It is often quite amusing to think about how much hasn't changed in the last few millennia. There are new people with new needs and new ambitions, but their conflicts are much the same as before. But the world [i]has[/i] changed since the days of my prime, though it is difficult to say how much of that change has been for the better.[br][br] For one thing, this Shardscape business has truly changed the balance of power in the world. I would venture to say that it has made us more vulnerable to existential threats that we would have never had reason to be concerned with in the past. Needless to say, the creation of the Shardscape has also proven to be beneficial in some senses.[br][br] Take my kin, for example. In centuries past, before the Shardscape, only the oldest and most powerful among us could take a humanoid form. Not only did this make us more vulnerable as it required disgorging our heart of hearts, it was also a painstaking process—often in quite a literal sense. The mastery of self that was required, alone, could take decades, if not centuries to achieve, not to mention the mastery of the arcane arts that was necessary to store one's excess mass as raw energy in one's heart of hearts.[br][br] Nowadays there seems to be no need for such a laborious and skill-intensive process. With the advent of eldritch magic, the fabric of reality itself could be bent to the will of the wielder. Why bother deconstructing, storing, and reconstructing extra mass when it can simply be destroyed and recreated at a whim?[br][br] Suffice to say, there is much yet to discover in this brave new world. Much of it could prove to be helpful, but there is also reason to think that not all of it would be so practical.

There was a wise man who visited me, once. While I was dreaming before I found my champion in this era. I could never make him out. His face was obscured from me. But he felt somehow like an old friend. His eyes, though, seemed ancient.[br][br] We talked at length about life and the world. How it had changed while I waited for the next soul that would take up my blade. And our conversation wandered, eventually, to the matter of hatred and its corrosive nature on those who cling to it and the world at large.[br][br] He told me something I have never once forgotten. "All hatred is irrational, your majesty," he said. "Whatever the reason, however much justified, no hatred [i]can[/i] be rational."[br][br] He then paused and seemed to look out. Beyond the veil of the world. When he turned back to me, he continued. "It is the first thing I teach my students. Not that hatred is irrational, no. The first thing I teach my students is to hate. I teach them to hate with every breath in their lungs, with every fibre of their being. I teach them to live in hate. To dream in hate. I teach them how to make hatred the core of their being. Why? Well, it's actually rather simple, your majesty. Only those who rise above hatred are worthy of inheriting this world."

The true measure of a queen is her people's prosperity, for without them, she is nothing. She shares in their wealth, rising radiant like the sun when they are happy, well-fed, and vibrant. She partakes in their suffering, humbling herself and the fare of her castle when they suffer from the pangs of hunger and thirst. She laughs with them. She weeps with them. She [i]is[/i] them. For a queen that [i]must[/i] elevate herself above her people is no queen at all; she is a tyrant.

Peril lies at the frontier, where lies the unknown and the unfamiliar. However, danger, [i]true[/i] danger, the kind that can cause the fall of civilizations, comes from the known and the familiar. Complacency is the true danger, one that festers unseen, hidden by comfort and the all too eager willingness to ignore that which can disrupt it.

How wonderful. Many thanks for the portrait to my dear friend Sadida.

Kaladrea joins the ranks of Heroes!

Kaladrea enters the scene of legendary heroes! Welcome to the family of the Eternals!