[quote][i]From the Journals of Toland, the Shattered[/i][/quote] [quote][spoiler]I drive myself to the edge of madness trying to explain the truth. It's so simple. Elegant like a knife point. It explains - this is not hyperbole, this is the farthest thing from exaggeration - EVERYTHING.  But you lay it out and they stare at you like you've just been exhaling dust. Maybe they're missing some underlying scaffold of truth. Maybe they are all propped on a bed of lies that must be burned away. Why does anything exist? No no no no no don't reach for that word. There's no 'reason'. That's teleology and teleology will stitch your eyelids shut. Why do we have atoms? Because atomic matter is more stable than the primordial broth. Atoms defeated the broth. That was the first war. There were two ways to be and one of them won. And everything that came next was made of atoms. Atoms made stars. Stars made galaxies. Worlds simmered down to rock and acid and in those smoking primal seas the first living molecule learned to copy itself. All of this happened by the one law, the blind law, which exists without mind or meaning. It's the simplest law but it has no worshippers here (out there, though, out there - !) HOW DO I EXPLAIN IT it's so simple WHY DON'T YOU SEE[/spoiler][/quote] [quote]Imagine three great nations under three great queens. The first queen writes a great book of law and her rule is just. The second queen builds a high tower and her people climb it to see the stars. The third queen raises an army and conquers everything.[/quote] [quote][spoiler]The future belongs to one of these queens. Her rule is harshest and her people are unhappy. But she rules. This explains everything, understand? This is why the universe is the way it is, and not some other way. Existence is a game that everything plays, and some strategies are winners: the ability to exist, to shape existence, to remake it so that your descendants - molecules or stars or people or ideas - will flourish, and others will find no ground to grow.[/spoiler][/quote] [quote]And as the universe ticks on towards the close, the great players will face each other. In the next round there will be three queens and all of them will have armies, and now it will be a battle of swords- until one discovers the cannon, or the plague, or the killing word.[/quote] Our story begins here. The stage is set for a battle of swords. The three nations are all built around one great monument. None of the queens dare lay claim to it, for fear of attack by the other two. One day, the three queens decide to go to war over the monument, as they all want to assert their ownership over it. The queen of the army sends 25 knights, with 3 acolytes each to serve as squires. Each knight drunkenly revels in the eve of battle, while his acolytes sharpen his blade, prepare his armor, and cook dinner. The queen of law, lacking the manpower of the queen of war, sends 10 knights, with two acolyte squires each. The knight must sharpen his own blade as the acolytes cook his dinner and ready his armor. Each knight still revels, and drinks the night away ahead of battle. The queen in the marvelous tower has no army, as her people live in peace exploring the wonders of the sky. She sends her finest man as her lone knight. She sends her lawman, a former hangman from the dark ages of her country, as the acolyte who will serve as squire. The knight sharpens his blade and helps the acolyte with his armor. To assist the knight, the acolyte must find a way to cook dinner on the side. He remembers he brought his old hangman's noose along, as a good luck charm. He ties the cook pot above the fire with his noose. The knight has a drink, and then rests up for battle. In the morning, the kingdoms go to war. The drunken knights stumble about and stand no fair chance against the opposing forces and their squires. After all 36 knights have fallen, the remaining squires have it out. All seems lost. 36 knights gone, and 96 squires with them. Then, rising from the ashes, a lone figure emerges. The acolyte sent by the queen of the tower, the old hangman. He had not bested the others, for he was badly wounded. He, however, had not been bested himself either. [quote]Everything is becoming more ruthless and in the end only the most ruthless will remain (LOOK UP AT THE SKY) and they will hunt the territories of the night and extinguish the first glint of competition before it can even understand what it faces or why it has transgressed. This is the shape of victory: to rule the universe so absolutely that nothing will ever exist except by your consent. This is the queen at the end of time, whose sovereignty is eternal because no other sovereign can defeat it. And there is no reason for it, no more than there was reason for the victory of the atom. It is simply the winning play.[/quote] The shape all of this boils down to one cold Truth: [quote]Of course, it might be that there was another country, with other queens, and in this country they sat down together and made one law and one tower and one army to guard their borders. This is the dream of small minds: a gentle place ringed in spears. But I do not think those spears will hold against the queen of the country of armies. And that is all that will matter in the end.[/quote] The queens united can not hope to stand stronger in the face of the queen of armies. For the Truth will have been lost to them. The Truth won in battle and carved in the stars as lie come to fruition as spoken Truth. Of the three nations with armies of swords, the victor spoke it. [spoiler]The squire of the high pot on the noose is equal to the squires of the other two sides![/spoiler]