westwhere | stage iii

stage iii

THE ASHES

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Rathakku’s forces deepen their siege, with sharp-clawed harpies, fire-bearing catapults and archers raining hell upon Alem. The last two watch towers collapse, along with half the roof of the Keep. Several structural pillars dissolve and most windows shatter.

The Lord Who Waits has tired of patience.

HIGH CASTLE

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■ Attack is vicious and perpetual: Rathakku’s creatures descend from above, harpies make lairs in dark corners, and the fallen rise as undead enemies. Rathakku now necromances even the recently deceased, who retain a sense of personhood. Characters with mind control and necromantic abilities can take over these units. The recently resurrected have yet to decay substantially and hide they perished in order to infiltrate.

■ The dragon Irenia dips in to breathe frost onto Rathakku’s forces, but never lingers long. She disappears on March 20 but will return post-Arc.

■ Aware of his native Ellethia’s implicit role in raising Rathakku, Zenobius offers to teach you how to use the rare metals and saltpetre of Alem to create generous explosives — a set that triggers a very high blast, and a smaller shipment that can annihilate any magic — including death and summoning sorcery — in a 20-metre radius for two hours. Zenobius is a hard, curmudgeony taskmaster: expect to be worked and criticised to the bone.

■ Expect frequent quakes in the fortress, as catapults strike and the roof and pillars wobble. A hard winter is no longer contained by shattered doors and windows. Fire kindle and other supplies run scarce. Huddle together.

■ Paladins fall into zealotry, calling to sacrifice young princess Cle-Florens to ensure their success in battle. Deimar does not dissuade them, but lowers the number of guards protecting Cle-Florens’ quarters.

■ The voices that haunted Alem now multiply, increasingly likely to drag you into a dream-like state to descend into the glacier lakes underground. Spy thereabout at night, and you spot demonic fire sirens of golden scales, who gather in the fourth glacier lake’s cave to urgently complete their task before Alem falls. Their leader produces a purse of dark glass shards. A siren painfully transforms her tail into human legs by consuming such glass — she intends to infiltrate the fortress as a refugee. Sign up for a RNG thread to interrogate this mermaid.

■ With a few more shard crumbs, the sirens summon a ‘Jatharin’ — a fast dispersing silhouette that floats ethereally. They give it a white-silver string punish Prince Haiva for wronging a sister.

■ The Jatharin survives only two hours in the human realm. It lacks human consciousness and memory, remembering little of its target’s description and pursuing what ‘young men (with pale hair)’ it finds in the Wards. It is invisible to all who did not witness its birth — so keep your companions out of its way. It approaches a target and chains itself to them with a shadowy ‘umbilical chord,’ before sucking dry their life force. It can also deplete energy through... mouth-on-mouth action. Clean executions: Victims make no sound and barely shudder throughout their entrapment. Some say, these are painless deaths.

■ Sirens summon a Jatharin for three nights.

	HARPIES Fast, perpetually furious, prone to consuming human flesh. Deterred by loud noise and vibrations. Imbue their claws with poisons that prevent blood coagulation, extending bleed-outs.
	CATAPULTS Deliver projectiles of stone, fire and minor explosives. Rathakku’s most ferocious instrument, taking down Alem’s foundations. Manned by four undead apiece. Sturdy but slow, best targeted aerially.
	FIRE SIRENS Native to Hell. Deeply bound to ‘sisters’ and ‘family.’ Possess golden scales and shards of the previously encountered dark water mirrors. Their song is tinny but compelling. Their speaking voices are crackling and gravelly. Survive the glacier lakes’ cold by exuding flame. Skin burns to touch.
	JATHARIN Smokey, dispersing silhouette. Invisible to those who did not witness its birth. Kills by consuming life energy. Descended from the Motherless of Hell. Cannot be outright stopped, only avoided, enslaved or consumed. Can be distracted if you take an aspect similar to Haiva. Leaves a golden string on unintended victims.

THE DEPARTING

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■ King Deimar orders caravans to urgently evacuate, carrying refugees and provisions through mountain routes into a new settlement. Able men, guards, healers and merchants make preparations around the clock and will gladly accept, command or guilt your assistance. Help them.

■ Courtesy of Jimmy and Nacho, merchants Batthour and Eles provide some last-minute wagons and resources. An Alison-coached Deimar strikes a tenuous agreement for supplies.

■ Having received ‘healing’ flowers, Prince Haiva seems entirely recovered — far more confident, he menaces guards to assist the caravans. Deimar watches uneasily. Haiva asks the party to lead the refugees through the icy mountain passageways, where Rathakku’s immense bat demons loom.

■ The caravans journey to a well-warded settlement near the base of the mountain — former paladin monastery Hassir. Those who wish to avoid conflict can remain here. Prepare to kill any wandering pursuers, before they may alert Rathakku of the settlement's location.

	MOUNTAIN BATS Monstrous, blood-thirsting. To the size of 1.5-3 metres. Bulky, quicker to use their brawns than their speed. Stalk together, but compete for food and want to drag their prey to some great distance before consuming it, for privacy. Use that time to escape.
	HUNTSMEN Undead forces, typically old resurrections of Rathakku. Once human natives of Alem. Excellent knowledge of hiding spots and the mountain. Hostile, take perverse pleasure in the game. Will prolong a chase for sport and give their hungering hounds the chance to catch you. Unusual kinship with local animals, who sometimes obey them. Some scent blood.

COME HELL, THEN DARK WATER

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Hell is ruthless, but pragmatic — and must be sealed, before Rathakku controls Alem and weaponises it.

The growing cracks in Alem’s underground Room of Seals widen to reveal full-fledged stairs. More and more demons emerge as the rifts broaden. You have mere days to close Hell, ICly starting on 18 March.

■ Back/forward date your posts and logs as needed. Network access is spottier in Hell. Deimar’s paladins accompany the group.

■ To prevent the outpour of Hell, you must reach Level III and record disrupting at least three Motherless.

■ Each level of Hell shows shallow stains or streams of the familiar ‘dark water.’

LEVEL I

■ The Room of Seal leads into an underground stone passageway. Demons and skeletons are chained to stones or pillars, begging water. The dead are fickle: some offer directions, others answers to your questions. Most lie for their own gain.

■ The stairwell to Level II is behind locked gates, on a stone dais framed by a wall of flames. To reach it, cross a threadbare walkway of bones in a large hall room that has largely submerged into lava.

■ If the bridge ruptures, jump onto the nearby talking floating skeleton heads. Skeletal hands reach out to destabilise or drag you into the fire waters, as do demonic lava mermaids.

■ As you near the dais, the wall of flames might depict either the time when Thyvault’s people slaughtered the lava sirens, or your worst memory of betraying or failing someone. That same person is found shackled with long chains on the dais. If you never wronged anyone, this is someone to whom you are dearly indebted. At times plaintive, at others incensed, they appeal to your guilt or goodwill, bartering the gate key for their release. Their chains will only open if someone agrees to take their place in imprisonment.

■ You can steal their key, kill them — at which point, they return to their true form as a reptilian shapeshifter, or offer to take their place. Do so, and your character is stuck in Hell, suffering the intense heat and occasional clawing of mermaids, until Hell closes.

■ Up to you if anyone else can see your character’s memory in the flame wall. Please trigger warn adequately if you are describing sensitive memories.

LEVEL II

You descend deeper, into an underground urbanscape infested with flesh-like structures. Some stretches of land and stone are covered in membranous, dense, thick surfaces, letting you feel the faint, distant heartbeat of Hell. Other landmarks — lairs, adornments — are made of the remains of fallen demons.

■ Step lightly and rapidly. Flesh-eating demons roam these lands, as do hungering hell hounds and golems that chase you for parts to patch their limbs.

■ The next stairwell is guarded by a deathly groom or bride, their tentacles barring your path.

■ To proceed, you must gain the ring they are safe-keeping for a future ‘intended.’ You’ll need to persuade a local demon, assemble a passing corpse bride, sell a companion or offer yourself to betroth them — and negotiate a dowry.

■ The groom is crafty, cunning, eager to manipulate you into offering your soul as a dowry; the bride is cruel but irresistible, stirring you and your companion to violently compete for her hand.

LEVEL III

Behold true hell, an endless wasteland, its horizon fathomless and grey. Your mouth tastes of perpetual ash, bone dust scattered at your feet. You walk aimlessly for hours in fields of gravel, haunted by stone snakes and shapeless bone creations.

■ Demonic creatures rally as armies, fighting each other for crumbling territory or for overground dominion, as they prepare to invade Alem. Some drag rows of sullen, depressed or bellicose dead men behind them, whose souls you can liberate furtively when the demons make camp, or are assaulted by Deimar’s paladins. These captives did not all originate from Alem.

■ Some of the lesser demons may part with information, if you give them memories, important trinkets or a taste of your soul.

■ Most paladins are on this level and will shield you. You hear from them or from passing demons that Hell is now able to seep into Alem because of the Motherless — dark and flickering silhouettes, two-three times the size of a man, who float high above ground. They send down thick ropes like umbilical cords that consume the energy of whatever they attach to. They redeliver this energy as tectonic blows against Alem above.

■ Beyond a hatred of the Room of Seals, the Motherless lack conscience, speech or allegiance. They are drawn to the warmth of living things, or the purity of their spirit. Their ropes are broken easily — but the presence of a Motherless can quickly drain you.

■ The Motherless are briefly visible when they fling their ropes down, but otherwise roam invisibly and can only be recognised by the trails of barren land and aridity in their wake. You know a Motherless has stopped above you when you are suddenly paralysed by chilling fear — run, at all costs.

■ The Motherless swarm when endangered. They cannot be killed.

■ Deimar’s paladins share that, hundreds of years ago, their brethren committed ritual suicide, so their spirits could perpetually hunt the Motherless in Hell. You find ghostly paladins walking listlessly in lakes of dark water, seeming to remember nothing of their mission or their former selves. Try to remind them of their duties without entering the water and stranding yourself.

NOTES

■ Hell demons can recognise if your character is canonically connected to hell. Up to you if that’s a (dis)advantage!

■ Everyone should eventually make their way to the Hassir monastery.

■ Sign up for a RNG thread with an unexpected travel companion on the trek to Hassir.

NPC THREADS

QUESTIONS

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( She... changes appearance. Instantly, irrevocably. Without introduction or preliminary concern, as if it is a simple thing, a trick to entertain an unsophisticated guest and she has merely performed it.

...Lan Wangji does not gape. Xue Yang appealed to such feats diligently, masterfully, ruthlessly. This is nothing that has not been achieved before by crueler hands. Yet, to see it done so expediently —

The girl Cle-Florens draws back in horror. Perhaps she would mutter of witchery or curses or gods haunting the good earth, if her mouth weren't bound, if she didn't retreat behind Lan Wangji, to peer past the defences of his sleeves, like a shy child seeking solace.

He offers his hand, fingers curled with residual, seeping tension. She takes it.

To Yuri, once more: )

How long will it hold?

[It's only when she sees the reactions that it occurs to her that maybe she should have approached this a little differently. She's used to ESP to be a known thing, even if her powers are exceptionally strong it would have been something people knew about.

She should have considered that but this is really the first time she's shown off this power like this to someone who didn't already know she could do this.

She flailed her arms a little, still wearing the illusion of the princess but her panic is very much her own. She remembers to try to keep quiet at least.]

Sorry. I didn't meant to scare you! I just thought...there wasn't a lot of time right? So, um...sorry!

[Well, at least the princess is more scared of her now than the person that's supposed to take her away. That was a plus.]

I've never tested it...but I should be fine for a while.

[She doesn't want to explain how often she's done this before and for how long. Even she knew how scary that information could be. But there's an ease with which she claimed to be fine that implies a lack of concern for how long she can hold it.

A little hesitantly, she comes closer to speak to the princess.]

We'll keep you safe. You need to stay alive so you can take care of your people. That's why...please value your life a little more and don't just throw it away, okay?

[She's tried so hard to think of what Kaoru would say but in the end...she wasn't Kaoru. So this is the best she can do.]

( Keep her safe.

A dainty, fragile notion, less promise than embittered lie. One girl cannot pledge her words true. Another, now tentative in Lan Wangji's hold, rightfully distrusts them.

She pushes, pulls back, shows the glistened white of her teeth, only the corners that the stitching of the silence spell yet allows. He thinks, to evacuate her, he might drag her — must render her indifferent to her own extraction. This will not happen easily, readily, without trouble. He cannot presume her cooperation. Does not.

Gently, he waves the — other Cle-Florens close. )

Seek a shawl and her sleep salts or incense. ( A princess royal would surely dispose of them. And it cannot be Lan Wangji who hunts for them, when he remains timidly bound down. When he moves, the girl will attempt her escape. It is plain. )

[Ah, well.

That didn't work how she was hoping it would? But she's also not surprised. Kaoru probably would have done a better job.

She could put the princess to sleep...but she's probably made a bad enough impression already. She doesn't have to make it worse.

So she goes to look for the shawl and the sleep salts...but 'looking for' was maybe not the most correct way to put it. As was the way brains worked, the moment Lan Wangji mentioned the items, thoughts of them flashed in the princess's mind.

So she "found" both on the first try.]

These are fine, right?

[The sleep salts she's a little unsure of but hey. She can use them for cover for putting the princess to sleep, right?]

Gratitude.

( A quick hunt, perhaps guided by familiarity. Not all girls bear a likeness in behaviour or habits, but it seems whatever routes the preferences of mistress Cle-Florens in matters of storage is not entirely unknown to Yuri. So, then: the salts, the shawl, gamely discovered.

Lan Wangji's gaze travels them in simple assessment, nodding as he passes judgement after a breezy scrutiny — the powders he collects on his fingertips reek of crushed chamomile, root of valerian. He wipes his hands hand, clumsily and far too carefree, bereft of elegance, on the nearest armrest. Then, in increments of barely stored patience, he drips a pinch of the powders into a scratched goblet of fast-misting water, releasing the silence spell barely enough to ensure the child Cle-Florens may drink. )

Please. Do not require us. ( It will only be more tragic if Yuri and Lan Wangji must intervene. Something must tell the girl so — she nods once, to convey her acceptance to them. Again, to herself. Then, she sips, and the infusion wanting more to set her to sleep than might sorcery or a hard sedative, requires her to rest and wait.

She does, slipping to her bed, curling, eyes lost, starting to shut as she negotiates slumber. It will be moments until she can be trusted to unconsciousness. Then, the salts that Lan Wangji stores in his qiankun purse will awaken her in the caravan.

For now, they wait until she has fully drifted asleep. And for want of much else to do, Lan Wangji settles on curiosity: )

How is it you may assume her likeness?

[She's glad it was working and that the princess was going along with it. She really would have felt guilty for using her powers on the girl.

Her shoulders relax, thankful and relieved.]

Oh, um. I can create illusions.

[She mentioned this on the network already so it's sort of already public knowledge. If she lies about it now, even if this person didn't see it it will eventually get out that she is lying...and that might raise more questions.]

I really didn't meant to scare you earlier. This kind of ability isn't exactly common where I'm from but everyone's at least heard of it...

[So she...forgot. How alarming it could seem.]

( I... llusions. Deceptions. A craft of artifice and unsavoury lies. Those who wield it wear a thousand faces, each a mask. And how are they known, between their changing truths? How can they ever be trusted?

Flinching, Lan Wangji recedes, gaze stormed but settling, in the end, as if he has resigned himself — if not to admiring the girl's ability, than to accepting its pivotal role in princess Cle-Florens' expedient withdrawal.

They must make use of every skill, every last dreg of knowledge, every innovation they can concoct between them. They must toil and prevail and live. He knows this, viscerally. Knows too that his natural does not allow him to greet every talent with equanimity.

He is his uncle's nephew more often than he cares to admit. Nodding, he strives for better: )

How will you weather, should guards learn your nature? ( Perhaps by catching the difference in her scent, or a taste of her magic? There are those skilled even among the people of Alem. ) I shall return for you.

[She doesn't need to read any minds to see that reaction and know what it means. She'd escaped experiencing this personally simply by right of her upbringing...but she had seen it through others.

So her fingers close nervously and lowers her gaze as her shoulders hunch a little, trying to make herself look smaller, less hostile, only peeking up when he asks his question.]

...I should be okay. [The better the guards know the princess, the better the disguise. She's currently drawing on what she sees but it's easy enough to adjust based on what others know should be true.

Besides, worse comes to worst, she could use this power to fight.

Even so, when she speaks she still sounds uncertain and hesitant.] I can find my way out of here afterwards. So...you can just focus on what you need to do.

( She will sacrifice herself for them, wait and not offer an inkling of hostility, of grudge, of stubborn opposition.

She does not think we will return. Their gazes cut without encounter. He watches her, the slight tremors in the lines of her body, how she comes back to herself, how she pledges to bear it.

Only, he will return. He must. )

Hear me. A shi's time. The time to burn a candle. ( Thick and strong, as they display them here, to the span of a man's grown wrist. Perhaps not so tall. ) I shall return for you.

( It strikes him, all at once, that this matters — that she should know and believe him, know and hold her faith. That he in turn should prove equal to that commitment.

How many have failed their oath before you?

His hand, catching that of Cle-Florens, is soft, wilted. He calls the child up as much as she obeys, some part petrified, another resigned. They flee like thieves in a long, cloying summer's night, steps barely echoing in the corridor's dark.

In his mind starts the count. )

[She doesn't consider it a sacrifice, not really. Not when she knows exactly how terrifying her powers can be.

And because of that it was true. She didn't think there was reason for anyone to return. She could count on one hand the number of people who ever thought she was worth protecting, worth coming back for (as a person, not as a business asset).

(She's come to admit to herself, that she wasn't worth it.)

So she was surprised both by the offer to return for her and the sincerity with which it was delivered.

In the face of that sincerity she wasn't sure how to begin to delcine...and before she could figure it out he'd already left.

So she was left in the room, filled with uncertainty. She had planned on leaving at some point but...if he promises to be back and she wasn't here then that'd be a problem, right?

She spent a little time agonizing over this before settling down to wait. She wasn't entirely certain how long it would take to burn a candle and if she started burning one she wasn't sure how she'd explain why if someone were to ask.

So she just sat down and waited. And would have patiently continued to wait until dawn without any complaint just to avoid someone having to come back to pick up no one.]

( The child-princess is grudgingly coaxed, if easily delivered. They are numerous those in their party who understand the grievances that might be inflicted on a young girl, a would-be saint, one destined for sacrifice. She is packaged as a refugee, smeared with the paints of poverty: her red cheeks greyed with ash, her clothes swapped, the soles of her shoes thinned. In the caravan, the princess barely spoke, even once the last of Lan Wangji's sorcery dwindled, and her voice returned to her.

Terror, he knows, the tragic misapprehension that the man who rescued her from servitude to her brother's cause intended her harm. That another girl now wears her face in her quarters, claiming her name.

Another girl whom Lan Wangji returns to, breath halved, sweat dropping sour on his nape, excusing himself like a shadow between rows of guards. He does not knock, does not greet Yuri, does not introduce himself — only clicks the great-groaning door behind himself, and delivers the girl the princess' ancient shawl, murmuring — )

Choose another face. It cannot be hers. The guards will cut path.

( It is as dangerous now to be Cle-Florens retreating, as it was to be Yuri, slipping in. )

[When the door opens she doesn't jump. She sits, poised and prepared for whoever was coming in.

...except for the one who actually comes in.

Her eyes widen a little, equal parts surprised and full of wonder.]

Oh. You came back.

[She blurts it out softly. Not because she didn't think he would but secause she had been surprised when Hanzo and Nai stood with her in spite of her orders for them to leave and they at least had reason to be fond of her and this man and her were practically strangers and--

[--and then she slaps a hand over her mouth as if realizing how rude that sounded.]

I mean. I didn't doubt you or anything!

[She doesn't know how to explain her reaction though, not without explaining some other uncomfortable truths..so that's all the explanation she gives.]

[Yuuri stands and she takes the shawl. She covers her head with it, hiding most of her face in its shadow before letting the illusion slide off her, more careful now that she remembers how unsettling it could be for others. Then she slides the shawl off her head and onto her shoulders, looking once again like herself.

She notes the breathing and the sweat and thinks, this person really is very kind.]

...I can make us invisible if that helps.

[It is, she understands, unlike to fool everyone, especially not as they get closer to where the fighting is most severe owing to her powers working better on people than non-human individuals but it will make leaving a little easier, at least.]

( You came back, voice brimming wonder.

Had he not said he would? Is his pledge as the ash that crowns Alem, debris and scattered? He hesitates, at once unwilling to press the point of his fidelity and to frighten a girl who has already demonstrated the heroism of a champion on this night.

Instead, the gift of his torn shawl, spreading in his hands. Waiting to envelop her, until she propositions, and he —

Blinks, caught aback. Scarred. )

That — ( Is impossible, improbable, true sorcery, wrong. His mouth draws tight-shut. ) ...would be helpful.

( If Hermione could reduce him to a portable form and sink him in wine, he supposes invisibility is no worse. )

[She holds her breath as she waits for an answer...then smiles as if to be helpful was such an amazing thing.

(Using her powers to help people is only a thing she had recently started, and while it would never make up for all the harm she did under Father's orders she still wants to do more good with them.)]

Then, let's do it things that way. There might still be people who can see through it but I think they'd have to be expecting it to begin with.

[Which since she'd kept this power so much to herself so far it shouldn't be something people expect.

And if they're caught...well. She'll have to figure that part out later. She sees he has a sword...? Maybe sometimes the answer is fighting.

She approaches the door open with the assurance of someone who knew her powers will work just fine...though she'll still have to open it gently and slowly. The less noise and movement there is to hide the better.

Before she does open it though, she adds,] You might have to lead the way, especially in places where there are more people.

[She doesn't ask to be carried even though it would be easier to focus that way because it was embarrassing.]

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