Heavenfall

Taochusu strolled around the perimeter of the camp with his hammer over his shoulder. He kept his eyes peeled for anything concerning, doing the duty of a guard. It wasn't an exciting job, but that was good for everyone really.

Near the edge of the camp, another was sitting at the point that the path came in. He might be keeping watch, or he might just have set there. He seemed focused on his work - carving a large stone. He was working with some bronze tools, had one carefully scraping at the stone, then honing it on a sharpening rock every once in a while. He looked up at the large man's passage, and gave a nod.

Taochusu returns the nod an pauses to take a good look at the path. "All quiet here?"

"A few of ours going in and out. Nothing else."

"Good. Never carved stone before. Making something interesting?" he asks.

"Not yet. Right now, I'm taking off the bits that are more brown than green. Slow going - it's a strong, sturdy stone. Dulls blades, gets half as much from other stones as it gives. But, it does proceed." He held up the piece. It was brown and green in color, though it was clear that the outside part was what was brown, and the inside mostly green. It was currently about the size of the large man's forearm - or a little smaller than an ordinary man's thigh.

"Green stone? Never seen anything like that. I mean, stones covered in moss, sure," he said as he looked it over. "So you use it for making jewelry and stuff? Maybe a little statue?"

"Eventually. I've done so in the past, with others I've found. And I do so with bits I pull off here. As to what I will make with this? Not sure yet. Still thinking it over; going to see what it makes me think of."

"I mostly work with wood. Arrows and huts and the like. Never worked too much with stone other than using pieces of it for weight and sometimes using pointy stones for arrowheads in a pinch." He looks at the rock. "That's a real neat color though. Are there other rocks in other colors like that?"

"This is jade - at least the green parts. Not sure if the brown parts are as well, or not. There are other green rocks, but none as vibrant as this one is. Jade is... special. Other green rocks are just... rocks. Jade has some extra quality." He looks over the piece as he says this.

"I have made arrowheads with stones, and even a knife. Pretty nice one, but only really good for my spirit calling. Too small for most other uses."

"Jade? Well it certainly looks neat." Looking out of the camp, "So you do magic then?"

"Sometimes, yes. Mostly, I run a mine for my tribe. Oh, and the knife isn't jade - it's a different stone, one I have called Obsidian."

"Net color for that one too. Really shiny for a black stone," he says with a nod.

Kyosei pulls out his obsidian knife, and turns it this way and that. "Yes. Very hard to work with, but once in a while, it turns out quite nice. Very sharp, too."

He sets it back in it's holder, and takes up a rasp, to slowly grind on the big piece again. "Anything to note on your circuits?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary for a swamp. Just people coming and going. Pretty peaceful," he says with a nod. "The way I like things."

"Peace is good. Very good. Um, what's ordinary for a swamp? This is the first one I've been in."

"Snakes and frogs, mosquitoes and flies. Little predators that like to bite off more than they can chew once in a while. And the smell. The swamp smell is mostly the same smell as any swamp I've been in."

"Mostly? What's different about it?"

"This one's a bit warmer. More humidity in the air. Makes the air smell slightly more like the stagnant waters that collect away from the stream."

"Huh. Learn something new. Being warmer makes sense. The further south I go, the warmer it gets. And I'm guessing it's only going to get worse."