Subtlety Is Far More Artful than Blatancy

I am pleased to accept the formal invitation to join this community of higher-minded individuals. I am, for those unfortunate beings who have yet to make my acquaintance, currently known by the name Alicia Fenn. For the time being, that name shall continue to do nicely. I had originally intended to follow the example set by other colleagues and offer an abbreviated autobiography here, but I have since changed my mind. I would rather use this forum to voice a particular concern that has been troubling my mind.

I have noticed a most distressing trend in recent years. Apparently, those enlightened individuals who seek after evil have now completely lost the fine art of subtlety. It is really quite deplorable to see how clumsy individuals have gotten in this present age. Consider Haden, for instance. Over and again I have striven to hold that man's baser instincts in check, and yet still he persists in blatant mass executions and other such tomfoolery. I cannot count the times I have reminded him of the important, simple lesson, "One can accomplish far more with a single well-placed poisoning than one can by massacring an entire city." And yet, still my lessons have had little impact on him.

Allow me to illustrate my point:

When I was a small child, perhaps three or four years of age, I very much desired a unicorn for my birthday. When the day came, however, my parents gave me a kitten instead. She was a fluffy yellow creature, selflessly devoted to me from the very beginning. Now, I did indeed cherish this creature, as any child might. Nevertheless, it was not a kitten that I had specifically asked for. Now, I might have followed the example of other artless children and wept and wailed in the hope of securing the desired present. I was not like those other children, though. I was not foolish, weak, and unmethodical. I was above such things, even at that tender age.

I named the kitten Muffin and took her with me everywhere, demonstrating a most emphatic fondness for the little creature. My parents actually grew to believe that they had skillfully deceived me into accepting an inferior gift. After two weeks of constant, tender affection bestowed upon the kitten, I took her outside one night and strangled her. I left the body on our front steps. The next morning, I "discovered" the body and was inconsolable until the loss was made up for with the long-desired unicorn. Later, when I had grown into an academically-minded adolescent, I used the blood and organs from the unicorn in some of my first experimental potions. Ah, yes, I really was an endearingly practical child.

From that simple and charming childhood lesson, I learned significant truths about life and the pursuit of one's desires. These lessons, as one might surmise, have served me immensely well. And so, in this forum, I take it upon myself today to remind all others who have chosen to forsake "good" and other such nonsense of this most essential truth: Subtlety, always subtlety.