thewarningafter | IC inbox for Snowblind

And people just keep living them? What is this, a horror movie? If the house is haunted, move out. It's not that complicated.

I asked their new Viscount about that. His answer involved a lengthy diatribe about my ancestry, port tariffs, and a paean to the pride of his people and their melting pot.

Of course it did. God forbid we show any common sense when we can be patriotic instead.

I am in full, if hypocritical, agreement. To his credit, Varric did agree with me when I said it was a shithole. But then he's a dwarf and they're immune to magic. And mostly immune to lyrium an occasionally immune to not being stubborn assholes who need to find new places to live.

A dwarf? So it's elves and dwarves, you've got the whole subset of fantasy races. Not fantasy, obviously, same as I'm not a comic book -- I've been thinking a lot about interdimensional reverberations and their apparent effects on works of fiction in neighboring universes.

[There's a pause.]

Elves, dwarves, Qunari, and humans make up the intelligent races of Thedas. Humans and Qunari came from somewhere else. There must be other worlds out there because we came from somewhere.

Do you mean the reverberations of people crossing from one world or... Alright, I don't usually mention this. But when I was in the crossroads, there was a book. Varric had been working on another of his serials, Hard in Hightown. There was a chapter there, one Varric claimed he hadn't written. It included a character who sounded a great deal like someone we lost in battle two years before.

Huhh. That's...creepy.

[Sorry, Dorian, full, unfiltered honest over here.]

Could be people crossing over, but I don't think it is. I think our universes echo into each other. There are people here who I know aren't real in my world, and people here who know me as someone from a -- it's a kind of book. With pictures.

[Dorian doesn't disagree.]

Well, that's- hrm. Perhaps if there are as many potential iterations of the world as some have posted, then a world where your life is coincidentally the subject of fiction seems not entirely unreasonable. Or some people have insights into other worlds without recognizing what they are doing.

Or perhaps any story is reflected somewhere because we follow similar patterns. You are not so different from mages I have met in my own world. In terms of personality and so forth.

[Dorian speaks slowly, processing as he talks.]

In an infinite multiverse, infinite things are possible. Of course, that presumes that the multiverse is actually infinite, which we'd have a hard time proving. Or disproving. Or testing at all, frankly. So sure, it could just be that when you have enough monkeys banging on typewriters they'll eventually write my life story. And illustrate it. I've thought it's probably that middle possibility, but if you're going to claim that there's anyone out there like me other than me, we might have to go with patterns of life. Or maybe mages are just all handsome, talented people because that's what it takes, I'm not going to discount that possibility.

Alas, I have met mages who are less than talented or handsome and not merely in comparison with myself.

Though I do agree with the impossibility of testing how many universes there are. Perhaps the people who've passed through this place represent all the worlds there are. I doubt it but until others come, it's the data we have.

There was someone a great deal like me here. Same name, same perfect teeth and hair.

The first Dorian, yeah. Died before I came here, only ever saw him as a name on the obituary. That's...most people who have had other versions of themselves here before them don't like to talk about it. Then again a lot people are sensitive about anything I put on the census.

Well, I'm not exactly happy a version of me kicked the bucket here. But it does open up some fascinating lines of inquiry, does it not?

I find that most people are sensitive about things that matter or would provide better insight. After all, they might provide better insight into them as well.

[So many reasons Dorian decided working with Spirits was preferable to working with humans.]

Sure. Going off the data, so far whenever someone dies and is replaced by a second version, the first version hasn't come back even if the second dies. Don't know if that means anything, but it struck me as interesting. We don't even know if we're even really talking about two versions of the same person, or one person who's lost their memories. People gainmemories while they're dead sometimes; there's nothing to say they couldn't lose them as well.

In most cases we may not know but I am certainly not the man who was here before. In my world there was a cataclysm recently.

[Dorian's tone turns brittle but he doesn't seem to notice.]

Someone blew a hole in the physical world. In my version of events, the woman who closed the hole and saved the world was Inquisitor Malika Cadash. According to what I've found on the network, the previous version of me was here with an Inquisitor Lavellan. His relationship appears to have been quite similar to mine with Inquisitor Cadash. Her relationship with one of our mutual friends, Commander Cullen, is quite different.

All three of them can be found among the dead in this place.

[He meant the other Dorian, Ellana, and Cullen.]

...Now that's one I haven't heard before. The...everything you just said. I don't think most of the people with doubles do that kind of researcher; you're probably alone in actually wanting to know about the other guy.

What kind of hole? Like a hole into the Fade?

[Excuse him, he's incapable of staying on topic. Or displaying tact.]

He was here walking around, talking to people. Like his history was his own. The nerve.

[Dorian would prefer to have at least some idea of what people might have learned and which ones might know more.]

Yes, precisely. A hole between our world and the Fade. Very unhealthy for a number of reasons.

I can't imagine how you must suffer thinking about it. Except I can because it's occurring to me that if I die, Billy's Doctor Strange might show up in my place.

Creepy.

Seeing another similarity between your story and mine.

Dorian is torn between laughing and trying not to think too hard about the horror of their existence.]

Yes, we do seem to share quite a bit of common ground.

But we were discussing magic, I think, as enjoyable as this digression into my uniqueness has been. What do you think the chances are that whatever is under Norfinbury is related to time magic?

[He'd meant to bring up that idea more smoothly but oh well.]

Time magic?

[He's honestly surprised by the question. For once he hesitates, though it only lasts the briefest of moments.]

Not very high, if I'm honest. There's not a lot you can do without the Eye of -- the infinity stone, the time stone --

[His efforts to head himself off from naming the artifact backfire, leading instead to tighter clarification.]

-- which is definitely not in a library in Kathmandu inviting some kind of invasion if anyone finds out it's there -- oh, for --

Well, then. Alright. I will note that I have no desire to experiment with this or invade Kathmandu, but, this Stone. Is it a green sphere by any chance?

Capable of holding immense power. Arcane lore practically wafts off it. That sort of thing? Roughly three times the size of a man's closed fist as a wild example?

[Stephen would be more worried if he thought there was a chance of this getting back to someone who could actually do something about it. And, well, if he had more of a choice about blabbing. He lets out almost a choking sound in surprise.]

Ye -- no? Green yes, sphere, yes, immense power yes. Crystal ball size? No. It's tiny, it's a little rock in a pendant.

I'd be more comforted if I knew whether the size was necessary for a somniborium or yet another instance of Magisters being unnecessarily melodramatic. Does it have any connection with dreams or travel between worlds? Most of my experiences with such devices have been overwhelmingly negative.

No? I don't think it does. It's...an infinity stone. I don't -- I don't know what that means. I know how to use it, but I have no idea what the thing is.

A somniborium is a Vessel of Dreams. It contains immense power that can be put to a number of uses evidently. They're Elvhen so I don't know as much about them as I might. There seems a strong likelihood the elves brought them to Thedas when they crossed worlds.

[A hesitation.]

The time travel I experienced was only possible while the escaped energy from a broken one was warping reality.

Not the same thing, then. This thing wasn't broken; you just had to know how to tap into it. How not to tap into, too, but the casing helped with that.

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