The Ultimate Liberation

[cRaZy8or5e]

There was a time when I believed that everything in the world; from our comprehension of the world around us, to love, to death, were products of simple misunderstandings.

Wherever my fiendish heritage came from; the fangs, the horns, the red eyes, or the lion’s tail, all of it a simple misunderstanding I was sure.

The mother and father I never knew, who “lost” me on the roadside to be “rescued” by others of my kind that patrol the lands around Garagoth. Another misunderstanding. One I wish to rectify someday, and have even tried to pay a wizard to scry for my parent’s existence. He took my money and was unable to produce results. So I took his life and had a cleric obliviate his soul. Life seemed full of simple misunderstandings.

Like my upbringing. I was taken in by the Tiefling guards that patrol the lands of the Mystral Ascendency but not as some sort of child they had affection for, or even as some sort of silly mascot. No they took me in as a slave, and forced me to clean their barracks and do other more reprehensible things. When they were in a good mood they would only beat me. When they were in a bad mood, or desired entertainment, they tortured me. Sometimes when they were really nice they would have me fight with the dogs for choice pieces of meat and bones from their table. Otherwise I had to steal my food. Part of their torture would be to dump food into the middens and offal behind the barracks building. I’m not ashamed to say that there were times when I would go after it. The debate between survival and shame is very one sided. No the patrolmen did not want me dead, nor were they needlessly cruel. Their cruelty was inflicted upon me with the best of intentions. It was just a simple misunderstanding on my part, for all I could see or feel was the derision and the pain. But really they only wanted me to grow strong and cunning, and to realize that nothing in this world of value is given to you. Only that which you take is of value, because it is only in taking that you pay in blood, effort, and guile; placing a very personal expense on that which you have taken. No, they were good men really, but I didn’t understand that, and I hated them for being good men. I tried to poison several and actually succeeded in killing one with his own knife after he had passed out drunk. I had to leave after that.

At the time I thought even the murder I committed was the result of a simple misunderstanding. When I found him, at first I was merely going to steal from him. However I began to I pretend he was my real father, the man who had abandoned me. After he had taken on that personification, killing him just seemed to be logical. I didn’t really mean to kill him, but at the same time, I had to.

It was good he had a warm leather cloak and a dirk. They served me well when I escaped to the docks district of garagoth. I would live in among the crates, killing and eating rats when I had to, and stealing food when I could. I would do the odd job or run errands for the local sneak thieves and mages willing to hire a desperate youth like me. Very often whatever job they had me doing was something unsavory, but the golden rule of; “survival first and shame second” was always in the forefront of my thoughts. Those were hard days. Even then I was alone in the world, an outcast feared and ridiculed by the other street children for my protruding horns and tail. Children can be so cruel.

I’d always been strong for my age, and I learned to be fast. One gang who had beaten me severely for trying to steal some food on a dock they had claimed as their territory, found out just how strong too. Well, my strength of determination anyway. But that was also a misunderstanding. I did not realize that I had impinged upon their territory. It really was too bad that I couldn’t understand the payment I had to give them in blood and pain was fairly minor for the offense I had committed. Yes children can be so cruel. I hunted them down individually and took their eyes from them. Some died, and others were taken by mages. . . to be used for spare parts. I went where I pleased and stole what I wished after that.

As I grew, more of my gifts came to the fore. The teifling darkness that I could summon and my extraordinary nightvision made it so I was very valuable to some of the local gangs and thieves’ guilds. My reputation for brutality and love of confrontation also made me of value. Have you ever met a thief who was willing to fight when the outcome was not certain? I don’t know very many like that. More often than not they are inclined to strike at an unsuspecting or weakened target. I on the other hand relished confrontation. I always felt a need to test myself, to gain the fear and respect that had been denied me my whole life. That need for fear in and of itself was a “simple misunderstanding” about interpersonal relationships and life in general. Fear is not needed. Only respect, but I did not realize that at the time.

That need for others to fear me, while inappropriate, inadvertently lead me to my true calling. I legally, for once, challenged a man to a fight over a “working girl” at the brothel in Garagoth, because I thought he’d tried to move in on a girl I had claimed for my own. He met me in the street carrying a beautiful weapon, it looked like a staff with two maces affixed to either end. I looked at the short sword and dagger I had, and realized I had to have that weapon. So in the fight, I waded in through his blows, took it from him, and then killed him with it. What a fantastic weapon the dire mace is, one that I feel I was created to use. I’d never used a dire mace before then, but had used a quarterstaff. The balance and the moves were similar although the weapon was much heavier. But inherent in that extra weight was extra damage. I fell in love with that weapon from that point on. It’s sheer brutality married well with my own personality.

After I killed the man I pooled all my meager resources, in order to buy the girl from the brothel. Then I tortured her and killed her for her disloyalty. She ranted and cried about how the man had merely been paying her a compliment and that he daren’t do more for fear of me. Oh well, I’d bought her, and I had no permanent establishment within which to house her. So I “discarded” her. Killing her is the only act I’ve ever regretted on an emotional level. Any other regrets came from a different ethic; I should have done this in order to seize more influence or booty, or I should have killed so and so rather than let them live because they might represent a danger to me now. I constantly felt that my actions were being governed by misunderstandings. She was the first person that I felt I had killed needlessly and her death only served to strengthen my remorse and my feelings that I misunderstood my life and what was important about it. In hindsight it really was a shame that I killed her. She was spectacularly beautiful and still had at least 10-15 more good years of entertainment left in her. But, as I said, where would I have kept her? A man of my proclivities can’t afford to be tied to a location. Bad things happen to people like me if they stay still for too long; too many enemies and authority figures bent on my destruction. After I had finished torturing and ruining her body, she was of no more use, and was even a danger. It was only proper that she be thrown away with all those other things that were no longer of use to me.

A couple months after that instance, while I was seeking instruction from anyone who could teach me about the use of my newfound friend, the dire mace, I was approached by a SyNful man. He recognized the burgeoning feelings of regret and remorse tearing at the foundations of my soul. He helped me to come to the realization that so much of what determines how we act and react and the inherent consequences while often construed as simple misunderstandings, are in reality part of an overarching ethic that defines the world.

Chaos.

He showed me that feelings of remorse and sentiment were weak failings of our sentient nature and had no place in the natural chaotic order of things. Regret had its place but only as a learning tool. He showed me how to dismiss those feelings that made us weak and encouraged me to seek a new ethic to govern my rage and to rule my appetites. He introduced me to Cyric and what Cyric wants for all of us; to simply appease our own desires through whatever means necessary. Nothing is shameful, nothing is above reproach. Consequences and outcomes are the only governing influences for a SyNner.

I never kill needlessly now. I kill so that Cyric’s chaotic designs may come to fruition. Death is the quintessential act of creating chaos. Bodies with their ordered machinations suddenly fail and become corrupted. Interpersonal relationships are torn asunder, love turns to loss, heartache and loss breed anger and rejection of other interpersonal relationships. It’s a chaotically beautiful cycle. I was introduced to it by a great man, the same man who showed me the way to Cyric. He is known by the name “Painfinder” of Cyric’s House of SyN. There are rumors that he was once an inquisitor in that misguided and misapprehensive conclave called the Northern Coalition. Don’t they realize that every time they try and order things they only create more chaos!?!? Chaos is the only truth to the multiverse. You cannot shape things without keeping that in mind. And once you understand that Chaos will always triumph, then you can learn to work within it’s bounds to secure a life worth living. That’s all that’s left to us anyway. I have chosen my life. Painfinder has shown it to me. I sow death and destruction for Cyric and for myself. There is so much rage within me. Painfinder says my rage is a gift, a gift that MUST be shared with the world. He encourages me to use it on our own members, lest they forget what death and destruction and ultimately chaos means to our House.

I have been truly blessed to be a member of House SyN and a part of our Dark Lord Cyric’s intrigues. Once you realize that you are an instrument of chaos, everything is so much simpler. There are no more “simple misunderstandings,” there is only chaos. No more questioning of motives or decisions, only cause and effect, action and reaction, encounter and outcome.

You see chaos is more than a condition, an explanation, or even an ethic. Chaos is the ultimate liberation.

-From the Personal Journal of Grond of SyN-