I am not delivering official reports calling it a mana pooper. Anyways we’ve started setting up a living space for it at Uudistar alongside the other critters. The village constructions have begun largely along the coast and established the home guard between all of them in a more organized military force. Roads also under construction.

In other news, our scout force venturing eastward found another of those northern villages filled with angry fur clad folk. However, not long after that we lost contact. I should note though, they did report the discovery of the village before they went missing. Which indicates that said northerners may not have actually attacked them, even if that is the usual pattern. Generally when such hostilities break out our people are able to at least evade and report back. I suspect the monsters got to them instead, that or some foul conspiracy.

Also I’ve had the order put out to the armies to recall in and stand ready at the capital with the gatestone. Next cycle we will be landing, if all reports are correct then this will be rough.

In regards to the politics going on within the elven city, our ambassadors have taken a new approach. While the Aywin are preaching for emigration we’re now offering something closer to a refugee deal. Because Katara and Aywin are liable to go to war soon, and we imagine the civilians might be tired of that. They’ve opted to try and predict future events rather than charismatically convince of current situations.

Greetings Keeper! It is a glorious day for the Oda people.

In regards to the monks, I’ve discussed recruiting the kineticists with Shime. She notes they aren’t really aggressive warriors, so if you order them to join an assault on anything they are liable to abandon their duties. Though they do make for great scouts at least. It is noted they are not actually the best fighters, but their ability to manipulate the environment around them makes them quite dangerous depending on the location they fight in. The more ‘stuff’ is around them, such as within the forest, the more powerful they are. They might not do so well within cities though. On the upside, in terms of defense, we could just place their weapons of choice strategically around the city. It is unlikely that a cauldron of water would be useful to an invading enemy despite being a dangerous weapon for a kineticist. So with prep time we can maximize their impact.

Yuzuki heard of this and opted to pitch her newest advancements to me…I think their competitiveness might be getting out of hand. But Yuzuki’s experiments have yielded results after constructing several dozen swords until one worked. It utilizes the gudwud as a core and backing of their blades in some peculiar arrangement. While it might slightly compromise the durability and integrity of the sword it allows her students to channel their ki through it. Resulting in what she calls the Kensei, they can channel their ki through their signature weapons which gives it remarkable benefits. While the Sohei were able to create a fighting style exploiting utilizing their ki to move the weapon in their hands, the kensei have become one with their weapons. Allowing it to serve as a true extension of themselves as evidenced by their ability to pour ki into the weapon. While it does not work with enchanted weapons as it relies on the pathways normally used by magic to be open for ki, they seem to produce similar effects. Rivaling at minimum third tier enchantments.

She has drafted her best student to us for testing.

Takei is a bit on the young side though that seems to have advantaged him in learning new tricks. He also showcased the greatest natural talent, besides Yuzuki herself, when it came to mastering these new techniques.

He is a bit of a serious sort though it doesn’t suit him well given he looks like a sixteen year old girl if you ask me. Though I’m told that’s normal for students this early in their monastery training. They haven’t quite gained enough footing to feel the pull towards self expression over being a well disciplined student to appease their teachers.

Through is innate Ki his sword has a similar effect to the true strike spell. In the demonstration Yuzuki arranged, I witnessed Takei split twenty arrows loosed at him simultaneously with just his sword. Well that might be a bit of an exaggeration, he dodged some likely due to them being too close to impacting at the same time as another arrow, but still quite impressive!

In my frank assessment, Yuzuki’s Kensei are vastly superior warriors to the kineticists as it stands now. Though they do have the advantage of learning from the way of the Sohei and improving upon it, along with Yuzuki’s military minded advancements in fighting. So they are technically a generation ahead in their fighting style.

Yuzuki asked you to find something for Takei or herself to do in the field, believing that the techniques can only be further refined by practical engagement with an enemy.

In relation to monastery affairs, Amare has since left Haven to return to the south I believe. Not entirely sure however, she is a hard one to keep track of.

Moving on to Naval matters. Iwanagi has finished navigating the perimeter of the island. As far as he can tell they are in large a much more technologically primitive society across the entire island. Though they do have boats and the ability to travel to other nearby islands they never took the much longer voyage to the main continent, likely due to sea monsters.

Speaking of the nearby islands, our scout boat that was traveling along this way found more island clusters west of the area Iwanagi was exploring. To add to that, another island was found in the far northeast when passing by monster island.

As to your question regarding the dreadnought, it’s always had a captain.

Moving on to political subjects. We’ve initiated a public relations campaign with the elven people, urging them to come visit up north and consider settling down here as requested. Though we will see the results of that over time.

So we’ve sent the settlers, done some economic conversions, and as your advisor I’m stopping you from recruiting Vaslochar before we have a second civil war. They’re the demonology house, we JUST had a big fight over the blackguard’s demonic ties and it produced Alexandria who is liable to just murder them all.

Moving along, Ivan isn’t terribly princely. I’ve noticed his distinct lack of interest in becoming one, something about a warrior’s pride and spirit. Hence his constant lingering around with the knights. Can probably order him to father at least  a few children though.

Our forces have reached Moncayo pass in full now, with the Nalkas cannons arriving and opening fire immediately. Despite its convenient location it definitely lacked a standing government and the place was reduced to a ruin within the day by the cannons. In the chaos most of its people fled south into the forest to avoid…well being on fire.

They didn’t put up much of a defense afterwards, while they might have been able to they  opted to flee outright. So through shock and awe I suppose Alexandria has taken over Moncayo with no losses. The place is in a bit of a ruined state now though so might take some effort to repair but it still has some houses for now at least.