Never Let Me Go - 11/05/2023 - Mendel Recounts
May 13, 2023 15:46:28 GMT
Velania Kalugina and Yinmaris like this
Post by Andy D on May 13, 2023 15:46:28 GMT
A tale featuring the; smith, tinkerer, mason, and all around Clan Crafer superstar, Mendal Vultan, where, as part of an adventuring party, he journeyed forth to the northernmost point of Kantas in search of a stolen book.
The adventurers discovered the book in a wizards’ tower, and learned that this was no ordinary book. It belongs to an evil and powerful being, one who was locked away from our world, but is no longer chained. The book is, Alatar’s Cobalt Codex!
The Morning After The Journey Far North
Daring Heights - The Dwarven Quarter
Residence of Mendal Vultan, Kavel Castiron, Dr. Archie Haltur
The Kitchen
“Sounds ominous, this plane-shifting door stuff. Shame the big man’s in Port Ffirst and we can’t quiz him about his adventures with Gerhard,” the Dwarven man said to his friend, and housemate, Archie Haltuhr, a Human Scrivener Wizard.
“No. But, I will try to call on Orianna in her department of the Academy before I get on with my own research. I believe she is romantically involved with Gerhard and might be able to shed some light on what her fella is involved in these days.” After telling Mendal his plan, Archie held his tea cup up to his mouth, took a sip of tea, and awaited the inevitable interrogation.
“So. Doesn’t seem like you brought me back any fucking mithril, does it? I can’t see an ore-like bulge hidden in your fancy suit, or in your messenger bag here.” Mendal kicked the underside of the kitchen table where Archie’s messenger bag rested to amplify his point.
Before responding, Archie blinked slowly and took in a deep breath before letting out a sigh.
“No. I did not. Like I told you, a fist-sized sample of the mithril was given to Professor Quillis, and Calla rather greedily took the remaining amount for herself. I would have brought you some. But there wasn’t any left for you.”
Mendal’s mouth turned up into a scowl as he tapped the table with anger. He took a deep breath in, and then let the air out. His mouth returned to a more neutral position.
“Alright. I’m sure you did your best. And I won’t bring up again the sheer audacity that I, the eldest of the house, was sent - sent! - on a mission to retrieve a magic book, when I would have much preferred your journey to the Plane of Minerals.”
“well... thank you for not bringing that up again,” Archie interjected, earning him another one of Mendal’s scowls. “Perhaps we could go to the Plane of Minerals together some time, and get you some mithril?” Archie suggested.
“Oh. No nevermind,” a more appeased Mendal responded. “No. Don’t worry about it. I’ve got my adamatine armour. Mithril is a poor man’s adamantine. It’s for those who wear armour as jewellery to sneak around with, instead of protection.”
“Some Book or Whatever” - Mendal Vultan
“So, I was at the Temple of Selune. I met Seraphina, who you also have worked with before, right Archie?”
“Yes. I visited one of the farms with her. She acquired a Pot of Awakening there. I do hope her little green friend is enjoying the temple?”
“Didn’t see another Juniper there (Archie’s own Awakened Shrub). I saw a chap, Yinmaris, Eladrin bard - I guess? Kavel mentioned him once, I think? There was also a tiny person, Bella; Fairy with dragonfly wings and lots of sharp points. Oh, and a bloody child”
“Aarocokra? That’s Egg, isn’t it? Kavel’s Ice Hockey friend?” Archie inquired, remembering a story Kavel told them.
“That’s right! The very one. I met two of the moon sisters he told us about as well. The one that can hold a sword accompanied us north, and the prophetic one gave us advice about fighting fiends as if she was recalling a text she’d read. Didn’t see the other one - the more diplomatic one. But, Lyra, poor girl. These are sisters, triplets, and yet whilst Aries is like a girl of her age, Lyra needs looking after as if she’s a child. Seems like Selune crammed the poor girl’s brain at birth with so much religious crap, she can barely function. I bet Selune had to give Lyra not one but two sisters to ensure she was looked after!”
“Well that’s terrible,” Archie agreed, “I think your assessment of Selune’s actions and reasons may be reductive if they are correct, but nevertheless it can’t be easy for the girl. But, what about the tome? Seraphina, if I recall, is on a holy quest to recover a tome that was guarded by her order. But, it was stolen, right?”
“Yes, some book or whatever - at least, that’s what I thought at the beginning. I thought, ‘here we go again!’ Some god wants to feel important. So, said god gets one of their clerics to protect some allegedly important holy book. Now, the book’s never going to be used for whatever reason - a lot of nonsense really. But, I guess it gives the cleric something to do, and they’ll feel like they're contributing to the faith in an important and meaningful way. Meanwhile, clerics of Moradin, like me, are crafting meaningful items that will actually be used by the faithful and the public at large.”
Archie nodded politely. Internally though he was thinking, ‘here he goes again taking shots at other gods, while praising his own, who seems content to let Mendal be the most perfunctory cleric I’ve ever seen.’
“Okay, but Lyra, through prophetic means, told you where you needed to go. So how did you get there, what did you find?” Archie asked, in an attempt to pull Mendal back to the story.
“Oh, well, Portal Plaza, obviously. But before we went, people were doing their own preparations. Since we were in a temple, people seemed to find it necessary to listen to the choir and pray. I grabbed Egg, told him not to mind all that crap, and uncle Mendal transferred his Blessing of the Forge over to the little man’s armour. I couldn’t let the little bugger go on an adventure without doing something to keep him safe.”
“Well done, Mendal. That’s a fantastic use of your divine gifts,” Archie said, very happy to hear of his friend’s good deed.
“Well, I had to, didn’t I? Wouldn’t be right not to. The lad is a rather good ‘egg’ so to speak. Not like that Mittens kid you’ve told me about - he’s a Fireball accident waiting to happen.”
The Wizards’ Tower
“Now this is why you should have been there instead of me Archie. We found the…” and Mendal paused to put emphasis on the next word he said, “wizard book, in a wizard tower! And in the absence of a wizard in the party, it was I who casted the Identify spell on this bloody great sarcophagus.”
“Okay,” Archie relented, “perhaps I will go up there some other time and see if my extensive reading can’t shed some light on the tower’s history. How did the casting of Identify go?
Before Mendal could respond, Archie interjected with a thought.
“Wait! Didn’t you mention that the basement of the tower was full of water, ten feet deep? If the sarcophagus was under water, how were you breathing during the ritual to cast Identify?”
“I stood on top of the sarcophagus so my head was above the water.”
“... a bit sacrilegious, no?”
“Whatever. I had to cast the spell somehow. Oh by the way, the bloody tower was in an appalling state. Whatever wizards used to be there did a shit job of looking after it. Terrible waste of good stone.”
Ignoring the dig at wizards, Archie pressed Mendal for the result of the Identify spell.
“Right well, again, you should have been there since there was this funny symbol on the tomb, which Lyra had presciently alerted us to back in the Temple of Selune. But, anyway, I felt a lot of fucking magic coming off of the sarcophagus; abjuration, enchantment, conjuration, and obviously - who didn’t see this one coming - necromancy. This was the tomb of Alatar - meant to hold and summon the bugger. It should be sealed, and obviously - it wasn’t. There was some weird black matter under my feet spiralling round the tomb too. Then this wizard woman came to mock us and scared the living shit out of us, too. She seemed to have more wizard juice in her than you - fuck knows how powerful this Alatar guy is?! She admitted to Seraphina that she was the one who stole the codex from Seraphina’s sect. The wizard was scary - mind you; also pretty sexy. How come the evil ones are sexy, and the good ones, well - look at you - you’re old.”
“Oh shut it Mendal. Stay on track. Tell me what she did that made you think she’s powerful?”
“Well, Bella tried something magical that I couldn't see. The wizard woman saw it though. Egg tried to loose an arrow into her; she deflected it. Bella tried a spell, turns out she’s not just about pointy weapons. But, the wizard laughed it off, and in response blasted us with a necrotic explosion that bloody hurt. I managed to catch most of it on my shield. Bella went splat into the water, and seemed to be paralysed. Her tiny body sank down behind me - and it shouldn’t have, because Seraphina casted the Walk on Water spell on all of us.”
“I see, that is powerful. I can’t even think how one would accomplish that one up manship of magic. Normally you dispel magic, you don’t suppress it by bulldozing your own spell over another.” Archie made a mental note to add magical suppression to his list of items to research.
“I scooped Bella back up out of the water and gave her some divine healing. I daresay, had I tried to smite the wizard with searing magic, she probably would have laughed it off. She disappeared, the others followed, and from what I gathered, Yinmaris had to beg for our lives.”
Who is Alatar?
“So, she left, which meant we had time on our hands to explore the tower. We found some loot. The gold will be used by some of the others to research this Alatar person. We found some pretty decent items too, I made off with a potion of Hill Giant Strength - I won’t tell Kavel. I don’t want to hear about how Stone Giants - his supposed kin - are somehow better than Fire Giants. Fire Giants are clearly the best Giants, since they are smart enough to develop pretty decent crafting skills.”
“Famously, Cloud and even more so Storm Giants are reputedly the strongest,” Archie said, disagreeing with Mendal. “ I’ve read that in books detailing Giant social structure, or if you will, the Ordning.”
“Whatever.”
“So, you had a long wait before one of the Plaza’s attendants could teleport you back?”
“Yes, so whilst everyone was feeling massively dejected; for not retrieving the book, and escaping death by wizard, I got on with some crafting courtesy of my artisanal blessing. I made Aries a better sword - sort of an apology for fucking up the Magic Weapon spell I was planning on casting on the sword she brought. I also made some silvered arrows for Bella - hers looked shite. I gave some of the arrows to Egg too, trying to cheer him up a bit.”
“That was good of you.”
“After I was finished with the rituals, I asked Seraphina why her lot didn’t just burn the bloody book instead of locking it up? Makes sense, right? I assure you, as Moradin’s best artisan and devotee, Moradin would have been okay with me chucking the book into the fire to feed the forge.”
Archie raised an eyebrow in response. “Despite your reassurances that you are Moradin’s favourite divinely blessed servant, I do struggle mightily to believe you.”
“I fucking am.”