Mark got a snack, opening the fridge to find it had been completely stocked with food.
It was so full he didn’t think he could even manage to dislodge anything. There were large fruit looking things, both reddish yellowish ball shaped ones that resembled apples or peaches and longer stretched looking ones that came in a variety of colors.
Gallon jugs of various liquids, loaves of bread in the refrigerator, boxes of green leaves, purple leaves and bright yellow leaves. Packages of ground meat, slabs of meat and thinly sliced meat from a variety of animals.
He poked a whole fish that seemed to be staring at him with its bulging eyes.
“Huh.” It was definitely dead. “I will need bread… Condiments… Cheese? Do they have deli meats or pickles?”
~
“The subject is having difficulty identifying familiar foods.” One of the researchers turned from their screen to write down everything the human had touched.
That was all that needed to be said, it was a long list, the human was certainly a picky eater.
Through the screen they could see that Zirrilit had grabbed an entire cod and swallowed it raw and cold, bones and all. But then as a deathworlder her body’s interior was probably more hostile toward bacteria than a proper oven.
Meanwhile the human was pulling things out, sometimes sniffing something but he had yet to take an actual bite out of anything.
A yellow brick, it was soft and malleable even through the clear packaging.
Mark clearly understood what this was. One of the more bland flavored cheeses.
Then he took out a loaf of cold bread, some of the boxed green leaves, and then some of the cooked thinly sliced beef and layered them up.
The researchers who were watching through five different cameras located within this room now knew of one human staple food.
Sandwiches.
Though he only used pre prepared ingredients, this seemed less like a prepared meal and more like a snack. Something to tide you over until a more serious meal.
One of the scientists looked away from the screen, “Do you think that humans are more industrial? If they innately care less about food quality and other amenities their work speed could easily outpace anything but another crafting oriented species.”
That could be an interesting idea, if he was suspicious of the food variety because he was used to a more processed nutrient mush. He was certainly uncomfortable with the obviously luxurious mansion and this could either be attributed to being thrust into an alien environment or a racial tendency to shun wealth.
So that was added to their notes.
The elf was clearly far more interested than his partner, “He is definitely omnivorous, he’s eating dairy, meat and vegetables.” He pointed at the screen, “And he’s eating quite a lot of it. It is too soon to tell if this is just the result of eating magically created food for so many days or if this is his natural consumption rate.”
Their partner had just gotten up to stretch their legs. As a Halvid, they were highly intelligent but usually more administrative oriented than an elf. Blue skinned and with ridges along the upper nose and their brow.
A halvid and an elf, one specialized in research and higher learning, the other specialized in administration and law. One of the most stereotypical pairings you could find in the universe.
Mostly because the halvid would prevent the elf from violating their code of ethics, no staring at them in the bathroom, no secretly feeding them poisons to see what would happen…
No mad science in general, no insane magical research.
Not that elves tended to do that sort of thing, but it only took one before measures were put into place.
The elf did turn and point to the screen again, “Hey! Come look at this!” He was ecstatic, pointing and fumbling for his clipboard.
The halvid walked over to peer at the screen, slightly arched legs positioning himself lower so that he could see what had made the elf so excited.
“See! He’s pulling out different fruits, clearly performing his own research on the viability of the many food sources presented to him!” The elf had their clipboard in hand and were beaming. “He’s clearly an analytical species, something used to using their mental facilities to outperform their own planet’s denizens.”
The elf was right, the halvid leaned forwards further to see that the human had even roughly organized the various produce from the refrigerator by size and color.
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He lifted one, a bright red fruit that fit nicely into the palm of his hand. It was highly acidic and more often used to flavor other foods. Did it have some kind of acid ability?
It was well known that people with resistances to acid preferred highly acidic foods. Something about the sour taste was familiar to them.
He lifted the small red fruit, so brightly colored it practically glowed, opened his mouth and consumed a giant dripping bite.
They watched his face scrunch to a small fraction of its previous size. The human gagged and they watched him vomit slightly trying to expel as much of the product from his orifice as possible.
Acid resistance or abilities of that nature were crossed out.
After a few minutes of lapping at water from the sink he turned around and tried another fruit, this one green and could have been described as a cucumber in shape.
It was crunchy, but tasted grainy and sweet like an apple or pear.
He ate a few bites, then set it aside. He was earning full notes in the elf’s book, you taste some of each fruit to see which ones best suited your pallet and biology. If you got sick, come back later and identify which ones were bad.
Sweet ones, sour ones, grainy, large, small…
In the end, the human hadn’t actually written any of this down, so the researchers secretly watching him thought he had memorization abilities.
He actually just remembered a couple of the better tasting foods and forgot about the rest.
They did learn the human vastly preferred sweet foods to the straight tart or more bland flavored vegetation.
And now it was time for his lessons.
~
Mark sat down on a small pillow in a fairly average sized room.
The entire floor was padded actually, there was something that resembled foam tiles but from what he understood it was probably magical and better than the earth equivalent.
In front of him was a large number of small multicolored cubes, they locked to each other like a combination of legos and magnets.
He felt a slight deja vu before he realized the area resembled a child’s daycare.
Bright shining colors and obviously childproofed toys adorned the floor and small containers towards the corner.
He looked upwards slightly towards the elf that was supposed to be teaching him about life and the universe or something and wondered if she thought he was a child.
In the questionnaire he filled out earlier he wrote down that he was over legal age and had reached ‘full maturity for his species’ which led him to wonder why he was in a room clearly designed for children.
This elf doesn’t have a child do they?
“No, I do not have any children.” She answered.
That stunned Mark, he hadn’t even asked anything. Did she have psychic mind reading abilities?
“No, I have been blessed by Bonrellag, one of the major gods of learning and schools. As such I innately sense any misunderstandings that you possess while in a classroom and questions or information that you may lack.”
“Oh…” Mark paused for a moment. “So it’s… Divine psychic mind reading abilities?”
He was trying to equate this with what he was familiar with. In this new land that he had been taken to there were mages, superhumans, monsters and evidently clerics.
So clearly since she had this power from a divine source, she was what popular media would refer to as a cleric.
“Actually,” the elf went to correct, “clerics are officially ordained positions, theoretically anyone could receive a proper blessing should they fit the correct parameters.”
Mark tilted his head, which the elf correctly assumed was a sign of curiosity.
Then Mark asked the obvious question. “What is a blessing?”
It was something that everyone knew, something that everyone should know.
So why didn’t Mark?
Was he a deathworlder like Zirrilit?
Some worlds were dangerous, either abandoned or enslaved by their gods. Those people might not have an understanding of what a blessing was or the more well known intricacies of divine power.
After all, their gods would never explain it to them.
“A blessing is the manifestation of a divine being’s will, as gods are capable of creating, destroying or altering reality they are thus capable of granting abilities that do not adhere to any form of the laws of physics.”
It was a concrete textbook description, it was actually the textbook description.
Mark nodded, “So… What do they do then?”
A common question, among deathworlders.
“Anything.” The elf clarified, “Literally anything. Twice the strength you should have, laser vision, not needing food or drink, a second head or the ability to make an animal's necks longer.”
“Oh,” Mark took another moment to process this. “How do I get one?”
That was where one of the many complications for Mark came in.
The elf frowned, “For whatever reason Mark, you have been shown to resist blessings.”
The researchers had been puzzling about the exact reason but as of yet there was no concrete evidence.
“Since you have traveled to another planet and are among the first of your kind, you should have received a fairly powerful traveler’s blessing and should expect to understand all spoken languages at minimum.” the elf continued, “however as it turns out we needed to bring our own methods of understanding other languages.”
“Oh.” Mark scratched at his arm. That revelation sucked.
On one hand he knew he shouldn’t expect cool magical powers to fall from the sky, on the other hand he had gotten his hopes up for a moment. It was slightly crushing so he tried to put his mind off of it.
The elf just continued with their lesson.
“Blessings however, are a fairly serious part of reality. If you have an ability that lets you produce something at twice the rate of everyone else then you have an obvious advantage over people who cannot do that. Similarly sometimes blessings are something that can be dangerous if used incorrectly or without caution.”
A small flame lit itself on the tip of her fingers.
The elf moved the flame from fingertip to fingertip and Mark sat quietly staring at the impossibility. He had seen street magicians do similar stunts, though usually with colored balls or rings. Knowing that this was actual magic made it all the more mesmerizing.
“Some people resist fire, you know.” She added. “I could put this in their hair and they would walk away just fine. The vast majority of arson charges are the results of fire based blessings being used without restraint, or even accidental usages from people who don’t know how their actions may effect other species.”
“So you want to make sure I don’t burn down a city or unleash a plague by accident.” Mark summarized.
“Exactly.” The elf grabbed a pile of blocks and poked them into a large cube. “Now, imagine this cube here represents a god. It has many colors, mostly red and blue but some yellow and green too. Look-” she pointed “it even has a singular black brick.”
Then the elf pulled one singular red brick from the cube and replaced it with one from the pile next to it.
She held the singular red brick up. “This here is a reflection. A small copy of the whole that does not completely embody the god. This is what you refer to as an angel. It is red, not blue or green or black and thus it only copies a portion of the god’s abilities. It spawns from nothing, it feels no emotions, it only copies what the god does because it is a copy.”
Mark received the red brick from the elf and held it in his hand. “So if you can see enough types of angels – reflections I mean, then you can tell what kind of god I have? Can’t you just talk with my god the way that you talk with yours?”
“That is correct, and we cannot currently speak with your god yet, I do not believe your religion is allied with any of ours yet-”
And people who try to speak with your god melt.
“-but that doesn’t matter as much, I am here to teach you what you will need to know for life on this planet. My name is Errifin and I will be instructing you here during your stay.”