"Oh. Should have read those instructions before setting out," Chimwemwe comments, mostly to himself. "I can take care of that right now, then."
He dismounts from his elephant bird and pulls out his crafting kit under cover from the rain. "I'll need to determine just the right moment to send it aloft."
Chimwemwe's kite soars high and flies free into the sky until it becomes a dot. It's then obliterated by a lightning strike. perhaps that means Gozreh has accepted it.
You look at the second letter.
Burn me! Deliver my missive to The All-Seeing Eye by casting six spells upon me simultaneously. The letter should be destroyed in a conflagration of magic.
"Do you think that means it needs to be fire magic? I would need to reconfigure for that."
You think any element is tine so long as it is destructive.
"Maybe any magic," Chimwemwe hypothesizes. "Maybe, hmm, even not every spell needs to destroy, merely that the end result of all six spells is/ hmmm, is the destruction of the letter." He looks around at his cohort and begins fidgeting with his puzzle box. "We will need help to manage six simultaneous."
Akoril nods "I can fling it like a paper airplane."
"I'm currently configured to spit a magical caustic substance, when needed. I believe that will suffice to contribute."
Chimwemwe thinks for a long moment, drawing and wiping away invisible diagrams in the air with his finger. "Most of my magic, hmm, the magic I've developed is, hmm, is internally directed," he explains. "I can interfere with the flow of energy, hmm, and, hmm, make it explode outward. That isn't exactly casting in the traditional sense. But, hmm, maybe, if we combined it with the power of the air pillar--air feeds flames--it might do something more." He looks around to make sure he has not completely lost the audience. "If Akoril can send the letter into the air pillar while the rest of you cast your traditional spells, I can release my armor's enchantment as it enters the pillar. Just, hmm, just don't stand too close."
Akoril can also add a shooting star to the mix.
"Just as with the candle when we arrived, I can use magic to heat it up."
You take your chocobos elephant birds back to the campus. The Circle is empty thanks to the downpour; its energy-pillars crackle and hiss in the rain.
Wisps heats up the letter; it starts to crinkle at the edges. Soomdevi casts a sleep hex on it to make the pages droop. Akoril pierces the letter with a quill and then flings it into the air where it's battered with a blob of caustic acid. Finally, Chimwemwe sends his armor into overdrive, creating a shock wave that pushes the missive into the pillar of Flame that's still powered by Black Heron's own magic.
It's total overkill. It's glorious. Praise Nethys!
☀☀☀
The final lettter is not a letter in and of itself, but rather a set of instructions to create and deliver a letter to Mazludeh, empyreal lord of stewardship, community, and snakes.
The following letter shall be transcribed upon an egg, and then fed to a snake. Beware: should Mazludeh not receive this message, it bodes woe for the canal! Should the snake consume the egg, it bodes weal. Here are the words that shall be written upon the egg:
We beseech you, Mother of Hearth and Wall, that the new canal will be strong and reliable! Give us your blessing!
Wisps will think about what kind of eggs are tastiest to snakes.
In contrast to the first and only other time that you have seen Chimwemwe unleash the fire within his armor, this time, after the conflagration clears, the runes are sparking and smoking. One of the runes near his shoulder releases a bright flare of sparks that burns his ear. "Bas!"
"I'm going to need to fix that later," Chimwemwe mutters to himself. Listening to the instructions for the message to Mazluda. "Hmm. If Anchor Root's chicken has any eggs, we could probably feed Zimodzi or Ziwiri. They're about due for their big meal. Or maybe Lumusi has some."
"Let's start with Lumusi. I'm not sure how Anchor Root will react to a request for an egg to feed to a snake."
Being that you're already on campus, it's a convenient trip to the dining hall.
Lumusi is happy to give you a quail egg, and a free tip. There's a shrine to Mazludeh near the The Black Crowned Crane. The priestess there is friendly, so I hear.
Akoril asks "Who's got good handwriting? There's not a lot of room on that egg."
Make a craft, thievery, or some Lore check to write a message on the egg without breaking it. Creative ideas are welcomed.
"Most of my experiments involve drawing, hmm, very intricate, hmm, precise geometry," Chimwemwe says. "But nothing so small."
"Or maybe we should attempt to inscribe multiple eggs," Chimwemwe reconsiders. After some discussion , he retrieves his brush calligraphy set and ink.
Holding the egg, gently, between his thumb and forefinger, he begins to brush the tiny, delicate letters onto the quail's egg. He carefully rotates the egg with his middle finger as he works. "Now I just, hmm, I just need to not drop it," he says with a self-depreciating chuckle.
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Wisps gather some spider silk from her room. She carefully wraps the egg(s), leaving a gap for the writing.
"Now it is more protected if you drop it!"
Chimwemwe inscribes the egg. You head off to the temple with a well-protected egg.
The priestess there directs you to the snake habitat.
She warns you, a recent community project resulted in a lot of prayers, so the snakes aren’t very hungry today. Indeed, they lounge around in the sun napping. There are several uneaten eggs laying on the sand, some just inches away from the drowsy reptiles.
Alrinkiri moves about the enclosure, making sure to make more noise than usual as they do to see which snake reacts the most.
Akoril watches in amazement I've never had a good rapport with animals, I'd do well to pay attention here and learn.
"So many snakes," Chimwemwe gazes around in wonder. "Can anyone visit, any time?" he asks the priestess while his companions search for a hungry looking snake.
Alrinkiri takes a few long moments, but eventually finds the runt of the litter hiding away from the group. They feed the egg to the shy snake, giving it much-needed nourishment while delivering message to the Mother of Hearth and Wall.
The omens are good!
☀☀☀
While they do that Wisps asks around about the last bad handwriting letter, and discovers there is no "13 Jemaa el-Fna" Therefore, you head to Janae Edepna street and deliver it, proving Chimwemwe's translation was the correct one.
☀☀☀
It's early evening by now. Only the descriptive address remain. Rural areas far from the city don’t have standardized addresses. Instead, these parcels bear unhelpful directions in place of addresses, such as:
Chukwu who lives up the road from the creek
Or, in one particularly awful case,
You know Mubasu, his mother’s Inyene from Abwele, but he’s from the city, grew up in Ejosa, and moved when he got married. Lives with his in‑laws now, has many children and seven dogs and an ostrich and four cats which I told him will steal his baby’s breath, but he won’t listen. He has a shrine to Gozreh in front of his house, but half the wave’s head fell off and it looks like a lump now.
To deliver these addresses you can use a survival check to find and follow relevant landmarks. You can also gather info, but it will take a bit longer.
"None of those descriptions make any sense to me," Chimwemwe says, "but I've only been here, hmm, less than a week."
"I wandered the countryside around here once, long ago. Let me see what I can remember..."
Akoril ponders outloud "Can't they at least have unique sigils?"
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Alrinkiri still recognizes the echoes of the land as it once was so long ago; hills are just small rises now, forests have been cleared back, and rivers have found new paths into the bedrock. But they can still find the way in this memory-haunted landscape.
Soomdevi needs to assist with one address; there, a family feeds you a huge dinner to thank you for working so late in the evening.
☀☀☀
Stuffed with food, you ride your elephant birds back to campus. Tzeniwe offers you hot ginger beer to help shrug off the rain.
Ignaci nods. Well done, well done indeed. You even followed up on that complaint about some minor misdelivery or somesuch. What a shame that letter landed in your pile and not ours, by the way. Such is the luck of the draw, I suppose.
Ignaci! You should be nicer! I'm so sorry we gave you that letter! Tzeniwe seems horrified when she learns you had to deal with the mis-delivered lamp. No one wanted to take care of that!
Mere coincidence, I assure you. Ignaci grins. And now it's done.
Wisps flashes a grin back. "And I'm sure that Ignaci has an even chance of getting any difficult letters in the future."
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"The stars aligned so that the, hmm, the right people for the task where in the right place at the right time," Chimwemwe adds with a friendly smile. He is not bothered by doing extra work. He pats his elephant bird farewell. "That was a novel experience!"
Upon returning to the Spire Dormitory, he heads to his room to put away his things. He spends some time repairing the runework on his armor, carefully cleaning and repainting the burnt out symbols on each plate. Once he is finished with that, he writes a note.
Mariama,Jaha is riddled with curses. The past invades the dreams of people who live there. I still have the dreams. The plants are special there, too. I thought you might be interested to examine a sample.
-Chimwemwe
Chimwemwe takes the note and a small cutting of one of his bioluminescent plants and knocks on Mariama's door before setting the cut and note down next to the door.
He then goes to work on the tiny little wooden carvings he's been making the past couple of days.
Oh, Surely. says Ignaci.
It's late. While Chizire and Haibram are up drinking, the warm cider makes you drowsy. Plus, it's late and you need a full 8-hour rest for tomorrow…
☀☀☀
The next morning, Chimwemwe notes that his bioluminescent cutting isn't in the hallways anymore. Mariama must have accepted his gift.
Okoro greets you near the Soaring Spire. Good morning! We are here to give you the Uzunjati assignment! Noxolo and I are not quite members quite yet, but the tale of our becoming shall be a good tale to hear, someday. The Uzunjati tell stories to others and learn new stories in turn. Today, we would like you to tell us the story of your past week so that we can learn it and pass it on to others. It is not only training for you in how to tell a story, but training for us in how to be good listeners. We all benefit!
Noxolo dances on, her movements somehow evocative of intentional listening.
Okoro nods at her. Indeed, Noxolo. He turns to you. Stories don't always need words to carry meaning.
He sits down and prepares to listen.
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Akoril steps forward nervously "Before coming I felt confident in my magical skills and looked forward to honing them even more, but I've learned there is much of the world I don't yet know or understand and have much more to learn than I had ever imagined."
Continuing "Between eggs and mail and rare fowl and misdelivered lamps I've had quite the adventure and look forward to continuning to expand my horizons. Just watch out for hostile mushrooms."
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Chimwemwe covers a yawn as he steps forward. He removes a puzzle box from his pouch. This puzzle box is different than the small one with smooth and shiny surfaces from years of use that he frequently holds in one of his hands. The puzzle box is made of freshly sanded and unvarnished wood.
He holds the box out in front of him so that everyone can see it if they gather close enough. "This is a story of the unexpected," Chimwemwe begins. The design on the lid bears five stars in a balanced set upon elliptical tracks. "Five new stars placed by Shimye-Magalla in the night sky came into auspicious alignment around a yellow bird." He slides the wooden stars along the tracks into a different configuration. "The yellow bird asked the stars for four favors."
The lid opens along a seam; the two halves swing out to reveal another tile beneath them. This time has four ground birds carved onto it. ”First, they had to find a rare bird. The stars found a pair of birds at a merchant’s stall. The merchant traded them the birds at a fair price, and they returned triumphant or so they believed. The yellow bird showed them that the birds were counterfeit. The merchant had tricked them.”
Chimwemwe splits the tile again and reveals a tile decorated with three roughly carved canine-headed humanoid forms. ”The second task was to evict a pack of mischievous gremlins from a granary. While the stars expected violence, the gremlins dropped their weapons and surrendered when confronted in peace by the stars. They were not unrepentant villains.”
He splits the tile across the middle and reveals another tile below. The tile has a design that resembles a mushroom with a fierce face. ”The third task was to collect the ingredients to craft a magical paint: a lucky bone, a bloody cap, and a stinging caterpillar. In the peace and beauty of the jungle, the stars were attacked from the shadows by a lone, selfish wolf, but they defended themselves together and drove away the wolf.”
As he reveals the last time, the carving on the wood resembles the pattern on the lamp at Jaita’s house. ”The final task was to correct another’s mistake in the city of gold. A woman had taken what was delivered to her in error, even though she knew it was her neighbors. The stars confronted the woman. She refused for rightness. She refused for fairness. She refused for lawfulness. Finally, she relented only when threatened with future loss.”
Chimwemwe closes all of the tiles, closes the lid, and slides the stars back to their original positions, locking the puzzle box. ”So a kindness hid betrayal. Trouble hid peace. Beauty hid danger. And some people are exactly what you expect them to be." He pauses a moment, clears his throat, and adds, "However, I also learned over these few days that the stars in my constellation have good hearts, clever minds, and many talents. Even if they wear surprising or unfamiliar faces.”
He offers the puzzle box to Curling-Wisps-of-Smoke Reliava. ”Cogs and gears can teach you things, if you look.”
|
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Soomdevi stands in the shadows of the spire, listening.
How much do I want to share with these folks?
Finally he pulls down his hood and steps into the circle. Soot runs out and stands on his shoulder.
"I wasn't supposed to come here, but I'm glad I did. Not just 'cause I got to meet all of you, and help out with all these things, like the frogs and the tunnels and the cultists, but because I see all the ways we think and do things. It reminds me that it's okay to be different and see things in ways that other people don't. That it can actually be our strength, or whatever..."
He is suddenly unsure how to proceed, so he just gives a nod as both a thanks and a finish, then puts up his hood and steps back.
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Yeah, or whatever. Agreed Noxolo as she dances. Haig praise indeed!
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"Time has moved quickly this week" Alrinkiri speaks up. "It has not been the slow, unyielding march that I know so well. I have spoken more words this week than in the previous decade; met more people than I had in the previous century. Time has moved quickly."
And what of you, Curling Wisps Of Smoke Reliava, asks Okoro.
Well, no matter, says Okoro. You have the day to yourselves. If you wish to tell us your story later today, Curling-Wisps-of-Smoke Reliava, you may do so.
Tomorrow, Teacher Ot sure you are to meet him at the stage. I am fairly sure is for your introduction ceremony.
Noxolo says, Wear cool outfits.
☀☀☀
You have the whole day to yourselves! What do you do with this time?
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Once they have finished telling their stories, the first thing that Chimwemwe does upon returning to the dorm is to slip another silver coin into the All-Seeing Solutions. "How do you transform fire into lightning?" He observes and listens to the device with a craftsman's perspective, trying to glean clues to its workings.
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The All-Seeing Solutions clicks and clacks and whirrs. Its mouth spits out a scrap of paper. This one looks like it was written in a different hand; neat, crisp, and legible.
CHIMWEMWE,
BUOYANT PLUME EMISSIONS OF THERMAL HEAT FROM WILDFIRES RISE INTO THE TROPOSPHERE AND MIX WITH COOLER AIR, FORMING A CONVECTIVE CLOUD CALLED A CUMULONIMBUS FLAMMAGENITUS. THE CUMULONIMBUS FLAMMAGENITUS IS AN EXTREME MANIFESTATION OF A PYROCUMULUS, COLLOQUIALLY KNOWN IN THE VANJI RIVER BASIN REGION AS A 'FIRE CLOUD.'
BOTH THE PYROCUMULUS ANDCUMULONIMBUS FLAMMAGENITUS FEATURE PRECIPITATION; THE FLAMMAGENITUS CLOUD, HOWEVER, MORE OFTEN FEATURES EXTREME WEATHER SUCH AS HAIL, EXTREME LOW-LEVEL WINDS, TORNADOES, AND LIGHTNING.
THUS, FIRE IS TRANSFORMED INTO LIGHTNING VIA THE ACTION OF METEOROLOGICAL PROCESSES.
— NETHYS
To Chimwemwe's knowledge, this answer seems not only correct but thorough. If anything, it serves to make the machine even more mysterious. It might warrant longer-term study, or learning about it from its creator.
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Curling-Wisps-of-Smoke Reliava takes a deep breath. She accepts the puzzle box from Chimwemwe with a grateful smile.
"I have heard the stories of my family members who attended school here. I am excited to start building the stories of my own.
We had to use our wits and our magics to show that we belonged here. The tests did not end with the lit candle, though. We had to find the Ojofiri chicks, in the rarest shade of blue. We had to clear the pugwampis from the barn, without harming them, and we learned how from the library. We had to gather the ingredients for a ritual, though the ritual did not go as planned. We then had to deliver the mail, which required much more creativity than one would think. While these tasks seem small, we are learning more about the Magaambya every day, and the Magaambya is learning more about us."
Wisps using pacing and gestures to bring each part of her story to life.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wisps writes letters to her family to tell them about how her first few days have gone. She then goes to the library to browse. She chooses a few books at random to look through.
Akoril spends some time wandering the grounds and surrounding lands. Realized he lacks the wilderness skills to take care of him self he does not wander too far from well worm paths.
Additionally he'll spend some time in town shopping for a Jaunty hat for the upcoming ceremony.
Chimwemwe takes the answer from the All-Seeing Solutions to his room where he remains for the next half of an hour. He emerges with his fingers freshly stained with ink, which he ineffectually wipes on his gambeson as he walks down his hall. He makes his way to the front commons of the dorm and glances surreptitiously toward Mariama's door to see if his gift still sits there.
Continuing onward, he stops and knocks at Okoro's door. "Okoro? Are you back? Are you busy? Hmm. Do you have time to teach me a new game?"