The mystical art of melalia is widely practiced in Latori and sparks much interest and debate, even beyond the country's borders. This art involves practices like "immersion" into the Paper Gardens, creating symbols called veve, fortune-telling, traveling to the Flat, and even communicating with ghosts.
So, who can practice melalia?
The ability to practice melalia is something you are born with; you can’t learn it from scratch unless you have a natural gift. This gift only appears in those with parba blood. Given that most of Latori’s population has some parba ancestry, you might think there would be many who are gifted. However, only a small percentage of sahash (those with this gift) can actually practice melalia. True melalo are highly respected. Let’s focus on their skills.
One of the key abilities of a melalo is entering a place known as "the Paper Gardens." To get there, a melalo covers their eyes with their palms, cutting themselves off from the physical world. The Gardens exist beyond the usual boundaries of the Stream and Flat, but they are intangible. For those without the gift, the Paper Gardens will always remain a myth, a dream, or just a legend. For those who can immerse, the Gardens are very real, though strange.
They are a monochrome world, with no colors at all. Despite this, they are filled with a sense of beauty, peace, and a strange feeling of presence. At the heart of the Gardens lies a majestic mansion—a house of secrets. Some say they have seen an old sign above the entrance that reads "Avalanche," forged from black metal. The meaning of this word is unknown.
No melalo has ever been inside the mansion. It remains temptingly close but always out of reach, just a few steps ahead. The desire to uncover the mansion’s secrets drives many melalo to deeper and more dangerous immersions, each hoping to gain hidden knowledge or perhaps even meet the mysterious inhabitants of the mansion. The pursuit of the unreachable is a lifelong quest for many melalo, a symbol of their deepest desires and ambitions.
Another remarkable ability of the melalo is creating veve. These symbols aren’t just drawings; they hold real power. The process of creating veve is beyond the reach of ordinary people and sahash, but in truth, veve don’t appear out of nowhere. They are revealed to the melalo during their time in the Gardens. Only a melalo can see these symbols with their special "inner eye" and then bring them into the real world.
Each veve has unique properties. They can be used in different ways: from healing wounds to controlling elements or even influencing the thoughts and emotions of others. The knowledge of how to use veve is passed down from teacher to student, and the true meaning of these symbols is often kept secret.
Since there are so many parba in Latori, many people claim to be melalo. There are more fakes pretending to have the gift than real ones, making it easy to fall into the hands of frauds. However, those who have met a real melalo know that their powers are impressive. The ability to enter the Paper Gardens and create veve gives them a unique connection to forces beyond Shang-La, allowing them to do things others can only dream of. Many melalo also have their own special talents, like communicating with ghosts or understanding the Flat better than others, but that’s a topic for another, more detailed article.
Melalia is one of the most intriguing practices in Latori. It’s a gift that is respected, feared, and even hated by some. Most talented melalo become true idols in Latori, gathering fan clubs around them. They are opinion leaders, stars, and their names are always on everyone’s lips. As long as the mysteries of the Gardens and the mansion remain unsolved, melalo will continue their quest to unlock the secrets of this mystical art, always seeking knowledge, power, or simply the truth. Melalia remains a key to understanding the deeper mysteries of Shang-La.