thenearshore | the wizard that lives on the hill [closed]

[Kouten welcomes Hakkai inside the barrier, apparently expecting and recognising him. It's quiet at the Temple of Aditi, silent but for the gentle breeze and the faint cooing of chickens already settled in to roost. From the temple itself, there's the soft scent of incense and cigarettes.

Sharak Sanzo herself is sat in the center room, lounging under the open sky and reading through some old books and papers with a cigarette in one hand. She doesn't look up when Hakkai enters, waves her fingers briefly in acknowledgement.]

Hey, come on in.

[The downside to gradually becoming better friends with Sharak is that she stops bothering with the polite hostess routine as often. Though at least Hakkai doesn't merit a greeting at gunpoint.]

[Hakkai offers her a polite smile and a bow -- although not a very deep one, considering she isn't even looking at him -- and takes a seat a few paces in front of her. He offers her a nod.]

Good evening. [--and, with a quirk of his eyebrows:] Anything interesting there?

I hope not to take too much of your time, but I've heard a little about those spots.

[And it's been a long time since they talked over them, but, well. As unhelpful as the information is, Hakkai's hoping the two of them might be able to think up some way to use it, or that she might have a guess about what is magic does.]

[Sharak closes the book with a thud, finally looking up at Hakkai curiously.]

What you've got already sounds more interesting.

[A quick glance at the title of her book should tell him Sharak's reading about shinki magic. Not a usual topic for a goddess. The other texts are also about magic- from the kind shinki use to other, less reliable kinds- and the reliability of their sources varies. She's trying to get a better understanding of the magic of this world in general.]

Did you find another one?

Edited 2017-08-25 11:09 (UTC)

Evidence of several.

[He produces a little memo book and tosses it to her: she'll find that the first several pages are filled with locations, ranging from most to least evidence and with notes about the online evidence supporting the location -- curious locals, short News of the Weird segments...

They range across every inhabited continent, with no clear pattern to their location or the times they became news.]

I took the opportunity to visit the top five. There's no blight left at any of them, but the soil has been cleared and turned. I'm convinced that there was once something there.

[And someone found them, and fixed them. He folds his hands on his knees.]

I can't find a pattern, but I don't know if that's because there are more I don't know about, or because they're actually random.

They're cleaning up after themselves, huh?

[Or someone is doing it for them, which is almost more interesting. Sharak flips through the book, taking in the information.]

... They might be random and still have a reason. [She puts the book down and leans back thoughtfully.] The location itself might not matter, but there's an obvious benefit to moving around. Especially now they're putting in the effort to hide their tracks.

[They're harder to catch. Slowly takes a drag from her cigarette and holds the smoke in her mouth before exhaling again.] Or they're worried about the impact it has. The spell could rely on the power of the environment. You wouldn't want to over stress one region if so.

[They're definitely harder to catch. The whole world is far too large to effectively surveil, teleportation or no, which means if there's no identifiable pattern Hakkai may have to give up the hope of getting there before they do-- whatever it is that creates those blighted spots.]

Mm. I was reminded recently of an earlier incident.

[He frowns, leaning back to look up at the sky through her ceiling.]

A human sorcerer summoned and controlled an unusual ayakashi meant to drain life energy from children. Although it was destroyed, and he couldn't answer most of our questions -- apparently he believed he was summoning a demon to grant his wishes -- I wonder if this blight might not be the mark of something similar? If energy is being drained from these areas to support...

[He opens his hand, palm up. He has no idea what it might be for.]

... something. Thus leaving the blight, and the dead area. It would also explain why they need to move around.

[Sharak frowns.] You don't mean the incident I arrived during, do you? The one in that town. Someone was using a circle to summon something then.

[She'd been distracted from investigating too thoroughly- she'd just arrived and Genjo had been in such a state.]

That one was in the middle of a city, and it definitely had an effect on everyone around it. By the end of the night it seemed like everyone was half-asleep. [She idly taps her cigarette on the edge of an old, dusty ashtray.] But that attracted everyone's attention before the spell had even finished casting.

[So... Probably some kind of summons.]

The ayakashi could be part of the energy draining, they could just be attracted to the magic being performed... or they could be part of what's being summoned. If they're involved at all, it would explain the blight everywhere.

[Hakkai shakes his head.] It was before that. Possibly related, but I wasn't there for that incident in the city.

[Gojyo had been in a state, too, at the time... and he'd been in no mood to politely obey Heaven's orders to go investigate this or that. His smile is dry.]

But I'd heard there was a similar draining effect. And nothing since.

[He shakes his head.] I think there must be ayakashi involved somehow, yes. It's possible they're just attracted afterwards, but having seen them be used to drain energy from living humans, I lean towards thinking they must be a part of the spell....

Perhaps they decided to be more secretive after those incidents.

[Maybe there are advantages to doing the spell surrounded by people, gods and shinki, but the interference must be a pain to deal with as well. Perhaps it got too risky.]

The blight we found was pretty big for them to have just come for a taste. [And either she and Hakkai arrived not long after the event itself, or the people responsible hadn't started bothering to clean up after themselves yet then. Sharak shakes her head.]

Alright, they're doing something and ayakashi are probably involved, possibly draining resources from their surroundings. A spell like that would have to be for something big. If each of these locations is a different instance, they've either been trying and failing a lot or they've been successful many times. What's the result? Us?

Perhaps it is us.

[The timing on the bizarre blighted spots doesn't match the timing of their arrivals, but that doesn't mean they aren't involved with gathering energy for later spells, Hakkai supposes. It must take immense power to drag souls to the wrong world, much less incarnate them as gods.

But, reluctantly, he has to shake his head.] If it isn't us, then it must be something we don't know about yet, or you're right that they've been failing. The attempt at the school failed, at least.

[He frowns, and adds:] But... the attempt at the school was made by a living man. The others might have been too.

I think I'd like to talk to them.

[She nods. She wouldn't mind a word with them as well, though if they were tools by someone non-human, they've probably been dealt with somehow on that score.]

It's been a while since we had a major incident line up with new arrivals, have you noticed? Ever since they started sending people to Bishamon's temple for induction instead. The last one that happened close to newcomers was when our ages changed- and that was caused by two of ours. [It had been a large incident, but she still doubts anyone had planned it going by what Add described.] Granted a few of the ones before that were just parties with a few ayakashi intruders, but...

[Still. No big, flashy distractions and no sudden catastrophes coincidentally linked to energy being drained or spirits being summoned. No "down with Amaterasu" leaflets either.]

Maybe they've gotten better on controlling their timing. It doesn't seem like there's ever been a limit on when we can disappear, after all.

Maybe they have. I thought for a while that our disappearances were random, but from what Add described of his observation, it sounds a little more deliberate, doesn't it?

[A faint line etches itself between his eyebrows.] If so, I wonder what their choices are based on.

It may be that the timing of new appearances isn't based on necessity, but on some sort of calculation.

Isn't the thought of disappearing at any time, without warning, much more frightening than someone appearing? No one dreads the new people arriving so much.

[But they don't need to discuss the fear that tonight will be the night that someone vanishing, or the horrible realization that an empty room or missing temple gives. Most people on the Far Shore know those by now.]

I've been wondering why they need a changing population at all. Our numbers haven't grown or shrunk drastically since I got here, as far as I can tell. [A bit, sure, but not on any significant scale.] It's not even just a matter of "fresh stock"- some people have been here months while others have vanished after just a week or two. And it's definitely being done deliberately.

[She taps her cigarette again thoughtfully.] Did Add's description remind you of anything?

It keeps us off balance and distracted. More importantly, I think, it keeps the Heavens from being able to grow to know and rely on us. Our disappearances, our changes... if a stable population had arrived all at once and remained, I think our current situation would be very different from what it is now.

[He knows that fear, knows the chill of that realization, but it is, he thinks, too solipsistic even for him to believe that they're deliberately being picked off at random simply for the pleasure of watching them suffer. While there are people who would go that far to torment him, most of them are dead, and none of them would have reason to torture the dozens of others who have come and gone.

If it's deliberate... well. He's willing to defer to her on that point. His own magical education is minimal.]

It reminded me of what happens to a body animated by a spell when the spell is broken. Perhaps you're right, and it is deliberate.

[He turns his right hand palm-up, looking at it. Every line is the same, every little scar where a knife had slipped peeling a potato or jarring against a rib. Is he a soul housed in a form that's no more than a shikigami? Are their temples created the same way, that they crumble to dust when the animating spirit is gone?]

Did it suggest anything else to you? I am not, unfortunately, familiar with... rifts like that.

[But it sounds like the kind of power that nothing less than one of the sutras could command. To pierce through the skin of the world itself--

Unfortunately, it doesn't limit his suspect pool significantly to think, "it must be the power of a god."]

[She nods at Hakkai's reasoning- it's solid, and matches the motives she's already ascribed to other aspects of the operation. Building mistrust and pulling people apart seem to be part of their enemy's goals. The fear element is likely just a bonus.]

It reminded me of when a medium is removed from a shikigami. [She's evidently pleased Hakkai went to the same association.] It would explain how quickly the temples fall apart too.

I don't know much about rifts through space or anything like that- [If that's one of Kouten's powers, it's not evidently so.] but mediums I do understand. [She gestures vaguely behind her, at the string of bells and ornaments hanging between the pillars above them. One of them is the center of the barrier surrounding the Temple of Aditi.] Any object can be turned into a medium and even a living being can be transformed by one. They can even become so closely tied together that it's impossible to separate them.

[If he thinks back enough, Hakkai might remember an example of that himself.]

But turning a living being into a medium, or an actual soul... [Sharak frowns and takes a drag from her cigarette.] The former is volatile and dangerous, the latter unheard of.

Among humans. The gods seem to use souls more easily.

[After all, what are their shinki if not human souls transformed into the vestments and regalia of the divine? And shinki -- "normal" shinki -- far predate the appearance of the newcomers. Gods are clearly familiar with magic to bind souls.

Whether that would affect their ability to use the newcomers' souls as the medium for spells creating their bodies and temples-- who knows? Hakkai certainly couldn't speak on the topic.

It doesn't seem impossible, and so, after a moment, he shakes his head.]

Whether or not there are humans creating those blighted areas, I think our real enemy must be a god. I can't imagine all of this could be orchestrated by humans, no matter how powerful their magic.

[Sharak nods, conceding the point. She keeps referring to her own education, which is why she's been trying to improve upon it lately.]

A shinki with a name isn't so different from a medium. In theory, so long as you can isolate the soul, turning even a living being into a shinki shouldn't be too complicated. [In theory. Any god can create a shinki from a soul, so it's just a matter of... reaching it. She'll refrain from mentioning the obvious method of just killing the person, be they kidnapped from another world or otherwise, and casting any spells then. For one, it's a little too straightforward for everything that's going on.] Turning a human or anything else into a god seems more ridiculous, but it's more likely that we're just replicating symptoms anyway.

[They can hear prayers and make shinki, but the former could be someone casting magic separately and the latter could be a function of them all being part of the same chain of spells. No one really believes Sharak is Aditi, after all.]

It's either a god or some other being incredibly familiar with their magic. But they're probably making use of humans too. As far as they've gone with everyone else, I'd be surprised if they weren't utilising them in some way.

From what Yukine has told me, gods are created by belief. I've wondered if that's part of what we're here for -- normally, when a god is destroyed, the ongoing power of their followers' belief reincarnates them. I doubt we're really being turned into gods, but it could be our souls are being used to absorb that belief and interrupt the process of reincarnation.

[He raises his eyebrows, half-amused, and adds:]

... Or that's my theory. I have no idea if it's possible or not.

But yes, it would have to be someone who could use divine magic and manipulate souls, even if not a god. I think it's more likely those humans we've seen are just tools. Or perhaps faithful followers....

Some of us are representing rather obscure gods... I'm not sure how many people have even heard of Aditi these days. [She's occasionally surprised she has as many followers as she does.] I wonder if that helps at all.

[Sure, they've got some big names among them but they have some... really little known ones as well.]

I've wondered before how much competition there is for followers. The more devout a person is, the fewer gods they probably worship, right? Among a pantheon it's probably easy enough to share, but now the Japanese gods are being made to compete with foreign gods more directly.

That's a good question. [Hakkai spreads his hands.] They all are; I don't see any reason why a devout person wouldn't continue to worship multiple gods, so long as none of them are jealous, but I doubt there are many people who worship, oh, for instance... Li Tieguai and Aditi at the same time.

[Spreading the worship of ancient or foreign gods could, in that case, weaken the Japanese pantheon. But if that's part of the purpose, then--]

But some of us represent Japanese gods, too. And some are incarnations of gods who are historically identified with one another - Athena, Minerva and Menrva, for example.

Aditi's followers will believe in most Hindu gods and definitely the other Vedic ones, but they probably don't give two shits about Li Tieguai. Or Amaterasu, for that matter.

[As for associated incarnations-] Now does that strengthen Athena or cut her power into three? If the belief is going to three different people, when before it was going to one? Are the different pantheons they're associated with being affected by that division?

[That probably depends on how it worked before the newcomers showed up, but still... If the Greek gods have lost three of theirs, but the Romans have only lost one, does that have political ramifications?]

Until fairly recently, it looked like the pantheons didn't interact much, right? It was probably awkward, considering most countries have a mix of different faiths represented. Now the others are seeing their friends and family vanishing and their names turning up over here.

I don't think I've studied nearly enough theology for these questions.

[And it was even one of his majors. He chuckles, shaking his head.]

But while the political ramifications might be part of the motivation -- for instance, if the anti-Amaterasu agitation is linked to whoever is bringing us in, angering other pantheons with the disappearance of their members would make them unwilling to help a goddess who can't control or stop those disappearances -- managing divine politics isn't our problem. Luckily.

[They're not real gods, after all, and even if they don't disappear on their own like others have, they want to go back. If they're still alive back home. If there's a way back -- and all of those other concerns that they're leaving unspoken. He shakes his head.]

And we could question those details for decades without finding useful answers.

I've considered asking Add whether his powers would make it possible to observe the creation of one of those blighted spots. He was able to look back in time to see the disappearance of that god, after all, but without Gojyo's former god to help him it might no longer be possible.

I wish he'd been able to see a shinki vanishing as well, it'd be useful to see if there are any differences.

[If there aren't any, it would confirm the suspicion that the new shinki and new gods are just copying traits exhibited by the old ones- there's no significant changes at all. If there are differences, they can start figuring out why.]

I get the feeling Ekko's role in that might have been a little too crucial, but it's worth asking. Though I have to wonder if we'll be as lucky in the side effects as we were last time.

[Remember the library goblins.]

Most of us come back to life if we're killed.

[He's not quite so indifferent to the effects as he pretends to be. Still... as strange and widespread as the results had been last time, with both gods and shinki shifting in age in mind and body, there's no reason to believe it will be worse. And last time, only the goblins had died.]

... It's not something I'd try for a lesser cause, but if we can't predict when new spots will appear and it could happen anywhere in the world, that may be the only way to know how they were created. If he can do it, of course.

Ekko didn't.

[Probably unconnected to that incident but... Possibly not. Either way, there's no sense killing themselves for the hell of it.]

If we could figure out a way to make one ourselves, that'd be something. [Sharak, that's not... less dangerous...] Then we'd know what kind of magic has that effect, at least.

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