"Eohedon Act Prologue"

En la inmensidad del tiempo y en el abismo del ser, el hombre es el arquitecto de su propia condenación y la fragua de su propia gloria; Porque ningún dios lo ata, ninguna estrella lo guía, excepto aquellos que él mismo enciende en su alma. Se dice: el hombre está condenado a ser libre.
– Inspirado en el existencialismo de Jean-Paul Sartre
Así, el destino parecía revelarse ante Eohedon. Iztrholltour, como quien en su destino reconoce lo prohibido, apareció a lo largo del camino hacia Eohedon, despojado de las complejidades de las que una vez pareció jactarse.
El camino, digno de un escrutinio meticuloso, se extendía ante él, pavimentado con bloques de sangre coagulada: una visión tan macabra como sublime, capaz de inquietar incluso al conocedor más devoto de lo grotesco.
Ya fuera en el interior o en el exterior, era difícil precisar dónde se encontraba Eohedon atravesando este camino; Porque aunque la atmósfera era escalofriante en su esencia, se volvió mundana ante la iluminación recién descubierta. Su viaje, sencillo y concreto, se calmó ante la imponente puerta.
Sin embargo, ante él, tal obstáculo no existía. Se limitó a mover el brazo, como quien ahuyenta una molestia, y, como si se tratara de una orden grabada en piedra, la puerta se abrió.
En su centro había una invitación a la reflexión: más allá de esa encrucijada se alzaba una cámara abovedada. Sus paredes, suelo y techo estaban adornados con los pasajes y aspectos más sublimes de la vida. Allí, los retratos representaban la concepción, el linaje, la unión, la relación y todos los actos imaginables en la existencia material. Cualquier visitante que llegara indeciso caería, en consecuencia, víctima de la tentación de sus propios placeres. En el corazón de esta epifanía, como una oda a la elocuencia pura, un trono estaba de espaldas a Eohedón, señalando hacia la puerta que probablemente serviría como salida.
Dando un paso adelante, fue detenido de repente por la voz de Eltrouhides:
—"Eohedón, este lugar carece de la cortesía para ilustrar tales visiones obscenas; aquí no discierno una noción, pero detecto una presencia inestable".
Eltrouhides, en su etérea prudencia, irrumpió en la escena con una observación que parecía estar en sintonía con fuerzas más allá de la mera percepción sensorial. Su advertencia no fue una reacción al espectáculo de la cúpula, sino la intuición de que algo más acechaba dentro de esos muros, muros que rezumaban la historia misma del deseo y la existencia.
Sin inmutarse, Eohedon permitió que sus ojos vagaran por los relieves y las figuras inmóviles que parecían cobrar vida con cada parpadeo. La opulencia del trono, la disposición de la cámara y la tentación implícita en cada talla... Todo parecía diseñado para atrapar al visitante en una contemplación sin fin.
Sin embargo, si había una lección que había aprendido en su viaje, era que nada existe sin un propósito.
—Eltrouhides —replicó Eohedon, con su calma afilada como una espada—, si esta cámara pretende devorarme con todo lo que soy, entonces sólo puede significar que todavía hay algo dentro de mí a lo que pertenece.
Su voz resonó en el espacio y, por un instante, incluso el aire pareció temblar. ¿Era la cámara una entidad viviente, o era simplemente la sombra de duda en la mente de Eohedon lo que la dotaba de poder?
Dio un paso más, atento a lo que su espíritu pudiera percibir. Si hubiera una presencia inestable, ¿sería un enemigo, o tal vez un reflejo de sí mismo esperando su llegada? Pero, como en una comedia absurda, siguió su camino. De repente, otra voz lo interrumpió:
—¿No te agradas en lo que aquí se muestra?
La voz surgió de la nada, o tal vez de todas partes a la vez, con un tono que oscilaba entre la burla y la profunda curiosidad. No era un simple sonido, sino una presencia, una insinuación que se deslizaba entre las figuras talladas, tejiendo su esencia en los pliegues de la historia blasonada en esas paredes.
Eohedon detuvo el paso, más por interés que por sorpresa. Sus ojos escudriñaron la inmensidad de la cúpula en busca de un interlocutor; Sin embargo, no apareció ningún rostro ni sombra, solo el eco de palabras enraizadas en el aire.
—Placer —repitió la voz, como si saboreara un concepto antes de decidir si escupirlo o tragarlo—. "No es una cuestión de gustos, sino de propósito".
Eltrouhides fell silent; his presence was a latent warning, an invisible sentinel against the unknown.
—"Ah…" the voice dragged out its exhalation with the sweetness of a lover and the malice of a jailer. "Then, are you one of those who seek purpose in everything… even in that which has none?"
The question hung in the air like a poison waiting to be inhaled.
Eohedon smiled faintly—the curve of his lips as slight as a crack in a rock, yet as irreversible as destiny itself.
—"If it has none," he whispered, "I shall give it."With that, the dome seemed to respond, as if its walls breathed for the first time. The sculpted images acquired an impossible fluidity; their faces twisted into expressions of ecstasy and torment, and upon the throne, turned away, a silhouette began to take shape slowly.
Eltrouhides exhaled a murmured sound:
—"Whatever lies here already knows who you are."
Eohedon did not answer; he simply advanced, defying the threshold of inevitability. He reached the throne and regarded it. To call it "complex" would be an understatement: though it bore an affinity with the human, it could not be assigned merely a gender or age. Its voice—profoundly beautiful and captivating—revealed a duality: it was as small as a child and, at the same time, as anguished as an ancient forebear.
—"You claim that all power can find answers or be given meaning," spoke the being, whose voice, with graceful sweetness, contrasted with the abysmal depth of the subject at hand—"then, what is the motive of life, of my life, of my very existence? For from what I see, everything lacks purpose. The gods who once guided us are dead; we have slain them ourselves. That which once appeared as Eden now reveals itself as a nightmare. And the only constant is that, before the gravity of existence, at the end of the road, all is reduced to nothing."
—"If you have no purpose, then you have no name. Or have you been called by any name at all?" responded Eohedon, his tone both defiant and serene. "Your existence lacks purpose, and therefore, must lack a name."
Unperturbed, Eohedon stood tall before the being that observed him from the throne. The chamber, once an echo of passion and desire, transformed into a silent battlefield where the highest principles of existence clashed in a combat of words.
The figure on the throne—this creature that blended the childlike with the ancient—moved by Eohedon's challenge. It did not react with anger but with a deep, stirring unease, as if Eohedon's words had struck a chord that had resonated for centuries in that ambiguous form.
—"My name, my purpose, my existence," the creature murmured, gazing at its own hands as if they were not its own—"all has dissolved into the abyss that devours gods, men, and memories. I have no name, for in the vastness of oblivion all identity dissolves. And my purpose…" It lifted its head, its empty eyes gleaming with the coldness of despair—"what meaning is there in continuing to exist if the purpose of all is to be reduced to nothing?"
Eohedon did not move. His words flowed with the calm of a river that, having overcome the tumult of doubt, simply continues on its course.
—"Nothing," Eohedon said softly, yet with a certainty from deep within—"is but a perspective granted by the human mind. What you call nothing is merely the void the mind fails to fill. But within that void there is space for the ineffable. If you have no name, then you are the very possibility, that which has yet to be defined. And therein lies purpose: the purpose of being what you are not yet."
The creature stared at him intently, and its eyes began to awaken from the darkness that had imprisoned it for an eternity. Something in Eohedon's words had touched an essential point, as if the veil of despair had torn apart. Still unmoving, Eohedon let his words flow with the gentle persistence of a river that, having braved the storms of uncertainty, simply continues onward.
—"You are like an echo of something forgotten," said the creature, its voice now less solemn, as if recalling something long buried. "Creation is, in itself, an act of bestowing meaning upon that which has none. Yet you still ask: why continue if in the end all collapses?"
—"Because in collapse," Eohedon replied, almost whispering, "new forms are born. In the dissolution of the old order, the new emerges."
The creature raised its hands toward Eohedon—not in supplication, but as if attempting to grasp the last remnants of its own substance. Its fingers, once solid, began to fracture into specks of pale light, like sand carried away by an ancestral wind. Every particle that detached did not die but danced in the air, swirling in spirals reminiscent of constellations forgotten in the annals of time.
—"Do you see?" the creature murmured, its voice now an echo of a thousand simultaneous tones. "Even in dissolution... there is beauty."
The throne, once solid, began to grow translucent, revealing within it a pulsating void—a black heart beating in time with a yet unborn universe. The creature, reduced now to a mere specter of itself, gazed at Eohedon with eyes that shone no longer with despair but with the curiosity of a child beholding a new toy.
—"Perhaps…" it murmured, as its torso disintegrated into iridescent atoms—"nothing… is only the canvas…"
Before it could finish, its mouth vanished, and the last to disappear were those eyes: two black holes that, for an instant, reflected not the void, but the reconfigured landscape of the chamber… now bathed in a golden light that had never before graced its confines.
Where once there was a throne, only a swirling vortex of stardust remained, slowly spinning until it dispersed over the carvings on the walls. The scenes of desire and decadence absorbed those particles, and for a moment, the sculpted faces smiled—not with lust, but with the serenity of one freed from their own myth.
The ensuing silence was heavy, yet laden with possibility. The chamber, once suffused with desire and decay, now held a calm that invited contemplation.
Eohedon stepped back. With one final glance at the now-empty chamber, he understood that the true question was not whether there was purpose, but whether he was willing to bestow purpose upon everything—beginning with his own being. In that recognition he found the key to his redemption.
Eltrouhides, in his silent presence, watched without uttering a word. Eohedon's words had unlocked something beyond what either of them could comprehend. Eohedon's journey was not yet over, but at that crossroads between creation and nothingness, he understood that purpose is not found—it is forged.
And with that understanding, Eohedon advanced—not with certainty, but with the audacity of one who dares to walk into the unknown, letting the path be forged beneath his feet.
—"There is no reality that justifies existence, nor existence that justifies reality. There is no purpose in life, nor life in purpose. Ultimately, only our consciousness shapes us. Yet chaos is, and will remain, immutable in its beginning."