All Good Things...Date: November 25th, 2012Place: Achoria, the Mists, a Black Star Guild Fortress, and the Prison of Rosetta Gathering: All good things... Working under the theory that putting things to paper sooner rather than later will provide better detail, I start this record on 11/26/12. My memories are currently 11 days old. My first nine days were much different than the tenth. When I went to sleep on the ninth evening, I was not feeling very well. I was weak, tired, nauseous, and found it difficult to focus. I was also in my guardian form, and did not look human. When I awoke on the tenth day of my memories, several things had changed. For one, I looked human. Apparently this is the form that most of you that once knew me were familiar and comfortable with. I could sense that there was some force or power that had tinkered with my mind. It was likely the same one that changed my form, and moved me from the camp I was in to a gathering of heroes in Achoria. I didn’t feel right. My emotions and mental capacities were taking rather chaotic and illogical leaps in many different directions. Usually, this didn’t keep me from being helpful, but sometimes it was not so helpful at all. I did my best to inform those I was traveling with that something was distinctly wrong with me, but they seemed little concerned. I understood this to be a gathering that would help fight the thing called Bedlam. I only knew a very little about the struggle, from what I had read in the Library of Ivory. The gathered heroes were broken up into teams. Each team had a ‘color’ and a ‘team leader’. I was placed on the Red team. The leader was Baledor. The only other team member at the beginning was Janus. We were, at the beginning, the smallest team. By the end, we also had Dodge and Caleal added to our number. Each team leader was a Path Walker for the position of the Mage. Very little was explained to me about it in the beginning. Apparently the Queen of Faerie needed five counselors. I was told later she needed them to prevent her from sacrificing herself to help defeat Bedlam. I know that Baledor was the team leader for Red. Ged was a team leader, as was Atticus. I know not what color each led. I also was never introduced to the other team leaders, but I think Tria may have been one. We were very light on fighter/heavy armor and big weapon heroes. Sir Callin, Tara Harkon, Monique, Dodge (no armor and just daggers), Caleal and Axel were our fighters. The first room we entered was broken up with walls of color. Only those of specific teams could actually pass through the colored barriers. I quickly learned that there were ‘keys’, pressure plates on the ground, that would bring the barriers down. I served in the capacity of ‘door person’ for a very long time, allowing people to go through the red barriers. Eventually, I was asked to go to the other end of the hall, and leave the red barriers up. There was a puzzle involving lights and patterns that I quickly decided was just meant to waste our time, though it was pretty. I walked away from that and worked to the multi colored barrier that was keeping us from proceeding onward. I soon discovered that when I touched the wall, I would get a ‘negative’ feeling. When Baledor touched it, the wall made a ‘positive sound’. I told Baledor we should just have all the team leaders touch the wall in unison, and move on. He agreed it was a good idea, but people were busy trying to solve the ‘puzzle’ with the lights. It took another 20 or so minutes for the other team leaders to get around to try opening the door, which worked, and let us move on. Breaking the wall set off a peculiar noise. It’s hard to describe on paper. Sort of like a flute… no, a wind driven instrument. Like blowing on the edge of a bottle. But less ‘monotone’. Sort of a woowoowoo, with each ‘woo’ having its own tenor and pitch, sometimes higher, sometimes lower, like a ghostly whip-o-will. I did notice a woman in black, short, sad and lost looking, wandering through the room. She didn’t seem to see or hear any of us. I learned her name was Aisling, and that she had helped us from time to time, but got ‘lost’ to Bedlam. That was the ‘entry’ room. From there, I think we headed to each ‘area’ of the Black Star Guild fortress. Each of the rooms were theoretically related to different ‘branches’ of the Black Star Guild, and each of those branches may be related to the five branches of the star that the five counselors are based on. The five branches of the star, as I understand them, are: Air, Water, Earth, Fire and Space. Each space between the five points was filled with color. And those were the colors each of the five teams were made up of. I think. There were some oddities in my mind, but then, I was ‘off’ anyway. The colors were Blue, Red, Purple, Yellow and Green. But I’m told Yellow should have been White, and that they didn’t have any inherent meaning. The mid-points are where each of the counselors fell: Space and Air seems to be the Dreamer, filled by Johan. Air and Water was the position of Defender, filled by Freesia. Water and Earth was the position of ?, filled by ?. Earth and Fire was the position of Druid, which was filled by a demoness. I think that demoness’ name is Havala, or something similar. Fire and Space was the position of Mage. At the start, that position was held by Rosetta, who we were at that place to kill/Cycle and replace. I am unclear why he needed to be killed, since he was obviously a prisoner of the Black Star Guild, probably tortured to madness, so likely not completely at fault for his behavior. There was likely some reason, but being only 10 days old at the time, I likely don’t have all the details. It had been decided that Ged would attempt to take over the position. The next room, was full of monsters (lycanthropes and possibly a demon) trying to kill us. There was lots of fighting. I tried not to die. We eventually won our way through. I found myself in intense one sided conversation with a dead Black Star Guild member. He showed me his spellbook, and I learned some of the magic words that were flying around an awful lot. The magic didn’t ‘taste’ that good to me, as it was powered by people’s souls. It wouldn’t take an awful leap of logic to see that someone selfish with no regard for other people’s lives would simply destroy other people’s souls to the sake of more power, which is likely why the Black Star Guild was so powerful. I eventually raised the fellow so he could go his own way. I heard the same wooowoowoo noise that I now came to associate with ‘we can leave this place’, and moved to leave, but was told I couldn’t cause it would lead to the mists and I would be lost forever. But my instincts said I should leave, and being a creature of instinct, I listened to them and my understanding of the ‘woowoo’ noise and left. I waited for a while and got bored with waiting, so I took a nap. I don’t know how long it took everyone else to figure out I was right and catch up. I think this ‘arm’ of the Black Star Guild may have been related to the Druid. My memories become somewhat muddled about the order at that point. I think the next room was where ‘the Shield’ stood. This group of the Black Star Guild was all warriors, and they were bound to keep us from continuing on. They challenged us to honorable combat, which we lost repeatedly, as we didn’t have a lot of warriors to choose from. Eventually, we defeated them in an all out war, or they just left, and got through the room, but I had the distinct impression that the Shield didn’t really want to perform the duty, and let us win. I learned later that one of the more powerful ‘Shield’ members was closely allied to the power of Ice, so Baledor sacrificed a part of his own personal ‘fire’ to melt that enemy and defeat him. The resulting loss to Baledor apparently took his emotions away. I guess that members of the Shield are the equivalent of the ‘Defender’ position. Next, was a room where I found myself in a small area with someone that said she was Freesia. She said she was there to help, and knew the way, but she needed help and was asking us to follow her. The only people with me were Laurante, Shane, and I think Indana and one other – one from each of the teams. Outside the little area seemed to be a number of wandering ghosts. Sometimes, these creatures, which someone said were ‘mists – don’t listen to them’ would try and take over my mind, but it didn’t do anything to me. I saw what appeared to be a little boy, sitting dejected on the floor. “Freesia” convinced Shane Stillwater to go with her, and we promptly learned that Freesia was also a ‘mist’ and Shane was lost in the mists. I wasn’t really paying attention to that, though, intent on trying to save the lost child. I had the intuition that he needed to be laid to rest, so, using the odd power that was making my find feel weird, I did my best eulogy for a lost child, and asked the power that was influencing me to save the boy. The child vanished, and all that remained was some kind of artifact that was labeled “Relic Furnace.” I gathered it up, and left the room with the rest of the heroes. At some point after that, I fell into a deep magical sleep. When I woke up, I was in a small room with five beings with riddles. After answering three, a door opened in front of me, and I was more or less forced through. Only a few others managed to get through, before, according to Sir Callin, an ant showed the others a pathway through the room of sleep and questions, which I suppose may have been related to the Dreamer. Then we ended up in a very dark room with other people that looked like adventurers. I, of course, didn’t know any of them. Johan was there and said he was there to help. Of course, that was what ‘Freesia’ said, so I was a bit skeptical. Johan didn’t seem very helpful at all, he only seemed to be keeping himself alive, and little else. I died several times, and started to find it very hard to keep any kind of focus. Through deathwatch, I saw the mist-adventurers kill all of us. I think it was Atticus, or team yellow (or both) that left the room with some powerful artifact or rune, escaping. I saw Laurante, his body dead in front of me, but his spirit walking around, start talking to Aisling and asking her to help. Then, everything went funny. I was suddenly somewhere else, and I was moving around, even though I was dead. I didn’t like that at all. When I came to be alive again, I know things got jumbled, and I felt like nothing made sense, everyone was an enemy, and no-one could speak common anymore. I followed the crowd, being confused, leaving the room with the useless ‘helpful’ Johan and the mist monsters that weren’t really our friends. Then some of the ‘Mage’ leaders wanted to skip ahead, since we were running out of time, and we ended up in Hell. I was still not able to understand everyone, but Tara and Indana were trying to break through the communication barrier. Janus gave me a fan, and suddenly everyone made sense again. Before us was a line of demons, led by a someone called ‘the Queen of Worms’. I was told that the leaders of the teams were negotiating with her. The blue team was already gone. The Queen of Worms got annoyed or something and her horde of demons killed us all. I felt something get shoved down my throat that was horribly disgusting, and I woke up with the feeling that there was something inside me that didn’t belong. I was told that it was a demon-worm, and that killing and scalping me would get rid of it, however many, many of us had the problem, and we didn’t have enough Call’s to help anyone. I tried to get confirmation on that, but couldn’t find anyone that would give it to me. At some point during the ‘sleeping riddle room’ something happened to Laurante, and Sir Callin, trying to be helped by using a healing ability on him. Laurante apparently got his ‘hand’ back, which somehow was a problem. We were again informed that we were running out of time, and needed to hurry up. It seemed that after escaping hell, we ended up back in the Entry Hall, or a place very similar to it, but the walls were in different places, and there was someone in the middle asking to talk to Tara, as if she were a long lost relation. There were again walls of varying color that only the ‘properly’ colored team member could get through. Again, I ended up being a door stop. From my position as door stop, I could see Shane was in this room, dead, and inside some kind of Circle of magic. Eventually, I saw he was recovered and returned to life. Also from my position, I could see some people that were obviously mentally damaged in some fashion. Being ‘stuck’ where I was, I could do little but watch as one of them kept beating his head repeatedly into a wall, and laugh about it. I eventually caught this poor person’s attention, and beckoned him over to me. He was an elf. His ears had been cruelly chopped of, and his mind damaged into believing that ‘they’ had made him ‘better’. I felt a swell of power within me, and a NEED to heal this elf. So I mended his ears, and using the power from a Call the Soul mended his mind. I learned his name was Artek, and he was a commoner in the fay courts. He was grateful to be returned to sanity, and I had every intention of getting him out of that horrible place. Heartened by my success, I managed to get another of the damaged elves to come and speak with me. He was very concerned about ‘the eye’ and warned me that we shouldn’t look at it. I tried to heal him, using the same powers I had invoked before, and he was not healed, only started to scream that I was not worthy of being warned, and I had ‘undone’ him, that he was ‘fixed’ and I ruined everything. Despite the setback, I was determined to save Artek. I asked Baledor and Janus to help me, as I was stuck at ‘the door’. Eventually, we got Artek out of the worst of the areas, and I found we were stuck at the very same kind of door that was in the entry way. I was puzzled as to why no-one opened it, as it was the same mechanic as before. Artek was rather lost and fragile, but another elf commoner had been slain, and no-one was able to mend his mind, so I was given custody of the body. Unable to keep track of Artek and the new elf at the same time, Artek got separated from me. The heroes finally opened the door, and I was swept by a press of bodies into the next area. Artek was lost. I was very, very angry. If we were not there to save the innocents that were lost here, if we were not there to stop the evil, if we were going to ignore and leave the evil to fester, or forge ahead without any consideration for the wake of ruin we’d left behind, what the hell were we doing there at all? I’m sure the muddling with my head, the repeated death blows and the baby demon thing inside me didn’t help my mood at all. I was informed that we were there to get a new Mage Counselor, and to kill a ‘thing from beyond the stars’. Eventually we moved on, and fought through another batch of monsters, and I was still minding the body of the fallen elf, and trying not to get killed. This room was very dark, and a very large tentacled head was on the left side of the room. I navigated to the other side of the room, being very low on any kind of helpful magic, and towing a dead elf. Someone used a cry of life, waking the dead and crazy elf in my arms. I managed to talk to him some, but I had no more ability to attempt to heal him. He was in agony, screaming for release. I granted him that, but am not happy for it. From where I was, I could see monsters had pinned what was left standing of our army in a little bottleneck, their back to me. I attempted to kill one, and my weapon had no effect at all, so I was slain. Eventually, when I regenerated, I made my way back to the other side of the room, where our people were mostly in control, still fighting the giant head. Mages used an enfeeble spell to reveal a giant eye. Reasoning that the eye was the vulnerable spot, I walked over and clubbed it. It didn’t do anything, and I died again. When I came to again, someone had taken my weapon, so I sat in a corner and waited for us to either prevail, or to be slain with everyone else, as I had nothing left to give. Eventually Azrum killed the ‘beast from beyond the stars’ and with its death, I believe someone managed to kill ‘Byecross’. I went to gather the body of the elf I was trying to save, intending to bring him out, but the body was gone. We’d ‘won’ through, and now had only Rosetta to deal with. Several of us were dead and scalped. After gathering all our resources and getting the fallen back up, we headed into a room with nothing but a pair of ritual circles and a broken box that 'felt like lots of power'. I moved to a back corner of the room and waited, having no idea what was going on, and having no 'resources' for them to take or use. The current 'Counselors' of the Queen began to filter into the room. Johan, the Druid Demoness thing, Freesia... The Demoness made it plain we were on a time limit, and that they would only remain for a short while. I watched the mages get every relic we'd gathered, and sacrifice them. It wasn't enough. Tria asked who was holding back? Who didn't already give up everything? I watched them gather all the other Path-Walkers (most of the heroes gathered, but I was not, so remained in the back, waiting) and do a complicated ritual that left some dead, some insane, and some scalped. I still wasn't enough. Johan and the Demoness began to taunt Ged, (are you a Mage or a Mouse?) into taking the power he needed, to BECOME the Mage and claim the title. So he did. He took it from the box. From the souls of his supporters, from everything. He, Ged, claimed the power as his ("Mine all mine...") At that point, a man, bound and chained, and somewhat hysterical appeared. He seemed to be both laughing and crying. Ged addressed him as Rosetta. At that point, whatever force had summoned me there finally felt I had seen enough (or was simply tired of toying with me) and I vanished, returning to the point I had left. |
Created by Faelinn Shadowmoon (Leanne Micciche) at 11-27-12 01:50 PM
Last Modified by Faelinn Shadowmoon (Leanne Micciche) at 11-27-12 01:50 PM