Dealings with Chaklinas 703AG-706AG

Dealings with Chaklinas 703AG-706AG is a book within the collection of the Library of the Poet in Rydoon.

## Description

Detailing the journeys of emissaries and dignitaries into the jungle realm of Tviatin from the Duchies of Tynd, Dealings with Chaklinas 703AG-706AG gives readers a background on the Coautl Chaklinas, as well as their efforts to create the Crystal City of Culhuaca.

## Research

### Completed by Hassk

Despite the will of Srar spurning forth the unusually early arrival of Whiterose this year, the jungles of the region of Tourmalini'i remain as unsettling in heat and humidity as ever. The night brings no respite, for save the faltering light all else that changes in the chatter of birdsong transforming into the chaotic warble of insects drawn close by the flame of our torches. A week or so passed before we came across the boundary, a circle marked in the soil and stone by a thin gossamer trail radiant aureate - near indistinguishable from the beams of sunlight breaching through where the canopy twisted in the breezes arching overhead and displayed a cloudless sky of azure beyond - a marked departure from the heavy dark clouds that had released enough rain on our journey to flood half the buildings in Evonlock. We pushed on, finding that with each step the aches in our shoulders were relieved, the swellings across our legs from biting midges no longer itched and that each breath seemed to fill our chest with air clean and revitalising.

The rest of the journey, some three miles or so, was a gentle climb that seemed almost to reinvigorate the body and soul in tandem, my thoughts drifting, as if guided, to words unsaid, deeds not yet done, wrongs that I needn't to make right. With new conviction, a path laid before me when our matters with Chaklinas were at hand. The Couatl, heralded by the priests of Karamble Keep in the Duchy of Mannefeld taught that Chaklinas was created specifically by The Guildmaster's Master, a seemed echo of the Glimmer Knight of Tohmos with whom the couatl is so commonly associated. A sudden change in the nature of their relationship saw Chaklinas retreating into the jungles contested on the eastern fringe of the Empire of Raq, later established to be at least in part caused by Chaklinas' acknowledgement of its incoming demise - a gift and curse of personal foresight that all couatls are claimed to possess, though the amount of time given in warning in known to vary signficantly.

And so we found ourselves gazing upon the legacy that Chaklinas now sought to leave before returning to the Celestial Citadel of its master and creator. A city within the jungle, the heart of a grove of foliage hued in kaleidoscopic fashion, though none obtrusive or crass in their competing colours and designs. Stone and crystal shaped thin as glass created temples in cresentric arrangement, growing larger towards the central pyramidal construction. The shimmer of a dome-like ward came to a zenith at the feather-shaped gemstone - quartz or diamond, I cannot say for I dared not go too close, but I know it stood taller than any man or beast I'd encountered up to that time or since. With the coming of its time, Chaklinas' plummage had grow paler still, near-white at the tips, but glowed with a warmth and luminescence all the more for it. Whimsy had crept into the mind of the couatl now, resting as they were beneath the heartstone of the Crystal City, for they simply spoke in riddles - words laden with echoes of the past, memories of their own and those around them bleeding together as they looked starbound for their mortal demise and divine ascension. With our later visits over the coming years, Chaklinas sometimes spoke with us in little more than passing, busying themselves with other matters. Other times we would be sought out the moment we crossed the radiant boundary, treated to stories like old friends around a hearthfire.

While I cannot say in truth to have known Chaklinas in truth, immeasurable a mind and soul they possessed, I cannot deny the sadness I felt to hear of their passing. Knowing death was merely another step for a being of such celestial form brought little respite, until such a time that I found myself shedding a tear in memory - only for it to fall into the half-finished cup of sherry, turned into a tiny piece of crystal quartz. I have not felt sorrow for what was lost since, only joy for what had now become.