"Sure thing. Some people are, like, naturally magic resistant, I think. That might be it. Apparently we all have secret powers and just can't show them unless we transmigrate. Not me, I'm still just a glorified plumber, but yeah."

"So you do a lot of construction?"

"Yeah. But never with my hands again, no more sore back! There's - telekinesis, stone shaping, that kind of stuff. Much easier."

"Cool!"

"Do you have pictures?"

"Yeah! You have to use old-fashioned chemical film for some reason but I digitized some of my favorites-"

He beeps on a wall TV and shows some pictures; Big stone temples with weird designs, busy city streets lined with wrought-iron lanterns and strange fashion, a dragon-lady wearing tons of gold and a wolf-guy wearing tons of silver having a duel or something, a jungle with a volcano looming over it and the distant figure of a dragon flying in the sky, some sort of parade of people with really elaborate armor and robes, waving and throwing candy.

"Are there other things like digital cameras that don't work there?"

"Semiconductors just don't work, apparently. Random voltage spikes. Or something."

Other people ask questions about the places he's seen, and he answers in a rambly sort of way.

"What's Khintal like?"

"He's not really a guy, he's like a bank or something. Or like a coworker you never see outside of work who refuses to talk about anything but work. Money, productivity, long term benefits, just... All the time. He knows we don't always care about that, but that's his whole - lens of seeing the world. Does that make sense?"

"...not really."

"If I tell Khintal I don't like the way someone talks he's like, well does that affect your productivity, did he break any laws or courtesies, you have to instead say it like- I'm going to charge more to work for him specifically, I'll be generally reluctant to do anything at all involving him for intangible human reasons."

"Huh... do you have more personable management or is it just directly reporting to Khintal?"

"Not really? It's not that bad, he's not mean, just kind of..." He shrugs. "If you say 'I need help, I need someone who understands my problem in human terms' he'll send you someone but it's mostly kind of a freelance thing? Except not really, it's more like- Well, everyone's got their own bubble, but hooking up to other bubbles is fairly cheap, so we hang out with each other a lot. People make their front rooms into bars and malls. You have your friends and you trade jobs and contacts around sometimes. The Earthsea can summon 'a Khintal angel', oh, sorry, 'Agent', and get someone semi-random from those taking summons at the moment, at Khintal's whim - so, powerful people with big offers tend to get more experienced agents. Or they can summon you specifically if you have a fixer give them your name or make good contacts yourself."

"Fixer?"

"Broker. Manager. They match people to jobs, it's a lot more convenient than randoms since they'll schedule you and give you people they think you'll get along with."

The others seem willing to go along with this course of conversation. It seems pretty relevant. A couple are taking notes.

"Are all the angels through Phoenix? Are the fixers?"

"No, no, most of them are natives. I know like three other transmigrators out of hundreds of people, all Phoenix. We get pulled for having huge magic power and new perspectives, Khintal likes the modern perspectives and infrastructure. Fixers are just people who like being a fixer. They're good at it, or they'd have to stop."

"What're the natives like?"

"I mean... What are French people like? What are Chinese people like? They're kind of violent sometimes, but the place is a lot more dangerous than Earth is, so fair's fair in my opinion. Even the guys who aren't human still seem mostly human if you don't pay attention to the scales or tails or whatever, if that's what you mean."

"I mean, like, do they have any particular tendencies to think one way or another about transmigrators, what tends to get them into angeling..."

"They kind of think we're young punks a little bit, honestly. Uh- Khintal turns people who pray to him into an-Agents, sometimes, and they feel like they deserve it more, at least at first. I might be overinterpreting."

"So there's a whole religion about it? What's that like?"

"They're all about working hard and learning things. There's a whole bunch of gods-"

"The only real god is-"

"Oh piss off!" He points at the middle aged woman who interrupted. "Call them powerful magical entities if you must. They exist."

"Well, I never."

Joe rolls his bright blue eyes. "It's pretty recognizably a religion. They have songs, and services, and stuff. Hard to sum up."

"Do they all pray to all the gods or do they pick favorites? What are the others like?"

He'll talk about the gods a bit, though everyone else starts pushing her out of the question-asking position to ask about Earthsea culture, magic, etc, etc. Tsokhem is a god of justice, boldness, gambling, and monsters, and is apparently unusual for being kind of in the middle of the good/evil divide - his actions kill people, but he also gives them magic powers. Lorakh is goddess of motherhood, agriculture, sleep and dreams, and the home. Khevvo is a god of parties, drugs, sex, joy, and also rebellion. Georkh is a god of hunters, lumberjacks, wilderness, and animal herders, and claims responsibility for Megadeer (which are deer that happen to be as big as a house; He has a photo).

Do all these gods get along acceptably? Do angents - agels? - wind up in interdeity conflict at all or is the job strictly building and healing?

"Angents? Heh. Now, a lot of the other ones do, but Khintal - doesn't forbid us from fighting, or making forts, or whatever, but doesn't make us do it either and will punish people who try to force you into it, if you report it. I haven't heard of any god-wars, but I don't know if they have a divine Geneva Convention or what."