PeaceKeepers of Northmorrah

Vin stands by the window of Ömertyr’s backpack, his gaze fixed in the direction of Vox’s isle. The "excitement" of his academic exchange with Ginro has been replaced by a cold, leaden weight in his gut.

"It’s not a shield", he murmurs, more to himself than the room, though his voice carries a sharp, urgent edge. "It’s an engine. We aren't just fighting an Astral Dreadnought and a Lich and her army, we’re fighting a tide that grows with every drop of blood we lose. The moment one of ours falls within that aura, they aren't dead. They’re just... recruited. It has to be taken down, and quickly. Should we help with that first?", he asks, his voice raising slightly although it is maybe. not clear whether he is talking to himself or everyone else.

He turns back to the group, his expression grave. His time in Ginro’s lab stirring concoctions and filling in the thousand-year gaps of material history felt like a peaceful lifetime ago. Even the memory of the playful Xorns chasing a flustered Neferox feels like a dream compared to the logistical nightmare of a field that auto-reanimates the fallen.

He looks at Elthana as she makes her request. He remembers the outcome of her last attempt all too well.

"I will watch over you, and provide some help to focus your mind", he says firmly.

"Stay strong of mind and will", he whispers. "See what we need to see, but remember where you are and who you are. And who you have with you, backing you up".

Muir who hasn't been able to put the book down he borrowed from Elthana pauses long enough to provide support as well "Oh yes support....Definitely...The cosmos can tell us of terrible omens or boons! I can commute with my notes and see what can be foretold to support your well being." Muir spouts word salad offering a d6 of support

The room within the mount provides ample space for all to keep watch and Elthana settles into a comfortable seated position in the center of the room, Gewyn begins strumming a soothing melody to aid in the cause, Vin and Neferox both keep a vigilant watch for any change in body language or look of discomfort in their friend, and Muir summons a star map to provide some divine assistance. Elthana, going into a meditative state begins to see...

(Elthana you can give me a wisdom save at advantage adding the relevant benefits from the group)

Elthana sits and with all the benefits that the group allow her she seems to go into a trance. Unmoving for a long time, ten minutes, twenty, thirty, and then a look of panic crosses her face as she seems shocked by something. Neferox growls as Elthana shoots one leg out straight in some kind of reaction, still perfectly sound in her trance, but then her eyes begin to slowly open. Her face in a wickedly sinister smile though she doesn't seem fully conscious.

Vin has been holding his breath for the better part of thirty minutes, his eyes tracking the minute tremors in Elthana’s hands. When her leg shoots out and the growl ripples through Neferox, he knows it has gone wrong.

But he freezes when her eyes open, that smile sending a shiver down his spine.

"Elthana?" he whispers, his voice low but sharp, cutting through the heavy silence of the chamber, his gaze searching for any flicker of his friend behind that sinister mask.

"Elthana, listen to my voice", he says more loudly, hoping to reach her consciousness. "Come back now. Fight her!".

His eyes flick briefly to Neferox, then back to his now possessed friend. He is ready to act if she turns violent, but for now, he is fighting a war of wills. "You have no place here, Nivara", he hisses, his voice hardening. "Give her back, you hollow...", he growls, stopping short of cursing. "For every moment you spend here, know that Elthana is there", he adds, trying to make her at least a little uncertain.

"Elthanaaa..." The eyes remain unfocussed but the word comes out clear and amused tone, toying with the name as though it is some mere fakery. "She has certainly grown stronger, I would expect nothing less from a fragment of my soul... but there is nothing she can do there that will prevent the inevitable. Her stolen life will come to an end along with yours if you plan on helping her..." It is an odd horror watching the words, thick like treacle and not at all in Elthana's mannerisms, coming from the possessed face of a friend. "...none of you can kill me in a way that truly matters, but why would you want to? Eternal life for all is what I offer, and the price is merely your friend. How can you deny every humanoid that? What gives you the right?"

Muir actually pauses. Thinks. Which is perhaps the worst possible response to a villain's monologue.

"That is...not an unreasonable question on its surface," he admits, and he sounds genuinely troubled by it. "Eternal life for all. Who does have the right to deny that..."

He trails off, something working behind his eyes not allowing himself to be outdone by an undead monster.

"Except that I have seen what you offer. I have walked through forests where nothing rots. Where the dead things simply...stand. No decay, no return, nothing feeding what comes next. It is not life you are offering." His voice finds its footing. "It is an insult to it. Every creature that has ever lived is part of a great unbroken chain of return. You would snap that chain. For everyone. Forever."

He looks at Elthana's face and his expression carries something between grief and resolve.

"That is what gives us the right."

"HA!" She spits out her derision toward Muir, "YOU. The righteous Muir, the only one in you group to practice necromancy willingly, you would sit there and judge. You do not have the courage to stand by your own convictions or you would have let Vin die, you would not have dragged him back from the claws of the raven and celebrate your little victory if you truly believed in your chain..." She settles slightly. Slowly dragging the outstretched foot back into a cross legged sitting position but it looks like it pains her. "You are right that the cycle that binds you is certainly a chain. One that I will break, because I mean what I offer, it will not be the form of undeath that you have seen... No, people will own their souls and not owe the raven anything, a freedom from these tyrants that decry their own divinity and demand to be worshipped, what is your reward for your begging? Your children dead by disease, your poor starved, your lives snuffed and stifled by oppressive hands, your parents tortured and killed. This is your chain..." She lets her point lie for a moment before smirking "This is what you fight for. But your courage is carried like a babe with a broken toy, fiercely but without understanding. These realms do not need saving by the likes of you, they need fixing..."

The accusation lands and Muir doesn't flinch away from it. He sits with it for a moment, and when he speaks his voice is quieter than before.

"You are not wrong." He exhales slowly. "Vin's thread was cut before it was finished. I tied a knot." His eyes find Vin for just a moment. "That is not the same as unraveling the loom."

He turns back to Elthana's face. "But there is a difference between a man who steals bread because his child is starving and a man who tears down every granary in the world so that hunger becomes meaningless." His voice finds its footing again. "I broke the chain once, in grief, and I will answer for it. Not to any god. To the earth itself. I do not defend the gods, Nivara. I do not defend the Raven Queen. What I defend is older than her and it does not need her permission to be true. Everything that has ever lived has returned to something. The forest floor is built from it. That is not a chain. That is the world breathing."

He looks at her...really looks at Nivarra....and when he speaks again his voice has lost its edge entirely.

"You are afraid of losing someone again." A quiet pause before unleashing this whopper "Like your brother."

Vin remains rooted to his spot, coiled and ready, though the threat of immediate physical violence seems to have been replaced by a surreal battle of words. He listens as Nivara uses his own brush with death as a bludgeon against Muir, feeling a hot spike of anger at being reduced to a convenient talking point in a Liche Queen's grand manifesto.

His jaw clenches. It feels absurd, like they have suddenly stumbled into an academic debate club rather than a desperate fight for their friend's soul. A monster is sitting in front of them, casually wearing Elthana's face while trying to justify the destruction of the natural order, and they are trading philosophical theories. He opens his mouth, ready to cut through the grandstanding, end the debate, and demand Elthana's return.

But Muir’s steady voice holds him back. He watches his companion absorb the accusation without flinching, returning the volley not with anger, but with an unyielding, grounded truth.

Then comes Muir's final, quiet strike. Like your brother.

Vin snaps his mouth shut, the retort dying on his tongue. He recognises a mortal blow when he hears one. Not of steel or magic, but of raw, personal history aimed directly at the cracks in the Liche's armour. He holds his ground and his silence, keeping his eyes locked on Elthana’s face, waiting to see how the hollow queen reacts to having her own ancient wounds ripped open.

The eyes roll forward finally coming into focus as Nivara gains full control over Elthana's body. She sneers ever so slightly at Muir's words. "My brother was not a special case. It happened over a thousand years ago, but situations like his have happened every day since. It is needless and unnecessary. Done only to sate a mad god. Your lives are so short and precious to you, but you celebrate the delivery of yourselves into the mouth of death like cattle, brainwashed into thinking that this is the only way... The forest will continue to breathe if the ones tending to it never die, the granaries will not be struck down if no one had need for Hunger to begin with, your logic is a flawed excuse that merely wears a guise over the attachment you have to death..." She begins to stand, knowing that any violent action taken against her will only harm Elthana's body. "I had hoped that you could see things the way I do."

Vin’s jaw remains tight, his eyes never leaving the possessed form of his friend, but the shock has been replaced by a cold, sharp-edged frustration. He has heard enough of the grand monologue.

"It’s all grand hyperbole, Nivara", he says, his voice cutting through her philosophical posturing. "Fine words, but they fall apart the moment you look at the detail. You talk about ending hunger, but what is your actual plan for the population explosion? If the cycle stops and the breathing ends, where do you put the people? Do we just stack them to the rafters until there's no room left to move? And if no-one is eating vegetables and meat, what about the plants and animals, where do they go?"

He stays his ground, despite the urge to strike. "And what does this 'immortality' actually look like? Can you still feel hunger, only you’re denied the release of death? What happens when a man is crushed by a fall or mangled in the wheels of a carriage? Does he live with those injuries forever? I saw a play once back in the day—Death Becomes Her. It was about two women who couldn't die, but their bodies were nothing more than broken, painted porcelain; walking nightmares of twisted limbs and rot. Is that your gift? Eternal life in a shattered jar?"

He huffs a short, humourless breath, his eyes narrowing. "You say your brother was not a special case, but whatever happened to him certainly seems to have driven you insane... or was that something else? Was it the centuries of solitude, or just the weight of your own ego that finally snapped?"

He hisses the last words, his contempt finally boiling over. "If you’re as invincible as you claim and we’re as 'puny' as you say, why are you cowering in the skin of our friend? Why the games? Why the shadows, the clones, and the duplicates? A true power doesn't need to hide behind a hostage to make its point".

He leans in, his voice dropping to a dangerous, low growl. "Stop messing with her. Give Elthana back, step out of the shadows, and let us come to you. Give us the chance to show you exactly how 'weak' we really are".

"you've been getting nothing but chances. Boy." Now fully stood she pulls out Elthana's ki blade and admires the razor edge on it. "The missing piece simply requires this body to perish and the fragment of my soul to return. I could have simply slit her throat the night when I took over on Ginro's isle, but instead I gave you a chance. None of these issues will be a problem when I am ascended. Undeath will be mine to sculpt as I wish. Sterile, maybe. Rotting and broken bodies, never. Hunger, if you wish... The problem with Nectyran is greed, hoarding souls for power and for all that he found himself trapped in a cage. One of you should know all about that" she glares pointedly at Neferox. "You call this insanity, it is motivation and understanding, the reaches of which are not out of your grasp if you simply try..."

Vin takes an involuntary step back, entirely unsure as to what to do.

"I assume you didn't because you aren't sure what would happen, which piece of soul would remain in charge if you are in the vessel that dies", he suggests, hoping beyond hope that it is true and she won't just end Elthana right now.

"And of course, there is the matter of us simply undoing your handiwork".