[Can’t Opt Out]

So, apparently, the weird caverns that contained the cities of Lüshan were incompatible with Zavriel’s abilities—who knew!?

Or, well, Zavriel supposed he probably shouldn’t generalize. The cavern that surrounded the Lüshanian capital of Falmíer were incompatible with his abilities was more accurate—after all, for all he knew, it was only this specific cavern that was the issue!

Did Zavriel think it more likely the case that every cavern that had been touched by the mythic hands of the Lowdouran were going to be blocking his own majenstra abilities? Absolutely. Didn’t mean he should generalize. Also! How weird was it that the Lowdouran had a capital letter? As far as he knew—and a quick catch and release of information with his abilities confirmed he was correct—there were only a handful of irregular deviations that had ever been given a proper, capitalized title. Off the top of his head, he could only think of Dyadism, and he was almost positive—another catch of information confirmed he was, in fact, also correct in this—that capitalization was buried in social and medical context.

That capital, in a way, seemed to be an extra othering of Dyads and Lowdourans. Just as Lüshanians and Crisharians were different, that capitalization of their nationality a pronouncement to the world and one another that they were separate entities who could never be considered as one, even within the scope of the lowercase that encompassed humanity, so too were those who possessed a capital letter title different, and you know what!? This was why Zavriel didn’t exactly like using the ability he had accidentally come to have.

Insanity—being able to pull knowledge into himself messed with his brain!

It was said, in ancient texts of the majenstra, that all knowledge already existed. This, most scholars of Crishar agreed, was in line with their nation’s beliefs in the will of the aether. If the aether were able to know the future well enough to guide people’s hands, to show the Sever and their Gloriana—yet more titles of capitalized differentiation—and the synat—oddly not capitalized—and the occasional other soul visions of potential futures, then surely, the aether must contain all knowledge that should ever exist?

So, in theory, just as the majenstra can reach into the mind of a human—or even occasionally an animal, if the majenstra in question possessed a mind suited for interpreting such things, rare as that ability was—and scoop out memories and knowledge, so too should they be capable of reading the mind of the universe.

Myths existed of people capable of doing such things, but the last reference to anyone having such an ability was thousands of years gone. Once, the teachers of the children who were forced to bear the genes of the majenstra had been intent to try to create more readers of the universal mind. They had never succeeded, and by the time Zavriel had first encountered talk of such things, it was nothing but history and myth.

There were no meditation classes, their little bodies forced to sit still while they attempted to reach into the blood and guts and winding neurons of the universe—or, whatever universes had that were equivalent to the neurons and soul of a human mind and body—and find the glimmer of something.

There were no classes in theory that hadn’t worked in millennia but existed nonetheless in those ancient tomes that the scholars kept tucked away from little prying eyes and minds.

There were no mutterings of maybe one of you will be the next great majenstra; instead, all there was in their classes was a vague amalgamation of history and myth.

The irony that Zavriel had accidentally stumbled into his abilities—all those eons spent trying to force the ability into their predecessors, only for the dropping of hope that someone like him would one day exist once more, allowing him to come into existence. Gaining these abilities had, quite honestly, been an accident. He’d been running off from the majenstra who were intent to drag him back to the palace and kill or imprison him—or possibly reeducate, as even before discovering his ability to harness the power of the universe’s mind, Zavriel had already been at the top of his class. Running off as he had been, Zavriel hadn’t been paying attention to where he was going or whose mind he was touching, erasing his presence from each person he happened across.

Next thing he knew, he was in the archives, and well… No one had known he was there, okay!? It had been warm and relatively safe and there had been all those books.

So. Many. Books.

What was a guy to do!? Leave that haven of knowledge behind!?

Sometimes, Zavriel thought he should have. The things he had learned in that room were amazing—a million pieces of knowledge that clicked into place in his mind until he had forgotten he didn’t already know it all, then, BOOM! He had known it all, and it was all so much.

So much.

So much—his brain an overflowing thing, until he had forgotten it was overflowing, and instead, he just was. Some of the knowledge was still there, lingering in his mind for his use. Other bits, he knew, his mind has purged because a glass could not simply decide it was no longer overflowing; rather, his brain now seemed to hold an index—a long line of connections to knowledge he could once again pull into himself.

It was a long index—so long, that even after several years of going through the bits of information he could pull from the aether, he knew he had barely skimmed the surface. Each bright spark of knowledge led to a thousand more sparks, and part of the problem he had realized early on, was that knowing a fact does not equate to understanding it.

For instance, Zavriel knew that something of his ability to force the aether to forget he hadn’t always been in Falmíer—which was inadvertently the station that led into the Lüshanian capital, as he apparently couldn’t move himself into the city itself with his abilities alone—could be used to create a Baalphorian skills that would give people a similar ability to jump through the world. The problem was, he didn’t understand skills, and he knew more bits of information were needed to get some mind that did understand Baalphorian skill design to the point where they could create this particular skill, but he didn’t know what that information was nor where to look for it within the universal mind.

Facts buried beneath facts and he was only one man! In the years since he had come out of that originating trance in the archive and realized that he needed to get the fuck out of there—forget about the Majen being upset that he had figured out the man was planning to manipulate Prince Meridian and might already be manipulating their king, if the Majen found out about all the information Zavriel suddenly had access to, his life would be forfeit!

If the Majen caught him, the guy was going to imprison him and force him to do terrible things for the rest of his life!

Actually! Worse than that! Zavriel was almost positive he had forgotten how to age, so he might never die! Now, he wasn’t positive on this point, as it had only been a few years since accidentally acquiring these abilities, but he was pretty sure he’d stopped aging and it was weird and something he generally didn’t enjoy thinking about.

Also on the list of things he tried not to think about was the fact that he might be plain old immortal now. There were signs—signs he was trying not to think about, mostly because it meant if someone caught and imprisoned him, he might literally spend the rest of eternity being tortured for information plucked from the aether. The other reason he was trying not to think about it? Oh, just that some of those mythical majenstra who had allegedly had abilities like his own had, you know, vanished.

Poof.

Gone.

Never to be seen again.

Maybe they had died. Maybe they had retired and were still out there, living their best hermit lives. Alternatively, maybe they were currently being held hostage! Or had been left to wither in some unknown location, their body never able to fully let go of life!

Was it possible he could potentially forget that he had forgotten how to age? Yes, it was. Zavriel wasn’t going to try that though! He might end up accidentally killing himself!

It was all very complicated, was the problem. He was an island of knowledge and he had no idea how to handle it all—had no idea how to handle the rest of his life, if he were being honest. The fact that he was just going along with trusting Prince Meridian when he insisted that several of his friends would give him shelter was a pretty big sign he had no idea what he was doing.

Prince Meridian trusted his friends, but Prince Meridian didn’t seem the best judge of character—too naive and innocent. At the same time, even if his prince weren’t being too naive and innocent, Zavriel knew perfectly well that the moment these foreign friends found out about his abilities, they might be perfectly happy to swipe him up, and then, BOOM!

Imprisoned.

Fuck his life—and fuck his bleeding heart! How dare it be all like, “No, no, no! Zavriel, we cannot leave our prince to be sad! We must help him, even if it puts us in danger!”

Even now, as he descended into the station towards the entrance to the city—papers checkpoint, a fractal of the universe offered him of its own volition because it also did that: give him information it thought pertinent to the moment—Zavriel’s stupid heart insisted they go on. For all his brain and heart knew, his abilities might plain old not work within the city. Currently, he was assuming the rock itself was the issue—and yes, as he descended into the station that was built into the rock that still held echoes of the Lowdouran's abilities, Zavriel was aware he could still use his abilities. For the moment, it seemed that the rock blocked the use of his abilities on or through it, but not while within its negative space. That could change, and he and his heart were stupid!

Reaching one of the lower levels, Zavriel took a moment to consider the situation he was walking into and the heavy weight of the international currency Prince Meridian had given him. There were a number of things he should buy before entering the city, he knew. The stations were known throughout the continent for being centres of trade, where people could buy nearly anything—as long as it didn’t come from Dion—if they knew where to look. Zavriel thought this likely an exaggeration—or, he hoped it was, anyways, given the number of horrific things people could sell—but still, it would be stupid to rush into the city and only then bother looking for some of the items he needed.

Tilting his head, Zavriel let himself forget that he didn’t know Lüshanian, the language filling him to near bursting before the strain of it fizzled out. Over the last few years, he had practiced learning this and that in large bursts. For languages, he had pulled the dialects found on the edges of Crishar, as well as the occasional language spoken by small ethnic groups and refugees, into himself. As a result, he knew his knowledge wouldn’t be perfect—he would both be missing large amounts of information about what had led the language to exist in this specific way, and his tongue would trip over syllables in the same way that, even if he forced knowledge of a fighting style into himself, his body would be unable to fully understand and enact what his mind knew.

Zavriel knew there were ways to make his body forget this or that thing—ways to make it forget it didn’t have muscle mass, didn’t have memories of the movements already within itself in the same way it had seemingly forgotten to let time pull it along. Shifting his body in such ways wasn’t something he couldn’t do, but it felt weird. Just being able to fill his mind with knowledge it shouldn’t have was uncomfortable—this erasing of who he was because people were all the pieces of what they knew and had experienced, puzzled together to create something that was them.

As he now knew new things, he was inherently different than he had been a moment ago, and while that was how the ever flowing experience of life worked, the amount he learned made it feel strange and abnormal.

His brain and mind were an untrustworthy thing—something that could forget and remember anything. So, he didn’t like touching his body with his abilities, leaving it to remain as himself, even if he knew it would also change as he lived this cursed and blessed life—really, he thought this accidental ability of his something that lay between a torture and a gift.

Perhaps, in a way, that was why he had accepted coming here: in this small way, he could confirm for himself if his abilities were something that would help or hinder him and those around him.

Could he help here—save the life of someone he had never met?

Would Prince Meridian’s friends offer him protection, or attempt to claim his abilities for their own power?

Slipping the xphern he had just purchased into his pocket, Zavriel wiped his visit from the mind of the storekeeper—left her to forget he had been there and forget that some random customer hadn’t bought one xphern, leaving her to assume the person had actually purchased the two that would be missing from her inventory. Interestingly, he had to choose a foreign customer to attach the purchase from, a quick shift through the knowledge of her mind revealing that foreigners received one type of Censor while locals received another. The shopkeeper didn’t know why she needed to have two different types of xpherns—something that should have been identical, no matter what nation they were purchased in—but Zavriel knew enough about Lüshan's government to guess the xpherns had strange things installed on them—programs to spy on their citizens, for instance—and that giving a foreigner such a device would risk an international incident.

Once he was inside the city and sure his abilities would work, he would message his prince’s friend and let her know he was getting closer to her. For the moment, he assumed Prince Meridian had let her know he was coming? A quick check with the aether told him that no, actually, his prince had decided to let Zavriel handle contacting her—interesting. Unfortunately, with his natural shield, Zavriel could only guess that the prince hadn’t completely trusted him to actually come to Falmíer and hadn’t wanted to get the girl’s hopes up.

When he got to messaging this Emilia, Zavriel would have to tell her to let his prince know they had been in contact, if only so the boy would actually head back to the palace—he had been desperate enough that Zavriel didn’t doubt he would continue attempting to recruit people to his cause until he was sure someone was headed to his friend.

It was sweet, if also quite dangerous.

People moved out of his way as he continued into the depths of the station towards Falmíer, a gentle nudge against their minds all it took for Zavriel to make them forget they hadn’t meant to get out of his invisible path. There were elevators, but making people move out of his way was easier on the stairs—plus, this way, he could tug bits of knowledge from the minds of those around him. Able to read information from the aether or not, human minds were easier to understand and sort through. There was also the fact that human minds seemed better equipped to know what was important, whereas the aether’s mind was a soup of everything, and learning what was actually relevant at any given moment and then locating that information was like dipping one's hand into a barrel filled with berries and hoping to pull out the tastiest one on the first go.

Human minds, however, gave up things of import so easily, and oh, the things he learned as he made his way through the papers checkpoint. People stepped out of his way without notice. The Drinarna manning the checkpoint and holding everyone back in a slow drip of people in and out of the city—they didn’t want to completely stop travel, but neither did they want people entering at the normal rates, although none of them had any idea why they were holding people back—let him through without looking his way, none of the people he had cut in front of noticing him.

It wasn’t until he had been walking in the city for nearly a minute, frowning down at his new xphern and trying to figure out how it worked—the majenstra really only communicated with one another and had other ways to communicate over longer distances—that Zavriel realized someone had followed him out of the papers checkpoint.

That alone was odd, as it was rare for anyone outside of other majenstra or members of Prince Meridian’s maternal family to be capable of shielding themselves from the abilities of the majenstra. Then, however, Zavriel realized it was even odder than that as the person who was following him didn’t seem to realize they had fallen into his shadow of manipulations to escape the papers checkpoint, nor even that they were following him.

Fascinating. What sort of mind could make use of his abilities without realizing it?

Leaning against a nearby wall, Zavriel turned his eyes to his xphern, taking the moment to pull information about how it worked into himself as he waited for his accidental stalker to catch up.

In a rush or not, there was no way he didn’t want to see this person for himself.