The dwarf looked up from where he'd been examining the handprints in the floor. He'd not seen any that looked particularly dwarven, and now he didn't see any dwarves in the ghostly throng which had appeared int he cavern.

"Watchers eh?" Bodric asked. "How come none of ye be dwarves then? Make we not good sentries?"

"The Delvers of the Deep have kept their own vigils in their own way, for stiff-necked they have always been. You shall be the first..."

The dwarf snorted in that noncommittal way for which they were famous, but the others noted he was chewing at a bit of beard, which meant he was thinking...

"Well, I be a long time away from the company of me kin. I guess I be a lot like this leaf-eater of a gnome here, and enjoy the sun on me face once in a while. Tell us this, do we stand a chance against what it is that be comin'?"

The bearded leader of the ghostly apparitions shook his head. "Not that which comes... that which is here! ...Nay, as you all stand now, you have no chance. Few of those still living do, but you all have potential, and the sun has not completely set upon the world as of yet... Consider however, that you stand a perfect chance of slavery and even death if you do nothing... Any of us would gladly take your place in mortality, though we may not, just to stand against this Threat we've long watched for."

"So be it then. I, Bodric, called Battlebelly by some, have much to atone for. How can I be patchin' up me life if there ain't nobody around to make me amends to?"

"If there be a chance to save the innocent from the terrors we be seein', and mayhap by some miracle me own family along the way, then I'll be yer first dwarf. I'll find a way to revenge Gilgamar and see that the Huntsman becomes the Hunted. Count me in. Me honor be needin' a boost about now anyway..."

Bodric shifted a little until his hands were above a smooth spot on the stone of the cavern floor. Then he glanced up once more at the prior, ghostly Watchers, took a deep breath, and plunged his thick hands into the stone!

Zeeny-Deedle stared back at the watchers unblinking while Bodric negotiated in what Zeeny had come to learn was his friendly and agreeable way.  Calmly he waited until Bodric fell silent then took the moment.

"I assume this is the call and that you know about the Enemy.  What is the answer you are hoping for other than our verbal oath?  I assume that will not be enough to defeat the Enemy.  Who exactly is the enemy and what must be done to overcome them?

Maksim turned his head at the dwarf's comment. Bodic's reaction to the spectral host telling of the impending doom was resigned and calm. Maksim made to pat his dwarven friend on his broad back but stopped short as Bodric's hand sank into the stone floor.


Looking from Bodric to Deedle to the Watchers again Maksim spoke not waiting for the answer to Zeeny's question, "Everyone that I held dear was in Gilgamar-- or here-- and it sounds like everything else, beyond our small village is gone or threatened as well. I cannot let this doom come unchallenged! I, Maksim Munzuk, of the Gilgamar and the Young People, answer this call." Taking a knee next to Bodric, Maksim followed his example and pressed his hand into the stone of the floor.

Fantastic as the events of the past few minutes, including the appearance of the Watchers, had been, Sepulos found himself chocking with annoyance at Maksim and Bodric. The attitude of the dwarf in his exchange with the Watcher was simply astonishing: by his tone alone he might have been talking about something as utterly mundane as arrangements with a friend to help him transport some bricks for a house or feed for cows! He was equally taken aback by Maksim's sudden, painfully ingenuous assumption of the heroic air, and his readiness to plunge into these terrifying beings' request at the mere drop of a hat. Sepulos was far too sarcastic by temperament, and far too cautious by habit, to be anything but disgusted at the wide-eyed pair of humanoids. At least Zeeny had had the sense to ask forthright and practical questions before committing himself to who-knew-what madness and peril.

Casting a poisonous glance at the dwarf and the gnome, who seemed to him at that moment, kneeling there before the Watchers, to have the air of utterly ridiculous children, Sepulos erupted: "Have you people lost your minds? You don't know anything about these Watchers! I know you think you have good reason for believing what they're saying, but why don't you stop to consider some other possibilities. I've never heard of any of these things--not really--and I'm someone who should know about them! This is all too strange--I don't really believe it, can't really believe it until I get up there and see what's been going on. I mean, we could all just be losing our minds for all we know to the contrary. What if these Watchers are nothing but hallucinations? That glowing fungus--what if it's affected our minds and making us see things? What if these Watchers are really demons or illusions controlled by that necromancer who's torture dungeon we came across back there? Maybe he's just playing with us before he turns us into ghouls like the one we met? Personally speaking, even if these things are real, before I commit to answering anyone's "call," I want to know a little more about what exactly it entails. We don't know anything about the background of all this except some moving cave paintings and their seeming coincidence with your war stories." He took a breath and looked at the bearded Watcher: "What exactly do you want from us? What's the catch? Why do you think we'll be of any use to you? What exactly do you expect us to do, anyway? You have to understand that we'll need more information than what you've given us. . . ."

"Each of us has taken a time. Some alone, other times in groups. The Threat... is difficult to describe, for it is more than a being or beings. The Threat is elemental, primordial, ancient... The Threat needs an agent, an agent of chaos and destruction, an agent of digression. We do not know the agent of your time, only the agents of our own times. The most powerful was a young Godling, arrogant and rash, both of which were seeds to his expulsion. Perhaps he has returned, perhaps this cycle's agent is a new one that's never been confronted...

We are not permitted to see much of the detail of your time. We can only offer generalities, and thus it has ever been for each of us. The call is to repel the Threat in whatever form it may take in your time, just as each of us attempted to do in ours. Overcoming it may not be possible this time, we cannot see that. Resistance however... resistance is crucial. Win or lose, victory or retreat, conquer or conquered... let it not be said that no one tried..."



The bearded spokesman looked a little confused, which was a strange sight for an apparition. Finally he shook his head and asked, "What more indeed? Each of us accepted the call. That was enough, and still is."

Zeeny-Deedle looked at the apparitions for a moment then, careful to not put his hands on the floor, sank carefully ending cross legged between two hand prints.  Spreading his arms and holding his hands over the prints he closed his eyes and slowed his breathing.

He quieted his breathing and closed his eyes and then, pitched in a volume perfect for his own ears and barely audible to his companions, Zeeny-Deedle asked, "Zoran, do you wish this?".

As he asked, he quieted his raging insides and listened for the response.

14:58, Tue 15 Apr 2014: Zeeny-Deedle failed (no successes) using 1d20 with the Target Number system with a target of 14 ((9)).

He sat in silence and listened to the nothing that was his response.  Apparently this was his decision to make alone.

"For as long as Zoran will allow, I will resist this Threat as my purpose."  As he spoke, he dropped his hands into the stone.

The dwarf, like the rest of the survivors, was quiet and wore a somber face as the scholar spoke. Images flashed before his eyes of the last decade or more of his life. He saw the faces of his wife and children, and his last memory of them, which was fuzzy for it was well diluted with barrels of spirits, was not a happy one. They all had tears running down their faces as they'd come to say good-bye. He'd been too drunk at the time to get off his hind-end to stop them and so the chance to make a new memory to replace this most terrible was slipping away.

If what the appeared Watchers were saying was true, and he felt in his gut that it was, he may never have the chance to tell them he had changed. He might never see them again. It was this Threat which had taken that opportunity from him and the pain and anger built inside. It was his own fault they'd left him in the first place, but he might never be able now to fix it, and that was the fault of the Huntsman and his Hounds, whoever they were.

"Sepulos," the dwarf said through trembling lips, "Don't believe it if ye don't want to. But don't be tellin' me I be losin' me mind! Nor Maksim, nor the lass. What we seen, we seen. What we fought, we fought! And if Korak and Durgon were here, they'd be tellin' ye the same story! Would ye believe a cleric of Lady Autumn?" He remained facing the floor with his hands still pressed into the stone. Large tears dripped off his whiskers and sizzled as they hit the floor, steaming.

"It weren't no apparition that we be seein' up there! Gilgamar be destroyed! Our friends and their families, people we be knowin' for decades... they be dead now... or worse. Whatever Tuar did..." The dwarf trailed of painfully, squeezing his eyes shut in an effort to block it all out.

"There weren't no necromancer down here neither. When ye all wandered off, Maksim and me went back in there. It be an evil place, but whoever ran it be long dead. Who knows how long the ghoul be chained to that wall..." As he said this, his eyes opened and he glanced sideways at the monk. He was still sweating and sickly-looking, but was not acting strangely, at least any more strangely than normal.

"How about ye? I keep remindin' ye that ye'd be mushed up goo in the bellies of them centipedes if we hadn't found ye. Ye didn't see the destruction of Gilgamar, but all the same ye ended up here didn't ye? So this be all new... Look around yerself! These walls be stone! These handprints be real! And me own hands... they be sinkin' into the stone themselves! And here be those what placed theirs in around me, tellin' me that the whole world may face the fate of Gilgamar!" Bodric looked at the cleric and the monk and his old ranger friend. "I ain't much fer knowin' about Gods and history and all that, but I be feelin' it in me gut, and I long ago learned to trust it. That be all I need."

He remained doubled over, with his hands pressed into the stone. In a flash the others realized that experience itself must be special and singular to a dwarf.

The gathered apparitions glanced at one another as Sepulos vented his frustration. He was a man of learning and sometimes these sorts of things tended to rattle the foundations of scholarly types. The bearded spokesman looked upon Sepulos and finally spoke.

"We have spoken plainly. Our brother in the Watch is missing. He is not with us, so he must be yet among the living. We ask that you find him, and then, if it be your choice to do so, rid yourselves of the mantle we would place upon you. From our own experiences, and the histories which have been painstakingly maintained here in this cavern, we know that the Threat we've feared and fought against... has returned. If no one stands against it, then slaves you already are or soon will be. You will be doing nothing for us... we've passed on... you will be resisting the destruction of this world and its decline into a place of torment and slavery... a prison. It is for you we come, though we know you not. You may choose to do as you wish however..."

Agelia very carefully takes events in, looking from one speaker to the next, to the next, and then back again.  In the back of her head, she felt herself despair.

Taiiemnian - and Magic - did not necessarily care whether one world on the Prime Material Plane should exist or not.  Elder Titans were strange creatures who predated even the more "common" Titans.  Taiiemnian was as a great sea to Agelia and its followers, who were as tiny, insignificant droplets of water to it.  In comparison, most deities, and even the mythical Arch-Devils and Demon Lords, were as beautiful lakes to their servants.
Magic was a force in the world, in the multiverse, like Chaos or Law.  It cared even less about Agelia and her order than Taiiemnian - that she could wield and shape it meant nothing to it.  That Taiiemnian wanted to truly understand it meant nothing to it.  That beings were slain for using it meant nothing to it.

At the end of the day, all that the places of worship that Agelia held dear to herself were nothing before what she had been called to serve.  She choked slightly at her understanding of this revelation, went numb, wanted to just curl into a ball and shut everything out.  Outwardly, she still looked as calm and collected as always, even if she was still water running deeper than usual at this very moment.

Yet, there was nothing at all in the Pravi about helping others being detrimental to the ordering of things.  When a young Cleric of Taiiemnian such as Agelia helped herself by helping others, Taiiemnian's followers - well, the Order of the Celestial Gatherers, in her case - also benefitted.  Knowledge of Magic would benefit in the future, for she would educate those who would listen after her escape of it.

Agelia quietly approached a pair of handprints that seemed to correspond to herself, and looked up at the spokes-spirit.  She wanted to survive, but if helping others to survive was a part of that, then that would be what she would do.

The leader of the apparitions looked one last time at the scholar to see if he had further inquiry or if he would accept the call as his companions had. Finally, he motioned them to arise and face them.

"We honor you, and you honor us. None of us were very eager to Watch either. We feel that the title must change now, for the time of Watching is over, the Threat is here. What you call yourselves, what title you desire means nothing to us. What we seek to impress upon you is the necessity to resist. Resist and grow yourselves. Recruit allies. Find ways to push back until you've grown in strength and number and can challenge the Threat directly. Even that title must change, for it is no longer a Threat... it is a reality, a dark reality and the world grows dark with it."

"From times long past, battles have been fought. Some won, some lost. This is an important area for some reason. It is the place the Threat has often come first... It may behoove your endeavors to discover why..."

"May Those of Higher Order look upon you and sustain you. Return if you discover our brother and help him back to his Watch. And, for now, farewell..."

The apparitions turned and faded into the rock walls. The fire died down and the images of the cavern ceiling and walls returned to looking like they had when the party first entered the cavern. It grew quiet as no one knew quite what to say. The only sound was the muted rumble of thunder without and the constant rush of the sea in the distance.

Bodric reluctantly withdrew his hands from the softened stone. It had been an exquisite feeling for the dwarf, one that he would never forget, and likely never share or experience again. After the apparitions faded away and the hush fell over them and the fire burned low, he cleared his throat and said huskily, "It be low tide now, we be needin' to move out if we're to be havin' a chance. C'mon."

It was half-hearted, but it was true. Bodric gathered his dilapidated gear and trudged toward the ramp to the east, only waiting long enough for the others to follow before leading the way.

At these words of the Watcher Sepulos went into a bit of a stupor, or rather a highly abstracted state of mind that was characteristic of him when he was faced with decisions that required more information or understanding than he had on hand. At the very best, the Lector was extremely uncomfortable with all this. All he wanted to do was find the ruins of his ancient Elvish city and spend the rest of his life studying and documenting his finds. Why did all this have to happen and ruin everything? These recent developments were completely unexpected and--what was more--unwanted. Sepulos had no interest in being a Watcher--it really wasn't his business, and though he wished these people--these dead people--all the best in their search for their missing member, he really felt that such tasks were not in any way in his line. Bodric and the others would be much more suited to this sort of thing--they didn't seem to have anything better to do anyway. . . .

The Lector paused at this last though, realizing that it exhibited the height of arrogance and selfishness. Once again, he realized with an aching inner sob, the ugly reality of his personality utterly contradicted his professed lofty philosophico-mystical ideals. According to these ideals, there was no separation in reality between his own self and that of anyone or anything else. To turn away from the needs of others, even the most seemingly insignificant creature, was to betray himself in his deepest essence--there was no way around this. And there certainly was a need here. Bodric and the others had made this clear before the Watchers had even come into the picture. Some terrible things were going on up there, people had suffered and were most likely still suffering. The Watchers merely confirmed this, such that there could be no doubt now. As such, he knew that there was nothing for him to do but to commit himself to whatever the need of the hour was, offering his services in whatever capacity they might be found useful. Either that or boil in the knowledge of his own hypocrisy. . . .

While he was thinking all these things, the Watchers had disappeared. He had realized this vaguely, but it was only at Bodric's exhortation to the party to head out did Sepulos finally snap out of his abstraction sufficiently to declare in a low voice: "If my help is still wanted, I will do my best. That is, if it is not too late to put in my hand. . . ."
This message was last edited by the player at 03:35, Thu 24 Apr 2014.

Sepulos brushed his hand across the surface of the stone floor of the cavern, still just a bit unsure of what he was doing, and even what was going on. Unlike the others, his fingers did not stir softened stone. He pressed just a bit, still holding back the full commitment. The stone was cold and hard. It would not matter how hard he pressed his hand now, nor how much his heart changed... his opportunity had passed by and his prints would not be forever held in this sacred place.

He wondered if he may have missed his chance to become a part of the history of the world he'd dedicated the last two decades of his life to and was so driven to study...



OOC: Is everyone ready then? If so, narrate it out and I'll post the next scene this weekend. Hopefully I'll have a computer working by then...

Bodric led the party, followed by Sepulos, then Agelia, Zeeny and finally Maksim Munzuk the little gnome who had been such a support for his old friend through all of this. It had only been five days since they'd met above ground in the ruins of the Golden Toad Inn, after a couple of long years while Bodric worked out his self-exile. Of the original group of companions, only Maksim had stayed around Gilgamar. The others had split up, each for his own reason. Some sought learning, some sought power, some sought fortune. Bodric had sought a way out of an ale keg... Maksim had encouraged it. Without the little gnome's tough love, Bodric might have drowned in that barrel as he had been about to do.

The planned reunion had not turned out how any of them had planned. It was anticipated to be a joyous occasion but instead had turned into the biggest nightmare of their lives. In less than an hour of their reunion, which hadn't been celebrated at all, merely as if the years hadn't even passed at all, Maksim and Bodric had found themselves fighting for their lives with new companions and eventually lost underground.  It was a friendship that was not expressed in flowery gratitudes, but more in the quality of their verbal jabs at one another. Bodric was glad to have his old friend guarding their rears right now.

As they made their way through the twisting cave, they each found themselves thinking of the unearthly events which had taken place in the Watchers' cavern. It would have seemed so strange if it had not been for all the stranger things which had happened to them in the last few days. To some it brought a sense of purpose, others relief, others apprehension, and others... well, each dealt with it in their own way.

The low tide made it much easier to navigate the way and most of the time the water was only knee deep on the dwarf, waist deep on Maksim and varied from below knee to boot-top for the others. From time to time, the enigmatic monk, Zeeny, would help Maksim through a particularly deep spot. Eventually, they came to a wide and very tall cavern which smelled strongly of the sea and sea-birds. Their torches had begun to sputter and the dim glow filling the cavern was a welcome sight, for it meant both an escape and daylight... something some of them had barely seen in nearly a week.


The tunnel ended at a sandy ledge, and Bodric noted the tide was beginning to rise. They scanned the cavern, but could not quite see the opening, far to the south.  On the far side was what looked to be a ledge along the top of the rocks, perhaps leading around the far wall toward a portal back to the above-ground world...

It was the small and once again throughly soaked Maksim, who spotted it first. A ripple on the surface of the underground lagoon told them they were not alone.


Map updated...

The faint light of the sun reflected on the water of the lagoon and the walls of the cavern would have been truly gladdening to Sepulos' heart, had it not been for the gnawing sense that he had made a bad mistake--a "sin of omission," as it were--back there at the Watchers' cave. Had he lost a never-to-be-repeated opportunity to be part of something great, more important in the grand scale of things than the narrow scholarly triumphs he longed to achieve? Only time and the events to come would tell. He would at any rate act as if his hand prints had been accepted, and stand by his promise to do whatever he could to help. Perhaps he had missed something, the precise nature of which it was difficult to understand. Still, his own principles bound him to do what he could for the good of the world, even if there was no hope of glory for himself.

The sage suddenly felt old and worn out. His soaked feet were cold and his body still ached from his fall. His armor was tight and uncomfortable, and at that moment the thing he wanted more than anything else was a nice hot cup of boral root tea.

The ripple in the water below sharply did away with all these thoughts, as the Lector froze in awed, irrational terror at the thought of whatever thing it was that moved beneath the surface.

Agelia welcomed the reflected light well enough, but despite this her mental state did not seem to have improved all that much.  She still made the occasional casting-about that suggested she may well have swapped essential brain-parts with an overly excited rabbit.

And then came the rippling.  Agelia looks at the water, seems intent on whatever is stirring beneath its surface...and then makes a disinterested grunt, although she still keeps her eyes on it.  "I wonder what that's all about."


Seriously have you seen a rabbit when it's curious about something, forget it!
[Private to GM, Bodric Battlebelly: And you probably thought I forgot all about the amulet's effects gradually wearing off!]
This message was last edited by the player at 22:55, Fri 09 May 2014.

Maksim let out an audible sigh at the sight of the sun. How long had it been? How long since the gnome felt the warmth on his face? With everything that has happened, this simple pleasure did much to lift Maksim's spirits.

Then there was the ripple. Subtle and distant but directly between them and the fresh air and sky outside.

With Bodric's verbose waring about the tide, "Rising." Maksim's eyes scanned the cavern. Seeing the ledge on the far side of the cavern Maksim pointed, "We should try to get up there. I'll look to see if there is a path. I'm tired of being wet and I don't like the look of whatever that is out there. Bodric, how long do you think we have before the tide is in? And how high does the water get in here?"

Bodric cast about, considering what he could see paired with his innate instinctual underground timeworks. "Aye, the tide be comin' in, and it could come quickly, depending on the elevation and slope. That ledge on yonder side looks like it be goin' all the way... at least as far as I can tell. We don't be havin' much time! That be the high water mark." Bodric pointed to a salty white line on the rocks several feet above his head. "See over there? The ledge be above the mark." Indeed it was, but only by a few inches...

As the nimble Maksim scampered off to find a vantage toward the far shore, Bodric shifted his battered backpack around to his front, to keep it out of the water, and began to scrounge around. He had one length of decent rope left, and whatever he'd been able to retrieve from the centipede nest where they'd used it last. He began to calculate in his head how much they'd need, and how much they had left.

Maksim returned with a dejected look on his face. He reported that there was no way across, but at least there was a narrower spot. It might be their only shot. Bodric sized up the rest of the troupe. Were they up to a dangerous crossing? They had to try something, and quickly for the tide would soon make their task just that much trickier... not to mention whatever murk-gulper lay in the dark water waiting for a mishap. The sight of reflected light had bolstered them all and Bodric hoped its shine would grant them all just a little extra incentive, here, so near the end.

Zeeny noticed the ripple.  As much as the sight of the sun heartened him and made him want to race out into it, his recent experiences with water had shown him that he would be best served to consider the water a worthy adversary.  He had proven in the river that Deedles don't float.  The thought of something in the water with him petrified him and he peered at the surface futilely trying to pierce the depths with his gaze.  He needed to see the thing in the water.  In his mind it was hunting them.  It had reptilian eyes with the cold intelligence of the slayer of thousands.  It had long sharp fins and long sharp teeth.  No, it had suckers.  Maybe it had a spear on its nose.  Zeeny had long since stopped even looking at the sunlight in his intensity of looking at the water.  When Bodric started digging in his pack, Zeeny spared him a glance and, at just that moment, caught the dwarf looking at the ledge across the water.  The deep water.

In a moment, it occurred to him what the dwarf had in mind and it turned his insides to water.  Calming himself, he glanced again at the ripples then pulled one of the dried meals from his pack.  Casually breaking it up into fist sized pieces, he threw the pieces into the middle of the water, away from the narrow spot Bodric had been looking at.  The dried food struck the surface of the water with a smack that echoed in the cavern that was suddenly eerily silent.  Zeeny watched not even realizing he was holding his breath.

It has been less than a day since Alton had seen fellow people, but the rush of joy that filled him matched what would be expected of a sailor trapped on a deserted island for years. Perhaps it was that he never thought he would survive the night, and only now was daring to let a sliver of hope persist.

He slips back behind the ledge before making contact.

"Hail fellow travelers", he called out in a hushed voice.

He lies on the ground, hiding on the ledge with a white-knuckle grip on his dagger.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:49, Sat 10 May 2014.

OOC: Alton is on the ledge on the far side BTW. Not sure if I made that clear...