Not sure if the name of our prospective 5th circle woodworking tutor has been decided already,
@Vesvius , so I took the liberty of making some assumptions.
Planning a bonfire
In a small courtyard a fair bit away from the great light-providing column, a gentle sound of hammering could be heard. The rhythmic sound broken only by the noise of something heavy dropping into its place. Tap, tap, tap-clunk. Tap, tap, tap-clunk.
This however, was normal. These sounds had echoed in the courtyard for two days now, from an open door in the courtyard.
Tap, tap, tap-clunk. Tap, tap, tap-clunk.
There was a pause. This too, was normal.
A woman emerged from the doorway, and went to the pile of wood carefully arranged next to the door.
She would lean over a small log, no thicker than a wrist and shorter than she was, examine deeply the expensive anam-enriched piece of Cold Starwood imported at frankly ludicrous price, lay her hand on it and with a simple swipe send sawdust flying one exacting hair-thickness at a time, in pursuit of perfection.
In defiance of common understanding, the sawdust did not linger in the air, it fell to the ground like gravel, and this too was normal. For the properties of the Starwood had the side-effect of making it very, very dense and almost impervious to normal tools of woodworking. But that was no obstacle here, for the seeker of perfection was one Changying of the Lu family, Honourable Sister of the 5th circle of the Delving Heart sect and her anam-fuelled carving technique was well beyond the need for mundane tools.
A paper was drawn from wherever it was hidden and was glanced at.
Swipe after swipe, cut after cut, until all was as it should: The wood debarked and a precise series of holes and crevices made, in accordance with the plan meticulously researched.
With great effort, she lifted the log and carried it inside the building, whereupon it was placed to the strange platform – or perhaps cage – hidden within.
She lifted her hand, and gave a gentle
tap. One end of the log sunk just a little bit to a crevice in the previous log carved specifically for this purpose.
Another tap, and so did the other end.
A final tap, and with a
clunk the whole log dropped three inches fully into its place, completing yet another aspect of the array.
Changying held up a lamp and peered closely. Not a single ray of light could escape through the logs. The angle was as required and the seal was perfect, as it should be. As it needed to be. For this was a culmination of 6 months of research and hard work. The Great Closed Lotus Formation, scaled upwards and layered upon itself sevenfold, and crafted from a specific subset of Starwood imported from a specific grove located in the Valley of Divine Truths.
All designed to work with her anam. It would make for a great bonfire and she would be right at its center as it burned, cycling and purifying and refining her anam through the formation and into the flames and then back into her core again. Maintaining her consciousness would be challenge for Cold Starwood burned not hot but intensely, hungrily, insistently, and for a long
long time. Once lit, it would take an Elder to quench prematurely.
But that day was a few weeks away still. Many more logs would need to be carved.
And in the meanwhile, she'd still need to make payments to cover the costs of this rare material. This time, it was some 9
th circle whelping called Kong Zhi who needed tutoring in woodcarving. Boring, and almost certainly an utter waste of her masterful skills, but it was worth some money.
Her hands itched to get back to work, yet duty calls.
But seriously, Ninth Circle! Not even a sixth or seventh, but a ninth? The young brother had better not be some wet-behind-ears beginner better served by reading scrolls and drinking their mother's milk, or by the Earth and the Heavens there would be violence for the insult against whomever had scheduled this amateur-hour tutoring session for her.
