Truth, above all.

I’m only here for the truth.

Do I intimidate you? Do you refrain because you think I’ll get upset and you’ll lose whatever bridge I’ve been for you? Are you mein enemy, keeping me close, trying to read me and deceive me? Does it get you off to do me dirty, to lie? Are you afraid of me?

I often ask these questions to others when navigating outside of my safe havens of The Void and The Land. I question in energy and movement, rather than basic speech. I find that it cuts swifter, cleaner and deeper — an easy death for façades — whereas the latter just creates fuss and unnecessary chaos. I question, by being vulnerable and giving others the knife; I show them exactly how to kill me and wait patiently for my end . . . figuratively.

Do it. I know you want to. I know you’re… prone to — like a snake… It’s your nature.

I’ve died many times over. Their betrayal is a poison in their veins, but it’s my stinger. A honeybee, I die. And they may live. But their brain will swell, their eyes will waver, their mind will play tricks, and they will suffer through a veil of confusion and a sea of illusion, deathlessly.

I die, and because of that, I win.

You’re trying to kill me, I know… You’re trying to end me, I’m sure… You’re trying to make me your corpse… You’re trying to make me a ghost… But I’m dead either way. (Jean Dawson, Ssick Girl Online)

Death is but a reward. A clear path, sculpted by Ògún’s machete. An unmasking, of all 99 faces of God. An unwrapping. A gift. Everything is laid bare. Death is the truth that seems to set souls free. And I live in the realm of the free — the home of the dead. That’s essentially what The Tides is. Everyone that’s made it to this place has died multiple deaths inside of eight deaths; they’re living their ninth life which is comprised of many lives, yet is their very last. In other words, they’re given nine major lives to live throughout the span of their existence, but each of their nine lives consist of a multitude of literal deaths and rebirths, which means that every major life that they’ve lived has consisted of many minor lives.

We can reincarnate, for each minor life, as a new element of our loved one’s lives — a new descendent, a new partner (or enemy), a new pet, a new bird nesting in their tree(s) nearby, plants in their garden, moth larvae that eats their clothes, or even the wind that bites their face in the dead of autumn, a singular wave in the ocean that carries them further from shore, and the warm, familiar look in a stranger’s eyes.

If there’s a Heaven, you would think they’d let you speak to your son. Maybe she has in the form of a baby’s laugh I heard passing by in a stroller reminding me, “Hey, keep rolling,” I ‘on’t know. Maybe she has with a prick of a blade of grass I’ve been laying on way too long, got me itchy, got up and roamed a li’l mo’. (André 3000, Life of the Party)

Sometimes, we just reincarnate as the same person having a new experience of living the same life, in an alternate world. Or as a new expression of an artist we loved that died before we did. Or as some sort of life form on a different planet, in a different galaxy, or in a different universe altogether (all of which only happens for major reincarnations).

But like pit stops during a race, corner breaks during a boxing match, or half-time during a game, the minor lives are just splits in the time, mind, and body of a major life, which is the game, match, or race itself. It’s only when the car goes up in flames and there’s a K.O., that the game (one of your big lives) ends. Only then do you die one of your big deaths. An actual death. You go Home, there’s a whole ceremony of rituals in which your old lives are put to rest, your next major life and its new realm is decided, and you move onwards.

Although I do reincarnate like everyone else, I don’t get to experience the euphoria and rejuvenation of that kind of death, as an immortal Alkhemist. I merely evolve, like Baby did. I have minor deaths (those “splits in time, mind, and body”) for my minor lives, yet major evolutions for my major ones.

Every new incarnation is technically an “afterlife” experience, so the Tides is the realm of our last afterlife before our transcendence of both life and death overall. Here, we’re all 99% aware of our spiritual existence and live our death (as every life is elementally the death of the life you lived before) as soul, as the Universe or gods, more than humans — hence our supernatural abilities. Our powers are the result of living and dying through all of our lifetimes, the sum of all experiences and lessons we’ve traversed and rectified.

Fathom always says, “It’s a game we’re in. We shall level up with each life we complete, until we’ve completed them all. Then we transcend the game…” I wonder if you get to decide to play the game again at the end of it all. I wouldn’t, but I wonder. And is there a leaderboard?

I show them exactly how to kill me and wait patiently for my end… I’ve died many times over.

Back to being gutted, a part of me sort of enjoys leading people to being the culprits of my temporary, imagined demise. I suppose I’m quite the backwards hunter, but there’s just something about the calm that I feel in a storm such as that. They fan a flame that I can never fully touch… I can only be tranced by its taunting dance — so tranced that I’m often convinced, “My Alkhemey is no match this time.” Yet, I’m always rising from the ash, coming back from the “dead’s dead”. Playing…

There are always instances in which my prey genuinely doesn’t take the bait and I live on as usual. I find those instances irrelevant — those souls, just NPCs. But there are other times when, not only does my prey not take the bait, but… I live to “transcend”. What I mean by that is that these encounters cause me to experience snippets of transcendence. Like how one experiences “little deaths”? Yeah, I’m able to get a glimpse of what actual transcendence could be like. I’ve lived to live and only be killed later, I’ve lived to live and only be dead either way, but when I live to transcend, the other souls that make it so, they truly liberate me. How do they do it, you ask? What’s so special?