Garden of Enchantment 8: Finding Out More about Cecilia

A/N: I spent the last four hours doing paperwork for SBA because reasons that are impacting everyone right now. When you think that tropes are too unrealistic, the government pops up and shows you why they exist for a reason… “Complete form 4516-T, and form 5, but also do form 5C if you are sole proprietor, and yes, you have to write out the same information four different times. Also, don’t forget to sign tax return receipts, Loan supporting information…” on and on and on…

American Bureaucracy.

You are both the cause of muse and its killer.

Also, it’s the first time we’ve had a three-way tie with the votes in at 2-2-2 at Monday, 1:00pm PDT.

-VB-

To his surprise, Talrith discovered more of the differences between Boston and Brockton Bay. 

For one, no one openly wore gang colors. Even the Downtown, which was “jointly” ruled by Accord’s Ambassadors and the local PRT, no one openly spoke of their allegiances to an ideology or faction beyond what was far more socially acceptable. 

For example, when he walked away from Accord’s office, he overheard fair skinned children talking not about oppressing the minority but rather how “cool” it would be to become heroes. Adults who walked the streets were dressed far better than their Brockton Bay downtown counterpart and spoke not of the small bubble of safety that was their Downtown but rather higher levels of strategic, tactical, and logistical matters of city, region, and overarching nation. 

Oh sure, there were the usual people just running about being people and talking about the opposite gender, who made how much money, and whatnot, but the point of his observation was that he hadn’t met people who casually displayed their higher education in Brockton Bay as he saw them here. 

Again, this disparity in cities made him wonder why it was so. Was it because this city had more higher education institutions? Talrith didn’t know the exact details of the placements of such institutions. Maybe he could ask Margaret when he got back, or ask her how he could research all of these facts himself. 

He didn’t intend to stay a mere mercenary, not when he’d been so much more at the height of his life. After all, there was such joy in taking something so wretched and making it beautiful. If it gave him more power to lure spry women to join him in bed, then all the better.

Anyways, this Cecilia was supposed to be in the southern area of this metropolis, yes? The thought of running into the Butcher, whom he had been warned about by Margaret, didn’t feel his mind with calm. He wasn’t a newcomer to the mind arts; there were numerous cults and orders dedicated to that very branch of magic back in Runeterra as far back as he had been “alive.” He had encountered many fake mind readers, but few genuine mind warpers. 

Intellectually, he knew that there had to be mind warpers here as well. After all, Elle warped dimensions without even noticing the scope of her action and brought him here. 

But the Butcher was sinister in ways that made Talrith remember the Old Noxus. The sins committed in the Immortal Bastion was that left him full with the raw sadism and terror that perfused the place with each sacrifice upon the altar of the Mordekaiser, but it left him sick with its monotony and disgusting stench.

He wondered if this Butcher that the “East Coast” was afraid of ran in the same vein as Mordekaiser. 

And if this Sister Cecilia fought well enough to not kill the Butcher and get away when necessary, then she had to be far more powerful than him. Hmm, he needed more information. The brief codex he got about Cecilia spoke very little of her abilities and mostly about her behavior. Maybe Accord couldn’t get much information out of observing Cecilia, but that would make his target’s ability to stand against the Butcher unknown.

Talrith doubted that an openly berating figure like Cecilia would remain unbothered by capes, not when she was supposed to be a healer, which was a force multiplier for any kind of organization. Attrition and supplies were the two biggest pillars of logistics, regardless of where you lived or when you lived.

Ah, speaking of logistics, he remembered the first Noxian advances into Ionia. That had been an absolute clusterfuck for the Noxians, even with their on average better trained soldiers. They expected the kind of warfare the likes of which they and the Demacians engaged in: a show of brute force in which armies clashed directly. 

Perhaps he would have to consult the “Youtube” and “Parahuman Online” to learn more. Visual recordings and knowledge base were so freely given in this world. He loved it. Why if he got back to Runeterra, then he might try his hand at creating its version of the “internet”...

-VB-

A quick visit to a local cafe and using the “smartphone” Margaret gave him with a few instructions, Talrith found all of the information he needed, much of which Accord had neglected to give him.

Prick.

Okay, so what he found out about Sister Cecilia painted a very different picture from Accord’s drab and dry information. 

So the “Teacher” with a capital T was a bigger deal than he expected. It made her … well, a lesser version of Azir, and that was scary. The fact that she was capable of increasing the capabilities of others and then earning their near-absolute loyalty through the process. 

On top of that, she was capable of punching through a plate of steel with ease. 

Oh no, it wouldn't work on him because if he really wanted to, he could convert his body back to his baser gaseous form. It wasn’t his favorite form and it was slow, but he could get away if he really tried.

What concerned him was her ability to heal. 

Apparently, it didn’t so much as “heal” as it “corrected” what she saw as wrong. 

Yes, if he was going to fight her, then he was going to have to prepare something. 

… Drugs are easily accessed here. Could he get something that might inebriate her without making her drink alcohol?