"At one point, I was a normal, if musically talented man living in Greece. Don't ask me where. I had a penchant for playing sad songs, and I was a master of the lyre. Like many artists of the time, I revered highest Apollo, god of the arts, and higher still his chorus, the Muses. Melpomene favoured me, granting me the ability to bring even the strong-hearted to tears with my songs. Such was my ability that I was visited upon by Melpomene herself one day. She was so beautiful and graceful, but so very sad. Her existence was tragedy, pure and simple, and she oft mourned that all she brought was sadness to the world." He sat nearby and began to play a quiet, sad tune as he spoke.
"I spent many years from then on… I wrote song after song. Songs of joy, songs of heartbreak. Songs of war. Songs with the lute, the lyre, the dulcimer… She listened graciously to each and every one, but never once did she smile for me. I died an old man of seventy, my voice cracking and hands calloused. Not once did she smile."
"I was a good man… Or at least good enough to go to the Elysian Fields." He smiled slightly. "It would seem the Greeks believe a life dedicated to the arts is one well spent. In any event, I spent some time there, still writing songs, until I dared to venture to Olympus itself, to beg the Gods allowance to journey their realms, that I may learn more of experiences and sensations. Perhaps I did not have enough emotional knowledge…" His eyes had glazed over. "They granted my request, and I spent much time wandering the realms of the Gods, from Olympus itself to the very pits of Tartarus. I drank with Dionysus, hunted with Artemis, and sang with Apollo, such being a great honour to one such as myself."
He took another breath. "But, after visiting each God's realm, I still could not write a song worthy of Melpomene's smile. And so I asked Apollo for a boon, his humble servant begged for a lyre that would play the richest sounds, and bring forth all the emotion within me. And so each Muse braided a string from her hair, which was cast in Hephaestus' purest silver. From Pan's very grove I myself took the wood and carved the instrument with nothing but the strongest love for the Muse that had given me purpose in life, and in death. But when this lyre was made, Apollo bade me not to play it as I had played so many before it. He told me that to unlock the fullest power of this lyre I would need to pluck the strings with a part of a God, and so he plucked from his own mouth one of his teeth, and bade me use it."
"And so, I wrote one last song. I poured my very soul into this song, a song of all I had experienced…" The notes came together more, and there was a swell of emotion. "Triumph, tragedy, joy and pain, love and hate and lust and power and despair… My very essence became this song." The music began to get more and more powerful. "And so, with my soul in notes and the Lyre in my hands, I played for Melpomene. I played with my heart, and held nothing back. No secret, no matter how dark or deep, was kept from Melpomene's ears. The very Gods in attendance were moved to tears with each note, but I focused on my muse, my purpose… And when I plucked the final chord, I let it reverberate through the air…" The music sped up as he did not speak for what would feel like an eternity…
…And then, it stopped completely. "And, as the last note faded, she smiled. The most beautiful sight in all the world. No words could possibly describe the feelings it stirred within me… But, in that very moment… She vanished." He let the gravity of this sink in, and then resumed playing. "In bringing the purest of joy to the very incarnation of tragedy, I subverted her essence, and rendered her unto oblivion. I killed tragedy. Being the only being to ever do such a thing, the Gods deemed it that I would be the only one capable of undoing this. And so, they cast me from Olympus back to the Earth, to a live-long quest for a tragedy great enough to write a song powerful enough to return her to Apollo's chorus." He ended his song, and moved his guitar away from him.
"I've been at it for three thousand five hundred and twelve years."
