Archive of Our Own ^beta

The Star.

I keep having these dreams… Strange dreams… I remind myself I must embrace the good I have now, the peace, the serenity… I came here to search for hope like our Empire once found in the Grand Empress.

I just can’t find that peace, however. Because… Because I’m afraid…

Death.

I fear my end is close upon me, I cannot rest with the knowledge I’ve obtained… It’s all over for me… If I don’t get the fuck out of Rotfront this day may be my last. I mean it when I say I am not getting paid enough for this. I believed in the cause and I wanted to serve our Empire with pride, but now I’ve quickly learned we’ve bitten off far more than we could ever chew. Miss Yeong is nothing we can meddle in lightly and I beg my compatriots to take my warnings to heart. I wrote about it in my Dream Diary, but I shall reference it again.

I was a worker in the mines of Leng, when I was consumed by a shapeless sea of flesh, my flesh joining with the flesh of many others, until only my bones remained. My mind joined the collective of flesh, which persists after death. Death… I don’t want to die… I’m scared stiff just thinking of what could happen to me at the hands of Miss Yeong or the Nation and at this point, I don’t know which is worse…

The Sun.

I named myself Sun because the Sun card in Tarot has always been my favorite. It helped me stay positive that the Empire would prevail, and that the Nation’s reign of tyranny would pass someday. It reminded me of old tales of the big bads of history finally facing defeat and the justice of the world restoring and blossoming anew. I thought I could help be that change. Even in reverse, this card is positive and hopeful, a symbol of the Empire indeed. Now when I think of the sun I think of that accursed dream… I saw a burning eye in the sky above the clouds of Buyan. I was walking through the floating imperial palace, when the gaze of the sun-like iris burned my body to ashes.

This is not the Sun I know… This is a hungry ancient stomach hungry and calling to consume all that may dare to awaken this dormant beast… A red eye… Like Miss Yeong’s…

The Lovers.

It’s a common misconception that The Lovers card is only ever about a romantic or sexual bond. It's true, I remember when I first drew the card when asking a simple innocent question I was so puzzled by its seemingly random presence. This card represents brutal honesty and vulnerability between two people, something I cannot afford…

I think it’s too late anyway, with what I’ve found about Ariane… She probably always knew my intentions and saw right through me, a beast toying with her prey just before swallowing it whole… I tried to get closer to her, on the Empress’s name I did… But when I did she could see right through me, eat me whole from the inside out, slurp out my guts like sampling oysters.

I had a dream that itches my throat and gnaws like the vicious mandibles of thousands of tiny ticks and the fangs of vermin… I dreamt I was an Imperial Farmer, I embraced my lover in the red deserts of Kitezh, when a storm consumed us, sand grinding us down till nothing remained.

I wonder who my lover was. A lovely woman who bathed in the morning sun? A tender man whose smile shone like a beacon? Or Miss Yeong, a mocking manifestation of the puzzling card… Not a lover but The Lovers… 

The Tower.

I truly thought I could do it, this deception I wore like chainmail armor surely would’ve kept me from harm… I figured finding a bioresonant individual would be our salvation, our Grand Empress returned to us! Praise be! Surely, surely! 

I was wrong, so very very wrong. When I think of the beautiful Grand Empress I see her hair like a wedding veil of white, her bioresonance so great it forms a halo around her like a crown of nobility, her beauty unmatched, and her heart full of so much love for her people it killed her… When I see Ariane I see eyes as red as the spot gazing down… Watching me, watching my every move. She’s always known I was a fraud, a spy, she’s just playing dumb. She thinks she can play with her food before her stomach drags me into its endless depths. She is a perverse image of the Empress with her white hair resembling that of a widow rather than a bride…

I was plagued with another nightmare… 

As a storm raged in the sky, I fell from a ruined sky-scraper on Vineta, but I never reached the ocean below. I kept falling, when suddenly lightning struck the building and I woke up…

I was the perfect spy for this mission, everything about my persona and my plan was flawless… And then I started having these dreams, the red eye above started to follow me… She started to read my thoughts as if I was as 2 dimensional as the cards we tried our exercises on…

The Moon.

I simply can not take this anymore, my most troubling nightmare occurring to me on the 18th night. I was floating in the sunless sea below Rotfront, when I saw a large creature move in the darkness below me in the moon's dark core. There is something dormant awaiting to consume me. I believe this creature is Ariane, some unholy recreation of our Grand Empress… 

This truly is the land of my affliction… I have to go, I need to leave immediately! I will be fleeing to Kitzeh, maybe there truly is a lover awaiting me there. Regardless, I cannot remain here. Either these discoveries will cost me my life, her powers will kill me, or she may turn me into the Nation. I simply cannot be put at risk. I must go posthaste and save myself from the slumbering dragon that awaits to snatch up my flesh and meld it with itself…