Reading was overrated. A person could get by in the world just fine without needing to learn more than a few marks to draw or recognize. The letters of your name, for example. Location on signboard. If you didn't know how to feel the weather, you could memorize the lettering for "rain" or "snow" or "heat." None of it necessary, but sometimes convenient. There was one other word you could sometimes look for, and the letters always seemed to stand out even if the rest of the nonsense didn't.
You couldn't make out that the squiggles and lines talked about Norin's Knickknacks or the history the establishment had eked out. Last chance at making a living after the Calamity, some nonsense of shoddy goods ending that dream years ago and the person in charge of it refusing to pack up and go. It didn't matter what the words said beyond a few letters, the ones you took to first and always seemed to notice even if you weren't looking. It's not like you chose them, it happened the opposite way in fact.
You could remember back before the fireball, quiet summer evenings out at dusk. It was equal parts ritual and childhood mirth, building the cone out of branches and sticks and waiting for it to be dark enough to matter. Pile it with combustibles, sprinkle a touch of oil, toss a spark and whumphf. Light in the darkness, and it always seemed to reach towards you. At first it was just the wind maybe, but every time, no matter where you happened to be, you could see it. Fire just drew to you, not the other way around. Those alchemy sticks to quickstart something aflame would flicker and dance in your direction no matter who held them. Shows of juggling fire and sitting around a cooking pit were the same. Even in your dreams, the ones where you saw the long tunnel with the torches on the walls, they would lean towards you as you passed through, so it wasn't like any of it was really your fault.
The rest of the words on the page don't interest you, but you fold it up and keep it anyway. It's thin, it's dry, and you can feel it calling. It's not weird, it's just nature.
You couldn't make out that the squiggles and lines talked about Norin's Knickknacks or the history the establishment had eked out. Last chance at making a living after the Calamity, some nonsense of shoddy goods ending that dream years ago and the person in charge of it refusing to pack up and go. It didn't matter what the words said beyond a few letters, the ones you took to first and always seemed to notice even if you weren't looking. It's not like you chose them, it happened the opposite way in fact.
You could remember back before the fireball, quiet summer evenings out at dusk. It was equal parts ritual and childhood mirth, building the cone out of branches and sticks and waiting for it to be dark enough to matter. Pile it with combustibles, sprinkle a touch of oil, toss a spark and whumphf. Light in the darkness, and it always seemed to reach towards you. At first it was just the wind maybe, but every time, no matter where you happened to be, you could see it. Fire just drew to you, not the other way around. Those alchemy sticks to quickstart something aflame would flicker and dance in your direction no matter who held them. Shows of juggling fire and sitting around a cooking pit were the same. Even in your dreams, the ones where you saw the long tunnel with the torches on the walls, they would lean towards you as you passed through, so it wasn't like any of it was really your fault.
The rest of the words on the page don't interest you, but you fold it up and keep it anyway. It's thin, it's dry, and you can feel it calling. It's not weird, it's just nature.
![[Image: yEROfKO.png]](http://i.imgur.com/yEROfKO.png)
