Shhhh! Digital Media Presents: Era of the Spellbound: Episode 12 - The Sacred Weave

I'd like to welcome Bilibili.com to the Shhhh! Digital Media family. I've been with them since March 31, 2026 and I'd like to think that my recent boost to productivity directly results from their inspiration and influence, in much the same way that the circle of YouTube creators I idolize continue to inspire me.

 

Despite this storyline taking place mostly in Shepperton off the Thames, United Kingdom, it is entirely written in Moss Park, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Shepperton is close to my heart in ideas rather than kilometers.

 

I am Brian Joseph Johns and this is Shhhh! Digital Media at https://www.shhhhdigital.com or https://www.shhhhdigital.ca in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701.

[Spellbound - Siouxie And The Banshees]

Do you like enigmatic characters, engrossing story, magic and the ever atemporal weave?

Play Baldur's Gate 3 [On Steam]

Chapters

1. Adversarial Networks
2. Coming soon...

 

This content is produced by the artists indicated on the site, including myself, Brian Joseph Johns.

I, under no circumstance will trade, barter or otherwise swap my own identity for that of another person and I protect the same right for those who've contributed their artwork to the various projects under my management at Shhhh! Digital Media, my own company, no matter the colour symbolism involved. These rights are protected by law under the Charter Of Rights And Freedoms under section 7.

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I'd like to point out that it was the incredible Gary Sinese Foundation that brought the issue of Veteran's rights to my attention. I've always had little respect for those who'd forget the great contribution made by those who've risked life and limb to defend those values that so many of us espouse. Perhaps the true measure of one's principles are by that for which they'd risk their life.

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Because Barris told me to put it here. If I didn't, he said he'd walk. Geez. Stardom really gets to some people's heads. Maybe I could kill him and bury his heart beneath the floor boards! Or I could encase him in behind a brick and mortar wall, for shaming my family name of Amantillado! 

In all truth, there's a good chance that thanks to the works of Edgar Allan Poe, Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain), William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Jonathan Swift, Mary Shelley, Robert Louis Stevenson, Herbert George Wells, Jules Verne, Dr. Seuss, Stephen King, Clive Barker and Pierre Burton (for The Secret World Of Og and his ground breaking interview of Bruce Lee) that all of us are literate. Actually that goes back much farther to the Phoenecians and their first 22 character system of symbols. Literacy is important. Really it is. Literally. It allows us to approach our employer at the end of the week (with a big club) and ask: where my money?! Math important too. It help us count our thirteen fingers and toes.


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Shhhh! Digital Media

Brian Joseph Johns

Shhhh! Digital Media Presents:

Tales of the Sanctum: Era of the Spellbound - Episode 9: The Tarot Be Joined

by Brian Joseph Johns

[Era of the Spellbound - Theme Song]

Adversarial Networks

[A Forest - The Cure]

Glynis waved to her father in the car as he watched her hobbling along on her cane, perhaps purposely appearing to struggle ever the more in order to maintain the illusion needed to keep her secret friend within her safe. Unknown. A mystery without a clue.

Glynis turned, moving the cane twice in order to cover one hundred and eighty degrees, waving to her father as he slowly pulled away, leaving her in the park across the street from the Chicken Burger restaurant that now occupied the same location as had Sato's Curios and Treasures once upon a time.

She walked along the path and through a park, where many people, and their furry and much shorter counterparts ran and played in the grass.

A short distance away from her, in a gazebo, one that looked eerily familiar to Gallea, Glynis' stowaway of the psyche, sat a familiar lady occupied by an even more familiar stowaway akin to Gallea.

When Glynis was certain her father was beyond view, she proceeded more quickly and with far less effort, though keeping herself incognito enough so to maintain the illusion. She smiled at the irony of her situation. A girl twenty years of age, who'd spent the last ten years of her life struggling against the onset of Becker Muscular Dystrophy.

The irony of it all was the fact that her stowaway, a refugee from another time and space, and one that had been lost in a catastrophe of universal proportions, had somehow ended up within her. Cohabitating rather than outright replacing her, as if two separate souls had merged into one body.

This second soul, who had since arriving, had become her close friend. Gallea, as was her name had become a sort of internal crutch to counter the effects of Becker Muscular Dystrophy, for ever since her co-habitation of Glynis body, Glynis had with Gallea's assistance been able to walk freely and without impedance or pain. Gallea though had not been a cure, but rather, a second soul with which to carry the weight of an undeserved life hurdle.

The real irony though was that here she was, walking in a park, fully capable of walking without the cane, however if she did, she stood the chance to reveal herself and Gallea. Here she was with a temporary solution, and yet in the cruel nature of the situation, she was still required to hide her ability to walk. She had to pretend in order not to raise any alarms about the presence of Gallea within her.

The real irony of the situation though was something that irked her. Something that few asked themselves. What if, someone outright cured Muscular Dystrophy. What would happen to everyone whose livelihood depended upon the search for a cure, were suddenly without that livelihood.

[Policy of Truth - Depeche Mode]

She thought of Gallea and how thanks to her friend, she could have run a marathon. She however, remained silent though and continued walking with the aid of the cane, causing Gallea inside of her to ask herself, who was truly helping who?

As she approached the gazebo, Susan stood from the bench within and came outside to greet her.

"I was beginning to wonder if you were going to come," Susan greeted her with a reluctant smile.

"Which one of us were you talking to?" Glynis asked Susan.

"Both of you, of course. We were beginning to get worried," Susan greeted Glynis and the two of them stepped inside of the gazebo and began their discussion.

"I'm just a tag along in this instance, so I'm going to let Gallea take the reigns, but be reminded. I'm going to be listening," Glynis spoke in a calm and rational voice, despite the immediacy of her implications.

"Just as Susan is already listening I'm sure. Shall we get started?" asked Miana.

"We might as well, though we've already been down this road once before. I'm only doing this for the benefit of Mila, Nelony and Shaela, because I really believe they have a chance. A good shot at this. A new beginning," Gallea stated to Miana after they'd sat on the bench beside each other, the gentle spring breeze slightly chilling under the warm sun.

"They've met recently with others. Soothsayers as it were once called. Seers of the distance," Miana informed Gallea, who craned her head to the side in curiosity.

"Oh really? And how is it that they can see into the distance? Isn't that like looking at the pieces of a broken vase, before you dropped it?" asked Gallea, of innocent intent and sincere curiosity.

"These ones, they do it with cards. Susan told me that there are scientific theorists who believe that there is no true entropy. That there is implicit order in everything, including seemingly random events. These readers of cards are able to draw meaning from symbols whose appearance occurs via random events such as being drawn from within a deck of shuffled cards. This randomness always contains a link to its host reality, though I know from wielding the weave for myself that it is more of an intuitive nature than anything to do with numbers or rationality," Miana said as she opened her palm, revealing a multi-legged insectoid of the shadow variety.

Miana said something in a language that Gallea did not understand, and the shadow insect immediately leapt from her hand and onto one of the supports of the gazebo. It then in much the same way a termite would, began gnawing at the fibrous and treated wood, quickly eating away the support until there only remained a piece an inch thick, holding up one sixth of the entire structure.

"Enough. You've made your point. You said cards. Do you mean those of the tarot variety?" asked Gallea, suddenly very interested in Miana's answer.

"One and the same. Why do you ask?" Miana began digging for information from Gallea.

"There were tarot card readers at our Mila's last party. She had friends..." Gallea revealed without getting into specifics.

"Like a Gypsy?" confirmed Miana.

Gallea leaned forward slightly and inquisitively.

"She was a Gypsy?" confirmed Gallea.

"Yes, and a young blonde haired woman not unlike yourself, with the exception of your specific circumstances if you don't mind my saying," Miana smiled, pointing to Glynis' cane.

"Gwendolyn...?" asked Gallea, a look of joyous anticipation upon her face.

"Is that her name? Then yes, she was there too. Isn't it funny how all of these pieces fall into place?" Miana asked Gallea as a ball came rolling over to the gazebo, bouncing off of the steps and rolling off in another direction.

Gallea suddenly moved as if by reflex with frightening speed and agility, and in one motion and step, she was over the railing of the gazebo and nearly six meters out from the railing, stopping the ball before it could roll any further.

She picked it up, and tossed it to its owner.

"Thanks. You should be playing football on the Shepperton Women's team I'd say. If I wasn't already a web designer, I'd pick you up as a free agent and make a load of money in the process..." the man responded, a handsome one in his late twenties.

"Thank you. I'll consider that," Gallea responded entirely seriously, not seeing the jest in his words, then returning to the gazebo and the bench without the aid of the cane.

"You've not lost anything by the transition to this young woman's body. If anything, I'd say you've improved, over that artificial former body of yours. Craft alchemists are no match for what is etched by our living souls and into bone and flesh. The living art of our natural essence I'd say, versus that deterministic archetypal alchemy," Miana both complimented her, and denigrated her and her father's work.

"I sense a bitterness in you. You're jealous of them, aren't you?" Gallea quickly caught onto something that was amiss in Miana's expression.

"Who?!!!" Miana shot back quickly.

"Mila. Nelony. Shaela. They've begun uncovering the secrets you know," Gallea admitted to Miana, once again without revealing the details.

"Did they invite you?" asked Miana, waiting for the answer with a seeming obsession.

"No. But I don't think the reason for that is given my legacy. That of a golem. My father said that even humanity's creator made them from a handful of clay. A poetic reference to the building blocks of organic matter, like the alchemists' silver, firm and strong but not malleable, unlike alchemical gold, the canvas of dreams for any alchemist, which is silver's opposite for this reason. The clay therein holds the secret of both. Perhaps humanity's greatest legacy. Delicate and shapable, yet firm and perseverant," Gallea replied, perhaps hoping that in her defense of humanity, she might become closer to them.

"You are your parents' daughter, Gallea. I'll give you that, though the evidence is still out there as to whether you possess a true soul of the living. We've seen this all unfolding before Gallea. They who uncover the weave, systematically so, and then teach it to their children, in hopes of growing their influence over it. The weave I mean. How do you think it will occur for them? So much to do, and so little time to do it. Remember, it took Lyra and Lorr thousands of years to discover what they're trying to uncover in months. Do you truly believe they can do it?" Miana asked Gallea, still witholding much.

"Did you think that your sister could truly do it without you?" asked Gallea, her gaze fixed upon Miana as she was overcome with grief.

"Did you?!!!" Gallea raised her voice.

Miana kept her silence as she was reminded of the pain.

"Search yourself Miana, because there within your real soul, lies the answer to the question you just asked me," Gallea replied, from the body of a fellow woman struggling against Muscular Dystrophy much like Miana's own lost sister.

"Curse you!!!" Miana screamed at Gallea, causing several people around them to stop and watch, perhaps protectively so.

"You, I cannot figure out!!! You are my enemy. You are my friend. You are however, the one who needs to hear what I have to say, more so than anyone. There was a third seer. A wielder of the vision of the Tarot. She had a passenger, just like you and I. I think that she found a way to liberate herself from within..." Miana revealed to Gallea.

[Leave Your Body - The Grid]

A distance from where they sat, a child began crying.

"I don't want to wear this anymore..." the child cried during their game, in which she was forced to wear a mask.

The child took the mask, and tossed it onto the grass, and it lay there, its lifeless eyes staring up at the sky, while the child, now completely engrossed in something else, had already forgotten about it.

Both Gallea and Glynis stared at the mask, and then the child.

To be continued... and I don't play guitar. I've never owned a guitar, but as I've stated, it is a very expressive instrument in the hands of a skilled player. The modern violin and harpsichord rolled into one. Me? I'm a keyboard and piano player, though not Polish with all due respect. I'm my real fathers' son.

Written by Brian Joseph Johns and this is Shhhh! Digital Media at https://www.shhhhdigital.com or https://www.shhhhdigital.ca in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701.

Credits and attribution:

Special thanks to Udemy, whose courses I have relied upon for the last few years to allow me to grow my skills at my own pace, even finding time between my frantic work pace here at Shhhh! Digital Media.

Thank you to ComfyCloud, whose web based desktop interface and cloud based rendering solution is one of the best solutions I've found yet. I first learned of ComfyUI from YouTubers MickMumPitz and PixelArtistry. If you're looking to get into using AI on your local machine under ComfyUI, then I'd highly suggest checking either of their sites for tutorials covering the topics you'd like to explore.

Thank you to Grok AI (via ComfyCloud) who was the key artist behind: (Danger Tiger), (Tea Reading), (Sailors at Port), (King's Court), Tarot Cards: (The King of Pentacles), (The Page of Swords), (The World), (The Inverted Hanging Man)

The image of the glossy red nail polished thumb holding the inverted tarot card was sourced from Paloma Glow, and in accordance with the Creative Commons 4.0 license, as found by this search on Google under images, where the license details are indicated.

Thank you to Kling O1 Image (via ComfyCloud) who was the key artist behind: (Nathalie and Gwendolyn).

Thanks to this Reddit post for the interpretation of The Hanged Man Inverted.

Special thanks to Perplexity AI and their Comet browser, who have recently become a part of my software toolkit. Their AI powered helpers accelerate your research, reference at every step of the way, not to mention built in tools for content generation, though Shhhh! Digital Media does not rely on text generation for any of its stories, though I do work with AI for suggestions, and scientific accuracy of concepts in Butterfly Dragon, and for delving into the more esoteric traditions of mysticism that are aligned with the story and background of Era of the Spellbound.

Special Thanks to the Natural History Museum in London, England and of course to the Royal Ontario Museum in my own home of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Special Thanks To Rocket Fuel Lakeshore Blvd West, perhaps the best place in history to get a coffee, circa 2001-2004. Miss you all very much.

Artwork: Amy Wong, Wendy Pusey, Ghastly, Birdman, Brian Joseph Johns, Daz3D, Unreal Engine...
Tools: Daz3D, Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, Lightwave 3D, Blender, Stable Diffusion (Easy Diffusion distribution), InstantID, Sadtalker, Google Colaboratory, Microsoft Copilot (Windows 11), Hitfilm, PhotoPea (a great web based Photoshop stand-in if you're on a low budget or in a pinch), Borderline Obsession...

DeepSeek AI for suggestions on exercises to improve aspects of describing scene and settings with a more sensory focused grammar.

InstantID by: Wang, Qixun and Bai, Xu and Wang, Haofan and Qin, Zekui and Chen, Anthony. Research Paper Title: InstantID - Zero-shot Identity-Preserving Generation in Seconds.
Sadtalker by: Zhang, Wenxuan and Cun, Xiaodong and Wang, Xuan and Zhang, Yong and Shen, Xi and Guo, Yu and Shan, Ying and Wang, Fei.

Research Paper Title: SadTalker: Learning Realistic 3D Motion Coefficients for Stylized Audio-Driven Single Image Talking Face Animation.

Gratitude: Our Mentors, Senseis, Sifus, Sebomnims, lifetime inspirations, family, friends, the Nomads (ask Stanton about that one), the Music, the Movies, the Theatre, the Arts, ASMR, (both YouTube and Bilibili and the many other creators on those platforms), the Gaming and Developer communities and of course, the audience.

Martial Arts (in the words of real experts and at least one comedian): https://brucelee.com (home of the real Dragon and an entire family of inspirations), http://iwco.online International Wing Chun Organization (International presence of a very scalable intensity martial art, protected and developed by Shaolin Nun Ng Mui) and the alma mater of Jinn Hua's own specialized variation thereof, https://iogkf.com International Okinawan Goju-Ryu Karatedo Federation (even Hanshi had his teachers), https://itftkd.sport International Taekwondo Federation (Here there be Taegers), https://tangsoodoworld.com Tang Soo Do World (the path of Grandmaster Chuck Norris), https://www.aikido-international.org International Aikido Federation (how else would Navy Chef Steven Seagal liberate a Nimitz Class Aircraft Carrier from a team of hijackers?), https://www.stqitoronto.com Shaolin Temple Quanfa Institute (The City Of Toronto's own Shaolin Temple), https://www.enterthedojoshow.com Master Ken's Ameri-Te-Do presence (If we can't laugh at ourselves, then we can at least laugh the loudest at others, and other Zen)

Magic (performance, illusion and perhaps the real thing): Magic Week Archive (I'm currently growing this section so stay tuned)

Special thanks to Aitrepreneur, Mickmumpitz, Hugging Face and the YouTube educational content producers, including those catering to the AI content production pipeline and of course AlphaSignal.

Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery 
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health, physical and mental wellbeing in every day life

Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery 
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health, physical and mental wellbeing in every day life

Jesse Enkamp: Karate Nerd
Jesse, a reknowned Sensei who runs his own dojo, explores the world of Martial Arts, traveling to many exotic locations to meet practitioners of a variety of different arts

Sensei Rokas: Martial Arts Journey
A reknowned Sensei of Aikido who in seeking to understand the roots of Aikido and its applications, seeks to stress test its effectiveness in a number of real world situations while studying its history

Seamus O'Dowd
An extensive growing archive Katas, Techniques and Waza (mostly Shotokan)

Iaido: Train For Katana Mastery Like Samurai 
The original weapons focused curriculum under which Samurai became masters of their art

Tapp Brothers Exercise For Better Motion 
Extensive courses for calisthenics and body strength, stamina and flexibility

Special thanks to Canva for inspiring other creators and giving them the tools

Special thanks to Captain Crunch and his wonderful sister!

Special thanks to Bandcamp for giving indie music artists a home under one roof

Something to give you perspective: The very first teacher had no formal education, didn't graduate and was self taught, but only because they had no other choice. We do.

This content is entirely produced in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701 under the Shhhh! Digital Media banner.

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