The instant I left the outpost behind, I knowingly abandoned the concept of destination itself, along with all the external constraints I had been bound to over the last months.
From here on, I had no contracts to help draft, no one expecting a report, no other [Cultivation] schedule than the one I decided to abide by, and no objectives to attain other than those I fixed for myself.
For the next month, I was well and truly free to pursue my every whim without a grumpy nearly three-hundred-year-old grandpa nagging me with [Wisdom] that did not belong to my Path.
All that was left...
Was an entire Realm of endless red sand.
So, appropriately, having given up the concept of destination, I opted to let the winds take me.
Sometimes I flew with them.
Sometimes against them.
Other times, I simply ceased deciding altogether, letting the currents push me wherever they wished until the time came that I decided to either rest, contemplate a unique scenery I stumbled on, or write another page of "The Nascence of Solaena".
Hardly a few days later, the goings were already pleasant enough to warrant genuine smiles at times.
Not because I was particularly happy, though.
It was just...
Alright, I would settle for the concept of happiness.
There was no way I would make this last journey about self-[Awareness] and introspection, after all.
Though if I had to ascribe what my true feelings were...
It was that the Red Sand Realm simply existed.
And so did I.
◇ ◈ ◈ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◈ ◈ ◇
Days accumulated.
Then weeks.
Perhaps.
I stopped counting.
There existed remarkably little difference between the seventh time I woke up and the twenty-seventh once the passing of time held no more sway over me beyond when it allowed my Essence to develop a sliver more.
In the meantime, I experienced all that the Red Sand Realm was willing to offer me.
People hailing from Civilization.
Merchants escorting cumbersome cargo in either a traditional sanddrifter pulled by individuals or strange platforms whose movement depended on gigantic wind sails.
Scouts flying alone with practiced efficiency.
Entire groups of winged entities crossing the skies in disciplined formations.
Travelling caravans of gatherers and harvesters, which included children racing each other through the dunes while adults pretended not to notice.
Others less fortunate...
Twice, I observed wanderers pursued by groups whose intentions became self-evident by their mannerisms and the weapons they bore.
Once I intervened.
Once I did not.
Neither decision occupied my thoughts for particularly long.
Civilization may be built upon cooperation, but it was equally built upon conflict.
Neither invalidated the other.
It wasn't even worth considering an [Insight], really.
It was just reality.
What was much more [Worthy] of consideration, however, was the ever-changing Red Sand Realm and the endless sceneries it deigned to offer me.
One time, I landed upon a dune whose crest overlooked a vast stretch of perfectly smooth and flat sand spreading farther than my vision could perceive.
Elsewhere, I witnessed dunes so impossibly tall and vast they defied my [Comprehension] of how they ought to have formed through pure accumulations of grains.
Another time, I stumbled upon dunes curved into spirals.
Ones even resembled enormous creatures buried beneath the desert.
Some other even miraculously formed arches that persisted despite my every expectation that they should collapse the instant my eyes landed on them.
Then I flew right through them, daring nature to prove me right, only to be wronged by something that did not heed my whimsical wants.
And of course, one of the most plain expressions of nature not heeding any of my fickle desires was through the storms it haphazardly threw at me.
The smaller ones whispered.
The larger ones roared.
A handful swallowed entire horizons.
Within them, the Realm ceased to possess direction.
Above.
Below.
Forward.
Meaningless concepts.
By the fourth or fifth sandstorm, I had ceased resisting them.
Instead... I listened.
As stupid as it sounded, there existed something of a rhythm to their [Chaos].
Not something as shallow as logic, something deeper.
Something that allowed me to appreciate them for the phenomenon they were, and not for the slight impediment they were.
When I needed to, however, I didn't hesitate to take to the sky, where nothing could endlessly pursue me other than the boundless radiance.
The higher I pushed, the thicker the omnipresent red radiance, until there came a point that I could only reach with my [Ambition] fueling my [Will], where it stopped feeling like a sky and instead started resembling one of those "oceans"...
Except suspended upside down.
I came short of plunging into it, ultimately only capable of catching the whispers of its existence before having to retreat.
Another part of the Red Sand Realm I had to retreat from, apart from particularly hostile sandstorms and the higher reaches of the sky, was the elementals that wandered with an equal disregard for purpose as I.
Towering Essence Entities sculpted entirely from drifting sand striding across the desert with steps that reshaped everything.
Some wandered within storms, their forms barely distinguishable through the wildly swirling grains.
Others burned with the same radiance as that found at the highest reaches.
Some yet were made of a sand so crystalline it refracted the crimson sky into wondrous spectacles that were as beautiful as they were deadly.
One I observed from an enormous distance appeared less like a creature than a moving titanic dune composed of compressed sand so dense it reflected light like polished stone.
None acknowledged me.
We simply shared a Realm.
A Realm with a history that predated even the very Resurgence Era that began more than a thousand and five hundred years ago.
A history that could be gleaned from the ruins of Civilization scattered here and there that had certainly not been built by "us".
The top of collapsed towers.
Broken railways surfacing from within the deepest valleys between dunes.
Immense metallic skeletons whose original function escaped every hypothesis I formulated.
Machines larger than the Prime Temple.
Everything rusted.
Everything silent and lifeless
Occasionally, I entered.
Occasionally, I merely observed.
I would have wanted to visit one of the supposedly intact atmospheric stations that initiated the entire interest-shifting frenzy that was presently transpiring, but unlike every other ruin, each one that was discovered ended up so heavily protected that not even Stavros allowed me an attempt at infiltrating one.
Too many political ramifications, he said.
I agreed with him.
Attempting to infiltrate one just wasn't worth the nuisance that surrounded them.
Not that I cared to begin with.
And this journey only brought my lack of care to an even lower point.
As it turned out, whether I [Will]ed to or not, my self-[Awareness] was now plainly another Aspect of my existence, and I could not avoid falling into it if I tried.
What's more, when taking in so much majesty while having to retrace the steps of my Path while writing "The Nascence Of Solaena".
From this perspective, how I wound up uncovering thoughts that I never suspected I attached so much importance to, yet fairly did, honestly wasn't a [Mystery].
And from the instant I became aware of them, what else could I do but delve deeper into them?
Matters of relationships.
Remembrances of notable comforts.
Minor regrets.
My [Harmony] may preserve and protect the foundation of my Path against such things as uncertainty and inner conflicts, but beyond serving as practical implements to further its [Cultivation], there was no rationale for holding onto them if I could do away with them.
Hence, I ineluctably commenced on a parallel journey.
A journey that took me inwards, through shifting thoughts and fluctuating outlooks on reality itself.
An introspective journey.
When I stumbled upon a rusted ruin, I reminisced about Valow, the small town I was born in, now reduced to a rusting wreck crawling with rust abominations, somewhere in the rust wastes.
When I sighted travelers, I thought back to the first giants that took care of me, the gray-haired one that smelled bad, the wrinkled one... and another who didn't like me, simply for having been born as I was.
When I went to sleep, I reflected on the solace that was being able to rest for as long as my Essence required without having to contemplate the unknown that awaited me on the morrow.
When I allowed myself to contemplate all that was holding me back, I found myself mulling over the causality of relationships.
When I dug yet deeper within, I relived all of my failures during Sentinel assignments, from when I failed to heal babies my age, to when I became a powerless witness to a faction slaughtering people for seemingly no reason...
In less than three years, unbeknownst to me, my Path had unceasingly accumulated what I could only consider to be small defects.
Defects that had quietly settled into the foundation of my existence, and that I ultimately retraced to the extent of feeling confident in purging them, with or without having formed my [Purity] Aspect yet.
Each regret.
Each comfort.
Each lingering attachment.
I endeavored to understand precisely what place they occupied on my Path.
Some surprisingly deserved one once I truly pondered deeply on how they came to be.
The vast majority of others did not.
That [Comprehension] alone already proved remarkably liberating.
The failure to save those infants.
It remained a failure, no matter how I turned it.
But it was nothing more and nothing less.
The slaughter I had witnessed.
It was simply an event.
A reminder of what drove my [Ambition].
Not a burden.
And the comforts I had found within the stability provided by the Faith?
They were real.
They were worth remembering.
But the [Truth] behind their continued existence was that the day Essence overdevelopment ceased being an issue—if that day ever came—they would cease to matter in comparison to the development their absence would produce.
Likewise with the relationships I forged.
For all that some of them had deepened to uncomfortable territories over time, I [Truth]fully didn't find in myself the [Will]ingness to sacrifice even the most insignificant fragment of my Path to sustain them.
None were [Worthy] of such efforts.
One by one, like pieces of a puzzle, I resolved all the defects that had secretly accumulated throughout my Path by viewing each through a hundred different contexts and perspectives...
Until, while hovering mere meters above the surface and soaring over a dune that ended up concealing a wondrous, inexplicable depression hundreds of meters deep, a strange [Insight] echoing this sudden occurrence emerged regarding my ongoing introspective journey.
Had I been so heavily [Focus]ed on my own self-[Awareness]... that I ended up blinding myself to the small defects that should have been self-evident all along?
The realization was strange precisely because it was so evidently obvious in hindsight.
My [Focus] Aspect had allowed me to isolate my thoughts, my [Insight]s, and my memories with absolute precision, thus enabling me to examine each fragment of myself and my Path until every detail became apparent...
Yet, in doing so, I had somehow neglected something equally important.
A fragment, no matter how much I [Focus]ed on it, remained but a fragment.
Maybe a fragment worth dedicating months to musing over and developing...
But a fragment nonetheless.
I had been examining the pieces of the puzzle that were my Path so closely to see how they fit together, how their development could best be optimized...
That only now, through a serendipitous—again—confluence of an aimless journey of introspection on the eve of leaving everything behind, did I stop [Focus]ing on every Aspect individually and instead look at everything for what it truly was.
And I did so with...
[Clarity].
My mind paused mid-contemplation when I looked upon this [Insight] from the perspective of something I longed for.
It was such a peculiar feeling to so unexpectedly reveal one of the concepts I was chasing after so clearly after vainly attempting to for so long.
It was so much so, in fact, that even many seconds after I first apprehended the quality of [Clarity] in this sudden [Insight], it took [Guided] prompting me to start assimilating it with my entire being before I finally acted.
Letting myself glide down, I slid into a state of [Focus] to further fathom this unforeseen revelation more distinctly-
Until I was denied by one of [Guided]'s blaring warnings, urging me to not risk tainting whatever it was that I grasped about [Clarity].
Barely in time, I held myself back from [Focus]ing and suppressed this ingrained habit of mine to resort to entering a state of [Focus] whenever I felt higher thought processes were required.
It felt... instantly wrong.
It felt so, so wrong not to [Focus] that, by the time I landed on the first dune my feet found, I had to [Will]-enhance my [Harmony] Aspect merely to put a stop to my endless, instinctive ventures into slipping back into that familiar state where no unrelated thoughts could disturb me.
It didn't resolve the root of the issue, but it at least cleared my Path enough to begin grasping that ephemeral [Insight] and its accompanying realization relating to [Clarity] right there and then...
...before it slipped away and became but one of thousands of vague [Insight]s [Guided] accumulated and periodically reminded me about in the hope of seeing them through.
Assisted by [Guided], I refused to [Focus] on any single thing, thereby entering what was, at least in theory, the proper state of mind.
Then, holding onto the elusive realization I had found by happenstance without narrowing my attention upon it, I began the assimilation process.
I first reflected upon the nature of the [Focus] Aspect.
The narrowing of one's attention.
To choose one thing amidst many.
My current foundation.
The foundation from which I could, and would, synthesize the [Clarity] Aspect.
After that, I began leveraging the thousands of minor [Insight]s I had formed over time regarding what the concept of [Clarity] meant for me.
For my Path.
Each naturally wove itself into every other, as my attempts to strive for the concept of [Clarity] had never ceased, and I did everything in my power not to [Focus] on any one in particular.
It was unbearable.
My very existence revolted against my refusal to [Focus], causing my mind to waver regardless of how much I [Will]ed it not to.
[Harmony] or not, relying on my [Focus] Aspect to eliminate all stray thoughts turned out to be a much more deeply rooted habit than I had ever deigned to consider, and it was obviously not something I could do away with merely by deciding to.
From that realization, doubts regarding my ability to synthesize the [Clarity] Aspect, when I had yet to consider such a fundamental facet of its concept, naturally attempted to assail me and cause my [Will] to waver further.
I unhesitatingly called upon my [Ambition] Aspect.
My mind returned to a semblance of [Clarity], I forced the assimilation onward by contemplating my lacking [Comprehension] of what the concept of [Clarity] truly embodied, until finally...
I meshed my latest realization into it all.
The realization that it had taken ceasing to [Focus] on anything in particular for me to discern with [Clarity] what were, at the present time, insignificant blemishes and deficiencies in my Path, but still blemishes and deficiencies that could have one day unsettled its foundation if left unattended.
It felt so evident that something was there.
A single [Insight] connecting everything.
It wasn't about something as fundamental as [Clarity] of thought.
Neither was it about something as complex as [Clarity] of [Awareness].
Nor was it about the subtleties of [Clarity] of intention or [Purpose].
It was...
About...
Something so much more basic...
Yet so much more...
Convoluted?
Convoluted.
Convoluted‽
Yes.
That was it.
It became blindingly obvious the instant I integrated my current thought process into the [Chaos] that was my mind seeking that final elusive defining [Insight].
It was about [Clarity] amidst complexity.
For what else could the concept of [Clarity] be... but the ability to consider the entirety of something without allowing complexity and convolutedness to obscure what was truly of import?
The moment that distinction settled into my Essence, I felt it.
The subtle initial surge indicating that I had achieved something, and that something being recognized by my Essence, resulted in the wondrous advent of an Essence disorder.
I wanted to commune with my Essence immediately to confirm whether this was truly happening, but, as ever during such turns of events, [Guided] disagreed.
It wanted me to delve into my present [Comprehension] of [Clarity] until I collapsed half-unconscious.
Because if my Essence was genuinely synthesizing the [Clarity] Aspect, then this was my final opportunity to obtain personal, unique, irreplaceable [Insight]s into the raw concept that I resorted to achieve it.
And if there was one thing my Path was bound to rely upon more and more as I endeavored to ascend beyond its emergence phase...
It was precisely those [Insight]s that no book or mentor could ever hope to provide.
I didn't even attempt a counterargument.
I accepted it.
And my [Ambition] only burned brighter from it.