Correspondents

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"There are some things we were not meant to know, they say. But you wouldn't be down here if you took that seriously."

Beyond this point lie spoilers for Fallen London, Sunless Sea, Sunless Skies, or Mask of the Rose. This may include midgame or minor Fate-locked content. Proceed with caution.

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"The Correspondent writes with a pen of fire and a hand of adamant. No topic is beyond his consideration, no subject too fundamental or necessary to be critiqued. He has, with a single essay, destroyed a religion, started a war, or shaken the earth."[1]

Correspondents are professionals fluent in the Correspondence, the language of stars.

The Study of Reality Itself[edit]

"Yours is a flexible career in a world of flexible rules. It will demand much from you. But with keen mind and keener pen, with violant ink and blazing imagination, you may reshape the world."[2]

Correspondents specialize in world-changing academics - rewriting the world with their pens. These individuals tackle scientific topics no one dare question (like gravity), or topics typically taken for granted, and flip them on their heads, causing upheavals across certain circles and outrage among others.[3] However, their publications are often considered to be too advanced for the average reader,[4] so such a career trajectory may prove startling if one has an established fan base.[5] The Correspondent profession is generally separated into two fields; however, most employed Correspondents will involve themselves in elements of both.[6]

Scholarly Correspondents, known as Epistolants,[7] prefer to adhere to this academic and legally straight-edged path.[8] This involves the study of Correspondence sigils and their nuances,[9] and the discovery of not just what Is in the law that this language encodes, but what May Be.[10] The less objectionable applications of the Correspondence include designing safe tattoos[11] and security measures,[12] reconstructing ancient texts,[13] writing demands[14][15] and contracts[16] with unspoken meaning, and conveying description and emotion in a way that would be impossible with mere words[17] or musical notation.[18] Particularly skilled Epistolants may be commissioned to translate advanced and dangerous messages,[19] like webs of sigils encoded in captured sunlight,[20] and messages without beginning or end.[21][22]

Crimson Engineers, meanwhile, have chosen to become experts in wielding the Correspondence,[23] displaying and taking advantage of its power as more than just a language and more than the laws of reality.[24] Much of the time, this is considered to be usage of the Red Science.[25] The Red Science might be used to augment a client's anatomy to their liking,[26] alter a reader's personality (usually applied by the malevolent),[27] and even break physics a bit in order to uncover the truths behind it[28] or accomplish a particular scientific goal.[29] At its pinnacle, at least in human (and similar species') applications, the Red Science may even forge an entirely new form for someone whose consciousness lingers to inhabit it.[30]

A few particularly skilled Correspondents are also (not) familiar with its frigid opposite, the Discordance. Correspondence may be used to repair the damage done by Discordance,[31] although such a process is extremely complex and dangerous.[32] Even without Discordance present, applied Correspondence has plenty of dangers beyond the usual fiery effects. One unlucky Correspondent attempted and failed to place their consciousness inside a treatise,[33][34] incinerating their body[35] and trapping them in a "linguistic in-between."[36]

Indelible Ink[edit]

"The smell of scorched air. The acrid lucidity. The burns on your fingers that will not - d__n it! - keep you from holding a pen. Violant handwriting flows out of you like a confession, though it will not unburden you."[37]

The ink Correspondents prefer to use is violant, the color of troublesome but necessary connections,[38] and a difficult color to forget. Violant ink is also one of the best inks for conveying the connection between meaning and symbol.[39] It tastes like pitch with a hint of tears.[40]

References[edit]

  1. ↑ Become a Correspondent, Fallen London
  2. ↑ A stack of blank lead plaques, Fallen London [This text is used for all results of The Jobbing Correspondent.]
  3. ↑ Become a Correspondent, Fallen London "Within the month, your searing exposé on the inconstancy of gravity provokes – in order – accolades, censure, a conference, death threats, three visits from the Ministry for Public Decency, one from God's Editors, a modest riot and the foundation of a new science. A cult of academics burn their libraries in the University's quadrangle and dedicate themselves to the 'New Physics'. Sincere, fire-eyed men and women for whom the universe has been made anew. [...] You burn new correlations across the gulfs of heaven, and plumb the earth to its roots. You are fluent in the language of stars."
  4. ↑ The Correspondent's Accomplishments, Fallen London "With the Correspondence as your lamp, you report on reality's intrigues. Few understand your despatches from the foreign frontiers of knowledge, but they will not admit it. You exchange letters with the city's finest minds, sifting their responses to separate insights from folly."
  5. ↑ Become a Correspondent, Fallen London "Your established followers do not appreciate your new direction. 'Remember when the [genderdescription] used to be a good writer?' they ask as they depart for easier fictions. You are beyond them now."
  6. ↑ The Jobbing Correspondent, Fallen London "Those who reach the pinnacle of Correspondence may dictate what the profession means to them – the apex of writing the unwritten or the dread arts of universal science. But those plying this trade must accept that commercial Correspondence is the business of coin, and coins come with two sides."
  7. ↑ Perfect their great work, Fallen London "You will become an Epistolant, favouring the scholarly paradigm of the Correspondent."
  8. ↑ A copy of your treatise, Fallen London "You came into this profession as a shaper of the written word, and for all that new vistas of reality have opened to you, you still see yourself as scholar, first and foremost. However, your role necessitates certain concessions to practicality. That doesn't mean you have to violate supernal laws and commit to paths of treachery, but you must still understand that which you aren't breaking in order to meet your client's needs."
  9. ↑ Discover what is mandated, Fallen London "Some sigils are known and frequently attested. Some can be guessed, assembled from other marks. Some are hapax legomena, seen once in the corpus and never again."
  10. ↑ Discover what is mandated, Fallen London "The Correspondence encodes what Is, and cuts away false propositions. But it is difficult not to notice the edges of the language – the radicals and diacritics that imply, subtly, what May Be."
  11. ↑ Design a skin-safe tattoo, Fallen London "A Bazaarine Gadabout wishes to be adorned like his muse's spires. Provide a sigil tame enough for bodily beautification. [...] | [...] The resulting sigil retains the majority of his intended meaning – but only warms the skin, instead of immolating it."
  12. ↑ Craft a set of defensive glyphwork, Fallen London "A glyph of entropy. A glyph to turn aside. A glyph of unveiling. And a glyph to snare their lives. Neither pick, nor ram, nor blow lamp shall breach these bounds of steel and sigil."
  13. ↑ Restore a palimpsest from the Library at Jericho, Fallen London "It takes strong light and chemistry to read the old sigils. They were written by someone used to hieroglyphs. [...] The text was poetry: one line per page, seven feet per line. The seventh foot was never set down at all. The reader must reconstruct that from the cadence of the rest. But you make out what the poem is. Betrayal, treason, escape, revolt. A trapped thing turning in its trap. A cur biting out the bar of its cage. _____."
  14. ↑ Rely on your professional standing, Fallen London "At the bottom of an anodyne memo, you draw a single word. It is a hapax, a word you have never seen, let alone written, before. The recipient of your memo will not recognise it. But to an expert in the Correspondence, the delicate threatening significance can be deduced [...]. The Dean of Supernumerary Faculty [...] will not take the full effect. But he will comply at once."
  15. ↑ Expand your workshop via persuasion, Fallen London "You spend an evening composing your demand. Once complete, it is bald and perhaps a little discourteous; however, to add a single softening word would light the page on fire. Better to send it to the Dean as is."
  16. ↑ Help a client forge a contract, Fallen London "The Devil watches mildly as you set down the very binding terms of the contract. He can handle the volume (and punctuality is overrated). His record is spotless (a bloodstain isn't a spot). His business ethics are— ah, appropriate relative to the negotiated remuneration (pay him as agreed and everything will be okay)."
  17. ↑ Compose a nostalgic ode, Fallen London "The Counsellor tells you of a [...] home she lost. [...] Much of what she told you sounded like elaborate fiction stretched over the bones of truth. Your pen cuts down to those bones. Your poem rhymes beautifully with her lost place. The happiness when she reads it may only be a caesura in her pain for a return, but in that brief breath, she will be home."
  18. ↑ Write something to sear the eyes of fools and lift up the great powers, Fallen London "The sigils name a future beyond comprehension. Extra dots and hooks give tune to the lyrics. The ink makes the whole indelible. Even those who cannot read the meaning will not escape the melody, and the song will be ragged in their throats."
  19. ↑ Operate from first principles, Fallen London "Light, they say, is law. A mirrorcatch box squats on your dresser, accompanied by a return address on the Bazaar's flank and a single-word command: 'Translate'."
  20. ↑ Operate from first principles, Fallen London "You drill a pinprick with a tiny awl, and a fierce blade of sunlight scatters through your prisms, bathing the walls in complex, scorching patterns. [...] The web of sigils is incalculably vast. A living ephemeris rages on your walls. Your mind burns with possibility. Your transcription is hurried; your migraine lasting. And this from a hole smaller than a pinhead!"
  21. ↑ Translate a Möbius text, Fallen London "Among the more dangerous works of Correspondence – and the most illuminating – are those without beginning or end."
  22. ↑ Translate a Möbius text, Fallen London "The danger is inherent: it is fascinating, compelling, truthful – and infinite. Even secondhand exposure to such a text could entrap a mind – so you make arrangements. [...] Senior scholars to assist you – working in shifts, never longer than an hour, and never alone. [...] When the hourglass runs empty, watcher removes scribe, by force if necessary, and the next shift begins."
  23. ↑ Create a vessel to refocus their consciousness, Fallen London "Game Instructions: You will become a Crimson Engineer, specialising most in the Red Science."
  24. ↑ An ornamental treachery, Fallen London "The Correspondence has so much more to offer beyond mere language. You know what it is to move beyond the page and make your Correspondent's craft a manifest thing. This will serve you well in your work."
  25. ↑ The Theory and Application of the Supernal Arts, Fallen London "To practice your profession, you must put yourself at the sharp end where Correspondence meets the world. Some call this applied art 'Red Science', though others insist that term should be reserved for those advanced forms of hubris and treachery that its more extreme adherents employ."
  26. ↑ Perform an odontographic augmentation, Fallen London "Marks of manducation, tattooed inside cheeks and on gums. Orthodontic apparatus – brackets of Stygian Ivory, wires of wounded metal. And the drilling – dear God, the drilling. Their grin is wide, their appetite uninhibited. Ship metal, cornice stones, secrets, shadows, smiles – they will sample them all."
  27. ↑ Defend a client with applied counterepistolography, Fallen London "Screening the Mondaine's post is a tedious affair. She has become wary, however, since the letter trapped with love-excising sigils. It was a choice moment to learn that her chambermaid had been intercepting her letters. The maid stays now at the Royal Beth, stripped of any care for her work, salacious gossip, or herself."
  28. ↑ Pursue truths through the Red Science, Fallen London "The forging of new bonds may uncover existing ones. | Examine the shrapnel of broken chains. Taxonomise the forms of newly-forged links. Pay no mind to the flames behind your eyes. Remember the letters your hand idly scratches on the table, twitch by twitch, with a fingernail."
  29. ↑ Engineer a flying contraption, Fallen London "Betraying gravity close to the ground would be a less powerful contradiction. You ask the Captain, one last time, if she's sure. She steps out into space, and hovers, governed only by the laws you have broken."
  30. ↑ Create a vessel to refocus their consciousness, Fallen London "The manifestation's grasp exceeded their reach. Returning them would be straightforward – had they not immolated their body on departure. But: science provides. You will craft them a new vessel. You must work with what you have: ash, scattered texts, and a powerful disregard for the natural order. [...] You fashion it delicate hands of paper. You cannot say for sure what the Consciousness will be, now. But you have given them form – and the chance to decide that for themselves. Science does indeed provide. And with it, you can make wonders."
  31. ↑ Safely dispose of a cold word, Fallen London "A Reader in the Correspondence saw a sigil she should not have seen. The damage lingers in the Lowest Reading Room. Some inversion of the Treachery of Shapes, they think."
  32. ↑ Safely dispose of a cold word, Fallen London "Repairing the Librarian is a professional triumph. Repairing the Lowest Reading Room – eyes closed so you don't read the writing on the wall, skin slicked in seal fat, teeth clenched to prevent dental misdemeanours, with two Impossible Theorems committed to memory? That is a red miracle."
  33. ↑ Commune with the lacunate consciousness, Fallen London "The manifestation, you learn, is the mind of a Correspondent who sought to delve beyond mortal limits. The text into which they tried to scribe themselves is still extant, but the lead slags before they can tell you where."
  34. ↑ Locate the transcendent text, Fallen London "It started with a book [...] till book alone proved insufficient. The walls, the floor, the void where the ceiling used to be – the whole room now plays vessel to the story of a mind. Their text is a work of staggering hubris, complexity, and genius. But it is incomplete, effable, trapping them here. A ghost lost in translation."
  35. ↑ Locate the transcendent text, Fallen London "But what of their body? Whether by design or accident, there is only ash to speak of now."
  36. ↑ A Correspondent's Calling, Fallen London "The Lacunate Consciousness intended to shed their skin and enter a transcendent state, to ascend to new heights of comprehension. Instead, they stranded themselves in a linguistic in-between, a pidgin only you have had the skill to learn."
  37. ↑ Capture what you've learned, Fallen London
  38. ↑ A Pot of Violant Ink, Fallen London "Violant is the colour of necessary, but troublesome, connections."
  39. ↑ Discordant Studies (Storylet), Fallen London "You're using Violant Ink instead, which is better at capturing the connections between symbols and their meanings."
  40. ↑ A Pot of Violant Ink, Fallen London "The ink tastes like pitch mixed with tears."
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