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Sender: Phantom
To: Everyone
Subject: Healing Magic

Good evening. I write to ask if there are any amongst us dreamwalkers who may be able and willing to teach the healing arts.

The ability to mend wounds and cleanse poisons is a valuable skill that can help us prepare for unexpected events. Owing to the varied forms of dreamwalkers, I believe that magic would be more effective, as well as more accessible, whether drawing from magical aptitude or from our own dreamotion energies.

Please let me know if you are interested in teaching. I can offer some compensation for your time. I also encourage fellow prospective students to write in, I shall keep you apprised of any developments.

Thank you for your perusal, and I wish all a pleasant sunset.

Phantom

[ ooc: Sometimes I render Phantom's network posts with 𝔣𝔞𝔫𝔠𝔶 𝔣𝔬𝔫𝔱 to emphasise his handwriting and/or way of speaking. It's opt-in since I understand it can be kind of illegible! Let me know via PM if you want the 𝔣𝔞𝔫𝔠𝔶 𝔣𝔬𝔫𝔱. ]

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Oh, thank you… They’re no replacement for real healing spells and rest, but… Hopefully they help, especially in an emergency.

[ The potions are handed off successfully, and with that Ori allows herself to sit at ease. The takes up her cup of tea in her hands, first savoring the aroma. Given that this tiefling wears any number of flowers on her at any given time, it would be reasonable to assume that he was right to select a floral blend for this particular visitor. ]

You know, I’ve been thinking about whether that would be easier than trying to teach someone the healing magic that I know from home. Maybe, if the solution was brewed, but infused with dreamotion energy instead of druidic magic… I wonder if that would work…?

[ Which is to say… No, she hasn’t been made aware of his nature. She has a vague recollection of Phantom having had his own experience with turning noctaere from the journals, but Thoma had been in a sleep coma at the time, and she couldn’t bring herself to leave him in such a state… ]

[ So the potions were made with both magic and materials... he suspected that, and had been hoping otherwise, though he supposes it can't be helped. Arts in his world could only serve as a temporary measure, it truly took a different type of world and rules to create these things. ]

'Tis worth trying. A failure can pave the way for future successes.

[ This he says after a sip of his tea. He supposes he should mention his... little problem now... ]

Miss Oriphi... as you may have already noticed, I did not fare as badly within the glacial cave compared to our other friends. The cause... is due to a certain change in my presence, my very nature. My soul is attuned to the nightmare, instead of the light of dreams. Mine fear is that this difference may harm others instead of help them.

[ He falls silent afterward, waiting for Ori to give her perspective. ]

[ Oriphi nods in agreement, keeping her ponderings about dreamotion-powered potion-brewing tucked away in the back of her mind for now, as Phantom starts to elaborate on himself.

She is, naturally, eager to get to know and learn more about him based on the fact that they’ve now fought and survived through quite a harrowing experience, but what he tells her isn’t quite what she’s expecting to hear. Come to think of it, she had noticed that he seemed particularly resilient to all of the nightmare energy. ]

Attuned to the nightmare…

[ She repeats his words, as if to ascertain that she’s heard him correctly. She falls silent in turn, too, only giving a contemplative hum. ]

I see… How did you come to be attuned to nightmare energy, if you don’t mind me asking…? I… I know that some people were using it back when we were all on the moon - and that it wasn’t necessarily harmful to do so, back there. That you can use it and that it wards you against nightmare energy feels like a good thing, but…

[ Phantom closes his eyes for a moment, trying to compose his reply without too much rambling. It's a rather complex issue, tied deeply into his past experiences, and he feels it impolite to burden her with all the details at their first discussion. ]

In my world, most are able to use Arts, a skill analogous but not identical to magic. I was... cursed when I was quite young, which changed the nature of mine Arts, and my very soul. My power is over shadow, and mine voice inspires madness in all who listen. [ He indicates the limiter around his neck, covering some but not all of the Originium crystals embedded in his throat. ] I know not the specific mechanism, but they are strengthened by the nightmare energy of this world.

[ There's also the matter of him turning noctaere a few months back, but on hindsight that was probably inevitable. ]

Perhaps the seed of nightmare was already within me when I first arrived, or that my power warped me from within after arrival... regardless, I am of the darkness now. Mourn not for me, I have made my peace with it. I only wish to avoid harming others .

[ At least, if he had found himself rambling, Oriphi would simply have continued to listen dutifully as she does now. Perhaps there will be time yet in the future for those more complicated conversations, and she would be as happy to hear out his burdens then as she would be now. After all, she’s spent the last few days telling the others that they can rely on her more, that they need to be more forthcoming about their struggles if they’re to prevent such a tragedy from happening in the future.

But then again, Phantom likely knows that better than most. He’s lived through it, too, and Oriphi knows that must be a changed man for it. ]

Ah…

[ For but a moment, she wonders if her own magic would do anything against his curse. She has a spell that is meant to lift curses - but what he describes feels so very different from anything she’s ever encountered in her home world. The nature of the curse doesn’t seem like it could be lifted even with a spell like Greater Restoration… Yet, she can’t keep herself from wondering. ]

In a way, I guess it worked to your advantage here. Your curse, I mean. I think the same thing might have happened to me, but on the opposite end. My magic draws from nature and primal energies, and some of it from the Fey realm - but this place seems to have replaced the latter with its own, with dreamotion.

[ She falls silent for another moment, thinking on this conversation, his resilience. What she and Aerith had talked about the other day, about the Dawn flowers. ]

Maybe… If we made something using Susato’s Dawn flowers… And then imbued it with the nightmare energy you’re able to use… If that would create a potion that can grant someone that same resilience that you have against nightmare energy? It’s not the sort of healing potion you were looking to create - but it would still be a huge help.

[ Phantom did become a changed man after the events of Dreammare castle; his friends' belief in him bolstering his confidence and setting him on the path towards mastering his shadow. He would not burden others with the things that he has left behind, but perhaps he could share these stories with Oriphi one day as recollections. ]

Hm. That is a perspective new to me.

[ He thought that his own resistance was because of his shadow, and that someone without a similar shadow would succumb and become a noctaere if exposed to the same energy. If he could lend others his protection without the prerequisite of suffering, then... ]

I was told that Dawn flowers repel, or consume nightmare energy. Perhaps a modified potion could allow the user to lessen the effects of nightmare energy on themselves, instead of counteracting it directly, and requiring constant replenishment to upkeep the effect.

[ The more that they speak of this, the more determined Ori becomes to find ways to counteract nightmare energy… She would be naive to think that there’s a way to make sure what’s happened to Phantom and Eustace and others who’ve succumbed to the nightmares could be entirely preventable. She knows of the fickle natures of dreams and in turn, nightmares, after all…

But surely there must be ways, just as she and Phantom are speaking of now, to ensure that the nightmares aren’t as destructive as they have been. ]

If we can create ways to help… I think we ought to. We have to - or at least try. No matter how small. I don’t want to see that happen to anyone again…

[ Especially those she cares about. She only wishes she had met Phantom sooner. ]

I… I know we’ve only just met, but I want you to know that you can rely on me, too, if things become difficult with nightmares or your curse or anything. If there’s any way that I can help, I’d like to. I’m a healer, after all…

[ Light and shadow, day and night, dreams and nightmare... trying to repress or eliminate the nightmare would be fruitless. Phantom believes that it would be more productive to accept one's darkness and learn to coexist with it. Of course, he's not one to assume that this would be easy. It would be a battle that each person has to fight on their own. ]

I feel the same. Those nightmarish experiences ere wdifficult to endure, but we come away from them with lessons learned. I am sure we are able to devise a solution of some sort.

[ No lives were lost during his and Eustace's transformations. He counts that as a next positive. As Ori continues speaking, his solemn expression softens into a slight, gentle smile. ]

I appreciate your offer, truly. I will keep it in mind; I may have need of your assistance in the future.

[ Venti and Zelda are helping him now, but he thinks that having another perspective would still be beneficial. By comparing the various magics that work on his illness, perhaps he could derive some useful findings. ]

For now, I muse upon the possibility of teaching healing magic to others. I understand that different worlds have different structures of power; it seems the most universal source of power would be dreamotion, which is accessible to every dreamwalker. The question, then, would be how to adapt this source to fuel proper healing spells. [ He was not able to heal, even when he could still command dreamotion energy. He believes there must be some frame of mind required to enact healing magic. ]

[ Ori feels the same way, although she’s likely never truly thought of it in as much words. But she has seen many people turn away from the nightmares of their past, for one - both at home and here - and there’s never anything good to be had when one runs rather than accepting those fears… She’s guilty of the same, though.

Regardless, they move on. Ori has never purely relied on dreamotion for healing; she’s always only used it to bolster the healing she casts upon injuries using her own magic. But there’s certainly merit to the idea, and in fact it’s something they should all be exploring for the collective safety of all dreamwalkers. ]

Where I’m from, healing magic can come from different things… Whether it’s from a druid’s connection to nature, or cleric’s belief in their deity, or a bard’s song… I guess among those, the one thing we would have in common… would be faith.

Faith in your god. In the spirits of nature. Or in the wonder of music…

[ She has a feeling the lattermost might resonate with Phantom, especially. ]

So maybe… Faith is a key to achieving healing effects with dreamotion? I mean, it’s worth trying, at least…

[ Phantom nods as Ori speaks her thoughts, and there's a twinkle in his eyes as she mentions music. While his song can only harm others, his voice is not the only way he can express himself. ]

Faith in hope. No matter how dark the night, that the sun would rise again tomorrow.

[ One's emotions could manifest into reality in this world, and it would not be too much of a stretch to expect those positive wishes to take effect as well... at least, that's what he thinks. Incantations and rituals can then guide these positive emotions into physical form. ]

Do you perhaps have any spells or rituals that you use to channel your power?

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