It was well past sundown before Dross alerted Lindon that Mushi and Lee were making their way down the street towards them.
[I still think we should have gone to the library, I almost have half of the language figured out]
Lindon scratched at his chin "I've got a good gut feeling that we're on the right track"
Dross groaned [Gut feeling? You know what comes out of guts right? Maybe you should start thinking with your head instead of your digestive organs]
Lindon rolled his eyes before stepping onto the street and waving at the approaching duo.
Mushi waved back "Lindon, do you have the goods?" he said in a mock serious tone.
Lindon pulled the small black box out of his sleeve, the silver accents shone in the moonlight as he pulled the lid off. To the naked eye, it looked like any other fancy tea blends Lindon had seen. The shredded black tea leaves were peppered with dried herbs and fruit skins. In his Jade sight, the tea radiated purple dream aura. Mushi inspected it for a moment, before shaking his head.
"The middle of the street is no place for this, please, let us welcome you to our home." Lee was already opening their apartment door, apparently having no interest in the tea.
Lindon bowed "Thank you for the welcome"
Lindon followed Mushi into the apartment building. Their room ended up being on the second floor, it was modest, but each occupant got a separate room and a shared cooking area. Lindon entered just as Lee closed the door to his room.
Mushi laughed it off "My nephew must be tired. As much as it pains me, he doesn't care much for tea either. We probably won't see him for the rest of the night."
Lindon nodded as Mushi moved to the kitchen to prepare a fresh kettle of water on their stove. As the water heated Lindon took the initiative to speak.
"Pardon if this is rude, are you and your nephew the only ones who live here? Did more of your family make it to the city?"
Mushi didn't turn away from the stove, but replied "Lee is the only family I have left…well, the only family worth looking after."
Lindon bowed his head to Mushi's back "My condolences to those you have lost."
Mushi half turned to Lindon "Thank you. Truth be told, I think it's better for Lee that it's just the two of us. He's at a rough point in his life."
Mushi brought the now steaming kettle over to a table in the common area. He also set down a teapot and two cups.
Lindon handed the box of tea to Mushi "The sage's niece didn't have time to give instructions before we got separated, but I don't think it should be much different than regular tea."
Mushi nodded before accepting the box. He examined the loose tea one more time before spooning two heaps of it into the teapot. He filled the teapot with the hot water, and then things got weird.
The first indication that this wouldn't be an average cup of tea, was when purple vapor billowed out of the spout instead of regular steam. Dross was fascinated, while Lindon began to sweat. This wasn't what they had expected to happen. Lindon and Dross had speculated that the tea would seep dream aura into the water to make for easy cycling for any dream artist, or hungry mind spirit. Lindon checked on Mushi to find he looked astonished.
"I've never seen anything like this, this truly is fit for a sage." He closed his eyes and sniffed the air "It smells like fresh dew clinging to a flower in the early morning."
Lindon really started to panic, it clearly smelled like fire and blood and…and Yerin?
Dross cleared his throat [It's just a property of dream aura, it'll smell different to everyone]
That calmed Lindon down a bit. Mushi was now pouring two cups out. The liquid wasn't purple as Lindon expected it to be. It looked like inky blackness speckled with light, as if someone had poured the night sky in a cup. Mushi looked absolutely gleeful now, he picked up his cup and waited for Lindon to do the same. Lindon picked his cup up, and they both took a tentative sip. And then…Lindon slipped away.
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Dross had gotten used to living fused to Lindon's soul, he hadn't forgotten what it was like to exist independently; but it was very disorienting to suddenly be forced out of his sacred artist and left with only his own senses and awareness. So disorienting, in fact, that it took him a few moments to realize he was the one screaming like a dying animal. He also didn't appreciate the fact that Little Blue was laughing at him, which sounded like chimes and raindrops. He turned to glare at her and got another disorienting surprise; Little Blue was no longer a small blue woman in a watery dress. She now stood at least four feet tall, with pale human looking skin, blue robes and water for hair.
The laughing cut off when they locked eyes. She pointed at Dross, then looked down at her own arm in horror. Dross smuggly tutted, who was screaming now…if you can call the sounds of a rainstorm screaming.
"Blue? Dross?" Lindon's voice cut through the noise. "What happened to you two?".
Lindon looked almost exactly the same, except his right arm no longer looked like a remnant.
Dross almost hadn't caught what he had said "What do you mean 'you two'?".
Little Blue ran and tried to jump into Lindon's robes, as if that would make everything better. Lindon managed to twist and catch her, so she just latched onto his side. Lindon looked between her and Dross
"She looks like a person and you…you're just a big ball of flame."
Dross tried to look at his arms, but found he didn't have any. He did the only thing he could think of, and went back to screaming.
Lindon hadn't immediately noticed his arm had changed back to normal flesh, only because his whole body felt how his remnant arm normally did. It was as if being told what things felt like. He didn't have much time to test his arm before Dross and Little Blue had started taking turns yelling. They had changed much more than he had. Little Blue looked like a person, it reminded him of how Ruby was mid-transformation between a blood shadow and Yerin's twin. Dross had turned into a floating ball of fire, not even purple fire…just fire. He had just gotten Dross to calm down and Little Blue settled in his arms when he heard Mushi speak up.
"This may be rude to pry, but…do you know those spirits?" Mushi looked exactly the same as before.
He was looking between Lindon, Little Blue and Dross with a bewildered look on his face. Lindon ran through a few responses in his head before nodding.
"Yes, let me introduce you to Dross," He nodded at Dross, "and Little Blue" he said, turning so that Blue was half facing Mushi.
"Amazing…absolutely amazing. I've always had a fascination with spirits and have studied any documents I came across. But I've never heard of anything like this. How did you meet? Did you give them those names? How did they know to find you here?"
Lindon considered Mushi's questions before asking one of his own.
"Speaking of here, do you know where we are?"
Mushi looked even more surprised "This is the Spirit World, I've dreamt of being able to come here for many years." He looked up at Lindon with the biggest smile Lindon had ever seen "I should have known tea was the answer" Mushi said before giving a hearty belly laugh.
Lindon looked around this strange environment. It seemed like any normal field, tall grass waving in the breeze, clouds drifting by overhead. He tried to open his copper sight and found that he couldn't. Holding down panic, he tried to cycle; but he only managed to breath to the cadence of his cycling technique; he couldn't even feel his own madra. Lindon peeled Little Blue off his side and set her down, she chattered in annoyance, but didn't try to jump back up.
"Pardon, could you explain more about the spirit world?" Linon asked. Mushi gave a few strokes to his beard before plunging in. Explaining how the spirit world exists on a parallel plane to the physical world. How spirits and humans can sometimes cross over. Finally he explained the Avatar, the bender of all four elements, who is a bridge between worlds. That piqued Lindon's interest, 'Bridge between worlds' he thought, remembering Ozriel's message that had explained there being different iterations.
'Could we have somehow passed into another iteration?' He thought, waiting for Dross to comment. He quickly realized Dross couldn't communicate through thought here, which was alarming and slightly freeing. At the moment it was a hindrance; Lindon didn't want to share too much in front of Mushi. Luckily, Dross seemed to have a similar idea, because he started asking Mushi very inconspicuous questions about the Avatar bridging worlds. Mushi began answering his questions, while asking Dross a few of his own.
Little Blue was very excited after hearing more about the spirit world. She chimed that they should explore and tried to climb onto Lindon's shoulder. Lindon held her back
"Blue, you're too big for that, try to run around, you might like it."
She pouted, but did try to run through the field. Apparently, she liked being in a bigger body, because she started jumping and skipping too. She ran in a big loop and ended up back with the group, babbling to Lindon, which sounded like a series of bells.
"Yes, I saw you running…" Lindon answered "...mhmm I saw that too…and the big jump." Mushi had turned away from Dross to look at them.
"Can you understand her?" He asked Lindon.
Lindon paused. On one hand, Mushi was really a stranger and they probably should be more secretive about themselves. On the other hand, Mushi was a trove of information and had been nothing but kind.
Lindon nodded "Yes, she's been with me for years now. Dross is a more recent addition, but we all travel together." Mushi's eyebrows were pushing into his scalp.
"I've never heard of spirits being in the human world for so long. Amazing. So…were they with us in the living room?"
Lindon scratched the back of his head "Ahh…yes. I've had to keep them hidden while we're in the city."
Mushi nodded quickly "That is probably wise, most people don't know much about spirits and people fear the unknown." Little Blue was peeping and jumping up and down, clearly ready to move on.
Lindon patted her head "Should we explore a bit?" he asked the group. Everyone agreed and they moved on, through the field and into the surrounding forest.