Vilus releases Marigold's hand from the device and the ships disappear, "see, now that we know, we can move on. Hm? Nothing keeping us here but a crummy old shop. Let's go save Samir and Mal's home."
As Vilus turns his back on the group he finds his hand reaching out to the device, of its own accord. He is curious anyway. If anything has changed, he needs to know, there could be more, there's a buzzing in his mind, a compulsion, but he can fight it if he wants...
Suddenly the world turns black. The air is cold, and the only sound is of... waves lapping against wood.
Wait, no. The world isn't entirely black. Everyone's eyes adjust to the darkness. No... that isn't right either. In a moment of jumbled confusion, Malachi, Ashley, Joren, Samir, Vilus, and Marion realize they are all sharing one disembodied awareness. There is another there too. Marigold. Just as confused as the rest.
Above, there are pinpricks of light. Stars. And far in the distance, there is the faintest sliver of orange light over a curved horizon. But the light doesn't bleed up into the sky as much as it should. It's like the night is pressing back against the light, compressing the sunrise into a thin line.
There are silhouettes' in the water, black on black, easy to miss. Ships. They are all around, and in a strange formation. In the front, they form a V formation, but behind that, there are others forming an ring. People can now be made out, all identical to either Jon Shep or the human half of Marigold's face once stripped of the mask. They go about their work efficiently, but in revolting silence. The ocassional glint of starlight reveals heavy chains skimming the water, leading from each ship in the ring to a spot in the center, right below the awareness. There is a structure there. An impossible boat in the shape of a tower, being both dragged and stabilized by the chains to the surrounding ships. The tower is in the shape of a sharp spike of black wood that looks more like charcoal the timber. And floating several feet above the tower is a teardrop of dull black metal the size of a house.
There is something akin to a terrible heartbeat within that metal. The awareness experience a dull tug towards it. Some part of Marigold being drawn towards it, even as another part recoils. The heartbeat goes still, as if sensing it is being observed.
Then the vision is over as jarringly as it begun.
(Wisdom or Dex save to keep your feet as you find yourselves back in your bodies)
Malachi looks up in indignation at Vilus “What do you mean crummy old shop? Why,Talmouth’s Treasure Chest will have only the finest in collectibles and rare items, once we get it up and running..”and then Malachi’s world goes black.
Malachi regains his senses, staggering to maintain his balance, breath ragged from the vision. “What…what just happened? Did you all see that, the invasion fleet, the tower? Did you feel the..” he pauses, struggling for the right words. “It felt like it was alive, like it knew we were there.”
Vilka takes his hand from the machine, and looks around, he begins helping Ashley and Samir back up off the floor, bit he seems dazed, like his thoughts are elsewhere "sorry I... It was like a compulsion. I knew I could fight it but, curiosity got the better of me... The watcher wanted us to see that. The tower... Could it be Rasmus itself?"
The thought is punctuated by quiet sobs. Marigold. It is odd seeing the wooden half of her face the more expressive one, as the wooden tendrils of her face scrunch in a facsimile of anguish.
Ashley staggers to her feet as Vilus helps her and Samir up. She wipes her brow and looks to the ceiling again, wanting to see the stars. "I.. I don't know. Or was it the floating object? Either way, we need to recruit more people, this is way beyond just our little group. Why do you think the watcher wanted us to see that? I still can't tell if the watcher is on our side or not?"
She looks down at Marigold, but doesn't know what to say.
Joren's teeth are bared in an animal snarl. In his anger at the vision, he almost forgets to help his companions to their feet as he ordinarily would.
"I am not seeing how that could be anything but Razmus. The dull metal shape hanging above the tower. The vile, beating heart of that angry, evil god. Being uncertain whether Vilus' Watcher wanted us to see that, or wanted to see it for themselves through us. Through Vilus."
He takes a deep breath, regaining his composure. "It is seeming beyond us, and yet... what was causing it to change course with its fleet? Seemingly our actions. It is seeming as we are having three choices. First, heading north through the Veil mountains to head off the main fleet somehow." Joren grins fatalistically at the thought of marching into the Veil once more. "Second, heading south to head off the two ships bound seemingly for the cities of the Venn canal. Or third, remaining here to face the clandestine organization whose peril Vilus' warnings would have us flee from."
"No matter which path we are choosing, you are having my blade at your side, always. Yet there is remaining one more thing here with the Hydaelym."
He turns to Marigold, gruffly attempting to comfort the sobbing half-arboreal woman.
"Councilwoman. I am sincerely hoping that is the last you ever sense of... the abominable deity I think we were just seeing. It has turned away from Talmouth for now. May it be staying that way. We are needing your other half, now."
Gently but firmly, Joren maneuvers her so as to position her left, arboreal hand towards the Hydaelym. Wondering how he will feel to see red...
Ignoring marigold, Vilus searches his mind to try to answer Ashley. "I... I think it wanted to show us to guide us, I've been frustrated, aimless since we took down that ship. This is direction, right? It's possible that it just wanted to observe the tower and used me and the machine like a beacon. But I don't know...
As for if it on our side, I don't thinks so. It's not on rasmus' side either, it observes. A neutral party to this war with the ebb and the flow and the apogee... Though it makes sense that it wants to continue watching, continue it's purpose. If there is less to watch, if Rasmus succeeds with wiping out a continent as they had planned, does that weaken the watcher, with less to observe? Either way I'd trust a neutral party over the words of one who had been controlled" he states that final word casting a quick glance to Marigold, a little malice on his words as he looks away and listens to Joren, "I'm game for one of the first two, Rasmus is a threat to the wider world, delirium will stay within the bounds of the city consolidating their strangle hold here, that battle can wait."
Samir almost staggers as he comes back to his feet, gripping tight to the hand offered him. "What in the devil..." He shakes his head, as if trying to clear away the vision. With his glasses in one hand and the other rubbing at the bridge of his nose, the scholarly half-orc puts his shoulder to the nearest wall, letting it take his weight for the moment as he peers at his companions. "I cannot see how we could hope to stand against such an armada. What we accomplished here was against a fraction of that number, and then only with the help of the city and its people. Against that we have no hope nor chance." He sighs, slipping his glasses back in place. "Regardless, I must return to Madurst. I cannot abandon my home to the machinations of these monsters."
With Marigold's other hand placed atop the device, a speckling of red dots, nowhere near as numerous as the blue was, appear in Cambria, with some concentrated in the cities, but a handful of others appearing out in the plains and farmland between towns in the interior.
"I have memories of horrible things that I have done, and while part of me feels agonized over them, the part feels nothing. But the worst part is..." She sniffs, "I know the part of me that cares isn't real. I'm... not Marigold. I killed her. I am a monster in her skin. But I still hold her pain..."
"we can make that pain stop permanently, if you will it" vilus says, this time with more reverence than malice, what life is this woman going to live anyway, surely the group would grumble at him less if marigold wanted a quick exit.
"Madurst, sounds good, I'm on board, we need more help and that's as good a place as any to find it... It's a direction, and direction is what we needed, anywhere away from here is... Well, it's better."
Malachi steps forward and places his hand on Samir’s shoulder. “It’s not much of a choice, I like our odds against two ships better than a fleet, and that presence in the tower. And it’s home.”He steps forward and rubs his hands together eagerly “We’d best get started then. We need to arrange travel, it looks like we have a bit of a head start. I don’t fancy the idea of crossing the mountains again, but I bet our friends at the docks can help arrange passage by ship. Can we get out of the sewers now?”
Samir manages a pained smile at Malachi for a moment. "Yes, please. I think a ship is our best bet. I cannot know for certain but I would think that the ships the cult is using are perhaps built more for capacity and long distance. If we can find something instead designed for speed, it may give us a chance."
Marigold's eyes go wide with fear at Vilus' offer. She cringes and covers her face, while several roots tug towards the ground as if instinctively trying to find purchase. "Please, no!" Then softer, "Despite it all, I'm afraid. Every part of me is afraid to die. I don't know where something like me goes after..." She cries again, feeling wretched for her selfishness. "I can tell you about.... About..." She struggles to get her next words out, meeting resistance from within.
Vilus leans against the wall near Marigold, he hadn't gone for his dagger as Marigold's refusal doesn't come as a surprise for him. Disappointing maybe. But he grunts in acknowledgement and acceptance. "Go on, fight it, no one's going to hurt you, but you have to make sure that thing doesn't have a hold on you anymore... You have to fight it."
Ashley nods as Samir and Mal talk about going home to assist there. "Of course that's where we will go next! And yes, the sooner the better."
Turning to the half Marigold half tree, "What can you tell us? It looks as though the new part of your body wants to stay down in the sewers, want us to let it make you become part of the landscape here?"
"He... RAZMUS!"She shouts, louder then she intended, like the word was ripped from her mouth. "Sorry, he is... int that vision. You are right. He is, or an avatar of him is, within the vessel we saw. He is coming, and he will not stop until he has REVE- revenge. We- they will likely go to the twin cities and send one ship up the Venn Canal to the Khirian Dynasty while the rest of the fleet heads north to subvert the goliath war mages to their agenda. Please, I don't want to be left alone. Though perhaps it is just. Maybe it is best. Just..."
She looks around herself as much as she can and shudders. "Maybe it won't be so bad." A tear of sap beading in her wooden eye exposes the lie.
As soon as Joren sees the red lights appear across Cambria, he asks Samir if he can borrow parchment and pen as he begins to transcribe a makeshift map of these other glowing traces of those who embody the Red Huntsman's Ebb has he does. Even hearing of Razmus' plans to manipulate the Khirian and Khorianian empires, both, he merely grows tense, but continues his faithful transcription. But one word Marigold utters gives him pause.
"Revenge." It is an idea that Joren's whole life in exile has skirted around since he left. An idea that he has studiously avoided, despite his anger and recrimination. Gone are the gentle, gruff tones the soldier has used when speaking to the broken, arboreal woman. Joren's voice is toneless and flat.
"Revenge, being for what? And against whom? Against everyone? Cambria especially? Against the Blue Lady or Red Huntsman perhaps?"
"The Blue lady... Red Huntsman... Yes, that would be what you call them. Gods, BETRAYERS! Creators. Two pillars of the Trinity. Together they banished the third. I do not know why. I only' know Razmus' rage."
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Vilus releases Marigold's hand from the device and the ships disappear, "see, now that we know, we can move on. Hm? Nothing keeping us here but a crummy old shop. Let's go save Samir and Mal's home."
As Vilus turns his back on the group he finds his hand reaching out to the device, of its own accord. He is curious anyway. If anything has changed, he needs to know, there could be more, there's a buzzing in his mind, a compulsion, but he can fight it if he wants...
Vilus' hand slams onto the device.
"No, not moving on quite yet, Vilus," Joren begins. "We can still be using it to show us resonance with Marigold's arboreal red side..."
A look of puzzlement bordering on annoyance crosses the echo knight's broad face as Vilus smacks the Hydaelym with his hand.
"Is it that you are wishing to also see the... purple dots? For your Watcher? If so, I am seeing the sense in that. But do not be damaging it."
Joren readies himself to attempt to physically stop Vilus if it looks as if the goliath's intention is to harm the Hydaelym (or to harm Marigold).
Inge(Barbarian2): Krayveneer's After the Fall | Seri(Cleric1/Sorcerer1): Uhtred's Windward Isles | Xarian(Fighter1): NioNSwiper's Tyranny of Dragons
Dyson/Eleo(Cleric4): Vos' Beyond the Veil | Soren(Druid5): Bartjeebus' Ravenloft | Nivi(Rogue4): Raiketsu's CoS
Joren(Fighter6): NotDrizzt's Simple Request | Toa(Barbarian6/Fighter4): MrWhisker's Dark Lord's Return
Suddenly the world turns black. The air is cold, and the only sound is of... waves lapping against wood.
Wait, no. The world isn't entirely black. Everyone's eyes adjust to the darkness. No... that isn't right either. In a moment of jumbled confusion, Malachi, Ashley, Joren, Samir, Vilus, and Marion realize they are all sharing one disembodied awareness. There is another there too. Marigold. Just as confused as the rest.
Above, there are pinpricks of light. Stars. And far in the distance, there is the faintest sliver of orange light over a curved horizon. But the light doesn't bleed up into the sky as much as it should. It's like the night is pressing back against the light, compressing the sunrise into a thin line.
There are silhouettes' in the water, black on black, easy to miss. Ships. They are all around, and in a strange formation. In the front, they form a V formation, but behind that, there are others forming an ring. People can now be made out, all identical to either Jon Shep or the human half of Marigold's face once stripped of the mask. They go about their work efficiently, but in revolting silence. The ocassional glint of starlight reveals heavy chains skimming the water, leading from each ship in the ring to a spot in the center, right below the awareness. There is a structure there. An impossible boat in the shape of a tower, being both dragged and stabilized by the chains to the surrounding ships. The tower is in the shape of a sharp spike of black wood that looks more like charcoal the timber. And floating several feet above the tower is a teardrop of dull black metal the size of a house.
There is something akin to a terrible heartbeat within that metal. The awareness experience a dull tug towards it. Some part of Marigold being drawn towards it, even as another part recoils. The heartbeat goes still, as if sensing it is being observed.
Then the vision is over as jarringly as it begun.
(Wisdom or Dex save to keep your feet as you find yourselves back in your bodies)
Malachi looks up in indignation at Vilus “What do you mean crummy old shop? Why,Talmouth’s Treasure Chest will have only the finest in collectibles and rare items, once we get it up and running..” and then Malachi’s world goes black.
Malachi regains his senses, staggering to maintain his balance, breath ragged from the vision. “What…what just happened? Did you all see that, the invasion fleet, the tower? Did you feel the..” he pauses, struggling for the right words. “It felt like it was alive, like it knew we were there.”
Vilka takes his hand from the machine, and looks around, he begins helping Ashley and Samir back up off the floor, bit he seems dazed, like his thoughts are elsewhere "sorry I... It was like a compulsion. I knew I could fight it but, curiosity got the better of me... The watcher wanted us to see that. The tower... Could it be Rasmus itself?"
The thought is punctuated by quiet sobs. Marigold. It is odd seeing the wooden half of her face the more expressive one, as the wooden tendrils of her face scrunch in a facsimile of anguish.
Ashley staggers to her feet as Vilus helps her and Samir up. She wipes her brow and looks to the ceiling again, wanting to see the stars. "I.. I don't know. Or was it the floating object? Either way, we need to recruit more people, this is way beyond just our little group. Why do you think the watcher wanted us to see that? I still can't tell if the watcher is on our side or not?"
She looks down at Marigold, but doesn't know what to say.
Joren's teeth are bared in an animal snarl. In his anger at the vision, he almost forgets to help his companions to their feet as he ordinarily would.
"I am not seeing how that could be anything but Razmus. The dull metal shape hanging above the tower. The vile, beating heart of that angry, evil god. Being uncertain whether Vilus' Watcher wanted us to see that, or wanted to see it for themselves through us. Through Vilus."
He takes a deep breath, regaining his composure. "It is seeming beyond us, and yet... what was causing it to change course with its fleet? Seemingly our actions. It is seeming as we are having three choices. First, heading north through the Veil mountains to head off the main fleet somehow." Joren grins fatalistically at the thought of marching into the Veil once more. "Second, heading south to head off the two ships bound seemingly for the cities of the Venn canal. Or third, remaining here to face the clandestine organization whose peril Vilus' warnings would have us flee from."
"No matter which path we are choosing, you are having my blade at your side, always. Yet there is remaining one more thing here with the Hydaelym."
He turns to Marigold, gruffly attempting to comfort the sobbing half-arboreal woman.
"Councilwoman. I am sincerely hoping that is the last you ever sense of... the abominable deity I think we were just seeing. It has turned away from Talmouth for now. May it be staying that way. We are needing your other half, now."
Gently but firmly, Joren maneuvers her so as to position her left, arboreal hand towards the Hydaelym. Wondering how he will feel to see red...
Inge(Barbarian2): Krayveneer's After the Fall | Seri(Cleric1/Sorcerer1): Uhtred's Windward Isles | Xarian(Fighter1): NioNSwiper's Tyranny of Dragons
Dyson/Eleo(Cleric4): Vos' Beyond the Veil | Soren(Druid5): Bartjeebus' Ravenloft | Nivi(Rogue4): Raiketsu's CoS
Joren(Fighter6): NotDrizzt's Simple Request | Toa(Barbarian6/Fighter4): MrWhisker's Dark Lord's Return
Ignoring marigold, Vilus searches his mind to try to answer Ashley. "I... I think it wanted to show us to guide us, I've been frustrated, aimless since we took down that ship. This is direction, right? It's possible that it just wanted to observe the tower and used me and the machine like a beacon. But I don't know...
As for if it on our side, I don't thinks so. It's not on rasmus' side either, it observes. A neutral party to this war with the ebb and the flow and the apogee... Though it makes sense that it wants to continue watching, continue it's purpose. If there is less to watch, if Rasmus succeeds with wiping out a continent as they had planned, does that weaken the watcher, with less to observe? Either way I'd trust a neutral party over the words of one who had been controlled" he states that final word casting a quick glance to Marigold, a little malice on his words as he looks away and listens to Joren, "I'm game for one of the first two, Rasmus is a threat to the wider world, delirium will stay within the bounds of the city consolidating their strangle hold here, that battle can wait."
Samir almost staggers as he comes back to his feet, gripping tight to the hand offered him. "What in the devil..." He shakes his head, as if trying to clear away the vision. With his glasses in one hand and the other rubbing at the bridge of his nose, the scholarly half-orc puts his shoulder to the nearest wall, letting it take his weight for the moment as he peers at his companions. "I cannot see how we could hope to stand against such an armada. What we accomplished here was against a fraction of that number, and then only with the help of the city and its people. Against that we have no hope nor chance." He sighs, slipping his glasses back in place. "Regardless, I must return to Madurst. I cannot abandon my home to the machinations of these monsters."
With Marigold's other hand placed atop the device, a speckling of red dots, nowhere near as numerous as the blue was, appear in Cambria, with some concentrated in the cities, but a handful of others appearing out in the plains and farmland between towns in the interior.
"I have memories of horrible things that I have done, and while part of me feels agonized over them, the part feels nothing. But the worst part is..." She sniffs, "I know the part of me that cares isn't real. I'm... not Marigold. I killed her. I am a monster in her skin. But I still hold her pain..."
"we can make that pain stop permanently, if you will it" vilus says, this time with more reverence than malice, what life is this woman going to live anyway, surely the group would grumble at him less if marigold wanted a quick exit.
"Madurst, sounds good, I'm on board, we need more help and that's as good a place as any to find it... It's a direction, and direction is what we needed, anywhere away from here is... Well, it's better."
Malachi steps forward and places his hand on Samir’s shoulder. “It’s not much of a choice, I like our odds against two ships better than a fleet, and that presence in the tower. And it’s home.” He steps forward and rubs his hands together eagerly “We’d best get started then. We need to arrange travel, it looks like we have a bit of a head start. I don’t fancy the idea of crossing the mountains again, but I bet our friends at the docks can help arrange passage by ship. Can we get out of the sewers now?”
Samir manages a pained smile at Malachi for a moment. "Yes, please. I think a ship is our best bet. I cannot know for certain but I would think that the ships the cult is using are perhaps built more for capacity and long distance. If we can find something instead designed for speed, it may give us a chance."
Marigold's eyes go wide with fear at Vilus' offer. She cringes and covers her face, while several roots tug towards the ground as if instinctively trying to find purchase. "Please, no!" Then softer, "Despite it all, I'm afraid. Every part of me is afraid to die. I don't know where something like me goes after..." She cries again, feeling wretched for her selfishness. "I can tell you about.... About..." She struggles to get her next words out, meeting resistance from within.
Vilus leans against the wall near Marigold, he hadn't gone for his dagger as Marigold's refusal doesn't come as a surprise for him. Disappointing maybe. But he grunts in acknowledgement and acceptance. "Go on, fight it, no one's going to hurt you, but you have to make sure that thing doesn't have a hold on you anymore... You have to fight it."
Ashley nods as Samir and Mal talk about going home to assist there. "Of course that's where we will go next! And yes, the sooner the better."
Turning to the half Marigold half tree, "What can you tell us? It looks as though the new part of your body wants to stay down in the sewers, want us to let it make you become part of the landscape here?"
"He... RAZMUS!" She shouts, louder then she intended, like the word was ripped from her mouth. "Sorry, he is... int that vision. You are right. He is, or an avatar of him is, within the vessel we saw. He is coming, and he will not stop until he has REVE- revenge. We- they will likely go to the twin cities and send one ship up the Venn Canal to the Khirian Dynasty while the rest of the fleet heads north to subvert the goliath war mages to their agenda. Please, I don't want to be left alone. Though perhaps it is just. Maybe it is best. Just..."
She looks around herself as much as she can and shudders. "Maybe it won't be so bad." A tear of sap beading in her wooden eye exposes the lie.
As soon as Joren sees the red lights appear across Cambria, he asks Samir if he can borrow parchment and pen as he begins to transcribe a makeshift map of these other glowing traces of those who embody the Red Huntsman's Ebb has he does. Even hearing of Razmus' plans to manipulate the Khirian and Khorianian empires, both, he merely grows tense, but continues his faithful transcription. But one word Marigold utters gives him pause.
"Revenge." It is an idea that Joren's whole life in exile has skirted around since he left. An idea that he has studiously avoided, despite his anger and recrimination. Gone are the gentle, gruff tones the soldier has used when speaking to the broken, arboreal woman. Joren's voice is toneless and flat.
"Revenge, being for what? And against whom? Against everyone? Cambria especially? Against the Blue Lady or Red Huntsman perhaps?"
Inge(Barbarian2): Krayveneer's After the Fall | Seri(Cleric1/Sorcerer1): Uhtred's Windward Isles | Xarian(Fighter1): NioNSwiper's Tyranny of Dragons
Dyson/Eleo(Cleric4): Vos' Beyond the Veil | Soren(Druid5): Bartjeebus' Ravenloft | Nivi(Rogue4): Raiketsu's CoS
Joren(Fighter6): NotDrizzt's Simple Request | Toa(Barbarian6/Fighter4): MrWhisker's Dark Lord's Return
"The Blue lady... Red Huntsman... Yes, that would be what you call them. Gods, BETRAYERS! Creators. Two pillars of the Trinity. Together they banished the third. I do not know why. I only' know Razmus' rage."