What right do kings have that they can dictate the life and death of a hundred commoners living underneath them? That their very lives are at the whims of a regressive, inborn aristocrat without any applicable skills? It's madness, I tell you. Madness! The Monarchy must be annihilated!

From the 1001 Speeches of Thurazeya, the Monk Revolutionary Economist who spearheaded the Mind's Eye Movement in the nation of Nephrite upon the archipelago of the Heavenshards.

CW: Mentions of Sexual Assault

Raxri watched as Sintra Kennin and the two officials walked into their house. They took one last long look at Akazha, felt a pang of guilt in their heart--she knew the right path--and walked out of their room. Akazha needed the rest. They and Sintra Kennin could handle this, for now.

They had no choice, of course.

Raxri put on their outside-clothes--this time a simple sarong and a magua that was long yet wide-sleeved and had a tall collar. Their new hair tied up into a fierce ponytail, accentuating their sharp features and fire-like eyebrows.

The red upon their brown skin made them resemble a bonfire upon a charnel ground.

Raxri picked up their sword sash and wrapped it around Puksa--right, I should oil them. I should ask to go out with Sintra Kennin for that--and went out of the door.

The living room was a mess: a cavalcade of scratches, gashes, and breaks. Pieces and fragments of the wall and the floor strewn about. A hurricane blast through. Those ghosts really are fierce. Their hatred knows no bounds. I should have expected it, I suppose, from someone so ruled by their attachments.

Raxri couldn't shake the feeling that they were being watched.

"Ah, Raxri," said Sintra Kennin. Raxri looked up to see Sintra already up. He was pouring two... officials? tea and offering them betel nut and little rice cakes. "I pray you've managed to get some rest."

Raxri blinked; said: "A-Ah, yes. I did, thankfully. By no small part because of Akazha."

"Good." Raxri nodded. He gestured to the two officials beside sitting on the table. "Come, join us. These two officials are Hri Goton and Hri Isura, court officials of the great High Chief Trasan."

"Ah! Of course. Greetings to the two officials of Imos." Raxri bowed low.

Hri Goton, the tall one with the moustache, shook his head. "No need for that. We're all equals here, under your home. Come, please, join us. No doubt we've much to discuss concerning your... predicament."

Interesting. Raxri thought. An egalitarian official? What other paradoxes does this world bear?

Raxri nodded. "Very well." They were not one to reject a cordial invitation from someone on a higher social order than them, and so they walked forth and joined them at the table.

Raxri quickly realized that they were hungry, despite whatever healing magicks Akazha had performed. They poured some tea for themselves and then took a bit of rice cake, caked in sugar from sugarcane.

"These two officials were just about to relay some information to me concerning the patayenak we are encountering."

A chill ran up Raxri's spine. Instinct ruled. Raxri's Id pulled their vision to the attic door, which was closed. Had that always been closed? Was it ever open at all?

Raxri nodded in understanding. "So... it truly be a patayenak..."

Hri Isura, the short, clean-shaven one, pulled out a pair of spectacles and wore them. "We've received some reports of commotion going on here during the night. No doubt the people that were reporting this did not know that there was something going on here concerning ghosts."

Raxri nodded. "A horde of spirits and ghosts struck us at midnight. Wails, gasps... all about us. We could do nothing. Death was surely at our door, if it weren't for..."

Isura continued: "Right. Last night, inextricably, thunderclouds rolled in, blocking the Horned Moon. This increased the number of paranatural activity across the area. I'm afraid the ghosts have become something of a nuisance as of late. Even our local exorcists have not been able to stem the tide, and we have already called for an exorcist from Selorong to try and help our case. But even that does not seem too promising."

Sintra Kennin snorted. "Ghosts have ever been a problem since the end of the Second World Revolution," he said. Both Isura and Goton only nodded in agreement. "Too many dead. Too many ghosts. Even demons have escaped the hells.... Anyway: why not an exorcist from the Nunuk League?"

Goton grimaced. "Unfortunately, the Nunuk League is not in particularly good terms with the High Chief as of late. They have openly denounced his... capitalistic tendencies." Hri Goton's grimace was deep. This was not something they wanted to particularly be known for. And Trasan's capitalism was not something he endorsed: he just had no other choice, either out of necessity or out of duty. A good job like being an official here in the end of the world is a job the majority of the working class would kill for.

Isura was a bit more... lax about the subject. Detached, perhaps, is a better word. "It is something to note, as tensions between Imos Town and the Nunuk League increase. Some say war is inevitable, but there have been no skirmishes as of late." Raxri noted the pointed accent in Isura's tone... though they could not pinpoint the accent's origin.

Raxri munched on their breakfast. "I see. Selorong is... far away, I believe?"

Isura turned and looked at Raxri for a moment. Regarded the Heaven Dancer with a look of pure curiosity. Then, he said: "Yes. Somewhat. If the winds are good it would take around one week or two weeks of sea travel. We do not have the capacity to board a skybarge."

Goton turned to Sintra Kennin"What do you have here, Sintra Kennin?" He gestured to Raxri. "A child?"

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Sintra shook his head, and replied all too seriously: "An amnesiac. It is all right, they are not dumb. Just in need of a refresher. About everything."

"An amnesiac? On this exorcism?" Isura wrote something down on their palm leaf manuscript. This was the same strip that Goton was writing on just outside.

"But let's get back to the thick of things. What information do you have for us?"

Goton nodded. "Again, I must restate: we are sharing this information for the benefit of your exorcism efforts. If you use this knowledge to blackmail High Chief Trasan it will not end well for you, I swear it on Rutra."

Sintra crossed their heart with their finger. "I swear it on Rutra as well."

Goton said: "Good. Now. I'm sure you know how a patayenak might arise. Death during childbirth or through abuse. Those are the usual suspects."

Isura continued: "We're afraid to inform you that it is not a different story from here on out. A few years ago--nay, more than. Perhaps even closer to a decade. High Chief Trasan was young and handsome and extravagant and lascivious."

Goton picked it up: "The great High Chief Trasan was... let us say... quite comfortable with abusing his power to get what he wanted. Unfortunately."

Isura interjected: "As most aristocrats tend to be."

Goton nodded and continued: "They are born into power or they gain power and they are utterly consumed by it, and become beings of power and not powerful beings.

"Once, during a post-raid celebration--" Goton turned to Raxri, "--Piracy is very common in all of Utter Islands waters, as you should know. Anyway, once, during a celebration after such an act of piracy--was it against a Yavinian Guild trading galleon, Isura?"

"Yes," replied Isura. "A merchant galleon bringing goods from the Western Archipelago. They had a large number of long guns on them. Don't get distracted, mantri."

Goton smiled sheepishly. "Right, of course. Apologies. Anyway, during one of their drunken feasts, High Chief Trasan decide to indulge his Dionysian tendencies. There was a peasant girl that worked a nearby bar--the bar that the High Chief and his coterie at the time were going to anyway. He pulled her aside and took her, ravished her. All against her will.

"Afterwards, Trasan tossed her aside, as all kings do when having to face the consequences of their impassioned actions. A few months later, this peasant girl returns to the palace, and in front of High Chief Trasan's wife and officials, stated that her name was Usisi and that she bore his child."

"This did not bode well for the High Chief, of course. Though, for him, despicably, he was more worried about having a child outside of royal lineage rather than the fact that she had been assaulted. But that is the sin of those in power. The High Chief commanded her to approach the healers and have the child be terminated, but Usisi did not want this. It only made sense. In a world such as this, having you and your child bear some modicum of royal blood was a potential step into a life of comfort, away from having to toil one's days away in the end of the world.

"Unfortunately, when Usisi expressed her conviction and chose to keep the child, that was the wrong thing to say. To go against the High Chief's wishes was to go against the Will of God. And what happens when God is denied? He summons his Lightning Bolts. Usisi in her home, during her sleep, was slain. Her womb ripped open, and left to fester and rot and die."

Raxri was suddenly really glad that they had finished the rice cake they had been munching on. Otherwise they would have lost all appetite. Their heart-wrenching, they set to work on applying whatever curiosity they had to the case.

But then Isura said: "It would be prudent to know, I suppose, that ten years ago Trasan was still calling himself Raja Trasan. Raja being the term for the monarchs that once ruled all of the world, and cling to existence to this day, despite the eradication of their social class by the end of the First World Revolution. High Chief was his replacement title to avoid the ire of the workers and other libertines. He uses it because it retains an air of... royalty."

"Isura, I told you already about my class-fusion theory, right?" Goton asked, leaning forward and facing Isura, suddenly not caring about the other two.

"Yes. Mantri." Isura's face was deadpan and unassailable.

"I'm sure it's more than just a theory now. My theory was that, considering there were so many aristocrats and their social class just up and vanished, many of them simply became bourgeoisie, or removed their title and converted it into capital. Thus, fusing the bourgeois and aristocrat classes into a new, extra-powerful ruling class!"

"That is what happened, if you read any post-Masangwan analyses." Isura's face was still deadpan. "But you should know that some kingdoms yet exist. The Datos of the Heavenshards, the Rajas of the Charnel Isles. Some are even trying to re-establish the Huangdi of Shen, creating multiple warlords upon Jhongxiya."

"Ha. It's as if after the failed Second World Revolution, the old royals suddenly became thick-faced again!"

Isura nodded. "And then they will soon shake hands with the bourgeois class and sit upon the Lotus Throne. The Six Shards of the Lotus Throne are in the hands of the Six Devil Chakravartin after all."

"Whoa, Isura. That's delving too deep into conspiracy there for a bit. Let's tone it down for the normals over here."

Sintra Kennin and Raxri blinked at each other. Raxri managed a smile, as if to say: What an eccentric pair.

"Anyway, offtopic, forgive us," said Isura. "The important thing you should glean from this is that this patayenak has been haunting Imos Town for ten years. No doubt she has collected a veritable ghost kingdom."

Raxri scratched their head. "Why didn't you... deal with it during the ten years? Get your exorcists to do it?"

"We tried, trust me," said Goton, lighting up a cigarette. What's that? A paper pipe? though Raxri. Another mental note to ask Akazha about that later. "I hope you don't mind me lighting up inside."

Sintra Kennin and Raxri both shook their head. "My father frequently joins tabako smoke with betel nut. Makes the effects of the betel nut sizzle even more."

"Good taste, your father has," said Goton, doing exactly that. Chewing on a bit of betel, spitting, and then inhaling smoke. "Anyhow, we attempted to get our exoricsts on it but, well, let's just say an exorcism is only as good as the exorcist. Usisi's unfueled, undying wrath created a powerful ghost demon, that now no doubt only festers."

"So none of your exorcists were able to deal with it? For ten years? Why did you not get international exorcists on the case?" asked Sintra Kennin.

"One thing you must realize, great ones," said Isura, adjusting his spectacles. "Is that it wasn't really given much attention because it wasn't really affecting Trasan himself directly. Only his subjects. And so, it was pretty low the priority ladder."

"Now he's become a bit more urgent. Both because he's gained a bit in years, has lost some of his spiritual power due to attacks from the Nunuk League, and because the hauntings and attacks have gotten alarmingly frequent and alarmingly close to the Royal Palace."

"Frequent?" asked Raxri. They chewed on betel nut now as well. "How frequent?"

"Thrice a night," said Goton. "To the point that even the exorcists are afraid of walking out during the Indistinguishable Dark anymore."

"That is not good."

"Tell us about it" said Goton. "We tried reaching out to one of the most powerful magickers in the area, the ultramystic Sutasoma, but she has been impenetrable. Absolutely impossible to reach, even with magick correspondence. We are at an impasse."

Isura nodded. "And the Nunuk League does not wish to help us either, because this paranormal problem no doubt would help their cause in trying to destabilize--and eventually overthrow and replace--the Trasanian regime."

Raxri leaned back. Now they did not seem to want to help Trasan, after finding out everything about them. But then they realized that they didn't really have a way out, trapped because of politicking. If they did not help the High Chief, that could spell the end of their journey right there and then. Politics was a tricky thing to maneuver through. The power of the many made manifest.

But one other thing did keep nagging in Raxri's mind ever since it was mentioned. Raxri's curiosity reached critical mass, and they asked: "You said Usisi was killed in her home. Do you know where her home is?"

Goton grinned. A shit-eating grin. The kind of grin to tell you: Oh I've been waiting to tell you this. "Ah, well, of course I know where her home is.

"It's this house right here."

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