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Mial gets mail.
Mial gets a lot of mail. It starts out as a lot of mail and builds up to huge drifts of mail, as word spreads; if he doesn't stay on top of it, it may spill out the windows and start appearing in the soup while dinner is fixed and embed itself in the carpet under the sheer pressure of all the other mail.
People want their relatives back. It is mostly dragons who want this, but not exclusively. A number of vampires wish to know if the pontiff has been informed of all this or do they have to write him themselves. (Apparently they're concerned about the possibility of the pontiff being buried in mail but obviously have no such regard for Mial.) Dragons want to know how the possibility of future shrens has been addressed.
Some pixies in Gibryel have written to him about their political problems, unclear on the nature of the miracles available. Someone wants him to "fix Ryganaav". Finnah's egg father has written a rather sentimental letter imploring Mial to intercede with Finnah on the grounds that "it seems this would really take a miracle".
Someone wants him to eradicate south flu. Someone wants him to eradicate their son-in-law. Someone wants him to eradicate dust bunnies. Someone wants him to eradicate Sand Dusk Chanters. Someone wants him to eradicate an obscure parasitic illness of the tropics, and in case he isn't willing to do that, there are several pages of lurid explanation of the parasite's mechanism and anecdotes about people who didn't make it to adequately trained lights immediately. Someone wants him to eradicate nutritional yeast.
A lot of people want miracle teleportation powers. A number of people are concerned that conventional warding might not hold against miracle teleportation powers and want to know what he's going to do about that isn't he an Esmaarlan.
A substantial fraction of the world's dragon population seems to think that their variously heartfelt, scolding, or bewildered correspondence will be what convinces That Which Means To Eternally Plague Us With Shrenhood to do so less Eternally, perhaps this coming Saanen or something, he could have a little party, everyone could celebrate the final disappearance of that nasty family-destroying agonizing disease? Who would want to be a disease? The stunt has certainly gained attention but surely he has enough attention now?
He has a lot of attention now. Letters in assorted envelope colors with little flags on them pop into existence over the coffee table, hit the pile, and slide to the floor.
shrennaki
He consults his file boxes via miracle and pulls the letter from Amtaliwen out of the Letters To Shren Alyemi: Shrennaki sub-box. It appears in his hand.
"She sent me this; I replied," he says, opening it to see what Amtaliwen in particular did to merit the shrennaki form letter.
"She sent me this; I replied," he says, opening it to see what Amtaliwen in particular did to merit the shrennaki form letter.
shrennaki
"Ah, yes, now I remember. This is the one who called me a despicable degenerate. What charges is she trying to press, exactly?"
"She said that you sent her a 'vile neologism' calculated expressly to cause psychological pain," says Min the municipal functionary. "Which might or might not fall under harassment, depending."
shrennaki
"Depending on what? Whether it was calculated expressly to cause psychological pain? It wasn't. I would consider it more a concise and emphatic assertion that I am not a despicable degenerate."
"Since you only sent her one letter, then, yes, your intentions come into play. I do strongly advise you against sending her any more letters," says Min.
shrennaki
"I don't plan to. Unless she contacts me in some other capacity, but I don't think that's likely."
"I'd recommend letting a third party reply to any correspondence she winds up sending you in the future just in case," Min says.
shrennaki
"I don't think so."
He does contemplate asking if it counts as harassment that she sent him a letter telling him to be ashamed of himself for being a despicable degenerate. But he doesn't particularly want to go after these people for harassment.
He does contemplate asking if it counts as harassment that she sent him a letter telling him to be ashamed of himself for being a despicable degenerate. But he doesn't particularly want to go after these people for harassment.
shrennaki
Well, that was entertaining. It probably shouldn't have been, but it was. He wonders if there have been any other responses to his form letters, and checks the unsorted-mail box in his room to see.
Nothing quite that dramatic. Some of the more earnest people who are opposed to his continuing to be a shren feel that the form letter does not signify honest engagement with their concerns.
shrennaki
He reads their letters to find out if they have any concerns worth engaging with, although he very sincerely doubts it.
shrennaki
Eh. Not worth a vile neologism, and not really worth drafting another form letter, let alone personally responding. He files the responses with the originals.
Meanwhile, Kaylo's appointment with Lazarus arrives and finds Kaylo on the lawn of Binaaralav Academy with two humans, an elf, a halfling, and a merman in a wheelchair with a bubble of water around his head.
Kaylo is still himself. One human is a light, the other a sorcerer; the halfling is a water mage assisting the merman, who is both a colorist and a shaman.
nonbird
"Hello," he says generally to the group, somewhat distracted by his inspection of all of this magic. "Oh, I see what Mial meant about the problem with lights..."
nonbird
"Well, you have very nice tidy healing magic, but it doesn't work on anyone who has the same sort of nice tidy healing magic, which I imagine is probably very troublesome."