Albonium

Volume XI - Final Abandoning

Book XX - Four Days

I - The Lack of Glory

Codommanus and the visitor walked to the harbor and sailed to the mainland of Illiusbur. The city which was a jewel, which took its name from Troy, which Linian idolized, and Saint Petersburg, the port of Russia, and it was the pride of Elvenkind and of himself. Yet it was now besieged, and legions had already bypassed the shores and there was a long siege, with skirmishes in sewers and outside fields. Once, and now multiple times, the Romans had blasted a hole within the wall, and they invaded forth with several legions, and when Troseus had repelled them in the streets, it was deemed a great victory, for the Illiusbur had been miraculously saved and then the wall was patched and strengthened in the short time before it could be overrun. Yet, was it truly a victory if it was fought on such dire grounds, and the possibility of a defeat was as likely as it was? The Elven needed victory to motivate them, and the slaves needed news of victory to make them not rebel, and to remind them of an eternal suffering, and the latter were satisfied easily by the lie, but the former was not so. Why were the Elven so like men, and why, because they viewed contradiction and propaganda degrading, so desperate for victory? They appeared different, ate differently, and held magic and different technologies, and men did not have tentacles and did not have several eyes among their bodies, yet had a temporary nature of chasing after becoming great or virtuous. They thought themselves as inferior to some ideal, which was Hycattus, and so acted to become more like him and his teachings. Yet, would it not be simpler if they had accepted themselves as absolutely one with Hycattus, and so did not have to become greater in virtue, but only had to become greater in might?

The Elven now relied on the feeling of victory to motivate them, for they felt that a victory meant that they were just, and this was a feeling innate within men. Now, they were unmotivated in either decision he chose, for he could either proclaim a victory, and then the Elven would worry that they would be defeated soon, or he could not say anything at all, and the Elven would view the lack of victory and the dire situation as them lacking rightness, for might was a symptom of the right. To Troseus, there should have been might, but there was none...

Linian had a tormented soul. He hardly spoke to anyone, and he had become delusional, yet necessary. If anyone wanted to overthrow him, they would have been slain, and if he came to all meetings, and spoke in skillful rhetoric as if they were winning the war. To this within Troseus, what was he to do? He held great power, it seemed, but power was the ability to change other things, and if one was forced to remain the same, and venture to an end they knew, with the events in between similar as well, they held no power. But then he was told that two had arrived from besieged Cyprus from Ephialtis. They came that day, at the bunker.

What exploits have they discovered?, thought Troseus at the meeting. Meanwhile, Linian had ordered the evacuation of more streets, and the setting of more traps to others. Ditches were to be dug, and if some were trapped, they had to starve. Troseus had thought of this as mad, for it was contrary to what wanted, which was victory, and instead, Linian told the members major, "Do we not want to live, instead of perishing like the Fellic Republics and the endless resisters against Rome during the conquests of Caesar?" Troseus daydreamed then, while Linian shouted boldly, and then was told that Stasova or Stathlinus had betrayed him and fled. To this Linian ordered their execution, and if it could not be delivered, the news of it, but then remembered that the Elven were like men, but greater in strength and magic, and so were then greater in pride and if they realized falsehood, would have overthrown him. And as Linian believed he was essential, for the Elven state was the extension of his ideals, and he was the successor of Hycattus, he took another path. What was it? Troseus did not pay attention. Instead, he imagined the two having grand adventures, discovering entire cohorts of legionnaires and then leading warbands of Elven against them, scavenging for resources and oil, and so, becoming like a human legend, but superior to them, for they were real, and so there would be the first Elven legend after Hycattus. And to this, he wandered...