I, Kakzim, hereby set down for future generations the techniques for harnessing ki from the environment. My fellow monks claim that I have made use of life-magic, and have declared me heretic. But future generations will see that a location’s ki provides supernatural, not life-magical abilities.

When an individual locates a ki-rich location, study it. After much study of the location the individual will spend a day in meditation, three jugs of shape worth of material goods, and sacrifice some of their own internal ki. Some such locations have valuable treasures which resonate with the location’s ki, even when removed from the location by several days’ journey. These treasures, which I refer to as Touchstones, are very valuable. They can be used not only to avoid the months of study necessary for harnessing a location’s ki, but sacrificing the touchstone allows the individual to not need to sacrifice material goods valued at three jugs of shape.

To start, the student is instructed to look at this tower. How much do you know about it? If you were to study it you would discover that it is high in ki. Did the life-shapers know that this would happen when they built it? I suspect that on an instinctual level they would know, but I doubt it was conscience. Philosophers of other times can debate it. The important thing is that once you have harnessed this tower’s ki you will gain resistance to heat and fire. Furthermore, you will gain the ability to summon fire creatures if you climb the tower from within the chimney. After three uses of the summoning ability, the individual will need to ascend within the chimney again to gain another three uses. I have discovered that all such locations high in ki have a base ability and a higher order ability.

Should an individual travel to another location high in ki, the individual can fulfill the higher order ability recharge requirements in order to gain both the base and higher order abilities of the new location. However, doing so will cause the individual to lose the abilities of the prior location. Only by repeating the initial process can an individual have the abilities of multiple locations at once. I myself am able to use the abilities of eight such ki-rich locations at once.

Here follows a list of the ki-rich locations I have discovered, their abilities, and higher order charging requirements.

• The Estuary of the High Moon
  • Base Ability:
    • Low-light vision for a few minutes each day.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Bathe in the estuary during the full moon.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Low-light vision for a few hours each use.
    • Twelve uses before Recharge required.

• The Black
  • Base Ability:
    • Invisibility to Undead for a few minutes each day.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Fast for a week, drinking only the Black.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Command Undead.
    • Six uses before Recharge required.

• The Tree-Circle of Concern-Thought
  • Base Ability:
    • Reduced damage from Plant creatures.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Discuss aspects of nature with tree-people druids and any others present.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Animate overgrowth to entangle opponents.
    • Three uses before Recharge required.

• Drake Isle
  • Base Ability:
    • Project a concussive blast of force once per day.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Defeat the drake in solitary combat.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Conjure material from the elemental plane of earth once per day.
    • Fifteen uses before Recharge required.

• The Living City of the Cloud School
  • Base Ability:
    • Increase the defensive capabilities of a defensive formation.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Live and cooperate with and among the Cloud School unaided for a week.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Increase the offensive capabilities of a defensive formation.
    • Thirteen uses before Recharge required.

• The Temple of the City-State of Crescent
  • Base Ability:
    • Increase landspeed stride.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Sacrifice a great beast killed with your bare hands.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Gain the creature’s movement type at half-speed (such as air-swimming, water-swimming, earth-swimming, et cetera).
    • Two uses before Recharge required.

• Pyrean’s Peak
  • Base Ability:
    • Sense the immediate presence of a Pyrean.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Meditate without conscious thought for a day and a night.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Increase the power of life-magic effects.
    • Five uses before Recharge required.

• Conclave of the Lord of Tides
  • Base Ability:
    • Sense the tides of the sea and sky up to one quarter of a day into the future.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Channel positive energy into the bowl in the centre of the conclave.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Summon temporary servants of air or water.
    • Eight uses before Recharge required.

• Lava Tube of Sharaz
  • Base Ability:
    • Change the shape and direction of lava flows to a limited extent.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Climb down the tube to the bottom.
  • Higher Order Ability:
    • Divine one aspect of the future once per day while at the bottom of the tube.
    • One use before Recharge required.

• The Eye of Ral
  • Base Ability:
    • I have yet to determine.
  • Charge Requirement:
    • Sacrifice something which I have yet to determine.

Perhaps you, the student, can finish what I am too old to complete. Then you should go on to discover the other ki-rich locations bound to exist out there. My hope is that someday these words will be looked upon not as heresey, but as complementary teachings given freely to all.

~K

This scroll (made from papyrus) was written by the hand of Lorelie Lazarus of the Midnight Sindicate. It is a translation from Ancient Halfling of a silk scroll rescued by GaliLena from the desk of the evil ruler of the Red Tower.