Post:Ennui - 3/19/2009 - 5:49:14

Ennui · on 3/19/2009 5:49:14 AM	266
If I may indulge in cynicism, there are certain "horrors" of my discipline which are dulled with repetition. At least half of all Necromancers vomit while working on their first corpse, but I assure you that no one bothers to bring a sack by the tenth. Abandoning the comfort of friends and high walls is only a sacrifice until your eyes are firmly on eternity. So, too, it goes with the religious proclamations. I have heard the words of distant gods all too often, and I grow weary of the flashing swords of their dogs. A large portion of the Philosophy of the Knife is humanist and theological arguments that would make most priests' heads spin, yet it all proves utterly unnecessary. I am bored of damnation. Despite all the talk of ham-fisted rites to demonic patrons, I was labeled Perverse because I know every possible argument and no longer care to dwell on them. The years went on, as they tend to, with little concern. My investigations continued apace and I became quite skilled in my science. What my peers criticized as monstrous was, in fact, done for simple expediency: if I know what you are going to say before you know I am there, I can save us both a great deal of time by slitting your throat. If a mother will claim she cannot bear to live without her child, I may as well nip that problem in the bud. After all, it would be a grave insult to assume her love is insincere. I don't doubt my unholy mien is quite a sight at this point, though this simply means I have to keep a refined company. Criminals and woodsmen don't have the faculties to sense such things, while the brutes and lushes aren't smart enough to care even if they could. It lasted for a long time, but I suppose a miscalculation was inevitable. Hiring the Moon Mage was a calculated risk. I knew he could sense it if he cared, but I banked on two things. First, that he was too stupid to be curious. Second, that he wouldn't care. The worst case scenario I could imagine was he would detect the Arcane taint and blackmail me. Imagine my surprise when the dagger came at my head at gale-force speed. Wondrous surprise! My background investigation showed he was not a devout man, instead given to the casual heresy so rampant in his profession. Yet the sudden and impassioned violence -- oh, look, he's targeting another spell -- would have been right at home in church. I had to have a poke at his brain. Figuratively, of course. While my magic can touch and befuddle the mind, I'm ill equipped to acquire information from an unwilling man without a certain amount of screaming. Fortunately, I had to maim him anyways. I needed time to leave gracefully, and merely killing him would've had him at an altar raising the hue and cry seconds later. When dealing with guildsmen, it is always better to break their legs. I am afraid my knowledge of Moon Mage esotery was not up to the challenge. Between the pain and our wildly different educations, he was having trouble explaining what he saw, though I did my humble best to encourage him. I was left with a very fragmentary explanation. Something about death (of course), but in a context I was unfamiliar with. He babbled on about archetypes and prophetic symbolism. Death of life, he said; death of mountains. Death of stars. Death of meaning. At that point he slipped unconscious and beyond my reach. I did my mean best to slow his death and walked away, filled with razor-edged wonder. There is a way to hate me that I did not know; a blasphemy as fresh to me as a newly washed shirt. Dread crept up my spine for the first time in decades and I embraced it as a long lost love. -Armifer
This message was originally posted in The Necromancers (26) \ Necromancer Ideologies (9), by DR-ARMIFER on the play.net forums.