Edena_of_Neith
First Post
Chapter 1
Once upon a time, a non-descript and unimportant person from this Real World of ours was magically transported into the world of Faerun, and there he was forcibly introduced to someone known as Edena.
This Real Life person had read some of the fantasy series Guardians of the Flame, but had hardly imagined that he would himself be subjected to such a fate.
As for Edena, he was magically Geased at the same time. He had to take this Person on his adventure, but could not help him unless in extremis, and had to require him to undergo the rigors of the adventure just as Edena himself would undergo them.
Edena bought the Person mail, a finely wrought breast/backplate, paudrons, gauntlets, and all the rest that is Plate Armor. He bought him a fine helm, a beautiful long sword, a wickedly sharp short sword, the finest tooled boots, a goodly backpack filled with food light to carry and long to last, and a waterskin to wash it all down with.
On a chill summer morning the two of them set off for the dungeon, which lay 40 miles away. There was gold aplenty there, Edena knew, and the monsters guarding it were mere orcs. The wilderness was friendly, a good road ran most of the way through the trees, and there were even other villages to stop in, between here and there, with an inn or two, and beer of a most excellent nature.
There were, however, no horses or other beasts of burden. Edena considered magically summoning such, but the Geas restrained him from doing so, for some reason, so he contented himself to a long day's walk. A walk he would throughly enjoy.
The Person, however, had other ideas. The Person, thought Edena was crazy. The Person pointed out that the mail alone weighed 30 pounds, the plate armor another 30, the helm 10, the shield 5, the sword 3, and the backpack another 10 pounds. 90 pounds. The Person declared he simply could not walk along in such weight.
Edena, compelled by the curse, sadly and firmly informed the Person that if he did not try his best to walk that walk, he would be punished until he changed his mind. Edena did not wish to punish anyone, hated suffering and pain, but had to obey the Geas. Nor could he magically strengthen the Person, for the Geas disallowed it.
Edena wondered, long and at length, what cruel person would lay such a Geas, then sighed and went about his task of preparing for the adventure.
The Person could not even put on his own armor. Edena helped him, easily lifting the pieces into place with one hand, buckling and tying everything into place.
Chapter 2
Off they went. At Edena's pace, which would cover the distance in two days, assuming many stops at inns and many rests along the way. Edena was going at the most casual pace the Geas would allow for, in sympathy to the Person: Edena could have made the 40 mile trip in a single day, even in adamantine armor and without the help of any magic.
The Person, barely able to move at all carrying that much weight, nevertheless set off gamely for the adventure.
The Person, managed to walk one-quarter the speed of Edena's languid pace, trying as hard as he possibly could. Edena, fortunately, found the Geas relaxed, and he could slow down to match the Person's stumbling gait.
The Person quickly went from fresh to tired, then from tired to utter exhaustion. He stopped, fumbled for his waterskin, desperately thirsty, and could not even raise his armored arms to drink. Once he finally did get the strength, he could not open the visor of his helm. By the time he figured out how to do that, his arms were literally numb from the effort, and he gasped at the water, drinking it in with desperation.
This was all of 10 minutes into the journey. The morning sun shone, beaming warm and friendly rays down upon the chilled land. To the Person, the morning sun was an icon of pain, for he was already badly overheated, drenched with sweat, and the tepid water from the waterskin did not help. It briefly quenched the thirst pain in his mouth, but no more.
Edena looked with sympathy upon this Person, but there was nothing he could do, for the Geas prevented it. Shaking his head, he turned onward.
To the Person, the situation quickly turned into a nightmare. His muscles screamed with pain, his gamisson was as wet as if he had fallen in a lake (if only he could!), he mouth burned with thirst, and he had soiled himself. He would have thought he would have died from embarrassment from that: it had been an early fear of his, knowing he could not remove his armor to do the deed. Yet now he was in such pain that he didn't even notice the fact.
The Person had endured a traffic accident in which he had almost died, and had spent 10 days in the hospital. The Person had undergone broken bones, organ removal surgery, headaches that almost caused him to faint, and the usual harsh workday of the Real World, but this torture was wholly new and wholly worse. He begged Edena to stop, he pleaded with him to leave the heavy armor and backpack behind, he gasped for mercy, but Edena merely informed him that failure to continue would lead to torture with impliments of the most Hellish nature. (Not that Edena wanted this, but the Geas was a Geas.)
Chapter 3
The Person started crying from the pain, and he was not embarrassed, even though he was male. It hurt worse than any pain he had ever known. His gasping breaths could not replace the air in his lungs. His rivers of sweat could not cool his body. His waterskin was long emptied, and refilled repeatedly by Edena's magic, but no amount of water sufficed: the Person was losing water far faster than he could take it in.
It was now 30 minutes into the trip. They had walked all of 1 mile. The morning sun, an icon of fire in the sky, turned the Person's armor into an inferno from which there was no escape.
The Person somehow got a second wind, and continued on. The road Edena proclaimed as so easy to walk along was actually a terror, rolling up and down, filled with holes and cracks into which the Person stumbled and fell repeatedly, almost crying out as he had to get back to his feet carrying that 90 pounds. Edena himself looked at the Person surprised, since the road was a casual stroll compared to even walking in the nearby meadows, and naught compared to walking in a forest or in rocky terrain. Much less walking or running in a battle, or in water, or up and down hills and mountains. Edena wondered how the Person could possibly handle those things?
45 minutes into the march, one of the Person's major back muscles partially snapped, and with a shriek of pain he collapsed. Edena, would have given anything to stop, but the Geas prevented it. He magically healed the injured Person, then remorsefully commanded him to his feet. Weeping and almost screaming, the Person complied.
Five minutes later, another muscle gave out. Edena repeated the procedure. Then five minutes later, yet another muscle gave out. Edena again repeated the procedure.
The Person stopped, deciding magical torture was not worse than the this torture. Edena remorsefully applied the Ghostwhip, which ignored armor and clothing, and did it's work right away, and made it's point swiftly. The Person decided to continue on.
It was now an hour into the trip. The strong morning sun beamed down, slowly dissipating the night's chill. The Person gradually turned red, and became incoherent as Heat Exhaustion took hold.
When it turned into Heat Stroke, Edena once more used his healing magic to avert disaster, restoring the person to hydration, if not to happiness.
They had gone 3 miles up the road.
Then, the Person's eyes simply rolled up, and he collapsed. He had literally run completely out of energy, even as a Marathon Runner can do (and subsequently die despite urgent medical treatment.) Now he lay unconscious on the road, and even Edena's magic could not revive him. It could save his life, but it could not revive him or make him walk further.
Edena shook his fist angrilly at whatever sadistic Power had done this thing, and picked up the Person (armor and all) in his arms and continued on. Carrying the Person's total of 300 pounds was insignificant to Edena: Edena could carry many hundreds of pounds of weight as easily as the a Person in our Real World could walk to his neighbor's door on a friendly saunter to give greetings to a friend.
And so, the remaining 37 miles were covered, Edena jauntily carrying along the person, ignored by the villagers and peasants he passed. As he passed into the true wilderness, he Stoneskinned the Person, so that enemy arrows would not harm him. Certainly, there could be enemies in the wilderness, and Edena was taking no chances.
The Person did not regain consciousness that day, or that night, except for momentary lapses of semi-lucidity in which he drank every last drop of water given him, babbled incoherently (occasionally to state how he would kill Edena and everyone else involved in this madness), and to defecate, soiling himself uncontrollably.
Edena fought the Geas, and finally overcame it enough to pour healing (and cleaning) magic into the Person, so that by the next morning, the Person was very much awake and his strength had returned.
Chapter 4
The Person tried to kill Edena the next morning, but that failed when Edena simply froze him where he stood with his magic. When the Person attempted to run away, Edena simply laid a hand on his shoulder, and stopped him cold in his tracks. Edena forebear to use the Ghostwhip, feeling it cruel and heartless in spite of the command of the Geas, paying a great cost in red-hot pain himself to defy it in this way, giving all the mercy and compassion to the Person he could.
Into the Dungeon they went. Down the first hallway, Edena using a Continual Light Stone to show the way.
Out leaped a dozen orcs, bearing swords, bucklers, and wearing gleaming mail of their own. With howls of eager, bloodthirsty delight, the monsters charged forward.
Edena swept out his maces, massive killing heads on the end of great, four foot shafts of solid iron. In an instant, Edena was upon the these foes, and shattering armor, bodies, and equipment all in great single sweeps of his weapons, while his opponent's blades hacked futilely at his magically impregnated body.
The Person also pulled out his long sword, breaking free of his horrified stare at the charging monsters. He found he could not wield the long sword one-handed, for his wrist was not strong enough. He dropped his shield with a clang, and wrapped both hands around the hilt of the sword, drawing the weapon back for the mightiest swing he could give.
By which time the one orc that had gotten through Edena's guard had hacked and stabbed at the Person multiple times, but the Stoneskin had blocked all the attacks.
The Person round-housed the orc with everything he had, adrenal strength going into that swing. It caught the orc squarely on the side of his body.
The orc urked, as the blow cracked several ribs under his protective mail, and the blow sent him careening into the wall. The orc flung up his arm in time to avoid being brained against the hard stone, and his arm was all but broken in the crushing slam against the unyielding wall.
Furious, the orc leaped back, before the Person could recover or draw his sword back for a second strike. Driven by fury and it's own adrenal strength, the orc roundhoused his sword at the Person, catching him right across the middle ribs.
The Person's heavy armor withstood the blow, but the force of it knocked the Person into the wall. He cracked his helmed head on the stone, lost his orientation, and fell down with a bang.
The orc, in fury and glee, stabbed the Person right in the gut, where the plate armor did not protect, and only mail warded the flesh. The blow did not penetrate the mail, but it crushed stomach and intestines alike.
The Person felt a great numbness wash over him as shock set in. Suddenly, he found he could not move, and watched dreamily as the orc swung again.
The orc's third blow, aimed precisely and with adrenal fury behind it, slammed into the Person's armor, again over his ribs. The armor withstood the blow, but three ribs under it broke, and went into the lungs.
Edena, having killed all his orcish foes, turned and leaped upon the last orc. A sweep of his mace, and the orc went flying seven feet back, his chest crushed and spraying blood. The battle was finished.
The Person was dying. Blood was filling his lungs. His intestines had ruptured, poisoning his blood stream. Uncontrolled vomiting, caused by the damage to his stomach, had already half suffocated him, and he was already turned purple.
Edena sighed, produced his powerful healing magic, and in a flash of blue fire that illuminated the Person's skeleton from skull to slender toe bones, restored him to perfect health.
Then Edena sighed again, and proffered his hand, and he spoke:
'Up, my friend. Up. The Geas will not allow you to quit. It will not allow me to allow you to quit. Up. Now. Or shall I use the Ghostwhip yet again?'
The Person groaned and said; 'Just kill me and have done.'
Edena shook his head, sympathetic, but also purposefully; 'Ah no, my friend. If you die, then I am obliged by the Geas to resurrect you.'
Epilogue
For you see, my Dear Reader, that is the difference between Reality and Fantasy.
The Person is, of course, Yours Truly. Edena, is the character of Yours Truly.
Never the twain shall meet.
Hopefully.
The End
Once upon a time, a non-descript and unimportant person from this Real World of ours was magically transported into the world of Faerun, and there he was forcibly introduced to someone known as Edena.
This Real Life person had read some of the fantasy series Guardians of the Flame, but had hardly imagined that he would himself be subjected to such a fate.
As for Edena, he was magically Geased at the same time. He had to take this Person on his adventure, but could not help him unless in extremis, and had to require him to undergo the rigors of the adventure just as Edena himself would undergo them.
Edena bought the Person mail, a finely wrought breast/backplate, paudrons, gauntlets, and all the rest that is Plate Armor. He bought him a fine helm, a beautiful long sword, a wickedly sharp short sword, the finest tooled boots, a goodly backpack filled with food light to carry and long to last, and a waterskin to wash it all down with.
On a chill summer morning the two of them set off for the dungeon, which lay 40 miles away. There was gold aplenty there, Edena knew, and the monsters guarding it were mere orcs. The wilderness was friendly, a good road ran most of the way through the trees, and there were even other villages to stop in, between here and there, with an inn or two, and beer of a most excellent nature.
There were, however, no horses or other beasts of burden. Edena considered magically summoning such, but the Geas restrained him from doing so, for some reason, so he contented himself to a long day's walk. A walk he would throughly enjoy.
The Person, however, had other ideas. The Person, thought Edena was crazy. The Person pointed out that the mail alone weighed 30 pounds, the plate armor another 30, the helm 10, the shield 5, the sword 3, and the backpack another 10 pounds. 90 pounds. The Person declared he simply could not walk along in such weight.
Edena, compelled by the curse, sadly and firmly informed the Person that if he did not try his best to walk that walk, he would be punished until he changed his mind. Edena did not wish to punish anyone, hated suffering and pain, but had to obey the Geas. Nor could he magically strengthen the Person, for the Geas disallowed it.
Edena wondered, long and at length, what cruel person would lay such a Geas, then sighed and went about his task of preparing for the adventure.
The Person could not even put on his own armor. Edena helped him, easily lifting the pieces into place with one hand, buckling and tying everything into place.
Chapter 2
Off they went. At Edena's pace, which would cover the distance in two days, assuming many stops at inns and many rests along the way. Edena was going at the most casual pace the Geas would allow for, in sympathy to the Person: Edena could have made the 40 mile trip in a single day, even in adamantine armor and without the help of any magic.
The Person, barely able to move at all carrying that much weight, nevertheless set off gamely for the adventure.
The Person, managed to walk one-quarter the speed of Edena's languid pace, trying as hard as he possibly could. Edena, fortunately, found the Geas relaxed, and he could slow down to match the Person's stumbling gait.
The Person quickly went from fresh to tired, then from tired to utter exhaustion. He stopped, fumbled for his waterskin, desperately thirsty, and could not even raise his armored arms to drink. Once he finally did get the strength, he could not open the visor of his helm. By the time he figured out how to do that, his arms were literally numb from the effort, and he gasped at the water, drinking it in with desperation.
This was all of 10 minutes into the journey. The morning sun shone, beaming warm and friendly rays down upon the chilled land. To the Person, the morning sun was an icon of pain, for he was already badly overheated, drenched with sweat, and the tepid water from the waterskin did not help. It briefly quenched the thirst pain in his mouth, but no more.
Edena looked with sympathy upon this Person, but there was nothing he could do, for the Geas prevented it. Shaking his head, he turned onward.
To the Person, the situation quickly turned into a nightmare. His muscles screamed with pain, his gamisson was as wet as if he had fallen in a lake (if only he could!), he mouth burned with thirst, and he had soiled himself. He would have thought he would have died from embarrassment from that: it had been an early fear of his, knowing he could not remove his armor to do the deed. Yet now he was in such pain that he didn't even notice the fact.
The Person had endured a traffic accident in which he had almost died, and had spent 10 days in the hospital. The Person had undergone broken bones, organ removal surgery, headaches that almost caused him to faint, and the usual harsh workday of the Real World, but this torture was wholly new and wholly worse. He begged Edena to stop, he pleaded with him to leave the heavy armor and backpack behind, he gasped for mercy, but Edena merely informed him that failure to continue would lead to torture with impliments of the most Hellish nature. (Not that Edena wanted this, but the Geas was a Geas.)
Chapter 3
The Person started crying from the pain, and he was not embarrassed, even though he was male. It hurt worse than any pain he had ever known. His gasping breaths could not replace the air in his lungs. His rivers of sweat could not cool his body. His waterskin was long emptied, and refilled repeatedly by Edena's magic, but no amount of water sufficed: the Person was losing water far faster than he could take it in.
It was now 30 minutes into the trip. They had walked all of 1 mile. The morning sun, an icon of fire in the sky, turned the Person's armor into an inferno from which there was no escape.
The Person somehow got a second wind, and continued on. The road Edena proclaimed as so easy to walk along was actually a terror, rolling up and down, filled with holes and cracks into which the Person stumbled and fell repeatedly, almost crying out as he had to get back to his feet carrying that 90 pounds. Edena himself looked at the Person surprised, since the road was a casual stroll compared to even walking in the nearby meadows, and naught compared to walking in a forest or in rocky terrain. Much less walking or running in a battle, or in water, or up and down hills and mountains. Edena wondered how the Person could possibly handle those things?
45 minutes into the march, one of the Person's major back muscles partially snapped, and with a shriek of pain he collapsed. Edena, would have given anything to stop, but the Geas prevented it. He magically healed the injured Person, then remorsefully commanded him to his feet. Weeping and almost screaming, the Person complied.
Five minutes later, another muscle gave out. Edena repeated the procedure. Then five minutes later, yet another muscle gave out. Edena again repeated the procedure.
The Person stopped, deciding magical torture was not worse than the this torture. Edena remorsefully applied the Ghostwhip, which ignored armor and clothing, and did it's work right away, and made it's point swiftly. The Person decided to continue on.
It was now an hour into the trip. The strong morning sun beamed down, slowly dissipating the night's chill. The Person gradually turned red, and became incoherent as Heat Exhaustion took hold.
When it turned into Heat Stroke, Edena once more used his healing magic to avert disaster, restoring the person to hydration, if not to happiness.
They had gone 3 miles up the road.
Then, the Person's eyes simply rolled up, and he collapsed. He had literally run completely out of energy, even as a Marathon Runner can do (and subsequently die despite urgent medical treatment.) Now he lay unconscious on the road, and even Edena's magic could not revive him. It could save his life, but it could not revive him or make him walk further.
Edena shook his fist angrilly at whatever sadistic Power had done this thing, and picked up the Person (armor and all) in his arms and continued on. Carrying the Person's total of 300 pounds was insignificant to Edena: Edena could carry many hundreds of pounds of weight as easily as the a Person in our Real World could walk to his neighbor's door on a friendly saunter to give greetings to a friend.
And so, the remaining 37 miles were covered, Edena jauntily carrying along the person, ignored by the villagers and peasants he passed. As he passed into the true wilderness, he Stoneskinned the Person, so that enemy arrows would not harm him. Certainly, there could be enemies in the wilderness, and Edena was taking no chances.
The Person did not regain consciousness that day, or that night, except for momentary lapses of semi-lucidity in which he drank every last drop of water given him, babbled incoherently (occasionally to state how he would kill Edena and everyone else involved in this madness), and to defecate, soiling himself uncontrollably.
Edena fought the Geas, and finally overcame it enough to pour healing (and cleaning) magic into the Person, so that by the next morning, the Person was very much awake and his strength had returned.
Chapter 4
The Person tried to kill Edena the next morning, but that failed when Edena simply froze him where he stood with his magic. When the Person attempted to run away, Edena simply laid a hand on his shoulder, and stopped him cold in his tracks. Edena forebear to use the Ghostwhip, feeling it cruel and heartless in spite of the command of the Geas, paying a great cost in red-hot pain himself to defy it in this way, giving all the mercy and compassion to the Person he could.
Into the Dungeon they went. Down the first hallway, Edena using a Continual Light Stone to show the way.
Out leaped a dozen orcs, bearing swords, bucklers, and wearing gleaming mail of their own. With howls of eager, bloodthirsty delight, the monsters charged forward.
Edena swept out his maces, massive killing heads on the end of great, four foot shafts of solid iron. In an instant, Edena was upon the these foes, and shattering armor, bodies, and equipment all in great single sweeps of his weapons, while his opponent's blades hacked futilely at his magically impregnated body.
The Person also pulled out his long sword, breaking free of his horrified stare at the charging monsters. He found he could not wield the long sword one-handed, for his wrist was not strong enough. He dropped his shield with a clang, and wrapped both hands around the hilt of the sword, drawing the weapon back for the mightiest swing he could give.
By which time the one orc that had gotten through Edena's guard had hacked and stabbed at the Person multiple times, but the Stoneskin had blocked all the attacks.
The Person round-housed the orc with everything he had, adrenal strength going into that swing. It caught the orc squarely on the side of his body.
The orc urked, as the blow cracked several ribs under his protective mail, and the blow sent him careening into the wall. The orc flung up his arm in time to avoid being brained against the hard stone, and his arm was all but broken in the crushing slam against the unyielding wall.
Furious, the orc leaped back, before the Person could recover or draw his sword back for a second strike. Driven by fury and it's own adrenal strength, the orc roundhoused his sword at the Person, catching him right across the middle ribs.
The Person's heavy armor withstood the blow, but the force of it knocked the Person into the wall. He cracked his helmed head on the stone, lost his orientation, and fell down with a bang.
The orc, in fury and glee, stabbed the Person right in the gut, where the plate armor did not protect, and only mail warded the flesh. The blow did not penetrate the mail, but it crushed stomach and intestines alike.
The Person felt a great numbness wash over him as shock set in. Suddenly, he found he could not move, and watched dreamily as the orc swung again.
The orc's third blow, aimed precisely and with adrenal fury behind it, slammed into the Person's armor, again over his ribs. The armor withstood the blow, but three ribs under it broke, and went into the lungs.
Edena, having killed all his orcish foes, turned and leaped upon the last orc. A sweep of his mace, and the orc went flying seven feet back, his chest crushed and spraying blood. The battle was finished.
The Person was dying. Blood was filling his lungs. His intestines had ruptured, poisoning his blood stream. Uncontrolled vomiting, caused by the damage to his stomach, had already half suffocated him, and he was already turned purple.
Edena sighed, produced his powerful healing magic, and in a flash of blue fire that illuminated the Person's skeleton from skull to slender toe bones, restored him to perfect health.
Then Edena sighed again, and proffered his hand, and he spoke:
'Up, my friend. Up. The Geas will not allow you to quit. It will not allow me to allow you to quit. Up. Now. Or shall I use the Ghostwhip yet again?'
The Person groaned and said; 'Just kill me and have done.'
Edena shook his head, sympathetic, but also purposefully; 'Ah no, my friend. If you die, then I am obliged by the Geas to resurrect you.'
Epilogue
For you see, my Dear Reader, that is the difference between Reality and Fantasy.
The Person is, of course, Yours Truly. Edena, is the character of Yours Truly.
Never the twain shall meet.
Hopefully.
The End
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