(A standalone piece from my book, “I HATE Your Prophecy“.)
If you have heard any of the many, many White Wizard declarations of Anathema, you have heard some of these ideas before. What you might not understand is that they are not random; they are not a simple outpouring of hatred or anger. They are, in fact, the only truly pure thing in the Universe: a circle; the very geometric personification of purity—no edges, no ugly bits which jut out or cause friction, a flawless and unceasing loop which permits no entry. Consider it, if you want, as each part building every other part, like the flawlessly cut stones which, individually, are just rocks, but together can build a pyramid with extraordinary precision.
Perhaps you have seen this in pieces, and you thought it was simply the natural hatred all things Right possess for all the Blighted things of the World. Not so. It’s a formula, a mindtrap. Once you place something within, it can struggle, it can scream, but it can’t escape.
Declarations of Anathema, proclamations of anger, excommunications—they are all symptoms. You might see similarities; but the actual formula is larger than you know, and complete. And that is very good to know.
Let yourself be comforted by the nature of this Enclosure. Nothing outside can get in at all, and the only thing that can get out is a beam of blinding, burning light.
In short, The Never-Ending Enchantment Against Darkness happens thus:
Certain places, things, groups, realms, and ideas are of the Darkness.
All that which is of the Darkness is toxic; it harms everyone and everything it touches.
Those of us who serve the Light can identify that which is of the Dark.
The Darkness can only be identified; it cannot be cured, except by obliteration.
All must recognize and proclaim that the thing is of the Dark; or they are, themselves, toxic.
None may come into contact with the Dark, save to attack it. Any other contact is toxic.
All those things which are affiliated with, identified with, or even appear as though they might be in some way connected with the Darkness must renounce it; otherwise, they are contaminated, and toxic.
All that which seeks to understand the Darkness without attacking it is contaminated and thereby toxic.
Any who permit the things of the Dark to speak are contaminated. Darkness is known and absolute; nothing can disprove it, and any attempt to disprove it defends the Dark; it is toxic.
Those who hear the words or ideas of the Dark and do not immediately denounce them are contaminated and toxic.
Those who are of the Dark must renounce it, or they are toxic; but most of them lie. No matter their words or actions, they are almost certainly of the dark, and toxic they remain.
Nothing toxic can be friend to anyone. Nothing toxic can do anything but produce toxicity. Nothing toxic has anything to offer the world but toxicity.
Anyone who does not fight the Darkness by containing, restraining, attacking, and decrying the Darkness, and those who would speak for the Darkness, and those who would look at the Darkness, and those who would think about the Darkness without denouncing it—they are of the Dark and they are toxic.
All who question this are, tragically, infected and toxic.
All that which is toxic may be, and must be, destroyed; they may not be shown any forms of kindness, mercy, or Humanity; for they are purely a plague, and it is worth harming any number of lives to protect all the rest of us from the Darkness.
Because:
Darkness is everywhere. Darkness is increasing. Darkness is winning.
All Darkness must be burned to ashes, and then the ashes burned to dust, and the dust mixed with mud until none can find it.
This is our only protection. Anyone who violates a single precept of the Circle of Protection endangers all life as we know it; and anyone who does not seek, with all their being, to obliterate those persons is of the Darkness and must be obliterated.
All things started toxic. All things which have been built up have rotten, toxic foundations. There is no safe place anywhere; and so, we must call upon all sentient beings to cast out all Darkness; only those already consumed by darkness would disagree.
Envelop. Isolate. Silence. Attack. Silence. Isolate. Envelop. Attack. Always shoot to kill. If you must burn down your friend’s house to contain the toxicity, it is your job lest toxicity burn every house. If you must burn every house in order that a few isolated basements remain pure, you must do that thing; it is your job.
Nothing is safe.
Darkness is everywhere.
Darkness must be obliterated.
If we obliterate all things in order to destroy Darkness, then we have saved all things from toxicity. It is a painful, desperate act of ultimate heroism to tear down everything; only then can we start anew.
No one knows how we will ever build anything again, standing with broken hands in the broken rubble of shattered lives and dreams.
But at least we will be protected from the Dark.
