Book/Crumbling Diary

Crumbling Diary (as the title implies) is a crumbling diary donated to Azalea's Library by an anonymous, unidentified source. It details the workings and eventual downfall of a distant city.

There is as of yet only one copy of it, the original.

Text
''[This book is HEAVILY damaged, pages appearing to have been both burnt and waterlogged, with some missing entirely. However, the text within appears to have been mechanically printed on, and has miraculously survived the wear and tear still legible.]''

ENTRY #1

---

Diazi's demanding that I keep a journal. Old bastard must think the smoke's starting to get to my head. I can remember things just fine, thank you.

It's not a bad idea, though. A written account of our greatest work. The Heart of Magnel. Beating fiery lifeblood through our entire city. A somewhat flowery way to describe a power plant, I concede, but standing at the epicenter, feeling the heat on my face... I cannot help but be overwhelmed by its power.

To be chief architect of this project has given me no small sense of fulfillment and joy.

But why did I choose to write this down? Certainly not for myself, I live and breathe this life... and certainly not because of the old bastard's nagging, either.

I suppose, then, that I must be writing this in the hopes that it shall one day be read - by our descendents, wondering just how their magnificent city came to be... or perhaps by those further afield, wishing to know more about our legendary engineering.

To recount how we arrived here, then. How we settled this once barren island, how we discovered the burning bounty awaiting within the mountain, and how we harnessed i

[The rest of the page is too burned to read. The next several pages are missing.]

ENTRY #3

---

Romero brought his grandchild to the main chamber. The way that little girl's eyes lit up at the sight of the mountain's heart, as if reflecting the fire she saw raging within... I'd wager the sight changed her forever.

It certainly did the same for me.

ENTRY #4

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Expansion is proceeding ahead of schedule. As we pump more and more of the mountain's lifeblood to every corner of the city, our production increases tenfold and tenfold again. At this rate, we'll soon ma

[Many pages are missing. What little fragments remain only contain scattered segments of words, too removed from context to piece together. Mostly intact pages remain near the end.]

don't need his help, and I'd be able to do my job a lot better if he'd just get off my back. Old bastard.

The mountain's definitely making more smoke than it used to, though. Can't tell him that. Never let him know he's right.

ENTRY #22

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Miss when that little tyke of Romero's was still just a girl. Now she's joining the crowd of young dissidents telling us to stop increasing the power output of the heart. Keep telling them we've run the numbers, but you know how it is with the young folk. Always finding something to rebel against. What we're doing to the mountain is safe.

ENTRY #23

---

Another rumble. That makes three times the ground's shaken like that lately. The young folk are latching on to it, of course. Typical. Can't they understand that it's just natural seismic activity? It poses no threat to us this high on the mountain.

...There sure is a lot of smoke, though. Damn you, old bastard.

ENTRY #24

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Quake #7 just hit, and the smoke's turned a shade of black the young people are calling "foreboding". Some few dissidents are even calling for an evacuation, but that's balderdash. The city is safe. The mountain is safe.

The only thing endangering our people is their own disharmony. The next phase of development on the heart is nearly complete, and if we can just come together for this, the power output will be enough to propel us ttttttttt

[The last portion of the diary is hastily handwritten, and is thus more affected by the damage the book's sustained.]

Ma g nel is e ru pti ng the mo untai n is e rupti ng Ive be en a fool oh gods wh at have I d one

th e sky i s dark th e s ea is burni ng the p eople cant get out we cant g et ou t we

as I s it here w atching my cr eat ions b urn and cru mb le I th ink o f how I couldv e preve nted th is. but its too l ate now its t