The Hobo has finally been expunged in his entirety and returned to the One.

The Hobo, born Raiden and taking the name RedDwarf the BeardPirate as an adult, was a blight upon the world.

He awakened to his aspect at an early age, but – as he was the first generation of children born post-Collapse – had no one to help him control it. He was able to erase whatever stone he wished, which he refined as he grew older. He could have become a great sculptor, which is what he was rushing towards.

But then he became possessed. It is unclear what exactly these entities are – if they are remnants of something before the Collapse, some other creature made from the ashes of the previous world, or manifestations of mental illness made worse with greater access to powers – but this matched the same pattern as things that came after. What I will refer to as the Demon.

Raiden became obsessed with his art as a young adult, constantly striving to be better than the already perfect work he was able already realize. He grew desperate for more impressive feats. He carved facades into cliff faces. He fashioned the supports of giant bridges – architectural feats in their own right – into the form of monsters and beasts holding the platform across their back.

But as his fervency grew, so did his recklessness. He lost consideration for others as his passions overtook him. Accidents followed in his wake as did, toward the end, deaths.

While I can sense the passion within him, and the sense of awe, I can feel no intention from him during this time. It is as if he were led by something else, hence my dubbing it possession by the Demon.

What is most confounding to me is that he was planning his last great work, and everything stopped. He abandoned the work and, for the first time in nearly a decade, I can follow his train of thought. Or I could, if it were coherent.

Whatever had possessed Raiden had left him, and with it his mind was scrambled. Raiden was, effectively, dead. In his place was a new creature that would eventually be known as RedDwarf.

His aspect had also changed with his new perspective. Instead of causing bits of stone to vanish, he instead caused fire to spew from his body. He became a mercenary, using this power to destroy anything that stood in his way. The only reason that he wasn’t more of a terror at this point in his existence was that he was unfocused and had strange eccentricities.

RedDwarf was known as the BeardPirate specifically because the fire that was now his aspect would indiscriminately spew from his body, especially when he let his guard down while sleeping. He did not gain any resistance to his own fire, so he typically awoke with whatever hair he had grown over the course of that day singed to nothing. He decided that he did care about having magnificent facial hair but, as he could not grow any of his own, became obsessed with that of others. He grew a collection of beards.

While most of the previous owners were not good people – he was a mercenary and typically dealt with unsavory types – I can mark this as the start of RedDwarf’s decline. His depression turned to envy, which eventually grew into greed. He originally just scalped those that he killed, but eventually the order had shifted. He found a beard he liked, took it for his own, and killed the owner for no reason other than eliminating witnesses.

Things escalated from there.

RedDwarf still had some bits of humanity left to him, but it was skewed. He learned the populace of the kingdom he traveled complained of a refugee crisis due to some local conflict. That the homeless were nothing more than a stain on their pristine civilization. He took this to heart and used his aspect to strike terror to those on the streets.

Within five years, this single individual had solved the problems. The homeless no longer existed – they had all burned to ash.

RedDwarf was able to do so largely because the people with homes thought little for those without, and merely sighed with relief when they noticed fewer about. His aspect was powerful, and those that did attempt to fight back or confront him in some way stood little chance. By the time the authorities took him seriously, the fear and awe of the few homeless left, as well as those in danger of falling into poverty and losing what separated them from who they looked down on, had empowered him.

This is not to be taken as metaphor.

In a very real way, their fear of RedDwarf gave him more strength. His aspect grew more powerful. His body grew sturdier. He began to embody whatever people thought of him. They gave him power.

This is what a Saint is – a creature that has somehow surpassed their human limitations. They are repositories of power, fueled by the attention and regard for others. It is reminiscent of what my father theorized of gods prior to the Collapse.

This is when I found him. I could not kill him. But I could know him.

I used this to help organize a manhunt. He killed most of those who came after him, but there were too many. He had caused too much harm, and I can be persuasive when needed.

But as I watched his body cool, as I learned more of his past, his soul failed to dissipate. The fear of those who survived, and those that had made him a monster for children, kept him… He was no longer alive, but his essence still existed.

For a century, his presence lingered over the islands of the south. It encouraged evil in others, pure chaos disguised as a misguided attempt to give people what they wanted. Some wondered whether he was a lesson sent by the gods to teach people to be careful what they wished for.

They are dead now.

It took a century, but I managed to wipe out any record of the monster that was RedDwarf the BeardPirate. His presence still exists in some form – it was impossible to destroy all memories of him entirely – but I could destroy any reputable sources and turn him from legend into ghost story.

And as his story became less relevant to those still living, his essence gradually faded. Until it finally returned.

Even now, I wonder if these writings risk bringing him back. It is why I have had to be vague.

But also, I wonder why the book I found as a child had told this very story in brief. Was it predicting the future, or is this a repeat of what had come before? And is the fact that I stumbled upon that book related to my own aspect?