Tu Shanshu

One year has passed since I have arrived on these shores.

For one year, I have known the joy freedom, to wander paths that always have been closed. And while there is much I have learned, there is still so much yet to discover.

I hope these days can continue forever. But even if they cannot, I am happy to have lived them - to have known all of you. I am grateful.

If it is something I am allowed to choose, I would like to consider this date my birthday.

The words are back as they were. This is good.

I wish to ask - is there a way to cut magic out? I have...

...

[She looks away from the screen, gripping her upper arm, fingers digging painfully in.]

I do not want it in me any more. I want it cut away. Gone.

Is there a way?

OOC:

• Grey - Yorda
  
• Blue - China

[The feed comes on and there is Yorda and China Sorrows. The former looks a bit apprehensive and the latter about as pleasantly inscrutable as ever.]

Hello. There is something important that we have to tell you.

We have seen what the cultists have done to the other kedan. They are able to make stones that contain their lives, and pushed them beyond Death and Dreaming. All doors open both ways and they have crossed into the places we came from.

This is something they have hoped to do, something ordered of them. We have seen this.

[She looks to China, hoping that this is correct. China inclines her head briefly, indulgent, and takes over.]

Suffice to say that while something seems to have gone awry with their experiments, the goal appears to have been moving kedan across planes. While it hasn't been done again, our information implies that those who have gone have not come back, and I doubt they plan to abandon their goal.

I shouldn't have to tell any of you that this is a problem. As much as it goes against my nature to suggest the free trade of information, it may be beneficial to pool knowledge and resources to see if there isn't something to be done about cultists toying with lives and planes as they please.

[Yorda gives a small nod of agreement.]

...For the Kedan whose friends have gone missing... I am sorry this has happened to you.

[There is a moment where Yorda seems hesitant. It's hard to tell since her bangs are in severe need of a trim, but her brow is furrowed. She had promised China she wouldn't say anything yet, but she hadn't been forbidden to ask questions.]

[She screws her courage to the sticking point, sets her jaw, and looks at the screen, resolute.]

There was a time when the stones that hold - [She hesitates. Use your words, Yorda.]

...the soul-gems. There was a time when some were taken.

I would like to know about this.