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NorseQuest (A Norse Xianxia)

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Alectai said:
In unrelated notes, our Hamr rolls continued to be Blessed, it'll be very difficult for us to fail to level it up in time for the Murderkittens. And Hamr 6 should be enough to sharply mitigate the risk of serious harm even with three 15-20 pound murderkittens appearing suddenly.

I don't think there's a lot of Norse women with Hamr 5, let alone 6!
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Hopefully! I'm still planning on throwing, like, 7 dice at it to make sure we level it next turn as best we can, but getting to 6 is looking real likely. And yeah, I suspect most Norsewomen stop at Hamr 4 at most given the culture. Which is, I think, a mistake...but then I think a lot of things in Norse culture are mistakes. There's a bunch of cool stuff too, but also so many issues.

Imperial Fister said:
Silver-Tongue (to convince), Barb-Tongue (to needle the opposition), and Composure (to keep your cool). It helps if you have some kind of argument trick.

Also is handy to have silver on hand for bribes and also some knowledge of Glima, in case someone tries to make an especially in-your-face argument (or you to someone else).
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How many of these would be relevant vs. a ghost and would we have to go to Asvir to see a judge?
 
Imperial Fister said:
Not quite what I was referring to, but that is a possibility
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I'm just having a giggle, I'm still more hyped up at how I was fuckin RIGHT with regards to the Cultivation thing. I can finally use Proper Terminology for our Dantian Equivilant now (Well), and we know what our Qi Equivilant is (Odr), all we need to figure out now is how to Cultivate without Literally Courting Death!

And, you know, figuring out what we can do with this highly refined power. It doesn't help that the Enemy was wise enough to scrub most knowledge of it from Hallr before his death though, that's annoying.

EDIT: That, and it seems pretty obvious that Asveig was probably a user of Seidr, and if we were more girly she might have actually taught us. It does suggest she might have Left Something Behind to deal with any shenaniganry like this--and was probably parrying curses the whole time she was alive to boot. Which is why this shit is only happening now and things only started spiraling downwards after she was hurt by the rough birth.
 
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Grytorm said:
I think we need to carve runes in our soul somehow in which to cycle our Odr. The obvious things to investigate/experiment with would be our Muna, feats, and our base stats.
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Thinking too far ahead soul stuff is a few stages in like 4 or 5 usually, We just got this soul and Odr motes. This new soul was not there previously, if our Odr gaining method is dangerous, there should be a safer one that does not require the new soul. We likely need to construct a place to store Odr like Gabirels tabernacle. You always build up a reserve or pool before you cycle it and then refine.

I think if we do have to use runes perphaps we can turn orthstirr from 'word-glory' into 'words' and then use Odr to fill it like runes? Orthstirr is clearly incomplete Qi not complete Qi, since destroying another's cultivation base should not be as easy as shaming them.
 
Slickji said:
Thinking too far ahead soul stuff is a few stages in like 4 or 5 usually, We just got this soul and Odr motes. This new soul was not there previously, if our Odr gaining method is dangerous, there should be a safer one that does not require the new soul. We likely need to construct a place to store Odr like Gabirels tabernacle. You always build up a reserve or pool before you cycle it and then refine.

I think if we do have to use runes perphaps we can turn orthstirr from 'word-glory' into 'words' and then use Odr to fill it like runes? Orthstirr is clearly incomplete Qi not complete Qi, since destroying another's cultivation base should not be as easy as shaming them.
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We already have one though? A Well was created at the highest point of Halla's Soul. What we need to do is fill that Well to move onto the Second Stage, which will probably require a significant amount of effort, but first and foremost, we need to figure out a safer method of Odr Condensation--ideally one that doesn't require Blackhand's intervention if we hope to teach anyone else.
 
...Oh, huh.

Is Seidr done/learned/taught by physically weaving?
It is traditionally associated with Frigg, who is (among many other things, Frigg was a bit of a badass) also associated with Weaving.

Alternatively, perhaps you call upon Frigg's blessing in childbirth by weaving something special?
 
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Alectai said:
We already have one though? A Well was created at the highest point of Halla's Soul. What we need to do is fill that Well to move onto the Second Stage, which will probably require a significant amount of effort, but first and foremost, we need to figure out a safer method of Odr Condensation--ideally one that doesn't require Blackhand's intervention if we hope to teach anyone else.
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Filling your Qi sea is only part of the first sage cycling once full to open up the rest of your body to cultivation is another IIRC, but safer emthod wise it appears we wove all 3 together in our soul, normally cultivation has a rhythm to it like a steady breathing rate you must hold as you cultivate, i suspect whatever we made was chaotic but not unusable. Basically like a chinse cultivator suddenly coughing mid cultivation and the disrupted breathing causes him harm.
We need a structure and considering the sheer amount of writing references there are in our system, we might want to treat the well as an inkwell later and to treat creating Odr like creating paint (which is the other substance besides blood used to fill runes). I think the a long term cultivation goal is to write a saga/story inside ourselves and fill it with odr. How we will write it IDK. It would certainly be a way to make orthstirr more permanent as the deed is written down

Edit: Weaving might why it was dangerous, dyes are used in weaving to color yes, but these same dyes cant be used as paint and thus for runes, but the concept is similar enough that it might have barely counted.
 
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If we don't get the Steinarr issue resolved by summer we should take him to the Seeress.
Once we Star experimenting we should see how oder reacts to contact to the 3 aspects.

Big yay on the all 3 stoking.
Darn on the Bible/Latin teaching.
Yay on those Lifestock rolls, starting to slowly and passively upgrade our stock.

Baseline is Fine, assuming we want to keep our numbers but have the highest respectively available qualities:
1 Superior Cow can replace a Fine Cow.
1 Superior Hen can replace a Fine Hen
 
Slickji said:
Filling your Qi sea is only part of the first sage cycling once full to open up the rest of your body to cultivation is another IIRC, but safer emthod wise it appears we wove all 3 together in our soul, normally cultivation has a rhythm to it like a steady breathing rate you must hold as you cultivate, i suspect whatever we made was chaotic but not unusable. Basically like a chinse cultivator suddenly coughing mid cultivation and the disrupted breathing causes him to harm.
We need a structure and considering the sheer amount of writing references there are in our system, we might want to treat the well as an inkwell later and to treat creating Odr like creating paint (which is the other substance besides blood used to fill runes). I think the a long term cultivation goal is to write a saga/story inside ourselves and fill it with odr. How we will write it IDK. It would certainly be a way to make orthstirr more permanent as the deed is written down
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The real issue is that our method worked fine... Until our Aspects ran out, and then it went bad because the Gate was still open when that happened, because Halla wasn't conscious enough to stop the flow when it tapped out. A proper method needs to have a built in Ending to it, rather than free-forming. That, I think, is something we can do--once it's safe to experiment with Odr Condensation again anyway.

Either our Aspects woven in tandem are enough to blind the eyes of the Enemy, or weaving the Aspects in tandem are just required to open up Cultivation as a whole, either way, it was using all three Aspects that opened the Gate, and things only started going wrong when our Aspects unraveled with the Gate still open. My impression is that a 'Proper' Cultivation Method is designed to effectively hypnotize you into taking only what you need, without risking a deviation from drawing too much--which is what we're going to have to create from whole cloth.

Notably though, Odr was something The Enemy apparently took pains to scrub from Hallr's memory. Tapping it gave him enough to know that he did know about it before, and could remember its Name, but no more than that. Which suggests that Odr being a Secret is something the Enemy wants to remain true.
 
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Toboe said:
Baseline is Fine, assuming we want to keep our numbers but have the highest respectively available qualities:
1 Superior Cow can replace a Fine Cow.
1 Superior Hen can replace a Fine Hen
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We definitely can't afford to increase our number of animals substantially at the moment, not without more fields and more Management dice, anyway. We're a little marginal on dice even for what we've already got.

Alectai said:
Notably though, Odr was something The Enemy apparently took pains to scrub from Hallr's memory. Tapping it gave him enough to know that he did know about it before, and could remember its Name, but no more than that. Which suggests that Odr being a Secret is something the Enemy wants to remain true.
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This is plausible, but we can't assume it, Hallr's memory is fragmented even on subjects the Enemy likely cares nothing about just from the rest of his situation.
 
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This brings up an interesting question: who else knows about Odr? Norse cultivation has existed for 8000 years, and Blackhand somehow knew the name for Odr (if nothing else), and there doesn't seem to be any barrier to actually STARTING cultivation, just an inability to "stop". So, presumably other people know about this.

-The Enemy? Yes, obviously. There's a fairly good chance that part of his agenda is to keep Norse society as ignorant as possible.
-The Steelfathers? Maybe, maybe not. My theory is that Steelfathers are more a result of Norsemen trying to reach the pinnacle while NOT knowing about Odr cultivation, and end up locking away the path to the heavens in order to rule over this mortal Earth.
-The Jarls? Probably not, or at least no knowledge of 'safe' cultivation. Tropes abound regarding the hoarding of secret knowledge to maintain the social order, but if you're telling me that NO Jarl has ever gotten drunk enough to spill the beans about a method that almost any Norse can do, I would find that hard to believe.
-The Seeress? ...Maybe? She may be able to use her sorcery to approach the problem from another angle, and be ignorant of any "standard" method that any Norseman could use.
-Horra? ...I sincerely hope not. I mean, his accumultated nin might render him incapable of cultivation in the first place, but it would not be good to find out that he's somehow got a head start in this department.
 
DeadmanwalkingXI said:
This is plausible, but we can't assume it, Hallr's memory is fragmented even on subjects the Enemy likely cares nothing about just from the rest of his situation.
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True enough I suppose.

Anyway, it does seem like having a purpose in mind when you're tapping your Aspects are probably a good way to mitigate the risk. Not tapping it for it's own sake, but tapping it to craft a specific Narrative that's within your means, and then stop when you're done--that should manage to have it shut off before the Aspects tap out. We have Blackhand as a safety net at least, and once we develop a reliable method to shut off Aspect Weaving, we can start teaching others.
 
Learning how to weave better may also help us with weaving our Aspects together better, letting them hold their shape for longer.
 
I wonder what would happen if we told people what we did and tried to get others to replicate it, once we can make it not so...Save or Die?
 
Slickji said:
Thinking too far ahead soul stuff is a few stages in like 4 or 5 usually, We just got this soul and Odr motes. This new soul was not there previously, if our Odr gaining method is dangerous, there should be a safer one that does not require the new soul. We likely need to construct a place to store Odr like Gabirels tabernacle. You always build up a reserve or pool before you cycle it and then refine.

I think if we do have to use runes perphaps we can turn orthstirr from 'word-glory' into 'words' and then use Odr to fill it like runes? Orthstirr is clearly incomplete Qi not complete Qi, since destroying another's cultivation base should not be as easy as shaming them.
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Good point, we need to walk before we can run. But I think trying to find Muna and Feats would be a good idea because they seem like they would be building blocks of a Saga so even if we can't use them for anything yet finding them should tell us something.

Also, I think Gabriel's Tabernacle is the storage space for Muna-equivalents, something like moments of revelation and divine inspiration. Rereading the interlude as Gabriel breathes out he refers to, "All was gone but the pool before the tabernacle. Shining with Heavenly splendor, the pool of divine Fervor began to sink into the marble floors." If the tabernacle is not where Zeal resides then it might be the contents of the pool.
 
Interestingly enough, from at least a casual look. Orthstirr is not actually stored inside the Well or the Soul, the only thing that's in there so far is Odr apparently, which suggests that Orthstirr itself isn't actually something that belongs to the one who uses it.

Of course, we'll need to start investigating more closely in the future. It's still something to keep in mind going forward--Orthstirr itself is only how much power a Norse Cultivator can draw on to fuel themselves, but not something that they own, which is probably why it's so easy come, easy go.

Odr is probably more personalized, but we've got a lot to learn about it before we can make any clear distinctions. But it does seem that everything springs from the Well.

@Imperial Fister, what is the main difference between the Soul before the Gate was opened, and afterwards? You've made it clear that the former was 'Empty', but was it just a void outside of the presence of the Gate? While afterwards, it's some kind of open field with a hill containing the Well in the center?

Where's the Gate in regards to the new state of the Soul? Has it vanished? And is all of this region contained within the Not!Dantian region?
 
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I think the big uses of Odr might be in poetry, as well as.. well, going berserker.
 
Halla out here, just throwing shade on us.

Ow.

I swear it gets a lot better in the New Testa-

…actually, I doubt you'd like that either.
 
Shard said:
I think the big uses of Odr might be in poetry, as well as.. well, going berserker.
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I don't think Odr is quite so simple. It's what we're actually trying to Cultivate by all indications, which is why we technically didn't qualify as one until we first performed Odr Condensation .

I suspect it is to Orthstirr as Zeal is to Fervor, a more condensed, more personalized version of it.

More importantly, we're nowhere near reaching our limit in how much we can cultivate. The question mostly boils down to "How is it distinct from Orthstirr" and "Does our Odr come back on it's own or is it solely what we intentionally cultivate?". Also, "How can we use Odr to grow as a cultivator?"

We've progressed from Stage 0 to Stage 1, but that doesn't neccessarily mean anything on it's own, there are mysteries yet to solve! And if we want our family to have an unfair advantage in the future, we need to fully understand all of this and then be able to teach it to others.

Anyway, the Bible Study is interesting, it's good to at least know what your neighbors believe even if that's not the way you want to go with.
 
Is Halla capable of interfering on her Well?
Could we put a faucet on the Gate? Build a dam? A ship? A watermill?
Try to mix Odr with each Aspect separately and then together?
 
Alectai said:
@Imperial Fister, what is the main difference between the Soul before the Gate was opened, and afterwards? You've made it clear that the former was 'Empty', but was it just a void outside of the presence of the Gate? While afterwards, it's some kind of open field with a hill containing the Well in the center?
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Flat, featureless.

Now there's a hill in the middle, a well at the top. Hints of life peak from the nooks and crannies, an odd flower here and an odd root there. There's not much of it, but it's there.

The Gate, as always, faces outwards at the very edge of your being, where the inside meets the outside.
 
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