Returning

Returning – Write Up Summer 795 Stephane of Boine arrives at the covenant and, being well armed and apparently dangerous is invited to stay. Gael convinces Orella and Sylvie to go with him on a journey, first to the covenant at Salle se Trompier (the “Coven in the Mist”) to trade vis and barter for them to analyze the three magic items that were found in the valley in Red Nails Rip Off and thence to that valley to further investigate the Magical Basement of Manlius Servillius. They set out accompanied by three men at arms, Stephane of Boine and Martin and his band. The journey to Salle se Trompier is uneventful. They arrive at the coven and are greeted by Patch and his cohorts politely but with rather less joy than on previous occasions, perhaps they’re a little annoyed at Calor Novus for some reason? Gael launches into bargaining with Patch after dinner, vis is exchanged at rates that are later learned to be to the advantage of Salle se Trompier and an agreement is reached on the magic items as well. The magi at Salle se Trompier will discover what each does and they will then decide which of the magic items they will keep or, as Patch put it, “Which items are suited to you and your coven.” Agreed to all round the Calor Novans leave the next morning, pausing only to buy more supplies in the port nearby. The journey to the valley begins with Wolfie stumbling upon an armed band in the woods. After much maneuvering back and forth the Calor Novans are following this band down the road. In this manner they come upon a well looted and totally depopulated village obviously the work of this band. Wolfie is sent out to find their trail and comes back heavily wounded by an arrow. The Calor Novans, always noted as friends of the wild and befrienders of helpless animals vow revenge and take of in pursuit. A scout for the enemy is located and ridden down by Stephane of Boine but not before he calls out a warning to his fellows. The fight is soon joined and the band is soon eliminated but for their very large commander who is in a bad way. One or two of the grogs is hurt badly too and thus the group returns to the port and pays to have them all looked after. The journey to the valley continues with the entrance into the valley happening very much like it did in the first game. Walking along, monster attacks from behind, everyone runs into the valley. The difference this time is that Gael manages to penetrate the monster (!) but is unable to damage it. The valley is unchanged since the last game with food still growing in the crop lands and goats and rabbits wandering around unplagued by predators. Everyone settles in for an idyllic summer of food fun and frolic in the high mountains. Eventually a story is pieced together from the carvings in the basement: A nation of people is fighting with their neighbors. For a while all goes well with lots of looting and dismembering of victims. The tide changes and the previously victorious nation starts loosing with their cities being looted and their citizens being dismembered. A god like being sees something in an egg shaped thing. This god like being talks to the king of the people. The king of the people tells lots of nobles and non-nobles to do something. He sends to “priests” or hero’s out to do this thing along with a lot of soldiers and common folks too (workmen and the like). These people get on boats, land and attack cities and loot them, get back on their boats, land again, march off someplace where there is some sort of great victory over a demon or something. No one knows what to make of this. The night of the new moon two of the mages in the basement notice that two letters have deepened into “holes” in the “door”. They feel their Parma’s being brushed. Martin walks in, says “well that’s new!” sticks his index fingers into the holes and walks through the now open portal. Another grog walks in after hearing the cries from the magi. He says “Well, that’s new!” and walks through the door. This continues until the mages are the only ones left. They then walk through the doorway too after feeling something like a hot wind rush past them as they enter the portal. They were the only ones to feel this. All the members of the party emerge in a temple and infront of them are many priests obviously worshipping and apparently not at all surprised to see these people materialize in their temple. After a while a common language is determined (Greek) and a Greek slave is found to be an interpreter between the party and the natives. They are in the City Assur, home of the God Assur, and the home of his people. His people are being attacked by the Chadeai and the Bablyoni and soon the city will be under siege. The natives have a rule that non-natives cannot be armed inside the city. A camp site out side town is found and the players settle in with their interpreter coming to talk to them every day. They’re told that the natives are very happy with them and that in seven days when the portal opens again for the last time they will be allowed to return from whence they came. Of course all the priests of Assur and soldiers and so on will be going with them but they will get to go home. They also find out that a very large group of people was sent to the west and they left not three weeks ago. Instead of taking the easy way and returning home with a bunch of Assyrians and having just released Assur a bloody handed god of the ancients loose in 795 A. D. the players choose to hunt down and destroy the army that was dispatched to go to Spain and build the portal. Over the course of three months they manage to do this, finally destroying the Assyrian fleet as it attempted to land on Sicily. Again Orella destroyed the bulk of them with Site ranged Arc of Fiery Ribbons with help from Sylvie. Gael nearly got the spell off. And with that they were back in the valley where there were ruins dating from the Roman times and still the ruins of the bizarre Catalan feud. With nothing else to do they returned to Salle se Trompier where Patch told them that: The Horn is a total write off. The Pan Flute if played in the proper tune acts as Entrancement with +3 being added every round it’s listened to (so first round it’s +0, next +3, next +6 and so on). The Grecian “Angry Guy” Mask will only work if it’s put on and only if it’s not resisted. To resist it’s a Stamina roll of 9+ with Mentum and Parma defending for magi. It has an aura of fear with requires a Bravery roll of 9+ to avoid falling to ones knees and awaiting ones fate. Once it’s put on it can’t be taken off other than by the death of the wearer or by breaking the mask. Patch and his Soldali have decided that Calor Novus will be allowed to keep the “Angry Guy” Mask and they will keep the Pan Flute. With that and 20 silver pennies for the ransom of the large Catalan baronette they return to Calor Novus.

Research on the Mysterious Writings of Manlius Servillus After reading the manuscripts in your spare time and occasionally asking other mages or Brother Raymond for help interpreting the odd old Latin word or phrase here and there you have pieced together a rough time line of events that occurred in the Valley. This valley was inhabited in Roman times but has since become uninhabited for reasons that we shall see. A old Roman sorcerer MANLIUS SERVILLUS owned the valley and it's tenant farmers. He was powerful for an ancient magus but that didn't save him at the end. He lived in this remote place as he had located an even more ancient crypt in the valley and wanted to investigate it. Knowing that it was guarded by "as foul a specter as the barbarians had ever dreamt of" he decided that he needed mystical aide to ensure his survival while exploring the crypt so he tried a summoning of a local nature spirit to help him out. He got something that he didn't expect (THE MONSTER) and paid for his mistake with his life. THE MONSTER was then free and closed the valley to all outsiders. Eventually the tenant farmers died off either being killed while trying to leave or natural causes but not before they figured out that MANLIUS SERVILLUS was the cause of their problems. He did not long survive this discovery, being murdered you assume by his outraged tenants. Eventually the tenant farmers died out to be replaced later by the Catalans that Orella destroyed so handily. The writings that were found are difficult to interpret in parts as they refer to the physical wall in the basement that you're not in front of. If you're going to gain any true understanding of the door like carvings on the wall you're going to have to go there and investigate first hand. But you have come to the following conclusions: The portal/doorway predates any Roman presence in the mountains, some time in the BC's for sure but how old he did say or didn't know. The magic that Manlius Servillus was a practitioner of is evocative of Vim and Intellego and possibly Rego. He used those "arts" to summon the monster and was presumably going to use them to control it too. He seems to have failed in the last respect but he wasn't killed by the monster so perhaps he controlled it to some extent. He came to the conclusion that he, by himself, wasn't skilled enough to open or activate the portal/doorway. He was convinced that the portal/doorway, once opened, was guarded (as stated above) by "as foul a specter as the barbarians had ever dreamt of". He never says how he knows this or what this "specter" is like or if he was referring to a particular group of barbarians just who they were. Just what the portal/doorway opens or leads to is also somewhat vague and being able to see the wall while reading the documents would be helpful here but Manlius seems to indicate its a pathway to an older world. What ever that means.