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WEEKLY BULLETIN

announcements
What do you get when you combine a Catholic and a spirit child? I don't know, it's not a joke, it's just an announcement that one of the spirits-- a baby, it looks like-- has been adopted.

What an awful week, though. Both the exploration group and the distraction group did so well, and honestly? It made a difference. You guys should be proud.

On a lighter note, autumn is just around the corner! Look for temp drops and gusty weather cropping up in the next week or so.

classifieds
None.

If you wish to submit an advertisement, please drop them by the post office.

obituaries
Capt. Ben Winters: at least he died as he lived: doing something worthwhile. Thank you, Winters.

Number Five: clever right to the end.

A whole host of people have gone missing since the party... We haven't found their bodies or their lanterns yet, but I think it's safe to assume they're probably gone. Here's the list: Melisandre, Yaeris, Gene Hicks, Ahven Sychantus, Scott Ryder, Nathan Drake, Brienne of Tarth, Raylen Givens, John Constantine, Chloe Frazier, Irwin Wade, Elisha Harper, Dick Grayson, Aragorn, Rafe Adler, Billy Russo, Ben Hargreeves, Kyna Midha, Washington, Sam Drake, Daniel Riordan, Replica Riku Dawn, Eleven, Shadow Moon

[Worthy of note: this bulletin comes to you not via a newspaper, but by the network, now that Robin's connected with you guys once more!]

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Modern (for him) royalty sex lives are something crazy too from his limited understanding. He's happy not knowing the details.

Anyway, he shrugs.]

Can't please everyone. I know that's a cliche, but I imagine for the leader of a large kingdom it's doubly true. People who desperately want to be liked probably aren't good leadership material, anyway.

[Take Sengoku, for example. Excellent leader in his wholly unbiased opinion, but even he has questions. How in the hell was what happened to Flevance acceptable? Even from an objective, security and order-minded point of view? He'll never get to ask, now.]

[Zihuan's eyes narrow slyly]

There is much more to you than meets the eye, commander. I've thought so for a while, but you still surprise me with such wisdom.

[in other words, all totally true forever]

You didn't come here to listen to me talk about myself all day. It wouldn't be fair if I didn't hear about you in turn. You mentioned loved ones, after all.

[There is in fact some cleverness beneath the floofy bangs and tendency to trip over his own limbs, it's true. He just doesn't go out of his way to expose it all that often. He finds himself doing it on occasion here purely because there is no reason to hide and nobody to hide from. He had even admitted to Gene, when the younger man pried, that he was a spy of sorts, but Gene's gone now, so. Back in the bag that one can go.]

It isn't like I mind, though. It's healthy for all of us to get the opportunity to talk about what we left behind.

[As in, you know. Go on, talk about yourself so he doesn't have to. He finishes off the last of his tea and has a draw from the cigarette.]

I don't have much to say, anyway. Just family. Not anyone like you had.

Just family. They aren't as important to you as my wife is to me?

[note that for all he mentions his father, he sure hasn't said he misses the asshole]

Doesn't quite seem like the same thing.

[But leaving it there would be too obviously evasive, and anyway, he doesn't mind twisting the truth into something simpler and easier to relay to people here. Something that dodges his origins entirely. They're not relevant here and never will be.]

My father was the head of the military. So he was always busy, but he made time for me when I was younger, and I respected him enough to follow in his footsteps. I actually haven't seen him in a few years. I was hoping to soon.

[dammit another thing they have in common, sort of]

Ah, I can see how that would be. Busy with your own careers, and I'm sure the military life in your world is as all-consuming as it is mine. [casual sip] Is filial duty as important, too?

[because good lord could he go into a long round of kvetching if they can commiserate on that too]

I'm... you mean, obedience and duty to one's father? I think that's right. It's not mandated or anything. Not always expected. We have a lot of freedom. But I think it's looked on as a good thing anyway, to respect your father and learn from him, and to take care of him when the time comes. Not everyone does that much.

[The chain of command was overriding. It's hard to have a personal, familial relationship with someone you are duty-bound to obey. It worked for them since Rosinante always maintained some distance even from Sengoku, who he trusted most. Worked until it didn't, that is.]

Yes, like that. You're lucky...or, well. It may not be fair to say so, there may be some who genuinely care for their fathers.

[unlike this dickhead who trolled his dead father by pretending to hide his tomb]

Family can certainly be complicated, at least.

That it can be.

[AND DOES HE KNOW IT. But. That's for another time, or maybe never, if he's lucky.]

What was your father like? Pardon me for saying so, but you don't sound fond of him.

[well, he opened the door to that topic, so he might as well. Though he gets all dramatic about it, lifting his eyes toward the ceiling and swirling his tea around in the mug.]

Cao Cao, styled Mengde, Prime Minister of the last gasp of the Han. He is intelligent, shrewd, capable, charismatic, and a decent poet in his own right. He is also ruthless, cold, and dangerous to cross. He took the Emperor under his protection, to keep him safe and alive when usurpers wanted to destroy our country and entire way of life. Which, I will admit, is just a nice way of saying my father puppeted the Emperor for a number of years and got away with it.

[he sips the tea and then sets his mug down so he doesn't keep fiddling with it]

I suppose some part of me cares for him in some way, I was upset when I thought Orochi had killed him. But I also know him all too well, and I understand fully why some people dislike him immensely.

[Well, it's just as he'd said, then. You don't have to be liked to rule well. Or to rule at all, in these systems where rulership is by birthright. The king, or queen, or whoever - they rule because they were born with the right to do so and that's that, so long as you don't inspire a rebellion.

But this is a large part of why he's never liked royalty and why he prefers to stay out of their way, at home, where these things matter. Here, getting to speak with an emperor who is in fact ruler of nothing now and very much equal to everyone else is sort of indulgent.]

Complicated, as you say. Nobody should be required to like their parents, anyway. You can respect someone for their role in who you've become without liking who they are.

[at least your father wasn't the asshole, Rosi. Just your brother.]

Yes, I suppose you have a point. It's something I've come to grips with, really, but it's not something that can be said or shown publicly where I come from. Filial duties are sacrosanct and if I do not fulfill mine where people can see, I could be overthrown out of outrage.

But here we are, talking about me again... [his lips curl in another sly smile, but this time he doesn't pose another question. Merely a note to say he notices how easily Rosinante deflects conversations away from his own personal life.]

[Oh yeah whoops, casual coincidence, you know. He shrugs, ready to dismiss it as nothing meaningful.]

I guess I just like asking questions. I've never gotten to ask about the life of an emperor before. Not directly, anyway. It's a far cry from what I'm used to.

[yeah uh huh sure it is.]

Ah, I see. I don't know that my imperial life is truly exemplary of our time. After all, I never made any claims that I was ordained by Heaven to rule. In my experience, Heaven is a terrible judge of leadership.

Is Heaven an actual, literal thing where you're from?

[Seriously, better ask. Apparently some of these people come from places with actual gods, or something. So they say, anyway, and he's open-minded enough to at least consider that they might be right. Most people here seem to come from places wholly unlike his own world, and that's probably for the best.]

That depends on what you believe.

[he rests his chin on his fist, ready to throw some sass. As an atheist, he has quite the perspective, considering he's also fought demons and met the creator goddess. Dad tried to hit on her.]

As far as I'm concerned it's nothing but a fine metaphor, for the meek to rely on when they die. It can be quite a burden for those left behind, though, to ensure that someone is properly mourned and worshipped so they can make their way through hell and reach heaven at last. [a slight raise of an eyebrow] There are no less than three competing religions in my country at the moment. Is it anywhere near as confusing and complex in your world?

[So in other words, no, it's not literal if it's up to belief. Not in the way he meant, anyway, not something everyone accepts as real because they can see it and visit it and understand it as an objective part of the world. It's real for those who want it to be real and nobody else feels obliged to acknowledge it.

But that does answer his question.]

I try to stay out of it, but yes, there are many different beliefs. Many different islands, different cultures, so the variety feels pretty endless. I wondered because some people here claim otherwise for their worlds - that concepts like Heaven and Hell are real places they've visited, or could, and that the gods who patrol their worlds are real beings they have spoken with. I hadn't heard anything like that before, other than perhaps your godlike world-creating monster.

[Well. He's leaving out some context, but that's fine. And he does take their words with a grain of salt because of it. Anyone can come here and say their world had gods. How would he be able to tell? But this isn't their worlds and those things don't matter much now.]

...oh. I have met a couple of gods. [casually, like it doesn't mean anything even when talking about Heaven] But I chalk that up to the strangeness of the place to where I had been taken. In some ways it's similar to this situation - worlds colliding in a place that belongs to none of them. So, I consider it a separate situation compared to my true home.

Right. [Just, sure. ok.]

So I have to ask, then. What made them gods? I'm not trying to be funny, it's just a concept I have a hard time grasping.

[sliding his tea mug aside, Cao Pi laces his fingers together and rests his chin on them]

They are mystical entities, possessing of powers and knowledge that even a skilled sorcerer has never been able to duplicate. Calling themselves Fu Xi and Nuwa, who are the gods of legend who created humanity. I am willing to entertain the notion that no one actually created anything and they are merely mystics, but even then, they're powerful enough that I should not want to be on their bad side. So if not gods, then what? Mystics who reside where? Another dimension yet?

[his rhetorical queries are merely his sense of logic warring with what his own eyes have seen. It's pretty hard to dismiss actual mystical powers.]

[He considers this as he finishes the last of his cigarette, then snuffs the stub of it out on his napkin. Powers and knowledge beyond what's reasonably possible in Cao Pi's world? Sure, could be supernatural beings, why not. Could just be people with powers and knowledge they obtained one way or another that nobody else understands just yet. Could be smoke and mirrors. He can't possibly guess based on a brief description, he just has to trust that Cao Pi, who is plenty intelligent, means what he says.]

I don't know where I'd draw the line between "person with incredible powers" and "god" anyway, myself. Each of our worlds has a different standard for normal. Maybe someone could be a god in their world, come here, and find themselves below average.

[But rather than think too hard on that, he waves the spirits over to come bring another tea bag and more hot water.]

There is that. [he is at least open-minded enough to allow for alternate explanations.] What was normal in my own homeland was different from what turned out to be normal in a demon realm. I suppose in that sense, the difference was whether those beings could lay claim to having created worlds out of nothing and sculpted humans from the very mud - and make that claim stick.

[see now he'd almost kill to see Lady Nuwa or good ol' dead Orochi himself show up here and still have to struggle to keep a lantern lit. From the sly glint in his eyes he's thinking uncharitable things about gods entirely]

Mm, right. I'd probably draw the line at creating worlds and molding new beings from the ground myself.

[And given what he's learned here, such a god, or godlike being, probably does exist somewhere. Probably a few of them do. But it also rules out a whole hell of a lot of people who are definitely not gods, and that brings him some personal satisfaction.

Meanwhile, Cao Pi is scheming something or other across the table over there. He glances toward the spirits as they stack themselves up to fix his drink, then raises an eyebrow at the other man.]

What's that look about?

[what oh psh nothing you see nothing. Zihuan waits until the spirits have done their duty, waving off a refill on his own, and then allows himself that smirk openly]

Just privately wondering what would happen if they ended up here. That would be something worth seeing just for the learning experience.

You are quite careful to not let yourself slip, commander. I've opened up in the hopes that I might find it creating an opening to turn things back on you, but here I sit still wholly in the dark about so much of yourself. [LITERAL TEASIP] Such a skill takes careful cultivation, I'm impressed.

[He chuckles, almost embarrassed at being called out like that - though of course it's an intentional show of vulnerability, sort of like this whole offer was. He's still not convinced he should consider Cao Pi a friend, even if he comes across as likeable when he's not utterly intolerable.]

Sorry. I did offer for you to get to know me, I'm just bad at talking about myself. I spend a lot of time listening to others and learning from what they have to say. I got out of the habit of offering anything in return.

[Yeah whoopsie! Big soz! Totally just a weird quirk! He sifts fingers through his hair, then shrugs.]

I don't follow any particular gods, if that's what you're interested in. Can't say I've ever seen anything that qualifies.

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