So the second part has arrived.
If this is your first time here, click here for the Table of Contents!
For the rest of you, enjoy!
Original transcripts for your read-along or read-alone pleasure:
Oshvail’s
genesis, as far as Aden understood, began
roughly one thousand years prior to the date of Aden’s involvement. It began on a planet called Agmora. Even before Oshvail’s birth, the humans on
Agmora discovered traces of a mysterious element of supernatural
capabilities. A small population dabbled
in the ether to produce effects that were nothing if not considered magical. The element and its effects eventually became
the study of subversive curiosities. It
was a time when self-proclaimed sorcerers would be willing to trade their
unusual knowledge for copper, or if they were lucky, gold. But eventually those students of gullible
minds became aware of the deception, and so the victims who lost their fortunes
began spreading the word of false pretenses.
A few unexplained deaths, a few more dark catastrophes, and great
debates sprung like weeds amongst the people of more civilized nations.
Rulers across lands began to outlaw the
use of the mysterious substance due to the troubles and fears associated with
its effects. Only small populations
thereafter welcomed the usage and observation of the element. But still, there remained those shadowed
doors where hidden intentions were carefully--and sometimes
carelessly--nurtured. From those trivial
times evolved an era of darkness when war and murder was aplenty. Directly in the prime of those dark ages
arrived a day when an artifact was born, the masses vicariously hunting,
lusting after its enormous supremacy. It
was an artifact bred from sorcery and blood, referred to as the Granatium.
The Granatium was created by inhabitants
of Agmora, and it was by no means an accident.
The creation began with the sorrow of a ruler, who found himself in a
thick gloom of mourning over the sudden death of his lover. He voiced the command for his people to bring
his beloved back to him, at any cost; his reward was overtly handsome, promising
jewels, titles, and rich, fertile land.
As expected, all walks of life and status came forth, men and women,
each promising more magnificence than the last.
Allowed to display their merit before the ruler and his guard,
challengers produced their worth in a competition of the forbidden arts. Several competitors relied on tricks, turning
the event into an illusive farce; of course, those tricksters were swiftly
beheaded as a warning to other wily sorts.
But there were a handful of subjects who appeared to fare legitimately;
there were unexplained doppelgangers, miniscule temperature variations without
the use of visible tools, and even evidence of telepathic activity.
Eventually, after various arts had been
displayed, the seven who proved most capable were selected to combine their
skills. And so they attempted to do just
that, placing their ethereal strength into an ordinary stone the size of a
man’s fist, and after several weeks, after innocent blood was sacrificed, they
returned, proclaiming the object to have gained extraordinary potential. The ordinary structure of the stone morphed,
glowing a deep, dark, mesmerizing red.
Not a single hand was to touch it except for the ruler’s own, and upon
presentation he lifted the glowing artifact with a child’s anticipation. There he sat with his magical artifact, high
upon his golden throne, studying his priests and his knights with a worrisome
expression of befuddlement. Without a
single explanation, he forcefully expelled the stone from the nearest window
and wept, dismissing all from his presence without reward, without punishment,
and without answer. Three moons later,
witnesses spread the word:
The queen had been resurrected.
The rumors stretched quickly amongst the
peasants that a magical artifact had indeed existed, one that could grant them
their wishes just as it had the great ruler.
Soon the entire kingdom was searching for what people called the red
rock, the ethereal orb, the wish giver, the blood stone, eventually the Granatium.
Merchants took advantage of the situation
by painting regular stones red, plastering them with scented oils and selling
them for a high price to anyone susceptible enough to buy them. Of course, the truth was unveiled of these
vile merchants, and mass violence ensued.
Between the believers and non-believers, those who cursed the ways of
the ether and those who prayed to it, came the vast accusations and spilling of
blood, decapitations, stabbings, hangings.
Amongst the chaos, the true artifact traveled from city to city, from
land to land, and eventually across the oceans.
And so, as the ether quickly began to
evaporate from Agmora and the era of magic and illusion came to an end, the
artifact itself slipped into myth, told around night fires to warn little boys
and girls of what would happen should they pursue such greedy absurdity.
The tale of the resurrected queen,
however, continued to be told. It
morphed from those of glory to those of grim terror. Some said that her resurrection was not
synonymous with life, that she was an undead creature heinously feasting on
human flesh, some details more gruesome than others. Laypersons rumored that she became a vampiric
demon who stole men from their wives, disemboweling them in her ocean cave
where she fed the remains to her monstrous serpent-children of the sea. Horrific tales told to the young for scares
or for caution, none of them backed by an inkling of proof. But there were those who believed in the
legend, especially in hoping that the Granatium was somewhere out there, hidden
on Agmora. Tales in the south proposed
it was north, and tales in the north suggested that it was in the east. Nobody was willing to put time and finance
into an actual seeking.
According to Oshvail, the artifact did in
fact make its tour around Agmora, but it did not do so on its own, and by this
time, it had changed the lives of many unsuspecting individuals.
Oshvail said that a touch was all it
took. The stone’s power became
stimulated by human contact, the brush of a finger or a kiss of the lips, any
part of human flesh that was connected to a beating heart, flowing blood, and
living brain. The artifact would somehow
interact with the individual’s spirit, sometimes providing skills based on his
or her desires, while other times twisting upon their jealousies to unleash any
latent disgust.
From the Granatium’s travels around Agmora
began Oshvail’s genesis, when one human happened to stumble across the red
stone. The human’s spirit was kind,
gentle, yet in its very nature was the desire to have a peculiar sort of power,
a power of knowledge and a power to be more than human, to be able to guide
others in whichever manner was considered to be good, a very subjective ideal
indeed. But alas, an ideal nonetheless;
it was more than enough for the Granatium to activate.
That person, upon touching the artifact,
transformed into a new figure, humanoid in appearance, yet animalistic. The individual felt only slightly more
powerful than before. But eventually
fate connected another person of the same nature, and when this second person
made contact with the Granatium, their spirit was added to the original,
causing the first to grow more powerful in areas of strength, knowledge, and
the supernatural. Together as one, they
named their new self Oshvail.
This pattern continued, and more people of
the same goodish nature and desires became additions to the growing
demihuman. The original persona, at the
time being a singular entity of one body and one mind, was mutating into a being
of multiple experiences, and the memories and understandings of those who were
added soon became overwhelming. The
persona’s perceptions eventually consisted of numerous men and women from all
around Agmora. At one point in time, the
persona who called itself Oshvail split its physical form so that it was no
longer a singular unit, but a multitude of similar beings having one
amalgamated, shared mind. Deeming it
useless in this new existence, the Oshvails decided to dismiss the unnecessary
human sex between each pair of its legs.
The transformation had become complete; the persona had ascended into a
new complex race of Oshvails of the Oshvail tribe, its humanity once providing
the basic structure for the transcendent entity it had become as its perception
and power became amplified.
In a physical realm, this power could have
easily fallen to lust and greed, potentially devastating to the human populace
occupying Agmora. However, even with an
amalgamated mind of good-natured individuality, Oshvail still had to pay a
price for its power. The price that came
along with the new life was separation; a separation from the reality of the
known universe, to be confined in its own realm to build and change as it saw
fit. No matter how hard the Oshvails
tried, they could not leave the heaven in which they’d been given. Alone in its construct, Oshvail pondered on
its old histories and, with its new abilities, it found a new compassion, a new
sense of responsibility to the human race from whence it came.
Conceiving much of the dangers and
destructive capabilities behind the Granatium and how potentially dangerous it
could be when touched by ill-natured hands, Oshvail the Oshvail felt liable to
captivate it, obliterate it, or produce any other action that could at least
stop the humans from abusing the accursed object. But since Oshvail couldn’t leave its domain,
Oshvail realized it would have to rely on humans to perform this task.
That proved easier said than done. Inviting people into Oshvail’s domain in
order to communicate with them wasn’t as straightforward as sending an inked
invitation with someone’s name on it, and to make matters worse,
Oshvail--despite all its mystical clout--did not have the power to force anyone
to enter into its domain. Oshvail found
that it could only present its domain to those of its choosing, without
explanation and without hope that anyone would accept.
The domain was always presented in the
form of a terrible snow, replacing the invitee’s reality with a winterland
nowhere. All the invitee had to do after
that moment was either enter, or choose not to enter, and the choice had been
made. But it was a choice for humans to
make, and so Oshvail the Oshvail of the Oshvails had become quite powerless in
a sense, even in all its subsistence.
But all it would take was for the invitee to travel through, and Oshvail
would have--amongst other crucial opportunities--the power to strengthen, the
power to inform, and most importantly, the power to change.
-----------------------------------------
Next Part: Chapter I: Blood Pact - Part Three
For other posts non-related to The Granatium, click here.
You can find me on Twitter @Keatongwolfe
Until next time...
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| Art by Keaton G. Wolfe |
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