Destcember Day 26: Sweet Dreams

Our Revenge for Cayde Killing Spree Now Has a 0% Success Rate

Seriously, we didn't hurt anyone we wanted to in the long term, and actually made things a little worse for ourselves. All of the Scorn and Scorn Barons can just be revived by the Fanatic. We actually helped Riven, because killing her freed her and let her grant the Last Wish, cursing the Dreaming City. And Uldren was revived as a Guardian, which is an improvement on his old condition. So yeah, we killed 10 people to avenge Cayde, but the death toll now sits at zero.

Don't get me wrong though, I love the story. I'm glad that Uldren got revived and that Pulled Pork finally found his Guardian.

Hive Worms Are Just Tiny, Evil Roombas

Imagine if hive worms outside their host don't quite have depth perception, but also because they are worms they refuse to take help and are not given any, so until they find their host they just wander the hive tomb ships eating any scraps of food they can find. They would be like tiny, evil Roombas and there would be hundreds of them just crawling around the ships and running into walls in a way that could almost be called endearing.

The Last Word quest is like trying to run up a greased slide while a bungie cord holds you to the ground. I have been at this for two hours and have made no progress. I'd say to kill me, but then I'd just lose more progress.

Destcember Day #3: A Long Shadow

Humanity stands like a young sapling in an old forest. We have so much potential to grow large and prosper. We were on our way even before the Traveler ushered in the Golden Age. With just a little room and a bit of time, we could have been something great. But it was not to be, because we started our journey late. We were not in some bright clearing or field. No, we exist in the long shadow of the old races. The Hive came and blotted out our Light with their Darkness. It was so easy too, for they have enjoyed the benefits of maturity and age for billions of years before our little star even began to form, let alone our race. So, here in the shade of the old and the Darkness, we are left with two choices.

We can allow ourselves to wilt away into dust and rot, just a minor footnote in the logs of the Hive. It would be so easy. If we just stopped fighting, they would gladly wipe us without a shred of hesitation or remorse. If we were lucky, some of us might be taken by the Cabal as oddities or a new client race. Maybe some would survive the purge for a time, huddled together in the cold until nature runs its course or they find themselves at the end of a scout's gun. Our spark would go out and be forgotten in the shade. However, we have never chosen the easy path.

In order for a sapling to prosper, the old growth must be cut away. The old trees must be chopped away and cut down to size. Only then can the light pierce through the dark. Only then can the weak and the young begin to grow.

So take up your Light and your guns and wield them like an axe. Cut and cut and cut until the rivers run brown with the sap of the old trees. Cut until the Dark is no more than an old story that we tell our children. Cut until there is nothing left between you and the Sky. Today they may cast a long shadow, but tomorrow they will cast a shadow no longer.

Destcember Day 11: Guardian of Nothing

Guardians have a tendency to hoard. I think it has something to do with whatever the Traveler did with our brains when it brought us back to make sure at least most of us would help people instead of just wandering off. But as a side effect, we tend to take things we like and guard them too.

We all have things we store away, myself included. There are always a few dozen guns and bits of armour that are rattling around in our vaults that we tell ourselves will come in handy one day. All those ghost shells, mods, shaders, and shiny bits that we gather by the hundreds. We regularly spend enough glimmer to feed a family for months to buy things from vendors, put it in the pile, and promptly forget. And it's not just physical things we hoard. We love hoarding power.

Everyone loves power, be it physical or status. The Vanguad and the factions all cling desperately to positions. We all grind for that next arbitrary rank in crucible. We want more numbers. Bigger numbers and better numbers than our friends. It's more subtle than the physical hoarding, but it's still there.

I think that's why Guall's attack hit us so hard. Sure it killed people, but everything does that. But for a bit, we lost everything we guarded. Our guns, our gear, our ships and sparrows. Our ranks, our power, our people. Even our Light. For a while, we were guardians of nothing.

Destcember Day 27: Voices In My Head

There are a quite a few voices in my head. Most of them are my fault and can be suppressed. The whispers of worms, ahamkara, my conscience. All have easy solutions, but there is one that I can hardly hear. It whispers, quietly but insistently, in the very back part of my mind. I can almost never hear it, like a fly in another room. It gets quiter the further away from the City I get, but I know it's still there. But sometimes, when I die or am in the very center of the City, I can just make out the voice. It whisper so many things. PROTECT THEM. FIGHT FOR ME. GROW STRONGER. DON'T QUESTION. FORGET. OBEY. It isn't like the other voices either. They all seem to come from without, but this one emanates from within. Is it why I can't remember my past? I don't think that I should ask anyone about this.

Destcember Day 28: Ironborn

I was born three times in my life. Once of flesh, once of iron, and once of Light.

My first birth was of flesh. This is the one that I know least about. I know that I was born a human boy, with parents and a family. I likely had a home. All of that is gone now. I cannot remember anyone or anything from that time, not even the way I looked.

My second birth was of iron. Taken from my human body and turned into and exo. I cannot be sure why I did it or how, but I think it was a choice that I made of my own free will. If I did choose it, it would have been to extend my life or to improve myself. That seems like what I would have done, if I were the same person then as I am now, which I am not entirely sure of.

My last birth was of Light. Revived as a guardian to serve humanity and live my third life. Thankfully, this life at least I can remember. Though my life ends almost daily, it never truly does, thanks to the power of the Light and my ghost. Since it is the one that I live now, it is the one that matters most, but if I were given a choice, I would learn all I could about my other two lives.

So, I was born three times. Born, reborn, reborn. Human, Exo, Guardian. Flesh born, Ironborn, Lightborn.

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Sorry for the brevity and below average quality. I had an extremely busy day today and didn't have much free time to work on this.

Among kinderguardians, it is almost a right of passage to get your own sticky grenade stuck to your hand. In fact, there is a somewhat secret betting pool in the Tower for how long until it happens to each new guardian. The longer a kinderguardian goes without it happening, the larger the betting pool grows. The current record is two weeks.

Destcember Day 5: Black and White

So many guardians see our fight against our enemies in black and white. We are the heroes, dauntless knights fighting endlessly against the forces of evil, who long only to destroy us solely for the furtherment of evil. But things are never that simple. Every one of our enemies has their own stories and reasons to take up arms against us. The Cabal who so recently destroyed us are merely foot soldiers in a vast empire, knowing not why they attack, just following the orders that were passed down to them from a chain of command that they have no authority to even question. The Vex are fighting against the inevitable, for ever trying to stave of the heat death of the universe, warping time, space, and causality in service to their salvation, their "Pattern". The Fallen are lost nomads, with no home to call their own, their homeworld destroyed by the Darkness that we fight so hard against. Now they chase after their Great Machine, hoping, just like us, for the chance to reclaim their golden age. The Scorn have been corrupted by a force greater than them, using the Darkness in an attempt to free themselves from their dependence on Either and Servitors and to bring back those they lose to the deaths that we so often inflict upon them. The Hive and Taken, servants of the very Darkness itself, have their reasons as well. The Hive are slaves of their own free will, eternally killing and destroying to feed their worms, lest they be consumed themselves. They only chose this path for themselves after being in dire straits, with their choices being to take the worms into themselves and serve the Worm Gods, or have their species wiped out by an approaching disaster. Now they fight to survive, to bring the universe to its "final shape" and live forever by becoming death. The Taken, perhaps most pitiful of all, have no will of their own, being puppets to a will greater than their own, often being forced to fight against their former allies and kill those they once called friend. Even the Darkness may have a reason for their actions, though even I doubt that. To each of them we are the boogeymen, immortal monsters that can slaughter their way through hundreds of valiant warriors, with terrible powers of scorching light and weapons that have been known to kill even gods, before dying, only to return seconds later as if nothing ever happened. So, next time you begin to think in black and white, consider what I have said today and what your enemies think of you.

Destcember Day 20: Where Is My Warmind

I've never been sure if we could trust Rasputin. I'm not like Zavala, thinking that we should just abandon attempting to gain his help completely, but he does seem erratic. He helped us to fight off Xol on Mars, but that was more out of self interest. He has abandoned us so many times in the past, despite his reason for creation being to help us. Where was he during the the Collapse and the Dark Age, when he could have been fighting off the Eliksni or helping us rebuild? Where was he during the Taken War, when he could have been helping us fight off Oryx? Where was he during the Red War, when the last bastion of humanity was being destroyed and the Light being snuffed out? I want to trust him, I really do, but where was he? Where was my Warmind?