Standing on his yatch's sundeck, a man wearing a suit and tie casts his gaze upon the Pacific Ocean. It is a Thursday afternoon. The ocean is calm and the sky is clear. No birds, no fish, no clouds. Just him and his yacht, all alone in the middle of nothingness.

"Just the way I like it," he thinks to himself while taking a sip from his glass of lemonade.

After finishing his drink, he goes back inside the cabin and prepares his lunch. Out he comes with two trays, both with an equal amount of various seafood dishes and fruits. He makes sure not to spill anything on the circular table, nor make any sound while placing the meal. Despite his meticulous procedure, he managed to get everything done before the sun can even move an inch from where it floats in the sky.

He sits facing an empty chair shaded by an umbrella. Without a second thought, he begins eating. Alternating between seafood and fruits, he finishes his meal in silence with another glass of lemonade. He cleans up the food the same way he has prepared it. As fast and gentle as possible, without making any sound.

After the meal, he brings out his foldable beach chair and lays on it. While staring at the ocean and listening to waves, a voice breaks the silence and speaks to him.

"The food was nice." It was the devil.

"Glad you enjoyed it," he replies, never bothering to find where the voice is coming from.

"I admire your confidence." The devil walks to his left and unfolds another chair. "Others would have sacrificed their children alive just to catch a sliver of my presence."

"I have nothing to give up anymore," he says while paying the devil no mind.

"Precisely."

The man smiles and stands up. He walks to the deck's fences and leans on it. At last, he gives the devil a glance. Under the guise of a woman with crimson skin, the devil wears the same clothes as him. It locks eyes with him for a moment before standing beside him.

"Tell me about it," says the devil while staring at the ocean.

"If you say so," the man said with a smile.

"This boat was gifted to me by my cousin. She said that she doesn't know how else she could express both her gratitude and her apologies."

"Apologies?"

"She tried to kill me. Her father's last will only gave her enough to live a normal life. Everything else went to me." The man notices a cloud forming above his yacht.

"I'm just returning some of your hospitality. Go on."

"It was supposed to be mine anyway, the company was just given to my uncle because my parents died when I was young.

My cousin knows it too, but I guess she didn't care. She and her grandmother did everything they could to shun me away from the family. None worked.

Eventually, my uncle got sick. By that point, I'm already well established in the corporate world. My grandmother died, and my cousin knows that she just wasted her time trying to drag me down.

When uncle finally succumbed to his disease, I inherited his will. My cousin tried to poison me right away. It was in a glass of lemonade. Said she wanted to congratulate me for inheriting the company. Even told me that the company will be more successful than ever now that I'm in charge. Not that she's wrong.

When I drank the thing though, she just broke down crying and told me it was poisoned. Vomited that thing right on the spot. I wasn't mad. Not really disappointed either. I knew she was desperate so I just gave her the ownership of the company the next day.

Of course, she asked me why I did it after everything that happened. I said that nobody really believed in her, not even herself. But I was willing to. I helped her make the company succeed. Eventually, she was all on her own. She became successful, found a good husband. And oh-"

"Yeah, it's four days until Christmas."

"I think the twins said they want really big teddy bears. Anyway, after all of it, I retired early and donated most of my money to charity, research, and other things. I left just enough for me to live a comfortable life without the need to work until I die.

Then about a year ago at my 27th birthday, my cousin gave me this yacht. She asked me what I wanted for my birthday, and I asked her to donate to the research for reversing aging. They'd have solved it by now, I think. She donated but still decided to give me this yacht.

And so I sailed. From that moment. And now we're here."

"Consider me amused, Nibiru." The devil said with a smirk. "You have three wishes."

"Immortality, perfect memory, and teleportation." Nibiru replies, confident of his answer.

"Aren't you afraid of what could go wrong?" The devil jumps off the deck and floats in front of him. "Kidding. I know what you want. But before I grant them, tell me why?"

"You already know, right?" Nibiru asks, raising his eyebrow.

"But where's the fun in that?"

"I suppose. It's not that I don't want to die. I just want to see what lies beyond. Beyond life and death. Beyond everything material and immaterial. Beyond the lies. Beyond the truth.

Some people would say that immortality is a fate worse than death and yet the same people go on lecturing others not to take their own lives. I can understand, but it's still absurd to me. Why are we trying to extend our lives, curing diseases and reversing the process of aging? Is it just so we can spend more of our time being poor and hungry? Is life really just about spending every second breathing trying to make sure a robot doesn't suddenly kill someone?

I've had the luxury to walk away from that life. But others don't. To me, immortality is the cure. It is the door to freedom. I won't have to care about myself anymore."

"Why not just ask for the answers then? I can do that too, you know?"

"I could, but where's the fun in that?"

The devil chuckles. "Alright, your wishes have been granted. Without negative repercussions. With knowledge of how to use them."

"Do I need to thank you?" Nibiru asks after he teleports to an icy mountain.

"Not really," the devil replies, still facing him.

"I see. Until we meet again…"

"Nicole."

"See you later, Nicole."

Darkness deeper than shadows poured down from the sky. The devil vanished without a trace.

And so Nibiru spent his time learning and mastering every field of knowledge, covertly helping humanity into becoming a space faring civilization that helps other species thrive in their own way. Just like the teachings of his parents.

But like his parents, his uncle, his cousin, and his nephews and nieces, he watched humanity vanish in the end. They gave him their will. That through him, humanity will live on.

He watched the universe freeze. He watched it implode. He watched it reset. He watched it multiply.

He experienced countless realities. Encountered countless humanities. Studied countless moralities.

Everything lives as long as he remembers.

He remembers everything. All sciences, all magics, and all technologies.

And one day, while meditating on a floating rock in the middle of nowhere, he heard a voice.

"It's been an eternity."

"Talk about it?"

"Yeah, talk about it."

Word Count: 1268

Prompts: Glass, Legacy, Rebirth

Wanzu is a sphinx who sends avatars in various universes to do things for the sake of amusement. The avatars, who are made in Wanzu's image, can summon Wanzu's cosmic hands which can warp reality, enabling them to perform many supernatural feats. Things like teleportation, shapechanging, and energy beams are examples of the many things the avatars can do. To perform these abilities, the avatars must use the correct cosmic arm. For example, an avatar can teleport by using the Red Arm of Destruction to delete the space between it and the target location. These cosmic arms can also be combined to have more effects. Combining the Blue Arm of Creation and the Red Arm of Destruction for example, creates the Purple Arm of Corruption. Powers aside, Wanzu likes writing poems about the things experienced by the avatars.

Wanzu's avatars can take on many forms.

Avatar abilities:

Eternal Gaze - An avatar always has another avatar from a higher concept of being watching over it.

Cosmic Arms - An avatar can summon the cosmic arms of the avatars watching over it.

• Red Arm of Destruction - destroys concepts
• Blue Arm of Creation - creates concepts
• Yellow Arm of Preservation - prevents alteration of concepts
• Purple Arm of Corruption - creates entities that corrupt and destroy concepts
• Orange Arm of Evolution - accelerates the development of a concept
• Green Arm of Healing - restores concepts to their previous state
• Arm of Chaos - creates random things
• Arm of Order - creates balance
• Arm of Paradox - creates impossible things

Awakening Seal - When lifted, an avatar opens its third eye, allowing it to transcend all concepts of logic.

Other things:

• Eye color change based on the Cosmic Arm present.
• Wanzu's human looking avatars can be seen expressing their feelings through the ears. Their facial expressions are subtle, except for extreme conditions. Cat forms are very emotive.
• Wanzu (sphinx form) always talks in rhymes and riddles with an intonation similar to a YTP. Wanzu (cat form) is straightforward.
• Wanzu leans toward kindness but is not against violence.

Lore:

Wanzu has no past, present, nor future. All Wanzu has are memories gained by countless avatars. Because of this, Wanzu feels eternal dread. Since everything is just like dreams, Wanzu feels like nothing is real no matter how many avatars are present in countless realities.

All Wanzu avatars work in a tower with an undefined amount of space inside. The higher the floor, the higher the concept of being. Each avatar has its own cubicle, where it works on a computer. The computer has a program installed that contains another tower, which also has avatars, to be managed by the avatar working on the computer. The avatars on the computer also have their own computers with avatars that they need to manage, and so on.

Wanzu perceives all of what the avatars are doing and can interact with all of them.

More:

The best month for me so far, as far as art is concerned

• The collab I hosted was a success, it was very fun
• An individual art of mine got frontpaged (I managed to achieve at least one of the goals I set for myself this year. HURRAY!!!)
• Learned lots of new cool painting techniques
• Drafted the story of two comics
• Watched Song of the Sea (it was great)
• Did very well on the current college term

I'm quite happy. I hope I can be happy this month too. And the next. And the next. Etc.

Not much else to say. Good luck to me in the following months. Hope I can quickly get settled on a certain style for the comic.

I just finished drafting two different comics. Both planned at 100 pages, to be released at the end of the year. I could see myself getting it done, but there's a part of me who wants to take my time drawing. I have thought of three options:

1. Just finish both this year like I said earlier this month. May or may not make me a sad individual. (I'd definitely be happy achieving my goal)
2. Just focus on one. I will be happy with finishing one this year and finishing the other next year.
3. Do both, with less content. Would be unsatisfying, but at least I made progress.

I chose option (?) where I would focus on one first, then depending on how fast I finish it and how satisfied I am with it, I will continue the other. It's all about how I think of approaching it really. So, using a coin flip(best of three), I chose to focus on drawing Anastasia Project first.

My plan is to draw it traditionally, scan it, then trace/fix mistakes and color digitally.

I might upload some progress so I can look back at them in the future and see what I can improve.

(Is there anybody even looking forward to what I'm doing? LOL. If they somehow do exist and they were looking forward to Erebus, please bear with me... I'll get there eventually)

Congratulations everyone! I'm happy!!! And thank you again very much!!! I'll do my best to apply what I've learned to make the next collab I host even more fun!

After I finish the piece for the collab that I'm hosting, I'm going to focus on creating a fully-colored, 99-page, volume of the Anastasia Project webcomic. It means that there would be a lot fewer art portal uploads from me until I finish the book.

The title of the comic is "Anastasia: Tales of the Scroll Mage"

I estimate the project's release to be around December, along with the launch of my other one-shot comic "Erebus".

An idea finally hit me and I finished sketching 11 pages on a whim. If I get psyched enough I might make if full color.

It's going to be generic and formulaic but I'll try to mix things up and put my own spin to it.

Got inspired after remembering Magic Knight Rayearth.

• Made significant art progress, thank you everyone who helped me improve
• Published "The Testament of Hermestheus" as a "book" here in Newgrounds because I'm starting to loose my way about the story of Anastasia Project
• No Wanzu drawing this month (STREAK BROKEN unfortunately, R.I.P. goals I set for myself this year. I might as well break the other goal too LOL.)
• Hosted a collab for Pico day. (I better deliver on this one)
• Started slowly working on setting up my commission info

This month is great because I actually put an effort to further improve my drawings. I don't think my skills really improved that much, only my efficiency and perseverance (are these skills?). I was already satisfied about how my art looks and it was delightful to see that I can still make them look better.

Also, I talked about how I only want to draw characters when making comics in the past and how it was the only way for me at the time to express my creativity despite the obvious flaws in reasoning. (Or something like that). While it is still partially true, I finally came to the conclusion that it is because I cannot bridge my art and my storytelling. Whether it is due to me having too much fun with the panels (hard to follow) or being too conscious with them (uniform panel size), I'm still struggling to find the perfect balance. I might return to drawing them traditionally, since I have more "control" with a pen on paper than a finger on a phone screen. I might just have to bear with eraser dirt and pencil markings on my hand. Also scanning the work, so tedious only to end up being traced digitally too. We'll see. If I succeed, hurray. If I don't I'll find another way. (Or buy a good device from the money I can potentially earn from commissions)

I willed an infinitesimal part of my nonexistence into being and incarnated as Hermestheus, uttering its name and severing it from my influence. It rippled across the Material Realm; my body forming into that of a newborn angel, ignorant of the world. I gazed upon my material body as it fell down an abyssal ocean. It grew into a cherub as it acclimated to the realm, eventually drifting into the shore of Singirvam, the Land of Slaughter. 

As I set foot into the land, I felt the paralysing echoes of wrath, bloodlust, and death. Its inhabitants diverted their attention to me as my foreign presence alerted them. They slaughtered each other out of existence for the glory of being the one to keep me as their child. No one was victorious.

I walked alongside the endless shore and listened more to the echoes of the land. Some of those who sought my presence have returned to life, continuing their carnage once more. Others moved away to fight somewhere else.

My stroll was halted as a crimson light emanated in front of me. It was Aitromme, the Embodiment of Death, and a daughter of mine. I asked her name, in which she gave me a perplexed stare and asked, "Have you forgotten?" She answered my question and the utterance of her name erased my existence and left her in a greater state of perplexion. After returning to existence, she revealed that my presence faintly resembled myself. Her keenness made me proud as I observed from beyond. I, the incarnation, even more perplexed than she was, asked who I resembled. Her revelation of me resembling myself filled me with suffocating yet serene power, for the comparison was the most rightful for me than any of my daughters. The invocation of my name ringing in all corners of my material body.

"I was prepared to punish myself, but I am not mistaken. You must be THE incarnation of our mother." she spoke unto me with a delighted yet concerned smile. "But be warned, for you are no different from any of us. You are not our mother, however close you may resemble her. No matter how infinitesimally greater your resemblance is to her compared to any of us angels, all of us are still her daughters." Enlightened, I replied, "I am Hermestheus, Siaeraielle incarnated. I know not the reason for my being, yet I will roam this realm no different from any angel, devil, or fairy, for I am no greater or lesser than any of my sisters." 

Unveiling her wings, she said, "Indeed, heal or harm others as you may. Live the way you would be happy, have your death be meaningful to both yourself and the others, and continue the cycle of rebirth with vigour. Until we meet again, Hermestheus. Let us bask in the love of our Mother."

She disappeared before the crimson light could vanish and erased its presence from existence. I was left wondering about the place of love amongst this ocean of carnage, brutality, and animosity.

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Parts of our belongingness united into one, and became another place for our daughters to roam before returning to us. It was an endless land between our belongingness. Overlapped by Faedomme, underneath Domielle, and above Helldom. Our Mother named this union the Material Realm, as its echo was faint enough for the concept of Dimensions to materialize. And so the Material Realm became the realm of eternal finality, uncertainty, and controlled incomprehensibility. A realm of fleeting and false progressions. A welcomed form of perfect imperfection.

The existence of the Material realm delighted our Mother and so She named the boundaries between it and our belongings the Astral Realm. The Astral realm was a result of my sisters and I enveloping our belongingness with our Mother's love. 

Delighted by the union of our belongingness, my sisters and I united the names of our belongings, and called them the Primordial Realm.

And so the wholeness of Macrocosmos was realized as the fruit of the love that we gave to our Mother, for returning the love that She gave us would not suffice compared to what we felt when we received Her love. It was the end of the beginning.

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