As I suspected!

 As I am typing this, I am shaking with excitement, because what I suspected, was true!

Let's rewind.

I finally had everything prepared in order to "read" the book. So I went into our bathroom, specifically into the shower enclosure, locked the bathroom door, all the windows and the shower enclosure. I had my darling extend from me and morph a roof over the shower enclosure, making sure that when I burnt the book, all the smoke would remain with me.

And then I began to burn it, at first nothing happened and thoughts of doubt started to creep into my mind, but there was no going back now, the book caught fire quickly. Finally, the feeling of suffocation started to settle in, moment of truth, was I just killing off the body like an idiot, or was this a trial similar to the one when I jumped into the tar like waters of the catacombs? A cough began to escape from the body's lungs, we were suffocating, the temptation to break through the glass walls was strong, but just as that temptation began to settle a new feeling emerged: heaviness. A sudden force was pushing me lower to the ground underneath my feet, so intensely that I felt the human body develop aches in various areas, with a hot sweat going down the face and then another revelation hit me, I couldn't hear her anymore.

My darling, Fortissimo, the one who I am bonded with, whom I constantly hear, she was gone. Fear and shock took over my senses for a few seconds, but didn't really have the time to settle in as I felt a warm sensation splash over my face. It was blood, crimson red and hot, I lifted my head and I saw black, small branch that was cut amongst many, from it's tiny stump the blood was spurting out. The colour of the blood standing out among the dark colours of this heavily wooded place and then I heard it, the snapping of wood in the distance, lifting my head up is when I remembered where I was. In the distance, cutting various branches out of his way with a small Axe, forcing himself forward into the great unknown, AK on his side, a Shotgun on his back, all hanging over a grey, bloodied trench coat. 

It was him, Sergei.

Where he was going, I couldn't see, another blood spurt caught me off guard and landed right in my eye, obscuring my vision. But it didn't just obscure my vision, it burned it, I could hear the sizzling sound of the liquid burning into the body's iris, furthermore I could feel it and it fucking hurt, coupled with the heavy gravity I finally caved and dropped to the ground, desperately clawing at my eye trying to clear it up. That's when I began to hear their whispers, all around me, crawling in my brain, The Denizens. Vile, pathetic little creatures who used to fear me, because they recognized the scent of their Master upon me, even after my defection they still feared me since a piece of our Tall Friend has always been with me. Then I heard it, something bursting from the ground near me, I didn't have my vision to rely on, but I knew it was a bony hand, because it grabbed me by my foot and it's claws dug deep into my flesh. After the initial grab, I could hear more of them bursting from the ground all around me, grabbing for any part of my body they could get their hands on and once they had their claws firmly imbedded into my flesh they began to pull me underneath and I could feel the ground beneath me give way, slowly burying me alive.

I couldn't breathe, couldn't hear, couldn't feel, it was all too similar to my experience during my formation, it was infuriating, the thought of going back into the darkness again, I couldn't allow it! With renewed resolve I managed to dig my way out of the ground, my sight instantly returning to me. Looking around, there was tombstone behind me, marked with symbols that I didn't recognize, I was coming out of someone's grave. Finally being able to stand up, what I did recognize was the area that I was in, he took note of this place several times he ventured into the Path, the tree graveyard. Miles upon miles of graves, some of which had very tall, grey-ish trees growing out of them, some were undug with nothing in them, some had stumps sticking out of them. I didn't really get much time to get a breather, because I could feel the ground beneath my shifting, before I could even entertain the thought of examining the disturbance, a massive tree began exploded out of the ground beneath me, if I wasn't fast enough in yanking myself backwards, there was a very high chance that it would have taken my head clean off. On the other hand, because I hastily yanked myself backwards in order to avoid a cruel fate, I tripped over the tombstone behind me and began to topple down a hill, that I was apparently on.

The descent down the hill came to a halt once I ended up in a sea of water. Finally getting some solid ground underneath me, I took the opportunity to quickly look around, I was on a beach. The hill that I rolled down was across a beach, which made no sense, because I couldn't have immediately hit the water if it was always there. The Path was still as disorienting as I remembered it to be, whilst looking around, I tried to catch a glimpse of Sergei again, but was quickly interrupted by a bandaged hand shooting up from the water that I was in and grabbing me by my throat, choking me and slowly but surely pulling me under the water.

I struggled but in vain, very quickly I found myself what felt like several miles under the sea, slowly sinking deeper into the endless darkness. This time, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't move, yet again the memories of my 4 year darkness returned, the gruelling formation of my current self, the thought processes that would inevitably turn to white noise, it was all coming back. However, the trip down memory lane was interrupted by a painful, hysterical yell, echoing through the endless abyss around me: "DIE!"; "STAY DEAD!"; "KILLED YOU!"; "KILL ME!" and etc. Were all phrases among many that were being yelled out from an unknown source, in a fit of hysteria. It was Sergei's voice, it unnerved me, I never heard him like that, it was alien to me to hear him like that. Then, among the scream, a light source began to shine in my direction and in a blink of an eye, I began to rapidly approach it, with Sergei's screams more insane and loud echoing around me.

Then I was completely engulfed by the light, my ears ringing, I could feel my hands again pushing against a cold, soft surface. With my sight finally adjusting, I saw where I was, a massive, open field, grey grass covered with thin layers of snow and in the distance, endlessly towering over everything, a massive, pitch black, oak tree. I looked up in order to see how tall it was, but it stretched so far into the sky that I couldn't, it's crooked branches seemed like they were piercing the sky itself. Looking at it, a feeling began to creep up, this feeling of being on the cusp of something grand, something important, that didn't happen yet. The feeling washed away the second I was hit with a wave of extreme pain going through my entire body, forcing me to drop back to my knees, spitting out blood and vomiting immediately afterwards. Wiping my face and being able to muster up just enough strength to lift my head up yet again, in the distance, by the massive oak tree I saw him again. His coat all torn, his guns missing, covered in more blood than before was Sergei and he was doing something, winding his arm back and quickly bringing it down towards the tree, I stood up to try and walk towards him in order to get a closer look, but I was driven to my knees yet again by another wave of pain that suddenly shot through my body. It was coming from Sergei's direction, whatever it was that he was doing, I wasn't going to be able to get a closer look, so I braced myself and tried to see as much as I possibly could from where I was.

That's when I saw an all too familiar knife in his hand, the one that I gifted to Minxie, the one that was made from the Archangel's bullet. He was stabbing the tree with it and just like that, everything seemed to click in my head, my suspicions confirmed, I was about to start laughing, but a giant shadow began to loom over me. Turning onto my back is when I saw him, our Tall and Faceless Friend, standing over me, but surprisingly, not paying any attention to me, instead "looking" off into the distance at where Sergei was. I was going to make one of my many snarky remarks towards it, but then another wave of pain forced me to completely lay down on the ground, wincing in pain. Once the pain passed, I opened my eye and our Tall Friend was gone, turning onto my stomach I saw him in the distance, right next to Sergei. 

Sergei was facing it, blood covering his face and a wild smile forming between his cheeks, I could see several appendages popping out of our Tall Friend, preparing to engage Sergei. But all Sergei did was back up against the tree and stab it yet again with the knife and I swear, for a split second, before the wave of pain had hit me yet again, I could see bits of our Tall Friend fall apart, as if a sand castle began to crumble down. But then the wave of pain hit me, it was too much, I could feel that I was about to pass out, but before I did, I managed to catch a glimpse of Sergei's mangled body, every part of his body was torn off, his torso leaning against the bloodied tree. As I passed out, I could see his blood being slowly absorbed by the tree.

Then I woke up in the bathroom, on the ground next to the shower enclosure, my hand bleeding from the shattered glass of the enclosure.

As difficult as it was, I am very glad that I made this journey, for it has confirmed my suspicions. He ventured into The Path because he believed he had found something that could potentially hurt and even kill our Tall Friend. Oh how limited his vision was, there are far greater things behind that bleeding tree than he knew and I aim to exploit every single one of them.

The year has started off fantastically for me.