Chapter 16 : Livin' on a Prayer

Mnemon Rhomon, Sorcerer

Realm Year 764, Ascending Wood

Road to The Lap, Southern Inland Sea Coast, Barbarian Lands

“I suppose you’ll demand an explanation now…” Melia muttered with a somewhat bitter tone, knees pulled back and arms wrapped around herself. A defensive, wary posture indicating her reluctance about the topic. 

Rhomon obliviously chowed down on a thick campfire roast of wild turkeys, replying with his mouth full. “Unless you want us to only know what those scarfed guys said, I suppose.” Besides him, his new familiar ripped into its wild turkey carcass, mostly stripped of easy meat and the rest given over to the beast.

From the sympathetic link forged, Rhomon could tell that the lizard-bird was about as happy as a lizard-bird could be over the corpse.

“A little bit callous, sir Rhomon…” Shuri muttered in a reproachful tone, nibbling on a turkey leg of his own. 

All of them were arranged around a campfire, various bits of meat on skewers and allowed to roast adjacent to a pot of purely vegetarian stew. Out of respect to their monk and because the meat was delicious, none of them had yet touched the vegetable stew, save the monk in question. 

“I’m sure fair Melia has a reasonable explanation for why she’s being harassed by such ruffians.” Siata nodded with great confidence, a thick bandage wrapped around his slashed neck. Rhomon was briefly afraid that it had nicked the windpipe and that the Dynast was already dead and just not aware of himself, but it ended up being fine. Just the outer layers of flesh and tendon.

He was a Dragonblooded, he’d regenerate that damage in a week or two at the worst.

Melia was quiet for a while, staring into the fire, before slowly beginning to speak. “My mother was a great alchemist…” She started, tilting her head and eyes growing distant. “And I was her assistant as a girl. One day she came down with a sickness, and no medicine I could bring could cure her.”

“I was fifteen years old when she died. A half-trained alchemist girl with no one else. So I traveled to Abundance, and sought out my mother’s own teacher, a god of medicine named Violet Boughs.”

Rhomon took another bite of the turkey leg, staring at his aide as she told the story.

“I asked him to teach me, as he did my mother, and he agreed…” She gave a bitter laugh. “He was only interested in my body- but that wasn’t so bad. It was something I had, something I could give for a better life than some untrained herbalist. Service in exchange for education…”

“It wasn’t the best but it was… comfortable.” She muttered, using the tip of her shoe to nudge a rock, resting her chin on her knee. “Then the Immaculate Monks arrived.”

“To censor the god, was it?” Brahm asked bluntly, receiving a sharp glance and then a slow nod from the alchemist.

“I greeted them as they entered- and before they could reply, my master had flown through the back window and was racing down the street. They caught up to him moments later, kicking off the doorway and the stone… The battle destroyed the street, collapsed buildings…” Melia paused before giving a hysteric, bitter bark of laughter. “Ahah! It wasn’t a fight! They beat him into the stone! He was begging for his life! My master, a god, strong enough to throw a cart and fast enough to catch mosquitos, beaten like a broken drum!”

“He was so pathetic…” Melia’s laughter wound down into acrid amusement. “He disappeared, and I never saw him again. People stopped leaving tokens out for his praise, soon enough. I was asked to attend an auction for the property- with his disappearance the shop defaulted to city property, and they were putting it up for sale…”

“I wasn’t worried at first, there was a lot of jade in savings I could use! This was my chance- I was a learned woman, I knew how to run the store, I could do it just the same!” She declared proudly before her smile dropped from her face again. “I was outbid.”

She gave Siata a sharp look. “Peleps Galan.” Her voice was filled with hate as she said that.

“What? Good Galan did?” Siata asked.

“Good!” Melia replied mockingly. “Good that he purchased my store from under my feet. Good that he demanded outrageous rent. Good that his hired thugs scared off my customers and threatened my suppliers. Good that he dedicated his time to ruining my modest hopes!”

“But he would-” Siata began, pushing up from his seat with a mildly outraged expression.

“Cousin.” Rhomon said sharply, sending a glance his way. The Dragonblooded stopped, mouth snapping shut and eyes shaking slightly in searching bewilderment. “Let her finish the story as she knows it.” He took another large bite of the turkey leg, chewing calmly. 

“...Right.” Siata nodded slowly, settling back down again, brows furrowed.

“There’s not much more to say.” Melia muttered. “Months of faltering business. My best efforts to keep things running countered directly by his efforts, or the efforts of his lackeys. Every few weeks he visited, throwing his weight around, making flirtations…”

“He wasn’t interested in an alchemist. He just wanted another woman on his leg.” Melia hissed, reaching up to wipe her eyes with a palm. “I’m not going back. Not to waste all my years, all my efforts learning. Just to be a pet like that.”

She glared up at them, eye roaming and hand hovering near the glass vials strapped to her thigh. “I’m going to Paragon. I’m going to be a free alchemist.” She declared like a snake rattling its tail. 

Rhomon chewed thoughtfully, the crackle of the slowly dying fire his only accompaniment. 

Then, he swallowed. “Alright.” He shrugged. 

“...Alright?” She replied, eyes narrowed into a puzzled squint.

“Alright. Siata will pay for an escort to Paragon once we get in The Lap.” Rhomon tossed the mostly-bare bone to his familiar, who snapped it up and began to rip slivers of meat off of. 

“Alright- cousin, you hear her, she’s caught the eye of Peleps Galan!” Siata declared, waving a hand in her direction. “By helping her to Paragon, we’re sure to catch his ire-!”

“What would I care what Peleps Galan thinks of me?” Rhomon asked with an unimpressed puzzlement. Siata stopped short, hand slowly dropping out of the air and coming to rest by his side. “Oh no, one Dragonblooded in one Satrapy might be irritated at me.” He rolled his eyes, reaching over to scratch at the bird-lizard’s feathers. Simple bird-lizard thoughts of joy returned to him.

“...It is the role of the Dragonblooded to guide mortals…” Brahm began, repeating Immaculate doctrine but not sounding terribly convinced of it in this instance. 

“And my mother, a Dragonblooded far older and more powerful than this Galan, told me if I did anything to help any other Great House, it better be with House Mnemon’s benefit in mind. How does helping Galan get another concubine help Mnemon?” Rhomon replied with a wag of his finger. “You’re trying to apply idealized doctrine to a world full of messy political infighting, monk. You’re smart enough to know why that doesn’t work here.”

Brahm grunted disagreeably, but didn’t provide a counterargument. 

“In any case, I don’t really care that I interrupted some guy trying to get sex in such a convoluted manner. He’s a Dragonblooded of the Realm, if he wanted a sex pet he’d find no shortage of volunteers for the position.” Rhomon doled himself out a bowl of vegetable soup and leaned back again. “Going out of his way for an unwilling individual to fill such a position means he’s getting off to the idea more than her.”

“...Hey.” Melia protested lightly, narrowing her eyes at him. “I’m quite fetching, thank you.”

“Melia, I don’t mean to offend you, but you’re really nothing special as far as women available to the Realm goes.” Rhomon frowned and raised his brow. “There are women that can rival goddesses who are bought as slaves and loaned out as party favors at Dynastic festivals. Men too, for that matter. The really exotic parties bring out courtesan-demons and ritual mutilations.” 

“...We suppose sir Siata’s partyboat was relatively tame by comparison…” Shuri muttered with a glance towards the Dragonblooded, who rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. 

“Whatever your imagination of decadence is, Dynasts are more decadent than that.” Rhomon declared firmly. “The only exception are the Immaculates, and a rare few too absorbed in their work to have time for extravagances.”

“You sound like you have many criticisms, cousin…” Siata said with a slight frown. 

“All sorcerers sacrifice something to open their souls to the essence of the world. I sacrificed a physical eye.” Rhomon said cryptically, smiling. “My gaze is narrow, but my perspective is quite broad.” 

These two things didn’t really have anything to do with each other, but it was a good mystical excuse to pull out if anyone questioned why he had the knowledge he did. 

Siata nodded thoughtfully.

“If Galan has a problem with our actions, I can invoke friends in higher places than he can.” Rhomon declared, finishing off his bowl of stew and setting it down. “We’ll take Melia to The Lap, pay for her boat to Paragon, and return to An-Teng with our patient.”

The night air was filled by the crackle of coals and ash.

“Thank you.” The alchemist muttered, covering her face. 

—

“Pardon we.” Shuri said at one point, several days later into their journey. He was seated in the back of the carriage again, with the rest of them. Rhomon was walking along the side of the cart, keeping an eye on their surroundings through the gaze of his new familiar. 

He still needed a name for the creature. He hadn’t come up with a good one yet. 

“Yeah?” Rhomon replied, tilting his head and striding easily across the dusty road. A flex of his perfectly cool and dry toes reminded him of just how awesome these boots were. 

“It has been mentioned at several points, but our knowledge is limited.” Shuri brought his fingers together. “We know that the Immaculate Order is the faith of the Blessed Isle, but little more.”

“You’re asking about the Immaculate Order?” Brahm asked, turning his gaze from the road behind them to the snake-prince. Shuri nodded. “What do you wish to know?”

“Well, we know that it venerates a set of five dragons, and its monks are powerful enough to censor even the gods…” Shuri said with a slow nod. “We know that sir Brahm is an adherent of the order, and is forbidden against certain foods…”

The snake prince trailed off before giving a small shrug. “Anything more, we do not know.”

“The Immaculate Order is the state religion of the Realm, and was developed roughly fifteen hundred years ago as the core thesis for the holy Usurpation against Anathema rule.” Rhomon began with a drawling, academic explanation. “Its chief tenet lies in the idea of the Perfected Hierarchy.”

“Perfected Hierarchy?” Shuri repeated in a very ‘snake’ sort of way. 

“There is a structure to the universe, a celestial blueprint, and all things have their place in it.” Brahm began, speaking truths that were drilled into him in between martial lessons. “By acting in accordance with one’s position in this grand design, one approaches perfection, and the soul grows increasingly close to the Five Dragons.”

“We Dragonblooded are, of course, the closest humanity can produce to any of the Five Dragons, and thus as perfect as human souls can be.” Siata declared with great confidence. “Over many lifetimes of good, harmonious living we’ve earned our current position in the hierarchy, and are thus best suited to guide others along the path.”

That was an outright lie. Dragonblooded were no more spiritually enlightened than anyone else, but that was part of the propagandizing elements of the religion. Of course, Rhomon couldn’t just say that aloud. 

“Immaculate Dragonblooded are.” Brahm corrected gently, making Siata blink and look forwards again, slightly embarrassed. 

“Like all large organizations of people, it is ultimately a compromise between conceptual ideal and messy mundane interests.” Rhomon furthered the explanation. “There are many very righteous people who are ardent believers of the Immaculate Truth and work very hard to uphold it. There are just as many very unrighteous people who use it as a way to legitimize their own corruption and excesses.”

“There is always some false prophet, that is not the fault of the Immaculate Order.” Brahm declared firmly, frowning and glaring Rhomon.

Rhomon nodded. “Yes, that is correct. I didn’t say that it was, Brahm.”

Brahm maintained his glare and frown for a few moments, before huffing and sitting back again.

Rhomon continued. “The Immaculate Order exists in part to police the actions of rogue gods. Sure the souls approach divinity thing is their spiritual ideal, but their worldly function is to find and punish gods that are acting beyond their station.”

Brahm huffed at this, but it was a proud huff.

“Punish the gods… is that the right of man?” Shuri asked with a concerned frown.

“With the exception of about a dozen entities, none of the gods are transcendent or enlightened folks. They’re just spirits who have particular duties. The only thing that really separates them from humanity is that they’re a bit more naturally powerful.” Rhomon waved a hand. “Some are good, some are wicked, and most just want good food, good drink, praise for work done well, and a good house to live in.”

Rhomon huffed out in mild frustration. “Ideally, the Celestial Bureaucracy would police itself, but it doesn’t and hasn’t for a very long time. The highest gods spend all their time in the Jade Pleasure Dome, only rarely looking upon some missive or another, leaving the rule of heaven to their subordinates and the rule of Creation to the Exalted.”

“The- Heaven does not police itself?! Shuri said in alarm, the others glancing his way with rising worry.

“Once it did, the Directional Censors were charged with this kind of internal investigation, but their work has grown lacking as the centuries pass on.” Rhomon nodded. “Many have grown indolent or corrupt, and thus the gods grow increasingly corrupt and reports disregarded, and the state of Creation continues to decay.”

Rhomon snapped his fingers. “Which is, in part, why the Immaculate Order and the Wyld Hunt exists. The Immaculate Order arranges the worship of gods according to their great big calendar, gives a larger share to gods that do their duties properly, smaller shares to gods that are causing trouble, and sends teams of powerful martial artists to beat rogue gods developing unlicensed cults into a pulp.” 

“That’s a very cynical interpretation of the Immaculate Faith, sorcerer.” Brahm grumbled with an annoyed glance towards him.

“But very necessary.” Rhomon nodded. “Say you’re Ahlat, God of Southern Warfare and Cattle, and you tell a mortal you’ll grant them immortality after death by making them a tassel on his cloak.”

“That’s criminal.” Brahm growled.

“That’s incredibly criminal.” Rhomon nodded in agreement. “He just got a mortal to give up their position in the eternal cycle of life, death, and reincarnation to become part of his panoply- and he probably got them to beg and scrape and sacrifice for it. That’s extracting immense amounts of undue worship from some hapless mortal who has little chance of telling the mighty bull-god ‘no’.”

“Or he comes to you and says ‘give me your virgin daughter as my bride, or I’ll make sure she meets a few hundred good men when my warriors raid your city’. Wonderful!” Rhomon waggled his hands. “Now he’s a celestial extortionist!”

“What if they make a sacrifice to him of his own will?” Shuri asked with a thoughtful frown on his face. 

“Then either he gives them a boon for it- whereupon he’s now a god who is accepting bribes to bias his actions towards the mortal.” Rhomon raised one finger. “Or he’s a con artist who got a mortal to sacrifice to him for nothing.” He raised his other finger, then dropped the hand.

“The Immaculate Order is humanity’s great counterweight, to prevent a tyranny of corrupt gods.” Rhomon declared, looking ahead again. “Not to say that all manifest gods deserve to be beaten and humiliated by monks, sometimes they manifest for very just and helpful reasons, but it's a very important check to their potential power when so many Censors aren’t doing their jobs properly.” 

Brahm nodded firmly, head held high and hands on his knees. 

“So who are the dozen?” Shuri asked. “Earlier, you said with the exception of about a dozen entities- who are they?”

“Oh, that would be the Incarnae.” Rhomon nodded. “The Unconquered Sun, Luna, The Five Maidens of Fate, Gaia and her Five Elemental Dragons, and Autochthon.”

He scratched the side of his head. “I suppose Nox as well, but he’s not truly sapient anymore. Theoretically the Neverborn or the Yozi are about as powerful or moreso, but if you worship any of those I’m obligated to kill you.”

“...I don’t recognize three of those names…” Brahm muttered with furrowed brows and a suspicious look towards him.

“I’m a sorcerer, I’m obligated to know esoterica that is rarely ever relevant.” Rhomon tapped at his chest, making the monk nod, conceding the point. 

“Oh-! Look!” Siata declared from the front of the carriage, as they pulled up and over a broadly sloping hill. Rhomon already knew what was coming, having seen it through the eyes of his bird-lizard some time ago. “The Lap is within view!”

The rest stood up upon the carriage as it crested, letting them look out over the immense valley before them.

Stretching for nearly a hundred and fifty miles, a quilted patchwork of farmland, roads, and fruit trees sat. Two long mountain ranges pulled forth from the distant Firepeak Mountains, forming together into a point in the middle of this abundant farmland, and at the end of that point was the city of The Lap itself.

A statue of a meditating monk, thousands of meters tall, carved out of a mountain however long ago. It surveyed the land for miles around it, faced northeast, and the adobe and carved city of The Lap was built upon the statue’s very own lap. 

The most fertile land in the entire south of Creation.

And home to one very insane fire dragon.

Rhomon smiled, raising an arm for the bird-lizard to land upon and rest. 

Halfway done.