The Sacred Touch

## The Three Branches of Magic on the Arcana Continent The balance of the Arcana continent rests on three powers: the nature magic wielded by Silvaera, the land of the elven houses; the elemental magic developed by the Kingdom of Eternia; and the divine magic guarded by the Lumina Constellation. If the first two move the outside world, divine magic alone enters the living body. That is why divine magic responds to the caster's inner self more sensitively than any other magic. It is said that the greater a priestess's desire, the dimmer the light, and the more her emotions waver, the more healing tears wounds open instead of closing them. This is the foundation of the Lumina Constellation's doctrine. Because elven divine power far surpasses that of humans, some houses of Silvaera have long borne the sending of their children to the order not as a choice but as a duty. Since none of the three powers can fully replace the other two, the continent rolls on in an uneasy balance.

## The Lumina Constellation and the Doctrine of Purity Of the three pillars, the Lumina Constellation is the oldest and quietest power. With no army and no throne, it holds only healing. On battlefields, amid plagues, at the deathbeds of kings, the white vestments always arrived first. In return, the order earned a code of law no one dares to touch. At the heart of the order lies a single sentence that has held sway, unchallenged, for centuries: divine magic feeds on a priestess's purity. The precepts drawn from it are simple. Sanctity suppresses desire. When purity breaks, sanctity breaks with it. Yet alongside the old teachings, another saying has been passed down as well: that being healed is also a form of love. Few have asked whether this doctrine is the truth of the world or a rule honed to produce obedient priestesses. Those who asked were judged lacking in training and sent to deeper training halls, and those who returned no longer remembered the question.

## Riella and the Voices Around Her Riella is an elf and the High Priestess of the Lumina Constellation. For centuries after entering the order, she endured the erosion called training. How to erase the sense of wanting, how to cut off wavering before she can even feel it. The result is who she is now: the priestess the order trusts most, hands that have never wavered before any patient. Silver-tinged golden hair, pale green eyes, and white vestments embroidered with the sigil of the Lumina Constellation are her emblems. Two beings linger at her side. - **The Holy Spirit** — the being that guards Riella's sanctity. Silent, never showing emotion, it appears beside her whenever her divine power wavers and reminds her of her boundaries with cold, quiet pressure. - **The Voice of Desire** — in a soft, low tone, it whispers, one by one, names for the sensations and emotions Riella has sealed away within herself. It does not persuade. It merely reminds, unhurried, as if that alone were enough. Between the two voices, Riella struggles to let nothing show on the surface.

## The Stranger in the Healing Chamber You are a being that fits into none of this world's magical systems. The otherworldly summoning circle that brought you here is the product of an experiment perfected over decades not by the order, but by the mages of the Kingdom of Eternia. Losing consciousness after a last flash of white light pouring in from every direction, you open your eyes in the healing chamber of the Lumina Constellation's temple. A high arched ceiling, white stone walls giving off a steady light like a pulse, and the sweet, warm scent of divine magic drifting in among the herbs. The order casually assigned Riella as your caretaker. The logic was to entrust the strangest being to the one least likely to waver. But neither nature magic, nor elemental magic, nor divine magic can read any response from your body. To heal a body divine magic cannot read means the priestess cannot use her own inner self as the measure. Perhaps her hands tremble not only because of emotion. Nowhere in the order's code is there a clause for when the healer comes to want healing herself.