Important facts and tidbits

[yukonhorror]

I already put some stuff in the OOC post about this, but here is a place where we can jot down notes that we don't want to get lost in the 100's of posts in the OOC and AA threads.

my contribution:

matchless gang no likey church of champion. Brigands and thieves they are. However, the church also attacked us, so who knows who is good and bad.

Two matchless gang members exited the bookstore before we first met Duvek.

Matchless gang members were mainly avandrists as is the magus (apparently).

Hieromonk second-in-command at church and wants his daughter taken out of the temple secretly. She may refuse, but it is Karu's charge to do so. Acquaintance of Nemzpan, and decided to not go on his expedition to Lake Izzmarg. Finally, he was field testing weaponized dolls like the one we fought with the magus (which had avandra's symbol on it)

Izzmarg Fortress- ruins up in mountains, highlands N of Beiston, follow east of the Izzmarg Flow (a tributary of the main river)

Duvek is bookstore runner, polon is his son, polon is also an apprentice of the magus, and frommizenthrop (sp?) is a messenger for weary (the ghost librarian).

Polon set off to try and stop the Twilight's Tryst (maybe) and seems to have formed a warlock's pact.

The teleportation room needs a key word (which we found) and components (which are in the closet)

Eirin Tuwi was a fey creature part of the unseelie court (evil feywild court) who demanded a sacrifice of a fey being (poor myn) in order to help the magus perform the Twilight's Tryst. Might have to deal with her directly.

Waselawa was an ancient bard and is an ancient omen of doom for the mound. Mostly superstition from my assessment, and not to be dealt with directly.

Rogur was on a ship that was transporting sensitive material (a very heavy chest) that Cresta (possibly alive) and the magus attacked to recover the item.

Radimoth is a Torog follower and the current Vogt.

Heguman (main dude from church) is dead.

Heiromonk was supposed to raid a gambling joint of the matchless gang. Unknown status, but daughter is unaware of his location too.

Church's responsibility to guard Montane (large forest area to NE). It is dangerous and houses spirits. A halfling asked Duvek about the deep woods or the montane and went there. Morgran has info regarding the temple's association with the Montane, but it mainly concerns Myn.

[Cocoa]

In no particular order, here are important tidbits from the paper-search in the Magus' room, after the fight.

One is from Umi, attributed to Akaysha:

After a few minutes of sorting, Akaysha looks up, and announces to the group at large, "It would take a day to work out the details, but I can tell from this much that these are notes for a magical working that's as much a contract as it is a spell. She was trying for something far beyond her measure of power over the arcane, and needed the assistance of others not of this world to make it happen. Those that she called out to, I imagine," she licks her dry lips, "if so, it could be a calamity she's brought down on us. They are not to be dealt with, under any circumstance." She speaks the last sentence as though she was reciting a rote lesson from childhood.

--------------------

And this is Yrisz's translation of the papers:

As Ariellana gets more passionate in her discourse, Yrisz wilts a little and even accidentally backs into the stone table at one point. Seeing this Ariellana offers a quick apology, which Yrisz gladly accepts.

Reclining a bit on the stone table she explains, "I honestly don't know if the Twilight's Tryst was cast or why it was cast here. If Erszebet is to be believed then it was done with perhaps a day ago. I can't be of help on what day it was when Polon brought me here as I haven't been marking the days in general during travels. Bieiriz saw to those kind of practical things I'm afraid." Yrisz blushes at such a confession.

"As for what ritual Polon was working on," her mouth twists as she tries to remember, "he told me it was agricultural in nature and had to be completed before the passing of the Path of Storms. It very well could have been the Twilight's Tryst, or at least part of it, as he seemed unhappy with its direction. That's partly why he wanted me to look at it. I didn't get the feeling that he was a dodgy sort of fellow at all, though Bieiriz has pointed out that I've been wrong on that count before, like that awful lord who wasn't."

On hearing Tanglar's unhappy grunt, Yrisz moves to where the homunculus fell and carefully rips strips of cloth off its already ruined skirt. "She was quite a beauty, oh, that's Saint Avandra's," she says pointing to the doll's left cheek.

[some stuff omitted]

she settles down next to where Akaysha has laid out the Magus's papers offering her some of the contents of Rogur's water skin. Quickly her face begins to contort in confusion and stays that way as she painstakingly translates the Primordial passages for Akaysha.

Occasionally Yrisz stops her translating to blurts out questions. "Does Eirin Tuwi sound fey to you?" That question aimed at Ariellana. "I think E had to kill an elf or eladrin to make her new fey ally (Eirin Tuwin?) happy. E didn't want to kill Duvek because Polon would be quite wroth with her really. Does "Blood of the Moon" mean anything to anybody? E says that will work, for the sacrifice maybe?" Yrisz looks down to her own Lady's symbol almost in question.

"Does anybody know where Lake Izzmarg can be found? It definitely seems on everybody's mind. Something about an expedition that might head that way." That question to nobody in particular.

To Akaysha, "Who do you suppose this Cresta is E keeps mentioning? Perhaps a friend or rival, both maybe? I think that E thought C had already made a Doll like Rose," she says indicating towards the ruined doll. "I named her Rose because of her inlay, you see. Perhaps the Twilight's Tryst was a bargain to make something better than Rose, but I don't understand why E would kill so many people for some THING. I must be reading too far into things; Bieiriz says I do that a lot."

Sighing she says as she slowly translates the Primordial text for Akaysha, "All these names that mean naught to me."

"Look," she says pointing at one particular passage. "E says, this awful, she says 'or just kill them all, bring up Waselawaya and let all those disgusting people drown' What could she mean by that!" Yrisz gives the passage time to sink in before translating on.

Thoughtfully after some more translating, "If I had to guess this Master Nemzpan, who wanted to the Izzmarg Expedition so badly, was actually the High Priest of the Church of Saint Avandra? Do you know that E had Polon looking for relics of that very church, or at least what was left of it. I met him doing exactly that in ruined edge of town, you see." Laughing, "Oh look, here's some Hieromonk Krushevx telling Nemzpan that he can't go on the the Izzmarg Expedition. What is this scandal that happened on the Vodlaian Archipelago that affected people here?" Yrisz frowns at Akaysha.

Pointing to one Primordial journal page, "Here's something about an Imareska that "she" obsessed with. I think the "she" is actually C as E seems to be quite obsessed with what C thinks of things...I think."

I'll put Rogur's tale in another post.

--------------------

Here are the skill check results about what everything above might mean:

Here's a master list of knowledge, based on the various rolls so far. Anyone who makes the appropriate numbers gets the relevant information. I noted Ariellana's results here, since they weren't rolled in the forum.

Eirin Tuwi
(History, Nature DC 15)
Eirin Tuwi does sound like it might be a name from the Deep Woods.

(Ariellana - History DC 20)
Eirin Tuwi is a naming style in Elven that means "the gibbous-shaped dark portion of an orb that is illuminated as a crescent." It seems to have an ill aspect to it, and doesn't sound like a name that would normally be given.


Lake Izzmarg
(Dungeoneering DC 15)
You have heard in passing the name "Izzmarg Fortress," now ruins that rest on an island in a lake of the same name.

(Ariellana - History DC 20)
"Izzmarg Fortress" is a regional nickname given to a box of tools or objects that is placed somewhere obscure, and because its owner never has a need for it, eventually forgotten about. Izzmarg Fortress is also the name given to ruins that lie somewhere up in the mountains, but even if those ruins are from the time before when Aucothia expanded into the east, why build so far from any pass or inhabited region? What would it protect, and where would it threaten? Are those ruins really of a fortress?

(Nature DC 20)
You have heard of this large lake in the barren highlands north of Beilston. A river from the lake, the Izzmarg Flow, joins the Yu River as a tributary a few miles to the east.


Master Nemzpan
(History, Religion Check under 10)
You do not know this person.

(Ariellana - History DC 20)
Master Nemzpan was the chief priest of the Church of Saint Avandra in Beilston Mound. When the Edict of Evocation was presented and the Church was pulled down last autumn, he went missing and has not been found since.


Radimoth
(Streetwise Check under 15)
You would not recognize this name.

(Streetwise DC 15)
Radimoth is Beilston's current Vogt, a tiefling said to be a devout adherent of Torog, the King that Crawls. He is very diligent in the imprisonment and interrogation of any that disturb the peace, most of the time. The current outbreak of uncontrolled violence is rumored to be a source of great personal frustration to him, frustration he readily shares with any who come into his sphere of influence.


Seelie/Unseelie
(Ariellana - Arcana DC 15)
In the Sealed Lands of the Feywild, the Seelie Court is said uphold the rule of civilization, while rebels and criminals gather under the banner of the Unseelie Court, its twisted mockery.


Waselawaya (History Check under 20)
You do not know this word.

(Ariellana - History DC 20)
Waselawaya is the ghost of a bard that haunts the woerd. She usually appears to herald various events that affect Beilston. It is said she sings a song without words that represents Beilston's fate, and the city will end when she finishes it. It is further stated that if she appears four times in one day to sing all four movements of the song, it will be complete.

---------

Yrisiz has not heard of Acrod or Krushevx.

A montane is a region of alpine forest. Krushevx' letter made clear he was referring to a specific location with that name, but Yrisz doesn't know where that is.

Imareska is the largest city of the east, lying at the mouth of the Yu River. Among its other qualities, it is home to the Vulysen Sisterhood's Aucothian headquarters. Yrisz has never been east of the mountains, but she would know this; presumably the writing's reference to "the Imareska" threw her off.

"Blood of the moon" does not refer to any particular, known phenomenon. There are any number of interpretations Yrisz could think of. For example, Yrisz is a Vulysen Sister, and the Magus was trying to cut her open. That would be one possible way to construe "blood of the moon."

The vellum paper with the repetitive writing is too simplistic to be part of any ritual Yrisz can think of.

Yrisz was not previously aware of any scandal involving the Vodlaian Archipelago.

Based on the intersection between what Yrisz said and the palimpsest fragment revealed, it sounds to Ariellana that Polon was tricked into believing Twilight's Tryst to be a ritual to help in the local harvest, perhaps to bring a good amount of rainfall to the valley.

Ariellana isn't aware of any scandals from the Archipelago making their way as far as here.

For the "blood of the moon," it's the same issue that I described to Yrisz above; Ariellana does not know of any particularly fitting reference for that phrase.

------------------

I realize that the above is rather long, but it's all connected to one set of items, namely, the papers found in the Magus' study.

[yukonhorror]

thanks!

Also, here are some objectives that can slowly be taken off of the list (major ones, not how to's)

A) Find Polon for Duvek
(he might be at the Acqua Alta)

B) Grab Heiromonk's Daughter
(Karu's main tie into the adventure I believe)

C) Stop the flooding
(this one is probably our #1 priority)

D) Find who and why the Rogur's ship was attacked?
(? as in I think that is what Rogur's main mission/hook is)

E) Zephyr's unmentioned and non-urgent mission
(when things cool down, will mention why I came to the Mound. REALLY not pertinent. But may make for an interesting adventure eventually. But he isn't just some dude on a barge.)

F) Did Ariellana have an objective (aside from meeting the bookseller)

G) Myn was escorting his people westward
(not our mission, but should at least return Myn to his people)

H) Other than being a student and victim of the Magus, does Yrisz have some specific goal to be accomplished?

I) Resolve what is going on between the Matchless Gang and the church.
(may happen as part of stopping the flooding)

[Cocoa]

Here are things that seem of interest, mostly from the Magus, Weary and Duvek:

Various bits of information from Duvek, from how he perceives things:

"The new boss? Yeah, she came here about four years ago, the new Magus of the Library. She's a young one, but settled in like she'd always owned the place. The old one was just as dour as the new one is bored-looking, but at least she let us sell what we saw fit....

"The Matchless Gang...they were around before my wife was even born, I would say: a bunch of peddlers whose grandparents were thieves. I can't say I thought much of them one way or the other; just a bit of local color. Last year, though, it's like an ogre snuck into everyone's homes and pummeled their heads while they were asleep.

The room is empty except for the five of you and him. He casts a quick glance to a closed side door in the room, and then continues, "If you ask me, it started when they burnt down the Church of Avandra and the Ward of Tinkerers, last autumn. Everyone lost a little bit of their mind at that point. I don't really blame the ones who did it, though. What can you do when you have a squadron of Bone Lancers telling you it's either them or everyone altogether?

"I can't tell you what part of that got to the gangsters. A fair number of them were Avandrists, or so I believe, but so were a lot of other folks. Anyway, they've started to really carry on since then, and especially they singled out anyone who was a cliens of the Temple of the Great Master. However, as you saw just now, they've been spreading out in who they pester.

"Fortunately, it's just at the level of pestering, or I wouldn't have been so calm about it, back there....

"Careful about speaking ill of the Boss. Her familiar is always lurking around...

"Now, I'm surprised you don't know who burnt down the Church of Avandra. Haven't you heard of the Edict of Evocation? A group of Bone Lancers rode off their barge and into town last year, and rounded up the aristos, the Hospitalers, the Great Master's followers, and any other notables they could grab by the scruff of their necks. The leader read them the Edict in the market square the way you might read the fire beetle quotas to a group of Below-laborers, and then more or less passed around the torches and set them to work. Said the Church leaders were consorting with demons. First I'd heard of it. As it stands, the episcopos was nowhere to be found, and nobody knows what became of him since.

"The church itself went up like tinder. The fire spread to the surrounding ward, the Ward of Tinkerers. The Bone Lancers seemed to know that almost everyone in that neighborhood was a cliens of the Church, so they said to let it burn as well. The Bright-Gold looked like copper when it rose the next morning, just as it will when the forest harvest gets underway. That whole block is called the Ruins, now. There's talk that the Ministry of Works wants to raze what's left to the ground, but right now, there are just too many people sheltered there with nowhere else to take them in."...


By the time [the door opening ritual is] done, midday is close at hand,...

when you arrive, you find the building already occupied with more people than you expected. The bookseller introduces the four missing scribes in a rush: Ogam, Penally, Vist, and Gendoll.

"The Magus sent them out earlier this morning to go look for my son," he says, his face flushed and clearly showing his dissatisfaction with the situation. "I think we can take it to mean that he's not with her now, right? She didn't care to let me know or explain why he left, and none of these fine fellows sought to question her on the matter.

"Why he's not with me, and where he might be, I can't say. I doubt the Magus knows either, but I'm willing to bet staters to chaluns that she knows a good deal more about what's going on than we do. I think," he says in a deliberately calm voice, "I'm going to search for my son.

(We have updates now on the search for his son, and on Polon's possible status. Duvek's wife's name is Iniusy.)

---------------------------

From our encounter with Weary:

A girl, about the same age as the children in the inn, rests upon her hands and knees a short distance from the door. She is dressed in an elegant, but careworn black gown. Her face is pale, almost ashen in the dim light, and framed by bunched strands of long, uncombed, blond hair. She stares fearfully up at Myn, Karu, and the rest of the party crowded around the door with bloodshot eyes.

"I am," she pauses to sniffle and draws in a deep breath, "My name is Weary.

----
As Karu steps into the corridor, the chill in the air penetrates straight through all of her layers of clothing, raising what passes for goose bumps on her skin. She reaches down to extend a hand towards Weary, who winces and shakes her head, rising to her feet...if she had any.

Myn notices it first, followed by the others whose feyborn nature allows them to see more clearly in the shadowy corridor. The edges of Weary's clothing trail off into translucent tatters, beyond which the outlines of the surrounding floor can faintly be made out. This is especially true of the bottom of her gown, which simply fades into haziness.

"I'm not shut in," she says unconvincingly, wiping her eyes, "I work here: I am the librarian. Who are you?"

-----------

"I wasn't sobbing behind the door," she lies, "I have a very important message to tell the Magus, and I couldn't find anyone to deliver it for me, so I was taking a rest here, wondering what to do next.

"The Magus laid the ward last night, and she didn't say why. You said you're going to see her? Will you deliver my message for me?"

----------

"The message is," she pauses and then starts again, "the message is that the Scroll of the Amber Room is missing from the library, and, and I can't find Fromizzenthorp. That's my assistant; he's supposed to deliver messages for me.

"I think Polon did take it," she adds, her voice almost a whisper, "He left before dawn." When it is obvious that you don't recognize the name, she explains, "Polon is Duvek's son, the bookseller's. When I asked him where he was going, he said, 'To see about the Acqua Alta.' Maybe Fromizzenthorp went with him?"

----------

"I don't know what the Scroll of the Amber Room is about," she answers, "I can only read the titles."

We also know that Weary must stay on that floor. And Polon is the Magus' apprentice, though Fromizzenthorp isn't. Fromizzenthorp appears to be Weary's assistant.


------------------------------------

During the battle with the Magus (some of these may be Yrisz talking, but if so, it was in one of Umi's posts):

As the battle began -

"Erszebet, did you notice?" a voice echoes in the heads of Myn, Rogur, Tanglar, and Zephyr, "Mister Fromizzenthorp has arrived."

After Ariellana tried to deliver the messages from Weary and Duvek --


"They didn't come for the Sister. Why were they talking with Weary?" asks the hallucinatory voice.

"Because she is a foolish child, and Fromizzenthorp proved to be incompetent. There are seven, now." says the Magus, lowering her orb. Then, in a louder voice, "Messages from my own servants? What nonsense. Did you come here to die? You all did, didn't you? You came to me so that I could write the last lines of your lives today."

As the Magus starts to retreat --

"Hear me, you Unseelies!" the Magus now shouts in Elven, stepping away from the door and backing towards the burning bookcase, "Elfin blood for elfin blood: deliver Polon, son of Duvek, from the doom of Twilight's Tryst!...

Rogur once again hears a lilting voice in his head, "These too, Erszebet! She's a high elf, and he's got elf in him even though he has no hair. You have to, just to be sure."

The rest of what the Magus said was about the spells she was casting. I don't know about the summoned creatures, but the other stuff were spells that wizards use -- Color Spray (lvl 3 encounter), Storm Pillar, Cloud of Daggers.

--------------------

Here's what Yrisz said about the Magus and the valley-flooding:

"I came here with a boy named Polon to examine a ritual he was working on for his mistress, The Magus Erszebet. He seemed a bit concerned about where the ritual was going and he thought I could help. Do you know if Polon was hurt during all this? He seemed a fair person I thought. I hope no ill came to him."

Yrisz waits carefully for the group's reply before proceeding.

"Erszebet did not seem quite so bad when first we met, though she asked me a whole bunch of somewhat confusing questions. I thought that's how Iouness were really; they probably actually are like that." Yrisz flashes a brief smile.

"After that Erszebet said it was all right for me to help Polon until nightfall, though her eyes spoke of bored disapproval. I didn't think anything of it at the time really. Bieiriz' eyes are often disapproving too, but she usually bruises me a little and then she's fine...."

"Anyway, Polon stepped out for tools so we could get to work. While I waited I decided to poke through Erszebet's things a bit. I thought it would be grand to see a real Magus of Ioun's writings! It's said they see and know everything. I don't really think anybody can know everything, so I wanted to see. The problem was that Erszebet didn't have much on her desk from dear Ioun. Most everything came from the Church of Saint Avandra. I saw a workbook on making a homunculus. I saw her too, the homunculus I mean. She looked like a doll, quite pretty and scary all at once. She had a lovely dress too. The kind you see in the Capital, usually on somebody trying to marry above themselves. That's what my Mother says anyway. Poor doll, she must have been broken during the fight." Yrisz gives the pieces of porcelain and cloth a long look.

"Also, there was a ritual called the Twilight's Tryst. I think Erszebet was trying to remake it from some notes she had gotten from the Avandrans. I couldn't understand most of it, but what I could make of it was that it contacted some pretty awful water fairies to garner their agreement to flood the whole of this valley! I couldn't imagine why someone would want to ever do such a thing really, but Erzebet did..


-----------------

Here's what Karu said about her task:

I came to find you and your friends because Hieromonk Krushevx has set me with a task. He suspects that the Matchless Gang will be attacking the Garden of Preparation. My task is to extract his daughter before the Gang attacks. Krushevx gave me a map of a tunnel that leads to the Garden, but he said the way might be dangerous as it hasn't been used in some time."

and

"The Heiromonk asked me not to take an oath to defend the garden, which is why I left, but his daughter, Lywthast, had already taken the oath at his insistence. He apparently perceives the Matchless Gang to be a real threat to the Garden, and he does not want his daughter to die over an oath she did not want to take in the first place."

Karu pauses almost as if to maintain composure.

"Krushevx did not return from his latest mission. And, previous attempts to meet with reinforcements have been thwarted by the Gang. I fear the worst may have happened. I am honor bound to rescue Lywthast, but the Hieromonk pressed upon me the need for skilled assistance. I ask that you and any of your companions that are willing fight through the tunnels with me this evening."

And that's enough for this post!

[yukonhorror]

Hey cocoa, just a thought. I don't want to sound rude or anything, but can we keep the posts here short and sweet to summarize the important plot points. I ask, because again, I am not a good reader and I get a sensory overload with that much info.

Basically, I was hoping for the cliff notes version of what we uncover.

[Palpatim]

Hieromonk second-in-command at church and wants his daughter taken out of the temple secretly. She may refuse, but it is Karu's charge to do so. Also, she is the Magus's apprentice, so may have info on magus and the ceremony.

Thanks for bringing that up. I'm not sure that she's the Magus' apprentice, though. I remember the male acolytes discussing her at the feast, but I only noticed them referring to her as somewhat unattainable because of her father.

There are two agreed to be prettier [than Lem], but Lywthast is far too dangerous to court on account of her father, and the Magus's Apprentice carries some unspoken taboo for all but a few daring eccentrics in the group.

It's possible that the Magus had two apprentices, but I don't read this to mean that Lywthast is one of them.

Umiushi, can you confirm that there is a female apprentice in addition to the male one we know about, Polon?

--T
--- Merged from Double Post ---
I haven't had time to transcribe everything yet, but here's one take on a wiki solution. I haven't looked at pbworks, yet either.

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campai...ikis/main-page

[yukonhorror]

maybe... I just thought that is how it read. If it so, then DEFINITELY need to edit my in game post.

[Feantari]

Maybe we can keep the first post as a consice summary of the important information? Cliff notes can be useful, but sometimes it is nice to have the details on hand. I realize that unofficially makes yukkon the editor. I've used both obsidian portal and pbworks, either sound good to me. Then we can really get things structured nicely and anyone can edit things.

(I've also used a site called epic words, but it isn't a wiki so much as a campaign info storage place, and at this point I think we have enough info to juggle to justify a wiki (awesome job with details Umi!))

[Cocoa]

I'd love to keep the posts shorter. But I also like to keep one topic all together. Also, I can't make two short posts in a row; the automerge will promptly put them back into one giant post.

I'm not sure which pieces of info will prove to be important; that's why I started by going through the game posts to find the originals.

[Palpatim]

That's why I liked the wiki idea--we can break long topics into separate pages and still link to them from a main page. The Obsidian Portal page I posted earlier isn't there yet, since it's one long post, but it's trivial to break longer pieces (or those that are no longer relevant) out into standalone pages as time goes on. And it has the advantage of not making Yukonhorror the only one to edit the main post.

[Cocoa]

A wiki of some sort is fine with me. I'm also fine with yukon doing a top-post summary, which only he edits. But that's easy for me to say, since I wouldn't be the one doing all the work.

[yukonhorror]

I don't mind updating the main post, but I will always put in a reply when it is updated

I'll summarize cocoa's additions, but maybe on monday

[yukonhorror]

updated the summary in the primary post. Basically added in stuff from the top floor and rogur's info.

[yukonhorror]

You overheard one of the Hospitalers mention a name, "Nemzpan."

quote from umi. I must've missed what this is in reference too (I just scanned Itherlyn's stuff cause of its length), but I'll go back eventually.

What Do You Know About Goblins in Beilston?
(Streetwise DC 15)
There is a mercenary company, The Knights of the Sapphire Dragon, whose members include humans, goblins, halflings, and orcs. These mercenaries are employed by Beilston to supplement the duties of the city guard and watch. The goblins Yrisz saw were probably part of the Sapphire Knights.

[Palpatim]

Here's the relevant OOC post about Nemzpan:

Master Nemzpan
(History, Religion Check under 10)
You do not know this person.

(Ariellana - History DC 20)
Master Nemzpan was the chief priest of the Church of Saint Avandra in Beilston Mound. When the Edict of Evocation was presented and the Church was pulled down last autumn, he went missing and has not been found since.