Cades walked along a warm hallway, a stack of many papers, mostly theories and notes from his classes, in his hands, smiling as he looked forward to learning from the next teacher, his artificing teacher.
Perhaps it was weird that Cades thought of him like that as he was walking through the empty hallway, no soul in sight, no light shining, the wooden floor squeaking at some steps, perhaps due to insufficient funds, perhaps on purpose as to work against thieves, if there so were any, but Cades had been noticing something lately, something he was not sure as to why it had been happening.
While he had been sitting in class, he had been in pain, while he had been thinking, he had suffered greater than anything he had imagined, despite just laying in his bad, lazy as usual, already having finished studying, but most important, and something the doctor's and healer's could not explain at all, Cades was starting to forget things, he forgot names and he could not recover them, even when he asked the wielders, he forgot places, and he could not re-enter them, he forgot people, and they were gone, invisible to him, he was lonely, but for some reason, he did not care anymore, he was just happy to learn, to learn about artificing, as he had always longed for.
For a moment, a single instance, he felt as if the world broke apart around him, he felt as if he was walking on a robe made of human bones, strung together by a pianist who played on them beforehand, he felt as if everything was wrong, as if his face had melted, reformed, and turned into ice-cream and been eaten, just to reform inside the acid inside the eaters stomach, he felt as if he was wrong, as if this place was wrong, as if existence itself was broken, he felt it.
Then he realized, how was he here, how could he remember this place, and yet not remember their faces, the faces of...
Cades stopped, realizing that this was not real, but even worse, realizing that he had forgotten something incredibly important to him, realizing that he didn't remember the faces of his parents, that he had forgotten those visages, those smiles, those tears, those little wrinkles, of those that let him grow up under their literal wings.
Yet, for some reason, he felt almost as if they were never there for him, as if he wasn't really Cades, as if he only wore the name and memories, as if that which he was was so far removed from the original that he could not be called Cades, as if he was someone entirely different, as if he was watching everyone through a window through which nothing was real, as if he wasn't real, as if he was the only thing that was real, the only thing that truly mattered.
And in that instance, Cades was gone, his very mind realizing something.
Cades wasn't Cades anymore.
His name held no meaning to him.
Why should he continue to wear it...
He was so far removed from Cades that he wasn't Cades, he was someone else, he was someone who had no name, though he would probably still have to use the name for now when he thought about it.
Cades, no, the nameless man, would soon change his name, it was just that he had no idea what he should call himself, after all, at least Cades carries meaning, Cades carries a story, Cades resembles the ancient word sub-translated from cadere, which means as much as 'to fall', but in the second form, in the you-form, Cades meant as much as 'you fall', though it could also be translated as something like 'to be slain', to be dropped, or, in the form of a noun, caedis, bloodbath, murder, slaughter, or even massacre, though he preferred the meaning of falling.
And his name, Kirgun, also carried meaning, as much as 'come in', a ask, not a word, but it was something that Cades was always aware of, and something that he had formerly believed to represent himself, and added to that there was, of course, his former family, though he now didn't really feel much for them anymore, after all, he was a stranger in his own family, a caring family, he saw the stories, he felt the feelings, but it was all diluted, it was all.. weak... false, it was all a false bond, one that was bound to snap eventually, it had just done so at a point where he had no idea where he was, or even what had happened before he had arrived here, only remembering his last fight with the woman, and how she fell of the ledge of the great pillar they were standing on.
Still, Cades wasn't entirely gone, he still believed himself to be Cades, he just began to realize that he had lost everything, not that he had lost something, he realized that he had lost his family not only in a physical sense, he had lost his family in a psychological sense, his very should not viewing himself as Cades.
But still, while his name did no longer hold any meaning to the former Cades, his body, his face, the only thing he had from back then, meant something, his wings that he had lost, had meant something, his memories, meant at least something, though he now viewed it as more of a reader than an author, so to say.
Then, as if having waited for him to stop and think, for him to realize, the world changed, and he stood atop another stone pillar, smooth and long, round and about three-hundred feet in diameter, with him right in the middle, his clothes having turned back into the long cloth, covering his every body part, the mask being missing, as if to insult his mind, though he didn't know why it was insulting, and he knew that someone, or rather, somehow, something was coming.
He was back home, but this was just a challenge, this was the next battle, then it seemed quite obvious what manner of beings he would have to fight here, didn't it...