The Newt and Demon
6.81 - Epilogue

Theo Spencer,

15h Day, Season of Death,

873rd Year of Balkor’s Betrayal

Some people might have trouble replaceing motivation when they know the end of the world is coming. But I’ve never had that problem. I grew up in a world we knew was ending. I found meaning, even if it was a bit nefarious, and pushed on to have a decent life. Yeah, I get that a lot of people misunderstand what I did on Earth before I was taken to Iaredin. Instead of correcting them, I just let them make the same statements. And yes, I understand that not being the one to pull the trigger doesn’t absolve me of sins. But whatever. You had to be there to understand.

I write this in the last days of Broken Tusk on Iaredin. I’m looking forward to the task of tipping the vote of the gods to bring my new home to the heavens. Perhaps that involves me assassinating Death, or removing him from power, but these things need to be done. Why is a piece of land so important to me? Well, I just mentioned people having a hard time replaceing meaning in the end. Hanging onto something tangible is the way to do it. If that’s a chunk of land, a group of people, or whatever, you just need to hold on like your life depends on it because it very well might.

Let’s see. What has happened since my last entry? First, let’s talk about how we saved Qavell. Not only did we not destroy the place, but we also saved its new king and got rid of whatever weird infection plagued the place. We’re talking about some dimensional being that latched onto it. Well, we had this overpowered potion that persists forever. While I doubt we’re done with that creature, we gave it something to think about. After reinforcing the City of Qavell, her people were glad to join the Southlands Alliance.

As if a mortal alliance was the biggest concern we have…

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The biggest thing to talk about here is the damn struggle for power in the heavens. Turns out the gods are all fake. Cool, cool. Those that seized power in the heavens had done so by exploiting something within the system. They could make themselves proto gods by tricking the system with the ascendance feature. Basically, a person could create a little pocket realm based energy they could cultivate on the mortal plane. Khahar was smart enough to do a little double-trick on the system, giving him a more permanent realm. But the other were all booted from their realms. Goodbye, no one will miss you.

There was an exception to this exodus, though. Uz’Xulven got to keep her realm. Mostly because she had specialized it to such a degree it latched onto Tero’gal. Lucky her.

That led to one of the most devastating effects of the change. Aligned cores all around the world were removed, or changed to the unaligned versions. Two ascendants I can think of were spared. Zaul and Glantheir. They assumed the role of Shadow and Hallow, which is cool. Zaul might have been insane, but he was always on my side. I think. He hasn’t made any outward moves since the change, so I count that as a good thing. The system let me keep his core, even if it evolved into a Shadow core.

Speaking of cores, most of the people in the alliance now have a Tero’gal themed core. I don’t think Tero’gal knows what it wants to do. It has themes of subtlety, shadow, and willpower but that place is still figuring itself out. I’m sure it’ll make more sense eventually.

We’re close to helping the space elves. Very close. The change with the system didn’t help us out, but I think we have the solution. Once these reforge potions get done brewing, we’re in business.

The last thing that happened was the arrival of the guy who is supposed to help me. A man named Elrin showed up, claiming he was the guardian of the shards before everything went wild. I can’t tell if he’s on the level, but it doesn’t seem to matter. This guy is strong. He almost beat Tresk when she was using her Dreamer powers. Fenian used those same powers to beat back the dimensional being, so I can only guess how much power they’re granted.

As long as we keep at it, I know everything will work out. We’ve come too far to falter now. It does make me wonder how you’re reading this… Do you live on Tero’gal? Have you pilfered the contents of my personal room. If so, please make sure Tresk doesn’t eat all my good cheese. I need it for alchemy.

Thank you.