[Eastbound] IC Journal: Unsent Chronicles

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Letters and personal notes steadily taking up an increasing span of pages in Eleven's journal.

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Personal Chronicles

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Status Updates

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Letters addressed to Archeval.

Day 25 of Month 6

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Where to start.

The dragon was captured. I visited it once. It's surprisingly beautiful and there's a wisdom to it. Macaluso promised to release it, but I wonder if that will hold true.

There was a celebration held in the Bessis tower, the ice dragon held in the moat. Vannozza tasked a number of us with going through the waterways, certain there was something secret the Bessis were hiding and hoping to expose it. They were.

Attaryl undead and other people like us.

The dragon also started on a rampage and locked us in the tower with its ice magic for a few days. It hasn't been pleasant. The undead witches can float and have some kind of mind meddling ability. Fire magic is still effective at least.

I hope you're doing all right.

Day 9 of Month 7

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We loosed the dragon back into the ocean. It feels like a minor event now, despite the trouble we'd gone to.

There was another group meeting.

Among a handful of other things to come up, Wei Wuxian learned that the reason Taravast hasn't fallen to the undead yet isn't because it's strong. Bonaccorso brokered peace by selling out the other citadels. It's beyond revolting.

Anurr has made his presence known. So far nothing more than a request to take charge of the unfettered witches from the tower as though he can offer them succor in Sa-Hareth. The general thought is he may be here looking to expand his influence. Between him and the undead haunting the hunting ground and necromantic district, the city is beginning to feel as though it's being quietly invaded.

I hope you're safe where you are.

Day 27 of Month 7

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I'm starting to worry about you. I haven't heard from you in awhile.

The city is under attack. I'm writing to you from a mansion that we seized to house refugees from the southern district. Anurr is there now, spreading an unseasonable cold in a likeness of Sa-Hareth. The city's nobles are hiding behind Taravast's sorcerors in Artes Mundi. Neither Vannozza nor Macaluso are offering sanctuary to ordinary citizenry.

The Huntress and Beastmaster are the names of the fiends that have come to invade Taravast. They've brought their own terrible creatures with them to reign death and destruction. Worse, at least two of our own were captured and corrupted- Lily and Slick. Lily is recovering, but I haven't found Slick yet. I hope we can save him, too.

I've been in charge of the injured as they come in to the safe house, but the witches are saying we need to activate at least two towers to counter the assault. In the spirit of that, I will be leaving in the morning alongside Chu Wanning for the northern tower. I pray we're successful.

Please be all right.

Day 13 of Month 8

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Stunningly talented! I've listened to you for too long.

It's been more than two months since we last spoke. I've held up my end in keeping you updated, but I've yet to hear anything from yours. You know I finally grew desperate enough to ask Bloodbonnet after you? Imagine my surprise to learn he hasn't been able to reach you either. I even fell to bribing him for information if he discovers anything useful about your condition or whereabouts.

I care about you, and if I didn't have Lily to look after, I'd come looking for you myself and I wouldn't hear a word you had to say on the matter.

If you're dead, it had best be for some reason other than your goddess-forsaken pride.

So much has happened that I haven't told you about. For starters, it's partly my fault that the city was attacked. You could even say I knowingly provoked it without much stretching the truth. Some hero I've turned out to be.

Once more, it feels like I'm failing everyone. I should have tried to do more to help you. I can't even think about what I would do if the worst happened, but I know I would do everything in my power. Even if that doesn't seem to mean much of late. How many more times is it going to be like this?

Above all, I miss your calm, rational input. You have a way of making things make sense that no one else seems to be able to manage as effectively. I pray you come back and call me an idiot for ever worrying about you. It's killing me not to know what's happened.

You promised me.

If ever you do return, you owe me a drink and a very long, completely reasonable account of everything that happened.

Ps. Slick is okay.

Day 27 of Month 8

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Bloodbonnet is as useless as he ever is. I still haven't heard anything. By now, I guess I should accept that you've gone, one way or another. I pray it's in the same manner that Hendrik disappeared.

Even still, I've decided to keep writing you. It helps to pretend I'm still just informing you of goings-on. It keeps my thoughts focused, so here you are.

I'm in Sa-Hareth now. Because of the part I had to play there, it's better than I'm not in Taravast for a little while. It doesn't look like anything has really changed here. So much for all that useless conflict between undead warlord supporters. It's a nice room, paid up for a week. Though I'm starting to feel I was a little mistaken about basic comforts and should have included peace of mind. That's been difficult to manage lately.

I've heard there's threat of an uprising in Taravast. Before the attack, I think I could have supported something like that. Now, it seems only ill-timed. But it's possible the new weapons shipment may appease the undead for long enough to let the city choose new leaders. I'm hardly qualified to say.

In the end, what I pray for is preserving life in this world and ensuring it's well-defended. A seeming impossible task thus far, but I've resolved to keep trying.

Day 26, Month 8

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The room is nice. I've decided not to ask after the means. So long as it didn't cost lives, I can be content. I am not dead nor corrupted, as Lily promised. It's enough.

I can feel my injuries easing through the power of this bracer. Within a day or two of rest, I will be fine. Although there isn't much to do until then, save for lay down and let my thoughts wander, I've decided to work through them here in writing.

Already the days of my imprisonment feel like a dull haze. I was not conscious for much of it. What I do remember is colored in pain and anger. Certainly, I'd proven rash and reckless in provoking those beatings. I recall the feeling of a ship crashing through a roughened sea.

Worse, I know I'd wanted this pain. Perhaps more troubling still is the strange peace I feel now. I begrudge Rigarda her false accusations and sense, but not the men that gave into anger. I know this temporary suffering falls far short of the lives lost as a result of my foolishness, but it is some penance at least. It's eased my mind too, to speak all the terrible truths I've learned and withheld like a festering wound.

Now there are no more secrets save for one.

Even now I hesitate to put it to paper in even the most cryptic manner. I'll never speak of it, even should the opportunity arise. My heart aches, though I know it's much better this way. Over time, it should fade..

Goddess lend me strength.

I've made for a poor steward thus far. Even with my power returned, it's seemed there's been little I can do. I suppose it was short-sighted to think it would solve everything.

The proposition made by Hatisse only further suggests that something about the cycle is broken. Her soul shouldn't have lingered this long. I need to find out how Life and Death are meant to work here. If there's anything I can do to help this world, perhaps it's to restore that cycle in some way. If I could manage that, then it might be enough to atone.

In that way, both worlds feel as though they nearly mirror one another. It's what Erdrea might look like, should I fail and centuries of darkness linger.

Once more, though the part of me that is tired of heartache wishes to, I can't give up on the life of this world.

Day 2, Month 9

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I've had a great deal of time to think about it, and I still don't know what the right decision was.

We intercepted the weapons to keep them from being used against other living souls. But as a result, the dead swept through Taravast and destroyed much of it, ending lives in the process. I don't know how many died in that assault, but I know it was too many.

I guess there wasn't one, in the end. Both options led to loss of life. I like to think we were able to protect the living in Taravast more than we could have if the dead had taken those weapons to slaughter elsewhere, but it's impossible to say for certain.

I wish I'd had more time. I wish I could have seen through the politics of the city better to know how best to warn them. I wish now that we'd sold those weapons after all. Though from what I understand, they've been sabotaged. A small boon.

Nine months now, and I don't know that I've made a single good decision for this world. Small wonder the others fail to see me as capable. I pray now for wisdom more than strength.

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I don't think I ever thanked you for everything you did for me.

I was so guilt-stricken back then. I guess that hasn't changed too much, but I needed someone to confess my failings to and you let me do that. I can't tell you how relieved I was that you simply listened and didn't judge me for any of it. Better, didn't expect anything from me. Asked questions I had answers to. Told me about yourself a little. I treasured that.

I couldn't talk to anyone in Erdrea in such a way with my title hanging over me. I was supposed to offer hope to people and give them something to believe in. How could I do that, if they knew I didn't hold any faith in myself? In some moments, I even hated that I'd survived. Dying would have been so much easier. But people were depending on me. Even now, I'm not afraid of death so much as corruption.

..Forgive my ramblings. I'm a little drunk. Though I suppose you'll never see this for it to matter overmuch.

My point is, you've done a lot for me- more than you probably ever thought. Helped me realize I wasn't as defeated as I thought and helped rally what strength I had left through your own example and cloaked encouragement. And I can't thank you enough for that. I like to think I was beneficial to you in some way, but I know you helped me more than I aided you. I guess that sort of tally doesn't really exist between friends, but I desperately wanted to be able to help you and I continue to hate that I couldn't.

For some reason, since we walked together from the start, I thought that meant we'd see this through in the same way. A foolish thought. As a force of darkness, I should be glad you've gone. But you challenged me to think of life and death, light and dark as a balance and I'm grateful for that as well. Night and day are both important. But neither am I the sun.

Still there was something about you I started to feel was important. A reflection of sorts.

I think we might have been the moon.

..And I'm being stupid again, I know. A worrying trend. I'm going to bed.

Day 18, Month 9

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I think about leaving- of going back to Erdrea- and dread fills my heart.

For all this world's other failings, I've found love here. We always knew it would end of course, but with people making ready to leave, I begin to understand the depths of my own reluctance. But then I look to Lily's gift to me and I'm filled with longing. My heart is torn.

Good-hearted idealists. Moran may as well have called those of us that fall under that banner fools. He isn't wrong, but neither did he have a hand in the attack on this city. Wangji speaks of responsibility and Slick of a duty to those in his world. I understand both feelings well.

This group has been possessed of a singular goal. I wouldn't seek to sabotage it for my own selfish reasons- Marcos has an infant daughter for Goddess' sake- but I begin to understand that my priorities have shifted away from that goal.

What I pray for is preserving life in this world and ensuring it's well-defended. I meant these words when I wrote them to Archeval, and I mean them now. This is what's important to me while we're here. But of course there's the wonder and doubt of whether or not there's anything I can do beyond prayer to aid this world in that manner.

It's much the same in Erdrea, but there at least, Yggdrasil chose me. Surely there was a reason. Though in moments where my faith wavers, I sometimes wonder if She might have chosen wrongly. But neither can I abandon Erdrea to darkness, so long as I live.

In the end, I suppose Slick is right-- that my duty to Erdrea is greater than the sense of responsibility I feel toward the declining lifeblood of this world. Yggdrasil's will is divine. I'm only a good-hearted fool in this one.

Still the thought grieves me. More than just this city, this world feels doomed. Every life lost tips the scales in Death's favor. How many are born to counter it, I wonder.. Will there be a day when every city lies abandoned, fallen to ruins and home only to the desolate eternity of undeath? A chilling vision.

But now, as my thoughts turn to Lily, I think again of how difficult it was to walk while weighed down by grief. I will live through this heartbreak, but it will be the third most difficult thing I've ever done. Taking that last step will be the second most difficult thing.

Goddess, let there be hope somewhere in all this.

Day 23 of Month 9

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Bonaccorso is dead- killed by one of our hands.

I'm not one to celebrate the loss of life, but he was sacrificing others to extend his own life at the end. I guess many Doxe's have lived unnaturally long lives. There isn't a word I can think of that describes the depth of my disgust for such a practice. It's beyond heresy. Furthermore, he'd ordered the Bessis to set fire to Taravast's citizens for reasons I struggle to understand. He said he'd sooner see the city burn than in the hands of the undead when I met with him, but never did I imagine..

I'm glad he is gone from this world.

Macaluso is stepping up as the next leader, now. There was something about Bonaccorso intending to possess Vannozza. She'll be advising now, I guess. The city needs a gentle hand to recover with surely, but I can't help recalling you saying that I didn't have the capacity for rule and I've found many ways in which Macaluso and I are similar. Like me, he is too kind, too trusting. He was kept prisoner and accused of attempting to assassinate Bonaccorso when he went in search of answers. Reckless, lacking forethought-- sounds familiar, doesn't it? ..But perhaps having a close adviser like Vannozza will be enough.

Hatisse was revived to activate the beacon, and so it is being done now.

I wish you'd made it this far, that you could watch it open with us. I wish I knew for certain what happened to you. I will leave this world with that heavy regret. I will miss everyone I've made friends with here, but you and Lily most of all.

My heart is breaking, just as I'd known it would, but it's so much worse than I ever thought it would be. It feels like every moment of joy has become a knife to inflict wounds that will follow me for as long as memory. No such joy awaits me in Erdrea- only a painful journey. I will retire at the end of it one way or another. Should I survive, it won't be with the peace I thought I would find in Lonalulu, but instead a ragged heart.

Still I pray to one day see your ship piercing the skies over Erdrea, hailing from some distant star.

Thank you for everything. I'm sorry that these words will never reach you.

-Eleven