PlayerOliver

When you were a kid, you lived with your grandmother in the small town of Silvertree, on the edge of a magical forest. Grandma is a witch, and she taught you how to use your magic to affect the natural world, too. “Magic is a part of you,” she always told you. “Learning how to use it means figuring out who you are.”

Now you’re 19 and on your own. After years of living in the forest while you perfected your witchcraft, you’ve returned to take care of your grandmother’s house and crow-familiar while she’s gone. Figuring out who you are feels more important than ever - not to mention, figuring out what Silvertree is. A lot is just as you remembered: the friendly generous next-door neighbors with a kid just your age, the proud town council, the quaint little shops with quirky punny names, the gentle shadowy forest full of magic.

Stone in the shoe

It's a little daunting scrolling down and seeing so many comments, but you figure it's worth a shot.


By the time you're a quarter of the way down the page, however, you're not so sure. You can't see any way of getting through these comments without reading them one by one, and yet most of them don't seem particularly helpful—half of them are either promoting some local business (and you're especially skeptical of the ones that promise you "Free cash now" just for clicking a link), and the others are simply talking about how cool the story is without going into further detail.


It's only when you scroll down once more, and without warning the page updates to show you dozens of new comments, that you realize this is more trouble than it's worth.


Just as you're finishing up, you're interrupted by a faint pinging sound that seems to have come from the laptop. After a moment, you notice a little red envelope in the corner of the screen that tells you you have a new email. When you go to check you see that the new message is from Rana, but you also notice another new message from Tobias that seems to have been sent last night.


It only seems fair to read them chronologically, so you start with Tobias's email:


Hey. I just went to knock on your door, but then I figured you were probably asleep. I just wanted to let you know I'm going over to Mr. Logan's store tomorrow to pay him back. I thought you might want to go see him too, maybe. So just meet me by the store when it opens if you do. —T


Reading through Tobias's email, you feel yourself deflating slightly. You hadn't exactly forgotten about what happened at the crafts store, though you had managed to put it out of your mind for a while—but now that it's fresh in your mind, you're not really surprised that Tobias wants to wipe the slate clean. You're pretty sure it's what he wants you to want as well.


Glancing back over the message, you're struck with a feeling of:


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