[IMG]https://picload.org/image/rpocagri/markerjaelnec.png[/IMG]
[h3]The Duchy of Zerul, by a road in the southwest[/h3]
It was somehow kind of funny, contemplating how a different perspective could make a person reevaluate their plans for their future, and how just a single event could make someone question their own existence. Jaelnec found that lying flat on his stomach with his face buried in gooey mud was educational in and by itself. In the mud the sun did not shine in his eyes, no one expected anything from him and girls did not simply disrobe right in front of him. It was cold, clingy and suffocating, but the mud accepted him unconditionally.
Outside he could hear Angora, asking whether he was “all right”. Both from the question and her tone he surmised that she was not, in fact, angry at him. He could not reply, of course, since his lips were currently squeezed shut by the thicker, harder layer of mud beneath the malleable upper layer... and even if they had not been, it was not as though he could actually draw a breath to form into words. On the other hand, he did not want to remove his face from the mud and show himself to the others. What he [I]wanted[/I] was to wiggle further into it, nestle his face in it, burrow into it and disappear underground forever, never having to face this woman again.
But as much as he would have preferred to disappear off the face of Reniam and found a new race of worm-people in the dark underground, he really was suffocating, literally drowning in mud. He contemplated letting it happen for a moment, weighing survival against oblivion, and reluctantly decided that avoiding Angora probably was not worth dying over.

Planting each of his hands into the ground on either side of him, the squire raised himself out of the muck, which released him with a wet, sucking noise. He was positively covered in mud on the front, his otherwise nice, blond hair dripping with the stuff. His hat had fallen off during the maneuver and was lying nearby. His white shirt, the brilliant ghiril cuirass... [I]caked[/I] in mud.
He ran his right hand over his face, scraping as much of the stuff off him as possible, exhaled through his nose to clear his nostrils, and opened his eyes. Angora was smiling at him. Yeah. Hilarious.
“I’m fine,” he squeaked, his voice breaking and prompting him to cough and clear his throat. “Turns out mud doesn’t care who you are, either. I...” He faltered. What in the planes could he possibly say that would improve the situation in the slightest?
Rising to his feet, Jaelnec allowed himself a sigh. This was going to be exhausting, he could tell.

[IMG]https://picload.org/image/ddggriwa/nimbus.png[/IMG]
[h3]Zerul City, I’onriyi’s estate[/h3]
When I’onriyi prompted Nimbus to sit she made to do so immediately and eagerly, although probably not exactly the way her host would have expected her to. Without even giving the action a single thought she simply reached out for the chair he had indicated and dragged it behind her to sit in... without actually touching it, that is. Male’dai’s hands did not make the slightest movement to manipulate the chair, but Nimbus’ own hand – her invisible [I]divine hand[/I] – instinctively went to retrieve the piece of furniture.

“That’s mostly right, yeah,” she replied when I’onriyi seemed to live up to Male’dai’s expectations and figure out their circumstances on his own. “But Male’dai isn’t [I]just[/I] the body; she’s in here, too.” She tapped the side of her head with a finger. “She is my host, and I am... I suppose I’m technically possessing her.”
[I]I guess that’s true; “possession” simply means that you are controlling a foreign body. That doesn’t mean that you have to have taken control by force. Still... feels odd to describe our situation like that. I hope he doesn’t get the wrong idea.[/I]

She sat through him preparing his herbal solution in silence, eating much more slowly now, and stared at him with wide eyes once he spoke again, explaining his own current plans and what he needed from her. She nodded eagerly at it all, already trying to formulate an explanation for their situation in her mind, with a little help from her host.
“That’s fine. I expected as much,” she told him with a smile. “I don’t know how well I can really explain myself to let you ‘know’ me, but I’ll try to clarify the situation a bit, at least.
It all started when Cahl’nai’sulooth’iel – the city Male’dai is from – came under siege. From what we’ve been told the attackers were a group called something along the lines of ‘True Purity’, a faction of ascended deigan that persecute true deigan even more aggressively than most of their kind do. They outnumbered the defenders and had brought their own mages, so the city was being razed one building at a time. Hundreds died, and it was only really a matter of time before every single citizen there would have been executed.”
Nimbus’ smile had faded by this point, her posture turning more deflated by the second. “In a desperate effort to save the city, the true deigan turned to the Nameless – practitioners of forbidden magic – and begged them for a solution, their idea of which was apparently to sacrifice several people in order to summon an archangel, which the Nameless would then enslave and command to destroy the enemy. Male’dai, being one of the more... expendable survivors, volunteered as one of these sacrifices. But before the Nameless could complete the spell, their tower was breached. Everyone retreated before their escape was cut off to try again elsewhere, but Male’dai stayed behind, working frantically on the summoning despite having no experience with summoning magic in the first place.”
She sighed. “She performed the spell and called me, but... well, obviously it didn’t work as the Nameless had intended. It was a spell that normally took at least several casters, [I]and[/I] a few living sacrifices, to allow me to manifest fully in Reniam, body and soul. Alone, all Male’dai could do was to pull my soul here, and with no other suitable vessel nearby the only place I could go was in [I]her[/I].
Good thing I did, too; casting the spell required every morsel of magical energy Male’dai had in her, so her soul was actually already fading away when I found her. I instinctively reached out to help her, to sustain her with my power, and drew her back. Then the attackers broke into the summoning chamber, and I had no choice but to defend myself against them.” She hung her head regretfully. “None of them survived, and Male’dai was badly wounded. I healed her, and then more came. Rinse and repeat, until True Purity had suffered so many losses that they called the retreat.
Once things had settled down a little and Male’dai and I had had some time to adjust to our new circumstances, we used an Orb of Zhakos to leave Cahl’nai’sulooth’iel, which brought us to a cave on the coast. From there we found our way to Zerul City, where we’ve been for seven days.”

“As to what we can do...” Nimbus shrugged. “Male’dai has some knowledge of arcane magic, that is true, but we can’t actually make use of any of that. Arcane magic requires magical energy – that is, [I]mortal[/I] energy – and Male’dai drained herself completely to summon me. I can sustain her with my power to keep her from becoming a specter, but due to my being attached to her soul she can’t actually recharge herself.
As for me... Had I had my own body I would have been [I]very[/I] powerful, probably more so than any mage in this city, but I don’t. While Male’dai is more tolerant to divine energy than most mortals and makes an acceptable vessel, she’s far from fit to serve as an avatar. I have to continuously use some of my power to sustain her soul, some on healing the damage my own presence inflicts on her body and some on compensating for the fact that we can’t sleep. If I didn’t do those things, we’d die.
That said, I still have much power left over. I can summon my divine hand as normal -” saying this she summoned her invisible hand again, lightly tapping I’onriyi’s left shoulder with an unseen finger, “- and I can heal people, but doing so takes a lot out of me; it strains Male’dai’s body a lot when I use my powers, which means I have to heal her even more. Of course I can also heal Male’dai’s injuries, so there’s that; despite her situation being somewhat precarious, as long as I’m here she’s actually pretty hard to kill.
Finally,” she sighed, “I’m also trained as a warrior. I’m quite skilled with bladed weapons, especially falchions and cutlasses. Male’dai’s body is not very well-suited for fighting, though, and while I can lend her some of my strength, I can’t make her any heavier than she is. I haven’t had the chance to get used to fighting in this body yet, so I can’t guarantee how well I would do, but I do have the necessary skills to do so.”
She smiled at him apologetically. “It’s not much, I realize, but in time we hope that Male’dai’s body will grow accustomed to divine energy and allow me to use more of my power.” Her expression suddenly turned worried. “Please tell me that’s enough! We won’t be in your way, I promise!”