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Writer: Piknim
Date Sat Aug 29 16:50:14 2026
Subject KRAP: "A Modest Proposal"
It began, as most problems do, with good intentions.
The Gogothath enclave was Piknim Cracklespark's initial answer to a question
nobody had bothered to ask - what does Verminasia do with its kender? The
answer, historically, had been simple and unkind. King Isadore, who had
looked at a young would-be witch, with her bright eyes and big smile, and
decided to ban their kind outright. He had once referred to her as a
cockroach, she recalled bitterly. King Marcaus had instructed the
peacekeepers to attack kender on sight, which the peacekeepers had done with
characteristic Markonian enthusiasm. The policy across most of Verminasia's
history had been, in essence, extermination by inconvenience - make the city
hostile enough and the kender will wander elsewhere.
Piknim had built something different. Gogothath, the principal county of
her Archduchy, had been cultivated deliberately into a place where kender
could belong - not as pests to be managed but as potential resources
siphoned from other kingdoms. A racial enclave. A haven with purpose. The
logic was sound and the results had been, by most measures, positive. Teven
Wifflenut of the Verminasian Queensguard was proof enough of that.
The problem, she now recognized with the particular clarity of someone who
had made a very specific kind of mistake, was that kender wander.
They had wandered into Gogothath as intended, trickling in from All corners
of Arkania. They had also wandered out of it, escaping her notice, seeping
into the city proper, the back-alleys and bridge underpasses and parks, and
into several establishments that had lodged formal complaints. They had
brought their bright eyes and their big smiles and their tendency to eye
everything within reach into a city that had spent centuries cultivating an
atmosphere of elegance, decadence, and dark menace - and they were ruining
it.
Piknim stood upon the palace balcony, her gaze tracking an occasional streak
of color that clearly did not belong, and thought about Isadore. She
thought about Marcaus. She thought about the word cockroach and how she had
carried it like a stone for years and what it had cost her to become
something that word could not stick to.
Then she went back to the throne room, where a throng of counselors were
waiting, and drafted the Kender Relocation and Accountability Plan.
Writer: Piknim
Date Sat Aug 29 17:13:31 2026
Subject KRAP: "We'll call them Fun Camps"
The fundamental challenge of kender management, Piknim had concluded
after considerable reflection, was found in the middle. Very young kender
did not yet wander - they lacked the maturity and survival skills to do so.
Elderly kender, their wanderlust spent, had settled into something
approaching stillness. It was the middle - the bright-eyed, light-fingered,
perpetually curious middle - that caused problems. KRAP would therefore
focus its attentions precisely there.
Article I: Age Brackets. Kender below the age of wanderlust onset and above
the age of wanderlust conclusion were to be left in peace. They were not
the problem. They were, in fact, the solution - more on this presently.
Article II: The Sorting. Kender of wanderlust age arriving in Verminasia
proper were to be assessed and sorted into one of three categories.
Category A: The Afflicted. Kender displaying signs of moroseness, unusual
introspection, darkness of temperament, or what the common folk might call
being a little bit wrong were to be identified immediately and redirected to
Kendermoor Keep for further evaluation. These were Drakkara's business.
These were the Darkfinder's business. These were, in All likelihood, the
ones who had been waiting without knowing what they were waiting for.
Category B: The Compliant. A small, carefully curated number of kender
demonstrating above-average discipline, usefulness, or an unusual
willingness to do what they were told without immediately asking seventeen
questions about why - these could be retained as Camp Counselors and support
staff. There would not be many of them. This was fine.
Category C: The Remainder. One might accurately refer to them as normal
kender.
Article III: Disposition of the Remainder. Fledglings of the Moonlily
Circle were working overtime on a solution.
The cauldron had a tendency to produce magic of the most volatile sort,
whether a witch wanted it or not, that could polymorph people into frogs.
Some of the more complicated spell recipes were All but guaranteed to
produce a prodigious cloud of pink smoke that could polymorph several people
at once. This was, in controlled quantities, a useful property.
The Remainder would be processed in small batches through designated
chambers - cheerfully appointed, the Witch-Queen had insisted, with adequate
ventilation and light refreshments - and released thereafter into the
marshlands that dominated Gogothath, where the climate was agreeable and the
insect population robust. The transformation was temporary. Probably.
Hopefully not.
Article IV: The Resulting Culture. Gogothath would, under the auspice of
KRAP, develop a demographic profile unlike any other settlement on Algoron -
very young kender in the care of very old kender, with a sparse, curated
population of the Afflicted and the Compliant occupying the middle years.
It was, Piknim acknowledged, unusual. It was also functional, intentional,
and considerably tidier than the alternative.
She had not invented this problem. She had, however, caused it, and causing
it had put her in the uncomfortable position of implementing a solution that
Isadore and Marcaus would have recognized immediately and approved of
wholeheartedly, which was a thought she chose not to dwell on for longer
than was strictly necessary.
The kender in the streets were not cockroaches.
They were, however, somebody else's problem now.
Writer: Piknim
Date Sat Aug 29 17:18:12 2026
Subject KRAP: "My First Day at Camp"
The kender girl had gotten All dressed up for it.
That was the thing Piknim noticed first - the pink ribbon, the cleaned
boots, the little jacket with the brass buttons done up to the collar
despite the warmth of the afternoon. Someone had told her this was an
occasion. She had believed them and prepared accordingly, and now she stood
third in a row of six kender children recently arrived from the Great Forest
road, her smile beautifully bright and hopeful and pointed directly at the
Darkfinder moving slowly down the line.
Piknim moved the way she always moved in these moments - unhurried, affable,
a grandmother inspecting her grandchildren with fond and slightly terrifying
attention. She called them her little tadpoles. She pressed a small
trinket or tasty treat into their little hands. She straightened a collar
here. Tucked a topknot there. Inquired of a name and immediately forgot
it. The first two children passed muster for Category B - reasonably
compliant, useful-looking, already trying to pick her pocket which showed
initiative at least.
The girl was next.
Piknim looked at her. The pink ribbon. The bright eyes. The brass
buttons. The beautifully bright smile that had not wavered once since she'd
arrived.
She was perfect. She was exactly what a kender should be at this age. She
was comprehensively useless for a Darkfinder's purposes. Category C for
sure.
Piknim moved past her.
The boy at the end of the line was staring at the ground. Not in the way of
a shy child - in the way of a child who had found something off in the
distance worth looking at that nobody else could see. His topknot listed
slightly sideways. His delicately pointed ears twitched. When he looked up
and met Piknim's eyes there was something there that she recognized the way
you recognize your own reflection in a dark window.
She smiled. It was her widest smile, which was also her most unsettling
one.
She reached out and booped his nose with a single sharpened fingernail.
"Found you."
A cloak of raven feathers was brought forward and draped around his narrow
shoulders. He looked down at it with the expression of someone who did not
yet understand what was happening but suspected it was going to be
interesting.
His parents were compensated. The others were thanked and redirected toward
the appropriate processing facilities - cheerfully appointed, adequate
ventilation - and the afternoon's business was concluded.
The kender girl with the pink ribbon lingered at the back of the line for a
long moment, watching the gates of Kendermoor Keep close behind the boy with
the odd stare and the raven-feather cloak.
She was still smiling. But it was a smaller smile than it had been before.
She wondered what was in there.
Writer: Carrionmaw
Date Sat Aug 29 20:19:01 2026
Subject The Drawing of the Umbratide
The vast plane beyond the Rip stretched on without end, and the wyrm was
drawn onward through the pull of the Umbratide.
There was no wind here, nor current in any sense the living world would have
understood. The darkness moved beneath him and around him, bearing him
forward through a vastness that seemed to have neither direction nor end.
His wings beat against it out of instinct, but the effort was meaningless.
The Umbratide had already taken him.
And somewhere beyond it, something waited.
At first it was little more than a disturbance in the dark. A point of
pallid light, impossibly distant, appearing and vanishing as the tides of
shadow folded over one another. Too far apart to be one thing, yet too
closely bound to be two. He could not name it. Not yet, or it would slip
away again and the drawing would have to begin anew.
The wyrm angled toward the lights, but they withdrew into the distance,
remaining always beyond the reach of his sight. Each time he gained upon
them, the darkness seemed to lengthen between them. Each time he thought
them lost, they returned fainter than before, but somehow more certain.
He had known the Umbratide as a thing that consumed, and he had witnessed it
swallow armies, erase roads, strip flesh from bone and the very memory of
the dead. It had carried the remnants of the fallen into depths from which
nothing returned.
But this was different. The darkness ahead was not empty.
Around him, the currents twisted into impossible formations. Black waves
rose without breaking, folding upon themselves like great sheets of night.
Fragments of crystalline arcana drifted past, catching the distant light
before disappearing once more into the gloom. Each flash revealed something
for an instant: a ridge of unfamiliar stone, a shape moving far below, the
remnants of some ancient structure that seemed to have existed before there
had been anyone to remember building it.
Then darkness rushed past again like a riptide, and behind him, the path was
gone and there would be no returning by the way he had come.
The thought did not trouble him. The old world had already passed beneath
the tide. What remained of it was scattered behind him in broken armor,
abandoned weapons, ashes, names, and the fading cries of those who believed
themselves strong enough to withstand the Umbra's promise. Even the
threshold had become distant now, little more than a memory pressed into the
darkness.
Whatever awaited beyond the expanse could not be reached by returning to
what had been. And even if it could, why would he choose to? He followed
the flame, even though it remained impossibly far away. And though he could
not reach it, there were still distances beyond distance between his wings
and where he witnessed its becoming.
It was a thing so subtle that the wyrm almost mistook it for another
movement of the tide, a thread of pale illumination spanning the distance
between the dyad.
Writer: Symantha
Date Sat Aug 29 22:39:33 2026
Subject The Churn - Brutal Truths
The yearning for... Something had brought her here. Into the deeps of
Umbrus Caelum.
She had felt the pull of the Umbrastone and almost greater yet, the
moonwell. The living dusk rippled within its circular fissure, never at
rest, and as she stood at its edge its dark currents shimmered outward to
encompass her robed form.
...consume...
She was prepared, as ever, for the ravenous presence of the Umbrastone. It
skirted the periphery of her mind, ever seeking, and in the center of her
right palm where it had branded her she felt its pulse like an abyssal
heartbeat.
They were bound. At least, until it chose another.
Something stirred within the bleak nothing, but only enough to recognize
pain. The pain she had been striving for. There was purpose in it, even if
it was only to recognize that she was a source of energy for it. It would
consume her if she let it - the memory of the stone burning through body and
soul, blood pouring from her flesh, of dying, had never faded in intensity.
She had believed in her own destiny then though. There had been reasons to
let vengeance and unbending determination empower her will to survive.
Gritting her teeth, she reached out for the stone and embraced the glorious
heat of its agony as it bit into her palm again, as it fit to the burn scar
as surely as if it were a part of her.
Sharp spikes of pain shot through her arm, to strike at her heart in time
with its own pulses, and its furious hunger filled her - filling that empty
place where destiny had once sat.
She 'saw' then, and it was utterly ruthless.
There had never been a crown. Not for her.
She saw herself as the speck she was among so many other specks. Only as
useful as she made herself. Promised nothing.
The path forward had never been a path. She had wandered in the dark until
she had become the last. The volunteer tomato.
A chosen vessel, to serve the means of Goddess and Stone, but merely a
vessel. Time mattered not at All to things like the Umbrastone or Gods and
mortal lives snuffed as fast as they rose.
Destiny was for Gods, not specks.
When her vision cleared, she was still holding the stone, her pulse in tune
with it. There was harsh, bitter, wry amusement. Was it better or worse
that for the first several years after she had picked up the stone, she had
firmly believed she had been rejected? It made her choices simpler,
perhaps, and her empty gaze settled on the moonwell. It swirled, shimmered,
and a violently unsettled tidalscape of the Umbra came into view.
She still was what and who she had become, even if the fantasy had been torn
away and the barren truth instilled. A High Priestess, perhaps the last of
her ilk, blessed - or cursed - with umbral sight, and she had one absolute
job of which she had been reminded and berated for in the same breath.
Writer: Geirhart
Date Tue Sep 1 16:52:00 2026
Subject Pilgrimage: Cold Winds, Cold Hearts, the End Nears
'Out of the way human. ' snorted a large red furred Minotaur
as he walked northwards to the Keep of Ganth.
Other minotaurs filed north and south rocking the old man too and fro. Some
did not even look in his direction as they went about their business. Then
a wagon passed nearly running him over as he fell into a muddy puddle on the
side of the road.
He was tired, cold, and while the Empress had welcomed them into the
kingdom, the Minotaurs looked upon the other races with little interest. As
he laid in the muck for a moment, a large furry hand came into view offering
him help to stand again.
'Let me help you up, elder. You seem to have fallen. The streets
are not friendly to those smaller than our younglings. ' offered the black
furred minotaur.
'Most kind of you, sir. I am Geirhart of Althainia making my way
to the Chapel of Nadrik to the north. Might you help me on my way? I
believe I won't be jostled so much in your company. ' smiled the old man.
They walked a bit in silence, the large form of the Minotaur kept the others
at bay so that he had a hole in the crowd he could move through. Soon they
came upon the High Temple of Ganth.
'This is where I must leave you, Elder. May Nadrik and the monks
within see to your needs. There are some of us that welcome the pilgrims
and wish them to learn about our people. '
With that, the unnamed minotaur walked out into the sea of other Ganthians.
Geirhart turned and began wiping some of the mud and snow from his robes.
He passed by a small group of elvish pilgrims that nodded to him as they
went about their business. He walked down the hallway towards the Chapel of
Nadrik and its custodian the White Cleric.
Writer: Crelius
Date Wed Sep 2 19:42:24 2026
Subject Of Blood and Purpose - Stormheart
Atop a cliff on the outskirts of the Vallenwood, overlooking the perilous
northern seas, rose a solitary pillar. An obelisk hewn from the vengeful
breath of a goddess scorned. It was a place of power, sacred to the
ministers of the wood, whose faith had evolved from protective isolation
into something altogether more retributive. Like the deity they worshipped,
their stewardship of the natural order had been galvanized by the stormborn
wrath of a newly awakened domain.
A congregation had commenced beneath the obelisk, led by a druid-priestess,
an elven Stormseer whose exhortations tempered the uncertain hearts of the
gathered worshippers. Her sharp, aquiline features were cut in stern piety
beneath a weathered hood. Her words seemed to mingle with the wet, biting
wind that savaged the seaward cliff, carrying across those assembled before
her.
Those who had come were hardened souls of no singular creed or race, a
departure from the purist doctrine so often observed by the clergy of
Zandreya. It was a sparse gathering of humans, elves, and the wayward
bloodlines between. But a common thread bound them. Through each ran the
cold salt of the seafarer. They had come seeking the goddess's blessing and
safe passage across the tenebrous seas in these perilous times.
The tenor of the procession was broken by the rising sound of a thousand
voices crying out in torment. The source of that terrible lament drew the
immediate attention of the holy cadre before the pillar.
The air itself began to tear and rend apart, as if reality were being flayed
alive. A thin vertical line formed, extending from both ends like a scalpel
slicing through sinew. Their edges crackled with the coruscating false
light of the warp, the fabric of the material world fraying and distorting
around it. The line splayed open, widening into a gaping, circular gateway.
The portal resembled a profane vanity, roiling with raw, entropic force.
Its circumference pulsating and mutating, manifesting eight aberrant points
from the billowing non-matter.
A being emerged, cloaked in shadow and ruin. An armored boot planted upon
the sodden earth, its touch a pox upon the ground, seeding a decrepit
blackness as if the very realm rejected the figures intrusion. Its form
materialized further through the wailing portal, armor figured and wreathed
in an aura of tangible malignancy. Tendrils of fleshy roots invaded blue
dragonscale plates, interwoven like oily ropes and fused into a horrific and
symbiotic raiment. The growth began at his throat and crept upward,
gripping the pallid flesh of his face like an inverted crown. His single
baleful eye glared across those gathered, fixed upon the minister as he
advanced.
The gathered worshippers looked on in horror and parted before him, while
the priestess behind the pulpit raised a hand in defiance, clutching a crude
holy symbol of the storm goddess in her fist. The hood of her cloak was
thrown back by the rising gale as her gaze met the interloper. She wasted
no breath on admonishment or condemnation. Instead, she called upon the
tumultuous heavens, and they answered with the ire of a vengeful god.
Argent bolts of cerulean lightning tore down upon the advancing warrior,
engulfing him in a blinding concussion of thunder.
Writer: Crelius
Date Wed Sep 2 19:52:34 2026
Subject Of Blood and Purpose - Stormheart (continued)
Dismay wracked the druidess countenance as she watched the summoned
lightning ground itself harmlessly against the remnants of his blue-scaled
armor. As he reached the obelisk, a figure broke suddenly from the crowd.
Cloaked and otherwise unremarkable, the flash of metal and a blur of
startling alacrity swiftly dispelled that fallacy.
The stranger struck with adder like speed, twin blades dancing with
unnatural grace as they plunged into the knights back in rapid succession.
Blackened fluid spurted from the wounds, spattering the rocky ground, where
it hissed and smoldered like spilled acid.
As the assailant swept in for another strike, something unexpected occurred.
The diseased fronds entwined about the warriors armor writhed suddenly to
life. Through some profane amalgamation, flesh and armor transmogrified
together, twisting into the semblance of a grotesque aegis wrought from
fused metal, sinew, and corrupted flesh. The knight wheeled and brought the
flesh forged shield crashing against his attacker. The impact shattered one
of the strangers blades and carried through with brutal force, striking the
cloaked warrior hard enough to hurl them sprawling into the mud, senseless.
A rictus grin crept across the knights deathmask features as he uttered a
single word, rising from his throat like tar bubbling from a pit, "Kyorl.
"
After the briefest moment of satisfaction, he returned his gaze to the
obelisk where the priestess had stood. In that same instant, she crossed
the distance between them with feline stealth, driving a dagger deep into
the mans abdomen. Before she could withdraw, a metallic fist clamped around
her wrist. The knight wrenched her close and brought the hammer of his
gauntlet down against her temple. She crumpled to the earth beside her
would be protector, bereft of consciousness.
The storm raged overhead as the Knight of Ruin gripped both elves by their
scalps and dragged their still forms across the rocks and mud. Trails of
red and black blood followed in his wake, mingling with the rainwater
pooling beneath his feet. Lightning flashed, throwing his pale features
into stark relief. The mutilated hollow of his missing eye stood plainly
revealed to those who remained. The flesh carved into an eight-pointed star
where the eye had once resided.
He hauled his captives into the wailing portal, paying little heed to those
who still dared remain. Then the warp rift folded shut behind him, and he
was gone, leaving only bloody tracks in his passing.
Writer: Justian
Date Thu Sep 3 23:38:07 2026
Subject The Tree Made of Horn: The First Blood I
The fountains low whisper carried through the quiet hall. Nearby, the
tree made of horn stood beneath Malachives golden image. Light scarred its
bloody bark. The pale wounds crossed the horn where blood had long seeped
from within, and the stone bowl at its roots waited to receive each slow
drop.
Waaaghs declaration said the tree had begun to grow again. Blood of any
kind might feed it, though blood carrying potent energies was to be sought
above All others.
Justian came before the tree alone.
He did not immediately draw his athame. His attention remained upon the
injuries left by Light and the blood that continued to ooze around them.
The light-colored scars across the tree briefly darkened, as though the horn
beneath them were healing. Justian watched the marks closely. He had seen
them change before, but whether the wounded horn was truly mending he could
not say.
A faint warmth radiated from the tree, then vanished before he could be
certain it had been there.
He remained where he was, pondering the feeling. One hand rose slightly
before settling again at his side. For a while he did nothing.
Eventually, his thoughts returned to Waaaghs declaration and the blood he
had come to give. Before calling others to the work, he would measure his
own part in it against the Verities.
"First: Suffering exists."
Light had passed across the horn and left injury behind. The brief
darkening of the scars did not erase the blood still seeping from the bark.
Justian drew his veined hornwood-arcanium athameand placed its edge against
his palm.
"No one who calls another to bleed should place himself beyond the wound."
The blade crossed his flesh.
(continued)
Writer: Justian
Date Thu Sep 3 23:42:18 2026
Subject The Tree Made of Horn: The First Blood II
Blood welled from the cut and ran between his fingers. Justian pressed
his opened palm against the bloody bark. Fresh blood spread beneath his
hand and mingled with what already flowed down the horn.
"Second: Suffering has a cause. The false gods and the order they have
made." Justian kept his hand against the tree.
"Their order calls submission peace. Whatever refuses its place must be
corrected, cleansed, or destroyed."
His gaze followed the injuries across the horn.
"Light touched you and left this behind. Here is the truth beneath their
promise of order."
To Justian, feeding the tree made of horn was a way to sustain what their
order had sought to destroy. He could not yet know what would come. He
knew why he wished to help it continue.
"Third: The End is their death."
Blood continued to gather beneath his palm.
"The shedding of blood is not the End. Neither is your growth. The
strength gathered here must be turned against those who bound this world
beneath them."
Justian withdrew his hand. His blood remained upon the tree, slowly joining
what already flowed down the horned bark.
The creatures dwelling around the Red Moons impact would be his first
quarry. Waaagh had called for blood bearing potent energies. Justian would
seek it among the things that inhabited that ruin. He would hunt them,
gather their blood, and return it to the tree made of horn.
Others within Chaos would be called to join the work. He would explain
where he intended to hunt and why he believed the offerings would further
their purpose. Each would choose whether to take up this hunt or their own.
"Fourth: The Path is Chaos."
"The Path begins when truth demands action. Today, I give what is mine.
Soon, we shall bring the wound of the Red Moon."
Justian tightly gripped his slashed palm and stepped back. His gaze
returned to the light-colored scars. Their brief darkening and the
uncertain warmth remained in his thoughts, but he claimed neither as an
answer to the offering he had made afterward.
The stone bowl received the mingled blood at its roots.
The tree bled first.
Justian answered.
Writer: Geirhart
Date Fri Sep 4 12:41:14 2026
Subject Pilgrimage: Cold Winds, Cold Hearts, the End Nears ( 2 )
'Have some tea, Abbott. It looks like you had quite the time in the
streets of the Empire. ' offered the White Cleric as Geirhart entered the
spartan office of the minotaur.
'Thank you, Elder. Your hospitality is very kind. ' smiled the old priest.
Geirhart takes a seat in a chair built for a minotaur and holds the tea with
both hands. Sitting in silence, the White Cleric begins to speak.
'Icewall has not been without loss while the other continents continued
their wars. After the War of the Black Moon, many mourned the loss of
Mencius while also rejoicing at the return of Nadrik. Was there any other
kingdom or clan that could claim such a division of faith?
When Nadrik ascended the stair, I was hopeful. Yet a third of our trinity
remained dead. Where was the hope for the Mencians? Their Rage had no
place to go. Then, recently when Raije was hurt, the faith of our people
was wounded once more. It has been a battle and a loss that no Minotaur
knows how to deal with. '
The old man listens, his grey eyes warm and compassionate as he blows softly
on his drink allowing the White Cleric to speak more.
'We are a warrior people, we face our problems with steel and grit. We yell
our war cries to our enemies to make them fear us. Yet who do we yell at to
heal a god? Who do we battle to let him know we are here? The Empire has
no reaction to being impotent. It has no method with which to react. So
our people grow closed, hardened, and I have seen in their eyes the very
shadow of defeat. With the ascent of our Empress, I am hopeful that a woman
of faith can find that way forward. '
Geirhart nods slightly taking a sip he responds, 'The Light has been much
the same. We grasp at ideas to help us move forward unsure if this is the
right way. We know we should be doing more but we walk in circles. I think
we have more in common perhaps than we think. '
The White Cleric grasps a cub and lifts it in his large hand, 'To shared
loss and shared confusion then, Abbott. '
Geirhart lifts his mug of tea in response and then, both sipping, they sit
in the warmth of the room silent and thoughtful.
Writer: Qinrathaz
Date Sun Sep 6 11:37:46 2026
Subject An Entirely Unreasonable Turtle 1 of 2
There were, Qinrathaz had decided, two ways to learn where a magical
portal went. The First was to ask somebody. The second was considerably
more interesting. Where
At the time, Qin had not yet acquired the map that would eventually make the
guesswork significantly easier. What he possessed instead was a small
crystal dragon's natural curiosity, and the absolute certainty that
mysterious portals had obviously been placed in the Dragon Vale so that
someone would go through them. Otherwise they would simply have been walls.
Qin studied it from one side. He leaned his narrow head left. Then right.
Blue-white facets caught the Vale's strange light as he peered into magic
that provided no helpful hints. He stepped through. The world changed at
once.
The cool, sacred quiet of the Vale gave way to salt, water, stone, and the
distant restless sounds of the sea. The air tasted different. The sounds
were different. Even the winds had new and interesting smells. Qinrathaz
loved it immediately. He proceeded with All the caution appropriate to an
expedition into wholly unknown territory. Which was to say, very little.
There was too much to inspect.
Strange passages invited investigation. Living things moved in and around
the water, and every one of them represented something Qin had not seen
before. A sensible explorer might have begun by scanning the area for
predators. Qin began by wandering aimlessly. This was his first mistake.
His second involved a turtle.
Later, when telling the story, Qin would identify the creature only by
species. This was unfair to turtles generally but entirely fair to this one
specifically. It looked, at first, uncomplicated. A shell. Four legs. A
head. A tail an No wings. Nothing about this arrangement suggested a
serious threat to dragonkind.
Qin approached and the turtle objected.
There are many dignified accounts in the histories of Algoron concerning
battles between dragons and their enemies. They speak of fire crossing the
heavens, claws splitting armor, terrible magic, wings blotting out the sun,
and heroes standing against creatures older than kingdoms.
This was not one of those accounts.
Writer: Qinrathaz
Date Sun Sep 6 11:45:23 2026
Subject An Entirely Unreasonable Turtle 2 of 2
The turtle lunged. Qin sprang backward with a startled hiss, wings
flaring. Again it came at him. The little crystal dragon stared at it.
The turtle stared back with the serene confidence of a creature that had
apparently awakened that morning prepared to fight a dragon. Qin considered
this extremely presumptuous. He circled and it turned. He darted left and
right, its head followed. He tried as many tactics as he could in his
panic. The turtle remained committed to hostilities. For a creature
burdened with an entire house upon its back, it proved distressingly
effective at keeping the dangerous end pointed toward him.
Qinrathaz was a dragon. A young dragon, certainly. A small dragon,
temporarily. Still a dragon. This alone should have settled matters. It
did not. A third exchange convinced Qin that continuing to prove his
superiority to an animal incapable of appreciating the distinction was a
poor use of his afternoon. Qinrathaz retreated. The turtle, having
successfully defended whatever principle turtles defended, did not
apologize.
He looked behind him. Nothing pursued. He looked around. Then he
discovered the more serious problem. He had been so interested in
everything else that the route back was no longer immediately obvious. That
quiet realization did what the turtle had failed to do. It made him stop
moving.
The Sea Castle was suddenly less a collection of fascinating new things and
more a collection of fascinating new things in which he might become
inconveniently lost or gods forbid attacked again. It was time to leave.
Once back within the Vale, he turned around and regarded the portal for a
long moment. He had learned several things. The first was that portals
went to interesting places. The second was that interesting places
contained things that objected to dragons.
Much later, Solivar listened as Qin told the story of his travels into the
wrong portal, and his misadventure with a turtle.
"Vicious thing," Qin finished.
Solivar bobbed his head.
"The Sea Castle, yes."
There was something deeply unsatisfying about the ease with which the older
brass dragon said this. Then Solivar offered him a map given by a Gold,
showing where the Vale's pathways led. Qinrathaz hopped. Actually hopped.
"Thank you!" Qinrathaz chirped.
Solivar explained that even he had spent much of his dragonhood uncertain
where several portals went. Qin considered the map, considered the Sea
Castle, and considered one particular resident of the Sea Castle whose
viciousness had not been adequately documented. This did not mean Qin
intended to stop exploring.
Qintathaz glanced back at the portal one last time before walking away.
Somewhere beyond, an entirely unreasonable turtle remained undefeated.
Qinrathaz considered the matter unresolved.
Writer: Aothien
Date Mon Sep 7 13:19:11 2026
Subject The passing of flyers ( Pilgrimage )
Aothien sat in his chair, rocking back and forth. His heavy dragonscale
helmet sat in front of him, the umbral lenses staring into his pupilless
white eyes. If All was going according to plan, everything should be
happening right now, he thought. This plan was not as flashy as the last,
and probably not as impactful, but the seeds of fear and doubt must continue
to grow. A cold smirk slowly formed on Aothiens face as he brought his
hands together.
On the continent of Icewall, things were bustling. The Pilgrims had
gathered about as Ganth prepared to receive them. Four half elves, dressed
in ragged clothing spread out, each holding a rather large stack of papers.
They jumped up and down, speaking with fiery passion as they tried to hand
the papers to any and All that would talk and receive them. They moved like
flashfire through the crowds, darting in and out of various groups,
attaching the papers to poles, buildings, anything they could. And within
minutes, perhaps 5.. At most 15, they were gone. Flyers seen everywhere,
from the trash on the ground to the peoples hands and plastered on wells.
Aothien opened his eyes after picturing what had happened, and picked up his
own copy of the flyer.
"Tired of spending days and nights in the cold? Eating gruel while the
priests, knights and lords eat hot beef and drink hot wine? Are you done
suffering being a tool for the gains of others while you struggle to stay
warm?"
"This is not Love, this is not Honor or Goodness. This is just
exploitation, as it's always been. Do not listen to the lies."
Writer: Aliera
Date Mon Sep 7 14:12:47 2026
Subject The passing of flyers ( Pilgrimage )
Aliera noticed the papers first because there had not been papers before.
One had been fastened crookedly to a post near the well. Another had
already found its way beneath someone's boot, muddied into the snow. More
were moving hand to hand through the Pilgrims, and somewhere beyond them a
half-elven figure disappeared between bodies before she could make out more
than ragged clothing.
Her hand rose, "Let them go. " The words were meant for the nearest Knights
before anyone could decide pursuit was required.
Aliera stepped to the post and pulled the paper free. She read it quietly,
all of it. Her expression changed very little at the first lines.
*Tired of spending days and nights in the cold? Eating gruel while the
priests, knights and lords eat hot beef and drink hot wine? *
Her eyes lifted from the page, not toward where the half-elves had gone,
toward the Pilgrims. Some were reading, some talking... One paper had
already been crumpled, another was being passed between several hands. She
glanced back to the parchment in her hands.
*This is not Love, this is not Honor or Goodness. This is just
exploitation, as it's always been. Do not listen to the lies. *
For several seconds, she said nothing. Then she folded the paper once and
tucked it beneath her belt. "Do not take them from anyone. " Her gaze
moved among the Knights nearby. "And do not tell anyone they may not read
them. "
There were enough scattered over this portion of Icewall by now, that the
order would hardly contain them regardless. More importantly, trying would
accomplish precisely what whoever had sent them wanted. Aliera turned
toward the nearest gathering of Pilgrims. She had walked among them, stood
watch over them, seen their fires burn low in the night and watched tired
bodies rise again in the morning.
They -were- cold. They -were- tired. That was what made the thing clever.
A lie built entirely from lies was easy to destroy. One wrapped around
something true could be carried much farther. Her attention shifted toward
the fires, the provisions, the places where Knights and clergy had taken
their meals. "Find out what was served today, " she said quietly. "To
everyone. Pilgrims, priests, Knights and nobility. And where everyone
slept last night. "
A beat passed, and she clarified. "I want facts. Not assurances. " She
looked again toward the Pilgrims. There would be questions. Perhaps
accusations. Perhaps only glances that had not been there an hour before.
Let them come.
Tonight she had intended to speak to them of grief, of Mencius, of Raije
lying wounded, of Nadrik returned from torment with Wrath burning hotter
within Him than before. Of what happened when pain became anger, and what
happened when anger was permitted to choose its own direction. Someone had
walked into Ganth carrying tinder and discovered a people already hurting.
Aliera's fingers settled briefly against the folded paper at her belt. No,
not discovered, counted upon.
"Keep the watches as they were, " she ordered. "No one treats these people
differently because they have read a piece of paper. " Then, quieter: "And
if any of what it says is true, I want to know before I stand before them
tonight. "
She left the flyers where they were.
Writer: Geirhart
Date Tue Sep 8 19:59:58 2026
Subject Pilgrimage: The Passing of Paper Judgement
WORDS
To the old man, the parchment was but words. Ink placed upon some vellum,
their importance as transitory as the wind. Yet to others this was a
challenge. The words could divide people, it could incite people, and it
would tarnish what was being done.
Geirhart pondered things silently.
'If these words divide us, then it shows the pilgrimage has no faith in
itself or it's allies. After more than four months, are our bonds broken so
easily? '
The Abbott thought of the vampire issues that the General had warned him
about. The attacks appeared right around the deaths of the pilgrims.
Clearly the Executioner of Abaddon, now in the Horde, was in league with the
Inquisitor of Storm Keep. It was very evident that All these issues were
just works of the Darkness to take resources away from the Pilgrimage and
divide it. The Knights were already split now, some factions hunting
vampires while some on Icewall. Then there was the emotional division of
these letters. It was clearly a concerted effort.
'So what do I do? The Cardinal has already spoken. If we give it more
attention then we raise it ever higher. Therefore I shall treat it as a
test. I fear no judgement of my peers, of the pilgrims, or of the Darkness.
If there are those who have not given to the poor, that is their shame to
bear. If there are those who have not held tight to their oaths, they shall
be judged by the divine. '
Summoning holy fire, the parchment burns and blackens as it is consumed.
A messenger arrived at the Temple of Ganth, his cheeks a bit red from the
cold and the vapor of his breath causing a bit of mist as he spoke.
'Abbott, the wagons are preparing for our journey in a couple of days. Did
you want to look over the list of provisions and make sure All was prepared'
asked the messenger.
Geirhart nodded, 'Lead the way to Tolbrand. I'm sure he's got things well
underway and my oversight is merely a formality. '
The messenger lead the way while the old priest hobbled behind him wrapped
in his robes.
ACTIONS SPEAK THE LOUDER
Writer: Erlestoke
Date Wed Sep 9 17:17:30 2026
Subject Pilgrimage: On the March and in reflection
An unusual temperate gentle breeze blew in from the west on the road from
Ganth, nearly overshadowing the sound of soft boots landing on the path.
Here and there along the order of the march quiet voices spoke amongst the
Pilgrims. Though tired and weary from their long journeys they still
carried on, the end so near at hand.
Erlestoke varied his pace as he moved with the pilgrims, sometimes slowing
down and letting more of the column overtake him, at other times walking at
double time to move closer to the head of these pilgrims. Vigilant, perhaps
hypervigilant, his eyes roamed over the pilgrims and sides of the road
looking for irregularities or trouble. But it wasn't violence or mischief
that finally pulled his full attention, but the clatter of wood on stone
followed by a soft thud as one of the pilgrims collapsed and let go of his
walking stick.
With a slight headshake to remind himself Erlestoke muttered softly to
himself as he moved to help, "Remember, this is not a military endeavor, not
all threats are from violence, these pilgrims also suffer the travails of
the road. "
"Let's get you on your feet" he said as he helped the pilgrim up. "Come
now, just a little further lets get you dusted off and refreshed for the
last leg of the journey. "
Erlestoke uttered the word "candusima" hoping he could remove at least some
of the pilgrim's weariness as the column trudged onward. Rewarded with a
tired smile as the pilgrim once again carried on with the column and leaning
heavily on his walking stick, Erlestoke resumed his pace beside the column.
Privately, Erlestoke's mind drifted back to the sermons he heard in the
temple of Ganth as he walked. Many words on duty and honor, of discipline
and fraternity, he had much to reflect on for the first time in a long
while.
Writer: Naevera
Date Thu Sep 10 05:09:37 2026
Subject Lurking Purpose
That scent..
Cloying, sickly, a swampy mold. Carrying a touch of despair, terror, a
dangerous expectancy in its purpose. Something yet to be.
Venomous black eyes opened, focused and then narrowed, a breath of sickly
green chlorine slipping out from between long sharp teeth. The cloud wafted
down along the length of her broad scaled form, her tail lifting and
settling in brief agitation at her side.
That unique scent of decay was powerful and it found her where she rested,
through obscuring layers of rotted and decaying vegetation. Found her and
roused her fully.
Vicious irritation descended but as she drew in deeper of the scent, hunger
followed and a low, reverberating growl trickled through the cavern with
ominous purpose.
A sound followed. Something familiar enough that she pushed herself up,
breaking the thick vines that had woven over her wings, to sit. Pungent
slime had gathered beneath her, flowing freely over claw and scale as she
sat among it, and searched for the source of the sound. The slime, she also
recognized.
There.
A slow grin pulled at her snout, her teeth snapping wickedly.
It wriggled through her ancient chamber, visiting the stagnant pools,
consuming the slime that it used to pull its bulk along.
The larvae was not so small anymore. What she had pulled from the basin in
Dragoth's Temple, or something akin to it, crawled through the muck toward
her and she let it. When it grazed her, as if a feline rubbing along a
favored fellow, she caressed its bulk with the backs of her talons and
rumbled softly, moved again with protective urge.
It had come a long way from its pustulent chrysalis but she sensed this was
merely a visit. It had further yet to go for the lurking God's purpose.
It rounded her massive form, consuming the diseased vegetation as well as
the slime, and then it scaled the wall as if it were not a vertical feat,
and disappeared into a hole she might not have thought it could fit into
with an exultant screech that reverberated through cavern and earth.
Naevera needed no further reminder that Dragoth's purposes roamed beneath
the feet of all, that distance and time was no factor. The pestilent and
diseased hand of the Lurking God could, and would, reach all.
Digging slow rents into the ground beneath her, the cruel Green began to
consider how best to use this reminder even as the prospect of food
scrabbled at the entry of her cavern.
Writer: Agu
Date Thu Sep 10 21:55:13 2026
Subject The Rescue of Agu
It was early in the morning when the vessel came.
The Arkane Ship had just seen the signs of Warp operations along the shore.
Cannon fire strafed along the borders of the Chaos encampment, and the
followers of Malachive were torn asunder. It was only by the quick work of
the crew, and the boarding parties that went ashore that the tiny little
stronghold was destroyed with few casualties. It was after the battle that
they discovered the dungeon. Filled with prisoners of All races. They wore
shackles which drained mana, meaning that no magic could be used by any of
them. An assortment of folk filled the dungeon, and most of them looked to
the new soldiers in fear. Except for one, who recognized the symbol of
Arkane.
"It is I, Commander Agu Embermane, Of the Homeguard of Arkane. " Came the
weakened voice when they unshackled the wemic.
Some of the crewmembers knew of Commander Agu, absent many moons past. But
none of them reognized him. When his identity was confirmed, he was taken
aboard the ship. The whole area was godsforsaken because of Warp heresy,
but when they were finally able to set sail, it was then that a mage
appeared aboard the ship, wearing the University emblem, and brought the
shell of the former Commander Agu back to Arkane by portal. After reporting
his situation to the Queen, he stayed in the infirmary for a few days.
What was to come next, he did not know. He was excited to be home, but
equally afraid that people would see him in this state. What would the
coming days bring? Would his beloved family and friends stll be around, or
even alive? Only time would tell.
Writer: Kafis
Date Sun Sep 13 12:36:34 2026
Subject The Pull I Cannot Explain
Kafis woke before the temple bells reached for dawn, the way he had every
morning for the better part of three months now, staring up at ceiling beams
he knew better than his own hands and still, for one disoriented breath,
expecting red gates instead of grey stone rafters.
He lay there a while and let the dream fade the way smoke does when you stop
chasing it. It never fully left. It hadn't, not once, since the first
night it came to him: a shoreline he had never walked, stone worn smooth by
a tide he'd never felt, red gates standing half swallowed by fog, and
somewhere behind All of it, bells. Not the Serpents Eye bells. Different.
Lower. Older, in a way he had no business recognizing.
He rose anyway, because the sun did not care what a man dreamed, and there
was work in the yard before first meal.
A hooded monk found him there some time later, wringing water from the
training wraps at the well, and did not bother pretending he hadn't noticed.
"You've the look again," he said, in the flat, unbothered way he said most
things. "Same one as always?"
"Same one."
"And?"
Kafis wrung the last of the water out before he answered, watching it darken
the packed earth at his feet. "And nothing. It doesn't fade this time. It
hasn't faded in weeks." He didn't say the rest of it: that it wasn't
fading, it was sharpening, the way a half remembered word sharpens into a
real one the longer you turn it over. That he could, if he closed his eyes
even now, count the gates in the fog. That there were five of them, and he
did not know how he knew that.
The monk in a simple cloak considered him for a moment with the particular
patience of a man twenty years further along the Path than his student, then
went back to hanging wraps on the line. "There are names for what you're
describing, you know. None of them comfortable."
"I know."
"And you've made up your mind regardless." It wasn't a question.
Kafis didn't answer that one at all, which was answer enough.
It was not a small thing, what he was turning over. He had no family east
of anywhere. No teacher, no order, no debt of blood or oath that reached
toward that part of the map. He had checked quietly, carefully, in the
handful of texts in the temple archive old enough to even acknowledge an
island called Shokono existed, and found nothing that explained why a place
he had never seen should feel, some mornings, more real to him than the
ground under his own feet. Every account agreed on one strange point at
least: no gate reached it. No nexus, no door, no shortcut a mage or a
priest could open.
Whatever pulled at him, it did not intend to make the answer easy. Only a
ship, or a swimmer with more courage than sense, would ever set foot on that
shore.
He thought of the question again as he walked the yard's perimeter
afterward, turning it over less as doubt now than as a kind of grim
amusement. Made up his mind. As if there had been much choosing in it at
all. The pull did not ask permission and did not explain itself; it simply
sat behind his ribs some mornings like a held breath he could not release,
and had, in three months, gone from curiosity to certainty to something
closer to hunger.
He did not know yet what waited on that shore, or why it seemed to know his
name before he had ever spoken it aloud in its direction. But he intended
to find out, whatever it cost him to cross a sea that, by every account he
could find, could not be reached by any gate, any nexus, any door but a hull
and the will to point it east.
If anyone in these lands has sailed those waters and returned, or knows
someone who claims to have, he would hear of it. Price is no object.
Answers are.
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