Baldecaran wrote...
Well said. But what about LIFE? As little Endrik gazed up at you with admiration did you explain to him these abstract concepts of free will? He felt his fear and his hopes whether or not they were destined to be felt. If you had never come along, and Uther and other prophets just kept their mouths shut, then all the world would see fate as merely a hypothetical idea with no more substance than angels dancing on the tips of needles. It would be hard to convince them that their children must die in the name of such notions.
Let's answer to that in character :The chain is no longer unfelt, at least for the only person who can change something. And that possibility of chance in itself was already limited by the very laws of creation. It was impossible to remake the past, to provide freewill AND unmake the century of sorrow. Right ?
But who decided that there should be such a dilemna ? Who said "choose slavery and blindness in Fate, or face pain and betray the hopes of others to provide freedom " ? Who set the alternatives and forced a single individual to make a choice ?
It wasn't me. I didn't even had a say about my prophetic dreams, right ?
The choice, the
only choice to be made by me was built so that it was painful. How can the Prophet be responsible for the nature of the choice imposed on him/her ? He must choose
within those laws, not how they are made.
And what about LIFE ?
If he had lived, Endrick could have become a tyrant, a hero, or just one anonymous person amongst many others, who knows ? That's what we, mortals, hope for... that in life there is hope, and meaning. That we are what we do, and that sometimes, what we do makes a difference. Aren't we ?
As a paladin, until i "become" the Prophet, i try to alleviate pain when i help another, because of hope. Because i believe (or Fate has written i must think i believe...) that in the present - even in its painful and horrible nature - resides the possibility of a better future. That all the atrocities we make should be avoided, but that we can still make something good out of war and death if we can't prevent them. That despite its transient, ephemeral nature, despite the fact everyone WILL experience sorrow, pain, loss, and finally death, there are still good things to be lived. Not only tomorrow, but right now, and even good memories to relive and take succor in.
I am not a crusader who strive to be glorified, to make a difference of heroic proportion every breath i take. I do not rejoice in sacrifice, even if i admit those are sometimes necessary, i do not act to perpetuate things as they are and become a figure of legend. I hope that in a small way, things will improve. And i am not a single individual. I hope that society, that collective goodwill can improve things for everyone. Maybe not in my lifetime, but someday... someday.
I may be a paladin, but i am not a god. I live just like others, and i strive to make life better. Someday i will die, and i just hope i will have as few regrets as can be possible, and that if i make a little difference, it will be a good one. I stand for my ideals, not because i think myself a messiah, or just some kind of "chosen one" but because i have values and this existence is the only chance i have to act according to them.
This is the person i believed i was.
And then the illusion is shattered.
In Lor's creation, there is NO hope. Fate already knows. Fate knew what Endrick's life would have been. Fate set in stone what he would have been, would have felt, what would have been his successes and failures.
Where is Endrick, then ? Nowhere, except before my eyes.
Where are we all, then ? Nowhere, except before Lor's eyes.
Our mortal definition of existence means nothing. There is no hope, there is no future, no present, no past. There is only Fate. And so, there is no Life, that we could recognize as such.
The same applies for me, the Prophet, except that in a single instant, when i confront my past self, i can make the only choice i will ever make in my existence. The single choice everyone will make in all of Lor's creation.
Endrick might not accept it, most adult people would not even agree to it in a purely hypothetical way, but they are not the ones who have to make the choice. And i am not them. I am only me. A predetermined creation whose life and feelings were already written until this very moment, but who also,
just once, is allowed to
really decide something.
Why should my decision be perfect ? I live within those constraints that we call creation. I obey its laws because there is nothing else i can do. Nothing else anyone can do. And i had no say in the nature of the choice i had to make. If somebody if responsible for making me choose between two forms of suffering... this is not me.
I am only responsible for choosing who will be sacrificed. I am even
forced to sacrifice someone : either i let all those who live now die, or i save them and everyone will remain slaves to fate. Untold billions of people will never feel the chain that will remain here. And i can't go back. Lor offered me sanctuary for a time, in his dream, but i cannot even choose to forget and refuse to act. I MUST make that choice and my only act of freewill will be to determine which of those two alternatives i choose. Who will be sacrificed.
If that's what it is all about and nothing can change that, well, so be it. As already said, the chain that is not felt... and maybe, it is the true nature of existence in Lor's creation. Maybe for mortals, and even for gods , life has no meaning but to be a sculpture made by the Creator and shaped by Fate. And even the prophets, the herezar and the rest were only part of the show, to provide the chain of events that would allow for a single individual to make a single choice in his existence, in all existences.
Which leads us to the crucial question, because, you see, those events happened.
Because even Fate had to make them happen ! So...
W
hat if the Creator provides the possibility to change the laws of creation ? What if he gives you something nobody never had, not even Fate herself ? What if he allows you to make a choice, a choice that even Fate -and Lor himself - will have to accept ?
What if there is the possibility to provide
meaning ? To provide choices and hence consequences. What if instead of just ONE painful choice to be made by one individual in all eternity, there can be many little choices made by everyone, in his or her life ?
Would you choose Fate ? Would you provide the perpetuation of this charade ? Would you allow a future for untold billions of Endricks until whatever End of All Time there is,
if there is one ? Would you allow for untold billions of future people like Merudoc, Uther, Llarien and Evernorn to live, hope, suffer, make sacrifices and dream... in vain ?
Or would you accept that Endrick, Merudoc, Uther, Llarien, Evernorn... and even yourself,
must die one way or another, because that is what happens to mortals, but that
for once, those deaths will truly provide hope ? Would you sacrifice yourself and all people you know (most of whom important to you already dead in hope of making things better...) or would you sacrifice all who will come, just because the pain in the eyes of the child before you is too horrible ?
Would you act to spare a child and remain a hero in his eyes, and so doing, damning to ignorance this very child and everyone else for all eternity... and making the deaths of all the victims of the century of sorrow as meaningless as their lives... or will you accept that he too is fated to die, but that until there is truly freedom, no death, and no life either, has any meaning for mortals ?
And so, by my hand, they all died. All of them. I betrayed them, yes. I certainly did.
And after i made my choice, i saw that in fact, i made the right one. Creation was imperfect, incomplete, in Lor's eye. That's why he made it so that at some time, there would be a possibility to make it truer than it was.
In making my decision, my only decision, I made existence more real, for all those who would live, and their own existences would at least be more complete than our own. Their own sacrifices, pains, sorrows... they could have a significance, a meaning.
Maybe they will suffer and sometimes gain in their suffering, unlike us, who only played our part in an incomplete sculpture, waiting to be completed. We only thought we lived. They will truly live. The only significance of our existences was that we had to make room for them, for their freedom.
For once, in all eternity, there was a true sacrifice, which really made a difference. We all have to die, but for once, we truly die for those who will follow.
This is not Heaven, mind you, not at all. But now, this is truly Life. Experience, growth, change, death, renewal. And not just a tapestry that not even the maker is satisfied with...
I was a paladin, i strived to make things better. I acted all my "life" in hope that tomorrow, if not today, things would be better. I thought that in every child, there may be a future tyrant, a future victim, or a future hero. And that everyone should have his chance to become better, to enjoy his life and help others enjoy their lives. That nothing was pre-determined but that every choice had consequences and everyone is responsible for his own damnation, or salvation. That a single life, our very own life each one of us, can make a difference.
And i made that a reality.
Nobody will ever know, except Lor. There will be not a trace of my act, except in his mind. The past will be forgotten, this world and everyone in it is dead.
There are millions who died painfully and in fear because of me, and who will never remember they ever existed, and billions who will never know they own me their freedom. Only Lor will know, and i was nothing but his tool. Imperfect, and not at all guaranteed to act properly, but the final piece he used to complete his creation. To make it reborn anew or to stand incomplete, according to my decision.
I now understand that Lor wanted to complete his creation, but couldn't do it. If i had made the other choice, who knows how many centuries, millenias, would happen until Lor - the creator who wanted to perfect his creation - would again arrange events so that another opportunity to complete his work - another Prophet - would arise ? Who knows ?
And considering this intent of the Creator about his creation, who knows of many times in the untold eons past other Prophets appeared and had the same choice to make, but choose Fate ?
I will never know.
I strived to make things better. In a way, they are, now.
Then, i am no longer a prophet. Just a mortal who has no more home, and no more illusions. It is time then, to end my own charade. To go to sleep, to be forgotten. To leave room for something new, something in which life, purpose, freedom, consequences... are real. I cannot go back, i cannot forget.
Only the sands of time will keep the footprints of my existence... for a time. Even Lor will forget about me, somewhen in the future of eternity.
And you know what ? This is just fine.
Life, now, finally has meaning.
And because life is beautiful, it is time to die.
Modifié par Le Pénombre, 19 octobre 2011 - 09:11 .
