Kya’s Notes
Blessings are slightly confusing to me, and neither Alder nor Wade were much help. Rory helped me get my first one from the god of life, but that only brought more questions to mind. Is there an actual divine being out there somewhere lending small pieces of power to people? I’d believe almost anything from this crazy world but… a pantheon of literal gods is a lot.
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Rory woke up with a yawn and a full body stretch. Yesterday had been exhausting.
There was apparently some disease spreading through the poorer parts of the city, not deadly enough to warrant direct measures from that bastard city-lord, but still bad enough that by noon, he’d had a line out the door to see him.
As a User of Life, and member of the church, his was a class focused entirely on the preservation and continued nurturing of life in all aspects. He’d been lucky enough to get a coveted cleansing ability when he’d ranked up to 2-Star. Its general effect to fight back almost any malady meant that what it gave up in raw power, it gained in raw utility. So that, combined with the multitude of weak healing potions and more mundane remedies that he kept in the clinic, had allowed him to fight off the illness for a large part of the community, even if he now felt like he had spent the whole day running like some lunatic.
But at least today would be easier. Oh, he still felt like there would be a whole crowd of people coming in to try and get his help. Of that, he was sure. No, he just knew it would be easy as there was a gentle rain, the drops casting multicolored halos in the light of the morning suns. Rain while the suns were shining was a holy thing, which meant there would be a joint service in the massive cathedral of waters.
An hour and a half later, Rory and Tom sat together in one of the hundreds of long stone pews, listening as the choir sang somewhere on one of the upper floors, while the gentle bubbling of water and no doubt several small enchantments, leant to their voices sounding otherworldly and ethereal with sounds bouncing all around them and echoing back on themselves. Rory knew very little about the culture of the Air users, but he knew they had some fixation on music as a holy thing. Even they would have to be impressed by this, he thought, as it was simply majestic.
After several more minutes of singing, the large doors at the entrance to the cathedral were closed with soft booms, and the voices of the choir began to soften, until the faded away. As one, the congregation stood to the left, the priest of Life came onto the large round stage at the front of the room and stood behind a white marble podium with vines sculpted of glowing emeralds trailing up the sides. To the right, the wizened old priest of Water came forwards, to stand in the elevated pulpit, made of the finest dark woods, with accents of the same white marble and softly pulsing sapphires embedded throughout.
In unison, the two raised their hands and smiled, before lowering them as the crowd sat in the same moment.
The priest of Life spoke first, a woman that Rory had gotten to know somewhat well over the many years he’d been practicing his clinic in the city. She was a small woman, with dark skin and black hair pulled back in a tail, a few strands of gray showing through.
“The living waters are a gift to us all” she beamed, as Rory along with the rest of the congregation said in response “The living waters!”
“Through rain, plants may grow. Through water, life may flourish. Join me as we give thanks to our two great gods.”
Rory closed his eyes, placing one hand gently to his forehead, the other over his heart, as he knew every other person in attendance was doing the same.
“Oh great Makoa, oh sweet Ferona, we give thanks to your guiding hand, your bountiful gifts, your living waters. It is through your powers that all life continues to flourish in this land. It is through your benevolence that we have found strength to face the daily challenges of this land. Yesterday, a great many of your faithful, your chosen, were hit by a wicked sickness no doubt brought by Kharag to this land. We ask for your help, great and wise ones, to purge this sickness from this land. To aid us in our recovery, so that we may one day leave this land, for the waters of your kingdom. Bless us, lords, so that we may go on to bless those around us. As you wrote so many centuries ago: Through high and low-” and here the entire hall spoke as one “through thick and thin, through swift and slow, for kith and kin. Lead our paths, our rivers, our lives, guide us through promises turned to lies. Through you, we see the river and its bends, through you we see each other and our ends. Give us this day, this rain, and this shine, so we may gather together, as one, and dine.”
Opening his eyes, Rory reached down to pick up one of the small pieces of fruit that had floated near him. Under their feet a thousand more pieces of fruit floated on the tiny rivers cut into the stone floor. As one the whole congregation sat up and ate their small piece of food, joining in this small ritual of solidarity and faith.
As he swallowed, Rory felt a spark of warmth travel down his throat and blossom in his chest. It was something small, but he knew it to be the touch of Ferona. His shoulders relaxed as the tension of the day before slowly left him.
Smiling and raising her hand once more, the priest of Life stepped away from her podium and down off the stage, as the priest of Water stepped up and cleared his throat, and began to speak in a soft, slight rasp that nonetheless carried his lightly accented voice throughout the hall.
“Thank you, Everly, for that wonderful benediction, and thank you, one and all, for joining me this wonderful morning. How beautiful to see the sun's light on the clouds. The rain as it fell. I stood in the courtyard this morning with my arms outstretched simply basking in the glory of our gods. What perfection they have wrought on our land. What beauty, what majesty. Did anyone else do the same? Did anyone else revel in the morning's light and rain?”
He paused for a moment to the light chorus of murmur that greeted his words, the people all around eager to proclaim their faith and their similarity to the priest.
He smiled a warm, grandfatherly smile and said “As I thought. I knew it, I knew this city was blessed by the rains for a reason. As I stood there letting the rain drops run down my face, I could feel it. I knew that others were there too, though I stood alone. I knew that, like me, the faithful in the city basked in the glory of our gods. How could we not? How could we do anything different than stand in awe and reverence?”
Again, voices surged as the priest lapsed in his sermon. Someone in the middle of the crowd shouted out “We couldn’t!” and another called “blessings of the rain are a holy thing!”
Raising his hand for silence, it fell almost at once. As he began to speak again, the hint of a rasp in his voice fell as his tone grew slightly colder, slightly harder.
“And yet, I knew too that there was something wrong with the rain this morning. Something that, as I stood there and felt the cool drops on my face, prevented me from truly accepting them, accepting Makoa’s blessing into my heart. Did any of you feel this? Feel a weight, a block, a barrier between them and the rains?”
There was a longer silence than before, as the congregation held their breath, unsure or unwilling to speak. Finally, as he let the silence drag on for one uncomfortable moment after another, someone finally spoke out hesitantly “Some of us… couldn’t go out for the rains…”
Slowly, the priest came down from his pulpit, down from the stage, and into one of the aisles between the rows of pews. He found the scared looking man who had spoken out. It was difficult for Rory to see the man from where he sat, but he could tell his face was cast downward, almost refusing to look up and meet the priest's eyes.
“My child, raise your head.” Though the priest was undeniably whispering, the words spread out throughout the hall, able to be heard by every person in attendance. Raising his voice but speaking with a tenderness of a mother consoling her child, he said “Life calls us all onto different paths. Makoa knows this, Ferona knows this. Not everyone can drop everything to run out and bask in the rains, however much they might wish it to be true, or however much I might wish it to be true. Did you want to be out in the rains?”
“More than anything!”
“Then you cannot hold yourself in such low regard!” He clasped the man on his shoulder and looked directly into his eyes. “Your mind and spirit were out in the rains, even if you couldn’t be. For our esteemed lords, that is enough.”
Turning, he left the now beaming man and made his way back to the stage. Except, rather than return to the pulpit, he turned and stood behind the podium the life priestess had used earlier.
“I say again, for all of you this time, your belief, your faith, your devotion, these are what matter most. Even if you were unable to demonstrate that faith, that is regrettable, but by no means grounds for condemnation! You are the brothers and sisters of the living waters; you are the ones most loved by Ferona and Makoa both!”
He raised both hands as he spoke, and when he finished, there was a unified chorus yet again of “The living waters!”
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Slowly, so slowly, he lowered his arms back until they hung limply at his sides.
“So, I ask… again. Why did I feel as though there was something coming between me and our gods this morning?”
The silence grew more suffocating the longer it dragged on. Rory fidgeted slightly in his seat, which was nothing compared to Tom who all but squirmed, hands tapping lightly against his bouncing legs.
Someone finally said hesitantly “Is-is it the spatial user that recently entered the city?”
Rory’s mouth worked like a fish on land, as he tried in vain to pick his stomach off the floor. His limbs felt cold, and he looked rapidly back and forth between where the voice had come from and the priest who seemed to grow darker and stormier with each passing heartbeat.
A ripple of unease spread out among the crowd, some of the older members of the church grew just as tense as Rory, while some of the younger ones looked around in confusion and uncertainty.
“I see recognition in some of your eyes,” said the priest, “and yet I see nothing in the eyes of others.”
He took a deep breath, as if to compose himself, before going on. “Long, long ago, when the world was new and the mana of the world was shapeless, there came the twelve.”
People settled back into their seats to listen, the story as familiar to them all as the sound of their mother's voice, or the songs they sang as children.
“One to shape the mountains, to carve out the lands below. One to fill the oceans, to show the rivers where to flow. One to cool the world with wind and storm and gust. One to heat and light the world, with flames as red as rust.”
“These were the first four, as we all know. These were the ones who helped turn our world right after the monsters had for so long made it wrong. But it did not stop there. You see, there was still too much, too much of everything. There was chaos in the world, there were monsters and demons and no matter how hard the four gods fought, they could do nothing against the endless tides. They even tried to raise armies, soldiers to assist them in their righteous efforts… but it was all for naught. Despite the slivers of power they granted to the other mortals of their time, they weren’t enough. They needed help, they needed to kill the monsters faster, they needed to keep fighting for longer. They needed to control the mana.”
“One to breathe new life in you, to heal, protect, and guide. One to steal that breath away, and help all those that died.”
“This was a turn, a chance, and a change. It was the appearance of the twin sisters of life and death that truly let the gods take the momentum in the first war. They carved out a small territory to become the first stronghold, the first bastion, what is now the holy city of Cien-Alu. But it still wasn’t enough. It was like a wave came every day, the monsters that appeared were mighty and numerous. The war seemed never ending, and so, the six pooled there energies to call forth once more, and four more came forth in answer.”
“One to understand. To see, and think, and know. One to understand. To feel both great wonder and horrid woe. One to fight and defend, to avenge and finally win. One to maintain, to keep order and judge all sin.”
“These four, at last, brought an end to the ravaging in the world. The god of war was able to beat back the monsters, to push them from the lands and waters long enough for people to settle down. The other three made it possible to live, to form a better world. The world wasn’t just a place of conflict and death anymore, but a place of knowledge, of passion, of peace. These were the ten gods, the ten paths, the ten defenders of life. And things were good. Monsters still came in horrible waves, but with the foundation and assistance of the gods, people could finally lead a life that wasn’t purely martial. And it stayed like this for nearly a century, maybe not as peaceful as one would have hoped, but it was still a time of great growth for all citizens the world over…. But then came the last.”
“One to meddle with the passage of time, to see that it has no end. One to meddle with the ways of the world, to turn it, to see it bend.”
“These last two… They were a blessing and a curse. They were what finally allowed the world to settle back into true peace. It was their ascension that marked the start of the true golden age of life in this world. They joined the others, and with all twelve of their hands wrought out the great binding, all but banishing monsters to the nightmares of children. Oh, they still appeared of course, there was no stopping them altogether, but it was through the help from the final two gods that peace truly reigned. But it was not to be. Always there is a betrayer, always there is one that schemes and plots in the dark parts of the world where things are better off left alone. The second holy war started as the monsters began to appear again. ‘But why?’ you might ask, ‘why did they appear again if they had just been sealed away by the might of all the gods?’. Yes, it’s true that for centuries, civilizations grew unchallenged by the monsters in their memories. Generations came and went, populations grew, life went on. It was a glorious time. But it was not meant to last. The god of space… I hesitate even to let him have the title but have it he did. He went behind the backs of the others, and in the heart of his own realm, opened a hole in the world, a wrongness the likes of which had never been seen before. It was a door to a place of shadows, the home of the monsters, the place they had been banished. He knew this! He saw this and did he stop?”
Finally, the crowd that had been listening with rapt attention stirred, and a few scattered voices weakly said “no-No-No!”
“No! He kept going, pushing on and on, opening up one tear after another. The god of time found out, how could she not, for she was his wife. But did she condemn him? Tell him to stop? To cease? Did she even tell the other ten what he had been doing all this time, or what it could mean?”
This time, more voices were heard, and with more strength and unity in their reply. “No!”
“No!” he slashed his hand through the air and said, “She did nothing!” He had been growing slowly more animated, his voice slowly rising in anger and in volume. “When monsters started to appear again, at first slowly and then in greater and greater numbers, did he stop then, seeing the pain and death he was bringing, that he would bring ever more?”
“NO!”
Growing quiet again, his voice that same, resonating volume that was hardly more than a whisper and yet so clear to them all. “The other gods finally found out what happened. Finally found out what he’d been doing and that he was the root of it all. They came to him, confronted him, and did he stop then? No. No he didn’t. Left with no other choice, the gods, together as one, struck him down.”
The congregation were on the edge of their seats. They all knew the basics of the story, the beginnings era and the growings era were common knowledge to any of the faithful, and even taught to some extent in the schools. But this was more detail than most were ever given, it felt to many like a peak behind a curtain.
“But that wasn’t the end of it, not by half. In their benevolence, in their mercy, the gods punished only the one responsible. It was not the fault of the goddess of time, for what wife wouldn’t stick up for and stand by her husband. Nor was it the fault of the order behind the god, for even if his faithful had known, it was not the fault of theirs that their god had done these unspeakable things. It was mercy that stayed their hand. Kindness. And that was their mistake.” He punctuated the last line with a fist into a palm, the sound of the strike echoing out.
“When the next god of space came, he gave his word he would do no such thing, swore to the others that he would work to undo what his predecessor had done… but did he? No. No of course not. Hundreds of years passed, and the monsters only came more and more. A thousand years more passed, and finally, there was a shift. A change. The first of the waves. How could this have happened if the god of space had been closing the tears and working to undo it? Said simply, he hadn’t done anything. Or rather, he had done even more to worsen it. Working once more with the goddess of time, they had brought about the full return of the monsters, the horrors that plague us to this day. It was then the gods had to act, for they saw what had been done right under their noses. Yet, the god of space had been cunning. Had been telling lies and spinning tales of woe. This time, when the gods called on him to stop, they spoke not in one unified voice, but in many. This time, it was only four that went to see him, only four who tried to strike him down.”
The priests face contorted in anger and fury, and saying his next words with spittle flying from his mouth, he shouted “The slippery eel got away from them, got away and warned his followers that he had been attacked! Told the world that they had struck at him first, had broken their accord, that our noble Makoa and our fair Ferona had been the betrayers!”
Taking a shaky breath, as if it was a monumental force of will for him to simply control his anger, he took another, deeper breath, before continuing. “Thus started the last great war. The great last war. The war to end all wars, all monsters, all demons. The four gods who knew the truth, who saw what was truly going on, also saw the only way to stop the problem from getting worse. This time, they couldn’t simply remove the one in charge, they had to remove the entire order from the world to ensure peace. And so they did. Through much sacrifice, through enough pain to darken the sun, through enough suffering to boil the seas and melt the glaciers, they did. And so peace was established. So the monsters fled, and so the world was restored.”
The crowd, riled up from the story was anxious to hear more, and one of them was quick to point out the obvious in the silence of the priests words. “But the monsters are still here! There’s still deaths every day from those bast- uh, those evil things!”
“You’re right.” said the priest, looking up and slowly turning his head to look at the whole congregation. “You’re absolutely right. Since the end of the war, at least three more tears have opened up across the world. And the waves have only gotten worse. For a long time, I too was at a loss. Why? How? All the spatial users were gone from this world… right?”
“There was one in town just days ago!” came an angry shout “I remember seeing her in the markets! She was using her powers to fight some guy on a bridge!”
Nodding, the priest said “I know your words to be true. I saw her too. In fact, she came to this very temple to our gods, tried to enter these sacred walls and do Makao only knows what.”
Angered exclamations echoed out throughout the hall, hands clenched into fists and brows furrowed in anger.
“To many of you, she might just appear like another user. To many of you, she might seem like any other of the brave men and women who risk their lives every day to keep us safe from the dangers of the world. Let me assure you, she is anything but. She is a blight on the land, a curse to our island, to our nation, to our world, and to our gods.”
A large man stood in one of the many rows off to the right and called out “What are we waiting for, let's get her!” And dozens of others shot to their feet, as dozens more called out in agreement.
The priest raised both of his hands, and though it took longer than it ever had before, the crowd eventually quieted, though many of them stayed on their feet.
“Do none of you know the scripture? Do none of you know the law? ‘Vengeance lies not at the hands of the many, but in the hands of the one.’ says lord Makao. More than that, ‘violence without cause is the root of darkness. Justice must guide the hand as it guides the sword’ says lady Ilonia. I don’t want a single member of this congregation to lay a hand on her.” Though Rory sat relatively far from the priest, he thought he saw a gleam in his deep blue eyes, even from so far away and even buried as they were under his thick white eyebrows. “In fact, I want you to have nothing to do with her. Not. A. Single. Thing.” The grin that before had seemed so warm, so grandfatherly... now looked like it would fit better on a hell hound.