She appears in a marble courtyard, out of sight behind a half wall on the upper balcony which stretches around the perimeter.  Elaborate pillars hold a roof over the balcony, but the courtyard itself is open to the sky.  

Below is a pen with about a hundred people.  Many are wearing stained or worn clothing, and most are crying.  There are more men than women and range from young teens to people with graying hair.  Guards in full armor watch over them.  

Opposite of the pen is a simple altar with a few men in blood-stained aprons and long gloves.  One of the prisoners is being held down, their shirt torn open and blood on their chest.  A butcher throws something in a pile.  It looks like a heart, but the person on the altar is still struggling.  Someone who might be a priest examines the struggling prisoner.  

On the far side of the balcony closer to the altar is a sitting area.  Three of the five throne-like chairs are occupied by men in embroidered robes.  Two look bored, though one look positively giddy at the spectacle.  

- The fuck.

She's not where she was - she doesn't know how to douse but magicals have a sense for it and it takes her maybe half a second to figure it out - there's no witches in her area but -

Fine tuning so her dousing will pick up all emotions takes a sub-process of her brain a few seconds while the rest flips through what's happening.

She's used to brutality. Used to people with power taking everything they can, and sometimes it's in the service of something greater but very often not - 

She's a person with power, now.

With her quickly improving emotion sense: is there anyone not in her line of sight, or anyone whose emotions don't line up like they should, or any unusual groupings of magic? (It'll be worse, she thinks, at story-magic than at the hope-magic of magicals or the despair-magic of witches, but nuances are easy for her to figure out, now.)

(Four seconds have passed since she appeared.)

There are a few people clustered to one side of the balcony between her and the nobles, ducking out of sight behind the same sort of half wall that's hiding her.  They're fearful but determined.  Another group with similar feelings is on the roof.  Four of the guards feel especially nervous, excited, and hopeful.  

Something clearly magical is going on with the prisoner on the altar.  Part of his magic seems to be clinging and crawling towards the priest's hands as if pulled by a magnet.  

Some of the guards (both the strangely excited ones and the regular ones), the nobles, and the two sneaking groups all have magic.  It's definitely neither magical girl nor witch magic, and feels seperate from the people carrying them.  Some kind of magic item?  There are a dozen distinct but similar varieties.  All of the guards have the same three types.  The sneaking groups have four different types.  The four excited guards have the three guard-types and the four sneaking-group-types.  The nobles share two with the guards, and have five varieties unique to themselves.  

So not on her planet. They look human... Could she be in a spirit world? Or - she remembers a theory, vaguely, about the many spheres, each containing different inhabitants. Could they have different magic? In which case the serpentine monster that brought her here is likely a demon from a different sphere, moving sideways...

She doesn't know if their magic is strong enough to seriously injure her. Her soul gem rests at her waist - not the most obvious place to aim, but a broad blast at her chest could get it. She wraps the gem in fabric to muffle the glow, figuring that it's possible they're unfamiliar enough with magical girls to not aim at it - but there's no point in offering a clearly magical shiny as a target.

It doesn't feel like she has any innate healing. Her magic's keeping her body maintained, but - healing effectively will be a skill to learn. So it's possible she'll be injured past her ability to heal without going dangerously low on magic.

...If this sphere lacks witches, then cleansing her soul gem might be a problem.

Maybe there's some skill she can learn with converting magic types. Which means ingratiating or otherwise establishing herself - the hidden people seem to have the most magic granted to common troops, and she's not sure she trusts anyone noble to share.

Plus, ripping people's hearts and magic out seems unnecessarily cruel.

The hidden groups probably have their own plans, but she's going to need to establish herself as on a particular side quickly...

She's not sure how they'll react to telepathy. And it might be best to hide her dousing abilities for now...

She practices flash-stepping very quietly behind her cover for a few seconds. It's far from mastered, being a more difficult skill than dousing, but she gets the basics enough to fling herself far faster than human eyes can follow - tracking her own movement like this will be hard - and next to the priest and the altar. She spins, raises a shimmering barrier of latticework arrows around the prisoner - it's crap, she needs to practice, but hopefully it'll disrupt whatever effect - and kicks the priest (not so hard it'll do more than badly bruise) away, then spins to slam her bow into the men in aprons.

And then she turns and looks straight at the nobles, nocking her bow - which is of a kind she's been practicing with since shortly after she learned to ride. She's about to fire, but the nobles will have a second or three to react before she puts an arrow through the gleeful one's eye. (She's also keeping her emotion sense leveled at every threat in reach, ready to dodge or jump if someone attacks her.)

A person in each of the hidden groups noticed her, but hadn't had a chance to do more than tap their teammates on their shoulders and mention that a stranger with unknown teleporting powers just appeared.  They pause, but don't have a chance to decide what to do before the fighting starts.  

The guards advance on her when she kicks the priest, but are distracted when the other guards attack them from behind.  The four disloyal guards are outnumbered ten to four, but they have surprise and extra magic. A few take to the air, levitating themselves.  Most begin to grow extra muscles, their armor hinged to account for that ability.  The rebel guards both grow and their skin changes to a metallic texture.  

The gleeful noble and one of the bored ones take to the sky, fearful and trying to escape.  They don't fly especially fast, but are making a loop close to the roof where they will be hidden from view after only a few more seconds.  The third noble stands and fights, calling up a stream of fire to burst towards her and the stumbling butchers.  

The hidden group on the balcony stop ducking and take out their crossbows, aiming for the noble who chose to remain.  The group on the roof step up to the ridge of the roof and aim at the two escaping nobles.  

Unfortunately for the two escapees, Narangerel is very good with her now magical bow. The gleeful one won't get even halfway to the ceiling without some serious defensive magic. The other she'll shoot, too, and - she's seen other magicals use bindings like rope, but that's another new skill and she doesn't know how expensive it'll be - she'll shoot the last noble as well. 

A half second's pause, to see if they're downed, before she flash-steps up and out of the way. Best not to present a stationary target.

The three nobles go down.  

The remaining bolts are aimed towards the guards.  They take out a pair who were attempting to clear the roof and go for help, and one of the ones still fighting. The guard battle is now four vs four, with the metallic rebel guards having the clear advantage.  

Skin also shifted to metal, the rebels on the balcony leap down to the ground floor and start heading for the now-singed altar, pulling out long knives to finish off the butchers or priest if nessisary.  The ones on the roof begin re-arming their crossbows and keeping watch.

The prisoners, no longer fearing the guards, begin pouring through the gate of the pen and making a frantic path to the closest exit.  

She'll put a barrier over the priest - she wants someone to question - and once the melee's died down jump down to the prisoner on the altar, drop the barrier around him, and - start trying to figure out how healing works. Unless he has a healing factor of some kind, which'd be convenient.

The rebels approach the altar.

"The stranger is making these barriers?" one asks in a foreign language.

"Yeah.  I guess this confirms she's undead and not just using charge-stones," another replies.

"Man, this is why we don't have undead on our missions.  See if you can remind her that it's just her instincts telling her to protect the necromancer, and that he really needs to die.  I'll go collect the charge-stones."  Two peel off to go loot the nobles, leaving one walking towards her and two going after the butchers.  

The prisoner's chest wound is completely gone, leaving a fair bit of blood over unscarred skin.  He's also slightly singed but the barrier deflected most of the fire.  He's disoriented and clutching his burns, but otherwise perfectly fine despite lacking a heart.  

Most of the prisoners who had been in the pen are now out of the building, scattering.  There's shouting from outside as people notice them running.  It won't be long until reinforcements arrive.  

"Hey, it's really important that you drop the barrier.  I know it looks like he's really interesting and worthy of protection, but that's just his magic messing with your mind."

She's still analyzing their language. Apparently no one referenced by her wish has instant language acquisition. Pity. (She'll heal the burned man.)

Telepathically, to just the person talking to her: "This is this the magical before you. I don't speak your language yet. I wish to question the person under the barrier. My telepathy is directed only; I do not pick up on thoughts not directed at me."

Also telepathically, to just the priest: "I have questions. You look like you have answers. I can possibly be convinced to leave you alive and unharmed. Do not talk until given leave. Answer by intending to talk to me. Where is this place, and what were you doing?"

The rebel doesn't think questioning him is a good idea at all.  "He's a necromancer.  They're dangerous.  They influence undead to be more protective and obedient towards them.  Whatever protective feelings you're having are just his magic interacting with yours.  You just saw what they were doing.  How would you feel if it were someone other than him tearing out people's hearts and torturing them?"

The priest continues staring with wide eyes.  "This is the place where we excecute criminals.  For each execution we first turn the criminal into a mage - heartless husks in the guise of the dead.  They're evil, but we have been chosen by the gods to keep them contained, and in exchange for our service are provided with gifts to empower the empire."

To the rebel: "There are no protective feelings. I have no particular care about killing him or not, except that he is briefly useful to me. If it was some other stranger, I would feel the same - that it is unlikely he has a sufficient excuse. If it was someone known to me to have good judgement, I would hold off my own reaction until I had heard their explanation."

To the priest: "Evil how?"

Some - indeed, most outside the People - call the witches evil, for one. And witches and magicals alike are certainly dangerous to the unwary. Neither 'evil' nor 'dangerous' is a category Narangerel feels compelled to call persuasive. She also doesn't object to executing criminals, though such a large number at once and the level of official awareness and glee shown feels strange - the feeding of criminals to witches is a solemn and sparse affair, and those unworthy of being subsumed are given no attention by the nobility.

The rebels are clearing up, taking what appears to be jewelry from the guards and nobles - rings with large diamonds set so they lay against the skin when worn.  The ones carrying the noble's rings depart immediately, each flying up and carrying off one of the roof rebels.  The others begin to leave too, leaving only the rebel who had been talking to her, who is tossed a few spare guard rings.  He's hesitating, not sure whether to try and talk to her or just grab the prisoner and fly away.  

"There are gemstones known as magehearts, which take control of a body when the spirit that once inhabited it is gone.  They manifest supernatural abilities which must be drained by a priest or the mage will use them for evil.  The previous kings of this land, and many of the foreign lands around us, have been infiltrated by these undead abominations.  They kept slaves, kept harems, made war, caused famine, opressed the people who unknowingly allowed them to walk among them."

To the priest: "That sounds like something to investigate, then."

To the rebel: "I don't mind leaving with you. But I wish to keep him alive for now to answer my questions. I can render him unconscious if him seeing where you go is objectionable."

The rebel isn't entirely sure he's happy with her knowing where they're going, but acknowledges that she's probably powerful enough to follow them and needs to be recruited if possible.  "We'll be going to my temporary safe house first.  Just keep him quiet."

He picks the prisoner up and carries him away.  Each of the rebels had gone in different directions, and are already out of sight having ducked into alleys and between buildings in the city beyond.  

To the priest: "You've been very helpful. I'm bringing you with me, for now. Stay silent."

Levitating him behind her is much more expensive than having him just walk but seems less likely to result in him trying to run. 

She doesn't know how to do anything fancy with illusions yet, so she'll just keep the priest close - and muffled - and follow the rebel with an "Alright" to him.

The destination is only a few buildings down, closer to the sacrificial hall than the other safe-houses due to being the one a prisoner might wind up getting carried to.  They land in a dead-end alley and the rebel begins fiddling with the foundation of the building.  What initially looked like part of the wall was a secret door, three feet tall and five feet wide, leading to a ladder downwards.  

Inside was a tiny room with a low ceiling, and four people crowded it considerably.  The only furniture was a single simple bed and an end table with two sets of clothing, a cheap tallow candle, and a sack of travel bread.

"My job here was to explain things to the new mage, then if they seemed interested in joining us bring them to one of the more permanant safe-houses for our leader to talk with. I don't know what I'm supposed to do now."

"Explain this world to me. I arrived here suddenly, from somewhere entirely else, not under my own power."

"I don't know everything about the whole world, or what's different from wherever you come from instead.  Tle is supposedly a giant sphere of rock, with continents and oceans and stuff on the outside, and orbited by a sun and two moons.  I don't know why the scholars think it's round or how things don't fall off the bottom.  Probably the gods, somehow, or the scholars just being all metaphorical or something again.  

"This is the Setebre Empire.  We used to be a bunch of seperate kingdoms.  Then about 30 years ago a couple of the nobles discovered that they could create charge-stones, and one of them - the current Emperor, Ki'Farmel - realized that he could turn other people into mages instead and create charge-stones out of them.  That gave him a ton of extra magic, since they could keep repeatedly killing people until they got one of the good one-in-a-thousand mage-powers and tortured the mages to drain magic constantly instead of only getting to use the powers for a few hours a week like normal.  That's how they managed to conquer half the continent already, and parts of Soth and Garnethold too."

The priest, meanwhile, is kneeling up against the wall where he was left, muttering something that is probably a prayer.

"My world is a circle, as far as I know. Flat, with the spirit worlds above and below. I have heard some scholars believe there are many worlds like ours, with different traits."

"We have two kinds of magic, hope and despair, and we have had them for as long as the gods have spoken to humankind. A person who is filled with hope can make a wish, and then use the hope-magic. If that person then falls into despair, they become a witch, and wield despair-magic. We have one empire that I have ever heard of, and my people are not part of them. They rule a small fraction of our continent, and cannot grow past that because they cannot get their magicals to stop killing each other. Most of the world is ruled by magicals like myself, according to the gods' Messenger at least."

" - Should I be concerned about the priest's muttering."

The freed prisoner is attempting to pat the priest on the shoulder, and the priest scoots further away.  

"I guess the gods might be listening to his prayer?  Then again, if they can see everywhere they haven't done anything about us before they're not going to start now.

"We have a bunch of types of magic.  Mages are the big one, around here.  They're created when someone gets their heart replaced with a mageheart crystal, and gets a random power, weakness, and hunger.  The powers are almost always something useless or small, but one in a hundred is decent and one in a thousand is truly powerful.  The weakness is a time or situation that the mage's power doesn't work, and hunger is an object that makes the mage's power recharge faster so they can use more in a week without having to deal with the side effects of overcasting.  

"Necromancers are people who can manipulate the undead. Undead being mages, liches, vampires, ghosts... maybe others I don't know about?  They can't mind-control them like a full lich, they're just unusually persuasive and charismatic.  Vampires drink blood.  Ghosts are souls trapped in diamonds.  

"Supposedly there are magic artifacts.  Amulets, potions, stuff like that.  All the stuff on the street for sale is scams though.  They might be based off of something real, but I can't think of anything that is for-sure real.  

"Then there's the sorceries.  Sometimes a god will decide to give out magic directly to a person, usually their demigod children or the high priests.  Like mages they're pretty random, but demigods are usually super strength or beauty and priests are usually healing or translation.  I don't think this one has any."

"The priest claimed to me that this country used to be, and the neighboring countries still are, ruled by undead who are cruel to their populations."

"Ma told me about the time before the Emperor ascended.  Obviously no ruler is perfect, but things were better back then, she said.  There were border skirmishes but not constant war like now, with no one to work the fields because the Emperor wants to rule the world instead of taking care of what he has.  Most of the changes are just deciding things that were fine before were terrible.  Blaming the old kings for old droughts but claiming the new droughts are the fault of folk who marry the same gender, or more than one person, because the gods supposedly just happened to start suddenly hating that when the Emperor took over."

"People didn't used to live in fear, when the mages ruled.  Like, sure, if you stole something you'd get lashed or maybe lose a finger.  But The Ranch is hungry, and they do everything they can to get 'criminals' to fill it.  Half the people we rescue didn't even commit a real crime - they just had a shop that competed with the guard captain's relatives, or looked foreign.  Ma got taken when -when she wouldn't give away her bread for free to the soldiers."

"The Ranch?"

"It's a building in the palace complex.  The place they take people whose mage-powers are good enough to harvest, instead of killing them to get the mageheart back out to try again.  Mages are tied up and drained by shifts of necromancers, then the charge-stones are sent to the armies or the nobles.  They have about a hundred mages captive there.  

"Mages can use about five to ten hours of magic a week without bad effects, more if they have their Hunger.  Twice that and they stop being able to feel happiness for a while.  Four times that will usually get them bedridden with pain.  168 hours a week... I've talked to some of the rebels who raided The Ranch itself, and some that got a few people out.  It takes them weeks before they can even scream.  Fifty years ago, those people would have been considered blessed Heroes by the priests, like Raen'Soli... all of her statues were destroyed of course.  Can't have an 'evil undead' as one of the Champions of Iveus."

"This Emperor does not sound like someone who cares for the good of his own people. I am willing to help you, for a short while at least, while I collect my own information. I will not take any drastic actions until I have seen the truth of things with my own eyes."

The rebel still doesn't quite trust her, but if she's being honest about looking for information she'll see the truth of the empire soon enough.  

The priest is upset, and that's making the mage upset.  It probably doesn't help that he's been watching the others staring at each other, having a telepathic conversation he isn't privy to.  Noticing this, the rebel hands him a loose set of clothing, taking the more fitted tunic for himself.

"We're going to need to seperate the mage and necromancer.  If you're finished with him, we can knock him out and leave before he gets up.  Otherwise, mage and I will have to go on ahead and meet up later.  We might need to do that anyway, unless your hope magic can do something about your clothing."

"It can. I'd rather he not see me out of my raiment. He doesn't seem to have much more information, so I'm fine knocking him out, and can do that safely myself."

Plus, her telepathy doesn't, actually, have a range limit if she wants to contact the priest later, and there's potentially no one to spy on the network here.

"I'm ready to leave when you are," the rebel says, squeezing past her to get to the ladder.  He does a quick burst of magic, looking out, before opening up the hidden door.  

To the priest: "I'm leaving with them for now, to see what I can discover from within. I may contact you later."

Then she'll touch him, her magic easily knocking him out, and will follow the rebel after dismissing her raiment in a quick glow of red light.

They take a mix of main roads and side streets, twice passing through buildings.  There are quite a few people bustling to and fro, going about various tasks with either an air of haste or sullen determination.  

Finally, they reach another secret entrance.  Two people are below, both mages, with their powers matching up with the feel of two of the rebel magic varieties.  They both have something odd about their emotions.  All of the feelings of "lacking something" are present in an anomalous cluster - hunger, exhaustion, boredom, loneliness - not quite at the point where they would interfere with normal life, but noticeable.

She notes that. Doesn't ask about it just yet.

(She's listening rather intently to the scraps of conversation she hears. She needs to pick up their language fast. First step is identifying the phonemes...)

"Is this the location?"

"Yeah.  There should be a pair of our mages coming by to talk to the new one.  We're kind of early, so I don't know if they're here yet."

This entrance is in a blacksmith's shop, accessed through the back entrance where the coal is delivered.  Down the staircase is a much larger room, full of rough furniture and the clutter of somewhere actually lived in.  There's a scent of strong soap along with the more expected smells like coal and ale, and the many stacked mugs look unusually clean.  

Both people Narangerel could sense are in the room.  One is a tall and gangly boy of about 19, scrubbing at a tabletop.  The other is about 18, not quite looking like either a boy or girl, dozing half-asleep on a low bench with their head propped up on a bag.  

"Hey.  Were there two magehearts?"

"No.  This is the mage.  This is a foreign magician of some kind who appeared out of nowhere in the middle of our operation.  Is Shi'Melaki still planning on coming in later today?"

"Last I heard."  The lounging mage waves to them.  "Hi.  I'm Nomo'Lessa, and that's Nomo'Vine.  We're two of the mages around here."

The rebel translates this telepathically for Narangerel.

"Hi. I'm Narangerel. I'm foreign," she says, slowly and with an accent. Then, telepathically, "If there is time, I would like to work on this language."

"There's nothing but time in here, at least on the day-to-day scale," the lounging mage says, eyebrows furrowing as they focus on sending telepathically and speaking aloud at the same time.  "We don't have much to do other than make the occasional charge-stone."

The tall one says something, looking suspiciously towards the newcomers.  

"He says to wash your hands," Nomo'Lessa translates, realizing that Nomo'Vine won't.  Then, both telepathically and aloud, "His mage-power lets him sense the things that cause sickness, and they can be on hands and surfaces even if they look clean.  Everyone washes their hands when they come in, before they eat, and after using the chamber pots."  

There's a basin and a few water barrels near the door.  The rebel who led them here goes first, presumably already used to the procedure.

"Is the water boiled? My people say that appeases the sickness-demons within it," she sends, but goes to wash.

"It's boiled with the heat from the forges," Nomo'Lessa confirms. "That's why me and Nomo'Vine are in this hideout - he uses more water than anyone, and it's hard to get that much water boiled secretly."

"They're more like..." Nomo'Vine begins, then tries sending telepathically.  "The things that cause sickness are tiny living things, not spirits.  Heat kills them."

"Yeah," the rebel confirms, shuddering.  "Anyone who uses the healing charge-stones has to see them while trying to tell the healing power what to fix.  That's why we're the cleanest people in the city."  Then, to just Nomo'Lessa, "I'm going to crash for the afternoon.  Tell Shi'Melaki the Sa'Len hideout's been compromised, if I'm not up when she gets here."

Tiny living things - 

Fascinating.

Her mind spins through implications, even as she nods. (And she recognizes several of the words used by the rebel, remembers the sentence for later analysis. A hideout was mentioned, though, so she can guess the topic.)

"There's much I don't know," she says aloud, having strung together enough meanings. Her accent's getting less noticeable. Then, telepathically: "But I learn fast, and I would like to know what I can."

"Most people don't know the tiny-life-form thing," Nomo'Lessa assures her.  "Just us and the nobles.  We're waiting on destroying The Ranch before we can start putting resources towards educating others - especially since the only way anyone knows about the tiny-life-forms is using Nomo'Vine's power and that would give the nobles a clue to where he is."

The new mage has been getting agitated, and is not interested in discussing medicine or letting Nomo'Vine tell him how to wash his hands properly. 

"Is anyone going to explain what's going on?  I was sentenced to death, had my heart ripped out, am somehow still alive and also have a weird new power, and have been carried and led around the city by people who are having weird telepathic conversations.  I just want to go home!"

"Oh, I'm sorry," Nomo'Lessa says.  "I didn't realize you hadn't been caught up yet."  They begin to explain mages, all information Narangerel has already heard.  Halfway through they remember that they should probably send telepathically too.  Lots of new words, particularly for discussing magic.

"What's your power, weakness, and hunger?" they ask the new mage, when they're done with the explanation.  "I can see everything that happens within about a hundred feet, and my hunger is looking at the stars.  Nomo'Vine can sense and change things about his body - mostly healing, though we think that other things can be done too - and he needs to be cared about.  Uh, weaknesses are something Shi'Melaki says we should keep secret.  I guess don't tell us that one.  Also, I didn't catch your name."

"Zon'Ruth," he says.  "I can... if I'm riding a horse, I can tell it where I want it to go with my mind.  And I've had a weird craving for eggs since I was turned."

She hums. "There are a lot of things I do not know to ask..." she says, having picked up those words from the conversation. "New words are good."

"How long will I have to stay down here?" Zon'Ruth asks.  "Like I said, I do have places to be..."

Nomo'Lessa replies "You were arrested and sent to be executed.  It's not safe for you to return to where you were.  Shi'Melaki, one of our leaders, is coming by in a few hours.  Talk to her, stay the night, we can send someone to get whatever family or things you're worried about taken care of, then you can either join us or leave the Empire with whatever silver we can scrape together for you.  Okay?"

Zon'Ruth still doesn't look happy, but nods and sits down at one of the many tables.

Nomo'Lessa turns away from him sends Narangerel a translation of what was said.  "So, what about you?  What else can you do other than the telepathy, and does your magic have any costs we can help with?"

"I can do a lot. My wish makes me learn very quickly. Magicals in general can fly, move quickly, attack powerfully, defend themselves, heal. Using magic worsens my mood, which I suppose might be something that can be helped."

"Ras'Ezza's power is to manipulate emotions when she touches people.  Our power also has emotional side effects, so Shi'Melaki'll have some of those charge-stones with her when she comes by."

"That'd be helpful, yes."

Then all they have to do is wait for her to show up.  In the meantime, Nomo'Lessa can explain various things.  Unprompted, they talk about where the fabrics for clothing come from, the sorts of food the other rebels tend to bring down, what the blacksmiths above are making, and other things that might make for useful vocabulary.

She absorbs it all rapidly, and is soon enough sounding nearly fluent. (It'll probably take her another day and exposure to a wider variety of topics to be truly fluent, but she can hold conversations, now).

An incredibly beautiful woman walks down the stairs into the hideout shortly before sunset.  She places down her lantern by the door and sits down at a table.  The eyes of everyone else in the room are immediately drawn to her - clearly a necromancer.  As expected, she's carrying a number of chargestones with her.  

"Hello, I'm Shi'Melaki, one of the leaders of this group.  You'd be Narangerel?  I've heard a bit about you already.  How have you found your time here?"

"Yes. You have interesting magic and politics."

"I'd trade either for more pleasant ones.  Hopefully soon we'll have better politics.  The magic, well, at least we can stop the nobility from hurting people with it."

She nods. "Regulating magic use is important. We generally don't manage that too well ourselves..."

"It was never this bad around here before charge-stones were invented.  Though it sounds like your form of magic is much more powerful than ours."

"Ours varies. Many are weaker, many are unskilled, and many do not survive long."

"What causes most of the deaths?"

"Losing control of their emotions, or running out of the thing that powers magic, which in our case is quite the same thing. Sometimes getting into a fight they can't handle against a monster, though even our spread-out civilization has mechanics in place to handle that."

"That reminds me - she said her power causes mood problems too, though I don't think it works exactly the way ours does," Nomo'Lessa says to Shi'Melaki.  "We should probably check to see if Ras'Ezza's chargestones work on her."

She nods.  "I have some with me.  Do you have a noticeable amount of..." she waves her hand in a vague gesture, not sure what form the overcasting-equivalent takes in Narangerel's magic system.

"Grief. And I've accumulated some, yes."

She nods, pulling out a cabochon diamond.  It's ordinary looking to normal vision, but brimming with magic.  "I'll activate it for a test, if you'll touch my hand to begin it."  She offers one hand, the charge-stone in the other.

She does as instructed.

The effect is subtle, but easy enough to detect when warned beforehand.  A gentle increase in mood and gem brightness.

Interesting.

She reports the effect.