could offer him hope, and the little pleasure of a quiet meal. Underneath it all, the whisper told me that it could offer these things to me, and that the boy would respond one day with care of his own for me as well. All I needed to do was to undo the darkness that slowly rose from my very pores.

I hoped.

As I hoped, I cut off the destruction - but as slow as time flowed, it moved swiftly enough that waves were already passing away from me, and I could stop their forming. Desperate, fearing to lose the hope I had so recently regained, I reached out and somehow seized them, but like a child in the tide, I was simply carried along in their strength. So I reshaped them; one slim finger of power I allowed to reach out to the man whose arm even now began to descend, but all the rest I hammered and grasped and rode and reshaped - I turned them, and drew them back in. As the butcher disappeared into matter finer than ashes, I felt the waves now buffeting within me. My pride would like to say I sat down, or that I gritted my teeth, or even that I threw up and released my bowels simultaneously; but all I did was drop limp.