[007] Grace [filtered from the Project//Hackable]

Aug 03, 2008 15:11

[an odd crackling sound, and then Zedd's voice over it ( Read more... )

grace, desperation, voice, reading circle, warning, musings, think-tank

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 04:16:39 UTC
Need any specific reagents, or are you good?

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 09:35:38 UTC
Reagents? [Zedd snorts] You keep saying you aren't a wizard, and you keep thinking like one, anyway.

All I need is the few things I have here, that's all. This isn't some grand spell form, just a little...examination.

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 09:48:02 UTC
Bein' around my... adventuring companion for about ten years, you pick some shit up.

I'd like to have a look if ya don't mind. See just how similar it is.

Tell me about this Keeper guy. He doesn't sound too friendly.

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 09:53:32 UTC
Ahh, I suppose. Still. You have the mind for it.

I'm at the storage facility. I'll be here for a while. Stop by. I have apples.

The Keeper? Well, the Keeper of the Dead is the...the 'spirit' that watches over and is lord of the world of the dead. But He has never been alive...he is completly removed from the light of the creator. He hates the gift, especially, but any and all life is an affront to him, an insult, something to be destroyed.

And he has the power to destroy it, too, if ever the veil fails us.

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 10:02:47 UTC
[Augury's tone turns instructional, and it sounds like he's repeating something said by another.]

I can watch a bird fly. I know about the hollowness of its bones and the different feathers that make up its wings, and how it uses small movements of its tail to adjust itself.

[His voice turns dry.]

I'll still drop like a stone if I try to jump off a cliff.

... ah. So, there are just these two warring gods in your world?

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 10:09:32 UTC
Yes, but you never asked a bird about reagents, did you? [Zedd laughs] Sounds like something you've heard before.

Gods? Well, I suppose you can call them that. The spirits, too, play a part in the world, so far as it goes.

The Creator...he has made the world and given us everything we need to survive in it, and no longer interferes. The Keeper would take advantage of that, but the Creator left the veil, so that the Keeper cannot.

The Keeper cannot claim souls that are pure, either, so there is a balance...a chance to go and shelter in the light of the Creator.

But dead is dead.

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 10:33:36 UTC
[Augury snickers, but it seems somewhat forced, more nostalgic.]

Dead is not quite dead in my world. Not all the time.

I don't know if this shit is done with magic in your world, Zedd. In mine it's a crime punishable by death. Sorcerers, wizards that try to cheat death, they're called a lich. They lock their soul away in a container called a phylactery and continue using their body after it dies.

It's not pretty. Not at all.

And they're damn hard to kill.

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 10:37:16 UTC
I've spoken with spirits, but never seen or heard of anything like this "lich." Though I know the work of a few who tried to manage something like that.

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 10:39:40 UTC
Spirits. Y'mean like ghosts? Those sometimes happen, but they're just imprints. Memories. It's not the real thing.

... I hope you destroyed any and all research material on it.

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 10:44:10 UTC
Imprints? Bags, boy, they are as real as you or I! I told you, there are two worlds, that of life and that of death.

My parents are in the latter, but there are ways I have to speak with them.

There is a people, in the South of my homeland, who have a strong magic. They can call upon the spirits of their ancestors, consult them for wisdom and guidance. What I wouldn't give to see it...but no one has ever taken part who isn't a mudperson.

Destroyed it? My boy, that path was a fraud, worthless. I know of ways to consort with and perhaps hold back death...but they are grim and terrible, at great price, and always worthless, for they rely on promises from the Keeper of Death, who has no honour. In my world, death comes. It is the way of life.

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thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 10:49:14 UTC
Your spirits, then... have found ways to bridge life and death.

[Augury is silent for quite some time, listening.]

I hear you on that. Death's fuckin' unfair sometimes in who it takes, but it's not for mortals to fuck around with.

There are a lot of things mortals shouldn't fuck around with.

... heh. You ever seen a zombie, Zedd?

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wizardsgrace August 4 2008, 10:53:49 UTC
No, no, you misunderstand. I must create the bridge, with powerful and dangerous magic. It is something I have only done once, and may never do again in my entire life! It is a magic that might tear the veil, under the right circumstances, but there are times that counsel and guidance from beyond are vital.

The Ancestor Spirits of the Mud People use different magic, magic I cannot recreate. But even then, they must be called, and only on the most special and worrisome of times.

[Zedd sighs]

A zombie? What's that?

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[1/2] (Second post comes later today.) thatdamnsmirk August 4 2008, 10:56:03 UTC
I'll tell you later.

[USER IS OFFLINE]

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[2/2] thatdamnsmirk August 5 2008, 01:45:02 UTC
[Augury seems much calmer, now.]

A zombie is the remains of a human or a humanoid creature, reanimated through magic. They have no soul, feel no pain. They're only an extension of the will of the one who raised them.

They eat human flesh.

That is necromancy.

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wizardsgrace August 5 2008, 01:49:24 UTC
[There is a clatter, a few loud curses, something breaking, and then the PCD sounds like it bounced. Twice. Faintly, Zedd's voice can be heard] I was awake!

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[Voice/Video] thatdamnsmirk August 5 2008, 02:14:31 UTC
[A soft snicker.]

No you weren't.

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