Chapter Text
He thought he was clever.
D3rL0rd3 thought he was… outsmarting it. Him. Whatever was following him, be it- Many or singular, he thought he was winning against it. That thought just seems stupid, now. Naive and useless, belonging to a mind that isn’t his own, anymore. All he had been was a fly in a web that sparkled and caught the attention of the spider quicker because it wasn’t dull.
He was showing off. Of course he was. He knows that, now. Set two traps, not because he needed to know he was being watched- He already knew that much, he had heard the footsteps behind him. Had seen the torches go out in response to a message he hadn’t finished sending yet. He wanted to be a step ahead, wanted to… What? What did he want to prove? That he wasn’t some weak-willed running victim? That they were equals, that he was a player in this game and not an observer to it?
Predictable. Human ego kills human. Story told as old as time, and as special as a fly may be, it doesn’t matter if it’s already trapped. The moving flies get wrapped quicker, is all. You can’t outsmart knowledge itself, you can only entertain it. He had been a toy, he realizes all of this as he stares into the utterly unknown that’s slowly becoming known to him. Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back, isn’t that the saying?
He isn’t satisfied. He’s scared, and he regrets it, he regrets it all. He had earlier ran out of the church after he had read the book- Climbed up the ladder, stepped out of the doors and was heading back to the broken village, before he stopped and was driven back down by the same thing that drove him further into the caves in the first place. His need to know.
If it wasn’t meant to be found by him, if it wasn’t a puzzle he had to solve, it wouldn’t have been there in the first place. If that poem wasn’t meant to be deciphered, he wouldn’t have been able to. He wasn’t an equal, he was only reacting how he was urged to. A toddler thinking it had hidden cleverly, while the parent had placed the boxes for it to hide behind, and only was acting like it was surprised.
But his realization of all of that, of all of this, isn’t what broke his mind. No, it was what was behind the golden door that had.
A golden dressed figure, taller than anything had been or ever was, and smaller than anything all at once. And the flooding that came with it. The everything of all possibilities, and the knowing of all things and what all of those things knew- He could see himself, and he could see himself before himself was even a thought.
He stood there. Frozen, and shaking. Maybe shaking. He couldn’t feel his body, as his mind was so much above it, so far away. It was like he had no place in himself, anymore. Everything took the space that his consciousness should’ve been.
But he had always been stubborn. He still had things to prove. Holding onto his spot that was *his*, he managed to speak. Maybe outloud, maybe in his head- Did it matter if what he was speaking to knew what he was saying before speaking was a thing?
What are you? He questioned, even though he was slowly knowing the answer, as he knew all things. The figure that loomed, wrapped and above, didn’t speak. What is this? Nothing. Why this place? Nothing still.
It responded, only after D3rL0rd3 pleaded, only after he had whimpered, Why me? Then it was like he woke up. He could see only what was in front of him again, instead of the infinity that had been around it. And what he could see through his tear-blurred eyes was the figure smiling. Slow and mockingly. How did he know it was smiling, if it wore a pale mask? He just.. did.
“Why?” It repeated back. In the same way one might quote a line from a song. A soothing, horrible, soothing tune. It sounded pleased. Amused. “Hadn’t you wanted it?”
...Had D3rL0rd3 wanted this? If he had, he doesn’t now. If he had, he knew he wouldn’t have had if he really knew what it felt like to know all. But he.. did know. Atleast, he knew what he’d find would be awful. He was warned of it, and even then, he didn’t leave. Turned tail, but didn’t fully even leave then. His unshed tears feel unearned. If you willingly walk in front of an oncoming train, do you still have the right to sob because of the pain of being crushed?
…Either way, he tells the figure, No. No, I didn’t want this. No, this is unfair- You dangled something to solve in front of me, how am I expected not to look for the answers? How am I to blame? And as he does, he feels childish. All of his mocking of the antics the thing had put in front of him, all that ego, it all seems so, so stupid. Pleading what he thought to a judge that already knew all of him.
The golden cloaked figure leans. Or stands up, or- Or whatever it is, whatever it does, it holds his face. Gentle, with two hands, lifts his gaze upwards, to stare into a pair of eyes that aren’t even there. Frozen by the touch, he doesn’t move to pull away.
It leans closer, to whisper above D3rL0rd3’s head. Words meant purely for him. “You would have always made it to me. As destined as a corpse returning to the earth.” Then, it turns its head. Tilts it in a mockery of curiosity, for if you know all what is there to question? If you know the answer, why ask? “Isn’t it nature?”
D3rL0rd3 doesn’t remember pulling away from the grasp on him. He doesn’t remember running, he doesn’t remember why he had ran- All he remembers is the slow return of the flooding. Of the pushing out of his mind, as his body moved in an attempt to disprove what he was told he was. Even as he knows all things, even as he knows his next act is useless. D3rL0rd3 isn’t thinking with his mind. He returns to the start of his end, that stone start of a mine, and opens the chest in the middle of it.
There, he writes then places a book. One that he knows will change nothing. Afterall, the one in the basement of that church hadn’t stopped him, either. But panic does strange things to your mind- And as he still had a little of his mind left, that feeling took over and he poured what he wished he was told uselessly onto the pages. ‘Whatever you do, at the crossroads, don’t turn left.’, is what he had written.
He knows now his last ditch effort wouldn’t change anything. It didn’t matter if he turned left or up or down- He’s sure he would’ve found his way there no matter what. Maybe not writing at all would have been better, would have drawn Avery’s interest far less. But then again, D3rL0rd3 didn’t need a book at his own start to lead him to his ruin. He had walked into it, anyway.
It was his nature. It was their nature. And if his warning would’ve changed anything, he wouldn’t have been allowed to write it. He wouldn’t have been given a book, just as he wouldn’t have been allowed a pickaxe to break through that door.
Through all the possibilities, all the everything he knows, not one trail he can see is him never meeting that yellow figure. He returns to the earth, no matter what path or life he lives. And his last moments he sees of himself are of fear.