This week has been hell for me, so you’ll have to accept my apologies for this maybe being more low-quality than you may expect. It is certainly a shorter one. Things should normalize next week. Unless the universe deigns to throw me another curveball, of course. At this point, who knows?
I even had a totally separate post lined up for this week! I couldn’t finish it in time, though, so you might be able to expect that next week.
Also, sometime in the near future, you can look forward to a short story from me about Pich Sotheara, the heir-that-almost-was, and her dabbling in forbidden chronomancy (time magic). If you remember from our last post here, she’s the daughter of Our Radiant Emperor who was relegated to the Princedom of the Near West despite being older, and in her opinion more deserving, than her younger twin siblings. That is still a little ways away, but rest assured I am working on it. Or, trying to, at least.
But, anyway…
"I got this from one of the cipher-monks. He told me that it would be a good idea to give you one for your travels, so you can have fortune wherever you go, good tidings in your life, and spirits watching over you. I would bet whichever ones are watching you now are so proud of you, Nadezhda, like me."
Jasna San, cousin to the great sorcerer Nadezhda, before the latter departed from home to attend the Imperial Academy in Angkor Banreah, the Flowering City. San gifted the sorcerer with a bracelet of hairmetal.
Good luck, passed down through centuries.
When the Pre-Aspirants offered this world in their departure to its current inhabitants, they left their sprawling complexes both seen and unseen beneath the ground. Like caves that were calculated and exact, a rival to nature and the natural order of things, these were littered across the land for our people to discover. Whether they were homes, or schools, or tombs, we may not ever know. But they stand as proof to the existence of people that walked this ancient land before us, fed it with their creations, and thrived on, below, and above its surface.
Behind the walls of these complexes, spanning in most cases only short distances, were more intricate networks of tubes thinner than the width of a finger, and within them too was metal so thin it could only have been created from godly artisans. The general consensus from the scientific and religious communities alike are that this hairthread metal carried the ichor that fed the machines in these spaces, churning, breathing things that show life even centuries on. Though to what end is certainly unclear.
Now, particularly among the spiritually inclined, you will see evidence of this hairthread impressing upon our culture in the way of bracelets worn around the wrist. Blessed by the cipher-monks, harvested under their supervision by pilgrims and temple congregants, one can carry with them a connection to the gods. The essence within the hairthread empowers us, drives us to be better. In a way, it is as if the ichor feeds us as much as it did their old machines.
What does all this mean?
Essentially, we’re working with two separate civilizations. One, the wondrous and magical Harborage in which our main line of stories are set, and the other: a civilization of hyper-futuristic, spacefaring peoples that came long, long before during an era called the Pre-Aspiration. These precursors left behind remnants of their world before they were, for whatever reason, wiped off the face of the planet they elected to inhabit. The sprawling complexes referenced in the above excerpt include things like laboratories and space-ports.
And the “hairthread metal”? Copper wiring harvested from the inside of their walls, and woven into bracelets, blessed by monks. Somewhat to the chagrin of imperial archaeologists who would much rather keep these ancient sites intact for study. But, there are countless across the world. They’ll have their share.
Based on a true, real life!
Inspiration for these holy charm bracelets comes from the actual practice in Southeast Asia, and more broadly Theravada Buddhist tradition, whereby people will tie blessed threads around their wrists to absorb negative energy, as well as to offer protection, faith, and good luck from the universe and from Buddha. The predominant color is red, but they can come in others, like white. All of the ones I’ve had in my life have been white, with a few exceptions.
In one ceremony that I distinctly remember, my family and other temple-goers gathered outside of a shrine where a veritable web of white string hung from the posts outside to the posts on the shrine itself. Then, at the same time when signaled by the monks, everyone jumped in the air and started cutting whole lengths of it down. The blades of dozens of scissors and kitchen knives flashed in the noon sun. Afterward, the lucky harvesters blessed their lengths of string with petal-steeped holy water. My mother had collected some of the water in a water bottle.
You usually wear these bracelets until they fall off, worn by time. I never took mine off, including to shower or to sleep. I’ve had several throughout my life. Usually, you replace them after they’ve worn off. Right now, though, I’m not wearing one. Sometimes traditions can slip by the wayside when life gets hectic.
Thanks for keeping up with The World Journal! Hopefully things will start easing back into normalcy.