[An Alten word that references the concept of souls and spirits.]

I woke up again around midday, my body still sore from where Kared had cut me. My mind felt foggy as I tried to recall the events of the previous night. I remembered her attacking me, and me losing the fight. Ah, I probably died. After I realized, I looked around the room I was in. It was one of the hotel’s smaller suites, and looked pretty much identical to the room we were staying in, just with two beds instead of six. So I’m still in Ish’din. If I died, how was I revived without being brought back to Tsumi’din? The thought brought back the memory of the short moment I was conscious, when Oroske and Kared were arguing. I remembered the conversation a bit backwards, starting with Oroske mentioning that if he wasn’t there, Kared would have had to carry me all the way back home. From there, I remembered them talking about her mission. The memories didn’t really answer any of my questions, and in fact asked more. I was able to answer one question by inspecting my wounds, being greeted by the familiar sight of flesh being pulled and stretched to close the cuts.

As I was deep in thought, the door swung open loudly. Oroske walked in, followed by Kared. The two were bickering once more, though it seemed it was about something else. “Oh, good. You’re awake,” Oroske said, putting a firm end to their conversation. “We’ll be leaving in a couple hours, and we’re having a meeting with Meia, the Lords, and the other Clans at the foot of the stairs in about half an hour.”

He got straight to business as he usually does. “Okay, I’ll get ready to leave. May I ask what happened last night?”

Oroske nodded, then looked at Kared, who rolled her eyes with a sigh and left the room, closing the door behind her. I got the feeling she was just waiting outside. Oroske then looked at me, folding his arms. “Well, ask away.”

I told him everything I could remember before I asked my questions. “How was I able to be revived? I take it that Kared healed my wounds, but I mean beyond that.”

“A fair question. I suppose I haven’t told you the full extent of my own abilities, have I?” He was right from what I could remember. “First, I’ll tell you the difference between traditional Necromancy and what exactly it is that the Tsumi Clan does. The fact of the matter is that the two are fairly similar, and that the primary difference is how the soul is reunited with the body.

“Necromancy as it is used by the general public, ‘general’ of course being relative, essentially forces the soul to bond with the body. In this way the body becomes a puppet controlled by the soul, and is ‘alive’ in a sense, but still dead in most other senses.

“However, the Tsumi Clan are privy to the technique for ‘true’ necromancy. The soul brought back must match the body it’s being offered, and it must bond on its own. Furthermore, souls will only naturally bond to bodies that are ‘living.’ This is why the rule exists that the body must be in a state where it can recover enough to sustain life. The typical process goes as follows: the body is healed, the body is made into a living yet soulless vessel, the body’s original soul is fished out of the Aetherial Realm, and finally it is reunited with the vessel. If the soul accepts, resurrection is successful. Otherwise, the soul will return to dust, and must be sent back into the aether manually.”

“So how do your abilities come into this?”

“To put it simply, my elemental affinity is orun, but my aspect is veros, or ‘souls.’ The step in which the soul is fished out of the aether is incredibly complex and usually requires three or four people who have dedicated several years of study to the inner workings of aether and souls. Aspects can have a large amount of variety in how they manifest, and for me I’m far more sensitive to aether, just in general. It is not only easier for me to feel and manipulate aether, but I can delve more deeply into the details about the aether around me. More importantly, I am able to ‘see’ souls, and I’m able to manipulate souls to a certain extent, even if they are still bound to a living body. In this case, I was able to ‘trap’ your soul before it could fully dissipate into aether, saving a large amount of time, and allowing us an easy resurrection.”

It was a lot of information to take in, and it took me a while to digest it all and determine what was and wasn’t important at the moment. “I think I get it.” I thought outloud after organizing the information in my head. It certainly helped explain how he’s able to hold the title as being one of the Clan’s strongest, and why he was sensitive to the distortion caused by Sigils. But once again, I’m left with more questions than answers. “Next, I wanted to ask about your and Kared’s conversation regarding the Clan’s Chosen One.”

“I see, what do you want to know specifically?”

“Everything I can know. Who the Chosen is, how do you know who they are, and why can't I be it?” The last part especially bothered me. I didn’t really expect to be the Chosen in the first place, but hearing that there isn’t even the possibility of it being me made me sad.

“Very well, I’ll answer in order. Jarou is our Clan’s Chosen One. We know that it’s him due not only to his impressive magical and physical capabilities and potential, but also one of the signs the Clan leaders were told to look for: a slight gilding around the edges of their soul. In other words, his soul has small bits of a golden color, mixed in with the yellow that is his soul’s main color. And finally, while some who are out of the loop may suspect it to be you, due to your impressive potential, as you heard, it’s impossible for it to have been. I am not allowed to go too much into details, but it primarily has to do with your lineage. It is simply not my place to tell you further, and I have been told not to.”

“Who would I need to talk to then?”

“I also can’t tell you that. The obvious answer would be your parents, but they are unfortunately not around anymore.”

I felt like he wanted to tell me, and was just forcing himself to hold his tongue.

“So I don’t have this ‘gilding’ in my soul? What does that even mean?”

“Correct. If the Guardians told the Danfis and other Clan leaders about the meaning behind the gilding, it has been left a mystery to the rest of us. All I can say for sure is that exceedingly few are born with it, but it seems to relate directly with the person’s potential.”

I rubbed my forehead. All this information was starting to give me a headache.

“Any more questions?” Oroske asked.

“Tons, but I think they can wait for now. I’ve had enough information overload for one morning.” This conversation reminded me how little I truly know about the world. However, it also strengthened my resolve to learn more and more. I hoped one day, I would be able to hold a conversation about these kinds of topics without needing anything to be explained.

“Fair enough,” Oroske laughed, as he turned around, heading to the door. “I’ll leave you to get ready. See you outside in a few minutes.” He turned his head toward me before leaving, “Oh, and don’t tell Jarou about the whole Chosen One thing. It’s best he doesn’t know about it until the time is right. That way he can live a normal life while he has the chance.” He opened the door and shut it as he left.

There wasn’t much to do to get ready. My cloak had been brought from our primary suite into this one, along with my boots and socks. Once I put those on, I did some stretching, testing the limits of my movement based on pain. To my surprise, I was able to move around like normal without any additional pain. I was of course still very sore where I had been wounded, but aside from that I felt pretty normal.

I looked in the mirror present in the bathroom, and tried and failed to flatten down my very messy, all over the place hair. I gave up after only a minute or two, deciding it wasn’t worth the hassle at this point.

When I left the room, I was surprised to see Kared waiting in the hall still. She was holding the sword I used during our battle. “Here, figured I’d hold on to it for you,” She said as she handed it to me. She patted me on the shoulder, then turned away and walked down the hall. I followed her silently, keeping a good distance, as it was the quickest way to the lobby. I would have liked an apology for her murder, but I didn’t hold my breath.

Outside, almost everyone was standing around waiting near the stairs. Oroske waved us over to where he was standing, next to Raen, Meia, and the rest of our clanmates. “We’re about to start, just waiting for a couple stragglers from Kats’anum’s group and the Ishen,” he explained.

They finally showed up after nearly ten minutes. A couple of them must have had a bit too much to drink since they were stumbling a lot as they walked. Meia guided Oroske and Raen up a few of the steps so they could be more easily seen and heard by the crowd.

“Yesterday, Oroske Tsumi and Lord Raen Sen’anum were able to extract more information out of the bandits in our custody,” Meia began the unofficial meeting, “They have already agreed to assist with the issue on their way back to their homes, and would like to make a proposition to all of you. Go ahead, Oroske.” She finished, raising her hand to pass the conversation to him.

Oroske cleared his throat. “Thank you. With the cooperation of these bandits, we were able to ascertain the location of their camp, and they made a map to help us find it as well. We also learned that their benefactor is calling themselves a Demon Lord. Lord Sen’anum has already agreed to a detour along our route to Tsumi’din to stop by and ‘take care of’ these bandits, so to speak. We made a deal to not kill unless necessary, and want to go less to bring them to justice, but instead to learn what we can about this Demon Lord.”

“We wished to ask the other Lords and Clans for their assistance,” Raen spoke next, looking towards his sisters, “It would mean a couple day detour for the Incol, as we will leave from Sanctis to Oru’ou. The bandit’s camp is somewhere in the woods near there. If either party does not want to participate, they are not required to. If they do, however, they will be compensated with pay from the Lords and Parliament both.”

“With all due respect, I can hardly afford such a detour.” Lady Shen’anum responded, “I’d say you can’t really either, but I don’t think I’ll be able to convince you not to do it.”

“I also definitely can’t.” Kats’anum agreed, “It may be a single or two day detour for you, but it will add on a significant amount of time for me and the Incol. Especially when you consider how the route directly to the Incol’s home is much faster than our route here.”

“Fair enough,” Raen said with a shrug, “Please let our siblings know why I’m running late for our banquet. I suppose there’s no real point, but I’d like to hear the Ishen and Incol representatives’ thoughts.”

“Uin is right,” Myr said, “It would be a very long detour for us. On top of having responsibilities we must attend to in certain timeframes, it’s likely this detour would result in no real profit for us. It seems highly likely the compensation we would receive would only allow us to break even on the added costs, and we’d lose out on profit we could make in that same amount of time.” Uri looked proud of his younger sister.

Gai stepped forward to offer her Clan’s response, “I believe that while we would indeed lose out on profits, any information gained from this outing would be undeniable and first-hand. Considering this Demon Lord’s involvement with our business, I believe it would be good to go. It is also a considerably shorter detour for us than it is for the Incol, and saves us from trekking through the Der’venn’ya.” She paused for a minute then shrugged, “But if our Lady Shen’anum doesn’t want to, then we won’t go.”

“Just us it is then,” Oroske said with a smile, “Fine by me. Means more action for us.”

“All settled then?” Meia asked to confirm. Oroske and Raen nodded. “Very well, have Danfis send us the bill, we’ll bring payment when we hold our meeting in the near future.”

“Will do.” Oroske turned back to the crowd, “Alright! We head out in an hour. May we all travel safely.”