The First Pilgrimage

Back in the beginning of Time, the gods fashioned the Earth.  They shaped it round, like a fruit, and they scattered it around with stars, and they hung over it a sun and a moon.  At the north of the world, where on a fruit might be a stem, and on the south where might be found a blossom, the gods placed ice.  And they shaped the Earth into mountains and rivers and lakes and islands, and they placed the People upon it.

Now the People all came from one place in the beginning, for all tales start there.  And over the years the People did move in all different directions, separating, rejoining, marrying, and making war.  And so it came to pass that the People did live in every corner of the Earth.

Some of the people in those days were crossing the ocean, and the oceans were rising, though know man today knows why.  And there was one among them who was named Chamandra.  And Chamandra was young and foolish in those days, and he believed that he could stop the rise of the oceans and save his people, and he taunted the gods with his foolishness and he dared them to cast him into the flames of sacrifice.  And Chamandra boasted that although he might die, he would be reborn, and thus it was so, for Chamandra was the first Immortal.

Now Chamandra was reborn at the will of the gods, but he did not return to his people on the ocean.  He was reborn first in a faraway land where men and horse were one beast.  He lived there, and died, and was again reborn.  And each time he was reborn, he became less a fool, and he began to understand the grand creation of the gods, and he began to repent his previous ways.

So Chamandra began the First Pilgrimage, and he walked and walked and walked, until he died and was born again.  And when he came of age, he again walked and walked, until he reached the place where the land fell away into ocean, and from there he sailed, until he died and was reborn.  And when he came of age again, he sailed and sailed until he reached the place where the Four Gods had cast him into the flames of sacrifice.  And when he saw that island, which he knew of old, he knew that he had been a fool, for he had not been sacrificed, and yet the oceans had fallen.

And Chamandra regretted his boast, and he renounced it, and he decided his Pilgrimage must be over.

It was then that the women of the sea whispered to Chamandra, “Your Pilgrimage is not at an end.  Have you not learned?  Are you not wiser?  Do you not recall that you swore to protect your people?”

Then Chamandra knew that the real purpose of his Pilgrimage had been to remind him of his duty to his people, and thus he set off to follow in the footsteps of Windstrong Ravvy and Copperdawn Dainar, who last he saw, a hundred years ago, had talked of sailing for the mainland.

Year 106,170: The Rise Of The Salt Men

(To give the proper sense of dread and impending doom, I started the players off with the myth The Curséd Light.)

The difficulties faced by the Zefari Empire do not have much effect on the people of the Nutar Valley.  They have lived and farmed the valley near the ancient Skeltern for untold generations.  The people live happily atop ruins of previous settlements, and in some cases even blissfully unaware of those ruins; it has been over six thousand years since their ancestors first came up from the caverns below the mountains to try their hand at surface agriculture.

Further up the Nutar Valley, they have encountered iron deposits, and have just begun to make use of them.  Through their trade they have encountered the use of iron in weapons and tools, and they see the promise in such a hard, versatile metal.  Their valley culture, much more confined than the Zefari of the open plains, has encouraged a great deal more intermingling between the various races.  Unlike the Zefari, there is no culture of stone-shaping magic, because the Avadi and Fentan intermarry as they please, and that particular talent was bred out generations ago.  No one race is ascendant.  The affairs of the Empire are as distant and disregarded as the Phoenicians were to the Celts.  And for its part, the Empire had long ago ceased to concern itself with the lands which had given birth to it, and the policies of distant Emperors never intruded on valley life.

Not that the Nutar Valley was entirely peaceful, for there were occasional wars and skirmishes.  As there was plenty of fertile land north of the Copper Mountains, these were infrequent occasions at best — that is, until the arrival of the Kallko.

The Kallko began to emerge at night from the caverns along the Nutar River and farm the rocky soil.  They were infrequently seen by the Fentan people because they never emerged during daylight hours; and the lands they chose to farm were among the poorest, steepest, rockiest lands fit only for the grazing of goats.  It was, in fact, due to missing animals that the Kallko caught the attention of the surface-dwellers at all:  goatherds reported some of their goats had gone missing in the hills.  Expeditions to search for them led only to strange stone shelters near waterfalls, where spattering water caused strange luminescent mosses to grow on the nearby rocks.  Primitive shrines were found in the hills, too:  regular blocks of stone, possibly shaped by magic, arranged in a ring around obscene, dancing statues created expertly in obsidian.  These shrines were often decorated with rusting or rotting sacrifices left by the primitives who shaped them.

It was thought that the Kallko must be some tribe of barbarians or savages that had moved into the hills; the people of Fentan were well aware of the existence of Neolithic Peoples that the Bronze Age had left behind.  That made their first encounter all the more surprising.

The Kallko were underground people, pale-skinned, about five feet tall.  Most of the males had a sparse coating of a thick, metallic fur; all had horns, although the females’ horns were often larger and straighter, sometimes as long as a human’s hand.  Their eyes were large, their hearing excellent, and their language surprisingly sophisticated.  The Kallko people were very swift and sure-footed — some of the Fentan believed that the Kallko had hooves, rather than wearing boots as men do —as well as tireless and very good in the dark.

What was most terrifying about the Kallko was not their visage, nor their sudden appearance, but their war machines.  The Kallko were primitive in many ways, lacking art, a written language, an organized priesthood, and even the barest understanding of the sun, sky, and seasons.  In other ways, they were the equal of Fentan:  they had surprisingly complex music, a deep understanding of mathematics, and a sophisticated knowledge of weaving and knot-tying that the Kallko used in place of written letters.  Knots and beads and loops on strings could be manipulated in the dark with one’s fingers; no light was necessary.  But in one key way, the Kallko were terrifyingly advanced:  their war machines.

The Kallko did battle underground, and their war machines were designed specifically to shake down caverns or destabilize galleries.  They understood the casting of metal, especially iron and steel, and they had already developed the pulley, the geartooth, and the wormscrew.  The Kallko had mining carts on rails that extracted soil from the tunnels, powered by a water wheel; they had compact gear-aligned battering rams designed punch holes in stone walls; and most frightening to the Fentan, they had a six-foot screw press which they used on their defeated enemies.  Water, you see, is scarce in the caverns, and the Kallko were not about to let a valuable resource go to waste.  Often the bodies of their defeated enemies — at least those they did not eat — were used as fertilizer.

Within months of the Kallko’s discovery in the valley, the pale-skinned goat-men were using sorcery to extend the caverns.  Large parts of the valley were being enclosed in artificial tunnels to serve as habitat for the Kallko.

King Iden V (M, 49) of Skeltern has called together his advisers to consult on this matter.

Councilor Antharam (M, 43) is a guentar stallion from an aristocratic family.  His line made their name in long-distance trading, establishing a firm foothold in the olive groves and bartering much with his supplies of olive oil.  “They are impossible,” he says.  “We have spells to comprehend their language, but they do not seem to understand the nature of buying and selling at all.  They won’t take our bronze coins at all.  They say bronze is worthless.  And you can’t reason with them.  I bring them good merchandise, good olive oils, good cork, woolens and onions and flax, and they insist on touching it all.  And not one of them offers any better price than any other.  It’s like they’ve all agreed to buy my wares at one single price, no matter what I do.”

“You mean,” says Councilor Quag (M, 60), “you can’t lie to them.”  Quag is a traditionalist, ex-military Avadi.  His place on the King’s advisory council came from his service in the wars, routing barbarians in the north to keep them away from Fentanese settlements.  “They have strange ways, to be sure, but I’ve seen stranger.  They live in the dark.  Of course they’re not going to look at your wares.  They can tell more by feel and shape and size how much you’re offering.”

“But how do they always offer the same price?” says Antharam.  “Why do they never bargain with my men?”

“Who knows?” says Quag.  “Some barbarians have never heard of haggling.  I’ve seen it.  You’ll have to learn to do business their way, or teach them to do business your way.”

“It’s impossible,” says Antharam.  “And if they continue to take up the valley floor with their stone walls, they’re going to block off the entire valley.  Our communication and trade with the Aquilus Republic is going to be cut off.  Merchants won’t be able to get through.  We won’t be able to get vancium, or sell our merchandise there.  Your Majesty, I recommend in the strongest possible terms that you send an army up the valley to rout these goat-men.  They cannot be permitted to occupy the valley upstream of us.”

“Nonsense,” says Quag.  “You’re only worried that they’ll close the trade routes.  There are two rivers that come into Skeltern.  I’m not going to send good men up against those monsters until they become a threat to our safety.  I don’t have enough soldiers to squander any on protecting a few fat merchants from getting less fat.”

“What do you propose, Councilor Quag?” asks King Iden.  He is a man of mixed Avadi and Fentanese blood, and an amateur dabbler in magic.

“First, we must find every cavern we can and block it up,” says Quag.  “We’ll fill those caverns with stone if we must, and shut down our mines.”

“Shut down the mines, are you mad?” asks Antharam.  He can see the profits dwindling already.

“They come from underground, and our hills are riddled with mines,” says Quag.  “They may come up behind us, or through some old forgotten shaft.  Attacking them in the valley is a fool’s mission, and I am not a fool.  But we don’t have to let them attack us on their own ground.  They hate the surface, and they hate the light, so let’s make them fight on our terms.  We block up all the mines and fortify our western city walls against their devilish war machines.  We put spells in place to flood the valley west of us with bright light.  If ever they attack, we’ll shoot them down with bows.”

“That’s as good as closing down the Valley,” cries Antharam.  “You propose to make a pauper of me?  Then, your Majesty, allow me to make my recommendation to the Aquilus Republic.  Perhaps if we coordinated an attack from both sides—”

“Yes, the Republic,” agrees Councilor Quag.  “We should at least send a runner to warn them that goat men have arisen in the hills.  Perhaps they have already encountered them, but they deserve to be warned in advance.”

“That is your advice?” asks King Iden.  “You both recommend attack?  If it must be so.  But first we must consult the gods.  If they are sending goat-men of the deeps to destroy us, we should at least know why we are being punished.”

What The Players Decided 

As soon as Jack read out the part in the myth The Curséd Light where the god was named Toklokmok, Connor lifted his arms in victory.  That was the name of his character, and how he had signed the graffito he had left in the Salt Men's domain all those years ago.  His elation went downhill from there, as it became evident that the Kallko didn't really like Toklokmok, and in fact resented him for imprisoning them under the mountains.

The Players listened with apprehension as I described this warlike culture of engineers, builders, miners, and machinists that had sprung up right between the already-embattled Zefari stone shapers and the Aquiline Republic.

Connor wanted to investigate the salt men, to go talk to them, to find out what motivated them.  I think he was somehow proud of his hellish creation that was about to come down on civilized society like a hammer.  I wasn't keen to have the players try to speak with the Kallko, primarily because I felt it was more dramatically interesting to have one culture on the planet that they didn't directly control from the inside.  Unless the Kallko came to worship the players as gods, they would have no influence over them.

The Kallko were worryingly advanced in many ways, but I reminded them that they weren't superior.  They don't have literature and writing and culture, I pointed out.

"Which is exactly what I'd expect of a civilization created by Connor," Dave observed.  "Sorry, man.  It's funny 'cause it's true."

Joe was in favor of making the Fentan people solve their own problem.  The Fentanese had been, fifty thousand years ago, the very people who had exiled the Kallko into the darkness.  They weren't to remember that, of course, but Joe still felt it was their own mess to clean up.  "Take responsibility for the sins of your fathers," Joe said implacably.

Sins of the father?  Interesting.  That little phrase could come back to bite him someday.

"Besides," Joe went on, "blocking up the mines on this side wouldn't do any good.  It won't stop these guys.  They've got the same stone-shaper magic that the Zefar have, I'll bet.  They could just part the stone and walk right through, maybe pass through solid rock without stopping.  War isn't the answer here."

Dave and Connor, too, were all for finding a peaceful solution.  Perhaps the Kallko could be taught or trained in the art of barter, or the Fentan merchants could learn to handle things the Kallko way.  "How do they all pick the same selling price?"  Dave asked curiously.  "Is there any suggestion that there's some kind of telepathic link going on?"

Let me put it this way, I said.  They're engineers.  They live underground and they hardly ever use their eyes.  They're really good at determining things by size and length and volume, and they're not fooled by presentation.

Jack was opposed to any attempt to tame or civilize the Kallko.  "They're going to get taken advantage of," he declared.

"They've got deadly war machines," Dave objected.

"I know," Jack said.  "That's all the more reason not to let them get taken advantage of."

The ultimate decision was for peace and trade.  The Fentan were responsible for banishing the Kallko in the first place; they should be responsible for welcoming them back to the light.

Results 

I won't know the results of this round until I have prepared for the next round.

The Curséd Light

In the beginning the world was blindness and light, and the god Toklokmok created the first Sound.  And with that first sound he brought with him the first Echo, and he created the soothing darkness around us.

And in the cool, deep places of the world he placed the People, and he gave them ears to hear the Sounds of the earth, and he gave them steady feet, and he said to them, “This place in the world is to be yours, for you are unworthy.  Go you now into the darkness and find sustenance, for until you have proved yourself honorable in my hearing, you shall enclosed by the Earth.”

And the people went forth, and they tamed the mighty beetle kiklata, and they tamed the slithering snail lexita, and they found the silverhead serpent and put it to their own uses.  And the people ever resented the god Toklokmok for imprisoning them in the darkness, and they resented their neighbors above who lived in the terrible shallows.

Gonkol the leader said, “Toklokmok has placed in the shallows a fungus which contains the light of Creation, and it absorbs our enchantments, and it weakens our spells.  He placed the fungus there to keep us out.”

“Destroy it!” cried Gonkol’s people, and they tried, but into the light they could not go, for it burned their eyes and their skin.  And his people retreated from the shallows.

“Toklokmok, why have you punished us?” cried the people in their hurt.  “Why do you forsake us to the darkness?”

“The darkness is no curse,” said Gonkol.  “The darkness is our blessing.  It is cool and comforting and it does not burn our skin.  Here in the darkness we have everything we need:  metal for tools, stone for building, coal for eating, moss and insects for nutrition.  We have our hands and our ears, which Toklokmok has given to us.  With them, we will create a mighty empire such that Toklokmok must declare us honorable.”

And since that day, the people have embraced the darkness as their friend and guide, and dream forever of the day when they may show Toklokmok the powerful works they have built.

Year 106,129: Founding Of The Aquiline Republic

(Because we had already seen a little of the Chon Zin giants this round, I did not prepare a history document.)

For five hundred years, the giants and alvians have been engaged in politics south of the Valley, participating in the wars among the remnants of the Empire of Sathad. What they have discovered is that life is very different on the open savannah than in the confined Valley with its natural geographical barriers. Rivers and ridges separate the settlements of the Great Valley; not so the warlords of Sathad.

What the empire of Sathad-Zin has also discovered is that the Great Valley is very, very far away. Its politics do not weigh heavily upon the minds of the Pharaohs at Chazinta, for good reason. Though the Great Valley is generally stable and slow-moving, news from that region is rarely fresh, and it is difficult to respond swiftly to events thousands of miles distant. The Sathad-Zin have, for better or for worse, merely replaced the empire at the Teeth of Nagiz, not revolutionized it.

The Great Valley has taken a great deal of inspirational innovation from the Sathad, including horseback riding, glassworks, iron, and masonry. An understanding of Bazikian mathematics has improved their engineering. The rule-by-delegation of the former Bronze Empire has served as a model.

Now, the four peoples of the Great Valley intend to establish a capital of their own, separate from and independent of the Empire of Sathad-Zin. Their city is already built in quarters, in the same model as Chazinta, but they are at a loss how to establish a government that suits them.

Previously, their model of government had been leadership by volunteer; the person whose skills best suited the present needs of the people stepped forward and offered her solution, and stepped down when her talents no longer suited the crisis at hand. When multiple villages had conflicting interests, they took their complaint to the matriarch of the local town; when two towns were in conflict, they brought their disagreements to the nearest city. The final arbiter of disputes was the Grand Matriarch. Their system became unwieldy during times of crisis, and particularly during border disputes and succession of matriarchs. Occasionally, there was some argument over precisely which city was nearest, and who was matriarch of that particular city. A matriarch of one race was often suspected of favoring decisions that benefited others of her race. Decisions from the top became more sluggish as complaints and appeals worked their way up. Villagers often abandoned the process altogether and settled their differences without bothering the authorities for an official answer. The matriarchs were thus many months behind in responding to events that had long ago been settled.

In looking for an alternate system, they cast around for examples of effective group leadership, and found a possible solution south of Sathad-Zin, in the Bronze Empire: every two years a delegate was selected by the King of each island and sent to Varbu with specific authorizations; the delegate had limited power only on certain subjects and reported directly to his King. He presented his King’s positions to the Ecclesia, a body of ex-delegates who resided there. The Ecclesia debated the positions of the various Kings; they had only the power to examine the subjects brought before them by the delegates, and could pass no laws on their own. Once they rendered their judgment it was up to the delegates to report those findings back to their Kings. A delegate completed his or her two-year service and then permanently joined the Ecclesia until death, thus allowing that no one family controlled a delegation for too long, and giving no one family dominance over the Ecclesia itself. Because the Ecclesia was made up of about 200 ex-delegates from all the islands of the Bronze Empire, they were familiar with the local issues, the families of each island, the trade, and the geography involved. The system had its flaws, to be sure, but it had worked well enough for the Bronze Empire until the arrival of Celestrones.

The four races of the valley agreed to review their hierarchies of government. Considerable problems faced them in adapting the Ecclesia to their own needs.

For one, the lifetime membership of the Ecclesia was problematic. The tiny bat-winged Pizay only lived 30 years. They were quick to mature, reaching adulthood in only three years, and they were prolific breeders. It pleased them to hear that each town could select its own delegate, for the Pizay had both the most people and the most cities. Nearly three million Pizay lived in the Great Valley, spread among 300 tiny towns and villages along the river. Each of their tiny towns could occupy a space the size of a single tree. The lifetime membership in the Ecclesia was a problem, however, due to their limited lifespans. They worried that the longer-lived races such as the Chon Zin giants or the winged Alvians would dominate the proceedings.

There were approximately equal numbers of Chon Zin and Alvians, about two million each throughout the Valley. But the Chon Zin lived for 90 years, bred slowly, and had only 100 very large cities, while the Alvians lived for 60 years, and had only 10 permanent city structures. Few Alvians, in fact, lived in cities at all. Both these two groups found the Ecclesia more or less acceptable, but they worried that the even longer-lived Thryades would become the virtually immortal ruling committee of the Ecclesia.

The Thryades were tree tenders and quite tree-like themselves, with very long lifespans and a conservative outlook. They changed their minds and traditions only slowly, and lived for 150 years. There were only about one million Thryades in the Great Valley, concentrated into only 50 cities — but their cities were the size of whole forests, and often overlapped or enclosed the cities of other races. They worried that choosing delegates by population, or by city, would greatly favor the tiny Pizay, whose politics shifted far more quickly than the Thryades were comfortable with.

Last, the Great Valley contained some very old human settlements from the old Hazatar stone-shapers, whose borders were not contiguous. Cities of all kinds were scattered around the valley, in a time when the city was the largest form of government known. How could they establish the Republic that they desired?

What The Players Decided 

The Players had, at my suggestion, taken notes on scratch paper regarding the various races of the Great Valley, their numbers, their distribution, and their lifespans.  This was a task that suited them very well, in my opinion, because it was all about creating a Weaselly Middle Ground.  One might go so far as to say that that's what government is.  

Dave's first thought was to divine up the Great Valley by geography, rather than segregate the government by race.  Each county, or region, or canton — whatever its name — would send its delegates to government, just as in the Bronze Empire system.

At first they didn't wish to keep the Ecclesia with its lifetime membership, given the long lifespan of the Thryades; they would soon dominate any such a body.  Every time a Thryadean delegate left office it would join the Ecclesia and fill up every available seat with an undying tree-tender.

"Oh, great, it's the Ents," Dave said.  "It'll take them forever to decide anything."

Instead, Dave proposed limiting membership in the Ecclesia to three per race.  It would still consist of ex-delegates, who would then serve in the Ecclesia if there was a vacancy.  The lifetime membership would stay.

"Well, we know who the career politicians will be," Joe said.  "The Thryades will be in office while whole generations of the Pizay come and go."

That was the Ecclesia sorted.  The Grand Matriarch, they decided, could remain at the top as an executive branch; the culture already had a tradition of peacefully replacing the Grand Matriarch, so there was no need (the Players felt) to reinvent the wheel.

What would the body of delegates look like? I asked them.  We know where they go after they're done serving.  Thinking of the Roman Republic, I suggested that they first name that body the Senate, so we would not be reduced to pointing at Dave's muddled scratch paper and saying "these guys" and "these guys."

Their version of the Senate eventually became a proportional House.  Each county had proportionate representation by race.

"We'll base it on a proportion of their lifespan," the Players decided, although I don't recall which of them came up with the idea.  It was decided that each race's term would be set at 10% of a standard lifespan — the Pizay, 3 years; the Alvians, 6 years; the Chon Zin 9 years; and the
 Thryades, 15 years.  Any humans that happened to live in the valley would be represented, too; humans would serve a term of 8 years.

I pointed out the division of labor between the House and the Senate in the United States model; the shorter-termed House handled more immediate requirements of commerce, while the longer-termed Senators dealt with more weighty and conservative issues.  They agreed that this would be a good model, and declared that it would be appropriate to have the Ecclesia steadied by the contribution of by a few long-lived Thryadeans, to give it gravitas.  The House would have a sizeable proportion of Pizay, but not enough to dominate it over the other races.

This would be the Aquiline Republic:  the Eagle clans had a new system of leadership.


Results 
I won't know the results of this round until I prepare for the next round.

Year 106,072: The Abbadar Found Boladine

I started the players off with an interstitial document, an excerpt from the holy book of Abbadar:  The New Gospels of In-Pella.

As the year of the arrival of Celestrones the Conqueror neared, more and more of the Abbadar followed their Oracles and began a mass exodus from the Empire of Sathad. At first they moved west to the Galos River; when the Chon Zin giants moved south and took the city of Nagiz, many Abbadar again moved westward, spreading into lands only barely civilized by isolated pockets of agrarianism, swallowed up by vast tracts of hunter-gatherer nomads and horsemen.

They came to the west shores of what the locals called Sanctuary Bay. There they settled into the town of Matta, then a tiny fishing settlement. The Abbadar exodus continued over the five centuries following the giants’ defeat of Nagiz. Eventually Matta grew into a respectable port city, trading with the Celestrian Empire, the Chon Zin, and the remains of the Sathad. The Abbadar begin to populate the area, building towns and farms.

The Abbadar had brought The Gospels of In-Pella with them, and their traditions of marriage and their belief in Chimata, the Combined God. Those who had evaded the arrival of the Conqueror were among the best at foreseeing distant danger, further refining their culture’s tendency toward predictive psionics.

Indeed, so far into the future could these Abbadar sense danger that many of them wandered for years before settling anywhere at all. Even as they settled in Matta, they selectively built their houses on the northeastern parts of town that lay inland, due north of the peninsula, and not in the parts of town nearest the sea.

As a result of their idolatry of Chimata, the god who was made from two, the Abbadar had a fascination with twins, especially identical twins; they believed identical twins and triplets had an essence of Chimata’s divine power in them. Parents who gave birth to such children were apparently blessed by the gods; twins and parents of twins tended to become rulers.

When the Abbadar’s influence reached as far north as the Salvation River, they founded a colony there. To consecrate the new settlement of Boladine, the gateway to Salvation Vale, the governor-king of Matta sent his twin daughters Jelica and Shalya (F, 17). The new governor-king of the colony of Boladine had two sons, and it would be the honor of the eldest to choose one of the two as his bride.*

The Oracles of Boladine had declared the governor-king’s son Rolojer (M, 23) to be blessed; under the guidance of Rolojer and his offspring, the colony of Boladine would prosper for many fine years. Rolojer, in fact, was the best prospect for leadership in all the village. All the Oracles agreed that once he learned the craft of leadership under his father’s tutelage, Rolojer would be the first of a powerful dynasty, and Boladine would become powerful.

But other omens of the future were not so good. The most powerful Oracle among the Boladinians saw far, far into the future and made his prophecy: Boladine would pay for its centuries of peace and prosperity with a catastrophic end.

If Rolojer takes to wife Jelica, the Oracle proclaimed, the city of Boladine would be suffer a terrible flood, two hundred years hence. If Rolojer is the consort of Shalya, the Oracle foresaw, the city of Boladine would suffer a lingering plague and pestilence, three hundred years from now. If Rolojer chooses neither, on the other hand, the city would be struck by famine within twenty years.

The governor-king of Boladine, Bolad (M, 55) himself, asks of his god Chimata, “Whom should my eldest son marry? We accept that there is danger in the future, mighty Chimata, and we do not question what fates you choose to deliver to us. If we must buy present happiness with future pain, do I choose for my grandchildrens’ grandchildren a flood, or a pestilence, or a famine? And what do I tell my people? Only the best of my Oracles can see this now, but as the time draws nearer, more of my people will foresee this terrible danger. Must they know the truth?”

What The Players Decided 

"We already have our answer," Joe said, as soon as I had finished reading the scenario.

Dave was nodding.  "He'll just marry them both."

I turned to a section of my notes that I had prepared for this eventuality, and read:  If the players ask — Dave will probably think of this — if Rolojer marries both the twins, the city will last five hundred years, but would come to an utter end; it will be sacked, destroyed, and all its people slaughtered; nothing would be left of Boladine but dust and ruin. 

I did not read out the part about Rolojer's brother; I had told them that he was the eldest of two, but they didn't follow up on that.

"Five hundred years is a good run," Dave said.

"Five hundred years?  We're going to go through that in the next two pages," Joe said.

Something was still worrying Dave.  "I don't get the prophecies, though.  They say that Rolojer is going to be a dynasty, but then they say if he doesn't marry the twins, there won't be a dynasty.  Which one of them is right?"

I shrugged.

"And come on, five hundred years?  That's nothing," said Dave, who was playing an immortal god that had been around since Year Zero.  

How long do you think a dynasty should last? I asked.

"That's a good point," he admitted.

"Five hundred years is a good run," Jack said, echoing Dave's prior comment.

"As long as they leave your giants alone," Joe said, "you don't care."

"If they were going to get destroyed in 20 years, it's probably the Conqueror coming here to wipe out their town," Dave said.

No, they were escaping the Conqueror, I said.  They never would have settled in any place the Conqueror was likely to come.  Again, they didn't follow up on that, or draw conclusions about what that might mean.  In order to reach Boladine, the Conqueror would have to come through the land of the giants — and I had just said the Conqueror would never come this far.

Rather than point this out, I asked instead, So you're fine with breeding twins into the line of the Abbadar?

They were.  "This is every geek's fantasy, to be married to hot twins," Dave asserted.

"He's sacrificing his freedom," Joe said piously, "to be with his two beautiful women."

"I buy that," said Dave, "and I totally support that."

Of such decisions is history made.

Results 

I won't know the results of this round until I prepare for the next round.

*You might well be asking at this point, "Another bride?  Haven't you got any other ideas?"  To be absolutely candid, I didn't care who Rolojer married.  It was a decision of absolutely no consequence.  What I was trying to do was present the Players with the Abbadar culture, where decisions were made based on vague, long-distant prophecies of the future, rather than upon the Here and Now.  It would be literally impossible to found a city anywhere on Earth that could never be touched by war, famine, disease, flood, earthquake, tornado, storm, typhoon, fire, or death.  Were the players going to continue to encourage that kind of prophetic doomthink?  Or were they going to encourage the Abbadar to concentrate more on the moment?

The New Gospels of In-Pella, Kad:2

An excerpt from The New Gospels of In-Pella, from the Book of Kader, chapter 2.

2:10     And as the time of the Conqueror neared, the people were able to sense the steps of his approach through the mists of time, and they were afraid.

2:11     And the fear overcame them, and one by one, they began to leave the lands of Sathad behind, abandoning farms and villages and shops, taking with them only what they needed to survive.

2:12     Now to the west of Sathad lay the Empire of Sathad-Zin, which was a land of giants, and so large were the giants that the walls of their cities reached high into the sky.

2:13     And the worshipers of Sathad said that the Sathad-Zin were gods descended from Paradise Valley, but the people of Abbadar worshiped them not.

2:14     Mighty were the works of the giants, and strong was their rule, for they were masters of fire and water and sky, and with them fought the bird-men of the air.

2:15     Here Kellmas said, “This is our new home, for the Sathad-Zin are strong enough indeed to repel the Conqueror in all his might, when he comes.”

2:16     But the twin Oracles, Levrin the boy and Larsa his twin sister, stood before their people and said, “This is no place of safety, for when the Conqueror comes, he will surely come also to Sathad-Zin.”

2:17     And Kellmas was old, and he had walked far, and he had abandoned even his wife to escape the fear of the coming Conqueror, and foolishly he ignored the words of the Oracle twins, and he said, “To come hither I have walked many miles, and I can go no further.  Let the Conqueror come, though I be consumed in fear.”

2:18     But many people heard the words of the Oracle twins, and they knew that they had been doubly blessed by Chimata, for they were two spirits combined, just as was the God Himself, and he had given them foresight unparalleled.

2:19     “Let us follow the Oracles of Chimata, young though they are,” said the people.  “For they have the wisdom of Chimata Himself.  Lead us, Oracles, though the way be very long.”

2:20     “Whether the way is short or long, we cannot see,” said the twins, “for our eyes are on the distant future.  When we come to a place where the Conqueror dares to come not, there we shall abide a while.”

Year 105,988: The Sack Of Usta

In the last round, the Players had invented their own myth, which was to be used to protect the trading town of Usta from encroachment by its powerful neighbors.  I decided there could be no better way to introduce this latest development than to hand their myth back to them.  I gave them The Tale of the Sea Wind.

During centuries of breeding with the mermaids, the Mazani have developed into a race of humans with pale, almost blue skin, dark sea-colored hair in blues, greens coral reds and kelp browns, and eyes of all shades ranging from black to bioluminescent purple.  They are comfortable at sea, in rain, and in all temperatures above and below the waves, and every Mazani man and woman can hold his breath for an astonishing length of time.  Their race is slightly more than 60% female, a great improvement on the genetic heritage of the Amazons from which they descended.  Though they are strong enough on land, they are also very strong at sea.  Mazani are quick with their hands, and adept swimmers, though somewhat slower on land.  Their chief contribution to the area has been trade, at which they excel.  Their boats are not of a comparable quality to the Bazik, halfway around the world.  But while the Bazik are craftsmen, experimenters and engineers, the Mazani sailors are entirely fearless of the waves, and their ship designs border on reckless.

The Mazani have eyesight that adapts to both surface air as well as the dense refraction of underwater vision.  This has caused them to greatly simplify the ornate, symbolic pictograms invented by the Baruna and the Ovron into a smaller set of more distinct, abstract shapes.  Because the Mazani trading vessels still ply the coastlines, they have spread their simplified alphabet to virtually every city south of Barone, where it — or a local variety — is beginning to displace the pictograms.  Barunic cuneiform, pictograms carved into clay, are being slowly replaced with the more durable oil-based inks on silk, which (though expensive) can withstand the winds and rain at sea, or even be taken underwater.

By and large, the Mazani have not had many permanent homes in the Odeyinar Valley on the mainland, ever since the Circle Tribes united to seize control of their own lands nearly 2,000 years ago.  A few Mazani trading posts exist on the coasts near the mouths of rivers.  Their cities stretch from Klave, on the mouth of the Odeyinar, to Jarkos, on the western shore of the strait between the two continents.  The southeast continent is where the Mazani chiefly reside, operating out of the Bay of Tvern.  The plains esast of the port of Tvern are the closest thing the Mazani have ever had to a farmland to call their own.  The Baruna possess the wide cornucopic valley of Odeyinar, which is rich with rainfall and maize and grasses; the Mazani have marshy lowlands cramped between mountain ranges, exposed to the gales of prevailing winds that sweep up past Nvayek and into the heart of the continent.  Farming there is difficult.  Most of what the Mazani obtain, they get in trade.

The intertwining forested valleys are not much good for farming, but excellent for forests and for shipbuilding.  The mountain ridges are also excellent natural defensive bulwarks, enabling the Mazani culture — already accustomed to a certain fractured independence from life on the island chain, and life at sea — to fragment into dozens of smaller city-state cultures called klaves.  Each klave operates on its own, and much like a sailing vessel is led by a captain and a hand-chosen crew of officers.  Law is informally carried out by a panel consisting of the captain and select senior officers.  Political unity between klaves is based on a convention of non-binding mutual assistance, as convenient.  Occasionally a conqueror attempts to unify the klaves, but the wide distance between colonies and the difficult geographical borders encourage rebellion.

We must now turn to examine the Baruna and Ovron civilizations of the mainland, the Mazani’s principle trading partners.  While the Baruna are unified by their enclosed geography, their unity of culture and purpose, and their philosophy that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, the Ovron are splintered.  In 105,514, the warlord Jabess (M, 50) attempted to unite by conquest the various scattered cities of Ovron all across the great rolling plains.  This was, for Jabess, the easy part, for with his superior power of Air magic he was able to successfully both defend his empire against the storms of nature, and lay siege to those cities who resisted.  Harder — not for Jabess, but for his family — was to hold that empire together after his death.  His two sons, Jabess the Younger and Chamandra Prince of Dawn, and daughter, Danar Mistress of Stars, battled for a generation over the right to rule from the capital city of Jabbesandar.  The city was more fortress than colony, more administrative hive than trading center.  Without an empire to rule over, it became clear the city had no industry or self-support; conquest was the only business in which it had ever engaged.  Within another generation, the Empire of Storms was torn apart by internal power struggles and blood feuds that last to this day.

There are other colonies of Brun-descended tribes to the north, east, and northeast, but we will deal with them in due course.

Hundreds of years ago, the port city of Usta was established as a neutral ground, over which and for whose spoils both sides were forbidden to fight.  The spirit of Chamandra himself was said to stand watch over the city lest any would-be conqueror attempt to seize it for his own.  In the twenty generations since then, Usta’s influence has expanded, not through battle but in spite of it.

Although Ovron and Baruna each claim to respect the neutrality of Ovron, each side has increasingly come to rely on neutrality as a weapon against their enemy.  When the Ovron insisted that Usta adopt the sacrificial rites to appease the demons of sea and storm, Baruna petitioned that the Usta were merchants — to sacrifice the sheep that it took in trade was to hurt Usta.  All sacrifices of material goods were thus forbidden in Usta, sheep especially.  Ovron naturally responded by declaring it forbidden to slaughter any sheep in the domain of Usta, in order to harm the profits of the Baruna shepherds looking to take their flocks to market.

Certain roads on which Usta relied were subsumed into the “greater interest” of Usta’s well-being, then certain towns which supplied her, then the mines and mints that gave her coinage.  The Ovron would declare that the city of Klave was essential to Usta’s trading routes in the Odeyinar Valley, thus depriving Baruna of valuable influence along the coast; Baruna declared that the silver mines of Ovron could no longer be permitted to supply profit to the embattled warlords.  All too often, these imagined maneuvers and dictates were enforced upon the point of a sword.  After declaring its enemy in forfeit of Usta’s neutral ground, it would chastise its opponent by slaughtering a herd of sheep, enslaving an entire village, burning a field of crops, or other more atrocious offenses.  And all too often, the merchants of Usta were happy to appeal to the baser instincts of either side.  If Usta wished to take possession of a profitable town, it need merely hint to one side or the other that a show of force could deprive the enemy of a strategic resource, which could then be turned over to Usta’s profiteers.

And now we return to the Mazani.  It hasn’t been a good year for them.  The winter storms have lingered on well into spring, and the spring storms into summer.  Fishing is difficult, farming is impossible, and sailing is hazardous.  In addition, the recent skirmishes between Usta, Ovron and Baruna has cost the Mazani a great deal in trade:  their own surpluses are low, and the price of bronze from the mainland has skyrocketed.  This cold, wet summer is the final straw.  The Mazani need foods, metals, and livestock, or all that will remain for them to sell is their ships.

Agan of Green Willow (M, 41) is town captain of the coastal trading post of Nvayek.  It is a popular stopping point for trading vessels, offering a sheltered harbor against the worst of the winds, fresh water with which to resupply, and timber for making repairs.  The captains of Jorvkir and Tvern have passed through recently during a recent break in the clouds.  Each was on a desperate expedition to haul in a season’s worth of salted cod before the weather turned again.  Captain Agan knows the coastline west and east along Mazani territory, and has seen the trading vessels plying the great harbor between Usta and Klave, and has seen the Ustani scows carrying copper ore up the eastern strait.  “The mainlanders live in a valley of plenty,” Captain Djorl of Tvern (M, 51) tells Agan on his way east.  “They wallow in bushes of corn, they dance in acres of squash, and do they sell to us?  No — food is scarce, they say.  The armies are hungry.  The wars are expensive.  Prices have gone up, again.  There’s always some excuse.  We have little enough to sell, and nothing here of value.  Foul winds have driven away the fish, and what I do sell, I spend twice that to pick up cargo.  Twenty brass sigils I paid for a bolt of silk in Klave, which if I’m lucky I can sell for twenty-five in Jarkos.”

Captain Hvulf of Jorvkir (M, 60) is headed west in the opposite direction when he chances to encounter Djorl and Agan on the docks.  Like the other two captains, he is a man; though the Mazani firmly believe in equality of man and woman, they traditionally prefer men to captain their ships. “East of here,” he says, “the copper mines of Baruna lie.  I’ve heard it said that some of the Baruna are mining for silver there, too.  If we could seize the mines for ourselves, we could mint our own coins.  With those riches we could buy all the supplies we needed.  Then, if they wished to make war, they could come to us for their bronze.”

“Did you plan to fight the phalanxes of Baruna by yourself?” asks Agan.

“Our women are as strong as their men,” says Hvulf.  “If they think they can form a phalanx on a mountainside, or inside a mine, let them come.”

“And will the sorcerers of Ovron stand idle while you seize those mines?” asks Agan.

“Ovron doesn’t buy so much bronze,” says Hvulf.  “Their sorcerers don’t use it.  Anyway, they’ll be too busy taking advantage of Baruna to give us any trouble.  It will be the opportunity they’ve been waiting for.”

Agan disagrees.  “It’s dangerous, Hvulf.  The mines will be hard to seize.  The terrain is rocky, their archers will have the high ground, and it’s hard to approach secretly by ship.  I recommend instead we simply take what we need from one of their cities.  The Usta are merchants, not miners.  They’re only strong enough to count silver coins.  Besides, what’s the use of seizing a mine full of useless rock?  You can’t eat rock.  What we need are supplies.  I say we sail into the Great Harbor and make a raid on the storehouses of Usta.  I hear it practically bulges at the seams with food, all for sale, all there for the taking.  And it’s safe, because the Ovron and the Baruna are forbidden to garrison it.”

Captain Djorl of Tvern speaks up.  “Forbidden, yes, but when has that stopped them?  I was just in Usta a week ago.  The Baruna just happened to send several companies of men into the town.  They say it is to buy bronze at the markets, but the phalanxes do not shop for their own wares.  And the Ovron just happen to have sent several dozen sorcerers.  For bronze.  They need it for religious ornaments and statues, they say, as if sorcerers knew anything about appeasing demons.  That’s priests’ work, it’s beneath them.  I’ll wager that Usta will be in flames by the time we reach it.”

“What do you propose then, Djorl?” asks Agan.  “We have nothing to sell and nothing to eat.”

“We find both,” says Djorl.  “We farm.  There must be land somewhere in the land of Mazar that a man could farm.  North through the strait and then east down the coast, I’m told.  We could lose a lot of good sailors chasing after treasure.”

“I’m too old to start farming,” says Hvulf.  “Sixty years I’ve been sailing, I’m not going to start digging in the dirt now.”

What The Players Decided 

The choices as presented were farming, raiding the cities, and taking over the mines.  My gamers were never ones to see only the choices I offered them.

"They could go offer their services to Usta," Jack the Storyteller suggested.

"Doing what?" Joe the Leader asked.

"Protection," Jack said.  "They could protect Usta from both sides."

"And give Usta an army, so they can take over?" Joe asked with skepticism.

He was right to be suspicious.  The town of Usta hadn't exactly behaved as if it were a neutral and disinterested buffer state.  In fact, they were getting greedy.  An army would not be an improvement.

"Don't they have anything that Usta wants?" Jack demanded.

That would require them to have a surplus of something, I said.  They have little enough as it is.

"If we have these guys come up and attack the city," Dave said, "they could be the divine wave from the sea.  That would teach those guys to send troops into our city.  That's history repeating itself."

"We'll be turning these guys into Vikings," Joe said.

That's history repeating bullshit, I pointed out.  The first time the city of Usta had been attacked, it was just a made-up story.

"So we'll tell the people of Usta that this is the divine wave from the sea," Connor said.

How the people of Usta interpret an attack isn't up to you, I said.

"Then we'll tell the Viking guys that they're the divine wave from the sea," he said.

You'll tell them that their raiding is blessed by the gods? I asked.

"Yes," Connor said.

"Whaaaat?" Joe the Leader asked in disbelief.

"Why don't we say they're aspects of Chamandra?" Connor said.

"NO!" said Dave, punching Connor.  "No, bad.  Bad Connor."

"Look, we're stuck with Chamandra, we might as well use him," Connor argued.

"If they go and attack Usta," Jack said slowly, "what does Usta get out of it?"

We asked him to elaborate.

"Farming won't work," Jack said.  "They'll go all the way up here?"

"And start from scratch," Joe said.

"That will take too long.  Farming is out.  I say they either start raiding the waters, or they offer their services to the Usta."  Jack was back to the idea of paying service to the people of Usta.

Offer their services doing what?  I asked.  There isn't exactly a labor shortage.

Connor the Mystic evidently liked the sound of raiding the waters, and said, "I say we go pirates."

"Pirates," said Dave.

"Pirates," said Joe.

"Do they have the ships for it?" Jack asked.

"Oh hell yeah," Joe said.  "These guys aren't afraid of the water.  They're half mermaid.  They can sink the ships and dive for the treasure.  Dave, make them some boats.  We're gonna do this up right."

It then occurred to Joe that by destroying the town of Usta, the town that was supposedly under the protection of Chamandra, it would break their belief in him.  "They'll see the protection of Chamandra is false," Joe told the others.  "We're removing their fear of Chamandra."

"When they cry out to the gods for help," Jack said firmly, "we'll do nothing."

"Where's your Chamandra now, bitches?" Dave said in triumph.

That seemed settled.

"Oh," said Dave.  "I want you to note in the blog that I said to leave my giants alone.  Say, maybe the giants and the vikings could get together..."

"Superbowl!" said Joe.

Results 

I won't know the results of this round until I prepare for the next round.

Year 105,743: The Conqueror Turns East

Although this segment followed chronologically from the Courthouse at Celestria, we didn't play it until after the Conqueror invaded Zefar.  My reasons for this were twofold.  First, I didn't want to give the players the opportunity to stop the Conqueror from invading Zefar.  The players might have tried to abort the eastern expedition and convince Celestrones to consolidate his holdings.  That's a reasonable thing for them to have asked, but it wouldn't forward the development of technology, or the migration of peoples.  Second, I didn't want to mingle two events simultaneously and make the players juggle both the Courthouse and the eastern invasion; mixing up their two priorities might have resulted in some very odd developments.  I also did not prepare a historical document for this Event, as the players should already be familiar with the Conqueror and his purpose.

In any case, we turn now to the Conqueror, just prior to the eastern campaign.

Celestrones the Conqueror has completed his consolidation of his holdings in the former Empire of Sathad and, at age 38, is preparing an eastward push into the lands of the Haesonai.  The coastal jungles lay before him, and the savannah at his back.  His generals insisted upon first establishing firm control over the Galos River and the ports there, but Celestrones overruled them.  The giants of Chon Zin are a war for another day, the Conqueror says; we cannot forever ignore the raids of the Amazons into our eastern flank.

But, say his generals, we cannot either ignore the mighty giants.  They have fortified the river of Galos with walls and embankments and towers.  If we do not defeat them soon, their defenses will be impossible to penetrate.

Oresthal (M, 46) is Celestrones's most trusted adviser since the death of Attades.  “To do the most good for the most people, and the least harm,” says Oresthal, “I must first be allowed to study the giants and their culture.  They are unlike us, and their cities are built in fours:  their people are many and varied.  Among them are men with wings, both large and small, who live in the highest parts of the city; and long-lived men of bark-like skin who live in the gardens of the city; and the giants themselves.  How are we to know what is good, and what is bad, for a people of whom we know nothing?”

General Yantres (M, 50) is a strong supporter of Celestrones's empire, and a good soldier:  obedient when his orders come down, and loud-spoken when his opinion is asked.  In this case, he cannot agree to leave the giants at the Conqueror's back.  “Precisely because we do not know them, we must not think them idle,” he says.  “The giants came down from the Teeth of Nagiz and took the city.  They tore down the walls of Nagiz and seized the Empire at the moment the Pharaohs seemed weakest.  And here we plan to quit the field, to start an expedition east, and leave behind our holdings in the hands of the locals?  The Chon Zin are sure to attack us the moment we send the army east.  Let us attack them first.  If we impress into our army giants and winged archers, how much easier it will be to proceed east and conquer the Amazons.”

“The Chon Zin are fortifying only east of the river,” says Commander Hareton (M, 34), who commands the Conqueror's personal squadron of ships.  “They are preparing for our attack, and yet they are not massing armies.  I've seen the docks at Galos.  The new Pharaohs of Sathad aren't interested in fighting us, and I say it is best we keep things that way.”

What The Players Decided 

Dave likes the culture of the peaceful giants and wants to protect them from the ravages of the world.  He can always be counted on to support whatever side they're on.  "I say to leave them alone," he said.  "They're not attacking.  Do you walk up to the hornet's nest and start hitting it?  No, you just let them do what they're doing, pollinating flowers."

"That's bees," said Jack.

"Oh.  Did I say hornets?  I meant bees."

"I agree, they're not a threat," Joe said.  "As long as you're not attacking them, they won't attack you.  All you have to do," he said, as if speaking to Celestrones, "is walk up to them and tell them their leader isn't strong enough, and take them over.  Easy."

There was precedent for that in Earth's history, I told them.  That's precisely how Alexander the Great had gotten himself voted leader of the Athenian League.

"No, leave the giants alone," Dave said.

"I'm only taking this position because I know you like the giants," Joe said smugly.

"If I could just play Devil's Advocate, here—" Dave began.

"You, Devil's Advocate?  You're already on the giants' side," Joe said.

"—we already know that the Conqueror is going to survive this.  We've seen him in the future.  We can't stop him from going east and attacking Zefar.  Whatever happens here, we know the Conqueror is going to win."

But if he's fighting Sathad-Zin and Zefar at the same time, I pointed out, he might not have enough men for both.

"He could just take one, and then take the other," Joe the Leader pointed out, in his role as God of Conquest.  "Then when he got to Zefar he'd have giants in his army."

Dave again hoisted the "leave my giants alone" banner.

"I agree with Joe," Jack said at long last.

Dave wanted it to be known in the blog that he registered his disapproval.

Results 

I won't know the results of this round until I've prepped for the next round.