[Amelia] Chapter 14: Church of Light

[Mysticsage]

"I'm glad," Amelia smiled as she took a seat.

"Now, I called this meeting because I wanted your opinion, on this," She said taking the book out of her bag and sliding it to the middle of the table. "This is a book I brought with me from my world. I've spent the past few days reading through the contents for the basic information and I think it shows at least a take of my world's creation from the perspective of a god. It got me thinking, what if we use this with the collected doctrines we have from the other nations to try and figure out the nature of the shifting?" She said visibly getting more and more excited as she went.

"My world has a number of gods and religions compared to the goddess that seems to exist across your doctrines. If we can study the similarities and differences between the various creation stories and the stories of demons we may be able to find what links us all. Because what if all our stories have a truth in them? What if there are more gods in the cosmos then just those we know about and they-" She paused racking her brain trying to find the right words. "Pull lots? to see who gets to be involved in each world?"

"No, that is a stupid idea," she waved the thought away, "Regardless, the real question is, why take places from other worlds and place them together in another so under threat?"

Looking to Thyra and Clifton in turn, " Your two nations represent some of the oldest countries next to felencorp that either came to or originated in this world. I know that both of you are not exactly the historian types, but if possible I would like both of you two help me with this. I know Thyra has already agreed to stay and help,"

She made eye contact with Clifton, "I'd like you to look over the book too and see what you think, I know I will need help with the studying."

[Throndir]

"Using that book to find the nature of the shifting... But the idea that there are many gods and goddesses? That one is troubling... I do admit that many of the people that are shifted here have beliefs and faiths that are at times outside our religion of the 6 goddesses, and the goddess of light, but to claim that there are truly more than that will create ripplings through my country, and perhaps the alliance as well. However... when Father Barnabas invited me to come here, I've set myself to be open-minded... The nature of the gathering in the first place was due to share information." Clifton then pulled the book at the center of the table towards him. He frowned however as he continued to flip through the pages.

"I can't read this... This isn't written in the language of Bursteig, or of New Felothian."

[Mysticsage]

Amelia nodded, "That's why I need as much help as I can get to weed through the years of stories and myths for what remains of the truth. I do not have the knowledge nor the desire to prove anyone's faith wrong. I am the furthest thing from a theologian as there possibly can be in a case like this. My world is proof that there are millions of ways to view a topic like this and they all have elements of truth and are tied together."

"My goal here is to find answers and make connections, it's possible there are more gods it's possible there is one; I honestly have no skin in that game. The specific nature of how you want to interpret what we find I will leave to people like Father Barnabas and yourself. What I want is to work together to find some element of truth. After all, every nation that has been brought to this world have some element of linking narratives with these goddesses." She said taking out a loose pencil in her bag and a piece of paper from the table to draw a picture drawing lines between various circles to one larger circle.

"Take away the specifics and the number and the imagery generally lines up. Add to that the fact that each country has a similar hero summoning ritual and the fact that everyone ended up in one world together and there is at least circumstantial evidence that your worlds share some kind of basic natures with each other. Whatever that force is, be it gods, spirits, or laws of nature something pulled you together. The key to figuring out how the shifting occurred is in that connection, and how the hero summoning ritual works."

"That is where that book comes in," She said with a nod as Clifton went to read the book. "My world has nothing to do with the goddesses at least in a religious sense. Yet the magic chose my world which cannot cast spells or has no natural laws that would make us similar. So finding the link between my world and yours may be the key to isolating whatever it is about that magic or divine will that makes the shifting work," she said drawing a circle outside the others and unconnected.

As Clifton commented about not being able to read the book Amelia nodded, "I wanted to check that as well. Most of the book is written in my modern tongue from my homeworld, so I figured you wouldn't be able too. But the first few pages are older and something that I can read only because of the hero contract, so I was curious if you could make sense of it."

"So, I wanted to know if you were willing to help. This idea only works if there are plenty of competing viewpoints by those doing the research. we will need to read all these documents skeptically but with the desire to give everything a fair shake and full context. I'll need a team, and the fact that everyone is still sitting here tells me I want you all involved to have a voice and keeping me from making a cultural error out of ignorance." Amelia smiled. "It would take decades to even be passingly familiar with the nuances of religions. We don't have that time and I would still be ignorant to your level of knowledge in the long run."

"I need your help," she said with determination. "I would please like to talk about how you would be willing to do so. I would like for you to stay here with us, but I understand if that is asking to much for the sake of this project."

[Throndir]

Upon your mention of it, Clifton flipped back to the beginning of the book, where the forward was written in an older language of your world. "Well... There's a few characters that remind me of Old Felothian characters. I know very little of it, but enough to understand that this language written here is different still from Old Felothian." He shook his head again. "I'm not able to read it unfortunately. As for your request... Well..." He paused, as he considered it.

"It may indeed be beneficial... but I can't find it in me to leave my own country for too long. Sister Thyra..." Clifton said turning towards the valkyrie as Thyra turned to give him attention. "Have you heard of what happened to Hiedelswatch?"

Thyra narrowed her eyes, but shook her head. "Only that mine queen hath asked us to gather there. But nay... I've sent mine kin a message telling them of mine decision to stay here in Mendernich with the hero, but I hath no new news."

Clifton nodded his head understandably. "What remains of the Kingdom of Hierdsvain, the fortress of Hiedelswatch is no more. The valkyrie are fleeing towards our northern borders, and the knights of Antwarch are attempting to mount up a defense towards the north as well. However... That will only lessen the amount of troops we have on our western front to aid Isikawa and the elven kingdom of Lassetaure. Every proper dragonknight is worth at least a hundred regular foot soldiers." He shook his head again. "I'm sorry Amelia, but I can't..."

You noticed Thyra looked pale, but she kept her eyes on Clifton.

[Mysticsage]

[info]
Sense motive on Clifton to see if he is steadfast and arguing the point will just make him upset or if the vibe I am getting that he could be persuaded is correct.
[blockquote]Rolled 1d20+3 : 1 + 3, total 4[/blockquote]

Sense motive on thyra's state of mind and the side eye she is giving Clifton
[blockquote]Rolled 1d20+3 : 17 + 3, total 20[/blockquote]

[/info]

[Throndir]

[info]Sense Motive (Clifton): 4
You could not get any hunches on whether or not he would be persuaded. He seemed to stand by with what he said.

Sense Motive (Thyra): 20
From Thyra's narrowed glance, you had the feeling that she couldn't quite believe what she was hearing. However, due to her being pale, you had a hunch that she was actually quite disturbed with the news.[/info]

[Mysticsage]

"I respect your resolve and in all honesty, I probably would make the same decision you would, and I will help in any way I can," She said with a nod.  "I understand a little bit of that fear that is gripping your chest."

"That being said, I need to say this, while one dragon knight may be worth 100 regular soldiers you can only be fighting in one place at a time. I'm beginning to learn that I need to work within my means. Protecting your homeland is paramount for you and your people do not deserve the threat they are under. You cannot turn the tide of this war with will and blades alone we all need to help in any way we can. Figuring out why the demons are attacking and how to stop them would help take the pressure off your borders that is how I can help. You helping here may be a quicker way of getting to that goal then just relying on yourself."

"Please think about my offer while you are still in the city. That being said, if you do decide to go, I would ask if you could leave Bently behind. While he may not have your expertise he has an understanding of your material that will make this go quicker. I also will send any results I find to you. Though, I don't know how if my connection will reach that far out." She frowns.

"I'm sorry I don't like seeing new friends having to risk their lives," she paused. 

"Speaking of my connection your wife offered to teach me how to speak and use it at the same time. Would you mind if I followed you home for a quick lesson before you leave? I may need a passing knowledge of how to do it tomorrow morning," she said with a soft understanding smile.

[Throndir]

"That is true that blades alone will not win this war, as history has shown for the past hundred years we've only been slowing their advance, without gaining any new ground. However... It is wise to make use of one's abilities the best way it can, too. As it is right now, I'm not able to read the writing in the book... I will be here for another few more days though. While I'm here, I can certainly try helping as much as I can. As for leaving Bently behind... Well, that would be unexpected, but I originally brought him along in the first place for him to get experience of the real world. I will discuss that with my wife."

"Speaking your thoughts and talking at the same time... Yes, we could teach you that. We're leaving 3 days from now, so feel free to stop by anytime."

[Mysticsage]

"If the problem is you not being able to read the book and wanting to read it first hand," She paused. "I might be able to fix that problem at least for this book in particular. Though my memories of the specific details may not be the best," She said with a smile. Before Clifton had a chance to protest Amelia had her friend's list open and was focusing on his name.

Once the connection was open she did her best to focus on her language-based memories and the previous day where she had read the book cover to cover. She needed the help of everyone she could if she wanted to be more than useless as a hero's aid and at the same time avoiding being captured as a slave. If Clifton agreed to help it meant that she had more chips to play with Hallum the following day.

She didn't know if this would work for other pieces of literature, but if she could somehow make her powers feed the letters into his head it would be a halfway decent starting point in the long run.

[info]Using a hero point to give him memories of the language so that he can read the book. If OOC it would be better to use the language extension use that. But I would rather the memories because they last. [/info]

[Throndir]

Before I let you use the ability, keep in mind this goes off of your own understanding and knowledge of what you read and remember if you use the ability for memories. Meaning, this will be using your original roll of 7 and 10.

[Mysticsage]

Location: Church of Light
Date: Day 13 - 12-3 PM
[info]Not using the hero point then.[/info]

After a moment Amelia opened her eyes with a sigh, something seemed to stop her from making a solid connection, "I'm sorry it failed to work. I will have to work on something to see if I can find a way so that people can read the book."

Amelia will otherwise take the next hour or two with everyone to take out the various documents collected by the gathering of churches and organizing them from oldest to newest and talk about the ones that might have the most diverse information on the summoning rituals or rich information and terminology of demons.

[Throndir]

Like during the meeting of the churches before, they had their holy texts with them. Thyra and Clifton, being from the same original world as the Felencorp United Alliance, all had a similar holy text. Father Barnabas too had his own holy text originating from the world of Erdesin. Both of their holy books spoke of the goddesses, though, Erdesin's didn't have any word about the Goddess of Water. They also went through their own stories of demons in both of their books, but there didn't seem to be that much information about them other than the general idea that they were evil, and were the enemy of man-kind. Both of their holy books seemed to primarily be the point of view of the Goddess of Light was another observation you had made. And you got the feeling that specifically the Goddess of Darkness, wasn't looked upon favorably in the texts. The word suggesting the Goddess of Darkness to be almost understanding of demons.

There was not much mention of the summoning ritual, and the priests explained to you that the summoning ritual itself was passed down to each generation. It was through this, that you realized both Father Barnabas and the other two delegates had different ways of chanting the spell, along with preparations. For example, the summoning ritual that brought you from your own world consisted of a couple days of preparation of the summoning runes that the castle had deep within. It also required multiple casters, in Father Barnabas' case, Conrad Esser was the one who helped in the casting. On the other hand, the summoning ritual that Clifton and Thyra described only required a single caster. And depending on their skill level, could complete the ritual in an hour or two at most. The only thing that both required were the runes themselves, but they both told you that the art of making more of those runes were lost to them.

[Mysticsage]

Amelia took various bits of notes from their stories and explanations for use later doing her best to absorb and understand the basic details of the magic involved.

[info]
Using this two hour talk as a chance to roll two one hour training of whatever skill ritual magic knowledge falls under if possible."
[/info]

When they had finished their explanations she made another mental note to continue looking for any information on the "local" chapter of the church of darkness. It was clear to her that those in that secretive order must have clues to the rest of this mess.

Maybe she should read that book again and try to find a divine power from her world assuming they were true to try and pray to for guidance.

She snickered at the thought as she finished her notes; as if a god would be interested in her. As they finished up she looked over at Thyra. She did have plans for the rest of the day but something had just taken precedence. As they were finishing the last of their tea Amelia mumbled the command for her friend's list and looked at Nyx's name.

"Hey Nyx, I know you know this your free for the rest of the day, but I will need you rested for tonight to patrol for kidnappers on the castle grounds. Just as a heads up," with that done she lets out a sigh.

"Father Ragnar, do you have something on hand stronger than tea? Considering everything that has gone on today I think at least a few of us need a bit of a drink," She said finally. "I want to toast to our homelands if that's alright."

[Throndir]

Roll two Training checks, 1 hour each, for Knowledge (religion)

"Kidnappers? Potentially the Felencorp outside the city walls? Fear not, I'll catch anyone who sneaks in."

Father Barnabas grinned when you mentioned something stronger than tea. He paused when he realized the company he had was a holy man and a priestess from the Valkyries. But he eventually shrugged. "I keep a stash in the cathedral too." He flashed a smile. "A valkyrie, a dragonknight, and a hero... Alright, I think I know what to pull." With that, the High Priest of Mendernich stood up and headed out the room.

If you havea ctions in the next 15 min, call them out, otherwise I can continue the scene.

[Mysticsage]

[info]Knowledge Religion Training check
check 1
[blockquote]Rolled 1d20+1 : 20 + 1, total 21[/blockquote]

check 2
[blockquote]Rolled 1d20+1 : 3 + 1, total 4[/blockquote]
[/info]

Amelia will move to sit next to Thyra and place a hand on her knee, otherwise waiting for Ragnar to return.