Now you have learned the truth about your favorite, famous mythical creatures. “Dragons” went extinct, you’ve been secretly lusting after a manatee, you’ll never shoot fire out of your fingertips, humanity from the start has been the true villain all along, Santa isn’t real, and yes, your parents do prefer the family pet over you. That is simply the reality of the world humans created. Shame, isn’t it?

But, you know, it’s not all that terrible.

I give humanity a lot of (very deserved) crap, and I genuinely would not mind if another plague trimmed your numbers a little, but I don’t necessarily hate humans either.

I know, I know. I haven’t done much to show my slight affection, but it’s there, truly. And I can say that time and time again, humans amaze me. I mean think about it for a second, won’t you? If you have learned anything from what I’ve told you, it’s that amazing things existed and can continue to exist.

Take Santa Claus.

Yes, the big man in a red suit who breaks into people’s homes while they sleep to reverse steal isn’t real (think about how terrifying that really sounds), but you know who is? The very real, and very human, Nikoloas of Myra, otherwise known as Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker. As a young boy, his wealthy parents died tragically and left their vast fortune to him. Instead of becoming a fourth century Greek Batman, Nicholas decided to dedicate it all to helping the needy. From offering prayers and caring for children to secretly leaving coins in people’s shoes, Nicholas made it his purpose to give hope to those in need. Thus, he became the inspiration for the man we know as Santa Claus.

He’s not a big, fat, red man with a factory in the North Pole, but blame the soda companies for that perception. From the beginning, Santa has always been there to give children hope, whether as a real man or as an idea. Myths likewise function in nearly the same way.

No, you won’t get to fight a fire breathing hell-mount anymore, but you know what can terrify the shit out of you? Nile Crocodiles and acid-spitting snakes, two creatures that are the actual descendants of drakes, like chickens are of raptors. Similarly, commanding the forces of nature through your fingertips has virtually disappeared like an appendix’s purpose, but guess what does exist?

Science.

Science exists.

And like Santa Claus, science is really fucking cool. Humans can’t conjure fire right from the finger-tips, but you figured out how to make a glove-sized flamethrower, and that is awesome. You learned how to fly without wings, breathe underwater without gills, and get sick without dying. All of this learned within the last hundred or so years. Isn’t that in itself magical?

Yes, it sucks that it took people long enough to realize these things, and in the process the world’s greatest creatures had to die, but that doesn’t mean that the world we live in now is any less amazing than it was millennia ago.

Once upon a time, the world was a vast and mysterious place. Nymphs danced across waters as drakes soared the heavens. Survival of the fittest weeded out the weak. And yet, in that wide, vast world, the weakest of all became something more.

You changed this world. Whether good or bad, humans had—have—the power to change. I have lived for eons, forever static in mind and body. I have seen life come and go, yet only humans remain consistent in their inconsistency. That makes no sense, and I love that about you. The world changes so much around you that there is always something new to see, some new truth to explore and turn into a fanciful myth once you forget its origins.

So stop living in the past. Stop dreaming of a fantasy long gone, and instead make the world a reality of fantastic things again.

In the end, a person must see the world for what it is, what it used to be, and for what it could be. Just because one thing isn’t true in the most literal sense doesn’t make it false either. It is up to you to look for the new myths and truths, the new facts and fiction, and the blend between the two. The world is a mythical place all on its own. If you choose to look for it, you’ll find something amazing.

That, dear adventurer, I promise.