Stories of Lore 36

So speaking of  hoards, remember how Faelyn was the one to convert back into gold coins as currency while the aethernet was all messed up? Well you were correct there’s a lot of gold laying around. Zenaka isn’t as hyped up about gold as Sol is, but House Sharen still loves the stuff. So does Sakhessa but I’m guessing you don’t want me to try and trade with her. So we can sell it to them.

We tried to get in contact with Valencia and after a very long time of attempting to do so we found out something interesting. She had no idea the phantoms were even a thing, let alone have an opinion on them. It does make some sense though. Valencia is younger than the purge, she’s a benefactor of it and is a part of the pre-war era by playing the game of civilization. She has no real grudge against Sol nor does she face any persecution at all. So despite her economic influence, she’s probably never really been terribly eligible for membership in their eyes. Unlike Renjala who has to wear a mask everywhere he goes or be hunted down by House Song.  So she has no opinion on it…yet. I imagine she’s going to go assess some situations about now though.

Renjala has set up the portal to Eden and back so now populations are fluctuating. In large part due to Eden’s refusal to allow infrastructure that burrows, so no support beams. Also no cutting down any trees. So unless they like tents draped over branches they’re eager to not be there. So far the Astral Order are using the ships not only to power the portal, but also to hold the portal upright.

Also congratulations on beating cancer.

Setting up the portal in Zenaka is taking some shipping and handling. Renjala only made a rift between Moncayo and Eden.

I’ll have you know I actually have been here awhile, on multiple battlefields, survived parasitic mutation, and being held by Vasia. My odds of dying are not as bad as you might thi- wait what is my life insurance policy?

Vittles brings good news, fishing is pretty easy on an alien world that hasn’t had time to be overharvested by us yet. Bad news, Abyssal fish are ugly as I am. Good news, that guy who ran the burrito cart in Koura? Now he runs a taco cart with fish tacos. ‘Cart’ is relative, he has been operating out of what once was a military transport truck. We let him keep it because the tacos are really good.

The Radar however is going to take some effort, while destroying its major components was one thing we are now realizing…we’re not actually entirely sure how this thing works. The pandem elements were covered by Robert’s Rifts and Renjala but the arcane and psionic engineering were never touched by them. Khymin is working on it but there is a reason no one else has ever built one of these before besides funding. Regular radar parts are operational again and we can scan multiple planes with it but we can’t quite see with the same range and level of detail that we know it once produced.

Koda and Gunhild have taken over that random building down the street from the taco cart parking lot as  his new office to try and get the fleet back together. Finding crew for the new ships will be a challenge though and we’re working on that.

Laura points out that you killed most of her old criminal contacts, and whichever ones you didn’t kill she killed. Getting the Selona weapon again might be difficult, Solvang and Selona control the major black market. Which we’ve just gone to war with. She’ll look into it but odds aren’t great. Though Aryn did find that dark mysterious website so maybe we can order it anonymously and have it shipped to not-here.

The grieving evening was absent an Aryn who is currently away to retrieve the Closing Statement from its parking spot and bring it on over. That spooky effeminate drow guy is a real slave driver eh?

So the pandem radar issue can be summed up as: The basic parts are easy and we remember how to do that. The multi planar part we also can restore with a bit of effort. The ability to tell exactly how many of what sized ships are moving through space at any point on any plane across the galactic quadrant is uh…not so easy. We’ve had some engineering help from Khymin and VSEC but it’s…beyond them. Given our chats with Voriuk, we are now aware that the phantom engineering department is far beyond the rest of Sol’s. Though we’re not sure how much is the likes of Sakhessa versus Daiheb. If we assumed Daiheb has a hand in such things we should be very concerned given that they somehow appropriated the technology of a billions year old machine race. We’re working on the bigger features but…well I’ll update you on it as we make progress.

Selah, as it turns out, is the high and mighty Celestial Order of the First Temple’s very own Vasia. Well not anywhere near as bad but she’s their equivalently unruly but valuable member. Her obsession with celestial shenanigans led her to turn to Ankathi’s side pretty quickly upon hearing about it, betraying her order for a chance to bind with Ankathi. She studies celestial mechanisms and if she had the time or the talent she might have eventually achieved what Ankathi did on her own. In summary, she casts the big smite.

So apparently Ankathi isn’t the one who is planning to do anything to the Celestial Order, that’s all Selah. Upon convening with prophet Sarnai…yeah Ankathi barely noticed or cared that the order existed. She described them as ‘irrelevant’. So basically with the witnessed miracle of Ankathi’s doing it is Selah’s plan to convince as many as she can to join Ankathi’s little order we have going on as one of the side hustles we have. That’s it. That’s the whole plan. Civil war? Maybe, maybe not. She doesn’t fuckin know. She just knows that there is a god now, and that should have priority over archangels come whatever may.

I think we’ve been dealing with the phantoms and Arkaric for so long we forgot some people don’t have a thirty seven step master plan that corners all sides of the board into a position they want.

Eerihild said to remind you that Haziel is also super cool too even if she’s a bit absent at the moment. She also brought up the Chosen Wolve’s stat sheet in the Moncayo battle, which is pretty good. I didn’t have the heart to tell her the celestial branch’s. To be fair, Eerihild and Bill aren’t exactly the war machines that Reika and Selah are. Also speaking of them, Bill has developed a fascination with Eden upon setting foot upon her. They mesh better than he and Haziel. Even if he’s on team druid, he’s a bit too chill for Haziel’s fang and fury approach to things. Though they are getting some food production going in the forests of Moncayo in one of the other bubbles of atmosphere, as well as Bill’s work in the water. So…killcount aside they might get a higher ‘lives saved’ count just by combating starvation and exposure for the refugees.

In the spirit of Alexander, I say we find yet another ridiculous patron that will complicate our lives to no end and see how many we can juggle all at once before civilization itself implodes. I vote for an elemental. I would say something from necrosi but that might encroach on what you’ve got going on already.

Aku is off to hang out with Kaylen. Travel time. Also Kaylen is still in Sol, petitioning various people to join her. That and you’re mixing the Rising and the Purge histories. Rising is where dragons particularly played a big roll in helping us. Purge is when gunslingers on horseback rode across the open lands hunting down all the remaining monsters. I think Eli is actually from that time period but I can’t really be sure. He dresses the part though.

As for the River of Chaos as we’ve suddenly decided to start calling it, because Ankathi calls it that and Alexander isn’t here to tell her why her old timey names are stupid, yeah we put up warning signs. Though we had to move a few after some of them got turned into other things, one spontaneously exploded, and another is now five times the size it should be. So as you can see…it’s expanding. Irae has that under control, but before we realized it was expanding the signs were the canary in the coal mine so to speak. It’s standard pandem cleanup just much more dangerous than usual and much harder. The big problem being what Selah did is more than open a single rift. Instead of linking to another plane like a piece of string, she just stuck a pipe over there and let every plane through all at once. Irae has so far counted three hundred and seventy two planar intersections from that one rift. A number which has changed six times since she started, and not through her own doing. So instead of a bunch of singular rift clean ups, its a more painstaking operation to get all of them under control and every now and then another dozen or so spill out. We can say this particular rift is…very dangerous. The other knights are helping out though so give it a month and we should be okay. Just don’t cross the signs. One guy got turned into six dimensions and could see the future for a bit there. By the way, he says the colonists will get a massive wave of food poisoning because of the popularity of a particular type of poisonous fish with a very slow acting poison… we’re looking into that. Not the most useful prediction but…better than being unborn or having monsters explode out of your chest.

The Covura Castle is surprisingly still here in decent enough shape. We were never close to the palace due to how late to the party we were in the first place. That and probably to keep us at a safe distance from what was apparently a menagerie of monsters hiding under the floor.

Also as for new Knight-Chancellor, what are you looking for? Another nerd or just someone charismatic enough for delegation? I don’t know if the position was defined to just put a title on what Alexander did or if you specifically have a need for the scholarly arts. I mean Selah is here if we need our own mad scientist to keep up with everyone else. Oh you said that too. She does find it interesting but remember what I said about her earlier? There is some cause for concern with how interested she is in the scientific expansion of her pandem knowledge…and that she definitely really likes Ankathi. I still say we should get an elemental, or a demon, or a necro guy to balance things out. At least until Haziel gets back. As apathetic as she is, Haziel is still a heavy counterweight to Ankathi gaining total influence over the order. Just something to consider.

Also you say we’re anti slavery despite most of our workforce being slaves, I take it you mean anti demon magical enslavement. They’re on their way though.

As for new town locations, just walk down the air tunnel to the bubble Bill’s fruit forest is in. Or go the other way. It’s actually really easy, if there’s air there’s a good place for a town. I like the bubble with the waterfalls though. I think its pretty. That and there is the inside out desert planet if you don’t mind sand.

 

I think down the spine is correct…at least that’s what mine is like. Also, Aryn is retrieving the closing statement so she’s not here right now. Also it appears when the drones leave my range they go on autopilot. So depends what they were made to do. Don’t let Craylin’s drones wander too far from her… Oh and we already went over synapse extensions. That’s what you and Craylin are for. Like an aethernet relay…just fluffy. As things grow beyond my range, I just make more commanders to go stand over there for me. This is also why connecting to Azilath causes an immediate connection for the whole swarm. We’re technically supposed to be her relays…and all of us are Indal’s. Apparently we’re also Haziel’s…somehow. I don’t get that one. Druids are bullshit.

You may want to take your gripes about the Revenants up with Lancaster. Since she’s the one inviting Kaylen and Kaylen has taken a pretty ‘i don’t care’ approach to previous political viewpoints. Though, I’m also pretty sure the Revenants will say the same about us. At least as long as Vasia still works for us. I feel like I should say Sethis but lets be honest, it’s definitely Vasia.

I’ve asked VSEC to bring us some Nelta tech so we can try those out. Though we still don’t know the mechanism Sakhessa is actually exploiting. Do remember though, she has access to Selona tech, which has been repeatedly shown to be especially effective against alien technology and biology. Their ship weapons were even able to hurt Guardian after all. So worth a shot but don’t do anything dumb yeah?

So while you’re trying to figure out how her palace security works, Lancaster is trying to demolish the whole thing. You two might want to work that out. Also Aryn still isn’t here.

I heard that weird redheaded lady might be a spy. Don’t know what was up with all that though.

Also the new ichor is not quite reset but it is kind of refreshed. Vasia says its taken on properties based on recent events that have happened to me. When a queen makes a new puddle it is based on the queen rather than whatever made the queen. Otherwise theoretically all the ichor would still be based on the original silnian…who was an invader interested in eating us all.

The cloning gear is scuffed up. Though almost everything is at the moment. Though good luck with that project. I’d say it isn’t worth it because House Song will be coming for you if they hear about it, But you already have the Heretic parked right over there. So they’re gonna kill us soon anyways. Might want to work faster.

Honestly I have so much street cred with the phantoms that I could kill a few of them and then still get invited for membership. It just proves I’m extra strong and worth the losses. I think that’s how it works anyways.

Also you are correct, Ankathi would have abandoned you all to  the phantoms were not for the pleasure she takes in remaining nearby just to torment me. I’m going to fucking kill her.

I’m already an entity. I’m spooky, mysterious, ignore the rules of matter and energy, and wield unimaginable power. I killed twelve jesai, I don’t know what else I need to do to qualify.

Yeah I’ll leave you a text file on the star thing, though the star spell that Salied uses has a quirk. It uses an equal amount of mana as the star will produce, instantly. At least the version we have so far, I’m working out a safer way to do it but that’s on the backburner. Just don’t aim for a big star without doing the math first. The ‘instantly’ means it can kill you upon casting it if you forgot to carry the one. Good luuuuck.

Oh speaking of Sakhessa. I know a bit about her. She was in the group chat with me and Eliza.

If you die Larazja has bigger problems. Like me.

Eden says hi. Also the ichor making doesn’t really hurt, but it makes me a bit woozy. Also please don’t look at me while I do this, it’s gross. I suppose my blood is ichor rather than ichor being royal blood. I can technically smush a drone and use that if I wanted to.

You know, I haven’t really put much thought into the fact that I’m always naked until you mentioned that. I haven’t been cold or hot in awhile either. Now I’m suddenly very aware of it…so thanks for that. Also give me one of those shirts. Also i don’t have any “useful orifices”. Though I could grow some in the ichor if I wanted, but y’know…size differences.

Voriuk is a bitch. I could kill him myself. On the other hand, Haziel can apparently FUCKING CONTROL MY DRONES. Not to mention her werewolf form is bigger than me, with more teeth and claws. Druids are bullshit.

Sunstones are rocks, they don’t do anything in the ichor. Well…I guess if you charge them they’re kind of batteries at night. Okay maybe they do keep me a little toasty too. I approve.

Also Vasia is pretty sneaky if you didn’t see her bring Illdath all the way over. Though she and Yaellah both possess incarnum strength. The goons from House Song can all pick up cars just to graduate past white belt. That and sahad gravity manipulation probably, I dunno. Her whole schtick is abducting big things, she has to have a way she’s moving them.

As much as I do love being mysterious, you guys do know you can buy a floating disc on your APT right? It’s five credits you cheapskates.

 

My APT came off when I was turned into this actually. I just use APD instead now.

 

APD?

 

 

All Purpose Drones.

 

 

Moving on, hold on a sec. You want to send Craylin out of the synapse…to hunt an elusive necrocarnate we can never find before he finds us…while we’re concerned about the phantoms retaliating? Sure thing boss. Also I named her.

Who is Erik?

40th Day has submersible probes if that counts as a vehicle. The actual vehicles are….still in the boiling ocean. We didn’t really have time to pack those up before we had to just jump right into a rift and get the hell out of there.

Also Kaylen isn’t here yet. She’s still petitioning others for assistance, alliances, and to join the guild.

 

Aryn is on the way to retrieve the Closing Statement on a shuttle. She should be there soon if you want her to take it to Moncayo or remain in deep space with the Nomad Flotilla. Speaking of the Flotilla, they have taken on refugees from previous events that maybe don’t want to live on Eden where they can’t have plumbing or in the ruins of Moncayo. They were rather opportunistic about that, to the point I’d be concerned but I suppose the Flotilla’s internal economy is getting a boost from it.

Vanjin and Leon are setting up in Moncayo, though people are still arguing over what building is going to be what, whether or not to keep the palace, and the like. Also apparently they were arguing over who gets the mansion that appeared in the River’s aftermath before it disappeared just as mysteriously as it had appeared.

When it comes to sorting out the available recruits to the division, well we still have Allison who is not a terrible public operative. Actually she fits all too well into what was once Sophia’s position. Not to mention the Nomads themselves for underworld crawling. We could pick up another excuse for public violence in a bounty hunter like Vanjin, if not just give her an apprentice in the process as a cover. I’ve also found a peculiar fellow who is more of a business suit professional to move among more higher class scenarios. However many of those left there are. We could try recruiting a jydoq for more alien based affairs given current perception of solians.

So far, rummaging through the ruins of Moncayo hasn’t quite yielded any artifacts that would help keep anyone alive. Sarnai is still the most remarkable in this regard as one of the only people besides incarnites who can heal quickly let alone other people.