I am not mad.

I am unable to recall past incidents that have frightened or terrified me more than this moment, for my existence feels reduced to something brittle and ephemeral. I am no more than a man, a shadow of a man, lacking substance or purpose. I sow nothing, reap nothing; I am a barren husk in this forsaken estate.

These are not the ravings of a madman—I am not mad. My thoughts, though fractured, are illuminated by the pursuit of truth. I am a seeker, a sayer, remarkable only in my capacity to perceive what lies beneath us at this very moment. Can you not feel it? There is something alive beneath these stones, something ancient and immense. It thrums like a heart in a sunless void, bound in chains of iron that mock its divinity. Imagine a god, not seated on a celestial throne, but imprisoned in a tomb of brick and mortar. How grotesquely ironic.

The guards are outside my chamber now, pacing like wolves circling prey. Their boots scrape against the flagstones with a rhythm that sets my teeth on edge. I hear their muffled voices, their coarse laughter, their grunted orders. They believe themselves clever and capable, but I see through them. They are ants squabbling over crumbs, blind to the feast of knowledge that lies hidden in this place. Or perhaps they are not blind. Perhaps they have glimpsed the truth and now conspire to silence me before I can share it with you, my reader.

Yes, you—whoever you are. You must understand that what I write here is vital and urgent. When I am finished—or when they finally splinter my barricade—I will cast these pages from the window. I pray the wind carries them to hands that will recognize their worth. The guards are growing agitated now; they shout my name with a venom that almost makes me laugh. Their anger is like that of children denied a toy, ignorant of the greater game being played.

But I am not laughing. My fingers tremble as I write. Not from fear, but from the enormity of what I must convey. Below us, hidden in the deep, there is a god—not God, not the benevolent creator of sermons and psalms, but something far stranger. This entity defies worship and hatred alike, for it is beyond such petty human constructs. It is shapeless, bodiless, incomprehensible. Yet it is here, imprisoned, waiting. I feel its presence even now. A low vibration, like a breath held too long, presses against my mind. The questions it stirs are too vast, too terrible. They swarm in my skull like gnats, each one biting and buzzing until my thoughts are a frenzy of half-formed revelations. My time is running short. I hear the guards deliberating, their voices sharp with urgency. They mean to chop down the door. They think me defenseless.

Let them try. I have barred the door and stacked furniture high enough to scrape the beams. If they breach it, I will not surrender meekly. The fire poker sits within reach, its iron tip gleaming in the dim light as if God ensures I notice it. I will defend myself, and if blood is spilled, so be it. The lord, the true lord, will know my heart and spare me damnation. For I am no heretic. I am a prophet, chosen to reveal the truths they fear. The shouting grows louder now, joined by the splintering groan of wood under pressure. My hands fly across the paper, desperate to leave nothing unsaid. Reader, if these pages find you, I beg you to understand: there is a mask—a cruel, eyeless mask—that has been forced upon humanity. It blinds us to the reality beneath, a reality so vast and intricate it would shatter the mind of any who glimpsed it unprepared. This mask is the work of a great fraternity.

You must spread the truth. Tear the mask away. Let the light of knowledge burn through the lies. But beware—it is not light you will find beneath the mask. It is dark. Unfathomable. Infinite. And it has a heartbeat. I can hear them now, the guards battering the door with a fury that makes the walls tremble. Splinters rain down like falling leaves. My time is up. If they enter, I will strike. If they kill me, so be it. The god below stirs. I can feel it in my chest, in my teeth, in the marrow of my bones. Forgive me, reader. There is so much more I wish to tell you. But the door is breaking. The truth, as much as I can give, is now in your hands.

Copy the pages; find them all and copy them word for word. Do not mistranslate; do not make mistakes between words; this knowledge must be preserved. The fraternity is not what it says it is; they are everywhere, and there are more than you think. Their members are all hiding knowledge; their ranks are filled with scholars to royals and emperors. All men are created equal, but few, if any, maybe I am the only one seeking the true knowledge. I think they actually do know; they do know; they are intentionally hiding it. It all makes sense now why few are let in: only the strong or powerful.

My door is splintering; they are getting close to entering and killing me. I throw these words out now; may God have mercy on my soul, for I realize now I must jump, for I am no coward to admit that I do not wish to know if they are to maybe torture or maim me. I will die on my action: may God understand, may he understand and save me, may I spend eternity with God and Mary's warm embrace, and may these words find you—the truth.