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Warhammer Fantasy: Thirteen Tolls - An Apocalypse Quest

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[X] Tor Cynath, City of Dew

[X] For Fury.

[X] No.

- Ambrose is also sent to spy on us which makes him utterly loyal to his master, so every action we assigned to him, the Princep already knows. From the necoho sword to this ratline. We'll probably be seeing the princep's personal guards if we did try to escape
 
AGFarb said:
To me what's happened in the story so far speaks more to Xenophon having an obligation to save what he can rather than make sure when the fall comes everything he hates comes down with it.
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Yes, but what does he feel an obligation to save? It seems to me that 'duty' means 'the civilization', whereas I would be more inclined to say 'for love' - which does not mean Ambrose, lol. Or more accurately, it means all the people
 
Netos said:
Yes, but what does he feel an obligation to save? It seems to me that 'duty' means 'the civilization', whereas I would be more inclined to say 'for love' - which does not mean Ambrose, lol. Or more accurately, it means all the people
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I agree with you that Xenophon seems to feel an obligation to the people of the city. I would argue that with the wording of love vs duty that duty encompasses that far more. Love seems to be focused on the personal relations that Xenophon has.

My interpretation is that Xenophon's actions haven't been to save the people close to him, nor to try and bring down the filth and corruption we've seen nearly everywhere. But to prepare the groundwork for foiling the grand plot that would bring down the civilization. That speaks to feeling it's his duty to do so more-so than any other emotional reaction.
 
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Slight Change to [-] For Love
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    • As a note, since people seem to be in favor of something like it (and also motivated by @vsh writing in) voting for [-] Love if a [-] No is taken on the kiss will be interpreted by me as a love for the people of the Cities in general, rather than Ambrose in specific (albeit still personally focused). I'll extend the vote 24h to let people change if they'd prefer.
     
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    Vote closed
  • Voting
    • Scheduled vote count started by Graf Tzarogy on May 3, 2024 at 8:41 PM, finished with 31 posts and 22 votes.
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  • Voting
    • [X] For duty.

    Since it's a tie for the motivation vote, I'd like to break it.
    On further thought, duty seems more fitting. It's Warhammer, there are so, so many things to rage against. Duty is what brought us to this shit show and what is keeping us here, more than any specific emotion.
     
    Good point. But is it duty to the "greatness" of this fruity-decadent civilization, to its accomplishments taking humanity out of the barbarism of tribes... or is it duty to the people of these cities, and their lives? Because I think that Duty has a potential overlap with Love+No
     
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    Turn Four Results (Part 5) - Funeral
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    • ♫​

    "For duty" you say, and lean back, away from Ambrose.

    You see a spark in his clear blue eyes – Aqshy – passion, rage, love. But it passes, and he inclines his head in respect.

    "Lord Raven" he intones. "As you will. I cannot see it, to be frank, a redemption. But you see more with what the Gods have deigned give and these are your people, not mine."

    He stands, gives a bow, and turns to go.

    "You are one of my people" you say.

    "And a curse on me for that" he replies.

    You do not see him for the rest of the week.

    ...

    Ding-dong.

    The silver bell of the Roost rings for the first time you've arrived.

    Ding-dong.

    It is a call to prayer.

    Ding-dong.

    It is a call to rest.

    Ding-dong.

    It is the call of death.

    Ding-dong.

    You await within the Roost proper, in your fine black toga and raven-feather cloak. Your crown sold, one of those whose freedom it bought – Santo – has made a befitting substitute of black Morrite roses. None are at your side, as you stand behind the great stone door that is the entrance to your temple, this day and this day alone closed.

    Outside, you hear the creak of the garden's gate, and the multitudinous steps of a great crowd. Now, your clergy will be bearing a simple oak coffin, unadorned. Inside, the bones (disturbingly easy to acquire) of some unknown pauper. He is the Everyman, and today he meets his doom.

    The party will be lit by torchlight – the ritual of sanctification begins at midnight. The witching hour has always held to be the best time to speed the passage between worlds. The crowd's close enough you can hear weeping. The Melodus sisters are doing a good performance of it, their wails piercing through the stone. It is good. You wonder how their father's funeral went. Was the body even whole?

    The voice of Pelops breaks you out of your thoughts. "Halt!" he cries, in a voice much older than his years, weighed down too with some honest grief. You had told him what had happened to Sanguine. He had taken it relatively well, but you can say from true experience it never gets easier to say goodbye, no matter how many times you've done it before. This particular dagger is not dulled by the cutting and slices true to the heart every time.

    Iefyr approaches the door and pulls the great silver doorknocker, releasing it with the clang of metal on hard stone.

    There is a moment of silence.

    You speak clear and loud. "Who approaches the Portal to the Realm of Morr?"

    The crowd takes a moment to reply, out of practice, but your clergy lead the charge.

    "I" say they all, "Everyman".

    You speak through the door again. "But why do you come now?"

    "For the hour is late, and my bones lay cold, and I but desire to rest."

    "This house is open, Everyman, to all who bring a gift" and you crack the door an inch.

    There are perhaps a hundred people here, most dressed in mourning blacks. They watch you intently, as you appear from within, and you feel a cool breeze blow. You did not wear your sword today.

    "For funds?" says Iefyr in a black silk gown, trimmed with harpy feathers. In Naggarond, he says, the poor put their corpses out on the street, coins under their tongues, in the hope that some noble will take pity and instead of bearing the indignity of rot, allow the body to be devoured by their hounds or eagles.

    "No!" you cry, extending a hand and knocking the bag of denarii Iefyr offers to the ground. "What use is shine and glitter in this kingdom of the night?"

    "For friendship?" says Maban. He is in black like you, but wears a necklace of knucklebones. His people keep them, casting the rest of the bodies in the water, for they say to forget the dead is for them to die a second death.

    "No!" you reply, striking Maban's outstretched hand. "Here there is no fear or favour, no high or low. All are one, and one are all before Morr's sight."

    "For faith?" says a figure you don't recognize in a cowl dark and deep. You Look, and for a moment, there is just you and your Lord in perfect silence and stillness.

    You take a heavy breath and find yourself close to tears.

    "No." you say. "The God welcomes each and every one, sinner or saint."

    The black-robed figure tilts its head. You have a vision of you falling from the Tower. You have another, pushing someone off. Another, you inside, holding the Princeps dying. Another, the Princeps striking you down. The monster in the Tower tears you to pieces, then, you rip out its heart. The Tower falls, and every light in the world goes out.

    Ding dong.

    A million souls await at the Portal, and you are the guardian of the gate.

    "For duty?" says Morr, God of the Dead.

    "Yes" you say. "At the end of all labours, all journeys, all ways. Waste not the day, for hereafter is eternal. Speak now, for we forever hold this peace."

    Morr and the crowd turn to the world, and wave farewell, then turn again, God and man, looking to you.

    You open the door.

    And led by your Lord, the Cities lay Everyman to rest.

    A quiet, reverent, holy Doom.

    That is your obligation.

    Before you can have peace your own.

    …

    The crowds and clergy slowly trickle out of the Roost, after the final internment. Those bones, whoever they may be, may now sleep restful.

    There is always an afterparty to these things, and Pelops and Rosamunde seem well at hand at organizing it. A cavalcade of caterers appears a tasteful interim after the ceremony, and in the gardens, with the graves, as the sun begins to rise, your people have a lovely picnic. To remember, and to reminisce, a proper lovely time.

    The sisters Melodus are chatting to an old lady, a colonial, who's clearly come a long way to be here. She kisses them both on their cheeks, profusely thanking them for the ritual, and to repay them, produces a small box of sugar cane sweets from deep within her skirts.

    Ielfyr is with three other Elves, one in the green flowing dresses of Avelorn, one with the sharp whip of those from Karond Kar, and another with the curious Ghyran twist to their soul that marks them as a resident of Athel Loren. Together, they sing some Eltharin hymns, beautiful and haunting.

    Franka, Maban, and Santo are busy carving faces into squashes they call "Jacks". Inside they put candles, and put them on the tombs, a northern practice meant to protect a gravesite from robbers. The vegetables, with their chipper smiles, put a grin on your own face.

    Mervin, in the corner, is making honey sweets for some visiting children. Rosamunde is talking the ear off some teenage girls from the Casbah, beaming at the interest they're showing in her as a "servant of the Raven". Pelops is lying in the grass, arms crossed behind his head, eyes closed, basking in the sun.

    A cool breeze blows and a shadow comes to stand beside you.

    Morr surveys his garden, and your works, and though he does not speak, you feel a deep comfort, like jumping into a clear lake on a hot summer's day.

    But only for a moment.

    Morr gives you a surety of the quiet and the cold that awaits you, a dream without end. But now – the food is good, the chatter friendly, the rising sun so very warm. You are awake. Memento mori, indeed, but to know your death is not an invitation to meet it early but live well now. The hereafter – that is all taken care of. This world, these cities, these people – this is it, your charge and obligation. And you will do what must be done to save them.

    You look at your God. He bows to you, and you are both together proud.

    He vanishes, but with one final gift.

    What do you see?

    [-] Write-in. (Morr will answer, with absolute truth, any one question Xenophon might have.)

    …

    Ding-dong.

    You break out of your prophetic reverie. You are not dead, there is still work to do.

    But before you can react to what you now know, there is a roar of trumpets, and the stomp of feet, and a figure appears at the entrance to the garden – hair golden, teeth white, soul so very bright.

    The Princeps has arrived.

    AN: To be continued. Another pretty consequential vote, so a 24h moratorium please.
     
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    • Damn. Possibly most important question in this quest so far.

    ... How to kill him? What he fears most? What is his weakness that I can exploit? What is his doom? What should I do?

    There is probably something really, really clever to ask here. Like asking for a demon's true name before meeting them.
     
    PurposefulZephyr said:
    Damn. Possibly most important question in this quest so far.

    ... How to kill him? What he fears most? What is his weakness that I can exploit? What is his doom? What should I do?

    There is probably something really, really clever to ask here. Like asking for a demon's true name before meeting them.
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    I suppose the question we must ask ourselves more than anything is, well, what we just answered really.

    What the hell do we want out of this?

    We know for a fact this city is ending, we know for a fact there are things here turning that have been in motion from before we were involved or possibly even born, and we know that come hell or high water there is almost nothing we can do to stop this.

    We answered before that we're doing this out of duty but the question remains, what is our duty and from that how do we achieve it.
     
    There's only two real questions we can ask, objectives to pursue:

    How do we kill the deity being made in The Tower?

    How do we save as much of the good in the Twin Cities for the future?

    What's more important? What's going to make the greater difference? What will make the sacrifices meaningful?
     
    I think the question should be along he lines of "what should our number one objective be" if there's one thing to do that's more important to achieve than all others that could be worth it.
     
    Always Late said:
    There's only two real questions we can ask, objectives to pursue:

    How do we kill the deity being made in The Tower?

    How do we save as much of the good in the Twin Cities for the future?
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    For the Second we've already done that with pretty boy's offer. Those who can't fight and (hopefully) aren't corrupted are on a fast trip to "Anywhere but here" on the express line.

    As for the first, well...

    Alright I'm going to be a downer so forgive me but even if we win, we can't really win.

    This city is rotted to its core, possibly since its inception. The weight of its sins almost can't be measured and the arrogance of its people have piled that weight on more and more through the centuries.

    The tower isn't a cause, it's a symptom, and the disease has been terminal for a long, long, time.

    The horned rat may not come from the tower, but it will come. From the knives in the dark, from the delving of the desperate, from the depravity of the deranged, he has his avenues plotted and those gates are wide open.

    We can break the tower.

    Kill the most corrupted.

    We can stop the delvers from their desperate plan.

    We can save the soul of the city through blood and sweat and tears through faith and good works and the love of our fellows.

    But can we do all of that at the same time?
     
    Evaunit02mark1 said:
    The horned rat may not come from the tower, but it will come. From the knives in the dark, from the delving of the desperate, from the depravity of the deranged, he has his avenues plotted and those gates are wide open.
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    Skaven don't exist until Horned Rat does. But unless you're arguing full-on "Chaos Gods always existed in the warp so they'd always be born" recursive Archeon stuff, we're still doing proper Warhammer Fantasy rules.

    And you can kill Gods in Fantasy. You just need to be a bold, badass, bad-enough-dude and not cower in the face of hellish horrors.


    So yeah, we can ask how to stop the Unborn God from being born… if we word it right.
     
    Always Late said:
    And you can kill Gods in Fantasy. You just need to be a bold, badass, bad-enough-dude and not cower in the face of hellish horrors.
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    No you want, nagash didnt die, neither sigmar, hell not even the nehekharan gods right until end times. that is beyond us and quite frankly xenophon is not really the person to stop a long plan and waited apostheosis
     
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