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Dear Diary,
There was a battle near my borders.
I lost someone today.
Rain.
Rain fell like bullets on his back and flooded out every other sense still mingling in Technotwt’s nerves. The breath in his lungs stung like iron needles against hot skin, submerging his innards in a icy pail of dread, chilling it up until a lump of hesitation throbbed at the base of Technotwt’s throat.
“Hey.” A throaty whisper. Half-panicked hands reached out to grab at Dream2’s shoulders. The rain came down in rushing sheets, only increasing in strength. “Hey, are you…” The question died on Technotwt’s lips.
Silence dragged for an endless minute. Dream2 stared back at Technotwt on the blood-splattered ground, his eyes glassy, head lolled in an unnatural angle with a broken spearhead pierced through his gut. As much as Technotwt wanted to delude himself, the resolution of this battle was definite.
Dream2 was dead.
Kneeling, Technotwt fully lowered himself onto the ground, features dark. Mud stained his pristine hands and dirtied his battle armor. That was unimportant.
Someone had died today.
“I—”
The sentence stuttered to a halt.
Someone had died today, and that person was a friend.
At this, Technotwt didn’t know what to say.
From a young age, Technotwt was gifted in the art of fighting.
Cool-headed, the village gossipers whispered as he swept past them to find a suitable spot to train. Calculated. Kind. Brutal in battle. He’s perfect.
He was perfect, that is, to fight in a war. Technotwt was too balanced to tip over and make a mistake. He was too engrossed in military and strategy to understand anything beyond coating his tongue with diplomatic silver. He was only perfect in battle, in discussion; he was perfect at everything that sought to tear another down.
“A new king rises,” a god whispered softly to the minds of the innocent, “dressed in rosewood, carmine, and cherry red. Fight him. Crown him. Make him your leader.”
Eight years passed like a quick swipe of a sword, and land after land had fought to take Technotwt as their king.
Blade after blade, axe after axe; weapon handles were all shattered like porcelain plates as Technotwt ruthlessly emerged victor in all of his battles. And when everybody backed down, hackles lowered, the god itself descended with a halo and eight wings, blue like the expanse of forget-me-nots growing near an old battlefield long forgotten to the horrors of bloodshed.
The god echoed, “If no one will crown you, I shall do so myself.”
Immortality did not come from riches or an infinite pile of gold. It came from a goblet. Technotwt drank from a gilded chalice adorned with sapphires and diamonds and turquoise with marks of golden leaves carved into the rim. Ichor shot through Technotwt’s veins, and when he came to hearing the sounds of a thousand prayers, time seemed to stand completely still.
But the fact was that time did stand still. Because time became nothing but a symbol on his pocket watch. Time became meaningless, a concept for mankind—something he was no longer a part of.
And so, time stopped. Technotwt snapped his pocket watch in two. His hourglasses stopped flowing. His world stopped spinning.
Time became null.
Dear Diary,
The aftermath of the battle is strangely unnerving. Nobody mourns like usual. We’re preparing for the next siege.
Something feels hollow. It’s strange that I feel this way.
During the early years of immortality, say, the first few centuries or so—it was moderately exciting.
Technotwt built a city. With experience in forming allegiances no matter how temporary, Technotwt won the support of many larger kingdoms, and eventually, his city swelled into a country, then finally a kingdom. He was a benevolent ruler. He was kind to his people. When not in battle, he could finally shed his armor and reveal his true self, and the commoners worshipped his image. By the time being an undying monarch became somewhat tiring, Technotwt got up from his throne and left. He trusted that his people would be able to guide themselves, which they successfully did.
He traveled around the world, exploring new areas, finding new hobbies. Humans came and went. New people barely left an impression on him, because everyone became a simple face in the crowd. Hello, he would say to the new generation. Goodbye, he would say to a burning town, crumbling into ruins.
Never had Technotwt despised his immortality. It felt a little sad to see eras come and go, but this was just the circle of life.
One day, out of curiosity, Technotwt went to his kingdom to check up on their status. He watched in silence as his godless kingdom continued flourishing after centuries of unification. The sounds of prayers no longer filled his ears. What used to be a known god turned into yet another rumor, a belief, and finally, a folk tale.
The kingdom was proof of this. The only memorial of Technotwt was the well-polished statue of him, looking dreadfully unfamiliar, standing tall and proud in the middle of the main city’s central plaza.
Strange. This should be filling him with pride.
Technotwt placed a hand over his beating chest.
No feelings.
How peculiar.
Dear Diary,
It’s hard to think clearly.
I don’t know why Dream2’s death has affected me this much.
Humans come and go.
They don’t know you.
You don’t know them.
Technotwt was almost seven hundred years old when he first met him.
It wasn’t a normal meet-and-greet kind of thing. In fact, Technotwt could’ve gone his whole life never interacting with Dream2 if he hadn’t sat down beneath a tree to rest.
First came the light sway of leaves above him. Then a small sound of feet scrabbling against oak. Lastly, the entire body of a young man dropped from the sky—or tree—and landed directly on top of Technotwt with a loud curse.
A strange antenna bobbed on the top of this man’s head. Technotwt stopped crunching on his apple.
“Hello,” said Technotwt. “Nice gravity we have today, don’t you think?”
The man snorted. “You’re funny,” he provided before struggling to awkwardly lift himself off Technotwt’s lap. “I didn’t mean to fall on you. I was just, uh, curious? And I slipped.”
“Right.” Technotwt felt his eyebrows quirk up as the man shuffled to sit next to him, dropping onto the grass with a quick sigh. “What’s your name?”
“My name? It’s r/DreamWasTaken2.” Technotwt took the extended hand offered to him and shook it. “Just Dream2 is fine,” Dream2 added as an afterthought. “You?”
“Technotwt. I’m not from around here.” The last bit was true. He was far away from his hometown (which had been razed to the ground, maybe five, six centuries ago).
Dream2 barked another laugh. “I can tell. Technotwt, huh.” He smiled. “Nice name.”
Their friendship was uncalled for. Dream2 had approached Technotwt the next day, keen on following him, trailing after his flowing robes as he bounced with a skip in his step. They talked about the weather. They talked about entertainment. And then, out of nowhere, they delved into history.
History. Another word with no meaning. Technotwt was history. He had seen the rise and fall of many, many things. But then, Dream2 told him this:
“It’s not really history if it’s unimportant.”
And Technotwt had gone silent. He wondered whether or not those words rang true.
If they did, then those seven hundred years spent idling in a daze—those days weren’t history. They were only his ‘past’ of the current ‘present’ and the upcoming ‘future’. History had meaning. History had contributed to a building narrative. But not everything was history—a war was history. The destruction of some flower field was not.
History had meaning. The past five hundred years of his life had none.
At the beginning of his life, there was meaning, there was history. Technotwt had made it, after all—he built a city, ruled a land. But things dragged, and that little bit of significance was stretched thin and milked dry.
Technotwt realized everything with a jolt. The epiphany struck him like a ferocious thunderbolt. Dream2 only looked at him, innocently, unknowingly being the cause to make time start again.
Dear Diary,
I’m falling in love with a memory.
Technotwt took Dream2 to an empty flower field.
It was the same one he had witnessed during a battle ages ago. The same one with forget-me-nots and marigolds snaking around the corners, all burned to a crisp, left alone by the people who favored steel and smoke.
It was meant to be barren. Technotwt was supposed to confess about the status of his immortal life to Dream2 here—but now, there were spider lilies, growing en masse, spreading all over the land like little rubies in an emerald sea.
“Huh.”
Dream2 plucked a flower, color bathed in red like a general’s sword, and handed it to Technotwt. The sun’s heat bore down on them. Clouds curled through the sky. A gentle breeze kicked up and blew through the area, making Dream2’s ebony hair shimmer like rhinestones.
“Thanks for taking me here,” he said softly.
Quietly, Technotwt responded, “It was meant to be empty.”
Like he knew something Technotwt didn’t, Dream2 snickered. The sound was carefree. It made Technotwt’s heart stop.
The spider lily was taken from his palms. “That doesn’t matter.” Dream2 moved slowly and nestled the flower between Technotwt’s hair, right above his left ear. “Time heals everything.”
When the spider lily wilted, Technotwt was reminded that human lives were short.
He never told Dream2 about his immortality.
Dear Diary,
I can smell a storm brewing.
A war between Technotwt’s kingdom and a foreign power soon loomed like rain clouds across a farmland, and Dream2 drafted himself with a careless flick of his wrist, saying that he had nothing better to do.
Technotwt joined him, donning a disguise. Not like it mattered, because his likeness to his statue was almost close to zero.
They were assigned to fight on horseback. Dream2 named his horse ‘Lily’, and Technotwt named his ‘Time’.
Wherever Dream2 went, Technotwt followed.
Days flew past like bullets.
When Dream2 fell with a muffled roar, Technotwt fell too, to his knees.
Again, once again—forevermore—time ceased to continue.
Time became a reminder that Dream2 was dead.
Dear Diary,
The siege was unsuccessful. I've played dead, and I’ve left the army.
One month and twenty-three days. That was how long he had known Dream2.
It’s been a week since Dream2 had died in battle. Technotwt left the area. Crossed the sea. He estranged himself on a sizeable island, hoping to recuperate and get over his loss. Today, the sky was pale blue, tinted with honey and lavender. The sun slowly sank into the ocean as golden beams rippled across the water. Technotwt continued standing near the shore.
A crab skittered past his feet. He watched it with a sullen gaze, a low-heated ache hammering away inside his chest. He didn’t know why, but the ache grew stronger. His thoughts dwelled on the old days—less than two months ago—when Dream2 was alive and time had some meaning—
A broken whimper slipped past his lips. It evolved into an enraged yell, then finally, with pinpricks of tears welling near his eyes, Technotwt flung himself into the tossing sea.
It was pathetic, really. He hit sand, since he was at the shore. Technotwt choked on mouthfuls of saltwater as his tongue turned sour and grainy. Still, he waded deeper and deeper into the sea, and when he could fully bury his body beneath the tides, sinking to the marine floor, he let the deep take over him.
Technotwt stayed under the ocean for a month and twenty-three days, wishing he were able to drown.
When he emerged, alive, perfectly healthy—he no longer felt like a god nor a human.
Dear Diary,
I’m taking away my godhood.
It’s the least I can do for him.
Twenty years of searching to release himself. To any immortal, twenty years were equivalent to nothing. To Technotwt, it was like he was a human again—painfully aware of every passing day.
Through extensive information gathering and prayers, Technotwt found the god’s lair tucked deeply in the earth. The cave system was laden with glowing moss and colorful crystals. The walls were wet with groundwater. Stalactites grew around the draping ivy, curling and creeping down like streamers.
When Technotwt came face-to-face with the god who gave him the curse of never-ending life, he realized that the god too, was old. Its once-teal hair had faded to muted navy. Its irises, formerly electrifying blue, now carried no more energy within them. Technotwt had initially thought their meeting would start with a fight. As he sat down in front of the god preparing for a civil conversation, he immediately perished the assumption.
“I lost someone once, too. Or something.”
The god covered its face with clawed hands. Its mottled wings quivered.
“While you lost a person,” it continued. “I lost the whole of humanity.”
“We turned on you,” Technotwt stated.
“No. The people turned on me. You merely watched.” The god steepled its hands. “I don’t blame them. I have done many things I regret.”
“Do you regret giving me immortality?” Technotwt questioned.
“I don’t,” the god replied. “Because if I did, I would come to regret taking the offer to become an immortal myself.
“Believe it or not, I am a villain. But that’s because I’ve dragged my existence on for too long. I can only hope to fade out and disappear. And you… you should do the same.”
Technotwt and the god parted ways. Nothing except for conflicting emotions were gained from this long-awaited visit.
Dear Diary,
I want to forget how to love.
First came research.
How to stop love. He pored over scriptures and texts and essays written by potioneers. There were plenty of pieces detailing the steps on how to fall in, but not out of love. Technotwt gave up on reading.
How to forget. If he couldn’t stop loving, then he had to stop remembering. Potions made to block out unwanted memories were stirred and drank. But they only lasted for a day at most—permanent ones were deemed too dangerous; illegal.
How to hate. The final process felt horrible and was too far off to reach. Technotwt tried to convince himself to spite Dream2, but nothing could bring his heart to budge.
Nothing worked. No man-made item worked.
Feeling defeated, Technotwt turned to what he knew best.
He picked up his sword and joined another army.
Second came distractions.
Technotwt fought for nothing, killed for nothing, and lived thirty years in another daze. Men made him another god, this time in theory, and called him a glorious history-maker.
Hearing this oxymoron—a glorious history-maker, since when were wars glorious?—Technotwt laughed and laughed until he felt numb. When his vocal chords were sore and his muscles refused to touch a blade again, Technotwt left like he did seven hundred years ago, abandoning his title, this one bestowed not by gods but by mankind themselves.
Where all his titles came from—it did not matter. In the end, they were bound to be buried in the dust.
Last came memories, wishes, and mourning.
Laughably so, mourning came late. Technotwt found himself experiencing everything in the wrong order. Half a century had passed since Dream2’s death. Half a century since Technotwt tried to drown.
He built a shrine for Dream2 and fell asleep next to it. The next day, when Technotwt woke, a mundane memory tickled the back of his brain.
The more he looked into it, the less mundane it got.
Dream2 had asked him how he would live if he was an immortal. Technotwt hadn’t put much thought into it when he answered, “Like I’m doing now.”
The force of this memory connected him to every interaction he could recall in chronological order. Another memory surfaced, suddenly pivotal. Technotwt felt a sharp jolt stab at his heart.
Oh, that sly bastard. He did know something and kept it a secret. A ghost of a smile pulled at Technotwt's mouth.
”What’ll happen when I die?”
The sky was a color of obsidian. The moon hung overhead, as bright as floodlights. Technotwt shifted on the picnic blanket lain in the middle of the spider lily flower field. He placed his gaze on Dream2, who looked back at Technotwt with an air of solemnity.
“I’ve never thought about this question,” Technotwt sheepishly admitted.
“But it’s such an important question. We don’t know where we’ll be headed when we pass away.”
“I hope it’s better than this world. It’s just battle after battle. Maybe when we die, it’s just a land of peace. I hope it is.”
”I thought you were good at fighting.”
”I don’t wish that on anyone. To be good at fighting, I mean. Because if you know how to fight, it means there is unrest.”
“That’s wise.” Dream2 closed his eyes. The stars above them twinkled softly. “You know a lot for your age.”
“No. I know too little.”
Dream2 laughed. Technotwt realized that Dream2 laughed a lot. “You talk like you've been alive for too long,” Dream2 breathlessly mused. Technotwt hummed thoughtfully.
Maybe I have. He didn't say it aloud. Maybe I've been alive for too long. Or maybe I talk too much.
What happens when we die?
Technotwt ventured steadfast into the spider lily field. The moon was obscured. The sky was dark.
I've thought about this question.
He found the spot where he and Dream2 had once laid, watching the sky together like star-crossed lovers.
But it's not an important question—
Gently, Technotwt plucked a drooping spider lily bending above the ground. He spun it around his fingertips.
—because we know where we'll be headed when we pass away.
He lowered himself onto the floor. Without any more strength in his bones, Technotwt pressed his back against the fauna. He clutched the spider lily tightly, the hand resting atop his heart.
A sigh left his lips.
Something inside him shattered.
Maybe when we die, it's just a land of peace.
...
...
...
The god slackened his grip around his endless life. Technotwt shut his eyes.
...
...
...
I can only hope to fade out and disappear. And you... you should do the same.
Technotwt didn't die. He couldn't. But today, he will rest. Today, he will fall out of love. And when he does, he'll let himself wake. He'll look forward to that day.
For millenniums to come, sleeping in a field of bygone memories, he will let himself become part of the flowers, part of the spider lilies that bloomed upon memories and blood.
Dear Diary...
Technotwt never died.
But no one knows if the man in the flower fields—clasping a perfectly-preserved flower—will ever open his eyes again.