# Connor's Records of Seacliff- Updated 1/27



## ConnorSB (Dec 5, 2003)

This story hour is not actually based on a campain with PCs. I am between games, and have been for a while. But I'm working on a world, and the easiest way for me to flesh it out is through fiction. And so I've been writing.

Some basics about the campain world:

Its set on a map of Europe. The history runs sort of like earth's, save that most nations, rather than only differeing culturly, are actually seperate fantasy races. And there is magic and magical monsters.

The world as it is is set up politically like the Renaissance, but I have gathered cool quirks from all over history. In any case, the lands are set up roughly like this, as compared to a traditional map of Europe:

England: Kobolds and various other reptilians. They worship a beetle god and have a strong female monarch (get the insect pun?)

Spain: Elves. They are set up much like a traditional elf monarchy forest area, save that they have flying magic-powered ships as thier "Spainish Armada." And they are actually material plane giths, cousins of the githzerai and githyanki.

France: Orcs! This was mostly just because french accents and orc grunts are just so similer and hilarious... and I had no where else to put them.

Germany: Gnomes. this actually makes sense in the context of germany being a rather peaceful idyllic place at the time. Sort of...

Russia: Communist Dwarves. Moradin and Engles hit the shelves a few hundred years early, and now the stoic dwarves work not just for gold, but for Mother Russia as well. Plus... I get to use the Dwarven KGB.

and finally Italy. It is the last basition of humans. In this world, the roman empire lasted a lot longer than it did in ours, because the emperor himself was a demigod of magic. They had a theocracy (rule by priests and emperor/god), and still do. Basically imagine the sorcerer kings from dark sun. Only itallian.

Africa and the americas are unexplored, and i haven't given thought to the middle east or the balkans.

Anyway... here's the first installment of the story....


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## ConnorSB (Dec 5, 2003)

*"Discovery"*

The beetlepack was heavy against Kel’s small frame, pressed as it was into his back, but the small reptilian man dealt with the weight as best he could. The beetle’s bright eyes lit up the tunnel better than any torch, and the heat radiating from them kept his neck scales toasty hot. With his pick in front of him, he crawled on. He would push the pick forward, find a place to catch it on, and pull himself forward with it as leverage. The passageway was barely a foot high and an inch more than that wide.

The rock around him was wet with the damp, and Kel could smell rank mold growing there. He clawed at the wall beside him, and his claws came back black with the stuff. He put them in his mouth. Not quite ripe. He would try again in a week. Things do take time to age.

The tunnel wound on for a few dozen more feet, and then Kel emerged into the central cavern. He looked up at the spiral tower that rose parallel to the north wall. The central elevator, recently made faster by its steam-powered engine, was encircled by two sets of stairs, a double helix that rose away from the floor like some grand web. From afar, the steel thing looked fragile, a crisscross of metal struts, but up close Kel knew he would see the familiar buttresses, cables, and ornately carved supports that held the thing up. It was an amalgam of talent: the airy design was elfin, the metalworking dwarven, and the intricate, strong construction was, of course, kobold.

The stairway, the whole cavern, was abuzz with activity and sound. E team, the dwarven blast specialists, was just changing shifts. Sooty, smiling dwarves amiably ascended the stairs, waving to their friends from the new shift as those descended. Towards the ceiling, tethered kobolds rappelled down the walls, tending to the mold farms that grew in the highest part of the cavern. So carefully did they tend the mold, that it was not touched by reptile claw until the day it was harvested. Mold Farm Beetles were, of course, free to scuttle across it, leaving their nutrient rich droppings. 

From their deep purple color, Kel thought at least three of the patches ready for extraction. Purple Proxim, as the mold was called, was a prized commodity. Ground, it made an excellent spice. Cooked, it was a delicacy fit for dragons. A pound sold for thousands of gold pieces, and the central cavern’s ceiling represented at least a hundred pounds of the stuff.

Harvest day would be a joy, as it always was. The whole mine would congregate in the central chamber, and as the mold was harvested, bits would be missed, and they would waft down, sparkling in the darkness. Upon a signal, the darkness would be illuminated as every worker released a scarab into the air. They would flit about, gorging themselves on the mold particles. The cave would sparkle like a kaleidoscope, and then the beetles would fall, killed by a fatal reaction between the mold and their stomachs. The beetles would writhe on the ground as the reaction transformed them, bloating their hard flesh with gas. It was disgusting to watch their chitinous exoskeletons break apart. But that night, the workers would feast on their gas-bloated forms. Bloated beetle was a rare meal, and so it was much enjoyed.

Lost in his musings, Kel didn’t notice when another kobold exited the tunnel he himself had emerged from.

“Hey, boss.”

It was Roc, one of Kel’s subordinates and the Vor’tek Mine’s finest tunnel scout. In his youth Kel could have matched Roc, but all that changed five years ago. The day of the collapse. But Kel knew he would need a successor, and so had set about training Roc, a quick study. In no time at all, Kel was Scout Supervisor, and Roc his best employee.

“Roc. Anything to report?”

“Actually, yes, boss. I found this.” Roc held out a stone tablet. It was covered in fine runes, like tiny spider webs.

“Where did you…”
“In the far caverns, past the Unstable Section. I could show you.”

“No, that’s all right Roc. Was there anything with it? Anything interesting about that part of the cavern?”
“Well, there’s a whole wall of the stuff. Some stouts (that was slang for the dwarven day laborers of the mine) were digging a line towards that silver vein the stone swimmers sensed last week, and the found a cavern. The far side was this wall covered with these runes. This was at the front of it, this tablet, inset into the wall, but clearly marked and easily removed. Once they found the wall they went looking for me. I had them remove the tablet and seal off the tunnel, at least temporary.”

“Good. Keep it sealed until I tell you different. I think I know someone who can read these runes. They look draconic. Do you have the stout’s names?”

“Of course.”

“Have them at my office in the morning. Take the rest of the day off.”

Roc grinned.

“Oh and Roc…”

“Yes?”

“Keep this quiet. I don’t want anything to happen until I know what that wall is. And tell one of the mold farmers that the tunnel you just came through,” he pointed to where they had emerged, “will be ripe in about a week.”

“Yes boss. Thank you.”

***

Kel took the train into the city. It was a beautiful thing, bent iron cars in the shape of beetles, wheels inscribed with kobold scripture, pushed by eight iron golems cleverly hidden in its bowels. It was primarily a shipment train to bring the smelted metals from the mine into the city, where they could be worked and sold. But it also held a few passengers, and Kel was one of them.

The air bit him with cold, and so he had wrapped himself in a beetle wing cloak. The cloak was set with fire beetle eyes. Their heat radiated through the cloak and onto the lizard man. As the train crested the final rise, he saw the city before him.

Seacliff, Jewel of the Sea. It sprawled before him, spacious. There were the dual ports, miles to the left and right. Between them, the land rose and jutted out into the sea, a peninsula that ended abruptly in jagged cliffs, which fell straight into the sea…


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## ConnorSB (Dec 6, 2003)

Here's the next instalment:

*"Revelation"*

The thing about it was that Kel didn’t want to take the tablet to Dronosus. Sure, the sage could most likely unravel its secrets, but Kel didn’t want that. It was his find, they were his secrets, and the only ones who should benefit were him and his organization. Dronosus was a powerful man, with connections, and Kel knew that once he went to him, the information was no longer his alone. He would have to share, and Kel didn’t like sharing. 

No kobold did, especially with non-kobolds. Yes, Mevendrezek taught sharing and community. But he also taught his people the need for self-improvement. Jevean Smithe, the Beetle’s greatest cleric and follower, even said so in his teachings. He called it the Silent Hand: individual completion and gain was ultimately good for society. By pursuing one’s own goals first, one actually benefited the extended clan.

Kel was a devout believer in the Silent Hand.

And so it was with much footdragging that Kel entered the Pavilion of Sages. Like most of Seacliff City, the pavilion was ancient and spacious. It was a U shaped building, four stories high, built of yellow-white stone that curved seamlessly at the corners. It was decorated in the usual ways, repeated hexagonal patterns of beetles, and the vines that grew up the walls along the carefully carved relief lines added a tastefully organic touch. The roof was yellow tiles, many inscribed with runes of stability and strength. The interior of the U was done up a bit differently. The middle of it was a great grassy courtyard, blooming with flowers and a spacious rock garden. The stone walls gave way to treated glass. Doors were set into it, and walkways ran along the inside walls of the courtyard freestanding, with beautiful stairs running between them and airy bridges connecting the two sides of the U at various levels. These were the workplaces of the Sages, for beneath the building was one of the city’s biggest archives.

All the works contained within its walls were secular or close to it, as the City’s biggest archive, that of the Church of Mevendrezek, had long ago required that it be the only purveyor of such texts. True, many sages kept a copy of the Mevennocon for reference, but they were not to lend it out or allow the study of it by the public. It was a great hassle, but such was the politics among those who catered truth.

This is how Kel’s thoughts wandered as he took the stairs up to the third floor and entered the spacious office and home at the base of the U. He turned and noted the view, out over the courtyard, flanked by the two wings of the building, and then out over the city. Down Baron’s Hill if flowed, along the Street of Charms and then up the Hill of Gods, finally ending at the Temple of Mevendrezek, which was shaped like a great beetle, its wings just starting to unfold into flight. 

He turned back to the office, to this time and place, to the assistant sitting at a desk in the center of the office, great doors behind her. As Kel had come here before, he knew that the entire back wall was but a glammorred wall of force, and was quite transparent from the other side, allowing Dronosus his own magnificent view, of both the city and his assistant, a pretty young kobold woman, her scales a deep green, like moss.

“I don’t have an appointment, but its important. Very important.”

“I’m sorry sir,” she said in a cheerful voice, “Dronosus doesn’t like unexpected visitors.”

Kel looked past her, as if he could see through the glammor to the sage himself. He winked.

The assistant was nonplussed, and fell silent. They both heard the sage’s voice from within. “Let him in, Jora.”

She removed a hexagonal key from around her neck and put it to the door’s lock. There was a faint glow of purple and the doors swung inward. Kel stepped inside.

And there was Dronosus, just where Kel guessed he was. He was a tall being, huge compared to Kel. His features were some mix of human and beast, with great tusks emerging from the corners of his mouth, jutting out from his bearded chin. More horns lined the edge of his face, two rows up to his forehead. The sage, if he had stood, would have been at least eight feet tall, closer to nine. His dark blue skin was mottled and wrinkled with age, but he bore it well. Dronosus was an ancient Ogre-Mage, but it was a stately kind of decrepity. His great black beard was streaked with grey, but this may or may not have been intentional.

“Hello Kel. You have something important to show me? I don’t work for cheap.”

Kel tossed a sack up to the sage. His hand shot out violently, grabbing the bag of coins from their air like a swooping bird of prey would catch a fish. The claws of his hands completed the analogy. “Of course. May I?”

The small reptile-man came around the side of the desk. It was far taller than him, and he had to reach high just to be able to put the tablet onto its surface. He reached blindly with the stone, but managed to put it on the desk without knocking anything over. At least that Kel could hear. The ogre-mage lifted the stone to his face as Kel used a nearby bookshelf for a ladder and climbed up onto the desk. He stood on it, a mess of papers beneath his feet.

For a few long minutes the sage studied the tablet, mumbling under his breath.

“It was found deep in the mines, Dronosus, by one of my scouts. He pulled it from a wall covered with the same sort of writing. I had the miners who were working nearby seal up the cave the wall was in, just in case.”

The sage seemed oblivious. But a minute later he set the stone down and peered at the kobold. “It was good that you brought this to me before the church.”

“How did you know I haven’t taken it to the church yet?”

“Because its heresy, writ in the same tongue and by the same hand as the original Mevennocon itself.”


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## BLACKDIRGE (Dec 6, 2003)

Well, I am impressed. And you say you're still in high school?!

Anyway, I enjoyed the first two installments, your world is very unique and you presented a good hook early, I like that in a story. 

I would say your creative writing class is paying off .  

Looking forward to more.

Dirge


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## ConnorSB (Dec 6, 2003)

I'm aiming for a 1000 words a day, which is about how long I make my updates anyway. So here's #3.

*"Problems"*

Kel stared at the sage, startled. “Wha… what?”

“I’ll need time to study it, Kel. And the proper books. If you could see your way back out into the waiting room, I must take a trip to the vault. In fact, go get lunch. I don’t know how long this may take.”

“Uhh… alright, Dronosus.” He sighed and hopped of the desk. He went to the door, but turned and took a look around the room. Dronosus had his back turned; he was shuffling off to the door in the back of the office, the one with the private stairs to the vault that every office here had. Besides the desk and the door, the floor was bare. The walls, however, were lined with bookshelves. They were a mess, books stacked every which way and scrolls of parchment crammed into the corners. Kel put his hand to the door, which was actually simply a piece of the translucent wall, framed in purple, and it opened outward silently.

He stepped through, and suddenly the wall was visible again. For the instant that he had one eye in the office and one in the waiting room, the wall became blurry, a purple haze in Kel’s mind.

Jora had turned in her chair to face Kel.

“You’ll probably want to cancel your master’s appointments,” said Kel. “He said it would be ‘a while.’”

“Oh,” said Jora. “You can have seat over there.” She pointed a finger, snakelike, at a kobold sized chair set tastefully against the left wall.

Kel nodded, walked, and sat. And sat, and sat. This did not bode well, he thought. He didn’t really want Dronosus to look at the stone in the first place, and now it wasn’t even in Kel’s possession anymore. Who knew what the ogre-mage was doing with it, deep in the vaults of the Pavilion of Sages?

It was a quiet wait. The tempered glass walls provided a good damper on the noises of the city outside. But they echoed the sounds from within, and for a long time the only thing to pass through Kel’s ears was the scratching of the assistant’s pen and her quiet humming. It was an old tune, with many names and many subjects, but for Kel it was “The Ugly Elf and the Pretty Orc,” which provided a humorous twist on the two races’ eternal struggle. He could remember his mother singing it to him and the other eggs, so long ago. Kobolds were the only civilized race born by egg, and for reasons no one quite understood, most kobolds became active and aware long before they were hatched. By the time they emerged from their eggs, most could understand speech. Kel certainly could.

As he sat, it floated to the top of Kel’s mind that he was humming along to the tune as well, mouthing the words; Jora was looking at him. “You know the tune?”

“My mother sang it to me en embryo. It was always my favorite.”

“Mine as well.” She smiled. “Are you hungry?”

It was then that the office door flew outward, wreathed in flames.

Dronosus’ assistant flew over the desk, pushed by the explosion. Kel bolted to his feet. She hit the floor limp, unconscious, maybe dead. Inside the office, an inferno raged. Kel stared at the flames as they hungrily devoured the books and scrolls within. He heard the sickening sound of wood collapsing, and knew that the office was unsaveable. The building was stone, and heavily protected against fire. Each office was in its own sort of stone cubby. The doors to the stairs at the back of each one were metal, and reinforced with magic besides.

Regardless, fire was _not good_, and even the chance of it spreading in such a facility was unacceptable. And smoke was filling the room. Kel backed away from the blaze, picked up the Jora’s fallen body, and, dragging her outside, began yelling. “Fire! Fire! Fire in Dronosus’ office!”

The guards in the pavilion below turned. They started yelling, and one ran off to a set of steps leading down into the vaults. Kel took Jora’s body in his arms and moved away from the burning office, along the walkway that encircled the inner walls of the pavilion. He reached the steps down and took them carefully. As he did guards appeared from the vault stairs and ran across the pavilion and then up the steps past him. The first one paused until Kel assured him the woman was all right. After three flights, he reached the ground. He put Jora down on the grass of the courtyard, cradeling the back of her scaled head. He put his hand over her snout, felt her hot breath against it. She lived. He looked up at the office, and prayed that Dronosus and the tablet hadn’t been inside.

Suddenly, a gout of smoke belched from the building. A guard emerged suddenly from it, stumbling backwards and hit the railing of the walkway in front of the smoking office. Another figure emerged. Violently, it shoved the guard over the edge. He screamed as he fell, and hit the stone path that encircled the edge of the building with a sickening crunch. The figure leaped from the causeway, dropped the thirty or so feet gracefully, and landed softly, on all fours. The furry creature grinned with a mouthful of knives before bounding towards the lone reptile-man…


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## ConnorSB (Dec 9, 2003)

Here's the next update, full of combaty goodness...

*"Duel"*

As soon as he saw the guard fall, Kel’s focus narrowed. Time slowed, and the scenery blurred. Everything faded but the black furred enemy. This was Kel’s battle training in action.

Kel’s hands went to his neck, where a dull red choker was fastened tight against the skin. The choker was made of rust red leaves, hundreds of them like scales blending in with his own. He depressed a hidden catch among the tiny leaves, and the choker grew. The leaves became wider, longer, and flowed down Kel’s body like blood. In moments, the kobold was encapsulated in a suit of steel-leaf armor. It was one of the few things Kel had ever requisitioned, ordering it made by the mine’s spell-smiths.

	Around the suit’s waist a band of brown roots expanded, like a belt. Its buckle was a red leaf handle, which Kel grasped with his right hand. He pulled the handle from his armor, and with it came to roots. They were twisted and braided together, and the cord they formed stretched fifteen feet, ending with a sharp spike of leaves. This whip dagger was the reason Kel had the suit specially commissioned. It was the weapon of a scout, a light versatile thing, appropriate for an ex-tunnel stalker.

	All this happened in the space of time between the creature’s jump and it’s leaping charge towards Kel. As it ran, the thing drew a sword from its back. It leaped at Kel, drawing the sword sideways across the kobold’s body, an attempt at disembowelment. But Kel’s reflexes and his strange armor saved him, and the blow skittered across the steel leaves, making a sound like chattering teeth. The creature howled in frustration as it slammed into Kel, who was knocked back and away by the blow.

	But the quick little kobold recovered, flipping in midair and sending his whip dagger sailing out to catch the creature’s sword and rip it from his person. The blade flew sideways and landed with a dull thump in the grass. Roaring, the furry creature charged Kel, claws and teeth extended.

	For Kel, time slowed to a trickle. As it ran to him, Kel got his first clear look at the enemy. It was a strange creature, tall as a kobold but with fur instead of scales. Its jaw was shorter, like that of a baboons, but its eyes were somehow reptilian, and inside them Kel saw the calculating mind of one of his own race. But how could a lizard become a rabid monkey? Kel could not answer then, for time sped up again, and the strange thing was upon him.

	It bit and scratched, but not a blow made it passed Kel’s armor. Again Kel flipped back and away, striking the creature with his whip as he retreated. This time he was aiming for the thing itself, not its weapon, and it howled in pain as Kel’s whip sliced across the back of its shoulder, the cord stinging it and the dagger sinking deep into its flesh.
	On and on, they fought like this, the creature’s claws to weak to penetrate Kel’s armor, and Kel’s whip-dagger slowly cutting away at the thing, until finally it fell, its black fur matted with deep red blood. The battle-mind faded, and Kel found himself on the far side of the courtyard. He looked across to the office, which was no longer smoking. Someone, probably a guard, had moved Jora, for she was not where he had left her. Guards milled about, and quite a few were looking at him. So was Dronosus, who hovered in the center of the courtyard, supported by his magic.

	The ogre-mage spoke softly, but Kel knew that everyone could hear him. “Impressive as always Kel. Does it yet live?”

	The kobold reached to his neck, and his armor twisted back up into the rust choker, pulling the whip with it. Kel approached the fallen thing, knelt, and put his palm to its blood-soaked neck. He could hear a pulse, but it was faint and uneven, like rising bubbles. He looked up at the ogre mage, who was quickly descending to the ground. “Its alive, whatever it is…”

The mage landed. He drew a flask from his sleeve, undid the stopper, and poured a few spills of liquid onto the creature. When they hit, the things flesh sizzled and crisped. Soon the liquid spread to its whole form, and the thing burned and shriveled to a blackened husk. “Its dead now,” said the ogre mage.

	“Is the stone-”
	“I have it. I was not in the office when it was attacked.”
	“What was that… thing?”
	“I shall not speak of such things here, but suffice to say it was a kobold, but is no longer. Let us adjourn to the vault, we can discuss things privately there. Oh, and thank you for rescuing my assistant. She is… efficient. Now let us to the vault.”
	“But… what about your office?”
	“Do you think I would leave anything of value so exposed? All that was there was but copies and shadows. Illusions, nothing more.”
	“If everything was illusory, then what was burning?”
	Dronosus grimaced.

	“A very comfortable desk.”


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## Elder-Basilisk (Dec 10, 2003)

Since Blackdirge has grabbed the first fanspot, I'll grab the second. This is a good story and I hope you keep it up.


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## ConnorSB (Dec 10, 2003)

Oh, I plan on it. I'm typing up the next entry as we speak. It'll be done by later tonight. Oh, and I'm actually trying to base this story in actual DND, so I will probably be posting the stats of the different characters and mosnters in my low CR monster thread, right here:

http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=70930


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## ConnorSB (Dec 10, 2003)

*"Questions"*

If Kel were to give the vault’s interior a word, that word would be defended. They had taken the main stairway from the courtyard down. As it was the most straightforward access to the vault, it was the most heavily guarded. And after the explosion and fire upstairs, the place was milling with hired sword. Kel saw a few dwarves and gnomes, but they were mostly kobold, and all of them were decked in the black chain-and-mail of the Protectorate. 

Once the Protectorate was a slave army trained by the Empire, but when the Elemental Revolt came, they were quickest to switch sides, once they realized who now controlled the vast mineral wealth of Gowell and Espa, not to mention whatever treasures lay hidden in freezing wastes of Norjua. But now they were the largest mercenary organization on the continent. They asked a high price, but their customers were reimbursed with unwavering loyalty. After they had been hired, the Protectorate could not be bought.

	Whether it was the ogre mage’s reputation, or the deeply serious look in his eyes, not one guard bothered him or the small reptilian trotting in the shadow of his billowing cloak.

	Standing at his full height Drosonus barely squeezed beneath the nine foot high doors. The ceiling, like the doors arched at the top. As he and Kel made their way down the entrance hall, a narrow thing a hundred feet long, sloping downward, he had to walk in the exact center of the hall to avoid scraping his horns on the ceiling. The walls were lined with arrow slits and covered with runes of protection, warding, and privacy. Dronosus had full confidence in their protective nature, as he had carved most of them himself.

	The corridor ended in two doors, which opened as Kel and Dronosus approached. Behind them was a small dark room, its walls metal. Kel had taken this ride before: it was a magical lift, supported by discs of floating rock beneath the floor and above the metal ceiling. They entered the room and the doors closed. Dronosus stared at the wall, his back to the kobold. Kel felt the floor drop from beneath his feet as the box plummeted down and, strangely, sideways as well. He did not remember the sideways motion, the one time Dronosus had ever taken him into the vaults. But it was a big place, and maybe this other route was a faster way to get wherever Dronosus was taking them. But it never hurt to ask.

	“Why are we moving sideways as well as down?” Kel said into Dronosus’ back.
	Dronosus turned and dropped his eyes to his companion. “We are going somewhere safe, for a little chat.”
	“A chat about what?”
	Dronosus grimaced again, the same way he had when he spoke of the desk. “Schism.”
	“What?” Kel was nonplussed.
	The ogre mage heaved a sigh, which was loud in the small metal box, and leaned back. He rested his massive back against the metal wall, and looked piercingly into Kel’s eyes. “You’ve placed a heavy burden on me, Kel. And despite the accidental nature of it all, it is to you and I that this burden shall fall.

	The doors opened behind Kel. Light flooded the box, but his eyes adjusted after a few blinks. There was a long hall, and a table with chairs big and small. And people.

	Roc, Jora, and a third, a dwarf, stopped their conversation and turned to look at the new arrival. Dronosus spoke to Kel from behind. “I’ve gathered everyone who knows, except for the furry creature you fought, who is dead.” 

The ogre-mage strode pat him, and Kel scurried after him. The mage took a seat at the head of the table, and Kel took the only remaining one, next to Jora and across from Roc.

Dronosus reached into his sleeve and pulled the stone out. He placed it carefully onto the table in front of him and slid it into the center. “This is a marker, which,” he pulled a sheet of parchment from his sleeve, “I have translated here.” He draped the paper on top of the stone, so that all could read it.

_Here are the gates of the City of Fire,
Which has stood undefeated since the Sun first rose
And has weathered the beatings of time
So that you, traveler, could marvel at the wonders
Of the Kobolds, Children of Othar, Dragon-God of Fire._

The three kobolds looked twice at the paper, then at Dronosus, then back to the paper. The dwarf just muttered to himself. “…children of the devil, the lot of you scalies…”

Dronosus chuckled.
“What’s so funny, hornface?” asked Roc. “This is heresy!”
The ogre mage’s face lost all hints at mirth, becoming as rigid and hard as a stone. He pointed to the dwarf. “Its true, what Toros there said.”

Kel was, as usual, confused. “How…”

Dronosus leaned back in his chair. “Do any of you know how it was, before the Empire conquered our continent?”

“Magic ran wild!” exclaimed Jora.
Roc smiled. “The earth was unmined, the caverns a place of wonder and awe, and full of life. And they were everywhere.”

“Yes,” said Dronosus. “This was all true.”

Toros spoke. “And the kobolds worshiped Fire, just as the dwarves once worshiped Stone…”

Dronosus finished for him. “… And the elements were in balance. The magical creatures of the world were in perfect harmony, as was all of nature, and all of magic. Until the Empire came, and everything fell under their rule.”

Roc held up his hand. “Wait. Go back to the part about kobolds worshiping fire. Isn’t that what the orcs do now, them and their fire god Gruumsh? I’ve met some Gowellians, I know what they worship and its fire.”
Dronosus smiled. “That is the way of it now. But before the empire, things were… different. It has to do with the nature of belief, and the nature of rebellion…”


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## ConnorSB (Dec 14, 2003)

Sorry I haven't updated in a while, but I have the flu, or some sort of cold, and I've been too tired or head-achy to write anything vaguely coherent. I'll start updating again as soon as I get better. Freaking flu.

Connor


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## ConnorSB (Dec 20, 2003)

Well, I've recovered, and since its Nondenominational Winter Holiday Break, I have plenty of time to write. Expect some updates soon!


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## ConnorSB (Dec 28, 2003)

*New directions...*

Change of Plans! I actually got a campaign going, with, like, real players, so I'm going to cut Kel's story short for now, and start in on thiers. We just finished the second session, and the group seems to be coming together rather well. I'll post the PCs right now.

*Alex*- An elven rogue. He was born with his twin sister Alexandria in the elven capital of Madrid. They were orphanned at a young age and grew up to a life of crime. He was pressed into the elven navy for a few years as punishment when he got caught stealing from a merchant, and it was there that he fell in love with the sea and his life of piracy began. He returned to the city and his sister, where they plot their largest heist yet.

*Alexandria*- Alex' twin sister, she was left behind when Alex was pressed into the navy. She is now one of the primier thieves in the city of Madrid, with a small residence in the Forigner's Quarter, the only place that is truly safe from Espania's (The elven nation, based on real world Spain) priest-warriors and thier zeloutous devotion to the Queen of the Winds.

*Gorbois*- Once a young orc noble, he was forcefully exiled when the orcish king seized his familys lands, as his father had angered the young king. Now he lives in Seacliff, and is a recent member of the _Staged Men_, a group of dashing ruffians that are actors by day, and thieves by night. Their leader, playwrite, and all around awsome guy is the mysterious Eremis, a human with his hands in a lot of back pockets. Recently, he picked the pocket of a foppish young elven noble with a bright red hat, and found coins of a strange make, a flame on either side of them.

*Dakxa*- This aspiring young kobold is a cleric of the Beetle-God Mevendrezek. He is honest, trustworthy, and a bit naive. Currently he is under the tutalige of Bishop Moxolus, and is the bishops errand boy, apprentice, secretary, and all around lackey.

*Sura*- This stout dwarven lady is not to be trifled with. Having grown up in Madrid, the daughter of two dwarven merchants who had strayed far from the Motherland, she had a cosmopolitan youth, steeped in both the rich cultural heritage of the dwarves (Revolution!), and the hard faith of the elves. Now she is setting out on her own, and Seacliff appears to be the best place for an aspiring young fighter to go. And so she has booked passage on _The Western Shore_, a fast little caravel headed for Seacliff. It leaves in the morning, and so she sleeps on the ship that night.

Somehow, these five lives will spiral together, and only time knows what part they will play in this bold and expanding world.


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## ConnorSB (Dec 28, 2003)

*"A Bold Beginning"*

Espania’s people were as devout as they come, a cold and unforgiving populace that shunned strangers and abhorred change. Madrid was their capital, and the elves of that place were in all things more extreme than their provincial cousins. It was no surprise, therefore, that misfits had hard lives. As extreme as their peers were in their faith, so were pariahs in their general action and demeanor. Alex and Alexandria were perfect examples.

	Unlike the typical elven family, they were orphans, without kin of any kind. And kin was paramount in Espania- without family you were a vagrant not even worthy of the boots that kicked you. Their childhood was a hard one, always running, always stealing, and never safe. When Alex had just reached manhood, he was pressed into the Armada. Two years he served, before the ship he was enslaved to finally returned to Madrid and he could find his sister.

	The voyage had changed him, and not for the better. True, he fell in love with the sea, and was entranced by all it offered- the smells, the swells, the ships full of plunder. But these wonders were tarnished by his enforced company- the devout officers of the armada and their clerical overseers. Every day was prayer service, and every object on the ship was stamped with the seal of the Queen of the Winds. It may have been the most holy ship in the world, but for Alex it was a malicious overseer, an unruly beast that bit the hand that fed it. He grew to hate the church, and the armada, and even his own country. Everything Espania stood for was, for him, a joke, a lie, and a fraud.

	And so it was no surprise that when he returned to his sister, he had already planned the greatest heist they had ever performed.

	Alex and Alexandria were going to rob the High Church of Madrid of their most important relic. Notice that he did not say holy, for the Book of Teachings was in no way important to Alex. No, in his travels he had learned what truly rule Espania. It was not the Queen of the Winds: it was her bureaucracy. 

And so he and Alexandria were going to steal the Book of Accounts- the tome in which all transactions were recorded. Every bribe, every tithe, every payment for every sin committed by every important person, and every unimportant person, for the last decade or ten. It was a huge tome, and it was to be theirs.

Alex’ mind was set upon this course, and soon so was Alexandria’s. It would happen that very night.


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## ConnorSB (Dec 30, 2003)

*"Work"*

Skylines are not often dominated, but if you stood in Central Square in downtown Seacliff, you would see one that was. Facing south, facing the sea and the salty wind, you would see the Great Beetle rising from the center of the Point. Its great eyes, huge domed windows with a thousand shimmering facets, would stare out at the city. They would be looking everywhere all at once, one facet for every man, woman, and scampering little lizard-child in the city. No matter where you were, if you could see the eyes, one of the windows would bounce the sun’s rays onto you. This was comfort for Dakxa as he went on his errands. 

Scampering across the crowded streets of Seacliff, he mused on the building. It was a tribute to its builders and to Mevendrezek, three thousand feet high, the huge dome of the body a single piece of stone coaxed up and in upon itself. It was said that the day it was finished, Mevendrezek himself rose up from the earth and before the onlookers stood two identical things: the temple and the god. Even the beetle-god himself marveled at the artistry of his worshipers.

Dakxa had much to do that afternoon. Five deliveries had to be made. One of the Dwarven clerics visiting the city for the quad-annual Festival of the Four had to be found new accommodations, as his current inn had been accidentally burnt down by a band of very drunk ogre merchants who had rented the banquet hall for a post-sale feast that got a little too fiery. There was an elven ceremony he was invited to attend, high praise but a major chunk of his time. Then there were the normal religious devotions expected of him, the bishop’s letters and things to look after, and of course he was at the bishop’s beck and call for all other things as well, supplies and cloths and such. And meal planning as well, it seemed. 

With the festival a week away, the bishop had been eating less and less, and it fell on Dakxa, his secretary, errand boy, and assorted other job-person to see that he got some sustenance. Praise Mevendrezek, but the festival preparations were taking far too much of everyone’s time and life. Dakxa had not slept in nights.

Not that he minded, of course. Dakxa lived for this job- a life of service in praise of his god. And the benefits were good as well. The food alone was well worth the rest of the day- no one knows how to stir fry a moldy beetle like the priests of Mevendrezek.

There was one now! Dakxa dipped as he ran and scooped up a scarab in his clawed fist. He sang a little praise to the insect, before he put it to his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. True, Mevendrezek was a giant beetle, but it was the regular beetles of the world that served the god’s chosen race: kobolds. Mounts, food, pets- beetles were Mevendrezek’s gift to his people.

If only time for sleeping was another one of his gifts…


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## ConnorSB (Jan 1, 2004)

Hmmm.... I can't decide whether I like what the party did, or what was in my head for Kel. So... for anyone who is reading, would you rather I update the "origional" story, the one with real PCs that is just starting, or both?

Some caveats:

1. Both stories are happening simultaniously anyway, so I could theoretically do both at the same time...

2. You have yet to meet the best character ever in the one with real PCs. One of my PCs is Gorbois, the french orc swashbuckler of hilarious doom. He's probably well worth the story...

3. Umm.... look at one and two again...


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## GreyShadow (Jan 1, 2004)

If you can do both, I'd like to see how they interact in the future.


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## ConnorSB (Jan 23, 2004)

I finally got around to writing more. Here's an update for Alex and Alexandra again.

*"Scouting"*

The plan was simple- scout first, and later that night do the job. It was Sunday, and the High Temple had just finished morning services. As the crowd flowed out from the main auditorium and into the temple grounds, the two thieves strode in, like salmon swimming upstream. Only the spawning ground was full of blackmail material, and they were going to steal it. 

On the outside of their dress, both twins wore the charms and fastenings of the Queen of the Winds, but underneath were the charms and fastenings of the criminal underworld- a necklace of charm against detection, a bracelet of protection against mind reading, a tattoo of the unnamed god of thieves- a vertical dagger with four lines of various sizes crossing it.

Aside from charms, Alex and Alexandria wore the standard church-going garb of the elven populace, drab white and blue, the national colors.

The interior of the High Temple was an airy affair. In the many round rooms, the domed ceilings arched thirty, even forty feet up, with the chambers never more than half as wide as they were tall. The corridors were similarly spacious, three paces across with ribbed ceilings almost as tall as those in the rooms. 

The floors were plain tile, scuffed with use. The walls were usually wooden, magically sealed together so that there was not one seam in the whole building. There were no doors either, as they prevented airflow. And there was airflow- you could not walk anywhere in the High Temple without feeling at least a breeze. In any case, it was not wood that prevented entrance to a place, it was the temple guards that barred admittance.

All this Alex and Alexandra noticed as the strolled through the halls of the temple. After an hour of wandering, it was Alex that noticed something promising. Near one of the Temple’s side entrances, only a few rooms away from the outside, two guards stood at the mouth of a particularly noticeable hallway.

It was noticeable because its walls were not the seamless ones of the rest of the temple: they were bookshelves. Peering past the guards, Alexandria noticed that the hallway opened up after twenty feet, and she caught the faintest glimpse of a staircase downwards before one of the guards shuffled and grunted, and her focus pulled back to him.

“Can I help you?” he asked. The guard was dressed in white: white leather over white cloth, with a pointed white leather helmet. His buckles and other fixings were blue.

“Why, sure!” Alex stepped forward and stared the tall elf straight in his blue eyes. “My sister and I are, umm, traveling students, studying the great architectural marvels of Espania.”

“Well,” said the guard, “there is plenty of architecture besides what we are guarding. Perhaps you’d like to see it… elsewhere.”

“But,” exclaimed Alexandra, “this is the only piece with bookshelves!”
The guard looked at her. “… and?”

“Well, um… books are heavy, and need support. Thus, the walls around them must be reinforced, all that weight you know, and well, the architecture is different in this corridor.”

“The corridor that I’m guarding. So move along, before I make you move.”

“What’s so important back there, anyways?” asks Alex.

“Records. Now move.”

“All right, all right,” the twins sigh. They look at each other and laugh, and then move on.

Once they had turned a few corners, Alex leaned over and whispered to his sister.

“That’s definitely the place. We’ll need disguises.”

“I already thought of that, dear brother. Father Arem of this very church is meeting me at the Fox and Fowl at sunset.”


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## ConnorSB (Jan 27, 2004)

*"Negotiations"*

Gorbois was not pleased, not at all. Not only had Eremis cast him, once again, as the dastardly villain for Acts I and III, but he had to work crowd duty in Act II. How was he supposed to change costumes that quickly, and still look good on stage? He would have to have a talk with his employer. They could not treat him like this; He was Gorbois, an actor and a gentleman, not some petty thief. Although he did have talent off the stage…

He did not knock at Eremis’ office door, brusquely knocking it open. There was a loud bang when the door hit the wall. Eremis looked up from his papers. Eremis was a tall, brown haired human, with a serious face that was undercut by the smiles that often showed on it, and the laughter that erupted from its mouth.

“What ees thees, Eremis? I will have you know, I weell not tolerate being the veellain een every play your write! C’est stupid, Monsieur!”

He hit the desk with his light green fist. “And to make me work the crowd een Act deux, c’est, c’est horrible! I, I do not like thees!”

Eremis looked up at the orc actor, just recently arrived from Gaul. Gorbois was short for his race, but handsome. He kept his tusks quite clean and short, jutting up above the edges of his mouth in a dashing sort of way. He was well dressed, in subtly styled leather armor over a long black shirt and pants. He was, in all respects, a well cultured actor.

“Weell?” asked Gorbois, his eyes shooting needles at Eremis.

“Gorbois, Gorbois, I do these things for your own good! Come! I tire of this office. Let us walk, and I shall explain to you why I make you work so.”

“All right, Eremis. But you beest have good answers pour moi.” 

Eremis got up and walked around the desk to the orc. He put his hand on the green man’s shoulder as they walked out of the office and down the hall, towards the main stage.

“I work you so hard because you are already so good.”

“Flattery will not heelp you, Eremis.”

“But my friend, it is true. You are one of the finest actors I have ever hired, and a good pickpocket to boot. If I did not challenge you, those skills would fade. You know what they say-“

“- And what is that?”

“Use it or lose it, Gorbois. And you definitely do not want to lose it. When I saw you, sneaking off that ship from Gaul, you had nothing but the cloths on your back, and in fact owed the captain quite a bit of money. And look at you now! You have style, you have money, you have friends and a carreer.”

“But why must I always play the veellain?”

“All the villains I write are challenging roles, are they not?”

“Oui.”

“So I am challenging you again and again, you see? And the fact that the crowd responds to your tusks better than, say, Lasathalanus’ golden locks and pointed ears, well that cannot hurt you.”

“But all the otheer actors, Lasathalanus, Hobin Kobad, Robert Yorn and the rest, they play all sorts of characters, and I only veelains. What ees the parity there?”

“Gorbois, Gorbois, they may play many different kinds of characters, but not half as well as you play villains.”

“Fine, fine, Eremis. You ween.”

“Gorbois, you do me wrong! I’m doing this for you, not for me.”

“Oh, oui Eremis, of course you do.”

“But there is something you could do for me, and maybe I could get Hobin to work the crowd in Act 2…”

“Oui?”

“I had a whole bunch of pamphlets printed up about the play and the Globe in general. The usual. “Moon Maiden’s Folly” in big letters across the top, little descriptions and a few drawings of the sets and the stage, and a little bit about the theater on the back. Anyway, I need them distributed, a sort of publicity thing, and I think you would do a great job. You were excellent as the devilish hawker of wares in “Riding Day for Roxo,” I think you’ll do well with this.”

“Eremis, this work ees below my station, but I will do it eef you make Hobin work the crowd, and perhaps increase my pay for the performance, by, oh, ten gold.”

“Five.”

“Eight.”

“Seven.”

“Fini!”


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