Chapter I: I Know I've Let You Down
General Summary
- Vergil, Vivian, and Celestine find themselves on the small ship The Xin'ro crossing from Muni'edrin into Endsland
- They awake to find the backs of their left hands burning slightly, before the pain fades
- The other occupants include various goblinoids, a mysterious snowy owl man named Riss Nil Fan, a nervous hobgoblin attendant named Loro, and the captain, a jovial orc named Dav
- Riss Nil Fan explains that his kingdom, the old rexti kingdom of Thunderfall, fell to the elven expansion.
- The ship approaches Endsland, heralded by a flittering dragonfly
- Just as the ship reaches the harbor, plumes of fire bursts out from the town and engulfs the port; the shockwave knocks the captain to the deck
- Another ship takes off, quickly leaving the burning port behind them
- Vergil notices a metal-capped log approaching the ship through the air at a rapid pace; it rips through the hull of the ship leaving port and sinking it
- Vivian turns into a crocodile and swims to the ship to rescue people; she herds them towards The Xin'ro
- Some of the ship catches fire as more fireballs shoot through the air with a burning gelatinous substance
- As the fire dies down, the port is revealed to have jagged splinters of wood sticking out of most surfaces, and many buildings have been completely decimated; charred corpses line the streets
- The ship beaches, and the three go to shore to search for survivors
- Cecil finds a small green goblin girl (about 6yr old equiv) next to the body of her mother, who appears to have died protecting her
- As they progress further into the city, more buildings are standing, though most of the tips of the roofs have been clipped off
- It appears about half of the city (and its population) have been destroyed, and about a fifth of the survivors have been maimed
- Thawsayer wakes to find himself in great pain in the remnants of a building; he feels a burning on the back of his left hand
- He moves towards the back of the city, looking for survivors and smothering small fires as he goes
- Thawsayer meets up with Vergil, Cecil, and Vivian, and leads them towards the clinic for the child
- Along the way, we rescue a pair of teenagers
- When we reach the clinic, we find it overcrowded and spilling out into the street
- We pass the child on to the head physician in the clinic, an overworked orc woman, and spend the rest of the day helping out around the clinic
- Tai'jei, the elven company building we were supposed to go to, has been burnt down
- The charred corpses inside have a symbol branded on them; it appears to be a hawk facing to the right breathing fire
- Cecil investigates the bodies and notices that the cause of death appears to have been intentional burning
- The brands appear to be similar enough that there is likely a brand or stamp that was applied to them
- Thawsayer feeds the corpses to his swarm and takes the rest of the party back to his house for the night
- A strangely-purposeful looking heron peeks in through a hole in the roof, then flies away
- We talk about birds, trauma, and college before we go to sleep
- In the morning, Thaw repairs the roof and we all go back to the clinic to continue helping people
- After giving all of his blankets and food to the children in the clinic, Thaw goes to loot more supplies, but is caught by Captain Dav, who has been promoted to the highest ranking official now that everyone else is dead
- Dav says he has a plan for the town, but it doesn't include looting, so he arrests Thaw
- He returns Thaw to the clinic and asks the party to escort the "criminal" to Kier to tell them what happened and get help
- We leave the next morning, and we run into a hysterical Loro on the way; we take him with us after eventually calming him down
- We begin traveling through the Gresha, the cold bog on the way to Kier
- We see an abundance of strange herons, and when Cecil tries to read their thoughts, he only hears the sound of rhythmic footsteps
- Vivian senses that the herons are magical and associated with the Abyssal plane
- We encounter a few dead longrunners that appear to have been stabbed (larger than a heron beak Thaw feeds them to the swarm
- We find footprints that point to a large bipedal entity and a small bipedal entity passed through there a day or so ago, and a few hours before them a medium bipedal entity, along with several longrunners beforehand
- We make camp for the night, and in the middle of the night we hear something moving heavily through the water; the footsteps sound like the ones in the herons' brains
- A figure steps into the firelight; it has a platypus skull for a head and limbs made of mangrove roots
- "Unwritten, come out," it says, "Why are you here? You are not going into the forest, are you?"
- "If you see another like me, do not engage," it says, "Ald'Seit will not be so accommodating."
- Then it turns and walks back into the night
- In place of footprints, the nymph has left new growth springing from where it stepped (noticeably: Baby's Tears)
- Vivian explains the taxonomy of fruits
- When we reach the Megalio, Vivian tries to talk to the trees, but they just begin screaming in pain and terror; they seem to grow louder the deeper we get into the forest
- The foliage is dense enough that no light gets through
- Loro begins to drift, smelling something sweet, but we avoid it
- Cecil picks up some mushrooms and bocce ball-sized acorns
- As the day grows later, Vivian spots a light in the distance
- When Thaw sends Spite IV to check it out (looking through his eyes), he sees the world in technicolor; surrounding the fire is an ogre who seems to be praying and a green goblin with a spear twice his height
- We approach, and the ogre says that he and his partner are on their way to Kier
- His name is Son Yao Jin and the goblin is Mot
- We tell Son Yao Jin about what happened in Endsland; he says he will pray to Mastrix for aid
- Cecil checks their surface thoughts; Son is genuine while Mot is angry and suspicious
- We join them for the night; Vivian makes Mot a flower crown out of Baby's Tears
- In the middle of the night, Vergil sees a great horned owl watching us eerily; when Cecil calls to it, it flies towards him over his head
- In the morning, we continue on without them
- As we move further into the Megalio, the animal life becomes more abundant
- Loro keeps trying to drift off again; Thaw smells the same sweet smell
- Cecil makes Loro's shoe smell like menthol to drown out the sweet smell
- When he does this, there is a sudden shuffling as things move away from us on all sides
- Later, we hear a shriek and find a deer caught in a giant spider web; we skirt around it
- We make camp for the night, but in the middle of the night Loro disappears
- Vivian transforms into a deer and we track him down
- He is standing still, facing away, and when Cecil reads his thoughts he hears him thinking "oh fuck" over and over again
- Vivian notices some glowing strands over Loro connecting to something above
- Thawsayer slashes through some of the strands and we grab Loro, but Cecil collapses as Loro comes in contact with him; he is semi-paralyzed and stuck to Loro
- Thawsayer illuminates the area; there is a large darkwood dread moth and several smaller pill-shaped creatures emitting webs
- Cecil makes the moth afraid of him, we clean the two, and then we run back to the campsite
- We move the campsite farther away and finish the night with no further incidents
- In the morning, Vivian and Cecil wrestle while Thawsayer has a heart-to-heart with Loro; he can't remember the previous night very well and he's very scared
- Once Vergil breaks up the fight, we move on, and finally arrive at Kier
- The gate is closed and there is a large crowd outside, including Riss Nil Fan
- "They won't let us in because of the succession crisis," says one man, "They want to protect the new king."
- Both the green and red kings recently died of disease (2/3 of the triarchy) and have had to be replaced at the same time
- When Thaw tells the old man about what happened to Endsland, he panics and tries to run into the Megalio
- Thaw prevents him from leaving and Riss Nil Fan puts him to sleep; he says the guards won't believe him about what happened
- Thaw talks to the guards, but they don't seem to believe in the urgency
- After some language barriers, we convince the guards to let us in on official Empire business at the South Gate
- Riss Nil Fan asks us to put in a good word for him, as he needs to get into the city to conduct business
- We are let into the south gate and we enter Kier; it's much nicer and in far better condition than Landsend
- Loro tells us we need to speak to the commissioner in the Tai'jei building
- We don't know where we're going, so we decide to follow the whims of Vivian's mind
- We finally stop to ask directions from a very high goblin, who leads us to what appears to be some kind of strip club
- Thawsayer sends Spite IV to scout above to look for an official building
- In the center of the city is a large, crowded plaza with large buildings, and past it is an elven style building; we head to the elven building first
- When we knock on the door, we find a well-dressed snow elf named Therin who balks a little at our "ruggedness" and takes us to see the commissioner
- Loro is freaking out
- The commissioner is an light elf man with light blue skin, vibrant silvery white hair, and ears that point directly outwards. The hair is short and sticks up and back, and there are some lighter blue scars across the back of his neck and arms. He has a curved sword by his side. He has a large scar across his face, and his left eye is replaced by a yellowish gem. He also has a full silvery white beard
- We explain the situation, and he says this is the perfect time for the Empire to ingratiate itself with the new kings; we are too dirty to address the kings though
- The commissioner brings us some money for nicer clothing and arranges for us to meet with the triarchy the next day, as well as a place to stay
- His name is Commissioner Renge Thoma
- Loro says he will not be able to join us, as he is being sent back to Endsland with others from this branch in order to reestablish the Tai'jei company there
- In the tailors, we find a blue oni who takes our measurements
- We convince Loro to try and renegotiate so he can stay with us; Cecil spies on his progress with Troche
- We find an inn near the central plaza and get a room, then we go and stock up on supplies
- While Cecil conducts field research on the drug fizz, Vivian sneaks out of the gate as a skink to feed the people waiting outside; Riss Nil Fan is not there
- Vivan tosses the food in the air, and the goblinoids flee in fear; she does not speak Gob, and they do not speak Hai
- After successfully evading capture, Vivian returns to the inn
- In the morning, we get our new clothes and get our hair done; Thaw and Cecil struggle
- We go to the triarchy building for our audience with the kings
- After waiting with (and pestering) the secretary for a bar, we approach the kings
- The green goblin king, Tal Voss, is the equivalent of 4yrs old (age 2), the white goblin king, Sin Tho, is middle-aged (age 21), and the red goblin king, Vet Kane, is still in his youth (age 5)
- Tal Voss tries to eat Spite IV
- Sin Tho starts to hyperventilate, has a panic attack, and passes out
- Vet Kane takes control and asks questions; he tells us to tell the Tai'jei company to investigate the liminal town of Har, where amber passes through
- We return to the Commissioner, who seems like he's gotten dressed quickly and hurriedly agrees to send us to Har with Loro
- We plan to buy a longrunner who can lead us to Har
- We find the longrunner stables and buy two longrunners (an older blonde one named Cha-Cha-Slide and a younger brown one named Sussy Backe Loro rides Cha-Cha-Slide
- The longrunners lead us southwards through the Megalio towards Har as we temper their pace; Troche keeps Loro company
- A great number of great horned owls watch us silently; Spite IV is unnerved
- The trees are still screaming, louder than before
- More owls come to watch while we sleep
- As we move on the next day, we hear something crash down behind us from above, gasping and wheezing
- Eventually, she stands up by propelling herself feet-first to reveal herself to be a bright dwarven woman with bright white skin and purple eyes. She has semi-bob pinkish gold hair and is smiling widely. She appears to be slightly unhinged.
- Her name is Luxaria Lyrende, and she is an author (which explains why she is unhinged) and adventurer from the Empire who arrived here 3tj ago. She is doing research on great creatures of power, and is looking for nymphs while swinging through the Megalio without a light source.
- We tell her about our encounter and point her in the direction of Kier, and she leaves
- Cecil listens to an owl's brain; it sounds like static
- He quickly cycles through the others' heads (including his own, which hurts)
- Vivian notices something fly through the canopy above us, but it quickly leaves our view
- We make camp for the night; owls continue to follow us
- Cecil finds a glowing blue mushroom and takes it
- We come across a glowing purple gash in a tree emanating mana; when Troche "touches" it, they fly off and Cecil loses connection with them
- The gash appears to be from something splitting from the inside rather than an outside cut
- When Thaw cuts into another tree, he finds more purple glow
- Vivian senses that it is very magical and of destruction magic
- We move on, passing by more and more of the glowing mushrooms, which Cecil documents; they appear to attract small fuzzy black and blue moths
- Thawsayer smells and eats a moth; it burns the insides of his nostrils and tastes very bitter
- A few hours later, Thaw's hands and mouth turn blotchy red; Vivian uses Lesser Restoration and it seems to clear up
- The longrunners are very spooked; when Thaw speaks to them, they say that there is danger and that "he" has found us and is watching. They say he is watching from the trees and that we should go faster. We go faster.
- Three longrunners carrying large crates rush past us from the direction we are headed
- That night, Cecil terrifies Loro by making an emergency plan "just in case"
- Dozens and dozens of owls watch us sleep; Thaw monologues to them
- Poor Loro is freaking out, and none of us are competent at comfort
- Vergil notices misplaced branches, and when Cecil throws his snake at it, it moves away behind the tree
- The next morning, we hear footfalls behind us and we sprint away
- When Thaw looks behind him, he sees two glowing purple eyes chasing them
- We run as fast as we can, using spells and changing shape
- Just as it seems like it will catch up, we burst through the foliage and into the open; we've made it to Har
- We all crash to the ground in a heap in front of a stunned little green goblin girl
- She was collecting berries and doesn't seem to believe our story; to be fair, we aren't making much sense
- She leaves and comes back with adults and medicine
- The adults are all spooked after seeing Vivian's magic, but the girl, Gan, rallies and leads us to a barn
- Gan says they woke up eight days ago and all the longrunners in town were "crushed"; she takes us to the pile of bodies that have flattened chests or heads
- Cecil investigates and finds that they were all killed with one heavy blow from something blunt with a rounded edge, and the birds appeared to have shown signs of panic
- Next, Gan takes us to a beach with hundreds of small crates and driftwood scattered across it
- The amber is sent to Har by washing up on the beach in sealed crates, and every spring they receive baby longrunners on which they send the crates to Kier
- Gan is one of the only children in town; a few terrij ago the illness took many of the other children
- Gan learned about fiber root from a book that washed ashore
- Next she takes us to Old Man Yaol, who tells us about how they found the dead longrunners
- The bodies were mostly clumped in the back of the barn and there weren't any scratches or markings
- That night, Cecil and Vergil stay in Gan's book-filled house (we plan to send her to school eventually), Loro and Vivian stay in an empty house, and Thawsayer stays with the birds in the barn within yelling distance
- We all wake and gather again to make a plan; Thaw hears a noise outside the barn but sees nothing
- Upon further investigation, Cecil finds some rectangular shoeprints around a hole in the foliage near the back of the barn
- When we try to follow the tracks into the Megalio, we find that they appear to have drag marks behind them
- The marks are long and uniform, leaving deep gouges in the earth behind
- We send two swarmbirds back with messages; one to the nymph we met before, and one to Commissioner Toma
- Leaving the longrunners in Har, we follow the tracks to find a recently abandoned campfire with signs that something heavy was dragged through, along with a crate that looks like one of the amber ones
- Vergil approaches the crate and opens it; it's filled with a bunch of dead longrunner chicks and three living ones who are eating the others
- He takes the three back to us, and as Thawsayer cuddles them to his chest, a dragonfly lands briefly on his horn
- We start heading back to Har to find screams
- Leaving Gan, Loro, and the chicks in the outskirts, we rush back to find a destroyed Har littered with body parts; there are 17 dead
- In the center of the village, we find body parts spelling out "Follow" in Hai, with a trail of blood leading east
- Thaw sends Spite to follow the trail to a clearing to the east to find a figure waiting for us
- We approach to find an orc: 7'4", two large symmetrical tusks, beefy arms, shirtless, baggy pants, rectangular sandals, light greeneish skin, wispy white hair, widows peak, early-mid 20s; next to them is a long studded pillar that tapers off into a rod on the top
- He says that it took us long enough, and that Noble told him we would die in the Megalio
- He mentions people named Noble and Martyr, who have knowledge of magic
- His name is Keji, Challenger of the Phoenix, and he challenges us to a fight to the death
- He says the amber trade is a tumor on these islands, and if they have to burn it to the ground they will
- He picks up the pillar; it is the size of a person and it is his weapon
- We commence battle and then kill him; as his body burns away into ash, he says, "If you kill me, you have to kill Noble."
- We return to Har and help the villagers piece together the dead and grieve
Report Date
18 Apr 2022
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