giraine:summary-266

Summary 266: Victory at the Library (2020-10-31)

I sure didn't see it coming but you won fair and square!

Yomil began casting another, different spell and the Greeter, Scrivener and “Silenced One” noose-bearing wraith vainly tried affecting Boamund and Ahappi. Boamund's attempt to use the Shield's power on the undead came to no avail. You fought the undead knights, knocking one and then another down, as Ahappi invoked his Rejuvenate blessing on Fraud to bring him back to the fight, and then Sir Fit slashed Ahappi in the head and knocked him out, but Fraud returned the favour with his blessing.

Yomil threw his spell, unleashing bands of darkness that sought to choke the life out of you but you all boldly resisted. He began another spell, but the Greeter was cut down by Boamund, then the Scrivener by Fraud, and the wraith by a powerful blow from Boamund. And the knights' fates swiftly followed, too-Fraud hewed the head cleanly off one, and Ahappi split Sir Fit's head open before it could heal from his prior blow.

You rushed Yomil as you finished off your foes, and he finished his spell as Fraud got there- more black cords of throttling death issued from his fingers, and Fraud and Ahappi began choking. Yet it was soon three of you against Yomil, and he took the first wounds you'd dealt him yet. It looked scary when he nimbly glided aside from Fraud's attack, causing that death-blade to overswing and cut deeply into Fraud's leg, knocking him down and stunned. But Ahappi and Boamund pressed the fight and then gave Yomil the final blow that clove his essence open, and he broke into threads of his semi-corporeal being that issued screaming in outrage back out of the Collection, under a doorway to the Flaying Room, soon met by a distant hellish howling.

Triumphant, you gained the book of “Hell for Miguel” clearly bound in his own grim skin, and empty of words like the other books. You grabbed Bog and cut heads off the knights; Ahappi took the bronze force-blasting staff of the Greeter but later decided it was a Godlearner sorcerer's implement and broke it, to be sacrificed to the seas. While Fraud bandaged himself, Boamund explored the Flaying Room of the Bookmaker, finding Miguel's belongings inside an icy mound beside a flaying-table covered in frozen blood. More howls issued from the doorway beyond that room, which you'd never seen into before. Ahappi forced open a door to a small private chamber, met by an explosive magic of intense cold that he shrugged off bravely (it would have frozen his arm to the point of shattering!). Inside he found a coffin-like bed with a table beside it, and what seemed like sound-suppressive magics lingering. The table was inscribed with Law, Magic and Hunger/Undeath runes so in disgust he smashed it with his trident.

Now, regrouping, you considered what to do. With no sign of Miguel's body, you opted to push on into the room you'd never seen, and found that it was some larger ritual chamber with a blue-crystal pentagram and a sacrificial table. But the room was filled with seven worm-ridden undead horses of the Order of the Vengeful Worm, who confronted you aggressively, even attracted by Boamund's invocation of the Shield's power. You retreated to the collection, set fire to the piled books with Boamund's Fireblade, he summoned a Salamander from that fire and commanded it to burn everything except you, and you left through an exterior door from the Flaying Room.

Outside, howling from inside had begun to be joined by growls and other uncouth sounds, and Boamund saw movement from all around as unspeakable things began breaking free of their ice-shrouded tombs in the courtyard. He tried his Shield once more but clearly now it had now power in this realm, or maybe with Yomil's creations. You invoked the Breath of the Dead and snuck out, dragging Bog with you, as an undead horde emerged. And the gates swung open to your touch, blasting you again with frigid, scalding air, but you left and slammed them shut and took the key, so the gates vanished with a final distant howl of the evil horde.

Boamund led you safely through the silent Wormweald back into the Bad Place, where Fraud bandaged Bog back up to consciousness and you hiked to camp in the distance. No pursuit came; there had been no hint of it. In another day, you came to Burnt Priest's Hill, met by patrols outside who brought you with excitement in to visit with The Pontiff, in audience atop the volcanic plateau in a simple covered tent-like encampment with Shoor the Elder of the Sharde clan. You were joined along the way by a curious Narak the Mumbor, who'd become on good terms with the Sharde and was welcomed in to witness your news, and in the camp you met Gertrude and Groad from the Sottogh; and Shoor had a huge, seemingly intelligent Monstrous Toad as her guardian beside her. The frog-fish-faced Pontiff was there, too, and greeted you with much curiosity.

Fraud explained Gratt's words, and the Pontiff reasoned their meaning, then explaining: “This tells us much. Your struggles have not been in vain. We thought Gratt fell to Yomil's power as a martyr and that was the end of him. But alas no, he managed to survive the final battles and steal the enemy's power to leave himself as the final custodian of the imprisoned enemy at the Psychetheca Everlasting. Gratt thus has been trapped bound in torment since, and keeping sole knowledge of what happened before and after the defeat of Yomil, which he would impart only to those who knew the right words.”

[He noted that he felt something had changed with Gratt, and later agreed that your burning of the books had set Gratt's essence free to finally gain Solace]

“But Gratt was no Traitor; he was loyal to the last. I was the traitor, or I am part of the greater whole that is Granno, who betrayed the traitor-saints and Yomil, and used his secret powers to defeat Yomil. The Giranois always knew this came at much cost to Granno; his mind and body were corrupted. He became a Stranger to himself and his people, so lest he betray them too, he martyred himself at Chuck Em Off Point, shattering his essence into a triad: the spirit or sorb that I represent, and then the mind and body. My knowledge of this was incomplete; I did not witness it but Gratt did. And with Granno's self-shattering, so did the knowledge of the three Old Gods become shattered and they slunk off to distant realms; largely hidden by old Arkati magics. I preserve our sacred bonds with them, but the triad of Granno must be restored to bring it fully to bear. And now the way is known, thanks to Gratt's words you recovered.”

“What you call Skeleton Isle is Ye Prisonne of Ye Traitore; where Granno's mind and body ended up. Not in Hell or Solace, but out of Time in limbo between life and death; in a shattered no-place. Only Gratt knew this would happen. Granno's remains rise each Sacred Time to search for the Giranois but there is nothing on that island for him; a search he has repeated for six centuries now. It falls unto the Thralls of Granno to travel thence and find him and lead him back to me hence, where our essence can knit itself together again as a triad and lead the Giranois forwards in this woeful age. All this must be done before Sacred Time ends; before the Boat Planet rises and changes the Hero Wars' course.”

So, the short explanation was that Gratt, surviving the end of the conflict with Yomil, had wilfully made himself into a book (an unthinkable thing to Giranois, who hate the written word; especially books!) and thus was able to eventually tell you the tale of what happened to Granno, since no one else knew the truth; and now with the knowledge pieced together you could go to Skeleton Isle and bring him back.

Discussion then turned to Miguel's fate. You showed the Pontiff the book “Hell for Miguel” and he suggested something. “The Talisman of Granno [from the Gratt clan/Shrett] kept your friend Miguel alive, but transformed. The mud hags are the psychopomps of life and death to us; perhaps they know a way to release him?” But the Pontiff emphasized three times that the outcome of this ancient, near-forgotten ritual was unknown. It would use Seshna's power of Life and Tanosh's of Death, but that could just set Miguel's soul free to Solace. Duly warned, you agreed, and left the encampment to another spot atop the plateau, where mud and ash and pumice bubbled like a cauldron, and the Pontiff had called the grimacing face of Tusynta to manifest. She greeted you and explained the risks again, alarmed that so little of Miguel's flesh remained as that book, and you dropped the book into the mud pool at her bidding. She called out, “By mud we are mothered, to mud we are rendered.” And the Sottogh and other Giranois chanted this in response. “You have fed the book of the man to me. Part will die forever and part will experience rebirth; by Tanosh's and Seshna's powers. Watch. It stirs.”

And a form slowly began to emerge from the mud; as the ashen mud sloughed off it became clearer in form as a Giranois. It was not Miguel in appearance at all- he was massive for a Giranois, sturdily built and hearty, and fair to look upon despite his pallid, wide-eyed, scraggly-haired features. The Pontiff declared that Miguel Silvestre was dead and now Miguel the Sottogh was born; the Sottogh grinned and Tusynta cackled. Miguel groaned in discomfort at his rebirth and kneeled in respect before the Pontiff and Tusynta. He could barely speak, and it took a week for him to recover from this shock and get used to his new frame. In the meantime, Groad the Huntsman paid him frequent visits, patting him first on the shoulder and welcoming him as “family”, which was an uncommonly warm moment for a Giranois.

So you spent that week recuperating with the assembled Giranois of many clans and families, healed by their Elders and welcomed as heroes. Shoor the Elder accepted Boamund's presentation of the Men-of-Nothingness's heads, saying that your task was now done and the Sharde would join the war against the sorcerors of Seshnela; but there was one mystery left. The Vicar Rupert deFachez, bearer of the Rod of Plain Witness, had been left in the Library/Yomilstor at your first visit and never seen again. Shoor challenged Boamund that his fate must become known. They had private conversations, too, about the need for a Sharde Saviour; and Jzhurte's status.

You discussed your next moves. Good Toad Food was too far off for an easy trip in the remaining three weeks of Storm Season, so you could either confront the “necromancer”'s tower nearby or else go back to New Arv and explore the sewers. The latter was of much more interest to everyone except Bog, especially after the Library horrors. Enough undead and wizardry. Time for a dungeon crawl!

Well done! For “defeating” Yomil (), freeing Gratt, saving Miguel and all around capital-H Heroics, you're back to 3 party luck points!

Some updates toward the end of your resting week:

<ol><li>Big news can't help but filter in from colonist allies. Bad news. Nolos has fallen to the Seshnelans! The Duke has been captured! Land armies, aided by reinforcements from Waertagi ships bearing Brithini; and hired Wolf Pirates; and more Brithini coming via land from Arolanit; have pushed the fight from the coasts and from the land, now threatening the borders of both Pithdaros and Pasos on many fronts. The Quinpolic League is crumbling. Harrek the Berserk himself appeared in battle and is said to have personally killed a whole regiment of Nolosians.</li><li>Most foreboding of all to many, The Ship of Life Church, recently declared a Vadeli heresy by the Rokari faith, has had a string of disasters. All chapels have burned or otherwise been destroyed by freak events, and Zzaburi of the faith have vanished or been seen bursting into flames or carried off by gold-winged 'demons'. Moreover, regular practitioners of the SLC's Navigationalist doctrine have found that they no longer can use their sorceries! Access to that part of the Sorcery Plane has terminated. Their Dormali magics to Open the Seas still allow them to sail, but that is all. It could not happen at a worse time. Some say that the prophecy of the Boat Planet's rise is no coincidence with this Navigationalists may not be present when that auspicious time comes.</li><li>Closer to home, the Pontiff bears sad news. Three-eyed demons (you know them as demons from the Book of Eyes, which Taanashyara would regale Boamund about as a vile Chaotic tome of demonology) have been venturing forth from the Maggotweald with more and more undead, gradually. Amidst this, the final remains of the Gratt clan were found killed and eaten to the last. Shrett is dead, and the Pontiff leads ceremonies to mourn the passing of him and his small family's essences into Solace.</li><li>Further northeast on Giraine, word comes of battles raging around the misty realm of Good Toad Food. Undead and Chaos; and new wicked allies not yet understood; struggle with fungal-beings, spiders and their few other allies including local Giranois. The Huru have come in aid.</li><li>To the southwest, the Seshnelans have been quiet. Too quiet. They surely are preparing something, but no one knows what.</li></ol>

-John