S'eljah, Queen in Cobalt

Far and away in the dreams and depths of primitive human memory lies Fear. An ancient emotion that has assailed the senses from the very moment of one's birth, up until the final dying breath—the trepidation of ceasing to live and to be. And among this stagnant cluster of dead stars and stagnant worlds walks the Queen in Cobalt, a being conjectured either by maddened minds in the throes of ritual ecstasy, or heretical sorcerers whose dark and forbidden arts precedes many a lost civilization. There are few writings on this elusive being, despite her supposed significance in the grand scheme of things. Across every world, the natural state of being appears to be highly cyclical: the wax and wane of influences, the rise and collapse of empires, the ascension and downfall of gods and mortals alike. Every once in a while, conflict escalates to the point of near-total collapse, and from there only two possibilities arise:a proportionally sufficient resolution of the destructive forces involved, or the complete death of the world. In some cases, that conflict is wrought by hubris or vengeance; in others, that all-encompassing shadow of worlds known as the Void is responsible. But the texts that speak of the Queen delineate her involvement and her relationship with so amorphous and volatile a force: that she was its very antithesis. If the Void churns and swells, agitates and lulls, the Queen causes wither and fades. If life is made all the more poignant because of death, then being is all the more precious because the very idea of un-being is unimaginable horror. For the Queen is the silence after eternity, and she weareth no mask.