I suppose it should be noted that spirits, not just being the catch-all term for magickal beings that reside in the Fifth Path of Wandering, also sometimes known as Demigods, just below Gods, also describes various nature deities that are revered but are not actually gods. Sometimes, the words are not accurate. In some areas, spirits are known as Little Gods or Terrestrial Gods or sometimes Tellurians. When speaking with these kinds of spirits, it would be best to follow their nomenclature, so as to not offend them. Despite their "lower" status on the Wheel, as the Wheel of Pain is a wheel of cruel hierarchies, they still bear innate paranormal abilities and an innate greater toughness due to their spiritual flesh rather than mortal human flesh. It would be best to honor them all the same.

From Discourses On The Fifth Path by Contemplative Shukran

Raxri waited for Sintra Kennin to finish washing the dishes before they set out to try and find Achi Angko. Akazha agreed to doing the ritual on the condition that it was Sintra Kennin and Raxri who retrieved Angko from her house. They had no choice but to acquiesce. But first, they had to do laundry.

They had changed their outfits to better fit the workers. Sintra Kennin did not wear anything ostentatious: he were back to nothing but a sarong, a sash around that, and then a tengkolok. His dakgatana still hung from his back, kept strapped to his chest by virtue of a gold chain.

Raxri Uttara wore feminine clothing. Had been lent by Captain Ampalila, after they had run out of clothes. On their back, a rattan fiber backpack with their clothes. On their head an indigo headcloth. Wrapped in such a way to look like two horns. Pressed Raxri's hair into a pattern not unlike a flaring out flame. Raxri wore a blue, flower-patterned kebaya. Underneath a kemben. Wrapped Puksa in a sword green-white-blue flower sash around their hip.

"These impede my movements," said Raxri, referring to their skirt. "It is not as loose as my sarong and bahag. How can I take upon wide stances?"

"Wear you anything underneath?" asked Sintra Kennin. Though they wore a sarong, they did have a bahag underneath it, and their sarong largely was split in the middle, so they could widely split their legs comfortably.

Raxri nodded. "A normal bahag, but it seems incomplete. I cannot take the horse stance."

Sintra Kennin snorted. "Then it looks like you will have to be creative. Take it as a challenge."

A challenge. Gods, Sintra Kennin is a genius. Of course this is a genius! If I cannot fight with limitations then I cannot fight at all! Emboldened by this new idea, Raxri decided to follow through on that idea. A new method of training begins!

They walked to the docks and looked for the laundry spot. "Generally," said Sintra. "There are people by the docks or by the riverwells conducting their laundries."

Raxri titled their head to the side. "There was a river right beside our house. Why not wash there?"

"You must understand, Raxri," said Sintra. "Civilization largely means control of where you get to do what you want to do."

Raxri blinked. "Contrived."

"It is largely also believed to be necessary for a functioning community," said Sintra Kennin. "Especially a large one. You know what they say: when in Fia, do as the Fianese."

"Fia?"

Sintra smiled. "Ancient, primeval empire. One of the greatest in the Northern Isles, the shining beacon and darkling lighthouse of their civilization. It is far behind the Heavenly Shennin Empire, of course, but that is the way of things."

"I see. Do they mean: if I'm in a particular place, I should do what the people of that place do?"

Sintra nodded. "More or less. Courtesy and mindfulness. Unless, of course, what they're doing fights against your inner moralities. But that's a debate for philosophers and not for martial artists such as us."

As they walked through the mildly busy port--it was not the height of trading season so there weren't as many people as there usually would be--an elderly couple passed by them. Hair white, backs hunched, the woman looked like she had shrunken over the years. The matronly woman smiled at them, her eyes so small that she might as well have been squinting at them. She muttered to her husband: "Oh, what a wonderful couple. What a beautiful lady that big strong man has!"

Sintra smiled. "Did you hear that?"

Raxri nodded. "Yes. Think they we are a couple? Of friends?"

"No. They thought we were married, and you my wife." Sintra smiled at Raxri.

Raxri laughed. "Flattering, really." Raxri shrugged. "Enviable it is to have a river dragon spirit as your husband."

Sintra smiled as well. "They no doubt thought it because you're dressed as a woman. While clad in clothes feminine your mien is fiercely that of a maiden."

Raxri smirked. "As long as I be an attractive maiden."

"Yes," said Sintra, nodding vigorously. "Those attracted to femininity might salivate!"

"Oh wow." Now Raxri was actually getting a bit embarrassed at the praise. "I don't know about that. Maybe I should ask Akazha to teach me how to put on makeup as well."

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

Sintra Kennin walked up to the fish vendor lady who sold fish laid out on a beautiful textile cloth on the wooden ground. Porcelain jars and clay pots reeking of the sea surrounded her.

The plump swarthy woman said, smile so wide her eyes turned into black crescents: "Oy, oy! Welcome kah! Please, look you our wares, kah? Maybe find you delicious, kah?"

Sintra Kennin performed the heart reverence to the woman. The woman returned the gesture, flustered. She only performed heart reverences with those that did it to her first. "Auntie, it is all right to ask? Where can we find the laundry spot?"

"Ah? Laundrying you? Ay, travel you two uproad, upriver kah? Follow you and will find you the laundryhouse. Beautiful now, kah. No people no people."

"Laundryhouse? I see. So we have to laundry our clothes in the laundry house?"

"No, no!" she briefly turned to another customer who asked to buy a set of three dried fish. She received the cut in half joss sticks and gave them the fish. She spoke in a local language, one that Raxri did not know but Sintra definitely understood. Then, she turned back to Sintra Kennin. "Brother, everyone laundryhouse now. If no pay you no laundry. Simple as!"

"I see. Is there a name for the laundryhouse auntie?"

"Kretana Laundryhan kah. You find easy. Big symbol."

Sintra Kennin performed the heart reverence again. "Thank you, auntie." Raxri did it as well, and Auntie Fish Vendor bowed to the both of them.

They walked up the road to find the laundryhouse. "Interesting to find that they've capitalized even the washing of clothes."

"Anything can be turned into a business, after all," said Sintra Kennin, with no small edge on his voice. "But you are right. The world crumbles, and there are only a few pocks of civilization, and demons and ghosts roam the land. And yet, laundry must be monetized."

A chill ran up Raxir's spine.

The laundryhouse was a longhouse, more or less, flaring out on both sides and having multiple stilt house annexes that stretched into the river. From the outside, one could see the bubbling of detergents and laundry soap arising from the river and then flowing down. On both sides of the laundryhouse there were rows upon rows of clotheslines to hang and dry newly done clothes.

Sintra Kennin and Raxri Uttara walked into the laundry house. The reception area had a simple wooden counter, and then two doors that led to the innumerable annexes behind the longhouse, stretching into the river. They were immediately greeted by a young boy, wearing a sleeveless top and a thick bahag that covered all their thighs and reached their knees. "Welcome! To Kretana Laundryhan! I am Oyo and I'll be the one serving you today. What can we do for the beautiful couple?"

Raxri smiled. Sintra Kennin said: "We come to have these laundried."

"Very well! Please, weigh it over on the scale over there."

Sintra took the rattan backpack from Raxri quite easily and then walked over to the scale. The counterweight was a piece of thick malachite. No doubt carved from the dome of the sky.

Sintra placed the rattan backpack and it only weighed the counterweight down by a fingerspan or so.

The boy was writing something on a notepad. "Very well. That will be 34 joss."

Sintra nodded. Raxri, ever anxious about the time they have left, asked: "Will we be the ones doing laundry?"

The boy shook his head. "Unfortunately that is against company policy," said Oyo. "We will be handling it so that the quality of the wash remains of the highest caliber."

"I see," said Sintra Kennin, furrowing their eyebrows. Raxri either was not used to having someone else do their laundry for them.

Raxri asked: "How long will it take, then?"

The boy shrugged. "Oh, it'll probably be all done by tomorrow morning."

Sintra looked at Raxri with an expression that said: Not bad.

"You can have it dried and folded by tomorrow morning?" asked Raxri. "That sounds like a miracle."

"Well," said Oyo, gesturing to the back of the counter where he had popped out of. "We have hundred of workers at a time, and we also have a heat spirit to help us dry!"

Sintra raised an eyebrow. "Heat spirit? Do you have them... chained to a machine?"

"Oh no, none of that inhumane stuff sir," said Oyo.

He led the two of them to one of the rooms of the longhouse.

There, a heat spirit! A woman with red-hot skin and billowing hair. Like she sat in the midst of a whirlwind. She sat in a lotus position, blowing hot air out from her hands.

The fiery winds flurried clothes around and around into a spinning vortex of linens and silks. In the same room other workers conversed and shared tales.

The heat spirit looked up and smiled. "Oh, hey Oyo."

"Greetings Kainetan," replied Oyo, performing the heart reverence. "I hope everything is going fine?"

She nodded. "This is my third batch today. Two more and I'm done."

"Good! Don't overwork yourself like mama said!"

She giggled. "You're a good boy Oyo. Tell Mama I said hi!"

The other workers in there, who were busy folding clothes, listening to music from a clay pot that had green lines cutting through it, also waved hi to Oyo. Oyo waved back, and then closed the door. "See? Trust you now our services?"

Sintra shrugged. "I suppose giving work to orphaned spirits is a good thing. And they seem to be having a good time."

Oyo nodded twice. "Mhm. Mhm. Now that will be 34 joss."

Sintra chuckled. He handed over 37 joss, an extra three for the kid. "The extra 4 joss is for you, child."

"Thank you for your patronage. Please do arrive here during the seventh hour of the day! May your days be beautiful." And with that, Oyo went over to the rattan backpack and entered the annexes behind the longhouse.

The two of them walked out of the laundryhouse mildly impressed. "I've heard," said Sintra Kennin. "That in the larger cities and metropoles that they have laundry services just like this. That laundryhouse seems to be a small business. The metrooples have access to laundry machines and drying machines."

"I see," said Raxri. "I am eager to see these... machines."

"Well, if the rumors I've heard are any indication, there's a good chance you will see some in Blacklight City. That place strains the definition of town as more and more people flock to it."

"Why?"

"Death, famine. All refugees of the corpse-world, looking for places to survive."

Raxri nodded, grim. "Shall we make our way to achi Angko?"

Sintra Kennin nodded. He was already walking.

Before achi Angko's door, they knocked twice. When the door flung open, achi Angko was there, barely awake, without any makeup. Dark circles under her eyes. "What, what? Oh, Raxri? You look great!"

Raxri smiled. "Thank you, achi. You look--"

"Not great, I know," she turned around, leaving the door open. "I've barely woken up. What do you need? Come in, come in."

They walked inside and closed the door behind them. Raxri said: "I didn't realize you woke up so late. It is almost the Zenith hour."

"Yes well, magickry tends to keep one awake for longer periods of time, you know."

"The night and the Horned Moon are friends of witches," explained Sintra, nodding. "Forgive us for having come so early. Relatively."

Angko was in the back preparing coffee. "It's all right. Don't worry overmuch. Sit upon the mandala. No doubt you have some questions for me. It couldn't have been coincidence that I saw a dragon flying about last night killing ghosts." She smirked at Sintra.

Sintra Kennin and Raxri sat down on the table. "Ah well, let's just say our house..."

"Was attacked? Yes well, it has come to my attention that the house you yet sleep in is the old house of Usisi, the patayenak." She came over with a cup of coffee and a plate of rice cakes. "Forgive me, I haven't been completely honest with you. I know Usisi is the patayenak."

"You knew?" asked Raxri.

Achi Angko nodded. "I speak to her on some nights. I am one of the few that she has confided with over the past few months."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.