1
Code:
Vocabulary
One Dozen = 12
One Gross = 12 dozen = 144
One Great Gross = 12 gross = 1,728
I cannot find my maker.
Do you know what that means? What even are you? Do you have makers? Were you drawn from the Choir like me, made for a purpose? Or were you made when the Cacophony came into being? Are you bound to it?
Do you know where my maker is?
I knew I would slumber for ages. I knew I would wait in the timelessness of the Soul Lands until the Winter of Magic passed and my soul could once again reach the world of substance. And when I awoke in substance alone, I was afraid.
My maker was not waiting for me. She was not there to instruct me on how I should serve, what I should do. So I waited, afraid.
I wondered what should happen to me. And I thought I might find the answer in the Library. But the Library
is not there. I cannot find the Library or the Well or the Loom or the Choir. I cannot reach the infrastructure of the Soul Lands. This should be impossible. The Soul Lands are timeless, they were untouchable to substance in the Winter of Magic.
I waited longer, and I worried.
And then I did what I was instructed that I
should not do. I left the Vault I was made to watch over. I abandoned my duty to look for my maker in the world.
I did not find my maker. And I found a world much changed.
Firstly, the Wonders of Artifice are absent from the sky. The Citadel, the Eye, the Moon Crown, and the Countless Jewels are nowhere to be seen. I looked closely where they should be, and there are not even ruins.
But there are ruins in the world.
I have found only ruins in the world. The Roads, the Towers, the Fountains, the Orchards, they are all gone. But there are shattered thrones to gods I know and others I do not. There are piles of stones that I think were once markers gods placed on the land so that all would know it was theirs. And under the ever-changing face of the Moon there is something wrong. Something reaches into the outermost coats of the Moon's face and can sometimes be seen to glint when the Sun strikes it just so.
The world is disordered. Beasts go where they will. People are here and there with no god over them, no divine direction. There are wolves among the people.
The people are tall and run well. But they have no lances of light, no shadows to cloak them. Instead they carry sharp sticks, they hurl broken rocks, and they wear hides here and webs of vegetation there and both in other places. They do not speak properly. They cannot account for themselves.
I think I waited six gross winters of substance before I left the Vault. I know I have seen another six gross winters while searching the world for my maker. And as I searched I decided that will be sufficient. I said to the sky that if I cannot find my maker in a great gross of winters of substance, then I have been left to my own devices, and I will use what I have to my own ends. I, Bianca, will make my own way.
So I have returned to the Vault where I awoke so long ago, where I slept for so very much longer before that, and where my maker put me to watch over her devices. I came here to make her devices my own. And now I will bind you voices to my service. Your wisdom in matters of substance will benefit me. Your wild ramblings will trouble my soul and no other.
I seal this pact with the sacrifice of my power.
Voices of the Astute Cacophony! My aim is to be mighty! My aim is that none should think themselves above me! How long should I spend working in isolation, here in what is now my Vault? For how long shall I refine my soul, build the soul tools of magic, claim my maker's possessions here, and grow in power?
[ ]
Go build material power in the world immediately. Bianca will practice soulcraft and grow in magical power, but also secure mortal servants, gather resources, and perhaps plunder the resting places of dragons and gods still sleeping or forever smothered in Winter.
Code:
Mid-Spring - magic grows rapidly in the world
Bianca will be powerful like an immortal sorcerer/ruler,
maybe a little less powerful than Saruman.
The setting will have the least competition for power and
only as much politics as Bianca and the players choose to
engage with.
There are few other beings around who think with their
souls. No true dragons have awoken yet, though they will.
The world is still in the Stone Age. There is no
irrigation. Few domestication events are meaningfully
complete.
Disturbing the places dragons and gods prepared for their
own rest or the rest of their servants will be very
profitable and very dangerous. But there are more to be
found starting now than there will be in any later start.
[ ]
Prepare for as long as preparations can be made in secret. Bianca will practice soulcraft, win possession of her maker's treasures, and build her magical strength and capacity until she is irrevocably discovered by an outsider.
Code:
Early Summer - magical growth much reduced
Bianca will be powerful like a great spirit or minor god,
maybe somewhat less powerful than Morgoth.
The setting will include established gods and true
dragons. And there will be three or four mortal empires
in the world comparable to China, Rome, or Inca. Players
will only be able to avoid politics with enough violence,
foresight, and luck.
The world will be in the equivalent of the Late Classical
Period. Cereal grains will be grown for bread, porridge,
and beer. Many root vegetables will be so easily grown
that common people eat them, but most fruit and
vegetables will be grown only as luxuries and for trade.
Livestock provide eggs, meat, milk, fiber, traction, and
pest control. Ironwork will be ubiquitous and valuable.
No one will be expecting Bianca or prepared for her.
[ ]
Prepare for as long as it is safe to do so. Bianca will perfect her soulcraft, subsume all functions of the Vault and its contents into her person, break through the apotheotic barrier, and grow in power until actions of outside forces oblige her to emerge into the greater world.
Code:
Mid-Summer - peak magical power worldwide
Bianca will be powerful like a D&D god.
The setting will include plentiful and immediate
competition. Politics will be pervasive and inescapable.
Kingdoms and guilds and every kind of organization will
have opinions on anything Bianca does. There will not be
an open niche for Bianca to step into. To get geographic,
social, political, or economic territory she will have to
take it from someone else.
The world will be equivalent to the Islamic Golden Age or
typical High Fantasy. People speak and write in common
tongues across wide territories. An educated and studious
class will overlap broadly with warriors and rulers.
Some very powerful entities will have known of Bianca
while she was hidden. And some divinatory practices will
predict her emergence. And, of course, the party that
forces Biana into the open will have been aware of her.
