chasma | FAREWELL

ALL GOOD THINGS

must come to a (golden) end

WELCOME TO THE LAND OF PROSPERITY

Morning comes, and the world is alive.

Rays of warmth gently reach out to a place that has never seen the sun, bringing with it more vivid color than the world has seen before. The sky is clear, free of clouds and smog and gray, a picturesque scene to welcome a new day, a new life. The voices of the harpies welcome the dawn for the first time with a soft but joyful song, their voices light and sanguine as they take to the skies to sing of freedom from the powers they've always feared and served.

Drawn out by the familiar voices of the harpy, lifted into something beautiful, something heartfelt, are the ghosts that were hidden within the caves. Despondent, hopeless, beaten down for aeon by the harpies, they peer out into the open world that the bomb's explosion created. They watch the sun rise on the Land of the Dead - a sun many have not seen since time forgotten - and there is new hope. Slowly, one by one, the ghosts of the long dead and recently dead alike, those that have been ferried across to the resting place created by the Authority, begin to walk out into the sun.

And, just like that, they begin to fade to Dust, smiles on their faces after so long in the dark. The gold drifts in the air, to rejoin the world anew. Free will, intention, knowledge - soul.

The Tree of Knowledge thrives in the light, the last of the Dust of angels a perfect fertilizer to make it grow and stand tall over the participants of a competition they never chose to join, its branches blooming with flowers of white. And the participants themselves, all of you...

You, too, are alive. The icy touch of the ghosts has faded into something more natural and warm. Color returns to faces, and even without the touch of magic, all wounds are healed. You are alive. Your story will continue, and your happy ending awaits.

It's just across the river, and Charon is ready to take you there, through clear air where the mists have lifted. And when you finally arrive...

...Your souls are here to welcome you home. Even those who have lost that part of themselves will find it again, waiting at the docks to find their way into your arms the very second you step out, another second away simply too much to bear. And at last, your daemons shift, one last time, to settle on a form you may or may not have seen before - and you know, in your hearts, that this is a good thing, something natural, something to celebrate, no longer the herald of trauma or some misdeed.

Beyond the docks, the suburbs buzz with an energy it hasn't seen before. The ghosts, like your own, feel more warm and solid and real. The lost and misguided have a spark of hope in their eyes, their delight at the changes in this world unmistakable as they point to something, a little further out. Follow their gazes, and you'll find the source of their excitement easily.

A window to another world. Two - three - and more. As one person reaches out, a city on the other side slowly changes to a field of flowers. A small village changes to a desert market, through which the merchants wave people to come in, come in, they'd love to see you. Through another window, an empty and barren world littered with rubble shimmers to instead show a world filled with water and memory, perfectly intact, and someone new steps into this world to embrace a familiar face among the crowd.

The windows stabilize, allowing everyone to come and go as they choose. The Land of the Dead is no longer a prison, after all - merely a waypoint, just another stop along a journey that need only end when wanderers are ready.

What some might call an end, after all, is often a new beginning.

Welcome, travelers, to your golden end.

Dead and alive both have been revived, injuries healed, and powers returned to normal. Your daemons have all returned to you, though they will settle into one form, and will no longer shift - though this form does not have to be one of the three taken over the course of the game, and may yet be something new entirely.

Keep your coins! A new symbol has taken the place of the clock face or comet that marked your teams - a great, blooming tree. With that, you will be able to return to the Land of Prosperity at any time, and visit any other world that you wish to see.

Your characters are free to continue their stories however they choose - in their own world, or another.

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