Alright. Just for the record, I don't take commands, but I do know when to take a hint. Now let's take a look at these actual suggestions, and not the one I just gave myself. Hmm. Atrocious formatting. I think I'll take a minute to figure out a good way to phrase these for John. In the meantime, let's give him the few that are according to formula.
John: *john puts away the note cards and pulls out the playing cards, riffling through them. given a choice between poker cards and tarot cards, the choice was pretty much obvious - any good magician worth his salt should be playing with cards that are more obviously magic. this deck can still be used for gambling of course, but unlike the poker deck, with its 4 suits of 13 cards each, a tarot deck comes with 4 suits of 14 cards and a trump suit of 21 cards. hopefully immediately ditching the former numerical scheme doesn't have any ramifications later, but it feels like a choice his best friend would approve of. she's always been into weird and spooky things like fortunetelling, which a reliable source tells him is what these cards are used for a lot, apparently. and the cards in the trump suit have fun cool names like the hanged man, the tower, and the world.*
John: *john sets down the tarot deck on his window sill, setting down the cards he pulled face up, and turns to check out the handful of posters currently hanging on his walls. there's really only a few right now, but he'll keep collecting them as he goes. actually, he's not really sure these are all, strictly speaking, movies? some of them are more interactive, and he's heard that they might be called video games instead, but he's still catching up on the terminology. technologically advanced society sure is weird! john decides to focus on three. the names are written in the weird probably-magic text that pretty much everything is written in around here, so he doesn't bother to read them to himself, since while he can understand what they're supposed to say, the glyphs still give him a little bit of a headache whenever he reads them. the first of these is about an adventurous scholar apparently called an "archaeologist" who goes into ancient ruins, fights tyrannical bad guys from a faraway land, and uncovers that the true treasure was knowledge all along! if by knowledge you mean incomprehensible ramblings from ancient otherworldly beings that can make your head catch on fire, who ruled the world long ago! apparently this was the fourth in a series, and is widely regarded to be kind of ridiculous compared to the other three?*
John: *the second one is probably a video game, actually. this one is about a survivor who lives in a wasteland long after a war in which two major nations fought each other pretty much into extinction with terrible weapons that are powerful enough to destroy cities; holy shit! it's pretty funny, if a little dark, and apparently adheres to a genre called "schlock sci-fi." you can do pretty much anything you want in this one, and john hasn't made it all the way through, but he's mostly been following the main storyline as a character with high luck and charisma stats, and not much else.*
John: *this third one is animated instead of with live actors! you've been told that it's called a cartoon, or an anime. john is not sure which of them is right, but supposedly, it is made of many many drawings that are each replaced by another slightly different one in sequence to give the appearance of a moving picture. this is basically incomprehensible, so he doesn't question it. anyway, it's about this exile prince who has a curse put on him by an angry demon, so he has to go to a faraway land and seek the help of a forest god so that he doesn't die. in the process he meets a girl who is raised by wolves, a woman who is trying to rule the world with the help of powerful weapons called rifles, and they don't like each other. he has to learn to see with eyes unclouded by hate to resolve the conflict between them before the realm is consumed by ecological disaster. wow! this one... he actually doesn't like as much? he prefers the cornier ones, and this one is kind of sad and stressful to watch and a little gory! still A NEW FRIEND OF HIS FROM REQUISITION ASSURES HIM THAT THIS IS PRETTY MUCH OBJECTIVELY THE HIGHEST QUALITY OF CINEMA AVAILABLE IN SANCTUM, EVEN IF IT DOESN'T STRICTLY ADHERE TO HIS PERSONAL TASTES.*
John: *john... does have to admit, he's feeling a little hurt about their meeting earlier! he was really looking forward to catching up with her since the past couple weeks have been pretty tumultuous, and then she swore up and down that she didn't know him to her new fancy friends at the hub, the epic complex of government buildings near the center of the world island before planting this note card on him, whispering him a few cryptic words about a curse of dubious reality, and then shooing him.*
In theory, everyone in the city is supposed to collect some a basic income from the government, but John has been having a pretty hard time getting a hold of his. According to the aforementioned friend in requisitions, this happens a lot; inhabitants of the rim often end up living a hardscrabble life because the money disappears into the pocket of some corrupt bureaucrat even though rimdwellers are the ones it's supposed to help out the most. Attempting to get this situation sorted out took John to the Hub over the course a long high speed train ride, facilitating his happenstance meeting with his best friend.
John: still, john isn't going to let one bad experience color his perception of a friend too badly! he's sure she has her reasons. and the best way to find them out is probably to go see her.
There is still the matter of the clown.
John: *right. the clown can wait, but john would feel bad about throwing away the invitation to some kind of mysterious get together, even if it is from a complete stranger! he makes up his mind, pockets both note cards again, and steps out his front door.*
John steps outside into a dizzyingly agoraphobic space. Heaven divs out above him, and behind him, and ahead of him, and below him as he turns to face the stacks of the city, turning his back to the infinite sky behind him. He's got to watch his step here on the rim, where jetties have been built to hang out over the infinite nothing below the world-island of Sanctum. He has to watch his step here, or he could fall for a very long time. The buildings ahead of him get taller as they get further away toward the Hub, where the gargantuan spires host innumerable government offices and huge tenement stacks house tens of thousands in cramped spaces so they can work in high paying jobs near the city center. The city has an aesthetic that might be best described as somewhere between gothic and art deco, not that John knows what either of those things is.
Beneath the disc of the world-island, a honeycomb of catwalks and stalactite-like buildings jut downward in a way that makes the city's underside look like a smudgy reflection of its topside. Everyone who lives here on the rim is either a new arrival, or someone who will probably spend the rest of their life trying to scrape together enough to live a comfortable life doing the most basic labor the city needs to have done - and there is always work to do. The wind from beyond the edge whips past John as he starts heading into the city proper, chilling him to the bone and making his bandana flutter around. It produces a long, lone, low chord as it makes the metal struts beneath him shudder. It's the note that Regret plays to make the heart of its audience ache and set the hair on the back of their neck to stand on end and wonder what might have otherwise been.
John has a feeling that it's going to be a long day.
John: *john gets out of the jetties, and into the city proper where he's less likely to fall into infinite negative sky and then breathes a sigh of relief as he finds a spot to sit down nearby and reread the instructions on the note card.*
John. We can't spend much time together out in the open like this. Too many spectators. Meet me at 311 Bleeker Street, Laurelville, Clover Ward, Spoke 2, four days from now. I'll explain everything then. Tell the Bellman that you want to see the Seer. Don't
Unfortunately, the rest of the message has smudged in your pocket.
John: oh god damn it. don't do what? *john pockets it, and repeats the address to himself to make sure he doesn't forget it if it accidentally gets smudged too, and heads for the nearest mass transit station. the city's got pretty good public infrastructure at least, and you can cheaply get from pretty much anywhere to anywhere else by bullet train within like, a few hours! fortunately, it looks like her address is not hours away at all, and is more like 45 minutes away. he gets a set of tickets from the ticketmaster, and hops on board.
John spends the next long while in the cramped company of hundreds of others headed into the city for various reasons. As he heads further in, nearby skyscrapers get taller on average, and advertisements grow more frequent - local ward administrators often selling airspace, and local property owners often selling facade space to various corporate interests. The train passes through open spaces between buildings, and he has to embark and disembark multiple times to get where he's going, each train having fewer occupants than the last. At last, with only a few fellow travellers, he arrives at his destination.
The architecture here is full of white marble and brownstone, and terraces that support delicate green plantlife, with a large rectangular garden pond dominating the central space. Building design is balanced to create wide open spaces overhead, letting sunlight stream in much more effectively than it does in other parts of the city. The residential sections of Laurelville appear to have what are much more appropriately described as houses and condos compared to your shack.
The main thoroughfare is dominated by bourgie shops with a big greengrocer and a big bank sitting at the head of the boulevard across from each other. Bleeker street is an avenue off the main boulevard, containing some more niche shops, and John soon finds himself standing before the door to 311. It is a two story structure, and appears to be a shop of some kind - the front window is full of arcane odds and ends of all descriptions. Shrunken heads, jars full of eyeballs, leatherbound tomes, the works. This is a magic shop. For real magic, not prestidigitation. A sign written in Universal Syllabary, the aforementioned quasi-magical script, declares the store to be open.
John: *john steps inside, and looks around through the dusty building, looking over his head as a bell rings.*
There are rows of shelves inside the building, stocked with more and more mystic and occult supplies and tools, along with display cases showing off some of the more impressive wares. Behind the counter, a featureless white automaton - a homonculus, John recalls - stoically mans the register, while another tidies. It was hardly thronging or bustling outside, but it's still considerably more quiet here in this dusty store.
John: ah, jeez. i don't even know if these guys are going to understand me, but here goes. hey bellman! um... i'm trying to see the seer?
Luckily, it appears they do. The homonculus behind the register immediately responds, coming out from behind it, and moving toward a door along the back wall, beckoning silently.
John: *john follows him to wherever he leads.*
The homonculus, who John supposes must be The Bellman, leads John through the door, and up a flight of stairs. Opening the door at the top of the stairs, he beckons John into a room where his friend - a blonde haired young lady currently clad in wizardly attire and a purple headband - is presently looking out the large circular window of an attic room with a roaring fireplace, a pair of cozy chairs, and a coffee table upon which tea is set.
If you're invested in this work at all, you certainly know who this is already. Easing you into the stylistic changes from what is to you the source material, will, I hope, make you comfortable. And I'd hate to make you uncomfortable. But from here on out, we'll skip introductions between characters who already know each other. Really, let's get into the business of skipping introductions altogether, shall we? Helps preserve a little more mystery.
John: rose! *john runs over and is about to embrace her in a hug, but he stops short, looking at her inquisitively.* rose, is everything alright? what is going on! i mean, everything is obviously not alright, we've been shanghaied! or something like that. but what are you up to that you couldn't say hi to a pal at the drop of a hat! and what's this about us being somehow less than real! you have some explaining to do, i think.
Rose: It's nice to see you too, John. *She crosses her arms, and looks John up and down, smiling weakly and sighing in relief. He's alright. Or he looks alright. * And yes that's fair. I can concede to owing you an explanation.
John: and can you give it to me in the most fanciful, elaborate, and confusing way possible? as much as i want to understand what's going on, i could really use some good old fashioned rose right now!
Rose: *She smirks.* As long as I can count on you to tease me mercilessly, I suppose I could arrange for an explanation full of overly wrought and multisyllabic verbiage.
John: hehe. :) - I missed you Rose. First thing's first. How come you blew me off the other day?
Rose That's a complicated question to answer. Mind if we sit down while I do? I made tea. It's this incredible drink I've discovered.
John: sure, alright. *he sits with her in front of the fire, getting comfortable. wow. these chairs are super nice.*
Rose *She pours the tea, and hands him his, before taking her seat, and taking a drink. She sighs and gives a pleased shiver. Then, she rubs the bridge of her nose wearily.* Where to begin?
John: well, how about i ask a different question that i bet will help you answer the first one, rose? how did you end up running this fancy store? which i guess is probably what you're doing?
Rose: You're right, that is an easier question to answer. I've made a powerful new friend. He's a man named Nicolas Caledonius. He's one of the Realm Lords.
John: realm lords? oh right! they're those powerful wizard guys who run the city, right?
Rose: Sorcerers, actually. There is a difference but it's not terribly important right now. And yes. They're a collection of around two hundred and fifty powerful sorcerers who collectively form the parliament that governs the city. *She sips her tea, waiting for him to ask another question before she continues.* Lord Caledonius has taken a personal interest in our lives for reasons of his own - and he's keenly interested in our problem. And by problem, I don't mean our abduction by pirates.
John: and that's that we're not real, right?
Rose: Exactly right. And it isn't just you and me. Everyone we know and the entire world we come from are less real than the rest of the universe, John. Somehow, we've been made... phantasmal. Ephemeral. Ethereal. Maybe even fictional? We've not quite been erased, but we don't quite exist, either.
John: oh man! so we're like... ghosts or something?
Rose: Yes John. We are exactly like ghosts or something.
John: oh man! that seems kind of bad! but... do we at least get cool ghost powers out of it or something?
Rose: They're less powers, and more like... ignorance. There are forces and divinities that govern reality, and we can pass beneath their notice. They're not the only ones whose notice we can pass beneath.
John: i guess that'd explain why i can't get the stupid government to pay me. hey did you know that they give people free money here, just for being alive?! at least when the system works, i guess.
Rose: Yes, I'd figured that out. They do a lot of things like that around here, John.
John: this whole not real thing... i guess probably explains some other things too! like why i never feel hungry if i eat even a little... or i guess, really tired at all? i mean, sometimes i still sleep or eat, but...
Rose: Right. The food is more real than your insubstantial life force, so it fills you right up.
John: but if i want to eat, i probably can? i just have to... pretend like i am not really eating and i won't fill up? that seems like how this should probably work.
Rose: Feel free to experiment. We might as well enjoy the pros of our condition if we have to suffer the cons. Or well... we've already suffered the cons. But I'll explain that later.
John: oh man, i know this whole not being as real as the rest of the universe is probably technically a bad thing, but this is going to be great, rose! think about the prank potential! normally, i am already kind of a trickster, but now... i'll be like a ghosty trickster! *john grins, holding up a closed fist ambitiously, then remembers he has tea and drinks some. wow that's hot!*
Something resonates as John says the phrase "ghosty trickster."
John: ...That was weird. Did you feel that?
Rose: Yes. Certain things - words, phrases, sensations - seem to have that effect around us. I don't know why yet, but I'm going to find out.
John: so let me see if i've got this right. you and this lord caledonius guy - who by the way sounds like exactly the kind of creepy uncle guy an aspiring sorceress such as yourself has to be careful of - are comin' up with all kinds of plans with his other high society sorcerer buddies to see if you can't undo this curse that's been put on us so we're not so ghostly anymore! and you can't hang around me in public because you've got the whole high society thing figured out, and i'm comparatively kind of bumpkiny. is that right?
Rose: No. The reason that we can't hang around together in public is because when we're near each other, our auras amplify each other, and the negative energy produced agitates the Devae.
John: devae? that's not one that i know. what's a devae?
Rose: A Deva is an Empyrean God of Order. Some of them live here in the city, and act as elite police.
John: wait... are you telling me that in this city, gods work for sorcerers? that's totally backwards!
Rose: The Devae don't work for the Realm Lords, no. The relationship is complicated, and we don't really have time to go over it right now. They are dedicated to upholding peace in the city, and when we and the other people from our world showed up here in the city, it caused a disruption - there's too much negative energy in the world now. And while our dubious realness masks us in part from their notice, the balance between disruption and occultation is still sufficient to get their fiery hackles up. They know we're here, they don't know exactly what could happen if we stay here for too long, and they don't like it.
John: yikes! okay, so basically we're working with a powerful sorcerer to cure us of ghostliness without attracting too much attention from fiery law gods. this sounds like a quest, rose! is this a quest?
Rose: Yes, it's a quest.
John: *john jumps up with a woosh, floating slowly down instead of falling properly, to give his new abilities a try.* alright! holy shit! i didn't think i'd ever get to go on a quest! so... *he smoothes out his clothes as he lands.* what should i be doing?
Rose: *Rose stifles a laugh as she watches him enthusiastically leap into the air, and gets up.* Good question. For now, work on rounding up the rest of our friends and relatives. My ally is something of a prognosticator, and he's teaching me the art. We're all wrapped up in whatever is going to happen next. An excellent place to start would be to go find Jane. A rival Realm Lord has involved herself in this whole affair, and he suspects she's going to make moves to disrupt what we're doing, starting with Jane. Lord Rescha Peixes.
John: alright. then... i guess that's what i'm gonna do.
Rose: And stay on the lookout for other people from our world as well. You'll be able to tell even if you've never met them before. As you've probably noticed from talking to me, we have a sort of... blurry outline. Like an indistinctness.
John: oh one more thing, rose. are you sure we should trust this caledonius guy? he could very easily be trying to pull a fast one on us, and you are well known to have a weakness for knowledge and power.
Rose: *She looks surprised, and a little amused.* That's uncharacteristically suspicious of you, John. But no, I don't know for sure. We're far from home, and we don't have a lot of options if we want to track each other down again. And I'm not about to spend the rest of my life hiding from Devae.
John: alright. just be careful, alright rose?
Rose: I promise. You too.
John: *he shares a long smile with her, really relieved to be back in touch.* guess i should go.
Rose: See you.
John: *john jumps, and doesn't come back down. might as well get a headstart on practicing cool ghost powers! he floats up through the roof, and hangs in the air. screw gravity! this is awesome. screw directions, too! maybe if he just thinks of somewhere he wants to go, he'll be able to get there without uh... describing the intervening steps he takes? that's probably how these ghost powers work. pchooooo!*
Where to?