Karylni'ra

    Born with an innate, wild affinity to the slumbering mind, an awakening Karylni'ra, or dreamfarers as they are called, finds themselves helplessly cast into the turbulent Sea of Dream. Their early, uncontrolled entries are terrifying, akin to a stone skipping across a quiet pond—brief, chaotic glimpses of bizarre landscapes that rush by like summer storms, leaving them bewildered and utterly spent. Among those they touched, subtle ripples of recognition awaken — a lingering feeling of having met someone unseen, the phantom remembrance of a caress that never truly was.     A fully trained Karylni'ra, however, moves with the effortless grace of a moonbeam through mist within these same ethereal currents. Their passage, once a jarring stumble, now possesses the hypnotic rhythm and captivating fluidity of a Sarih'nira performance. No longer do they simply walk dreams; they are navigators, cartographers in the wide and roiling Sea of the sleeping mind, guiding troubled souls through the storms and currents of their own inner night. Their presence descends like a gentle twilight upon the waters of inner turmoil, their eyes shimmering with the deep, knowing stillness of a moonlit pond, holding universes within their gaze. It is whispered that when a true dreamfarer steps into a mind cloaked in darkness, even the worst specters dissolve like morning mist beneath the dawn's first light.  

Born from dreams

The luminous tradition of the Karylni'ra stretches back through the mists of centuries, born from a time when wild, dream-attuned souls found themselves unwittingly tumbling into the vast, sleeping minds of others. Most often this ability manifests in the turbulent years of early adolescence, when their awakening gift irresistibly pulls them deep into the nocturnal currents of the Sea of Dream.   These nascent "dreamwalkers", as they were called in those early days, are often revealed by the subtle ripples they leave upon those around them—a fleeting confusion in a friend's gaze, a half-remembered lullaby in someone else's thoughts - signs only a handful of elders or other dreamfarers know how to discern. If recognized, these awakening souls are often embraced into the fold by other Karylni'ra, their steps gently guided to join the quiet ranks of those who walk the dream paths. Yet, often, these budding gifts simply fade, settling back into the deep slumber from which they stirred, leaving only a faint, unnameable longing, the ghost of a forgotten dream.
 

Awakening

The path to becoming one of the Karylni'ra is a long, arduous journey, demanding years of unwavering devotion. What begins as a mere glimmer, an unrefined ember of talent, slowly blossoms into a revered, albeit reclusive, craft. Only those with the deepest empathy, a spirit as boundless as the dreaming ocean, and an unwavering inner stillness pass the rigorous mental and spiritual trials that forge a true Karylni'ra. To become a dreamfarer is not merely to understand the whispers of the sleeping mind; it is a metamorphosis into a being of two worlds, one who walks the path of the living and the dream to mend both.

Unbound and following only the currents of fate, they are a loosely knit family, united by a shared love for the Sea of Dream. Their individual motivations are as colorful as the dreams they traverse - some seeking a simple livelihood, others driven by a selfless desire to heal, and a rare few, by intentions veiled in shadow. And a few, rare souls forsake the gentle path of the Karylni'ra to wage war on the nightmares themselves, unbeknownst and without glory, all alone in the silent dark.  

To mend the dream

  Karylni'ra are far more than mere mind-walkers; among the waking world's clamor, they are the quiet mediators, skilled diplomats, always the gentle voice of reason, weaving tranquility where discord once reigned. They devote years to learning the way of the heart, to reading the quiet truths within the hearts of men. Yet, their true potential shines on the path of dreams, where they move with the whisper of silk in the night, shaping the world around them with an imperceptible touch. Indeed, their training is a ceaseless journey, both within the quiet rhythms of their waking world and amidst the boundless expanse of the Sea of Dream itself.   Within the waking world, Karylni'ra are quiet, filled with an unwavering stillness so profound it fills the silence around them. To hone their craft, they dedicate countless hours to breathing exercises, allowing their rhythm to echo the slow, cosmic pulse of a sleeping world. They immerse themselves in the myriad tales of storytellers, lose themselves in vibrant coats of paint and the quiet forms of sculpture. All of these broaden their senses, slowly awakening their minds to paint the Sea of Dream anew with the slightest touch, or to hone their sight to the faintest echoes and whispers of the subconscious. They learn to quiet their own inner noise, to become a watcher without trace, an unbent pillar amidst the ever-shifting Sea of Dream - an anchor of profound calm that casts no shadow even in the deepest slumber.   In the Sea of Dream, their training shifts to the art of '"dream-sight" -perceiving the true, often veiled, nature of a dream's landscape and its underlying river of emotions. With time, they learn the art of "dreamweaving" - the subtle altering of the dream's fabric so delicately that their presence leaves no discernible ripple, quite unlike the stumbling, chaotic journeys of their past. Above all, they learn to walk the sleeping paths—the slumbering corridors of the mind where no waking mind dares to tread—to follow the subtle taint of loss and grief, those threads snarled in the loom of memory.  

Beyond the veil

  At the heart of their practice, whispered among their quiet circles like a forgotten lullaby of dreams, lies a philosophy of profound, subtle influence. They understand that the Sea of Dream is a living, breathing tapestry, and their role is not to command or to fight, but to gently guide its unfolding with a whispered suggestion, an almost imperceptible nudge, a touch so light it's like the whisper of a candle. Every Karylni'ra views themselves as a being of two worlds—the waking world and the dream paths—and this philosophy of subtle influence is an unspoken understanding shared by all who walk their path.

They are quiet chroniclers of a people's inner landscape, explorers and healers and they see it all —the hushed anxieties that cling like evening fog to the soul, the fervent hopes that glimmer like distant, unborn stars, the lingering echoes of ancient grief that resonates through the sleeping depths of the mind. They carry the sleeping, regal soul of a people within their heart, adorned not in earthly finery, but in the shimmering, quiet strength of boundless empathy.