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It was inevitable

14 (41.2%)

Winners don't do drugs

6 (17.6%)

I'll be back

2 (5.9%)

Drink the Kool Aid

6 (17.6%)

Groovy

3 (8.8%)

Insane in the membrane

3 (8.8%)

Total Members Voted: 34

[Lenglon]

"No."

[Xantalos]

"Okay. I'll keep it for later. Donuts are always wanted eventually!"

[DarkArtemisFowl]

"Although there's probably a gradient between 'fuck the common filth' and 'sacrifice everything for the common good'. Not everything has to be super dramatic, you know. Just be vaguely responsible and throw people a bone every now and then and you'll do fine. No need to agonize over the fine details - better people than ourselves have fucked those up beyond our ability to resolve."

"Like with everything, there is a balance, yes. I am not saying that the entities - or Eido, for that matter - should anguish over every single death that occurs. But at the very least, I want understanding. Empathy. Eido did not visibly show that, and he did not talk about it, but at least he understood it with the framework of the Medium. Everything was connected. Every living being mattered because, well, we needed every little bit of willpower we could get in order to fight literal representations of despair." He looks down for a moment. "Maybe there's not the same sense of urgency here. After all, I'm not sure how great the power of the entities is. Maybe they're a lot stronger than Eido, and maybe they don't face too large of a threat now. But back then, we didn't have time. Everyone mattered. We couldn't afford to lose our only tool against the Shadows, and Eido knew that."

"No really, donuts ... don't worry about it!"

"It's not my nature to not worry about it. I was one of the Mediums, which meant that it was my responsibility to worry. Besides, I already explained the rest to Ike."

"Have you ever considered what happens when powers don't forget? When powers bind to every life and the inevitable destruction that living costs rips the power apart? What do you think happens then?"

"I have, and I know that's why Eido doesn't show empathy. He can't. He saw many, many more realms than I can count die. So many people, so many Guardians, so many Mediums and other living beings died or gave in to apathy. The Shadows grew from that, and there wasn't anything he could do to stop that. All he could do was hope, and continue to tweak the Medium and its balance, and pray that there was a slight chance in all of existence that a certain combination of Guardians and Mediums could actually unite people. Eido did not let me see his actual form, as his body was so greatly distorted and ruined from eons of resistance and grief that I would not be able to handle it. I think that, at one point, he did care for every single death that happened under his watch. For our sake, however, he had to stop. He was already weak and frail in the grand scheme of things. If he continued, he would die, and we would be alone, completely defenseless." He sighs, a little bit of frustration seeping into his voice.

"I'm not asking for an entity on that scale to have bonds with every living being. It's simply not feasible. But, at the very least, a sort of mutual understanding helps. A respect for life, as it is. Life is powerful and chaotic." He pauses for a few moments before continuing. "Then again, I suppose my opinion is juvenile at best. I'm nearly the youngest person involved in all of this. I'll probably see a lot more death during my lifetime and, perhaps, I might even get desensitized to it. I hope I don't get that way. At the same time, I saw what this sort of thing did to Eido, and that was over eons to someone who had power that was orders of magnitude larger than what I could comprehend. I don't want to destroy myself necessarily, but I do care. I don't think I'll ever lose that."

[Lenglon]

...
"What would you think of a Power that ran away? That, rather than feel or not feel, had abandoned their power instead?"

[DarkArtemisFowl]

Zechariah looks at Irine once again before continuing to focus on the trail ahead. "I wouldn't blame them. Knowledge and power are terrible, in truth. With those two things, either you become apathetic and detached to save your sanity and your soul or you attempt to make everything right and you lose both in the process. I know that it's true because I fell victim to the latter. I had the knowledge to change things through the Medium and the power to make it happen, but in doing so, I was going to be erasing my existence. I did so anyway. In theory, I would have liked to see a balance between power, knowledge, empathy, sanity, and the will to live. However, I know that finding that balance is nearly impossible to do without sacrificing something. Knowledge is incredibly hard to lose voluntarily, so, out of all of those things, power is the best thing to lose to preserve the balance. That's why I would never blame anybody for giving up being a god, deity, demiurge, or entity. As long as they continue to live and help others to live, I am fine with that."

[Lenglon]

"Thanks."

[Harry Baldman]

"That sounds a lot like absolution. You didn't perchance happen to be a god, did you, Irine?"

[Lenglon]

"I-I said I didn't want to talk about what I am, remember?"

Spoiler: context (click to show/hide)

"You mean you aren't a monkey? um...
But anyway, no! I'm not a reptilian anything!"

"I'm even less of a monkey than a chimpanzee, so yes. And what are you, then, if not a reptilian overlord?"

I look down uneasily.
"Um... I... I... I don't like answering that question. people get all weird when I do that, and try to take advantage of me all the time."

[Harry Baldman]

"You did? Huh... well, guess I understand why if you used to be a god and stuff. It's probably weird not being one anymore. Kind of like Zechariah here, except in a quieter, more brooding way," Ike shrugs. "Though I guess if you don't wanna talk about it, that's your choice. Be warned, however, that I'll be terribly disappointed if you do open up at some point in the future and the truth falls short of what I'm presently imagining."

[Lenglon]

"I... I only had one universe, and I shared it with nine others equal to me. After... after we finished creating it, and we allowed time to begin, I stepped down from power, because I didn't trust myself to handle it."

"We didn't last very long. Something from outside sneaked in and broke time itself. Stellar, my entity, pulled me out before the universe finished collapsing, but I'm pretty sure nobody else made it."

[Harry Baldman]

"Where'd you come from before all that, though?"

[Lenglon]

"Hmm? I made me when I stepped down. That was my final act as a deity. It's also why I don't have an ancestry, and am not related to anything other than myself. Meaning I really don't have a common ancestor with a lizard. Ever."

[Harry Baldman]

"Where'd you come from before you were a deity?"

[Lenglon]

"Um, that doesn't... Um, Ike? Remember how I mentioned that we had to start time? There literally was no such thing as before then, because there literally was no time. So... yeah. Your question doesn't really make sense."

[Harry Baldman]

"It's still a question worth considering. Did you sprout from the end of a time before time? Were you seeded by a higher creator, or several other deities? Willed yourself to be by sheer act of deific will? I'm really asking because you seem to have some sort of memory of creation itself, though do feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. And also the notion that you were doing any creating, which would imply that some form of cause and effect would exist even in the absence of what you call 'time'. And if there is an effect of gods being present, surely there must be a cause for that as well, right?"