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So they...function bit like a casting focus, a way to channel rather than power the magic itself. Fascinating.

[He reaches for the cup, pausing as he moves to pick it up.] For faith, I simply meant prayer. My magic comes from a god I pray to.

[He brings the cup up to breathe in the steam and smell and it's almost cleansing, the delicate scent and heat. Certainly, it puts a bit of ease in him, especially as he takes a sip.]

That's fantastic, thank you. Doubt I've had better made tea.

[Which was not flattery. He'd had plenty of tea, it was a staple of the household, but none so perfectly made.]

Thank you. Artistry is very important to me. Both in tea and in painting.

Your god provides you with power? That is a rare gift. You must be exceptional indeed to have the favor of a god.

[Huaisang sips his own tea, eyes closing briefly with bliss.]

[He takes another sip to cover for the flicker of doubt he quickly buries. That one was complicated and unfit for polite, new, company]

Perhaps. I’d love to hear more of what you paint and if your magic works through that as well, but maybe I should ask what it is about necromancy magic that’s got your interest first.

The magic is strengthened by concentration and focus. It doesn't improve my painting and I don't imbue my paintings with any magic, but the practice does help to strengthen my golden core, since I've taught myself a technique that lets me meditate and paint at the same time.

[As for the necromancy, well. Huaisang draws himself up a little, eyes on the table rather than his guest.] My brother was murdered.

[Chris blinks in surprise and sits up a little more as well, his expression shifting from polite and business-like to earnest and serious.]

I’m sorry. I’ve known that pain and carry it as well.

[Rhyt had been resurrected, but that didn’t erase the months of agony and scar on his soul of his twin’s body in his arms.]

Did this happen here or at home?

At home. He actually showed up here, once. Or a version of him did. [Huaisang frowns and looks away, looking more conflicted than one should over reuniting with his dead brother.]

This place contains different versions of people, from time to time. Sometimes one will hear that another of oneself had been here before, same and yet different, and it's nothing that you remember. [Not something that Huaisang has himself experienced, but it's frequent enough.] Time and death are easy barriers for this place to cross, it would seem.

[He's heard of the different versions of people, of people leaving and coming back without memory of being here and some with entirely different experiences. It's nothing he's experienced himself, either personally or from those he was close to, but it lived in the back of his mind as a possibility. He couldn't imagine...if someone he loved who was lost showed up here for any amount of time...]

That couldn't have been an easy time to bear. This place makes a mockery of death that ought be my duty to set right, but they've stripped me of some power that might help and others seem weaker. If you're hoping I can bring him back to you here...?

I expect nothing here, no. As you said, this place makes a mockery of death. And other things.

The version of him who came here ... he was like a mockery of my brother. I can genuinely say that I hope to never encounter that man again.

From what I understand, if we are able to return to our worlds--which seems unlikely, to be honest--we retain no memory of it. My experiences here have given me the theory that we are only flawed copies of our selves from home, and that if we leave here ... well, the copy is ... dissolved, I suppose. Into whatever ether created us. It is the only thing I can think of that explains how there can be different versions of a person, and those versions never seem to remember being here before, and time and space and death mean nothing. We are just a mimicry of the true image, like a stamp upon paper.

[He didn't mean to get so deep into existential theory, especially with someone he's only just met.]

But if there is any chance of retaining the memory, if my self from home can ever look into his reflection in a pool of water and suddenly gasp with knowledge and certainty...

My brother's body and spirit have been preserved. I have the ability to do that much, at least.

[Chris gives him his rapt attention throughout, mind racing with the thoughts. He knew Jon had some sort of similar theory, something to do with computers, like copies of a picture you might make in your phone or...a program, as limited as Chris' understanding of that concept is. The way Huaisang has put it makes more sense and has implications better thought over while not in new company, probably. But his aim in remembering...that strikes close to something Chris had been thinking for some time and told nearly no one about.]

There's merit to your thought, and I know some who'd argue evidence, though I'm no expert in either theory. I do think there might be...echoes. Thoughts and ideas we might think or do here that might travel on to us back home, whether the real us or otherwise. I've some experience with it myself, the couple times I've been returned home, once while still physically here and another gone completely. I've no proof it's not coincidence and no viable way to replicate it, but I think it's solid enough to say 'maybe.'

I know there's ways back home for people to etch memory into stone with magic and ways to use items to record thoughts and emotions, but trying to get those from here to there is still a sticking point. If I'd even the ability to move objects between planes, I'd have better thought to the problem, but as it is, I suspect it's lucky enough my Lady of Ravens can still see and hear me.

[And what does that mean, if they truly are just copies? Was that why he couldn't commune with her? Perhaps she only heard his voice as a faint echo in the Strings that surrounded her, a frayed piece off the one truly attached to him.]

[Huaisang blinks repeatedly at the last part, staring at him in shock and hope.] A deity? Outside of this realm, and she can hear you from within it?

[He instantly has so many more questions. He'd been so fixated on how to do the necromancy part of it that he'd given little enough thought as to how to move the knowledge between realms once he got it. A problem to be solved later, once the first insurmountable obstacle had been resolved.

It's also, honestly, a relief to hear someone speak of a deity or demigod as something real and tactile rather than the distant 'faith' of hoping in something that would never respond that so many people took as their religion. Huaisang feels adrift in this culture in so many ways, with the local Duplicity culture no more strange to him than the Modern Earth culture that so many of the LIERs come from, and it's a relief every time he comes across something in someone else's culture that he can understand and recognize.]

[That hope sticks in him more than the rest. He hadn't even considered someone else might benefit from knowing about it. Jon had expressed surprise that Chris still had access to his magic, but that had been so long ago now, he'd nearly forgotten.]

She...can. Mostly. I pray to her each morning and my magic's yet to fail me beyond what the city's stripped of me, the fact I can access it means I still have some connection to her. The fact I can change out my spells as I need in my prayers means she hears me, but any attempts to Commune directly with her as I might back home have been answered with harsh static in my mind, like something's blocking me.

[He shakes his head.] Even if she can't fully hear me or see me, she's still with me and I've hope in that. That's why I haven't let myself fall to thinking there's no chance of leaving. Perhaps we're only dissolved when we go...but maybe we aren't. Maybe there's more science and magic at work here than we've a mind to comprehend.

[Huaisang listens with wide-eyed interest. It is vastly different from the systems of magic that he knows, to be sure. In his world, if one is fortunate and skilled enough, one might become a god through magical mastery. There are some gods who were never humans, who were born from the very primordial forces, but there is not so much difference between them and the gods who had once been human. It is only a degree of power, nothing more. To have magic that is specifically given to a human from a god... Huaisang doesn't know anything like it. But it is still a source for hope.]

How fascinating. I... I hope that is true, after all. I would like very much to go home one day, and perhaps to take some of my lovers with me. It makes me sad to think of losing my memories of this place.

[There's a small flicker of thoughtful solemnity for that. He had people he cared about, but few he might take with him. Most had others they would go with, including the one man Chris might beg to consider not retuning home. Which would be fine, as long as he was safe, it wouldn't matter. Chris had friends, people like Crais, who couldn't return home or death would await them, for them at least, he hopes they find a way.]

I understand. Even if I couldn't take anyone with me for one reason or another, I'd not like to forget them as I did the times I've been forced away from here. Their impact on my soul might travel, but the memories would be sweeter.

I get the feeling there's something to my magic you were hoping would help in this, but I admit I've not yet thought of it or seen it for myself. What thought am I missing here to consider?

The necromancy part. If I can be of some aid in solving the problem of returning ourselves, our lovers, or our memories home, I will gladly work with you on it. At the moment, I simply have no leads to follow and I have never been a researcher, and my ability to come up with new spells--well. As lovely as my tea is, this kind of aptitude [he indicates the tea setup] is never going to bridge the worlds.

All that was just a tangent, though an enjoyable one.

Back home, I have my brother's body. It has been... stitched back together. It is in good condition, and imbued with enough spiritual energy to keep it that way.

And I have his soul. The problem--well, problems. He's not at peace. Any murdered spirit tends toward rage, but my brother was strong willed and had a temper, and then he was tortured to death in a manner that... See, his aptitude in combat was in quelling the rageful spirits of demons and monsters by pulling the rage into himself and his blade. Very effective, made him very fearsome in battle, but it meant a lot of effort soothing him and the blade later, and even with care and precautions and spells to soothe his soul and heal his body, that sort of thing damages the organs. Cultivators in other sects can expect to live to two hundred or more if they are skilled and vigilant. Powerful warriors in the QingheNie Sect do not often make it past fifty or sixty.

His murderer was someone trusted enough to cast the soothing spell for him, but he modified it to be a curse instead. So that all the rage from the monsters my brother defeated turned back inside him, and he died in a fit of rage.

So. That's the trouble. A soul at peace reincarnates. A body at peace returns to the earth.

A murdered, enraged soul, if it manages to reunite with the body, creates a creature corrupted by pure rage, powerful with what we call 'demonic' energy, in contrast to our normal spiritual energy.

One of my friends is an incredibly talented genius, with an aptitude for solving this sort of puzzles. He had a friend who was an incredibly gentle, soft-hearted young man. Skilled as a cultivator, but not especially powerful. Not a drop of rage in his heart. He gets murdered, my friend feels guilty about it and brings him back. A few mere hours after the death. And, as these things generally go, he wakes up as a powerful and enraged zombie. It took my friend weeks to contain the rage, soothe the spirit, restore the mind. He did it, and Wen Ning is ... more or less himself. More or less able to live his life, to love and be loyal.

If the same method is to be followed, if it took weeks for Wen Ning's gentle soul under Wei Wuxian's far more talented cultivation, I do not think my brother's spirit can be calmed and his mind restored within my lifetime. Not even if I live to be two hundred.

So I seek a more effective method.

[Chris listens, making a mental note to drop Huaisang's name to Nate if anything comes up in that vein again, he knew his friend was working on this very thing himself, but he couldn't say to the progress of it. Chris' interests and expertise lay more in the next part and he listens with rapt attention as the other man explains his predicament.

And what a predicament it is.

Chris' hand comes up to rub the backs of his fingers along his jaw absently, green eyes cast to the table while he thinks. His first inclination is always to wonder if the soul ought be put back. Murder of a good man is horrible and why resurrections magic ought to exist, but the trauma of being brought back is also why it shouldn't. Dying was not easy, but living again was harder. That one he knew personally.

It was a moot thought, however, the question at hand wasn't whether it should happen, it was clear he was set on this path and Chris couldn't begrudge him that. He'd certainly never stopped to wonder if he should bring his sister back.]

I know of some magics that can sooth emotions and clear the mind, but they're temporary holds, the full rush of feeling comes back in time. There're purifications that can be done, protections from good and evil can bolster a mind and spirit.

Otherwise, if there's no possibility in asking a god or spirit for help, I'd have to ask if there's a way to talk with your brother's soul afore you pull it back, if there's any healing or bracing to be done to ease his way.

[Huaisang nods at the information, though he does seem to deflate a little, sinking back on his heels and gazing down into his tea.] I suppose I didn't really expect there to be an easy solution to any of it. As much as I might have hoped for one.

There are ways to soothe the soul before it's pulled back, yes. I've done what I can, and when I go back I will continue to do what I can. I'd be grateful for lessons in every technique you're willing to teach me. [No matter how much Huaisang dreads and hates lessons and theory. He'll take any tools that he can get.]

[There's a moment of hesitation as he considers that.]

I can...try. If you like. Walk you through how I cast the spells I do, but I- [There's a flicker of vulnerability, an unsmoothed edge that seems to be catching more and more these days, but he pulls himself back together in the next blink of an eye. That turn of vulnerability, the feeling of inadequacy was not for other people to manage when Chris was doing so just fine, certainly not new company.]

My magic isn't a learning of books, as I said, I'm not certain there's much I can teach, but I'm happy to try as you like. If I come across any ideas to the problem or new solutions, you will be the first person I call.

[Huaisang nods, wincing his eyes closed.] Your magic is tied to your god. And the technique is not different. So in both cases it would ... not be of much use. Not worth the cost in time for both of us.

[He tries not to be achingly disappointed. He shouldn't have gotten his hopes up, after all.] Thank you, at least. It's the first time I'd encountered any necromancers who aren't ... from my world. I got excited.

[Chris nods, sympathy heavy in his expression.] I am truly sorry I don't have better news. I understand the pain of a lost sibling and I was lucky in that my world's rules are different. There is still something lost in the resurrection process, but not so violently. Death is traumatic for all involved; it's not an easy path to come back from.

[But that was the Death Cleric talking.]

If there's anything you think of we could try, I'll be happy to do so and same will go in reverse. But...if all you need's an ear for listening, I'll be happy to offer that as well. You don't need to carry it alone while you're here.

[Huaisang nods, and gives him a soft, grateful little smile.] That's kind of you. But it's ... it's a deeply private grief, for me. I'm enormously private in many things, and that most of all.

Shall we, um.

[Shaking his head to try and dispel the sorrow, Huaisang rises to his feet and gestures to welcome his guest to follow him.] Let us try to lighten the mood. I've had enough grief for one day. Shall I show you paintings, poetry, or pornography?

[Chris nods, no intention of pressing in him. He understood that just as well, talking was hardly the cleric's forte when it came to personal concerns.

He watches instead as his host stands and Chris moves to join him with a chuckle for his listed options.]

A fine array of art available! I'll admit an interest most in the paintings and pornography, my curiosity is certainly piqued.

All of the paintings in the house are mine, [Huaisang gestures at the two in the tea room, both in the Xieyi 寫意 (freehand) style, one of them a picture of clouds and mountains and the other of birds in bamboo. Leading the way through into the adjoining living room, Huaisang pauses so that he can admire that one as well.] A town in Qinghe province. Known for their mead and courtesans.

I have my video pornography in here. [The tv stand features shelves of pornographic movies, and it's the only tv that Huaisang has in the house.] The pornographic literature and art are in the library.

[Chris looks at the art with interest and clear appreciation for the elegant style of it. The town especially steals his attention, eyes darting from detail to detail.]

They're beautiful.

[He glances to the tv a moment but his attention returns to the mural.] I'll admit, we've no tv in the house I share with my dominant and I've seen next to no pornography before, Neither are things that exist back home and the habit never took.

[He turns his small, appreciative, smile back on Huaisang] That said, you've been nothing but an excellent host, if there's something to it worth seeing, I trust your taste and I've never been against trying new things.

[Huaisang nods, glad to introduce his guest to something new.] Then we'll do that. I have plenty of painted pornography as well, but the live action medium of film is a wondrous thing.

[Selecting a very artful title that focuses all on striking visuals and sweeping romance as a backdrop to the pornography, Huaisang starts it playing and then curls up on the couch, patting the spot beside him.] Shall we cuddle?

[He nods, his curiosity piqued as he watches the process of putting the video on. He turns to the couch as Huaisang moves to sit, but freezes at the suggestion.]

I...ah.

[Politeness struggles with that clawing feeling in him and a small flush of color raises to his cheeks, but more for shame than any embarrassment at the concept itself.]

I'd...love to, but I'm not good at it? It doesn't matter who with: friend or lover, this crawling sensation starts in my limbs and I get-

[He motions to his chest as though that would explain the feeling that would settle in him like a hand gripping his lungs and heart. Instead, he shakes his head.]

Don't mind it. Respectfully, I ought decline.

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