5, 6, 7) When my rest had ended, | passed through the gate and 
resumed my wandering. Up the taproot | travelled, and passed 
through the realms of the dead. They remained on the grounds of 
the Eternal House of Death, and under the watch of the brothers, 
and so will remain when all else ends. 


Of those realms there are many, but these were all but children of 
the older lands, of which there were three. | asked Speaks-With-Self 
if it knew the number of those who lived in those lands, and it 
responded “There are many, but there are many who have been 
waylaid by the King.” 


| thought then of the blood of Betar, and the eagle with bronze 
wings, and | wept. 


“There is no Way to enter,” | said. 


“No,” said Speaks-With-Self. “There are ways to enter. But there are 
no Ways to leave. Those paths have been severed, to protect the 
lands of the dead from what is to come.” 


| tarried little in the lands of the dead, for the peace pained me, and | 
wept long after having passed them on the Way. 


Of the three great lands, they were these, in short: 


Of the first was the Land of Glory. It was empty, but it would in time 
be filled, when the brothers claim all things. 


Of the second was the Land of Valor, and it was filled with great 
deeds and mighty heroes. 


Of the third was the Land of Kindness, and it was too painful for me 
to look upon it. 


In the end, we'll all end up there. There are worse fates. 


8) After passing through the lands of the dead, my journey on the 
taproot came to an end at its source, and | came to the core of the 
Tree. 


Here | found the seat of all Knowledge, a place where all wanderers 
come to rest. Within this realm was all knowledge that is and is not, 
and all that was and was not, and all that will be, and will not be. 
Amongst its words reclined many gods, and many mortal beings 
studied at their feet. They were all pilgrims, come to the seat of all 
Knowledge so that they might learn. The stores of knowledge were 
guarded by a great legion of keepers: blind Archivists, and Docents 
with their lanterns, and the Pages that swing between the shelves. 


| spoke with many gods and mortals in my time there, across the 
scope of Creation from its first moments to its last times, from the 
many facets of Yesod-With-Faces and the free kingships and all the 
other spheres. | spoke with beings of sunlight, who had danced 
amongst the youngest stars. | met with the First Empress of the 
Furthest South, and laughed with her at the jokes told by Loret, the 
three-faced god who had long since passed out of living memory. | 
drank with witches of the cold countries and listened to their bawdy 
tales. | debated philosophy with the green ones of Elrich, discussed 
the passage of time with a scholar from twenty-five hundred years 
hence my own and spoke with Malaclypse the Younger, a sorcerer 
of the tribe that would eventually become the Unspeakable Empire 
of the East. 


Too many more to count did | enjoy company with, and | read of 
hidden knowledge in the shadowed-time | spent there. | was filled 
with desire to stay, and spend the remainder of all my days under its 
roof, but it was not to be. The Seat of Knowledge allowed few to 
stay: those who came to it were to wander out in time, and spread 
the knowledge learned. 


Before | departed, | met with the master of the place, a vast Serpent 
coiled in the center of the realm. It looked upon on me, and, 
shedding its skin, spoke thus: 


“Please return your books on time.” 
And | was greatly troubled by this. 


The old man took me there once, when we first began our training, 
or whatever it is you'd want to call it. Something about the place 
always had a calming influence on him, as if it almost allowed him to 
forget whatever happened to him. It was there that | came to respect 
the man, which is as rare an honor as you're ever likely to find. Oh, 
and he Is not kidding about that serpent- it takes something special 
to rattle Jeremiah the Flayed, but a bespectacled serpent the size of 
a small planet, well, that's just about special enough. 


Didn't rattle me, of course. | didn't even return my books on time. 
Er. Don't tell the serpent though, if you don't mind. 


9) Speaks-With-Self, who had not spoken in some time, now uttered 
these words: 


“You have knowledge, both of the Serpent and of Death, but do you 
have methods in which to apply it? The Ways of ascent are 
treacherous, and you will need all of your arts to pass forward.” 


| agreed with this, and acted then to meditate on what | had learned 
in my wanderings. | sat at the foot of the Great Voice, and listened to 
its gentle whisper in copper and iron. 


In time, | understood, and | passed through the Twin Gates as | 
began the ascent. 


And ascend he did. 


10) | came upon a throne, upon which sat a Secret, and the Secret 
was ALEXYLVA. Upon the feet of the secret was written 
ALEXYLVA, and upon its left hand was written ALEXYLVA, and 
upon its right hand was written ALEXYLVA, and upon its forehead 
was written ALEXYLVA, and from the Secret's spirit, which was 


ALEXYLVA, which was hidden from the Secret by means of a wight- 
lock whose key was ALEXYLVA. The spirit whispered in a stream, 
which flowed through the lock that was ALEXYLVA. | gathered the 
stream into the word-womb of Speaks-With-Self and stoppered it 
with a secret, and the secret that was whispered was ALEXYLVA. 


With the secret stream | drowned Speaks-With-Self again, and when 
the word-womb was laden with the Secret’s spirit | readied myself 
for the final ascent, and sang preparation songs. 


Don't ask me, | have no bloody idea what he's talking about. 
Probably something to do with ALEXYLVA. 


11) The Way now was only one, and it was a treacherous path. With 
fortitude and wisdom, | managed to reach its end. Upon the summit, 
upon the uppermost Way, | beheld the visages of the elder gods: the 
Secret's spirit within the word-womb protected my sight, for | would 
have been struck down without. | was dwarfed in their presence: 
each was crowned with itself, a crown without facet or flaw or 
change. Here stood the oldest, those that would span the entirety of 
creation, who could be called upon in any realm lower, for their 
power ran deep, and they were mighty to behold. They were slow to 
act, and subtle in action, for they knew their power, and withheld 
their full might, lest they destroy those lower regions of the Tree. 


| can describe little more: the wisdom of the secret ALEXYLVA, the 
teachings of the Serpent’s Library, and the gifts of Death could not 
avail me for more than a few moments in the glory of the elder gods. 


Remember what | said before about the lower elders? Goes double 
for these guys. 'Too powerful and subtle’ my ass, they're all just a 
bunch of rotten cowards. Old fruit isn't the same as good fruit, that's 
a lesson Jeremiah never learned. 


12) | could go no farther beyond the elder gods, and the Light | saw 
beyond my grasp remained ever thus. Thus it is said “He knew the 
length of his arms,” and also “He stood in the shadow of the All- 
Mighty.” 


From this height, | fell. 


0) Of my descent from the home of the elder gods, | will say little: 
the horrors of those twisted Ways and hellish realms are fit only for 
the King and his servants. 


1) | fell from the Light, and the summit of the uppermost Way, and 
there was Nothing. There was Nothing, and | knew fear. 


My mind left me in the Nothing, burned away from my soul. | tore 
Speaks-With-Self from its place at my side and ate it. | did this to 
protect it from what was to become of it, and | was inured to its 
screams. 


And this, this is what those doddering fools are afraid of. They know 
that the fall is coming for them, and sooner rather than later. 


2) | passed from Nothing to Something, into the dregs of primordial 
chaos that existed before. Here | found the other elder gods, and 
they were terrible to behold, scabbling at the foot of the King’s first 
throne. My wisdom fled me, my gifts were of no avail under the gaze 
of those cruel, unthinking gods. As | passed, they sought domination 
of me, for that is their only goal. They fought in mindless rage over 
possession of me, and so they retreated enough for me to pass from 
their home and fall further. 


To witness gods of such scope move to such an extent, | knew that 
untold epochs were passing me, but the horror was lost upon me. All 
things were lost upon me. 


But not this one. Not the King. Never was one for fear, the King. 


3) | approached the concealed border between the home of the mad 
elder gods of the Darkness Beneath, and the Domain of the King. | 
remember that | screamed, and fell through a great cloud, and that 
is all | recall. 


4) | fell through the cloud and witnessed the engine churning at the 
center of the great smoke-pit, its metal body slicked with blood, its 
gears turned by the flayed backs of long-enslaved gods. It devoured 
all in its path, and in its gluttony spread further, so that it might 
devour more. 


It devoured me, and | knew pain in its stomach. 


Jeremiah always had a knack for understatement. Don't go through 
that machine. It hurts. 


5, 6, 7) | passed through the Lands of the Damned, and | saw there 
were realms uncountable there, spewed forth by their bloated 
mothers. There was the Land of the Burning, and the Land of Grief 
and Tears, and the Land of Carrion, and | saw that the Ways to 
these lands were wide open, and witnessed the uncountable throngs 
that marched into their roiling guts The guardians of Carrion, the 
fiery scavengers who stole souls from the brothers Death, tore at me 
with beak and talon, screeching their praises to the King. 


So... not very pleasant, being subjugated to the King, is what he's 
saying. 


8) | passed from the bowels of the Devouring Engine, and came to 
the Domain of the King. In the desolation | could see a great fallen 
multitude among the wastes of the realms that had once been: old 
gods and facet-gods and smooth-gods, kneeling with broken back 
before the Throne of the King. 


Upon the Throne | did see the blood-wreathed Scarlet King, and | 
saw his seven spears, and | saw his seven daughter-brides, and | 
saw the seven seals on their brows. | saw his children, the vast 
Leviathans in their ranks, and many others sworn to the King’s 
service. 


The King spoke to me, and said: 
TELL THEM WHAT YOU HAVE SEEN. 
Way ahead of ya, buddy. 


9) From the Domain of the King | passed through the path he had 
carved, the path he is carving. | saw the tangle of rotting Ways 
wrapped around dead, shattered realms, where there was nothing 
whole and all was polluted with the corpses of gods. Little remained, 
though | saw that many foul creatures had taken up residence in the 
wake of the King, and the Ways were stalking by the Rotting Men. 


Those monsters and demons, misshapen scraps left over from the 
King’s unending war, ate away at their boundaries like maggots, like 
moths eating at clothing, and | knew that they sought what was 
beyond. In truth, | saw many holes from which the long-songs of 
Yesod-With-Faces, and | understood by what means that faceted 
realm had gained its scars. 


Let it be said that the King's lesser brothers and sisters are not 
exactly the best company themselves. Trust me, you do not want to 
see what a rotten Way looks like. Not to mention the smell, ye gods. 


10) | passed beyond this, and there was emptiness, and naught but 
the low groaning wind among the ashes. 


0) | fell asleep, and knew no more. 


For now. 


Visions of a Better World 


It was such a simple idea, really. Barely a daydream, and yet... The 
proper forms were filed, the proper investigations taken, and, finally, 
everything approved. A single instance of SCP-500 was fed through 
SCP-786. And then, fed through a second time. Then, the pill now 
being too large to once more fit through the funnel, a chunk was 
removed, and the test was repeated, for quite some time, resulting 
in a near infinite supply of SCP-500. The pills were crushed, 
powdered very fine... and then introduced into the world's water 
supply. Virtually over night, all diseases were cured. Behold, a better 
world. 


...Or so they had thought. Alas, it was not meant to be. SCP-500 
was successfully re-purposed to cure all the world's ills, but what we 
failed to realize was that one Ill plagued the planet more than any 
other: Man. One by one men died inexplicably, their bodies 
decomposing instantly in to dust so their corpses would not mar the 
landscape. The survivors either died of dehydration, or committed 
suicide right then and there, knowing that no hope remained. In 
time, the waters tainted by the pill washed away all of man's 
creation, leaving only pristine, untainted wildlife. A healthy world in 
all respects, but one without humans to enjoy it. | alone sit at this 
table, recording the last words of a dead species. My last words 
finished, | pick up the gun and... 


...Wake up. If only the world had gone out that way; so simple and 
so peaceful. Instead we tampered with forces we could not 
understand. 


It was such a simple idea, really. Barely a day dream, and yet... The 
proper forms were filed, the proper investigations taken, and, finally, 
everything approved. Using SCP-289 and a carefully timed set of 
scales and counterweights, engines and pulleys, we constructed a 
perpetual motion machine of such enormous scale that the entire 


world would be able to have unlimited free power forever. | can't tell 
you how we did it... hell, | don't even remember all the details. But | 
remember that day clearly, the day they first added SCP-289 to the 
device. "Nothing can go wrong" they told me. The naive fools... 


The GOC warned us, then they attacked, but we fought them off and 
then wiped them out. They were the heroes and we, the bad guys, 
won. The entire disaster was a product of carelessness, but hell, we 
were cross-testing left and right and it really doesn’t get more 
careless than that. 


The World Engine was a giant fucking machine, and not just any 
conventional giant fucking machine. Not a single drop of petroleum 
or a single ampere of electrical current ran through the World 
Engine. Inertia had been shattered into bits; everything was kinetic, 
except for a couple cubed miles of water keeping the whole 
operation cooled down. It was, in a word, old-school. It was their 
style. 


It was just one SCP. No big deal. In the old days the higher-ups 
would have been scared shitless, but we were invincible now. We 
lost track of a pile of rusty, salt-encrusted gears. No big deal. 


Seventy-two hours later, witnesses reported steam bursting from the 
coolant tanks of the World Engine. Thirty minutes after that, we 
recorded the first heartbeats of the World Engine. 


Desperate times called for desperate measures. Psychics were 
running amok and sooner or later, probably sooner, the public would 
notice. 


We had found Prometheus Labs, found them and their recipes and 
their diagrams and reverse-engineered their crown jewel—SCP-148, 
Telekill. Mass production began on March 25th. Come Fall the mist 
of Telekill descended upon the globe; tiny flakes of the metal, 
invisible to the human eye and completely harmless and 
unnoticeable when ingested or inhaled, but a death sentence to 
psychics and telepaths. 


By winter, just about everything with a brain larger than a walnut 


was dead. 


Telekill did its job perfectly, but every human, maybe every sentient 
being, has a very limited capacity for psionics. For almost all of us, 
it's barely there - those little flashes of what the other guy is thinking 
or the location of something when you couldn't possibly know that. 
Petty occurrences, easily dismissed as coincidence or luck. 
Occasionally someone gets an extra-large helping, but everyone 
gets some of it.