The Void Rift Crisis

by Visiden Visidane

Prior - Ignis Cordo

Who was the Sixth Ascendant? Are you mocking me, colt? Are you one of General Gravitas' lackeys? My quest keeps me perpetually busy, but I can find the time to take a quick trip to Ida with you. There, I'll show you that we Seekers are not these scholarly weaklings your general thinks we are.

Ah, but you do sound earnest. Your ignorance is saddening, and I would suggest that you spend some time in Empyrea's Hall of Records. I'm sure Magnus will set you straight on the matter. So, why would you ask such a question now? It is hardly a popular topic, though I wish it were. The Herd seems quite content with just forgetting such a massive chunk of our history.

The Void Rift Crisis? Of course. I should have known. Every inquiry into the Sixth Ascendant now stems from that disaster. I fear the Seekers are going to forever rue the decision to trust so much in Turbo Pinnae.

Still your wings, colt, I was too hastily angered, and I apologize. You should get a Seeker's perspective before you talk to others about the Sixth. The Herd is full of misinformation from alicorns too hasty with their judgments, too apathetic to discover the truth, or too foolish to understand its importance.

Let this be the first thing you carry with you; no one truly knows who the Sixth Ascendant is. Those who would come to you claiming to be the one who knows is a liar. The Seekers of the Sixth have been searching for that answer for ten cycles now. We have among us some of the greatest diviners the Herd has ever produced, honed by cycles of searching. We continue to explore the far corners of our Eternal Herd, we scour other planes, the most resolved among us even wander Vestibulum, all for the sake of answering that question you have so casually thrown at me. If there is an alicorn out there who still remembers the Sixth Ascendant, I assure you, we would have found this alicorn.

We know that the Sixth Ascendant was a Queen, and it took a thousand-page treatise from Sagax Lumen for us to come to that consensus. We know that she was a necromancer of unimaginable power, thanks to the scraps of her discarded notes we found in the deepest depths of Bytos. We refer to her as "the Necromancer Queen" for now, but only because we have yet to comprehend the true measure of her abilities. For all we know, Necromancy might even be her weakest skill, and it just happens to be beyond the rest of the Herd. Beyond that, we continue to flounder with guesswork.

The Agamanthion was among our earliest and greatest discoveries. The mystery of it was such that even the name used for it in the scattered scraps of notes we found inside does not make sense. For a long time it had been lazily floating across the fields of Elys, hidden by a combination of illusions so complex that it took hundreds of Seekers to reveal it. And the revelation turned out to be the easy part. Discovering the functions of its mechanisms without disturbing them, destroying them, or activating the guardians took cycles to barely progress to. The best among us were tasked with learning everything about the Agamanthion. We even went so far as to establish a base there for our High Seekers. I was not chosen to be part of this team. It was disheartening, certainly, but now it certainly feels more like good fortune.

We were desperate when Turbo Pinnae showed up. The Fifteenth Cycle was ending without a single new discovery. It would have been the first time since the Seekers of the Sixth was formed for a cycle to pass with nothing to show. Some of us had started to believe that we had exhausted all our leads, and there was nothing more to be gleaned by physically searching. The Agamanthion was our best and last lead. There was even speculation that the Sixth Ascendant lay within the very core of the Agamanthion, which we could not reach.

Understand that we did not allow Pinnae to study the Agamanthion on a whim. He faced rigorous evaluation, he remained an adviser for a long time, and half of us, myself included, believed that he should be kept at that distance. I personally felt that he was too eager to examine the Agamanthion, like a colt with a new toy. Our High Seekers thought otherwise. Sagax Lumen was particularly impressed by his brilliance, and his eagerness. Quite possibly, by his handsomeness as well. Perhaps, she saw it as a bold, political move. After all, if Turbo Pinnae were to become deeply involved with the Seekers, and then ascended, we would gain the Throne's direct support. Turbo Pinnae was a passionate scholar. He might even mobilize all the Herd to the Seekers' cause. Regardless of the actual reason, Sagax Lumen pushed for Pinnae's inclusion into the main team studying the Agamanthion in an unprecedented case of an alicorn born outside of the Sixth Cycle rising so quickly with the Seekers.

I will admit that he was brilliant, and that there was merit in letting him join us. Having one not from the Sixth Cycle joining up improved relations with the rest of the Herd as well. I just wish we had more time. And I wish he had more time. Turbo Pinnae created a time limit in the form of the Sixteenth Ascension; a limit he shouldn't have. If we had that time, we might have tempered that impatience of his. Now, instead of improving how the Herd sees us, this decision led to our horrible, current state.

And we all know what happened as a result of that reckless promotion. Sagax Lumen and the rest of our High Seekers, along with several of our best seekers, were untimely diminished when the Agamanthion became active. We have lost our best lead, our leaders, and some of our best seekers. Many of us are falling into despair. Those of us wandering other planes have started mentioning talk of giving up. It seems now that we will never recover the Sixth Cycle.

Not me, though. I will keep searching, no matter how many cycles pass. Even if I become the last seeker.

Comments

[Follower of Chaos]

The Sixth Ascendant = True Final Boss perhaps?

These are good so far, I liked the librarian's strictly facts based approach to things. Though an entire period of their history simply vanishes and many want to just let it be forgotten entirely? If anything, the Void Rift Crisis should have made clear the very real threat of an unknown history coming back to bite the Eternal Herd in the flank. You need to learn as much as you can to prevent or prepare for similar disasters.

Learn from history Alicorns, don't ignore it.