*Shrug* That's fine, I admit that as a 'rando' I cant make you stop acting like a child, but I'm sure a Mod/Staff could if you keep this up.
And in case a mod does read this, no I'm not making a threat or anything, I'm just predicting someone is going to get sick of Doc sooner or later and report him.
"Immerse yourself in history, myths and stunning scenery at Abelhelm's Finger Fort, set abridge
across Draken just near the dreadful Drakenhof. Inextricably linked with the legend of the Dusk
Rider, for centuries this dramatic fort and coastline has fired the imaginations of writers, artists
and even the wizards. Now it's your turn to be inspired."
—From "The Comprehensive Guide To What You Should And Shouldn't Do In Stirland",
by Herr Felix Kiesinger (Wurtbad Press, 2755)
Abelhelm's Finger is a fortified bridge across the Draken river just next to the town of Drakenhof. In years passed since its construction during short-reigned Abelhelm Van Hal's Purge of Drakenhof it has been the toughest outpost of Stirland in Sylvania, where offensive campaigns started from and defensive campaigns took their first (and often decisive) stand. It is build around a cenotaph of Van Hal himself, soldiers defending the symbolic rest of the leader whose life they couldn't protect. The tower overseeing Sylvanian side of the bridge, staying vigilant over the grave, is called Mathilde's tower for reasons lost to time.
There's at least a token detachment of halflings and dwarves on duty at all times, symbolizing the unlikely alliance that led to this fort's establishment. Depending on the faction politics it's considered a duty of honor or a duty of punishment, but a duty nonetheless. The fort has been sieged form one or both sides of the river countless times, playing a major role in every Sylvanian Incursion, Purge, or Vampire War since the Fourth one (included). It has been destroyed to the last brick four times but never taken and always rebuilt, which is a major point of pride for Stirlanders.
Ehh... still not happy with the second half, so here's the first half. I'll probably have to do some more research into the lore of Gray Magic, and Dhar to figure out the spectacular stuff.
Omake - The Rise of The Dreamer (Part 1)
Julia Antoniette von Jungfreud (nee Massif)
2480
This month, it will be five years since Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal's ill-fated march on Drakenhof. Certainly, the Empire's records note it as a victory, if a costly one. But to Stirlanders the price was simply too high. For all the grumbling and discontent in his lifetime, the first Van Hal is nowadays remembered fondly as the Count that got closer to reclaiming "Eastern Stirland" than anyone else in centuries, and who would have undoubtedly led Stirland to a golden age had he not tragically fallen in battle. His son Sigmund, the current Elector Count, is... admittedly well-rounded and competent, but unremarkable in every other way, save perhaps a notable lack of ambition.
That battle, though. You weren't there in person, you've picked together most of the pieces of what happened in that chaos. After the gate was seized with minimal resistance, infantry stormed the streets and a vicious melee began. The Count and your then-employer Spymistress Weber broke through the enemy lines, but the formation alongside them failed to follow through on their example. The pair ended fighting back to back deep in the enemy formation, the Count was mortally wounded and Weber put on a very impressive solitary stand defending the wounded Count with his own Runefang. The dwarfs eventually shattered the undead, and a barely-alive Count Van Hal was evacuated from the field. Meanwhile, the Magister Jovi Sunscryer had miscast and set a good portion of the town ablaze with arcane fire as he exploded. Attempts to heal the Count failed and he succumbed to his wounds. At this point Lady Weber vanished; the last anyone had seen of her was a steed of shadows galloping toward Wurtbad. Brother Kasmir probably had a quiet crisis of faith, since he likewise disappeared and didn't show his face again until the force was withdrawing from Drakenhof. Of Stirland's leading officials, only Marshal Gustav remained in the field. With the Count dead, the inferno from Magister Sunscryer's miscast spreading, and the regiment around the Magister having lost seven men out of every ten, the Generals argued that it was best to cut Stirland's losses: raze the town of Drakenhof and withdraw, rather than risk a siege of the castle with the diminished force. Reluctantly, Marshal Gustav agreed (though a short while after the wedding, on last year's anniversary of the battle, he had privately confessed to you that he only did so because he suspected the generals would mutiny if he didn't, and that he regrets not pushing them forward anyway).
Really, the only piece you were still missing is whatever happened to your former boss. You ended up taking over most of the spy networks you had already been managing for Mathilde and, through contact with Anton, essentially became the new spymaster of the regency council. The promotion was made formal shortly after the Count's funeral. Unfortunately, that missing piece has been getting increasingly disturbing. She did return to Wurtbad: after about a year of digging around, you discovered her secret, hurriedly-evacuated residence underneath an inn. The timeframe also fits for someone shopping for a fine young horse among the merchants of Wurtbad; someone very suspiciously nondescript that none of the merchants in question could meaningfully describe. With Mathilde's hideout cleaned out of truly valuable information, all that was left was a thoroughly demolished shrine to Ranald, a very secure box containing a greatsword, and a number of her scrap documents. The documents themselves were not terribly useful: a series of personal schedules and reminder notes (none of them more recent than late 2474) and a whole lot of discarded papers describing some wizard stuff you couldn't make heads or tails of. Still, you learned that your boss really hated "Wizard Chic", because she had been trying for years to get equipment to study "the box", "the juice" and "the swords". Whatever those were. The only troubling thing, really, was the demolished shrine. Unsurprisingly in hindsight, Mathile had been a worshipper of Ranald. You've never been too devout yourself, but even in your opinion a state of mind where you're furious enough to destroy a shrine to your own God, that you yourself have built... It's the kind of state of mind that needs friends and priestly counsel to recover from, not solitude. And in the case of a wizard, turning into a solitary hermit that despises the Gods isn't exactly harmless to the rest of the world either.
A few months after going through Mathilde's lair, a Grey Wizard showed up in town and requested audience with the spymistress. He was quite surprised to discover you were not Mathilde Weber, and in the process you found out your former boss had stopped paying her College tithes (and loan payments). Knowing better than to anger a shadow wizard, you showed him the handful of documents you'd found and kept, as well as the remains of Mathilde's lair. Thus you finally had *some* answers. The wizard, sensitive to the winds of magic, had noticed a vial of what must have been "the juice": the vial had fallen into a crevice of the stonework, and subsequently covered in mud. It was really quite terrifying, to see a Magister (probably, they wouldn't send a journeyman to chase down someone like Mathilde, right?) look at the multicolored contents of the vial with the same amazed confusion look as you must've had when trying to figure out the arcane diagrams on Mathile's research scraps. The wizard rushed off without a word and left the town on a steed of shadows. Not long after, a formal missive from the College arrived: Mathidle Weber was officially a witch and a renegade.
Then, last week. Most question were answered. In a way far, far more terrible than you could possible have expected. On a stormy evening, as the privy council had gathered to make their report to the Elector Count, lightning struck outside, creating shadows for the briefest of moments, and at the table with the rest of us, stood a tall man in witch hunter regalia, unnatural shadows coiling and swirling around him, wreathing many of his features in darkness. A greatsword at his back and an iron box in his hands. The memory of that encounter would probably remain in your mind for the rest of your days (however *few* you had left, considering).
---
"Sigmund, my son" He spoke, his voice flat and devoid of emotion. "I have watched and waited. You have no intention of following through on my dream." he continued. A statement of fact and nothing more.
"But even so," a brief note of softness enters the voice, only to immediately become discordant as a strange echo, like a woman's voice speaking alongside, repeats the three words "You have a duty to fulfill to your bloodline. Our penance."
Marshal Gustav was the first to find his voice. "...What. What abomination is this..."
The figure itself seemed to ignore him, but one of the shadows around him lashed out like a whip, and wrapped itself around Gustav's mouth, silencing him before pulling him down to sit. Likewise Kasmir, hefting his hammer.
She dropped the iron lockbox on the table, and continued as if nothing was strange "I entrusted this to Mathilde, for safe keeping. Now, at last, I have seen enough to know you will not abuse it if I turn it over to you. She has no more need of it."
Something is off, you can tell. All others around the table are enraptured, seemingly believing the apparition is the late Elector Count. But to you, the figure looks barely human, like a really poor mask. And as that thought crosses your mind, the illusion melts, revealing the tattered wizard robes of Mathilde (still wreathed in living shadows). At least, revealed to you; the others remain enraptured.
"It opens with any key, so long as you speak the codeword while turning the key."
"A-and what is that word, then... father?" the Elector Count asks. Immediately after, you are deafened by cacophonic whispers, and from the look of it, so is everyone in the room besides Mathilde and Sigmund, given that Mathilde's mouth moves and Sigmund nods in response.
"Mathilde. The College has branded you a renegade." you finally find your own voice.
The smirk on the corner of her mouth has your blood running cold "Oh. Already? Of course, the gold I owe them. Well, that just means they can't do it again."
You shudder, but try to keep her talking "What... Where, where are you going, then?"
"To fulfil Abel's dream, alone." she replies. A few moments pass in silence as you process the madness she's insinuating, then another flash of lighting outside casts shadows across the room, and in that instant, Mathilde is gone by the time torch-shadows return.
But the box remains.
And by the time the rumbling of thunder ends, Sigmund has whispered the codeword and opened the box.
His face immediately goes white and he buries his face in his hands, shaking.
---
Liber Mortis. The *original* Liber Mortis. This is beyond you, now. The College needs to know. And the Witch Hunters. And probably the Emperor should be warned as well. Though Count Sigmund is probably better connected with the latter two.
So you begin penning a letter. This isn't going to be very formal. You're far too terrified to bother with frivolous formalities.
Greetings, Regimand Speiseschrank
Magister of the Gray College
I have news of your apprentice, Mathilde Weber. Hypothetically, if she had possessed the original Liber Mortis for the past five years, and now claimed to have no further need of it, what is the worst way you can imagine for her (as a Gray Wizard) to attempt to carry out the late Abelheim Van Hal's dream of a Sylvania without undead?
Gods help us all
Julia Antoniette von Jungfreud
Spymistress of Stirland
[*] The vacuum must be filled. Step forward and take command. Fulfil Van Hal's final legacy in the manner that it begun.
[*] Do nothing with it; your role is to safeguard it.
After some thought, you returned the grimoire's box to Van Hal's effects; it would be too great a risk to carry it on you, and here it is likely to continue to be overlooked. The doctors being called into the tent started a blaze of rumour that swept through the tent; them leaving so soon, and the expressions on their face, set off another. By the time you finally emerge from the tent, there's no need to spread word. Everyone already knows.
You grab the nearest soldier, and tell him to bring you his commanding officer. You tell the man that arrives the same thing. Soon you've got a Colonel, almost certainly the highest ranking man not currently engaged with the assault on the town.
"Your sole task is to guard this tent," you command him. "And every man in this camp is to dedicate their lives to this task until I order otherwise. Sylvania has claimed his life, do not let it claim his soul."
The order is overheard by the nearest soldiers, and burns its way through the camp. Before a single order is given, men are checking their arms and the watch on the camp is redoubled.
"What if-" the Colonel tries to say.
"Nobody," you growl. "If you think they have good reason to enter, tell them to come and find me. The spells I've woven within will destroy anyone who attempts to enter." All you could weave was an Alarm spell, but that will have you speeding back on a steed of shadows and then you'd personally destroy whoever triggered it, so it amounts to the same. "Am I understood?"
"Yes ma'am," he barks obediently.
"Good. Give me your sword." The man turns his blade over to you without a moment's hesitation, and stares at awe at the roiling fog that billows forth from it the moment your hand closes on the hilt.
Without another word, you summon your steed of shadows and are on your way to the gatehouse that claimed Van Hal's life.
---
The entire area surrounding the gatehouse is knee-deep in corpses - those of the Army of Stirland, those of the skeletal foe, and mixed in among them, what you assume were Drakenhof townsfolk. You push your horse to wade through undeterred, then jump from its back into the stairwell that leads to the walls. The dwarves hold these still, judging by the train of cannon that you passed, and have wonderful, terrible plans for what to do with the high ground.
From said high ground, the view of the town is awe-inspiring. An entire district is lost to the brilliant-white fires that are all that remains of Jovi Sunscryer, and conventional fires have claimed another. The sounds of battle rise to your ears, and you see flashes of various lights as gunpowder weapons are fired and Shyish is unleashed. And in one of the towers atop the walls, you find what you were looking for. Gustav, the generals of the 1st, 2nd and 4th, the general equivalent of the Halflings, the Amethyst Patriarch Hexensohn, the dwarven engineer Narfi, and Asarnil are gathered, looking over a crude sketch of the streets of Drakenhof.
"Weber!" Gustav calls as he sees you. "How is-"
"Dead," you interrupt bleakly, and his face goes pale. Around the room helmets and hats are removed.
"Blast," he mutters. "Damn and blast."
"How goes the battle," you say, moving forward to view the map.
Looks are exchanged across the table, but Gustav knows betters than to do anything but obey. "The whitefires have claimed this district," he says, pointing, "and this one is full to bursting with villagers - mostly staying out of the fight but there's those among them that turn berserk and attack, so it would be too costly to push through. That leaves the main road to the city hall, where the dead seem to be emanating from - either that's where they've been... stored, I guess would be the word, or there's enemy necromancers operating out of there."
"The fourth has taken so many casualties that they effectively no longer exist; they've been folded into the first and second," one of the Generals reports.
"The Dawi continue strong," Narfi reports, "but apart from a brief sally earlier..." the memory hits you like a physical blow, and it's all you can do to keep your expression schooled. "We've been entirely occupied with holding the walls. They've no compunction against sending a solid stream of infantry along the walls to our positions, even though we've set up organ guns to reap them."
"The picket holds," reports the halfling, "though we've had to stop asking nicely after several of them went berserk and caused heavy casualties. Now any that try to escape are greeted with arrows, and we hope the sight of their bodies just outside the gates dissuades the innocent."
"There are no battle magics at play here," reports the Patriarch, "save those that we deliver. If there are enemy spellcasters, they are focused on reinforcing their numbers, and as such my fellow wizards have been able to act unfettered."
You move to the window facing the town; unlike the arrow slits facing outwards, this was wide enough to present you with an unfettered view. The generals report to Gustav, and you're theoretically Gustav's equal and you've seniority as a councillor over him, and besides that he's always been a bit uneasy around you; you can use that to browbeat him if necessary. Hexensohn would take a wizard's lead over that of a mere horseman. You know Narfi, and Asarnil. You've enough leverage here to push them to do what must be done, and if necessary to take over completely.
"We were just discussing when you arrived," one of the generals says uneasily, "whether we should, well..."
"Withdraw?" Silence answers you. "Let Abelhelm's death be in vain?" Though facing away, you can easily visualize the uncomfortable looks being exchanged behind your back. "No. Even if the men of the Empire were cowardly enough to flee at this juncture, they'd take more casualties in trying to disengage than they would from pushing forward." You turn, and glare at the generals. "Besides which, desertion in the face of the enemy is a capital offence, and in the absence of the Elector Count I will be more than happy to carry out the sentence." They exchange looks at that; to these men, you are not a mere journeywoman who has learned only a few of the least of the secrets of Ulgu; to them, you are a wizard equal to any, capable of mysterious and terrible feats if roused. There is no objection as you return to the table.
Gustav points to the main road between you and the town hall.
[ ] "The knights are fighting dismounted to reinforce the line. If we pull them back, remount them, and charge them along, we can clear a path for the infantry to push through - like the initial assault on the gates."
Hexensohn nods.
[ ] "Or we could do the same with infantry, with my Battle Wizards providing support, sapping the strength of the enemy while bolstering that of our forces - though if there are necromancers in the Town Hall, they could try to counter the spells."
One of the generals shakes his head.
[ ] "The enemy has numbers but no tactical acumen. We can push the front line through a dozen streets and alleys and hold where we face resistance and push where we don't until we spill through to the town center."
Another points to the portion of the map containing most of the townsfolk.
[ ] "The reason pushing through here would be so risky is that we can't tell which are civilians and which are enemies. If we treated them all as enemies..."
Narfi waves towards the view out the open window.
[ ] "We have the high ground. We have artillery. We level the town hall, and any other pockets of resistance, and the infantry pushes through the rubble."
The halfling shrugs.
[ ] "Fire has taken a quarter of the town, why not give it the rest? Some fire arrows from here, and over the walls around the rest of the town, and we can consider the town pacified once the fire burns itself out."
Asarnil clears his throat.
[ ] "If you've no desire to take this town intact, Deathfang is only a horn's blow away."
---
After you had given your orders and the assembled leaders had filed out, Narfi approached you, holding out the Runefang. "The lads found this," he says. "We were going to present it back to your man, but, well..." He shrugs, and sighs. "He died a good death for a noble cause. That's all that one can ask, these days." You accept it with thanks, and he nods and leaves you alone in the tower.
- These choices are ranked roughly from least to most destructive; Gustav's plan will capture the town essentially intact (apart from the damage already done), while Asarnil's will basically result in a field of ashes inside the town walls. Weigh the casualties that will be taken here against the value of the town, both strategically in the current campaign and in the peace that will follow it - if you are in the mood to consider anything but vengeance.
[*] "We have the high ground. We have artillery. We level the town hall, and any other pockets of resistance, and the infantry pushes through the rubble."
You're tempted, oh so tempted, to let Asarnil do what he and his partner do best and turn the entire town to ash. But good sense prevails. The short conversation you had with Van Hal before... well. Before. It rings in your mind; a quote from the greatest Emperor since Sigmar, Magnus the Pious. 'If the wall is carried, then the other walls will hem in the defenders, and leave them ripe for massacre.' The wall has been carried, the defenders are hemmed in, and that means that they are, indeed, ripe for massacre.
You gave the order and it was accepted without question; with that, your position as de facto warleader has been cemented. Perhaps if Gustav had been around longer, had cemented his position as Marshall more, he might have resisted... but then, perhaps not. You know from your investigation into him that he's well respected as a cavalry leader, and from experience that he's gifted as a teacher, but it could be that his gifts just don't extend to being military leader for an entire province. It would likely be different if, instead, the knight had been given the role, the one you accidentally knocked out in the courtyard all those years ago...
You shake your head, resisting the pull of nostalgia, and look down at the map, hastily sketched out from what could be seen from above. Sketched notations cover it, half of them crossed out and half of the rest with several question marks after them. Fog may be within the domain of Ulgu, but the fog of war bows down to no power, and it rules over this battlefield as it does every other. At least you can tell which parts of the town are lost to the flames, both magical and mundane, and as they send twin plumes into the sky you know for sure that any element of surprise that could be had against Drakenhof Castle is lost.
You shrug to yourself. That was the decision Van Hal made when he chose to move on the town first, and it's one you supported.
Outside, the distant clammer of battle starts to be overlaid with the hammer of masonry; you glance outside the door to see Dwarves erecting scaffolds of wood to dangle pulleys over the battlements. It would be easier than trying to carry a cannon up a staircase, you suppose. Practically anything would be. You return to the window, trying to see the view of the city with an artilleryman's eye. The entire town is laid bare before you, though smoke and distance renders all but the closest buildings anonymous, save for a few larger landmarks; the town hall, of course, and a severely decrepit building that may have once been a church. You daresay a ballistic arc could deliver a cannonball into any building one desired. The trick, you suppose, would be in identifying the correct building.
Do Dwarves use cannonballs in their cannon, you wonder.
There's a knock on the door and you whirl in shock. "Ma'am?" asks the Dwarf at the door, the distinct accent of Dwarf-spoken Reikspiel lying light upon his tongue. Discounting the Slayers, he's wearing less armour than any Dwarf you've seen in this whole campaign - only a single layer of chainmail is visible, which is practically casual dress for a Dwarf. "My name is Launy of Karak Kadrin. Thori asked that I speak with you, if I'm not interrupting."
"Not at all," you say, waving him towards the chairs, he takes one and sits, and you resist the urge to pace as you sit across from him. If you're to lead this army, you'll have to make nice with your allies.
"I am a..." he hesitates. "The word in my tongue is Barazul; Reikspiel has no equivalent, but you could consider me an appraiser of oaths."
"Is Zhufbar reconsidering the alliance?" you ask, alarmed. That more than anything could doom the campaign.
"Not at all." You exhale, relieved. "What I wish to discuss is your Oaths to your fallen liege." Your thoughts must have shown on your face, because he holds up his hands conciliatorily. "Allow me to explain. You know the other name for Karak Kadrin?"
"The Slayer Hold," you respond, trying to keep a level tone.
"Aye, the Slayer Hold. And one of the more common reasons for a Dwarf to take the path of a Slayer is if an Oath they have taken is broken or rendered impossible. It is, of course, right and good that they do so; but not if the Oath has been fulfilled, or can still be fulfilled. And to help in this, we Barazul are called upon."
"So..." You squeeze your eyes shut as you try to make sense of this glimpse into Dwarven psychology. "You're... worried I'm going to become a Slayer?"
"Or some human equivalent," he says evenly. "We extend this to you as a courtesy. We witnessed your defence of your fallen liege, and have great respect for it. Some of us had taken to call you Govibarazak - she who makes an oath-stone of their liege - but with his passing, it seemed rather in poor taste."
You grit your teeth and drum your fingers against the table, looking across it at this patient Dwarf with his neat clothes and well-groomed beard. You want to send him away, and you'd rather do anything than re-examine those events, but... Dwarves take oaths seriously. If you can get this 'appraiser' to vouch for you, it would likely keep the Dwarves happy.
"Very well," you say.
He nods. "Wanbarazek. What oaths bind you?"
You take a breath. "Journeywoman's Oath to my Master. Wizard's Oath to the Grey College. The Oath of Service to Van Hal. And the Oath of Fealty as a Knight of Stirland, also to Van Hal."
He nods thoughtfully. "Are the first two relevant to the matter at hand?"
You consider. "The Wizard's Oath includes conditional loyalty to Elector Counts and to employers both, but it wouldn't apply here. So, no."
"Very well. The Oath of Service. Does it call for you to physically defend his person?"
You try to remember the wording. "No. To perform the duties given, and to work only in his interests."
"And has he instructed you to physically defend his person?"
You smile sadly. "He tried to talk me out of it a time or two, actually."
The Dwarf lets you dwell for a moment, before gently continuing. "And the Oath of Fealty?"
You close your eyes and let memory bring you back to the day that you were knighted, and the words leap to your lips as readily as when Anton taught them to you. "This day do I render homage and fealty to my Lord, the Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal of Stirland, who will, from this day forward, be my Liege. I will remain true in all ways, serving him faithfully - this do I swear, by my life and by my Gods." You wipe at your burning eyes with a sleeve, angry at yourself. "So say I, Mathilde Weber."
He ruminates on it. "A good Oath," he says eventually. "Nadammen - no insult is meant, an important word in such matters. Did you fight to the limit of your ability and strength, in defence of your Liege?"
You grit your teeth. "I did."
"Nadammen. Did you do all in your power to save his life?"
"I did."
"Nadammen. Do you intend to carry out your Liege's unfinished business, as best you understand it?"
"I will."
"Then I judge you Nubarazeni - one who is currently Oathbound, but fulfilment of the Oath is possible. Work to fulfil the unfinished business of your fallen liege and you will be Anadgirdbarazanui, one whose Oath shall soon be fulfilled."
"Just like that?" you ask, put off-balance.
"Just like that," he says simply. "Your word is sufficient."
"And that would prevent..." you wave your hand in the vague direction of any Slayers that might be left fighting. "The Slayers?"
He smiles, a little sadly. "The Dawi are Duri, people of stone. And just like stone, if we are caught alone and struck hard enough, we can crumble. A Dwarf who has lost those closest to him can be blinded by grief, unable to see a way to fulfil his Oaths and honour those he has lost, and thus many take the Slayer Oath and seek oblivion. Honourable, but often... wasteful." He taps himself on the chest. "It is the duty of many of we who serve the Karaz Ankor to take the raw ore of our people and smelt them into azul." He smiles. "Which is both our word for metal, and for dependable Dwarves."
You do your best to tuck away the insight into the Dwarf psyche for future thought, when you're not... distracted. "I see," you say.
He rises to his feet. "An honour to meet. And my condolences for your Liege. He was Anaddreki - destined for greatness. It is my thought that you will finish matters here and make him go down in history as Addreki, one who achieved greatness."
"Thank you," you say, and find that you mean it.
---
When you emerge, some minutes later, the walls are busy with Dwarven engineers running to and fro. The walls already bristle with cannon facing inwards, and more are being winched up by the minute. "Weber!" one calls, and you recognize Narfi at the center of activity. He waves you over to his island of tranquillity in the midst of all this business, and you maneuver through the toing and froing to reach him. "By Morgrim, you've given us the greatest firing gallery I've ever seen. This will be the volley that any cannoneer worth his beard has dreamt of."
"Have you got initial targets picked out?"
"Aye, we want to maximize the carnage before the enemy figure out what's going on and go to ground." He unrolls a parchment and holds it up for you to view; it's a miniature version of the map in the tower, though annotated in runes rather than Reikspiel. "The town hall, three barricades, and two points where a demolished house will allow for a badly-needed shortcut between streets. I've got some lads putting together smoke bombs that would give off smoke of different colours, to stand out against, well..." He waves a hand at the city in general, the district still burning with Hysh-white flames and one smouldering in a more conventional fashion, as well as a dozen smaller conflagrations scattered through the city. "Dawi, are we ready?"
"Nearly!" cries a Dwarf hurrying past under a burden of strange, conical metal objects, and you watch him go thoughtfully.
"What are they?" you ask.
"Ammo, of course."
"But the shape-"
"Er, right, you lot still use the round ones. Forget I said anything, won't you? Secrets, and all that." He doesn't seem at all sheepish about it, though. "On an entirely unrelated note, I will share the observation that an arrow flies truer than even a spherical slingstone."
"Noted," you say, watching as another cargo of the... cannonbolts? be carried past.
"Right, might want to cover your ears," Narfi observes, and you follow his gaze to a long line of cannon, each with a Dwarf holding up a hand to signify his readiness to fire. You cover your ears with your hands.
[Artillery of Zhufbar: 72]
And the world becomes noise.
As you gingerly release your grip on the sides of your head and check your palms for blood from what must surely be your burst eardrums, the cannon crews are reloading. In the city below, massive holes have been punched in the side of the town hall, and what you presume were the houses targeted for demolition are looking much the worse for wear. And in what feels like no time at all hands are already going up along the line of cannons, and you barely get your hands over your ears as Narfi barks the order and once more noise, noise that is felt rather than heard, batters you mercilessly. You're contemplating your retreat into the tower when you feel it - the feel and taste and smell like a disturbed swamp, as the Dhar that lies thick on the ground stirs in answer to a distant call. You gather your own will, ready to counter whatever is coming...
[Magical counter-artillery: 34]
And wait. And keep waiting. And cover your ears as another volley is fired, and the spell is still forming. You're disgusted at the fumble-handedness of whoever it is you're facing, and only the slightest bit intrigued that Dhar has made someone so incompetent into such a threat anyway. And finally the spell is formed and you instantly spot the manifestation - sickly-green bolts of dark magic shooting from a window of the devastated town hall, flying directly towards you, and you narrow your eyes as it as you recall the lessons you suffered as an Apprentice on the art of dispelling, confident that you can smash this spell asunder-
[Hexensohn interrupt: 40+40=80.]
And then, with barely a flash of amethyst light, the spell is snuffed contemptuously out.
The Dwarves saw the projectile even if it didn't reach them, and all around you cannon swivel and minute adjustments are made as almost three dozen cannon are trained on the exact window where the dark magic was so ineptly cast from. Pity attempts to surface under the contempt you feel for whoever is within that town hall, and fails.
[Dwarven cannon volley: 77]
The entire front of the town hall is obliterated in an instant as some thirty odd cannonbolts plunge into and through the outer walls. For an instant it stands as a cross-section of a building, and then surrenders to gravity and starts to collapse in on itself at the point where the would-be necromancer had so foolishly tried to strike back from. Whether the collapse would have been total or partial would forever be unknown to you, because the Dwarves with their characteristic thoroughness had been preparing another volley, and the structure's fate is sealed.
You think you're starting to get used to the noise, or at least you've been deafened enough that it doesn't bother you any more.
"Here," Narfi says, passing you his spyglass, and with some difficulty you unfurl the the unfamiliar device and peer onto the battlefield. Men are charging into the heart of the town that had been spewing forth, and a ragged and desperate charge it is; the spyglass is powerful enough that you can see bloody bandages and the hesitation in their step from here. But they charge nonetheless, their backbone partially stiffened by the knights and slayers scattered among their number.
[Infantry push - heart of the town: 55-10(poor morale)=45 vs 83-40(devastated)=43]
[Infantry push - hotspots: 25-10(poor morale)=15 vs 4-20(pounded)=-16]
[Infantry push - ???: 28-10(poor morale)+40(Amethyst trio)=58 vs 20]
[Dwarves on the walls: 53 vs 52]
The infantry are ragged, but their enemy so much more so, and their resistance is in the form of half-shattered skeletons and a few fresh zombies. The battle is bloody and gruesome, and only your own experiences with the human body in extremis gives you the stomach to keep from looking away, but in the end flesh and steel triumph over bone and darkness, and the infantry pour into the ruins of the building. You turn your eye to the streets and the barricades that the cannons were targeting, but the action there is already over, with the barricades torn apart and the few remaining skeletons smashed apart.
You turn your eye to the walls on either side, and find the Dwarves guarding the approaches to your position caught in desperate battle against a tide of skeletons and fresh zombies, carving a terrible toll from their numbers but being pushed back nonetheless. Narfi has already spotted this, even without his spyglass, and a hurried burst of Khazalid orders has the cannons swinging around to fire on what looks like his own men. You cringe, expecting to see the horrible carnage of friendly fire...
[DANGER CLOSE: 97]
But it was foolish of you to expect shoddy craftsmanship from Dwarves.
A single cannon barks, a cannonball plucking the head neatly from a skeleton, and seconds later the Dwarves disengage and fall back a dozen paces. Their foes would take only a few seconds to reach them once more, but that is all that is needed, as every other cannon sounds as one, and in a single very loud instant a tide of lead washes the walls clean of skeleton and zombie alike.
The Dwarves take up defensive positions once more and stamp out a straggler or two foolish enough to still be moving, but it seems the danger on the walls, much like the resistance in the town below, is finished.
[Town Hall seized and looted: 91-40(devastated)=51]
[Hotspots overrun: 49-20(pounded)=29]
[Other discoveries: 88]
[???: 1]
The troops, freshly buoyed by victory, bring you gifts - wonderful gifts of paper, bound in leather you hope is pig. Tax records, census data, all the accumulated paperwork of centuries of functioning governance, which somehow survived unscathed despite the frankly stupendous amount of firepower that was directed at it. Also captured, and unconscious, is a man in dark black robes with skulls, actual full-size human skulls, dangling from the sash. The mind boggles.
The results from the hotspots that, for whatever reason, the enemy attempted to defend is less grand - they received less of a pounding but whatever goodies they were protecting caught the brunt of it. Still, dead necromancers are their own reward.
You're also brought word, as Gustav and the generals file in and report to you without even needing prompting, that the warehouses of the town have been captured intact. Inside is mostly the stored result of toiling the harsh Sylvanian soil in such amounts that feeding your army has now become a non-issue, but after taking you aside and glancing about for anyone that could overhear, Gustav drops a small pouch into your palm. Giving him a quizzical look, you pull it open and the unmistakable shine of whats inside causes your jaw to drop.
Gold. Unworked, freshly mined gold.
"This was all there was," he murmurs, and you're not sure whether to believe him. "But there was mining equipment too, picks and shovels and wheelbarrows and whatnot."
Well. That complicates matters. When you've got a great deal more time on your hands, you'll have to go through every scrap of paper from the town hall and see if you can find where they've been hiding this literal gold mine of theirs.
What also complicates matters is the sudden departure of Hexensohn and the Battle Wizards. You seek out the men that were with him, and they tell of a mad delve through tunnels underneath the town, crawling with undead. From what you can piece together, the three Amethyst Wizards seem to have been searching for something, and had commandeered a significant portion of your men in the town to fight a path through the undead. But when he found whatever it is he was looking for - a small stone structure embedded in the deepest part of the tunnels, deeper than the undead of the town above had penetrated - Hexensohn had gone in, but hadn't come out. Eventually his Battle Wizards had followed after him, and then come out again carrying their Patriarch, who was deathly pale and quite possibly dead - none of the men got a good enough look to tell. That was the last of the Battle Wizards any of the men saw, carrying Hexensohn into the darkness of the tunnels, and they had to make their own way out using chalk marks they had left in their path.
How very confounding. And infuriating.
At the end of the day, the town is, more or less, yours. There's still undead roaming the streets, but have seemingly lost any direction, not even attacking anyone they see. The surviving townsfolk are mostly penned up in one quarter of the town, and under heavy guard even though they seem to have stopped producing those ensorcelled berserkers. The mundane fires are under control, and the Hysh fire is at least not growing any further.
The butcher's bill is heavy: a full quarter of the men that went into the town are dead or missing, with about the same wounded. The Greatswords appear to have been wiped out to a man, with Markus having led them into battle time and time and time again until there were none left, with Markus himself last being seen charging the town hall with only a few Slayers for company shortly before the cannons started firing. The Company of Honour, who featured heavily in the fourth wave that was supposed to support your charge into the city, are almost totally destroyed. And, of course, every single other Wizard has either died or left.
On the bright side, the Dwarves took minimal casualties, having taken to the walls early and apart from a brief foray to come to your rescue, not having left it. The knights and halflings have taken only minor attrition. Your artillery is untouched. And Asarnil and Deathfang are as ready as ever. Kasmir still lives, though he's currently wandering the town and smashing skeletons apart in a brooding sort of way. And everyone looks to you for orders.
Lords and Heroes Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal
Marshal Gustav von Jungfreud
Brother Kasmir
Journeywoman Mathilde Weber, Grey Wizard Magister Patriarch Viggo Hexensohn, Amethyst Wizard Lord
Magister Sigismund Herwig, Amethyst Battle Wizard
Magister Marike Grünberg, Amethyst Battle Wizard
Magister Jovi Sunscryer, Light Wizard
Asarnil the Dragonlord
Thori Stoneheart, Dwarf Thane
Narfi Hammerfist, Dwarf Engineer
Giantslayer Bjorgvin, Dwarf Slayer Sir Markus von Pfaffbach
Army of Stirland 12,000 9,000 spearmen 7,000 5,000 swordsmen
9,000 crossbowmen
800 pistoliers (dismounted) 500 greatswords
70 cannon
20 mortars
Throngs of Zhufbar and Karak Kadrin 6,000 5,500 Warriors
2,000 Miners
4,000 Thunderers
1,500 Quarrelers 500 300 Slayers
40 cannon
30 grudge throwers
20 organ guns
Other
Black Guard of Morr, 1000 900 knights
Talabeclander Knightly Orders, 400 350 knights
Altdorf Company of Honour, 2,500 500 infantry
Halfling Regiments, 5,000 4,800 archers
What is to be done with the town?
[ ] Leave a garrison; it is now de facto Stirland, not just de jure.
-[ ] Heavy Garrison - 10k men, 40 cannon.
-[ ] Medium Garrison - 6k men, 20 cannon.
-[ ] Light Garrison - 4k men, 0 cannon.
-[ ] Other Garrison (write in)
[ ] Nothing good can grow in such tainted soil. Burn it to the ground.
[ ] Abandon it to fend for itself.
What is to be done with the captured Necromancer?
[ ] Execute him at once, before he awakens. (+1 dead necromancer, 0 risks)
[ ] Execute him publicly, in the traditional way. Burn him at the stake. (+morale)
[ ] Spare some attention from matters of command to wake and interrogate him. (-your leadership, ???)
-[ ] Focusing on the 'Elector Countess'
-[ ] Focusing on the castle and its defences
-[ ] Focusing on the gold mine
-[ ] Focusing on the magic he wields
[ ] Leave him hog-tied and under very heavy guard until this campaign is over and you have the attention to spare.
What is your next step?
[ ] Nothing has changed. We have cannon, we have dragon. Castle Drakenhof falls.
[ ] We are no longer the force we were. We cannot risk attacking the Castle, not with our forces so devastated and our magical support gone and the element of surprise lost. The campaign is done, we return home.
- The Barazul are my own invention and owe nothing to existing Dwarf lore, except that it strikes me as the sort of thing Thorgrim might try to implement to try to slow the decline of the Dwarves. I also want to point out that 'Barazul' translates as both 'Understanding of Oaths' and 'Gateway to Steadfast Dwarves', because I'm pretty proud of that double meaning.
- Yep. Another nat 1. Though considering your concerns about the man, perhaps his nat 1 may not be considered entirely a bad thing for you.
Meanwhile in a parallell universe, user MoneyB wrote:
Uncertain Loyalties - an Advisors Quest
Turn 12ish
(Roll: [???] 100 + 20 (??? Blessing) = 120)
You awoke, the pain in your abdomen completely gone. You remember being somewhere, with someone. You felt it was important, but it was quickly fading away. Which is odd, because you didn't really feel that bad about it.
You didn't really feel anything at all in fact. The last thing you really remember was giving that book to....
No.
She didn't.
You opened your eyes to a very familiar face, a very familiar and very tired face, inches from yours. This face consequently let out a tremendous squeal and gave you a tremendous hug, which was surprisingly strong for the tiny, grey cloaked individual. You look around in shock, as your eyes adjusted to the darkness.
You were in the bowels of somewhere ancient. Underground by the lack of windows. Enchanting and magic related equipment lay on the surprisingly large amount of tables, while an entire corner was seemingly dedicated to cats. You blinked and looked at the very excited little wizardress that was in a fit of excitement. Smacking your lips as you realise just how much you thirsted for water, your voice came out much more gravelly than you were used to.
"Mathilde, did you do what I think you did?"
The little bundle of energy stopped, grey cloak swirling around her. Apparently she didn't expect those words to be your first. As she carefully put a certain book into a certain box, she turned to you.
"Yes, I thought it was appropriate."
If your eyes could've rolled back into your head, they would have. Wait, could they? You are undead now. Nevermind that, chalk that up to the 'figure out later' list. Addressing the now, a rising tide of rage at the idea of what you've become has started to assert itself.
"Mathilde, why am I alive. No, undead. Mathilde, why am I among the undead? What could have possibly gone through your mind to think this was okay?"
Mathilde face betrayed her chagrin, turning a unique shade of crimson. The little magic wielder began to waver in the face of your wrath.
"You were dead. They were going to elect some no-name from the backwoods I haven't heard of. I missed you. I thought it was your idea. I didn't know what else to do. I...."
You waved and shushed her. Rubbing your brow you tried to stand but realised your body didn't know how to do that quite yet. Instead, you chose to let loose the rest of your insulted feelings.
"I am an undead Elector-Count, no, better, I am an undead Witch Hunter. The irony of this must make some god laugh."
Which in response received a chorus of meows from the gathered cats. Why were there so many of them? However, Mathilde being a cat lady made far too much sense. Thinking of which, Mathilde seemed to have collected herself.
"The Countess in Drakenhof has been burnt, however that was simply one half of the plan. She was nothing but a plant from the Countess Gabriella von Bundebad, who turned out to be the actual Countess claiming to be the heir of von Carstein and has launched her war against our fatigued county. Stirland is on the backfoot, the new Count is more interested in horse racing, Gustav and Kasmir are both dead, and Anton is currently in the Imperial capital begging for help. I made the decision to bring you back in order to turn the tide against this evil woman and defeat the vampires once and for all."
You started to process all this information just as Mathilde presented you with your sword. However she got it.
Okay, so you are undead, Stirland is being routed by a truly diabolical plot, most of your court (former court) is dead, and leadership is missing. What's the worst that could happen.
Seemingly in response to your thoughts, the cats meow again.
Choose one action for each advisor. Voting in plan format.
Loyal, well-funded advisors may carry out additional projects on their own time to gain your favor, but this is not reliable.
Multiple advisors get a synergy bonus to working on the same major task, assuming they can make a relevant contribution.
In every category, you may also []Write-in.
(This is an AU post, you should not actually choose or vote for anything here.)
[] Diplomacy:
-Contact Anton and inform him of your return.
-Appoint a new Chancellor.
[] Martial:
-Appoint a new Marshal.
[] Stewardship:
-Find Wilhelmina.
-Appoint a new Steward.
[] Intrigue:
-Find out what the heck is happening in Stirland from Mathilde in detail.
-Let Mathilde be and let her figure it out.
[] Faith:
-Pray to Sigmar for guidance.
-Appoint a new Chaplain.
[] Learning:
-Find Detlef.
-Appoint a new Architect for Stirland.
Choose three Personal actions. "Write to" options count as half actions if you take more than one (correspondence is easier to handle in parallel).
[] Personal:
-[] Intervention: Select a second project for one of your advisors this turn. Cannot be chosen with Assistance.
-[] Assistance: Select one of your advisors, their project gets +10 to all rolls this turn. Cannot be chosen with Intervention.
-[] Investigate one of your councilmembers. (Choose which one.)
-[] Getting Back In Practice: Select an attribute to train. Higher attributes are harder to raise. Failing this action increases the chance of it succeeding if you pick it again the next turn.
-[] Figure out what has changed in your body.
-[] Write to some of the other Elector Counts and ask for advice on what to do.
-[] Write to the Grand Theogonist and seek spiritual guidence.
-[] Write to the Grey Order and report Mathilde.
-[] Pray for your eternal salvation.
-[] Come out and declare your return in Wurtburg.
-[] Coup the current Elector-Count.
Management wishes to remind you that shadow turns are for entertainment purposes only and should not be taken as reflective of events in the true quest.
[*] Leave a garrison; it is now de facto Stirland, not just de jure.
-[*] Medium Garrison - 6k men, 20 cannon.
[*] Nothing has changed. We have cannon, we have dragon. Castle Drakenhof falls.
[*] Execute him publicly, in the traditional way. Burn him at the stake. (+morale)
The pyre has been set up in the open plain outside the city walls, deliberately close to the gate where so many lost their lives, with the necromancer already tied firmly to the stake and the wood stacked high around him and doused in lamp oil, and a brazier set up nearby. He had awoken, briefly, at the preparations, and passed out as the most painful of them were inflicted. No matter. He'll awaken soon enough.
Even with Army of Stirland reduced by almost half, and significant portions of what remain busy elsewhere, the crowd arrayed before you is of breathtaking size. Thousands of men gather in the fading light, summoned by the messages relayed down the ranks: the execution of a captured necromancer will be occurring, and all who wish to attend are welcome. Blood, bandages, and distant stares are the fashion of the day, and you're no exception, since the Shallyan doctors finally gathered their nerves and did their timid best to convince you to let them bind your wounds, and you didn't have the strength to resist.
The opportunity exists, you dimly recognize, to deliver some speech, to fire the crowd up with thoughts of vengeance. But at your best you are no great public speaker, and this is far from your best. You hurt, inside and out, and like the men arrayed before you, you yearn for warmth and sleep and you're not going to get anywhere near enough of either.
So you keep things as simple as possible. "This," you call out, "is a necromancer. The penalty for necromancy, as we all know, is death." You turn to the pyre, regarding the man tied atop it; his mouth is very firmly gagged and his fingers broken to prevent any last-minute spellcasting, and you can barely hear his muffled attempts at screaming from where you are as he thrashes helplessly against the bindings. "The corpses he defiled took a great many of our comrades from us. And they took the life of the Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal." You're hugely relieved that your voice doesn't crack at that. He can take so much, you reflect, and you can only take his life once. It will have to do. "The penalty for every one of those lives taken, is death."
There are words for this, for ordering an execution; ritual and formality used by judges and witch hunters alike. Van Hal would know the words, but you don't.
So you look at the man, one of the necromancers that raised and directed the horde that had cost you and Stirland so much, and say nothing. You take the torch from the brazier, walk up to him, and hold it to the kindling. It takes barely a second to catch, and you drop the torch and back away as the flames start to climb, banishing the evening chill. You turn and regard the gathered men, whose eyes are universally locked onto the pyre as the necromancer thrashes and screams into his gag. Some few are sickened, but most watch with grim satisfaction. These men are Stirlanders, and have lived in the shadow of Sylvania their entire lives, as their parents have and as their children will. After today, Sylvania will have one less horror to inflict upon the innocent.
You turn back to the pyre, catching glimpses of the necromancer's terrified and agonized expression through the rising flames, and smile.
---
There's a thousand steps to garrisoning a town, and though no one man in the Army of Stirland can be said to know all of them, everyone knows their role and that of their direct subordinates, and that's apparently enough. Houses are turned into barracks, warehouses into hospitals, taverns into headquarters, and by midnight there's Stirlandian troops patrolling the walls, and by torchlight dwarven winches lower dwarven cannon and raise in place a score of Imperial greatcannon.
The tricky part, or so you gather, are the populace of the town hosting the troops. Even on friendly soil there's dozens of tricky little issues to be navigated, and on unfriendly soil the issues remain but with added urgency. Thankfully, it seems that the populace of this town come pre-cowed - the fanatics perished at the blades of the Army of Stirland and the cannonbolts of Zhufbar, those that remain are the regular townsfolk, who scrape what living they can from this blighted land and try to avoid the attention of whatever inhuman predator currently claims the title of their ruler. Their natural state is terrified obedience, and the martial law of an occupying force is, if anything, an improvement.
(You, of course, don't buy the 'poor victim Sylvanian' act for one minute, and instruct the officers to be left behind to be suitably cautious. The men are garrisoned together in one quarter of the town, and any of the townsfolk who try to cross into that quarter are to be given one warning before being riddled with crossbow bolts.)
There's nothing for you to do after you give the order, and that's a problem. You ache for sleep, but you don't dare stop. So you make a nuisance of yourself looking over shoulders and making sure things are getting done that are indeed getting done. You're not the only one going without sleep, but the men are resolved, the halflings are determined, the dwarfs refuse to acknowledge the hardship and the elf claims he can rest half of his brain at a time, though you're mostly sure he's just messing with you.
So at first light of dawn the remainder of the Army of Stirland marches, and with it marches the combined Throng of Zhufbar and Karak Kadrin, the Rangers of the Moot, one Knightly Order and representatives from four more, the tattered remnants of the Altdorf Regiment of Honour, and one elf atop one dragon.
---
As the morning wanes, the ultimate target of this crusade grows ever larger on the horizon. Perched atop a lonely mountain jutting out from the World's Edge mountain range, the castle starts high above the landscape and climbs higher still. Even from atop your horse, you can hear the unsure muttering in the ranks. Seen through their eyes, you can understand it. Though the castle compares unfavourably to the Imperial Palace or the Grand Cathedral in Altdorf, it easily outstrips any structure in Stirland. The winding path to the gate, and a second winding path from the enormous courtyard to the castle proper, would be a nightmare to assault. Even the most inept of defenders could hold off any number of attackers for as long as they damn well pleased.
Castle Drakenhof has stood for over a thousand years. It is older than Stirland's claim over Sylvania, older than the von Carsteins that made it their home. The soldiers of the Army of Stirland, and you'd wager the 'Elector Countess' herself, believe that to be proof that it cannot be taken by force of arms.
What they don't realize is this: that of the many things Castle Drakenhof predates, one very important milestone is the introduction of gunpowder.
You look past the worried men to the baggage train, where over one hundred blackpowder siege weapons are being pulled, push, carried, and generally manhandled (and dwarfhandled) towards Castle Drakenhof, and a grim smile returns to your face.
---
Goal:
[ ] The confirmed death of the Elector Countess.
[ ] The sacking of Castle Drakenhof.
[ ] The taking of Castle Drakenhof at least somewhat intact.
[ ] The complete destruction of the keep of Castle Drakenhof.
[ ] The complete destruction of the entirety of Castle Drakenhof.
[ ] The complete destruction of the mountain that Castle Drakenhof is built upon. [ ] The exacavation of a pit on the site where the mountain that Castle Drakenhof was built upon used to stand.
Deployment:
[ ] Leave it to the human professionals.
[ ] Leave it to the dwarven professionals.
[ ] Leave it to the halfling professionals?
[ ] Write in.
The Elf Factor:
[ ] Unleash him early and often.
[ ] Keep him in reserve for now.
[ ] Use him to counter any non-trivial sally attempt or any other counterattack.
Response to Offensive Magic:
[ ] Treat it as enemy artillery and counter-battery accordingly.
[ ] Unleash Asarnil on it.
[ ] Attempt to counter it yourself.
- For deployment, assume a circular mountain base surrounded by forest; small hills and rises can be found if desired. A throng of approx 12k dwarves can pretty much clear an arbitrary amount of forest as needed.
Goal:
[*] The complete destruction of the entirety of Castle Drakenhof.
Deployment:
[*] Leave it to the dwarven professionals.
The Elf Factor:
[*] Use him to counter any non-trivial sally attempt or any other counterattack.
Response to Offensive Magic:
[*] Treat it as enemy artillery and counter-battery accordingly.
---
All around you, the men and dwarves descend into feverish activity, as the halflings melt into the woods to scout the area. The first tree had fallen before you had even dismounted your horse, and by the time the leadership has assembled for you to address them more are being felled to clear a firing line for the artillery, and shovels had been distributed to grumbling men and dwarves.
"Defensible," Gustav mutters on one side of you, as you and the rest of the leaders of the gathered forces look up at the accursed castle.
"It doesn't matter," you say. "We're not going to assault it." You smile in anticipation. "This is far beyond the archetypal broad side of a barn; this is the broad side of a mountain. We all know the history - Castle Drakenhof was built by the von Draks during their control over Sylvania, up until Isabella von Drak's marriage to Vlad von Carstein in 1797. Three centuries later, our Dwarven allies," you nod to Thori and Narfi, "introduce gunpowder to the Empire. Meaning those walls, impressive as they are, were designed to stand against catapult and siege tower."
"No rounding, no sloping, no rampart, and the bastions are aesthetic rather than functional," Narfi notes. "Even the 'circular' towers are prisms, not truly round. And it's built on rock rather than soil, and the bailey is very small compared to the height of the walls, so an earthen bank would be impossible to source and impractical to have in place. It may be impressive to look at, but it's shockingly vulnerable."
"During the reign of the von Carsteins, nobody would dare march on it," you note. "And afterwards, nobody would bother. And so it has been a ready-made fortress for any necromancer, vampire, or other troublemaker to call home, and I daresay it's just waiting for the emergence of the next von Carstein. Well, I'll not allow it to see a Fourth Vampire War. Gustav, work with Thori on a defensive plan - I daresay there'll be some sort of reaction once we start knocking on their front door with cannonfire."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Speaking of which, if there's any magical response, treat it as enemy artillery and counterfire accordingly. If it's projectiles like they tried to use in the town, you'll be able to see the source easily. Otherwise, keep an eye on the walls and balconies - the hand motions required for spellcasting mean that it can't be done through an arrowslit."
"Aye, will do."
"Asarnil, there's been precious little opportunity for you to demonstrate your abilities. That ends now. When that castle does start spitting out foes, you are to make them regret it."
"Finally," the elf says in response, a savage grin on his face.
"Wilhelmina is coordinating with Zhufbar for our supply lines; our supply of ammunition and blackpowder is effectively bottomless. Pour fire into that blasted castle until there's nothing left but rubble. After this siege, Castle Drakenhof will be spoken of exclusively in past tense."
There's nods all around and everyone hurries off to get to work, leaving you alone, staring up at the castle. The bare mountain, topped by the rubble of Castle Drakenhof, would barely qualify as a suitable memorial to Abelhelm Van Hal, but it would have to do.
There's more to deploying them than pushing them into place and firing them at the enemy; the area around the base of Castle Drakenhof is heavily wooded, and enough trees have to be cleared to allow line of sight between the cannon and the castle, and while that is being achieved earth is piled up to partially shield the guns and for the crews to dive behind, should they feel the need. The other artillery pieces are slightly simpler, with the catapults requiring a ballistic arc and the mortars a parabolic one; you're surprised to understand the mathematics at play, finding that it overlaps heavily with what you were forced to learn for your paper on your Matrix. Elsewhere, more trees are being felled to create killing fields for any forces that try to counterattack, and already the air is filled with not just the steady thunk of axe on wood but also of sawing as the ever-industrious dwarves start putting the wood to use. Wooden boards for the artillery defences, stakes for the killing fields, and beams for constructing more siege equipment - field catapults and bolt throwers, which will lack the range to reach the castle but will do a great deal of damage to any forces unwise enough to give the dwarves an opportunity to entrench.
Finally, as the sun begins to edge towards the horizon, everything is ready. One of the camp followers had delivered a cushioned chair for you to observe from, and Narfi had had one of his men craft one on the spot from scrap lumber and he now reclined next to you. A barrel of ale had been sent for from the dwarven baggage train, and you found it quite to your liking - it was something like drinking liquid bread with a comfortable burn comparable to the Ostland brandy you're familiar with. You make a note to yourself to check whether it was being imported to Wurtbad. And an awestruck artilleryman who apparently witnessed your work at Fang Island hovers nearby, ready to pass on your orders to the human artillery contingent.
"Are we ready?" you ask the dwarf to your left.
"On your order," he says.
"Are we ready?" you ask the artilleryman on your right.
"Yes, ma'am."
"Men of the Empire. Dwarves of Zhufbar. You may fire at will." You finish your mug and hold your hands over your ears as two sets of orders go out. There's a few moments as the order filters down through the ranks, and then as fuses are lit and slow-matches held to touch-holes. And then, with noise that defies description, the greatest assembly of land artillery in the history of the Old World fires as one.
[Cannon: 96]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 45]
You had expected... well, you weren't entirely sure what to expect. Possibly holes blasted in the walls immediately, or perhaps this would take weeks of plodding work. But you hadn't expected this. And the smug look on Narfi's face proves without a doubt that he had planned for it. So far away that you need to squint to make out the statues, the castle gatehouse caves in on itself, burying the only visible exit to Castle Drakenhof in tons of masonry.
As if to hammer the point home, the first of many mortar volleys, having followed a much slower arc, descend, some falling outside the walls but enough falling inside that you smile a vicious grin.
You wordlessly pass your tankard to the chortling dwarf, who refills it from the keg at his side and passes it back to you, and then you tap it against his own mug in a wordless toast.
---
[Cannon: 6]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 90]
After that dramatic start, the rest of the day's fire is anticlimactic in the extreme, as balls and bolts impact the walls to no visible effect. Your only consolation is that the mortar shells and grudge stones have all fallen inside the courtyard, though you can't see what effect they might be having; you're starting to wonder if you might be besieging an empty castle.
[Enemy Force Reaction: 75]
[Rolling...]
[Enemy Magical Reaction: 22]
At least, you do until dusk.
The castle gate has fallen in on itself, but not all forces are constrained, and you glare through the spyglass that Narfi has handed to you as the spectral, glowing figures glide four abreast down the winding path. Cairn Wraiths, the long-dead and still lingering spirits of necromancers and sorcerers who could find no better way to cheat death. Many flock to necromancers to feed on the ambient Dhar their spells give off, and still more are forcefully bound to their service, because they make a terrible enemy for any mortal army to face: just tangible enough to kill, but mundane weapons do little to harm their incorporeal forms. You're already on your feet, ready to run to the front lines and weave Ulgu into as many weapons as you can before the damnable things reach them...
[DRAGONLORD INTERRUPT: 99]
When your own secret weapon makes itself known.
Deathfang, from what Asarnil told you, is one of the very eldest of the dragons of Caledor. Deathfang predates Drakenhof Castle, predates the Empire, predates necromancy. He was old when Ulthuan itself was young, and every year has made him stronger. And as he swoops down from a dimming sky to land in front of the advancing wraiths, you're given a very quick lesson on why Asarnil the Dragonlord is the most expensive mercenary in the entire world.
For a brief but terrible moment, a second sun appears on the horizon as white-hot dragonflame washes over the advancing figures, and when the light dies away the wraiths are not to be seen.
The dragon raises its head to stare up at the castle, and roars a terrible roar of pride and defiance, before launching himself into the air and flapping his way back up into the sky.
You retake your seat and accept a newly-refilled tankard of ale from Narfi.
---
The first light of dawn the next morning is greeted by a dawn chorus not of birdsong, but of over a hundred artillery pieces resuming their tireless barrage. They're well and truly sighted in now, and the crews are entertaining themselves by trying to hit individual points on the castle walls.
By brunch, the walls are showing signs of stress, with fissures opening up in the wall from the top downwards in two separate places.
[Enemy Force Reaction: 4]
[Enemy Magical Reaction: 4]
[Yes, that was two separate rolls]
[Rolling for miscast...]
At one point you feel magical energy struggling to manifest itself in your direction, but the spell is so badly mangled that you can't even make out what it was supposed to do, let alone what direction it was coming from. It would be the simplest thing in the world to reach out with your own magic, give it a nudge and let it fall in on itself like a house of cards, but you instead sit and watch in fascinated horror as the mistake is compounded as more energies are poured in and more strands of corrosive Dhar woven atop the spell in an attempt to correct the casting. Eventually, it's too much for the spell to bear and it snaps back in on itself in a jumble of twanging energy and then is sucked back to its origin. Whatever that energy did when it returned, you're absolutely positive it was bad for the caster.
Your good mood is compounded when Thori brings you word that the halflings found a cave entrance, the dwarves scouted it and found a tide of skeletons about halfway down a tunnel that seemed to stretch all the way from the Castle, and then detonated a few gunpowder charges to bring the entire tunnel system down on the head of the skeletal column.
---
[Cannon: 68+10(sighted in)+10(cumulative damage)=88]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 42+10(sighted in)=52]
The afternoon brings more of the same, as the dwarf and human crews start to intermix. The humans are given the rare opportunity to watch (though not participate in) the firing of a dwarven cannon and the dwarves entertain themselves by trying to get the greatcannon to actually hit something. Spirits are high all around as damage becomes more and more visible on the castle; one of the towers was knocked clean off the structure by a lucky shot, and bets are being made on how long the others will last.
[Enemy Force Reaction: 6]
[Enemy Magical Reaction: 53-20=33]
There's no further apparent reaction from the Castle; either their skeletons were all lost in the cave-in or have been unable to find another exit from the tunnels. But as you're starting to think about dinner, you feel magic start to form around you once more; from the look and feel of it, it's another attempt of what was tried earlier, except this time whoever it is is taking it slow, which is just as well because there's a significant difference in the feel of the magic even though it appears to be from the same caster; apparently the backlash's effects have taken their toll on the magical ability of whoever it is.
[Triangulation: 63]
It's simple enough to follow the 'feel' of a magical spell being formed, but more difficult to get a bearing precise enough to identify a position near half a mile away. But the spyglass is a miracle of engineering, and you're finally able to make out a figure at the windows of one of the towers, clad in a hooded black robe and hands waving in exaggerated gestures in your direction.
"Narfi?"
"Mmm?" he replies, not looking up from his diagrams.
"You see the northernmost tower on the lower walls? Tucked between the balcony and the cliff?"
He peers towards the castle. "I do."
"Be a dear and destroy it for me, will you?"
"No problem." He has a word with a dwarf that has a word with four dwarves who have words with forty more.
[Counterbattery: 86+10 (sighted in)]
"Thank you, Narfi," you say as the tower tumbles over the edge of the walls and down to the ground far below. You briefly wonder if that was the Elector Countess.
---
The third day begins, and the chorus of cannonfire is a balm for your soul. Each shot is akin to a chiselmark on the monument to the great man you knew.
[Cannon: 95+10(sighted in)+20(cumulative damage)=125]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 79+10(sighted in)=89]
The walls begin to fall to provide a charming complement to your breakfast, and the last of them falls to give you the perfect lead-up to lunch. If there were buildings in the courtyard, they're so buried beneath rubble that they're impossible to see, the walls having fallen inwards rather than outward. The keep of the castle still remains, but you've no doubt that it, too, will fall.
[Enemy Force Reaction: 98]
[Rolling...]
[How much does the collapse of the outer castle bother them? 99, very, very much]
[Enemy Magical Reaction: 18-50=-32]
However, it seems that the bombardment has awoken something. They emerge from the ruins of the courtyard one by one and throw themselves into the air with shrieks that carry to where you're sitting. You shout an unnecessary warning as men and dwarves bustle in a sudden frenzy of activity.
Vargheist. Like most Stirlandians, you knew the legends: deep in the bowels of Castle Drakenhof, there are row after row of countless coffins that the von Carsteins call their beds. But they are far from united, and whenever one falls from grace, their coffin would be chained shut as they slept, and they would remain trapped with nothing but their terrible hunger and the dark magic of Sylvania for company, and both would twist and mutate them until they were finally strong and insane enough to tear themselves free... it was one of a thousand terrible stories about the vampires, each less likely than the last, but it seems that this one was actually true.
Shouts in the distance as men and dwarf and halfling alike ready themselves as the creatures approach. You're incredibly glad that the collapsed walls are slowing their escape so much; the first of them is nearing your lines now, but there's still vargheist tearing themselves free of the piles of rubble and masonry and flapping desperately to catch up. If they had been able to hit your lines all as one... you shudder at the thought.
[Dragonlord Interrupt: 60]
The first is plucked out of the air by Deathfang and torn clean in two, the second pierced neatly by Asarnil's lance, the third disappears in a cloud of flame. But however mighty Deathfang is, he can only be in one place at once, and they start to slip past.
Arrows rise from the trees and claw one from the air, and the rest of the growing flock veer away, only to run into a wall of crossbow bolts. Shrieks of fury and hunger ring out as still more of them fall, but they keep coming.
A chorus of blackpowder detonations, and more of them fall. A constant flow of the freshly-awoken beasts are pouring in, but you seem to have reached some awful equilibrium of airborne death. If the legends were true, each was once a von Carstein. How many of them were there? How many lost the internal political intrigues that resulted in the three terrible instigators of the three terrible Vampire Wars? The first of them touch down, and there's a chorus of mixed battlecries to signify the countercharge; the Knightly Orders, by the sound of it. You hate that you can't see it, you can't be there.
[For Sigmar!: 60 vs 8]
[They Keep Coming: 13]
Their numbers seem to be slacking off, as less and less make it past Asarnil and the ground fire, and those that do are circling instead of landing. You're sure that these things are far beyond any sort of thought, but they do have enough instinct to recognize an easy target from a poor one, and they're starting to realize they've picked a hard target.
[Attempted escape: 37 (them) vs 63]
Their escape attempt is foiled; without a constant source of fresh vargheist from the ruins of the castle, Asarnil and Deathfang are able to chase down and pluck each of the would-be escapees from the air, rend them limb from limb, and drop them to fall to their death on the forest floor below. The final one is beheaded and carried all the way back to the castle to fling at the roof, which caves in at the impact, dropping the corpse into the rooms below. Deathfang flies a lap around the castle and bellows once more, announcing their supremacy over this battlefield to all.
The vargheist has just gone extinct.
---
Work begins on the keep that afternoon. To your relief, the mortars and grudge throwers start dropping shots where you could see them instead of falling behind the walls where you had no way to tell what effect they were having. You're truly starting to despise the fog of war.
[Cannon: 51+10(sighted in)=61]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 13+10(sighted in)=23]
It's not much of an improvement, because these mortar bombs and grudge stones are seemingly unable to penetrate the roof of the castle. Luckily, the walls have a similar effect to before: slow, but promising progress.
[Enemy Force Reaction: 65]
[Rolling...]
[How much does the collapse of the outer castle bother them? 10, barely at all]
The call is made by one of the artillerymen checking on a shot his team had made, and you follow his pointing: heavily-armoured skeletons are making their way in a disciplined column down the path from the castle to the ruined remains of the outer walls. The red kite shields that each carries matches another set of horror stories, as does the faint hint of screaming audible even from here: the Drakenhof Guard and their eternally screaming banner.
[Dragonlord Interrupt: 18]
Either guided by some unseen intelligence, or able to intelligently react due to the terrible mastery with which they were created, when Deathfang swoops in he is met by a wall of shields as the Guard move as one into a tortoise formation. His fire claims many, and his claws a few more, but the bulk of the skeletons are out of his reach.
[Cannons: 58+10(sighted in)=68]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 93+10(sighted in)=103]
With the dragon hovering above and roaring in frustration, you nod to Narfi, and that's all the signal he needs. A few barked orders later, and over a hundred guns roar as one, and Deathfang swoops clear as cannonballs batter the formation. Shields are no use against a cannonball, but the distance tells and the cannonballs aren't quite as devastating as you hoped.
But then the bombs and stones, having taken a longer arc, finally begin to arrive. The crews of those machines must have been frustrated, having the fruits of their labour for three days be hidden behind walls, and given a target in clear view they gave it everything they could, and the effect is ruinous.
Skeletons are obliterated as blackpowder bombs fall among them, but it is the grudge throwers that take the day as they strike at the causeway the skeletons march upon until it finally gives way, dropping the skeletons to shatter against the debris far below.
You nod in satisfaction, as does Narfi, as does the crews of thirty grudge throwers. And then the bombardment resumes.
---
Day four, and today is the day, you're sure of it. Today is the fall of Drakenhof.
[Cannons: 99]
[Mortars and grudge throwers: 94]
And you are proven amazingly, satisfyingly right.
The front of the castle is fallen by eight o'clock, by nine new rooms are revealed with each barrage and torn apart by the next. At ten, the roof collapses and the full range of your artillery is brought to bear on the superstructure. And finally, as the sun is reaching its zenith, there's a mighty rumble as the castle's superstructure can take it no more, and it finally crumbles in on itself. You track the fall of the tallest tower as it tears itself free of the castle and tumbles down the mountain until it drops out of sight. It's... over?
[Enemy Force Reaction?: 5]
It's over.
A cheer arises from some thirty-five thousand throats, and you find that yours is not among them.
It's over.
What do you do now?
---
[ ] The campaign is over, but your duty to Stirland remains. Go home to Wurtbad.
[ ] The campaign is over, so your duty to Stirland is fulfilled. Go home to Altdorf.
[ ] The campaign is over, so your duty to Abelhelm is done. What else is there? Leave. Pack your snake-in-a-box, pack your equipment, pack your savings, pack the Liber Mortis, and go somewhere else.
- The mortar and grudge thrower shots were influencing the organization and number of forces available to the enemy; as this was all happening out of line of sight, you didn't get to see what those effects were.
- In an alternate universe, the players of Necromancer Quest are very, very unhappy.
- The first option is to continue as the Spymistress of Stirland; the second is to continue as a member of the Grey Order, and the third is to seek a new purpose for yourself. Not necessarily a second coming of Nagash, but if that's the direction you want to go in, this would best allow for it. The last option isn't necessarily going rogue from the Grey Order - it can be considered part of your 'journeywoman wanderings'.
- Don't let your string-pulling benefactors dictate your decision here - they made you a Spymistress under Abelhelm Van Hal. They may continue to have 'requests' for you if you continue on in the role, but they will not prevent you from leaving it - not now.
- Likewise, your duty would be considered properly fulfilled if you want to leave the position of Spymistress but worry about your reputation in the Empire. It's rather common for people to step down from the council in the transition from one Elector Count to the next.
Five years, it took. Five years of working at feverish pace in the ruins of Drakenhof. But your duty to Á̸҉b̵̶̧̕͝e҉͟ļ͡ḩ̛e̴͡͏҉̕l̨̛̛m̷̸̛͟ is complete, now. The book you used so extensively for reference is in the hands of his son, as it should be. But the research and study of that dark tome has born fruit. Three tomes of your own making: the first relatively bening (a timid pursuit of the truth in shadows); the second dangerous to the unprepared (the work to accomplish your dreams); the third your preparations for a last resort (your nightmare made material). But now you are ready to finally deal with Sylvania once and for all. Á̸҉b̵̶̧̕͝e҉͟ļ͡ḩ̛e̴͡͏҉̕l̨̛̛m̷̸̛͟ is finally ready to return in earnest.
Not the intricate illusion you draped yourself in, but a true return. The "illusion", feeding on the images of Á̸҉b̵̶̧̕͝e҉͟ļ͡ḩ̛e̴͡͏҉̕l̨̛̛m̷̸̛͟ that Gustav, Kasmir, Wilhelmina and His son Sigmund held in their memory to reinforce itself, have discreetly given you the missing pieces you needed. Merging those memories with your own, you finally have enough to weave Him together from naught but Ulgu, with the barest sliver of Dhar to make the shadow permanent and independent of thought. You tremble as you make final checks and preparations, unsure whether from anticipation or nervousness. Years have passed, but you have found the place well enough (after all, you've lost count how many times you've come here to vent your frustration and grief). Drakenhof town, the very street just inside the gates, where Abelhelm's life was cut short, is where Á̸҉b̵̶̧̕͝e҉͟ļ͡ḩ̛e̴͡͏҉̕l̨̛̛m̷̸̛͟ will emerge restored. The city remains largely empty; though a few desperate souls still dwell in the collapses houses and intact sewer warrens, most of the city remains in ruin and the Vampires and Necromancers of Castle Drakenhof have yet to expend the organized effort to resettle the town. An hour before sunrise, you begin casting. Just after an hour later, the receding shadow of the sun leaves behind a man-shaped form into which you pour Ulgu (and Dhar), and not long after the figure is wholly solid. A memory, and a dream, made reality. The spell has succeeded. The greatest Champion of Stirland exists again. Despite yourexhaustion, you are quick to embrace the man.
An armored gauntlet softly pats your head and looking up, you see his face, nearly stern, but with warmth in his eyes and his lips curving just the slightest bit upward.
"Well then, Dame Weber." A͘b̕e͠l̢h͞e̡lm̴ begins "Shall we go and finish the job?"
---
Regimand Speiseschrank
2481IC
With the alarming news from Stirland's spymaster, Regimand had wasted little time calling in a great many of his favors to gather an appropriate response. Himself, and three other Magisters of the Gray Order went with him to Stirland (even the Patriarch might have joined, if not for an Imperial demand for his presence overriding yours). Eight witch hunters with their personal retinues, as well as two full knightly orders (Sigmar's Blood and Fiery Heart), went in beside them, outside his own calling. Some months were wasted, scouring Stirland for Weber, until the process of elimination concluded she was likely in Sylvania.
The witch hunters went in first, being the best suited to find and investigate. And one by one, fell completely out of touch with the rest of the effort to find Weber. Then, one of those Witch Hunters returned, alone, with dire news and shaken to her core. Alfhild Raftwald spoke of the madness she discovered.
According to her, Drakenhof was... changed. The witch hunters had sent agents there before. She had read the reports. Of a populace terrified, barely above starvation, and chained by shackles of despair stronger than any iron could hope to be; under the thrall of the Vampires' dark powers and unable to muster the will to do much of anything but silently support their dread overlords with their labor and obedience. Instead, she had discovered a town of hope, rebuilding. Its' citizens well-fed and stocky, if few in number. Instead of being met with suspicious glances or terrified scurring into building, they were welcomed. Though it was quite disturbing to see everyone, every sincle person they spoke to, assume that the witch hunters were there to aid "Count V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀" against the undead in the surrounding countryside. She recalled a section of town adjacent to the wall had been demolished entirely, and a fortified town keep being under construction in the open space, creating an incropping from the exterior wall. It seemed as if a rather thick and tall tower was going to serve as the inner sanctum of the keep.
Not long after she claims to have encountered A͘b̕e͠l̢h͞e̡lm̴ V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀ himself! Or rather, Raftwald quickly corrected herself, some monstrosity wearing his skin with a shockingly convincing visage. Weber was with V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀, no doubt responsible for the abomination. Then things took a turn for the worse: as the sunset confrontation in the streets of Drakenhof was developing, Weber's "allies" emerged from the buildings, surrounding Raftwald and her retinue. The other witch hunters, and their retinues, alive and well, and seemingly having sworn themselves to the "noble cause" of cleansing Sylvania from undead, and demanding Raftwald do the same.
She rejected him and the whole abominable situation. Weapons clashed, but the abominations were clearly just cautiously buying time for Weber to cast her vile magics; no wounds were inflicted on them, but neither did the six of them have success inflicting solid blows on the abominations. As shadows fell, The opposing "witch hunters" withdrew to the buildings and V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀ returned to Weber's immediate side, as six new figures rose from the shadowed ground: one each for Raftwald's retinue.
Raftwald begins to shake, as she recalls in detail what happened next.
---
The figures were our own. Like looking into a mirror... except not quite. In places there were imperfections, glimpses of shadow. But more importantly, our shadows were different from our true selves. More than we ourselves were. Like looking into a mirror and imagining what you want to see.
Our weapons were at the ready, but the fighting had paused. My... reflection spoke to me. It tried to convince be to join V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀'s cause. It made a persuasive argument. Just barely, I found the strength to refuse. By this point, I barely had attention for the other reflections. When I refused, she... it denounced me. I was "judged and found wanting"; the whole formal declaration, you know. It asked if I thought... Doesn't matter. I didn't even have a chance to respond when sh-IT said that perhaps, it's for the best. That I wouldn't have the strength to support V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀'s dream... but she-IT would. That it would be best if I just let her take my place.
"Please, Miss Raftwald. What did it ask you? I assure you, every little detail matters."
She asked me if Sylphie would be proud of me. Because there I was, a Witch Hunter, trying to put an end to the only force in the Empire that's actually working to wipe out the undead menace of Sylvania.
Sylphie is... was my older sister. Died when I was a child. The reason I... I even became a witch hunter in the first place. So there would be more reasonable individuals in the ranks, not maniacs burning everyone that a terrified peasant points a finger at.
"So... the reflection actually knew details about yourself that Weber couldn't... couldn't possibly know? Remar... Hm. Do continue, Miss Raftwald."
Fighting broke out, then. I snapped out of my daze just in time to clash maces. We... we were outmatched. Fighting stronger versions of ourselves. By the time we had a brief lull in the fight and I could glance around, there were only four of us left. Karken and Mossfeuer were... standing at Van Hal's side. Didn't even notice when their true selves went down. It... it's possible they didn't. They could've given in to words alone, as I said, I barely had attention to anyone but my own reflection for a while.
As the fight resumed, Wolfgang was out of position, and got overwhelmed by his reflection. His reflection stunned him, dazed him for for seconds, the reflection slowly grabbed his throat and the fell apart into a cloud of black fog that then went inside of him, through his mouth and nose. Maybe eyes and ears too. Didn't have too much time to stare at the process.
Galmar managed to land a solid blow on his reflection; right on the neck. It fell and started bleeding out into wisps of shadow. Not a moment too soon, because I had been disarmed and was about to get my own throat grabbed by my reflection when Galmar tackled her. The two of them left held the reflections off and yelled at me to flee. Galmar's own reflection had reformed, so it was three against two for them. Can-can't imagine they lasted long. Then I got to my horse outside the gates, and rode without stopping back to the border bridge.
---
We were on the cusp of victory. The battle had been arduous, despite the foe consisting "only" of Weber herself and no more than some 300 fighters; the Witch Hunters, as well as a number of patrols and skirmishers that she had "turned" over the weeks it took us to prepare for a march on Drakenhof. The "Dream Shades", as we had decided to name them, proved fully able to physically wound foes, despite all known Ulgu illusions being incapable of such. They weren't even limited to the core characteristic of the scant few examples of Ulgu-entities ("regular" shades) on record: the ability to reform and regenerate from any physical disruption of their form; in the case of dream shades, mundane damage failed to keep them down for any longer than a frighteningly short period of five minutes (and even that long was only from total destruction by direct cannon hit). No, dream shades were even capable of... terrifyingly quickly reforming from magical harm: ten to thirty minutes from brute-force magical destruction, depending on the degree of annihilation. Slightly over an hour to recover from generic dispellation aimed at the spellwork holding them together. To permanently destroy one, required a "live" capture and restraint, followed by a careful analysis of the individual shade, and a tailored disjunction of its' binding.
This process in the field of battle was not helped by the fact that Weber herself had taken to the field, and was summoning new dream shades in the images of the soldiers in the field.
Finally, after five days of constant skirmish on the streets of Drakenhof, and failed attempts to pin down that tiny but undying enemy force in close quarters, we have cornered Weber and her six remaining dream shades; including V̧a͟n͏ ̨H̕a͠l̶̨̀'s shade, whom we have determined is of a different type. Him we have captured twice now, once on the plains outside Drakenhof, and again on the first day of fighting within Drakenhof. For reasons unknown to us, even tailored disjunction has failed to keep him down for longer than a couple of days, though he has been altered by each disjunction, such that a new analysis had to be performed. No doubt, given their personal connection, Weber has done something to make his shade more persistent.
Weber was cornered. Her shades fading and losing ground. I saw her face several times during that final battle. She was unhinged to begin with, but I caught it. The moment when Count Sigmund bypassed the shade of his father and went for her directly. I caught the moment where she cracked utterly, seeing the blade come at her without doing anything to stop it. As the blade pierced her chest, a battle tome among her combat gear exploded with shadow and force, knocking away the Count before opening its' pages and the gates of madness. In the Winds, a vortex of power emerged as Dhar and Ulgu coiled around Weber and spilled into the sky as an invisible pillar right before my senses. The whole of the army was swarmed by a host of nightmares. Though I glimpsed at figures of madness from the corners of my eyes, from Orcs to Vampires to Daemons, I remained unbothered by all figues besides my apprentices: all of them suddenly around me, save for Weber herself. Back and forth the solid illusions switched places whichever way I looked: altering between states of death or undeath or corrption-by-Dhar and other unimaginably evil mockery whenever my eyes flicked around. What I feared they could become if I failed to prepare them accordingly... It was at that moment where I understood the nature of Weber's breakthrough and genius. Where the dream shades created an idealized image of ourselves, and twisted it just a fraction to serve Weber's crusade against the Undead, this hurricane pulled Ulgu through every mind in its' area and through Dhar made those nightmares into reality. Real enough to tear mail and flesh and mind alike. The army shattered into retreat in less than twenty minutes.
One of the Magisters I saw perished in the nightmare, two already before during the skirmish, the last, descended into the catacombs beneath the building, laughing and howling, his mind shattered by what he saw. I was all that was left, and I stood alone before my former apprentice and the shade at her side. Her mortal chest wound, and even the damage to her robes, gone as if they had never been there.
Magical Threats to the Empire (2500IC; Restricted Magister Edition)
... Sylvania and The Dreamer
Since the Battle of Drakenhof(2481IC) (also known as the Battle of Dreamshades), Sylvania has become one of the most dangerous and unforbidding territories of the world, surpassed with certainty only by the northern Chaos Wastes. Belonging to the entity known as The Dreamer, those passing into Sylvania rarely return, and the minds of those who do are greatly changed by it. Though once famous for its infestation of undead that often spilled over into Stirland, the Dhar-corrupted Shyish winds of the land have since faded. Instead, they have been replaced by Dhar-corrupted winds of Ulgu, resulting in a realm of shadow and madness, where dreams of the hopeful come true and make them reluctant to leave, while the fears of the frightful swiftly transform into reality and consume them.
The creator of this realm, The Dreamer, is an entity of great power whose exact abilities, at this point, are possibly beyond enumeration, given the wide variety of reliable, but conflicting reports on the matter. Some Magisters have hypothesized that The Dreamer gains and loses abilities based on what her individuals in her immediate vicinity believe them to have, though this hypothesis remains unconfirmed. Nonetheless, it has been confirmed within reason that regardless of their opponents' beliefs, The Dreamer is an Ulgu mage of Battle Wizard caliber, as well as having the ability to create Dream Shades. Almost always, The Dreamer is accompanied by their first shade: the Shade of E̸l̷ect͞ór͡ ̶C͡ount Ab̀ȩlhe̢l̡m ̴V͟an ҉H͝a͡l, once a witch hunter and a fearsome warrior especially in that state of aberration.
Besides The Dreamer themselves, Dream Shades are the most immediately dangerous of Sylvania's denizens, coming in three varieties: Greater, Corrupted and Lesser. All three varieties are sometimes referred to as Dopplegängers by the common folk of the Empire. All variations of Dream Shade are exceedingly difficult to destroy permanently: to do so requires careful analysis of the Shade's magical existence, followed by a disjunction tailored for the specific shade. To study and disjunct a shade that has yet to replace their original is a fairly straightforward (if time-consuming) task made complex only by the Shade's attempts to break free during the process; given time, even Apprentice-level Grey Wizards ought to be able to succeed at the disjunction. However a shade that has succeeded in the replacement is far more difficult, and a permanent disjunction is a Magister-level task, likely beyond all but the most talented of Journeymen. Fortunately, to restrain the shades of humans is fairly straightforward once they are captured: Dream Shades of all varieties lack the ability to become intangible at will, and can only do so in reaction to direct physical or magical damage to their form. The only exception to this is the Shades of wizards, which possessed such an ability before becoming shades.
Greater Dream Shades take the form of a living individual as they dream to be, and will likely attempt to convince a willing merger, where the true person is subsumed under the idealized strength and willpower of the Shade, though failure to persuade results in an attempt to force the merger. Greater Dream Shades are created personally by The Dreamer.
Corrupted Dream Shades take the form of a living individual, corrupted to evil and madness; should the individual in question possess such a fear. Shaped by the beliefs of the true individual, they may or may not outmatch the original. Unlike Greater Dream Shades, they will usually attempt to kill the true individual, rather than dominate them, though Corrupted Shades with an obsession of domination are not unheard of. Corrupted Dream Shades can be created by The Dreamer, as well as by the Shades of Gray Wizards.
Lesser Dream Shades tend to take an imperfect and transparent mockery of the true individual. Some stronger examples of Lesser Dream Shades occasionally manage to take a more perfect form that can pass for the original person in a state of weakness or brokenness. While they rarely confront the individual they are formed of directly, as Greater and Corrupted variations do, the Lesser variation pursues a different strategy of replacing the original: they stalk their original until an opportunity presents itself to slay or subsume the original (most commonly, when the original falls asleep alone, ideally in the isolated wilderness). While not as dreadful to face as the Greater and Corrupted variants once discovered, the Lesser variant is threatening in its' own way, as they are capable of shifting into existence without a summoner anywhere in Sylvania, simply from the presence of a true individual. It is also hypothesized among Magisters of the Gray Order that the "peaceful and optimistic" residents of Sylvania, reported by the handful of people to return from the lands alive, are Lesser Dream Shades that have replaced the original population. Or particular threat, are Lesser Shades of Grey Wizards which stalk their true self out of Sylvania, and may begin summoning Corrupted Shades outside its' borders if they succeed in replacing their original.
...
---
A Magister's Index of Forbidden Lore (2512 IC; Restricted Edition)
... The Three Tomes of Weber
The Three Tomes of Weber are a collection of books second in infamy only to the Books of Nagash (indeed, surpassing even the Liber Mortis at the time of this writing), and a harsh reminder to Mages of the Empire than not all great works of darkness and madness are something from ages long past. Written between 2475 and 2480 by the individual now referred to only as The Dreamer. Though the author's name and identity are known in Imperial and College record, it is hypothesized that people accurately remembering The Dreamer feeds The Dreamer's power, thus the true name and identity have been stricken from all but the most restricted secret records. The tomes, and the underlying research, was carried out when The Dreamer possessed the Liber Mortis, and is considered the definitive study of Umbramancy: the art of corrupting spells of Ulgu with Dhar. The three tomes making up the collection are: Liber Umbra Infinum, Liber Somnum Aeterna and Liber Verum Terros; or in Reikspiel: The Book of Infinite Shadow, The Book of Eternal Dreams and The Book of True Nightmares.
Liber Umbra Infinum is the most benign of the three, primarily dealing with theoretical analysis of Ulgu and laying the groundwork for the latter two books. After thorough review by the appropriate authorities, a version censoring some 1/5th of the book was approved for use by Magisters and Journeymen (with a Magister's letter of approval) of the College. A copy of the uncensored book is held in the vaults of the Gray Order, the justified study of which is occasionally permitted to select Magisters on the mutual approval of the Patriarch of the Gray Order and the Grand Theogonist.
Liber Somnum Aeterna is believed to be the tome containing the secret to creating Dream Shades. Any copies discovered and identified are to be retrieved and turned over to the Gray College without further study, or reported to the same if retrieval is impossible. A copy is held in unspecified Imperial vaults, to be studied in only the direst of emergency by the Grand Theogonist or the Patriarch of the Gray Order.
The contents of Liber Verum Terros are a matter of utmost secrecy. If you are required to know, the Patriarch of the Order will inform you of it in confidence. Any suspected copies are to be destroyed immediately, without further attempts at identification.
...
[*] The campaign is over, but your duty to Stirland remains. Go home to Wurtbad.
Part of you wants to pack up and leave Stirland behind, but pragmatism, duty and sentimentality combine to stop you. You've a base of power, you've a duty to at least see to a proper handover of power, and you've got friends in Stirland, albeit less than when the campaign started. So as the army packs up, you remain with them, technically still in command though there's no orders to give. You do note with some faint amusement that the carts that had delivered food, ammunition and blackpowder have been returning filled with freshly-cut lumber from the sightlines the dwarves cleared to bombard the former Castle; Wilhelmina never misses a trick.
The first separation happens almost immediately, as the Third Division remain on the far side of the River Drak to garrison the 'annexed' Drakenhof. You travel with them to see the town that claimed Abelhelm one more time, and oversee the mounting of fifty greatcannon on the walls of Drakenhof - and not all of them facing outwards. The town is not going to fall out of Stirlandian hands without a fight.
By the time you return to the bulk of the forces, they're splitting again. The Fourth Division and Schultz are staying behind to garrison and fortify what some are starting to call Abelhelm's Bridge, and some of the dwarves and halflings are staying with them, at least for now. On top of that, a contingent of the dwarves, mostly miners and quarrellers, are striking off south to blaze a trail to Zhufbar through the mountains.
You spend a great deal of the next few weeks in the back of a wagon, holding court with the leaders of the forces that remain. You strike a pro tem agreement with the dwarves to delineate where the Haunted Hills end and the World's Edge Mountains begin, to be ratified by the incoming Elector Count, and generally spent a great deal of time reminiscing over dwarven ale. Narfi is rapt with what he's calling the two greatest artillery campaigns he could have hoped for: bombarding an enemy-occupied town from their own walls, and the utter destruction of a pre-gunpowder castle. Thori has a section copied out of Zhufbar's Book of Grudges for reference purposes and is radiating sublime satisfaction as he makes notes as to how many could be considered Avenged by the campaign, not only against the von Carsteins and their ilk but also a few relatively minor matters they still considered outstanding against the von Draks. All in all, you seem to be getting along fairly well with the dwarves.
[Previous Dwarf Rep: +1]
[Govibarazak: +2]
[Two sublime demonstrations of the power of artillery: +2]
[Grudges Avenged: +8]
[Adbarazi: Your Oath Fulfilled: +2]
[Total: +15]
Also occupying you on the long road from Drakenhof to Leicheberg is a side-project with your maps and a pot of glue.
---
When you finally arrive in Leicheberg, most of the combined forces disappear - the Halflings heading home to the Moot, the Throng of Zhufbar to the Zhufbar Road in Southern Stirland, and the Second Division returning to Fort Redemption. In Zipf, the Black Guard of Morr head north to Siegfriedhof, the other Knightly Orders to Talabecland, and the Throng of Karak Kadrin home via Ostermark. It is only the First Division, some five thousand men, that remain for the rest of the trip to Wurtbad.
With the good company of the dwarves gone, you spend a lot of time alone with your thoughts as you let your wounds slowly heal on the road to Wurtbad. You were exposed to a lot of information and revelations over the course of the campaign. But there's one thing that stands out above all the rest for you that strikes you as the greatest lesson of the Purge:
ONE of the following will become a new trait:
[ ] Artillery is the King of Battle.
[ ] Dwarves are the greatest ally of humanity.
[ ] The Halflings have proven themselves as a worthy neighbour.
[ ] If such rank amateurs could rival the strength of an entire Province, imagine what a skilled hand could do with Dhar.
[ ] The dead of Sylvania's prehistory deserve an undisturbed rest.
[ ] Magic used recklessly has catastrophic effects; great care must be taken in it's handling.
[ ] The best battle is one where the enemy never gets a strike in.
[ ] The best counterspell is, in fact, a blackpowder projectile to the face.
[ ] The Black Guard of Morr were the most dependable human asset across the entire campaign.
[ ] Magic is unreliable, gods are doubly so: always have a mundane solution.
[ ] It's not a great hero who carries the day, but a lot of small men working in concert.
[ ] The fog of war is a bitch, to all involved.
[ ] Expertise matters. And Stirland has precious little of it.
[ ] Mathematics is universal.
[ ] Complex problems, simple solutions.
[ ] Unity brings Strength, Discord brings Failure.
[ ] Other (write in)
But as great an educational experience as the campaign could be considered, it was still a tragedy. There were a great deal of lives lost, and you can't help but brood over everything that went wrong and what could have been done better. As the walls of Wurtbad finally approach, there's one haunting thought that you simply cannot shake.
ONE of the following will become a new trait:
[ ] In the confusion of battle, even the greatest warrior can lose their life pointlessly.
[ ] The Colleges of Magic act in their own interest, rather than that of the Empire.
[ ] Sylvanians will meekly accept any tyrant, to the point of complicity in their actions.
[ ] The Empire is a morass of self-interest, to the point of becoming a millstone around the neck of humanity.
[ ] The Morrite compunction against mutilating corpses is the greatest gift necromancers could ask for.
[ ] I, personally, failed to protect Abelhelm.
[ ] What use are infantry, if all they can do is die in droves?
[ ] Magic is a curse; Magisters and rogue mages alike will eventually die in it's handling.
[ ] Sigmar abandoned his most worthy follower in his hour of need.
[ ] Gods will not help us.
[ ] Mysteries are not worth unraveling - just bury them deeper and call it a day.
[ ] You can't trust people to have your back.
[ ] I will never meet a man as worthy as Abelhelm was.
[ ] Dwarven ale is a valid coping mechanism.
[ ] Other (write in)
- I've been working on and off on trying to join up the maps of Stirland and Sylvania since the start of the quest, and it's appropriate that I've finally learned enough about image editing to accomplish it now.
- I'm allowing Approval Voting - feel free to vote for multiple items, but be aware that only one will win.
