Sgrios Mass: Hubris - the Heavy Cloak

 

Welcome, seekers of the fetid and rotten.

Gather close. Let the scent of damp earth and the subtle, honest rot of these halls remind you of your own fragile state. Some of you carry the weight of many scars, while other sparks are still polished and bright. I certainly wonder if that shine shall ever fade?

Tonight, we speak of a most curious weight: Hubris.

There is an old saying among the mundanes of Loures: "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink." They say it with a shrug, a simple dismissal of someone else's stubbornness. But to a follower of Sgrios, this is no mere proverb. It is a divine truth of our Lord.

Hubris is the belief that you - a creature of dust - know better. It is the arrogance of thinking you can choose the manner of your healing or the timing of your transition. It exists in many flavors, from simply swinging an axe without heeding the warriors warning, to assuming the position of power you hold is anything more than an epithet.

Consider the tale of a certain barmaid in a tavern in Piet. Colloquially "Mother’s Love" to many of you, and of her ailing daughter.

Afflicted, her sleep stolen by the Cthonic whispers we call nightmares. To the mundanes, these are terrors to be fled. To us, they are a thinning of the veil, a preparation of the spirit. Yet, moved by that inexplicable impulse the followers of Glioca call "compassion," a meddlesome Aisling - one standing before you, perhaps? - offered her a gift. A draught of stillness, brewed in the shadows to quiet the frantic spark and allow the child to find peace in the dark.

And what did her hubris do?

She looked at the healer, clad in the somber robes of our faith, and she felt fear. She did not trust the "gift." Perhaps -these- were the shadow people her daughter kept mumbling about. Her hubris told her that the light of the capital or the laws of Gramail were safer than the honest dark. She took that precious draught... and she did what any mother would.

She sold it.

She sold the cure for the clink of a few copper bars, thinking she could buy a "cheaper" treatment from a peddler of Cail's herbs or a priest of Glioca's empty tears. She thought she could outwit the sickness. She thought she could bargain with the Lord of Plagues by using His own mercy as currency for a lie.

Did the child get better? No. The nightmares deepened. The "cheaper" treatment was nothing but sugar and stagnant water.

Her hubris did not save her child. It only ensured that the suffering would be longer, the rot more agonizing, and the eventual claim of Sgrios more absolute. She led her own child away from the water because she didn't like the shape of the cup.

Therein lies a deeper rot: the dismissal of the practiced.

Whether it is a master herbalist who has spent moons studying the subtle languages of the root and leaf, or a priest of this temple who has peered deep into the Cthonic void, these are the tenders of their craft. To have tonics to tame the abyss, would you not expect said tender to have visited the abyss? Yet, how often do the arrogant look at a master's hands and see only dirt? They believe their own frantic, uneducated panic is more valuable than a lifetime of study.

To dismiss the expert is to invite Sgrios through the back door of your own ignorance. You think you are being "careful" or "wise" by questioning the one who knows, but in truth, you are simply speeding up the ticking of your own clock. You aren't "thinking for yourself"; you are merely choosing a more chaotic path to Him. In our Lord's eyes, the fool who ignores the herbalist and the king who ignores the rot are the same: they are both just fuel for the fire of entropy, too proud to realize they are already burning.

This is the power of Hubris. Sgrios does not need to hunt you; He only needs to wait while your own pride leads you in circles.

We offer the truth of the end to the world every day. We lead them to the water of the Honest Rot. We show them the beauty of the ruin and the necessity of our practices. But they refuse to drink. They cling to their "eternal" kingdoms and their "miracle" cures. They hide behind the walls of Loures, convinced that if they ignore the shadow, the shadow will forget them.

Do not be like the barmaid.

Do not look at the scars on your legend and wish them away with the pride of one who thinks they are immortal. Hubris is a heavy cloak that only makes the journey to the Cthonic Ruins more exhausting.

Go forth tonight. When you see someone drowning in their own arrogance, do not weep for them. Lead them to the water if you must, but do not be surprised when they turn away. Their refusal is just another prayer to our Lord. Their hubris is the very gravity that pulls them, slowly and inevitably, back to the soil.

Sgrios is patient. He can wait for them to get thirsty.

Memento mori my friends.