[Exalted] A Destiny Calls (Retrospect)
Bifford:
Week Nine.
(Full compliment of players and welcome Emma as replacement to Wayne playing An-Mo)
The group head towards the docks but find themselves down an unfamiliar street with the end of their road blocked by crowds of people cheering half-heartedly. An Mo and Pang Lo peel away from the group to look at the distraction. An Mo sees a parade of soldiers then gets fireman's lifted back to the group by Kavod. Kavod returns for Pang Lo and does the same and on his way into an elevated position he too sees the soldiers.
They go up stairs to the top level and enter a tea-room. Shortly after soldiers enter and demand to know why the group isn't by the road-side cheering and clapping. Mistress Li does her usual social thang and Kavod does his usual threatening thang and soon all hell breaks loose culminating in all bar four of the soldiers being dead. (Two were outside and ran off to inform their superiors. Two were escorting Pang Lo to the crowd, then got called back by Mistress Li, then got told their boss told them to go do their usual thing. This confused them, but they left. Though they may wish they had died once their superior finds out the full story.....)
The group scarper and head to the docks where Master Vulcan makes enquiries about ships for sale or use. Mistress Li does similar in a more casual manner. They eventually find a ship going East to Iron Fall that can take them for payment in coin and repair work by Master Vulcan.
The group board ship and that's where we leave them.
Bifford:
Week Ten.
(Full compliment)
On board ship to Iron Fall the group are all (bar Master Vulcan who is down in the hold doing repairs) in a group playing cards, watching or similar. They have a group vision, which is quite fuzzy and indistinct and a lot of what is gained is through sound rather than sight. The general gist of it is thus: a room in a hospital with a woman giving birth then the door being smashed open and everyone being killed and a man standing over the mother and baby, killing her then trying to kill the baby and failing. Twice. He then leaves with baby and they hear the voice of the Flame Lady saying "He survived and has been taken."
Once the ship docks and the group disembarks they stand chatting, but Dazzel slips off and sits on a bench. She re-creates the original vision she had of her in the Ice-Cave with the baby and the group. This vision is in ethereal matter around her for all to see like ghosts in daylight. It draws attention.
The group find a hotel and purchase a room and rope and wine and tea (all at Kavod's behest). The group then tie Kavod up and pour a wineskin worth of wine down his throat which he hopes will induce visions of his own. It partially works but mainly just makes him feel the worse for wear for quite a while after. While Kavod is unconscious Dazzel once more performs this time re-creating the most recent vision in the hospital. Through skill it comes through clearer than the original vision and Pang Lo (Sam) is clever enough to pick out details no one else can.
They hire a new boat to travel North and head towards Shield. However the weather is against them and while the ship will make it through the ice it wont have the speed needed to do so efficiently. The sailors start praying to their Goddesses of Water and Wind to aid them but the whisperings on the wind seem somehow unimpressed..... An Mo joins them and talks to the Water Goddess persuading her to aid them. She also tells the sailors how to better appease their Goddess of the Water. The waters calm a little.
Bifford:
Week Eleven.
(Full compliment)
We resume where we left off with An Mo starting a conversation with the Goddess of the wind. She had been totally forgotten by the sailors and was narked. An Mo sorted that problem and soon the ship was sailing fast and on course for Shields.
After being put ashore by boat they entered Shields, a small village comprising a series of Yurts and went to talk to the local shaman who also had the maps to these parts. Kavod and Shalpeng did not come over at all well but Li, Dazzel and An Mo made up for their lack of respect and won the map they needed as well as travel further up the coat with Seth and his huskies on four sledges.
They started the four day journey with ease, had a few misgivings on the way with Kavod and Shalpeng getting covered in huskie **** and pee.
Vulcan looked for tracks on the 2nd night after the camp had been set up and found some reindeer which he tried to take down with an arrow or two. The first one went totally wide, startling the deer who then started to flee. His second shot ripped through a fleshy part on its hind quarters making a nice blood trail out from its position.
Later that night, near to day-break the group are woken by a very loud noise that turns out to be a special warning call made by Seth. On investigation some rather large polar bear tracks are found which Vulcan and Kavod track. They find a family of three and set about killing them. They then try to pick one of the dead beasts up, fail, and so drag it back to camp where Kavod skins the beast and Vulcan cuts off chunks of meat for the huskies and for drying and curing.
Later that day they make it to Shields and ask for somewhere to stay and wash, and a place to sell the hide. While Li and Dazzel wash Kavod goes to the tanners and bargains for a coat made of the polar bear hide in exchange for the tanner keeping the left-overs. This will take two days.
Kavod and Vulcan also find out that there is a water-barge always ready to take them across the river to the ice-sheets so they plan to provision themselves with whatever is needed for the journey to the Plains of Pictures.
Here endeth the session.
Bifford:
Week 12
Having gotten across the river, with their backpacks full of hiking equipment they manage to hire some beasts of burden to travel with. A few days into their journey, amidst a nasty snow blizzard and during a camp for the evening the group has a major fright when a ma-hoosive boom resounds their way and a shape looms out of the snow shortly afterwards.
Looming out of the snow comes an Atronauch that calls himself Soltranauch due to the fact he was built to aid and serve Solars and no other Exalted. The group use Soltranauch to fast-track their passage through the Northern wilderness and he soon gets them to within safe distance of the chasm and "bridge" they have to cross to get to the Plain of Pictures.
Some of the group disembark and go to scope out the bridge which turns out to be millimetre thick, hand-span wide, impervious and extremely tough. One by one, in various ways, the group passes over the bridge and Soltranauch makes his way down the chasm and back up the other side.
He then takes them up and over the mountain range and they pause briefly looking down onto the massive bowl of the Plain of Pictures.
Soltranauch takes them into the plain, surrounded by high cliffs and with the interior of this stepped downwards towards the plain proper. They make their way to one edge and order the machine to sweep boulders and cliff-face off the side wall and over the Dragon-Led army that is mobilizing in front of them. This does quite a bit of damage!
From the back of the camp comes some sort of missile that annoys Soltranauch but does relatively little harm. The group decide to disembark and order him to go stomp on some bad guys. Meanwhile two of the characters take up stance to perform the sorcerous task of Obsidian Butterflys and the others gear up for a fight or defence.
We leave them there, arms outstretched, spear and swords ready for the on-rushing army.
Bifford:
Week 13
We re-enter the story just as An-Mo and Pang-Lo cast Obsidian Butterflies one after the other. An-Mo does a fair bit of damage but Pang-Lo does a fair bit more!
As the group makes their way around the havok along the edge of the bowl of cliffs Kavod and Vulcan take up arms to take down a small group of militia that have formed up into a wedge, less afraid of the Solars than they are of the commanders. Vulcan does most of the work for once with kavod merely play-fighting with his opponents.
Shortly after this Vulcan does a few things that pushes him over his limit-break and the Curse that is his comes into force and he became cold-hearted, merciless and compassionate about nothing.
They make their way towards the rear and ask Soltranarch where the ice caverns are. In answer it jumps into the air and lands, smashing through a layer of rock and ice to expose the system beneath. When ordered to he climbs back out revealing the tunnels. This took all of the group totally by surprise (his jumping up and landing that is) and they were all thrown onto their knees and were somewhat annoyed and surprised by his actions. They were also surprised when he chuckled (!!) when they told him to go get rid of any other bad guys in the Plain of Pictures.
The Solars found the entrance to the ice cavern system, quickly passed under the hole the machine had made and followed the tunnels on, underneath the side of the Plain and out the other side into more Ice tunnels.
They came across a group of six nasty hybrid beasties, warped by the Wyld. And quite easily massacred them. Moving on they entered a small ice chamber.
In one curve of the wall was the baby, surrounded by a force shield. Out of a small tunnel in another curve stepped a man, a well dressed man who when questioned gave his name as Corvellus Palladio. The group tried to talk to him as Dazzel, made invisible by magic edged around towards the baby and as Pang-Lo took up residence in a specific location.
Corvellus loosed a throwing dagger which embedded itself very close to Dazzel's head and then ran towards Kavod. He of course took up the challenge with relish. Any blows that landed on Corvellus also dealt damage back on Kavod.
Pang-Lo unleashed Obsidian butterflies towards them both. Kavod parried every butterfly that came at him with dexterity and Corvellus ducked and weaved out of the way. He then announced that he wasn't there and disappeared to re-appear closer to the rest of the group, near the entrance. Mistress Li's hand naturally went in for the pockets on the inside of his jacket while An-Mo took a swipe at him, the result of which hurt her more than him.
A few seconds later however and Corvellus stepped to the side and vanished out of this time and place. Li's hand was in mid-air with nothing in it and there was blood on the ground where Corvellus had taken wounds.
Dazzel picked up the baby, who shrunk his shield around himself and the group left the ice-tunnels the way they had come.
Once outside, and back inside Soltranauch, the baby pointed West making it obvious which way they should head.
A short journey (in the mechanical leviathon) later and they came upon a great circle of stone with a flame in front of it that changed shape into the form of a woman.
Talking to her she tells that the baby was, in his previous Exalted life, a great Solar Warrior and Leader. he was also her partner and she has been inexorably linked to him and that he would one day rise again to be great.
She also tells the group to walk through the portal in front of them and it will return them to Nexus. The group complain somewhat about this, saying that's not where they want to go, but others point out that it would be better to go there initially than to have to make their way back south by their own means, even if this is with the aid of Soltranauch.
So they comply and walk through the gate........to Nexus?
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