On the other side of a table is a young woman huddled under the coziest of the available blankets, sipping one of the beverages and looking faintly miserable. 

"So--not that I'm not--glad to not be where I was, but--what happened?"

"You died," Yoga Pants says, not ungently. "Now you're here, instead of being dead. I'm sorry to make demands of you, after what just happened, but--it's better than being dead, right?" 

Lucy sniffles and nods and sips her drink some more. 

After a little time passes without the younger woman asking any questions, Yoga Pants says, "My world has some peculiar qualities, chief among which is that certain of us who are connected to it in an unusual way have the ability to, once every few centuries, call forth from the void the recently departed spirit of one who recently died in one of those worlds which we can reach. Since this capacity is so rare, we have to be very careful whom we call forth." She reaches out and gently tips up Lucy's chin, smiles at her. "I don't, myself, know what it is that makes you exceptional. But I know that you are." 

"...Thanks," Lucy says, sitting up a little straighter. "So--what am I here for?" 

"You," Yoga Pants says with an insouciant little half smile, "are to be the Daimonarch, the leader of the Daimonoi, a group of magically-created beings and a force for change in the world. We cannot simply create a Daimonarch ourselves, as we can the Daimonoi; the Daimonarch has qualities which we cannot simply instill in a being created from whole cloth. Nor is it possible to confer the rank on one born within our own borders. It is absolutely necessary to bring in an outsider, not only for magical reasons, but because you will see what needs to be mended that others take for granted." 

You will see what needs to be mended that others take for granted.

It's not like the thought's never crossed Lucy's mind before. Everyone knows that demons are trouble, of course, and strictly speaking that's what Lucy's--unusualness--lends itself most to fixing. 

But nobody else seems to notice that suffering is bad. That death is bad. Yes, always. Yes, even when it's of old age, yes, even when it's someone you don't like, yes, everyone, yes, EVERYONE. 

And she had died before she could do anything about it, because a strong enough demon found her before she was ready. 

Maybe she can save everyone here. 

"What do I need to do?"

Yoga Pants smiles, "There's only so much specific direction I can give you," she says, "since we want the freshness of your eyes. But that doesn't mean there isn't anything I can do to help." 

"Tell me what you can do to help." 

Yoga Pants grins and stands up, stretching. 

She's tall, as is particularly apparent from Lucy's vantage point close to the ground, and the way she laces her fingers above her head, cracking her knuckles with arms fully extended only serves to emphasize that fact. 

She spreads her hands, and a haze of deep violet smoke forms in front of her, and then solidifies into the form of a living being. 

He looks - mostly human, key word 'mostly'. He has dark bronze wings like an enormous bat's, and a restless dark bronze spade-tipped tail, and two curling dark bronze horns peeking out of a mop of messy blond hair.

"This is the first of your Daimonoi, Set." 

???Ethics of just making people???

...She can maybe worry about that later? For now--

"Hi! I'm Lucy!"

"Hi." His tail swishes. "Huh, I exist now, that's neat."

"It is! How do you feel about hugs?"

"I feel great about hugs!"

"Ee!" 

She hugs him. 

She is a shapeshifter who feels very positively about hugs. She is soft and warm and in general just very very huggable. 

Wow! Hugs: even better than expected!!!

Hugs are so good. 

"So how do you feel about helping me save the world?"

"Pretty good!"

"Awesome." 

"Set is one of the High Daimonoi, second only to yourself among the Daimonoi in power. There are four others, which you must awaken yourselves, at the four ancient elemental temples. Once all four have been awakened, it will be possible for you to create further Daimonoi on your own." 

"And these people will all just--be coming into existence as adults? To serve a purpose? ...Gotta say I feel a little sketchy about that." 

Yoga Pants shrugs. "It is possible to create child Daemonoi, or to tell your creations they are free to pursue other lives, or to recruit outsiders to your cause. The choice is yours. The five High Daemonoi exist regardless." 

"Oooooookay then." She snuggles Set some more. "Is that...everything?"

(What a good and cozy friend she is!)

"Indeed not. While I do want to avoid spoiling the freshness of your eyes, there are certain things I think you ought to know, going in, in order to make plans and be able to function in society. --The first is a language effect; you should be able to speak any language you hear, since none of the languages in this world are English. This effect is shared by the High Daimonoi," she nods to Set, "but with the ordinary sort you create, you'll have to set what language or languages they speak at creation."

"...Okay. That works. Does it work retroactively, like, will I suddenly know what Alouette means?"

"I wouldn't call it sudden," Yoga Pants says dryly, "you'd have to actually think about it first. But yes." 

"Okay, cool." 

"The other things I think you should be aware of are the local magic system and Skill system." 

"Hit me." 

"Skills are a metaphysical scaffolding which supports the accelerated accumulation of ordinary skills. Once you have a certain amount of a skill in a thing, repetitive practice while focused will allow you to develop the first Level of the skill, after which ordinary exercise of the skill which falls within the bounds defined by the Skill will allow you to develop it further, building in further Levels. Skills can synergize with each other, and it's possible in some cases to build a new Skill off of an old instead of simply starting from scratch. Magic is performed by creating patterns, in the mind or with sound or with physical objects or actions, and then applying an appropriate amount of mana to the pattern. Mana is a natural resource which pools in living things; the easiest mana to access is the mana that pools inside oneself, but it is possible to access other mana under certain conditions. Does that make sense?" 

"I think so." 

"Do you have any other questions, before you embark?"

"...What can you tell me about the other High Daimonoi?"

"The four High Daimonoi you will have to awaken sleep in temples dedicated to what you would think of as the four classical elements; fire, water, earth and air. Marduk dwells in the temple of Fire, Tanith dwells in the temple of Water, Hestia dwells in the temple of Earth, and Neptune dwells in the temple of air. It does not matter in what order you awaken them." 

"How do I awaken them." 

"Simply step within the final chamber of the temple and command them to awake." 

Nod. "Okay. I can do that." 

"Is there anything else, or are you ready?" 

Lucy looks questioningly at Set. 

Big ol' shrug.

"I think so." 

"Excellent." 

The world goes white. 

When their vision clears, the two of them are standing in the courtyard of an old, ruined castle, moss gently climbing the ramparts as wildflowers run wild across what once might have been well-trimmed lawns. Parts of the structure have crumbled with age, but the construction is sturdy, and the parts that haven't crumbled yet don't look like they're about to anytime soon.

"...Ooh, pretty," Lucy murmurs, turning around to take it all in. 

"Yeah!" he agrees.

"Oh, man, I should totally have asked where we were landing in relation to all these temples. Oh well." She turns around some more, then walks up to the main castle building and presses her hand to the stone. 

The crumbled parts uncrumble. She leaves the pleasingly age-weathered look, but shores up all the internal structures. Then she slits her dress down the back to make room for a pair of feathered wings with which to launch herself into the air. She circles the castle for a minute, getting a sense of what buildings are where, then ascends higher and higher until she has a pretty good view of the surrounding countryside. 

She descends after another couple of minutes. "There's a town thataway," she says, waving towards the front gate. "Do you wanna explore here first, or find some locals to talk to? I could go either way."

"I would definitely rather explore the pretty castle than talk to people."

"We will definitely need to talk to people at some point but fair enough!" 

She fairly skips inside. 

The furnishings have withstood the test of time much, much worse than the sturdy stone of the building, where they haven't simply been looted and carried away. Fortunately, Lucy can fix anything that still has most of its basic physical structure, if not intact then at least close enough to figure out. And furniture is harder to loot than portable valuables, so they aren't going to have to worry about where to sleep tonight. 

Lucy holds up a recently-refurbished fancy embroidered blanket and looks at it critically. Suddenly it is--still fancy, still embroidered, but much softer and cozier. 

"...how do you do all that, anyway? I don't think I... know how magic works. I don't think I know how a lot of things work, actually."

"Oh, this isn't anything local, anyway, I've always been able to do it. Well--not exactly always, I had to figure out how, but it's a me thing, not a here thing." 

"That's weird. Is that weird? I guess I don't actually have any idea whether that's weird but I feel like it's weird."

"It's...pretty weird. There aren't many people who are or were like I am. Most people don't know we exist."

"Neat!"

"Well, it's also what got me killed."

"...less neat."

"Yep. I'm a--I couldn't find a less self-aggrandizing word for it than 'god,' which is not one of the kinds of magical people known to exist, those being fairies and demons. Demons are bad news and one of them figured out what I was and killed me before I could interfere with them being bad news at people."

"...Do you want a hug?"

"Pretty much always."

Hug. "I'm sorry you got murdered."

Snuggle. Guess who has HIGH TOUCH NEEDS. 

"Thanks. It was no fun."

Snuggle!! She's so cozy. A+ Daimonarch, would snug again.

"I wanna be your friend and never let anybody murder you ever again."

"I wanna be friends with you and all the other Daimonoi and never let anybody get murdered ever again and figure out how to bring back everyone who's dead." Oh man you know what would contribute to the coziness of this snuggle? If she had fluffy wings again. And wrapped them around him. 

Good! Good. Good yes this. Cozy wing snuggles.

"Sounds like a plan to me. I mean, I have no idea if it's possible, but I'm game to try."

Brightly: "Lots of things are possible if you refuse to consider the possibility of giving up on them!" 

"I guess that's one way of looking at it!"

"As far as I can tell, it didn't directly lead to my murder, so I think I can legitimately say that it's worked out for me so far!"

"What... happened with that? If you don't mind me asking. I mean, you said, but—I dunno, maybe you'd rather not get into it."

"So--I don't know exactly how he found me, he didn't, like, villainously monologue at me, but a demon--I don't know if I've told you things about demons and fairies besides the fact that demons are bad news--I think he had been following me, because he waited until I was alone, and then he grabbed me, and he tried to put a cloth soaked with some kind of chemical over my mouth, but I can shapeshift things that aren't me, and a demon can't, so I turned the cloth into water, and tried to make him let me go, but I wasn't better at shapeshifting him than he was at shapeshifting himself, and he was really strong, and I tried to turn myself into a shape he couldn't hold onto, but I hadn't quite gotten away when--someone shot me--and I could fix the damage, but, I think the second one got me in the head." 

"Man, that sucks."

"Yeah." 

Snuggle. 

"I hope--someday--I can let my mom know I'm okay." 

"Is your mom nice?"

"Yeah. She's really nice. I love her a lot." 

Cozy squeeze. "I'm sorry you got murdered and ended up in a different world from her."

So much hug. "Well. It's better than getting murdered and ending up for-real dead. Which is what usually happens when you get murdered. I think." 

"I sorta think so too but there's a whole lot I'm not sure about what with," shrug-hug, "being new to existing and all?"

"Yeah, no kidding. I think I'm gonna use the power to make new people out of nowhere, uh, sparingly. I mean, if anyone wants to adopt a baby daimon, I see no reason not to enable this, but in terms of making grownups out of nowhere. ...Maybe unless...I wonder if I could do, like, daimonic copies of people? If people consent to that I could try it." 

"I'm not sure if that works but it sounds like a cool idea!"

"I have no idea if it works but I could give it a shot!" 

"Then I hope somebody wants to try it so we can find out."

"It's a--actually I have no idea how big this world is, I was going to say 'it's a big world' but I have no idea how it compares to the world I'm used to. And it doesn't have internet. I should invent magic internet." 

"What's internet?"

"It...hm. Do you know what a library is?" 

"Ssssort of."

"Do you know what a book is?"

"I kind of know what a book is? More than I know what a library is. The thing I know about libraries is that there's a lot of books there and I feel like I'd have a better handle on the implications of that if I... had been alive... for more hours."

"Okay, fair enough. So, an internet is sort of like a book, or a library, except it's much bigger than either and you can access it from anywhere if you have the right doohickey."