was on day six out of fourteen, during the third dose I threw up trying to take the bismuth (huge pills). Then managed to get the tetracycline and the omeprazole but couldn't get get the metronidazole down before vomiting again
Went to the emergency room before vomiting again, and I don't think I can stomach the last dose of the night.
Did anyone else experience intense vomiting and nausea?
Good day! This is the second part to my in universe exploration to the ranking of spirits.
Before reading this, I would as that you visit part 1 for the introduction here --> https://www.reddit.com/r/WhiteWolfRPG/comments/1wq595y/a_hermetics_skewed_guide_to_the_classification_of/
You will find the link to part 2 within the link
There will be more parts after this, this one covering the rank known as "DEMIGODS" <3
please enjoy
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Now we arrive at something considerably more interesting.
Demigods represent an enormous advancement in spiritual complexity. Where Servitors are largely constrained by their essential functions, Demigods possess genuine individuality.
They are, in many respects, the citizens of the Umbra.
They have names. Identities. Ambitions. Interests. Preferences. Personal relationships. Political allegiances. Occasionally, regrettable taste in interior decoration.
Most importantly, they possess the capacity to learn, adapt, and act beyond the immediate dictates of their underlying concepts.
A Demigod of warfare may develop an interest in poetry. A spirit of mathematics may become fascinated with human courtship rituals. A great spirit of machinery might develop an inexplicable passion for gardening.
Indeed, I once encountered a particularly formidable Demigod of mechanical spiders that had become positively obsessed with growing roses.
It maintained an elaborate greenhouse, employed several lesser spirits as groundskeepers, and possessed a distressingly encyclopedic knowledge of soil chemistry.
I made the mistake of suggesting that its roses might benefit from additional sunlight.
We did not speak for eleven years.
The distinction between Servitors and Demigods is therefore best understood as the difference between a creature that acts according to its nature and an individual capable of interpreting that nature.
A spirit of war may still be compelled toward conflict, but a sufficiently sophisticated one could conclude that diplomacy, economic manipulation, or a particularly vicious game of chess represents a more effective means of pursuing its interests.
This adaptability makes Demigods both fascinating and extremely dangerous.
Consider the implications of a being possessing the strength of legendary Heracles suddenly discovering advanced mathematics.
Perhaps you negotiated an agreement with it several centuries ago, believing yourself exceptionally clever for securing its services at a seemingly negligible price.
Now imagine it learns compound interest.
And accounting.
And realizes you have been cheating it out of an absolutely obscene sum of money.
Congratulations. You have just created a creditor capable of throwing your house into the next county.
Demigods frequently possess their own servants, territories, rivalries, and political relationships.
Many serve greater powers, although the nature of that service varies enormously. Some act as loyal retainers. Others are independent contractors, mercenaries, courtiers, merchants, or opportunists who have attached themselves to a more powerful patron.
Still others prefer independence.
Their societies can be every bit as complicated as our own.
I have witnessed spiritual courts whose politics would make the Venetian Republic appear remarkably straightforward. I have seen vendettas perpetuated for millennia over insults so ancient that neither participant could remember their origin.
And I once spent three hours negotiating with a Demigod of abandoned shopping malls because it refused to release a colleague who had insulted its food court.
One should never underestimate the importance of etiquette.
Unlike Servitors, Demigods may possess genuinely complex relationships with mortals. Some take apprentices, establish friendships, pursue romantic attachments, or develop intense personal rivalries.
Others regard humanity as little more than an exceptionally noisy collection of temporary curiosities.
Their underlying concepts nevertheless remain influential. A Demigod of slaughter might develop an appreciation for classical music, but I would hesitate to leave it alone with the orchestra.
Demigods encompass an extraordinarily broad range of capabilities.
At the lower end, some are scarcely more powerful than the mightiest Servitors, possessing relatively modest supernatural abilities supplemented by their superior intelligence and adaptability.
At the upper end, however, we encounter entities capable of leveling entire city districts, creating catastrophic environmental disturbances, or pursuing elaborate schemes that threaten thousands of lives.
I once knew a Demigod who constructed an extensive tunnel system through a mountain using nothing but a pair of enchanted hammers that were a part of his existence.
Just hammers.
Admittedly, it took him quite a while, but the results were rather impressive.
The greatest danger presented by Demigods is often not their immediate destructive potential, but the combination of formidable supernatural abilities, independent intelligence, and eternally long lifespans.
A particularly ambitious Demigod could spend centuries pursuing a scheme.
And unlike your average apprentice, it might actually remember what it was supposed to be doing when those centuries have passed.
This category is so broad that comparisons inevitably become imprecise.
Many of the named curses from Jujutsu Kaisen, the more powerful devils from Chainsaw Man, and the Greater Daemons of Warhammer offer useful illustrations.
For those of you who prefer Western comics, consider characters such as Venom, Sandman, or certain incarnations of the more formidable supervillains.
The average Servants of the Fate franchise and post-Mending Planeswalkers from Magic: The Gathering might also provide reasonable comparisons.
I emphasize that these are illustrations of narrative scale, not literal equivalences in metaphysical structure.
Please stop asking me whether a particular fictional character could defeat another fictional character in single combat.
That is what Reddit is for.
Good day! This is the second part to my in universe exploration to the ranking of spirits.
Before reading this, I would as that you visit part 1 for the introduction here --> https://www.reddit.com/r/WhiteWolfRPG/comments/1wq595y/a_hermetics_skewed_guide_to_the_classification_of/
There will be more parts past this one as it covers the lowest grade of spirit. If you have any comments, criticisms or anything else, share :D
Please Enjoy <3
Let us begin at the bottom of our hierarchy with the humble Servitor.
Now, humble is something of a relative term. A particularly enthusiastic Servitor of combustion may consider reducing your house to a smoking crater a perfectly reasonable way of introducing itself.
But I digress.
Servitors represent the lowest classification of spiritual entity in our system. They are extraordinarily numerous, often acting as servants, soldiers, messengers, extensions, or even disposable instruments of greater spirits.
What distinguishes them from their more sophisticated brethren is not necessarily a lack of power, but a fundamental limitation upon their agency.
A Servitor is, for lack of a better analogy, programmed.
[Geller gestures toward a student in the front row.]
You there. Yes, the one attempting to conceal a Nintendo Switch beneath his textbook. Tell me, have you ever played Tetris?
Excellent. Now, have you ever attempted to prepare your annual taxes using Tetris?
No? Why ever not?
Precisely. Because no matter how skillfully you manipulate those falling blocks, the software simply does not possess the capacity to perform the task you have assigned it.
Servitors operate in much the same fashion.
They possess a repertoire of behaviors and reactions determined by the concepts and metaphysical principles from which they originate. They may exhibit an astonishing variety of responses to external stimuli, but their capacity to develop beyond their essential nature is severely limited.
Consider a lesser spirit of fire.
You may communicate with it. Befriend it. Convince it to perform certain services. You may even find that it possesses a delightful personality and an unexpected appreciation for nineteenth-century poetry.
But you will never convince it that setting things ablaze is inherently undesirable.
It is fire.
Fire burns.
One might as well attempt to convince an automobile that the concept of transportation is morally reprehensible.
Likewise, a lesser spirit of betrayal will inevitably betray you. It may genuinely enjoy your company, affectionately address you as its closest friend, and weep bitter tears while plunging a metaphysical knife into your back.
But betray you it shall.
The poor creature cannot help itself.
This is why I strongly recommend against marrying one, regardless of how persuasive its promises may seem.
Servitors may also lack individual identities in the conventional sense. Many possess no names beyond descriptions of their function or nature. A wolf spirit might simply be Wolf, while a minor elemental could be indistinguishable from a thousand others of its kind.
Not all Servitors are entirely mindless, of course. Some demonstrate rudimentary personalities, surprisingly elaborate emotional responses, or considerable cunning within the boundaries of their nature.
You might even encounter a Servitor that appears entirely human, capable of holding a conversation, laughing at your jokes, or developing what resembles a genuine friendship.
The distinction becomes apparent when you attempt to teach it something fundamentally contrary to its purpose.
You cannot teach a raccoon spirit the finer points of Kantian philosophy. You cannot persuade a lesser ice elemental to take up hot yoga. And you most certainly cannot expect a spirit of bureaucracy to approve your permit without demanding seventeen additional forms.
Believe me. I have tried.
Do not mistake simplicity for weakness.
The weakest Servitors are scarcely more dangerous than an unpleasant summer cold or an intrusive thought. Some can barely affect the physical world at all.
Others possess the strength and ferocity of a rabid grizzly bear that has consumed an inadvisable quantity of cocaine.
I have personally encountered Servitors capable of inflicting extraordinary physical harm, spreading disease, inspiring uncontrollable panic, and reducing an otherwise respectable laboratory to something resembling the aftermath of an artillery barrage.
The important distinction is that their power remains constrained by their essential nature.
A sufficiently powerful elemental of fire might devastate an entire building, but it cannot suddenly decide to become a merchant banker.
Unless, I suppose, it were summoned by the Syndicate.
For those of you whose understanding of metaphysics has been cultivated primarily through popular entertainment, consider the countless unnamed enemies populating your favorite video games.
The ordinary monsters in Dungeons & Dragons, the disposable henchmen employed by comic-book supervillains, the lesser daemons of Chaos from Warhammer, and the assorted horrors dispatched by Dante in Devil May Cry.
Even the little yellow Minions from Despicable Me provide a surprisingly appropriate comparison, albeit one I would prefer you did not mention to my colleagues.
They have recognizable personalities and serve their masters with enthusiasm, yet remain fundamentally creatures of a particular nature.
[Geller pauses, apparently considering something.]
Actually, the Minions may be considerably more dangerous than most Servitors.
Moving on.
Hello everyone! Current mage and werewolf storyteller here! I have created a admittedly skewed guide to the spirits from the perspective of a Hermetic professor and scholar. Below will be a In universe lecture on the subject by one such teacher. If you have any comments, criticisms, fun lore facts or anything else, I would love to hear them. Without further Ado!
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Good evening Apprentices and those of you who have wandered into the wrong lecture hall.
I am Magus Gideon Geller, Magister Scholae of House Ex Miscellanea, and tonight I have been entrusted with the enviable responsibility of introducing you to the wonderful, terrifying, frequently obnoxious world of spirits.
And before anyone asks, no, I will not teach you how to summon a succubus. That is Thursday's lecture, and attendance is restricted following last year's incident.
Tonight, we shall discuss the extradimensional metaphysical entities commonly referred to as spirits. These beings inhabit realities seemingly separate from our own, yet are so intrinsically intertwined with the fabric of existence that to consider them entirely alien would be a fundamental misunderstanding of the Tellurian.
A forest has a spirit. So does a city. So might a particular automobile, a corporation, a mathematical theorem, the concept of betrayal, or that dreadful little sensation you experience when you remember something embarrassing you said fifteen years ago.
That last one is particularly vicious.
What makes these entities fascinating is that they are not merely inhabitants of the Umbra. Many are the living embodiments of the principles, places, ideas, and phenomena that constitute existence itself.
Some are barely more sophisticated than particularly aggressive insects. Others are capable of intellectual discourse, genuine affection, political ambition, and the occasional existential crisis. Still others are so vast that what we perceive as a single entity may, from its perspective, be an entire civilization, ecosystem, or universe.
And then there are those for whom even the word entity becomes woefully inadequate.
Naturally, being the Order of Hermes, we have elected to classify them.
[The Magister produces an imposing stack of handwritten notes, places them upon his lectern, and immediately ignores them.]
Our subject tonight concerns spirits inhabiting the five—possibly six—great divisions of the Umbra, depending on whose cosmological model you subscribe to and how much you enjoy getting into arguments with Dreamspeakers.
Although the High and Middle Umbrae share certain metaphysical characteristics, the inhabitants of the Dream, Deep, Low, and Digital Umbrae may operate according to rather different principles. Some fit our classifications neatly. Others do not. A few would undoubtedly take offense at being classified at all.
For our immediate purposes, we shall concentrate primarily upon the spirits of the Middle and High Umbrae, with occasional references to their more unusual cousins.
I should also emphasize that our classification is not universal. The Garou, for example, distinguish between Gafflings, Jagglings, and Incarnae, among other categories. Certain mystics employ entirely different systems. Even within the Order, my colleagues have found endless opportunities to disagree with me.
Which, naturally, is their prerogative to be wrong.
The Umbrae themselves shall be the subject of a separate lecture. Attempting to cover their geography, cosmology, metaphysics, and inhabitants in a single evening would require either several weeks of your lives or a regrettable application of Time magick.
Instead, we begin with something considerably more manageable.
The five great rankings of spirits, ordered from least to greatest.
And do pay attention. You would be astonished how frequently the difference between a successful summoning and a spectacularly unsuccessful one comes down to knowing precisely whom you have invited into your living room.
I have currently downed the "TURBO TOILET KING 2000™" (Dulcolax) and now I am imbibing the elixir (MiraLAX) before I am interred on the porcelain throne, jet fuel rocketing my body.
Who is with me during their prep, hello! and good luck brave soldiers, brothers and sisters! May our procedures go well! and our preps too!
Tis Thomas, 37M From America! (I will be sure to give updates on the procedure, assuming how well I remember after dreamland....I mean sedation).
If you would please <3.
My conditions for those curious was bad consistent gas for a about a year, six months later I had changes in bowel movements rolling across the Bristol chart, Constipation followed by diarrhea. My colon on my left side began to burn regularly, Anxiety and loss of appetite, going a lot more, and sometimes, painful but brief spasms in the bottom pelvic region (between ones >!Testicles!< and Anus). Might have seen some red flakes as well in the stool.
Family worried it's the Big C, given I am 37 and it's happening a lot earlier, but I am trying to keep optimistic.
Also from the USA
Good day everyone! Allow me to introduce myself, I am Thomas (M37) and in america. and I have been experiencing some...concerning symptoms for maybe...colorectal cancer that has given me rare bouts of anxiety that I presume has been eating at my appetite.
Some previous information, survived a lightning strike so my body is not exactly normal anymore. Chronic pain through weird sensory stuff, fatigue, not sweating, memory loss, the whole nine yards. Basically on medicare through disability.
About a year or so ago, I noticed a greater increase in passing gas, and...a unknown amount of time later (Maybe six months ago?) I have been going to the bathroom more then my average. It passes between constipation and diarrhea. Sometimes I don't go for more then a day or two, or I go three to four times a day. My stool does not seem to have visible blood (I did however, during the release of the backrooms movie, passed quite dark stool like diarrhea, couldn't tell you if it was due to blood or something else, I wanna say...july?). I also pass stool all around the bristol test.
However, as of the last few or so weeks or months, I have sometimes felt a stabbing pain in bottom left colon, and sometimes in my rectum. I have also had a random, occasional and brief pelvic floor spasm. Along with well as a burning sensation that lasts in the lower left colon, along with what I assume is bloating.
My mother had a history of polyps and diverticulitis at her 50's
My General Care provider has ordered me a bloodwork and ultrasound for my abdomen and pelvic region and I believe she said she is going to order a Colonoscopy. Both the discomfort of my colon and my anxiety has done a number on me today
So for those who had or are fighting colon cancer (All my hope and prayers to you! Brave soldiers) and to those who found it was something else. Could you tell me your experiences? and perhaps how long it took you to get answers? Like with the coloscopy?
Thank you so much for anything.