20: Totems

When Felinia walked onto the stage, all the students were there.

She let them settle down and told them “I am aware that yesterday was a massive shock to you. However, I am taking things slow. In theory I could just hand you a guidebook and let you loose, but I won’t. I would summarize things so I cover the very basics in one session, but you will still be ignorant of what is needed. Thus I have to take things slow.

“This also means what you can do will only slowly increase.

“Today we will be covering totems. When I finish you should be able to starting working on the subject yourself.”

Every eye and ear was focused on her. Finally, something they could work on!

“Firstly, thoughts have power. All living things and many undead things have thought, even if it is just hunger. Yes, even plants can think. Some are smarter than some animals and machines!

“Thoughts about something create a mental construct of it, which may be shared. These constructs are generally called Totems.

“Astral energy is fairly easily shaped by thought, spirit and belief. Sometimes a totem gets enough belief in it over time to seep its influence into the Astral and can create an Astral spirit. These spirits are often called totems as well. They are more stable and can gain independence. They may even be able to let people call on them for power. People who use spiritual energy by calling on spirits, including this type are normally called Shamans.

“I was originally trained as a Shaman, and consider myself to be a decent one.

“However, they are still heavily influenced by people’s belief in them as they had no personality of their own.

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Another path Totems can go down is that while based on a person, the person might act as a Shaman of it, abet unknowingly in most cases. The old line about people being able to achieve great deeds because people believed in them is not just a line. It may be fact!”

People reared back at that! An old line people considered rubbish was true!

She let them settled and continued. However, in both such cases the person drawing on the totem has to have the totem agree to it. For example, a Shaman of a Bear totem might be able to call on it to help boost the strength of a tribe’s fighters. A savvy businessman might be boosted in spotting better deals.

“However, they would have trouble calling on it if they want to use it for things it opposes. A Bear totem may not favor healing those who prefer to fight using stealth and ranged attacks over brute force. Someone with a reputation for being a savvy business man would not get much help if he only developed that reputation because he was laundering stolen money.”

Glancing around she asked them “Think about what would happen if someone spread the rumor that a man who was actually just a good businessman was laundering stolen money? Think about how that would affect his personal totem? It would taint it!”

Now, the reason this is so important is because your Divine Spark merges you with your Totem. You draw strength from belief in you, or people even just being aware of you. Now, think about what you happen if someone was spread nasty gossip about that everyone believed?”

Fear settled in. Suddenly social gossips were considered a high level threat to either recruit, or kill!

“THIS is why I mentioned it can be a good idea to stop getting belief based power on occasions. Luckily for you, since you already have a mind and spirit of your own you are much more resistant to that. It won’t affect you, unless you allow it by taking that tainted belief.

“Any questions?”

Someone called out “So we need to be on top of how people view us?”

“Correct. Be warned because heresies are an easy way to twist people views regarding you.”

Someone called out “What if we have Subsumed someone who still has believers?”

“Very good question. Subsumed Deities who are hostile to you can try to feed on your own power like a parasite, and also feed off belief in them. Thus they might even be able to break free and kill or subsume you in the process.”

Another voice called out “What if people just learn a bit about us, but not the whole of who we are?”

“Another good question. This can actually influence you a bit to draw out that facet of you. We will cover this latter in Aspects.”

There were no more questions