A Literal Calling - 21/04/2022 - A Kavel Perspective

Kavel - The Polearm Master

I had just exited one of the City’s four main gates. There weren’t many civilians near me on the road, so I started doing one handed mace drills with my lovely chakan poleaxe. I spun that two-handed weapon around like I was doing cheerleading baton twirls and it weighed nothing. I can do this, not only because of my immense strength, but I’m so very talented with the poleaxe.

When I think back to the many times I wielded this poleaxe in battle, and felled many tough foes, I am impressed with myself. I don’t want to appear vain, but just revisiting a memory of my skillful, brutal poleaxe swings is very enjoyable for me; remembering the event itself, but also just the skill and talent - the mastery you might say - are moments of happiness for me.


The Runaway Library is Back!

There it is again.

A huge building. 100ft cube, sandstone. A circular pillar at each corner, and the entrance an overlapping archway of doors sized for small folk all the way up to gigantic folk, with two golden terrasques decoratively holding up the roof, on a mosaic of white and blue stones.

This time the library is outside the western gate of Daring Heights, the Stonegate. I walked up to the entrance. Unlike the first few times the library teleported into the Dawnlands, the entrance was locked, but I guess the Runaway Library is familiar with Dawnlanders now that the occupiers are happy to have an open door policy for them.

On the door was a notice, it read:

> Hello World!
>> The Runaway Library needs help.
OR (was it our caretaker?,
Is there a difference?,
Where's the boundary between humans and constructs?)
>> Our sparring armour sets told me there's a big strong adventurer that can help.
OR (was it a small scrappy adventurer?,
Was it an adventurer?,
Is there like a register with all adventurers?)
>>>> Abort
#Oh, never mind, the more the merrier! Can you please drop by and help us out?#

> 01010100 01000001, Cyanne. <3

Strange note. But, without wishing to sound conceited, I’m 100% certain that ‘big strong adventurer’ is referring to me. But who is the ‘small scrappy adventurer’? I thought to myself.

I looked to my right. Someone else was reading the note, a middle-aged, gruff, no-nonsense human male who has a very powerful (scary) psychic sword by his side. I’ve seen him use it, and this human paladin is not afraid to add copious amounts of smiting magic into his sword attacks - again no-nonsense.

“Comrade Grimes! Hello. What do you make of this note?”


Comrade Grimes

My cigar-smoking comrade explained that as a Sergeant of the City Watch he always likes to keep an eye on strange developments happening in his city, like for example a large library appearing out of nowhere.

I explained to comrade Grimes that the library is okay. The Greenhouse inside with displacer beasts is shit, but the Armoury is a great place.

We went inside. No Chonk to greet us. I hope he wasn’t sulking about not being allowed to eat the cherry pies again.

Amongst the many Dawnlanders in the Main Hall, there were three I recognised… one of them was squinting though…


Thicc-Boi Lite

Comrade Kelne seemed to be having eyesight problems. It seems they were on the same mission as comrade Ivan when he suffered his back problems. Did Varga damage her ribs on the same mission? Well, Varga nor Ivan of the Thicc-Boi crew were here, just Kelne, our honorary barbarian. We were lite on Thicc-Bois today.

Comrades Celina and Derthaad were here too. I last saw Celina here with Kelne and Derthaad when we got Chonk, the cherry pies he wanted so badly. I still can’t see Chonk - we might need to look in the goliath-unfriendly corridor to the cafeteria again.

Kelne, I last saw at the birth of the Thicc-Bois. Comrade Derthaad, the junior sergeant of the two present, I last saw very recently. I was with him, Varga and Ivan - more than half the Thicc-Bois, and we met a frustratingly thicc’er boi than all of us, who massacred the entire village of Greenleaf. We failed to bring justice to the people that day. It was very disappointing… were Thicc-Bois not the answer that day? Maybe it was a good thing there were fewer of us on this day?

Junior sergeant introduced the senior sergeant to Kelne and Celina. Sergeant Grimes’ eyes squinted like Kelne’s eyes when he heard the words ‘apple shop owner’ when Derthaard introduced Celina. I’m pretty sure Grimes’ eyesight is okay, but funnily enough Derthaad does the same thing with his eyes when he’s talking to Celina.

Though Chonk was absent, there were reminders everywhere of the rules of the library; don’t take any books outside, don’t annoy the flumps and leave before the third bell.

We discussed the note on the door and decided to go to the Armoury. Celina casted her Unseen Servant Barry to help guide Kelne.


Armoury Re-visit

Ha ha! The Metal Bros waved us in! They remembered me, and also Celina and Kelne. These living metal suits of armour are tough, and they gave me the chakan poleaxe - they are very awesome!

It looked like they were having an arm wrestling competition, and one of the Metal Bros was holding a book which had dwarven writing on it. Derthaard said the title read, ‘The Art of Stonehand - Dwarven Fighting Techniques’.

The bros wanted a fresh challenger, so I sat down at the table and put my arm and body in position. One of the Metal Bros faced me.

I checked with Derthaad if he’d be good to use his Mending cantrip to repair the table - last time I arm wrestled someone, the impact of our arms on the table, meant we ended up smashing the stone table we arm-wrestled on. The Metal Bros had a wooden table set up here. Derthaad said he had my back.

Derthaad was not needed.

I could not move my Metal Bro opponent’s arm by much, no matter how hard I tried. I felt I was at peak strength too. But, slowly, inch by inch, the back of my hand hit the table, and I had lost.

The other armoured bros applauded, which was nice. I congratulated the Metal Bro who beat me. No verbal response of course, they can’t speak, but they gestured appreciation and gratitude for the challenge. They also gestured something while pointing at my arms, which I understood as using my strength against me. Fascinating! I wanted to stay in the armoury and learn more.

A loud voice was heard from a box at the top of the wall by the armoury door:

“All adventurers, please proceed to the Herald”

I sighed.

I waved to the Metal Bros, and said we’d go check out what was happening in the Herald, and I’d be back as soon as possible.


The Herald - Not the Armoury

There are a lot of journals in this tower room. There was a gelatinous cube, large, teal coloured reading a journal with her two big eyes. This large cube also had bagpipe pipes sticking out of her back. Then there was Chonk - and he looked sad. We had found Chonk like this before, when Cookie wouldn’t let him have any cherry pie. It is a bizarre sight to see a sad mimic the size of Chonk with his upper half a treasure chest with multiple eyes and his lower half all pseudopods But, this time he wasn’t sulking - he looked unwell.

Kelne went to say hello to Chonk, and Chonk did not recognise them - not for the first time, Chonk doesn’t seem to ever remember us even though we are regulars at the library. Kelne couldn't get an answer from Chonk why he was sad. I suggested cherry pies for Chonk. Kelne went to ask the gelatinous cube why Chonk was sad.

The gelatinous, blue-ish cube introduced herself, and her voice emitted out of the pipes on her back. This was Cyanne, and from her voice, it was clear she was the one who left the note at the library entrance and asked for the adventurers to come to this room.

Kelne and Celina were fascinated with Cyanne’s bouncy gelatinous form. Cyanne allowed them to poke her. Kelne wanted to see if they could bounce on top of her - she allowed this. Kelne began a run-up to jump on top of Cyanne, who was about as tall as me. I was not expecting Kelne to make the jump, but well done to them, and Cyanne managed to bounce them to where Kelne could touch the ceiling.

Cyanne explained that Chonk was ill, and she was looking for advice in the medical journals here.

Derthaad tried his Lesser Restoration spell, and whilst it helped Chonk, Chonk was still very sad. Cyanne advised the problem was that Chonk had visited her brother in the library’s Laboratory too many times.

Kelne tried to consult her goddess Tymora, like I’ve seen her do before, but she couldn’t make a connection. They also asked if the journals had anything on magical blindness, Cyanne said she would help them research the issue, once we had dealt with her brother.

Grimes asked for a description of the brother. Cyanne said he was bigger than her and darker, and his name was Joon - wasn’t a fan of fire or divine magic.

So, it seemed we were going to the Laboratory…

To get to the Laboratory we had to go past the Armoury. I stuck my head through the door and told the Metal Bros that I’d just be a few more minutes.


The Laboratory - Also Not the Armoury

The room was poorly lit. We could not see anything except for a green light on the left and a red light coming from the right. Me and Derthaad went left towards the green light through some bookshelves, and Grimes, Celina and Kelne (and Barry) went right through some more bookshelves to approach the source of the red light.

There were tubs of liquid in the lab where Derthaad and I emerged. I didn't have a clue what was going on here. We found a giant contraption as well, which I was also clueless about. Derthaad detected conjuration magic from it and said it was a very old and defunct teleportation device. We heard Kelne announce she would cast True Seeing on themself, since they could see nothing with their cursed blindness. With the spell cast, Kelne said she could see a large, red crystal sculpture behind the shelves and guided the others to it. Kelne then joined Derthaad and I, and we all saw the source of the green light - it was one of the tubs, full of fluorescent matter. We could also see over the teleportation device, to the far right hand wall, the source of the red crystal sculpture, as Celina, and Grimes behind her approached it.

Celina dodged a dark ooze as it dropped from the ceiling.

“Get out!” A voice from a dark patch on the ceiling said, above the crystal structure. The dark shape then reformed on the ground by Celina, into a huge, collapsed and dark cube shape with multiple eyes on it.

“I think we found the brother,” Grimes said.


Joon - Least Favourite Gelatinous Cube Met in the Runaway Library

I quickened my breath, and entered a battlerage. Chakan poleaxe in hand, I dived over the broken teleporter and ran towards Celina and Joon. Joon reacted very quickly and threw a large amount of acidic slime at me. I thought I dodged it, but he got me pretty good. Luckily my body is so very well conditioned; because I got a lot of the acid on me. It burned and hurt a lot. I think a lesser humanoid would have died immediately without my constitution and battlerage.

I looked at myself sizzling. I then looked at the chakan poleaxe… oh no. The gold plating was melted and the edges of the weapon had been permanently damaged.

I could hear Derthaad’s voice from the centre of the room, he asked Joon about Chonks. Joon responded by crafting a Chonk-like person from out of himself, and it stood next to me.

Grimes must have seen all he needed to see from my smouldering body, as he unsheathed his psychic sword, imbued it with divine magic and slashed Joon twice with mighty force. Joon was very tough, these slashes would have felled anyone else. But Joon remained standing, and retaliated by spraying poison from his body at Grimes and Celina. Celina managed to dodge half of the splatter aimed at her, but both my comrades looked a little sluggish in their movement as the poison took effect.

“You’re just like my mother, aren’t you!” Joon yelled at us.

I could hear Kelne from behind me explaining to Derthaad that they could attempt to remove Joon from the room with magic, leaving the Chonk figure alone. I could see magical energy emanating from Kelne and striking Joon. This I believe was the Banishment spell, but while it looked like it would take, Joon shook the spell off at the last moment, and he remained in the room.

“Why don’t we stop and chat?” Celina asked Joon. I felt very suggestible to Celina’s suggestion, but Joon did not, so Celina changed her approach and let her Dancing Rapier lose from its sheath and let it strike at Joon, but the poison was having an effect on Celina, as Joon easily dodged the attempted thrust of the rapier’s point.

Damaged weapon in hand, I still brought it round my head and swung it with reckless abandon at Joon two times, before pulling back and thrusting with the poleaxes point. I landed all three attacks solidly. My polearm mastery was on full display. But, even combined with the immense damage comrade Grimes performanced - Joon did not look very injured. Joon, worryingly, was an immensely tough, huge slime. Joon smiled at me after the final attack hit him. He received more injury from comrade Grimes, but it seemed, I wasn’t sure, Joon was more impressed with me?

“Just like my mother! Think you can control me!” Joon lashed out with his poison splatter attack at all of us in the front line. Grimes got a full splatter, as did I. My tough body gritted out the poisonous pain. Grimes’ armour unfortunately did not prevent him from taking full damage. Celina, with her fast reflexes, managed to dodge half of the splatter.

The replica Chonk beside me then smacked me with a couple of its pseudopods.

“Chonk! What are you doing?” I asked, perplexed. I guess this might not be the true Chonk.

A reprieve in the punishment Joon was dealing to us was provided by comrade Derthaad’s magic. I hadn’t seen him do this before, but he created a wall of magical force around Joon, his Chonk replica and the immense red crystal structure Joon was… protecting?


Bargaining With Joon

“Can you help us with Chonk?” Derthaad asked, with Joon firmly behind his magical, transparent barrier. Derthaad informed us we had ten minutes of his spell, and also asked Joon about the broken teleportation device.

“Not mine. Mothers. She took me away from home! I was put in charge of this lab. And Chonk! I’ve been eating his memories. They are here in this crystal,” Joon said pointing behind him.

“Joon”, Kelne tried to persuade him, “can’t we be mates? Come on, we need Chonk’s memories back so he can get better?”

Derthaad joined Kelne in the diplomatic approach. Joon made us an offer.

“If you want that idiot's memories back, I can give you the crystal that contains his memories, but I’ll want some food in return. Memories for memories!”

We wondered if breaking bits of the crystal ourselves would work… we were, however, unsure which bit to break off.

Derthaad courageously offered up some of his own memories. I was not aware he had a squad - maybe like my Iron Strong Bros - before he arrived in Kantas. He said he lost them, and he was offering up these memories to Joon. Joon callously dismissed the offer claiming those memories would only feed him for a day.

“I need more memories than lost friends. I need skill. I need something earned over a long period of time. Fighting knowledge would feed me!” Joon said all this whilst looking at me. I guess you can’t absorb divine magic through memories, but you can absorb fighting techniques, and Joon seemed to have fancied polearm mastery ever since I attacked him.


Thicc-Boi Faces a Tough Choice

“Okay,” I began, “so for example, if you took my polearm mastery from me… I would forget the times I smashed this chakan poleaxe into enemy heads. Like how I smashed a demon’s head clean off?”
Joon responded that I would lose the muscle-memory and understanding of the technique. Swinging any polearm would feel foreign to me. I would retain the memory of smashing the demon, and all such memories, but it would be as if I was watching someone else perform those moves from very close range.

Derthaad warned us we were coming close to when his Wall of Force spell would end. We needed a plan of action.

Kelne and Grimes were considering an option that didn’t involve bargaining away our memories. Grimes tried to slice off a sample of the huge crystal, but his sword glanced right off it.

We asked Joon why he couldn’t be like his sister, who sustains herself through reading knowledge, but he insisted they were different, and he prefers eating memories.

I looked at my damaged chakan poleaxe. Even damaged, I could feel the potential it has to inflict damage when I choose to swing or thrust the weapon in different ways. The many ways of inflicting pain with it in my control was so embedded in my brain, the many ways came to me instantly. How could I possibly forget these memories when they were so engraved in me? They were put there through years of practice, and were earned the hard way; through time and effort, and never quitting.
If I gave away my polearm mastery knowledge and all its memories, in exchange for our friend Chonk’s memories returned… I would lose skill that took me ages to develop, and I would not see the same possibilities I see, when I look at the poleaxe now in my hand. The poleaxe would simply look like a foreign object, and right in that moment, I could hold the poleaxe and feel not just proficiency with the weapon, but mastery. There weren’t many people who can claim mastery of a weapon, like I could. It may be arrogant to say so, but it was true.

Derthaad warned us time was almost up with the Wall of Force and it was a very high level spell for him to cast, so he needed to know what we wanted to do. I asked my comrade if he could recast the spell. He looked at me, and he agreed to do so. We had another ten minutes to form a plan.

…

“I would still retain the memories of all I’ve done with every polearm I’ve ever used?” I asked Joon to clarify for me.

Joon said I was correct. Removal of the memory of the skill, would not mean removal of all the memories that go into using polearms. The visual memories will remain, but the visual memories will not be accompanied with the memories that would allow me to replicate effortlessly the same skill, since the skill will be removed and form a red crystal that Joon can add to his huge crystal.

“Why not rebrand?” Celina offered a business suggestion, “lots of people have lots of terrible memories they wish they could forget, because when they remember them they feel bad, and they get stuck in negative emotion. If you offer to eat those memories for sustenance, you get the food, and the customers no longer have the negative emotion?”

The idea actually interested Joon, and to be fair, it did sound like an interesting proposition for him. But, as he reminded us, this proposition would not satisfy his hunger right now, and if we wanted Chonk’s memories, of which Joon had many, then he wanted something equal in return, like my polearm mastery.

The clock was once again ticking on Derthaad’s Wall of Force, and Joon, much to our dismay, had proven himself to be immensely powerful. We were not confident we could defeat him, and even then defeating him meant losing access to Chonk’s memories.

The situation reminded me of the previous week’s failure. We had to walk away from the person, Slaughter, who massacred and destroyed the villagers and town of Greenleaf. We brought no justice to the people that day, and we were lucky to walk away. Joon’s crimes were lesser than Slaughter's and definable as memory theft, and identity theft. But, for me atleast; bargaining with him now felt like a bigger defeat than facing Slaughter.

“Your magic will subside soon, what will you feed me for Chonk’s memories?”

“Alright you son of a bitch!” I shouted at Joon, “... just the polearm mastery. Not the memories of the performed actions.”


Offer Accepted

Joon knocked on the Wall of Force. Derthaad dispelled the magic for him. Joon then placed a limb-like extension from his body onto my head. It felt painful. I hate psychic pain! I felt a sucking feeling where Joon’s limb made contact while holding my head. Eventually, a satisfied Joon stopped and removed his limb from me.

I looked at the poleaxe. I felt it had a name that went in front of it. Derthaad reminded me - if ‘reminded’ me was even the right word - that the word I was looking for was ‘Chakan’. This memory did seem to form for me. Derthaad asked me about smashing a demon’s head in the Angelbark forest. I remembered it! But, as I swung the poleaxe, I swung it how I remember to swing a maul or warhammer. The weight and shape of the ‘chakan’ poleaxe was… new to me. It was done. Joon had absorbed my polearm mastery memories, and I saw him put a new red crystal into the huge crystal structure behind him.

Joon extracted a different red crystal from the large structure and handed it to me.

Poleaxe in hand and red crystal in the other. We walked out of the Laboratory and back to the Herald, and in my hands I felt like I was holding not one, but two objects that were foreign to me.


Crystal for Chonk

Cyanne registered the red crystal in my hand. It was to her shock how large the crystal was. The size of the crystal was commensurate with the size of the memories inside it. Cyanne, she admitted, knew Joon must have been stealing Chonk’s memories, but until this moment, she was unaware how much Joon had stolen. Cyanne asked if we hurt Joon badly? Ha! We wished. I certainly did.

Cyanne instructed me to feed the crystal to Chonk. I went over to him, and knelt down beside him.

“Chonk. It’s me, Kavel. Look, I have a cherry pie for you. You love these.”

Chonks could not remember that he liked cherry pies, but he agreed to eat the red crystal anyway. As soon as he was done, he looked up at all of us, and said:

“I remember all your names,” Chonk pointed at us and correctly recalled all our names, and said, “and you’re right Kavel; I do like cherry pies.”

Chonk, of course, could not remember who Grimes was, because they had never met before, so they introduced themselves.

Chonk started to remember many things. Chonk told us a little about his mother. Kelne confirmed with Chonk’s that Chonk’s mother was the boss of the library.

Chonk’s took us to a portrait of his mother. We saw many wizard portraits on the way, but the one of Chonk’s mother showed a halfling lady sitting in a wheelchair performing magic. In one of her hands, Chonk pointed out, she was holding a baby Chonk. In the halfling’s hand was a small box, with a small pseudopod sticking out.

When I realised how much more aware of things Chonks was, I warned him, “Chonk you have to stop going to the Laboratory for your own good,” and whilst I was a little strident with my advice to him, it was pleasing to see him fondly enjoy the memories he had regained.

“So, are you feeling better now Chonk?” I asked, as Kelne went to hug one of his octopus lower limbs.

“Yes I am much better now. I remember so much. This was the best cherry pie I’ve ever had.”

Chonks hugged Kelne back, and brought me in for a hug too.

Afterwards, I told Chonk I should probably return this ‘chakan’ poleaxe to the Armoury.


Returning of a Chakan Poleaxe - Finally Back to the Armoury

Chonk joined us in the Armoury and chatted in a sign-language to the Metal Bros.

“You’ve made friends here, Kavel,” Chonk told me.

I handed back the poleaxe to one of the Metal Bros. They took it, and observed the acid damage and how ruined the weapon was. I was mildly embarrassed.

I wasn’t sure entirely what I lost, since I no longer have the memory, but I did know I just lost my primary weapon.

One of the Metal Bros tapped the dwarven book they had in their hands from earlier in the day, and Chonk explained:

“Kavel. The Metal Bros want to teach you Stonehand Fighting Techniques - the secret fighting arts of the Dwarves. They have a book, and they are proficient, and they feel you - their friend - will benefit from a crash course instructional.”

I was overwhelmed with a feeling of joy, and I believe relief.

I was also very excited! I was ready to start, and I appreciated that the Metal Bros, perhaps without realising it, had helped me not to linger on the negative feelings about what I had lost; by giving me something to look forward to and pursue.

I would not attempt to remaster the polearms - Stonehand Fighting Techniques were my way forward!


At the Cafeteria

I was so excited, walking through that goliath-unfriendly corridor to get to the Cafeteria didn’t bother me.

Grimes had a chat with Cyanne about what Joon had done, and Celina mentioned her business idea for Joon. Cyanne agreed she had to keep people out of the Laboratory and keep control over Joon.

The library would be staying here for an extended week, which would give the Metal Bros time to train me. Cyanne suggested Kelne come back during the week too, and she would help them research their condition here.

Chonk offered to tell us more about the library and his mother if we wanted to hear more. Kelne was up for this, and I would join during training breaks.

Cyanne rewarded us with a magic scroll, potion and 200gp worth of books - which we could take out of the library, ignoring rule number one as an exception.

Chonk had something too, specifically for Kelne. Chonk presented his little brother, Chump, who was a mimic shaped like a backpack, and wanted to explore outside the library, but needed a friend. Chonk asked Kelne to look after him, and they happily agreed.

This was a challenging day. I lost something today, but with my Metal Bros help, I’m going to replace what I’ve lost, and move forward in a new direction. A new direction where I apply my strength in a different way.

Training starts tomorrow, and I’m looking forward to it. I’m going to be a master of Stonhand Fighting Techniques.