Independent Merchant Vessel Keiryoumaru, Divinity's Log, day 5 of voyage

Spiritual purity of engine shrine exceeds 99%. Received offerings at hours 4, 8, and 12 promptly. Bilge spacetime dumped at hour 10.

Captain's faith remains lackluster. Purser remains diligent. Passengers continue to disrupt orderly ship operation by chanting sutras.

Land sighted at hour 15. Received offering at hour 16 promptly.

A young blonde woman wearing a tricorne hat which is entirely failing to convey a captain's rank is intently perusing a detailed watercolor painting of an almost suspiciously lovely world.

"Guess there's no welcome sign," she says. "Well, how do you space people do it? Do we need to radio someone?" She sounds excited at that last, grinning. "Ground control to Major Tom, right?"

The elegant woman in a perfectly pressed British Age of Sail uniform (with some obvious tailor's alterations) looking over the captain's left shoulder does not look amused. Her eyes are blank white expanses of sclera, her face unchangingly neutral.

"You are Major Tom," she informs the captain in an inhuman voice like the tiniest bells of a carillon being struck for the first time after a winter deep freeze. "Likely no radio available." She pauses for a moment, unmoving. "Edo technology. Perhaps."

The captain makes an exaggerated pout.

"I don't really know what that means, you know. Whatever, let's put in at a port. Those sutras are driving me nuts. Han-nya-ha-ra-mi-ta..." She shakes her head. "I'm going to become enlightened just to get away from it if we don't make land soon."

She rings a little bell next to the watercolor, and claps her hands twice in prayer.

"Hey, can we get a closer look at that coast?" She gestures towards the northern bay. "Let's find their biggest port and make a splash."

There are three clear candidates for the biggest port:

Over near the entrance of the bay, a set of islands guards a large sheltered natural harbour in a river mouth, with a brightly coloured city on either side; this port seems to be very busy with smaller sailing ships, mostly outfitted for trade and fishing rather than war, although the southern port has some larger examples docked.

Up near the middle of the bay's north coast, there is an entire sprawling island city, glistening with gold and marble, in another large river mouth; it's certainly the largest settlement on the coast by far, but the attendant naval traffic is a little lighter.

And the other side of the bay mouth, there is a partly burnt out, much darker and smokier looking sprawling port city, which is attended by much more impressive war ships - although they are still all primitive sailing vessels, these are the ones of most considerable size.

The watercolor display repaints itself smoothly. An observant viewer might notice the stylized ships moving in real time.

"Hmm," says the captain. "Big port, big city, or, uh, did those guys over there make someone mad? They might just blow us up or something. Wow."

(The stylized ships on the watercolor display do make a distinction between military and civilian vessels; or at least the god's best guess at same.)

"Praem, what do you think?"

Praem stares at the map for a few seconds.

"No evidence of interstellar travel," she says. "We will be diplomats first."

"Yeah. If we weren't quite as exotic as we are, I'd want to head there," she indicates the bustling trade port, "but we'll probably be stuck with politicians and scientists and whatever. Plus, there's the passengers to consider. Probably here," she indicates the shiny centrally-located city, "has more specialists. Maybe a university, if we're lucky."

She spares another glance at the warship-guarded city, lingering over it for a few seconds, but then shakes her head.

"Lost colony? Aliens? Those look like human boats and all, but what makes a boat human, anyway?"

"You are the only human on this boat. Is it human?"

"Well, it's based on a human design. Alright, shiny city it is. Praem, take the helm."

She is grinning, bouncing with excitement.

Praem takes the helm...

...and the starship descends towards the north coast of the bay.

The Keiryoumaru is, in fact, a functional sailing vessel as well as a starship. Its basic plan is modeled after the semi-legendary Chinese treasure ships of Zheng He. The sails are decorative; it moves by a divine miracle worked by the fragment of a god's awareness enshrined in its depths.

The deity sings a sea shanty to itself as it works.

Absent any surprises on the way down, Praem plans to hover above the estuary near the harbor, not too far from shore. It would be impolite to simply commandeer a pier or wharf without introducing oneself first.

The wide area around the island city is the home of two river mouths; by the time they are hovering in an estuary-like location, they are sat between a smaller town on the other river mouth and a large beacon lighthouse above strangely iridescent cliffs on the far promontory - and over an increasing number of small vessels which are competing to get a good look.

There are an awful lot of people lining various balconies, rooftops, lookout posts and so on, pointing at them, pointing hand-held telescopes at them, and a few emplaced larger telescopes are also being pointed in their direction.

The lighthouse seems to be signalling them in some kind of presumably communicative code. They start with 'Hello, Unknown Vessel, we are Sarvos, we welcome peaceful traders!' in standard Imperial heliopticon encoding, repeat that a few times, then start proceeding through a set of 'flash prime numbers at the people you might not share a language with' style recognition signals if this is not acknowledged.

Praem is good at somehow already knowing languages, the ship's god is good at knowing when a lighthouse is trying to talk to it. They figure it out (and can even reply in kind—they need specialized equipment for communications with the starfaring civilizations back home, but the ship's god can do simple EM emissions easily, at least as long as it's for maritime voyaging purposes).

It's the captain's prerogative to respond, though. She relays the message to Marisa.

(A mouse sneaks off the bridge.)

Marisa is pretty excited!

"Sarvos, this is the independent merchant vessel Keiryoumaru, on a mission of exploration and trade, under the flag of the Treaty of Hakurei. Requesting permission to send two officers ashore."

"Permission granted, take any open berth, recommend Caricomare Docks, landmark white granite statue holding coin and lantern."

There are indeed a set of gleaming docks that look much more newly constructed than their surroundings, the quayside featuring a large white statue of a middle-aged human man holding a strangely reflective coin and a carved lantern.

Praem touches down gently and elegantly. She gently lays a hand on the wheel for a moment after completing her maneuvering, communicating something wordless to the ship's god.

She'd be a wonderful miko. Pity she isn't human.

Sitting in port, the Keiryoumaru doesn't look much like anything but an ordinary sailing vessel, though there is a distinct absence of crew on deck doing anything with the sails. (They are furled, but decoratively, and by the ship itself.)

No lines connect the ship to its pier; it simply moves to the correct location and stays there.

Praem collects some rope anyway. It's more polite to the god that way.

Marisa is excitedly rushing on deck already, broomstick in hand. She hovers onto the pier from the deck (a very short flight) and touches down, looking around excitedly in every direction.

Praem arrives more sedately, walking down a gangway and symbolically tying the ship to the pier.

"Who's that guy, Praem?" she says, indicating the statue. (She doesn't really expect Praem to know, mostly she's just excited, but Praem is Praem so you never know.)

Praem does not respond, but joins Marisa in looking around at the sights.

There is a small argument attempting to be a delegation waiting to meet them on the dock. The argument appears to be about who gets to greet the newcomers, what questions to ask them, and where they might want to be taken first. The major players in the argument - although each has several hangers-on - are a tall fiercely dressed woman with impressive curved ram's horns and metallic patterns to her skin, a highly impassioned gentleman with pointed ears and filigree pastel swirls on his cheeks in a somewhat simpler but still sumptuous robe, and a shorter individual with very pale skin, sallow cheeks, spectacles and a clipboard.

"That is the statue of Miroslav, ex-Senator for Sarvos and initial benefactor of Caricomare," contributes Clipboard, which also gives them an excellent view of his unusually sharp dentition. "Your docking fee has been paid by the Carta Notturno, I quote, 'interesting guests'."

"Greetings, my good friends!" exclaims the one with pointy ears. "Welcome to Caricomare! I am sure you have many questions, and the scholars of the Diora University would be delighted to satisfy your curiosity, if you would be so kind?"

"Don't listen to him," snaps the ram-horned lady. "I am Laria di Notturno di Sarvos, of the Carta Notturno, and I expect you would like a tour of the sights and perhaps directions to particular areas of interest - be they commercial or political?"

Marisa grins up at Clipboard. "Cool!"

Then she mostly fails to assume a more serious expression. "I'm Kirisame Marisa, captain of the Keiryoumaru. My planet is new to interstellar travel, and lots of us have been striking out into space uncharted by the galactic powers we're near. This is the ship's purser, Praem Saye."

She indicates Praem, who nods elegantly.

"We don't need a large crew to operate our ship, but we also have some passengers." Marisa grimaces a bit. "We had to take them on because of some politics back home. They're fine, just..."

"Noisy." Praem's voice is high and musical, like an icy wind through wind chimes.

She turns towards ram horns. "Thank you," she intones.

Then she nods at the scholar, and nods at Clipboard, stepping closer to him.

Marisa also nods at Clipboard. "Praem will help with any paperwork. Maybe with accommodating our passengers? Somewhere people won't mind chanting."

Then she turns to the other two, grinning in full again.

"I assume you have a department of mathematics? And what's a Carta Notturno?" She bounces, hovering a bit because she's still holding her broomstick.

"I'm sure the city of Sarvos can deal with a little noise. Would you like an overview of our laws so that you can ensure they don't get into any trouble with the militia?" asks Clipboard of Praem.

"We do indeed have a department of mathematics! Would you like to meet the theorists, the prognosticators or the calculators?" asks the representative of Diora University, still at the peak of enthusiasm although possibly a little less about mathematics, maybe it's not his subject. "Oh, and where are my manners - Tommaso Diora di Sarvos, at your service." He essays a slight bow in Kirisame's direction.

"The Carta Notturno is the guild responsible for the area of the Night Market and more recently for the rebuilding of Caricomare, the district in which you find yourself," explains Laria. "As one of the primary investors in the area, we take great Pride in displaying the fruits of our investment to honoured guests such as yourselves."

"Yoroshiku," says Marisa casually, returning the bow on autopilot. She addresses the group in general, looking up at individuals and making brief eye contact occasionally.

"Business before pleasure this time. It doesn't look like you have any space traffic from this planet—is this a lost Earth colony or something?—so I've got to set a good foundation for diplomacy, trade, all of that. I'd love to see the sights, learn about this place, tell you about the state of the galaxy. We're new to it ourselves. But, uh, I had to live off secondhand books for years, and I do want to talk to at least one math department everywhere I go. I'm a theorist, I think? Trying to catch up with all the algebraic geometry I missed out on."

Praem nods at Clipboard.

"Five monks. One commander."

(And, uncounted, some additional mice, one of whom is listening in. This is why many ships have cats.)

"Basics of Imperial law: no violence except in self defence, including poisoning and pretending to provide medical care but actually not doing so, and restricting someone's movements without lawful authority; no theft, including counterfeit of currency or Bourse notes, destroying someone else's property, trade in goods you believe to be stolen. There are a number of substances and items that it is illegal to own or trade in some circumstances, but as foreigners you'll simply be asked to take them back to your vessel if you are discovered to possess them. No impersonation of Imperial officials, contempt of court and subverting the agencies of state are prosecutable but unless you're doing it on purpose you are unlikely to run into trouble there. Militia in this jurisdiction wear a red and gold sash with a horse emblem for recognition purposes, please follow their instructions. Please avoid proselytising any non-Imperial religion, most religious laws are unlikely to get you more than a warning on a first offence but it may upset people. If you bring slaves into the country then they are entitled to leave your service immediately, we have organisations which will help resettle them, you may be prosecuted for non-compliance with this." Clipboard instructs Praem. "Usually the courts are quite lenient with foreigners for their first offence as long as you clearly don't intend to repeat it, most likely any matter will conclude in a fine at worst, unless you decide to take that as license and do great or irreparable harm. It is very likely that nobody will even slightly notice six people, unless the 'monks' attempt to convert anyone to whatever religion they follow and it is not compatible with the Way."

"We have no means of travelling the stars," admits Tommaso, "and many people will be extremely interested in establishing contact! Some of the Empire's people did arrive from the stars many centuries ago, although I'm not sure precisely what you mean by a 'lost earth colony', we have plenty of good soil here. Ginevra, why don't you go round up a geometrist or two, ideally a pure theorist and someone who casts with it?" One of Tommaso's hangers-on scurries off into the crowds.

"Let me take you on a brief tour of Caricomare and we'll see if we can scare up the Senator for you," replies Laria. "I would be very happy to answer your questions as they come to you, and hear about what is out there; I can certainly offer extensive trading connections, but the Senator might be more appropriate for diplomatic matters." She nods to one of her hangers-on, who also heads off into the crowds determinedly.

Praem seems interested in the law, for types of seeming which don't involve facial expressions. She speaks significantly more words in a row than she has yet.

"I will review our cargo against your schedule of illegal items. Likely none." She pauses. "We have coerced no sentient being into our service. If slavery includes nonsentient spirits or natural forces, we may have committed it." She pauses again, her phrases getting a bit more terse. "I am Protestant. Not likely to proselytize. May discuss theology. The monks are Buddhist. They will want to but will comply with the letter of law. There is a god aboard our ship. Unrelated to either religion. Unable to leave it without difficulty. Likely not interested in such."

She pauses again, for very slightly longer. "I am interested in learning about your religious tenets."

Marisa has more facial expressions, mostly huge grins.

"Wow, I've never met someone else who casts with geometry. Had to build my entire theory from scratch. Actually started with traditional witchcraft, you know? Oh, right, Earth colony. As far as we know all human populations are descended from one planet, and you look pretty human. Uh, meeting with Senators and so on is probably important, yeah. We don't have a government, just a treaty, but I, uh, know a signatory." She looks a bit embarrassed. "Technically I'm one too, but not as important. Yeah, let's look around this city! Looks pretty great! Don't industrialize, apparently it makes your ports into total dumps."

She looks over at Praem.

"Will catch up," she says. "Unless we should follow?" she adds, glancing unreadably at Clipboard. "Passengers still chanting for the hour."

"You're free to go wherever you like as long as you obey the law; if you're on someone's private property they're entitled to ask you to leave, and to enforce that if you refuse," replies Clipboard. "We'll make sure someone is here to greet your passengers when they disembark, although that looks like it will not be difficult. Local law relevantly prohibits promoting false virtues, the teachings of false exemplars or false paragons, actively teaching and promoting false doctrines, or the worship, veneration or exaltation of any inhuman entity or force; we tend to be lax on that last one for foreigners as long as it's not encouraging anyone else to join in. Slavery is defined regarding persons, it seems likely that your nonsentient spirits or natural forces are not relevantly persons." He leafs through his clipboard and pulls out a piece of paper, small but densely printed. "Here is the schedule of illegal items, it's unclear whether you will know them by the same names, please do ask for clarification; policy is not to confiscate from the vessels of foreigners as long as they do not bring them onto land."

"If you'd like to meet our bishop I'm sure he'd make time for you, or we could head to the Cathedral and you can have your fill of religious education," offers one of Laria's group.

"Geometry isn't a very popular casting form here unless you count runes and constellations, but it's possible," replies Tommaso, "I'm sure they'll be extremely keen to exchange notes."

"Humans are only part of our population," points out one of Tommaso's hangers-on, "we also have orcs, and also not all humans are descended from the Steinr and the Vard - leading theories suggest origin populations in Varushka from Night magic, and separately in one of the jungle nations overseas, from the great apes."

"Our docks at Caricomare are of course the most beautiful in the known world," Laria asserts, "although you may also want to look in at Siroc for a different style. I imagine if Temeschwar or Holberg had great docks they would indeed be a 'dump', yes. Let's head towards the Blood Red Quays Art Gallery, do let me know if you want a closer look at anything we pass."

The docks are bustling with activity, mostly officials checking paperwork, stevedores loading and unloading (there are some construction projects ongoing that look like they are some kind of mechanical crane, but they are not yet in operation), passengers alighting and taking in the sights and smells of the city (surprisingly pleasant for a medieval kind of city, heavy on the spices and perfumes). A few enterprising merchants have simple stalls set up in the arches supporting the next level of the city, mostly selling food and drinks, some fishing and boat repair supplies.

Praem nods at Clipboard, taking the paper. The ship's cargo is unlikely to be contraband - it's mostly precious metals and gems (the subterranean youkai want most of the profits if those are traded, but some are Marisa's personal wealth), objects selected for artistic merit, various magical novelties intended more to show off types of magic than be useful, blank spell cards, fusion reactor fact sheets and schematics (not complete, meant as an enticement to join a technology-sharing agreement with the mountain dwellers), and jailbroken Galactic Federation computers (provided by Praem). It's a sampler which various factions loaned items to in hopes of establishing ongoing trade relations.

"I am also a bishop," replies Praem. "Should talk to him."

Marisa is keeping an eye out for a stall selling something sweet. (She doesn't have local money on her, of course, just an eclectic mix of gold and silver coins from civilizations that may or may not ever have existed.)

"I'm an ape descended human, as far as anyone out there in space knows that's the only kind. Where I'm from, there's humans and youkai—we use 'youkai' as a sort of catch-all for magical beings, even though it's not really accurate. Anyway, I haven't heard of anywhere else where humans do magic. Maybe that's this planet's advantage in trade. I do it, but that's just me."

"I know other human mages. Not recommended to learn that kind."

"Really? Never knew that." She addresses the locals again. "Yeah, Praem's really well travelled."

"Let's go and check in with her office, she's probably just in there writing letters," says the Carta Notturno member talking to Praem. On closer inspection, he appears to have yellow snake eyes, fangs and a bit of a lisp.

There are a good number of stalls selling sweet things, mostly elaborate pastries drizzled with honey and sprinkled with nuts, crisp pastry tubes stuffed with sweet creams, or sweet crisp breads with dried fruit. They are all quite happy to haggle a value for strange gold and silver coins, generally wanting to give her change in the Imperial currency - dull bronze coins stamped with intricate designs, denominated in one and five 'rings' - for them if she only wants an individual portion, at least after Laria gives them a 'don't rip off my guest' look. More of the stall-holders than their greeting party are baseline humans, but some have a variety of interesting features, from green veins and patches of bark to sharp snaggly teeth and a rather unhealthy looking pallor.

"The Empire has a considerable magical tradition; we like to think we are the most generally advanced magical power in the world, although there are a few foreign nations that have advantages in more focused areas," explains Laria.

"Are your 'youkai' creatures of the magical Realms, or some other kind?" asks Tommaso eagerly.

Marisa tries a few small servings. She probably won't turn over gold for street food, but might overpay in silver; she likes haggling but has no local knowledge yet. If there's a pastry garnished with strawberries, she'll feed any strawberries to Praem by hand.

Praem does not eat any food other than being fed strawberries, but seems wordlessly interested in a meeting with local religious leaders, nodding at the one proposing it.

"Some of them are from magical realms, but not any more than being from some mountain or something. You can recognize them because they seem a little bit like they're not real. It's like... the proper place to meet a youkai is if you're lost in the woods in the middle of the night or something. When you get back to camp, you'll wonder if you imagined the whole thing. Well, if you talk to one socially over tea, it's a little bit of that in the back of your mind. It's toned down with the youkai monks on the ship, because they're Buddhists, or I'd tell you to meet one and see. Maybe their superior, if she comes out."

(Marisa also tries to figure out their currency system from whatever clues there are. She hopes it's base 12!)

None of the sweet food sellers are doing strawberries, but there is a separate fruit stall which is.

"Follow me, then," says the somewhat snake-ish Notturno to Praem, and starts moving off more determinedly down the dockside.

"That sounds more like wolves than heralds," replies Tommaso, "maybe the word covers both?"

"Here we have the Blood Red Quays Art Gallery," announces Laria, pausing in front of a grand edifice in a stunningly white building material with red brick highlights. The tall door is surmounted by a pillared balcony looking out over the harbour. "Any particular artistic style you might be interested in, or shall we head up to the balcony for a nice view across the harbour?"

The currency system is, well. The 'rings' come in 5 ring and 1 ring pieces, the next coin up appears to be a 'crown', and that's twenty rings. Her adventures in small change have not got much further than that; some of the traders had four crown pieces in their cash boxes, however, which suggests that it does not necessarily proceed logically from there.

Praem elegantly follows!

"Can't say I know your art history," says Marisa, playing with some coins. "Point out the best ones for me, so I know how to look cultured. Is that building all stone? Uh, wolves? I can think of a wolf youkai or two, they like triangular fang motifs usually. Not sure that you mean the animal, though."

Marisa gives Praem a casual wave as she goes off.

The Carta member leads Praem through a maze of side streets and alleyways, many passing under and through other layered buildings, and arrives at a smaller, neat building with detailing in the bright white stone that seems to be popular for impressive architecture.

They enter through a small door set into one of two impressive iron bound doors, her escort nods at a receptionist or possibly guard who is sitting at a table near the door sorting through a pile of letters, and knocks on a side door off the moderately impressive main hall - lots of tapestries, embroidered cushions on long pews and so on, with a raised stage area containing an elaborately carved lecturn.

"The jewel of the collection is meant to be the portraits in the Butchers Gallery, especially the ones painted by the senator herself, but personally I've always preferred the cityscapes, especially Ilaria's - she came to us from Urizen, you know," replies Laria. "The Milestones exhibit is quite something, though, I'll give them that."

"Oh, sorry, wolves is a technical term," replies Tommaso. "Not really my field, you'd need to go to Temeschwar for the experts there, but essentially they're the things that go bump in the depths of the Varushkan woods. Responsive to hospitality, can't get you on the roads if they've been properly maintained, but makes the place rather perilous, especially at night."

Praem looks around a bit at the architecture, nodding politely at the door-minder. Her blank gaze lingers for a moment on the correspondence, but it would be rude to pry.

"Sounds like home, I live in some perilous woods. Humans actually getting eaten is rare these days, it was actually mostly before my time, but it's not exactly safe either. Yeah, lead the way, that all sounds good. Sounds like senators are the most important officials around here?"

The side door opens; a lady in rich red and gold robes looks vaguely annoyed at them for a moment, then notices Praem is somewhat odd looking and puts on a much more open and welcoming expression.

"Thisss is Praem, she arrived on a flying ship into the harbour and wanted to talk comparative theology," explains Praem's escort.

"Oh! Welcome to the Night Market Church. Do come in, have a seat, would you like some wine and nibbles?"

The office is clearly a working room, there's a desk covered in various bits of paper, several high backed wooden chairs with red and gold cushions, mismatched cupboards. It still has lovely patterned wallpaper and a couple of portrait paintings in gilded frames.

Laria leads Marisa through the grand entrance, nods to the attendant on duty at a front desk, and breezes past the guards on duty into a gallery with rich red wallpaper and many portraits in elaborate gilded frames, all labelled as Someone di Something di Something Else - often Sarvos - or Someone Something von Temeschwar, and 'Member of the Butcher's Guild' or 'Esteemed Patron of the Butcher's Guild'; sometimes it's 'of the Butcher's Bank' instead.

The portraits are all technically marvellous, although possibly a bit lacking in animation and character; they all kind of look the same, like there's an Approved Portrait Style for this gallery.

"Senators are second only to the Empress, if we had one; as it is, they're still squabbling, Lisabetta was a tough act to follow."

"Good day and thank you for your hospitality." Praem sits on the best-positioned chair. "I am Praem Saye, titled Peregrine Bishop to the Unfamiliar Places of the Church of England, appointed by Her Majesty, Empress Victoria III. I have not travelled here in that official capacity. It is a position with irregular responsibilities." Her high, sing-song tone has the quality of a practiced recitation.

Praem sips some wine. Someone perceptive might notice it fizz slightly as it passes her lips.

"I have authority for diplomacy. But I am mainly here to learn." She pauses. "A priority. Are there hostile gods here? By any definition."

Marisa flits from portrait to portrait, viewing them at various distances, continuing to talk. She tries to find patterns in the names, but not very hard; she knows how long it takes her to memorize things like this, and it's quite a bit longer than she's going to spend.

"Seems like the butchers are pretty important here! Guess it's their museum, right. Does the senate elect an Empress? Who appoints senators, does the local government do it? Sorry for the silly questions, government where I'm from is 'you get in a duel to resolve disputes, and if things get too out of hand Reimu comes and duels you and always wins'. Well, and the old treaty, and the new treaty, for the really powerful people. I've been picking it up as I travel!"

"Bishop Serelina di Notturno di Sarvos, at your service.

There are no gods here, and as far as we are aware, the concept is incoherent everywhere; every now and again some powerful beings decide to attempt to set themselves up as gods, which rarely goes well for anyone involved.

Juno, thank you for bringing me this very interesting person, you can go now."

The other guild member, presumably Juno, bows sarcastically and leaves them to it, shutting the door behind them.

"I have sent Juno away because there are laws against incautious proselytization, which I wouldn't want you to fall afoul of while we have a private, fascinating conversation.

What do you know of the Way already, so that I don't bore you by repetition?"

"The Butchers Bank - or, at least, Lorenzo La Volpe, in his capacity as the richest man in the Empire - sponsored this building, and an awful lot of other public works projects besides," replies Laria. "May he pass through the Labyrinth swiftly, or be propelled from it by his works, as I'm sure he intended.

The Senate is indeed responsible for electing an Empress; apparently last season's Throne vote was quite dramatic, one of the candidates died in the process, although they unfortunately didn't have the sense of style to elect her while they were at it.

The Dawnish used to have a big fight about their senators, but in general the Empire is not a fan of duelling that isn't entirely consensual, so our options are a little limited on that front; here, the owners of businesses get voting certificates they can fill in for the candidate of their choice, which is a little dull and sedate but does get the job done - and at least it's something people can trade, or 'lose', keeps it a little bit exciting. Every nation in the Empire is different in how it appoints its Senators, but essentially it's always some kind of popularity contest."

"I am unfamiliar. Few inferences."

"Sounds exciting, we don't usually have people die in duels, though I know one person who dies on purpose in them. It's a show of magic, doesn't really hurt more than a solid punch to get hit. Some people play rougher than others, but it's about the artistry and mastery really. And we've got treaties. They actually made me sign both! I'm just a human. Anyway, what's the Labyrinth? Can we see some more art?"

"Okay. I don't normally teach introductory classes, so let me know if anything is especially unclear.

When a human dies, their soul goes to the Labyrinth - which is probably not really a 'place', but one of our Doctrines is that you can't actually really understand it unless you're already about to transcend it, so don't get too hung up on that, I suppose.

They stay in the Labyrinth for some amount of time, and are then reborn in a new body, without direct access to their previous memories.

We know things about this because we can unlock those memories - but only very partially, and only with a very expensive substance that it takes a considerable amount of the Empire's productive capabilities to produce. We call the substance 'true liao' and the unlocking a 'past life vision'.

Due to this ability, we have also managed to deduce some other things about how this works. There are fundamental drives in human nature - probably the nature of all sentients, but our research has been primarily on humans - that we call Virtues. Some of these Virtues help a soul move faster through the Labyrinth - we call those True Virtues. Our current list is Wisdom, Prosperity, Ambition, Courage, Vigilance, Pride and Loyalty, which is fairly stable but there have been changes in the past when new evidence has been presented.

Some individuals that should have gone very fast through the Labyrinth instead don't come back at all - but do have, uh, variously documented effects on the world after their death. We call these individuals Paragons, and say they have transcended the Labyrinth and gone beyond it. The documented effects are mostly visions, and also sometimes what we call 'miracles' - effects that are not explainable in other ways, often to do with auras but not always.

Auras are, I suppose, a side topic in religion - the refined vinum that doesn't become true liao creates a substance that's just called liao, which lets properly trained priests leave auras of a virtue on places, people, and things. Only humans can successfully take liao out of the people we've tried it on; orcs can't stomach it and reject it rather messily, heralds have a range of effects but none are the normal one. Humans, and possibly orcs although this is controversial, can also leave these auras just by getting into a mindset extremely aligned with the Virtue in question - this is one of the most usual forms of miracle - but it happens rarely enough to be called that.

Are you following so far? There are a lot of edge cases, the words for the Virtues are a little misleading in places and could generally do with detailed exposition, and I haven't really mentioned Exemplars or the religious laws yet, but that is the fundamental basis of our faith."

"Yes, it's very illegal to murder someone in a duel even if they consented to it, although how much that is successfully enforced varies from place to place. Do you have better retrieval of past lives than us, or is something else odd going on with someone who can die repeatedly and still each time be a... consistent enough person that you recognise them?

The Labyrinth of Ages is where we go when we die; the soul loses access to its memories unless they're unlocked later, at great expense, but is reborn with the Virtues that you cultivated in your previous lives, and other general similarities.

Are you going to be looking for the Empire to sign treaties? Generally that would happen at Anvil, at one of the solstice or equinox gatherings.

Let's wander through the Roads gallery and get to Landscapes."

The Blood Red Roads gallery is a little monotonous - a lot of milestones and markers painted to look like the white stone, with names engraved and painted in red. Landscapes is much more varied and interesting, with everything from extremely abstract canvases to amazing hyper realistic paintings that must have taken an awfully long time to do by hand.

Praem listens attentively.

"Some common ground with Buddhists. Some of those on our ship. They seek escape from rebirth." She pauses for a moment. "Not all beings are reborn in the same way, or at all. Have seen differences even among human lineages."

"What are the metaphysics of the others you mentioned? Heralds, orcs."

"She was some noblewoman born centuries ago who drank an immortality elixir, she doesn't die die. She dies on purpose at the end of every spell, I think just so she can be reborn straight into the next one. A style thing, I guess. It's actually kinda hard to talk to dead spirits usually but they might remember their life, I think when someone's reborn the normal way they basically never remember anything. New brain and all."

She looks serious at the talk of treaty signing. "Realistically, the Admiral will want to sign something with your Empire before someone else who won't respect your sovereignty finds you. There's a lot of warlordism out there, and the Admiral wants to be at the vanguard of something other than that. My planet is a special case and some of the most powerful individuals signed a treaty with her as individuals, as well as some on behalf of various factions, that's the new treaty. It also incorporates the old treaty, which is like a dueling code for especially powerful youkai. I definitely didn't deserve to be on it, it's just that I come the closest to being able to win against Reimu, by which I mean I absolutely can't but I can lose with some dignity. The old treaty was around for long enough that the culture by now is entirely nonlethal, I can only think of three or four people who ever tried to kill me and they were all some kind of outsider."

The seriousness drops away at the landscape gallery. "Wow, this is great!"

She goes around from painting to painting, inspecting them from near and far. If there's any paintings of forests at night, she would especially appreciate those!

"'Lineage' means something specific here, which I'm not sure is exactly what you mean by it," replies Serelina carefully, "and we are very sure that our variety, which is based on ancestry or contact with the magical Realms, has no effect on any of this. There are some that hold that it is an impediment to Virtue, but I have seen no evidence of this; I think some people just like to have an excuse to look down on other people.

Heralds are creatures of the Realms; some are not really separate individuals to begin with, some of them go back to their Realm when killed here, and some simply dissipate entirely. They don't have souls, as far as we can discern; they are purely of magic.

Orcs... orcs go to the Howling Abyss. They get one chance to jump across; if they succeed, they remain on the other side as an Ancestor, and the living orcs can hear the Ancestors that they have some attachment to, usually by blood, although possibly also by other means. The True Virtues also help them - the leap is based on their deeds in life, if they were great and inspiring enough, and the Virtues prompt us to action."

She seems somewhat uncomfortable with the fate of orcs - much more so than of heralds, which was delivered in a much more matter of fact, almost careless manner.

"Oh! Like a Sovereign, then - they are ancient beings, once human, who carved out important parts of themselves in return for immortality, and haunt the forests of Varushka.

We have the means of accessing memories of past lives, although it's very expensive - perhaps you will be able to help us make it at greater scale, that would be quite something? We also have rituals for contacting the dead, although the longer they have been dead, the more perilous it is - if they've been reborn since, you generally get... something else... in fact, one of the candidates for Empress was eaten by one such monstrosity just this season!

The Senate can ratify treaties, although I think some provisions would require them to stop squabbling and appoint a Throne to confirm them. We have some ability to defend ourselves magically, but possibly not against a flotilla of flying boats that can... rain fire from the skies? Or simply drop rocks from very far up, I suppose that would be quite unpleasant?"

Cityscapes and pastoral farming scenes are clearly the most popular varieties of landscape in the gallery, with coastlines and sailing vessels out to sea as runners-up, but there are a couple of dark and deep woods, with glowing red or yellow eyes watching covetously from just off the road.

"Some locality. Were my human friend to die here, she would likely find herself in the Labyrinth, if it accepts all human souls. If she died on her homeworld, she would await rebirth in the Netherworld there. Likely knows enough magic to return from there as a phantom. Were I to die here, I would leave the universe, not unlike heralds. Because I am not from here. Unless I joined the Saye dead."

She pauses. "Simplifying some. I am not exactly alive. Just visiting."

She pauses again, for a bit longer. "Is 'lineage' a technical term?"

"Usually dead spirits are hanging around the Netherworld, or Hell, which are just places you can go, at least where I'm from. Well, there's a little magic involved. Trying to call back their souls seems like a bad idea, but it's not my field."

Marisa pauses her gawking at a painting to put on her serious face for a moment. "Dropping things is devastating, yeah. There's very large rocks available, or just small projectiles moving very fast. A big problem is that orbit is a completely unassailable position for a planet without orbital spaceflight. It's very hard to leave a planet, very easy to drop things onto one. No reason they even need to be as close as orbit. Maybe you have magic that can put things on very distant ships moving very quickly, which would help, or other really heavy-hitting powers. You're not near pirate clans, though. Well, you're not near anything, but closer to human admirals than pirate clans, which means defense satellites and a signed treaty are what you want, they might want to snap up a planet but they won't want to go to war with Admiral Hearn."

"I love this one," says Marisa, returning to look at a painting of some very spooky woods. "Reminds me of home. Just paint in my house over here. So are those spooky eyes supposed to be, uh, what did you call it, your version of youkai? Waiting to eat travellers, and all that?"

"That sounds like what heralds are - not exactly alive, just visiting.

People here sometimes become ghosts, if they can't bear to leave the world yet for some reason - generally it's a mercy to move them on from that state, though, it's rarely pleasant. And sometimes things emerge from the Labyrinth, but they aren't usually individual souls without being reborn; it has its own creatures which make it their home - the ones that come out are... rarely pleasant, either. Generally quite dangerous, in fact.

'Lineage' is a technical term for us, yes - although it also still has its general meaning of 'blood ancestry'. Those who are touched by one of the magical Realms have changes on them - like Juno who brought you here, he's a naga, touched by the Night realm - and we call them 'lineaged'.

I'd be fascinated to hear what you know of your own afterlives; I don't think anyone could mistake it for proselytization, I am a Synod priest and am expected to be able to look after myself on that front a lot more than a random person on the street."

"I expect with the right magic you could visit the Labyrinth, and certainly some cultures describe it as a 'hell' - the Faraden call it the howling wastes, and the Axou are so afraid of it they sometimes trap their souls in objects! I suppose that's what happens when you don't follow the True Virtues, you don't have a very good time of it.

I don't actually know how high up the limits of magic are; we can't affect the moon, I know that much, but people think that might be because it's made of White Granite or something rather than because it's out of reach. It does have some weird relationship with boundaries though, I'm not enough of a magician to know the details, but the lines on the map are somehow actually quite real, apparently - which is terribly awkward when it comes to conquering territories, it's a bit of an all or nothing job," replies Laria.

"Wolves," explains Tommaso, who has just caught up after having to pay for entry at the front desk. "And yes, if you leave the roads, then you are on the menu; the Varushkans have a lot of rules about hospitality and where you should be at night, for very good reasons. It's kind of fascinating really - other nations don't have anything like it, I've always wanted to see what happens if the Varushkans take a new territory that starts out perfectly normal, but Ossium isn't exactly a good test case - it's hard to tell if the woods are haunted because the Varushkans claimed it or because the Druj left it full of traps and... horrors.

I suppose Temeschwar still has it a bit, but it's not clear whether they would if they'd started League, rather than breaking away from the Varushkans later."

"No shortage of claimants on the dead. Likely easier to interact with than physical bodies. Some mages can seize themselves. I work with a god that claims human souls for physical resurrection. Being legibly claimable is important. My god submits to theophagy to align with souls. Reincarnation likely second best fate. Annihilation surprisingly uncommon. Possibly easier to annihilate a god than a mortal."

"No paper copies of my academic work on me. Can print later. I wrote a monograph classifying types of god. One is shorthand for a powerful being with relevant metaphysics. One is beings who gain from worship. One is eternal uncaused beings. My allied god is the last type, but I am also, and I do not identify as a god."

"Likely you are correct to steer people away from claims by most gods." Her eyes seem to narrow, but at the same time, her blank facial expression does not seem to change. "They are irresponsible."

"Huh, well, I didn't ask Sumiyoshi for a geological survey or anything. You have metaphysical borders, really? We used to, but then we got a planet, and it turns out huge amounts of physical space work just fine. Probably on or off planet counts as a border for you too?"

"I'd ask if your 'wolves' could be tamed, but that might rely on a lot of really specific things about our history, like nearly running out of humans such that eating us became a bad idea. I kinda don't like the sound of 'horrors' though! Does anyone ever talk to these things, or just get eaten?"

"Yes, that lines up with what we know about souls - people regularly get into a panic about 'souls being destroyed', but every time anyone has looked into it, at worst they're trapped temporarily and once you solve the problem they go on just fine.

The closest thing to gods that actually exists here is the Eternals - you'd really want to talk to someone from the University to understand them in depth, but as far as I understand it, they're kind of like big magical phenomena that coalesce around a particular theme that resonates with their Realm - and often act kind of like people, and can be negotiated with for power and so on, but fundamentally they don't really know what a soul is and they get confused whenever they try to understand them.

If they could affect souls I have no doubt they would be highly irresponsible with them, yes.

Just a word of caution - you should probably avoid talking to people in general about afterlife interactions and deities. The social contract of the Empire is that the priests of the Synod discuss this kind of thing, and the person on the street doesn't have to worry about it; they might get sufficiently upset to try to have you arrested for a religious crime, which would be unfortunate."

"Yes, we have metaphysical borders; we'd be delighted to find out how far up they go, experiments have so far been inconclusive - we can't really do much better than very tall towers and floating balloons, which can be hard to retrieve again when they get too high up.

It's possible to bargain with the more intelligent wolves, or the Sovereigns - those generally used to be human, but gave it up on the quest for immortality. Some of them are basically just wild animals and will eat you if you're not keeping to the general bargain made in the area, assuming there is one.

Druj just like doing, essentially, the most hideous awful thing they can possibly think of under all circumstances; so some of it is just your standard poisoned spikes under festering heads on poles type thing, some of it is a terrible miasma of despair that they really like spreading over any territory they hold, and some of it is the really big unpleasant stuff like tortured souls - it turns out, right, if you torture someone to death in exactly the right way, you get this extra powerful ghost that hates everyone and is quite effective at killing them, cursing them to kill each other, and so forth. It's possible to take them down, a lot of them have been taken down, but you need, like, an entire group of powerful priests to get it done properly.

Negotiating with them is not, so far, really a thing; and the Druj are constitutionally incapable of keeping any kind of agreement, the stabbing of backs is their national sport. Pretty much everyone who even stands still enough to listen to a tortured soul's complaints winds up cursed, which is fixable but it's a big hassle, or dead, which is not fixable as far as we're aware."

Tommaso is faintly distressed while describing what the Druj have been up to, but clearly also fascinated despite himself.

"Gods of the second kind are a fact of everyday life where my ship voyaged from. Worshiping them is transactional. A god of voyages serves as the engine. I perform rites as payment. He moves the ship and replaces most navigational equipment. A wooden ship cannot ordinarily travel the stars. Technological starships are extremely difficult. This type of god is close to an ordinary person with alien metaphysics."

"Many gods of any type are best thought of as naughty children. Which may be small comfort if they are stronger than you. More civilized ones are more narrow."

Her glass is empty. "Would you like some tea? I know you are the host here. It will be a useful example."

"I'm really just guessing but probably a tower is inside, a balloon too high up to see is outside. See either way I mean, the Mountain did some experiments with satellites, but they could see down from orbit. No idea if all metaphysical borders work like ours did though, like the Moon wasn't inside but it was compatible or something so it kinda was. It's almost certainly not some ad coelum thing, that would be really ridiculous."

"Hope your kinda-like-youkai things get civilized someday. And, uh, your Druj problem sounds pretty terrible. It's not like I've never heard of a vengeful ghost cursing people to kill each other or things like that, but they don't have territory bigger than, like, one building. And at home I'd just go over and duel them, because it'd be some youkai weirdo who thinks spreading miasmas of despair is fun and they'd stop after a duel. But I wouldn't duel a pirate clan, because they can't be reasoned with, all they do is raid and consume in order to raid and consume. I know someone who duels pirate clans, though." She leans in conspiratorially, which she is really too short to actually do properly. "You can probably hire her for real cheap, the secret is she doesn't actually understand money and just gets paid a lot because people hiring her are terrified of her. I asked and she's only blown up a planet on purpose like, three times, it's usually just already rigged to explode."

"Yes, you probably want to call that kind of 'god' an Eternal while you're here - or a Herald if they're small and move around in the real world, I guess - it's the same thing, just terminology that reflects that they aren't actually anything to do with what happens to your soul, makes people less excitable about it.

Naughty children is an excellent label for most of the Eternals, although some of them would be upset about it, I suppose.

Sure, I'd love your interesting demonstration tea."

"I'm sorry, my Old Asavean isn't really up to much - ad coelum?" asks Tommaso.

"I do rather hope our planet is not rigged to explode," replies Laria, "it's kind of where I keep all my stuff! I suppose if we all reincarnated somewhere else we could rebuild the Empire, but it sounds rather tiresome.

If the Druj could have done that they'd probably have exploded it in their frequent internal bickering by now, and I hope we'd have enough redeeming features elsewhere to avoid her deliberate planet-exploding services.

We do have several exciting pressing issues like that which could do with a firm hand; as well as the Druj, there's the Vallorn - not sentient this time, fortunately, but the kind of growing-out-of-control plant mass that would take over the planet if the Navarr didn't spend all their energy keeping it contained; the Grendel, whose entire economy is based around slaves and opportunistic invasion of anyone who looks like they're distracted; the Jotun, whose entire culture is based around dying impressively in battle, and thus they tend to pick a considerable number of fights; and that's just our local set of hazards that are active threats to us right now, the world has many more exciting little foibles here and there that we aren't currently fighting because frankly, that is too many fights already..."

Praem stands and pours hot tea from a teapot which was somehow already in her hands into a cup which was somehow already on the desk. She stares at the desk for a moment and sits back down, no teapot in evidence.

"I can serve tea to guests because that is something I do. I am experienced and can bend somewhat to serve tea while a guest, but there will be no refills. I attempted but was not able to pour a cup for myself. You will enjoy the tea, unless you are predisposed against me or against tea in general. The yaoyorozu no kami work similarly. Focus gives identity. Identity gives miracles. Miracles receive worship, which strengthens identity. The last applies to kami, not me. I am self-sustaining."

"Are Heralds similar? Would your beliefs accommodate space travel facilitated by performing rituals for a kami?"

"Ad coelum et ad inferos is a legal doctrine from before space travel, and I think before other stuff because cities have subways, where owning land means you own everything above and below that land. I think it can only possibly work if you can't dig very deep or go very high."

"I'm not sure what the deal is with exploding planets, honestly. I think the ancient birds used a lot of physics-warping geothermal power plants which tap the centers of planets, and somehow they can be rigged to explode. Uh, do you have any myths about wise and powerful bird people? Generally she just works independently or sometimes on contract fighting the pirate clans, who just attack everything for resources, and they like powerful bird tech, and she was raised by birds and hates pirate clans having bird tech, and planets explode in the crossfire, I guess. I just have random anecdotes from her. Honestly she might fight something that's not a pirate clan for vacation. I mean, she doesn't just jump into fights, or else she might have wiped out the more unscrupulous human admirals. I think there has to be either a really clear moral line or some bird tech involved. When she came to my planet we just had some normal magic duels, hung out at the firing range shooting lasers, that sort of thing."

"Hey, hey, when you guys get all your dignitaries assembled, I should show off some lasers! Maybe I can teach your math people?"

"I'm no magician, but that sounds like Heralds, yes." She sips the tea politely, mostly as a signal of trust.

"As to whether the Synod will allow it - if people show up saying that these things are gods and must be worshipped to receive miracles, absolutely not, you'd get the rabble who defaced everything the Asavean architect worked on which happened to depict gods shouting and making trouble.

If they instead call them magical entities which require ritual behaviour to satisfy negotiated agreements, I imagine some Highborn will get their knickers in a twist about it, but it's no different to what the Varushkans do with their local weird powerful entities; if it's needed for useful, practical outcomes I expect it'd be accepted."

"Bird people? I don't think that's one we have? There are Heralds that take the form of bird people, Lashonar's are particularly annoying - he's the Eternal of gossip, essentially, and they talk constantly," replies Laria.

"Hmm," replies Tommaso, "except we do have all those mysterious ancient ruins over in Urizen which aren't quite the right size for humans and have all these lovely big openings on upper floors over dramatic mountainsides - that sounds very like the kind of thing I would build, if I was a wise and powerful bird person?

Hopefully Ginerva will be back with our mathematicians shortly - it might be worth checking the lobby in a little while, actually, I suspect some of them would refuse the entrance fee on principle."

"Performing ritual honorably is sufficient. Foreigners will not stop saying 'gods'. Perhaps adopt a loanword. Perhaps they are foreign Heralds. If the theology is resolved, your planet could benefit."

"I am receiving an urgent call. A moment, please." She sits perfectly still and silently.

Marisa looks very worried at the mention of ruins in Urizen. "Uh, to be clear, planet destruction is a rare outcome. And those are uninhabited except for pirate forward bases. Uh, hold on a second."

She raises two fingers to her ear, geometric magic circles swirling in the air around them. After a second, she speaks. "危険だぜ！この星には鳥人の遺跡かもしれない！"

"Not time sensitive."

Marisa takes a long deep breath. "すまん。後で話す。" She hangs up, and looks at the others again.

"It's very unlikely to be on that scale. If that's what they are, they've been there for a long time anyway. It might be a good idea to get an expert opinion, though."

"I apologize. My friend was worried about an ancient civilization."

The bishop drinks the rest of the tea during the interruption; no need to let good tea go to waste. Instantaneous communication over distance, interesting.

"Oh, turn over a rock and you'll probably find an ancient civilisation. We've got trolls, we've got Terunael, we've got the ancient Asavean empire, and then there's whatever built the Spires... this place has been inhabited for a good long time.

Essentially the problem is, as soon as they get wind that someone is worshipping something as a god, it becomes an overwhelming priority that nobody in the Empire starts worshiping it as a god - so anything that looks slightly suspect, like ritual propitiation, suddenly gets a whole lot more scrutiny.

Is it possible to acquire different kami that nobody is currently attached to, which can be differentiated from the ones being worshipped? Or to negotiate the rite with the kami rather than have it passed on by someone who'll call it a god? We negotiate just fine with Eternals that we're pretty sure other people worship as gods, after all, we could probably get away with framing it like that. 'Kami' isn't a word we use, so it'll work fine as a word that won't set anyone off."

"The Urizeni are always very happy to collaborate with foreign researchers - as long as they don't mind being told to do everything in exactly the right way according to the Urizeni, that is. And possibly patronised a bit. I imagine if they share their interesting findings or novel magic they'll suddenly find they're the best of friends, though," replies Laria.

"If someone could come through and wipe out the Druj, there'll be plenty of abandoned ruined Spires they can study without anyone inconveniently living there," suggests Tommaso. "Normally I'm all for negotiation and learning from each other, but the Druj really do leave everyone very little choice in the matter."

"Can negotiate ritual, or help small unknown kami grow into their power. Recommend negotiating with at least two powerful established groups. Sumiyoshi are a set of three kami. Will provide starships. The Mountain is metonymy for a partnership of two kami and various other collaborators. Will provide technology."

"As a political favor, Buddhists travelled on our vessel as well. Five monks, as well as one commander, whose role is similar to mine in the Church of England. Handling exceptional cases. No Buddhist gods exactly. Only beings closer to enlightenment."

"All are youkai. Unclear why they practice Buddhism as they are not naturally reborn. Seems to distance them from their original nature as unfriendly spirits."

(Bishamonten's best exception handler has meanwhile finished scouting the dockside. Seems safe enough to head back to the ship and officially disembark, no one's likely to flip out at a few feathers or odd ears or something. Honestly, they'll be way more scared of the locals than the other way around.)

"Sounds like you'll have a bounty hunting contract to negotiate, I guess. Don't cheat her too badly or anything, but she is rich. Okay, I don't want to leave any mathematicians trapped somewhere with no chalk for long, where did you say they were?"

If she seemed rattled before, it's gone now, broom twirling casually in her hand.

"The Buddhist framing does sound more compatible with our doctrine, yes. Do you suppose the commander would be like to come by and join our little comparative religion discussion, or would you like to give me more details? Do they relate to kami differently, for in?

I imagine that the prospect of starships and improved technology will help with some people. It'd be better if we can work out a framing that won't immediately cause the Synod to attempt to veto or burn down the results, though.

You're fortunate to have landed in Sarvos - the League in general is a bit more open minded than other nations, and Sarvos more so than the reactionaries and rabble rousers down in, say, Tassato.

Even so, if you're in communication, you might want to warn your colleagues away from mentioning gods or worship at all until we've considered possible improved terminology here - it's even worse if it gets ahead of us and then looks like we're covering something up, rather than just getting out ahead of a potential misunderstanding."

"Out into the foyer," replies Tommaso, attempting to lead off in that direction.

"It's a shame we didn't get up to the balcony, it's a beautiful view," contributes Laria, but she doesn't seem to be pulling very hard in that direction; she wouldn't want to be seen fighting a losing battle.

A gallery attendant is watching the broom warily, in case it threatens to collide with any artwork.

"To my knowledge, religious technology, and its associated concerns, are unique to the planet from which I arrived, and this planet. More similar than different. Their equilibrium is for an endangered population, yours is for a large one."

"My Buddhist counterpart is cautious. Had she snuck in here I would have introduced her, but I believe she is still near our ship. I will call the others."

First, a call to Marisa. Praem does not move or give any indication she is calling, but speaks out loud.

"Please say 'kami' rather than 'god' when applicable."

Marisa remembers to use stealth this time.

「了解だぜ！」, she thinks at the communication spell. 「ここで大丈夫。」

"I have informed our captain."

And now another call, still speaking her end out loud.

"Would you like to meet local religious authorities?"

"Hello to you too. You work fast, I suppose they're all drinking tea out of the palm of your hand already. Did we rent a house or something?"

"They are accommodating. Disembark and act perplexed."

"I'll come armed for peace, then. 神祇不拝。"

"You will make friends here. May God watch over you."

Praem nods slightly. "They will find accommodations first. Meeting after is a good idea."

Marisa is gleefully heading towards the foyer! There will be math, after all. And maybe magic?

Nazrin stops by the ship's mess hall to collect her charges. "I'm ready to take us on land. Try not to creep out any humans, okay?"

Various youkai follow her abovedeck. They look around at the sights in awe and appreciation, while Nazrin tries and mostly fails to look innocently confused, scanning the dockside for someone paying attention.

Nazrin appears to be a fairly small (that is, around the height of Marisa-plus-hat) young woman with clearly visible large mouse ears, holding what looks like a fairly heavy pack with her tail. Some of the assembled youkai behind her have similar odd traits, like feathers or in one case horns.

"Well, if you'd like to head out and invite her over to the church, I'm sure more of my Carta are still lurking around the docks to ensure you all feel well disposed towards us when handing out the trade agreements," replies the bishop. "And if I don't miss my guess, Juno will be chatting up the doorkeeper on your way out, if you'd like an escort around the city."

The foyer of the Blood Red Quays Art Gallery does indeed contain a pair of squabbling mathematicians.

"Your problem is, you haven't taken account of the difference between riparian geometries and celestial geometries," one is impatiently explaining, a lady who is rather blue around the gills - yes, definitely gills - whose barbels are wobbling dramatically.

"Everything to do with celestial geometries is either astronomancy or conjecture!" asserts another, who has pointed ears easily visible through a balding mess of grey hair.

Ginevra is hanging out with them, looking rather embarrassed.

Meanwhile on the dockside, there are indeed more Carta Notturno watching out for additional arrivals, as well as the draughir with the clipboard hovering around in a vaguely supervisory fashion.

The youkai are getting their share of double-takes and funny looks - a few feathers seem to be entirely unremarkable, but mouse ears is definitely out of the ordinary.

"Greetingsss, and welcome to Sssarvos!" enthuses a young woman with scaly cheeks, a nice set of fangs and a few feathers of her own growing amongst her hair. "What can the Carta Notturno do to make your visit a sssuccess?"

"I will return presently. Good day."

Praem nods politely, and heads out.

"Well, celestial geometries are tricky. You must be from the math department? I'm Kirisame Marisa, just an ordinary magician. Well, an ordinary magician from outer space, I guess. Call me Marisa!"

"Thanks. We're hoping for accommodations for the six of us; don't worry about the other two, space for six is fine. I seem to have a meeting after that, but these five could use a tour guide. It's their first time offworld."

It's her first time offworld too, at least in the starship sense, but it's certainly safer than Makai. These people don't need to know that, though.

"I'll go with you until my people are accommodated, and then double back to meet Praem, probably. That's the creepy ice stare one, if you didn't catch their names. Oh, and I'll want to stop by someone who can give me local money for diamonds, and then a tobacconist, if you have those here."

"Tartuccio i Diora i Sarvos at your service!" replies the old pointy-eared gentleman, essaying a clumsy bow.

"Jania Diora von Temeschwar," replies the merrow, impatiently. "I suppose if you come from outer space, you must have more information than us on celestial geometries. Tell me, does the orbit of the inner stars stutter or does light have a speed?"

"I'm sure a great many innsss would love the honour of accommodating you; do you have any requirementsss or preferencesss? Clossseness to the dock, ssseparate rooms, exemplary food, the best feather bedding, the most delightful available companionssship?"

"Light has a speed, yeah, it's pretty fast on human scales, I don't have the astrometrics at hand but I think about 500 seconds from here to your sun? In the pretty typical range for somewhere inhabited. Usually we measure time and length in the same units for geometry, with the speed of light equal to one, it's simpler that way. You have a model of gravitation, right? Is there somewhere with a blackboard and chalk?"

"Yeah, six rooms, at a nice place, my expenses are all reimbursable. Wherever merchants who just had a great voyage go to live it up, probably. I'm going to lead monastic chants at odd hours, so a place where there's carousing anyway wouldn't go amiss. Monks are forbidden from drinking alcohol, but not a single one from our temple has successfully followed this prohibition, so expect carousing."

She spits tobacco-colored juice to her left, annihilating it in midair with violet magic from her left hand. "What do the natives do for fun around here, anyway?"

Praem spends a minute or so staring at the nave before seeking out Juno. Any invisible spirit life lurking?

"There'll be a room at the University, if you'd like us to take you there," notes Tommaso.

"We do indeed have a model of gravitation!" replies Jania. "It turns out you can derive it from a pendulum, and it seems to apply fine to the orbit of the moon, but there are ongoing arguments as to whether the quick stars are distant masses or something more esoteric. Especially the Wanderer."

"Everything comes back to the Wanderer with you!" exclaims Tartuccio. "There is no proof whatsoever that astronomantic entities are anything other than magical signifiers. The record of eclipses suggests we orbit the Sun, as the Moon orbits us, but there is no proof whatsoever for other 'celestial bodies'."

"So, good wine, good beds, ssomewhere that'd be okay with Asaveansss; do your carousssers have a preferred variety of professional companionssship, including 'none'?

There are a great many entertainments in Ssarvoss - anything from art galleriess, to theatre, to opera, to fighting pitss; from dive barss to wine tasting emporia; cicisbeoss to fit all budgets, recreational ssailing, academic argumentation, ssimply taking the air around the city; all manner of purssuitss."

There is, in fact, a surprising lack of invisible anything here. It's almost like anything that might have taken up residence has been fastidiously cleared away.

"Yeah, to a first approximation, masses are attracted with a force proportional to the product of both masses and inversely to the square of the distance, you can derive orbits from that, but it's a first approximation. There's a few planets in this system, I think, I didn't pay much attention, just went straight to the habitable zone. If a planet's too close, the water boils, if it's too far, the water freezes, so you get like one or two livable planets for a star like this. I don't remember anything super weird. It's, uh, divining the local orbits from down here would be a pain, maybe when I have a few hours free, but I have the Earth system already, one second."

She casts (using way too much power, if anyone is watching the magic as magic) a three-dimensional orbital diagram of Earth's solar system, with the Sun and planets through Saturn; Earth's Moon appears as well, but no other bodies.

"This is not to scale, the distances are much larger compared to the bodies but that makes a horrible diagram, and there's like 30 planets omitted, plus thousands of non-planet bodies, this only has the magically relevant ones. Uh, there's no end of fighting over terminology but the way I'm describing it is the mercantile convention, a star is anything massive enough to support fusion, like the Sun or the fixed stars, a planet is anything smaller than that but big enough to be round, like what we're standing on or the Moon or the wandering stars, anything too small to be round is an asteroid or a comet or something, depends on what it's made of."

"Uh, this spell is actually combat magic with the combat part suppressed, it'll only last like 90 seconds, I should really make a better one. I can do that while figuring out yours; how many magically relevant bodies are there? I can get all of those in a diagram."

"Talented hosts would be appreciated, we're appreciators of music and dance where we're from. Now, monks are in theory celibate, and I can personally vouch to you that none of them are married. I've got a lovely mouse husband tending the hearth back home, of course."

She grins, showing off teeth that are perhaps sharper and more carnivorous than the typical mouse's.

"I might haunt the dive bars a little, when I'm done with my work. Look for down-on-their-luck treasure hunters diving for shipwrecks, that sort of thing."

If Praem has thoughts on the silence, we are not privy to them.

She heads in the direction of Juno.

Ginevra and Tomasso are vaguely attempting to shoo the assembled mathematicians out of the art gallery foyer, although they are held up a little by the illusion, which is starting to draw something of a crowd from other interested gallery patrons. One of those patrons swift-casts Detect Magic: Identify Ritual Performance and looks extremely confused by the results, and asks another patron to have a go and see what they think.

"Only the Wanderer of the wandering-stars is magically relevant," replies Junia, "but there are also the constellations - the Phoenix and the Three Sisters are generally the easiest for a beginner to find, there are seventeen standard constellations in all and the Wanderer atop that. Ginevra, do you have a beginner's guide to Astronomancy on you? I could list them all out, but it'd be quicker for her to read them."

"Do you know if there is another 'livable planet' in this 'system'? The mystery of the Vard would suggest there might be, although I suppose they might have arrived by whatever mechanism you did, just in a slightly less controlled fashion," asks Tartuccio.

"Talented mussicianss and dancerss, likely to have sssix rooms available, unflappable... I think I know the place. Let me convey you to the Cockerel's Wattle."

The Carta naga leads them off down the docks, towards the great statue that dominates the harbour.

The streets of Sarvos are moderately crowded, especially as the group of youkai appear to have attracted a variety of curious bystanders tailing them with varying degrees of subtlety. Stall-holders and shop-keepers with open-fronted stores, mostly selling food items with occasional vendors of trinkets, clothing and household goods, call out to them from the roadside; the entire place appears to be somewhat one giant market, at least the parts they're being conveyed through.