Chapter Text
When the flames died down, nothing but ash remained.
Buer staggered through the charred clearing, avoiding the small fires that still burned. She held the Gnosis close to her heart, but she did not infuse it into her being like her mother had done countless times before. She didn't feel worthy of its power. She didn't think she ever would.
The child god took one unsteady step after another, and another, and another, until she stopped, and the world around her warped. Colorful lights blurred her vision, making her wince, and the motion made her dizzy; she could never get quite used to the feeling.
When the world finally stilled and Buer could open her eyes, the sight that lay before her shocked her. Instead of a beautiful, pristine temple filled with every type of plant imaginable, all that Buer saw was ruins. It was all dead, burned.
Buer stood there in shock, trying to hold back her tears. She didn't understand where it had all gone wrong. Just yesterday her mother had been smiling without a care in the world, alive and healthy.
She snapped back to reality when she heard the shuffling of multiple feet behind her. Buer turned to see her mother's sages warily and slowly entering the temple-turned-ruins. They took in the destruction surrounding them, their horror and curiosity evident in their faces. When the Sages noticed Buer, they scrutinized her with apprehension. They were silent as one, for a while, before the youngest of the Sages finally spoke.
"You're not Lord Bathym,” was all he said. His words were accusatory, and his gaze hostile. He didn't know who Buer was; none of them did. Only the Aranara knew of her existence.
“Where is Lord Bathym!?” another Sage snapped at her, her demeanor even more aggressive than her fellow Sage, “and who are 𝘺𝘰𝘶?”
Buer backed away from the Sages. She didn't understand why they were reacting to her presence so negatively. She gripped her mother’s Gnosis even tighter, hiding it from the Sages’ view. “She's gone,” Buer sniffed, “forever. I am…I am the Archon now.”
She was only eleven, young even by mortal standards. She wasn't ready to be an Archon, which the Sages clearly thought the same. Distrustful of Buer, they searched her expression, studied her sincerity. They must have realized she was telling the truth because their expressions turned from angry to grief-stricken in an instant. They whispered amongst themselves, horrified at the news. Then, to Buer's surprise, they looked at her with disdain.
The eldest, a hunched, wrinkled man with a cane, was the first to speak. “And what is your name, child?” he asked.
“Buer,” she almost whispered. The Sages were inching ever closer, and she didn't like it. She backed away from them even farther.
“Why is it that Lord Bathym has passed away?” the Sage questioned, his voice shaking slightly. “What could have possibly killed our beloved Archon?”
Buer's back hit a wall; she was trapped, the Sages blocking any means of escape. She answered the Sages slowly, her voice quiet. “She took it. The…that sickness, she took it with her. She sacrificed herself, I think. I'm not sure. She didn't tell me anything.”
𝘚𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘣𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘥 𝘮𝘦, was left unsaid.
The lead Sage closed his eyes, and the other Sages, once again, whispered to each other. “...so benevolent, sacrificing herself for us…” Buer heard one of the Sages say. She couldn't quite hear the rest.
“Clearly you're not very important if the Great Lord Bathym did not see fit to tell you of her plans,” the lead Sage muttered. Buer stiffened at that, and for a moment, she felt anger. How dare these mortals judge her when they didn't know her at all! If they had truly loved her mother, they would have welcomed her with open arms!
The Sage opened his eyes, and his features softened slightly when he locked eyes with Buer. “Why don't you come with us, child? We will keep you safe.”
“Safe…” Buer echoed. “What do you need to keep me safe from?”
He simply smiled, and it was the end of that. With great reluctance, Buer followed the Sages as they left the ruins. They continued to converse out of her earshot, although there was no need. Buer wasn't paying attention to her surroundings. She felt numb, and she feared for her safety. Something about the Sages, despite the fact that her mother had trusted them, screamed untrustworthy.
Buer brushed her suspicions aside. She had been through too much that day to care at the moment.
She should have listened to her instincts.
The Sages ignored her, at first. Buer let them lock her in a room, alone with her mother’s Gnosis and her thoughts. She didn't need to be in the same space to spy on them, after all.
She watched. She watched as they labeled her as less than her mother, called her Lesser Lord Buer instead of just Lord Buer. She witnessed as they wondered what to do with her, and she listened as they lamented over the loss of their Mother Goddess. The day that she snapped, however, was when she found out that they were planning to lock her away forever and use her as a tool.
Buer had never felt such anger. Her blood boiled, and her vision seemed to blur. She seethed, and she squeezed her mother’s Gnosis so tightly that she sweared it almost cracked. She had had enough of the Sages treating her as beneath them. She was tired of their constant comparisons and unfair judgements. She couldn't take it anymore.
Buer took a deep breath and infused the Gnosis into her being. She could feel its power running through her veins, becoming one with her own in an adrenaline-like surge. What was once her mother’s became hers like some twisted, tragic form of inheritance.
Buer couldn't recall what exactly happened next. All that she remembered was red, and her anger towards the Sages being fueled by her anger at Bathym; in Buer's eyes, her mother had abandoned her. The Sages actions had brought that belief into the surface, made it a part of her permanently.
She hated Bathym.
Buer remembered repeating it like a mantra during her rampage, the only clear detail during her maelstrom of fury. Why wouldn't she resent her mother? As far as Buer was concerned, Bathym had willingly left her pre-teen daughter to rule a nation alone.
She 𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥 Bathym.
When Buer was brought back to her senses, she was covered head-to-toe in blood.
She had killed three of the Sages: two of them had been impaled by the thorns of unnaturally large plants that had broken through the floor. The third was beneath her kneeling figure, flattened to a pulp by her own two fists. The remaining Sages were huddled together in a corner, screaming and crying.
Buer started crying with them. Her body shook, and she started throwing up over the completely broken body.
What had she done?
“You're not a goddess, you're a monster!” one of the Sages screamed.
“You killed Lord Bathym! It was 𝘺𝘰𝘶, you wretched beast!” another sobbed.
The Sages started screaming accusations and insults at her, their voices growing louder and louder until they unified into one overwhelming, booming voice.
“No, stop, I didn't mean to! Please, please!”
The building trembled. The floor cracked, and more plants burst out to strangle the Sages. They let out blood-curdling shrieks of terror as they ran, pushing each other out of the way to exit first. Buer cried and pleaded, but they didn't look back once.
Buer let out one final, ear-splitting yell before the entire building was engulfed by the power of Dendro, leaving Buer isolated with her tears and memories of better times.
She would be alone for a long, long time.