The Death Realm
They walk in through the gate, and Haalfrin looks around and feels a strange sense of closeness with the place. Deep in his soul, Haalfrin feels his Yiir Name stir as he looks at the land and breathes in the clean air.
Of course, Haalfrin hadn't been studying magic for 50 years for nothing; he knows what it means when your Names stir in your soul realm.
Your Reh (Spirit) Name stirs when you meet someone you've known for a long time…
The Yiir Name is your past, present, and future - your Fate. If his Yiir Rune is reacting to this place, then he has a very strong Fate with this cottage - a long future spent in this location, if he has to guess.
'Hmm…,' Haalfrin thinks, 'how troubling.'
"Halam! Reyya!" Das calls out as he walks through the little fence gate and steps past the rows of flowers in the garden.
A young boy and girl twin pair run around from the side of the house. The boy is carrying tree clippers, and the girl, a garden rake. "Master Das! You've returned!" the girl stops and bows.
Das waves at them, then steps aside while gesturing to Haalfrin beside him. "Let me introduce you. This is Haalfrin. Depending on the circumstance, he might be an important guest in the future.
The god then holds out his hand to the dirty-looking twins. "Haalfrin, this is Halam and Reyya. They take care of my property for me while I'm gone. They've been here for a long time, so they know what they're doing."
Reyya beams in joy at being complimented before she tugs on her brother's sleeve and says, "Come on. We need to go back to work."
"How long have they been here?" Haalfrin asks, gesturing to the cheerful twins as they're pruning a tree in the distance.
"Hmm… A million years or so."
Das then gestures to the forest around them and says, "As you can see, there are many fruit trees and meat in the forest, so they're pretty self-sufficient. I help out around the house too when I'm not busy."
Haalfrin scrunches his eyebrows at this. He can't imagine himself doing something so boring for so long. "Don't you guys get bored of doing that?"
Immediately, Haalfrin realizes that sounded a bit rude, so he quickly corrects himself, "I mean, it's been a million years. Wouldn't you want to try other things after so long?"
The twins both cock their heads in the same direction, and the girl – Reyya – asks sincerely, "Why would we do that?"
Das smiles, then he takes Haalfrin into his home and starts warming up ANOTHER tea kettle with hot water over a fire.
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"Well Haalfrin," the old god says after coming back with their tea, "that thing about getting bored… that's actually one of the main things I wanted you to understand about the Death realm - specifically, dead people."
"You see," Das explains, "living people like you can change as a person, but one of the main ways that Felkawyn Transforms a spirit is by taking away that 'change'. You could say that a living person is defined by life, and life is growth and maturation. Death, however…, death is the final form of a person."
"A good person will always be good once he dies," Das clarifies. "A skilled swordsman will always be skilled at sword fighting. A person who died while enjoying gardening will ALWAYS enjoy gardening. As soon as you die, your personality is locked in place. You can become MORE of what you already WERE, but you can't CHANGE."
This puts Haalfrin into deep thought. "Why are you telling me this - going through so much trouble to bring me here too?"
"Seeing a peaceful example like this would likely soften the blow." Das frowns and gets a rare serious tone in his voice. "I'm going to show you something pretty bad after this. Please prepare yourself."
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Das then takes Haalfrin back to the teleportation circle. The light shines as the enchantment is used, and they disappear from the forest.
The next thing Haalfrin knows, he's in a very dark place. Das claps his hands and a bright light appears above them.
Haalfrin then sees a giant hole seeming to stretch infinitely downward, and there's a dank, musky smell coming from the deep.
Lining the ridge they're resting on as far as the light lets them see, there are prison cells and tunnels hugging the walls all the way down as a bottomless slope spirals down into nothingness. "What is this place?" Haalfrin asks.
"This," Das answers, "is where we put all the dead who can no longer live in society."
Haalfrin looks in one of the cells through the small window slit. Inside is a raving monster vaguely resembling a man. The pointy-eared creature is so utterly mad that as soon as it sees these guests, he started biting the bars and squealing in anger.
Noticing something else, Haalfrin asks, "Why aren't there any door handles? You don't keep them here forever, do you?"
"As I said," Das replies grimly, "The dead can't change." He points down. "You see this entire hole? This is the section where spirits go if they're consumed by anger go. Many of those who die violently come here. Their last feelings in life were that of pure aggression. Now, the last feelings themselves may not define who you were your entire life, but it's those last feelings that come most naturally to you in the death realm."
"A person who died peacefully will find peace in their heart more easily than others. Those who died with anger will have anger issues forever. Now... Sometimes, this anger starts to control them, and they go mad. Once this happens, there's no saving that spirit, and they're sent here to rot forever."
Haalfrin feels a tightening in his chest. 'Did this happen to my clansmen?' If they wound up like this raving monster – locked away and forgotten about, he doesn't know what he'd do; he just knows it would be drastic.
"Haalfrin, they haven't been dead for very long. That's not enough time to go mad," Das answers.
Haalfrin breathes in slowly and says, "I want to see my clansmen."
Das thinks for a moment and said, "Very well. It won't be what you expect, though."
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Another teleport away, and they're in another vast, underground cavern… though this one's atmosphere isn't nearly as gloomy.
Das lights up the cave with his magic, and Haalfrin sees innumerable shades everywhere - some of them are more solid than others. A few of the more solid ones even start to look like they have corporeal forms… though they're all quite unrecognizable.
Seeing Haalfrin take in this sight with silence, Das explains to him, "The difference between a living soul and a dead one is that a dead soul has a little bit of Felkala in them… meaning they at least have some resistance to change."
Das looks up at some of the more solid shades. "A body," he continues, "is a part of your soul – a part of who you are… and that doesn't change even after you die. Hence, an unchangeable soul will constantly drift back to what its soul thinks they're supposed to be.
"In this case," the god finishes, "all dead spirits eventually grow their bodies back… and this is the place they go to while they wait to be regenerated. Of course, the higher your magic is (specifically, the greater your Fel), the faster this happens. Your clansmen weren't mages, so this process could take thousands of years.
Haalfrin sighs at this and comments, "So... I won't be able to find them for now… since they haven't properly woken up in the death realm yet."
The man looks down with a troubled look, and Das leaves him alone in his thoughts.
After a few moments, Haalfrin looks up and asks, "My clan brothers? I'd like to see them. They ARE conscious, even without a body, correct?"
Das looks up and scratches his chin uncomfortably. "Well, about that... it actually depends. Normally, the ability to think requires a brain, and you don't have a brain when you're disembodied."
"'Normally?' Das, I remember being conscious in the Spirit world, after I died the first time."
"Indeed," Das smiles politely. "I was about to say that people with strong spirits can still think and see things normally - people like god candidates."
Haalfrin crosses his arms, and he frowns impatiently. "I didn't wait in a tree crawler for weeks just to be told that I can't talk to my brothers."
Das glances down, then smiles fondly. "Fine. I'll teach you how to do it."