blargney the second
blargney the minute's son
Yaaaaay! Thank you, Sagiro!
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Sagiro's Story Hour Returns (new thread started on 5/18/08)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
Mishihari Lord
First Post
blargney the second said:
What he said.
In addition to thanking you for the story hour, I'd also like to add my appreciation for your work on BioShock. I just recently saw the trailer of the fight against a Big Daddy... and I am really can't express how excited I am to get my hands on that game. 
And on top of that, it's WONDERFUL to have you updating again.
And on top of that, it's WONDERFUL to have you updating again.
LightPhoenix
First Post
Congratulations on the new baby Sagiro!!!
Great dialogue, intriguing characterisation, and the immensely satisfying way the resolutions to nine and ten year old plot points slide seamlessly into place -- yeah, you've still got it...
For those wondering what I'm going on about, here are some quotes from the very early days of the campaign:
For those wondering what I'm going on about, here are some quotes from the very early days of the campaign:
Run #40 (page 47 of the Collected Story Hour) said:
Run #44 (page 52) said:
Welcome back Sagiro, and congratulations on the new daughter-to-be.Run #51 (page 64) said:
Plane Sailing
Astral Admin - Mwahahaha!
Sweet family reunion story Plus your descriptive style is cinematic - I could imagine it all unfolding on the big screen before me!
Also - congrats on the impending arrival in August. My two daughters are 2.5 years apart, and they love playing games with each other now. It's a nice age gap.
Cheers
Plus your descriptive style is cinematic - I could imagine it all unfolding on the big screen before me!Also - congrats on the impending arrival in August. My two daughters are 2.5 years apart, and they love playing games with each other now. It's a nice age gap.
Cheers
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 271
Explanations
“I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for a long time.”
Kibi is deliriously happy. Learning that his grandfather is a great wizard who lives in a magic workshop with little earth elementals has exceeded his wildest dreams.
“I always knew there was something special about my mother,” he says. “She encouraged my magic, even when other dwarves mocked me for it, and thought it was... a bit odd. But she didn’t remember anything about where she had come from, or how she he gotten there.”
“She probably won’t,” concedes Cranchus. “She’ll be lucky if she has any memory at all.”
“She has the most wonderful voice. And the best sense of humor.” Kibi sighs. He loves his mother, like a good son should.
“Yeah, that sounds like her,” says Cranchus. “So, I guess she got it all back.”
Cranchus allows Kibi to gaze upon his mother for a few more minutes in silence, before they retire to the adjacent room and Cranchus seals off the stasis chamber.
“Do you know the stories they tell about you, down in the valley?” Kibi asks.
“They call you ‘Crunchy,’" says Ernie with a grin.
“Crunchy?” Cranchus is appalled. “They call me Crunchy? Hrmph. Well, they can call me what they want, I suppose.
Kibi relates the stories they’d heard, while Cranchus alternately chuckles and shakes his head.
“All absurd,” Cranchus declares. “Though one of my experiments did go awry early on and caused some...seismic activity. Maybe the stories stem from that. I was learning to harness my one access point to the Source. I have some gems soaking in it right now, in fact.”
The what now? The Source?
Without even knowing exactly what that is, Ernie exclaims, “Maybe that can restore the Eyes!”
“Yeah!” agrees Dranko. “Let ‘em soak up some Earth Magic until they’re working again.”
Cranchus laughs. “It will take a little more fine crafting than that. But remind me: you need these Eyes to go back home, and they interact somehow with Condor’s Plinths to effect time travel?”
“They controlled our getting here,” says Aravis.
At Cranchus’s urging the Company relates all the relevant details: what day and year they left, what the visual effects were when the Mirrors started flashing, and everything else they can think of. This leads to a discussion about whether they’ll need to leave the Eyes behind, to avoid there being two sets in the future. And there’s even more confusion about the Wilberforce Ring, which has also been called “Cranchus’s Gift.”
“Don’t we have to have it, so we can travel without going crazy?” asks Ernie. “But then... we have to have left it here, so we can find it again in the future. And I don't understand exactly when it is that you actually make it. Oh, my head hurts.”
“Ah, a fascinating topic,” says Cranchus. “You seem to be suffering from the fallacy of the Fixed Prime Event Theory... an understandable misconception.”
“This isn’t going to involve onions and parfaits, is it?” asks Morningstar.
“Did you say ‘phallus?’ asks Dranko.
“I said ‘fallacy.’ It means an incorrect method of deduction.”
“But what is it, this... fixed event thingy?” asks Ernie.
“It’s an assumption that every temporal loop needs a starting point,” explains Cranchus. “That every object needs a moment of creation.” In response to the blank looks from most of the party, he continues. “Here, I’ll show you what I mean.” He draws the number ‘6’ on a piece of paper. “There you are.”
The party continues to stare, not as immediately enlightened as Cranchus seems to hope.
“That’s a six,” Morningstar correctly points out.
“Er... yes,” says Cranchus. He points to the “tail” of the six. “Here’s where I must have made the belt.”
Then he traces the rest of the ‘6,’ but continues to draw the loop, going around and around in a circle.
“Here’s the loop we’re in. The spur, where we started, where I crafted the belt, doesn’t exist anymore, but it did."
“So now it’s a zero,” says Dranko, scratching his head.
“Exactly! The ‘6’ doesn’t exist any more, and now we’re in the ‘0’, but I must have made the belt back in the six. Reality has pinched it off, closing the loop, to avoid there being a paradox."
Morningstar finds it easier to simply concede. “I believe you,” she says, and means it.
Sensing there’s still some confusion, Cranchus keeps going. “There’s no essential permanence to the spur of a temporal loop. In fact, as often as not, it has to become nonexistent to ensure proper continuity. Do you see?”
“So it can be made, even if no one actually ever made it?” asks Ernie. “Then...then how did it get on the statue?”
“Because you put it there,” says Cranchus. “And you find it in the future, so that you can come back and do that. That’s the loop. It seems like a paradox because you can’t see the spur anymore. You can’t see the tail of the “6,” when the ring was made, because you’re in the ‘0.’”
“But how are we going to get home without it?” asks Kibi, coming back around to Ernie’s original question.
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ll just make you a new one. You’ll need it – otherwise the energy involved in time travel would blow you all into bits, scattered across all of Abernia.”
Grey Wolf gulps. “Er, lets’ avoid that, shall we?”
“I’m more confused than I was before,” says Ernie. “Does anyone want lunch?”
It turns out that Cranchus hasn’t eaten real food in several years, though he does confess to munching on rocks now and then. “I even eat a ruby or two each month – keeps me sharp.” But Cranchus admits that while he still could eat real food, he’s a terrible cook, and he’s been alone for so long, he no longer bothers.
This prompts Kibi to ask, “So, why would it be so dangerous to the rest of the world if you left this place? Why would you be dangerous?”
Cranchus sighs and rumbles. “Too much contact with the Source.”
“What’s the Source?” asks Dranko.
“You do know where magic comes from, right? It comes from deep inside the earth...”
“Or it comes from where the Cleaners are,” interrupts Dranko. “You know, from where all those tentacles are.”
Cranchus blinks. “What?”
“Remember that place with all the horrible tentacles?” appeals Dranko to the rest of the party. “Wasn’t that place generating strong Earth Magic?”
Aravis and Kibi explain Het Branoi to Cranchus, but also remind Dranko that the Earth Magic and the “Cleaners” came from different sources.
“As I was saying,” Cranchus continues, “Magic comes, not surprisingly, from the Earth, and not the air, as most conventional wizards believe. In some very rare places, there are vents which lead down to... well, you know that Abernia, at it’s heart, is molten. It’s made of lava, for want of a better term."
“Really? Lava” asks Ernie, excited by the thought.
“That’s where magic is generated,” explains Cranchus. “Sometimes it bubbles up close to the surface, so that we can be exposed to it directly. There is such a vent near here, where I go sometimes to augment my experiments. But I’ve spent too much time there, and become infused with magic directly from the Source. The accident that killed my wife... well, if I were to leave here, and go out away from the Source, that sort of accident would be happening around me, all the time."
“We know what that’s like,” says Morningstar. “When we were in the wrong world, the Eyes told us we had to stay near your Stabilizer all the time, or we would tear apart the universe.”
“And you were only able to exist there in the first place because of what you called the Greenhouse,” muses Cranchus, stroking his beard. “Hmmmm. That’s an interesting case, right there. From what you’ve told me, this Abernathy sounds like quite an interesting person, and his Greenhouse... well, I’d like to study it sometime.”
“You’re welcome to come visit us, in the future,” says Ernie.
“I will, if I can ever figure out a way to leave here safely,” says Cranchus.
“Or maybe,” says Dranko, we can visit you in the future!”
“I wouldn’t recommend it,” warns Cranchus. “Just being here is dangerous.”
“Because we’d get infused by the Source?” asks Kibi.
“Exactly. In fact, you’d be badly off staying here as long as it will take me to fix these Eyes of yours. But don’t worry -- I’ll make you an extradimensional shelter. You should stay in that as often as you can.”
“Is it staying here that’s made you so powerful?” asks Kibi.
“That’s part of it,” answers Cranchus. “I’ve also been studying and learning for sixty years, and I was already pretty good when I left home. I might be the most powerful Earth Mage on Abernia right now. Condor was certainly more powerful, but then he... displeased the Emperor.”
The Company obviously presses him for more on that!
“I don’t know the details – it’s hard for me to scry things related to the Black Circle. But I am a powerful diviner – I have to be, to keep an eye on things out there, and make sure they’re not aware of me here. But I know about Condor. He built his Plinths, and then he sent his daughter, Moirel, into some kind of gateway in their center. When she didn’t come back, the Emperor deemed them a failure, and punished Condor severely. No one but the Emperor wields any significant power without his approval. The Emperor stripped Condor of much of his ability. I don’t know why. The Emperor is... not of this world, is the best way I can describe it. He is, but he isn’t. Something happened to him.”
“We know what happened to him,” says Dranko. They explain to Cranchus about the Black Goo that affected Ernie and Aravis.
“Do you know how we can get rid of the Black Goo altogether?” asks Ernie.
“You’ve said that you already tried casting wish, so I expect you’ll need some kind of powerful divine intervention.”
“Oh boy,” says Ernie.
“But I wouldn’t worry,” says Cranchus, “if it’s not affecting how you think or feel, and you don’t detect as evil. Still, if you find a way to be rid of it, I wouldn’t turn it down.”
Ernie and Aravis nod in agreement.
“Cranchus,” asks Kibi, changing the subject to something he’s been meaning to bring up. “I had a dream – a prophetic dream, I think – about Abernia having a splinter. Does that ring any bells?”
“Yes!” answers Cranchus, surprised. “The earth has said similar things to me over the decades. That it needs my help and understanding, that it’s wounded and needs to be healed. But I’ve never been sure what that means.”
“Me neither,” admits Kibi. “But... if I do figure it out, could we come back and visit you, in the future?”
“We could even bring your daughter!” says Ernie.
“Please don’t bring her back here,” says Cranchus, growing solemn. “The accident that took my wife’s life was not the last one I’ve had. It’s just that now, there’s no one left to kill. I’d like to keep it that way. It will be enough for me to know that my Gela is living a full and happy life.”
At Dranko’s suggestion, Cranchus does promise to write a letter to his daughter, that Kibi can take back with him. He seems brightened by the prospect.
“And now, I should get started on fixing your time-travel gems,” says Cranchus. “Feel free to wander around, but don’t touch anything that looks dangerous, and spend most of your time in the ‘mansion.’”
It turns out that when Cranchus casts “Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Mansion,” it always ends up being a series of connected caves, not unlike the one he lives in. It does have beds, and a pool of clean water, though the banquet table is covered with small rocks.
* *
The next day the Company spends mostly inside the mansion, though Cranchus invites Kibi to visit the cave in which he accesses the Source. En route they pass a room full of hourglasses, which Cranchus explains are part of his own experiments in time travel. He’s never made much headway, and it’s clear he feels both some jealousy toward Condor and his successes in that area, as well as some schadenfreude regarding Condor’s punishment at the hands of the Emperor.
The Source Chamber is little more than a wide stone platform high above a river of lava. Kibi can feel Earth Magic streaming up from below, along with the intense heat. Cranchus has shaped himself a number of outcroppings that hang in the full blast of the Source, and on these has placed several gems, including two of the Eyes of Moirel. He warns Kibi that while the Source helps augment his spells, if he spends too much time in its direct radiance he would start to physically fly apart. Despite that warning Kibi finds it difficult to leave that place – the Source has an addictive quality that he is reluctant to relinquish even after only a few minutes.
“These are forces you don’t mess around with,” warns Cranchus. Spend too much time here, and you’ll turn out like me. You don’t want that – trust me.”
The truth of this warning is well demonstrated a couple of days later, when those in the Company who are outside the mansion hear a tremendous explosion a few caverns over. Some stalactites are shaken loose from the ceiling and clouds of dust kick up from the floor. Minutes later a door is shaped open nearby and Cranchus stumbles through in a daze, his half-flesh, half-stone skin covered with glowing striations and smears of dwarfish blood. Dranko rushes forward to heal him. Kibi can feel the Earth Magic radiating out from him.
Cranchus shakes his head.
“It happens,” he whispers hoarsely. “It happens. But it will only set me back a day or two, and I’ve already learned something about the Eyes. I have a theory, anyhow. These Eyes, they work with Condor’s Plinths to allow time travel. They would need to draw on a huge amount of Earth Magic to work, but by mathematical necessity they couldn’t draw power from this earth – from Abernia. It would lead to some paradoxes and... well, planetary ruin. So the Eyes, the first time they were called upon, must have found another nearby Prime, and used that one. I’m guessing that they created a Slave Prime in the process.”
A ha! That would be Volpos, the world that the Black Circle tried to cause to overlap Abernia in order to transfer the Emperor and his armies. The world on which the Emperor is, thankfully, still trapped.
“That’s a phenomenon found sporadically throughout the cosmos,” explains Cranchus. “Slave Primes. Sometimes two Primes get caught up together, and one gets cut off entirely from all the coterminous planes – you know, the Astral, the Ethereal, etcetera. The Slave Prime is cut off from all other planes save its ‘master.’ They are perfect places for a prison, if you want to stop someone from escaping via planar travel. I’ve always wondered how such places come into being. I guess it must be unique in each case.”
Aravis asks, “If the connection between Prime and Slave is severed, would that cause the Slave to be cut off entirely, or freed to the rest of the universe?”
“I’d guess cut off entirely,” says Cranchus. “But that would be extremely hard to do, assuming it’s possible at all. I doubt Condor intended that to happen in this case. I think the Eyes did it on their own – they needed a world to power Moirel’s time travel, and there was Volpos, and wham – Slave Prime.”
Ernie smiles. “So the Emperor was indirectly responsible for creating his own eventual prison, and probably has no idea?”
Cranchus chuckles. Dranko lets out a loud guffaw.
“Now that’s comedy!”
...to be continued...
Explanations
“I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for a long time.”
Kibi is deliriously happy. Learning that his grandfather is a great wizard who lives in a magic workshop with little earth elementals has exceeded his wildest dreams.
“I always knew there was something special about my mother,” he says. “She encouraged my magic, even when other dwarves mocked me for it, and thought it was... a bit odd. But she didn’t remember anything about where she had come from, or how she he gotten there.”
“She probably won’t,” concedes Cranchus. “She’ll be lucky if she has any memory at all.”
“She has the most wonderful voice. And the best sense of humor.” Kibi sighs. He loves his mother, like a good son should.
“Yeah, that sounds like her,” says Cranchus. “So, I guess she got it all back.”
Cranchus allows Kibi to gaze upon his mother for a few more minutes in silence, before they retire to the adjacent room and Cranchus seals off the stasis chamber.
“Do you know the stories they tell about you, down in the valley?” Kibi asks.
“They call you ‘Crunchy,’" says Ernie with a grin.
“Crunchy?” Cranchus is appalled. “They call me Crunchy? Hrmph. Well, they can call me what they want, I suppose.
Kibi relates the stories they’d heard, while Cranchus alternately chuckles and shakes his head.
“All absurd,” Cranchus declares. “Though one of my experiments did go awry early on and caused some...seismic activity. Maybe the stories stem from that. I was learning to harness my one access point to the Source. I have some gems soaking in it right now, in fact.”
The what now? The Source?
Without even knowing exactly what that is, Ernie exclaims, “Maybe that can restore the Eyes!”
“Yeah!” agrees Dranko. “Let ‘em soak up some Earth Magic until they’re working again.”
Cranchus laughs. “It will take a little more fine crafting than that. But remind me: you need these Eyes to go back home, and they interact somehow with Condor’s Plinths to effect time travel?”
“They controlled our getting here,” says Aravis.
At Cranchus’s urging the Company relates all the relevant details: what day and year they left, what the visual effects were when the Mirrors started flashing, and everything else they can think of. This leads to a discussion about whether they’ll need to leave the Eyes behind, to avoid there being two sets in the future. And there’s even more confusion about the Wilberforce Ring, which has also been called “Cranchus’s Gift.”
“Don’t we have to have it, so we can travel without going crazy?” asks Ernie. “But then... we have to have left it here, so we can find it again in the future. And I don't understand exactly when it is that you actually make it. Oh, my head hurts.”
“Ah, a fascinating topic,” says Cranchus. “You seem to be suffering from the fallacy of the Fixed Prime Event Theory... an understandable misconception.”
“This isn’t going to involve onions and parfaits, is it?” asks Morningstar.
“Did you say ‘phallus?’ asks Dranko.
“I said ‘fallacy.’ It means an incorrect method of deduction.”
“But what is it, this... fixed event thingy?” asks Ernie.
“It’s an assumption that every temporal loop needs a starting point,” explains Cranchus. “That every object needs a moment of creation.” In response to the blank looks from most of the party, he continues. “Here, I’ll show you what I mean.” He draws the number ‘6’ on a piece of paper. “There you are.”
The party continues to stare, not as immediately enlightened as Cranchus seems to hope.
“That’s a six,” Morningstar correctly points out.
“Er... yes,” says Cranchus. He points to the “tail” of the six. “Here’s where I must have made the belt.”
Then he traces the rest of the ‘6,’ but continues to draw the loop, going around and around in a circle.
“Here’s the loop we’re in. The spur, where we started, where I crafted the belt, doesn’t exist anymore, but it did."
“So now it’s a zero,” says Dranko, scratching his head.
“Exactly! The ‘6’ doesn’t exist any more, and now we’re in the ‘0’, but I must have made the belt back in the six. Reality has pinched it off, closing the loop, to avoid there being a paradox."
Morningstar finds it easier to simply concede. “I believe you,” she says, and means it.
Sensing there’s still some confusion, Cranchus keeps going. “There’s no essential permanence to the spur of a temporal loop. In fact, as often as not, it has to become nonexistent to ensure proper continuity. Do you see?”
“So it can be made, even if no one actually ever made it?” asks Ernie. “Then...then how did it get on the statue?”
“Because you put it there,” says Cranchus. “And you find it in the future, so that you can come back and do that. That’s the loop. It seems like a paradox because you can’t see the spur anymore. You can’t see the tail of the “6,” when the ring was made, because you’re in the ‘0.’”
“But how are we going to get home without it?” asks Kibi, coming back around to Ernie’s original question.
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ll just make you a new one. You’ll need it – otherwise the energy involved in time travel would blow you all into bits, scattered across all of Abernia.”
Grey Wolf gulps. “Er, lets’ avoid that, shall we?”
“I’m more confused than I was before,” says Ernie. “Does anyone want lunch?”
It turns out that Cranchus hasn’t eaten real food in several years, though he does confess to munching on rocks now and then. “I even eat a ruby or two each month – keeps me sharp.” But Cranchus admits that while he still could eat real food, he’s a terrible cook, and he’s been alone for so long, he no longer bothers.
This prompts Kibi to ask, “So, why would it be so dangerous to the rest of the world if you left this place? Why would you be dangerous?”
Cranchus sighs and rumbles. “Too much contact with the Source.”
“What’s the Source?” asks Dranko.
“You do know where magic comes from, right? It comes from deep inside the earth...”
“Or it comes from where the Cleaners are,” interrupts Dranko. “You know, from where all those tentacles are.”
Cranchus blinks. “What?”
“Remember that place with all the horrible tentacles?” appeals Dranko to the rest of the party. “Wasn’t that place generating strong Earth Magic?”
Aravis and Kibi explain Het Branoi to Cranchus, but also remind Dranko that the Earth Magic and the “Cleaners” came from different sources.
“As I was saying,” Cranchus continues, “Magic comes, not surprisingly, from the Earth, and not the air, as most conventional wizards believe. In some very rare places, there are vents which lead down to... well, you know that Abernia, at it’s heart, is molten. It’s made of lava, for want of a better term."
“Really? Lava” asks Ernie, excited by the thought.
“That’s where magic is generated,” explains Cranchus. “Sometimes it bubbles up close to the surface, so that we can be exposed to it directly. There is such a vent near here, where I go sometimes to augment my experiments. But I’ve spent too much time there, and become infused with magic directly from the Source. The accident that killed my wife... well, if I were to leave here, and go out away from the Source, that sort of accident would be happening around me, all the time."
“We know what that’s like,” says Morningstar. “When we were in the wrong world, the Eyes told us we had to stay near your Stabilizer all the time, or we would tear apart the universe.”
“And you were only able to exist there in the first place because of what you called the Greenhouse,” muses Cranchus, stroking his beard. “Hmmmm. That’s an interesting case, right there. From what you’ve told me, this Abernathy sounds like quite an interesting person, and his Greenhouse... well, I’d like to study it sometime.”
“You’re welcome to come visit us, in the future,” says Ernie.
“I will, if I can ever figure out a way to leave here safely,” says Cranchus.
“Or maybe,” says Dranko, we can visit you in the future!”
“I wouldn’t recommend it,” warns Cranchus. “Just being here is dangerous.”
“Because we’d get infused by the Source?” asks Kibi.
“Exactly. In fact, you’d be badly off staying here as long as it will take me to fix these Eyes of yours. But don’t worry -- I’ll make you an extradimensional shelter. You should stay in that as often as you can.”
“Is it staying here that’s made you so powerful?” asks Kibi.
“That’s part of it,” answers Cranchus. “I’ve also been studying and learning for sixty years, and I was already pretty good when I left home. I might be the most powerful Earth Mage on Abernia right now. Condor was certainly more powerful, but then he... displeased the Emperor.”
The Company obviously presses him for more on that!
“I don’t know the details – it’s hard for me to scry things related to the Black Circle. But I am a powerful diviner – I have to be, to keep an eye on things out there, and make sure they’re not aware of me here. But I know about Condor. He built his Plinths, and then he sent his daughter, Moirel, into some kind of gateway in their center. When she didn’t come back, the Emperor deemed them a failure, and punished Condor severely. No one but the Emperor wields any significant power without his approval. The Emperor stripped Condor of much of his ability. I don’t know why. The Emperor is... not of this world, is the best way I can describe it. He is, but he isn’t. Something happened to him.”
“We know what happened to him,” says Dranko. They explain to Cranchus about the Black Goo that affected Ernie and Aravis.
“Do you know how we can get rid of the Black Goo altogether?” asks Ernie.
“You’ve said that you already tried casting wish, so I expect you’ll need some kind of powerful divine intervention.”
“Oh boy,” says Ernie.
“But I wouldn’t worry,” says Cranchus, “if it’s not affecting how you think or feel, and you don’t detect as evil. Still, if you find a way to be rid of it, I wouldn’t turn it down.”
Ernie and Aravis nod in agreement.
“Cranchus,” asks Kibi, changing the subject to something he’s been meaning to bring up. “I had a dream – a prophetic dream, I think – about Abernia having a splinter. Does that ring any bells?”
“Yes!” answers Cranchus, surprised. “The earth has said similar things to me over the decades. That it needs my help and understanding, that it’s wounded and needs to be healed. But I’ve never been sure what that means.”
“Me neither,” admits Kibi. “But... if I do figure it out, could we come back and visit you, in the future?”
“We could even bring your daughter!” says Ernie.
“Please don’t bring her back here,” says Cranchus, growing solemn. “The accident that took my wife’s life was not the last one I’ve had. It’s just that now, there’s no one left to kill. I’d like to keep it that way. It will be enough for me to know that my Gela is living a full and happy life.”
At Dranko’s suggestion, Cranchus does promise to write a letter to his daughter, that Kibi can take back with him. He seems brightened by the prospect.
“And now, I should get started on fixing your time-travel gems,” says Cranchus. “Feel free to wander around, but don’t touch anything that looks dangerous, and spend most of your time in the ‘mansion.’”
It turns out that when Cranchus casts “Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Mansion,” it always ends up being a series of connected caves, not unlike the one he lives in. It does have beds, and a pool of clean water, though the banquet table is covered with small rocks.
* *
The next day the Company spends mostly inside the mansion, though Cranchus invites Kibi to visit the cave in which he accesses the Source. En route they pass a room full of hourglasses, which Cranchus explains are part of his own experiments in time travel. He’s never made much headway, and it’s clear he feels both some jealousy toward Condor and his successes in that area, as well as some schadenfreude regarding Condor’s punishment at the hands of the Emperor.
The Source Chamber is little more than a wide stone platform high above a river of lava. Kibi can feel Earth Magic streaming up from below, along with the intense heat. Cranchus has shaped himself a number of outcroppings that hang in the full blast of the Source, and on these has placed several gems, including two of the Eyes of Moirel. He warns Kibi that while the Source helps augment his spells, if he spends too much time in its direct radiance he would start to physically fly apart. Despite that warning Kibi finds it difficult to leave that place – the Source has an addictive quality that he is reluctant to relinquish even after only a few minutes.
“These are forces you don’t mess around with,” warns Cranchus. Spend too much time here, and you’ll turn out like me. You don’t want that – trust me.”
The truth of this warning is well demonstrated a couple of days later, when those in the Company who are outside the mansion hear a tremendous explosion a few caverns over. Some stalactites are shaken loose from the ceiling and clouds of dust kick up from the floor. Minutes later a door is shaped open nearby and Cranchus stumbles through in a daze, his half-flesh, half-stone skin covered with glowing striations and smears of dwarfish blood. Dranko rushes forward to heal him. Kibi can feel the Earth Magic radiating out from him.
Cranchus shakes his head.
“It happens,” he whispers hoarsely. “It happens. But it will only set me back a day or two, and I’ve already learned something about the Eyes. I have a theory, anyhow. These Eyes, they work with Condor’s Plinths to allow time travel. They would need to draw on a huge amount of Earth Magic to work, but by mathematical necessity they couldn’t draw power from this earth – from Abernia. It would lead to some paradoxes and... well, planetary ruin. So the Eyes, the first time they were called upon, must have found another nearby Prime, and used that one. I’m guessing that they created a Slave Prime in the process.”
A ha! That would be Volpos, the world that the Black Circle tried to cause to overlap Abernia in order to transfer the Emperor and his armies. The world on which the Emperor is, thankfully, still trapped.
“That’s a phenomenon found sporadically throughout the cosmos,” explains Cranchus. “Slave Primes. Sometimes two Primes get caught up together, and one gets cut off entirely from all the coterminous planes – you know, the Astral, the Ethereal, etcetera. The Slave Prime is cut off from all other planes save its ‘master.’ They are perfect places for a prison, if you want to stop someone from escaping via planar travel. I’ve always wondered how such places come into being. I guess it must be unique in each case.”
Aravis asks, “If the connection between Prime and Slave is severed, would that cause the Slave to be cut off entirely, or freed to the rest of the universe?”
“I’d guess cut off entirely,” says Cranchus. “But that would be extremely hard to do, assuming it’s possible at all. I doubt Condor intended that to happen in this case. I think the Eyes did it on their own – they needed a world to power Moirel’s time travel, and there was Volpos, and wham – Slave Prime.”
Ernie smiles. “So the Emperor was indirectly responsible for creating his own eventual prison, and probably has no idea?”
Cranchus chuckles. Dranko lets out a loud guffaw.
“Now that’s comedy!”
...to be continued...
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Jackylhunter
First Post
I read this wonderful story, and it makes me sad. My own D&D group just spent 3 hours debating what the wholesale prices on dinosaurs were. Sad really.
Anyway, great story again, keep up the good work.
-Jackylhunter
Anyway, great story again, keep up the good work.
-Jackylhunter
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