Rites

Battle of the Mind XIV

True battles unfold within...

Does the Creator's world have "boundaries"? If so, wouldn't this suggest the Creator's power has limits? If not, wouldn't Their creative work continue endlessly...?

You fall into this philosophical abyss, thinking repeatedly, finding no answers...

ID: 5004831

Type: Enemy

Tips: None

Duration: 1 days

Waits For: 3 days

Marked as New Only on First Occurrence: 0

Starts Automatically: No

Triggers Result Automatically: No

Tag Tips: None

Tag Tips Up: None

Tag Tips Text:

Random Text: None

Random Text Up: None

Actions When Wait Expires

Action:

Slots

Slot #3
Your Own Thoughts

Locks: No

Is Key: No

Is Empty: No

Is Enemy: No

Conditions:

Pops: None

Slot #4
Your rationality can help, if you possess it

Locks: No

Is Key: No

Is Empty: Yes

Is Enemy: No

Conditions:

Pops: None

Slot #6
People from distant lands

Locks: No

Is Key: No

Is Empty: Yes

Is Enemy: No

Conditions:

Pops: None

Slot #8
A mysterious text

Locks: No

Is Key: No

Is Empty: Yes

Is Enemy: No

Conditions:

Pops: None

Activation Conditions

This rite has no activation conditions.

Outcome

Prior

This rite has no prior outcome.

Regular

Glass Prison
You recall a creation story your nurse told in childhood - enslaved people from unknown lands brought these ancient myths into your nurse's storytelling repertoire.

Supposedly, traveling continually eastward would eventually lead to a glass dome. This dome extends from the heavens, enclosing the known world, with nothing beyond its exterior.

Your nurse said humans resembled ants on a god's table, covered by glass to prevent escape. After this comparison, your mother summoned her for chores.

But you - both as a child and now as a powerful adult - remain trapped in despair and fear. Why would gods fear ants escaping? Are gods watching the ants? What happens to these ants when gods finish playing?

As a child, you could cry loudly when faced with unsolvable questions, with adults providing answers; now you can only pull your hair in desperate madness.

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Lost Path
You foolishly seek to resolve your spiritual crisis through the absurd gods of the cultists.

You pray, plead, beg... only to be answered by cold laughter from the darkness.

Perhaps you still need to prove your worth to the chaotic gods.

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Impurity
You seek the Purist's grace to quell the storm in your mind...

A blinding flash lances through your consciousness and down your spine, a jagged bolt of pure agony. This is the Purist's answer to your plea.

"Unworthy," the pain whispers. "Ask not what the light can do for you, but what you can offer the light."

It "assists" your meditation for a grueling while before the sensation finally ebbs away.

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Primal Guidance
You look out over your garden, from the grandest pomegranates to the tiny nasturtiums, and see how everything grows just as it pleases. Nobody taught them how to be plants, but they know the drill. It's fascinating that they all grow to their strengths. The low-lying flowers grow wide leaves to snag every stray sunbeam, while the towering trees layer their branches like pagodas to share the light. Perennials don't feel the need to rush their seeds, while the annuals hitch a ride with the birds to spread across the globe...

Maybe this is how a world should be made, you think. Like giving every child a bag of gold and letting them find their own way. If they don't make it, their legacy simply feeds the next generation.

You sit in your garden, enjoying the fresh breeze, the warm sun, and a perfectly clear mind. It's a wonderful feeling.

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Gods Mandate
While contemplating, you're repeatedly interrupted by messengers. Proud, handsome imperial guards delivering the Sultan's words; strangers in unusual garments with long braids, foreign messengers residing in the Sultan's city seeking connection with you, a powerful official - standing nervously at your door with gifts and letters.

Normally you'd barely notice them, but today you suddenly consider: if earthly kings possess territorial boundaries, wouldn't gods as well?

Many kings, Sultans, emperors, lords, chieftains, czars, generals - all rule their lands. Similarly, many creators, architects, primordial beings, chaotic seas, the Old Ones - all create their worlds.

This thought immediately releases your tangled concerns.

Though untested, you know Sultans and kings can be overthrown; perhaps gods can be toppled too.

Since They aren't immortal, Their created worlds remain fragile; you, even more fragile within this fragile world, needn't overthink.

You pour palace-gifted wine, generously offering foreign messengers drinks; today's good mood stems from proving gods share your vulnerability.

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Naked Ape
Experience fighting in Dark Alley teaches that humans are merely hairless apes, this world merely a jungle of brick and mortar. You've witnessed men and women tearing at each other with teeth and nails, seen how desperation and hunger unleash beastliness. This requires no creator god - They need only ensure edible food remains scarce against hungry bellies.

To prove this, you stand before your mansion, tossing gold coins into the street.

Several beggars immediately pounce, already kicking each other while grabbing coins; a bean-seller strikes their hands with her ladle, attempting theft. This commotion attracts passing merchants who abandon their goods to join - that load isn't worth three gold coins anyway - then a blind fortune-teller touches the abandoned wares, hungry dogs lick the cooked beans... This small accident energizes the street, requiring no rehearsal or planning. You simply tossed gold coins...

The Creator does nothing more.

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Different Forms
You thought of Fardak’s tribe, their revered god purported to have crafted the initial humans from flour, thus their monarch scattered flour upon ministers during annual rituals to recreate creation. When soliciting aid from The Sultan, Fardak claimed, 'We can’t bear using flour for rituals anymore; distribute it for consumption'...

The legends recounted to you varied, with The Creator sometimes using His own flesh, sometimes dirt at hand, occasionally fragments of stars... Diverse creation materials; not to mention each god's world-making techniques—you read once, an Eastern goddess, weary of shaping individual figures, dipped willow branches in mud, flicking it; each droplet transformed into humankind.

So possibly, isn’t “The Creator” a general term...? Perhaps creation lacked absolutes...

Perhaps you too can create following your desires.

Such thought makes you shiver uncontrollably in avid excitement.

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Maps and Borders
If anyone truly knows the world's contours, it must be Manar.

You consider her numerous adventures and news about distant oases...

Did the Creator design such vast worlds for people like Manar? If everyone remained confined to birthplaces, would other locations matter?

Because people like Manar exist, you know other places exist, hearing exotic stories, imagining world boundaries...

Perhaps the Creator anxiously observes Manar's steps just like you; with each forward stride, He must create another mountain.

You return to your study, reexamining maps, fingers gently tracing inked mountains and rivers... Your anxiety and doubt vanish, as Manar's solid, mortal footsteps break through mental fog.

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Dream Garden...?
You finish reading, thoughtful.

The author, a mad magician from a century ago, claims everyone with spiritual aptitude can sketch a garden in their mind - essentially creating worlds.

According to him, the stronger you become, the more vast and flourishing your garden grows. The crazed magician states that once you begin building this garden, no one resists the urge to expand and beautify it; but this wasn't his personal experience - he heard it from an enlightened individual... who then vanished, seemingly erased from existence.

The magician believed his enlightened friend became completely captivated by the dream garden. He laments attempting countless methods to open a door and enter the garden, but failing; even succeeding, he doubts he could glimpse his friend across garden boundaries.

"If you've crossed a threshold - don't ask which one; if you don't know, asking proves pointless - please continue advancing upward. When you build your dream garden, look around for Aimuode's garden; tell him I miss him terribly and I'm nearly insane."

You close the book, thoughts abundant.

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Corruption's Tide
You consider the Cultic God's smirk.

Indeed, perhaps creation merely represents a prank? If orchestrated by the Cultic God, They'd surely act contrarily... They'd locate a perfect, complete world, then overturn everything, roast every beautiful thing, meticulously smearing excrement across earth.

Perhaps your current world already endured Their treatment.

That's why it brims with stench, malice, turbid people and affairs, entangled emotions and ambiguous motives...

Yes, certainly so - creation reverses; destruction reveals truth.

Your god appreciates your reasoning. Expressing approval, They fill your home with the most unbearable stench... lasting three days and nights.

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Action:

Relic's Heart
You consider the Purist's teachings.

Since They aim to cleanse the entire world, rendering it pure... this suggests the world was once clean before contamination, correct?

Then when this purified world becomes soiled again, will They return, leading followers to scour evil once more?

Increasingly disturbed, the hairs on your neck rise... Which cleansed world is yours - Their first, second, hundredth? What happened to previous worlds? They...

No, no, no, such thoughts displease divinity. You already feel the surrounding temperature dropping significantly...

You must stop this line of thinking.

Holding your breath, you imagine standing within pristine ruins, using all your strength to protect the beating heart within. Regardless how beautiful this ruin once appeared as a palace, restoration remains forbidden, because abundance represents impurity, while emptiness embodies purity...

God will sternly passes your ear as They reluctantly release you.

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Extra

Rebuking Darkness
You dare invoke the most unholy name before the Immaculate Purity!

They thunder through your mind, Their light a spear piercing heaven and earth, a ruler lashing the world...

Until the next day's sunset, whenever your focus wavers, everything before you shatters into light and flames... This divine punishment They foretell... fortunately, They cannot execute it immediately.

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Ancient Enmity
Darkness boils as you mention Their enemy's name before a god.

Their anger transforms into a dark forest, intending to make you lost forever... Fortunately, you still pray for light in your heart. This beam, like a faint lamp, illuminates your path back to the mortal realm... it also reveals the monstrosities the evil god created from your fears. Masterpieces crafted from your inner terrors... about death, betrayal, failure, love... After waking, these images linger.

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Spiral of Destruction
Two rival gods, who both want nothing more than to end the world, keep running into each other in the back of your mind.

It's a perfect little battlefield where they can tear each other apart, and your mind along with it... for all eternity.

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References

Referenced in Effects

This rite is used in effects for the following entities.

Events
Mind Wars - 14Mind Wars - 14 - Repeated Refresh