A Monster...
Yes, that was what Da Lian saw in his reflection—a monster.
Not of tooth and claw, but of essence. A being born not merely of flesh or sound, but of inevitability itself.
An anomaly rejected by two worlds: humanity, and the Tacet Discords.
Humans clung to their fragile mortality; Tacet Discords, to the resonance of their frequencies.
And yet, both withered in his presence. He was the silent scream between their frequencies. The pause before decay.
Wanted by none. Accepted by none.
"Why?"
The word caught in his throat like glass. Tears streamed from one eye—his human eye. The other remained cold, impassive. As if incapable of grief.
Half of his face mourned. The other simply accepted.
He knew what he was. He knew why he existed; Fear of Impermanence.
Not a curse, but a law. A truth so old that even time dared not question it. He did not grieve this knowledge.
No—what tore through him was the agony of unintentional sin. The pain of extinguishing a life not his to claim.
He had reduced a family to dust. Unraveled a Tacet Discord into silence. All because the miasma of Impermanence flowed from him like breath... yet it spared him.
He bit his lip. Punched his thighs. Pain blossomed like lightning across his nerves, but his Insight whispered: "Pain is but a condition of the body. Nothing more."
Yet his Compassion remembered. Remembered the eyes of the one he had erased, the flicker of wonder in a soul now scattered. He had stolen their opportunity—that one precious thing called life.
He had sinned.
He was a monster.
Crack.
He drove his fist into his leg, the bone shattering like porcelain. His wrist followed. Not from guilt. Not as penance.
He wanted to prove something.
That he was not immune to Impermanence.
He dragged trembling fingers across his face, tearing skin, gouging out the uncrying lotus-shaped eye. He bit into it, swallowed it whole—devouring the sight he did not deserve.
Then, with bloodied fingers, he gripped his own throat. Hard. Air became agony.
This was death.
Finally.
Da Lian's twisted lips curled upward—not in joy, but revelation. Where the miasma could not reach, perhaps his own hand could.
"Come to me," he rasped to the void, inviting death like an old friend.
He saw a scythe rise above him—its silhouette carved from shadow and sorrow. Life flickered behind his eyes; a memory of what he had gone through.
Children laughing in the serene village. Parents weaving through golden fields. The silent grace under which Tacet Discords harmonized.
Amidst which, a gentle, distant word echoed through him like a forgotten note: Play.
It was a whisper from the third quality Da Lian possessed: Mischief.
"I want to play with them," he whispered.
His hand loosened.
The scythe vanished.
His throat burned, bruised with violet-black handprints, yet alive.
And then he cried—not in sorrow, but release. His Threnodian resonance shook the air. The world trembled in kind, evoking a Waveworn Phenomena.
Rain fell—soft, compassionate, cleansing.
Not the thunderous downpour of judgment, but the tender mist of forgiveness. Flowers bloomed from dead roots.
Greenery, once scorched by miasma, drank the gift and rose anew. Even the withered pond stirred, birthing resilient lotus flowers with petals of pearl and dusk.
Da Lian's gaze was drawn towards the pond.
Reflected in its trembling surface was a broken thing—one eye gouged, blood streaming down a mangled face, lips torn and bruised, throat darkened by his own hand.
Ugly.
His human nature declared him hideous.
Discernment agreed: he was flawed.
His Ego urged him to perish.
Compassion sided with Ego.
"Better to vanish," it said. "You are not needed. You are not wanted."
Insight agreed. Every truth pointed to one end.
Yet one voice remained.
Mischief.
It whispered: "You are a beautiful creation of existence."
With trembling hands—one broken, one whole—he tugged the corners of his lips into a smile. A grotesque, defiant smile.
"I must not weep over my flaws," he said, softly, amid the whispering rain. "They are a gift. And existence... it loves me. It accepts me."
Da Lian trembled with quiet whimpers, his voice lost in the rhythm of falling rain, and the frequencies amidst the waves.
Grief remained in his heart. Perhaps it had always been there—a binding chord woven into the fabric of existence itself.
And Da Lian, born with the quality of Insight, now evolved into the still sharper blade of Discernment, found himself asking: "What is the source of my grief?"
Had he never reached this level of clarity, perhaps the question would have never formed. But now, it emerged, unmistakably—aching, raw.
Grief, like all pain, is capable of breaking the rhythm of the heart. But sometimes, in the breaking, a new rhythm can be born.
Da Lian sat with the pain, quiet and unmoving.
"What has caused me to grieve so deeply?"
Being alive, he had always wanted to play—to live, to laugh, to harmonize with both humans and Tacet Discords. He remembered the spark, the first fluttering desire: the dream of co-existence.
But then... his insight struck with force.
"No."
The word came like thunder, not as denial, but revelation.
He never truly sought coexistence. If he had, he would have left them undisturbed. What he had truly sought was something far more elusive, yet blindingly obvious: Attachment.
He was attached to the idea that, as one born of both, he could belong to both. That he had a place cradled between humanity and the Tacet Discords.
But he did not.
He belonged to neither.
He was not a man. Not a Tacet Discord. Not even a monster.
He was... an existence. One of many in the world of Wuthering Waves.
He had made a mistake—not in existing, but in believing he was meant to be both. Yet in truth, the Threnodian of Impermanence was something else.
A separate existence. A sovereign self, allowed—permitted—by the grace of reality to simply be.
Perhaps born of strange circumstances... but not flawed.
And so came another question, pointed at the humans and TDs: "Are they truly different from me?"
"No," he whispered.
The separation dissolved.
They, too, were existence
And so was he.
In that final acceptance, even with a broken body, a shattered heart, and a bleeding spirit, his Discernment evolved into something purer: Detachment.
With it, Da Lian gained his first victory over the consequences being sentient—Ego, Wishes, and Attachments.
But, even as these foes were now at his mercy, he did not cast them away, and it was not out of compassion.
It was Insightful Detachment—the understanding that he need not destroy or abandon those things. He simply need not cling to them.
He did not ask, "Why must I forsake them?"
He did not ask, "What will I gain if I let them go?"
He simply... let them be.
And with the silence that followed, a new awareness bloomed; the freedom that were under his jurisdiction: Rights.
He had violated the rights of others—however unintentionally—by ending lives not his to end. This struck him not with guilt... but with a deeper truth: "I am weak."
The miasma of Impermanence flowed from him. It was his to bear, his responsibility. Yet he could not control it. And in that helplessness, something stirred within—A wish.
But not the selfish craving he once mistook for desire. No, this was something purer: a spark of intent, a will to grow.
And from that spark, attachment returned—not as a chain, but as hunger. A hunger to master what was his by right. He wished to understand himself. The world. The veil between.
With one leg broken and crossed over the other, one shattered hand grounded, the other resting open near his navel...
With one eye gouged—a tunnel inward and outward—and the other eye clouded, no longer even attempting to see...
Da Lian began to understand.
He was not human. Not Tacet Discord.
He was neither arbiter nor aberration.
He was simply...
A servant of existence.
Whatever he was, he could never be lesser than what he was, nor greater without cause. And his powers—his burdens—existed for a reason.
He exhaled.
A spark lit within him. The stirrings of resonance. And its trigger was...
Bliss.
Yes. Bliss.
Though he had battled questions, endured answers, and peeled himself bare, all that seemed to matter now was one final thought: "I know absolutely nothing."
His mind, once a wheel spinning wildly down a hill, found even ground. The momentum faded. Slower... slower... until stillness.
He had become ignorant.
No—he had realized he was ignorant.
And always would be.
But instead of crumbling beneath this weight, he laughed.
A bright, open-hearted laugh.
"Hahaha!"
Unrestrained. Unbothered. Unreasoned.
A laugh of ignorance—filled with bliss. And in that joy, the weight of his sins began to lift.
"There is no right or wrong," he whispered between the laughter, "so there is nothing wrong with how I live."
And finally, he understood: "Whether I exist or not, there will be consequences. And the one who chooses what those consequences mean… is me."
There would always be consequences to existence. And to non-existence. So why mourn the right to be? Why weep if one could no longer play?
In both being and unbeing, the world would change.
And so, Da Lian sat in stillness—not in despair, but in surrender to the truth: They was. And that was enough.
With that blissful clarity, something was evoked: Resonance. It surged, not in whisper, but a flood, breaking past the Human Resonance threshold as Da Lian's body began to morph.
Strings of Resonance coalesced around him, shimmering threads of power that cradled his broken form.
The world of Solaris III was not called the World of Resonance for nothing. Everything—everything—was made of it.
Now, aligned with that world, his broken limbs began to knit themselves back together. A stream of Resonance mirrored his own and formed within the void of his ruined eye.
Upon his neck, a Tacet Mark appeared—but unlike any ordinary Tacet Mark. This one glowed with a pale yellow hue, crystalline in form, more akin to a Tacet Field than a brand upon the body.
It retained the same diamond-shaped design, but in its center pulsed a light—soft, strange, sacred.
It felt as though the world and Da Lian were no longer separate.
His pain was no longer his alone, but a ripple among all existence. He felt the suffering of everything.
From the glowing Tacet Mark, a white Resonance Cord emerged. It pulled the miasma of Impermanence from his body, seizing it, then sealing it within.
But more than that—Da Lian felt it. A connection. A thread tied to another realm entirely, a place beyond this world but not apart from it.
He lifted his gaze to the sky. For a moment, the heavens rippled like the surface of a sea, and he whispered its name: "The Etheric Sea."
"The surge of Resonance came from there…"
Just then, a voice interrupted.
"—???"
Da Lian turned to see figures approaching. Dressed in pure white robes, marked by grace and discipline: The Order of the Deep.
They stopped in their tracks as they laid eyes on him—his beauty, his stillness, his unplaceable splendor. It was of one that rivaled the magnificence of the Sentinel.
Among them, a blonde-haired Acolyte stepped forward. Phoebe.
"Excuse me," she said softly, her voice carrying an air of duty. "Have you seen something… strange happen here?"
Instead of immediately answering, Da Lian approached her. She tilted her head, confused, until he suddenly reached out and gently held the sides of her face.
Startled, Phoebe blinked. Then winced as he pulled them.
"What are you doing?!" she cried, stepping back in alarm.
Da Lian smiled, a weary and relieved expression crossing his face. He bowed with grace.
"Forgive me," he apologized. "I just... have been through numerous strange experience."
He rubbed the side of his neck, where the Tacet Mark still glowed faintly.
Phoebe's eyes narrowed. "Did you just awaken as a Resonator?"
Da Lian nodded.
"By the mercy of the Sentinel… that's wonderful news," she replied, her voice beaming. "We have another righteous one to help purge the darkness."
Da Lian paused, before asking. "Who are the unrighteous ones?"
The Order members exchanged glances.
One scoffed. "Have you lived your whole life under a rock? We speak of the plague—Tacet Discords!"
"And how are they unrighteous?" Da Lian's expression did not change. "They are merely guided by instinct… survival."
"They bring destruction!" Another spoke up.
"That is all they know," Da Lian responded calmly.
"That's a flaw." The third reasoned.
Da Lian shrugged. "You speak as if you are perfect."
Phoebe's eyes wavered. His words stung with uncomfortable truth, bitter like medicine the heart resists.
Aware, she stepped in before the tension could rise.
"Enough," she said. Then, more composed, added, "We're looking for a man… someone who took innocent lives."
Da Lian raised a hand. "I am that man."
Phoebe blinked. "I… see." Her voice trembled slightly. Then her eyes widened as she registered what Da Lian said.
"What?!" Her eyes stared at him in disbelief.
Da Lian's voice remained calm. "I killed them."
A pause, then he added. "And a Tacet Discord, not long ago."
Shock rippled through the Order. Some scowled. Others looked to him with suspicion. Phoebe remained still, though curiosity lit her eyes.
"Fool."
One of the Acolytes could no longer contain themselves, thus they shouted. Yet, it was not merely insult—it was judgment. A branding.
In the sacred laws of the Order of the Deep, those who break doctrine are no longer considered misguided. They are marked: Fool.
Phoebe exhaled as she took the lead, not wanting things to escalate. "You have sinned."
Da Lian did not deny it, causing Phoebe's eyes to tremble. The simplicity of his acceptance unsettled her more than guilt ever could.
And yet… she smiled, offering: "Would you like to receive judgment?"
He turned to her, eyes untouched by the mud of scrutiny nor apprehension. "Who are you to offer me judgment?"
"You and I share the same world. The same existence." Da Lian pointed. "On what authority do you presume to judge?"
Phoebe's smile remained. "I do not claim such right."
She stepped closer. "But perhaps... the Sentinel might."
Da Lian tilted his head. "How so?"
Phoebe hesitated—something in her gaze trembled between faith and fear.
"For that," her voice carried a tinge of apprehension, "you will have to participate in the Pilgrim's Sail."
To be continued...