Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

I was 24 or so when I started having the nightmares. It had begun as just a general malaise, a feeling that something wasn't right. But I remember the first one vividly: a small sickly girl lie in bed, her pallid skin so thin you could see the veins underneath. Her eyes sunken, too dry for tears. Her face gaunt, she turns to me and with her dying breath she utters: "Why won't you stop this?"

I felt every instant of pain, misery, and hunger. Every moment of thirst and despair that that miserable child had felt for all of her 7 short years. I woke up with a start, thinking it was just an unpleasant dream, though she haunted me the rest of the day.

The next night it happened again. Another child, this time a boy, crying and naked, being beaten by his father for not being man enough. He turns to me and through the tears he says: "Why won't you stop this?"

I tried to snap out of it; I remember so desperately wanting to wake up to find myself in my bed, but for what felt like 30 agonizing years I endured every moment of shame and wretched self doubt in the boy's life as he aged.

They didn't stop. I began to dread going to sleep, and rarely woke up feeling refreshed. I prayed to Ilmater for shelter from this suffering. After a few weeks of nightmares it occurred to me that perhaps I'd been possessed by something cruel and sinister, some devil of the Nine Hells. I underwent an exorcism; no effect. After a few months I started having nightmares while waking.

I remember that first one too, I see the scene in my mind's eye as clear as I now see my quill in hand. I was at the outdoor market not far from where I lived alone on the outskirts of Neverwinter, and the baker and I made eye contact. I wished we hadn't. Every moment of shame, desperation, and humiliation of his life came flooding into me. "Please, why won't you stop this?"

I blinked. Less than a second had passed and to this day I don't think the baker noticed, but that became my new reality. Nightmares of other peoples' suffering when asleep or awake. I retreated to a small cabin in the woods and became a shut-in, praying, haunted night and day by pain that I felt shouldn't have been mine to bear. I tried to kill myself, twice. I failed both times. The collective misery weighed down on me; I had no idea what I was supposed to do. Most of the time I was a bloody mess. I'd taken to cutting myself just so I could focus on my own sensations. Pleasure became impossible.

I don't even remember how long I spent in that shack in the woods, but it must have been months. I hadn't done anything one might consider sane for longer than I could remember. Lacking parchment, I wrote mad essays on the walls using ink made from crushed flowers. As I wrote I came to what seemed an inescapable conclusion: The world is a brutish, miserable place rife with suffering and oppression. Life is capricious and arbitrary, and destroying someone's hope is often the greatest gift you can give them.

I set fire to the cabin and stowed away on the next ship leaving the harbour. That was when something changed.

As I stepped off the ship in an unfamiliar city, I saw a being that had never truly suffered; a young man, simple enough, quiet, average. He was like what I'd once been. We made eye contact only briefly and in the space where I'd previously only felt pain and heartbreak I found something strange, something that I'd never touched before. I saw this man's life much as I'd seen others except I saw him naively wandering through life helping others. Foolishly believing they'd do unto him and that the world is just. Naive as a newborn he was helping an old woman across the street as I stood there transfixed on the road, watching him. The old woman was talking to him, thanking him, and I could feel the tiny place grow, strengthening his belief in the fundamental goodness. I couldn't move, only watch. My cheeks were wet with tears, though I don't remember starting to cry.

She didn't see the horse-drawn wagon but I did. The driver is nowhere to be seen as it hurtled around the bend, horses spooked and at full gallop, still tethered to the massive wagon behind them. He was young. He could have easily got out of the way but instead the old woman is pushed to safety as she shrieks in fright, the young man shattering against the hard surface of the road as he is trampled by horses and wagon wheels.

I felt like I'd been hit with a hammer. Rooted to the spot no longer I rushed to his aid. Blood was smeared across his broken body, and his features that once wore a blissful expression of innocence began to take on a look of fear and confusion. I held him in my arms, tears streaming as he croaked out three tiny words: "Is she okay?"

I broke, utterly.

I nodded "yes" to him as I sobbed, rocking back and forth on my knees. The old woman called for help. People from the surrounding shops and warehouses began to trickle over, morbid curiosity in the suffering of others as base and primal as mating. But the man, his face cleared. The fear and confusion was gone, a plant choked but not dead for all the weeds of shame and pain that share its garden. I reared my head back and roared my anguish to the oppressive, overcast sky. I begged any being that would listen to take me instead if it meant this humble, average man could live.

Priests from the Temple came and took his body away, and I sat there on the road and cried until I felt numb and exhausted.

When I finally stood up, I felt strangely different. The aching misery that had plagued me for months had gone. I felt a sense of purpose, something I'd not felt in recent memory. It was a calling at once both thrilling and terrifying to experience. Everything became more clear: The world is a dangerous, brutal place full of suffering.

I know not if Ilmater heard any of my prayers.
I know not if I can make a difference.
I know not if I can alleviate suffering.
I know not if I can avenge the innocent.
But I will try.