>>6182307>>6182349This dream comes, time and time again. Whenever things go uncertain in life, you return to this misty place. Fighting this swan for long never bodes well. At some point or later, your luck runs out.
It's better to do what good you can with what time you have left.
So you swim back up, and crawl onto the boat. The frigid tides didn't feel that bad as you were immersed in them, but being brought to the chilly air just excites the pain.
The boy is sitting there. He is as unprotected from the elements as you are. As cold as you are, as vulnerable as you are, as all humans are. Though he had next to nothing in life, he has even less in death.
You think to apologize to him again, but stop yourself. Forgiveness in his heart won't save him, nor could any of his words do anything to change your course. With your spear, you begin to paddle the boat away from the massive iceberg in the distance, toward the shore from which you came.
But from the depths of the water, the bird rose again, its mangling nowhere near sufficient enough to stop its ability to fly. It sails above the surface, away and above, before turning back around.
<span class="mu-r"><span class="mu-s"><span class="mu-i">If this fate terrifies you, why must you run toward it? You did not send so many here from the safety of your bed. All your ventures were made walking a cliff's edge. Every kill a wager, made with your immortal soul at stake.
So go on. You may leave and never come back, never look back, not until your time has come...</span></span></span>
The swan, reaching the apogee of its flight, stalls in the air as it turns its head toward you. The openings of its body writhes with the intoxicating miasma of death, teeming with black frogs and snakes, worms and lizards. An abhorrent creature from beyond the fold in a form even more wretched than the birds that fly from this domain. It is a thing of the arcane. The proof that life was crafted with intent and design.
The design that, from the start, from the very womb, doomed you to failure.
Unless you do something drastic.
<span class="mu-r"><span class="mu-s"><span class="mu-i">... But, what is one more gamble?</span></span></span>
<span class="mu-b">You stand, skyclad, facing death's bird. The Gods themselves spy your travails. <span class="mu-i">And they bellow, bellow, <span class="mu-s">bellow.</span></span>
Two anons, roll 10d6. Target: 10 successes.</span>
