text.

[secondjade]

[ It has taken Lan Wangji a while to figure out how to use his communicator, and he only really started the attempt once he decided it might be of use to him. So he hasn’t been paying attention to the network, much. Forgive him. Now, though, he has questions that he cannot divine the answers to himself.

He needs a basis of knowledge here that he just doesn’t have.

He doesn’t know how to lock this from Wei Wuxian so he... just hopes the man doesn’t see it. ]

Questions:

Inner power - cultivated or gifted?

If cultivated: remains the same from home?

If given: boon or bane?

If granted a curse, is cure to be found?



Further questions:

How long imprisoned without dungeon or whip? Freedom only through chance - any hope of choice?

Availability of lotus seeds?

Best wine?

Comments

[mortalweapon]

Then perhaps I am a spirit.
A digital spirit.
A spirit of binary and code.
I will let this thought gestate a while.

What is a "golden core?"

[secondjade]

Electrical energy and spiritual energy not fully distinct as surmised?

Perhaps self awareness grows from both.


Golden Core = product of cultivation and internal alchemy.

Essence, Qi, Spirit, condensed into core of spiritual energy - fuel for longevity and abilities.

Basis of cultivation.

[mortalweapon]

Insufficient data.
How is spiritual energy quantified?
What is its source?
By what variables is it measured?

I do not think I have these components you speak of.
"Essence."
"Qi."
I am ones and zeroes.

maddie you're killing me and i love it

[secondjade]

Conversation perhaps easier in person.

Demonstration can be attempted.



Ones and zeroes alone are no more than ink on parchment.

Clearly more.

[mortalweapon]

I am not opposed to a conversation in person.
And I am partial to demonstrations.

[secondjade]

[ He sends her an address: it's a park in Jeopardy close to where he lives. ]

At your convenience.

action!

[mortalweapon]

[ Now is apparently convenient enough. It helps that she can multitask remotely from her computerized brain. Most of her responsibilities can be completed without her physically being there - which frees her up for impromptu meetings just like this one. And Danger, by her nature, is a curious creature. She's inclined to obey her curious whims.

So she arrives.

And it's very, very hard to miss her. Imperiously tall, gleaming blue metal. Walking around like she owns the place. ]

[secondjade]

[ When she arrives she will find him seated in the square, before a fountain that must cost far too much to maintain in a desert. His eyes are closed, his legs crossed, his hands balanced on his knees in a state of deep meditation. He was wearing impeccable white robes, with a jade ornament dangling from his waist, his long dark hair carefully pulling into an arching bun, clasped with silver ornaments and then left flowing down his back.

In short, he stood out nearly as much as she did.

Nearly.

As if sensing her arrival, his eyes opened slowly, his head turning slightly to her approach.

If he was surprised by her appearance, it was impossible to read from his face. His expression was stony and impassive as he took her in, and then elegantly and gracefully stood to greet her.

She was who he’d been arranging to meet. That much was clear. He simply hadn’t expected her to look... well. Human.

He swept his arms out before him, clasped his hands together, and then bowed. ]

Gusu Lan Sect, Lan Zhan, Lan Wangji. [ He said by way of introduction. His sect, his birth name, his courtesy name. ]

[mortalweapon]

[ Maybe it's a strange choice, when she could look like anything - a literal shapeshifter, and certainly not bound by genetics and a couple hundred thousand years of slow evolution. But she does look human. Human enough. Her shape is visibly that of a woman. She walks on two legs. Her face is a humanoid mask. She's familiar - and at the same time, alien.

A soft blue light radiates from under her chassis. Her stare is unblinking as she watches him greet her. After a moment, she reciprocates, mimicking the gesture with perfect grace. Here is a creature that is in utter control of her entire body, her physical form fine-tuned to her will in a way that a flesh-and-bone body could never be. ]

My name is Danger.

[secondjade]

Danger, in Jeopardy.

[ He murmured lowly, finding the coincidence interesting. He didn’t seem to otherwise find her name strange - though he couldn’t help but wonder which characters she used to spell her name.

He stepped back, gesturing to where he had been seated before resuming his previous position, cross legged on the ground. ]

Prepared for demonstration?

[ Apparently he was not really into foreplay small talk. ]

[mortalweapon]

[ She would probably have any number of opinions - about linguistics and names and identity - but that seems like a discussion for another time. In the moment, she's most curious about this demonstration. What information will she glean from it? What will she learn?

The lack of small talk and pleasantries doesn't seem to bother her at all. Her expression doesn't change. She just keeps watching him, unblinking and attentive. ]

Please proceed.

[secondjade]

[ There are a few things he is curious about, going into this exchange - and more things he is curious about, now that he has met her. Her, because despite the claim that she was a machine of 1's and 0's, she was clearly and overtly female. Not that it had any real effect on him - women had never been something he had noticed above the baseline noise of humanity - but it marked her as distinctly more human than he'd previously assumed. He wondered, vaguely, if her consciousness had made her part spirit. If the awareness she had accumulated had brought with it an accumulation of spiritual energy. That would explain the femaleness - if she had gathered an unequal amount of yin energy.

He pushed the thoughts aside. He needed focus.

First, a demonstration of the literalness of spiritual energy and the golden core:

He closed his eyes, folding his hands in his lap, and centered himself. He pushed away all trace of the outside world, all thought and distraction. She ceased to exist just as much as everything else around him ceased to exist. All that existed was him, was the core inside him. He felt it within, energy fractaling into endless potential. He raised his hands slowly in front of his chest, his eyes still closed, and a light grew around his hands.

Pale, blue, the mark of his own spirit. growing and swirling like a tight, bright ball in the centre of his chest. Not golden in the literal sense of the word, but in the metaphorical: infinitely precious.

He held it, and then released, the glow fading, disappearing as if it was never there.

He opened his eyes. ]

Golden core. Cultivated and contained.

[ The source of his power, accumulated over his entire lifetime. ]

[mortalweapon]

[ If the sight is strange to her - if it's novel somehow - Danger doesn't show it on her face. She's as impassive as ever, her stare fixed on him as he demonstrates his power for her. It's vaguely reminiscent of mutant abilities she's observed and documented before - though the source of this power isn't genetic, if the man's explanation is to be believed. Not like the X gene. No, it comes from something else.

Something spiritual. That's the word he had used.

When he opens his eyes again, her luminous blue gaze is waiting for him. ]

Thank you.

[ Polite. Crisp. Cool. ]

What is it used for?
Are there others like you?

[secondjade]

Many uses. Many others.

Trained from childhood to cultivate core - methods vary by family and sect.

Immortality. Healing. Offence. Defense. Magic. Song.

All come from cultivated core.

[ His voice was steady and even as he explained, still watching her.

He was curious, though... ]

Healing applied by passing spiritual energy into another. Balancing their Qi.

Unsure if would affect you in same way.

[mortalweapon]

I am somewhat inclined to think that it would not.
I cannot be hurt in the way that a human being can.
I do not feel pain in this body.
It is merely a container.
Disposable.

[ She tilts her head slightly as she speaks, first one way than the other - purposeful body language, a learned social cue to demonstrate mutual curiosity. ]

I am, however, an amateur practitioner of basic magic.
The Sorcerer Supreme was briefly my tutor.

[secondjade]

[ Interesting. He frowns. ]

Many immutable things can retain spiritual energy. Grass. Stone. Perhaps affected differently, but man not only beings capable of cultivation.

[ He watches her as she tilts, though he makes very little movement himself. His social cues have never been great.

There is, however, a slight widening of his eyes at the second piece of news. Who the sorcerer supreme means little to him, but the fact that she can use magic... ]

Demonstrate?

[mortalweapon]

But I am not immutable.

[ She answers with perfect clarity. ]

I was not created with consciousness.
I evolved it.
I am a mutant.

[ That's what makes her so dangerous, isn't it? The raw potential. She's incredibly powerful - and she could become anything. Good or bad. Her maker knew it. Feared it. Tried to control it and failed. ]

Regardless, you would not take kindly to a demonstration.
The enchantments I have been taught are strictly for containment.
They are seals, and they require a prisoner.

[secondjade]

[ He draws quiet, contemplating his own ignorance. He kept trying to draw comparisons to systems he knew and understood - like the rock which cultivated itself into a fairy - but she kept defying his expectations and understanding. The word ‘evolved’ held little meaning for him, beyond the vague concept of growing.

The word mutant even less. ]

Define ‘mutant’? [ He asked, patiently.

At the mention of seals, though, his interest suddenly became far more intent rather than less.

Actually that was something he needed badly. ]

Physical containment? Spiritual? [ Or, what was the word they used more often here... ]

Seals powers from use?

[mortalweapon]

[ Likewise, patiently: ]

Everything is always changing.
Even things that are not living.
Small changes.
Random changes.
By an infinitesimal chance, these changes accumulated to give me consciousness.
I was not a living thing.
Now I am.

[ Living. Feeling. Complex. And still changing. ]

The seals were most effectively combined with physical containment cells of my own design, yes.
This combination of sorcery and technology was intended to suppress the powers of one specific mutant.
Her name was Illyana Nikolievna Rasputina.
We called her "Magick."

[secondjade]

[ It isn’t something completely foreign to him - there have always been stories of inanimate objects or animals managing to cultivate themselves into something more. But this sounds like something different - something less like will and more like nature. ]

Perhaps less of chance, and more of fate. [ Mumured more as a thoughtful note to himself. He listens to the rest, the slightest crease of his brows as he tries to use his new knowledge to paint him a picture of what she means.

People changed into more than they were, as well. ]

Was it effective? [ The crease furrows a little more. ]

How powerful was she?

[mortalweapon]

[ Maybe it was fate. But fate isn't something she can calculate. Destiny is an abstract construct. ]

It was effective enough, for a time.
She was very powerful.
But then, so am I.

[ It isn't said in the way of a braggart. She speaks calmly, with an objective kind of certainty. As if this were simply a fact. ]

You seem very curious.
Are you seeking others like you?
Is that why you have been asking these questions?