The Good, Bad And Ugly

aka: No Country For Old Mages
aka: Desperately Seeking Villagers
aka: Trust, Lust, and Must

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GM: Jeff Leddra
Session: Winter 813wk
Night: Wednesday
Location: Glenn's place
Level: Low
Party:

• Ahiga - Human Barbarian Rune Mage Warrior (good)
• Mîm the Pilgrim - Shapechanger Tiger cutie, Dark Mage and Thief (bad)
• Tallama - Giant Goblin female namer, Military Scientist (bad and ugly - PB5)
• Pug - diseased goblin ice mage, Military Scientist (bad and ugly - PB8)
• Elenna - E&E Mage. A shy human, not very pretty but quite practical (PB9)
• Rupert - E&E Mage (Good and ugly - PB10)
• Angus – Human, Illusionist, Troubador, and entertainment master

Employer: Elephant (a magic item maker)

Pay:

• 500 sp a week (standard guild pay)
• A week's iron rations (yum)
• A Magic Item

Guild Briefing

In one of those small stuffy guild rooms we meet Melody - young and female, looking distracted & wan, and a little bit translucent (odd). She's known as an interplanar transporter and an enemy of White Raven.

She's hiring on the request of a 'friend' , Elephant and will provide transport. It sounds like she is doing this for Elephant in return for something - something that may help her free her mother from the frigid clutches of White Raven.

Elephant wants us to investigate the spate of missing (and dead) villagers in the cold north of state known as Darwor, on the plane known as Sihode - and deal with the problem. He'll make a magic item for each of us if we succeed. Melody also has three 'resurrection' items which three of us can absorb - but it should be a good person, and she has a letter describing some constraints we need to be aware of.

Darwor has few mages, although once they were powerful and ruled there. Mages are known as lazy, greedy and ineffective or charlatans. Melody doesn't know, but it sounds like the nature of magic may have changed. Powerful Land Owners took over - with large estates.

Humans are the most common species in Dawor. Elves are rare and Orcs are scum.

A tired looking Melody has wants to leave immediately (she seems to be on a mission), but we pursuade her to lie down for a couple of hours while Ellena cast Greaters and we get some cold weather gear together.

Somehow we acquire an additional party member - the guild guard’s nephew. One Angus - who despite his stated skill as a blacksmith is a thin skinny teenager. I don’t think the guild guard likes Angus.

It begins

Duesday: Death on Ice

New Moon

Resurrection Eggs

Melony has three black eggs (DA: Highly magic, living) from Elephant for three members of the party. She doesn’t have much information, except they should be given to good members of the party - and she has a letter for those three that we will get once we get to Darwar. Ignoring the advice one goes to Ellena (good), Tallama (so-so) and the last to me (Mîm) (oh dear). As they momentarily blacken the skin of our hands and then are absorbed, my egg is heard to complain (oh dear)

We didn’t expect that

After a boat ride up-river, in the early evening a noticeably fading Melody riffles through the portals (as she does) until the way to Darwar is open. We all file through, blinking at the cold icy glacial whiteness – and Melody proceeds to eviscerate herself, her spilled blood quickly freezing where it hits the ice. Our healers can do nothing.

Our frantic attempts to revive the song are interrupted by the appearance of 20, then 30 then 50 ice shrouded figures, emerging from the cracks and crevasses that furrow the glacier. We prepare: I get some shadow wings up – but they seem to be sucked into the glacier. Pug casts ice traversal and Ellena makes us all invisible - at least that works. Rupert takes the rapidly cooling corpse, seeming to merge even more imperceptibly with his surroundings. They still approach – each armed (literally) with a long very sharp looking spear of ice.

After some quick bear-back flying (dodging ice projectiles) Pug talks with his spirit polar bear (only recently returned from spirit salmon-bingeing) who says The glacier is alive! … and promptly abandons Pug (again) to go and talk with it. The goblin is not happy - he gets the feeling that the bear won't be back soon.

Despite our stationery invisibility, all except Rupert is faced by a spear of ice, exactly targeted at our warm beating hearts. I check out the aura of mine: semi-sentient alive, with an ice projectile attack, 200 years old - controlled by an entity that is extremely close. Not good. Pug throws up an ice wall, but it too seems to be sucked onto the glacier.

Mr Big Approaches

Even bigger than Tallama, and taller than Rupert - a huge icey figure slides smoothly to face us

• Why are your spilling blood on me - on the ice? We explain
  
• Are you mages? Er, yes
  
• Are you lay lords? Ah, no
  

We find out the spirit of the glacier had an understanding with the Lay Lords (who ever they are) not to spill blood on the ice. We plead ignorance.

• Some villagers do come onto the glacier to collect ice – and I take them when I find them. Humm – so that’s where his ice warriors come from.
• Can the taken ones be returned to normal life? Yes, if they haven’t been taken for too long

We bargain – if you give us back one of the most recently taken villagers, we will try to convince the villagers to stay off the ice. He agrees.
We clean the ice and he moves us 20 miles to the edge of the ice – along with the de-iced villager, a cute teenager named Any (Best skill - Ice Sculptor). Of course, Angus thinks this absolutely marvellous (I'm sure some of his pimples burst with joy)

Rupert watches ...

... all this totally unnoticed, and moves off alone with his burden – to make a 20 mile trek across the ice. Mr Big spots dripping blood and moves him too - along with a kill-on-sight banishment (because Rupert can be sooo imperceptible)

Silent Night

Pug's magics protect us from the cold of the night, while we look at Melody's possessions and talk to Any.

• It doesn't look like Melody will be coming back soon - her eviscerating knife causes unresurrectable death (and if you possess it any attacker needs to make a Magic Resistance roll to hit). I take the knife.
• Her blood stained letter answers no questions.

There's something you must know about the device in you ... 

(the rest is washed out with Melony's blood)

• Tallama divinates me - but the egg has no apparent magical effect
• Any had a simple life before taken, but tells of a wizard's fallen flying city (Ryk) a couple of days travel to the east, where treasure hunters come away with a deadly wasting, mutating disease. Sounds like fun.

Overhead cold stars sparkle - extinguished by the coming dawn.

W'ansday: Hot Villagers

Any guides us back to her village – but smoke in the distance alerts us to a large band of armed horse riders besetting a burning village. Up closer a mage is spotted – soon a target of Tallama’s nightmare illusion – but when the illusion reaches the mage it turns around and heads back to the big goblin. I go feline and go mage hunting too – but a perfect leap to take him off of his horse encounters nothing, and I have to shake off the impact of some pretty serious feeling magic. This mage is not what he seems.
Meanwhile, horsemen charge the rest of the party. Rupert goes feline and knocks some over, Ahiga hammers a few with well-placed arrows. Elenna keeps us moving fast while Pug prepares to engage.
Two strange effects are noticed: the sun seems to have dimmed a little, and we discover Angus is no simple blacksmith. He has some illusionist spells.
The battle isn’t going well for us so we resort to mass fear and flashes of light. This turns the tide and Mîm sees the real mage hiding in the rocks a few hundred feet to the south. She races over prepared to rip the sneaky devil to pieces but he turns into a rainbow and disappears, but not before casting some nasty spells on most of the party. Some have a burning green glob which needs to be scraped off, along with some skin. Rupert is a bit slow and the green effect seeps into his cell structure. We check him out and sunlight causes him massive pain.

In the meantime we manage to capture 10 raiders, 18 horses and save 71 villagers. Not a bad effort really. We begin to interrogate the first prisoner but he immediately dies. This was a bit premature so we pause to consider our next steps.

The Band of Brothers

A band of 12 riders approach. Doakin is the leader and he greets us warmly. He explains that the “knifemen of Palin” (our prisoners) have stepped up their raiding efforts lately and his band races to any area where an partial eclipse is predicted (they have a hedge mage who can figure this out). The prisoners have some powerful magic on them. Any attempt to question them leads to their deaths. We all agree that this is unsporting!

The riders fill us in on the history of the place and we find out the ley lords used to be powerful magicians but they were betrayed from within. A huge magical battle was fought in their floating city before it crashed to the ground, killing all of them. The crash site is only 100 miles away anyone where enters comes out diseased and looking hideous (something like a goblin actually).

• There is a library in Akiro, the capital city of this region, which is 350 miles away.
• And there is a Sage in another village (alyeo) which is 150 miles away.

Mîm passes her black marble from Melody to Rupert. The shape enters Rupert and comments on how much better it is in him than the evil Mîm. It also says the algae bloom converts light to energy and so Rupert doesn’t have much time left.

Rupert has this odd plan to slowly to move his body into the sunlight and let his shapeshifter regeneration ability bring back pure cells instead of the infected ones. This will cause many hours of extreme pain and so most of the party agrees it is a good idea.

Pug's polar bear appears and starts talking to us in Common. He also looks a bit more solid than normal. We suspect the bear is now an agent of the sentient glacier. This reminds us to tell the villagers not to go near the glacier.

Elenna notices she is wearing Melody’s snake belt. It tells us Elephant is in the palace of the dead and that the resurrection ability has a price. One of your loved ones will die to bring you back. Tallima starts to divinate the snake belt but gets bitten for her troubles and paralysed. Elenna convinces the snake to fix Tallama. It seems the belt was tasked with protecting Melody but since she has already taken her own life it decided Elenna was the only female here worth saving.

Orcs!

In the twilight we finally notice a huge band of orcs approaching - about 300 and they have already surrounded the village.

The leader demands the rotting bodies from the attack and is annoyed when we tell him the riders had already burnt them. Angus (the shy young blacksmith who it turns out is a guild illusionist with a secondary mission) steps up to the leader and threatens him. Then he promptly bends down and kisses the orcs boots. This may have something to do with the massive sword being levelled at him. The orc then demands some slaves so we give him the 10 prisoners (including the dead one) and he goes back to the main group. They don’t leave though. This has us worried.

The snake belt tells us the orcs use the dead diseased bodies to extract some sort of biological weapon. We don’t really know what that is but we nod like we do.

Th'rsday: Pillage & Burn and Furry Friends

Village Pillage

Pug suggests that he and Rupert go to the glacier and offer some service in exchange for healing Rupert. The debate is interrupted around mdnight by the orc leader demanding to be shown the whole town. While we escort him around (and a small band of 20 orc bodyguards) we explain about the ley lords and how we chased one off. The mention of ley lords makes the orc go pale and he seems perturbed.

Pug then does something to offend the orc leader and receives a well deserved thrashing. Unfortunately beating Pug to a pulp only triggers a severe case of Chaos. Pug has a fungus which releases noxious vapours over the whole town. He then triggers a helmet of darkness which covers all the town and several hundred feet further out. The orcs take this as a bad sign and charge in to attack anything that moves.

Mim has to trigger her mass fear again and we all head for the corralled horses. A few judicious flashes of light and some galloping sees us free of the town. Most of the band of riders get away with us but the villagers are a complete loss. We suspect the orcs will feast well for breakfast.

After another sound Pug thrashing...

... the party are not surprised to see the disgusted Band of Brothers leaving, vowing to spread word of our evil deeds. Pug tries to defend himself by saying the glacier will be happy because the villagers are no longer a problem.

Rupert Burns

Just before the sun comes up we have a spirited discussion about how to help Rupert. Pug still wants to go to the glacier but the party doesn’t trust him (he doesn’t understand why).

At 10am Rupert finally decides to go the way of pain and burning followed by regeneration. 5 hours of glorious pain later (at least Mim thinks so) and Rupert is his normal self.

The sun is beginning to set again (at 3pm!) and in the distance we hear an unknown number of wolves howling. When we spot a couple we can see they have 6 legs and look quite formidable.

Furry Friends

It was not a good experience for our barbarian plainsman – ripped and ravaged to death by 6-legged wolves They seem to appear out of nowhere (with camouflaged/chameleon fur) - we all had 2 or 3 wolves at our necks.

I (Mîm) don’t mind getting in close - and shred my attackers until they fled (can’t touch me - particularly when Elenna has quicked me). Rupert has some fun roaring around the place.

Pug nearly dies from his own fanged friends and desperately encourages the wolves to shred Any’s tender flesh, cursing as she moves towards her true love Angus (and out of the range of the wolves' interests). I grudgingly obey the Party Leader orders to save Pug, ignoring my five attackers, slaying both Pug’s wolves - forcing them to regurgitate the repulsive pustulating fungoidal body that is called Pug.

Tallama crushed one between her thighs. Rupert helped a little – he managed to stop the wolves fleeing with the barbarian’s body parts.

I wonder how Ahiga feels about a shallow grave on a cold plain - under the arctic sun?

Teenage Dramas

14 year old Any had conniptions when Angus doesn’t return her love and then tries to commit suicide when Angus was revealed to be the dirty old man Roberton (all of 25 years old) I advised her never to trust any man, but Rupert saved her life by donating his ‘life egg’ thingy – so she’s still with us.
Pug’s spirit bear returned, but seems to have been tasked by the glacier with being Pug’s conscience. Good luck to the bear.
Talima has strange dreams that night, that there is something big and hairy between her thighs perhaps? The snake belt opines that she is going insane. Excellent.

Frysday: Flight to Wisdom

Sage Bound

The next morning, we decided to fly to the sage at the crater-lake – 150 miles to the south (we’ll get there before the Band of Brothers). The land becomes warmer as we fly south, with more brush and trees, and even the odd woodland.

After a few hours we landed outside the village of Dell (about 100 miles south of our wolverine encounter) - and chat to the Watchman Entiper, who is happy that their stock of glacier water will become more valuable (it has healing properties). Roberton spent some time lying to the villagers getting directions: the village of Tonsenamus is about a day's walk south, Olyeo, the crater town, is two days walk. They sell mean pikelets, lemon juice and sugar - we have to come back this way.

Flew closer - and walked to the cliff edge of the huge crater-lake (200 foot drop). We were lowered on some binder contraption down to a small lake-side village to be met by B'lonem, councillor, and welcomed to the city – and told to be gone by nightfall, or after the entertainments end at 9pm. We went to the pub for lunch - chef Newman - and found Resya, the short, cute, human sage, talking to someone about when the Band of Brothers may be back.
No accommodation lake side, so we’ll have to take the last trip up to the cliff top and stay in the settlement there

Is Ahiga still dead?

He seems to be slowly regenerating (troll-skin like) – the healers think his body might be ‘whole’ soon. But – his spirit is elsewhere. Pug suggests that Ahiga’s spirit seek out Elephant in the land of the dead. Don’t know if Ahiga can hear – Tallama says there is no sign of that spirit

Inn Time

As we discuss what to say to the sage lunch is served - and this is the best food we have ever tasted. I (Tallama) DA the chef - College of Magic - no answer. Must be a genius.

Divers are over-heard talking to the sage at the bar - discussing retrieval of gems and metals from the lake and the finding of a statue on their deepest dive. Why would there be a statue in the lake? DA the Diver - last magic to impact - No answer. DA the sage - 2nd highest ability - Uncanny ability to sense what people are thinking. Ok this sage is somewhat of a concern.

We intercept the sage as she is heading from the bar and we are invited to see her at 3pm that day, at her house in the new part of town.

Robinton Reaches New Depths

Our illusionist decides to go deep - and challenges a diver (with a well developed pair of lungs). Apparently he doesn't have to breathe! (but can he talk when he's not breathing?) Bets are laid - most gamblers finally agree that the deeper diver wins (Pug figures Robinton can to 10 times as deep as the diver - silly goblin)

We head off to where the diving boats are - in the rust red walled crater lake. The diver put forward is Nipal - ew errs from the party - she is 'quite' pleasant on the eye. Elenna heads out with Robinton and Nipal on a diving boat. We don't want to be expelled from this town before we speak with the sage - so we are careful not to offend!

Robinton and Nipal are 250' down to a rocky bottom - even stevens. R grabs a 'starstone' and is attacked by a parrot fish at the bottom - and by a blue ring octopus on the way up (it grabs hold and pops into the wound and disappears into Rob). He drops the starstone - and the decision is to go down again (to break the tie)

On the second dive Nipal finds the 7 segment star stone. Still a tie.

Third dive - the decision to try and go deeper. Nipal gives away the stone - obvious to us for Robinton to fail the dive. Robinton is oblivious to this - and doesn't recognise the hint. On the way down the R'ton's octopus leaves the wound as they head down this time to about 1,200' deep - where mini trees and fish are seen.

After about five minutes down there Nipal passes out - not good. The courtier brings her up - and lucklily healing is successful when they both reach the surface. The divers see the bet has been won - Robinton saved Nipal - all for 20silver pieces. Pug loses.

I DA the entire crowd around us and there is not one mage in the crowd. DA Robinton - last magic to impact on Robinton - Penetration.

Mana here is High.

Rupert tries to find a place to bed Any (for her to stay that is). The tavern won't rent a room, Any is a sculptor - a and so has a chance of staying here if needed.

Ahiga is Heard

I hear a voice from the sack - Ahiga - Get Melody. Elenna - Melody’s spirit or body?<br) Mîm heads to the other side of the tavern and outside - and distracts the locals by dancing
While Eleanor heads into the urn to get the Melody's body Robinton secures a private room and we meet Melody - and learn that Melody has met with Elephant.
The message from Elephant is - get rid of the madness and get rid of her permanent death.
Her planar ability has caused the madness. It’s a curse and requires physical healing and no planar travel for a while. We're directed to talk to the sage and find some serious magic - probably in the the crashed city.

Resya is Heard

We meet with the sage tell us your story. We exchange information

• We find out that there is no magical healing / resurrection
• Help for healing madness - no help at all that she knows of.
• Ley lines? There is a node in the lake. It is accessed when its still. There is a tradition of not going onto the lake when it is still.
• Other ley nodes: Silver mountain, Mount Tranquil, this lake - and others (like the glacier)
• The laylords died out about 500 years ago - Betrayal caused the city to crash. A young laylord was been seen about 2 years or so ago.
• Mages now are less powerful than mages of the past. The crashed city may have items to enhance abilities.

Resya advises to kill the person who created the dagger (assuming this is so that Melody can be recovered)

The kidnappings - they are looking for something. Hall of the dead is far to the west. The Band of Brothers savant - knows when eclipses occur. The savant is a nephew of a friend of the sage. Eclipses are localised to where the attacks occur. The sage says that there is a corona around the sun at an eclipse.

Resya's tapestry

It has 4 areas / squares / quarters. Top left is spring, top right summer, bottom right is autumn and bottom left is winter. Each picture is of the same place but each shows a different view The same woman is in each picture - from when she is a girl through to when she is an old lady in making the tapestry. The tapestry has been handed down from mother to daughter.

• Spring - shows fallen leaves, a small grey tombstone, a ruined courtyard and a flowing fountain.
• Summer - shows snow drops
• Winter - shows an eclipse and a moon in the lake with a wolf
• Autumn - shows leaves fallen, a weeping willow.

All 4 quarters show flowers in the middle There is a message on the tombstone

NEVER THE PLACE
never the time

DA on tapestry - about 500 years since creation. 4 seasons in one day ? DA on sage - any unknown ley abilities ? DA on tapestry - Preservation magic. Ancient divination on the tapestry - Highly magical, preserving something - linked and its protecting something. There is no transport magic.

We discuss who needs to die Sage discusses with the council - it is granted that we are allowed to stay the night.

We heal Ahiga’s body - both Tallima and Robinton are involved in this. 29hours of healing are needed to repair what is damage and broken.

Melody is infected by plague insanity which is activated by planar travel.

Reapsday: The Healing of Ahiga

Healing
Healing
Healing
Healing
Healing
(...Mîm spent her time memorising the tapestry)

Sunday:

Healing of Ahigas body is complete. Ahigas spirit moves from Melodies body to Ahigas with the help of the spirit bear.

We investigate Runes - the ones at the village.

5th Rune - Triangle point down with a circle touching a circle under the point in colour blue - Air / Water. 6th Rune - Looks like a heart or a pie with a slick out of the top, colour is indigo. 7th Rune - Triangle point down. Colour is violet. We note that the colours are the last 3 colours of the rainbow.

One of the other Runes is a V with a small circle on each side of the point and its colour is green.

Elenors spirit willingly goes with the spirit bear.

Admin

Watches

• Evening: Rupert, Ahiga
• Middle (Lady's night): Mîm, Tallama, Any
• Morning: Pug, Ellena, Angus

Marching Order

• Meat Shields: Ahiga, Pug
• Cherished Flowers: Ellena, Mîm
• Cowards: Angus
• Bum Guards: Rupert, Tallama

Treasure

Melody

• Resurrection eggs x 3 (Elenna, Tallama, Any)
• Dagger of Unresurrectable Death (and make Magic Resistance roll to hit possessor)
• Snakeskin belt vs Male Molestation (it's alive and biting)
• Boots (?)
• Purse (?)
• Ring (?)

Horse Raiders

• Miscellaneous weapons and armour
• Horses
• Coinage

Arctic Wolves

• 6 skins (camouflaged/chameleon fur)
• 6 sets of teeth

Calendar

Winter: Frost 813 (7)
	Moonday		Duesday		W'ansday		Th'rsday		Frysday		Reapsday		Sunday
		Samhain	1	Guild, Death on Ice	2	Hot Villagers	3	Pillage Burn Fight Furry Friends	4	Fly to wisdom	5		6
	7		8		9		10		11		12		13
	14		15		16		17		18		19		20
	21		22		23		24		25		26		27
	28		29		30		1		2		3		4
Winter: Snow 813 (8)
	5		6		7		8		9		10		11
	12		13		14		15	Solstice	16		17		18	Yuletide
	19	Days of Chaos	20		21		22		23		24		25
	26		27		28		29		30	Twelth Night	1		2
Winter: Ice 813 (9)
	3		4		5		6	First Plough	7		8		9
	10		11		12		13		14		15		16
	17		18		19		20		21		22		23
	24		25		26		27		28		29		30