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[boundinblood]

[One of the biggest problems with research into her major projects at home is that simply saying what she's after is a gamble. The chances aren't slim that she'd be discouraged or outright denied help by virtue of what she asks being thought absolutely impossible, or too close to revealing a Warden secret, or borderline heretical. The Seven-Fold City has been the best place she's found to study, lacking any of these issues.

She's done as well as she could here, but now her problem is she can't readily make sense of new ideas without the framework of her home. She needs new input. Fresh, entirely unprecedented angles on the matter. And what better place than here, which barely seems to have even heard of Thedas?

She pans the camera deliberately over stacks of books on a table to show off her research. The volumes are from Tomorrow and Sorcery both, with a couple of field guides from Adventure thrown in, tomes on magic and medicinal marvels.]

All of this, and it's worth so little. [She turns the device around to show her face. She's well-rested, as opposed to the last time she'd contacted the network while binge-studying. There's no brightness this time, no spark of curiosity in her eyes. Instead, her expression one of inerrant focus. She's on a mission, but it weighs on her.] I need perspective. New ones. I was wondering if you all could help me. I'm working on two projects right now, and...I need some outsider's insight.

The first project is...well, it's hard to describe, but there's a slow-acting poison in my world. It can be treated to act even slower, but not nullified. It's less like a spider's venom and more magical, but...well, I'm trying to cure it. If anyone has any knowledge of magical illnesses, forces of corruption, or...oh, anything you think might be relevant, I'd like you to share it. It's, um... [She glances at the books offscreen.] ...bloodborne, if that's useful.

[She seats herself at the table the books are stacked on, her staff clinking lightly as she props it up against the stone wall beside her. The crescent moon tip catches the firelight of a torch nearby, glimmering gold.]

The second is much easier to explain, but, I'm worried its relevance is limited to magic. In my world, demonic and spiritual possession can only be cured by gathering the right amount of mages and materials, and having enough time to kill or drive off the demon in its own realm. Otherwise, the only way is to kill the possessed.

So tell me about possession in your world, and the ways you have to cure it. Maybe something will be useful for my world, too.

[She shifts her weight a little, glancing down as if self-conscious. The click of claws on stone approaches and a dog's whine comes from offscreen. She reaches out of frame to pet the animal, her voice taking on a slower, graver tone.]

I know this sounds like a lot. It is a lot. But I need to do this, I need to succeed. There are innocent lives depending on it. I'd appreciate any help you can give.

Comments

[thygospelevity]

[He squints suspiciously at this explanation. Okay... that definitely sounds fake... but--]

When one doth persist within the darkness of the wicked mysteries, motherfucking mysteries they do so remain. Dost thou not treasure the mysteries of the universe sister Katherine? Woudst thou truly be so bold as to explain a joke? For such, all humor is lost! And so meaning. I wish to work the special science only in seeing what happens as it opts to occur. Honk.

[boundinblood]

[Kurloz has mentioned familiarity with magic. If it's anything like her own, it can only be strengthened by greater understanding of what he reshapes.]

But the same joke never works twice on one person - once it's told, it won't be as funny again. But what good is a joke if you never tell it? Of course, you tell that joke, and then come up with another. There will always be mysteries - some of which can only by found by solving others.

I have a story to illustrate this - the discovery of a certain herb where I come from. Would you like to hear it?

[thygospelevity]

[Hm. He has never considered it all as such. This is fair addition to the metaphor. Miracles may be experienced again and again, but not jokes. She cracks a hard bargain... but ultimately he must accept the telling of stories. He goes back to smiling again, settling just the same he always does for the preachers.]

I consent. I shall deign to hear the weaving of tale from thee. Honk.

[boundinblood]

[Settle in for a story, Kurloz, because she's doing a little more than just reciting the Botanical Compendium from memory.]

In a country to the east of my homeland, a noble lord's daughter fell ill. It was a sickness of the lungs, and breathing became more and more difficult for her every day. Their healers tried to cure her, but to no avail. Sorrowfully resigning themselves to their child's death, her parents surrounded her with the most beautiful, brightest flowers they could find, hoping to make her comfortable in her last days.

But the girl didn't die. Instead, the illness began to subside, and she grew stronger by the day. The lord and lady could easily have called it only a miracle, and rejoiced in it and nothing more. But their joy came, too, with curiosity, and the healers investigated the girl's recovery. They found one of the flowers surrounding the girl, a lovely warm-colored lotus called embrium, had medicinal effects - the fragrance of so many around her had treated the illness. They set to work on distilling it into a more potent medicine.

Without this discovery, they might not have known what cured their daughter at all. They might have simply thought it a gift from the Maker, and anyone else who fell ill with the same sickness would die. The healers might have singled out the embrium and left it there, and it would take dozens of flowers to cure a single person.

But because they worked to understand this miracle, they enabled themselves to create something even more miraculous - a distilled version. Where dozens of flowers might be needed to cure one person over a matter of days, a potion brewed from one or two might cure the afflicted in half the time it would take for the flowers alone. Embrium extract has also been found to stabilize potions that protect the body from injury or muscles from strain - without the pursuit of understanding that first miracle, these would not be possible, either.

I will end this story with a question: Did the discovery of how the girl survived make her survival any less wondrous?

[thygospelevity]

[He loves a story. It hasn't got to be shakespeare, his favorite. Anything will do. The parables of the gospelevity, tales from his ancestor and the other adults of the church, a good book either from his own collection or from Meulin's. Even some wild retelling Mituna's dredged up from the depths of the internet can entertain.

Nearly without fall, he listens to all enraptured.

Even if there are some things that confuse him. Even if there are things that throw him off.]

I... suppose...

[He says it slow, unsure, then follows up with words coming very fast.]

But, it was divinity was it not? Was no vision bestowed that such flowers should be gathered mother fuckin swift? Was not the miracle made to be through thus?

And... what's a daughter? And a parent?

[boundinblood]

Not at all. The flowers were only gathered because they were beautiful and bright. The only divinity here is-

[She stops short, hearing Kurloz's next question.]

...How do children in your world live? Are you raised communally, without families?

[There's no judgment there. Circles of Magi are little different, though it is rare for magic to manifest itself before a person understands the concept of a normal family.

Speaking of which, she now has to explain this to someone who seemingly knows nothing about it? It's a bit strange, both the need to describe it, and the fact that it is so normal and yet does not apply to her. (and yet would have. should have, even, though it's more intellectual observation than anything that carries emotional weight.)]

In most parts of Thedas, children live with their parents, or at least with their birth mother. There are exceptions, of course, but... What do you call the people related to you by blood?

[thygospelevity]

[Well that definitely sounds like blasphemy. He tries not to make a face. He really, truly tries.

Mercifully, she latches on to something else. He eases. Even considering this topic isn't the happiest for him at times. He smiles anyway.]

No one bides by the mothergrub. [He says it with a laugh, as thought it is obvious.] None but the jadeblooded, so rare as they mother fuckin be.

[He is still uncertain as to what a parent is, but he continues, this time hands folded together] By the blood of the mother, all are family. By blood of the indigo, we see this true.

But, [He continues, eyes open and bright again..] a direct connection is an ancestor. One must be most blessed by the Mirthful to meet that which most may not. A wriggler hatches only hundreds of sweeps after an ancestor, a thousand even, or more! That is why the Messiahs give us the Lusii. It is one's mother fuckin lusus what looks after a troll, and they in turn are to be looked after. In all mother fuckin shapes do they come! Mine was to be the most noble capricorn!

[And then the awkward part. He breathes deep and keeps the smile on.]

My lusus proved... unfit, with time. Thusly, upon the day I was discovered, I was culled! The culled are to be looked after by those of higher blood. Like the communal business of which you mother fuckin speak. I would have been slated for culling by a seadweller had not my luck been in favor. My ancestor still lives, his Grandness being of the most ancient of persisting trolls.

[boundinblood]

You're all born of the same mother? That does help me answer you, I suppose.

[It gives her something to work with...how would someone writing about humans and their like as if they belonged in an encyclopedia of beasts describe it?]

Among humans like me, and the races like us, any- most women can bear a child, and most men can sire them. Usually, we live in pairs, and one pair can have as many as five children, but normally less, and sometimes more. The man and woman are called parents when they have a child together - a male child is called their son, and a female their daughter. Does that clarify the story at all?

[thygospelevity]

Bear? [Did she mean like the mothergrub does...] But... you are no grub. You have two legs and appear almost a mother fuckin troll... [What does that mea- no. He doesn't want to know what that means. But.]

I... think I fathom the meaning for son and daughter. But I host all manner of confusion for all else. How is one to choose a partner to stay with of their quadrants? Is no lusus had at all? How does all your kind live so long? And, oh, sister Katherine- [He laughs a little helplessly.] -you truly are an alien.

But that's okay. I like you. I guess the lusus ancestor parents held some vast nicety and time to heed an ailing wriggler as happened. [That at least isn't blasphemous.] I will pay heed to that you've explained to me. My deep gratitude, Sister Katherine. [He bows low.]

[boundinblood]

Of course...

[She sounds very distracted as she tries to wrap her mind around this new information. When he said "mothergrub", he meant an actual grub? He's not the only one left utterly bewildered at how alien the other is...]

...from the sound of this, I have a lot to learn about trolls, too. "Alien", indeed.

[thygospelevity]

[He laughs a little sheepish and puts on a smile again.]

Should you wish ever to inquire of me, I shall gladly deign to be of assistance in understanding. Consider how wondrous a mother fuckin miracle it is that we chanced to meet! How distant we may have unrighteously been!