Merlin had helped his apprentices save the world, and had died in one or two timelines to do it, and had made peace with a family of monster hunters, but now time had marched on, and his magic shop, Spells R Us, now was next door to a magical tour agency!
"Welcome one and all, men and women of all ages to the magical worlds tour. Contrary to popular belief, there is more than one realm besides our own. There are as many as there are countries in the world. And like nations their size wild vary. Some are as big as our universe, some a galaxy, some nations, cities, or an house. AND JUST LIKE OUR WORLD- MANY ARE DIVIDED POLITICALLY, SOCIALLY, OR ECONOMICALLY! Though lucky them thanks to magic they've sustained cultural unity.
"Naturally we will not be visiting all of them in our tour today. But you can sign up for more tours afterwards.
"We have the realm of the kitsune, now recovering from attacks from anti-magic-extremists.
"The kitsune are in fact only the Japanese branch of the magical foxes.
"The European branch are called the Renard.
"The Finland and the Norse are the Firefoxes, the Finnish branch are the Revontulet. And the Norse branch translates as either "tulikettu" "tulirepo" or "tulikko", take your pick.
"The Chinese branch are called the Huli Jing, be extra careful not to insult them, they likely own stock in the company you work for.
"And... there's the Kumiho of the Koreas. The less said of them the better. While on that leg of the tour, if you see any long dead or lost loved ones, ignore them, that is a Kumiho in disguise, they want to eat your heart."
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"Moving on, we have the realm of the undead, really big moons, and not much sun for obvious reasons. Your average zombie and skeleton are just mindless corpses animated by their programming. Lichs cheat death by putting their soul into an object using magical means and are all powerful mages. Ghosts are tied to regrets or unfinished business that imprison them on this plane of realities.
"Mummies preserve their bodies and sustain their unlife though RELIGIOUS means, and they composed of generations after generations of central American and Egyptian families.
"Vampires are different... they're animated corpses yes, vulnerable to sunlight, repulsed by the smell of garlic, and religious symbol held in good faith hold them at bay.
"... but the soul of the original person isn't in there. A new vampire spirit is born whenever someone is completely blood drained and left to animate, this new spirit is able to use the memories of its host corpse, usually taking their name, but these memories are like pages in a book to them describing the life of a stranger. They have no endearment towards their host corpses' family and friends. And yes, the Tepes' family do rule the vampires, but due to a recent coup, the CURRENT Tepes has through strength and intimidation ordered the hunting of innocent humans to cease... whatever you do, DO NOT give these bloodsuckers an excuse!
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"Eastern dragons are mostly concerned with the balance of nature but ultimate bear humanity no ill will except in self defense.
"Western dragon... to make up for their slow reproductive cycle, often transform humans who are the most greedy and ruthless of business men (and women), with the flock of sycophants such people inevitably attract being turned into the found members of their obedient person kobold clan who see the needs a dragon size makes harder for them to take care of for themselves. Western dragons are defined by their desire for wealth and power. Kobolds are FANATICAL in their service to their dragon, so never bad mouth a dragon in front of one of their kobold servants, you have been warned.
"This only applies to converted dragons, natural born dragons are driven by possessiveness and overwhelming desire, but free willed individuals... it's just once you can make fully grown dragons out of effectively nothing... natural born dragons become rarer... Each generation of natural born dragons fear they're be the last ones hatched naturally."
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"Unicorns for the record aren't just horses with a horn... they have the tail of a lion, and the legs of deer, and males have the beard of a goat, and to an outside observer look visible frail. Whatever you do, do NOT mention the TV show 'Divine Design-Team', in particular the episode that talks about how impossible unicorns are. They shall prove their physical existence to you in a VERY on-hooves and direct way. Like many mythical creatures, they see us humans as potential transformation stock, since as humans, changing and being changed is in our very nature. They do their best to recruit from environmentalist groups so the transformation won't rewrite much of the human's original personality.
"They are immortal, but not unkillable."
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"And now we come to what the furries in our tour group will want to hear about. The beast-kin, the lycanthropes, and the skin-changers, and the rare but dangerous skin-walkers.
"It's important you understand these are all very different beings in spite of similar appearance.
Beastkin, like the Wolfen, are humanoid animals, plain and simple, people with superpowers basically. But they went to follow the darwinist mentality and 'sticking close to nature.'
"Lycanthropes are NOT 'people with superpowers' they're people with a DISEASE, with the patient zero being King Lycaon of Arcadia, who was cursed after murdering his own son and supposedly serving him to the gods. Lycanthropes' disease manifests on the nights of the full moon, and they will seek out human flesh in particular, they retain full memories of everything they do in that form... but are driven completely by blind instinct. The only thing a Lycanthrope will never attack is one of its own kind. Contrary to popular belief, the disease is curable, the victim must be in its beast-form, have silver needles pierce its palms, and addressed by their true name, for religions, this refers to the name they chose for themselves when converting or going through confirmation.
"Skin changers however ARE 'people with superpowers' able to shift between human and animal, and some in between, they are bound to an animal skin of the creature they shape shift into, and guard it fiercely, as anyone who takes it, the skin-changer must remain at their side as a companion unless they steal it back.
"And Skin-walkers... avoid them at all costs. These are seemingly normal animals who murder humans, take their skin for themselves, and then steal their identity, run their life into the ground and move on.
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"Fairies, pixies, brownies, sprite, know that in their domain, if you're asked FOR your name... do say your name. Say 'You can call me' instead. This is became names equal possession. And promises HOLD POWER, their entire economy runs on promises! A promise with a fae is unbreakable. Between, the Seelie court is relatively reasonable if you can figure out the rules, the Unseelie court is very much UNreasonable and will string you along only as long as it amuses the before turning you into a raccoon or something.
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"Tanuki... close allies of the Kitsune family... might as well get it out of the way. Their scrotum range in size from absurdly large to gigantic. Showing it off is considered 'fun and game.' Nudism is not a taboo. They also LOVE using it for shape shifting. Just beware what the bike they ride, the limo you ride in with them, or the table and chairs they have you sit down at actually is. And yes, the females have chests equal in size, thank you very much! ... I'm paid to explain this every day, yes, I'm paid money for this. Ugh.
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"The bakaneko, the nekomata, and the nekomimi are again at first glance smilier, but very different. But they all inhabit the same domain.
"The bakaneko are magical felines who originally inhabited the island nation of Japan. They have asked me to insist that if you agree to be turned into a magical girl, it will NOT cost you your soul, you will NOT turn into a monster, and your soul REMAINS in your body, but you will stop aging, and will likely die in battle against demons. You're also entitled to a cut of all magical girl merch with your likeness.
"The nekomata had ties to the Yakuza. They live for 100 years among humans, then their tail split, they gain magical power, but are driven by an overwhelming instinct to eat and devour their mortal foster parents. So yes, nekomata tend to raise their children like cocos... the ones that 'adopt' ruthlessly train their foster children to be effectively members of the family.
"The nekomimi are the most recently to evolve tribe, able to pass for humans by wearing a hat, skirt or kilt, gloves, and a cloth mask to hide their ears, tail, claws, and fangs. Having been born from humans only a century or two ago, their among the closest to humanity among the mythicals.
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"The satyr and the dryads, while two different forms, they need each other to reproduce... the satyrs are always male, the dryads are always female. Satyr tend to only have sex and partying on their minds, but they love their territory as much as the dryads. The dryads manifest from the tree their soul is connect to, if the tree ties, they die. Nymphs... never look at one directly, you'll see the most beautiful being in existence... but it'll be the last thing you'll see as the image will be burned into your eyes as you'll have beheld perfection and you'll be blind forever.
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"Dijinn... hoo-boy. Just as they're bound to faithfully, obediently, subserviently, ruthlessly, and dutifully serve the human who holds their vessel (be a lamp, a bottle, a boombox, an incense burner, etc), as long as they human pays them proper respect... on their own plane of reality... humans tend be fair game... Having been branded by King Solomon to obey us after one too many arrogant genies saw humans as their playthings... They're immortal, and are many are still bitter about that, they can't screw you over on OUR plane of reality, but MANY genies WILL take a chance to claim a human as THEIR servant on their own plane of reality if given a chance. STAY WITH THE TOUR GROUP!
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"The goblins... are an odd lot... they're a buncha green skinned, bat-eared, long nosed, little black claws, needle teeth, short-stacks. They have horrible grammar, likely a hold-over from their old superstition of books stealing your thoughts, but are actually hyper intelligent. They also have no nudity taboo, or hygiene taboos for the matter, since they have an overwhelmingly powerful immune system. So their building style tends to be a mix of tribal, high-tech, and the lewd. They have stock in every tech company on the planet. And they place a shockingly high value on public education. They've also developed golems that can hold a human fetus to term while slowly turning them into a goblin, they're willing to adopt any unwanted pregnancies, free of charge, this had resulted in them being granted indulgences from the catholic church."
"Naturally, even these aren not all the realms in existence, not even close, these are just the most popular ones to visit.
"WARNING! MANY OF THESE DOMAINS ARE STLL OLIGARCHIES OR MONARCHIES! THEIR WORD IS LAW AND SOME ARE QUICK TO OFFEND! PLEASE DO NOT SPEAK UNLESS SPOKEN TO, AND RESPECT THE LAWS OF REALITY OF THEIR REALMS REGARDLESS OF YOUR PERSONAL MORAL AND POLITICAL ATTITUDES. YOU ALL SIGNED THE WAVER OF YOUR OWN FREE WILL! IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THESE RULES, ON YOUR HEAD BE IT!"