Chapter Twenty-Four: Crypt
Incomplete
She took a deep breath and stepped forward.
One step. Then another. And another.
“Yes, keep going no matter what, and then you will see.”
She would keep walking. She would keep searching. And perhaps, in the end, she would finally understand.
But as the path led inward, the Elder Children grew hazy, time changed, and her life began to lose focus. And as it did, the world began to unravel before her eyes.
Rainy walked the narrow path through the woods, her boots pressing into the damp earth, her breath curling in the cool morning air. She had taken this path many times before in the morning to think and reflect—toward the river, past the fields, along the edge of this new world she had come to love. But today was different; she was leaving.
And as she looked ahead, she could no longer tell where the path ended and the visions began.
At first, it was only a whisper—an unfamiliar stirring at the edge of her mind, like a half-forgotten dream pressing its way into waking life. The trees around her swayed, but not with the wind. The light shifted, colors deepening, sharpening into something more real than real.
And then the vision took her in once more, this time with a consuming hunger.
She gasped, stumbling forward as the world around her bled away. The trees stretched impossibly high, their roots winding through the bones of ages past. The sky cracked open, revealing not blue, but an expanse beyond sight—a vastness filled with knowledge too great for words. And beneath it all, the earth itself hummed with something ancient and alive, something that had always been but had never been seen.
She wanted to turn away.
She wanted to shut her eyes, to block out this terrifying clarity, to step backward into the simple, solid world she had once known. But there was no going back.
She could see now. Her minds eyes opened in an instant and she could not unsee.
Her knees buckled, and she pressed a hand to her chest as if to hold herself together, as if she might break apart beneath the weight of understanding.
She saw the threads that bound all things, woven together in patterns beyond human reason. She saw the rise and fall of countless lives, each flickering like candle flames in the wind. She saw the toil of hands planting seeds in the earth, the labor of generations building towers, weaving cloth, forging steel. She saw the prayers whispered in the dark—some answered, some lost to silence.
And she saw the end of it all; she saw the end of the world, of life, of knowing.
The quiet collapse. The world hollowed and forgotten. The great ambitions of men fading into dust, their names lost, their monuments crumbling.
Her breath came fast, uneven.
Why show her this?
Why tear her from her small, simple life, from the quiet joys of planting and harvesting, of stories told by the fire, of laughter shared between friends? Why was she chosen to carry a sight so unbearable?
Her mind reeled, but deep inside, something shifted.
She was changing.
She could feel it, the way a tree stretches toward the sky without knowing why, the way the river flows to the sea without question. This knowledge was not just something she had been given—it was something she was becoming.
A Teller who had begun to see the beyond; a Reader.
And now, she could never stop seeing.
Rainy fell.
The weight of the vision crushed her, and her body gave way beneath it. Her hands struck the dry, crumbling earth, dust rising in a silent cloud around her as she collapsed. She tried to breathe, but the air was thick with decay, filled with the scent of time unraveling.
The ruins of civilization stretched before her, a graveyard of ambition. The bones of towers, once reaching for the heavens, now lay shattered and half-buried. The great mills, once filled with the ceaseless hum of human toil, stood silent—worn away by the steady march of years. Stone by stone, dream by dream, it all crumbled into nothingness.
Darkness crept in like a living thing, thick and heavy, swallowing the horizon. It seeped into every broken doorway, every empty street, every forgotten name. Time had abandoned the world. It had turned its face away, leaving behind only silence and shadow.
She lay still, her body sinking into the dust, as if the earth itself wished to reclaim her. She could feel herself dissolving, her flesh withering, her bones becoming brittle. Soon, she would be nothing but a memory lost to the winds.
From her place in the dust, she saw to the very end of the world, and all lay silent.
The wind howled through the emptiness, its voice hollow, bereft of life. The fields, once golden with harvest, lay barren, forgotten. The roads that had carried travelers and traders, dreamers and fools, crumbled beneath the weight of time.
And she—she laid amidst the ruin, staring into the void where civilization had once stood.
A sob tore from her throat.
She wept.
She wept for herself, for those she had loved, for the children who had laughed in the village square, for the mothers who had sung their lullabies, for the fathers who had worked the land with calloused hands. She wept for the ambitions of men, the dreams spun so high, only to fall into dust. She wept for humanity as she wept now for God. No, not for God, with God.
She wept for everything and everyone.
The grief was endless, an ocean with no shore. It crushed her, drowned her, filled her lungs with sorrow until she knew she would never breathe again.
What had it all been for?
This experiment called creation, this fragile thing called humanity—had it all been meaningless? Had all their striving, their suffering, their joys, and their pain amounted to nothing?
The mills in the hearts of men lay silent now; nothing had ever had any value at all.
The ambitions of kings and beggars alike had been swallowed by time.
And what of the light? The light she had always chased, the fire that had burned in her heart? It had only ever been a fire, warming them for a while, but in the end, it had consumed them, reducing all to ash.
There was nothing left to return to.
No hope.
No justice.
No mercy.
Just dust and silence.
The wind blew empty and cold through the ruins that had been Rainy. Time ceased, and the life drained out of her. And the void came with indifference to greet her.
Then there was nothing.
But--
Her fingers curled into the earth. Her nails dug into the dirt. A different fire stirred inside her, fierce and wild.
No!
She clenched her fist in rage, trembling, shaking beneath the weight of the vision, but she would not yield to despair, she could not.
Love is charity, and forgiveness is its highest form!
The words rose unbidden in her heart, fighting against the darkness that sought to smother them.
What about that?
The nothing answered. But she spoke to the nothing aloud.
Forgiveness is giving what one does not deserve!
Had that been in vain too? Was love nothing but another dream swallowed by the void?
No! The thoughts poured into her heart now, and she yielded to them.
Charity is wisdom, pure and untamed, and wisdom is the only true power! It reveals what is real, what is true. And love—love is truth. Love is all!
The voice of doubt roared against her, whispering of futility, of the inevitability of loss. The hungry mouth of nothingness beckoned to her. But she fought it, gasping, straining against the despair.
A loving heart shares what is important, what fosters love in others. And love—true love—is given freely, without expectation.
Ask, and it will be given. Knock, and the door will open.
Silence. But would it?
Tears streamed down her face, hot and angry.
Judge me not by what I am, but by what I strive to be!
She wanted to believe. Oh, how she wanted to believe! But the silence pressed in, mocking her.
Forgive me for my shortcomings!
She longed for the brilliant, loving mind she did not yet possess.
If I do not practice forgiveness, how can I ever hope to receive it?
She tried.
She failed.
But still, she tried.
The world is unjust.
Nature is cruel.
Yet--
Forgiveness transcends them both. It transcends everything, anything!
To break the world’s laws is our only hope.
The darkness clawed at her mind, whispering, "This is nonsense, give up. It’s over. There is nothing left. There never was."
But--
Love is the ultimate law.
Love never fails.
Not the love of comfort, not the love that is easy, but the love that forgives even when it is not deserved.
The wind screamed through the emptiness.
And Rainy screamed back.
Beyond the silence, beyond the cold, beyond the ruin of all things--
There is always a hand reaching down for you.
Always.
"Give to others what they do not deserve," she whispered, though the words shook, though the doubt still lurked.
She pressed her palm to the earth, grounding herself, anchoring herself to something beyond the void.
"Ask that the Eternal do the same for you."
And as the last echoes of despair faded into the wind, she lifted her eyes.
Her body ached. Her soul burned.
But she stood.
And then--
In silence, it cut through the darkness like a silver thread, impossibly thin yet unbreakable. It shimmered just beyond her reach, pulsing faintly, as if breathing. It was fragile and small—so small—but in the endless night, it was the only thing that remained.
Rainy's hollow eyes fixed upon it. A single shard of light.
A thread.
A thread in the ruin.
A thread in the dust.
It did not flicker. It did not waver. It simply was there.
And in that moment, as she lay at the edge of oblivion, something new inside her stirred,
And a hand reached down to take hers.
She took a deep breath and stepped forward.
One step. Then another. And another.
“Yes, keep going no matter what, and then you will see.”
She would keep walking. She would keep searching. And perhaps, in the end, she would finally understand.
But as the path led inward, the Elder Children grew hazy, time changed, and her life began to lose focus. And as it did, the world began to unravel before her eyes.
Rainy walked the narrow path through the woods, her boots pressing into the damp earth, her breath curling in the cool morning air. She had taken this path many times before in the morning to think and reflect—toward the river, past the fields, along the edge of this new world she had come to love. But today was different; she was leaving.
And as she looked ahead, she could no longer tell where the path ended and the visions began.
At first, it was only a whisper—an unfamiliar stirring at the edge of her mind, like a half-forgotten dream pressing its way into waking life. The trees around her swayed, but not with the wind. The light shifted, colors deepening, sharpening into something more real than real.
And then the vision took her in once more, this time with a consuming hunger.
She gasped, stumbling forward as the world around her bled away. The trees stretched impossibly high, their roots winding through the bones of ages past. The sky cracked open, revealing not blue, but an expanse beyond sight—a vastness filled with knowledge too great for words. And beneath it all, the earth itself hummed with something ancient and alive, something that had always been but had never been seen.
She wanted to turn away.
She wanted to shut her eyes, to block out this terrifying clarity, to step backward into the simple, solid world she had once known. But there was no going back.
She could see now. Her minds eyes opened in an instant and she could not unsee.
Her knees buckled, and she pressed a hand to her chest as if to hold herself together, as if she might break apart beneath the weight of understanding.
She saw the threads that bound all things, woven together in patterns beyond human reason. She saw the rise and fall of countless lives, each flickering like candle flames in the wind. She saw the toil of hands planting seeds in the earth, the labor of generations building towers, weaving cloth, forging steel. She saw the prayers whispered in the dark—some answered, some lost to silence.
And she saw the end of it all; she saw the end of the world, of life, of knowing.
The quiet collapse. The world hollowed and forgotten. The great ambitions of men fading into dust, their names lost, their monuments crumbling.
Her breath came fast, uneven.
Why show her this?
Why tear her from her small, simple life, from the quiet joys of planting and harvesting, of stories told by the fire, of laughter shared between friends? Why was she chosen to carry a sight so unbearable?
Her mind reeled, but deep inside, something shifted.
She was changing.
She could feel it, the way a tree stretches toward the sky without knowing why, the way the river flows to the sea without question. This knowledge was not just something she had been given—it was something she was becoming.
A Teller who had begun to see the beyond; a Reader.
And now, she could never stop seeing.
Rainy fell.
The weight of the vision crushed her, and her body gave way beneath it. Her hands struck the dry, crumbling earth, dust rising in a silent cloud around her as she collapsed. She tried to breathe, but the air was thick with decay, filled with the scent of time unraveling.
The ruins of civilization stretched before her, a graveyard of ambition. The bones of towers, once reaching for the heavens, now lay shattered and half-buried. The great mills, once filled with the ceaseless hum of human toil, stood silent—worn away by the steady march of years. Stone by stone, dream by dream, it all crumbled into nothingness.
Darkness crept in like a living thing, thick and heavy, swallowing the horizon. It seeped into every broken doorway, every empty street, every forgotten name. Time had abandoned the world. It had turned its face away, leaving behind only silence and shadow.
She lay still, her body sinking into the dust, as if the earth itself wished to reclaim her. She could feel herself dissolving, her flesh withering, her bones becoming brittle. Soon, she would be nothing but a memory lost to the winds.
From her place in the dust, she saw to the very end of the world, and all lay silent.
The wind howled through the emptiness, its voice hollow, bereft of life. The fields, once golden with harvest, lay barren, forgotten. The roads that had carried travelers and traders, dreamers and fools, crumbled beneath the weight of time.
And she—she laid amidst the ruin, staring into the void where civilization had once stood.
A sob tore from her throat.
She wept.
She wept for herself, for those she had loved, for the children who had laughed in the village square, for the mothers who had sung their lullabies, for the fathers who had worked the land with calloused hands. She wept for the ambitions of men, the dreams spun so high, only to fall into dust. She wept for humanity as she wept now for God. No, not for God, with God.
She wept for everything and everyone.
The grief was endless, an ocean with no shore. It crushed her, drowned her, filled her lungs with sorrow until she knew she would never breathe again.
What had it all been for?
This experiment called creation, this fragile thing called humanity—had it all been meaningless? Had all their striving, their suffering, their joys, and their pain amounted to nothing?
The mills in the hearts of men lay silent now; nothing had ever had any value at all.
The ambitions of kings and beggars alike had been swallowed by time.
And what of the light? The light she had always chased, the fire that had burned in her heart? It had only ever been a fire, warming them for a while, but in the end, it had consumed them, reducing all to ash.
There was nothing left to return to.
No hope.
No justice.
No mercy.
Just dust and silence.
The wind blew empty and cold through the ruins that had been Rainy. Time ceased, and the life drained out of her. And the void came with indifference to greet her.
Then there was nothing.
But--
Her fingers curled into the earth. Her nails dug into the dirt. A different fire stirred inside her, fierce and wild.
No!
She clenched her fist in rage, trembling, shaking beneath the weight of the vision, but she would not yield to despair, she could not.
Love is charity, and forgiveness is its highest form!
The words rose unbidden in her heart, fighting against the darkness that sought to smother them.
What about that?
The nothing answered. But she spoke to the nothing aloud.
Forgiveness is giving what one does not deserve!
Had that been in vain too? Was love nothing but another dream swallowed by the void?
No! The thoughts poured into her heart now, and she yielded to them.
Charity is wisdom, pure and untamed, and wisdom is the only true power! It reveals what is real, what is true. And love—love is truth. Love is all!
The voice of doubt roared against her, whispering of futility, of the inevitability of loss. The hungry mouth of nothingness beckoned to her. But she fought it, gasping, straining against the despair.
A loving heart shares what is important, what fosters love in others. And love—true love—is given freely, without expectation.
Ask, and it will be given. Knock, and the door will open.
Silence. But would it?
Tears streamed down her face, hot and angry.
Judge me not by what I am, but by what I strive to be!
She wanted to believe. Oh, how she wanted to believe! But the silence pressed in, mocking her.
Forgive me for my shortcomings!
She longed for the brilliant, loving mind she did not yet possess.
If I do not practice forgiveness, how can I ever hope to receive it?
She tried.
She failed.
But still, she tried.
The world is unjust.
Nature is cruel.
Yet--
Forgiveness transcends them both. It transcends everything, anything!
To break the world’s laws is our only hope.
The darkness clawed at her mind, whispering, "This is nonsense, give up. It’s over. There is nothing left. There never was."
But--
Love is the ultimate law.
Love never fails.
Not the love of comfort, not the love that is easy, but the love that forgives even when it is not deserved.
The wind screamed through the emptiness.
And Rainy screamed back.
Beyond the silence, beyond the cold, beyond the ruin of all things--
There is always a hand reaching down for you.
Always.
"Give to others what they do not deserve," she whispered, though the words shook, though the doubt still lurked.
She pressed her palm to the earth, grounding herself, anchoring herself to something beyond the void.
"Ask that the Eternal do the same for you."
And as the last echoes of despair faded into the wind, she lifted her eyes.
Her body ached. Her soul burned.
But she stood.
And then--
In silence, it cut through the darkness like a silver thread, impossibly thin yet unbreakable. It shimmered just beyond her reach, pulsing faintly, as if breathing. It was fragile and small—so small—but in the endless night, it was the only thing that remained.
Rainy's hollow eyes fixed upon it. A single shard of light.
A thread.
A thread in the ruin.
A thread in the dust.
It did not flicker. It did not waver. It simply was there.
And in that moment, as she lay at the edge of oblivion, something new inside her stirred,
And a hand reached down to take hers.