૮꒰˵• ﻌ •˵꒱ა ewe can do it~

[noarchitact]

WHO: You, you, & you.
WHERE: the Pasture!
WHEN: Day 91

[ 🐑 baaa. ]

Comments

[endsjustified]

[well he was reading at another table in the vicinity but he does come check on her when they happens]

Azdaja—?

[wants_the_phd]

[Still leaning heavily on the table, she's tenderly stretching her leg, testing her knee before putting her weight on it again.]

--Sorry. I'm alright.

[endsjustified]

Are you sure? That looks like an injury…

[a little uncertain]

[wants_the_phd]

No, my body's starting to fail.

[gingerly crouching down to start picking up her dropped books.]

This is what happens at the end of our lifespans.

[endsjustified]

[a slight horrified pause, before he shifts to help with the ones that scattered further out]

When you said you were unlikely to have the time to finish the work you wished to do, it did not sound so presently literal.

[wants_the_phd]

[Wry:]

If there's no end to the work you want to do, no amount of time would ever be enough.

[Seeing that he's helping, she gratefully eases herself into the nearest chair, instead. She lets out a slow breath.]

Last time we spoke about it, I hadn't started senescing yet. Even though I've been years overdue.

...It's here now, though.

[endsjustified]

[he shifts up briefly to put a stack of books upon the table before going after the last couple of stragglers; in that moment where his head isn't bowed there is concern writ upon his expression.]

Can it be stopped; reversed? There is no shortage of magic here to turn towards such issues.

[wants_the_phd]

[She interjects small "thank you"s as he puts the books on the table.]

I don't know.

Angel Devil is trying to help me build a prosthetic body to hold my soul in. --Make me into what he is. I don't know if it'll work, though; there are a lot of potential points of failure.

[The books he's picking up all seem to be about magic and its practical applications in health and technology.]

Other than that... I dunno. Appeal to the Forever Snake, or try to bargain with Death? I'm a little out of my depth. If you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

[endsjustified]

Just to be sure—you have confirmed limbus maintains the same physical age as your original body? There is no possibility of a rejuvenating effect from that at all?

[he knows very well how much work she does with it, so he knows the answer is almost certainly in the negatives. but it never hurts to check and confirm aloud.]

[wants_the_phd]

Not that I've been able to detect. I recently made myself a brand new arm and it already aches just the same.

[endsjustified]

Hm. Interesting.

[he supposes Minuet's body's issue was 'energy,' not 'aging'...]

The Snake is one avenue you could take, since its scales cause time-related effects; you'd want to talk to it direct and ask if it can control that, though, since otherwise you'd be subjecting yourself to random changes until you found the on you wanted. Perhaps your priest can convey the request for you if you did that...?

The Child-Rearing Demon is another. I'd offer Lily's stone from the latter as it rewinds time for an individual, but as it is I'm not sure you'd like the fact that all your knowledge and experience would rewind right back to the timepoint your body was brought to.

Perhaps it could be bargained with for a similar item that affected the body only, though. But the Snake might be safer, more benign.

[wants_the_phd]

Talking to Vera is definitely on my to-do list. You're right that I don't want to lose any experience, as that's the single greatest advantage of age in the first place. But it's also not enough to be simply be reverted to a younger body, because then I'd be back in this same position again within the decade, but possibly without any ways of fixing it next time.

My ideal would be to find a permanent way to stop aging. But the locals here... thanks to the Forever Snake, they've been trapped in stasis for at least five hundred years now. And while their bodies haven't changed, nothing else about them has, either. They've been unable to learn or grow as people. They've been unable to come up with any kind of meaningful new ideas for solving their problems. And what's the point of being alive if you can't develop yourself over time?

[endsjustified]

That’s true. It sounds like a living nightmare, to be unable to use all that time to make progress.

…I don’t personally know of something that would help you the way you want, that I could directly obtain for you. I do not think Red would bring a True Rune through for me at all, and they don’t confer immortality without terrible drawbacks, in any case.

But I would suggest you speak to Lethe, also. His world has all sorts of possibilities, and he’s spoken of meeting beings who are far beyond a mortal’s typical lifespan.

[he cannot offer what Lethe can do; only Lethe himself can do that.]

[wants_the_phd]

Yeah? I'll keep that in mind. Thanks for the tip.

[That said, she's skeptical. Yeah, she can ask Lethe anything she wants, but it seems there may now be tangible evidence that Lethe would rather literally die than answer questions. She has about as much confidence in her ability to get answers out of Blossom.]

A True Rune...

[Why does that sound so familiar? It's like she heard about it a long time ago, in a dream...]

Those are... pieces of the gods, right?

[endsjustified]

[asking Lethe questions in a conversation is pretty different than asking him questions under coercion, but he’ll leave them to sort it out because if he discloses Lethe’s skill without permission he’s gonna get murdered about it

as to her question, he pauses a moment in obvious surprise, then nods]

Pieces or gods in their own right; the line gets a little blurry. But yes. They’re about the most powerful magic one could access in my world.

[wants_the_phd]

[It is her direct experience that Lethe will not answer her questions conversationally, either. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ We'll see!]

What are they like? Are they similar to the Eidolons in Angel Devil's world, if you're familiar with those?

How are they used?

[endsjustified]

You bear them in your own body. Not unlike a normal Rune, that way. You take on their power. You cast their magic, such as it is—or restrain it, in some cases.

[he peels a glove off to show her the symbol of the Earth rune branded into his hand, as an example]

The difference is that a True Rune is sentient, and also very difficult to get rid of once you have taken hold of it. It has its own will and agenda. It’s not…it doesn’t exactly talk to its host, if my understanding is correct, but it pushes them anyway. Through true dreams, through visions to try to force and influence their actions, through enacting its nature with or without their say-so.

[wants_the_phd]

[Oh!! He has one! ...She doesn't know why she's surprised, but she still is, somehow.]

So is this a "normal" Rune, then? Is this where your magic comes from?

[endsjustified]

Yes. Runes are the typical source of magic in my world; I would not have any without one. They’re a struggle for me to use as it is.

[wants_the_phd]

Is all magic from Runes where you're from?

Are they common?

[endsjustified]

Some kinds like this Earth Rune, or some weapons enhancement Runes, are very common. Some are extremely rare.

There are many other types of magic—creatures that bear their own, spirits that may be called on by those born to their lands—but they are far less common and tend to be localized to small areas.

[wants_the_phd]

Fascinating.

Where do Runes come from? How do you get one?

[endsjustified]

You…

[makes a kind of general gesture with his hands, indicating the environment around them. it’d work better if they were outdoors and not in a library, but.]

The world is more or less made of their substance. The earth and monsters provide Runes and Rune shards which can be crafted into such; our very mythology has it that the earth and seas and sky were formed from the bodies of the gods who divided into the True Runes. Sometimes humans themselves are born with Runes incorporated into their being.

Magic is at strength in that way where I am from, in the way science and technology are where you are from, I suspect.

[wants_the_phd]

Man. That's so cool.

It's hard for me to even conceive of a world where magic is such an intrinsic part of the natural order. Here, it seems like behind every magic, there's someone responsible for it somehow. Like magic is a craft instead the fabric of reality.

I'm sure I'm wrong. It's just hard for me to understand a world so full of impossibilities, even when I'm living in one.

[endsjustified]

You live in a world of impossibilities for me too. Travel between worlds and stars, easy, purposeful; interstellar research and conquest; machinery I can barely begin to conceive. Even your natural state of existence, humanoid to dragon and back—much as it pains you now.