That is weird and concerning.

He immediately does it again.

His finger bones might be humming.

Continuing to poke the Concern Shards is probably a bad idea.

Maybe this time... he will poke it... with a stick.

The stick doesn't catch on fire, turn into a serpent and attack him, fold in on itself until space is permanently wedgied there, or anything else strange. The shard also doesn't make any sound at all when nudged around.

? ?? ???

He has expectations about how objects behave and these objects are not being that way.

Probably it's magic. Probably some kind of dangerous magic.

He pokes it with the stick again.

Silently moving as he pokes it.

Also its shadow is staying in place, drawing out as it moves.

What.

He pokes the shadow.

It doesn't do anything interesting when poked.

Someone leans to look over his shoulder from behind him.

"What are you doing?" ze asks, voice melodious and liquid.

—?!

That person was not there a second ago!

"I'm... poking a weird shadow with a stick?"

Ze nods. "A good first investigation."

"Thank...s....??? Who are you?"

"I'm Tyrant. Who are you? I haven't met you before." Ze peers closer at him. "...What are you?"

"Oh, I'm a sword."

"Odd. Swords do not usually talk. I am a Lord of the Is."

"I don't know what that means!"

"I do not know what a talking sword means, either. Everything I have met that talks is a Lord of the Is. We Lords create the Is from the Not, and then shape what we have made to our liking. I have not heard of anyone making their automatons feel like people, so I do not think you are that, either. Where did you come from, and how did you start existing?"

"I don't really remember. By the time I woke up I'd already been around for a while. There was a person and she was using me to kill things and then I was awake and we killed things some more and then we had an argument and she dropped me and ran off." He scowls. "She wouldn't let me change."

"That is rude. Changing is important."

He nods emphatically.

"What was the rude person?"

"A... person? I dunno. Not a sword. Or a bird-woman."

"And not a Lord, if you didn't know what I am."

"I think she was probably not a you," he agrees. "But if she said what she was I don't remember."

"Fascinating, that there is more life out there than I knew. I had known the demesnes sometimes connect to a strange, hostile world, seemingly at random. I had not known any beyond us Lords were intelligent. I wonder if they have art?"

He shrugs. "I wouldn't know, I'm like a day old."