213. The Mirroring Lotus

  All was darkness. Total, disorienting, diminishing. Consumed by shadows as still as the moon yet as far-reaching as the sun.

  Serac took a few steps forward and went nowhere. She had free use of her limbs, yet the sensation of not-going-anywhere reminded her of being [Hammerspaced] inside a Glutton. Shuddering reflexively, she sought to blast her way out of the metaphysical prison, namely by reaching for her personal boomstick.

  Light trickled in as soon as she touched REVOLVER. Yet it did little to illuminate her surroundings. This was more akin to sharing Realgar’s [Dusklight], her vision limited to only what the Mirror wanted her to see. Or was it what she wanted to see in the Mirror?

  Nevertheless, as a gunslinger firmed her grip on her gun, the light grew in presence if not quite strength. No further instruction issued from within or without the Lotic space, but the next step seemed obvious enough. Serac unholstered REVOLVER and held it loosely at chest level, unduly confident there’d soon be something for her to aim at.

  A Wayfarer priming her Instrument. That was the input the Mirror had been waiting for. As if in response, the vision—or was it reflection?—found definition, shifting into and through shapes and figures for Serac to track.

  First came a blinding flash, startling in its intensity. New shadows emerged from within the light and seared themselves into Serac’s retinas. Six empty spaces arranged in a circle. What else could they be? They were the Six Chambers of the Seerflame rainbow.

  With a familiar ‘click’, one of the shadows expanded to fill Serac’s vision. No, not just vision. Her body, her mind, her full complement of senses were swallowed up by the ‘hole’ that represented Chamber One. How did she know? For starters, finding herself engulfed by the black flames of Penitence was a pretty big clue.

  Black fire burned bright against a backdrop of darkness. It illuminated two additional figures now sharing the Lotic space with Serac. They had their backs turned, but they were both easily identifiable as Rakshasas.

  One hugged her knees inside a skeletal cage, onyx claws digging into her own skin. The other held a severed metal chain within a mangled, bloodied hand. From where Serac stood, there was no way to tell who the blood belonged to.

  The reflections stilled. Waiting for an answer. They needed the beholder to choose the true reflection of her self.

  From where Serac stood, the choice couldn’t be simpler. One reflection filled her with pity and shame, while the other woke in her a familiar righteous bloodlust. Having made her choice, however, how was she to express it?

  A Wayfarer held her Instrument in her hand. It was her stamp on the world: the conduit by which to express her power and desire. What else to do but imbue the truth with her own intent?

  Serac aimed, locked, and fired. The bullet flew from REVOLVER’s [Chamber One], black as the defiance in its wielder’s heart, and embedded itself into the Rakshasa with the severed chain. Exceed thy grasp.

  The Rakshasa jolted as though shaken awake. She spun and rounded on the shooter, revealing crimson eyes that overflowed with tears of blood. The chosen reflection then became one with the beholder, swelling in size and ferocity until it effaced its rejected counterpart and saturated the entirety of an obsidian mirror.

  Another flash of light. The ‘cylinder’ returned briefly, only to cycle over to the next hole over with another audible click.

  Chamber Two was a field of pearly-white whorling with jade-green waves. It too sprouted two figures, both with their backs turned as they presented the gunslinger with a second choice.

  They were Yakshas. One was a typing Serac had never met: a startlingly pretty feminine figure, sleek body adorned by colorful corals. The other was a hulking bull-shark: muscles and fins poised to slice through rivers, seas, all the water in Mount Meru and beyond.

  The choice wasn’t as instantly obvious as the first. Serac found herself drawn to the coral creature’s exquisite beauty and equally enticed by the shark’s rippling freedom. She had to ask herself. Would I rather be beautiful or free? The best answer was both, but the true answer was…

  Aim, lock, fire. [Chamber Two] sent a jade-green bullet into the bull-shark’s proud dorsal fin. Be thou as water.

  The shark spun and met Serac with a wolfish, serrated grin. Muscles bulged and teeth glistened as the reflection fused with the beholder. Serac experienced a brief yet terrifying sensation of drowning, but that too was merely a rite of passage.

  Click. Cycle. Choose.

  True to its Realm of origin, Chamber Three had split itself cleanly in half. Day, parched by the pitiless sun. Night, soaked in the all-seeing moon. Yet, somehow, both figures were cloaked in shadows. Silhouettes billowing behind the veils.

  A Mriga, rigid and steadfast. A Tiryaga, slouched and ever ready to pounce. Duality. Or duplicity? What was Serac to choose? Which of them should she believe?

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Neither. Both. After her crash course in detective-ing, Serac knew a thing or two about shadows, light, and the truths hidden in between. As such, she made the only choice that was true to her self. No stone unturned.

  Aim, lock, fire. Neither and both. The bullet split [Chamber Three], right down the middle. The seams cracked open, pulling down the veils and throwing the whole world into a shared Gloam. The silhouettes met in the middle and fused with each other before together joining the gunslinger.

  Onto Chamber Four. Now, Serac was well and truly in uncharted territory. The universe had seen fit to give her a taste of Manesfera before she’d earned the right. To that, all she had to say was ‘hell yes, bring it on’.

  It took her some time to make heads or tails of the new vision. The pattern held, insofar as there being two reflections to choose from. Yet, the longer she studied them, the less she could shake the feeling they were images of the same soul. Or perhaps reflections of each other.

  Where the Mriga and Tiryaga had divided the world in half, these Manusyas stood back to back, rotating in place so the beholder could watch them in turn. One was a stern-faced, gray-haired man, head bowed and hands clasped in meditation. And the other, Serac could swear, was the same man, except much younger and… busier?

  The old man kept his silence and rigid posture. His face plainly showed the ravages of age, but also the serenity born only from enduring countless sorrows. His shoulders sagged under the unremitting weight of life’s burdens, yet were all the broader and sturdier because of it.

  The young man, on the other hand, couldn’t stay still. He ‘wore’ a constant purple aura around his person, which rapidly shapeshifted from one attire to another, as the man himself cycled through one identity after another.

  Swordsman, archer, mage. Scholar, painter, carpenter. Somewhere amidst the chaos, there was even a flash of something akin to a NINEFOLD pugilist. Each time he ‘transformed’, the man adopted wildly different poses to fit the mold (Serac’s muscles ached just from watching him). Yet the one thing that never changed was his facial expression: an unwavering mask of tense, grim concentration.

  Serac was more than a little put off by the young man’s relentless dance (and the feverish energy behind it). In comparison, the old man’s quietude was much more appealing, even if he did look sad and tired. But as she raised REVOLVER to lock in her decision, she was derailed by an intrusive thought.

  Why am I throwing in the towel already? I’m not old. I’ve still got plenty to give. And so what if I hurt myself in the process? After all, the axe forgets.

  Serac aimed, locked, waited a beat for the reflection to rotate, then fired. [Chamber Four] sent out a purple bullet to be absorbed by the young man’s restless aura. He then burst into myriad iterations of himself, all of which merged with Serac and instantly left her feeling drained.

  Tired or not, the beholder’s rite wasn’t over. Next was Chamber Five. A direct flight up to the dizzying heights of Suradao.

  Here, the world was clear skies and windswept clouds, as blue and distant as Serac’s dreams of home. Two new figures flew into view, and this time, they were locked in battle.

  Needless to say, Serac had yet to meet an Asura in the real afterlife (unless Zacko’s crackpot theory about Ebenezer Yama being one held any weight). They cut dashing, striking figures: four arms, three eyes, and a pair of wings leaving raven-black feathers in their wake. They might even have been beautiful, were they not tumbling through the air tearing at each other’s throats.

  As for choosing between them, Serac was at a complete loss. Unlike the previous examples, there was nothing to differentiate the two. As the Asuras grappled in mid-air with their extra limbs and powerful wings, they looked equally free, equally determined, equally angry.

  I mean I guess I prefer one of their clothes over the other. Midnight-blue goes better with the black wings than forest-green. But aren’t there any criteria that are more… relevant??

  There was no rhyme or reason behind it. And perhaps that was the point. Serac had to choose, and choose she did, siding with the berserker with the slightly superior fashion sense. She aimed (carefully at a furiously moving target), locked, and—

  Missed! The Asuras fought too fiercely and flew too fast for a KL-72 gunslinger. [Chamber Five] fired a bullet of flaming red, sizzling the sky before piercing the green Asura through one of its wings. The man roared with pain, frustration, and more anger, then burst into flames himself. Ash to ash.

  Perhaps a better marksman would’ve been truer with her aim. As it stood, Serac had to live with her choice—arbitrary, erroneous, or otherwise. The scene shifted one last time, cycling over to…

  Chamber Six. A field of white, of purity, of nothing.

  No, not quite nothing. A hole within a hole. A mass of darkness roiled at the heart of nullity. What was less than nothing? What was void?

  VOIDLING stared back at the beholder from the heart of Chamber Six. It and only it. There was no other, and Serac was forced to reckon with her own mirror image. The inverse of her soul. Or was it the obverse?

  The final question was its own answer. A single Path. The only real choice was to stray from it, which was no choice at all. Illusion of constraint. Splitting hairs.

  Serac Edin aimed, locked, and fired. [Chamber Six] spat out a pure-white fragment, as flimsy and misshapen as a Hellspawn Jailer’s lead pellet. It wobbled through the air, then promptly vanished into the void.

  VOIDLING’s Circlet flashed against the Mirror. A maniacal cackle filled the Lotic space—filled Serac’s head with cold, metallic fire. The pain was mercifully brief. But the memory of it—of hollow victory and choiceless choice—would ring eternal.

  The world darkened and solidified into velvet obsidian. When next Serac beheld a reflection, it was of her own. Onyx horns, ash-gray hair, cinnabar skin. Round, crimson eyes shadowed by an indescribable heaviness of heart.

  [Trinket acquired: THE MARK OF THE OATHLESS]

  [Burden: 21/38 -> 48/38]

  [Wayfarer Status Effect: OVERBURDENED]

  [TIDEWATCH: Your OATH has been reaffirmed.]

  [REVOLVER Spell unlocked]

  [Chamber Three: YOUR NAME]

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