Round 2:
Initiative Order: Felix, Cole, Moria, Dusk, R1, Juno, R3, Sinset, R4, R2.
Only one of your attackers remains standing after that, begging for her life.
Please, spare me! Nothing makes sense anymore! It's horrible.
The chapel room contains some benches and an altar with a red linnen draped over it, accompanied by two small and lit braziers.
Besides the Roidirians gear there is nothing worth it's while in this room.
You move on into the last remaining room.
This area seems to be the heart of the shrine. You find a circular, shallow pool that glows with otherworldly power at the center of a smaller crater also overgrown with trees and open to the sky. A sharp odor emanates from the water, at once smoky, earthy, and sweet. At each of the cardinal directions is a Roidiran supplicant, knelt in mute prayer.
The words “All discoveries reflect the beholder” are inscribed in glowing
letters along the pool’s side. Everyone perceives these words in her native language.
Unsure what to do, you approach the pool, what appears before you — first in place of your reflections, then as an entity in three dimensions rising from the water — is as stunning as it is unmistakable.
With eyes like starlight and voluminous hair full of secrets, the dark
and striking woman who seems to bend all attention and space in genuflection to her is none other than Roidira herself.
As she materializes, she looks at each of you in turn, her solar eyes almost painful to meet; then, she speaks.
Welcome, supplicants. I am Roidira. You have walked my Road and now, at last, you are ready to drink from this most perilous of cups. Answer my questions truthfully, with an open mind, and you shall be rewarded with the greatest gift in the planes: my Enlightenment.
Fail, and wander forever in the darkness of the ignorance you laughably call ‘wisdom.’
She eyes everyone some more, then begins her interrogation:
What must every good Roidiran say before calling upon my power in prayer or speaking an incantation? More importantly, why must you do so?
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Cole thanks Juno and Felix for the assist then follows the group down to the water where Roidira emerges.
Cole looks on in wonder as she speaks, completely forgetting what the question was, but before he can answer Juno attacks.
He shrugs and draws his cold Iron Rapier. "Guess it's the hard way then ey."
Roidira waves her hand at Juno, enveloping her in a perfect darkness that deadens her to the world. It is not blindness — when Juno holds her hand in front of her face she sees it — but a total absence of all other sensory stimulation. It's not visible to others.
Roidira doesn't seem to take any damage, nor does she give the impression as if she would attack you.
You heard this phrase several times: “There is no presence; there is absence. There is no meaning; there is only knowledge.”
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"My dearest Roidira"starts Sinset, recalling the phrase used by her supplicants, Those of us who take the path to enlightment say that there is no presence; there is absence. There is no meaning; there is only knowledge."
"Certainly, this is because your presence is truly that, an absence--your black wings, a vast expanse of emptiness, as large as the space between stars. And because while learning leads to knowledge, that knowledge is the end itself, because knowledge leads to more knowledge, not a single answer, but only a vastness of questions, an ever-growing expanse of beautiful nothingness."
Sinset's tongue grows more and more silver as he speaks. Feel free to add more and aid me on that roll, friends.
Cole just saw how Juno tried to attack the godess and now helplessly flails around after Roidira waved at her.
You sure you don't want to try that aid another?
Roidira smiles and claps quietly as she lowers her gaze upon you.
Thus you have learned the true significance of emptiness. Tell me, as a good Roidiran, then, do you believe in nothing?
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Having no knowledge of religion, except what he's heard in the court parlors, in his travels, and on this adventure, Sinset continues to take a wild gander at what the goddess is getting at, bowing as he says,
"Of course we don't believe in nothing, we believe in the perfect void of emptiness that comes from the knowledge of the goddess herself."
She simply nods, smiles, and carries on.
Now for my final question: is true knowledge even possible?
I grant you this was not easy, but come now, show some intellectual backbone, some rhetorical bite! Enough with these answers filled with platitudes and flattery! Stand, and speak a true sentence, supplicant! Roidira answers to Sinset. She seems to be waiting on some more input.
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Moria begins speaking, really have no idea what she is going to say. "I think true knowledge is possible, but only in the absence of meaning can we hope to arrive at such a state. Like you can't really truly know what it is to breathe in the air until you've lived life without air. You can't appreciate the wind in your hair without having felt without.
Err... Yeah?"
Moria nervously bounds on her heels, not really understanding any of this whatsoever.
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Having been raised among the courtesans in Oppara, Sinset is more comfortable with platitudes and flattery than religion.
Nevertheless, Sinset obeys the goddess, stands up straight, and says something honest for once. "The truth," says Sinset, is that we'd really like to know why so many of your former worshippers are now phantoms.
Roidira smiles and exhales, as if a burden has been lifted. [/b]So, you claim understanding. You have mastered the ways of the tongue, now let us test the deepest rafters of your mind.
[b]Now you may drink from this fountain of enlightenment, she says, as she gestures to the pool beneath her feet. Sup on the knowledge that shall shatter all you hold dear, she says, with a strange edge of intensity. All of you, step forth. Don't be afraid, this will not turn you into a phantom.
She doesn't give a further answer to Sinset, but seems to wait for you to claim your price, to drink from the fountain of enlightenment.
Junos senses come back with those words from Roidira, she heard all of them and saw her motion to the well.
All of your senses fade, leaving you floating in a dark and silent void. In this silence, a telepathic presence presses itself upon your mind, I am not, and I have never been. Lesser minds construct reality from ephemeral illusion, forcing the trappings of existence upon that which has never worn them. All the void can grant are echoes.
Roidira, fully corporeal, stands before this very pool in some age when the shrine was better maintained, polished and swept with reverence. Standing in the pool, she produces a long, curved sword. Leaning her head back, strong arms skillfully maneuver the sword until its point presses into her starry robes. With a single breath and thrust, she runs
herself through and dissolves into the pool, a shower of white feathers fluttering down before all fades to black.
Roidira speaks, You are not Roidirans. Did you all really think to take me for a fool? No matter. Hear me now, for no one, least of all my wretched faithful, shall ever believe you: I have no use for followers. Where I now walk is beyond your imagining, beyond the realm of your comprehension.
It seems the water contains wine and stimulants.