"And if you just want something else to disappear, that should be easier to get..."

"Yeah, we need somewhere to settle and somewhere to dump magic into so that trying to settle it doesn't eat everybody who's later in the queue ahead of schedule."

"If you can target the magic dump into Wild Space, I'm not sure anyone'd notice."

"I can try it. It does have to be safe enough for mages to come and go occasionally, we need to access disappearance points to connect to them."

"Maybe somewhere marginally claimed with a Wild buffer..."

"If it's on the same planet as someplace inhabited it'll eventually be a problem, but 'eventually' can be a pretty long time."

"Using it as a magic dump might count as claiming it? Since you'd be altering it."

"Which implies... being able to keep people off it?"

"Implies you get the magic from it, and can decide what happens to it. There's supposed to be planets with nothing on them in Wild Space - or, things that're close enough to planets."

"I am still not clear on what I do with magic that I find myself in possession of besides buzz and have awkward social interactions."

"You'd probably have to ask an Overlord for stuff that isn't - rumors."

"...I think the thing where most people don't know how magic works is maybe intentional, though, since it makes breaking free feel dangerous."

"Yeah, it seems like it might be functional ignorance." Sigh. "I'm probably going to have to talk to an overlord eventually, aren't I. And they aren't going to know anything about my magic so I can't threaten them effectively by carrying a sack of ashes."

"I would not recommend starting with the local one."

"I take that recommendation very seriously," agrees Cor.

"For who to start with..." Shrug. "There's - a thing where we don't know much true about our neighbors, since it's hard to talk to them, and there's not a lot of movement of people. So most information we get is local official propaganda - which doesn't tend to be bothered with much - and foreign official propaganda. So whatever I know about a foreign Overlord is - at best the image they want to project?"

"...Which can actually be a lot. Someone whose projected image is 'we're a very nice place to live and way better than your Overlord' is - someone who probably has fundamentally different goals from someone projecting 'I am all mighty and you should never defy me because of the punishment you'll get.'"

"Yeah, I get that."

"Which, combined with 'who accepts immigrants' is... A somewhat less risky place to start."

"My friends are under instructions that if they can't find me in good condition and able to explain the situation they should not pursue colonization here unless they're really, really squeezed for alternatives."

"...Probably a good precaution."

"It won't help if someone manages to produce me in the semblance of good condition and we don't know if they can do that but this universe has.... air... and we don't know how rare that is yet."

"Also most people don't kill themselves, so - that might not be a good heuristic but. Lots of people would rather live here than not exist."

"You're confident everyone remains able to kill themselves? That's promising because I can explode."

"There's anyone who can't - people not physically able, mostly, but if exploding is a mental action, you'd probably be safer there?"

"I have to talk but not much."

"So don't let anyone know you need to, then."