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First Post
Introducing new and imp--no... wait. Not so much new or improved, actually. But... wait... maybe new... oh no!
Not more nonsense!
In any case, here for your viewing pleasure...
Sleeping Sword Campaign! (campaign page)
A Prelude: The Tumbling Begins!
* * *
A young man with eyes the strange shades of gold and silver, bearing golden, short hair, and wearing full plate of bronze walks the empty trail toward the busy river town of Glaspel, a crow image engraved on the hilt of his bronze longsword.
This man, Cerne Paliel, soon spots the town on the horizon.
* * * *
A human knight, one Ezekiel Flamebrand, leads a party of initiates, guided by a strange man with a russet beard, through the ruins of central Three Road.
The guide is to lead them to a particular stone said to sit at the site of an ancient battle in the time of the Circle War, and they are to protect him.
* * * * *
Creeping in the jungle near a primitive man-village goes a willowy, nine inch tall figure with dusky skin and yellowish eyes, black beady dots at the center. His hands extend almost to the ground and end in razor sharp needles that drip strange ichor. A cloak wraps over his frame, and a comparatively large pouch hangs from his little belt.
* * * * * *
In the merchant kingdom of Oceana, in a village near the city of Dunmare, a man called Valfein, a man of average height and wiry build, stalks through the grass.
This little village, Breeze, is the place where he has followed the men he now watches for—Gradan, a slave trader, and his hired thugs. Power has changed in Dunmare, and justice calls that this sort of man cannot be allowed to escape unscathed.
* * *
Cerne goes down the road in the mid-afternoon and finds the busy river town of Glaspel completely empty. Along the way he scours for bodies. He sees a mere scrap of parchment blowing through the empty streets.
He approaches a nearby door. He looks about, attempts to examine it… but it crackles strangely and turns to dust when he touches it. Inside there is only darkness, so he decides to turn his attentions to the scrap of paper.
* * * *
Ezekiel and his party follow the russet-bearded man. They pass pillars and ruined walls, all that remains of a battle between powerful sorcerers so long ago. King Edward’s orders ring through Ezekiel’s mind, and he follows the man (who is rumored to be a sorcerer himself). Magic is not trusted, but despite Ezekiel’s suspicions, the guide seems to have his use and knows where he is going.
Soon they arrive at a break in one wall. The sorcerer passes inside, seeming to think this is the place.
* * * * *
The little shadovig sprouts from the shadows of the jungle toward Tonchon, the primitive little village. Tonchon means “Hot Springs” in the language of the strange jungle men, the druids.
The hot springs today are filled with children bathing, while all of the men and some of the women are out in the jungle, gathering, the rest staying indoors. The tiny figure of Shink of the Dusk creeps on between the huts, looking for the man-leader he wants to visit…
Outside of the chief’s hut, Shink sees the most beautiful women of the village, the wives of the chief, bathing in the best of the hot springs, wide and shallow enough for comfort.
* * * * * *
The eyes of Valfein catch sight of his mark. Blonde-bearded, bald Gradan engages his two flunkies in conversation. Carefully, Valfein steps out of the brush, mingling in with the morning milling of the villagers.
Looking like a rather middle-class commoner, he fits right in. Looking for someone to engage in casual conversation, he avoids the gaze of Gradan as much as possible. But before Valfein has a chance to even say hello to one of the other villagers, Gradan’s flunkies take off in one direction, and Gradan himself runs… toward the town square…
* * *
When the piece of parchment blows by the young man’s feet, he decides to go chasing after it. It takes a few snatches at the ground, and a good deal of running, but soon Cerne has a hold of it. It crinkles in his gauntleted hand, but he uncrumples it.
As he reads it, a strange sensation travels up his spine… but he shakes the feeling off. Surely his imagination… but then the parchment seems to crinkle of its own accord and then… again flatten out to normal.
* * * *
The knight, Ezekiel, decides to follow the man through the break. He bids the initiates, who seem rather frightened of this forbidden place, to follow him. The group moves toward the breach, and there they see their guide kneeling over something… a source of greenish light. Whatever it is, it is obscured by the russet-bearded man himself, whose back is to them.
Ezekiel pipes up, “What’ve you found there? Is that what the king sent us for?”
There is a flash of light…
* * * * *
He stays in the shadows, but speaks to them in his high-pitched, crackling voice, asking if the chief is in. Two of the three women are afraid, but one is eager to speak with this “spirit” that has visited them before.
“He is in. He said for you to wake him when you arrived.”
Shading his eyes from the vile sun, Shink steps out of the shadows and heads into the chief’s hut. A conversation ensues in which the chief treats him with characteristic amazement and fear… but at the mention of his true name, “Shink of the Dusk”, the chief becomes afraid… and dies where he stands.
* * * * * *
Valfein is still posing as one of the crowd when Gradan takes a hostage, a young woman. Though the crowd becomes panicked, and a woman even screams, Gradan’s hostage is strangely calm.
Gradan proceeds to order whoever it is in the crowd that was sent after him to come out, or the woman will be hurt. Valfein just stands there, mimicking the shock of the rest of the crowd.
As Gradan again shouts out that his hunter reveal himself, the young woman lifts her hand gracefully, smacking Gradan with a blow to the temple and releasing herself. Gradan’s head strikes the well he stands near, sending a few old stones toppling.
* * *
Things become even more strange as the paper begins to take on words where before there were none, in the (obscure) language of Cerne’s birth, Lorni. The words are insubstantial and hard to follow. He fights the urge to look away from the page, and keeps his eyes locked on.
The writing becomes more intelligible, and even takes on frightfully bold print.
Hello, my fellow traveller, appears there. As soon as the words have appeared, they are gone, and are replaced by, You are strong. Would you like to make a journey? The plate-armored fellow curiously scratches the print as it disappears.
* * * *
Blinded momentarily by the flash of green light, Ezekiel topples over, striking his head on the ground. He regains awareness of his surroundings, and hears the rest of his party fleeing. He gets up.
The sorcerer is gone. The light is gone, and the building is dark. Only the night sky that shines through the long-rotted roof remains. He shouts after the fleeing men, but they do not respond, and he no longer hears their footfalls.
“Initiates…” he says with a sigh.
Then he notices a pale light brightening where the sorcerer previously kneeled. Though he’s confused by the events, he is duty-bound as always, and looks at the source…
* * * * *
…a small, flat, gray stone falls out of the now relaxed hand of the dead chief, Dain. Shink, discovering the man-leader not breathing, commands him to “Wake! Wake! Wake!”, but he does not. He shakes him… but to no effect. He looks for the source of death… and finds nothing but the scrapes and healing scratches of a gatherer.
To his great shock and confusion, the human begins to turn to dust before his eyes and under his needled little fingers, as do the walls of the hut. The ground grows thick with weeds and grass, and Shink dives for the stone.
* * * * * *
The villagers continue to stand in shock as the young woman flees, fleet of foot, and Valfein approaches the still body of Gradan. Not entirely convinced that Gradan isn’t faking it, he takes caution, but the slave trader doesn’t move. Valfein begins to search him for weapons.
Gradan moans, and Valfein silences him by smashing his head again against the well. A few more stones tumble, this time into the well. One in particular falls forward, onto the ground by Gradan. A flat, gray stone, about three inches in diameter.
It winks with a strange glow.
Valfein announces that the man is all right as he heaves him over a shoulder and grabs the glowing stone. As he touches it… a tingle travels down his spine.
* * *
The tingling sensation engages golden-haired Cerne’s spine once again, growing this time and spreading across his body. He imagines he hears laughter, but he dismisses it to be the wind. He tries to pull his eyes away from the paper to look around, but the paper seems to tug at them.
…but not so strong as I, appears on the paper.
“What is this?” he cries out.
And again, new print on the paper appears, It is my existence, traveller. His eyes begin to feel as if they are being pulled from his sockets. The world around him gets dark, fades, including his own armored body below him.
“Stop it!” he cries. And the final words come to the parchment…
Stop what?
* * * *
Ezekiel picks up the flat, gray stone. “This can’t be it.” Something happens, and a tingle spreads over his skin. There is a flash of numbness then, and then another flash of almost painful tingle. It soon stops being just a thing of the body, spreading to his mind. He finds it hard to concentrate, and he seems to be locked within a single moment in time. The stars, however, seem to turn and turn and turn onward and forever, now streaking across the sky!
* * * * *
It’s about three inches in diameter, this former possession of the man-leader, so he has a little trouble maneuvering with it, especially as the grass grows taller than him and thicker than is comfortable…
Truly odd things are happening! But Shink calms himself, and the grass seems to stop growing. There is clear blue sky above, but even that seems to change, becoming darker as he watches. The grass blows by what looks like a strong wind, but Shink cannot feel it.
“Refreshing gloom, embrace him,” comes the raspy little words from the shadowy fey. The darkness does embrace him… it tugs at him, hard, pulling at his very essence. He begins to feel lethargic, and his body feels heavy.
* * * * * *
Valfein wonders… Was that stone… loose… or part of the well?
Suddenly the villagers seem unconcerned by the scene. They turn back to their work as if nothing has happened. Valfein’s whole body goes numb, and everything going on around him seems to take on a terribly speed, and it only accelerates. The stone burns in his hand, and seems to drift into nothingness, as does all around him.
* * *
The parchment crinkles into a ball, turns gray, and travels up from his hands. Words appear on the blackness now, white letters on a field of nothing.
Traveller? Are you sane?
Cerne cries out with, “Evidently not! This is paper talking to me!” His bones ache, creak, and all of them seem to shatter, sending pain through his body. As he realizes he still feels them, solid, the pain spreads throughout his body and fades. The now-gray paper balls loses its wrinkles, and flattens out slowly. Cerne falls to his knees.
Now in the shape of a flat, gray stone, the thing circles around him as if observing. Traveller? the word appears. This final bit of text fades away, as does the gray shape. He feels his head fall downward, and finds his body gone.
* * * *
To Ezekiel, the streaking stars continue… but no day ever seems to come as time speeds up thus. The streaks of white on dark, dreamy blue expand to form a completely white backdrop. For a moment, he forgets his troubled past, and forgets all the world save the whiteness.
* * * * *
Shink hears the sound of screaming. Not men-folk, not anything he recognizes, just a noise that seems hollow and despairing. He quickly becomes worried, his heart beating faster. He sees nothing, and feels nothing, and nothing but darkness surrounds him and his mind. Strangely, though, he finds no peace in this… it does not feel like death.
Then, just as before, he feels the tugging, tugging! Tugging until there is nothing but pain… “Please, Masster, make it end!” he cries out… and his pain ends. He feels exhausted, breathes, seems to sit in the center of a broad nothing.
* * * * * *
The burning in Valfein’s hand does not intensify. As he tries to release the stone, he sees it drift from his hand and vanish into his surroundings, which ripple and vanish all the same. Blackness creeps upon him. Everything familiar seems to fade.
* * *
Somewhere in the back of his mind, the golden-haired young man imagines he feels a wind on his shoulder… but he doesn’t.
* * * *
His body feels old. Darkness falls over the bright white, as Ezekiel reaches out for it longingly. He sees nothing… he is nothing…
* * * * *
Shink hears a soft voice, almost like that of poor, dead Dain… “Come, come Shinkofthedusk… come…” The voice echoes, but is at the same time subtle and soft… “Come.”
* * * * * *
A last thought drifts through Valfein… “Damn… I hope I actually killed that #^@$%&…”
*END
*END!
I am le Roche! Malamala Stay tuned!
Not more nonsense!
In any case, here for your viewing pleasure...
Sleeping Sword Campaign! (campaign page)
A Prelude: The Tumbling Begins!
* * *
A young man with eyes the strange shades of gold and silver, bearing golden, short hair, and wearing full plate of bronze walks the empty trail toward the busy river town of Glaspel, a crow image engraved on the hilt of his bronze longsword.
This man, Cerne Paliel, soon spots the town on the horizon.
* * * *
A human knight, one Ezekiel Flamebrand, leads a party of initiates, guided by a strange man with a russet beard, through the ruins of central Three Road.
The guide is to lead them to a particular stone said to sit at the site of an ancient battle in the time of the Circle War, and they are to protect him.
* * * * *
Creeping in the jungle near a primitive man-village goes a willowy, nine inch tall figure with dusky skin and yellowish eyes, black beady dots at the center. His hands extend almost to the ground and end in razor sharp needles that drip strange ichor. A cloak wraps over his frame, and a comparatively large pouch hangs from his little belt.
* * * * * *
In the merchant kingdom of Oceana, in a village near the city of Dunmare, a man called Valfein, a man of average height and wiry build, stalks through the grass.
This little village, Breeze, is the place where he has followed the men he now watches for—Gradan, a slave trader, and his hired thugs. Power has changed in Dunmare, and justice calls that this sort of man cannot be allowed to escape unscathed.
* * *
Cerne goes down the road in the mid-afternoon and finds the busy river town of Glaspel completely empty. Along the way he scours for bodies. He sees a mere scrap of parchment blowing through the empty streets.
He approaches a nearby door. He looks about, attempts to examine it… but it crackles strangely and turns to dust when he touches it. Inside there is only darkness, so he decides to turn his attentions to the scrap of paper.
* * * *
Ezekiel and his party follow the russet-bearded man. They pass pillars and ruined walls, all that remains of a battle between powerful sorcerers so long ago. King Edward’s orders ring through Ezekiel’s mind, and he follows the man (who is rumored to be a sorcerer himself). Magic is not trusted, but despite Ezekiel’s suspicions, the guide seems to have his use and knows where he is going.
Soon they arrive at a break in one wall. The sorcerer passes inside, seeming to think this is the place.
* * * * *
The little shadovig sprouts from the shadows of the jungle toward Tonchon, the primitive little village. Tonchon means “Hot Springs” in the language of the strange jungle men, the druids.
The hot springs today are filled with children bathing, while all of the men and some of the women are out in the jungle, gathering, the rest staying indoors. The tiny figure of Shink of the Dusk creeps on between the huts, looking for the man-leader he wants to visit…
Outside of the chief’s hut, Shink sees the most beautiful women of the village, the wives of the chief, bathing in the best of the hot springs, wide and shallow enough for comfort.
* * * * * *
The eyes of Valfein catch sight of his mark. Blonde-bearded, bald Gradan engages his two flunkies in conversation. Carefully, Valfein steps out of the brush, mingling in with the morning milling of the villagers.
Looking like a rather middle-class commoner, he fits right in. Looking for someone to engage in casual conversation, he avoids the gaze of Gradan as much as possible. But before Valfein has a chance to even say hello to one of the other villagers, Gradan’s flunkies take off in one direction, and Gradan himself runs… toward the town square…
* * *
When the piece of parchment blows by the young man’s feet, he decides to go chasing after it. It takes a few snatches at the ground, and a good deal of running, but soon Cerne has a hold of it. It crinkles in his gauntleted hand, but he uncrumples it.
As he reads it, a strange sensation travels up his spine… but he shakes the feeling off. Surely his imagination… but then the parchment seems to crinkle of its own accord and then… again flatten out to normal.
* * * *
The knight, Ezekiel, decides to follow the man through the break. He bids the initiates, who seem rather frightened of this forbidden place, to follow him. The group moves toward the breach, and there they see their guide kneeling over something… a source of greenish light. Whatever it is, it is obscured by the russet-bearded man himself, whose back is to them.
Ezekiel pipes up, “What’ve you found there? Is that what the king sent us for?”
There is a flash of light…
* * * * *
He stays in the shadows, but speaks to them in his high-pitched, crackling voice, asking if the chief is in. Two of the three women are afraid, but one is eager to speak with this “spirit” that has visited them before.
“He is in. He said for you to wake him when you arrived.”
Shading his eyes from the vile sun, Shink steps out of the shadows and heads into the chief’s hut. A conversation ensues in which the chief treats him with characteristic amazement and fear… but at the mention of his true name, “Shink of the Dusk”, the chief becomes afraid… and dies where he stands.
* * * * * *
Valfein is still posing as one of the crowd when Gradan takes a hostage, a young woman. Though the crowd becomes panicked, and a woman even screams, Gradan’s hostage is strangely calm.
Gradan proceeds to order whoever it is in the crowd that was sent after him to come out, or the woman will be hurt. Valfein just stands there, mimicking the shock of the rest of the crowd.
As Gradan again shouts out that his hunter reveal himself, the young woman lifts her hand gracefully, smacking Gradan with a blow to the temple and releasing herself. Gradan’s head strikes the well he stands near, sending a few old stones toppling.
* * *
Things become even more strange as the paper begins to take on words where before there were none, in the (obscure) language of Cerne’s birth, Lorni. The words are insubstantial and hard to follow. He fights the urge to look away from the page, and keeps his eyes locked on.
The writing becomes more intelligible, and even takes on frightfully bold print.
Hello, my fellow traveller, appears there. As soon as the words have appeared, they are gone, and are replaced by, You are strong. Would you like to make a journey? The plate-armored fellow curiously scratches the print as it disappears.
* * * *
Blinded momentarily by the flash of green light, Ezekiel topples over, striking his head on the ground. He regains awareness of his surroundings, and hears the rest of his party fleeing. He gets up.
The sorcerer is gone. The light is gone, and the building is dark. Only the night sky that shines through the long-rotted roof remains. He shouts after the fleeing men, but they do not respond, and he no longer hears their footfalls.
“Initiates…” he says with a sigh.
Then he notices a pale light brightening where the sorcerer previously kneeled. Though he’s confused by the events, he is duty-bound as always, and looks at the source…
* * * * *
…a small, flat, gray stone falls out of the now relaxed hand of the dead chief, Dain. Shink, discovering the man-leader not breathing, commands him to “Wake! Wake! Wake!”, but he does not. He shakes him… but to no effect. He looks for the source of death… and finds nothing but the scrapes and healing scratches of a gatherer.
To his great shock and confusion, the human begins to turn to dust before his eyes and under his needled little fingers, as do the walls of the hut. The ground grows thick with weeds and grass, and Shink dives for the stone.
* * * * * *
The villagers continue to stand in shock as the young woman flees, fleet of foot, and Valfein approaches the still body of Gradan. Not entirely convinced that Gradan isn’t faking it, he takes caution, but the slave trader doesn’t move. Valfein begins to search him for weapons.
Gradan moans, and Valfein silences him by smashing his head again against the well. A few more stones tumble, this time into the well. One in particular falls forward, onto the ground by Gradan. A flat, gray stone, about three inches in diameter.
It winks with a strange glow.
Valfein announces that the man is all right as he heaves him over a shoulder and grabs the glowing stone. As he touches it… a tingle travels down his spine.
* * *
The tingling sensation engages golden-haired Cerne’s spine once again, growing this time and spreading across his body. He imagines he hears laughter, but he dismisses it to be the wind. He tries to pull his eyes away from the paper to look around, but the paper seems to tug at them.
…but not so strong as I, appears on the paper.
“What is this?” he cries out.
And again, new print on the paper appears, It is my existence, traveller. His eyes begin to feel as if they are being pulled from his sockets. The world around him gets dark, fades, including his own armored body below him.
“Stop it!” he cries. And the final words come to the parchment…
Stop what?
* * * *
Ezekiel picks up the flat, gray stone. “This can’t be it.” Something happens, and a tingle spreads over his skin. There is a flash of numbness then, and then another flash of almost painful tingle. It soon stops being just a thing of the body, spreading to his mind. He finds it hard to concentrate, and he seems to be locked within a single moment in time. The stars, however, seem to turn and turn and turn onward and forever, now streaking across the sky!
* * * * *
It’s about three inches in diameter, this former possession of the man-leader, so he has a little trouble maneuvering with it, especially as the grass grows taller than him and thicker than is comfortable…
Truly odd things are happening! But Shink calms himself, and the grass seems to stop growing. There is clear blue sky above, but even that seems to change, becoming darker as he watches. The grass blows by what looks like a strong wind, but Shink cannot feel it.
“Refreshing gloom, embrace him,” comes the raspy little words from the shadowy fey. The darkness does embrace him… it tugs at him, hard, pulling at his very essence. He begins to feel lethargic, and his body feels heavy.
* * * * * *
Valfein wonders… Was that stone… loose… or part of the well?
Suddenly the villagers seem unconcerned by the scene. They turn back to their work as if nothing has happened. Valfein’s whole body goes numb, and everything going on around him seems to take on a terribly speed, and it only accelerates. The stone burns in his hand, and seems to drift into nothingness, as does all around him.
* * *
The parchment crinkles into a ball, turns gray, and travels up from his hands. Words appear on the blackness now, white letters on a field of nothing.
Traveller? Are you sane?
Cerne cries out with, “Evidently not! This is paper talking to me!” His bones ache, creak, and all of them seem to shatter, sending pain through his body. As he realizes he still feels them, solid, the pain spreads throughout his body and fades. The now-gray paper balls loses its wrinkles, and flattens out slowly. Cerne falls to his knees.
Now in the shape of a flat, gray stone, the thing circles around him as if observing. Traveller? the word appears. This final bit of text fades away, as does the gray shape. He feels his head fall downward, and finds his body gone.
* * * *
To Ezekiel, the streaking stars continue… but no day ever seems to come as time speeds up thus. The streaks of white on dark, dreamy blue expand to form a completely white backdrop. For a moment, he forgets his troubled past, and forgets all the world save the whiteness.
* * * * *
Shink hears the sound of screaming. Not men-folk, not anything he recognizes, just a noise that seems hollow and despairing. He quickly becomes worried, his heart beating faster. He sees nothing, and feels nothing, and nothing but darkness surrounds him and his mind. Strangely, though, he finds no peace in this… it does not feel like death.
Then, just as before, he feels the tugging, tugging! Tugging until there is nothing but pain… “Please, Masster, make it end!” he cries out… and his pain ends. He feels exhausted, breathes, seems to sit in the center of a broad nothing.
* * * * * *
The burning in Valfein’s hand does not intensify. As he tries to release the stone, he sees it drift from his hand and vanish into his surroundings, which ripple and vanish all the same. Blackness creeps upon him. Everything familiar seems to fade.
* * *
Somewhere in the back of his mind, the golden-haired young man imagines he feels a wind on his shoulder… but he doesn’t.
* * * *
His body feels old. Darkness falls over the bright white, as Ezekiel reaches out for it longingly. He sees nothing… he is nothing…
* * * * *
Shink hears a soft voice, almost like that of poor, dead Dain… “Come, come Shinkofthedusk… come…” The voice echoes, but is at the same time subtle and soft… “Come.”
* * * * * *
A last thought drifts through Valfein… “Damn… I hope I actually killed that #^@$%&…”
*END
*END!
I am le Roche! Malamala Stay tuned!
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