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She had felt it.
When the old man had left his body behind, she had felt it.

Oorlaith had foreseen that he would decide to leave this World, and thus was not affected too much. However, she was not sure that Leonard, who she had sent to the highs of Mount Elok’ram had had time to retrieve the cup of Margilonia.

Oorlaith had already collected the wand of Selvaniel, which Leonard had brought back to her, thanks to her indications, from the Forest bordering the Marshes. Now, she hoped he had time enough to get to the old Abbot.
Otherwise, it might be more delicate…
Much more delicate…

Hopefully, she had made contact with Roselyn, who had been settling in another part of Asgurdy, on one of the numerous rocky islands bordering the South-western coasts, where life was scarce and the soil barren, but where it was safe enough to do magic in this superstitious land, as not much people ventured to these places.
Her spiked dragon had helped her carve out her new residency and she was quite well installed now.
Before moving from the deserts of Asgurdy, she had managed to get the sunstone of Agnima.

From Georges and Salome’s diary

I woke up from my mediation, having seen those whom Georges refers to as “Guardians”. They looked deeply troubled. Apparently, they possess some kind of power that each of them share to an extent, at least the Eldest of them (or Jokans). With that power, they can travel in time and space and undo what another of them could have planted at some point in the canvas of their material reality.

It thus appears of extreme importance that their decisions are reached with unanimity, as they have come to experience. My own presumptions tell me of a time not so far from this now where they were more numerous, but that the competition may have quickly decimated —exhausted, most certainly— those who did not align with the more powerfully expressed movement. Or perhaps they simply parted in different probable versions of this World, which is an eventuality equally as presumable.

In any case, they were distraught over one in their ranks apparently doubting the decision they had just taken. They all knew of the consequence of one of them disagreeing, and it could nullify their efforts. It was thus of great importance that they come to understand, as much for the group as for the individual the source of his anguish. It seems some big changes are being planned…

When Veranassessee entered the secret facility with Gloria and Sharon, her blood congealed in her veins.
Patient 4 had escaped the safety straitjacket and was holding the doctor at paper-clip point.
Patient 4, was one of the first six patients they’d treated on the island, an awful miscarriage… Of the six, all had developed strong reactions to the medication especially as they had not yet found the appropriate dosage for the blue spider venom. Some had developed extra appendices, most had been hideously disfigured, and all of them had gone bonkers.
“Four” was the last alive of them all, by an inexplicable combination of luck and genetics, and by far the most dangerous one. Apparently, apart from madness, the venom had gifted “Four” with supra-human velocity and strength. It was what had kept that mad doctor from “erasing” that mistake, so sure he could find some interesting way of making profit out of that prodigious lucky find.
But now that was compromising everything…

V’ass pushed the two chatty old ladies in a broom-closet behind with a wink Be right back ladies!

Sharon and Gloria giggled in the small room, wondering about the unexpected sense of hospitality of the people of that resort. All was so funny and exciting since they’d decided to come to that place.

— Four! Release the doc’!
— Don’t move an inch closer or I’ll kill him!
— You have nowhere to go Four, backups will be here any minute now…
— One second is all I need to snap his neck!
— No! Dr. Chris Bronklehampton was moaning
— You, stay still, the mummified Four snapped to the panting doctor.

Quicker than light, V’ass shot a powerful sedative into the arm of the mummy. Four winced, drawing the dart out of the arm, crushing the fluffy fletchings between the fingers. Quickly assessing chances to escape, Four sent the doctor flying at the other side of the room, in a powerful swing of the arm, and jumped through the window in a formidable sound of smashed glass, disappearing into the jungle.

— Chris! Are you alright? Nurse Bellamy was already caring for the fainted doctor.

It’d been two hexades that the Abbot Hrih Chokyam Lin’potshee had been laying in bed in poor condition.
At first, he had wanted to be as strong as he had always been towards hardships, but he’d finally admitted that quelching the pain wasn’t doing any good to him. So he had agreed to be taken care of by a young monk, and to lay in bed as long as was necessary.
He knew that he was very likely not to get out of that bed but with his body covered by a white sheet, nevertheless, the thought was still something distant. The pain in his body was making him so present to himself that the only thing that was still blatant was that he was.
More than the body, it was all his faith that was shaken. He had thought he would leave this life without mess, without pain, probably very discreetly in his sleep… But now, his head was wincing at every noise, even the nature’s sounds that once felt like music to his ears, he was eschewing them now as much as he could. His very skin was hot and couldn’t bear even the soft contact of the bedsheets.
What was the point of all of this? He had never doubted that everything had its purpose, but now, he was doubting…
He was even trying to find some reasonable reasons for what was happening, he who never trusted in reasonable reasons in the first place. Perhaps that was because of his seating under the chilly air and the warm sun in front of the Meditation Wall, reading for all of the poems that had been written by the monks who had dared to write. Perhaps he had “taken cold”, whatever that means…
“Perhaps not” the voice kept saying softly in his head.

Now, his whole succession was feeling like a moot point. After all, he was not even capable of saving himself from anything, then how could what he created make the slightest difference? These were all like an extension of his body, bound to decay and come back to Earths.

Not so many monks had dared write upon the Wall about their highest truth. A few jokesters had begun at first, helping the others to participate.
One in particular had had Hrih laugh for quite a while.

A toad is a toad
Unless kissed
Endless Bliss

Then a dozen of others had flourished upon the wall, until Aum Geong decided to write his own. He’d not wanted to go first, to allow the others to express without the burden of comparison, and also to have some more time to write something deep and thoughtful. But that profusion of nonsense between some occasional pearls of wisdom made him write his own.

Unattainable is the Truth
For in the Dust of things
All in our View is bleak

Doing Wrong we forswear
For Dust to be lifted
And Wisdom we seek

In the deed of the Elders
And the Faith in the Community
Light and Trust bespeak

All the monks had been quite impressed, but Hrih had not been entirely satisfied by it… To be honest, he even completely disagreed with it.
Now, however, stuck in this bed, the poem was playing in his head and suggesting that the Worlds were something terrible that he had not yet understood, or be willing to avoid seeing. Perhaps Aum Geong was wiser than he was.
Perhaps all that Hrih had put as foundational to his life had all been Dust…
“There is no Dust, and you know that” the voice whispered softly.

Now that he is about to die, what difference will it make anyway…
He reach out for a bowl of water, and almost let it fall, as the weight of it surprised him. He was becoming so weak… He never had been so self-conscious in many many many years.

After he had propped himself up to drink a few burning swallows of the lukewarm water, he noticed something folded on his bedside, that had been put under the bowl… Young Franiel had been the one attending him with Jog Lam, so it must have been the doing of one of them. He intuited that was Franiel.

As he read the stanzas, tears were in his eyes…

I am the driftwood
the wave carried me
I was buried in sand

I am the flower
the butterfly touched me
I fell in love

I am the raindrop
the cloud released me
I became the ocean

The Young monk had probably not dared write it on the Wall, especially after most of the monks’ vocal appreciations of Aum Geong’s poem…
“Perhaps not” the voice again spoke.
Another reason for it formed into Hrih’s mind. Franiel perhaps didn’t feel ready for such responsibilities and his role and fulfillment in this community was not form rules nor to continue it.
It was more to inspire them, and perhaps to start his own discoveries.

Hrih wrote a note behind the paper. He wanted to leave something for Franiel, for him to keep faith in his coming adventures during these coming times of change.
After a deep breath, he took another paper that was with him for already such a long time, wrote down some words, and signed it, the aura of his hand burning a glyph that was his signature in the paper. He then called for Jog Lam.

— Jog Lam, my friend…
— Elder?
— I’m dying…
— I know Elder
— Let me continue. (Jog Lam nodded)
First, will you give that paper to Young Franiel after the cremation ceremonies. (Jog Lam nodded again)
Second, I want you to relay that I have made my decision, and that Aum Geog will succeed me (Jog Lam’s surprise was noticeable in his eye). He is, to date, the most adequate successor for this monastery.
— I will do as you want.
— Thank you my friend.
— Elder…
— Farewell, my friend, I am always with you.

When Jog Lam stoically left the room, Hrih Chokyam laid down, his eyes on the ceiling. His body was so weak that all he could do was to project behind his closed eyelids and see the starry sky, even if he would have wanted something different for his death. He would have loved something like a nap in a sunlit meadow with a little singing brook.
But seeing the actual World was something even more precious to him. The barren mountains of the icy season, the clear unclouded sky. His mind was so full of energy that his body lacked.

With a deep feeling of gratitude for his body, he bid it farewell.

All he remembered was the name “Akita”… He was not sure that it was his name, perhaps it was not, but he had taken it as his own.
He’d been stranded on that island for so long he barely remembered whether he’d had a past before. In the beginning, he had taken an inventory of the passing time, but soon had discovered that days were irregularly long, and nights would sometimes last for more than one day, so that it was all pointless…
The toughest part had been to live in good intelligence —he couldn’t really say harmony— with the predatory hairy nest of the daughters of Narani. But at least he’d made clear that he was able to defend himself and retaliate if needed…

— Thanks to me, grunted a big dog half-focused, his head on his lap.
— Yeah, mostly thanks to you, Kay

Kay had appeared a few days after Akita discovered himself on that strange land. He was no common dog… In fact, Akita was wondering that it may only exist in his mind. Kay had been approaching him, more than he had tamed it, and soon Akita found out that he was no dog at all.
He was, as Kay had said, an inugami or dog spirit, able to shape-shift, and willing to bond with Akita. He’s said Akita his previous owner had died, and that he would have to die with him unless being adopted by another…
Akita had been reluctant at first, finding that there was something unclear, but he had agreed anyway… Better be with a faithful and powerful dog-spirit than die in the webs of the giant spiders…
All he had to do was to name it. And so he named it Kay.
Kay couldn’t be seen by most of the creatures in the forest, though the most sensitive could feel his presence. However, he could decide to take a more corporeal form, but that exhausted both Akira and Kay, and was rarely done. So most of the times, he was roaming the island in spirit form, which didn’t mean that he was powerless, far from it.

— I can sense something’s coming, growled Kay who took the shape of a big two-legged werewolf…

— So he wants us to paddle down a river of pea-soup, is that it, sweetie?
Al was asking Tina, while playing with his teeth and gums…

— Oh, I don’t have any clue really, sighed Tina who began to feel annoyed by Al’s constant fiddling with his mouth.
— Well, not to worry then, except I’ve got focuses dead from poisoned pea-soup as far as I remember, so I am not overly enthusiastic about the whole pea-soup adventure… Better make it some more fluid…
— And will you tell me what you’re doing now with that mouth of yours Albert? Last time that was the hair, then the nails… it seems you can’t get enough of these explorations of your body consciousness, can you? Tsss… Tumold aligned people…
— Oh, this is fascinating, can’t you see, how fluid this all area is, despite the appearances.
— If you say so…
— Look!
— Oh now, you’re being gross! Tina was positively appalled by Al’s behaviour
— Oh, it’s funny, look… I can make my gums as malleable as marshmallow, and have my teeth float on that gum-soup…
— Yikes!
— Entirely fascinating… And I can also grow some new ones, what would you say of pointy teeth like cannibals?
— Oh, come on, Tina was now no longer impressed… Have fun as you want, I’m going for a walk to help Becky buy her wedding dress… She wants something that looks “tribal” she said…

Tina went outside shrugging at the toothy grin Al gave her.

Linda and Peregrine’s portrait had taken a little longer than expected to realize. Quite abruptly after India’s encounter with the old wrinkled mummy, Bill Jobsworth had fallen ill. An abrupt cold he said he’d caught, that had left him stuck in his bed for a few weeks.
He’d thought that after the stone heads and the mummy, that was good he didn’t believe in maledictions, because he would have been dead by now. India Louise had been taking care of him, to the surprise of the old Lord who, however, barely expressed more than a raised eyebrow at her incongruous request.

That little retardation was in fact the perfect pretext for the young couple of globe-trotters to settle down in the castle, and prepare a little photographic exposition on their last trip in Eastern Africa. Though in 2057, photographic cameras were by far outdated, Linda was very fond of these old contraptions that she could use to render some of their trips with a certain kind of focus.
She’d a custom set of specially adapted cameras that she’d enhanced with devices to free her of the burdens of storage mostly. However, they could function most like the ancient ones. Capturing light through a single lens, in a very focused time and space framework.

She was very proud of the pictures she had taken of the Dragon’s Blood Trees in Socotra Island and the natural lighting of the scene gave a surreal feeling to it as though an actual iridescent dragon had been hovering on clouds above them.
When she saw them, India Louise had been gaping, telling they looked exactly like what delirious Bill had depicted of his visions …
Linda was moved beyond words at how amazingly complex and delicately beautiful this reality was…

And another movie sync! Watched a cartoon last night on TV called Madagascar .

“Exploring their surroundings, the four friends soon meet the Malagasy locals (a type of lemur given to having loud “rave-like” dance parties ) and their carnivorous enemies, the fousas (a type of mongoose). As the two sides try to use these four new, strange (and large) friends to their benefit, our heroes are also confronted with the reality of their predestined roles in nature.”

If the King of The Lemurs wasn’t Patel I’ll eat my hat. Hilarious! Unfortunately, despite thoroughly enjoying it, I suddenly fell asleep and missed half of it.

Georges and Salome’s journal

From Salome’s account of her journey to the Murtuane

There is a purple beach that I have seen briefly in my third eye, with a stranded people of the Murtuane. It seems like a possible focus of Georges, named… “Jarvis” I would translate.
Georges having moved to the mountainous and icy lands of the Duane, I thought it would be entertaining to discover more about this focus before telling him about it. Though it was not what I initially in mind as per an exploration, it surely has its purpose.
This island has in fact the size of a continent, but being in an isolated part of the Murtuane, few are those knowing of it. It fosters some interesting creatures not found in other places of the Murtuane. Jarvis is not yet aware, but he is observed by some of them. Zentauras (these black-and-white striped centaur-like creatures) are guardians of this Island, and thus do not see the arrival of one of Jarvis’ kind as a particularly good omen. What puzzle them is that he has been rescued by one of the Daughters of the Sea.

When I connect with Jarvis, he tells that he knows this land as “Kandulim”, a fabled island from which people could easily go into another world and bring back whatever is most precious to you. It always had been a legend for him until he had opened his eyes and seen the purple beach.

HE managed NOT TO GET lost WITH THE spiders downstream,
HIS exploration sense WAS NOW yellow, AND THAT opened SOME NEW thinking AND ideaS,
HIS hands COULD easily CHANGE THE maleDICTION THAT HE’D seen,
AND IT seemed A close light WOULD bounce FORTH
ANNOUNCING SOMETHING fine AND soon great TO COME.

In the discave, full of glimmering lights, and bouncing dragons, Salome started to sing an old tune :

Sunny, yesterday my life was filled with rain. :weather-showers-scattered:
Sunny, you smiled at me and really eased the pain.
The dark days are gone, and the bright days are here,
My sunny one shines so sincere.
Sunny one so true, I love you.

Malika jotted down some notes on the chat window, depicting the images as they whizzed into her mind like the pages of a multicoloured flip-book

“As she swam swiftly to regain the spot of her observation, she skimmed almost to the surface, and as she did, she saw lights. She surfaced and heard sounds that resembled the music that she and her sisters played.
They held in their hands objects that projected sounds…”

As she swam swiftly to regain the spot of her observation, she skimmed almost to the surface, and as she did, she saw lights. She surfaced and heard sounds that resembled the music that she and her sisters played.
They held in their hands objects that projected sounds, and their echoes in the waters were projecting harmonious symphonies that were carried miles across the waters.

How odd that the sounds where so similar to the ones she had always known. But they were different, rasher, suffused of a violent nature which was so alien to the world she was coming from. It all was perplexing, and almost deafening to her. Her eyes getting slowly accustomed to the light could not yet perceive that there was no longer the life she’d felt on the strange floating body, but she knew it assuredly even without seeing it.

She plunged back into the waters, to reattain the gliding peace and softness that she had been missing so much already, even though she had been out of it for barely a few moments.

Where was the life she had felt… Gone in the strange world of the surface? She knew so little of that world, that she imagined that all their creatures could swim as easily in the airs as she could do in the waters. Was there a bottom to their environment?
All of these questions were erupting and expanding in her mind, when a sudden feeling got her forthwith.

She could feel him. Sinking slowly… and she could feel his pain inside, something else that was alien to her… He was so fascinating…
She swam fleetly to where he was.
She turned in small rounds around him, following closely his descent, not daring to touch him.
So alien, yet so beautiful.

She could communicate with him, as he was in something close to a deep slumber, and allowing for that exchange to happen. It was a breach of the rules, she knew.
She had been told not to interfere with things from the surface, yet she was interfering already, and she’d always been doing it in a sense… At what point did that breach leapt from her imagination to reality? She couldn’t say…

The light was casting a yellow radiance in the blue waters. A feeling of warmth and comfort surrounding them.
He was telling her he was dying, yet he was comfortable. Time meant nothing…
She conveyed to him that she could help him, bring him back to his floating station, where he could spring back into his world… She wanted to share so many things with him…