Genie's Sacrifice

Date: 2/17/2020

In the setting of this dream, there are 2 kinds of magic. Both are kept secret from the general public, and only practiced behind closed doors. There's elemental magic, which works a little bit differently from one element to the next, and there's the kind of magic you can only use if you're dead. If you die, there's a chance you'll turn into a ghost. There's an even smaller chance that, as a ghost, you'll be able to use that special kind of magic. If both things happen and you're, specifically, a magical ghost then you're called a genie. A group of elemental magic users are living together in this setting. They've populated an old, cheap, run-down apartment building in a really out of the way spot where normal people don't usually go. They've basically made themselves a tiny village in this apartment building, and they have their own customs and beliefs. I don't remember much of their actual culture, I just know it was distinct from the culture of outsiders. This village has a few families with young kids, some couples in their 20's, a handful of elders ranging from their 70's to their 100's, and a few single people also in their 20's. It also has a genie in his late teens as a permanent resident, and his living middle school age sister who often comes by to visit. The genie feels comfortable in this environment, and likes everyone in the village. He's mostly okay with being dead, and I think there's some implication that the reason he died in the first place was to save his sister from something. He uses his magic in little ways, making life easier for the elemental users, and doesn't ask for anything in return. He has a place to "live" where people can see and interact with him, after all, and they've promised to continue protecting his sister in his place. What more could he want? Only elemental users and people directly connected to a genie's death can actually see genies, but one day the sister brings someone who's never seen any magic or spirits at all. Her classmate from school is a little spooked once she sees that magic is real, but the sister assures her that there's nothing scary about any of it. In fact, it's something that's important for both of them right now. She tells the elemental users that her classmate is sick, and she suspects it's an illness that involves magic somehow. She asks the elemental users to diagnose her classmate, and help if they can. The villagers agree immediately, and start with a couple of young water users trying a diagnosis. I don't remember much of what they actually do, but there's a lot of water levitating around and touching the patient's skin during the process. By the end of it, they conclude that their patient almost definitely does have a magic illness. An energetic elder in her 70's grabs the patient next, and uses ritualistic air magic on her. Someone nearby gets excited and says "I've never seen air magic actually being used before!" She ignores this and focuses on her work. She paints things in oil paint on the patient's wrists and arms, and moves air all around her. She shoves air down the patient's throat at one point, making the kid cough so hard she really does start to feel sick. She gets dark circles under her eyes at this point. The elder looks her patient over for a minute more, then turns to the villagers and the genie's sister. She tells them that not only is this a magic sickness, but it's a very old magic sickness that shouldn't exist anymore. All of the villagers suddenly understand what the patient has, and they get visibly worried. Parents hold their kids a little closer to them. I think there's some kind of deliberation over what to do at this point? The genie and his sister get involved, while the water users from before catch the patient up to speed on magic and comfort her so she doesn't start freaking out. The genie says he'll do whatever he can to keep this apartment building village from being wiped out, and of course to protect his little sister. Somehow, this leads to him... traveling back in time? He goes back a few decades, I think. When he arrives, the apartment building is a fancy hotel and he's a living person again. He has a mission to convince the people here to use genie magic to... do something? I'm guessing they're supposed to eliminate the source of the illness before it can spread, but I'm not sure how. It is a dream, after all, so there's only so much clarity I can expect. The main problem with his mission is the lack of genies. He's alive, the only person from the village to come with him (one of the elders) is now a spirit who can't use magic, and the hotel doesn't have any other resident genies whose help he can request. He's stuck. While he's trying to think of what to do, a blizzard strikes. It traps everyone in the hotel, including him. He uses this chance to try and convince people that there's a magic illness and they need to be prepared. He insistently makes speeches to pretty much every person he sees. Hotel guests are starting to hate the energetic, delusional, over-familiar guy in the weird clothes. At a certain point, the hotel manager decides that they're going to stick the annoying guy in a stew and eat him. Most of the guests gather in the shiny, well-kept dining room with our ex-genie sitting against a wall a little ways from the table. He's not tied up or anything, just sitting with his knees curled up to his chest and watching with fascination as the hotel manager preps other stew ingredients in a huge pot. The spirit by his side says that she doesn't really like how comfortable he is with all this, but it is a way to turn him back into a genie again... they can accomplish their mission if he gets eaten, as much as she hates the idea of watching him die that way. The ex-genie assures her that he'll be fine. At one point during the meal prep, however, he does end up making the hotel guests feel awkward and guilty. It's easy to do, since none of them have even considered eating a human being in a stew before, and their food supplies aren't totally out or anything. They're following the hotel manager because he probably knows more about how far their food will go, and because he has an aura of authority around him, but it's not something most of them would have chosen to do on their own. The annoying guy they hate says some things that get them questioning this decision. He talks about how it's uncomfortable for humans to eat monkeys. He asks why it's difficult and answers himself: because monkeys and humans are so similar. He does the same thing with dogs and cats and horses, this time saying that it's because these animals are close to humans in the emotional sense. They're important to each other, so having to eat each other is an awkward experience. The spirit tries to get him to stop talking, since this could lead to them changing their minds and not killing him after all. She warns him that the goal is to become a genie. Talking them out of cooking him into a stew could interfere with that goal. He promises that he knows, and goes on to say out loud that he's not asking them to reconsider. The only people who have an easy time eating animals similar to them in form or close to them in nature, according to him, are people who respect the sacrifice of the animal. All he asks is that they show him similar respect when they eat him, since he's an actual human being. The guests shift uncomfortably, and even the hotel manager who's been trying to shut him up the whole time is unusually silent. The ex-genie settles back in against his wall and thinks about how he'll see his sister and the villagers again soon. He'll have to die again, which sucks. It really sucks. He's actually trembling just a tiny bit, from a fear he didn't think he had anymore. He hates this, but he's able to keep it in a lot better than the last time he died. He'll just be a genie again, after all, and it's not that terrifying when he thinks that he'll still be around. He's both scared and perfectly calm. Reasonable, clear-headed, determined, and just a little bit shaky. At this point, something happens on the elevator. It gets stuck or something, and the ex-genie goes to help get it un-stuck. It ends up free-falling when he's in it, and I think that might end up being how he dies. In a shiny, fancy hotel elevator with a gilded door. There are some vague memories of how he returns to the future. I think he tells the villagers about the elevator, but not what happened right before that. I think they bring back some kind of cure, even though that wasn't the original plan at all, and save his sister's classmate. I don't really remember much beyond that, but I do feel like the genie got a bit of mental scarring from his second death even though he'd told himself he was prepared to die again. That'll all I know. Until next I wander.