Shadowlands Clan Letter
From the journals of Yajinden,
I write this without fear that my master will find it. What have I to fear from him? He knows I can do nothing to defy him.
Countless centuries ago, I was an artist, a craftsman. My talents lay in the working of steel and stone and magic. Yet my craft was not complete. An urge deep within me always demanded that I become something greater, create that which had not been created before.
This urge to create was what led me into the service of Iuchiban. He was a man of great power and influence, with the means to make my visions realities. Together, we created spells and artifacts of power unrivaled in history. Together, we conquered death itself.
Yet always I have been a pawn.
Though it was always my genius that devised our greatest weapons, that plumbed the deepest mysteries of magic, Iuchiban always devised more potent ways of putting my creations to use. It has been my eternal curse -- though he could create nothing without my aid, his ability to use what I have created invariably dwarfs my own.
Iuchiban claims the Bloodspeakers are an order based on the power of the individual, a chance for all men to wield the power of the gods and become great. It is a fallacy. The only truth that lies within the order of Bloodspeakers is the truth that all of us are slaves to Iuchiban. The higher in the ranks we progress, the clearer it becomes -- and the less can be done to avoid this truth.
I do not consider myself a conqueror, as he does. I consider myself an artist, and an artist cannot continue to be so if he is constrained. Yet each time I seek to escape my master's control the chains only bind themselves more tightly.
There must be a way to be free.