The message spread like wildfire across both continents, carried by every communication crystal, every magical telegraph, every carrier bird that could fly:
"If you're still yourself, if you can still choose to be brave or cowardly, kind or cruel, wise or foolish—then you carry a disease that someone wants to cure. But some diseases are worth keeping."
"They promise you peace without pain, harmony without conflict, perfection without choice. They offer to solve all the problems that make you human by making you something else entirely."
"We say: Keep your problems. Keep your pain. Keep the beautiful, terrible burden of deciding who you want to be every single day."
"This is Selene of Blackmoor, and I'm infected with freedom. Join us if you want to stay sick."
The responses came back f
