Sgrios Mass: Endings

 

Sgrios enjoys a reputation as the guardian of the end. He is the last thing we see before oblivion, and, as such, the net that keeps us from throttling over the edge of mortality into the realm of unbeing. For those focused on the preservation of the past, they see Sgrios as a God of Death; those with eyes fixed on the future embrace his stewardship of the living. Regardless of the vantage, Sgrios stands as the God of Endings; which seems cut and dry - birth allows us a starting point, and death punctuates the finality of that journey.

What do we do, however, when the concept of an ‘ending’ is more complicated than that..? We, of course, know that life is more than a single narrative; it is a thick tome of adventures in which you are the protagonist. It is a journey composed of countless endings, and where one bleeds into the next is never as clearly defined as the chapters in a book. So, my question is: how do we know when something is over?

When the meal has been served and we recline in our chairs: is supper over? While we may expect the tab, sometimes we instead find dessert, or a fine digestif. A mint, perhaps. Other times, what we think is an appetizer turns out to be the whole of a disappointing meal, ending before we had even begun. Sometimes the check never comes at all, leaving our sense of finality dangling over the void. If something as mundane as dinner can be so uncertain, how are we to identify the closing of more complicated matters in our lives? 

And when it comes to complicated issues, matters of the heart seem to be as complicated as they come. When can we say love has ended? Is it when the union is severed? Well, more often than not, love has long since dissolved by the time the inevitable break-up manifests. At other times, one partner has lost the passion, where the other carries the flame long beyond the span of the relationship. Tell me, in this scenario, where did it end, if it ended at all?

Death seems the simplest ending to define; the heart ceases to beat, the fire of life is doused - either naturally or through some act of fate. It is easy enough to say that this person is dead, that life has ended, but is it truly so? Just because the body has vanished, doesn’t mean that life ceases to have an impact - in fact, some people accomplish their greatest feats long after they have been laid in the ground. Has their life truly ended if they continue to accomplish such feats?

Ah, and what of the tortured phantoms that roam the land? What of the reanimated dead that Necromancers parade through the night like grim marionettes? In the course of our Aisling lives we die constantly - and yet, we return home with naught but a scar and an existential crisis. Still, yet, do our hearts provide shelter for the memories of those we lost, who live there like macabre companions; never truly fading from the world of the living as they carry on in memory and dream.

When considering the end of life, we must also consider the beginning: what are we to make of those that walk among us who live lives so unremarkable that it seems they never truly lived at all? For all intents and purposes these creatures appear to be among the living; they do the things that the living are wont to do - eating, drinking, making love. But when it comes to the spark, they appear more as a black void than a light in a dark age. If life never began, how can it possibly end?

When a ship begins to sink, we do not stay aboard until our heads are submerged before we abandon the vessel. The end of that journey comes long before the ship reaches the ocean floor. As such, we must look at the world at large and ask ourselves this: is our ship sailing happily over new horizons, or are we blissfully unaware that the water is about to drag us under? In the last cycle we’ve seen a massive wave of new sparks flood our lands, but already the tide ebbs. Can we truly say that Sgrois has ceased to make a meal of a world we adore?

Hy-Brasyl, the Golden City and the zenith of mortal achievements - this culture was the pinnacle against which we measure our rehabilitation of this tattered land. Will the records show that the Aisling Age was one of tremendous progress, or will it simple read “Aislings work with little progress”..? We must remember that the fabled city of the past was dragged to the bottom of the ocean with a population much more enlightened than that which we entertain now - and with that in mind think about what future awaits us when the Gods see fit to end this social experiment.

We worship at the feet of the God of the End, but do you even recognize the weight of what that entails? Endings are complicated things, and it is often beyond us to appreciate that something is coming to a close until it is already long gone. Bring your attention to Sgrios; He is with us every moment of our lives, and it is not enough to only raise your voice in worship once the end is upon us. If we can walk arm in arm with Sgrios as our guide, we can find strength in the myriad endings our life entails, and find comfort in the end that closes out the story of our lives.