Post by Spus on Aug 12, 2006 2:58:28 GMT -5
Transcript
From the Journal of Valletta Derag
I've seen my dear brother Victar do this... write down his thoughts at the end of the day. Once, I asked him what he was doing and why. He said, "Trying to hold on to the last shreds of my sanity, and I can't remember why."
I didn't understand what he meant until now.
All has gone mad since the transmuter lich Jana (was it really Jana, disguised as an elf? Or one of her minions?) bespelled and abducted Victar. I am horrified beyond belief at the unspeakable torments she could be putting him through right now. I am horrified beyond belief at the unspeakable torments the Lady Aiko wants to put him through when we find him.
We left our guide from Morbirgan, Sorely, outside the portal to Jana's realm, to keep watch for more giants. Beyond the portal, we expected to find transmuted monsters, bone-crushing traps, and a malevolent undead lich-queen.
We did not expect to find a civilization.
A blue-skinned race of dwarves have a city in Jana's realm. They cannot be native to it; when the Lady Aiko gained an aerial survey of the plane, she said, "It's like one of those little toys with houses and the trees in a bubble and you shake it up and snowflakes fall only there's no bubble no snowflakes no trees and I want a toy. Give me a hug?"
Jana must have brought the dwarves here - why? For the pleasure of ruling over a city of slaves? As experimental transmutation subjects? We could not speak a word of their language, but they recognized her name, and they did not respond well to it. Or to us. Our unusual appearance caused such a stir that a company of dark-dwarf guards sought to arrest us, though we had committed no crime.
They surrounded us, demanded that we put away our weapons, and made us march to a distinctive four-story tower. We hypothesized that Jana had to be inside. Zalajin and Perun resented being herded like sheep to the slaughter. The dwarves kept prodding, even striking Lady Aiko when she foolishly repeated Jana's name. At last Lady Seonia, the Fearsome Elven Destroyer, decided that enough was enough. She teleported us away from the forced march, and that is when the gates of Chaos opened.
Parts of what happened next are barely in my memory... others are horrifyingly clear. We sought to brave the tower and battle Jana. We set off alarms. The dwarves fought us - and while Zalajin and Perun restrained the lethality of their attacks, sparing most of their enemies' lives, Seonia and Aiko could not. In a life-or-death battle, their specialty lies in bestowing death. Nor are my own hands clean of dwarven blood. I should have at least made an effort to stabilize the gravely wounded among our foes; in the battles we fought, I betrayed my charge as a healer. Though they tried to slay us, the majority of the dark dwarves are not evil - and I would not wish slavery to Jana upon them even if they were.
At one point the Lady Aiko fell in battle, only to miraculously rise anew. At another point, the Lady Seonia nearly collapsed beneath the mystic onslaught of what I, in my madness, thought came from clerics of Siliskor - of course they were not, they made no response to Siliskor's name. We slaughtered, subdued, or sent fleeing all the dwarves we found in the four stories of the tower, only to find nothing. The one thing of interest in the tower was a wall of teleportation on the second floor, designed to transport individuals into Jana's lair, or possibly into a trap. Lady Seonia dispelled the wall, at my suggestion I am ashamed to say, and over the Lady Aiko's objections.
With no route to Jana, there was nothing more we could do. The option of destroying the tower was raised; perhaps it was the light of Pelor and Bahamut that reminded us of the subdued and helpless dwarves within the tower that would have been massacred by such an act. We came so close to committing cold-blooded mass-murder... in the end, we retreated through the portal to Jana's realm, having achieved nothing but pointless slaughter.
Jana must be laughing at our shame. And at our corruption. Even if we try to communicate with the xenophobic dwarves now, even if we try to offer them freedom from Jana's domain, will they listen? We have left so much needless death in our wake...
How could we have avoided this catastrophe? By fleeing early on, and waiting for Pelor to grant us the power to communicate with the dwarves at dawn? I fear that only you, big brother Victar, could have been wise enough to suggest such a plan. You have been the voice of reason among us; without you, it is all turning to insanity.
I don't know what to do.
Thankes to Lei, because I'm a lazy bastard.
From the Journal of Valletta Derag
I've seen my dear brother Victar do this... write down his thoughts at the end of the day. Once, I asked him what he was doing and why. He said, "Trying to hold on to the last shreds of my sanity, and I can't remember why."
I didn't understand what he meant until now.
All has gone mad since the transmuter lich Jana (was it really Jana, disguised as an elf? Or one of her minions?) bespelled and abducted Victar. I am horrified beyond belief at the unspeakable torments she could be putting him through right now. I am horrified beyond belief at the unspeakable torments the Lady Aiko wants to put him through when we find him.
We left our guide from Morbirgan, Sorely, outside the portal to Jana's realm, to keep watch for more giants. Beyond the portal, we expected to find transmuted monsters, bone-crushing traps, and a malevolent undead lich-queen.
We did not expect to find a civilization.
A blue-skinned race of dwarves have a city in Jana's realm. They cannot be native to it; when the Lady Aiko gained an aerial survey of the plane, she said, "It's like one of those little toys with houses and the trees in a bubble and you shake it up and snowflakes fall only there's no bubble no snowflakes no trees and I want a toy. Give me a hug?"
Jana must have brought the dwarves here - why? For the pleasure of ruling over a city of slaves? As experimental transmutation subjects? We could not speak a word of their language, but they recognized her name, and they did not respond well to it. Or to us. Our unusual appearance caused such a stir that a company of dark-dwarf guards sought to arrest us, though we had committed no crime.
They surrounded us, demanded that we put away our weapons, and made us march to a distinctive four-story tower. We hypothesized that Jana had to be inside. Zalajin and Perun resented being herded like sheep to the slaughter. The dwarves kept prodding, even striking Lady Aiko when she foolishly repeated Jana's name. At last Lady Seonia, the Fearsome Elven Destroyer, decided that enough was enough. She teleported us away from the forced march, and that is when the gates of Chaos opened.
Parts of what happened next are barely in my memory... others are horrifyingly clear. We sought to brave the tower and battle Jana. We set off alarms. The dwarves fought us - and while Zalajin and Perun restrained the lethality of their attacks, sparing most of their enemies' lives, Seonia and Aiko could not. In a life-or-death battle, their specialty lies in bestowing death. Nor are my own hands clean of dwarven blood. I should have at least made an effort to stabilize the gravely wounded among our foes; in the battles we fought, I betrayed my charge as a healer. Though they tried to slay us, the majority of the dark dwarves are not evil - and I would not wish slavery to Jana upon them even if they were.
At one point the Lady Aiko fell in battle, only to miraculously rise anew. At another point, the Lady Seonia nearly collapsed beneath the mystic onslaught of what I, in my madness, thought came from clerics of Siliskor - of course they were not, they made no response to Siliskor's name. We slaughtered, subdued, or sent fleeing all the dwarves we found in the four stories of the tower, only to find nothing. The one thing of interest in the tower was a wall of teleportation on the second floor, designed to transport individuals into Jana's lair, or possibly into a trap. Lady Seonia dispelled the wall, at my suggestion I am ashamed to say, and over the Lady Aiko's objections.
With no route to Jana, there was nothing more we could do. The option of destroying the tower was raised; perhaps it was the light of Pelor and Bahamut that reminded us of the subdued and helpless dwarves within the tower that would have been massacred by such an act. We came so close to committing cold-blooded mass-murder... in the end, we retreated through the portal to Jana's realm, having achieved nothing but pointless slaughter.
Jana must be laughing at our shame. And at our corruption. Even if we try to communicate with the xenophobic dwarves now, even if we try to offer them freedom from Jana's domain, will they listen? We have left so much needless death in our wake...
How could we have avoided this catastrophe? By fleeing early on, and waiting for Pelor to grant us the power to communicate with the dwarves at dawn? I fear that only you, big brother Victar, could have been wise enough to suggest such a plan. You have been the voice of reason among us; without you, it is all turning to insanity.
I don't know what to do.
Thankes to Lei, because I'm a lazy bastard.
