My final entry.

May history judge me kindly, for tonight, I have set in motion events that will echo through eternity. The device has awakened fully, its heartbeat now intertwined irreversibly with my own.

It pulses, and reality itself seems to bend around it, whispers becoming shouts, shadows deepening into forms of impossible beauty and terror alike. Ravenswood Bluff will never be the same—its delicate equilibrium shattered, reborn through chaos and revelation. I have done what no other dared; whether savior or destroyer, the legacy is written in both Flesh and Bone.

I have lost more than myself along the way. And finally, I feel the journey coming to a slow.

Tonight, I step willingly into the darkness, ready to face judgment in whatever form it comes.

May those who follow understand what I could not.

The night calls, and every shadow whispers truths. all secrets lie hidden, waiting to be revealed under each silvery light of the Full Moon.

For those that are brave, or foolish, to tread this path. Follow the sign.

Fleeting moments haunt me, and the lamplights flicker as if mocking my restless mind. Tonight, the culmination of my life's work stands before me---a creation born from the fusion of mortality's starkest symbols: the skull and the heart. This amalgamation, this... device, pulses with an energy that defies the natural order, a testament to my genius or perhaps my madness.

Ravenswood Bluff has long been ensnared in a ceaseless dance of suspicion and betrayal, its inhabitants' pawns in a game orchestrated by unseen hands. But with the activation of my invention, the balance shall tip, and the eternal battle will shift in ways none can foresee. Some whisper that it is a weapon, others a beacon of hope; I alone know its true purpose.

As I pen these words, I feel the weight of destiny pressing upon me. The device hums softly, a lullaby of impending change. Tomorrow, when the sun rises over the mist-laden streets, Ravenswood Bluff will awaken to a new reality. And I, the architect of this transformation, will watch from the shadows, both creator and observer of the chaos to come. Uncertain, at this point if I will grace heaven's gate-- or if I am just mere mortal.

Exhaustion gnaws at the edges of my consciousness, I no longer sleep, yet admittedly, I am too frightened to close my eyes. The device thrums quietly, its rhythm matching my own weary heartbeat, filling the chamber with a subtle yet insistent melody. Reminding me that each harmony breeds a new secret---fragments of truths dispersed in the world that I scarcely dare to understand.

Lost in contemplation, the final assembly draws near, every piece painstakingly refined, awaiting integration. My pulse quickens, mirroring the heartbeat of the device itself, growing ever stronger, more insistent.

Ravenswood Bluff slumbers fitfully tonight. Every reflection of myself haunts me from polished brass and mirrored glass, eyes hollow yet alight with determination. Tomorrow approaches swiftly, carrying either salvation or ruin upon its silent wings. I stand at the crossroads, knowing there is no return. Whispers drift from campfire to cathedral, curiosity festers in every darkened corner. They sense something is coming, though they know not why.

Soon, they shall understand.

Tonight, I find solace only in the certainty of tomorrow's arrival. Let the dawn bear witness to my triumph or villainizing defeat.

Such a magnificent discovery has struck like a blade to the heart---sudden, sharp, irrevocable. It did not creep upon me like the whispers, nor did it veil itself in riddles. No, tonight, the truth descended.

Somewhere between waking and dream, in that fevered liminality where time folds upon itself, I saw it. The vision tore through the darkness, searing into my mind with impossible clarity. The skull. The heart. Not two, but one---a singular, unholy union. It had never been a metaphor, never an abstract fixation. It was real. It was waiting.

I stumbled from my bed, hands trembling, heart hammering in my chest.

Heartbeat quickening, I recognize it now---not mine, but the steady rhythm emanating from something beyond, something demanding to be born.

The device.

I had to capture it before the vision slipped away before doubt and reason could poison my certainty. Charcoal met parchment, desperate, furious. Sketches spilled forth, no longer random lines but a blueprint, a design dictated by forces beyond my comprehension. Bone and flesh. Machinery and spirit. The framework of a skull, yet not hollow---at its core, a pulsing heart, veined and visceral, impossibly alive.

My fingers shook as I shaded the ridges of the bone, and traced the latticework of unseen sinews that bound the two together. A conduit? A prison? A creation or an abomination? I do not know. But it breathes. Even now, staring at the finished drawing, I feel it pulse beneath my fingertips.

This is no longer a question of discovery but inevitability.

The path ahead is illuminated, stretching forward in blinding certainty. It calls to me. It beckons.

Promise and dread entwined, like the heart and skull, inseparable now.

All boundaries have dissolved. Dreams and wakefulness have become one, stitched together by fevered obsession. I drift through a twilight realm where certainty no longer exists—only symbols, only whispers, only the ceaseless pull toward something vast and unknowable.

Now, my workshop is no longer a sanctuary but a labyrinth of madness. The sketches multiply, sprawling across every surface—pages upon pages of skulls and hearts, bound, entwined, inescapable. They press in on me, watching, waiting, demanding. The meaning remains just out of reach, a truth obscured behind a veil I cannot yet tear away.

The whispers surge. Louder, sharper, more insistent than ever. Not just murmurs now, but commands. They guide my trembling hands, my ink-stained fingers tracing the inevitable with each fevered stroke. I do not understand, but I no longer need to. The choice has already been made.

Deserted by Akuma, I must finish this alone. I no longer hear their voice. I hear no voices at all.

The void has found me and I am fully aware that there is no turning back.

There never was.

It looms before me, whispering its siren call. It knows me. It has been waiting.

And so, I step forward.

I am ready to receive it.

Night after night they come steadily. Nowadays, the nights seem to bleed into one another, each more fevered than the last. Each is more urgent than the last. The visions claw at my mind, relentless--- insatiable. My hand moves without thought, driven by something beyond me---sketching, scrawling, birthing the fusion of skull and heart onto parchment in frenzied strokes. Yet the truth remains just out of reach, a specter lingering at the edges of comprehension. I chase it blindly, maddened by the pursuit, unwilling---unable---to stop.

My dear friend Akuma grows feverish with need. To see our work completed, to see me understand what those in their time could not. As if the completion of the work is supplying them closure in the afterlife that was not possible when they were mortal.

Beyond these walls, Ravenswood Bluff stirs. The town hums with unease as if some unseen force gnaws at its edges. Rumors spread like wildfire through dimly lit inns and shadowed alleys---whispers of odd happenings, of something not quite right. Do they know? Can they feel the tremors beneath their feet, sense the shifting of unseen tides?

They want answers.

I no longer move among them as I once did. They watch me now--- from a distance. Their eyes linger too long, their voices hush when I pass. I feel their suspicion, their fear. Perhaps they should be afraid.

Tonight, I teeter on the edge of something vast, something monstrous. The abyss calls to me, its whispers as familiar as my own breath. I should recoil, turn back---but instead, I take another step forward.

I want answers.

Let it come.

On this night, enigmatic stillness blankets my workshop, broken only by the rhythmic ticking of a solitary clock and the faint scratching of charcoal upon parchment. The air is thick, charged with something unseen, something waiting.

Nervous looks and whispered questions from the locals have accompanied my recent supply runs. Thankfully, the undertaker remains discreet—the coin is good—but it's only a matter of time. For my own safety, I've locked myself in my workshop.

My sketches betray me. What once were idle markings now form unsettling patterns—blueprints of something both profound and terrifying, familiar yet utterly foreign. The Heralds murmur louder now, their voices sharpening, their cryptic chants nearly tangible. What was once a distant hum in the recesses of my mind now presses against my skull, insistent, unyielding.

"Two and seven. Two and seven."

The numbers carve themselves into the grain of my desk, whisper from the flickering shadows, etch themselves in the shifting coals of the dying fire. I do not yet understand, but understanding is no longer a choice. It is coming.

Every soul in Ravenswood Bluff trembles on the cusp of revelation. Its people go about their lives, unaware of the strings that guide their every step, their laughter and sorrow orchestrated by unseen hands. I watch them from afar, and I wonder: am I one of them, blind and bound? Or am I the hand that pulls the strings?

The abyss yawns before me, dark and infinite. I see it now, clearer than ever, and yet my feet refuse to stop.

If this path leads to ruin, then it is decided by the gods that ruin is where I must go.

Alas, the phantasms' secrets remain just beyond my grasp, their whispers growing louder---persistent as the ticking clock, as if time itself waits, lurks, watches.

I am never alone.

The walls breathe with shadows; the air is thick with something unseen. Have I lost myself? Or worse---have I lost the light I was following all along? Either way, it hardly matters now.

I'm afraid to make my worries known to my dear Akuma. They do not take to self pity. A sturdy rock in my times of darkness. A wonderful companion and mentor. Their contributions have been exactly what I needed to move the work forward.

The other voices pull and twist, tug and taunt---a cyclical torment. One moment, they beckon me forward, urging me deeper, deeper still. The next, they mock me, jeering at my ignorance, my blind pursuit of a truth I may not be prepared to know.

"Look for the Heralds in the coming days," they murmur these days, their voices threading through the marrow of my bones. "Two and seven. Two and seven."

What cruel riddles they weave, what sinister games they play. The numbers coil around me like serpents, their meaning a mystery, their presence undeniable. They scrawl themselves in the condensation on my windows, appear in the flickering candlelight, and lurk in the ink bleeding across these pages.

Am I their puppet or their master? Do I command them, or do they command me? The line blurs. My resolve wavers, but curiosity, insatiable and unyielding, demands my obedience.

I have decided that I will be ignorant to their schemes no more, I will follow the numbers, follow the voices, follow the unraveling thread. Whether it leads me to revelation or ruin, I cannot say.

I am already too far gone, given too much of myself, to turn back now.

Pressure mounts incessantly. Each hour tightens--- constricts like a vice around my mind. My dreams grow darker, more insistent; the whispers crescendo to a chorus, relentless and maddening. I fear any day now, what has managed to evade a man as proud as me, will suddenly come crashing down, like a world built on some kind of spirited devotion to ambitiously create something that both contrasts and mimics the horrors of reality. What becomes me? Symbols swirl endlessly before my eyes---skulls embraced by beating hearts---each vision more vivid--- flashing--- yet maddeningly intangible.

Ravenswood Bluff senses the unrest; I see it in the wary glances, and hear it in hushed conversations drifting through the moonlit streets in the quiet of the early night. I must be careful. They feel a change coming, though its nature remains shrouded in mystery. My face remains, and my demeanor is stoic until I'm able to make right on what I've started. If by chance, this voyage dirties my soul and comes to a sudden end by some unscrupulous discovery of a way purer than my own, that deed shall surely bring me to my knees. But the crucifixion is imminent--- their faces--- remind me that they've never quite forgotten.

The writings of Akuma encourage me to persist. A brilliant engineer in their day. I often wish they were here now, able to collaborate and see their vision realized.

What if there was a way? The work is too important not to. I know we aren't allowed to play God--- certainly. Though the barriers between life and death, good and evil, have always been thinner within Ravenswood Bluff.

My scholarly sojourn returns me to the library, but now I seek not knowledge but power. There must be a way, there will be a way.

Purpose haunts my sleep. My own dreams torment me.

Can you imagine?

The vision to change the world, the ability to alter an unseen battle of good versus evil that affects our very souls.

Is there a purpose more righteous, more important? I know what must be done, but how?

Some nights I feel my visions hold the key, but they flaunt and dangle it further away from me each opportunity I get to reach out and grasp it. But then--- they seem to obliterate into a void--- an unknown nothingness. I see strange symbols and writings. That too is hidden from me. Their menacing symbols I can scarcely decipher. But I envision myself able to decode--- decrypt somehow, what the writings on the wall seem to scream out to me. I feel I'm too void to manage to contain and accept that which seems to leak crimson water--- as if patiently waiting, in a sense to quench my thirst for what had successfully evaded me.

In the daylight I seek truth. The local library is ancient and holds esoteric texts suited to my purpose. I am drawn to the writing of Akuma, who was an engineer. Who tried to shape the forces of evil into predictable patterns so they could be defeated. Tragedy struck before they could complete their work as the townsfolk believed them to be in league with evil and they murdered Akuma.

Now the hour is late. I look outside my window as I write this, watching the last of the candles in each of the homes extinguish. Ravenswood Bluff seems quieter tonight, as though holding its breath, awaiting the first notes of a dark symphony.

Akuma's tale could very well mirror my own if I am not careful. Should I step back, take a different path? No. I am too far gone to turn around now and knowingly, I have become too wasted by my own devices to not carry on--- to not continue.

I must carry on. I must complete this path, even to oblivion.