Of Fire and Peace

Drenched in the twilight of a weary day, I rappelled down the sheer cliff-face into the unknown. My eyes were heavy, my body aching, my boots caked in mud. I had walked and climbed for endless miles toward the source of the smoke, and I had found it…

I am a restless man. A curious man. A man who sought to understand the world and himself. I yearned for a sense of belonging, and searched anywhere and everywhere, hoping to find it.

I explored, to the extent I could, the city of Akatharta—the city I called home. I wandered its streets and alleys, its buildings and monuments, its people and their stories. I had no family, no close friends, but I met many along the way and made my living through whatever labour they were willing to pay me for.

My dwelling was modest: a small rented room with few furnishings and a fair collection of books—including a notebook I cherished, filled with the stories of my findings.

I never anticipated that, in time, my most profound discovery would share its pages with my deepest sorrows and regrets. I could never have foreseen that the woeful story it would come to hold would devour my thoughts for the rest of my days.

I had grown bored of Akatharta.

I had spent my entire life within its soot-stained, stone walls—observing, listening, writing. Though born and raised there, I felt no real connection to the place. No purpose, no goal, no direction. I was a free man, yes, but also a lonely one—a man caught in a futile search for significance.

If you are the one who now holds these words, then you too must know that kind of ache. You’ll understand, I hope, that some of us are simply not made for contentment.

As my familiarity with the city grew, so too did my hunger—not of the flesh, but of the spirit. I longed not for bread, but for meaning. I began to ache for more—more places, more stories, more purpose. Some men are content to drink and wither beneath the same roof their whole lives. Forgive me, fellow seekers, but I am not one of them.

It was one of those far-flung sights that captured my fullest attention. It would come to mark the beginning of my most fateful journey.

There was a mountain range visible from the single window in my small rented tenement. It lay far beyond the city’s border, taunting me from the horizon. I had never been there—had never even ventured that far beyond Akatharta—but one day, something changed. I noticed what I had never noticed before: smoke, rising between the peaks. A thin, silver thread, climbing in slow, spiraling revolutions into the clouds, as if marking a path known only to the spirit.

I wondered what caused it. What it meant. What it hid.

And then came the feeling—sudden, inexplicable, and absolute. A pull. A magnetization. A summons whispered to the soul.

Fellow seekers, I decided I would go to it.

Aware that a journey into the mountains might be a perilous one, I packed a few essentials into my carry-sack: some rope, food and water, a bundle for sleeping, and a knife I kept tucked in the lining of my right boot. I left a note on my door stating simply that I had gone out exploring—and that, should I return, I would not know if or when.

I crossed the city’s border that very day and started toward the mountain range. I took no horse, for I wanted to walk and feel the earth beneath my feet. I wanted to breathe the air unfiltered, to follow my instincts, and to surrender myself to curiosity. More than anything, I wanted to be alone.

I walked for days and miles, trekking through fields and forests, wading through rivers and mud. I passed an impressive array of insects and beasts, plants and rocks, sights and sounds. I inspected some, avoided others—but observed all. I learned new things, forgot old ones, and recorded everything I could. I felt the ache and the awe, the thrill and the fatigue.

I felt human.

I reached the base of the mountain range, where the smoke—that first lure—was now close enough to fill the air with its pleasant, woody scent. It had taken several more days of climbing still to reach the highest peak, to find the source of the fire.

I was tired. Hungry. Thirsty. Filthy. But I did not stop. I did not care. I had a mission and a passion. I had to see. I had to know. I had to understand.

When at last I reached the summit, I stood atop the world, looked down—and gasped.

Nestled in the depths of a vast crater, encircled by sheer cliffs and cut off from the world above, was a village.

A hidden village. A secret place.

It was vast, yet simple. Contained, yet welcoming. Ancient, yet untouched by time. I saw houses and gardens, fields and orchards, wells and fountains. I saw people—children, elders, men and women alike. I saw history. I saw culture. I saw life.

And then—I saw the fire.

It burned in the very center of the village,
contained in a wide stone pit,
crackling and glowing with breath and purpose. The smoke rose from it in a great pillar,
spiraling upward, coiling like a living thing,
its center hollow yet unbroken.
It did not ascend as an arm reaching heavenward,
but as a vast, unblinking eye,
cast into the sky
to watch over the village below.

This was no ordinary fire.
It was glorious. Sacred. Fierce.

How I wish you could see it for yourself, fellow seekers.
It was light, heat, power.
It was faith, hope, love.
It was, I came to understand,
their heart,
their soul,
their god.

It roared not like a beast,
but like a song.
A hymn.
A heartbeat.

All around it, I saw the people—the worshippers—going about their lives. They wore simple garments adorned with flowers, their cloth embroidered with playful patterns and delicate threads. They were working and singing, dancing and playing. Some held hands; some embraced. They laughed easily. Smiled warmly. There was peace on their faces. There was joy.

They looked happy, yes. Content. Grateful. Pure.

My fellow seekers, they looked like a family.

After tying my rope to a sturdy formation of stone and casting the loose end over the precipice, I began my descent into the village below. The natural walls were steep and jagged, but I made my way down with purpose.

A few tending their cattle looked up from the herd and saw me. Their faces filled with surprise—then wonder. And then, joy.

They waved and smiled. They came to greet me, offering hands and words I did not yet understand, but whose meaning I felt nonetheless. Their warmth was immediate, unfeigned. They welcomed me as one welcomes the return of a long-lost friend.

My heart swelled with gratitude for such kindness from those to whom I was nothing but a stranger—an intruder, even. And yet they took me in. They showed me their village. They gave me fresh clothes and shelter, ensured I was rested and fed. They shared with me their fire and their faith, their stories and their songs, their peace and their pride.

They gave me their trust. Their joy. Their world.

Fellow seekers, they gave me back to myself.

Their lives flowed like their rivers—unfazed, untouched by the troubles of the world above. They had no money and no laws, yet not once did I see a quarrel or cruelty. They shared what they had, helped where help was needed. They feared no death, and so they celebrated life in every breath. Each night they danced, told stories, and sang around the fire, as if the night itself were a friend to be entertained.

I felt something I had never felt before—not just acceptance, but belonging. I had not known such joy could exist, nor that it could be offered so freely.

I stayed with them. I learned from them. I lived among them.

I ate and drank and slept. I worked and danced and played. I sang their songs, chanted their rites, and prayed beside their sacred fire.

I joined in their celebrations, their traditions, their reverence. I wore their clothes, spoke their dialect, followed their customs. I held their hands. I embraced their hearts. I smiled. I laughed. I wept.

I became as they were—happy, content, unburdened. They treated me as one of their own. No—more than that. As though I had always been one of them. As though I was them.

I recorded everything. I wrote of their kindness, their harmony, their joy. I wrote of my discovery—my gift. I wrote of love reborn, of hope awakened, of spirit restored.

I wrote of the climb up the mountain.
Of the descent down the cliffs.
And of the rising of the fire.

The villagers returned my curiosity in kind. They asked me questions about my origins, about the world I had descended from. They asked with wonder and admiration, with innocence and eager eyes. They loved me. They respected me. They revered me. They longed to learn from me, to be like me. They wanted to know everything—everything, everything.

And I told them. Oh, how I told them.

I spoke with pride and with vanity, dressing every memory in the finest exaggerations. I told them my stories not as they were, but as I wished them to be. I wanted to amuse them, to impress them, to dazzle their hearts and widen their eyes. I loved their laughter, their awe, the way their firelight flickered against their faces as I spoke. I loved myself for how they loved me.

I sat beneath the stars by their sacred flame, spinning grandiose tales of the world above. I told them of Akatharta—my city—great, magnificent, noble. I painted its streets with vivid colours, its monuments with grandeur, its people with legend. They listened, rapt and wide-eyed, as I spoke with eloquence and conviction. I stirred their emotions, guided their dreams. I made them laugh. I made them marvel. I made them hope.

I spoke of its splendour and wealth, its miracles and machines, its wisdom and will. I regaled them with tales of its literature and art, its inventions and discoveries, its progress and promise. They had never heard such things before. They leaned closer with every word.

And I gave them more.

I taught them new words, strange ideas, visions they had never imagined. I taught them to dream bigger than their borders. I taught them to reach.

I praised our philosophies—noble philosophies, sublime philosophies. I spoke of systems that could explain the world, that could reason and prove, question and answer, guide and transform. I told them of thinkers who could unearth any mystery, solve any problem, define any truth.

And the politics—yes, the politics.

The hopeful politics. The noble politics.

I told them of leaders who could unite and liberate. Of voices that could protect and defend, govern and uplift. I told them of politics that promised justice and peace, equality and freedom, prosperity and joy. I spoke of ideals, of great men and greater ideas, of nations carved by thought.

Fellow seekers… I told them everything. Everything. Everything.

I told them everything.
But I had told them nothing.

I lied—or, at least, I misrepresented the truth. I painted my tales in colours more vivid than any honest memory. I dipped them in gold, in glory, in wonder.

But worse than that… I lied by omission.

I did not speak of Akatharta’s ugliness. I did not speak of its sadness. I did not speak of its shadows.

I said nothing of the smoke-choked skies or the streets slick with filth. I said nothing of the sickness that clung to the lungs, or the hunger that haunted the gutters. I did not mention the war, or the violence, or the petty cruelty that passed for law. I did not speak of the thieves or the tyrants, the poison or the rot. I did not speak of the fear.

I did not tell them of my own loneliness—how it howled in every alley. I did not tell them of the emptiness, the quiet despair, the long nights spent questioning the point of it all. I did not tell them how I had wandered not just streets, but meaning. How I had suffered without purpose. How I had existed, but not lived.

I told them nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

And why?

Because I did not wish to. Because I could not.

Because I was selfish. Because I was proud.
Because—I was afraid.

I was afraid they would not understand. Afraid they would no longer love me. Afraid they would judge me, reject me.

Afraid they would see me—not the storyteller, not the explorer, not the dream I had cast in firelight—but the truth.

Afraid they would see me.
The real me.
The truest me.

And see only the faults.
Only the failures.
Only the shame, the dishonesty, the ruin I carried with me like a stain I could never scrub clean.

I felt guilty.
I felt bored.
I felt restless.

I felt guilty for lying to them, deceiving them, betraying their trust.
I felt bored—of telling the same stories, hearing the same praises, watching the same wonder bloom across the same innocent faces.
I felt restless—trapped in the same place, performing the same role, pretending to be someone I was not.

I could no longer bear the disappointment gnawing inside me. I could no longer endure the heat of their fire, which seemed to writhe more fiercely with every untruth I spoke—as though it knew. As though it judged.

And so—I left.

I told no one. I explained nothing. I offered no apology.

I was too selfish.
Too proud.
Too afraid.

I left in the dead of night, like a coward. I slipped away beneath the cover of darkness and the hush of sleep. I took my pack, my tools, my notebook—and vanished without a trace.

I left the village. I climbed the rope. I reached the summit.

I left the fire and the friends.
I left the soul and the self.
I left the mountains—
and the world I had grown to love.

I returned to the city.

Returned to Akatharta.
But I did not recognize it.
And it did not recognize me.

I did not belong.

Everywhere I looked, I saw its ugliness, its sadness. I felt its darkness pressing on my skin, its madness clinging to the air. I smelled its rot, tasted its poison. I breathed in its pollution, choked on its disease. I witnessed its violence and its cruelty, its crime and its decay.

I felt the weight of my lies. I saw the shape of my illusions. I stood face-to-face with the truth I had hidden, and I could not look away.

I had once painted this city in gold.
Now, I saw only rust.

I experienced, firsthand, the depth of my deception—my vanity, my pride, my cowardice. I saw the truth of Akatharta. The truth of its people.

The truth of myself.

I returned to the city.
But I did not live.

I felt empty.
I felt motionless.
I felt… gone.

***

For the next forty years, I was haunted by a recurring dream—one that filled my nights with dread and left me sleepless in the dark.

In it, I had once again left Akatharta. I had followed the smoke back to the mountains, climbed the cliffs, and descended into the crater.

But the village was not as I remembered it.

The fire—the glorious, sacred fire at its centre—had been extinguished. In its place rose a tower: tall, cold, and metallic. It loomed over the houses like a watchful god, spewing rancid black dust into the sky and groaning with mechanical noise. It pulsed not with life, but with power.

The villagers were no longer dressed in their simple garments. They wore bright, extravagant clothes, heavy with ornaments and jewels. They moved with haste and arrogance, pushing past one another, their faces crooked with greed and envy.

They had built factories. Shops. Banks. They had carved the land into plots and fenced them off, naming them, claiming them.

They had formed parties and factions, and fought over titles and positions, over laws and profit. The language of unity had been replaced with slogans and disputes. The music of joy replaced by shouting.

They had abandoned their old customs—their dances, their prayers, their stories. In their place, they adopted the morals of Akatharta: laws, debts, contracts, hierarchies.

They indulged in pleasures that dulled the soul and vices that blackened the body.

And worst of all… they no longer smiled.

They had lost their joy.
They had lost their innocence.

I do not mean to offend, fellow seekers—
but I have no gentler way to say it:

They had become us.

I tried to speak to them. I begged them—begged them—to forgive me, to forgive each other, and to return to their old ways. I confessed that I had lied only to be loved, to be admired, to make them—and myself—happy.

I tried to explain how my stories had harmed them, how I had misled them, how I had ruined what was once pure. I tried to show them my regret, to lay bare the sorrow I had carried ever since. I pleaded with them to let me help, to let me make it right. To save them. To restore what had been lost.

But they would not listen.
They would not believe.

They called me a hypocrite.
A coward.
A curse.

They said I had returned to sabotage their progress, to undo their civilization, to poison their pride and strip away their freedom. They said I feared their strength, envied their success, hated their innovation and independence.

They called me jealous.
They called me bitter.
They called me a liar, a villain—
a plague.

They seized me. Dragged me to the tower—the one that stood where the fire had once burned. They cast me into its depths, into a cell dark and wet and silent.

And there, they left me.

Left me with nothing but my thoughts and my memories.

I could still hear the village beyond the stone—shouting, metal, and bursts like distant thunder.
The sound of something holy turned to war.

I cried out for mercy. For justice.
No one listened.
No one came.

I prayed for peace. For redemption.
No one answered.
No one cared.

I would wake from the dream sweating feverishly, gasping for breath. I would scan my room in Akatharta, forcing myself to recognise its objects, its shadows, its familiar sounds. I would feel both relief and disappointment. Nostalgia, and disgust. I would wonder—was it a prophecy, or a nightmare? A warning, or a punishment?

Some nights, I questioned whether I should return. Other nights, I wished I could forget it all forever.

Each evening, restless and half-mad, I returned to the same beerhouse. I sat at the same table. In the same seat. Drinking from the same glass. I drank, and I remembered.

I remembered the hidden village.
The secret village.
The sacred fire.
The loving friends.

I drank, and I escaped the city’s plight—its poisoned air, its shrieking machines, its uncaring voices that never softened and never stopped.

And I became, over time, a most unforgivable sight.

Sallow. Thin. Unkempt.

My clothes were ragged and greyed with grime. My hair was matted and thinning. My eyes were sunken—dull, void of light. I did not speak to anyone, save to mutter for more beer.

I was a drunkard.
I was idle.
And everyone knew it.

As I sat and drank, a stranger approached me, seeking conversation.

The approach itself was not unusual—after all, even the best of us cannot resist a little entertainment in ruin—but the man who approached was unusual. He was young. Bright-eyed. Curious, in the way I had once been.

He had heard rumours, he said. Stories of a mysterious drunkard with a forgotten past. A man who sat in silence, who drank from the same glass at the same table each night, who never spoke unless pressed. A man who once climbed mountains.

He wanted to know more.

He wanted to pry.

He wanted to see if the wreck before him held any secrets worth salvaging.

“Evening, old man,” he said, tapping my shoulder and slipping into the seat across from me.
“Why is it you’re always here, night after night, drinking so much?
What is it you’re remembering—
or perhaps trying to forget?”

I looked at him, a faint flicker of recognition passing through me. I had seen him before—wandering the city as I once had. Asking too many questions. Sticking his nose into things that didn’t concern him.

I didn’t like him.
But I didn’t care enough to chase him away.

“I drink because I am unhappy,” I began, my voice bitter and hoarse.
“I drink because I have nothing else—nothing better to do. Because I have no contribution to make, no place in this world. I drink because I am selfish. Because I am a liar. Because I am a fool.”

“A fool?” he asked, brows raised. “Why do you say that?”

I clenched my fists on the table. My patience—what little remained—was beginning to fray.

“Because I was offered everything—ev-e-ry-thing—and I threw it away.
Because I was given joy, and I betrayed the ones who gave it.
Because I found purpose… and still, I ruined it.
I ruined them.
I ruined myself.”

“What do you mean? What did you have? What did you do?”

I sighed.
I settled into my seat.
I sipped my beer.

I knew he would not relent—not until my secret had been unearthed like some ancient relic. He had the same stubborn curiosity I once did. The same hunger for truth, even if it burned.

As my thoughts drifted back to that hidden village, a wave of nostalgia washed over me. And behind it came the tide—shame, regret, the bitter salt of everything I had lost.

I decided to tell him.

Not because I wanted to.
But because I needed to.

I needed to confess.
To unburden my soul.
To make someone—anyone—understand.

“I was just like you, once,” I said.

He winced at that, and his expression irritated me. It was rude, unwarranted. But I bit down my frustration and pressed on.

“I wanted to explore the world. To discover new places, new people, new experiences. I was restless, like you—always searching for something more, never satisfied with what I had.”

He leaned in slightly. “And did you ever find it? That more?”

I let out a bitter smirk. “I thought I had. For a time. But tell me this, fellow seeker—can you say, with all honesty, that you’re satisfied?
No, surely—you cannot. Not if you truly know this city. Why else would you be here, speaking to a drunkard like me? You wince and you judge, yet here you are, poking your nose into my business. You want to understand—but you can’t, not yet. Not until you’ve lived with the disappointment long enough to name it.”

He opened his mouth to speak, but I held up a hand.

“This city—I hate it. And you will learn to hate it too. Perhaps I hated it even when I had your youth, but lacked the honesty to recognise it. It is a filthy city. A crowded city. A noisy, choking, ceaseless city. It is vile. It is corrupt. It is violent and miserable.
I searched it, you know. Every alley, every crevice. I walked every path until there were no paths left—only the ones I made myself. And through all that searching, all that restlessness… I found nothing but its treachery and despair.
All I wanted was to escape it. Just as you do. Or will. I needed to find something better. Something pure. Something beautiful. Something peaceful.”

He blinked, cautious now. “And did you?”

I nodded. Slowly. “Yes. I did. I found my peace.
I found the most beautiful place in the world.
A village—hidden deep within the mountains, beyond the outskirts of Akatharta, far from the reach of any map or mark of man. It was surrounded by cliffs—high, stark, consuming. So perfectly enclosed it was as if God himself were cupping it gently in his hands.
The only way to reach it is to walk for days and miles across treacherous land owned by no one, and then to climb the steep, biting mountains where no living thing dares to dwell.
There are no roads. No signs. No directions. There is only the smoke to guide you by day, and the stars to guide you by night.
And so I walked.
And I climbed.
For days and miles, I followed the smoke and the stars—until I reached the precipice.
From there, I could see the entire village below me.
I saw the fire at its heart.
I saw its wooden houses, its gardens and fields.
I saw springs and streams of crystalline water, stretching outward like the fingers of a great hand.
I saw its people—kind, generous, full of joy—waiting below, ready to welcome me.
It was paradise.
Paradise on earth.”

The young man wore an expression I couldn’t quite place. It looked like disbelief—but I wasn’t sure if he doubted the story itself,
or simply the idea that paradise could exist in a place so hidden, so improbable.

I continued:

“I stayed there for a long time.
Longer than I had ever stayed in any one place before.
I was happy—truly happy—for the first time in my life.
Everything they had, everything they were, everything they could be… they offered it to me.
And I took it.
I took it all with the most unforgivable greed, and the most inexistent gratefulness.
And I enjoyed it.
I enjoyed the purpose. The praise. The dignity.
I enjoyed the admiration. The attention. The awe.
I enjoyed the love. The affection. The peace.
I enjoyed it all…
And yet—I wanted more. More than they could give me.
More than I could give them. I could not be satisfied.
And so—I left.
I left the village.
Left them.
I left without goodbye. Without explanation. Without forgiveness.
I left in the middle of the night, when all were asleep—when no one could see me.
No one could stop me.
I left the world below,
and returned to the world above.
I never saw them again.
But I never forgot them.
And I have never… never forgiven myself.
That is why I drink.
That is why I drink so much.
That is why I drink myself senseless. That is why, every night, I sit in this same beerhouse—
at this same table, in this same seat—
wearing this same bitter expression.
That is why I am a fool.”

I knew I was rambling—that I was offering the young stranger far more than he had asked. But so I should! He had asked, and so the burden was on him to hear the confession in full.

I watched his face closely. Every twitch of muscle. Every subtle change in expression. He looked at me with disbelief, with pity, with curiosity. He didn’t know what to say, or think, or do. He didn’t know whether I was telling the truth, or lying, or embellishing.

He didn’t know if I was sane.

He didn’t know whether the village existed—or whether it was ever as beautiful as I claimed.

All he knew was that he, too, wanted more.

And so finally, he spoke:

“Take me there.
Take me to the village.
Show me the place that made you love.
That made you happy.
That made you dignified.
Show me the paradise on earth.”

My head pounded and spun with rage—suppressed only by the fear and sadness that followed. He didn’t care about the consequences, because he didn’t know the truth. He couldn’t.

I had misrepresented it again.
I hadn’t learned. I hadn’t changed.
I had spoken with eloquence and passion.
I had painted vivid pictures with my words.
I had stirred his emotions with my voice.

I had made a fool of myself again.

I didn’t want to take him there—to the village.
I didn’t want to show him the place I had abandoned. It had loved me, yet I had forsaken it.
It had offered me dignity, yet I had revealed my sin.

I didn’t want to return to the place where I would have to face my past,
where I would have to suffer my consequences.

And I didn’t want him to go, either.

I didn’t want him to suffer a fate like mine.

…But you know my faults all too well, fellow seekers. I am a restless man.
A curious man.
A man who sought to understand the world and himself.

I could not say no.
I did not say no.

I gave him a time, gave him a place, then went and packed those things I had packed all those years ago.

The rope.
Some food and water.
The bundle for sleeping.
And the knife—where it had always been, hidden in my right boot.

I took what I had gathered and met my new companion at the place we had agreed upon. Before I could come to my senses—before I could protest the expedition—we were already walking. Walking for days and miles, across the plains, through the hills, and toward the mountains.

I led the way, following the old, forgotten trail that only I knew.
And he followed beside me—curious, eager—asking questions, telling stories, lighting the path with his youth.

He was a young and handsome man, with a bright, cheerful face.
He had a passion for adventure, and a thirst for knowledge.
He had learned many things, and his intentions were admirable—though he was still naive.

He told me how he once rescued an old woman from a fire in the market, carrying her over his shoulders and bringing her to a doctor.
He told me how, in gratitude, she taught him how to read and write.
He spoke of how precious that gift was to him—how he would use it to keep a journal of his discoveries, to give meaning to his wanderings.

I listened to his stories.
But I told him none of mine.

I could not.
I dared not.

I needed to keep my silence—to protect what was still good in him.
The parts of him untouched by Akatharta.

Upon reaching the base of the mountain, it took us several more days of arduous climbing to reach the summit. But at last—we stood at the cliff’s edge.
The thread of smoke rose before us, still and silver, coiling skyward in slow, deliberate spirals. It twisted not wildly, but with intention, like a ribbon drawn up by an unseen hand. And at its center, the destination——or was it the source?Our eyes followed the trail downward, spiraling from sky to earth, from the unknown to the known, until they met the fire. And there, encircling it—the village.

I felt an immense weight lift from my shoulders.

I had begun to believe my nightmares were true.
I had feared the worst.
I had feared that the village would be gone.
That it would be changed.
Ruined.

But it was still there, just as I had remembered it.

We stood in silence, gazing down with awe and wonder.
It was still vast.
Still simple. We could see the wooden houses, the gardens and fields.
We could see the springs, and the streams that sprawled outward like silver veins.
We could see the people—kind, generous, moving with purpose and peace.
And at the village’s heart—glowing, eternal—we could see the fire.

“Look,” I said to my companion.
“Look at the village.
Look at the fire.
Look at what I left behind.
Look at what you can have.”

He looked at the village, and then at me—with admiration, and with gratitude I did not deserve. He didn’t know the full story.
He didn’t know the lies.
He didn’t know the weight of my guilt, the depth of my shame, the truth of my fear.

All he knew was that I had brought him here—
to this place of beauty, of peace, of joy.

“Thank you,” he said softly.
“Thank you for bringing me here. Thank you for giving me this chance.”

I nodded, but I did not smile.

I did not turn my gaze from the village.

I felt no pride.
No satisfaction.

Only sadness.
Only remorse.

I felt only that I was doing what had to be done—
what I should have done long ago.

I took the rope from my backpack.
I tied it to the same sturdy formation of stone—still there, somehow, after all these years—and hurled the loose end over the precipice.
I watched it unravel, coil by coil, all the way down.

I stood at a crossroads.

To descend would be to leave behind the world I had known.
Perhaps I would not come back.
Perhaps there would be nothing left of me to come back.
I found myself torn—between self-annihilation and the lure of redemption.

The choice was mine.
But the truth was inescapable.

To descend would be to face the most unbearable parts of myself.
It would be to confront the lies I had told, the lives I had touched, and the soul I had blackened.
It would be to admit—to truly admit—my wrongdoings.
To recognize and sear away all that remained impure.

But with honesty comes danger.

There may be too much Akatharta in me.
Too much that I am unwilling to surrender, even now.
Too much that I know I should, yet clutch like treasure.

I may not survive the descent.
For beneath my thin veneer of civility… lies a soul.

And that soul, I fear, is wretched.

So polluted, in fact, that it cannot sense the depth of its own corruption—
not until it has inflicted itself upon the good,
upon the moral,
upon the beautiful.

“Here,” I said, handing the rope to my companion. “Take this. Climb down to the village. Meet the people. Live among them. Be happy there.”

He took the rope with wide eyes and trembling hands.

“And you?” he asked. “Will you come down after me?”

“I have not yet decided.”

“And why not?”

I gave him no answer.

I could not tell him that I was afraid—afraid to be seen for what I truly was: a liar, a fraud, a man undone by his own pride. I could not tell him that I feared the fire would reject me, that the village would not remember me as I once was, but as I truly am. I could not say that I wasn’t sure I could bear to look those people in the eyes… or myself.

And so, I said nothing.

He looked at me then—searchingly—with confusion, concern… and something close to sorrow.
He sensed the weight inside me, the heaviness I could not shed.

“Please,” he said softly.
“Please come with me.”

I was stubborn. I held my silence.

“Please,” he had said one last time.

We looked at each other for an eternity—no words, no movement, only the stillness of a moment too fragile to break. And in that moment, I believe he saw the truth. He saw that there would be no persuading me. That my mind was set. That I could not be helped.

He understood that he had to go—that he must leave me, and hope, and pray that I would follow.
He understood that we each had a fate to meet. That, whatever happened, it was the way it had to be.

And you, fellow seeker—what is it that you see in my silence?
And what, I wonder, will you make of my final act?
Perhaps you will question whether it was born of mercy… or of malice.
Perhaps you will wonder whether it was to save my companion… or to spite him.
Perhaps I am selfish.
Perhaps I am kind.
It is not for me to know. It never was.
And so that, I leave to you.

My companion grasped the rope with sure hands and descended,
vanishing inch by inch into the paradise below.
I watched him move down the cliff face.
I watched the villagers welcome him.
I watched them gather at the fire.
I watched as, little by little,
he became one of them—
as I once had.

Then I reached into my right boot,

drew the knife,

and severed the rope.