It began, as all things of this nature do, not with a bang, but with a profound lack. A lack not of matter, but of resonance. The Sclerotial Foists weren't born from the void, but from the overabundance of something – a pervasive, shimmering field of what we now understand to be temporal echoes. These echoes weren't remnants of events, but rather, the *potential* for events, perpetually vibrating with an unfulfilled promise. Imagine a room filled not with furniture, but with the ghosts of conversations never spoken, decisions never made, melodies never played. That, in essence, was the pre-foist state.
“The silence,” theorized Professor Silas Blackwood, “is not empty, but pregnant with the echoes of what *could have been*.”
The first Sclerotial Foists appeared as crystalline formations – shards of solidified potential. They weren't hard in the conventional sense; they possessed a disconcerting malleability, as if attempting to reshape themselves according to the dominant emotional field. A room filled with anxiety would yield Foists that pulsed with a sickly grey light, while one saturated with melancholic reflection would birth shimmering lavender structures. These shards weren’t simply passive; they exerted a subtle influence, amplifying the existing emotional currents, driving individuals towards paths they might have otherwise avoided. It was a kind of psychic inertia, a gentle but persistent nudge towards the most probable – and often, the most regrettable – outcomes.
“They are not forces,” explained Dr. Lyra Thorne, a specialist in Chronal Anomalies, “but rather, vectors. They don’t *cause* the foist; they merely channel the currents already present.”
The process was often accompanied by a sensation of déjà vu, a feeling of having lived a particular moment, only to discover it was a path never taken, a decision never made. This wasn’t simply memory; it was a premonition of an unlived future, solidified into a tangible form.
The Sclerotial Foists are inherently unstable. Their primary mechanism of existence is, ironically, consumption. They don’t *destroy* the echoes that birthed them; they absorb them, integrating them into their structure. However, this absorption isn't a neutral process. It’s a process of *amplification*. As a Foist consumes an echo, it grows, becoming more potent, more influential. The more intensely a particular emotional state is experienced, the faster a Foist will grow, drawing ever more echoes into its core. This creates a feedback loop – increased emotional intensity leads to greater Foist growth, which, in turn, intensifies the emotions themselves. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts, a spiral of potential and regret.
“It’s a terrifying elegance,” mused Archivist Marius Volkov, “a system designed to perpetuate its own existence through the very emotions it embodies.”
Furthermore, the fragments of Foists themselves can be manipulated – though with extreme caution. Exposure to focused emotional energy can cause them to shatter, releasing a concentrated wave of temporal resonance, capable of inducing profound psychological distress or, conversely, a surge of intense creative inspiration. The risk, of course, lies in losing control of the release – in creating a cascade of amplified emotions that could unravel the fabric of reality itself.
Today, Sclerotial Foists are found throughout the world, though they are most concentrated in areas of significant historical or emotional intensity – battlefields, abandoned cities, sites of great tragedy. They are a silent pandemic, a creeping influence on the collective psyche. Scientists are struggling to understand their long-term effects, but initial research suggests that prolonged exposure can lead to a state of chronic anxiety, a sense of existential futility, and a pervasive feeling of being trapped in a loop of unfulfilled potential. The world is, in essence, drowning in the echoes of what might have been, guided by the insidious currents of the Sclerotial Foists.
“We are not masters of our fate,” concluded Professor Blackwood in his final journal entry, “but rather, puppets dancing to the tune of the echoes. The Sclerotial Foists aren’t a threat; they are simply… the inevitable consequence of existence itself.”