Up until this point all of my posts have pretty much been related to Game Development in some way or another. They likely will stay that way, too, but I just wanted to try something. Going to put some of my writing out here and see if it gets any response or what people think of it. I actually wrote this piece quite sometime back. It’s the introduction to one of the novels that’s still in the brainstorming stage in my mind. It’s not even the novel I’m currently working on writing. That all said, here goes:
Elves, dwarves, fairies, werewolves, vampires, especially the sparkling variety, none of these things exist. They’re just stories, fanciful and wondrous ones sometimes, but nothing more than tales. Something from those stories is true though, something that shows up in almost every story in one form or another. It has fascinated people for ages, but it’s always been held as belonging in the realm of fiction, magic.
Magic is not fiction, it’s the one thing from all those stories that does exist, or at least it did. Where is magic then if it used to exist? It couldn’t just disappear, and that’s why no one believes in it. Illusionists of today are not magicians, they do fanciful tricks, but magic is something far beyond that. Magic is an ability beyond description, beyond definition.
The reason why you do not see magic today is because it’s sealed away. I don’t know how it happened, at least not the first time. Well, I’m not even sure that was the first time, I was quite humbled by just how ignorant I really am not too long ago so I’m first to admit that I don’t understand. All I know is that somehow it was sealed away, because it’s dangerous.
If I had realized that before I probably could have saved myself and so many people a lot of trouble. Of course maybe I’m giving myself too much credit, it’s possible it could have happened without me. I’m sure I’m not the only person out there with the level of fascination I hold for magic. Not just to the point where I loved reading about it, but to the point where I would regularly imagine myself using it in my daily life.
Maybe other people had that same feeling, and it still would have happened with or without me. Maybe if other people did not feel the way I do it never would have come to pass. So many maybes, just a number of ifs, if doesn’t matter though, it happened. This is the story of how my fascination with magic finally stepped out of my dreams and into reality. This is the story of how I was shown that I’m ignorant of so many things, and that some things are better left alone.
Dragons. I’m not saying they’re real, but their depiction has always been one meant to inspire wonder and fear. Their very mention and thought brings to mind power, mystery, and danger. Most people would not approach a dragon if they were real. Sure in the stories there tales of knights facing dragons to save damsels, but even in the stories they did not always win. So if there really was a dragon, I don’t think many would go out looking for a fight with it.
I have not seen a dragon, but that depiction, that wonder, the feelings inspired by their presence must be why it was what I saw. I’m not sure if it is how anyone else would have seen it, but it was how it appeared to me. Sometimes when I thought of magic I glimpsed in my mind two large towering doors, nothing overly impressive about them. Simple dark wood, but no handles or knobs. Instead in the middle where they met there was the gigantic head of a dragon, obviously ornate as it was fashioned of some sort of metal.
The dragon’s head glimmered, and when it appeared closer in my mind each scale was visible in the metal, finely sculpted somehow in that soft grey metal. The ridges portrayed empty metal circles, eyes that even without pupils seemed to be staring and boring into me. Its mouth open and long sharp teeth glinting in the dark. It was abnormal enough that the door hung in darkness, but the way those teeth shone should have put more fear in me. The vision of the dragon should have driven me away and kept me away, perhaps it had for many over the years.
For me I knew immediately what was behind that door without the handle, without any seeming way to open it. I knew that for some reason and somehow it sealed away magic, and that was why no one could use it, no one could touch it. Magic was real, but it was just not within our reach, it was kept behind some sort of door, seeming magic itself. I never imagined myself actually standing before that door, even now I think it perhaps just the way my mind saw whatever it was that sealed it away. The way I chose to envision and understand the protection that kept it out of our reach.
The first time I saw it I was much younger, and I didn’t try to reach past it or at what was behind it. Maybe I unconsciously knew then what I had forgotten when I grew older. There had to be a reason that it was sealed away like that. Some reason that magic would not be out in the world. That perhaps the seal was not to protect magic from us, but to protect us from magic. Dreams of touching it, controlling it, and having it sought me out more over the years even in waking.
If I could just have magic my life would be different, it could bring some meaning into it. I had no desires to conquer the world, nothing villainous in mind to do with the power. I simply wanted to have it, because I knew I could do good things with it, that it would make my life better. I don’t know if it was all me, I don’t doubt that I’m entirely capable of greed like that, but maybe somehow the magic had reached me from the other side of the door? Perhaps it wanted to be free as much as I wanted it to be.
Magic isn’t human, but I think in someways that it might be sentient. It’s not possessed of feelings or emotion, it as a force is not good or evil. Magic does not choose who can control it, when it is free it is simply a force there to be touched by any who wish to use it. It’s just like a gun, anyone can pick it up and shoot someone. You don’t have to know how to aim it to kill someone, and the gun is not at fault for what happens. Magic is dangerous in that way, that anyone can touch it, anyone can control it. Except that magic is far more dangerous than any gun.
This is the force I would unleash on the world, unknowingly, but it was still my fault. I just wanted things to be different, I just wanted some meaning to my world, wanted my life to matter. It definitely would come to matter, and I did something very important, but I can’t be proud of it. Because in the end it was all my fault to begin with. I caused it all to begin with, I brought magic back into the world.