My mother was born in a small village. Her childhood days were spent in cold, hard labor. She often dreamed about a better life, where she could live in luxury, and fill herself with thick, expensive steaks. Then, one day, she heard a rumor that there was someone in the woods who was granting wishes to whoever would summon a certain name - someone who wasn't quite... human.

My mother passed her early adult years in luxury and comfort. A great mansion and a loving family. But soon, the someone came back to her, looking for repayment for the wishes granted so many years ago.

You see, this demon took "names" as his price. This is somewhat equivalent to the idea of "soul" in western culture, but it's closer to the idea of "identity". When the demon took your name, it took everything about you: your memories and personality and thoughts. Physically, you would become a husk, and would end up going insane, or more often, dying quietly.

My mother refused to give me up. When she refused the steep price demanded of her, things began to change. Gloom fell about my family.

My mother became cursed with a sickening depression, and began to waste away. The doctor's prescription of relaxation, mild exercise, calm music, moderate consumption of white wine and regular copulation failed to reverse her condition. Before she passed, she gave me a golden pocket mirror. "Do not even let it go..."

When my mother passed, my father began to follow. He grew depressed by her absence. No other women, no amount of alcohol helped. He followed my mother to the grave.

Later, I found out that my brother Henri had been contacted by the demon as well, and he'd made a deal... in exchange for his own name. Henri knew about my mother's deal in the past (likely the demon told him, to manipulate him), and lost hope. He went willingly with the demon, as he thought the only chance he'd be reunited with me was if the demon allowed us to be together after taking both our names.

But what the demon didn't know at first, was that my mother had been planning all those years to protect me from him. Through some strange, perhaps purposeful upbringing, I had developed multiple personality disorder of the strongest kind.

When the demon finally tried to claim me, I gave up one of my identities, but I had the others, and so did not suffer a complete loss of my name.

The demon found out, however, that he had been tricked. I was committed to a mental asylum at the time, as my entire family had died, and my insanity discovered. While I was committed, the demon cast one final curse on me, placing me in an indefinite nightmare, where he attempted to take each of the "names" from each of my personalities.

It was in this intensely vivid dream that I learned the full truth of my mother's past, and so can tell this story today. Through that great ordeal, I somehow managed to protect each of my personalities, and freed the personality that I had given up to the devil in the first place.

I had beaten the demon at his own game.

As I prepared to leave the nightmare, I relinquished all of the personalities which I'd protected from the demon. Perhaps they formed into one, which I became, or perhaps they just dissipated, freed but no longer needed to protect me. Finally, I awoke back in the bed in the asylum. It seemed to all the doctors that I had been miraculously "cured" in my deep sleep, which they couldn't wake me up from. Time to start a new life..

Goldia_Die_Heilige