We ready ourselves for battle ....

Dillon and I have started on a campaign of encouraging each other to write something every day, alternating inspirational music, ideas and topics between us. He chose today's inspirational song:

I kind of like the picture that I began to form in this snippet. It ended up surprising me, to tell you the truth, but I had sort of run out of things to write and still had 400 words to write to reach my daily goal of 750 words so I pushed on and this is what my brain came up with! It's why I love taking a stream of consciousness approach to writing - it's never boring. I don't think I'll do anything with this to refine it or turn it into something bigger, though.

---

We ready ourselves for battle.

There have been fights before, but none like this. My people have fought wars for glory, or for the principles of others, and always they come to us with hands outstretched and gold dripping from fingertips, knowing that none can beat us when we set our minds to battle. But now, we fight for ourselves. The darkness has swept across the land, the moon hidden from our skies, the sun veiled behind a thick cloud summoned by the most evil of magic. So now, we fight. Not for others, not for money, not for glory. But for our freedom against those who would beat us into the ground.

Blood drumming through my veins, I arm myself. Like too many others, this will be my first fight. I come from generations of fierce warriors, but too many of our parents are dead, leaving only us behind. By the calendars of my people I am still a child, and have not even undergone the final ritual of readiness. But my mother was slain in the Battle at Discord Bay, and my father was taken by the Monks of Paulton, and my sisters were swept in the magic of the Mysterious Moon, so now we are all that is left.

There are so few of us left. So few of us to take up arms, to carry on our legacy. But what else can we do? Through away our heritage? Accept the coming darkness?

There are some who have done this, of course. There are always those who fail when faced with true enemies, with a true battle. But I cannot. I was raised since I was young to believe in the tenets of my people, to believe in the Way of Battle above all else. Though I will admit that our Way has been swayed over the past generations by gold, that we have become mercenaries as opposed to the feared religious warriors that we once were, I do not think that our Way has been completely corrupted.

And now, fighting for myself, for my people, as opposed to a sum of money given upon completion of a victorious war, I believe that my blood will burn brighter for the battle lust, that knowing that I fight for principle over greed I will be victorious. I have both might and right on my side.

I cannot fail.

---

This text was found written on a scroll in the latest excavation of the ruins in the north. It is the first eye-witness account that we have of the days leading up to the infamous War of the Night. During that time, there was a lot of confusion and strife over what we now know to be a dust cloud that filled the atmosphere after a large meteor decimated a continent to the south of our lands. The days that followed the impact were filled with fear, accusations of magic, and bloody battles as various lands pulled themselves apart in terror.

Of course, we know what happened to all of those who fought in the War of the Night - believing that they were facing an enemy who drew upon magic to block out the sky, they readied themselves using faulty knowledge about herbal lore, believing that if they covered themselves in certain ointments they would be able to block magic from affecting them.

Unfortunately, they used a deadly combination of plants and spider venom, and every single warrior quickly fell ill, breaking into contact rashes which swelled into boils. Skin literally sluiced off their bodies as they disintegrated from the outside in.

Even as they died, they called out against the dark sorcerers they believed to be causing their doom.

Today we understand that they were merely the victims of natural disaster and inaccurate scientific knowledge.

It is with these memories that we continue to model our society on the scientific ideal, eschewing supposed claims of 'magic' and working to understand the true underpinnings of our universe.

It is only by completely eradicating all those who profess to use magic that our society can progress.

For this purpose, I have decreed that all those who claim to practice magic, or to have experienced magic, should be killed on sight. No trials shall be held for those who sacrilege against logical progress.

Because after all, there is no magic. And those who accuse me, your great leader, of being a powerful sorcerer who came into power after the chaos of the War of the Night because I engineered it in order to take advantage of the situation are obviously insane. The fact that I have lived so many years longer than expected of someone my age is obviously a sign of healthy living, not a sign of blood magic. And the fact that those who would oppose me die mysteriously is only a sign that the universe is in my favor, not that I have some sort of magical power and assassinate my opposition.