Behind the fun there was a fire

🜁 Witness of shared imagination

They laughed.

They packed up their dice.

Tossed cans and bags into the trash.

Said "good game," and left for the Real World™.

You smiled too.

Because that’s what you do.

But when the door shut, you were still sitting there.

Your maps still spread across the table.

Margins still full of notes.

Chest still echoing from something no one else seemed to feel.

They moved on.

They're just visitors to this realm.

But it stays with you.

Something sacred.

They call it a hobby.

To you it's a calling.

Even if you’ve never said that out loud, you’ve always known.

You're not just rolling dice for max damage. You're pulling at something deeper.

You aren’t playing make-believe.

You're laying bricks in a world that feels true.

And you aren’t just a player.

You are a witness.

🜂 The forge beneath the table

They say it’s just dice.

Just voices.

Just a way to blow off steam.

But "just a game" doesn’t change how you carry yourself the next day.

"Just a game" doesn’t haunt your waking memories, challenging you to see something the others missed.

"Just a game" doesn't bring you back to life after a hell week.

You’ve felt it.

In the space between laughter and lore.

You've tested courage in imaginary tombs.

You've mourned characters who never lived- and changed because of them.

You’ve held grief in your throat while everyone else looked at their character sheets,

not sure if they should speak.

This was never just play.

This wasn’t escape.

It was entry.

Into something old.

Something sacred.

The table was your forge.

The character sheet was your mirror.

And session by session, roll by roll, you weren’t just telling stories.

You were becoming someone more true.

🜃 Remember who you can be

Here's a true secret:

You aren’t just playing a game.

You're learning a language older than words.

Every table you sit at…

Every choice you make in-character…

Every world you help to shape with your imagination…

That isn’t escapism.

It's initiation.

You are the magician reaching into the dream to pull back something real.

The world wants to give you one option: survive the system. Become a part of it. Integrate or die.

But you can map the unseen.

You can hold multiple realities in your head and heart- and make them play together.

You can watch fiction shape emotion.

And then watch emotion shape action.

That’s not just being an audience.

That’s power.

Because the people who can imagine new realities are the only ones who can reshape the old one.

You don't play to hide.

You play to remember what most of the world forgets:

That imagination isn’t a toy.

It’s a tool.

And the ones who know how to use it?

They don’t wait for meaning.

They create it.

🜄 Cast It Forward

You don’t need to "come back to reality."

You need to cast what you've found into it.

You walk in myth.

You wield stories like weapons.

You’ve felt something sacred stir across a table covered with dice and cold pizza.

So now what?

Now you treat your day like the campaign it really is.

Make the decision no one else wants to.

Hold the vision when everyone else shrugs.

Speak true, especially when it isn't easy.

Being able to imagine things that invoke emotion is a rare talent. Those without it are in the dark. You are their light.

Because the dungeon was never just about treasure.

It was about learning who you are in the dark.

And now that you know?

You don’t just prep the next game.

You prep the next moment.

The next conversation.

The next opportunity to remember who you are.

You don't need a dm to tell you you’ve leveled up.

You can feel the resonance in your voice.

You feel it in your posture.

In your refusal to ignore what's inconvenient.

The magician’s work is never finished.

And it always matters.

-Rex