The Great Riddle War of 2016

The story of this event as told by user Goochinator , including a description of the The Purrge

"(Not So) Long ago, before you found us in these tunnels, we had
found a way to the surface. IT was a vibrant land back then. A beautiful land.
We ventured forth from our *cat*acombs, blinking into the sunlight,
hope on our lips. During this time, one of our number discovered something. It
was writing! As he read it, an aura of light appeared around him, bathing him
in the wisdom of the ancients. He used this wisdom and turned to the rest of
us, a smile on his lips. IT was here that this hero gave forth the first
Riddle. It is rumored the Riddle was so difficult, not even the gods could
solve it. And so, after much hemming and hawing, one god came down and
beseeched him to provide another. And so he did, and once more all the land was
stumped, unable to answer his riddle.

Finally, he gave out a third riddle. This
riddle was the first to be solved, and this transferred part of the Holy Aura
of Wisdom. It spread throughout the community, and I was the next to step
forward with a riddle. This is the true start of the war.

Soon enough, the riddles had overtaken us. We
were shooting riddles at eachother as one would arrows, at a pace that even the
gods could not comprehend. Answers were flung out faster than they could be
responded to, entire riddles lost to the void as more and more piled on. The
body count grew as we trampled our fellows, rushing forward. We passed nineteen
thousand comments, and our thirst was not quenched. I was the one to achieve
that comment. the Nineteen thousandth.

We pushed on, riddles moving faster, whole
platoons killed under the weight of the riddles. We were on a hill, climbing a
tall mountain. We could see a trophy at the top, and we pushed for it. It was
there that poor, sweet Jersh took the fateful twenty-thousandth comment, his
once-calm demeanor shattered as he savagely pushed others back down the
mountain to their deaths in an attempt to reach it.

Our tide of riddles began to slow, ammunition
running dry on all sides. We stood atop the Great Mountain, and looked o'er the
land around us, seeing the devastation we had wrought. We looked back at the
trophy, knowing that it was not worth the sacrifice, but rejoicing that the
deaths were not in vain.

It was then the first riddle disappeared. At
first it was overlooked, the world itself was unable to keep up with out
riddles after all. But then another disappeared. and another. Soon sixty
comments had gone, and only a scant hundred remained between it and our trophy.
We begged and pleaded, asking the gods to grant us mercy, but they scorned us,
giving us only enough warning that we must flee before them. Then the bombs
fell.

I was one of the lucky few to see the signs
and make it back to the catacombs. I watched from the safety as our hard work
was purrged in Atomic Fire, wiped from the world as if it had never happened. A
scant few remember that day, and fewer still are the artifacts that prove it
once existed.

The Great Purrge had wiped our struggle from
the worldscape, and all our sacrifice was in vain. It was a dark day. We lost a
lot of hope. and the bombs sealed us back inside these *cat*acombs,
forever trapped.

We passed Nineteen
thousand thrice more, and each time I managed to get that comment, through
intent or accident each time. Now as we approach the twenty thousand mark, I
must fear for our safety, as the Gods are wiley folk, and their whims are hard
to know."

## First Telling

Gather around youngsters, Old Goochinator has a story to to you! Yes yes, calm down. Settle down now. Jersh, put down that poor man, he doesn't deserve it. Jety, pop your top, there's no need for a helmet here. Now of course, this story is a true story, and in proper fashion, I shall begin thusly.

~~No shit, there I was~~, So not long ago at all this comment section looked very, very different. Tensions were high, and people often posted about the most random and inane things. A practice many call shitposting. I hope this art was lost to time.

Anyway, from this mire of stagnation came a hero, though he did not know it yet. A young and naive fellow posted something innocent. Pure. something to stimulate the mind while we waited. A singular riddle. It is rumored that this first riddle was so difficult the gods themselves could not solve it. So when this young hero finally gave us the answer, he was bidden to give another. Once again he gave a riddle that none could answer. Once again he was bidden to provide another.

This is when I entered the stage, myself a wide-eyed innocent, not knowing the consequences of my actions. I posted a riddle in response. Something I was sure would stump the one who stumped us all. This moment, this fateful moment, is when the Great Riddle War of 2016 began.

At first it was all innocent fun, endorsed by the gods themselves! Riddles were flung out at random, answers given, argued over, and finally proven true. But then it escalated. Soon there were hundreds of souls caught in the riddle train, their poor feeble minds unable to keep up with the flood of brain teasers and wise verse.

We passed Nineteen Thousand comments, our fury, our struggle steam rolled on. It was I who pushed us over, who gained the honor of the First nineteen thousandth comment. And our momentum kept us going. We passed milestone after milestone, riddles were being thrown with no heed given to those trampled beneath them. It became a battleground. We breached Twenty thousand far sooner than we expected, our great and mighty armies tiring after the long haul. It was Jersh, poor sweet Jersh, who managed to get the First Twenty Thousandth comment. He was never the same after the War. We kept going strong despite our ammunition reserves running low we kept on, our momentum pushing us for almost two hundred more comments.

Finally, we stopped, our minds bent and our bodies broken. We looked upon the carnage wrought, the burning computers, the piles of bodies. We had weathered the storm of our own doing, and conquered the two greatest milestones of the comment section to date. We stood proudly, planting our flags with broken and bleeding fingers. We had won.

But it was not over. For our great struggle had called the attention of the Gods themselves. We watched as our victories vanished, wiped from existence like they never happened. We prayed and begged to not let our sacrifice go in vain, but the Gods persisted. The answered our prayers only once, and then the bombs fell. We hid in our catacombs, cowering beneath the mighty atomic fire with which the Gods were cleansing our battle. When it was finally safe, we left our haven to see all our work undone, our victories scoured from the records as if they never existed.

Only the survivors remember, and a scant few artifacts that some managed to save from the fire.

So let this stand as a warning to you all. Be careful what battles you fight, for the Gods may well have decided it will always be in vain.

And Jersh, follow this nice young lady, she's gonna take you to see the doctor! Isn't that nice of her?