As the most qualified person to recall the history of the Raposa, a (somehow alive) Wilfre takes it upon himself to chronicle it all from his unbiased perspective. It goes...fine enough.
“No, no, no!”
Deep within the woods outside any village or town, there existed a cabin. Within the cabin, a lone Raposa set out to chronicle the history of his kind, all from what he knew, experienced, and learned throughout his travels.
After all, someone had to, right? And whoever that someone was, they’d need to have the whole story. No one but him fit the picture—well, maybe Mari, but she was busy enough already dealing with the villagers. In his place of solitude, he could piece together their fractured past into one, unbiased picture.
And where else to start but at the nexus of it all?
Yet, no matter how many times he tried, Wilfre couldn’t get it down in a way that satisfied him. Describing the events from a neutral perspective only made him feel like he ripped his soul out, stomped on it, then decided to become the Creator’s greatest fan—eugh, even thinking about it…
“That’s just it, isn’t it?” He leaned back, wooden chair scraping and screeching against the worn planks which made up the floor. “I’ll sit back and allow the Creator to weave the narrative. No, that won’t do.”
Come on, pen to paper—so he told himself. Start from the beginning. The true and honest beginning no one saw but him.
It was said no color belonged to us.
It was said the Creator creator gave it to us. The planet, the stars, all forged by a pen no one ever thought to wield. Ever hoped to touch. From a little Rapo to a body in the soil, this legend’s beaten into everyone’s brains, reverence burned into our souls.
But it had never been that simple.
This world existed for one purpose.
All for one ridiculous child who never even appreciated it. He never said thanks for all the lives nearly taken for his sake, for the soil crafted for him to walk on, not even an air of gratitude when it all faltered, all for an instant, all to save his life.
In the end, one thing became clear. The creator cared not for their disposable creations, but for the soul who threw them all away and left those gifts in the dust. Those Raposa which should have never been gambled away, but cherished.
If * had * ch****, I w***d**v p***sh*d each gr**n of **** for the Raposas lucky to grow up on this planet. I would’ve pa*****d the sea with the l**** of ****onds as the ***** **y bled with all the colors on my canvas.
Wilfre uttered a curse and gave up on the remnants of words strewn across the page. He’d tainted this draft enough with the mess—though in regards to the writing, he found no regret. Everything rung true, whether the other Raposa deigned to listen to him or not.
But that wasn’t the point.
But wasn’t it important? He’d create because he cared! Not like them! Never like the creator.
Nothing made sense. Nothing came with fairness. As much as Wilfre wanted to pen his curses towards the creator for this world’s miserable origins, this wasn’t what he set out to do. For some reason, he lived. Despite everything he’d done and become, he breathed, and today he wrote to preserve the history no one else bothered to.
So he’d focus on his goal.
Nothing more, nothing less.
As the world forged into a gift to its inhabitants, the Raposa found a humble existence within its gentle embrace. They drank from the world’s rivers, enjoyed its crops, and found coexistence among all its inhabitants, from the benign to the malignant.
All had their place.
All except one.
His name didn’t matter, for many exist with the same seeds of ambition in their heart. Nurtured by the respect of his village, he came to think about the world around him. He peered beyond the veil of gifts and splendor, and sought a purpose above beyond all he’d ended up with.
If the creator could wield their brush and create miracles, why couldn’t he? What made him, or anyone else different from the one who brought them to life? As it stood, the only difference he could think of…
Rested within Creation Hall. The book of life, pages stained with the building blocks of their world. Every inch stenciled, brought to life, colors and shapes teemed from the worn paper, threatened to burst out and make a world unto their own.
It was said that Raposa drew upon the pages with his own colors. A black pen, to which only inky darkness poured.
From those pages, strange creatures emerged. No matter what he used to mark the page, it turned to black, to ink, to smudges, smudges which snarled, snapped, destroyed.
When the others found out, they discarded him.
So he did all he could—destroyed the accursed symbol, left his home behind as the torn pages disappeared over the bridge before him. This act of anger changed the course of the world, for all it meant.
The book emptied of its substance meant the world emptied with it. The darkness the lost soul created stuck to him, granted him power over the world. He figured, in its dying state no one hoped to repair, the only mercy left was to choke the life out of it.
It was all that selfish creator’s fault. They decided no one else deserved the power they held, and for some reason, everyone chose to die in agreement over finding any path of resistance.
The sun vanished, the food supply dried up, and under mountains of snow and forsaken dreams, the darkness dug into the lands. When all died, its tendrils would reach into the sealed Creation Hall and rip the false edifice apart.
A shrine which stood for nothing, now that their god had abandoned them.
Until a hero arrived.
A damned gift to a girl who begged to the silence. The lost soul did everything he could to destroy that mockery, but as the hero returned the pages to the Book of Life, banished the darkness seeped into the land, brought back the world…
An accursed mixture of feelings took root in him.
Resentment, seeing the hero take his place among those he cared about.
Pity, that the hero danced via the plucked strings gifted to it by its creator.
Some other unspecified things which didn’t need to be mentioned, and were completely irrelevant to the story. All that mattered in the end was ** *** ***
All that mattered was that the lost soul, the respected young Raposa, made a choice. And to the creator, it made him the villain of the world.
Though, he did try to kill the world. That stayed true, no matter how the tale unfolded. The lost soul unleashed monster after monster upon the hero, but nothing made it falter. He retreated to his castle, and as the hero made a move to invade it, in an act of desperation…
The soul dripped in ink returned to his home village, slaughtered the mayor, and stole the Book of Life once more.
And what did the creator do about that?
It was said the mayor watched the lost soul grow. A young Rapo, to a condemned one—though he never lived to see the downfall of the one he once praised.
The hero raised its blade. It stormed the castle; despite every desperate artifact the inky soul unleashed on it, it never faltered from its pursuit. In his last moments, he looked upon the creations he ripped and manipulated from the book, and wondered why he could never draw a star so bright.
When the blade went through him, his soul died—dyed in shadow.
The world remained as it was born, just like everyone wanted. The hero left, no longer needed, and everyone danced and cheered as peace reentered their lives.
For some reason.
“…The ending needs some work,” Wilfre muttered to himself. Freedom of choice and self-determination lost to blind faith, and for what? The same thing as always, where Raposa sat around, unchanged, alive by the mercy of a being who never once cared for them as much as they did for it.
He still didn’t understand it.
Still…
He needed to acknowledge his personal bias in the matter. He’d rather be dead than be controlled—but Mari put it best.
“I guess we like having someone we can rely on,” she said, eyes glued to something beyond the stars. “You wouldn’t get it. You’re…you.”
He was himself. All he’d ever be. But even as himself, he’d never understand the next part of the story.
Yes, he’d take credit for the more heinous portions of his actions. He understood trying to kill the world was bad, he wasn’t five. Did he regret it? His emotions on it, even now, mixed with so many thoughts not even Wilfre himself knew if he did.
But as for what came next.
He jammed his pen back to paper, hunched over his seat.
In a state between life and death, the lost soul now mixed with the inky darkness of his creations, found the World.
Not the world created for the Raposa, but the World beyond the world, to which he finally laid eyes on the truth of their existences: their sad, unloved existences.
The Raposa worshiped a creator who forged them out of ink for the sheer purpose of erasing them all.
A lone thing called a human slept in the world made for them. As he made friends and found his place there, the life of the world would serve to rouse his soul, so he’d wake up in the world he came from…or something like that.
In the process, he’d need all the life the world provided—the color, the Eternal Flame which connected the Raposa to the creator, all of it. Would those left behind have anything left? The lost soul doubted it—all that slaughter for one young life.
A young life who knew nothing, who’d leave with his hands clean at the end of it all, the creator’s blessings shielding him from consequences.
The story sounded so ridiculous he found himself laughing for an eternity in the void. The Raposa risked everything for a creator who never loved them! How ironic was that? Rotted in the cold, sacrificed by the pen which drew them—he saw no difference.
But despite having every reason to abandon them, the lost soul took this knowledge and set to work. He’d always been a cut above the rest, so he fashioned a solution to rob the world of color, so it wouldn’t be used to wake the boy who kept their world alive. At the same time, it meant the shapes and structure still stood.
No life—but no death.
He saw it as fine, if it meant protecting whatever was left.
Despite it all, though, the village he called home turned against him once more. To do his work, the lost soul stole a body which only existed as an illusion to comfort the human who never deserved to be there.
The mayor’s daughter Mari and her friend, Jowee, so attached to that body and their home chased him to the ends of the planet in revenge, the rest of the village in tow.
He made new identities, threw up obstacles, revealed horrid truths and forged a weapon of pure color, all to strip the creator of their power and save everyone once and for all. Yet they chased,
and chased,
and chased,
and fought,
and awoke
for something that never loved them.
Wilfre tossed his pen against the wall.
“I cared—I did everything for them!
“The creator never loved them, I did! I only wanted to create newer, brighter blessings, but, but—!
“No, you see, I didn’t intend to make those monstrosities. If It wasn’t me, then surely the creator would’ve! It already saw everyone’s lives as forfeit!
“Right, right! The creator wanted to kill the world first! I only…I only…”
He knew he should’ve felt regret. But every time he thought of what the creator did, of what he did, every thought jumbled into an incoherent mess of blame and anger until he lost the story which trembled at his fingertips.
Did he love his village?
Did he love it enough to watch it from the trees, from the shade, where no one dared to see him?
Did the creator ever watch?
Did the creator ever look down at a corpse stained with ink, which once smiled so brightly, and feel nothing but hatred?
Wilfre scratched away the ink which dripped onto his fingertips. Filth clung and stained flesh, flaked under fingernails and clutched silver fur. At least, with this ink, it came off after a wash or two.
But oddly enough,
he missed it.
And as long as he couldn’t understand why he missed it, he’d remain in these woods. He’d watch, pen the beginning, and look away as the stage collapsed, the damage burned, and these indescribable emotions bubbled under the rubble.
Call him the self-determined villain to the blind, beautiful faith of the creator. But at least, he’d never be a puppet ever again. Not to a story—not to the narrative he’d been bound to, string by twisted string.