Crumpled Note
Item · 1 gp · Weight 0
"If you've found this note, I want you to know: art is pain. My name is Floggy the Sculptor, and the moment I was born, the goddess Shelyn struck me with the most horrible curse of all — she gave me a craving for art. I became a sculptor's apprentice when I was seven, and by twenty five I had already become a reputable and ambitious debutant. Alas, this didn't bring me any happiness. My first piece of art, a composition called 'The Last Azlanti Takes a Step into the Lands of the Axis,' caused a stir... and most reactions were shouts of indignation. For some reason, the public decided that my depiction of Aroden bore a striking resemblance to the Chairman of Absalom's Grand Council, Lord Woors. They accused me of being corrupt and subjected me to a shameful beating right at the grand opening! I attributed this calamity to my youthful inexperience, and I intended to turn the tables. To avoid further accusations, I chose a topic that was pronouncedly distant from Absalom's realities. So I depicted the Tian goddess-warrior, 'Tchizuru.' How could I have known that so many people from Tian Xia live in Absalom? And why did none of them warn me that the name of the goddess is actually spelled and pronounced 'Shizuru' or that misspelling it is a great blasphemy? How could I even suspect that one part of my audience would be outraged by the excessive bellicosity of my statue, the other would be insulted by its extreme femininity, and the rest would brand me a parasite trying to make money off of undisguised cultural appropriation? Feeling desperate, I turned to abstractionism! And when the time had come to give a name to my statue, I chose a random set of letters, consonants only — but caused even more trouble. That very night, a bunch of strangers clad in hooded black robes broke into my house, threatened me with daggers, and demanded that I never again try to depict their mysterious deity or mention one of its secret names. Having failed at gaining glory among the educated and sophisticated public, I fled North, to Sarkoris. There, among the simple people, my talent could finally blossom! I showed them wooden sculptures, whose crude grotesqueness emanated strength and the primordial power of the earth — things they were supposed to understand. ...so, they beat me up for good measure and kicked me out of their settlement — right after they broke my favorite chisel and spat in my travel bag. Until this day, I have no idea what I did to offend them — by that time, I had already learned not to ask pointless questions. The desperation of it all made me feel bitter and stubborn. But fate challenged me — so I accepted the challenge! I had found my mission — I wanted to create a statue that would INSULT NO ONE. After several weeks of contemplation, I decided to sculpt a chicken. Yes, a simple chicken. What could be offensive about chickens? They are yellow, and they chirp, there's definitely nothing bad about that. Oh, I couldn't have been more wrong. A week after my sculpture was showcased to the audience, a group of grim-looking people came and fell to their knees before it. They pronounced my statue to be an idol of the deity they worshiped — an infernal duke, Iaozrael. It turned out that there is a Duke of Hell whose unholy symbol is... a chicken! More and more cultists came to see my sculpture every day. And then another kind of public arrived — tough knights with long swords, who chopped all the 'admirers of my talent' into pieces. After they were done with the slaughter, they started searching for the person who created 'the blasphemous chicken' — for me! I fled, taking my unfortunate creation with me. I dragged the statue as far as I could, and I left it in the wilderness. I hope no one finds it here — although, since you are reading this, my hope was futile. In this case, you should know: art is pain. Beware of the people who worship chickens, and equally beware of those who hate them. And here is the main thing I was trying to say — I DIDN'T MEAN TO HURT ANYONE'S FEELINGS WITH THIS STATUE! Floggy the Sculptor"