Of Self, and Purpose
There is one, unimaginably important question we all must ask ourselves.
“Who am I?”
It is not a name, not a vocation. It certainly has nothing to do with whatever species, race, or object you are, but of who you; as a thinking, existent being must ask yourself in manner of the self, of metaphysical, immeasurable importance.
There has not been a single day, however those might be measured in this sunless place, where I have not questioned this of myself. And of course, I receive no answer from the source most important; me.
The Doll, my only companion, the quiet, and soft-spoken thing is a daintily lanky and artificially beautiful plain white mare. I would humor myself by asking her now and then, and receive the same reply.
“Dear Hunter, you are a Hunter now as you have always been.” She would speak with certainty and gentleness as always, her glossy blue eyes betraying no true emotion, her voice betraying no sense of truth, or falseness.
But a Hunter of what?
Answers?
I must be a terrible Hunter then, for it must have been years...perhaps infinitely longer since I have come to be in this sorry state, left with nothing otherwise to hunt, trapped in this Dream of a lone chapel on a hill, stuck forever in eternal moonlight.
Indeed, I at least had been a Hunter, at any rate….
I Hunted the beasts in the land, the wolfish monstrosities poor ponies under the influence of the Old Blood had morphed into.
I Hunted the horrid spirits, the lesser Great Ones known as Amygdalas who like the spiders they resembled; wove a web across the minds and hearts of Equestria to hide the Truth with the aid of the accursed Vacuous Rom.
I Hunted the abominations summoned and created by the School of Mensis, that sought to foolishly plunge the world into death and chaos all for their selfish desire to gain favor with the Ascended Great Ones in the Realm of Dreams, all for their pursuit of the Eldritch Truth.
I slew the Nightmare, I laid the cruel and monstrous thing to rest and freed Queen Lacunae of it’s influence, and the world in concert, ending the Eternal Night, the Night of the Hunt, and saving Equestria from the Ritual of Blood, stopping the spread of the Beast Plague and hopefully allowing Queen Celestina to restore order, and civility.
At least on that last note, I hope so….
I would not know for certain, beings directly after I had slain the Nightmare that had possessed Lacunae, my Master; Ghermane, summoned me back to the Hunter’s Dream, a small spot drifting in the Realm of Dreams where Hunters such as I were bound, and would save us from death upon being overwhelmed by the tasks before us.
It was then that Ghermane fully revealed his true colors.
The gray and ancient earth pony stallion, the First Hunter, said he would free me from the Dream for my exemplary service, that I did not need to suffer anymore. Of course, being so devout to my cause, the cause to save as many as I could, I refused to submit.
The duel to follow was legendary, I was certain I was doomed before my Master’s superior skill, but I persevered, and managed to best him with my own obtained skill, the power my accrued Blood Echoes had instilled in me, and the simple fact that Ghermane had forgotten; the Dream still sustained me.
When I laid the final blow, and he’d vanished from existence, I hope, to the peaceful hereafter, was when my curse began.
I had unknowingly done something irreversible to myself during my quest to save Equestria.
During my journey, I had discovered dark objects of power, things the Doll told me were called “Cords of The Eye” or “Thirds of Umbilical Cord”. She had merely mentioned they were things of great power, that would grant me Insight to see through the veil hiding the Truth from mortal eyes. I foolishly consumed three of them over the course of my journey, and it was when a second Nightmare did descend from the Moon of the Dream, that I sealed my fate.
It, like the other Nightmare, sought control. But unlike the Nightmare of Lacunae, it desired the minds, the very souls of the world, rather than their bodies and hearts. It used Ghermane, it used the Hunters, it used Me to whittle away at it’s competitor who so foolishly longed for a child to the point of possessing a Queen, an Earthly Great One, to achieve so.
Then it tried to bind me to it, to make me it’s puppet just as Ghermane had served so, but I was disgusted, I was enraged, I despised it beyond any shadow of a doubt. I cast it’s beguiling embrace away like nothing and fought it as I did it’s Kin.
When the final battle was over, I fell, I convulsed, my body writhed as my sight faded with agony, and when I awoke, I was something else, something new and profound. I had ceased to be a pony then, for I had eyes, so many eyes.
I could see.
The Dream, and beyond into the Nightmare Realms, I could see through the veil of the Dream and see the other Great Ones that Ascended, but I could not see into the material plane, the Realm of Life.
I was trapped.
I could not leave.
The Lanterns would not respond, the Tombstones to the Surface went dark, the Messengers that now truly answered to me could only wordlessly bring baubles and trinkets through the Veil, the reason being simple.
The Hunt, was over, and there has not been a single Hunt since.
I could only assume I had succeeded, that the Beast Plague had ended and the world was saved.
Which meant I; as a Great One, as a being bound to here and not to the material plane, could not return without being sought out, without somepony asking for my help as Ghermane had so foolishly asked the Moon Presence, as I had come to call the former Nightmare of the Dream, or as Lacunae had asked the Nightmare in her despair and loneliness.
But that returns me to my question….
“Who Am I?!”
I howled forlornly at the moon above, my sadness and despair taking hold once more. As time passed, my slug-like body had grown and morphed into a shape I suppose was unique to myself, as was the case with all Great Ones.
Under my concealing attire of a comically broad-brimmed hat atop my Bone Ash Mask, Tomb Prospector garb, and Executioner Gauntlets and Trousers, my body was a queer blend pony, were-beast, and the velvety and shiny flesh that helped prove I was Kin from how outlandish my bipedal body was. I possessed the six eyes to match the mask of my preferred body-concealing attire, not counting the ones I kept closed that were under my clothing.
It was beyond tiresome to become accustomed to having eyes littering my body, so I felt it simpler to keep most of them closed when I did not need them, much like the Amygdala when I consider it. Besides, some things were best left unseen, and keeping too many eyes open at once for too long can bring sights from beyond that really could not be unseen.
What I am was not important however, I came to grips with that long ago.
“Who...am I?” I asked the moon again, pleading that Queen Lacunae could somehow hear me, that my beloved Goddess of the Night could somehow bring her answers to me as she so easily had done for everypony in the past.
Sadly, she was a ‘lesser’ Great One, bound to the Material Plane, and thus, unlike my newfound Kin, could not answer when called. Oh yes I had dared to call upon others of my kind, but mostly they would just want a rough tumble, either in a fight or...well, they might be sterile towards one another, but they at least try.
I sat upon my wheelchair, the very same that Ghermane once sat in, at the base of the great tree atop the hill in the moonflower meadow. My own pitiful throne, over my small fragment of the Dream Realm. I refused to move it from this spot. It was where Ghermane last sat, I would honor his memory at least with leaving his only lingering possession in place, as I could not guarantee the Burial Blade the Messengers supplied me later on was truly Ghermane’s and not just a copy.
“You are a Hunter, as you have always been.” The Doll answered me as blankly and kindly as always as she approached me. Odd...she rarely leaves the graves, especially the one she somehow erected for Ghermane. She curtsied before me as she always did once I obtained a more suitable form, and I rolled my many eyes in exasperation at the tall, regally dressed mare. “Dear Hunter, I bring news.”
I blinked my six open eyes in surprise, some of the blue light glowing from the skull-like sockets of my mask in feeling something unfamiliar. “What is it? Have the Stump Messengers become rowdy again?” The little scamps always seemed up to something, how they remain amused so easily was beyond even my sight.
“The Moon Rises on the Hunt.” The Doll answered simply, and I gasped as I abruptly stood from my seat, towering over the tall 7-foot mare by a good foot of my own height. And I wasn’t done growing apparently...I always feared if I would become something like Ebrietas.
“No...please say you are joking.” The way her head cocked slightly to the side in her only tell of confusion was all the answer I needed. Doll never joked, the thing was too droll for something like comedy.
“I do not. The Hunter rests at the foot of the stairs, just as you did so long ago.” Doll easily stated before turning her black-bonnet adorned face towards the graves. “She has suffered greatly to seek you out.”
“Truly? Why did she not simply call to me?” I asked curiously as the Doll guided me down the hill, still treating me like an infant, and I complied with allowing her to hold my hand, since denying her made her express sorrow, perhaps one of the few emotions she was truly capable of displaying, and I didn’t like seeing her that way.
“How could she call for you, when you do not even know who you are, Dear Hunter?” Doll asked softly, and I had to think on that. It was profoundly realistic in a sense. How could she call out to a being that did not even know itself?
My musings were ended when we reached the path to the workshop, and I stared quietly down at the slumbering cyan mare with prismatic hair, wearing veritable rags that had to have been in that condition before the Messengers linked her to my Dream. The rainbow lightning bolt mark on her thighs meant she was an adult in both body and in her own sense of self-actualization.
How lucky for her. I lost my marks when I became what I am, and forgot who I was. “How did she come to be here?”
“She had slain a Beast, and accidentally swallowed some of it’s blood in the fighting. Now that she has come, the Messengers bring me much despairing news. The ruins of Yharnam have come to life with the beastly scourge, perhaps having found ways up through the labyrinths, perhaps all the way from Lost Ailing Loran.” Doll informed, getting me to growl in a decidedly beastly manner, fitting for my muzzle lined with nothing but rending fangs that the mask’s jaw opened to reveal whenever I spoke.
“So indeed...the Hunt is on….” I hissed, looking down at the unfortunate mare, now bound to my Dream through Blood and Contract, but who did she sign to? I have no operatives in the Material Plane, I would’ve known...or would I?
The mare suddenly awoke, and her limited mortal sight likely could not even see us barely a foot in front of her, and she stood in awe and mystery of the foggy realm, of the great and beautiful moon lingering above, of the lone chapel before her. “Celestia’s teats...where am I? Twilight said that ritual would do something to protect me...could’ve sworn I got my throat torn out though….” The mare mused in a cracking voice as she moved past me and Doll, as she could not see us without Insight, and the Messengers rose from the steps holding out some of the workshop’s weaponry to her shock and curiosity.
“Do you not see Dear Hunter? You are a Hunter, as you always have been, and always will be. You hunt now not just Beasts and other monsters, but those who can do so themselves.” Doll said as she slowly approached her favorite place at the bottom of the steps, and sat, the mare apparently becoming able to see an ‘abandoned doll’.
“...Hunter, eh? A Hunter of Hunters...hm, hm, hm...not like dear Eileen though.” I opened my eyes...and what once was hidden from me, became clear. I could see the Material Plane again, and indeed as my sight turned to the ruins of Yharnam, I saw nothing but the twisted and malformed bodies of former ponies, turned almost into mockeries of diamond dogs prowling the streets, howling with abandon, a city of beasts. “Is this my answer?” I asked as I looked at the athletic mare in rags as she was looking between her new Sawcleaver and Hunter’s Pistol in bemusement as one of the tombstones lining the stairs became alight with Messengers drawing her attention.
I watched her face set in a far-too-familiar determined scowl, and rushed to the tombstone, accepting a tiny hand of a messenger, and she faded away like mist, making me smile a terrifying cheshire grin.
“Hm...good enough for now….” I guess, it’s better to try making myself into someone, rather than just wallowing about asking myself who I am. Heh...I used to be about action anyway. “Tonight, Rainbow Dash Joins the Hunt. Good Hunting to you, Hunter….”