Session Seventy-Three Summary (Graveyard of Empires: After the Fall)
Session 73, December 1 2021
Introduction
We continue at 12:00PM on the 29th of Laurilden (00.000.10.02 on the Apocalypse Clock) with the party having concluded their extended discussion with Azrael and Jardin about the nature of the threat to Meidia and what might be done to foil Asmodeus's dastardly plot. While Kauri and Oskar accompany the Dragon Emperor down into the archives to find records from the dragons' war against the Matriarchs and Alisceon Hayne retrieves some healing elixirs from the storerooms, the rest of the party follows Jardin to the dervish cells to settle into their temporary home. The plan is to leave in a few days to assault Hdrasta before heading off across the ocean to raid the Inquisitorial Library for information on Medial Dimensions ...
Larry's Summary
As agreed at the end of last session:
- Kauri & Oskar and Velkin go with Azrael the Dragon Emperor to look at things.
- Allician Haynes healing potions.
- Jardin leads rest of party to Dervish cells to rest.
The party gets settled in.
Druul focuses on Oswitha and ends up with a mat of flowers on the floor that make a map with blue flowers as waves, brown as the southern islands of Curabel, and white flowers as the lands far to the south. Red flowers like ships, and a gold flower on the lead ship. Druul sketches a map, then cuts down the flowers and annoys the Winter Elves with them.
Velkin, Kauri, and Oskar go with Azrael to his ancient study and help look for the report on the ancient Matriarchs.
The summary follows:
After thorough interrogation of the captured human warriors and vivisection of select specimens, the initial hypothesis that the entire human race is native to Meidia must be revised. While the prisoners themselves were born in this dimension and will admit to no knowledge of a previous home, there is clear evidence that members of this particular tribe have ancestors from Elsewhere. Specifically, the supernatural powers of some of their shamans (i.e., those who don’t practice blood magic) depends upon a unique “negative” trans-spatial force. This negatively charged intrinsic quality allows them to manipulate energy to create effects similar to what the Draic’kin can achieve, but by very different means; they are, in effect, energy sinks that passively collect power just from existing on Meidia. The likeliest scenario is that two groups of humans have mixed in this tribe – one native and the other Outsider. This would explain the sporadic nature of these abilities in the current population. While this is interesting from a theoretical standpoint, it follows from the distinctive nature of the negative trans-spatial force that further study of this tribe will not lead to any insights regarding a means for our own people to return home. Their original dimension must differ considerably from the Draic’kin home, at least in terms of energy signature. The best course of action, therefore, is to eliminate the unusual shamans and pacify the remaining tribe members
Lungmold, Brendil, and Ranarth use the much more frayed and much smaller portal to go to the Winter King. They find the Nexus bare and the portal to the Winter Realm much smaller. They are greeted by Sir Firthold who leads them to the Winter King.
The Winter King charges them to tell no one of his desire, not even other Winter Elves, for the secret of time travel and to get it from the dragon emperor unawares. He changes their medallions to only have a dim light, like Kauri's candle, and gives them a small snowball that only lets them call the Winter King, he can't listen in. Brendil takes charge of that.
The Winter King muses that if they succeed, they will be at his right hand like brothers and he can give them entire planets. They can meet the dragons with overwhelming force and kill them, then do the same for the dwarves and use their portals to take over their realms.
He admits to being worried about the DVLs as they are a lot like he is which is why he is consolidating power in the underdark.
Sir Firthold leads them back to the Nexus and they learn that there is another web portal in the Higeki temple in Malgrim. They send Ranarth to tell Velkin that Lungmold and Brendil are going to get the other portal from Bili.
Ranarth is obviously lying when he says that the Winter King promised them some things vaguely and said that we are doing a great job and to keep it up. He even suggests Velking should get in on the action.
Lungmold and Brendil get to the embassy and get the portal from Bili and tell him about the other portal in the Higeki temple.
Azra gives Lungmold a bunch of paper labeled "To Kauri."
Jax says that he won't leave the embassy, but that Azrael or one of his flunkies, like Jardin are welcome to visit. He "resigned" which isn't allowed, so is concerned about retaliation.
Lungmold and Bredil head back to the other portal.
Khelratha gets a basin and water for a bath and a comb and beard oil, that Alician gets from Jardin.
Khelratha washes up and combs out the scraggles in his beard and applies and combs out his beard and used a generous amount of beard oil (using nearly all of it) and braids it to indicate he is a dwarf without a clan and is on a mission of revenge.
Lambertus then knocks on all the doors asking if we've seen Lungmold, Brendil, and Ranarth.
This agitates Ajax who flies to Druul, who uses the scepter to learn that they went to see the Winter King.
When Khelrathat learns this he hurriedly dresses and stomps off looking for them.
We get to the room with Velkin, Kauri, and Oskar and learn that everything is ok. Oskar returns with the group and Ranarth squeezed in the middle.
Druul shares the sketch he made of his flower map with Velkin & Kauri and stays with them.
When Lungmold and Brendil get back they explain what they've learned, omitting details about their deal with the Winter King.
Lungmold gives the papers from Azra to Kauri.
Contents of papers for Kauri:
i.) The Matriarchs are ancient heroes who sacrificed themselves to preserve the knowledge of their people. They are the guardians of knowledge, wisdom, courage, and good health.
ii.) The Matriarchs called their original acolytes to the Great Mountain before they cast off their mortal forms, teaching the earliest Daughters and Sons secret wisdom that was used to fight back the wilderness’s monsters and establish a realm of peace surrounding their holy mountain.
iii.) Eventually, though, the Matriarchs grow ancient and chose to sacrifice their living form to become eternal guardians. They were able to continue shepherding their acolytes, who consulted the Matriarchs’ wisdom in prophetic dreams and visions.
iv.) When the Dragons came from the Outer Darkness, the Matriarchs helped lead their living acolytes in war against those abominations. Despite their great wisdom and goodness, though, the Matriarchs and their children were almost undone by the unnatural power of the dragons.
v.) Some, like Oswitha’s children, fled the dragons; others, hid themselves on the holy mountain; most marched to their deaths in an attempt to destroy the Outsiders.
vi.) When it was over, the Dragons had triumphed. However, the Matriarchs were kept hidden and safe. They whispered in the dreams of their children, keeping alive the memory of freedom – both through the Dragon’s realm of terror and the Dwarven Empire that succeeded it.
vii.) Finally, when the Matriarchs’ great-great-grandchildren won their freedom from Outsiders, the Mothers called a new generation of acolytes to the Holy Mountain. There they lived lives of simplicity and hard work, guided by dreams and visions filled with the Matriarchs’ wisdom.
viii.) The ascetics of the Caverns of the Dead taught me and Azra about the Mothers. Neither of us attained the same degree of enlightenment they enjoyed, but we were improving. When the earthquake killed them, we tried to continue our meditations on our own, but it was hard.
Druul takes Brendil to his room and gathers up a bouquet and asks Ceres to breath ice on them, and Druul says, 5 gold for your lady? Brendil pays and delivers them.
She gives him a stony look as Brendil hands them over, but does not knock them out of his hand.
Brendil bows and she points at Brendil then points at the door. Then he hears a bunch of laughter and giggling.
Lungmold relays to Tyrial that any way shape or form to get the information on time travel from the dragons.
For Next Session:
- Tell Azrael about Jax to work on the pylons and the snowflake thing.
- Azrael did make a sketch of Hdrasta. Just general shape of main entrance.
- Velkin will ask if there are any stashes of weapons that will affect the DVLs. Most Imperial weapons were DVL stuff.
- The door One Horn can't open has three depressions the stone key around his neck looks like the stone on the bracer that Brendil now has. So we need one more.
- Perhaps the Harpy lair or Myrientaxus' old lair?
Lungmold's Summary
Lung mold session 73
After the audience with the winter king. We are shown to where we will be sleeping. i mention to trial that he should set up Watches, he agrees and suggest each winter elf take a prisoner as well to watch over.
He is a good kid, i wonder why he thinks of me....
Hmmm of course Hard Stone Floors, i wouldn't expect anything else
from peoples so detached from the land.
so i asked the jardin fellow for some fresh dirt to settle into. he agreed. Well they are very abominating, i suppose they are not that bad.
i do need to talk to this jardin more about the time travel stuff.
So Vulcan , Kauri and Oscar went below to look at what this dragon king calls his library for some kind of information, always writing and studying those two,
while waiting for my dirt i got this since i should go talk to the Winter King and as i was thinking it, ranarth came in and suggested the same, and his emblem was slightly glowing.
i said ok but need to grab brendil, and go find Welkin. On our way out. The dragon people came back with my dirt enough for one night.
, and then we ran into Alician, who had the potions we requested.
i did tell Ajax where we were going so at least someone here knew, in case there was trouble. So Alician directed us down to where Velkin is.
as we made our way we ran across Azrael, he had a lot of questions about why i wanted to know about time travel, and what these symbols
the three of us ware, he wanted to examine one, but i declined to do so before asking the winter king about it. so we respectfully declined and went to find Welkin.
Finding Welkin, Kauri and Oscar, in a room filled with scrolls and a couple of desks i tell welkin we need to go to see the winter king right away. Welkin doesn't hesitate, but as he opened the portal, he noticed it started to fray a bit more. he said he would leave it open just in case.
so we go into the web portal and find the chambers to be empty except for Firth old he was expecting us. Before we head into the winter realm we notice the portal is way smaller now we go in and make our way to the winter kings chambers.
as we arrive, we are announced by foothold, seeing no one else there and all furniture removed from the chamber except for the one chair the winter king is in
The Winter king greets us and tells us to come get warm by the fire
then he proceeds to tell us about the web portals won't be used by him much longer although they will still work. and how they are moving the portal to the Front, where they will be attacking the silence from.
We talk for a bit and the winter king is very pleased without progress, and we need to pursue getting the info for the time travel.
he praises us and talks about trust, and status of position should he succede with our help on time travel, he talks about going back in time, and figuring out how to defeat all the armies that have come here over time.
he then asks us for the medallions we wear. and know Ariel will find out what they are he dispels the magic on them, gives them a small dose of magic in the form of a glow.
and says he trusts us enough now so the need to know every move is not necisary. The Winter King gives us a snow ball, and tells us it will track us, but he can not hear through it (i dont know if i believe that) tells us to hold it in our fist and help will arrive.
We finish up with a bit of small talk, he even called us Brothers, and then we head back we decide to to Malgrim to get the web portal from Billy for a back up, lucky for us there's a portal open in the upper halls, so its not far from the Embassy.
We send Ranarth back to let the party know we are ok, and where we were going. so they dont worry.
We get to the Embassy. and talk to everyone there, telling jax about the possible meeting of the minds, jax suggests they come here azura gives me parchment for Kauri, and all information is shared. then we head back.
coming out of the portal they are relieved we are back. i give Welkin the 2nd portal. and give Kauri the parchment.
Velkin's Scrolls
Velkin Scrolls 40 - Session 73
Laurilden 29, 12:00pm 00.000.10.02
Azreal leads Kauri and Oskar and I down to his ancient study and we find a scroll with notes from the time soon after Azreal and the Dragons arrived on Meidia and were in opposition to the Mikal humans.
This is the scroll we found:
Human Matriarchal Tribes from the Mikal Peak Region Conclusion: After thorough interrogation of the captured human warriors and vivisection of select specimens, the initial hypothesis that the entire human race is native to Meidia must be revised. While the prisoners themselves were born in this dimension and will admit to no knowledge of a previous home, there is clear evidence that members of this particular tribe have ancestors from Elsewhere. Specifically, the supernatural powers of some of their shamans (i.e., those who don’t practice blood magic) depends upon a unique “negative” trans-spatial force. This negatively charged intrinsic quality allows them to manipulate energy to create effects similar to what the Draic’kin can achieve, but by very different means; they are, in effect, energy sinks that passively collect power just from existing on Meidia. The likeliest scenario is that two groups of humans have mixed in this tribe – one native and the other Outsider. This would explain the sporadic nature of these abilities in the current population. While this is interesting from a theoretical standpoint, it follows from the distinctive nature of the negative trans-spatial force that further study of this tribe will not lead to any insights regarding a means for our own people to return home. Their original dimension must differ considerably from the Draic’kin home, at least in terms of energy signature. The best course of action, therefore, is to eliminate the unusual shamans and pacify the remaining tribe members.
He gives us the scroll and heads back up top while Kauri and I continue to filter through his study. There’s 2 desks here, they were Azreal’s and Prix’s desks. He seems nostalgic about the past and is more focused on going home than he has been. Or so he’s leading us to believe.
He relates that the Mikals were a more negatively charged race, Dragons from Drakon, are a positively charged race.
Hdrasta was the Mikal’s last fortress.
The Winter King’s sworn come looking for me and ask to open the portal, they've been summoned to an audience with the Winter King. I oblige and they head down the portal. It’s very frayed and only 1 person wide now. It’s curiously less cold than it was. Kauri and I continue our scouring of the Dragon Emperor’s study.
Azreal took interest in them on their way down and quizzes them on the Winter King and his motivations. They stonewall him when he asks to examine a snowflake.
Raynarth returns without Lungmold and Brendil, I chat with Raynarth, he’s not forthcoming about the meeting with the Winter King and is obviously hiding something. He does attempt to sway me to siding with the Winter King. In his mind, the prevailing party in our future. This could be a problem depending on what exactly is going on.
The whole party came marching down looking for whatever trouble Lungmold, Raynarth and Brendil went to take care of. Raynarth relates his story and since there’s no excitement they head back up. Druul stays and shows us the map he received from his meditative vision. How interesting. The Matriarchs listen.
—--- The web nexus is empty when Lungmold, Brendil and Raynarth get there, the portal is notably smaller with a single winter elf, Sir Firthold standing guard over the portal. The portal is having problems and we’re moving. They’re going to open the portal near the Silence and the Winter King wants an audience with them. The dining hall is empty with just the Winter King present. The Herald is also gone. Firthold announces them and leaves the room. The three are alone with the Winter King.
The Winter king says, you’ve surprised me again. Time travel, you’ve found a way. Lungmold says he’ll acquire the time travel papers from the Inquisitorial Library. If the Winter King turns back time and is ready for both the Dwarves and the Dragons and will wipe them out, they can flip time multiple times coming back multiple times creating bigger and bigger armies. When the dwarves come, we take their ships, go back through their portal and take their empire and you’ll be given entire planets. He takes their symbols and gives one of them a little ball of snow. It’ll do the same thing as the symbols and has less of a connection than the medallions. He can’t hear what your group says and sees. “But you’ve gained my trust.” He places his hands on Lungmold’s shoulders and says “I trust you, you’ll do the right thing.” and does it to Brendil as well, but not Raynarth.
Brendil carries the Snowball of the Winter King after the medallions are taken. And asks for a replacement/fake medallion to be examined by Azrael. He demagics them and passes them back. This conversation stays between the four of them only. No one can know this plan.
Lungmold reports the winter elves of their retinues are doing well. He says that they are fully within their bounds to promise them rewards once the Winter King conquers the Contested Lands. They bow and leave. He says you do this last thing, bring me time travel, you’ll be like brothers… Not like that Summer Lord brother, he’s an ass. I’ll amass an army over eons and then I’ll crush him and take over the Contested Lands. Do not let Azreal have the information.
He shares some information: The DVL’s are the one enemy he has concerns about. Ideally, they can be dealt with before they were ever free’d. Depending on what the rules of Time Travel reveal. Lloth is fraying the portals. The whole web nexus will be gone eventually. The portals have been given to the commanders that have been sent out to fight. They’ll need them for his offensive against the Silence.
Firthold says that the portal to the Higeki citadel in Malgrim is open and they’re free to use it. Tralvig is where the Web Nexus is.
They go get Billi’s portal at Jax’s to take back to the party and swap out with the frayed portal and talk with those at the Malgrim Dwarven Embassy.
Lungmold and Brendil go through the correct passage into the Higeki citadel of Malgrim. They head to the Embassy. The city is calm again, no fighting. Though there’s a fair bit of graffiti, pictorial and in gnome. Anti-Winter King propaganda. At the Embassy, Lungmold tosses a grapple over and goes into the Embassy, telepathically using the Password (Dedicated Virtual Lifeforms). Lungmold and Brendil leave their DVL stuff outside. They go find Bili with his Aunt in the Eastern room (Kitchen/food prep) along with Lucifer the cat. They get Bili’s portal. And we’ll use the Higeki citadel to come back to Malgrim. They have their freedom of movement papers for Bili and the rest. No traffic, the city is still on edge.
Jax and Azra come in. Azra goes over with some papers tied with a string. Points to it and it says “To Kauri” on the outside. Jax comes in, “Weren’t you just here?!?” We have news. We’ve been talking with Azreal and Jardin with a way to repel Xhen Khel.
He’s not interested in coming to Xhen Khel but they’re welcome to come to the Embassy. He’d worked with Jardin before. He ‘resigned’ his position with them, which is not allowed… so he’d rather meet them under his terms, not theirs. In case a discussion is needed.
Jax has misplaced his ‘freedom of movement’ papers. He’ll clean the table… Azra mimes… ‘SHE’LL be cleaning the table.
Head back to Xhen Khel. —--- Brendil and Lungmold return.
I ask about the Winter King’s meeting and get vague answers. Concerning. They pass me the backup portal and give Kauri the message from Azra. And we write down directions to the Higeki tunnel from the Nexus.
Message from Azra on the teachings of the Matriarch she knows.
i. The Matriarchs are ancient heroes who sacrificed themselves to preserve the knowledge of their people. They are the guardians of knowledge, wisdom, courage, and good health.
ii. The Matriarchs called their original acolytes to the Great Mountain before they cast off their mortal forms, teaching the earliest Daughters and Sons secret wisdom that was used to fight back the wilderness’s monsters and establish a realm of peace surrounding their holy mountain.
iii. Eventually, though, the Matriarchs grow ancient and chose to sacrifice their living form to become eternal guardians. They were able to continue shepherding their acolytes, who consulted the Matriarchs’ wisdom in prophetic dreams and visions.
iv. When the Dragons came from the Outer Darkness, the Matriarchs helped lead their living acolytes in war against those abominations. Despite their great wisdom and goodness, though, the Matriarchs and their children were almost undone by the unnatural power of the dragons.
v. Some, like Oswitha’s children, fled the dragons; others, hid themselves on the holy mountain; most marched to their deaths in an attempt to destroy the Outsiders.
vi. When it was over, the Dragons had triumphed. However, the Matriarchs were kept hidden and safe. They whispered in the dreams of their children, keeping alive the memory of freedom – both through the Dragon’s realm of terror and the Dwarven Empire that succeeded it.
vii. Finally, when the Matriarchs’ great-great-grandchildren won their freedom from Outsiders, the Mothers called a new generation of acolytes to the Holy Mountain. There they lived lives of simplicity and hard work, guided by dreams and visions filled with the Matriarchs’ wisdom.
viii. The ascetics of the Caverns of the Dead taught me and Azra about the Mothers. Neither of us attained the same degree of enlightenment they enjoyed, but we were improving. When the earthquake killed them, we tried to continue our mediations on our own, but it was hard.
—- Druul meditates, concentrating on Oswitha and wakes when Alisceon knocks offering healing, he finds himself in a room full of flowers that coincide with what we know of the geography south of where we are now with the symbology of ships heading this way with a gold star on the lead ship.
Druul destroys the flower map leaving a rootbed over the floor. Collecting the flowers for his nefarious purposes. Selling them and making the Winter Elves uncomfortable. Although he does good by Brendil… —- Brendil gives Tarathiel a bundle of frozen flower. Her and Adthana do some giggling when he leaves. They’re still working on their language skills. ___ Khelratha cleans up and uses most of Jardin’s beard oil… —- Alisceon sends up Whiskey to us at Brendil’s request and is convinced we’re hedonists… naked Druul, a Dwarf needing bear oil