12. Meditation

The other side of the fork—the road more traveled—led into a wider passageway segmented by rings of cartilage (“The windpipe. There’s our answer of where all the air was coming from”, according to Trippy).

This windpipe then ballooned into an antechamber of sorts, the far end of which was gated by a roughly Rakshasa-sized flap (“The epiglottis… designed to keep things out. Interesting. There must be a separate passage where the inmates are brought in.”).

Trippy’s anatomy lesson notwithstanding, Serac’s attention was immediately drawn to an object that occupied the center of the antechamber. A lotus flower, just as giant and pure-white as the one she’d left behind in the Pulverizer room. This was another Waystation, but she clearly had nothing to do with its genesis, which meant—

“It’s mine,” Zacko said with obvious relief as he sat down next to the lotus, “but feel free to use it. You certainly look like you need it.”

I do? Serac watched with mild bemusement as the Manusya crossed his legs, rested both hands—palms up—on his knees, then closed his eyes. Just like that, the man looked the perfect picture of calm and concentration, so much so that one had to wonder if he might be serious people after all. Serac, unfamiliar with the apparent ritual, turned to her sentient six-shooter for an explanation.

Trippy? I think this might be your cue to continue the tutorial.

“Indeed it is. Waystations are vital to our journey, as they’re one of only two avenues by which a Wayfarer can reconstitute herself as well as ingrain all that hard-earned Liminal Karma. Although…”

The disembodied voice trailed off, as if its owner was deep in thought. Or had dozed off. Serac had no way to tell.

Trippy?

“Apologies. It’s just… I can’t help but wonder about this particular Waystation’s placement. If it indeed had been dropped here by Zacarias Borges-Juventus, he certainly chose an odd location for it. He followed someone into the Damnatorium in order to recover his Erudite Instrument, did he not? If that were the case, you’d expect his Waystation to be somewhere near or along the entrance and not the exit… unless—”

Unless he’s already made his way in and out before? And now something’s keeping him here? An obstacle, or maybe…?

Serac’s mind flashed once more with the image of a lush mountain, as vivid as it’d been unattainable. She hadn’t asked Zacko what manner of Hanging Fruit might be out of his reach—and whether the lure of that Fruit might be powerful enough to make a man willingly subject himself to torture…

“Regardless, it doesn’t change what we already know, which is that the Manusya hasn’t told us everything. Be sure to keep your wits about you, but right now, the best way to do that happens to be… to take the Manusya’s advice and put his Waystation to use. Go on, Wayfarer. Have a seat next to the lotus and imitate your companion’s posture as best you can. It’s time I talked you through meditation.”

Serac obeyed with an alacrity that might’ve rankled her inner pragmatist who yet hung on for dear life. The truth was she didn’t find it so difficult to trust Trippy’s judgment on this matter, as she herself more or less agreed with its merits.

No, the hard part was physically contorting herself into a cross-legged sitting position. She was a lot wearier and sorer from the preceding leg of the journey than she’d realized, and it didn’t help that REVOLVER and its holster rode up on her as she lowered herself to the ground. It took her a good minute of fidgeting and weight-shifting to settle into a pose that was painless enough to maintain.

“… Good,” Trippy continued with a hint of annoyance, evidently having waited longer than he’d expected for Serac to get comfortable. “Now, this next portion might require a bit of trial and error, given there’s much individual difference in how a Wayfarer might commune with the Interstitium. The analogy that helped me when I started out was to imagine two water balloons packed into one larger one. To start with, their membranes are so thin and malleable as to be all but inseparable. But as soon as you poke a hole in one of them—even a minuscule one; the smaller the better for this particular exercise—the leaking water separates the two membranes, thereby giving shape to the once indiscernible space between them. Do you follow, Wayfarer?”

Serac tried to follow, then immediately ran into a problem, namely that she’d never seen nor played with a water balloon in her life. Trippy’s analogy, therefore, was a little too fun and fantastical to resonate with a Narakite that’d spent her whole existence in prison.

Having read her thoughts, Trippy let out a sigh. “I’ll admit, Serac Edin. I never anticipated I’d have to teach someone how to meditate. It’s something that often comes naturally to those who need it, especially since most Wayfarers’ prior life experiences aren’t… quite so limited in scope as yours.”

Yes, yes. I’m an uncultured hell bumpkin who didn’t know her Poise from her Zen. But that doesn’t mean I’ve got nothing to draw from, does it? Spurred on by competitive spite, the Rakshasa bumpkin took to her task with renewed passion if not a real understanding of the assignment. The point is I should picture spaces that don’t really exist; is that the gist of it?

“That plus something freely entering those spaces. Preferably something that you can equate to a part or essence of yourself.”

An essence of herself filling spaces that shouldn’t exist. That was all the clue Serac needed to latch onto a reference point from her ‘limited-in-scope’ existence. It only helped that the experience in question had been quite recent.

Solid into liquid. A viscous soup seeping into the unseen crevices between craggy teeth. To join the ancient layers of redness that were already caked on there. To become an ungodly amalgam of the Pulverizer plus whatever still remained of a Rakshasa and her fading dreams…

Serac’s eyes, closed as they were in ‘meditation’, filled with new visions. A shift in her metaphysical world. Pathsight unlocking more features of itself in recognition of a hell bumpkin’s newfound resonance with the Interstitium.

The first thing she noticed was something felt rather than seen.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

The pure-white lotus grew outward—or perhaps Serac herself had shrunk into the flower. The petals then wrapped and merged with every facet of her body, lingering upon bleeding wounds and strained muscles.

They didn’t linger for long, however. For soon after coming in contact with the lotus petals, the wounds stopped bleeding and the muscles repaired themselves. Before long, Serac left behind the wear and sores of the preceding leg of the journey as she was made whole once more. Reconstitution.

“Precisely,” Trippy confirmed what the rookie Wayfarer had already surmised. “I have to say, I’m more than a little disturbed by your vision of choice, but we got there in the end. Now, look. Everything is back in its proper place.”

[Designation: SERAC EDIN]

[Karmic Level: 1]

[Liminal Karma: 2384 क]

[HP: 577/577]

[MP: 68/68]

[Stamina: 108]

[Poise: 65]

[Cartridge: 6|30]

[Burden: 0/27 (Light)]

The next part of meditation was something seen—and puzzled over—rather than felt.

Serac soon became aware of a second block of text. It was denser with information than anything else she’d seen previously. And in true Pathsight fashion, none of it was explained well or really at all.

[Karmic Level 1 -> ]

[Liminal Karma: 2384 क]

[Requisite Karma: 1030 क]

<>

[Ambition: 15 -> ]

[Attunement: 9 -> ]

[Abidance: 14 -> ]

[Substance: 6 -> ]

[Insight: 11 -> ]

[Integrity: 13 -> ]

[Immanence: 20 -> ]

<>

[HP: 577 -> ]

[MP: 68 -> ]

[Stamina: 108 -> ]

[Poise: 65 -> ]

[Cartridge: 36 -> ]

[Burden: 27 -> ]

[REVOLVER Base AV: 111 -> ]

[PULVERIZER Base AV: 89 -> ]

[PHYSICAL Mitigation: 11.9% -> ]

[INFERNAL Mitigation: 15.3% -> ]

[ZEALOUS Mitigation: 8.5% -> ]

[PRIMAL Mitigation: 17.6% -> ]

[ERUDITE Mitigation: 12.5% -> ]

[MARTIAL Mitigation: 14.2% -> ]

[DEIFIC Mitigation: 19.9% -> ]

Serac sat with the information for some time… until both her physical and metaphysical eyes glazed over. And you said this was less work for the Devas to keep track of?

“They’re numbers. Concrete and discrete. And by that simple virtue, they’re easier and more intuitive to work with than almost anything else one could think to substitute in their stead.”

I guess I’ll take your word for it. But what concrete and discrete thing am I meant to do with them now?

“You’re going to level up. Literally. Right now, you should have enough Liminal Karma to level up twice. Choose one of the seven attributes you see listed, and you’ll ingrain the Requisite Karma in exchange for one additional point in that attribute, as well as an increase to your overall Karmic Level.”

You mean I have to spend the Karma I just earned? Doesn’t that… defeat the whole purpose? I thought we were meant to accumulate more Karma so we can ascend to a higher Realm.

“Ah, but you see, Liminal Karma is just that: Karma in its intermediate and volatile state, belonging more to the Interstitium than to any one soul. Karma doesn’t become truly yours until you ingrain it. Think of yourself as a mobile Waystation, if you will, and meditation the method by which you permanently Anchor the Liminal Karma that’s followed you on the latest leg of your journey.”

Let me get this straight. I can lose Karma while it’s still in its Liminal state. But once I ingrain it, it’s mine forever?

“… Strictly speaking, my answer to that would depend on your definition of ‘forever’, but that’s a discussion best tabled for another day. You more or less have the right of it, Serac Edin. In fact, you have a living breathing example of this very concept sitting right next to you. Even though Zacarias Borges-Juventus’s Liminal Karma deficit is in the negative ten-thousands, his Karmic Level of ‘16’ remains unchanged. Whatever made that man stray so drastically from the Path, it must’ve happened after he’d been Wayfaring in good faith for some time.”

Alright, I think I get it. And I’m guessing that adding points to an attribute is also going to improve these, uh, ‘parameters’ down here? Like I can have more HP… or maybe more Cartridge?

“Precisely. Would you like me to go over them with you? As opaque as Pathsight’s black box can be, Wayfarers across the ages have had Kalpas to compile findings and compare notes—on the rare occasions where they did form alliances. I could share with you my own interpretations and philosophies about Pathsight’s leveling system… if you want me to, that is.”

At first, her tutor’s sudden reticence struck Serac as odd. Wasn’t he meant to be her handler, ready to prod and steer her along every twist and bend in the road? But no, that had never been their ‘agreement’. And Trippy himself had expressed that it wasn’t his intention to hold her hand through every challenge and uncertainty.

Trippy had chosen Serac, not to mold her in his image, but because he’d been seduced by the promise of what she could become on her own. Ambition and the talent to match. What kind of a Wayfarer would she be if she couldn’t even decide how to ingrain her own Karma?

No? She communicated her answer, rather hesitantly at first. Then she reiterated with more emphasis. No. Something tells me this is one of those things I need to figure out by myself. By trial and error if I have to. Otherwise… otherwise, I’d just become Trippy #2 instead of Serac Edin.

It was a strange thing. Somehow, she could sense Trippy’s smile of approval, even though she had no idea what he was supposed to look like—or if he even had a face with which to smile.

“I don’t disagree, Serac Edin. Indeed, it’s one of the immutable truths about the afterlife—that for every billion or trillion Wayfarers, there will be a billion or trillion different Paths to tread. At the end of the day, a soul must above all be true to itself for its place in the universe to mean anything.”

Even in the midst of her meditation, Serac found herself smiling back. She wasn’t absolutely sure if she fully understood this ‘truth’ Trippy had endorsed and she herself had apparently arrived at on her own. Regardless, affirming it had filled her heart with warm fuzzies, and for now, that was good enough for her.

Except… Ambition? Attunement? Abidance? In what context? On second thought, maybe it would be prudent to ask for a quick primer. Just a little prod, just to get her started on the right—

“Don’t tell me you’re a leveling virgin too.”

Serac’s eyes snapped wide open, erasing her meditation-scape in an instant and bringing her face to face with what was surely the vilest, most vomit-inducing smirk in all the Six Realms.

“I don’t think you could’ve found a more repellent way to say that if you tried,” she spat, now utterly bereft of any goodwill Zacko’s earlier heroics might’ve engendered, “and what’s it to you, anyway?”

“So you don’t deny the ‘too’ part. Noted. And it’s okay, don’t be shy. We all had to start somewhere.” Zacko’s smirk remained, unbothered by the ire it’d drawn. He then proceeded to prove Serac wrong. He could find a more repellent way to say the thing. “Would you care for a quick primer? I’d be happy to provide one, you know. It’d be my honor to help pop your leveling cherry.”