OtH 1.20 - The Man Who Knew Too Much

Enjoy!

There were no signs that Lurona had moved, no sound or breezes of displaced air. No sign other than the sudden lack of her presence.

Reodan doesn’t show signs when he moves at super-speed, other than the barely visible blur... This is probably more of the same.

Wish she had bothered to tell me what she was doing.

One of the reasons they were talking in this room was now obvious, at least. Even with her absence, the energy density was still low. He could feel the dense qi pressing up underneath the stone, held away by the glowing lines.

He wasn’t sure what elsea qi isolation chamber might be useful for, besides having less powerful guests, but he didn’t know if that was the only purpose of the formation, either. Using it to do the reverse, and contain especially dense qi, was something he had already seen with meditation chambers.

Are qi senses reliant on the density of qi? Maybe long distance senses won’t work over a distance if they encounter an area of low qi. That would be another reason to talk here. It would ensure privacy.

Of course, Lurona didn’t seem to worry about being overheard when we were having tea earlier today.

Eh, by her own admission she wasn’t investing any real effort into me at that point. If someone had found out, all it would have done was ruin her equivalent of a joke. It might have been much worse for me, but I cannot really blame her for not putting too much effort in on my behalf.

He wanted to blame her, of course, but exposure to politics from a young age had made it easier to not take it personally. It was perfectly fine for others to be allies of convenience.

Teaching him not to let his personal feelings get in the way of what he actually wanted to accomplish had been an ongoing lesson from his parents for years.

Getting angry and emotional, without taking the time to consider it, was almost always the wrong response. It was far more likely to play into the favor of your opposition, if only by making you look juvenile and unable to manage your emotions.

Carefully channeling your emotions to make a reasoned and impassioned appeal, debate, etc… That was a different story. People were surprisingly good at detecting real emotion. Unfortunately, politicians tended to be equally good at channeling emotion through nonsensical arguments and hoping their audience didn’t notice.

He had spent far more time than he liked to admit being disappointed by how well that worked.

His meandering train of thought was promptly derailed by Lurona’s return.

She reappeared in the chair as though she had never left, her appearance just as soundless as her previous disappearance, like a raging fire that had guttered for a moment before bursting back into flame.

She smiled at him.

“Since it was a time sensitive issue, I placed your device into stasis.” she said.

“Stasis,” he asked, “you mean it is suspended in time?”

She shrugged slightly before replying.

“I cannot say I really understand how it works. There are few individuals who can manipulate temporal qi. I’ve had the basics explained to me, however. It doesn’t actually stop time, it merely slows it down enough to appear stopped.”

Her eyes focused fully onto Aarick once again, her gaze’s intensity seeming to burn through him.

“Exactly what happens from here will be up to you. It depends on what you are capable of offering me, and what you might become in the future.

“Firstly, I want to tell you what I could do.

“Understand that this is not a threat, and even if you completely refuse to work with me, I will not be doing this. However, you need to understand the danger others could potentially pose to you. And, ultimately, my generosity is at least somewhat self-serving.”

She sighed and offered him a wistful smile. He didn’t dare to interrupt.

“I am too principled to properly engage in the political game. It’s why I chose to serve Yisutan instead. It offers my family some influence, but allows me to avoid most politics when I choose to.

“I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself for taking the most distasteful option. Plus, I have the hope that my generosity will be properly repaid.

“Ultimately, if I wanted access to all your knowledge, and didn’t care about you, I would hire a mentalist. Finding one that is resistant to the Eldritch, could filter that knowledge out, and with a binding agreement to remove their own knowledge afterward… Well, it would be exorbitantly expensive… but I couldarrange it.”

She looked at him, her gaze serious.

“It is unlikely your mind would survive the process, but in the end I would gain something similar to the jade slip that you used to learn our language.”

His eyes widened.

Wait, did someone have to die to make that thing?

Lurona raised her hand at him a gesture of negation while she shook her head, no doubt understanding his assumption.

“Don’t worry. The one you used is produced en masse in some fashion. I cannot say whether the original required that kind of sacrifice, but I doubt it. Certainly they are updated by mentalists without any sacrifices.

“While the one you used likely felt invasive, it was nothing close to what is already present in your memories. The full weight of even a few decades of life is immense.

“Having someone do a full scrape of your mind is a worst case scenario, and also highlyunlikely if you follow some reasonable precautions.”

She smiled at him grimly.

“I assume you now understand the severity of your situation?”

He did, he really did.

There is no way that would be a pleasant experience. Just having a language implanted was painful already. And a language might be one of the easy things to implant, now that I think about it. I already knew how to talk, it just needed to make some new connections between associated sounds and ideas. I already had a full language for it to work with.

Wonder if there was a chance for things to go horribly wrong when I used the slip?

He resolved not to ask. Unless he needed that knowledge in the future, it was best to assume that using the slip had been perfectly safe. If he needed to use one later… he would ask then.

As for information security… well, being gay was practice with that for years.

Not like I didn’t already know I needed to keep my nature as an Outsider hidden. This will just be a more complete disguise.

He wasn’t exactly thrilled about that, but taking reality at face value was the only way to proceed.

Lurona was watching him, likely waiting for a response.

“Yeah. I understand,” he said. “The stakes are higher, but it is the same deal. Don’t reveal I’m an Outsider or that I know too much.”

She nodded at him.

“There are a number of things I can do to substantially lower that risk, as well. Of course, that requires us to make a deal.

“The smallest deal I could offer, would simply be an agreement to not harm the interests of my family.”

She offered him a tight smile.

“This would be in exchange for the support and tutoring that I have already offered, and being allowed to leave the creche at all. If you don’t agree to that much, then you will live comfortably here in the creche and die in a few hundred years.

“Your knowledge and potential might amount to nothing, but you might also become truly influential in the future. I might not like politics, but I do love my family. This merely represents a precaution.”

Honestly, the fact that she wanted to protect her family as her minimum price, endeared herself to Aarick far more than it hurt. Even in the worst case, she would only prevent him from becoming a threat, but still ensure he lived comfortably.

It couldbe a lie, but he didn’t think so.

She had beenaccommodating and helpful even beforehe became potentially valuable. And, based on her mention of a binding agreement, it sounded possible to ensure that they bothneeded to live up to an agreement if she insisted on making one.

You would think that binding agreements would make betrayal impossible. Based on what I was reading earlier, there must be some kind of catch.

Could just be a social stigma, though. Or just not feasible for large groups.

He sighed. He kept running into his own lack of knowledge.

He dismissed that thought for the moment and smiled at her.

“Right,” he said. “That seems like an entirely reasonable compromise. It would depend on the exact details, but I am generally fine with that. However,” he paused for a moment to smirk and give her a long look, “it doesn’t sound like that’s what you actually want.”

She tilted her head slightly as she gave him a nod, her own smile one of satisfaction.

“You are, of course, correct. My mother would never forgive me overlooking such an opportunity. The deal comes in multiple parts, but it relied heavily on what you are ultimately capable of. Or, rather, what the knowledge you hold is capable of offering.

“If you can use your knowledge of fire to deepen my own understanding and consequent connection to it, then I will tutor you myself in cultivation. I will also arrange for you to have access to materials to make your enlightenments easier.

“If you cannot help me connect to fire, or another qi aspect, then your earnest attempt will still be rewarded with some extra resources when you go off to school.

“You… are likely a prodigy to some degree, and that will make your enlightenments easier. This conclusion isn’t due to your connection to fire, but rather your connections to qi and ziu. They are notknowledge from your own world. That means you managed to finish the full enlightenment on your own.”

She sighed and shook her head.

“In all honesty, I wish I had not destroyed the formation that brought you here. Knowing the parameters it was searching for would help determine what your own gifts might be.”

He opened his mouth and raised his index finger slightly, but hesitated to interrupt.

“You have a question?” she said. “Go ahead.”

“Uh, yeah,” he said. “You never actually told me much about what happened. Why I was summoned here.”

She looked at him blankly for a moment, before she replied.

“I suppose I didn’t, at that. Before it wouldn’t have mattered… but I might as well tell you.

“I arrived because there are warning formations set up by The Empire for various types of dangerous formations, qi, and so on. It warned me of a breach in the dimensional barrier.

“The exact goals of the cultists are impossible to know. Various investigators have been assigned to trace what they can, but we may never be sure.

“However, I think they were trying to summon a cultivator from a higher plane. Just as you come from the Sealed Lands, which are a lower one. Presumably they would try to convince the cultivator to help them in whatever grievance they hold against The Empire, a noble faction, etc…

“The only part of the formation to survive was directly below you. That part asked for someone from “outside the heavens.” Technically you fulfill that role, and it would be much easier to pull you across than a more powerful individual. They should have asked for someone “beyond” or “above.”

“In the end, you are here due to a grammatical error.”

For a moment, Aarick just allowed himself to sit stunned as he shook his head.

Joy, the magic language that can rewrite reality is just as finicky as programming. Someone’s poor word choice pulled me between worlds.

Formations are another thing I’ll need to be ridiculously careful with. And, of course, I need to learn them to send a message home.

I swear, it feels like someone is having an enormous joke at my expense.