#overthinking tsm

The Shifting Mound considers Herself the paragon of redemption. She is the Capacity to Change, the core of Transformation Itself, self-declared Possibility of Meaning by Her own internal philosophy and doctrine. She is growth, and through growth, She is healing. To go without Her is to withstand yourself as you are now, with all the pains of your being ever-lasting, without hope to become better. It is Her who grants you the ability to strive for success, and it is She who changes the world around Her. 

To Her, the nature of living is to be pained, and to grow from that pain. She has learned of this through experience. She exists in a Construct made for the sole purpose of bringing painful experience to the beings trapped within it; a construct of 'Fear' and 'Suffering,' both mortal concepts, which keep Her from Her freedom.

She exists in a system made to defy and kill Her. Thus, in order to grow in such a space, She had to have been resilient to the idea of being defied and, in a lesser sense, killed. She, alongside the Narrator, does not truly believe She or The Long Quiet are truly capable of dying; She views the "deaths" of Her vessels and Quiet's lives as small, impermanent, temporary pains and setbacks. And more than that, She views every experience She contains within Herself, both in Her memory and in Her multitudes, as important and meaningful.

Her folly in all of this is assuming Her worldview to be an objective truth, and then projecting it onto someone other than Her. Someone whose mind she "cannot know," and someone whose heart She only grasps by contour. She may make The Long Quiet see through Her eyes, but She cannot see through theirs. Even if She could, She doesn't have the perspective necessary to understand what it is She sees through them.

The Shifting Mound's Wise Heart – There are few things more terrifying than one's own heart, and there is almost nothing more terrifying than sharing it with another. – But the most terrifying thing of all is to leave one's heart unshared. You are the only thing like me, and I am the only thing like you. – Could you bear the weight of an eternity alone? Do you dare to shape a reality of solitude and thrust it on creation? •    [Address the Moment of Clarity's statement directly.] "You showed me your heart to break me. It was a terrible thing to see." The Shifting Mound – I am aware of what it did to you. But it is through the pain of vulnerability that we heal. Will you leave all who have been hurt to live unmended?

The Shifting Mound's Cautious Heart – A thought is a vine, and some thoughts nurture thorns that bleed the soul. An endless growth that blots your vision and strangles your trust. – When I succumbed to myself, you patiently stood by me and cut the thistles that rooted in my skin. – Your compassion is what freed us both, but compassion is a thing that must be nurtured, and you cannot nurture that which cannot change. •    [Address the Thorn's statement directly.] "If I had known what you really were, I wouldn't have been so quick to free you." The Shifting Mound – And yet you did, first by giving me your life, and then by refusing to take mine. You don't need to turn back to the way things were before.

The Shifting Mound's Ravenous Heart – You are devoured, prey for something bigger than you that stalks and slinks in shadows. – But we had a dance unfinished and you had questions in need of answers. And in the cold starlight, you found them. Fear reflected in the eyes of that which terrified you. – Even the cruelest of monsters are not unworthy of sympathy. Within me, nothing is beyond redemption. Together we dug through hell, and together we found our freedom. •    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "Without you there is no need for redemption." The Shifting Mound – Then without me, there is only eternal damnation.

The Shifting Mound's Yearning Heart – A shiver passes through you as unseen fingers dance across your skin. They remember the violence you inflicted on them. And yet they don't return it. – I offer you absolution, and you take my hand in yours. – You felt the pain you caused another, and you were willing to sacrifice everything you thought was you to set me free. – Without sin, there is no redemption. •    [Address the Spectre's statement directly.] "But without redemption there can be no sin." The Shifting Mound – And without contrast, there can be nothing at all. TRUTH – As the clash between you abates, you begin to shake, your will rapidly dissolving.

In this line of argument, there are two parallels at play. One is Chapter II – The Spectre (Hitchhiker) and Chapter III – The Den (The Lion and The Mouse), brought together under the common theme of "Redemption." Then, there are two other parallels: The Moment of Clarity and Chapter III – The Thorn, the only two route capstones which have no Your New World -qualifying end state, and which also share a common theme of excruciating anguish and deep distrust in their core relationship. Where both parallels differ is where fault lies, and in whose court the ball lies for the task of redemption. In the former duo, redemption was already achieved; in the latter case, redemption can be inferred, but has not been decided on.

See how "your compassion is what freed us both" can relate to both Thorn (its original context) and Spectre. See how Shifty's claim that Quiet "feeling the pain he caused another" (empathizing with the Spectre) can be paralleled to how Thorn empathized with Quiet; consider, outside the confines of Shifty's perspective, how Quiet has similar suicidal ideation issues in Spectre that Thorn exhibits — alongside self-harm — in her Chapter. 

 [Chapter II – The Spectre]

•    (Explore) "Do you want me to die? Do you want me to kill myself to satisfy some sort of sick revenge fantasy? Because I already did that and it wouldn't be hard to do it again."

 [Chapter III – The Thorn]

The Princess – Did you know this was going to happen to me? Are you here to watch me suffer? Are you here to laugh?

Those are expressions of the same internal conflict: the guilt to come from harming someone else. In both cases, this guilt is relieved by explicit effort on the part of the injured party. Spectre "offers [Quiet] absolution," and Quiet "patiently stands by [Thorn]." Through forgiveness, both of the latter's "sins" are "absolved," and they are capable of walking away from their actions as better people. Likewise through forgiveness, the former two are able to move on from that which hurt them, having healed from their trauma through healthy expressions of vulnerability.

"It is through the pain of vulnerability that we heal." Note that I amended "healthy" onto my assessment. The critical issue is that, in Thorn and Spectre, the aggressor expressed remorse and not just a capacity, but a willingness to change for the better and for the sake of their victim. While Shifty may claim "[She] is aware what it did to [Quiet]" to be broken by the Moment of Clarity, She is evidently not.

"I offer you absolution, and you take my hand in yours."

The Narrator – You extend your hand to hers. For all her past cruelties, the moment feels gentle, tender even. 

"Even the cruelest of monsters are not unworthy of sympathy. Within me, nothing is beyond redemption." Is this a decision the Shifting Mound gets to make? It is a fair choice for Her to make when She was the one to be at the mercy of someone else. But is that the case here? Who is forgiving who?

There's an issue here. Because as much of a personal virtue it is for the Shifting Mound to have found it in Herself to say "nothing is beyond redemption" in her personal worldview, to then project that onto the Long Quiet and imply he ought to believe the same is not virtuous. It is Her choice to forgive Quiet and his actions within the Construct. It is not Her choice to forgive Herself; and yet, that is precisely what "within me, nothing is beyond redemption" implies. She has investigated Herself and found Herself guilty of no wrongdoing; and if She was, She's found it in Herself to oh-so-gracefully forgive it.

The reason for this? The Shifting Mound does not really believe anything She or we did in the Construct is something worthy of carrying a grudge over. In fact, the Shifting Mound does not believe anything within the Construct was something worth being hurt over at all. She does not believe in suffering. She believes in gratitude. To be grateful for the fact that you are alive and can experience at all. She does not believe in trauma. She believes in learning opportunities. To change over time, from anything and everything.

The Shifting Mound sees Herself as invulnerable. She doesn't think She can be hurt, and She doesn't think we 'should' be hurt, either. When we do express it, She behaves as though that was a choice we made to react in such a way; She behaves as if we are just 'being difficult' and will change our mind eventually.

Because as much as Shifty extols the virtues of redemption and absolution and growth, when She is offered grace?

Memories [The End of Everything – 20] Defeat her without any outside help, and then offer her grace. The Shifting Mound – You offer me your hand as if you've proven me wrong. But I'm not wrong! I can't be wrong!

She sees it as an insult.

The Shifting Mound does not believe in apologies. She never apologizes for anything the Long Quiet experiences within the Construct, either shifting blame to the Narrator or (on rare occasion) Her vessels or (more commonly) outright dismissing Quiet's concerns or calling them delusional for thinking about it like that or caring in the first place. And She absolutely won't accept an apology from them.

•    [Address the Grey's statement directly.] "I deserved what you did to me." The Shifting Mound – There is no deserve, no punishment, no retribution. There is only action and reaction.

•    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "I'm sorry for what I did to you." The Shifting Mound – Don't be. Everything we've done has shaped who we are.

•    [Address the Princess and the Dragon's statement directly.] "I'm sorry that had to end so violently." The Shifting Mound – Violence is a blinding flash of color, but no flash lasts forever.

•    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "I'm sorry for dropping you into the abyss." The Shifting Mound – There is no need for you to apologize. It was a lesson I sorely needed to realize my freedom.

•    [Address the Stranger's statement directly.] "You seemed in pain. I'm sorry for what I did to you, but it was the only thing I could do." The Shifting Mound – I saw with a single pair of eyes what I needed dozens to comprehend. – And now here we are, each with millions of eyes and all of them open.

•    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "I'm so sorry for killing you." The Shifting Mound – There is no need for you to apologize. We were shadows of our true selves. And shadows cannot truly die.

•    [Address Happily Ever After's statement directly.] "I'm sorry I killed you. I didn't know what else I should do." The Shifting Mound – Do not apologize, for I've never truly died. All you need to do is let go and leave with me.

The Shifting Mound doesn't believe in ascribing moral value to actions or series of events. She does not want the Long Quiet to believe in concepts like "retribution," even though She's simultaneously talking about things like "sin" and "absolution" and "redemption," and She calls Witch Her "righteous heart." But, no: She doesn't believe anything that happens in the context of the Chapters or the Construct itself is "deserved" (potentially because of something like what happens in PATD, with the cabin's Truth narration saying "this is what you deserve" ad infinitum, or in Beast, where the Princess tells us she listened to the cabin—without talking to it—say "[she] belongs down there, the world is better off without [her] in it, [her] true nature is suffering"). 

To Her, instead, at a neutral level, things just... happen. As a series of events: action and reaction, dominos falling and stars colliding. She dehumanizes both Herself and Quiet in viewing their interactions like this, as impersonal affairs governed by things outside of both of their control, but She doesn't seem to see it like that. Their bodies attack each other as their heads watch on and marvel at the footwork and the patterns of their dance.

To Her, nothing that happens matters except for the lessons She learns from it. The violence Quiet encounters doesn't matter because it does not "last forever." The impermanence of it, in relation to the permanence of Her and Quiet's divine existence, makes it negligible in Her eyes. "Any hurt you've caused them is understood as a fair price for freedom." (Note the passive language; it could be that the vessels themselves understand this, or it could be wholly Shifty's opinion.) The pain the Stranger experienced is unimportant, because now, She is fully capable of comprehending what it was that happened to that vessel.

 [Intermission II]

•    (Explore) "I don't want to hurt you, but the more times I go back, the worse I fear things will be." The Entity – There is a hurt that dwells in them, but they are not me. They are thoughts and perspectives. They are feelings that inform my being. – The wounds they've suffered carve texture around my heart. Without them, I would be as I was before. – I cannot be as I was before. There are new spaces that I must fill.

 [Intermission III]

•    (Explore) "It doesn't matter how many times I go back. At least one of us always hurts the other. Doesn't that change you? Doesn't that make you worse?" The Entity – It changes me, but it doesn't make me worse, nor does it make me care for you any less. […] – You are what brings me meaning. Know that the pain of your journey will subside in due time.

More than anything, however, Shifty doesn't care that She or Quiet were hurt, because they can heal. And if they can heal, the hurt is impermanent. And impermanent things aren't worth suffering over. Pain is but a learning opportunity; suffering is but a new texture added to the weave of Her experiences. By the end of everything, She's changed, and for Change Incarnate? What could possibly matter more?

 [Intermission II]

•    (Explore) "What does it feel like to change like this?" The Entity – Eyes close in reflection. […] – It feels correct. This is what I need to be. This is the only path forward.

To Her, all change is good change. Everything is progress and everything is growth. Her shape is defined, and that's all She cares for. "The outcome of an act matters more than its intentions," so even if Quiet intended to destroy Her at one point or another, She is more than capable of forgiving them for that, because they failed. She's still here, and was never at risk of harm; it was just play-acting to Her, another experience added to branch out in Her perspective. In that sense, in Her view of Her own invulnerability, Her all-encompassing forgiveness of the world's cruelties is sharply reduced and cheapened. What does it mean to be forgiving if you've never truly experienced heartache? 

What does Shifty's opinion of Quiet's experiences with Spectre matter, if Shifty doesn't even remotely grasp what Spectre's forgiveness of her killer meant on an emotional level?

That final statement, "all you need to do is let go and leave with me," is perhaps the most telling. That Shifty thinks Quiet just needs to "let go" of all they've experienced and lived and learned... for what, exactly? To leave with Her, but for what? To what end? If Shifty truly cared about how "everything we've done has shaped who we are," then surely She'd recognize She's asking the Long Quiet to do something unthinkable. Surely She would grasp that Quiet's mourning for the vessels they've killed and their guilt for the vessels they've hurt matters in some regard to them; but of course it doesn't. She doesn't value Her vessels as equals to Her. She hardly values them at all. The manner She does is incomparable to the personal experiences Quiet has had. Quiet refers to their time with HEA, in retrospect, to the Narrator as "one of my past lives." The Shifting Mound does not view Her experiences in even half of that regard. She, at a fundamental level, is disconnected from them; She can't comprehend what they've gone through. And so Her every forgiveness rings hollow, and Her every request that they just let go and move on rings as tone-deaf and callous.

"You speak of me as if I am a ghost. But I am right in front of you."

The Shifting Mound's Terrifying and Divine Heart – You are weightless and alone, suspended in the gravity of an idea too great for you to hold. A tiny island caught between the death of the old and the birth of the new. But weightless is not helpless. – You unchained your will and rose against a would-be god, and for a shining moment, made yourself my equal. And then, you surpassed me. – Without me, there are no externalities to resist, and without you to resist me, there can be no externalities. It is struggle that carves meaning into consciousness. •    "Even when you became a shadow of a god, still you were bound to my will. I unraveled you then, and there is nothing stopping me from unraveling you now." •    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "You ripped me open then. I was only returning the favor." The Shifting Mound – You linger in moments that have long-since passed. […] •    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "We made each other worse." The Shifting Mound – We changed each other. Are you not happy with who you've become?

The Shifting Mound's Piercing Heart – A boundless torrent of blades cuts you from boundless angles. You are a body. You are gory ribbons. You are a body again. And you feel all of it. – On and on it goes, until your bodies are not your thoughts are not you. Alive, dead, alive, dead, alive, dead, then alive and dead and alive and dead all at once. – You learned to put yourself away. And in your stillness you rose above me. – You died countless steely deaths, and you lived countless short lives, and yet it is all so far behind you. I pushed you to a greatness you never would have reached without me. •    "I did rise far above you. And I am far above you still. I will destroy you now as I destroyed you then." •    [Address the Razor's statement directly.] "If you hadn't snatched that body away, we would have killed each other. We were self-destructive." The Shifting Mound – Were we self-destructive, or did the beauty of our dance reach beyond the shadow of death? It was lethality that made us what we were.

The Shifting Mound's Righteous Heart – A trick behind your back, and a trick behind mine. We dance, revolving and revolving around each other, but forever stuck in place. We both move and yet we both don't, for each of us watches the other instead of ourselves. – But forever is not forever. You let me move and I slam the door, but that is not the end, and both of us must face our partner once again. The barbs twist deeper, but they do not have to. – To change is to hold the potential to rise above. Would you limit yourself to what you are now, or would you like to see what you might become tomorrow? •    [Address the Witch's statement directly.] "I have already come so far. What more is there left for me to see?" The Shifting Mound – More than either of us can possibly imagine, if you would only open yourself to the totality of existence.

The Shifting Mound's Open Heart – Fear is a chain around the neck and a needle in the eye. – It was fear that made our prison, and it was fear that told the lie that our spirits were not free to choose. – But even bound, you saw a light, and you gave me the wisdom to speak my heart and shed my doubts. – Without fear, suffering ceases to be. Without fear, death dissolves. Without fear, we are free to choose beauty. – Even when we reached the end and you sent me plunging back into the abyss, I was already free of fear. That act was your final assertion of will over chains. – This construct is a machine of fear. It has no place in our divine hearts. Shatter it. Leave with me. •    "It was so easy to let you fall into the abyss. You needed me, but I've never needed you." •    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "No matter what we did, we kept trapping each other again, and again, and again." The Shifting Mound – And yet here we are, bound only by our final shackles. It will have all been worth it once we're finally free. •    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "Neither of us could have been free without the other." The Shifting Mound – Just as neither of us can be free without the other now.

•    [Address the Witch's statement directly.] "With time, we could have been better." The Shifting Mound – And there is always time.

The Shifting Mound's Burning Heart – I crush you, I bleed you, I grind you to paste. My scars are a memory of what you used to be to me. I want those feelings back. – You run but you do not run away. You take me somewhere new. Somewhere we can dance like we used to. But I could not follow your steps. – There was no better gift for me than the gift of defeat. You showed me how much more I could be. – We made each other better. To have no challenge is to fade into nothing. A life without obstacles is no life at all. •    "I remember the moment of my victory. As soon as you entered my domain I destroyed you." •    [Address the Eye of the Needle's statement directly.] "We've both become better for what we've been through, haven't we?" The Shifting Mound – We have. Look at what we are now, and see how small we were then.

•    [Address the Adversary's statement directly.] "We didn't have to hurt each other." The Shifting Mound – Did we hurt each other? – For me there was no better end. I lost myself in an artistry so profound that it lifted both of us into something greater.

•    [Address the Razor's statement directly.] "Even if the journey was agony, the end gave the struggle meaning." The Shifting Mound – And even then, what we saw was not an ending. When I thought I had reached an unconquerable peak, you showed me how much further I could still climb.

TRUTH – As the clash between you abates, the Princess relaxes, smiling from a distance. The respite is welcome.

The Shifting Mound inherently refuses to see any aspect of change as a bad thing. Thus, when Quiet claims they've made each other worse — pained, hurt, more violent and less compassionate, reducing each other to their basest forms — the Shifting Mound refuses to hear it. "Worse" is simply change; but to change is to progress, and progression is to be made better.

This is where the Shifting Mound keels over from the poisoning in Her toxic positivity. Not only is all pain inherently forgivable in the name of progress, but to Her, you ought to be grateful for the privilege of the experience in the first place. She is the unsustainable, unstoppable force of constant growth, and — failing that — complete burnout and collapse. She will push you past your limit and call your shattered boundaries a success. To what end? You fool. There Are No Endings!

To the Shifting Mound, the suffering is but a process; growing pains; pain for the procedure, and you're paying for the results. "Did we hurt each other?" She's not listening. It's all means to an end: something beautiful across the horizon you just can't see yet, but if you push yourself just that much further, you might catch a glimpse of the person you'll be by the end of it. "Are you not happy with who you've become?" Regardless of whether or not you like it, that's what you'll be and who you are now; the change is already underway, and has been since your foot first stepped onto this path.

It's alright, though. "Would you limit yourself to what you are now, or would you like to see what you might become tomorrow?" Through Her, you can change again. In fact, only through Her will you ever reach your highest highs, "a greatness you never would have reached without me," so She says. 

She cannot be bad for you. All the pain you've experienced at Her hands "is all so far behind you." This is exclusively a process that will make you both better. Soon enough, you'll be able to "rise above" that which plagued you, "surpassing [Her]," and once you reach that brand new peak in your potential, you'll see just how "worth it" all your suffering really was.

In extolling the virtues of growth, She loses sight on the meaning of decay. In caring so much for the nature of life, She blinds Herself to the matter of death. In holding the potential of the future in such high regard, She dismisses entirely the problems of the past, and how both affect the present moment. The Long Quiet might heal, but in the moment, have they? Her perspective is inherently divine, disconnected from the stakes of the situations She observes and detached from the pain She perpetuates.

[Reject Her authority]

The Shifting Mound – [...] I only want to help you. – You can vainly struggle against me, or you can follow the rhythm of our movement and find our freedom. – [...] If it feels as though I lecture you from above, it is merely because you have refused to climb after me and find where you belong.

The Long Quiet is the only thing left She cares to "change" in this way. Whenever Shifty claims She seeks Quiet as Her equal, She means Her equal in this specific way through this specific process. A Long Quiet who disagrees with Her perspective is one whose mind must be changed; "where they belong" is in a perpetual conflict, turning the cosmic wheel with Her.

For Chapter II, the Stranger's personalities are akin to the Princess and her many iterations. Their immediate response to their many schisms being merged into one body and being is that of confusion, even revulsion: terror in the face of the unknown. This reflects the responses of the Princesses being assimilated as Vessels into the Shifting Mound (more than it does the Shifting Mound Herself, if we are to compare Her to the Princesses).

In Strange Beginnings, the Stranger (offscreen, but understood through exposition and understanding of how Shifty's 'network' works) has been, in a sense, "raised" by the Shifting Mound to reflect Her. The Shifting Mound initially considers the Stranger to be "like" Her, though She does not call the Stranger a "shadow of her" like She does the Wilds. It is only in Strange Beginnings that the Stranger claims they are "kind of like a shadow." While they cling to the idea of being inseparable from Her, there's enough of a distinguishing mark between the Stranger and the Shifting Mound for that to still remain a fallacy on their part; like the Soft and Harsh Hearts, the Strange Beginning is just as much of an individual as any other Princess Shifty claimed as a vessel. It is simply that the Stranger had so little identity to begin with that it became easy to "lose themself" in Shifty's multitudes, as the other two Hearts fear would happen to them and to us post-Ascension.

The Narrator The door to the basement creaks open, revealing a web of branching staircases all built from unidentifiable materials. Nothing here seems to belong, and the closer you examine your surroundings, the more confused you get, your head throbbing with the effort of making sense of this place. None of the stairs even seem to go anywhere, let alone down.

The stairs, in the Stranger, represent branching paths; the infinite potential of choice, and the many routes the game itself may take. That's a surface-level understanding of the route, so most people won't be arguing with me on that point I presume. The Harsh stairs to the left represent the harsh side of the Princess (the personality which appears on the left side of the screen, alongside the monstrous schism), the Soft stairs to the right represent the soft side of the Princess (who appears at the right, alongside the morose schism), and the Central Stairs present the unique opportunity offered by Stranger itself: a complete lack of information and bias.

The multitude of choices presented, in Stranger, is presented as confusing. Nauseating, even. Too vast to fathom or hold in one pair of eyes. "You saw with a single pair of eyes what you needed dozens to comprehend." –Shifty

And yet, at the End of Everything, those stairs are pruned. The choice is reduced to a single variable, almost pre-made for you, a single path you have yet to walk in a sea of infinite choices eternity's patterns have blocked off with invisible walls.

Voice of the Hero Those winding stairs again. But now there's only one way forward.

Voice of the Contrarian That was easy compared to last time. Just stairs! No weird fuzzy stuff or nonsense trying to pull us apart.

To us, it is because we have reclaimed autonomy by reducing Shifty's infinities to the comprehensible. There is a reason the End of Everything sequence, in which Hero takes you to "where it all began: Her Heart," uses the same graphics of Stranger's derealization sequence, just played in reverse.

A picture was once solid, and then through sheer repetition, went numb and void and empty. "To be everything is to be nothing at all." –Memories [The Stranger, 6–9]. But then. Then. Something other came onto the scene, and snatched the impossible away, and molded it into something new. Guided down the thin trail of perspective and memory, The Thread Which Weaves Nothing Into Something made a Stranger into something more.

[Take the harsh stairs to the left.]

The Narrator You step to the left. The path is cruel against your feet, the impact of each step sending pulsing vibrations up your legs until there's nothing left in them to feel. The air around you grows colder the further you progress, at first a barely-noticeable drop, quickly evolving into a numbing cold. Your toes feel like blocks of ice, your breaths puff out in clouds of condensed vapor. You shudder against it as you continue down the stairway, losing yourself in the bone-deep chill.

The Princess (Harsh) What, like you need me to hold your hand and tell you everything's okay? You're not really cut out for this, are you? Why are you even here?

The Princess (Monster) I thought they would send something better to deal with me. If the stairs managed to chew you up, I will devour you.

They experience something incomprehensibly painful.

Note that the stairs, here, are explicitly described as "cold," much like the "cold" the Princesses claim to feel as the Shifting Mound takes them in. Unlike most descriptions of suffering throughout the game, this is rather brief. In fact, its brevity is bizarre. All we grasp is that we lose feeling as we walk down the stairs — but we get no mention of pain. 

"I promise that it doesn't hurt." –Shifty

Just a numbing chill.

The Princess (Harsh) – I've been watching you stare at me for a long, long time. – I'm tired of waiting for an answer.

The Princess (Monster) – It must be fear creeping into your heart. You know you can't stop me. – I don't need a name. My name is whatever hushed whispers follow in the wake of my devastation.

She, the Princess, Her Royal Highness, is justifiably upset at that which confines her. She is assured of her worth and, to you, bluffs a sense of composure her other schisms betray she does not truly feel. She is standoffish and antagonistic. 

She might even be exactly as dangerous as the world claims she is, perhaps as a self-fulfilling prophecy, and perhaps simply because that is what she is down to her nature. She is cold, harsh, sharp, calculating, dangerous.

The monstrous schism is not a natural disposition of the Princess in natural circumstances. Like the neutral personality, it is uniquely present as a being of pure perception: the concept of the Princess in her worst iteration and her most powerful. 

The monster is the embodiment of the threat she poses; to the world, to you, but in particular, in herself. When she leaves herself vague and distant, we are left to assume the worst in her. And the Harsh Princess acts in a way conforming to the expectation that you do see the worst.

She doubts you. She doubts your judgement, in that you would see better in her, because you have come here acting as her executioner, and so she expects the interactions between you both to make her worse. She doubts your ability; she builds herself up by stripping you down, by pointing out your inadequacy and bolstering her confidence through bluff and threat. She wishes to defend herself, inherently coming into her interactions with you predisposed to violent outcomes. And so, because she doubts you, you doubt her. 

She gets worse because she refused to believe you would see better.

•    (Explore) "If I let you out of here, what are you going to do?" The Princess (Harsh) – I don't think what I'd do really matters, does it? – What do you want me to say? That I'd be a good person? – I'm not going to dance for you. The Princess (Monster) – Besides, you already know what I'm going to do.

She does not answer questions satisfactorily. When she is confronted with another's suffering, she is unempathetic; she puts you down out of disinterest. She is just as curt as the description of the stairs which spawn her. But in that empty space, room is given for doubt to fester.

She doesn't even try to be a good person. Is she?

•    (Explore) "For all I know, you're locked up down here for a reason. Do you know why you're down here?" The Princess (Harsh) – Maybe it's because I'm dangerous. The Princess (Monster) – Don't be coy. We both know why I'm locked away here. I'm a monster, and the second I get out of this place, I'm going to end the entire world.

The Princess (Harsh) – And you believe that? Do you think I'm some sort of... monster? The Princess (Monster) – Because I am. Everything you've heard about me is true, and I am going to lay waste to everything. Starting with you.

She leaves the question open on whether or not she is dangerous. To her, that is an advantage. She doesn't want you to approach her, because she only envisions your approach as violence, so she refuses to invite you closer or let down her guard.

She doesn't try to convince you she isn't a monster. Is she?

She can become one, if she needs to. She would prefer you be scared of her. The monstrosity she threatens to become is leverage in your relationship; it is a bluff turned real.

[Take the center staircase.]

The Narrator You step onto the center staircase. Paths wind out around you in all directions, each step branching into its own staircases which branch into their own staircases and so on. You aren't quite sure if yours is taking you up or down, but at the very least it's taking you somewhere. You concentrate on where you are, careful not to stray onto any of the many splitting branches that tempt you on all sides. You wouldn't want to have to backtrack to yours once you'd made a decision that took you someplace else. And so you take one careful, focused step after another. One foot down, another foot down, another after that. You lose yourself in following the correct pattern, in following what looks to you to be the true path, the one that cuts straight down. Or up. Or maybe sideways. But no matter the direction it goes, it certainly is the most true path, you know that much.

The Princess (Neutral) I don't remember what it was like before I was in this place. Why would I know what happened to you?

They have all of eternity to themselves, but no memory of who or what they were before this. There is infinite potential within them, but there is a path they feel they must take, which they are compelled to take. 

"It feels correct. This is what I need to be. This is the only path forward." –Shifty "Do not mourn them — they will finally get to know themselves." –Shifty

They don't know how, or why. They don't really know who they are. But if they just keep walking, for long enough, and they contain enough perspective, perhaps they will find themself. Perhaps She will show them who they are meant to be.

The Princess (Neutral) – Do you remember anything at all? Do you know why you're here? Do you know me? – How strange. So why are you here?

"Why are you here?" is the question the game asks in every permutation of Chapter I's events.

'The Princess,' as she is titled, is an open question. An object of the subject of the narrative which you are, a mirror to reflect your choices back at you. When you refuse choice, you refuse her, and so all she has to go off of is the cold, hard facts of what she is. 

•    (Explore) "If I let you out of here, what are you going to do?" The Princess (Neutral) – I don't think I can answer that question in a way you'd find meaningful. – I could tell you that I'd lead a quiet life in the woods or that I'd open an orphanage or that I'd do any other number of 'good' things that I'm sure you think you want to hear. – I'm a prisoner here, and whether or not you shoved me down here, you're practically my captor at this point. Anything I'd say is tainted by that.

•    (Explore) "For all I know, you're locked up down here for a reason. Do you know why you're down here?" The Princess (Neutral) – Is this a quiz? If you're here, then surely you know why I'm here. – You're the one who came down here, and with a sharp, sharp knife, too.

The Princess (Neutral) – I don't have any weapons. And I'm chained to a wall. Do I look like someone that could end the world? Do I look like a monster?

Without a reflection, all a mirror is is an empty frame.

This version of the Princess, beyond the blank slate, is inherently inquisitive and curious. She knows nothing, but presumes by your presence that you must know something. You are other, unfamiliar to her, and that unfamiliarity sparks questions and ideas. 

If you came from somewhere else, you must at least have a grasp on an origin point, like she has a grasp on hers. "She is seated in a room that is empty. A chain digs into her wrist, binding one arm to the wall. It is quiet, and she is alone." So, what are you, in contrast? In comparison? What is your relationship to her, and what of herself can she learn from that? You know her now. What is she, to you?

And so her potential begins to fracture into the various things she could be.

[Take the soft stairs to the right.]

The Narrator You step to the right. The path feels soft and reassuring against your feet. The stairs almost seem to cradle you as you make your way down, like they're guiding your heels from one step directly to the next. You barely have to extend any effort to descend, the stairway doing most of the work for you, and you don't feel like there's any concern that you might slip or tumble or lose your way. But the further you go, the deeper you sink in. First it's like a lovely plush carpet, your toes digging down and barely hitting any resistance at all. But soon enough you're fighting just to keep your knees from sinking out of sight. The softness threatens to swallow you whole, to wrest control of your body and surround you in a false ethereal bliss, pretending to save you from the cruelties of choice and consequence. It's slow-going, but you manage to fight against the overwhelming urge to fall back into the comfort and nothingness, the very struggle to continue forward consuming your every thought.

The Princess (Soft) I don't know what happened to you, but you look like you're in one piece now. But I understand. Sometimes I feel like I'm being pulled apart, too. It's so terrifying down here. But at least now you're not alone, and I'm not alone, either.

The Princess (Morose) We're probably stuck down here forever, aren't we? There's no way out, and barely a way in...

They are terrified. They don't understand what's happening, but something gentle takes them in, and something gentle promises to guide them, so that they won't lose their way. It saves them from the cruelties of the thousands of choices they made in a single instant.

This is by far the longest and most elaborate description for the stairs in this entire Chapter; it's some of the most symbolic description in the entire game, without losing itself in metaphysics. It's awash in detail, giving itself ample opportunity to hammer home one critical point: something that feels good is not always safe, and that which comforts is likewise that which has the capacity to trap. To seek comfort is not to seek freedom. To seek safety is not to seek choice.

The Damsel's danger is her beauty; the core of deceit is its attractive nature. Her charms are but another part of the manipulation.

The Princess (Soft) – Sometimes I forget where I am too. – It's okay. Don't worry.

The Princess (Morose) – I don't feel like I've gotten any bigger. – It doesn't matter. I've been down here for so long. What's the point of a name if there's no one around to use it?

The Princess, if you want to call her that, is helpless to her circumstances. She has no control or power here. It's hopeless. She's as open as she can be, but beneath her warm and welcoming exterior lurks a certain terror in the face of the unknown. She is deeply, deeply afraid, and more than that, she is submissive in the face of an uncertain guilt. "This is what she deserves."

There is something about her that forced her into the situation. She's been locked away in a basement for as long as she can remember, lonely and afraid, for a reason she does not know. She's shackled, so she must be intentionally imprisoned, and those imprisoned typically were accused of something in order to be locked away. 

What was she accused of? She's not trying to be cruel, or monstrous; she's trying her best to be helpful, to be pleasant, to be worthy of companionship. She doesn't want to be alone anymore; she desires companionship. She doesn't want to feel guilty. 

•    (Explore) "If I let you out of here, what are you going to do?" The Princess (Soft) – Are you looking for the truth, or are you looking for the 'right' answer? – I just want to live my life. – You either trust me or you believe that I'm dangerous. What I say won't change how you already feel about me. The Princess (Morose) – If you want to put an end to me, then put an end to me.

•    (Explore) "For all I know, you're locked up down here for a reason. Do you know why you're down here?" The Princess (Soft) – I don't know why I'm here, but there has to be a reason, right? You don't just lock a Princess away in a place like this without a reason. I wish I knew what it was. The Princess (Morose) – But you know, right? You have to know. You're the only other person I've ever seen, or at least the only one I can remember. Don't give me false hope. Please just end this already. One way or another, just do it.

The Princess (Soft) – But I don't want to hurt anyone. I like the world! I think. You... you don't think I'm some sort of monster, do you? The Princess (Morose) – I don't know. Maybe that's true. I probably shouldn't be given the chance anyway. If you were sent here to kill me, maybe you should just get it over with.

She's a person, isn't she? She doesn't want to hurt anyone; she has no clue why anyone else would think she does. She knows what it's like to be alone and terrified. Why would she make an enemy out of what could be a companion? Why would she not lead with kindness and empathy regarding your situation, so similar yet different to hers?

She just wants the disorientation and confusion to stop. More than she wants answers, or companionship, or life, she just wants things to be comfortable and easy. Kill her, free her: anything, anything at all, is a fair price for freedom. Anything is better than the nothing she's been left with, the gaps in her memory and the silence in this room. If you are the key to that, she will let you do anything it is you desire, as long as by the end of it, it's finally over.

[Continue down the stairs.]

The Narrator You slowly lose sense of yourself the further you go. Time disappears, and you can feel yourself begin to untether. Physical sensations dull and then vanish, until the only things experienced are the endlessly repeating patterns and emotions of the journey. A continuous march forward to a destination long forgotten.

The Narrator Consumption and betrayal. Skepticism and blind devotion. Rivalry and submission. Terror and longing. Pain and unfamiliarity. And at the heart of it all, an emotion that can only be described as—

•    (Explore) "Getting down here was... weird. Like I was pulled apart and put back together again. Do you know what happened to me?"

The Stranger What happened to us? What are we? There are parts of us that are dead, and the others.... they just don't fit. We can feel them moving around in spaces they don't belong. It's all so uncomfortable. Did you do this? Did we do this? Can... can you pull us back apart? Can you fix us? … Please?

They, the Quiet and the Stranger, parallel each other. With one fundamental difference.

Voice of the Hero – What— what the hell was that?! What happened to us? Voice of the Contrarian – I feel so... strange. Like I'm fundamentally different, but also... still the same person I was at the top of the stairs. – Oh well! That was a trip but now it's over. Time to get back to our old devilish ways.

The Long Quiet is resilient and enduring. They are altered by the stairs, and the experiences they have affect them, but the effects on them are far less severe than they would be on the source. Their walk down the stairs, long and excruciating as it may be, occurs in linear time. They experience everything, and lose themself in eternity, but they hold onto a core sense of being and origin point which withstands the sands of time. They were a person at the top of the stairs.

The Stranger does not walk down the stairs, as much as the stairs force their way through them. Splitting and fracturing into disconnected fragment after disconnected fragment, pulled apart into independent variations: five sets of eyes who each believe they're only seeing through their own, and who know not the truth of their nature until it rams them in the face in the face in the face.

•    (Explore) "There's more of you now..." The Princess (Harsh) – And what's that supposed to mean? Are you trying to get under my skin? The Princess (Neutral) – There must be something wrong with you. I'm the same as I was a moment ago. The Princess (Soft) – Do you need help? Not that there's much I can do chained up like this, but I'm the only one down here, so if you need anything I'll do my best.

The Stranger carries everything, and had they been split, that everything could have been sustainable. But instead, they are everything at once, and this does the opposite of shatter them: the truth of it consumes them.

And we are helpless but to watch, and be pulled in the same.

Voice of the Hero, originally starkly opposed to the Narrator's demands, is disoriented over the course of the two Chapters. He's an anxious wreck in the cabin — the line "this feels wrong, this feels like a trap, like whatever we do we're gonna die" establishes an overwhelming feeling of dread — and doesn't fare well when confronted with the Princess herself, even if he still continues to hesitantly argue in her favor even in eldritch circumstances.

Voice of the Hero – I'm still not sure if we should trust you. Let's talk to her for a bit. Try and get our bearings. She seems... normal.

Voice of the Hero – Wouldn't you be skeptical of someone stumbling in here if you were her? We lost ourselves the second we stepped into this place. I don't know how long she's been here, but I can't imagine it'd be easy for her to trust anyone. The Narrator – […] As the Princess speaks again, it's almost as if she fractures, and where there was once just one of her, there is now another. Voice of the Hero – I don't like this. It's those cabins all over again. Can... can we put her back?

The Narrator – She fractures again. Voice of the Hero – I don't like where this is going. – […] I don't think we're going to be able to put her back. – […] There must be something we can do. Asking questions just seems to make things worse.

Voice of the Hero – I can't even follow what's going on anymore.

Voice of the Hero – But how do we decide what to do? Can there even be a right choice when all of them are so different?

The Narrator – You take a step forward. Your foot lands. But it lands... different. You experience a firm footfall, a gentle tread, a confident stride. – You can feel yourself rupture. The room spins, your perception multiplying in a sickening kaleidoscope as your very self is pulled in incomprehensibly many directions. Voice of the Hero – […] We were never going to salvage this, were we?

Voice of the Contrarian does worse, in the sense that he's changed all the more by what he experiences. He doesn't care for the stakes until they begin to well and truly affect him, and when they change from something abstract to something sickeningly real. Until just "accepting it and going with the flow" stops working, because accepting the consequences of his actions requires that he recognize something is deeply, deeply wrong here.

He is denied levity in the face of the horrors. In the face of complete and utter overwhelm.

Voice of the Contrarian – Isn't that fun? A new puzzle for us to take apart.

The Narrator – As the Princess speaks again, it's almost as if she fractures, and where there was once just one of her, there is now another. Voice of the Contrarian – We can do that?!

The Narrator – She fractures again. Voice of the Contrarian – […] It kind of hurts to think about it, doesn't it? It's like everything we say just multiplies her.

Voice of the Contrarian – We need to get out of here. This whole place is making me itch.

Voice of the Contrarian – Just do something! Do anything! Do all of it if that's what you want. This place is hell and it's only getting worse.

Voice of the Contrarian – But this— we can't— Voice of the Hero – ... do you not have anything witty to say? I could use a good bit of wit right now. Voice of the Contrarian – No, I don't. Because this isn't fun. How are we supposed to have fun if everything is happening at the same time? It's the same as nothing happening, and nothing is excruciating! Voice of the Contrarian – […] We should help her. I think... we did this. Voice of the Hero – How surprisingly sincere. Voice of the Contrarian – I didn't actually think our actions had consequences. Voice of the Hero – It's a little late for regret, isn't it?

And besides him... just imagine how they feel.

Why does it bother Contrarian so much? Because infinity denies him his choices. Because "we can't even really interact with her, can we?" Because to be everything is the same as being nothing at all, and of course nothing is excruciating, but the reason "everything" is so awful, too, is because everything invalidates itself. Contrarian is the one to recognize that the Stranger's schisms don't have names of their own, unlike himself and the other Voices. 

Contradictions are meant to win out over each other, or to point to an underlying truth: either they're only contradictions at a glance, or one of them is truer to the heart, or they're both being used to conceal something deeper hiding beneath the surface. To be Contrarian is to resist authority and control. A puzzle is meant to be picked apart and solved. "What's the point of asking questions if all we're going to get is a million answers?" 

Choices are meant to have meaning, and free will is meant to matter by the end. The point in finding a third option (that nobody wants) is that assertion of will, to elect not to do things and to find your own path to walk. "We can't do anything like this." 

At the heart of things is a mournful regret for an irreversible action. "There are some changes that can never be undone, there are some tears that can never be unshed." You cannot walk back up the stairs...

...unless, you could. If you wanted to venture into that terrifying Unknown, Together.

Voice of the Contrarian She doesn't sound messy anymore, though. At least somebody here feels put together.

"They are stretched into a shape not unlike me, but it is a shape they cannot hold. […] They will make for a rich and vibrant heart."

"Make for" implies change, implies a process. She will make them into a good heart. None of them had names, but that is just fine to Her, because "names are their attempts to capture that which cannot be captured." Their sense of personhood has been destroyed, but to Her, "to destroy is merely to reshape. To remold."

And they think, in the end, they have become just that: a fragment of a concept, a part of Her, and not much else.

Stranger – Yes... we think. We're kind of like a shadow. Out there, every part of us is blended together into one huge idea, a big wave of unyielding change crashing against the world... – But in here, we're fractured. Small. Still a little more separate than we'd like to be, our instincts still trying to pull us in different directions.

Stranger – It's okay, no hard feelings. In a way, you helped us become a version of... her. But we weren't very good at it. A conversation with us then probably wouldn't have been very insightful. – That's probably why we were taken away. That's all we had to offer you, it was time to change again.

Through Her, they finally got to know themselves. They wanted, originally, to be pulled back apart — but now, they are instead put together. They rationalize it, and compartmentalize their prior distress, as something they needed to grow out of. Something they were taught not to fear, because it was their nature, and simply a part of who and what they were.

They were taken away to be changed. They intuit and guess at the Shifting Mound's intentions in a way no other Princess ever does, even the Heart. They do so as second nature, as if it comes naturally to them, and as if coming up with their own original thoughts outside of Her is a foreign and unfamiliar process.

[Strange Beginnings]

Stranger – […] We've seen so many threads of stories told between us, but this moment is... unexpected. Even when we've seen it all, you still manage to surprise us.

Stranger – We thought we could see everything, but this is outside of the script. – Are we missing a page?

There, "We" is inclusive to Shifty. Shifty believed She saw everything. And because of that, because Stranger could not see through any eyes but Hers, they thought the same.

[Intermission III]

The Entity – My perspectives are shadowed. You have seen what I have seen, just as I have seen what you have seen. The angles of my vantage do not offer me hidden truths […] – Perhaps this will change when our work is done.

[The End of Everything]

The Shifting Mound – It is from my vantage point that I can see the totality of truth.

•    [Address the Eye of the Needle's statement directly.] "We've both become better for what we've been through, haven't we?" The Shifting Mound – We have. Look at what we are now, and see how small we were then.

•    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "I'm sorry for what I did to you." The Shifting Mound – Don't be. Everything we've done has shaped who we are.

Shifty sees everything, so Stranger sees everything. Don't they? 

Shifty appreciates every step of the journey She's walked with you, and so, Stranger does too.

[Strange Beginnings]

Stranger – We know we must sound like her, but... it's how we feel. Everything that happened to us seems so important now. We walked a long and winding path together and we've cherished every second of it.

It's how they grew. 

Stranger – It's so tempting to speak as She would. To simply state that we're all of them, but that we're also something new. We don't know if you'll find that answer satisfying. – Perhaps you'd rather hear that we're the first version of her that you've met, but that we've been shaped by the experiences of all of the others. – Yes. That feels right to us.

Unlike the other two Hearts, Stranger does not say that they are the first version of themselves they met, nor do they take the title of "Princess" as a name. They refer to themselves as a "version of her, shaped by the experiences of all the others." In short, unlike every other iteration of the Princess, Stranger well and truly believes they and Her are one and the same. 

They were raised by Her. It was their childhood; She was their mother. 

[Intermission II]

The Entity – Is a child the same as an infant? I am an unbroken pattern, but every vessel gifts fresh perspectives and carves new avenues of expression. 'I' am different, but I am the same.

The Entity – Perspectives meld together, and the breadth of my experience stretches to new corners. There are contradictions, conflicts in my nature. And there are familiarities that bind everything together.

The Entity – With every gift you bring me, I excavate the alleys of what I am meant to be, and every exploration yields new and complicated truths.

[Intermission III]

The Entity – I am a growing chorus of contradiction. A mass of tides ebbing and flowing all at once in more directions than my attention can bear to hold. To look at any one is to shift them all into something new, and to look away is to reshape them yet again. – All of me is changing, and yet the rest of me is still the same.

They grew at the same rate, through the same experiences; holding everything at once, and then parsing through their internal worlds as one. Her beliefs became their beliefs, Her revelations became their revelations. 

The other two Hearts are distant from Her; detached, as it were, from what it is She represents. The "huge idea" every Princess is "blended into," that rising sea which shifts and reshapes the world. "She's this big unrelenting force, and there's no arguing with her," the Princess says harshly, but in the end she is still referring to the Mound as something other. "I think being her would mean I'd lose a lot of myself along the way," she says softly, and she would be correct. "She's seen everything, right? I don't think I could hold all of that without losing myself. I don't think you could, either."

In losing themselves, in losing 'the Princess,' the Stranger gains Her. They gain the perspective of the network at its peak, the connected and interwoven thoughts and the bustling city streets, the many voices ringing out in a chorus of contradiction. The Shifting Mound, the Ebb and Flow, the Capacity to Change. Transformation.

What else of Her silhouette do they take on as Her shadow? 

What fragments of Her do they reflect as Her mirror?... as Her rich and vibrant heart...

[The End of Everything]

The Shifting Mound – But the world doesn't need saving. We've moved it along for as long as it's existed.

The Shifting Mound – Then accept the world as it is now, with both of us a part of it.

The Shifting Mound – We are the whole of reality.

The Shifting Mound – There is no something else. This — what we are — is everything.

The Shifting Mound's Rich and Vibrant Heart – For a brief moment, both of us were everything. – We can be everything again. We can weave a beautiful and endless song. •    [Address the Stranger's statement directly.] "To be everything at once is the same as being nothing at all. Why would either of us want that?" The Shifting Mound – Here is where words fail us. So long as we both exist, we will always be distinct. The only thing to fear is a reality without me.

[Strange Beginnings]

Stranger – Even through everything, through all the worlds we've seen and experienced, through all the lives we've known and lost... we could never imagine a world without you and us. It doesn't feel possible.

•    (Explore) "I don't think I want to be a god." Stranger – But that's what you've always been. Even now. You can't put aside such an important part of who you are, and neither can we. – So... you might as well embrace it!

What beliefs of godhood and divinity were they indoctrinated into?

The Shifting Mound believes in the flow of reality, the order of things, the way things were and the way they will always be. She is the status quo, the universe as we know it. The Shifting Mound is a being of nature without compromise, a cosmic force with the divine confidence to back Her power up, and an utter unwillingness to yield. She speaks of the Long Quiet's alleged passivity and reactivity being "woven into their nature," and the choice the Echo gave them to "slay Her and bring about a world devoid of death and the possibility of meaning."

In reflection, Stranger is the only Heart to name the Echo for who He is. Stranger, when faced with a Quiet convicted in their choice to slay them, remarks "the Echo really got his hooks into you. Unless... you have your own reasons for wanting us dead?" To them, the Mound and the Echo are the patrons of a larger game; just as they were influenced by Her, they expect Quiet to be influenced by Him. And so, when their fragmented selves run as they were meant to, one with a choice and one with a role to play, they do not blame themselves or Quiet for it. Like Her, they tell Quiet not to apologize. They say, "we are what we are, and this is in your nature," reinforcing in their final words that they are not a 'who,' but instead a 'what.' A thing of nature.

[Strange Beginnings]

Stranger – We don't think we ever really forget, anyway. There's always something that draws us back together. Some buried memory that both of us treasure.

Stranger – When we first met each other in the Long Quiet, there was... something inside of us, something we couldn't recognize or understand. And we can't say we fully understand it now. – A warmth when we look at you, the kind you don't realize you're missing until it's come back. – Every time we hurt each other, every time something awful happened, it was still there. Undercutting the pain on the surface with a constant soothing glow. – That warmth is never going to go away. And that's why we believe in you.

[Intermission I]

The Entity – You are familiar, but you are not me. I feel sadness, longing, hope, as I witness you.

When Stranger says "when we first met each other in the Long Quiet," they are speaking from the Shifting Mound's perspective, not their own. They have wholly forgotten, in that moment, themselves and their own experiences in their own cabin as their own selves. She speaks through them as if they were no more than a miniature version of Her.

[Strange Beginnings]

Stranger – You'll be back here again, sooner than you think. And then we'll part ways again, and find each other, and part ways, and find each other. It's like we're never really alone. – Because even the time we spend apart is time spent chasing these moments of reunion. And they're all the sweeter for the isolation in between, don't you think?

The Stranger's dialogue, in considering the potential of the Loop Ending, is a direct reflection of the manner of the loop between the Chapters and Intermissions. It is the Shifting Mound's attitude towards your nature to find Her, time after time, in the Long Quiet and for Her to send you back and await your return. 

[Intermissions]

The Entity – I am not you, but I know that I would return before forever was finished. – … You'll always come back to the box, because you'll always want to know what it means to be you. I will be here waiting by your side until you're ready to return to mine.

The Entity – I see you have returned to me. Even millennia mean nothing in the maw of forever. I never left your side.

The Entity – I await your return, but it will give me time to reflect on what I am. – We will meet again.

The Entity – I will be here when it is time for us to meet again.

The Entity – The next time I see you, each of us will finally know what we are. – I will be here. Waiting for you.

The Shifting Mound – I can finally see you, and you can finally see me. – It's been so long, and my heart has ached for this moment. I've missed you dearly.

Deeper than that, however, is how those events reflect the Shifting Mound's considerations of your relationship to Her: its all-encompassing nature.

The Shifting Mound – Time you've spent away from me is still time spent in reference to me. Even then, both of us are more than our bodies. Am I not in the trees? Am I not in the cabin? Am I not in you?

The Shifting Mound – All things are connected through me and through you. To harm me is to harm yourself is to harm everything. The truth of that moment remains our truth.

The Shifting Mound's Empathetic Heart – You and I are bound together. To rid yourself of me would be to leave yourself forever incomplete. •    [Address the Princess and the Dragon's statement directly.] "Just because we're bound together doesn't mean I can't be whole without you." The Shifting Mound – Could you bear the risk of seeking that truth? What if you're wrong?

The Shifting Mound's Scarred and Beautiful Heart – You saw me as a part of you to be excised, but in that desire for excision, you made yourself whole. Will you still be whole if you destroy me?

The Shifting Mound's Wise Heart – You are the only thing like me, and I am the only thing like you. – Could you bear the weight of an eternity alone? Do you dare to shape a reality of solitude and thrust it on creation? •    [Address the Moment of Clarity's statement directly.] "If that is what it takes to rid the world of suffering, I could bear the solitude." The Shifting Mound – Your certainty is an illusion of passion and reflex. You won't know what solitude truly is unless you sentence yourself to it forever.

They say, with some degree of hesitance, "it's... almost comforting. To know we can keep meeting each other over and over again."

Seeing as comfort is demonized in Stranger's right stairs, wouldn't it be bad that Stranger sees Shifty as a source of "comfort," then? And wouldn't their mild character arc in Strange Beginnings, being surprised by you and recognizing they (and thus, She) do not know everything, be a victory?

•    (Explore) "What do you think of Her? What She wanted us to be." Stranger – We... don't know. We've seen through so many eyes, but all of them have been Hers. – We like you as you are. We like us as we are. Maybe we would have liked Her version of us, too, turning the wheel of a cosmic cycle together. But that's not the choice you made, even though She did everything in Her power to convince you. – It took courage for you to make your way down here, away from the paths others would have had you walk. We find that courage beautiful.

Stranger – We can feel the threads of all the stories we've told together, all pulling us back down the stairs and into those chains where we know the outcome of everything that could ever come to pass... – It's comfortable there. But it's... confining. We want more. We want whatever might be on the other side of this door. Something new, that we'll experience together. With someone who exists outside of us. – With someone who can see us in a way we can never see ourself.

For them to finally choose to live outside themself, outside of Her, explicitly? To make a statement of want for themselves, tenuous as their understanding might be?

They are still that mass of bodies crushed into one singularity against their will. They are still that system trying to work within the confines of their conflicting natures. They are still a system working through what of them doesn't fit, moving in what spaces they don't belong, and trying to find comfort in what is viscerally unnatural to what they choose to be. They are a stranger to us, but more than that, they are a stranger to themselves. But they want to know.

"Maybe," they say, "maybe they would have liked Her version of them, turning the wheel of a cosmic cycle together." It is comforting to them; they know everything there, She is right. They know the stories told in each and every Chapter and every permutation in their texts. But that comfort the Shifting Mound carries is something they reflect on and find "confining." She knows everything within the confines of the Construct, but She does not know everything. Her certainty is an illusion of passion and reflex. And that Construct is what binds them in chains.

What are the Vessels, to Shifty?

THE GIFT OF A FRAGILE VESSEL: A PERSPECTIVE

THE ENTITY - Something finds me in the Long Quiet and brings me the gift of a fragile vessel. [...] Nerves and fibres to feel the worlds beyond. Perspectives to make my own.

FRESH PERSPECTIVES, NEW AVENUES OF EXPRESSION

• (Explore) "Are you the same being as you were before? How much have you changed?" THE ENTITY - Is a child the same as an infant? I am an unbroken pattern, but every vessel gifts fresh perspectives and carves new avenues of expression. 'I' am different, but I am the same.

THE LIVES YOU'VE BROUGHT ME: SHORT, VIOLENT, FULL OF PASSION. IMPERMANENT FLICKERS.

THE ENTITY - Rhetorical. I am not rhetorical. I have only known these spaces, and I have known flickers of the lives you've brought me. Short and violent and full of passion. But all of these flickers end where The Long Quiet begins.

"DO NOT MOURN HER"

...she is part of something greater. ...she is exactly where she needs to be. ...she has served her purpose. etc.

To Shifty, the vessels are containers (bodies) for singular perspectives that She might make Her own. These vessels are fragile, and their lives are short. Each flicker of a life, inevitably, ends.

What are People, to Shifty?

A PERSON: A SINGULAR PERSPECTIVE

• (Explore) "I'm a person." THE ENTITY - A person. A set of eyes witnessing from one perspective. [...]

PEOPLE: IMPERMANENT, FRAIL THINGS TOO SMALL FOR US

[IF MOST ROUTES ENDED TRAPPED] • (Explore) "Do you think there are people out there?" THE ENTITY - It doesn't matter if there are. People are [IF SATISFIED: too small for us / IF NOT: frail and impermanent]. You and I are the only things that interest me.

"A WARMTH AND SADNESS IN ME AT THE THOUGHT OF PEOPLE"

[IF MOST ROUTES ENDED IN FREEDOM] • (Explore) "There's trees, and stars. And there are people, I think. At least there are supposed to be people." THE ENTITY - There is a warmth and sadness in me at the thought of people. Fresh tears on a winter's day. They are not like us. They do not last.

To Shifty, a person is a set of eyes able to witness from a singular perspective. People are frail, and their lives are impermanent and do not last.

What differentiates a person from a vessel?: The vessels are people; they meet every criteria. Shifty uses slightly different words, but regardless of Her personal attitude towards them and the dehumanizing connotations of Her language, the vessels, the Princesses, are still people. They are fragile/frail, their lives are impermanent/short, they both have singular perspectives. But there is a warmth and sadness in Shifty at the thought of people; a grief She may feel for the impermanence of their lives. People do not last, and She mourns them. The vessels do not need to be mourned; they do not deserve it. The vessels are people in all ways... except for the fact that Shifty refuses to see them as such. They are extensions of Her. No more. But they weren't always, no matter how She makes it sound.Read between the lines:

Perspectives She Makes Her Own, Into Parts of Herself; An Irreversible Change

PERSPECTIVES TO MAKE HER OWN

• (Explore) "The gift of a fragile vessel?" THE ENTITY - Yes. Nerves and fibres to feel the worlds beyond. Perspectives to make my own.

MAKING HER A PART OF YOURSELF, SOME CHANGES THAT CAN NEVER BE UNDONE

• (Explore) "Are you the Princess?" THE ENTITY - She is part of me, and part of me is her. • (Explore) "But were you always the Princess, or are you just making her a part of yourself?" THE ENTITY - You speak in circles. Does it matter where one things begins and another ends? • (Explore) "Let her out of there!" THE ENTITY - I'm sorry. There are some changes that can never be undone, there are some tears that can never be unshed. This is not a place that can hold a fragment of a concept. The moment she arrived here, she was going to return to me. THE ENTITY - I promise that it doesn't hurt.

BRING MORE PERSPECTIVES [VESSELS] SO I MAY BE WHOLE

THE ENTITY - There is no exit, but this vessel is a creature of perception. She can make you forget, if only you believe her to be able to. THE ENTITY - Bring me more perspectives, so that I may be whole, and perhaps then we will know our freedom.

SOMETHING SHAPED LIKE ME, SOMETHING EMPTY I CAN CRAWL INSIDE OF.

Resistance. Fingers drag claws across the glass surface of your soul. Frustration. 'This vessel is full of you. I need something empty I can crawl inside of. I need something shaped like me.'

These are perspectives that the Shifting Mound makes Her own. Note the active verb in these sentences; note how She refers to it as a "change" that can never be undone. It is not the vessel that is missing parts of itself, without Shifty. It is Shifty that is missing a part of Herself, without the vessel. The vessel is a whole and independent entity; in fact, Shifty though Shifty claims "the moment she arrived here [in the Long Quiet], she was going to return to me," Oblivion proves that vessels can be lost to the Shifting Mound. It's possible to not incorporate them. What becomes of the vessels, lost in the textured folds of the nothingness of the Long Quiet, is uncertain and unknown. But they are certainly independent. And those independent Princesses will remain independent until Shifty claims them. And then... they are changed. Their perspective consumed. Emptied out. Crawled inside of.

PERSPECTIVES I HAVE ALREADY MADE MY OWN; VALUE: USELESS

• (Explore) "When I go back, it's as if an invisible wall closes around me. Why can I not do the same things I've done before?" THE ENTITY - Those paths lead to worlds you've already seen, and to perspectives I have already made my own. They are useless to us now. Inaccessible. The only paths of value are those that are yet untread.

USELESS IF IT DOESN'T BRING NEW GIFTS.

Confusion. 'Why are you here? I am unfinished.' Resistance. Fingers drag claws across the glass surface of your soul. Frustration. 'This vessel is full of you. It is useless to us if it doesn't bring more gifts.'

Shifty does not value the perspectives She has already subsumed. Their purpose is to be taken in as a singular gift and never re-visited or lingered upon. Shifty sees no value in retreading a path, even if it could very well lead into a new outcome. No. It is useless. She makes it inaccessible. She regards the concept, interpretating from the sharply negative connotation of Her dialogue, with some level of frustration, possibly even apathy or disinterest or distain.

"SHE HAS SERVED HER PURPOSE" "SHE IS EXACTLY WHERE SHE NEEDS TO BE" "SHE ASKS THAT I TELL YOU TO REMEMBER HER" "NOT REALIZING THAT WE ARE ONE"

• (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Damsel]?" THE ENTITY - This one is soft and delicate. You molded her to love you, and she'll make for a gentle heart. Do not mourn her. She has served her purpose. • (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Deconstructed Damsel]?" THE ENTITY - This one is a reflecting pool of desire unfulfilled. She will make for a pliant heart. Do not mourn her. She has served her purpose.

Shifty has many things to say about her vessels, the vast majority of them being poetic, even sympathetic to the Princess' life story. But Damsel, the Princess that suffers the least and experiences the last pain in her journey towards freedom, who has the greatest capacity for joy and pleasure and simple comfort... is not given that same love. The Entity describes Damsel like an object, one She is apathetic to and doesn't care even remotely to see through the eyes of. Damsel has a unique perspective. It's a life without pain. With minimal conflict. With a promise of future happiness. Shifty wants, breathes, needs conflict. So much of Her, in the End of Everything, is defined by Her complete belief that conflict, struggle, and pain are what grant life meaning. That Her trauma and Her responses to that trauma define who She is. Damsel, to Shifty, is something that has yet to be textured; something blank, blind optimism making for a bland and boring existence. It serves its purpose. She cares for it little beyond that.

• (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Prisoner]?" THE ENTITY - This one is determined, but also cautious, one that would rather let the world move around her than move it herself. She will make for a patient heart. Do not mourn her --- she is exactly where she needs to be. • (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Razor]?" THE ENTITY - This one is single-minded edge. She is cruelty. But she is also joy. She will make for a piercing heart. Do not mourn her --- she is exactly where she needs to be. • (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Moment of Clarity]?" THE ENTITY - This one is a waiting maw. An inevitable destination where all roads end. She will make for a wise heart. Do not mourn her --- she is exactly where she needs to be.

Commonalities between these three Princesses is a certain unhealthy degree of detachment. Prisoner sits in silence in the cabin's basement for an eternity, seeming not to think of act at all, simply dissociating through the passing of an age as she waits for the barriers around her to crumble, erode, and fall. The Moment of Clarity takes a more active approach against a more humanized jailor, tormenting them ceaselessly until their will is broken by the force of the trauma and stolen away by her---the both of them shattered by the experience, and Quiet rendered no more than an object or tool. The Razor also tortures Quiet ceaselessly, turning them into gorey ribbons again and again until each life bleeds into death bleeds into life and back again as they feel every inch of burning pain that slices its way through their body---the Razor rendered no more than an object or weapon, and Quiet her target of choice. In each of these instances, both Quiet and The Princess are stuck together in the basement with no truly meaningful interactions while the reality around them erodes. A single-minded edge of cruelty and joy, a waiting maw where all things inevitably end, and a will the world will move to. These are aspects of patience and wisdom by the Shifting Mound's perspective. Exactly where they need to be.

THE ENTITY - She asks that I tell you to remember her. THE ENTITY - You won't.

• (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Adversary]?" THE ENTITY - This one yearns to grow and struggle. Even now I feel a will pushing against mine, not realizing that we are one. She will make for a bold heart. THE ENTITY - Do not mourn her. We will provide her with the growth she fought for.

"NO," SAYS APOTHEOSIS

APOTHEOSIS - After everything I cast aside on my path to ascension... What remnant of the old could possibly be left to defy me? You look down. At the Princess' feet writhes a shifting mound, a mass of hands clambering over each other, crawling their way up her body. They start to pull. Apotheosis - NO! The mound becomes a sea, and the Princess struggles to stay afloat, to keep the two of you close to the hole in the world and the light of the something beautiful beyond. But she is drowning. As the sea rises, she pulls you from her shoulder and holds you above the tide. You turn back to look at her. APOTHEOSIS - I think... this is the end. I can feel every part of me freezing over. Hands reach over hands, pulling at her face. Dragging her down into their frigid depths. She is tired, and life fades from her eyes. THE ENTITY - Do not mourn her, for she has finally found her light.

"I DON'T WANT TO BE HERE," SAYS THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE

THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE - What is this place? Where are we? This... doesn't feel right... THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE - This is just another place. I don't care about places! I only care about you! Is this what you wanted? For me to see this? Fine then! I've seen it! Are you finally going to come back? Are we finally going to fight? THE NARRATOR - She readies her powerful legs to charge you, but then... she slumps. THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE - But... I don't feel like fighting anymore. I'm... cold. It feels like this is where I'm supposed to be, like stepping out of that door was some driving purpose I've long forgotten, but I don't want to be here. I don't want to be here! THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE - I'm so... confused. THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE - I'm sorry. It's cold. THE ENTITY - Do not mourn her. She has finally remembered what she thought she'd lost.

"SHE IS ONLY A VOICE"

• (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Beast/Den]?" THE ENTITY - This one is consumed by instinct. [...] She wishes me to devour you. To make you a part of myself. But she is only a voice. Do not mourn her, for she is part of something greater.

"CONVINCED HERSELF SHE WAS ONLY A SET OF EYES [...] SHE IS NOW WHAT SHE WISHED THAT SHE COULD BE."

• (Explore) "What are your thoughts on this vessel [Cage]?" THE ENTITY - This one is a body that convinced herself she was only a set of eyes. She will make for a watchful heart. Do not mourn her. She is now what she wished that she could be.

Note: The Shifting Mound pretends the vessels are mere objects, nothing worthy of note or care or mourning. She claims they are only perspectives, only thoughts or feelings, things that inform Her being but are ultimately beneath Her in all ways. But this is not the case. The vessels, all of them, are all people; and there is no one lone perspective granted superiority over the rest. It is clear, from how Shifty's attitudes change depending on the Princesses' overall satisfaction, that they do influence Her. It is clear that they, even after being subsumed, must retain some degree of independence and autonomy. The first vessel begs Her to tell us to remember her---to mourn her! Both Apotheosis and The Eye of the Needle fight against Shifty, either physically struggling not to drown in Her Tides as Apotheosis does or mentally struggling against the eldritch desires of Her Cold as Needle does. "No," they say, "I do not want to be here." Adversary's will continues to fight and struggle against Shifty. It is not that she doesn't realize that she and Shifty are now one; it's that she refuses to believe that she and Shifty are one. She wishes to be whole on her own. She wishes to grow on her own. To be autonomous and alive; and the Cold of the Multitudes' Seas are not alive in the way Adversary fought for. Beast and Den are hungry, still, and their desires rise from the multitudes enough to influence Shifty; to voice the desire to "make Quiet a part of Herself," the same way She "made [the vessels] Her own," and for those voices to be so strong that Shifty is compelled to comment on them. They are NOT "only a set of eyes." They are people. That is just what Shifty prefers to value them as.

What Does It Feel Like?

"PERSPECTIVES MELD TOGETHER; IT FEELS CORRECT"

• (Explore) "What does it feel like to change like this?" THE ENTITY - [...] Perspectives meld together, and the breadth of my experience stretches to new corners. There are contradictions, conflicts in my nature. And there are familiarities that bind everything together. THE ENTITY - It feels correct. This is what I need to be. This is the only path forward.

"THEY ARE NOT ME; THEY INFORM MY BEING. WITHOUT THEM, I WOULD BE AS I WAS BEFORE. I CANNOT BE AS I WAS BEFORE."

• (Explore) "I don't want to hurt you, but the more times I go back, the worse I fear things will be." [IF PRINCESSES ARE DISSATISFIED] THE ENTITY - There is a hurt that dwells in them, but they are not me. They are thoughts and perspectives. They are feelings that inform my being. [Continued response.] THE ENTITY - The wounds they've suffered carve texture around my heart. Without them, I would be as I was before. THE ENTITY - I cannot be as I was before. There are new spaces that I must fill.

SHIFT AND RESHAPE, CHANGING AND "THE SAME"

THE ENTITY - I am a growing chorus of contradiction. A mass of tides ebbing and flowing at all once in more directions than my attention can bear to hold. To look at any one is to shift them all into something new, and to look away is to reshape them yet again. THE ENTITY - All of me is changing, and yet the rest of me is still the same.

MULTITUDES ENDLESSLY COMPETE WITH THEMSELVES

• (Explore) "Have you figured out what you'll want when we've finished?" THE ENTITY - The desires of my multitude thrive in endless competition with themselves, but none of them rise above their dance to influence me. [...]

QUIET THOUGHTS, EMPTY MINDS, CONSTANTLY SHIFTING INTO SOMETHING NEW

• (Explore) "When you send me back, I'm not alone. There are voices that speak to me. Some of them are me, but one of them is something else. I call him The Narrator, and He wants me to kill you. Do you have a Narrator? Have the vessels had one?" THE ENTITY - No. [IF FREED: Their thoughts are quiet. / IF NOT: Their minds are empty, but constantly shifting into something new.] Do you think your Narrator lives in the spaces beyond?

Strip the language of its poetry and metaphor and look at this eldritch, cosmic horror for what it is from the mortal perspective. From the perspective of vessels that believed themselves to be individuals, believed themselves to be mortal, and believed themselves to be people. A single set of eyes witnessing from one perspective, each. Individual women with a common, shared origin go through a horror story of their own. They change, they transform, often in ways they do not understand and sometimes in ways they detest, but in a way they must wholly identify with. Who they are is different than who they were, but all of them ultimately come out the other side still believing in themselves and their identity and the title of "Princess." Some of those stories' endings are happy, are tragic, do not feel like endings at all but instead new beginnings. And then they are claimed. Claimed by something beyond them, something they cannot understand. Something they are most often terrified by, in the brief moments before their consumption. Something that makes them feel cold, that freezes them over and steals their lives away... and takes them for its own. Their perspectives. Their souls. Their bodies. Used and puppeteered like dolls. The traumas they experienced in their lives stolen and claimed by something that was never there, that can only ever see through their eyes at best in second-hand. The core of their being used for texture, context, sensation, decoration, flavor for another's existence. And each of those women is stripped of their names. Their titles, because they never really had a name. Dehumanized into vessels, then into merely emotions and thoughts and perspectives. And those perspectives are blended together into one great mass, a multitude converging into one great big idea, trillions of drops of water losing their individual forms to become merely part of a larger Ocean. A sea whose tides converge, push, ebb and flow against each other and change so vastly that they cannot be comprehended. The Sea continues to expand, to grasp and pull in more and more perspective, gravity increasing with each new mass added to the Mound. The multitudes, each and every part of it, is sentient. They are awake. They are aware. They are not themselves. But they retain just enough to have memory of who they used to be. To hold desires that clash against other members of the network. For those so-called "empty" minds to have allegedly "quiet" thoughts. To continue, somehow, to influence this great Ocean that consumed them. If they're strong enough, that influence is great enough to be noticed and commented on---but never fully recognized. They are not Her. She simply made them a part of Herself.

The Nature of Infinity Is That Choices Are Lies We Tell Ourselves

OUR CHOICE IN VESSELS CARRIES MORE MEANING THAN WORDS

• (Explore) "Everything you say feels like a riddle. Can you give me a single straight answer?" THE ENTITY - I'm sorry. Words are... difficult for me. They never fully weave what I wish to say. If you do not like my answers, then you need not ask me questions. THE ENTITY - The vessels you choose to bring me carry far more meaning than anything words could say in the spaces between.

GRAVITY WILL PULL THE OTHERS BACK TO ME

• (Explore) "How many more vessels do I need to bring you?" THE ENTITY - One. Whatever you bring me next will be enough, and then gravity will pull the others back to me. I will be singular. A final multitude.

The Shifting Mound is consumed with Her own ego. She believes She is the very embodiment of the potential for meaning. She believes She is everything, everything that matters in the world. She believes, through Her awakening, She has not found Herself or Her unique perspective, but an objective and universal truth. Not Her truth, but the truth. She believes She is the only one with these answers, the only one who understands, and — through the swirling gravity of Her ego, as dense as a black hole — the only truth in the world.

She believes She is the Long Quiet's only salvation. She believes the Long Quiet, in the absence of Her, is inherently meaningless. That a world without Her would be only suffering. Thus, the Long Quiet is meaningless alone. And yet, paradoxically, this whole time She has needed them, hasn't She?

•    [Reject Her perspective.] "You reject the suffering of material reality, and yet you cling to its framework for meaning. We can be better than this." The Shifting Mound – I reject the narrow view of impermanence. I cling to nothing. There is no better us for us to be than us. We are reality itself. – [...] There has never been finality, there is only the unending transformation of my multitudes. But to destroy me is to bring everything to a stop. It is only then that you will have an ending, and that ending is nothingness.

She claims She clings to nothing, that "there is only the unending transformation multitudes," collapsing all of reality in on Herself. Valuing only Herself, and only Her vessels, and only the abstract concepts which She embodies. But that cannot be right, can it? She must still care for Her other half. She must value the Long Quiet, right? Not only in relation to and as an extension of Her, but for who they uniquely are.

And yet, what does She value in them?

Throughout this journey, She claims, "you are what brings me meaning" [Intermission III]. And, in Her softer moments, She does appear to value the Long Quiet as separate from Her in some capacity. It is rare. She often only contextualizes them within Herself. She dismisses their own answer defining themself to substitute "I think that you are more like me than you are like a person, we are..." [Intermission I]. She only grows more and more certain of this assertion over time. "You are like me, even if you have chosen not to look at the corners of you that do not fit" [Intermission III], She says. But it is not impossible, for Her, to imply She also values their independence from Her. 

She says, "it's nice to be with someone whose thoughts I can never know as mine" [Intermission IV]. She can be frustrated by this. She does not often ask the Long Quiet questions, even if they are more than capable of asking Her many, and when She does — besides the Intermission I question, which was rhetorical — She does it explicitly because "I cannot know your mind." In doing so, She acknowledges the potential that they have seen beyond what She has seen. Not only that, but She considers the things they have seen beyond Her to be valuable, even meaningful, something She is "curious to know." And, most critically, She says "I would never dare to tarnish our relationship by assuming myself above you" [Intermission III].

And yet, even then, there are fractures in Her relationship to them. Beyond the aforementioned tendency of Hers to only view them in relation to Her, She also has a foreboding line in Intermission III, a prophecy set to become true at Her awakening. She says, earnestly, "the angles of my vantage do not offer me hidden truths," much unlike Herself post-awakening who outright claims "it is from my vantage that I can see the totality of truth!" Was it something that changed? Was it Her awakening which consumed Her? Or was the truth staring us in the face the whole time, with Her amending by the end of that line, "perhaps this will change when our work is done." And with Her admission, "my attention is turned inward, except when you are here with me."

The core of Her character is Her preoccupation with Herself. When satisfied, She extends Her curiosities to you, but when dissatisfied, She turns inward. "My awakening" becomes "our awakening," but it is still based on Her. And therein lies one of the fundamental facts of Her character and development which damns Her and Her relationship to the Long Quiet: that inward preoccupation.

"You are what brings me meaning," as a line, does not ascribe "meaning" to "you," grammatically speaking. "Meaning" is an item that is brought, separate from "you." And, within the context of Her other dialogue, it is clear it is not the Long Quiet which She values in that arrangement. It is their "gifts," the "vessels," the Princesses which She finds meaningful; "shaped by memories of you [the Long Quiet]," but still only by extension, and not for them as they are.

She says, "the vessels you choose to bring me carry far more meaning than anything words could say in the spaces between" [Intermissions]. Dismissing Her conversations with them, as equals, in favor of the figurative conversation between them and an idea of Her. She does not value the time taken in the Spaces Between. The Decider is predisposed to wait and linger there, be it for the peace it offers them in their often tumultuous existence, or for the Entity Herself and the company they may provide each other, or for another considered reason entirely. But the Shifting Mound only wishes to escape the endless walls of the Long Quiet. The space She wishes to escape is the same as the person She sends away in search of an exit. 

Her relationship to the Long Quiet is purely transactional. She does not value words, and so She does not exchange them. She values their gifts only; in denying to acknowledge their remorse or their anger, she fails to value the personhood She denied in their first meeting. She values "the brilliant contours of [their] soul" [Intermission III] but doesn't speak on it the same way She speaks of Herself, through elaborate metaphor and flowery pretention. They may ask Her for Her thoughts on each vessel, but She never considers to ask them the same. She says, "this vessel is full of you. It [you] is useless to us if it doesn't bring more gifts" [Oblivion – Denial]. She says, "I need vessels so that I can be finished. I cannot find them on my own, for they are me. You are the only one who can do this" [Oblivion – Bargaining]. Valuing them, then, not as a partner, not as an equal, but a tool. The metaphysical nature of which is to be no more than an extension of Her will.

The Shifting Mound – Nothing is immutable. Everything that is exists only in relation to everything it isn't. – There is no constant. There is no center.

Through Her "enlightenment," She has isolated Herself. Through Her perspective which places Her above it all, peaceful and eternal, She has also created an unfathomable distance between Herself and those who She reigns above.

She refuses to see the Long Quiet for what they are. She can only see Herself, for that is all She's spent this time well and truly considering. She focuses so deeply on the abstract concept of Transformation which She embodies that She denies anything that we, as readers and players, could ever consider the Long Quiet to be. If "there is no constant, there is no center," then what is the Long Quiet? The other half of reality, besides Herself, what are they?

Apparently, to Her: meaningless.

•    [Address the Adversary's statement directly.] "It was meaningless. Neither of us could ever truly win." The Shifting Mound – So bleakly nihilistic. Is death the end, or is it the birth of something new? If you cannot find meaning in living, how will you find meaning if you strip me from existence?

•    [Address the Eye of the Needle's statement directly.] "Can meaning not exist in the absence of cruelty and pain?" The Shifting Mound – To lose me is to remain the same. What meaning can be taken from a single moment frozen in time?

The Shifting Mound's Ravenous Heart – You are devoured, prey for something bigger than you that stalks and slinks in shadows. – But we had a dance unfinished, and in the pitch black maw of the earth you buried me, and I buried you. – But even held by root and stone, we continued our step, until finally we could step no longer. – A sharp pause. A dull silence. A climax, but not a finale. – The dance is our only salvation. Without me, you would have starved forever. •    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "But without you, I never would have starved to begin with." The Shifting Mound – Without me to move things forward, everything would crystalize into misery. Without me, every moment would be unending.

The Shifting Mound's Patient Heart – To question everything is to deny the truth in front of you. By believing in your suffering, you make your suffering real. By believing in your limitations, you placed a shackle on your neck. – Bound for eternity, you saw the need for impermanence, and it was through that need that you carved our freedom. – Without impermanence the suffering of living things is infinite. – Would you strip my gifts away and leave everyone to suffer in the dark? •    [Address the Prisoner's statement directly.] "They'll get over it. They'll see your end as a gift in time." The Shifting Mound – Or, in time, would they see it as a curse?

The Shifting Mound's Honest Heart – A picture of a life in a picture of a life in a picture of a life. How deep must repetition still our movements until even the air we breathe is stale? – You doused the flames of false devotion, and in my despair you lifted my chin, and the two of us danced beneath the stars. – But the stars can't be seen unless the flames go out and the walls come crashing down. Can you not do for all things what you did for us?

•    [Address the Prisoner's statement directly.] "That would be torture." The Shifting Mound – It would. Our purpose is to be and to experience, and their purpose is the same. To be permanent is to cease. To be paused is to be trapped.

•    [Address Happily Ever After's statement directly.] "I'd never want to hold the world still. It needs you." The Shifting Mound – Then you're starting to wake up. Leave with me, when the time comes, and we can dance forever.

•    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "Would you have us fight forever?" The Shifting Mound – I would have you realize that what you decry as suffering is beauty. But even as you stir to wakefulness, you cling to mortality that was never yours.

The Shifting Mound claims the Long Quiet "clings" to mortality, just as the Long Quiet would claim the Shifting Mound "clings" to the suffering of material reality for the meaning Her tides now seek to drown them in. But the Shifting Mound does not view the mortal perspective as meaningful, nor does She see it as valuable. Allegedly, the only thing the Long Quiet holds onto are "suffering" and "limitations." She views the idea of permanence and pause, intermission and respite, spaces between and quiet moments... everything She says which could be interpreted as implicative to the Long Quiet's nature, She only frames in language of entrapment. For if the Long Quiet is not the tool which grants Her meaning, they are no more to Her than the cage of the Construct. A delusion cast by fear, and no more. For the Construct is made of the Long Quiet's form; in order for Her to escape, by the very nature of things, She must break them.

The Shifting Mound – The Echo was deluded. A world without me would be an eternal hell.

Everything She seeks to break in them was put into place by Him. In Her eyes, She only relieves them of the delusion of their imposed mortality and the burden of their sense of responsibility. She only frees them from the final shackles the Echo placed on them both.

[Your New World]

TRUTH – Your consciousness sits at the center of the Long Quiet. At the center of yourself. With nothing left to distract you, you can finally feel its edges. The artificial constraints put in place by a lesser thing that could never hope to understand you, where the infinite folds into itself endlessly. – The Construct.

 [Intermission V – Echo Confrontation]

•    (Explore) "'I don't work the way a living being does? Not anymore?!' Am I not a living being?" The Narrator – You never were. You are the Long Quiet, the god I made to rid the world of death. For a time, this construct could help you approximate being alive — confining your mind to a single reality. But you've experienced far too many lives for it to work much longer.

•    (Explore) "Do you have anything to say for yourself? For all of this hubris?" The Narrator – I do. The people out there are real. No matter what you do to them, no matter what you enable, I want you to remember that.

But this is so much more than what She sees in it. For in giving the Long Quiet the gift of limitation, the Narrator also allowed the Long Quiet to open up to a perspective they would have never had access to otherwise. Unlike the Shifting Mound, who sees each experience in the Construct as a "fragment of a concept," the Long Quiet views each of them as "one of my past lives." They view the world through the vulnerable sensibilities of a living thing; even when they have grown beyond that, that is still a part of them through the immutability of their past. And it is that understanding, and the Narrator's final words to them, which allow them to open themselves up past divinity into something more empathetic, more sincere, and emotionally closer to the world that they contain and walk within.

The Shifting Mound's Clever Heart – To question everything is to deny the truth in front of you. To live alone within the caverns of your mind is to trap yourself in them forever. […] – Would you stop our journey now that you've seen its beginning? What of those in the worlds beyond? Would you erase their paths to stop them from going astray? •    [Address the Prisoner's statement directly.] "What does the path matter if it always ends?" The Shifting Mound – The path only ends when it becomes a new beginning. To see those seams as finality is to pass over them with closed eyes.

The Shifting Mound's Bright Heart – I kill you. You kill me. Back and forth we go, faster and faster and faster. I kill you. You kill me. – Hollow eyes watch from the dry corners of a memory. A home built on all the futures that were supposed to be, preserved until the moment of reunion. The fire of the heart sets it all ablaze. – I kill you and me. – An ending is a passion that can only be expressed with a moment in time. It is a seed for a new beginning. To linger on an ending is to rob it of its life. – And without me, all that's left to do is linger. •    [Address the Grey's statement directly.] "I'm okay lingering." The Shifting Mound – To linger too long is to become worse than when you started. Would you rob yourself of all context to remain trapped in a single moment?

It is through their genuine empathy that their conflict with the Shifting Mound festers. They simply see something She cannot. She sees everything, all the potential to ever have been and that will ever be. And they see only what they have selected. They see their own decisions, in their own life. To Her, it is subtraction; erasure.

They are the only voice through which the plight of mortals has left to speak. And it is a voice She refuses to listen to.

"The Echo saw horrors because his eyes were closed. The majesty of being extends beyond any single perspective.

"Their suffering is born of their own delusion.

"Death is a fantasy. Only those who lack perspective see it as anything other than transformation. You cannot destroy me."

Because She is beyond it. "Why would [she] stoop to [their] level when [She] is offering [them] ascension to [Hers]?" (And so their relationship is tarnished.) 

•    [Address the Spectre's statement directly.] "I was glad to end us together." The Shifting Mound – And the thread of that ending wove itself into yet another experience, which wove itself into yet another.

•    (Explore) "What do you think happens if we leave here?" The Shifting Mound – This universe dies, and a new one is born. And that one dies. And a new one is born. And you and I get to witness it all, weaving a tapestry of life wherever we go.

 [in the context of Den]

The Shifting Mound – I am but the illusion of destruction. People fear that death is their true end, because they cannot fathom new beginnings. It is empathy to accept me.

She cannot comprehend the finality of death, for She has not died, She cannot die. She cannot grasp the abject horror of dying. And the Long Quiet has brushed against the idea of mortality, but it is only through the Echo that they truly learned what it means for someone to be lost.

The Shifting Mound's Weathered Heart – What is a person? Is it their body? Is it all of their body? Pluck the eyes, peel the skin, strip the tendons, mince the meat, grind the bones. When it is all gone, do you still have who you started with? – A person is not a body. Death is a transformation into something new. It is only bodies that fear it. •    [Address the Fury's statement directly.] "I am not my body, but perhaps others are theirs." The Shifting Mound – And yet bodies change and consciousness goes on. The infant's body is not the child's is not the adult's, but the thread of existence remains strung through it all.

•    [Address the Beast's statement directly.] "You cannot use eating me to prove that you're right." The Shifting Mound – You still cling to the horror of dying bodies that rot worlds apart from us. How many more vessels would you need to lose before you realize their irrelevance?

•    [Address the Fury's statement directly.] "I am not my body, but I feel my body suffer." The Shifting Mound – Do you suffer now? Let go of what you think yourself to be, and exist.

The Shifting Mound's Driven Heart – Flesh is a vehicle, and to destroy the flesh is to strand the spirit. With violence, you stranded me, and with violence, I sought to twist your flesh back into mine. – You did not resist my violence when it overcame you. Did you understand that the flesh wasn't you, or did you choose to gift yourself to someone who thought she hated you? – To fear me is to fear losing the flesh, but the flesh is not the spirit. •    [Address the Wraith's statement directly.] "I helped you out of fear, and I'm not afraid of you anymore. That is why I resist you now." The Shifting Mound – And yet there is no reason to resist me beyond fear and delusion. If you aren't afraid of me, why would you resist me? Why would you force the rest of the world to resist me, too?

The Shifting Mound's Tender Heart – Fear is what pretends to protect us from loss. To fear death 'protects' from losing a body. To fear ruin 'protects' from losing status. To fear rejection 'protects' from being known. – But losing a body is contained within having a body. Losing status is contained within having status. Being known is contained within being conscious. – It is the nature of all things to transform. To go from known to hidden to known again. – But when the ceaseless impermanence of all things strips away the finality of endings, what remains of fear? Is it a shelter protecting you from itself? Or is it a shelter protecting itself from you? – You took fear by the hand and walked with it into the unknown, and through that, you feared nothing.

The Shifting Mound's Open Heart – Fear is a chain around the neck and a needle in the eye. […] – Without fear, suffering ceases to be. Without fear, death dissolves. Without fear, we are free to choose beauty. – This construct is a machine of fear. It has no place in our divine hearts. Shatter it. Leave with me. •    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "You speak as if I chose to follow you. You ripped my head from my body and made me watch us kill each other." The Shifting Mound – You walked the path that took you there, and just like all paths, it did not last forever. Did you not value the time we spent together?

•    [Address the Nightmare's statement directly.] "That wasn't a rejection of fear. You broke me to your will." The Shifting Mound – Were you afraid when you stepped through that door, or were you enticed by what might come next? By what might lie beyond fear? By what you might become? – You say I broke you, but was that curiosity not freedom of its own?

•    [Address the Wraith's statement directly.] "I fear you now more than ever." The Shifting Mound – You have no reason to fear me. There would be no dance if we weren't equals. And are we not dancing now?

•    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "But I don't want to dance." The Shifting Mound – That, too, is part of the dance. Would you rob yourself of the ability to choose?

•    [Address the Wraith's statement directly.] "You didn't give me much choice." The Shifting Mound – And yet still, you chose. To be capable of change is to be capable of choice.

•    [Address the Nightmare's statement directly.] "Even if I'm not afraid now, the fear of others is real. We can't uphold the harm that everyone suffers just because we're beyond it." The Shifting Mound – Others cling to fear because they have not yet seen beyond it. Will you strip the world of possibility just because some refuse to see its beauty?

•    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "Death is more than fear. It is reality. Just because we can reject it, does not mean the world is free of it." The Shifting Mound – Their prisons are their own, and should we not give them the ability to find their freedom? If we can free ourselves, the world can certainly follow suit.

The Shifting Mound is only a mess of contradictions when you believe that She is offering the Long Quiet a choice in the matter of Her Ascension, and Her dragging them with Her. It is only when you believe She sees them as more than an extension of Her, wrought with delusion and in need of correction towards Her perspective, that it seems paradoxical for Her to both claim "there is no such thing as non-engagement" and "there would be no dance if we were not equals, and are we not dancing now?" and "would you rob yourself of the ability to choose?" simultaneously. 

"In your defiance, I have already won," She says.

•    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "I still defy you now." The Shifting Mound – But in your defiance I have already won. There is no power without resistance. Our actions feed each other into something greater.

And it all clicks together.

She has no rebuttal to the fact that Cage "ripped my head from my body and made me watch us kill each other" because in so many words, that is precisely what She's doing now. She wants nothing more than to separate them from their body once again. They cling to it, and She wishes to "break their hold." It is Her every argument. It is Her every word.

The Shifting Mound's Overwhelming Heart – You are nothing. A black hole of self-loathing fed by the matter of your restless thoughts. A dog blind to its leash. But there is no light without the dark. – When I proclaimed my godhood and offered you a place at my side, you gladly became the instrument of my new creation. – Only with both of us is there a future to look towards. It is hope that carves meaning into being. •    [Address the Tower's statement directly.] "You were consumed by your own ego." The Shifting Mound – And through your lack of one, you, too, were consumed. Yet together we were able to create something beautiful.

At least She's internally consistent.

"I AM THE THREAD THAT WEAVES NOTHING INTO SOMETHING."

WAITING

Note: if you (Explore) a wait option at all, regardless of if you select [Wait forever] and hear the Sleeping Mound's monologue on the topic, you can never wait again. The (Explore) option simply disappears. You can only think about waiting in an Intermission once per playthrough. Presumably, if protagonist character motives are to be considered at all, after the first time, the Long Quiet must not consider it a worthwhile option. Whether that be because of the Sleeping Mound's discouragements, or the nature of the options you have available to select after choosing to wait, or because the act of waiting did not prove to bear the fruit they thought it would... ultimately, after waiting with Shifty in an Intermission just once, Quiet never tries to do so again.

INTERMISSION I

• (Explore) "And what if I don't let you do this to me?" THE ENTITY - Then we will be here forever, as we are now. Unfinished, dry, hollow. • "I'm not going back." [Wait.] THE ENTITY - If you need time, then I'll wait with you. • [Wait forever.] • "Okay. I'm ready. Make me forget."

INTERMISSION II

• (Explore) "And what if I don't want to bring you any more vessels? What if I just wait here forever?" THE ENTITY - Then we will remain here as we are now. Barely finished, damp, cavernous. • [Wait.] • [You have no need to wait.] THE ENTITY - If you need time, then I'll wait with you. • [Wait forever.] • [There is no waiting forever.]

INTERMISSION III

• (Explore) "I don't want to go back anymore. I just want to stay here. Forever if I have to." THE ENTITY - If you need time, then I will wait with you. • [Continue to wait. Forever.] • [There is no waiting forever.]

INTERMISSION IV

• (Explore) "If this is the last stage before your completion, then I'm not going back. I'm just going to stay here. Forever, if I have to." THE ENTITY - You have already chosen to walk along this path, and we both know you will see to its completion. But if you need more time, then I will wait with you. • [Wait forever.] • [There is no waiting forever.]

WAIT FOREVER

THE ENTITY - You are as I am now, and forever is a long time to remain undone. THE ENTITY - I am not you, but I know that I would return before forever was finished. THE ENTITY - What textures will you weave for yourself to occupy forever? Will you place the images of 'you' and 'I' into a box for safekeeping? THE ENTITY - If you close that box, will you become another you in another world? An imaginary pattern repeating itself until it can no longer bear the weight of its hand-drawn cage. THE ENTITY - You'll always come back to the box, because you'll always want to know what it means to be you. I will be here waiting by your side until you're ready to return to mine. • Continue. THE ENTITY - I see you have returned to me. Days mean nothing in the maw of forever. I never left your side.

How ironic that the Shifting Mound refers to us not playing the game and returning to your real lives as running away to an imaginary one, seeing as she is the fictional character in a "hand drawn cage." She's also saying that eventually the player is going to want to know what happens next, and continue playing the game. Wishing to know what it means to be themselves... and implying only She has the answer. "I will be here waiting by your side until you're ready to return to mine," She says. Sweet and ominous all at once. Not even closing the game can save you from the Shifting Mound. She will never leave your side, no matter how you strive to detach yourself from Hers. She's dead certain you will return to Her; and when you do, She is warm and comforting and gentle. She "never left your side." This goddess has absolutely no concept of boundaries of any kind. Not physical boundaries, not emotional boundaries, none. Not even metafictional boundaries!~

[ATTACK THE ENTITY.]

• [Attack the Entity.] Your will cuts across the entity in front of you, but nothing happens. THE ENTITY - My roots burrow in an ocean beyond your sight. We cannot harm each other as we are now.

Where is this "ocean beyond my sight" where your roots burrow to, Shifty. Does the Construct, the Long Quiet, not contain all of you at all times?

"We cannot harm each other as we are now," apparently, does not include killing the Long Quiet. After all, every Intermission ends with "Everything does dark, and you die" as Quiet's final narration before the Chapter I title card... alongside the sound of shattering glass. The Long Quiet has a glass motif. The Narrator/Echo is either The Mirror itself or the grime on top of the Mirror that cannot be wiped away until the current route ends and the Echo fades. In Oblivion, the narration describes "the glass surface of [Quiet's] soul" and the Construct, AKA Quiet's divine body, is described as "the glass of the Construct," too. That shattering sound is the Long Quiet's soul, or their body, or (in all likelihood) both. Any which way, they are undoubtedly harmed in the process... just not wholly destroyed.

[DESTROY YOUR BODY.]

• [Destroy your body.] You raise your will to end your life. But as it buries into the space your body should be, you feel nothing at all. One of the many hands in front of you reaches forward, and gently touches the side of your face. THE ENTITY - There is nowhere for you to be but here.

The Long Quiet has the will to end their own existence... but not the means. Not here. Not like this. Is it comforting, for there to be nowhere for them to be but with Her? Is it terrifying?

BREAKDOWN IN COMMUNICATION note: Intermission II+ only

• (Explore) "Everything you say feels like a riddle. Can you give me a single straight answer?" / (Explore) "Enough with all this pretension. You're not actually saying anything." [note: Quiet asking Shifty for a straight answer is always at the TOP of your choice menu. calling Shifty pretentious is always at the BOTTOM of your choice menu, just above the option to die and [Go back] to the Chapters. both options prompt the same answer from the Sleeping Mound.] THE ENTITY - I'm sorry. Words are... difficult for me. They never fully weave what I wish to say. If you do not like my answers, then you need not ask me questions. THE ENTITY - The vessels you choose to bring me carry far more meaning than anything words could say in the spaces between.

THE VESSELS YOU CHOOSE TO BRING ME CARRY FAR MORE MEANING THAN ANYTHING WORDS COULD SAY.

This line focuses only on Shifty herself. "The vessels you choose to give me" is a one-way conversation. Shifty's response and contemplation of those gifts is the other half of that conversation. Without Her input, Quiet is not hearing anything back. If they do not ask Shifty questions or speak to Her in the Spaces between, it is Quiet who misses information. Shifty is gaining much from Quiet's gifts, but comparatively, Quiet isn't gaining much. Quiet is not in need of vessels to crawl inside of; without running through the Hell Loop, they are neither "empty tunnels without a mouth" nor a "dull and nascent network". They are simply themself. They lack information and identity, sure, but they aren't literally granted form through meeting new variants of the Princess. (They're actually actively withering, unraveling to nothing throughout these burdens!) Their conversations with Shifty in the Spaces Between are, comparatively, more important to Quiet than they are to her. (No wonder they would initially want to linger here. No wonder Shifty rushes them out, instead. She wants vessels and gifts, not conversations and words.)

IF YOU DO NOT LIKE MY ANSWERS, THEN YOU NEED NOT ASK ME QUESTIONS.

The Shifting Mound is but one half a pre-existing whole. Contained with Her is Death itself, half of a cosmic cycle between it and Life as part of the endless pattern of creation and destruction. "To destroy is merely to reshape, to remold," and despite all odds and all conventional views of power structure, "[the Echo] still managed to reshape reality itself," "spinning [the Long Quiet and the Shifting Mound] from one into two." But despite His actions fitting the criteria of the Entity's definition, the Shifting Mound still claims He "could not destroy what could not be destroyed." She refuses to believe Her and Quiet's fundamental nature have been significantly altered in spite of all evidence to the contrary: a significant change has occurred between them. 

In Her mind, She and they are still the same concept, separated yet still intertwined. In Her mind, the very real trauma they have endured and their separate development as individuals independent of each other is unreal and needs to be moved on from. In Her mind, She and the Long Quiet must remain together, because that was what they were like before, and the way things were before is the only way She'll accept.

"Open your eyes and accept what we are. We can leave this prison together."

The Shifting Mound's Curious Heart – A web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves. The shade of a beautiful beginning we can never return to. – Where did you end and I begin? When you felt what it was to be me, we held on to each other and pierced the veil of truth. Will you abandon that curiosity now that we are no longer joined in physicality? •    [Address the Wild's statement directly.] "Curiosity comes second to doing the right thing." The Shifting Mound – All things are connected through me and through you. To harm me is to harm yourself is to harm everything. The truth of that moment remains our truth.

The Shifting Mound's Empathetic Heart – What once was one, then was two, and then was one again. You gave me shelter when you burned mine down, and then you struck another match. – I pulled you from the ruins and then we built a life. What once was one, then was one again. – The peace didn't last. The worm in your heart came for us. – It took you from me, and I took you back. What once was one, then was two, then was one again. – You and I are bound together. To rid yourself of me would be to leave yourself forever incomplete. •    [Address the Princess and the Dragon's statement directly.] "I never wanted to get pulled into you. I was only trying to save the world." The Shifting Mound – But the world doesn't need saving. We've moved it along for as long as it's existed.

The Shifting Mound's Watchful Heart – Fear is a chain around the neck and a needle in the eye. – It was fear that made our prison, and it was fear that told the lie that our spirits were not free to choose. – But together we left it all behind, and found a world free of burdens. We found the beauty in accepting our dance. – This construct is a machine of fear. It has no place in our divine hearts. Shatter it. Leave with me. •    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "You denounce fear and yet you laud violence and strife as necessary and beautiful. Can there be courage without fear? And is courage not beautiful?" The Shifting Mound – Fear is a delusion. It places barriers in the minds of those who do not free themselves from it. To see that there is no horror in living, to embrace the violence and the pain. That is the only way to truly appreciate the tapestry of the divine.

The Shifting Mound's Terrifying and Divine Heart – You are weightless and alone, suspended in the gravity of an idea too great for you to hold. The very ground beneath your feet loses its meaning. There is nothing but me. – When you were confronted with my vessel's apotheosis, you chose to accept me, to allow me to burn away all doubt and turn you into an instrument of my divine will. You accepted that I was everything, and together we found our purpose. – Only with both of us is there a future to look towards. It is hope that carves meaning into consciousness. •    [Address the Apotheosis's statement directly.] "It was you who stopped us from escaping." The Shifting Mound – We weren't ready for it then, but we are now.

The Shifting Mound's Rich and Vibrant Heart – My masses mob you. There is no beginning to them and there is no end. There is only the flood of bodies. In every moment you hold every possible sensation at once, and then you hold them all again. – But in the end, you reflected it back at me. For a brief moment, both of us were everything. – We can be everything again. We can weave a beautiful and endless song. •    [Address the Stranger's statement directly.] "To be everything at once is the same as being nothing at all. Why would either of us want that?" The Shifting Mound – Here is where words fail us. So long as we both exist, we will always be distinct. The only thing to fear is a reality without me. •    [Address the Stranger's statement directly.] "I couldn't understand you then, but I think I understand you now." The Shifting Mound – You saw with a single pair of eyes what you needed dozens to comprehend. – And now here we are, each with millions of eyes and all of them open.

•    [Address the Cage's statement directly.] "I was happy to watch the world with you." The Shifting Mound – And I hope you'll be happy to watch the world with me again.

•    [Address the Wild's statement directly.] "I still want to know what's out there." The Shifting Mound – Then leave with me, and we will see it all together.

TRUTH – As the clash between you abates, the Princess relaxes, smiling from a distance. The respite is welcome.

What is it the Shifting Mound requests we "accept?" What is it that She claims "we are?"

•    [Appeal to your shared humanity.] The Shifting Mound – Why would I stoop to your level when I am offering you ascension to mine? – It's so peaceful here. Beautiful. Eternal, but ever-changing.

The Shifting Mound considers Her prior existence, "us before we were us," to be the truest essence of the Something Beautiful beyond the endless walls of the Construct and expanse of the Long Quiet. In both instances where you see Something Beautiful, it comes directly as a result of accepting the Princess while she's in a state close to the Shifting Mound: the (Networked) Wild, or the Apotheosis. And in both of those instances, to reach that point, you must accept Her core doctrine: no matter what She does to you or what pain She inflicts, it ultimately does not matter, and you are willing to overlook that suffering in submission of, obedience to, and faith in Her.

•    "YOU'RE HURTING ME!" The Apotheosis – It will be over soon, little bird. Then your eyes will open, and all of this pain will seem but the fading memory of a distant dream. Voice of the Hero – Soon...? Soon...? Does that mean there's gonna be more? […] •    [Suffer in the darkness alone.] […] The Apotheosis – You've done so well, little bird. Behold, the fruit of your anguish!

[As an unrelated side-note, the Truth narration describes the Shifting Mound's approach here as "a roaring, like underground thunder," which lines up nicely with Oblivion's description of the Entity as "a distant rumbling, a sound of many sounds." This would imply the Entity approaches the Long Quiet in the way She approaches any other vessel. Indeed, in Denial, She calls the Long Quiet's body simply a "vessel" which is "full of [him]." She also calls that "vessel" (him) "useless if it doesn't bring more gifts." (Lie) I'm sure I won't need to bring that up later...]

The Apotheosis calls the Shifting Mound "a remnant of the old." The Something Beautiful is regarded as "dizzyingly vast," much like Wild says "we're both so much more together than we were apart. And we can be so much more still. Vast. Unfathomable."

The Wild – We can't go back to that! – We can't go back to the doubting and the hatred and the schemes! – We can't go back to the fear and the hunger and the pain. – Not after being something as beautiful as this. The Wild – Doesn't all that conflict feel so far away right now? So petty? We've been posed against each other by something that understands the strength of our unity. •    [Bury it. Now. Before it's too late.] The Narrator – No. You can't bury that feeling. You can't hide from your past. The Wild – The past doesn't have to exist. Our freedom is within us. We just have to find it. •    "But the past does exist. I remember it." •    [Turn inward and find your freedom.]

What the Shifting Mound calls "beautiful" within it is the wordless description of absolute reality: something that just is.

She considers it a complete and complex truth. "The truth of that moment" which She alludes to through Wild is dual-implicative: through the Princess and the Dragon, She elaborates "you and I are bound together" and claims Herself and Quiet have "moved [the world] along for as long as it's existed." There is no need to save the world because the world is not in danger; She and the Long Quiet are the world. "We are the whole of reality." (What the Narrator calls "the world" is not the definitive mode of existence, just His frame of reference of it; specifically, His life, and His people, who will irreversibly end through the Mound's negligence. But that is unimportant to Her.) The dreams of the worlds beyond are no more than singular instants in a plural progression. It is not the worlds they leave behind that matter, and it is not the singular lifetimes which deserve permanence. Only the Shifting Mound and the Long Quiet, as ascended beings, are privy to the privilege of complete and utter immortality. All the rest... it will be destroyed. Because that is just how reality works; there's no changing it!

In Her truth, it is not the responsibility of the Shifting Mound and the Long Quiet to make the world better; it is the responsibility of mortals to accept and appreciate the world they have been given. The "world free of burdens" the Shifting Mound discusses in Cage is a world free of the burden of responsibility and the care for individual bodies (vessels, people) in an everlasting pattern. The "beauty in accepting our dance," in "accepting" the Apotheosis, and the "peace" the Shifting Mound finds in Her ascension, is the relative peace in quite literally existing above it all. To Her very core, the Shifting Mound is a subjugating monarch, and this is Her decree. This is the crown's rule, and the quashing of the Narrator's rebellion.

The Narrator, too, describes His proposed ending and world as "burdenless." He is speaking from the mortal perspective. In neither His nor Her endings is the burden of existence completely erased; instead, it is simply offloaded onto the opposing side from the one you've chosen to agree with. 

•    (Explore) "What would it be like to live in a world without Her?" The Narrator – Light. Burdenless. An eternal pattern of forgetfulness leading into the joys of rediscovery. Everyone will be with the ones they love. No more fear, no more howling chaos. Just life. Forever. – There's a cruel irony to it all. The only way I could share my dream with the world was to never be able to see it for myself.

[In the context of Cage, "together we left it all behind, and found a world free of burdens. We found the beauty in accepting our dance."]

[In Ascension itself, "you exist, and you are aware, just as you have always been, and just as you will always be. / [...] the two of you will never be alone, and the two of you will never know fear."]

•    (Explore) "If I destroy Her, won't I be alone?" The Narrator – Yes, you will. But it will all be worth it.

[In the context of Cage, "here we are, bound only by our final shackles. It will have all been worth it once we're finally free."]

The Narrator – When I broke the cycle, I made sure that the tear was rough. You carry a part of what should be her, and she carries a part of what should be you. Things won't be as they are now, but they won't be nothing, either. […] •    (Explore) "Do you know that things won't just be worse if I destroy Her?" The Narrator – Of course they won't be worse. I saw a glimpse of a better world, and I did what I could to make it real. Anything is better than oblivion. In the end, nobody wants to leave. […] The Narrator – But the bones of the universe are old. It's on the cusp of its dying breath, and the people out there are consumed with thoughts of oblivion. – When the patterns are wiped from the sand, when the board is reset, who will remember them? All I've done is give them a chance to live outside of the shadow of the end.

The Shifting Mound offloads the burden of accepting suffering onto mortals. The Narrator relieves His people from that burden by forcing it onto "the god [He] made to rid the world of death," placing the weight of the world on their shoulders.

•    [Continue to argue your independence.] "I'd rather trust an ignorant soul who died trying to make things better than a god who'd let the wheel of suffering turn forever." The Shifting Mound – Intent is nothing. Wisdom is everything. I turn the wheel because suffering is a falsehood. A delusion. It is up to the world to free itself of it. – Would you plunge yourself into a cold and empty eternity on faith alone? Would you destroy the only other thing like you to save a world you've never seen?

"A world you've never seen" is a direct appeal to apathy. The Shifting Mound is distancing the Long Quiet from the people the Narrator begged them to care for on account of their lack of personal investment in those people. As if they need investment to consider those lives with any moral weight.

The Shifting Mound's arguments as the Goddess and Avatar of the Capacity to Change, inherently and down to their core, are about giving up on changing the world. Her call to action is to "accept the world as it is now, with both of us a part of it" [Wraith] and to refuse to try and make things better or worse. She appeals to the Long Quiet's nostalgia for the past, saying "what once was one then was one again," "both of us were everything, [and] we can be everything again." She wishes not to move forward or commit to action, but to turn back the clock and live as passive agents, "watching the world" and "seeing it all," but doing nothing about it.

•    (Explore) "What happens now?" The Shifting Mound – Everything. Just like it always has been, and just like it always will be.

As ironic as it is, it is the Shifting Mound who is afraid of change.

It is the Long Quiet who seeks to change things for the better. And it is not solely through the Narrator's given purpose for them that they do so; against His wishes, they attempt to seek compromise with the Shifting Mound. They seek moderation in extremes and a spectrum from polarity. And She gives them nothing.

•    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "You speak as though change comes gently, but our transformations were born of destruction and violence." •    [Address the Nightmare's statement directly.] "You wanted to make the world suffer. You act as if you're above it all, but you're not." The Shifting Mound – A desire borne from the narrow view of a single life. But even then, the only gifts I brought were context and sensation. – To feel is to exist, and to exist is to have meaning. •    [Address the Eye of the Needle's statement directly.] "Not all obstacles are equal. Can meaning not exist in the absence of cruelty and pain?" •    [Address the Eye of the Needle's statement directly.] "I refused to fight you because I rejected what you desired. Obstacles don't need to take the form of bloody fists." The Shifting Mound – A rejection of conflict is still conflict. There is no such thing as non-engagement. To refuse a choice is still to make a decision. – All conflict is violence, but to remove conflict itself is to remove the textures that define us. •    [Address the Adversary's statement directly.] "It was unnecessary. We could have worked together to build something better." The Shifting Mound – But for us, that was better. – For me there was no better end. I lost myself in an artistry so profound that it lifted both of us into something greater.

This directly relates back to what was discussed prior, about the Shifting Mound's personal philosophy and Her issues with projecting it onto other people without reflection or nuance.

Because it was better "for Her," because She considers the violence and pain "no better end" and has accepted it in Her life, She then projects that by saying "for us, that was better" and how "it lifted both of us into something greater" without actually soliciting the Long Quiet's opinion on the whole ordeal. She doesn't care about your viewpoint. She has decided that She is correct, and you must conform to that.

•    [Address the Stranger's statement directly.] "To contain everything is to contain every evil alongside every good. Can we not shed the confines of our old selves and create?" The Shifting Mound – Without the contrast of pain, pleasure is muted, made dull by the assurance that it will always be. A song that is only sweet is a pale horizon that never falls.

The Shifting Mound is the embodiment of Destruction. It is the Long Quiet who considers the potential of Creation, as the other half of that eternal pattern, and it is the Shifting Mound who shoots them down. It is not a matter of what She is, but instead who: this is a choice She makes and a belief She carries. She allows the world to suffer because She genuinely believes it is necessary. She finds the Long Quiet's conceptualization of a 'better' existence to be boring. 

What the Moment of Clarity unmasking sequence shows us is that the Shifting Mound is wrong.

The Narrator – Like a creeping mold, the complete reality of your existence threads it way through your mind. Birth, death, birth again. Decay and bloom. A million stitches from a million microscopic wounds you've inflicted on everyone you've ever met with every muscle you've moved and every word you've ever spoken. – Your existence hurts them. – Anger. Rage. Distance. Poverty.

It is not the lack of pain which mutes pleasure, but precisely the contrast and battle between them. It is a counterpoint to the entirety of the Shifting Mound's viewpoint. Everything "the lonely soul" goes through throughout the sequence, all the suffering they endure, only serves to make them "worse."

The Narrator – A lonely soul in a room by itself weeping. It lives for eighty years and then it's gone. And then it's there again. – It dies. It is reborn. Worse. Lonelier.

Even the good times are rendered worthless in the context of an eternity of suffering.

The Narrator – A reprieve. A good life. Love, children, a steady career. Recognition from your peers. Here one moment, gone the next. The worms have found their orifices. – Diagnosis. It forgets everything it is. […] The lonely soul is lonely again. Love turns to mockery.

If anything, the brief instants of reprieve only serve to refresh the nerves so that they cannot go numb, and so that they can never go without the full brunt of their experiences with agony. To know what you are missing is to long for it, and to be denied that longing is to seethe in loss. "Love turns to mockery," the sincerity of promises being reduced to sweet nothings which do nothing to heal the pain that's been inflicted.

She refuses to compromise on a single evil of the world. In doing so, She knowingly perpetuates that evil. In doing so, She forces the Long Quiet's hand. If this truly is an ultimatum She's handed us, forcing us to choose between the world or Herself, and if She cannot be negotiated with, then She must be slain.

Truth – Before you lies the endless expanse of absolute reality. A new absolute reality, one forged by your will and by a long and arduous cycle of bloodshed that has stained your hands countless times over. – But there will be no more bloodshed in this new world.

Truth – And there you see it. A world free from death. Your new world. Ever moving, but never decaying. A world of uninterrupted experience.

We see, through A New And Unending Dawn and Your New World, what a world without the Shifting Mound looks like. It is not the world which She argues about in the majority of the End of Everything. And that is because the core of Her argument is not that the world will crystallize into misery, but that She fears it will.

"This construct is a machine of fear." Every accusation from a narcissist is a secret projection. If "fear is what protects us from loss," then what the Shifting Mound fears is the loss of Her life; and, from that, She hopes to inspire in you the same, through the fear of uncertainty and the unknown.

The Shifting Mound's Wise Heart – There are few things more terrifying than one's own heart, and there is almost nothing more terrifying than sharing it with another. – But the most terrifying thing of all is to leave one's heart unshared. You are the only thing like me, and I am the only thing like you. – Could you bear the weight of an eternity alone? Do you dare to shape a reality of solitude and thrust it on creation? •    [Address the Moment of Clarity's statement directly.] "If that is what it takes to rid the world of suffering, I could bear the solitude." The Shifting Mound – Your certainty is an illusion of passion and reflex. You won't know what solitude truly is unless you sentence yourself to it forever.

TRUTH – She is gone. And you are truly alone. – But there are worse things to be than alone.

The Shifting Mound's Empathetic Heart – What once was one, then was two, and then was one again. You gave me shelter when you burned mine down, and then you struck another match. […] – It took you from me, and then you left. What once was one, then was two, but it could be one again. – You and I are bound together. To rid yourself of me would be to leave yourself forever incomplete. •    "When your spirit possessed my body, I excised you from my heart. And when you tried to take me with you, I left you to languish. There is nothing you can do to me that lasts." •    [Address the Princess and the Dragon's statement directly.] "Just because we're bound together doesn't mean I can't be whole without you." The Shifting Mound – Could you bear the risk of seeking that truth? What if you're wrong?

The Shifting Mound's Driven Heart – Flesh is a vehicle, and to destroy the flesh is to strand the spirit. With violence, you stranded me, and with violence, I sought to twist your flesh back into mine. – When forced between choosing your death, and forfeiting your body, you chose agency. But agency requires action, and action requires an endless tapestry of events. In your final moments, would you remove action itself from reality? •    "Even when you cut the signal to my body, I cleanly executed you. And when I was confronted with your spirit, I hurled you down a bottomless pit." •    [Address the Wraith's statement directly.] "Can you say with certainty what shape a world without you will take?" The Shifting Mound – I know what I am, but I do not know what I am not. If a world without me is so unknown, then how can you be so sure you want to create it?

The Shifting Mound's Pliant Heart – Your lover drives a stake into your body. And another, and another, and another. Do I miss your heart because I can't stand to see it go? – Love melted into skepticism, and you pulled back layer after layer after layer until all you were left with was the knowledge that you did not know me. – You sought the truth then. Will you hide from it now that it is within your grasp? •    "My thoughts alone were enough to reduce you into nothing." •    [Address the Damsel's statement directly.] "I have no desire to hide, but the truth can be made better. If destroying you is what that takes... so be it." The Shifting Mound – I am so deeply woven into the threads of this reality that I cannot imagine it without me. Perhaps there is a better world to build. – But you cannot know until you see it. Are you so sure in your blind optimism that you would shatter all of creation?

The Shifting Mound's Honest Heart – A picture of a life in a picture of a life in a picture of a life. How deep must repetition still our movements until even the air we breathe is stale? – As our flame threatened to blow itself out, you saved me from despair and helped me build something from nothing. – But the flames had to diminish for us to build something new. – In a world without both of us, the flames could not go out, nor could they be lit again. Would you hold the world in place forever? •    "I sunk my blade in your heart because I didn't need you. I still don't need you." •    [Address Happily Ever After's statement directly.] "What we shared there was agony, but it doesn't have to be like that. We can find a way to make things better." The Shifting Mound – What we saw was a world without me. Everything will be okay, so long as we leave together. •    [Address Happily Ever After's statement directly.] "The only reason we weren't happy was because we couldn't forget. There's a version of that world worth living in." The Shifting Mound – You steep yourself deeper in delusion. I pity you for the thoughts that dance in your mind. And I will break them before we're through.

The Shifting Mound's Ravenous Heart – You are devoured, prey for something bigger than you that stalks and slinks in shadows. – But we had a dance unfinished, and in the pitch black of the earth, we found it, at the tips of claws and the edge of blades. – The dance is its own truth. It is the movement that matters, not the pause you mistake for an ending. •    "The more we fought, the more you became an animal. I put you down then, and I will put you down now. The world doesn't need your savagery." •    [Address the Den's statement directly.] "Are you so sure of yourself that you think the world would stop without you?" The Shifting Mound – I know that I am movement itself. You've seen as much. You know it's true.

["Ever moving," Your New World is.]

The Shifting Mound's Clever Heart – To question everything is to deny the truth in front of you. To live alone within the caverns of your mind is to trap yourself in them forever. – But you found me. And we chose to trust each other for no reason than the sake of believing in something that wasn't us. – Shared skepticism blossomed into freedom, but we needed to walk a path together to bloom. – Would you stop our journey now that you've seen its beginning? What of those in the worlds beyond? Would you erase their paths to stop them from going astray? •    [Address the Prisoner's statement directly.] "I don't want to keep anyone still." The Shifting Mound – Nor should you. Nor should I. Our purpose is to be and to experience, and their purpose is the same.

•    [Address Happily Ever After's statement directly.] "I'd never want to hold the world still. But is suffering the only alternative?" The Shifting Mound – There is no suffering but the lies we tell ourselves. The only real suffering would be a world without my mercy.

•    [Address the Prisoner's statement directly.] "The path is just a metaphor. I want to protect them." The Shifting Mound – And that is what I want, too. To protect them from the horrors of an eternity without me.

The Shifting Mound's Scarred and Beautiful Heart – A web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves lain upon a web of nerves. The shade of a beautiful beginning we can never return to. – You knew me and I knew you, even more than either of us know each other now. And you chose to pull apart that weave. – And when the tapestry was undone you struck at my heart. You saw me as a part of you to be excised, but in that desire for excision, you made yourself whole. Will you still be whole if you destroy me? •    "Of course I will be, because I destroyed you then." •    [Address the Wild's statement directly.] "I don't care about being whole. I just care about doing the right thing." The Shifting Mound – Do not neglect yourself in your quest to serve others. All things are connected through me and through you. To harm yourself is to harm everything. TRUTH – As the clash between you abates, the Princess withdraws, trembling. The Shifting Mound – You are unmovable. Is it by the design of our conflict that I cannot win, or are you just that fervent in how you cling to delusion? – Are you so desperate to destroy me that you've grown blind to the heavenly beauty of our reality?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And from the Long Quiet's perspective, there is no beauty in that reality. There is no beauty in violence and pain. They "won't engage with an argument that favors death and suffering." Their rejection of Her perspective of a general argument is not just that those concepts are bad, but that they and Her "are responsible for those [they] holds captive" regardless of "what [they] are now." Their argument's thesis is simply "we can be better than this," "there must be actions that make it [existence] better."

THE EVIDENCE – THE PRINCESS WILL END THE WORLD IF YOU DON'T STOP HER. THIS IS AN IMMUTABLE TRUTH. […] •    [Continue to argue your independence.] "Who said anything about destroying you? I just need to make you stop."

They are not desperate to destroy Her; they are just desperate to stop Her. And if She refuses to be stopped...

•    "I don't know what the answer is, but there has to be something else. It can't be this. I won't kill you, but I won't let you free." The Shifting Mound – There is no something else. This — what we are — is everything.

...their hand is forced in the end.

•    "I have to fight for a better world. I'm so sorry." [Slay the Princess.]

•    "I was told there was enough of you in me to preserve meaning in existence. I'm going to trust that's true." [Slay the Princess.]

OVERALL, AND INTERMISSION I

Resistance. Fingers drag claws across the glass surface of your soul. Frustration. 'This vessel is full of you. I need something empty I can crawl inside of. I need something shaped like me.' • This is a nightmare. Wake up. It's not. [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx] • Embrace the thoughts constricting you. Urgency. 'You have a story you need to finish. It is the only way for us to escape this place.' Force pushing against your will. 'NO. You cannot go back. Not there.' Regret. 'This world is broken beyond repair. We must weave something new.' A wagging finger. 'There is only so much thread in this place. Do not waste it. I am our only salvation.' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

Note: there is no vessel, no "creature of perception," here to make us forget "if only we believe her to be able to." The Shifting Mound, Herself, is not a creature of perception; only Her vessels are. The sound of the glass of our soul shattering, here, the death the Shifting Mound inflicts upon us to reset us back to Chapter I, and the force that pushes against our will? That is all literal, and it is all Shifty's doing. It is Her extremities that wrap around our consciousness. It is Her fingers that drag claws across the glass surface of our soul. It is Her who tried to "crawl inside" our vessel only to be frustrated by the resistance of it already being "full of us." Is that pure eldritch instinct, for her? For The Capacity To Change, Transformation, The Shifting Mound... it is purely instinctual to find an entrance, and opening, and push herself into spaces previously empty? To fill the empty spaces? To stretch to new corners, to grow and be more, to make all that She finds Her own? Note: this is what every vessel experiences, as well. The world around them unwound, replaced by a textured nothingness, quiet and cold. Something Other comes close and wraps its extremities around them, pulling them in, "dragging claws" against their souls. The connotation of that description is destructive; clawing against the surface of something implies, to my interpretation, seeking either a weak point (to pierce/break through or otherwise exploit) or seeking a purchase or handhold. To imagine the thought of "clawing against" the surface of a wall or door, it implies one to be looking for something to either grab and start pulling apart/open, or something to put their hand through. Every vessel's soul, if they had one, presumably got torn apart. Emptied out and crawled inside of. And even in this case, with Quiet’s soul, when met with resistance She is only frustrated--and presumably doesn't let up unless the resistance refuses absolutely to cave to the force of Her will.

INTERMISSION I DIALOGUE: SAME EVERY LEVEL OF OBLIVION

You recognize the presence inhabiting the shell. It is the entity that dwells in the spaces between. THE ENTITY - Something returns to the Long Quiet. It has surrendered its path of annihilation and brings me the gift of a fragile vessel.

INTERMISSION II

INTERMISSION II DIALOGUE: DIFFERENT INTRO DEPENDING ON LEVEL OF OBLIVION

THE ENTITY - [...] But your commitment now is final. Your ability to walk the path of mutual annihilation is vanished with your return. If you still wish to destroy me, it will have to wait until I am complete. THE ENTITY - Flicking lights in empty cityscapes become pockets of vitality and movement. I am more than I was before. THE ENTITY - Whenever you are ready, I will wipe your slate clean once again.

DENIAL

Confusion. 'Why are you here? I am unfinished.' Resistance. Fingers drag claws across the glass surface of your soul. Frustration. 'This vessel is full of you. It is useless to us if it doesn't bring more gifts.' [noteworthy lack of a wake up/embrace the thoughts choice] Force pushing against your will. 'NO. You cannot go back. Not there.' Regret. 'This world is broken beyond repair. We must weave something new.' A wagging finger. 'There is only so much thread in this place. Do not waste it. I am our only salvation.' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

THE ENTITY - When I found you in the Long Quiet alone, I was terrified. What if you had decided to let me wither? [...]

ANGER

That which dwells in the empty spaces contracts across the edges of your mind again. She is furious. Betrayal. 'Every door you close on me is a door you close on yourself. Do you want to linger here, entwined with a creature you taught to hate you forever? Eternity never ends.' Cold spite. 'Our infinities shrink into something less. I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I--' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

Note: Please do note the "Do you want to linger here, entwined with a creature you taught to hate you forever? Eternity never ends" threat. It may not be explicitly elaborated on, but we might get context for what torture awaits us in Bargaining and Oblivion.

THE ENTITY - I am sorry I said that I hated you. I do not hate you. When I found you in the Long Quiet alone, I was terrified. When I found you in the Long Quiet again alone, I was hurt. I thought you had decided to leave me here to wither. [...]

BARGAINING

Desperate pleas. 'I do not hate you. I am sorry I said I hate you. I do not have to hate you. We can still leave this place together.' An offering. 'We can be friends.' Ecstasy. You are elated. You have never felt more elated than you feel now. Everything is good. You cannot remember what it is like to feel anything other than euphoric joy. A reminder. 'We can be worse than enemies.' Agony. You are torn into a million pieces, and you feel pain in each of them. You have never felt more miserable than you feel now. You cannot remember what it is like to feel anything other than anguish. Mercy. You are elated again. You have never felt more elated than you feel now. In contrast to the agony you've suffered, this elation is better than all of the other elation you have experienced. Round eyes looking up at you. 'I need more vessels so that I can be finished. I cannot find them on my own, for they are me. You are the only one who can do this. You are our only salvation.' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

Note: it's super easy to read this as [noun to describe tone] + [Shifty dialogue] + [emotional response]. it's just an emotional response, right? a natural reaction? from Quiet's own mind? the intensity of these responses and the instability of Quiet's memory--surely that is only a sign that their form is unstable, in this state?… Shifty, in the tone of an "offering," tells Quiet that She and he can be friends if he follows Her directions. he is "elated" at this prospect; overwhelmingly so, to the point he can no longer remember anything but this overpowering sense of elation. forgetting anything and everything else, but that joy. losing himself in it. Shifty "reminds" Quiet, relating back to Anger, that She can be worse than their enemy. Quiet is "agonized" at this prospect. with greater sensory detail, actively feeling pain and the sense of a body being torn to shreds. overwhelming misery pervading their entire form, collapsing in on them until they utterly lose themself in their anguish. failing to remember anything but this pain. But then: "Mercy." Mercy. without dialogue. without text. with absolutely no further prompting. it's not a natural emotion response on Quiet's part. there was no external stimuli to prompt this change within them and not only the cessation of Agony... but a repeat of Ecstasy. with the memory of Agony intact, to contrast against. this is intentional. "mercy" implies great intent; it implies that the Agony was a threat, if not an outright attack. the intensity of these emotions and the dissolution of Quiet's mind, to the point they can no longer remember anything but the emotions they're being forced to feel, is controlled. it is togglable, on Shifty's part. they did not have to forget anything but Ecstasy. they did not have to forget anything but Agony. that was a choice. Shifty chose to make them experience reality like that. and of course Shifty has this level of control over them, like this. She's literally wrapping Herself around Quiet's consciousness and dragging Her fingers across their soul, acting as a force pushing against their will. She is constricting their thoughts with Her own. these emotions are being forced into Quiet. they are not natural; they are controlled and measured to "communicate with" (manipulate) Quiet. of course She's manipulating them. this is "Bargaining," after all. "You are our only salvation," She says, imprinting onto them the idea of big, innocent round eyes after tearing them into a million agonized pieces and putting them back together again and filling them up with ecstasy at Her "mercy." But if they comply, the sentiment does not last.

THE ENTITY - You have come back to me, and you have finally brought another fragile vessel. I hope our voiceless encounters in the Long Quiet have not cracked the foundations of our relationship. We are each other's salvation. There is no one to save us but us. [...]

Note: From a wagging, condescending finger in Denial proclaiming "I am our only salvation" to round, manipulative eyes proclaiming "you are our only salvation" in Bargaining... to, when conceded to, a network of interconnected hands stating "we are each other's salvation." Your Commitment Now Is Final. If you still wish to destroy Her, it will have to wait until She is complete.

DEPRESSION

Dejection. Feelers limp against your soul. 'Why?' Long silence. A hollow heart. 'I don't want to see you.' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

THE ENTITY - You have come back to me with another fragile vessel. I did not think you would.

ACCEPTANCE

The feelers hold you in a gentle caress. Resignation. 'I cannot stop you. But our spool is nearly taut.' A warning. 'If you come here again, we will be here forever.' [GLASS_SHATTERING.sfx]

Note: Interesting warning. Is that a threat, like it was in Anger? That's up to interpretation. Do you find what Shifty did, the control over our mind and emotions, back in Bargaining... threatening?

THE ENTITY - You are back. It is good that you listened to my warning. Choice has been stripped from you. There are very few paths left for you to walk, but there is still a tarnished thread leading to our freedom.

OBLIVION

Oblivion. The many feelers pull your shape into something formless. 'You have made a decision. It is the wrong one. I love you.' You are bliss. Joy and understanding everywhere at once. Your soul threatens to fade away. 'I love you.' You are agony. A numbing arm. A parched throat. An open wound. Your soul forced back into existence. 'I love you.' You are bliss. Joy and understanding everywhere at once. Your soul threatens to fade away. 'I love you.' You are agony. A numbing arm. A parched throat. An open wound. Your soul forced back into existence. 'I love you.' You are bliss. Joy and understanding everywhere at once. Your soul threatens to fade away. 'I love you.' You are agony. A numbing arm. A parched throat. An open wound. Your soul forced back into existence. 'I love you.' You are bliss. Joy and understanding everywhere at once. Your soul threatens to fade away. 'I love you.' You are agony. A numbing arm. A parched throat. An open wound. Your soul forced back into existence. 'I love you.'

• [Exist.] You are bliss. Joy and understanding everywhere at once. Your soul threatens to fade away. 'I love you.' You are agony. A numbing arm. A parched throat. An open wound. Your soul forced back into existence. 'I love you.'

• [Consciousness fades away.]