Sonetto: Ms. Stranger, where are we now? Ms. Amundsen is a human. If she's been caught by Manus Vindictae ...
Ms. Stranger: Shh, keep it down.
Ms. Stranger: We're in the tunnel to the sanctuary. It's the easiest path to follow, but also the most dangerous.
Sonetto: Is that a lake?
A prolonged silence hangs after the question. The answer obvious, yet the words petrify on their tongues.
Vertin: No. That isn't water.
The wind tugs at black hemp cloaks, but the hoods remain unnervingly still.
Sonetto: It's the believers ...
The circular plaza is flooded with believers, the "lake" rippling with their kneeling forms.
Believers: Their eyes see not one light of the Bright Star.
Animus: Down THEY fell in martyrdom, but from death's murky waters, THEY rise once more.
An older woman stands atop the ringed ruins, delivering fiery words upon the frozen earth.
Animus: Children of the resurrected Mother—lowly bearers of THEIR mantle—let your bodies and souls be the means of THEIR return. It is through THEIR eyes alone that we may see the truth of this world, for there is no Inculcator but THEM.
Black-clad believers chant hymns that undulate with each wave of rhythmic bows.
Animus: Call THEIR name! Beseech THEIR light! With the Mother's will manifested, the gate of ascension will swing open! Oh. What glory! Oh. What exaltation!
A fervent voice erupts from the center.
Ms. Stranger: The gate to the sanctuary is at the far end of the plaza.
Her fan points across the "lake."
Sonetto: But how do we get past all these Manus followers?
Ms. Stranger: If you look closely, Ms. Sonetto ...
Ms. Stranger: You'll see what they've become.
The believers kneel or prostrate, every head held low, their recitations seeming more and more mechanical.
Vertin: Strange. It's almost like they're in a state of unconsciousness.
Ms. Stranger: "It's the easiest path to follow, but also the most dangerous."
Ms. Stranger: Whenever a sacrificial ceremony is held in the plaza, Animus has all the believers put on masks to ensure she has full control over them.
Ms. Stranger: Right now, there is only one thing on their minds—the ceremony.
Ms. Stranger: If we're careful and choose our route wisely, we can slip by them unnoticed. No one will see us except for Animus.
Vertin: What's the purpose of this sacrifice?
Ms. Stranger: ...
Ms. Stranger: To open the gate.
Sonetto: They're taking a life just to open a gate?
Ms. Stranger keeps her focus locked on the elder conducting the ritual.
Ms. Stranger: We must take this opportunity to slip through to the sanctuary.
Vertin: What exactly do you mean by that?
Another rising wave from that distant voice muffles their whispered discussions.
Animus: Great Revealer of Arcanum, we humbly present this offering.
As the elder's voice fades, the "offering" steps onto the plaza.
???: ...
Though well-worn, her attire betrays her former status.
Sonetto: The offering is human?!
Vertin: No. Not just any human.
Vertin: That's one of Nautika's expedition team members.
Sonetto: Timekeeper, look over there. It's Ms. Amundsen.
The believers fill the plaza in concentric rings; while across the gates, Nautika stands motionless.
She is transfixed on the "offering" with unblinking eyes.
Sonetto: What's she doing there? Something about her doesn't look right.
Ms. Stranger: She's too close to Animus. At that distance, the arcane skill controlling the believers could affect her too.
Vertin: We need to get her out of there.
Ms. Stranger: Stay down. Not yet. Animus could spot us at any moment.
Ms. Stranger: The ceremony is about to begin.
Animus: Praise THEM! Worship THEM! Children of flesh, bear witness, for we shall bask in THEIR radiant blessing!
Animus: An offering taken, a gate opened! Through bone and blood let the gate fling open, and the path to ancient glory be revealed!
Animus: Be thankful, you unenlightened little beast, that the Mother is willing to take your pitiful life as THEIR gift. What great mercy THEY show!
The horrific vision in Animus's words is laid bare, yet Friele maintains her eerie smile.
She walks toward the gate, nodding respectfully to the kneeling believers along the way.
Then she halts just before the entrance.
Her lips mouth inaudible words.
Nautika: "Through the Giant Mother's bones the path is laid. In bloody pain, eternal life is made."
Nautika: It's just like in Tales of the Mother Spirit.
Friele drifts her eyes rolling over the scene until they seize on the sight of her former companion.
Their eyes lock.
Cracked lips part, soundlessly forming words.
"Homage." "Approach."
Nautika: ...!
"A great gift."
Nautika: You really are going to see Her.
Ear Worm Máhtu: "The Mother Spirit's light, with ancient glow, guides us to the great current—nature's flow."
Nautika: The ninth story in Tales of the Mother Spirit.
Nautika: "It happened in that season on that day—The children found their Mother at the gate."
Nautika: "With offerings the finest of their art, they paid Her homage with a faithful heart."
Nautika: "And in return, their reverence repaid. By Her great gift, Her children were remade."
Nautika: "By Her great gift, Her children were remade."
Countless hands reach from inside the gate, swarming over Friele in waves.
They coil around her like vines and gnarling roots, reality fracturing across her body inch by inch.
Nautika: Right, that's right.
Nautika: This is the climax of the story.
Nautika: When the children come close to the Mother Spirit, share Her pain and Her sorrow, and become one with Her.
Her breath hitches, a scream claws up her throat, blood boiling in her veins.
Nautika: The Mother Spirit will come! She'll come to guide us!
Nautika: She'll come to guide you, Friele!
Suddenly, a deafening wail explodes from within.
Friele: AAAHHHHH!
Friele crosses the threshold, and a shriek tears out from her searing chest.
Nautika: ...?
Nautika: Friele?
Friele: AAAAAAHHHHHHH!
The scream echoes across the expanse, its force so profound even the lava seems to halt mid-flow.
Nautika latches her hands onto a prostrate worshipper, gasping out questions—
Nautika: What's happening to her? Have you been through there? Why is she screaming?
Her questions are met with a devotional void.
One minute. Two. The crowd does not speak, does not murmur. Silence rules.
Nautika: Mother Spirit ...
That shriek still rings in her ears, muffling all sound as if it were vacuum-sealed.
The believers are unresponsive. Unspeaking.
Unbreathing.
Nautika: Friele ...
The shriek fades into a dull tinnitus.
Animus taps her longbow on the ground, shattering the silence.
Animus: You humans should be grateful, flawed and pathetic as you are, yet nonetheless granted access to the gate at the mere cost of your tongues.
Animus: Deeper is her sin than our cleansing could purge, greater her crimes than our judgment could mete. Yet, in THEIR boundless benevolence, the great Mother of Resurrection has seen fit to accept her.
Animus: May the Guiding One return to us and restore this world to the ancient order.
Believers: May the Guiding One return to us and restore this world to the ancient order.
Animus shakes her bell, and at the cue, the entire congregation erupts in synchronized cries, heads bowed.
Nautika: Cleansing ... judgment? What are they talking about?
Animus sways with her bell, the spectacle becoming a wild dance.
And the chant resumes.
Believers: Their eyes see not one light of the Bright Star.
Believers: Men's past ways are shaded by their shame.
Barefoot, Animus circles the center, fully lost in her movements.
Nautika: I-Is that it? Is that the whole ritual?
She darts her eyes around, searching for some purchase in her whispered questions.
Nautika: W-Where's Friele? What's behind the gate? And those hands ... What were they?
Nautika: Is she really with the Mother Spirit now?
But their hollow eyes only stare ahead.
Believers: Paeans are but admiration's mirror half.
Nautika: Uh, what just happened?
A dissonant note cuts through the chant.
A small voice reverberates between earth and sky, the sound almost pitiful against the enormous volume of the scene.
Animus: ...
Yet Animus pauses her dance; atop the raised center, she spies down at Nautika from the corner of her eye.
Animus: Ah, a conniving little rat dares to taint the purity of our sacred land with her profane, filthy paws!
Nautika draws a shuddering breath, the crisp air shivering her inside and out.
Nautika: My friend—Friele, where is she? Why hasn't she come back through the gate?
Animus: Why, it seems the lowly little beast has a friend to share in her misery.
Disgust and impatience twist her lips.
Animus: She has been taken by the Mother of Resurrection—not that there was much flesh and wit to take.
Nautika: Flesh and wit?
A blinding light hits Nautika's face, and her eyes narrow by instinct.
The gate cracks open.
They watch as the crack widens into a gap, then a doorway, and finally, the gate swings open.
Animus: Praise THEM! Worship THEM, children of flesh!
Animus: The sanctuary gate has opened! The Mother is pleased with our offering, and we have been welcomed into THEIR hall to bear witness to the final ritual!
Animus: Yes, bear witness to all THEIR infinite kindness—THEIR unmatched benevolence! THEY have taken so little, yet THEY grant us so great an honor.
Animus: Great Mother of Resurrection, O Guiding One. We fall to our knees before your boundless love.
As if Nautika's presence had become intolerable, Animus waves her hand with the kind of lazy energy usually reserved for swatting flies.
Animus: How much longer do you intend to allow this human to sully THEIR holy land, hm? Feed her to the gate. She must be removed.
Without another glance, she surges toward the gate.
Behind her, two silent disciples seize Nautika.
Nautika: No, let me go!
Sonetto: They're taking her!
Ms. Stranger: Don't. Now is not the time to act.
Ms. Stranger: If Animus spots us, she might lift her control over the believers. Then we'll find ourselves in some serious danger.
Nautika is lifted up like a fledgling bird, then slammed onto the ground.
Nautika: Ugh!
Still halfway in a daze, she looks up toward the gate.
Nautika: All this ... It was all just to open the gate?
Nautika: But this feels wrong, horribly, horribly wrong. This isn't how it's supposed to be. Is it, Máhtu?
Nautika: But, Friele did say that she was going to see the Mother Spirit, so she must be with Her now, right?
Nautika: Then the Mother Spirit must be there. She must be behind that gate!
Animus stops—turns back with an inscrutable smile.
Animus: Hah, Mother Spirit?
Animus: What nonsense are you sputtering?
Nautika: ...
Nautika staggers to her feet.
Nautika: She is the tides! The flowing light! She is the rocks and the soaring partridges and the swooping peregrines! She is the energy behind all things!
Nautika: She will give Her children a great gift! A gift that will change their lives forever!
Nautika: I have traveled all the way from the northernmost edge of the world to this place, following Her guidance!
Nautika: And I have found proof—proof that the legends were true, proof that She is here!
Animus: Ah, I see.
Animus strides toward her, longbow tapping once again over the ground.
Animus: Mother Spirit ... Ahahahaha!
Animus: That's how you imagine the supreme being of this world, is it? A deity no greater than a charlatan shaman? And what flattery to claim yourself personally guided by a goddess.
Animus: Yet, still, I cannot help but feel a twang of pity. What hope can there be for a kind born with minds too narrow to comprehend true greatness?
Playful malice kindles in her eyes.
Animus: An inescapable predicament, indeed. Before you are thrown to the gate, allow me to share with you a fragment of truth, so you may die knowing what you've served.
Arms spread wide, Animus shuts her eyes with sick devotion.
Animus: There is no "Mother Spirit." The great Mother of Resurrection has cast THEIR eye upon the Earth from time immemorial.
Animus: Antarctica has ever been the sanctuary of Manus Vindictae. Here, we serve Arcana, the only and eternal Mother of Arcanum.
Her lids slip open again, and a flood of venomous glee surges out.
Animus: Few are fortunate enough to learn this truth. What was that pitiful thing's name again?
Animus: "Fraley"? ... No matter. Your little friend came to me, boldly claiming to share our noble faith, and pleaded to be thrown to the gate so that she may meet her goddess.
Animus: And though I was inclined to turn down such a blindly foolish request, I agreed.
Nautika: ...?!
Animus: She must have been ever so disappointed when the flesh dissolved from her bones and her body melted into naught but a lump of flesh behind the gate—all that screaming and crying.
Animus: Ah, humans. So full of your precious "reason" and "logic," yet turned at even the most basic arcane trick. How foolishly simple you are.
Nautika: ...!!!
Nautika: ...
Animus laughs. The shock and agony on Nautika's face is expected—anticipated.
Animus: Ahahahahaha! Yes, that's the look—confusion, disbelief. It suits your kind perfectly.
Animus: What a miserable, blind existence.
Animus: Scurrying about in the dark, unseeing, unperceiving, your limited, darkened minds blind to the spark of enlightenment.
Animus: A creation forsaken from its inception. You could never wield true knowledge!
Animus: Yet still, you have brazenly infested every corner of this Earth, claiming that you would uncover all its mysteries.
Animus: Such ignorance! Such arrogance!
Rage and revulsion accumulate too much and too long, like a vast bank of snow waiting to fall into an avalanche.
Animus: How could you possibly grasp its secrets? How could you catch so much as a glimpse of the greater existence in the barren tenebrosity of your minds?!
The enormous, twisted gate pulses as if to match her statement, a movement somewhere between convulsing and retching.
Gulp ...
Glug ...
Something is being digested.
Nautika: ...?
From beneath the gate, strands of crimson slime creep out toward her.
Nautika: Is that red algae?
The algae surges below and beyond her, bleeding over the white rock. With every inch it advances, its color decays.
Scarlet.
Maroon.
Brown.
Black.
Nautika: ...!
Red and black algae sprawl across the ruins in tangled knots, their tendrils creeping toward the glacier beyond.
Blackened arteries pumping and pulsing over the land.
Nautika: There's black algae here, too.
Nautika: No ... I ... No, no, no way.
Nautika: I ate them. I was eating ... No. vomit
Her murmured mantras fail her. Kneeling, she clutches her stomach as her throat convulses and a stream of vomit pours out.
Animus: Are you satisfied? Has this "great gift" satiated your curiosity?
Animus steps onto the soft, viscous algae. That familiar, chewing sound grates against Nautika's mind.
Animus: Has realization finally dawned in your darkened mind?
Animus: Your friend is gone. She will never return from the gate.
