Brief Candles

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Please go to the 'Talk Page' to let me know what nights you can play. This will involve some time on Perfidious Albion (Yboracum), Reich (Berlin), Alusia (Calder), New Terra (Khemet), Hell (Ys). The Risk Factor is ?.
Treaure will be distributed using the Loot Auction convention.
I run the game under these variations and may add others from time to time.
Players should submit a .pdf or similar file of their character sheet and item list to me at jim.arona - at - gmail.com. You can be as thorough as you like, although I prefer brief and to the point. It is important to me that the information is readable and organised logically.

Preamble

Summary

Adventure: Brief Candles
GM: Jim Arona
Session: Spring 813
Night: TBA
Location TBA
Level: High

Party
  • Domino - An arcane trickster played by Jason Stevens
  • Suhoi - A fluid warrior played by Denys Matve'ev
  • Robin - An eco-warrior played by Heather
  • Kara - A sorceress played by Sylvia
  • Endgame - A wanderer from the Outer Darkness played by James
  • Grendel - A sorceror played by Simon
  • Ace, the Wonder Dog - a wonder dog, played by Dean
  • Mr Ed, the Wonder Horse - a wonder horse, played by Stephen
Employer
Mark, Death's Champion
Mission
The Angels of the Seal have returned to the Known Realms at the speed of death, and have much to reveal of what they have seen.

The story so far...

Buffs

Magic Rk Effects Dur Do Su Ro Ka Eg Gr A ME
Rune Armour (A) 20 +10 Dodge +3 Body Void +5 Armour 10.5 Hrs
Smite (A) 20 +22 Damage on first strike, stun, knock down 21 Hours
Mind Shield (Gr) 13
Water Breathing (Gr) 13
Cold Resistance (Gr) 7
 
Melee Combat +4 Dodge +1 BodyVoid +4 Attack +1 minor action at end of pulse
Those under the military command of Mr Ed gain these bonuses in Melee Combat
Watches

Treasure

Resource points
Type Qty Do Su Ro Ka Eg Gr Ki Ar
Iron 39 13 13 13
Similarity 14 4 5 5
Worm or Skull 78 From Wormskull horrors (6x13)
Worm - 13 13 13 13 13
Skull -
Mountain or Torrent 70 Mountain Scream
Mountain - 18 17 17 1 18
Torrent - 18 17 17 18
Eye or Discord 12 Eye of Discord
Eye - 3 3 3 3
Discord - 3 3 3 3
Dragon or Hunter 145 From Verjigorm
Dragon - 29 29 29 29 9 29 9
Hunter - 0
 
 
 

Experience & Other Awards

Domino Bower Suhoi
 
After racial tax:
 
After bonuses:
 
After Loot Auction:
 

Calendar

Calendar

Spring: Thaw (10) 813wk
Moonday Duesday W'ansday Th'rsday Frysday Reapsday Sunday
Candlemansa 1 Guild Meeting 2 3 4 5 6
7 8 9 10 11 12 13
14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27
Spring: Seedtime (11)
28 29 30 1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 Rites of Thunor 9 10 11
12 13 14 15 Equinox 16 17 Eostre 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30 1 2
Spring: Blossom (12)
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 Floralia 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Walpurgisnacht

People and Places

Scribe Notes

Serpents & Similarities are seeking the answer to The World Riddle - Does God exist? This is a bad thing as when that question is answered it increases the certainty in the known realms and that's bad. Mark has gone to try to slow the answer down. The party is tasked with helping.

Similarities used the Well of Trumps to create/influence The Lands of Chaos, his plan includes using the LoC as a focus when multi-verses collide to create a new version of the known realms, the LoC becoming a map of the new multi-verse granting him significant power over it. The certainty from the World Riddle, stolen time, jet tree forest, etc. are all tools or triggers related to the timing and control of this event.

Ungoliant exists within the multi-verse (though on the edge of it in the outer darkness) her efforts, unlight webs etc are probably related to anchoring herself to the parts of the multi-verse that Sims wants to preserve so that her existence and power base are preserved through the change.

Dioscura to Red Keep

Day 1-20

On our way to check up on things in Perfidious Albion and ask after Mark, something goes awry in the Astral, Kilroy and I get separated as we drop back into the real world (Tanuel) ?

I disguise myself and infiltrate the nearest city to find out where I am, it turns out to be Dioscura, City of the Hidden Gods. After a day or so of blending in with the locals I see Grendel and subtly get his attention, he introduces me to Domino and we make our way to their house to talk.

They explain what's going on and how they're trying to help Mark, following some visions they saw in the caves of twilight and messing with the plans of Sims, Snakes, Berith, and anyone else who might be associated. Though I'm not sure how this helps as apparently the arrival of the answer is inevitable now that it has begun its journey. Or possibly they can find out something that we can tell Mark that will allow him to stop it or maybe 'kill the answer'.

Last outing they found a Basilisk (the Lord of Serpents) feeding on the place where Mark had been imprisoned - gathering essence of mark to help fight him. They killed it and dispelled all the remaining essence.

Grendel, Domino and a couple of other immortals have raised a joint house here, had a look for the hidden gods (they're still hidden). They're looking for the spiders of Unlight (ungoliant's brood).

Kilroy turns up, and we head off to the city of twilight (5 day walk), named Ioaoa (something like that with lots of vowels) origin of Medeanite witches. The city is run by witches, several covens. Toughest are the Medeanites. Grendel is identified as a powerful witch as we enter the city and questioned by 3 witches from a local coven and manages to convince them he's a power hungry witch just visiting for a while and he needs to maintain his masculine disguise.

We poke around for a week gathering information from the locals in our specialist ways. Domino finds that the city walls are wicker pailings containing a web of Unlight. The strands from the walls all head off into the astral, woven together into a 3 metre cable. Following that through into the abyss and it looks like they eventually head into the outer darkness where 'the big U' hangs out. Six big abyssal demons (named by Sims, all with the same name which is not normal - they're normally unique) are guarding the cable where the astral meets the abyss. We kill five of them, the sixth gets away. Then we spend a couple of days slowly cutting through the cable. Then back to the Witch City, they are a bit stirred up, Medeanite Dancers examining the walls, the Medeanite Sorceress with her usual entourage active (Toad, Psionic Orchid, Floating throne), we leave.

It's a five day walk to The Red Keep which was seen in the twilight visions.

NB Grendel's vision is of intertwined spires it's still to be investigated - he knows the location.

Red Keep, Dark Mountain

Day 21-24

The Red Keep has magical walls, only two of the walls may be seen at any time, the defensive power may be concentrated on whichever wall is being attacked, an effective offence would need to strike all four walls at once. The corner towers are pentagonal. Once we enter the keep Domino and Grendel can sense a fifth wall and a Nexus.

We enter as questors which they accept quite happily, find a reasonable inn and poke around for a couple of days. We meet Endgame who also has an interest in Unlight and Ungoliant's activities and decides to join us for a while. The keep is being evacuated in an orderly fashion, they have been attacked by Nephilim and Blood Wolves who have come south into the area near the keep and can't defend against them. We debate for a while whether the impact on the Red Keep is deliberate or incidental but come to no likely conclusion. We gain audience with the Lord of the Red Keep, he doesn't know of the Nexus in his city but can tell us that Black Dwarves have been seen in the north where the Nephilim used to be.

We decide to head north and check out what has driven the Nephilim out. About 100 miles north we find a large black mountain that hasn't always been there, we work out it is a damage sink for the Lord of the Dark Earth that he can use when on this plane. While approaching and investigating we attract the attention of several smaller and one large horror. The smaller ones attack Grendel and Domino from the astral; Grendel hands out Tinctures of Aconite and Passionflower; Domino opens a door into the astral; Kilroy blasts the smaller horrors with a Sunray as they open a small portal to target us; the big horror arrives, Endgame and I engage it. The battle is fast and furious, we are victorious though somewhat drained and damaged.

Jungle and Fiends

Day 24-34

We try to come up with a clever plan to subvert or drain the mountain, in the end Domino sets some siege venom to work on the mountain and we return to Red Keep. Kilroy and Domino stay in the keep to search for the Nexus and work with a large group of mages currently in town to create Rune Wards against Nephilim.

Endgame, Grendel and I head south into the jungle to find some Athelas to heal Grendel and some Passionflower for more tinctures. We spend a couple of days, finding Athelas and healing Grendel fairly quickly but taking longer to find Passionflower. The third day we come to a large town in the forest, gaining entry as questors again we are directed to a master Herbalist with an effete aide who agrees to make tincture for us in return for a portion of the flowers. He warns of an illness in town but he has a potion to cure it if we're afflicted. At our request he directs us to a town elder who can direct us to an empty house to use for a few days. They attempt to charge us too much for the house but we negotiate it down to merely an extortionate amount.

In the morning Grendel and Endgame are ill and get potions from the Herbalist before we head out to harvest more Passionflower for the three days it will take the Herbalist to make the tincture.

Chatting with the locals one evening we find out one of the tribes coming in from the west is overdue, we head out in the evening flying along the trail they should have arrived by and searching either side for signs of firelight. We eventually spot them, land in a clearing and approach their camp. They had diverted south to avoid Blood Wolves(?) near the main trail, we get the impression they have been tracked or watched, one of the children remembers seeing someone who we believe is a Succubus.

We escort the tribe back to town and then start checking the town for signs of succubus infestation, there have been a couple of suspicious deaths but we don't scare any Demonics into the open. We go to consult with the Herbalist and finally spot that his aide is a Pit Fiend in disguise. I discretely warn the Herbalist and he says he knows, he found it in an old temple in the forest to the west and has it bound. We suggest we stand guard while he checks the bindings, at that point the Fiend reveals itself and combat ensues. The room we're fighting in has been rigged as a fire trap, greek fire, incendiaries, very messy for those of us who are not creatures of fire. Pulling out all stops and the Unforgotten we make it out, with Endgame unconscious, the building in flames, and it turns out the Herbalist is Blackrod in disguise with his familiar the Pit Fiend. Blackrod and the Pit Fiend have a decent lead by the time we chase after them, we almost catch up to them when they land in a clearing and banish themselves - presumably back to hell.

Blackrod has been here a while, he has curses under many of the buildings making the inhabitants sick, they come to him for a remedy and get given his herbalist potion that lets him harvest their souls when they die - and a discrete counterspell for the curse that's ailing them. We explain to the tribes what has happened and help them identify who has been affected. I gather and use more Athelas to cure part of the affliction on Endgame and Grendel, then we head back to the Red Keep to seek Kilroy and Domino's help in lifting the curse portion.

The Fifth Wall

Day 35-43

Endgame leaves to follow his own leads.

With the agreement of the Lord of the Keep we decide to seek military help from the Tintagelites, Kilroy establishes a permanent Geode Portal from Red Keep to near a cenotaph 80 miles north of House Tintagel.

House Tintagel is busy and it takes us a couple of days to get in to see The Castellan. He agrees to station some troops at the Red Keep and sends a Lieutenant with 100 warriors back with us. While there we make use of their Gift Box, I draw an opening to Mark's pocket, Domino draws a Rod of Ambiguity which we stick in my pocket for Mark to use against the answer, Kilroy draws the Forge of the Insubstantial.

Domino has located the Nexus, it is the gate in the fifth wall and leads to another multi-verse. There's something weird about how long the nexus has existed, its time since creation is increasing faster than the normal flow of time but we can't work out the rate or how long it has been here. Heading through we emerge from the entry into a castle built into a mountain. The castle has been assaulted by something big. Featureless stone in front of the gate leads to a bridge through mist into a dark and gloomy forest.

The bridge is a hollow tube, we break in and explore. It is home to a tribe of Kobalts who are working on repairing the castle. They tell us that Dwarves used to live in the castle, it was attacked by a Dragon - Mountain Scream, who was after their hoard of gems, the Dwarves survived but have fled. Nobody lives in the castle any more but a couple of people occasionally emerge from it and travel to the human settlements to the south. We identify this couple as the Biolurgen and Mister Wolf.

Grendel makes a river boat and we set off down river, lots of fun navigating perilous rapids until we reach a small lake where the Dragon attempts to ambush us. I close with it, shoving my sword in it's mouth as it engulfs me in flame and biting it's neck, the others put themselves out, keep me alive and then start blasting the Dragon. Battered and burned we defeat the dragon and feast on its heart blood. Then spend a couple of days skinning, boning and looting the corpse.

Domino locates its hoard, we make our way there, lift the curse and start counting our new fortune.

Wands, Patterns, Beirut

Day 44-90

We continue our interrupted journey and enter the first walled city we come to. The city is quartered, ordered, strong religious/military presence, and is lit by lamps that use Galvinism or something like it. We're exploring in the evening when we something fly over the walls and come down a couple of blacks from us, we head over to investigate and are met by the Lord of Wands. We exchange information about what Sims is up to, he is investigating this world and suspects Mister Wolf has some of his people here, he will continue investigating here, he suggests that we need to warn the Lord of Patterns about the risk of incursion by the Lord of Serpents from the mirror city in Perfidious Albion. And on our way there he asks us to place some of his house cards in the Lands of Chaos.

Travelling back to near the Kobalts by Rune Portal we let them know the Dragon is dead then head through the Nexus to Red Keep, through the astral to Jiroth then through the Lands of Chaos to the abyss, placing the house cards and finding an interesting garden where Domino finds the herb required for the antidote to Blackrod's soul poison.

Two weeks hiking through the Abyss then up the cliff to the astral of Victoria where Domino leads us to the Astral gate of the Lord of Patterns. We are granted entry and are very careful and polite as we are admitted and then granted audience with Serafin. We quickly give warning about the threat from Perfidious Albion and tell him what we have learned of Grimes plots and related events.

We ask what we can best do to help, Patterns tasks us with going to Beirut (Nualis) to gather the souls in the Garden of Tophet before Berith gets there and to take them to the Lady of Souls on Sparlainth. He provides us with a phylactery to gather the souls into.

We spend a week while I learn to Detect Ley Lines and make armour from the Dragon scales.

Then through the astral to the Abyss, two weeks across the abyss to Nualis, up the cliff and into the astral to Domino's house on Nualis. The house in near on oasis on the Dark Continent, we want to minimise our time travelling from here so we don't catch the attention of the Lord of the Dark Continent. We refresh buffs and then I Windwalk east to the Red Sea, fly over it then north up the coast to near a city about 1,000 miles from the house. Setting down Grendel's crystal, I wait and watch for a couple of hours until they wormhole in. After a late dinner we walk to the city which is full of knights, clerics and monks of the Holy Mother Church. We find rooms in a dive which is the only place not filled with HMC knights and rest the night. The following day we enquire after boats travelling to Beirut but they are all busy taking the HMC the same way, we decide not to risk travelling with HMC knights and witch sniffers and head out of town to make our own boat. Grendel and I sail us north and east for 3 days, we dismantle our ship and make land at a rocky cliff a few miles from the city. The coastal villages are occupied by HMC knights, we avoid them and make our way to the city.

Scouting round the outside I find three ley lines which would intercept near the centre of the city, we sneak over an inland wall and follow one of the Ley Lines towards a large church that is the centre of activity for the HMC troops. Most of the buildings here are built over the remnants of older buildings, we know that the garden was close to the old temple and probably near the intersection of the ley lines, we guess it is beneath the church. We sneak as close as we can, observe from the cover of a small cemetery then enter an old building just over 100' from the church. Kilroy and Grendel bind earth and air, slowly forming a tunnel into the crypts beneath the church where we find the entrance to the middlemarch containing the Garden of Tophet. Covering our tunnel and tracks we enter the garden. It takes a day and a half to gather the 24,000 trapped souls into the phylactery. While doing that we gather the round stones that paralysed the souls trapping them in here, destroying those we can't carry away with us. Then we wait until nightfall and make our way out again, sealing up the crypt chamber with tonnes of stone to slow anyone else trying to access the garden. Sneaking back out we make it out of town then a further mile or so until we can get over a ridge and out of line of sight. Then Domino opens a door into the astral and we exit, unfortunately the door doesn't close.

The Eye of Discord was with the HMC at the church, detected the door, moved the opening to them and sent knights in after us. I hold the door to slow them down but something like a wizards eye gets past me. Kilroy and Grendel get walls down, battle monks cast at us through the door and a cone of annihilation from the eye almost slays Domino. Grendel sends a red grenado through into the room with the battle monks which kills or disables them and the knights. But the Eye of Discord has already teleported through to behind us in the astral. He blinds me, I charge anyway swinging blindly and getting the occasional wound while Grendel and Domino blast him, Kilroy moves around to strike from behind him, the combination of attacks eventually overwhelms his defence and he goes down, Domino races forward to pin his soul before it can depart.

The Journey of Souls

Day 90-490

We postpone deciding what to do with our dead immortal and deliver the 24,000 souls before they get us in trouble. Crossing the abyss with them might be bad, either attracting the attention of a horde of abyssal demons or worse, attracting the Lady of the Abyss. Kilroy conceals the phylactery in my axe then connects to his portal near Victoria, from there Domino guides us over the True Stone bridges to Sparlainth, we need to go via two other worlds as the Victoria-Sparlainth bridge is broken, this takes about 3 weeks. Then standing in the Astral in Sparlainth, Domino realises he doesn't know any exits from the Astral in Sparlainth so another week back over the bridge to Feralie, then through the Astral to The Ring Keep.

Judecca, the Lord of Rings is home and a bit bored it seems as he decides to come along for the ride when we fly off to the Manor on the Moors. This world is bound by rings about 90,000 feet up, 'stars' (crystals) are suspended from the rings and move in the normal patterns, it is possible to walk around the rings to travel this world - if you have a way of getting up and down. It is about 2,000 miles east to the Manor on the Moors, with Domino providing a tail wind it takes about 2 days. As we descend and search for the manor, we are careful to stay clear of the city to the west, it is home to the Lord of Corruption and his Church of Purity.

We pass through the nexus to Sparlainth emerging on the Bridge of Sighs. But we don't know how to get to the Lady of Souls - more accusatory looks at Domino. Domino can tell us that she resides at the Forge of Souls with the Lord of Iron, we ask around but the locals don't know of it. Kilroy tries asking spirits and lucks out, finding one that was an agent of the Lady of Souls, investigating the incursion of the Church of Purity into the city. He was killed by them and is about to head back to report to her. I lead us into the Valley of Death and we follow him to where he emerges and we find ourselves standing in front of a mountain fortress with a desert ruin behind us (domain of the Lord of Ruin, Ozymandius) and an old looking (Greek) temple fading into the distance (Temple of the Dark Moon - a dangerous place).

Had we been travelling by land we would have had to travel a long way south from the Bridge of Sighs to the City of Roses then east through the Ruined Desert or bypass it south through a forest known to be home to dangerous serpents.

We are admitted to the keep by a Dwarven Scholar and granted audience with the Lady of Souls. We tell her the story and hand over the phylactery of souls, she knows what to do with it but declines to share details with us. We discuss what to do with the Eye of Discord, the lady tells us he is no longer immortal and will presumably seek to regain his immortality. He is also extremely talented in treachery, any deal we make with him is likely to be broken or twisted to our disadvantage, she suggest not interrogating him as we could just give him information to use against us. We decide to unpin his soul and let him resurrect, hoping that the rumours of his intent to betray Similarities are true and not just a rumour he spread to protect himself from people like us. Maybe, if we're lucky, he'll steal Similarities immortality.

We stay here a while to forge weapons, rest, train and initiate. A year and a day passes.

Dark Ladies of the Night

Day 491-518

When we consult with the Lady of Souls about what we can do to help with the current crises she has nothing specific, just some philosophical stuff about accepting that change is inevitable. We're discussing what to do next when Grendel pipes up "I've just realised, I'm a pattern..." and fades from view. As Grendel's vision was the spires, he was keen to check them out and now he's vanished, perhaps that's a sign we should check that first.

Using the Astral gate of the Forge of Souls, we head to the Abyss, 2 weeks to cross to Kerberoth without incident, take a short cut to Jiroth then fly and walk 40 miles north to the spires.

We check out Anthari, the nearby town first and all seems normal there, no sign of Blackrod's toxic presence. Then to the spires themselves, no sign of activity in Blackrod's lab since he was driven from there. The road from the town, lab, and stairs carved into the spires all seem to have been done with bound earth. The spires appear tall but it's not until they are seen from the air that they are revealed to be about a mile tall. We investigating the spires further and find nothing of interest!

This info is not recorded anywhere and we try not to discuss it ever again but is here for player benefit.

The spires are made of True Stone, we return to Jorith to enter the astral and check out the spires presence there, they are a seal, checking out the runes on the inside of the seal we're fairly sure this is the cap imprisoning The Devil. Domino is surprised by this as he tells us The Devil is imprisoned on Sparlainth under a mountain of True Stone - everyone knows that, he's been there himself. We figure that one of them is real and the other a decoy but have no way to determine which is which, if we knew then we could safely harvest True Stone and power from the decoy. We ponder why the vision led us here, presumably so we'd know where and how to release The Devil if all else fails - it's a great way to increase uncertainty in the world.

Domino suggest Jade Rain may be able to answer a certain question for us, we return to Jiroth, find a pool and enact the rite to communicate with her. A green crescent forms over the pool and a sexy voice speaks from it. We chat and Jade Rain invites me to come visit her in person. We head back to Kerberoth and the Abyss where Jade Rain meets us and takes us home. We ask if the Mountains in Sparlainth are real or the decoy, she doesn't know but thinks it better that way, if there are two such places then it is uncertain which is the real one, we agree that's probably a good thing. Jade Rain teaches Domino the recipe to create an antidote to Blackrod's poison from his herbs. I ask about the weakest link in Sims plans, she says it is if the Lord of Serpents gives in to his vindictiveness. Mark, the Lady of the Abyss, and Domino are his most hated and most likely to be able to trigger his vindictiveness. She also tells us that the trump found on Mr Hiss leads to a staging post in the void. We spend a happy week with Jade Rain before moving on.

We decide to check on the drain in the Midnight Sea where Mark was imprisoned, while Mr Hiss was slain in the Astral there, there might be more we need to check in the physical world. Domino and Kilroy learn Water Breathing spells, we head through the Astral to H___(?) where we hire a ship and set sail on the Midnight Sea. The winds are fortunately favourable, 3 days later we arrive at the choppy waters above Mark's former prison, Kilroy and Domino can see blue on black patterns in the water that are similar to runes of the Medeanites. With water breathing and bound water, we head down.

Deep down the blue and black patterns form a funnel that leads down to the copper-ringed entrance of the middlemarch, it's not sucking in water but Divination reveals it is draining the memory of nights from the sea and has been doing this a long time. The copper seal used to be a lock on the entrance but is now broken and ineffective. Kilroy sends his spirit in to scout and sees and is seen by the Medeanite Sorceress who is accompanied by Kamuel the Cold Knight, Shireth of Darktree Tower, half a dozen spider-people who look like Endgame (minions/creations of Ungoliant), and her bound spirits - the Void Chalice, Sentient Orchid, Toad, and Hawk. Kilroy sends some sunlight through the entrance, Domino follows up with several bolts and blasts which do a lot of damage to the spider people who are charging up. The Chalice sends a swarm of entropy locusts at us, Kilroy blocks them with his bound water then hits them with a curse that turns them on the Chalice, the Hawk banishes them but not before the Chalice has fled. As the spiders (who are horror-level ugly up close) are defeated Kamuel makes his way up to engage me at the entrance, Kilroy uses the distraction (and obvious inability to pass through the entrance) to discretely teleport down behind the sorceress. The orchid has moved into position and now releases a cone of confusion over those of us at the top. I resist, Domino wriggles out of it but Kamuel is caught and unable to act for a while. I pound on him with a variety of weapons which only just get through his armour but Joyeuse seems to have an odd effect so I concentrate on that. Kilroy sneaks up on the sorceress smashes her head and strips her water breathing and pressure protections, she enacts her backup - telekinetically keeping the water at bay and the orchid takes her wounds, then she strikes back with Necrosis and Disentegration. Domino teleports down to help Kilroy just in time to catch her Agony spell. Kilroy calls his bound water down, Domino starts working to overcome the pain. Kamuel recovers from the confusion with enlightenment in his eyes, he takes a knee and renounces his evil, I welcome him back, he then seeks my blessing to end his undead existence and pulls the spearhead from his chest, enacting his true death. Using his cold iron armoured body to weigh me down I jump through the opening into the middlemarch, arriving with the dead Kamuel attracts the attention of the others, Shireth draws a 4th circle of protection and looks worried, the sorceress sends a maximum damage enhanced phantasm at me which along with the agony, I ignore, her disintegration leaves a small scar but I advance, flirting all the way. With her attention focussed on me, Kilroy directs his bound water to engulf her which overwhelms her TK shield and she is crushed to death by the depth of the water. Her bound spirits are released and move off, Shireth teleports away before Domino can reach him.

They have been making grenados of infernal cold here, presumably as weapons for Mister Wolf and his kin who would be immune to their effects. And the vortex above has drained the memories of thousands of nights from the sea. We decide to claim a few for ourselves before breaking the vortex and letting the rest bleed back into the sea.

Domino has pinned the sorceress' soul, we decide to resurrect her, take her extra life then kill her for the final time. As her life returns with us standing around swords raised, she pleads for mercy, offering to tell us everything she knows. Undecided on whether to grant mercy we bind her and compel her to tell us everything anyway.

  • She convinced the other Medeanites to work with Ungoliant, her plan is to bring U back into the world so that U will help protect it, accepting that there will be collateral damage.
  • She is allied to Eris and an opponent of Anathel of Karthri who follows Nyx.
  • She is a Spirit Binder and a Sorceress giving her access to Mind and Necromantic magic.
  • Her spirit minions are:
    • Hawk, a Namer, her familiar with upgrades.
    • Void Chalice, a Celestial of Night and Stars which is after an artefact that was taken by the Mindflayers.
    • Toad, an Earth mage, an Imp that was given to her as a spy which she then subverted.
    • Orchid, Mind Mage, wants a cure for lunacy for its people.
  • Her Resurrection chamber is in Dioscura.
  • She was involved in the draining of Mark during his imprisonment, after he was trapped by Sims, U. and others.
  • She is next due to meet with Sims in Berlin, Reich in about two years.
  • At the staging post, Sims and Serpents are building an army. Named Demons of the Abyss as well as a non-abyssal army. They are protecting the area from being detected by demons like the Kerberites do with their arch.
  • The Biolurgen is probably in Reich as is Mister Wolf.
  • Transurania is an imaginary planet near Neptune on Nualis that exists both above and below the known realms. The world beyond the Fifth Gate in Red Keep is below the Abyss. Around 1-5,000 transuranians escaped Mr Morden's accidental burning of their world on an aether ship they had captured.
  • The Jasonites are in Chalcis, north of Greece. They are diminished, most of their recent plans have failed.
  • The Serpent folk that worship Yig have talked with Anathel, they won't talk with her.
  • The three children she was after are known to have innate gifts of Wizardry (Thomas), Sight (girl), and Love (boy) but they each have another unknown gift.
  • Her heart could be rendered for 18 Strife.

Scouting, shopping and jumping

Day 519-573

After a long discussion and a quick vote, the Sorceress is killed, permanently.

We portal back to Haran(sp?) to check up on the reservoirs the drain was feeding and we're fairly sure they've been cut off.

Then through the Astral to Kerberoth where we spend two weeks learning the runes used in their arch and walls.

Then one week to Victoria via the shadow paths to consult with Vanity about involving the lady of the Abyss in our plans, while the agrees that the lady would be keen (sane or not) in her insanity phase she wouldn't know when to stop and could get captured which would be all bad.

Back to the abyss and a week to get to Damien to see what he knows of the staging post, he sends a scout (Point) which takes another week for its round trip. Point tells us there is a mile long asteroid ship there and spawn of Tethys (Lady of the Deeps).

We come up with a crazy plan and head to Nualis, a week later we are in the Astral heading to the gate of David, the Lord of Artificing. His people give us some interesting alchemical concoctions to try and note the unfortunate effects. David agrees to gives us the cases we ask for if we have a small wager with him. It's a race to the bottom of his mile high tower, the last one to use magic or trickery to avoid the damage wins. Domino would like 3 days first to leave the extra explosives he's carrying at his house, which David agrees to. While we're at his house Domino explains that David has a skill of landing and the he will simply plummet and land safely. To win we have to cheat somehow and get away with it. He creates an Illusion to fool David, Kilroy and I come up with a plan, then we return.

Kilroy prepares the landing area with bound water, making the water soft. And binds some air to streamline his fall. I rely on my flying and Aerial affinity to fall faster, then we all jump. David pierces Domino's illusion, we impact at much the same time as David and he calls it a draw.

With 4 cases containing enough explosive to level a small city, we head back to the abyss and towards the staging post. Two weeks later, we stop about 5 miles out.

The Abyssal Big Bang

Day 573-593

We spend days tunnelling in from 5 miles out with Earth Elementals, Binding Earth and similar abilities. Hiding the tailings from scouts is one of the biggest issues on a featureless plain. Eventually we make it and cautiously emerge beneath the ship which is floating a few feet off the ground. The rock is normal, not Abyssal rock which makes it easier but half of it is bound to move to repair holes so we have to work around those bits. We make our way in through the hull slowly and carefully then barely avoid some sort of telepathic scan which we assume is the Elder Brain. We figure if we go slowly then sooner or later we will fail to hide from the brain so we go faster with Kilroy destroying the rock to create a crawlway. Despite our precautions a patrol of demons spot us and crawl under the ship to check what's going on. We quickly cross into the crawlway and close it behind us while we continue the rest of the way through the shell. Kilroy sends his spirit to scout, the inside is dark and deserted, we consider breaking in but decide that setting them off in the outer shell means there's less chance of them being found and deactivated. As we're almost set to go, we feel a shift, spirit scouting again the ship hasn't moved but the inside has changed, we guess there's some kind of shifting above/below the universe going on in a Transuranian kind of way. A little while later it shifts back. We set the cases to go off in 4-5 minutes then leave...

Plan A was to Banish/Recall our way out but something is blocking them. Kilroy re-opens the exit and we jump down. 10 of sims demons are in our tunnel, the other 20 are up top waiting their turn. I send a dozen dragon-warriors up to delay the topside demons and engage the front line down below. Domino sends a fireball down the tunnel and I try to shield him and Kilroy from the back-blast, which works well enough until the black iron grenado's the demons were carrying detonate, this mangles everyone. The fire triggers a secondary explosion in the dust-laden air which extends up to where we planted the carefully timed explosives which will almost certainly lead to early detonation. Domino projects his concern as a mass fear which is enough to encourage the demons to run. We feel the shift of the inner ship again and I wish for the detonation to catch them at their most vulnerable. Kilroy teleports down the tunnel, Domino leaps into the trump in my pocket and I windwalk down the tunnel. I make it about half a mile before the blast wave hits, incinerating the air faster than it can rush away. Impending death looms so I leap into it, my windwalk cloth burning away as I move into death. The next thing I'm aware of I'm galloping clear as some sort of fire horse, a short while later I stop and check out my new form, a tan steed with dark mane and bronze hooves. Domino gets out of the trump and I check around for Kilroy and get a sense of him below us and heading a long way away.

With nothing much we can do for him now we head for our rendezvous point which is where Kilroy would Banish to once he is able to do so. As we leave we can see a large glowing cube rising from the burning wreckage with several figures inside.

Galloping in my new horse form transits the void faster so we make it to the edge of New Terra in 3 1/2 days, no Kilroy yet, we wait a while then contact Jade Rain to see if she can tell where he is. Half a day later, Jade Rain tells us that Kilroy is within something beneath the universe that is travelling back and is due in a dozen years. Domino calls on Moonlight who agrees to open a portal for Kilroy and his ride if we take care of the Elder Brain we released into the abyss.

Kilroy and his Bakku return, we spend a day patching up wounds and armour then head for Nualis. The Elder Brain and Transuranians got there ahead of us by teleporting across the void, Moonlight teleports us there only a couple of days behind them. They emerged into the rift valley and raided the mine into Hell. They killed some devils and took a lot of Brimstone, we carve on the wall that the Elder Brain and Transuranians were responsible and postpone chasing them any further, guessing they have headed to Reich to get healing from the Biolurgen.

We head back to New Terra instead to pick up the last case and Domino's Grenados from his house, then to Kerberoth and through to our house in Perfidious Albion.

Refugees from Yboracum are camped out in the forest, pumping them for information I find out that the city was invaded and is occupied by someone who came up river from the Sea. We go to investigate and find out it is le Comte de Versillac who is now an immortal know as White Raven. We meet and talk with him. He has a dozen Golems made from form-without-substance and substance-without-from, they are nearly indestructible and spearheaded his invasion. He took the city for it's manufactories, to create an army to annihilate the Holy Mother Church. He knows of the invasion of Victoria, it has started which is why he attacked, figuring he was safe from retribution while they're focussed on that. The attack on Victoria is taking place over several years here compressed into a much more rapid attack at the other end.

We part ways and head south towards the Londrum Metroplex to mess up their plans.

Serpent's End

Day 594-608

Flying south by Air Ship we land well out of town, wait for night and then sneak in down the Fleet River. Laying low within the outer city, we wait until after dawn then brazenly enter through one of the gates as a Wolf Lord, mounted on his steed with hound at his heel.

The city is quieter than when we were last here, people seem to have been leaving town - or being killed off. Hijacking a Fox Lady's coach we make our way to near the palace of clocks, break into an empty house and set up shadows to return to. Then back to the carriage and east to where Domino and company previously broke into the time infused sewers, we are dropped off and dispatch the carriage to take the ladies safely out of town.

Making our way to the bottom of the spiral we bore through to the old sewers beneath and then make our way west. Kilroy and Domino try to divine the layout of the sewer-time-multidimensional-maze, Kilroy makes a 3 dimensional approximation of it, Domino looks to closely then keels over unconscious - now would be a good time to have a healer. There are no external wounds and Kilroy thinks there's a wound inside his head, so we cut it open and stick a nut in - that wakes Domino up though he's a little square-headed. We warn him of some details he probably shouldn't dwell on right now.

Using our new knowledge to continue towards the centre of the maze beneath the Palace of Clocks, we get most of the way there before we a are spotted by a short-lived vampire (lifespan about 4.5 seconds after meeting us) but he probably got a warning away on mind speech. Going in a bit further, we plant the case on a 10 minute timer, backtrack, lay an obvious trail heading away and shadow walk back to the empty house.

From there we make our way through the streets, setting siege venom on the bridge nearest the Palace of Clocks and the chaos seed on the side furthest from the explosives. Kilroy unfreezes Left, now within a mile of the Palace of Clocks it is not possible to turn right - this is bad for the many clocks within the palace.

Upping our pace we head for the edge of town but only make it a few blocks before we notice a short, slim man with a pronounced widow's peak on the street behind us - Set, The Lord of Serpents! Running now, Domino calls The Panther and we take the first left to break line of sight, Set transforms into a Feather Serpent and flies after us, gaining ground. We break into a house on the left, the snake breaks into the roof then starts ripping through floors to get to us. We turn left again and break through into the adjacent building, Kilroy putting a rune wall down behind us. The snake crashes through the floor to go under the wall, we smash through building after building with Set crashing through the basements gaining ground on us, Domino leaves a Siege Grenado for him but he just takes it on the chin, barely slowing.

The Panther arrives, we break out onto a narrow street, the Panther is slowed getting to us by the no-right turns, we have to engage Set to buy time. Kilroy drops blinding light, I step up to engage, Set poisons everyone that directly targets him so Kilroy and Domino target me with Fireballs while I close and try to restrain him with Kamuel's gauntlets. I add the Unforgotten into the fray but the evil snakes spends enormous amounts of power like it's nothing to avoid the damage then starts to head to the river, dragging me with him. Putting everything into it I clutch his right arm and leap back trying to fling him into the maw of The Panther, I end up sailing through the air with his arm. Kilroy blasts him with freezing wind and Domino hits him directly with magic, barely surviving the return poisoning. But we are making progress, Set is slowed a bit by the wind and irked by the loss of his arm as it makes his restoration potion harder to uncork and drink.

He makes it to the river as The Panther pounces, but he calls on the Lord of Similarities to activate a trap they had prepared and capture 'the cat'. Landing back next to Set I drop two seven-packs of Fireballs and whack him a few times to keep his attention while Kilroy sneaks up with an active Sacrifice, wishing his restoration to be swapped with Kilroy's 90 pt Restorative just as he drinks it surprises the snake and he takes a lot of damage. The while he's off-balance Kilroy strikes and kills him with the sacrifice. Then he promptly resurrects and turns into a serpent to fly off, Domino cures himself and Kilroy of the venoms while I leap after the snake to slow him down. Grappling in mid-air, he thrashes against the buildings before we both crash to the ground. Grappling and biting each other gives Kilroy and Domino another chance to sacrifice and grand accelerate him which only partially work but he does seem to be getting worried and eventually overcomes the grip of Kamuel's gauntlets to turn insubstantial. Quickly drawing my axe I strike with all my might and slay him again. Domino pins his spirit and we pick up the corpse.

Considering if we can do anything for The Panther we seem the Lord of Similarities on the other side of the river as the more destructive secondary explosion goes off. We flee rapidly move to exit the blast zone, Kilroy gets clipped and loses a couple of ravens but we make it.

A couple of days later we meet up again at our house and quickly loot our prize.

Before anything can go wrong we make for Victoria to hand Set's body and bound spirit over to the Lord of Patterns who would be delighted to make a new rug out of him.

Chapter 11

Day 609-