#v1-8 is a parable about what happens if ozma succeeds

[bestworstcase]

listen to me. listen. listen cinder fall is an incarnation of the god of light.

eighty years ago ozma carried the divine relic of destruction into battle and carved unprecedented peace out of sand soaked red with blood and terror; the international accords born in that crucible of violence included the abolition of slavery and the establishment of four huntsman academies to safeguard four reliquaries. he raised atlas into the sky with the relic of creation, to serve as an inspiration and a symbol of global harmony. the whole world, united in purpose and ideal. the divine mandate has been symbolically fulfilled and the relics symbolically brought together.

who is cinder fall?

a lost child from mistral, raised in an orphanage near the very foundation of the pre-war alliance between imperial mistral and fascist mantle, the city of argus, and purchased with utmost banality by an atlesian hotelier of no special wealth or status. in the gilded heart of ozma’s shining, elevated symbol of unity, in a world that had outlawed slavery more than half a century before she was even born, cinder fall grew up wearing a shock collar and surrounded by throngs of people who politely pretended not to notice the starving child devouring their scraps, the scars beneath the necklace, the absence of housekeeping staff. a kind-hearted huntsman took her under his wing and told her it was her duty to suffer: you cannot fight back. endure this in silence for seven more years and then you can dedicate your life to the service of others.

she lasts for five before it breaks her.

the huntsmen and atlas are the symbolic fulfillment of ozma’s mandate and cinder is the god of light summoned to judge whether he has led humanity to salvation or damnation; and she finds his efforts… wanting. this is not a tragedy. this is not an accident. this is what happens when you hand over your trust, your safety, your children to men who claim to be our guardians but are, in reality, nothing more than men. […] huntsmen and huntresses should conduct themselves with mercy and honor, but i have witnessed neither. […] i know the existence of peace is fragile, and the leaders of our kingdoms conduct their business with iron gloves.

having deemed his cast of humankind inadequate, irredeemable, she unleashes total destruction on the world he created: kills his fall maiden and claims this power for herself, kills ozpin, fells beacon tower. the life of a true, noble hero is unfairly cut short by the hand of fate. grief rips the world apart. the cycle begins again. atlas is judged and found wanting and falls into the sea. the maiden of choice and the incarnation of destruction carry creation and knowledge away from the rubble. the divine gifts are taken back from the carcass of the world.

do you see! do you get it! cinder is every sin the god of light perceived in salem’s grief: selfish, arrogant, obsessed with power and control, deceitful, defiant. she is the embodied failures of ozma’s world. and she is the symbolic incarnation of the god of light, cold and cruel and unable to conceive of people except in terms of subjugation and authority, adjudicator, executioner. the pointless cruelty of incinerating pyrrha repeats and is repeated by the pointless cruelty of incinerating ozma. destiny, order. the maiden of choice.

oh