Kaylessa's Message

Item · 1 gp · Weight 0

"Whoever is reading this, know that my name was Kaylessa, and I was an elf until my last day. When I lived in Kyonin, our blessed land, I witnessed a great number of injustices and crimes against conscience. Even we elves are not absolutely pure. And to the best of my abilities, I fought against these wrongs, bringing justice to those that had evaded the law. While I was not alone, we were few, we remained in secret, and we called ourselves the Sunset Wasps. We revered Calistria, and in her name, we exacted vengeance upon those who had lost all shame. But we had been deceived. We were pawns of a vicious priestess of Deskari by the name of Anemora. She manipulated us, lied to us — hiding under the guise of the oldest and the wisest of us. At her behest, we spilled the blood of the innocent, not the guilty. When our transgressions were discovered, we became pariahs, monsters in the eyes of our people. Anemora revealed her true identity and offered her patronage. All save for me agreed, and I am ashamed of their choice. But what brings me even greater shame is that, when my former comrades approached me, I could not find the strength to draw my dagger and take my own life. I wish I had. I was taken captive and brought to the Worldwound. There, our new mistress taught us the ways of evil and darkness. We studied sin, and I learned alongside the others. At first, I was controlled by means of magic, but then... When you are forced to torture prisoner after prisoner, when you lose count of their seemingly endless number, something snaps inside you, and you cease struggling. And that was the moment of truth. Read carefully, for this revelation is the reason for my writing these words! I fell into the embrace of the Dark Fate. A mysterious curse hangs over elvenkind: whenever one of us sinks to certain depths of evil, they turn into a drow. We were lied to. The dark elves are not a degenerate, flawed branch of our people. They are not a parody envisioned by the dark gods. They are us. And their sins are ours. We cannot renounce our responsibility for them, because every elf — EVERY SINGLE ONE — has the potential to become a drow. I expect that this truth will be dangerous. Among the elves, there are many who are powerful and influential, and I fear that they will seek to bury this revelation and destroy all who know of it. But I believe that truth is greater than gain. I always have. Farewell, and believe in truth."