LOG START
[17:31:53] Master of Games
All Creation, Beneath the Sword
Session 5
There is no denying that many threads are converging in Jibei. Perhaps that’s only to be expected—why would Fate bring three heroes with the Sun on their brow together where their light is not needed?
There is something going on with the essence of sacred Ama-Ni-Traya. A party of specialists dispatched by Clan Anori to investigate the matter has apparently been incommunicado since, and that patch of mist in the center of the lake still isn’t clearing up. But perhaps the true root of the problem lies farther away, in a forest manse seemingly hollowed out such that its own manifest soul crumbled to ash miles away. If it’s happened more than once, nothing says it won’t happen more than twice.
At the same time, guests from far away are in the country, speaking in hushed tones of discontent and regime changes. There are sympathetic ears for them to be sure, but the dragons of the Blessed Isle aren’t known for selfless altruism. And then there’s the bandit problem, of which at least one of you is part and another to be the solution. Perhaps they’re just tall tales, but perhaps even stories matter.
Everyone wants a piece of you, it seems. It may be up to you to decide who gets what before the Maidens take the matter out of everyone’s hands.
What do you do? Or rather, what do you do first?
[17:50:23] Raizo
Raizo has taken the opportunity to avail himself of some bread and rose water from Datei’s larders, and on the way to and from he’s used the time to think things through a bit. “Here’s what I’m thinking right now: our bandit problem risks running around the country for days not achieving much. I consider them almost more of a symptom than a cause, and I’m no physick but the last time I talked to one, she droned on about fixing the cause to heal the sick or something like that. These foreign agents may make moves sooner than later, which is worth thinking about, but maybe I can lean on V’neef to forestall any plans until we can better gauge how friendly they would be to us. I think the longer we take on the geomancers, the closer they are to dead, and their knowledge ought to be useful to us. If nothing else, saving them means they owe us a favor. Just pragmatically speaking I think if the land is sick, there’s no sense in ruling it, so I think we should study that first.”
[17:50:30] Raizo
”What do you think about that, Kagemori?”
[17:53:36] Datei ma Kagemori
”I think this is a fair assessment. I think when it comes to bandits, we need more information. I do not like fighting enemies blind. I will try to gather more information on it. The geomancers, there is little to be done other than to see where they went, I think.”
[18:00:36] Raizo
”Agreed. Maybe there’s no crocodile rider, maybe there is, maybe if there’s not we can make one, but I think lives at stake are more important, especially if they help us learn what, if anything, is happening to the land.”
[18:01:17] River Snake
”I agree with Raizo, the gemoancers are the only one with an urgent timetable. I’ll see if any of my contacts can find out about the bandits as well.”
[18:04:16] Datei ma Kagemori
”We seem to be unified in thought. Is there anything we should do before we head to the lake? Do we want to bring any friends along, to move light and fast?”
[18:05:16] River Snake
”Do you know anything that would be helpful about the lake site?”
[18:12:41] Datei ma Kagemori
”Hmm. I am not much at home here in the capital, but I have heard much about it.” He takes out a scroll of notes from a shelf. “I believe this manse dates back…” He goes over a few factoids, trying to recall ones that are currently relevant.
[18:24:27] Master of Games
The manse in the middle of the lake is an old one, he recalls, though it’s been rebuilt over the centuries. It has always been a shrine, and every shrine has its priests. But this shrine doesn’t belong to a Clan but to the mountain, or perhaps the lake, or the great old fish that dwells in it—records and ritual have always been diplomatically cagey on the matter. Be that as it may, the priesthood is generally drawn from among those who frequent the lake most: that is to say, the dive-miners who haul up iridiscent iron-sand from its bed. As such, the position is not a full-time one, and whether anyone is currently tending the shrine depends largely on whether there is cult business to be seen to, endeavors to be blessed, or forgiveness to be begged. If there isn’t, one would expect to find its priests on the shore, diving with everyone else.
[18:28:42] Datei ma Kagemori
”I imagine the shrine will have few people present, at least those there legitimately, other than the geomancers. Perhaps a few priests, but even a full cadre of them would be of some surprise. Today is not the day of a major ritual, and the job is a part-time one.”
[18:49:08] Raizo
”If it’s all the same, I’d like to bring my band with me. Who knows what we’ll run into, and I’d trust them with my life. They’ve saved it many times before, in fact.”
[18:50:52] River Snake
”Hopefully we dont run into anything that will require their assistance, but with missing geomancers, anything from bandits to monsters is on the table”?
[18:51:19] Datei ma Kagemori
”Very well. I’ll call for a boat.”
[19:04:53] Datei ma Kagemori
Kagemori also issues an order for information on local bandits as he gets the travel plans figured out.
[19:14:21] Master of Games
And a boat comes, after instructions are given to look discreetly into other matters while the master is away. The journey over the lake is peaceful. It’s a gorgeous view, really, if you have the mind to enjoy it, but the awareness that the “morning fog” around that islet still hasn’t lifted, even though it’s afternoon, may spoil the scene somewhat. It makes sense, now, why the divers seem less active. They must have been the first to notice something was afoot.
[19:15:51] Master of Games
Fog is a misnomer, really. As the boat sails towards the island, the mist seems to get thicker as you approach, resembling more a cloud cover concealing a mountaintop than wispy fog.
[19:19:02] Master of Games
Perhaps to the military-minded among the passengers, it brings to mind layered fortifications. Either way, there’s nowhere to go but inside. The boat slows down, pulling the sails and relying on oars as a precaution against shipwrecks given the visibility, and slides into the clouds. The islet isn’t big, and this patch of fog around it can’t be that much larger. Surely, you’ll hit land quickly.
[19:23:25] Master of Games
Something floats in the air, dark against the white fog. As it drifts past, it looks like nothing quite so much as writing, an ancient character you can’t read, bleeding like ink dripped into water.
[19:24:51] Datei ma Kagemori
Kagemori stares into the fog. “Natural fog does not behave this way. Where even is the isle?”
[19:25:52] Raizo
”Eyes sharp, rogues.” Raizo says, eyeing the inky apparition as it passes. “Cover every angle.”
[19:27:19] River Snake
”Well, we knew it would be weird here. This looks like something magic related, for sure”
[19:34:38] Master of Games
There’s movement in the mist, and one of Raizo’s band slashes at the fog. The vague outline of some creature with many legs, floating in the air, is cut in two, but it is only fog. There’s a startled yelp from among the rowers, noticing the apparition belatedly.
[19:36:53] Raizo
Raizo pans his view across the surroundings, and solemnly puts his helmet and mask.
[19:37:03] River Snake
”Is this a bad time to mention that I’m not really that good in a fight?”
[19:40:19] Master of Games
The boat is still difting forward, and ought to have hit land or else sailed back out of the patch of fog by now. But at all times, there seems to be a wall of clouds behind you and another before you, yet to be crossed. The rowers try changing direction, leading the boat between what looks like layers of fog, and end up sailing around corners and back into the mist. It’s a different sort of mist from that Kagemori would know to associate with his clan’s tutelary deity—Nazubi’s rains and mists are shrouds and veils, this is a layered, forbidding wall. Raizo is almost put in mind of a fortress, or trenches meant to guide an attacking force along the path the defenders want them to take. To River Snake, this feels like nothing so much as a maze in an ancient tomb. The problem, then, is how to get out.
[19:45:08] Datei ma Kagemori
Unseen Essence flows through Kagemori’s eyes, looking for a cause of this magical fog. “Stay firm, men, we shall cut through this wall soon enough. Someone wants us to stay out, but I go where I please.” His eyes search the fog, looking for anything discernible beyond the apparitions.
[19:49:08] Master of Games
Kagemori glances around with eyes used to the spiritual and honed by the brilliance of the sun. He can confirm, at least, that these apparitions are not spirits, nor are any invisible gods playing pranks on them. They are purely shapes in the mist, though it’s hard to imagine them being random. The imagery is mismatched and confusing, but there must be something behind it.
River Snake, meanwhile, feels like the floating ink resembles characters he’s seen before, the language of the old realm that preceded the age of strife which in turn preceded this one. The characters are vague and malformed, but perhaps they could be read?
[19:51:51] Datei ma Kagemori
”There are no gods about unseen, for what it is worth. Do either of you have ways to cut through mystic illusions or weather?”
[19:59:03] Master of Games
The layers of fog seem to multiply as the shadow of a centipede as long as your boat drifts by. New clouds rise like fences.
[20:00:00] River Snake
”I dont know anything like that…but the floating blackness looks like writing” He squints a bit and tries to make out the wispy text
[20:02:31] Raizo
”It seems like it’s trying to draw us in, or rather draw us along a direction of its choosing. But for what?”
[20:04:02] Datei ma Kagemori
Kagemori wracks his memory for accounts of any sages wielding powers like this, or any gods with similar abilities.
[20:04:45] Raizo
”When threatened with ambush, the best defense is often charging the enemy, but if this little ruse just has us going in circles, we’ll be charging nowhere fast.”
[20:05:25] River Snake
”Can’t charge what you can’t see. I think this is old realm, I might be able to make it out”
[20:11:51] Master of Games
River Snake thinks he can make out words. Perhaps they might even be phrases, but they’re out of order—Fence, border, mountains, eightfold. Perhaps if you can find the order… The boat drifts along, following the inkblots. “Many-fenced mount”, “many clouds rising”, “to dwell there”, “clouds rise as fences”, “eightfold fences”. Something changes in the mist. The boat sails through a layer of fog and sees a vision of Ama-ni-Traya, shrouded in clouds, like a fortification—eightfold, octagonal ramparts of cloud. A deer’s head leers out of the fog at you.
[20:13:22] Raizo
”Quite. In this case, it would be simply charging forward, but…” Raizo trails off, racking his brain. There’s no forward here, just fog sending them in circles and no point of reference.
[20:16:11] Master of Games
This all feels like something Kagemori should know. Eightfold cloud ramparts ring a bell, but they have nothing to do with any of the Ninety-Nine Stars, or with the fish Dai-Kiga. But he seems to recall expressions like that, from the legends of how the Stars brought peace and safety to the land, dispersed the dark clouds around Ama-ni-Traya.
[20:17:28] Master of Games
They sail through another layer of cloud, and see octagons within octagons.
[20:18:16] Master of Games
The contradiction remains: fortifications, or a channel, but they seem to be going in circles only. Where’s the castle?
[20:19:17] Raizo
If this fog is a wall, perhaps there is some weakness he can see? What would they be protecting, anyway? The Thousand Correct Actions don’t cover magical misdirecting fog, but…
[20:25:24] River Snake
”Maybe we should’ve brought a priest with. The shrine isnt always defended like this, is it?”
[20:33:21] Datei ma Kagemori
”Normally, the shrine is easily accessible. It is possible this is a defense it has long had, but it is not usually active at least.”
[20:34:47] Master of Games
…But they do cover both fortification and misdirection. A wall made of clouds can hardly stop a man moving through it, but the idea of what may be behind it can. A horse doesn’t like to charge through water it can’t see the bottom of. The clouds are really walls without the physical wall, and thus they work as walls—as long as there could be something on the other side that keeps you from wanting to charge through them. But there is nothing on the other side here. The walls are just clouds, and all they can do to keep you out is make you want to stay out.
The boat grinds to a halt against sandy ground.
[20:35:38] Datei ma Kagemori
”This reminds me of stories of how the Ninety-Nine Stars dispersed clouds around Ama-ni-Traya. But this is not- Ah. Was that ground?”
[20:35:38] River Snake
”Well, we found something”
[20:44:15] Master of Games
You see before you the small rocky island near the center of Agate Lake. Itself merely the size of a large estate, it’s dominated by irregular rocks that seem as though they’ve grown from the water, many of them decorated with ropes and paper streamers in patterns that surely make sense to those who pray here. The roofs of the central shrine buildings can be seen from the beach, circling around a spire in the middle of the islet whose surface almost looks like it’s covered in flowers made of rock—or did, once. Cracks have formed in that spire, and many of those flowers are in the process of scattering.
[20:49:39] Raizo
”Ah. Huh.”
[20:50:42] Datei ma Kagemori
”The cracks are connected to the damage to the manse, I would think. Unclear if that is what caused the strange fog. Perhaps the manse trying to protect itself. Or maybe the source of the damage trying to keep others out who might disrupt their work.” Kagemori looks up and down the beach as he disembarks. Are there any other boats?
[20:55:59] Master of Games
There’s one boat, slightly smaller than your group’s, that may be the one that held a party accompanying the Anori specialists. It’s unmarked and discreet, but of higher quality and more expensive materials than boats you’d expect the divers to use. There are also a few smaller vessels laid upside-down on the beach presumably for use by divers, by this doesn’t necessarily mean many of them are here. They may simply be spares in case a boat used to reach the islet is damaged or lost.
[21:00:18] Raizo
”Let’s see if we can find any sign of the Anori here, then look for a way in.”
[21:01:11] Datei ma Kagemori
”Agreed.” Kagemori approaches the possibly-Anori boat. “Anyone home?” He raises his voice and calls out. To the boat mostly, but anyone else nearby could also hear it.
[21:02:16] River Snake
Snake follows along the other two, focusing his senses as he takes in the scenery