All Around Jingshan

Under the Guilty Pagoda Tree
Nestled beyond the confines of the Forbidden City was Jingshan park, enjoying a moment of peaceful stillness in the absence of the usual swathes of tourists passing in and out of its perimeter. In the heart of the garden, a man stood beneath the infamous, a small pearl resting in his palm. A smooth, shape-less black that threatened to swallow everything up in its depth. An ominous aura emitted from the stone, a primordial sensation of sorts that instinctively triggered in all of those within its presence somewhat befitting the eery light that had begun to emit from its form.

Forged from the scraps that remained of the dead, these stones were to serve as a link between the Coven's realm, Home and the mortal realm. Slowly, the powers of the stone would draw them together and allow the essence of the other world to overwrite that of the mortal plane, supplanting its existence in total. To ensure this process went undisturbed, the mage had decided upon taking precautions. Such that now, when he pressed the stone upon the pagoda tree before him, it sank into the bark freely, swallowed up within its confines. Light radiated all around the park, revealing some manner of spell at work, he had subtly altered the properties of the world around him, but the light dimmed quickly and the rules of the park returned to normal, leaving the small sphere perfectly well hidden, deep in the depths of the tree.

"To think I'd find something like this here", the mage mused, his voice deep but carrying an almost soft, melodic air to it. "Perhaps the master had planned it this way".

The sky had begun to darken under the sphere's, a lodestone, influence, so too had the ground begin to transform around the tree, conforming to the unusual landscape of Home. The mage's robes billowed briefly as a small gale began to blow through the air. He removed his hood to reveal his rather impressively feathered headdress, now gently bristling under the breeze.