Edmund will follow.

Zei puts his sandals on and grabs his staff then walks out and down the stairs. He offers the innkeep a small wave then ducks out and leads the way away from the inn in long strides. "I gotta admit I'm excited to show summoning to someone who's never seen it before. But I don't wanna do it too close to the village otherwise people will want to come see and I won't be able to talk to you in Al Bhed."

"It does sound exciting. Summoners where I'm from can do... well, golems, those are human-sized elemental creations, and undead, like zombies or skeletons or wraiths. Nothing that would level an inn."

After a minute or two of walking Zei stops, still in view of the village but somewhat hidden by trees. Then he holds a hand up for Edmund to stop walking and takes a couple more steps away then stops.

"When people die, here," he says, "they don't always go to the Farplane. They can become lost in grief for their own deaths, and jealousy of those who still live. If they are not Sent, and do not make their way to the afterlife themselves, their emotions can consume them, and they become monsters. Fiends is what we call them, and they mindlessly prey on the living and continue on in torment until someone can give them release.

"People have learned how to harness this process, though. There is a ritual, and a willing person can sacrifice themself to bind their soul and their will to this world. Rather than being lost in despair, these people are united in hope. We call the people who have chosen to die this way 'fayth'. Their spirits reside in stone, and they wait for us, for summoners to visit them. And there, we commune with them, join our hearts and voices for a while. And if we are aligned in our desire to protect others and destroy Shiin, we form a bond."

The ground and the air start glowing around him, then. Faintly at first, but quickly growing bright enough to illuminate their surroundings entirely. "Through this bond, we summon them." And he extends his arms to the sides, the one holding his staff tilted diagonally up at the sky and the other down at the floor.

Four mystical symbols appear in the light, rotating around Zei and emiting more light, going 'round once, then twice, before stopping and sending four flashes of light into the heavens. They spiral towards each other, and when they meet, they join into a single bright source of light which takes the form of... a bird?

Not quite. The creature flies down from the light, wings hugged close to its body for extra momentum, before it extends them so it can glide and land heavily in front of Zei, the impact enough to leave a crater on the soft sand and the wind nearly pushing Zei off his feet. It is twice as tall as he is, but it leans down forward until its eyes are almost level with his.

Zei reaches up and pats the side of the creature's beak gently, smiling up at it. "This is Valefor," he tells Edmund. "She is my first aeon. My only aeon, so far."

"Valefor," Edmund repeats. He bows to the aeon. 

She looks over Zei's shoulder at Edmund, and returns the bow.

Zei turns around to look at Edmund himself, then, keeping the hand on Valefor's beak. "There are many temples in Spira with fayth in them that can grant summoners our aeons," Zei continues. "For our pilgrimage, we visit as many of them as we can, and try to commune with as many of them as we are able. All the way from Besaid, south of here, to Zanarkand, all the way to the north.

"And there we get the Final Aeon, which is meant to be the culmination of our desires to destroy Shiin." He frowns, then, and looks up at Valefor...

...who takes this as her cue to leave. She jumps, her legs powerful enough to lift her up into the air by enough that she can flap her wings to fly into the sky.

He watches his aeon go, then looks at Edmund again. "Everyone who summons Valefor will see that creature. It's the form she took, when she performed the ritual to become a fayth. Every Ifrit, Ixion, Shiva, and Bahamut look the same. As far as I know, they are the same.

"But the Final Aeons aren't. Every summoner who has killed Shiin had their own, individual Final Aeon, who did not look like any others. And every summoner who killed Shiin has lost at least one guardian. My father's guardian Auron did not survive the fight with Shiin. Lady Yocun, the high summoner of a hundred years ago, lost one guardian—but only one, out of the three that accompanied her in her journey."

"...huh. A ritual sacrifice. I can't say I'm unfamiliar with the concept, but... usually they're not so beneficent."

"It's not in the teachings," Zei says. "It's not something Yevon tells people about. When I raised this possibility with Lulu she—was distraught, but she hadn't known anything about it either. My guess here is that... however close the bond a summoner can form with the various fayth around the world, it's probably not as close as what we can have with the people who have spent our pilgrimage with us. That's probably where the power the Final Aeon has to pierce through Shiin's shell and kill it comes from. That's probably why Lady Yunalesca's husband also died when she first killed Shiin a thousand years ago.

"So! Question the first: why isn't it permanent? Why does Shiin return? Question the second: if former guardians become fayth for the summoning of the Final Aeon, why don't they stick around afterwards? Every other fayth can be found in temples around the world, they're there, available for everyone else."

"It's pretty fucking suspicious, I must admit."

"My guess, which may be complete bullshit and overactive paranoia, is that the answer to both questions is the same, that the whatever it is that's behind Shiin, creature or person or soul, uses the Final Aeon that killed it to rebuild and regenerate. Maybe I'm crazy, but I would hate to find out what happens if whatever is inside Shiin can jump ship and into you. From the story you told me, I don't want to know what a Shiin with your abilities could do."

And this theory would mean that his father's guardian, Sir Auron, is in Shiin right now, maybe being mind-controlled or, or whatever. Who knows. Ain't that a cheerful thought.

"I think... if anything like that happened to me, the Goddess would immolate us in a fury never before seen in all the worlds, which would solve your problem. But I'd rather not die."

"What would prevent it from jumping out of your body and into her, then? Genuine question."

"...I don't imagine Shiin can possess a puddle of molten jade."

"—right, probably not, for some reason I thought she'd be immune to her own fire."

"Generally she is. But - the idea of becoming host to a monster like that - she'd never tolerate it. She'd sooner destroy herself."

"I share the sentiment." Zei gestures towards the village, then, with his head, and starts walking back. "Before your impossible selves showed up my plan had been something like 'see if I can dig up any more information on this in Bevelle' and, failing that, 'see what the fuck is up with Zanarkand', but I am more than happy to take a support role."

"As I said, I'd rather not die, so that research sounds like a good idea. I'd rather be surer of my own ability to keep the bastard down."

"Yeah. So for now I guess you come with us and I do my best to play tour guide of Spira for you."

"Excellent. I couldn't ask for better."

"Save the flirting for when you're not reliant on me to speak the language," Zei says with a half-grin.