'Are you that attached to this place?' Sunlight streams in through the window, glass filtering it clean of its warmth, turning it as frigid and dirty as the panes. 'This parlor is just as I remember it—not very big. The only difference is, the mold is ever ranker now, isn't it? Ebenholz paces through the deserted parlor. The expensive furnishings that once filled it have now either been stolen to sell by retainers fleeing the spire, or simply left behind due to their sheer value. He spies that someone tried to move the excessively large piano, but gave up for whatever reason, their attempt having left a visible scratch on the floorboards. Comical, and loathsome. The walls are thick with dust and mildew, no longer showing any sign of the patterns beneath. The only familiar sight is the fireplace sunk into the wall. The timbers' ashes lie under a fresher layer of grime, but they're still there in the hearth, just as Ebenholz had left them. 'It's been a long while since you left, and no one's lit the fireplace in the meantime, hence the dust and rot. That's been the story of this room, yes, ever since you left.' Ebenholz approaches the fireplace. He can still almost remember how it used to burn. There was a fire here. There was warmth. Now, though, it is an ugly yawning chasm, and all he finds in its maw is darkness. Ebenholz lifts a hand to brush away the stale air, and refreshes himself if only for a moment. 'Will that even help? Five seconds, ten, and the foul air will fill your nostrils once more.' Ebenholz draws his wand. The Originium dice float, circling in a steady orbit, letting off light and heat. 'Of course you could do that. Raise a gust of wind, summon a ball of fire, those are simple feats for you. They can blow away the dust, burn off the rot. You've tried as such before. You've seen some results.' Silent, Ebenholz puts away his wand, and the Originium dice fall back into his hand. He bends over, the darkness inside the fireplace staring out at him. 'But they always come back, don't they? You can resist, you can refuse, you can do everything you can to keep the darkness at bay. You've contended with it all for far too long. You can choose to brush away the miasma, you can choose to leave Urtica, you can choose to hide, and the further the better. Light your glimmering lights until you lose count, but you will never keep the long night from becoming day.' Ebenholz reaches into the ashes, and pulls out a wizened branch, not wholly consumed. 'Decay will keep creeping over this parlor with endless arms, until it clambers into your mind and body, just as it ate at your parents, and all the masters of this spire before them.' 'No!' In an instant, the dizziness born from the depths of his brain takes hold of his entire consciousness. Ebenholz's vision blurs. The voice sneers, loudly and clearly. From the scorched branch protrudes a bud, just as black and burnt, and it pierces through Ebenholz's palm, and winds about his wrist, binding his arm. It grows thorns, pricking his skin, stabbing into his marrow. Fresh blood springs forth, trickling down the branch's length, falling into the darkness and mingling with the embers. 'Urtica's veins are the branches of the dark. The decay and withering are nigh. You cannot break free.' Ebenholz opens his eyes. The branch is not in his hand; his arm has landed in a layer of fine ash. No wounds, the blood still flowing beneath his skin. The beating of his pulse seems to suggest all that happened just now was an illusion. An illusion—I want no more illusions. 'No.' Ebenholz finally breaks his silence. 'I know decay and withering will take Urtica's every branch and leaf. I know that so long as your soul still lingers throughout my body, this nightmare will never end. 'But this rot, this shambling corpse of trite rhetoric, has lingered for too long now.' Ebenholz stares back into the dark within the fireplace. The charred branch lies upon the embers there, stained with fresh blood, permeating the black soil. Its blood seeps into the cracks, with first heat, then a spark, and then flashes are crackling about the branch's tip. In an instant, they gather together into a black flame, engulfing the entire branch. Once more, the embers begin to burn. 'So it will conclude. So it will end, full stop.' The fireplace is lit with a flame blacker than the dark itself, the glow from the charred branch filling the whole parlor. The voice finally ceases to jeer, ceases to respond. 'How about I go meet that so-called Austere Authority for myself.'