April 2nd Topic Madness

[Tehya]

Madness can embrace many reactions such as a rage, insanity, extreme folly, ecstasy, enthusiasm. Feel free to place your art or writing in any way you interrupt madness.

Tehya

[mozenwrathe]

*There are many ways that madness can be defined. Insanity is not something that is unique to one race, and is well known to a few as a disease or malady that consumes the old and the sick. Though when it comes to some races such as the dark elves, they embrace what others call madness and call it "living freely." Zealots are also known by many to be partially or completely maniacal about their chosen faith, others delving deep into pools of delirium and insisting others drown with them - sometimes quite literally. Though in the end, there is little more frightening than when a deity's chosen avatars embrace such derangements as a distraction... unless it is the god (or goddess) themselves. What was found below was in a journal left in Hurema'Inca a significant amount of time ago. There was no name affixed to the journal, though, so the owner could never be positively identified*

L.M.N.O. (Lengthy Monologued Narcissist's Overture)
by Prydain Mozenwrathe

There are some things you just do not tell others. Like when you see little trails of fae dust behind them and you know there are no tiny folk around for miles. Or if you look up and see three headed ravens sitting on a building behind you, in a town where birds are simply used as food. Normally, you bother not to say anything as it's more interesting to let people see such for themselves. For the record, though, I've never seen a bird with more than one head unless it was a dream. That would be just disturbing to say the least, and quite unnatural. Of course, I am sure some necromancer has accomplished that feat already, and is at the moment working on figuring out how to make an eight-legged horse for the accolades from their peers.

I trust not necromancers for they delve into things best left to the gods. Not that I have much trust in the gods either, but that is something else entirely. Those who trifle with dead things often in my humbling experiences have not that solid a grasp on reality to begin with. The heady wine of power that they sip from in dabbling with death easily sways the step and staggers the sanity. Not that I have heard of one blasting their own minds away and ending up a gibbering mass of flesh and bone, though. No, whenever they make mistakes, it tends to endanger the bodies of the many rather than the minds of the few. Such actions are something I would personally call crazy, but there are so many that respect the fondlers of fatality that my words would be completely meaningless. Nothing really unusual there, as I am but one voice and without much social or political weight.

There are others whom I would dote upon with the characteristic of crazy, such as most of the dark elven females I have heard of that are infamous. Almost every last one of them seems to savour destroying things for the sake of... well, destroying things. Ending lives just because the person is wearing a colour they despise, or causing an minor tremor just to knock a book off the shelf - really, the stories are varied and many. Not all of them revolve around magic, either. For example, I heard of one dark elf - or moriel, if you will - named Ardula Godeund who had a habit of hunting down trolls, raping them with some strange leather armor, and then... Alright, some tales do not need to be retold in all detail. Let's just say that her armor was dark green for very good reasons. The truly insane part came at the end, where she would leave the trolls half buried, and set up a shrine around them so her loyal goblin legions could worship them for a full week. So I know not who was more unbalanced: the dark elf that was doing the molesting, or the goblin horde that followed her without question.

Oh yes, then of course there are those who willingly sign up for a cause that makes no sense at all. Of course, that just takes timing, planning, and more than often a charismatic individual to draw the masses. I mean things such as saving a petrified tree from being removed from an already dead forest. Seriously? If the lands around have essentially given up, what would it matter for one dead redwood to be shifted? Unless it is god-marked, it is just as important as any random boulder on a mountain. Of course, that was something I experienced years ago and far from this Ilfiran Empire. Skirmishes were fought because of that one tree, and blood soaked into the ground quite a bit. For all I know, roses and anthuriums now grow rampant around that place. It was seven years ago, and I don't believe I could have left that region any faster. The fervency of the factions surrounding that tree was nothing less than terrifying to the common man.

There is a special place in my heart, though, for zealotry. Those who believe their god is so much better than the others, that anything they do is correct and should be blindly accepted by others. For many of them, are they no more than touched in the head. Some of them are straight out lunatics. I myself follow a faith, and have done things that others would not condone. I make no excuses for what I have done, however. I know that I have harmed others in my way before, and I will do it again. However, I shall not try to blanket myself with "my god told me it was alright for me to do this, so you have to accept it." None has to blindly agree with anything I have done. Those whom insist I must bend to their deity's desires are fooling themselves. Those who use such a line like that as a shield are looking to get beaten with a wheelbarrow.

Yes, you read that correctly. For anyone who does not know what I meant by that, it means I would be picking up a wheelbarrow and beating the person with it. An empty one, of course, because I am not that strong at all. And if you are really curious, I've done it already thrice before. Of course, I was weaker then, and it took me a lot more effort. I have never called myself a truly civil or civilized individual, and I refuse to now. Lying should be done only when there is something imperative to gain or lose. And if you are reading this bit of parchment, I've already lost this journal of mine and have found no need to try to reclaim it.

I have borne witness to a group of nature spirits losing their tenuous grip on reality before once. Once. That was a nightmare that I could not wake up from. It lasted for no more than a few minutes, but what I saw there was chaos and catastrophe in a few heartbeats. Know I nothing of what happened with them, only was that I was supposed to watch and learn from it. The nature spirits ended up destroying themselves in a spectacular fashion, but were somehow reborn. I strongly suspect Gaea had a direct hand in their rejuvenation, but I wasn't about to question. Every few months, the scene replays in my head, and I wake up in a cold sweat. To get back to sleep, normally must I pace for a few minutes outside where the wind flows and the sky can be seen. Nothing like being scarred permanently by something that had nothing to do with you.

As for myself? I can't say I am free from delusions or preposterousness. It is part of being alive - to dream of things far beyond yourself. To have goals that drive you, or visions that haunt you are all a part of being normal. Without such flying bits of fancy and fantasy, societies would never have artists or toolmakers. There would be no motivations to do anything, really and truly. Kitten-sized bouts with unreasonableness and irrationality are fine and dandy. As long as they are managed accordingly, you can continue on with your life and make something of yourself. Of course, if they are ill-timed, such as while scaling a cliff, that could be just a little detrimental.

Besides, all I really want to do is stab a goddess in the face a few times. That's not blasphemy or insanity at all. That's just a destination in my life I haven't reached yet.

[Lucien Valdres]

Emptiness prevails, no wind behind my sails, yearning down below, threatens to bring me low, cold
skeletal hands, dark barren lands, trodden by the dead, destined to become our stead, a place my head
goes, my suffering and my woes, bring me there to dwell, my oh so personal hell..

by Lucien Valdres

[mozenwrathe]

*As most know, not every tale about someone they will tell you. Some of these hidden tales are secrets. Others are simply forgotten with time. And then there are a few stories that just do not seem all that important to be shared. Slivers of history that fall through the fingertips and end up swept away by other memories. Always there to ruin one's day, but never on the tip of one's tongue. The dark elves have a phrase for such memories: "daggers within the soul." The humans also have a phrase: "steps that tumble you down into the dark." The end is always the same if you focus on them, however.*

With Ordinary Care Would Such Things Never Happen
by Khithaulhú, vulpine of many names and talents, lovers and legends

My people are a long lived one. And as such, there are things we will see that others do not. Moments some would wish forgotten. Little seconds that could be the start of something new. Or that last breath of life from something - or someone - old that floats back into the sky from whence many believe life descended from. However one may see us, are we here, and no elf can say we are not as wise as they when the years turn into decades, and the decades into centuries. Of course, there will always be some that doubt, but that is their choice to know little about so much and call it "knowledge."

Something many do not discuss amongst my people is the loss of the ability to understand truth in one's own self. To loosen the heart and the spirit from the body in such a way that are they out of balance with the true nature of the person. There are numerous words in the vulpine language that describe aspects of this, but the humans have a word that sums up the result of such deeds and fates: insanity. I have never known of one of my kind to find themselves in such a state without having many, many horrific and tragic things happen to or around them. The humans, however, are a far more fragile people spiritually, regardless of what sort of human they are. As great as they may climb, the heights from which they fling themselves would shatter boulders with equal ease.

What I remember now is a story of a dream told to me by a half-blooded one. Her name was Bandhura Acua'Pil, but I forget if the dream was her own, or did it belong to her walking mate of the time. Regardless, the dream reminded me of something I saw within a gladiator's game one season. I believe it was the winter, for they had the slaves naked for all to see. It was bloodsport like I had never seen, and not something I would willingly look upon with favour. Even then, was I the guest of one who enjoyed such shedding of spirit and skin for his personal entertainment and as such did not wish to insult him too very much. He had chosen these games to attempt something new: feeding some of the favoured gladiators foods that would make them sluggish and yet stronger, to draw out the gore and galling butchery. For the slaves and condemned, were they forced to drink liquours and elixirs made from the byproducts of various apothecary potions.

Each match was a horrid example of what was worst in every race. One of them featured three goblins against one minotaur. The goblins were well armed, well trained, and seemingly inebriated on something that made them sleepy. The minotaur, from what I was told, was given some extract of the scum from making LP9 and some other random potion. The end result was three deaths, a crowd of disgusted and amused onlookers, and one overly satisfied minotaur who keeled over from injury and blood loss after he finished with his last victim. To this day, can I remember the screams of anguish from the goblins, and the serpentine gaze that my host - if one could truly call him that - had upon the entire proceedings. He was as one transfixed with the spectacle of sadism and sanguine sordidness. When I think back upon that day, I truly thought him to have dove deep into something his mind would never come back from. The way I heard him try to stifle a giggle while one of the goblins plunged a dagger into the shoulder of the minotaur was the cruelest sound I ever heard.

Another match is what Bandhura's tale reminded me of. My host had a particular grudge against another grand slave owner. If memory serves, she was a drak`sen, and a most powerful and beautiful one. Every step she took, did others take notice. Her stable of slaves was nothing to snort lightly at either. Something from almost every race did she have in her household in one form or another. She was missing a few choice tidbits, like one of those legendary Magi or a minotaur of her own, but she more than made up for it with some rather powerful looking barbarians and Sheykans. As my host could not truly strike at her, he chose one of the female's closest associates. Another drak`sen, both of their names elude me at this moment. The second one also had a good assortment of males and females to use at these gladiatorial matches, but there was one in particular that was my host's target.

This one slave was in heavy iron collar and manacles both. The chains looked heavy enough to weigh down any regular man indeed, which must have been why he was wearing them. A body that looked as if it was meant to be used for breeding, with shoulders that one could balance halflings on with room enough for a nereid on each. Skin darker than I had seen any barbarian before in that region, so I thought he must have been bred from one of those people from the deserts. His hair was a strange colour as well, something which reminded me of sullied snow. What I can remember most, though, were his eyes: they seemed dead. As if the spirit had been ripped out of the man, leaving him a husk of his former self. Though was I to learn this was not quite the truth of the matter at all. Did he not speak or look elsewhere, simply gazing straight forward, blinking with a slow cadence only to keep his eyes from drying out. His breath was shallow and yet slow, keeping his movements to a minimum. Most jeered at him from the stands and asked if his jaw had been shut through sorcery to keep him from drooling everywhere.

The two drak`sen merely smiled and sent him off into the ring with the lengths of chain still attached to his wrists. His arms were free enough to move, but his hands could be no more than twice his shoulder width apart. And into the ring, my oh so noble and honourable host sent in not one but two trolls. One from the mountains and one from the swamps. Both of them had been caught on his last hunt and had slain their way through at least three matches over the past few months each. As a pair, this was to be nothing less than a horrific rape and slaughter at best. Each of them loomed far over the height of what that barbarian could have possibly been, and were already armed with axes that looked like they could have outweighed a centaur.

And here is where I learned what true fear meant. The moment the gates closed, a howling the likes of which I had never heard came from the barbarian's throat. A grin that only those whom have lost all sense of hope or thought appeared upon his visage. And then he began to run. A sprint like I have never seen in the direction of the two trolls. Most thought he was simply looking to die swiftly. It was as he stumbled and fell that some noticed there was a bit wrong with how he collapsed. The swamp troll, looking for a swift kill, lumbered over far faster than the mountain troll. What he got for his trouble was a broken spear that had been left behind through the center of his legs. In one thrust.

In mere seconds, the man had actually injured the first of the trolls. How he managed to dodge the downward swing of the axe is anyone's guess, but the force of the blow did nothing to the links of chain around his wrists. As the axe moved, a heavy boot carried the barbarian into the air. The mountain troll had arrived to "aid" his gladiatorial ally, and in doing so must have broken a few of the much smaller fool's ribs in the process. Landing, the dark skinned one started coughing up and spitting out so much red, it looked like he was repainting frozen sands with rubies. More broken and discarded weapons were about, and the mountain troll was not interested in ending up like the swamp troll. He moved swiftly, advancing on the barbarian while making deep sweeps with his cleaver-on-a-staff.

The barbarian's luck was with him again as he leaped over one of the swings, grabbing and then hurling broken sword pieces at the face of the mountain troll. Nothing actually pierced the miniature mountain of stone, but it did cause the troll to back up some even as the other troll had removed the spear piece from his body. The barbarian was full of surprises though, for he managed to grab the hilts of two busted short swords and charged the troll again. It was as if the fool was keening for his own corpse to be made, only to be foiled as a backhand sent him flying into the wall of the arena. Though the next scream to be heard was from the mountain troll: in the midst of the barbarian's rage, the troll had found both his eyes full of broken blade. Blinded, the mountain troll was swinging his weapon around in agony, hoping beyond hope to hit his obviously fallen foe before they could strike again.

Here did we see the swamp troll's native cunning. Pushing the mountain troll in the direction of the downed human, the wounded bog-loving bastard thought to use the blinded gray skinned goliath as a shield. What neither of them could have known was that the bruised and beaten barbarian still had fortune on his side, as if some goddess was purposely keeping him alive to punish all three of them. The man had found a javelin, and aiming for the mountain troll, flung it to hopefully pierce the chest of the lumbering land leviathan. It was an overly strong shove with the axe by the swamp troll that did his own self in. For the mountain troll stumbled, allowing the lopsided and two handed throw to continue upwards, catching the swamp troll right in its mouth - and out through the other side.

Coughing up even more, the barbarian dodged the wading sweeps of the mountain troll, seizing upon a sword used by one of my host's own champions. The barbarian dodging came to an end when he was hit with the flat of the axe along his left side. The resounding slap and thud made one believe that had to be the end of the combat. The mountain troll, knowing not that its distant cousin by race alone was dead or at least dying, shouted to it in vain to finish off the lowly human. For all the world, the barbarian looked like a hanging wooden puppet with its spidersilk thread sliced away from it. It did not look as if he even breathed. That was until somehow he forced himself up again. Dragging the sword along the ground, he walked around to the side of the mountain troll, alerting the much larger beast to its presence on purpose by slapping the metal of the sword to the chains upon his wrists. One backhanded swing went for the male's position by the mountain troll, determined to finish this at long last. What none were expecting was the power in the barbarian's legs to catch the troll midswing, stabbing the blade deep into its side and pulling downwards.

At this point, was the fight done, but the almost dead barbarian had other plans. Disturbing plans, that truly haunt me to this day. Those dead eyes returned as the barbarian's body went almost slack. Holding the blade, he dragged himself over to the swamp troll and started to stab the body. Lightly at first, until they were full plunges over and over again. It was like watching a woodpecker at work, but that was no beak, and it was not tree sap that could be seen flying everywhere. Guards had to be summoned to get the barbarian off of the troll's carcass, giggling and laughing with his own bile and blood seeping from his lips. From what it looked like, more than five spells were emptied into the barbarian before he went as still as the trolls. How he managed to not die from such was a secret the pair of drak`sen smirked to themselves about, collecting their winnings from the crowd.

Any time someone speaks of madness, I remember that barbarian. Any time someone speaks of obsession, I can recall the raving of my host for a whole hour about how the two drak`sen had somehow cheated him of a "decent and proper bloodletting." Never have I thought of owning a barbarian slave after that day, figuring that dark elves and wolven would be far less dangerous to possess. All of this is years in the past now, at least five complete turns of the season. That barbarian slave would have to be dead by now. Nothing that completely lost in fury and famine of the spirit should be allowed to survive, ever. To put a hollowed shell of a man out of his misery would be a most suitable mercy.