Alciver's Metal Hunt and Jen Death.... In summary!

Jen's death. Was injured. Went to alciver's name'd cottage to heal . Forgot about lycanthropy problem, so invited priest over the night of the full moon. First fatal mistake. When priest came, ran out of house in wolf form cause a wolf would be pretty damn freaked out by the house and priest got to middle of forest, woke up nude next morning in freezing weather. Cause of an incapcating wound. A being of golden light appeared unto him. Offered him a deal There was a witch hiding in the body of a young girl. If he would cleanse the evil, the being would heal him. He chose to annoy the being and the girl He chose.... poorly and therefore roasted on an open bed of stakes.
Alciver's metal hunt, Went to mountain, intellego terramed the metal. Rego terramed it out loaded up cart Rego terramed metal in cart into swords(Why? We do not know these things) Anyways, cartheading back. Ran into bandits. He decided to ... talk with them... and then in the middle of talking... start casting. That was... painful for all involved. Shiny?

Escape! (funny that's spelled the same way as escape...)

Presented with few other options and having exhausted their efforts at intellego, our Magi descend.
And find themselves confronted by an oddly familiar chasm though it has widened considerably. Yvonne shrugs and creates her wind bridge which immediately cracks in the middle and disappears from sight. Hijinks ensue. Calvin instructs a gremlin to leap the chasm. The gremlin does not make it. Calvin instructs a gremlin to throw Jen over the chasm. Jen does not make it. Yvonne and Calvin use magic to mitigate the effects of the fall upon Jen. Calvin attempts to climb down the chasm and upon falling finds himself looping… Yvonne waves as he keeps falling past her from the ceiling thru the chasm. Jen accepts some tea from the gremlinses… and then realises she is eating fae food. Jen is now addicted to tea. When Calvin resets to the edge of the chasm, Jen does too. Jen promptly dives off the ledge in search of more tea. Yvonne and Calvin do nothing to mitigate the effects of the fall. A voice interrupts the argument between Calvin and Yvonne. It is quickly established that a magical creature known only as the platypus is bound here and as the Magi are amusing, it will not let them leave. Negotiations result in Calvin setting free the magical being with the promise that it will not harm them or others unless they agree to it. It is also agreed that the Magi will return in a year’s time to play with it again for which they will be rewarded. Finally escape is achieved and the long journey back to the covenant begins. Virida runs off. Calvin, Yvonne and a badly injured Jen run into Alciver on the road. Sweet boy that he is Alciver creates a house for Jen to recuperate in and leaves one of the covenant’s grogs to watch over him in his convalescence.

One Stream, Two Chambers, Three Puzzles and a lot of Vis

After three days on the road the Magi and companion reached the village of Saint Sebastian. Leaving asides some small incidents involving fire, snow, witch craft and sainthood the villagers were persuaded to show Jen to the shrine of Saint Sebastian located some distance from the village in a cave. Yvonne and Calvin tailed them at a distance with Virida running between. The villagers departed after depositing Jen at the cave and it was time for the exploration to begin.

Upon entering the cave it was discovered that a small stream ran down the centre of the passageway and that strange glowing moss grew on the walls. Yvonne collected some moss on a stone to help light her dungeonlab. Further on the passageway forked and two tunnels led up and down. The upper passageway seemed well ventilated and the clear sweet tasting stream was running down that passage. Everyone ascended to the chamber in the right hand fork, except Yvonne who kept falling down because of the water and the divine-ness of the place. In the chamber was an island surrounded by water upon which a statute with outstretched arms stood, several glowing objects at his feet.

The first to attempt to cross to the statue was Jen who promptly found him her itself completely immersed in water which is quite a feat for a stream that’s only ankle deep. Just before it began to panic a voice spoke calmingly about the Divine, asking it to accept it truly with its whole heart. Upon doing so Jen immediately found itself standing in front of the statue on the island. It retrieved one of the artefacts lying at the feet of the statue and cross the small stream to join its companions. Calvin and Virida were soon to follow and also returned sporting small divine gifts.

At the fork in the passageway Yvonne impatiently awaited their return. The lower passageway led to down into the darkness and eventually to a large chasm. This barrier delayed our magi for sometime as they concocted various methods to get around it. Yvonne finally made a bridge of air and with Virida’s ropes and Calvin’s gremlinses skills, they managed to cross the chasm.

Finally they entered into a large chamber lit by flame. One wall of the chamber was oddly rounded and had a strange design marked on it, two others contained a number of objects and a set of hands and the centre of the chamber was taken up by a large chandelier and table with many coloured glowing flames on it.

Fascinated by these objects the group began to examine them. Upon discovering that here were puzzles for them to solve the Magi dissolved into a friendly competition to defeat the cipher, logic puzzle and flaming table. At each success a grinding rumbling sound echoed through the chamber from the vicinity of the curved wall. The Magi could feel themselves getting closer to the goal. However before they had completed the last challenge their companion took it upon itself to un-complete one by removing the coloured globe that Calvin had so carefully selected and placed into the hands on the right wall. Jen could only hurriedly replace the ball when the grinding rumbling sound was joined by the tinkling sound of breaking glass…
Upon completing the final puzzle the curved wall rolled back and the Vis source was revealed. A beautiful geometric design around a well of power produced crystals of raw magical power… most of which Jen had crushed by un-completing the puzzle.

As Yvonne and Calvin debated the best method to collect the crystals, Virida reached forth and tried to collect the shards of the broken vis with her fingers incautiously. The shards cut into her releasing raw magical power into her blood and triggering wizard’s twilight. Fighting against this frightening experience Viridia struggles free but not without results, her fingertips are now pure hard sharp diamonds. Jen immediately comes to her assistance with its knife, attempting to dig the crystals out of her skin but with no chirgury skills Jen is sadly ineffective and manages only to wound itself. Yvonne collects the power from the Vis shards into a few of the larger remaining pieces and plucks the whole crystals from the air. After a short debate where it is decided not to render down the now unconscious Jen for Vis but to instead cast a permanent female aspect onto it. Calvin unfortunately doesn’t quite succeed and manages to anchor this to himself instead of Jen. To douse the spell he extinguishes the red flame on the table the he linked it to, plunging the chamber into darkness. A quick creo ignem shows that the chamber no longer contains the puzzles and that the passageway instead of leading up out of the chamber leads down.

Journery to St Sebastions

The following is a true account of the year our magi spent at the Covenant of the Axe and Rods.

After the Aegis of the Hearth and the yearly cretamen, Francis approached Yvonne about a Vis source that he'd heard of near the village of St Sebastian. It apparently was unclaimed and he requested that it be explored and claimed on behalf of the covenant. After requesting the assistance of Calvin and Alciver, she left the regio’s to locate this Vis source. The Inn located outside the covenant proved an obstacle for Alciver whose unconscious form was left behind. Yvonne's childhood friend Jen who'd been travelling with her for some time joined her and Calvin who'd finally gotten directions to the village of Saint Sebastian. Upon the way a few strange occurrences... uh.... occurred. A young soldier rode out of the forest on their second night on the road. Accusing Jen of running away from home and not dressing appropriately. Jen became so enraged that he...err she turned into a wolf and ran off. Yvonne and Calvin, somewhat shocked by this development, chased the solider off and attempted to recover their friend. Calvin enacted a brilliant plan. He called forth from the earth... Gremlinses! These foot high stone magic might lifters were persuaded to play a game of catch that wolf.... unfortunately they all caught a wolf only one of which was the transformed Jen. Not to worry Yvonne created a small pit of earth for each Gremlin and wolf where they would stay til morning. The camp was soon after approached by a beautiful white deer that had been on the run from the fae hunt. Upon realising that her new companions were speaking in Latin and using hermetic magic Virida thankfully revealed herself as a human. Though unable to speak she communicated her intent to remain with the Calvin and Yvonne and Jen (who eventually turned back into a man... er girl). So the journey continued.

Certamen

Game 2. Cont.

First up was NPC and Alciver. Alciver briefly disappeared into the trees with his large companion David and emerged looking a little worse for wear. Alciver's arse was handed to him. Politely.

Next came Calvin and Yvonne. Choosing Creo Terram the pair began certamen. Calvin creo terram The whole earth and Yvonne responded by creating mountains on the earth. Calvin reached below these mountains to create flawless diamonds in their depths and Yvonne could not respond. Calvin's advantage was so great and the magical aura so high that we entered the Twilight Zone! sorry... Wizards Twilight. Botching again on the GM's request Yvonne emerged hours later slightly less good at Terram than before and with a twilight scar of muddy footprints that evaporate after a minute or so. While she was so frozen however Calvin, naughty little boy that he is could not control himself and sketched a moustache upon her upper lip with grease paint. She was not impressed.

In the meantime, Calvin and Alciver bent their minds to a further certamen; Perdo Corpus but not before Alciver again disappeared into the wheat with David for a short space of time. However this time it was David that returned looking fatigued. Calvin gained a large bonus early on but set himself too high a standard with an opening action of Perdo Corpus "I destroy your thingie" Naturally Alciver had only weak floundering defense against such an attack and incorrectly counter attacked with Perdo Mentem "I destroy your mind". Still Alciver seemed especially energetic as Calvin began to tire even his best shot at Perdo Corpus "I destroy the thingies of all your future children and their off spring" met with little success against the seemingly inexhaustible Alciver. Calvin was forced to retire at the point of exhaustion.

The final certamen of the evening took place between the newly recovered Yvonne and Alciver. It was a contest of Rego Vim. Alciver took the lead raising a demon to eat Yvonne's entrails. She enclosed him in a protective circle. He contained the demon in a circle.
She suppressed the circle around the Demon. He summoned an angle to fight the Demon. She moved the vim inside the demons corpse. He created a connection between the two certamening magi. She used it to suck at his vim and was promptly knocked unconscious.

Fiat Lux!

Game 2

If only creating light was as easy as commanding the heavens, "Fiat Lux!" Friday's game consisted of two parts, a comedy of errors in trying to create habitable dwellings and quite a few rounds of certamen.

Play commenced as the players were told that not only did the sun shine eternally in the regio, as far as they were aware, but that their sanctums and laboratories, not designed as such, had ... nothing. No beds, no tables, no windows or light sources.

Each of the characters dealt with this problem in their own way. The grogs and companions happily started building huts in the "endless" (not quite) wheat fields. This was the sane and rational thing to do. Therefore, the magi did not pursue this course.

As a simple introduction to that night's Comedy of Errors, Alciver, Master of Spontaneous Magic and no slouch at Rego (to control) looked at his walls and desired... windows. A little chanting under his breath and a window was dialed into the stone. (Rather sloppy, but still, window.) More casts made a table, a hearth, and a stone bed.

Thus we arrived at the first philosophical quandary of the night. In terms of Aristotelian physics, weight, solidity, and other "aspects" of something are indeed aspects. Due to magic, (Perdo, to destroy), these aspects can be targeted. Thus, you can cast a Perdo Terram (Destroy Earth) spell on a stone and destroy its weight. After a brief think (and then cleaning up the bits of exploded brain) we decided that destroying stone's hardness was outside the scope of what their magics could accomplish. Thus, our innocent, trusting, and naive lad Alciver used Rego Herbam (Control Plants) to weave wheat stalks into quite a few domestic items. (A mattress, window shades, etc.) After a disastrous attempt at making a door, he decided that enough was enough and he'd make one every time he wanted to leave.

Thus ended the sane portion of the night.

Next up, we have the Marineta mage, Calvin. Named, unfortunately, not for the famous philosopher and theologian, but for the comic character. The house Marineta is known for their association and attraction to the Fey. Calvin, unfortunately, suffers from "Big" syndrome. One year into his apprenticeship, he went to sleep in a field and ... spent a busy busy day in Arcadia. He returned to discover that, while no time had passed in the real world, he, himself, was twenty years older.

This put a certain crimp in his apprenticeship. And in him. For he was someone who had spent twenty years as an 8 year old, now in a 28 year old's body. Of other interest, at present, is his uncanny mastery of Animae Magic (not something that everyone can do, thank the gods.) Specifically, he has a focus in Muto (to change) magic with an emphasis on changing things like thoughts and stones... into pesudosentient faeries. Yes, he can turn a thought into a pseudosentient creature. No, he hasn't tried it yet.

So this trick-seeking 8-year old in a 40 year old's body (now that he served out the rest of his apprenticeship) can create friends that most people wish were imaginary. He had a number of objectives. The first was, indeed, to get some light in his rooms. The second was to have a fireplace for his pet dragon. (Very very very small dragon.)

Fnord. And here is where one of his flaws came back to bite him on the ass. Badly. He had (he just retconned it out, I give all players a free retcon at the start of the game) the flaw Chaotic Magic. Basically, for spontaneous spells (I'm going to pull an effect out of my arse, thankyouverymuch) his.... tended to go rather awry.

As all disasters do, it started quietly. He decided to fiddle with his wall. Specifically, he wanted to adjust a property of the stone, he wanted to reduce its opacity. No problems (he was being very conservative.)

Lacking any rego (so he could shape the stone) he decided to be of "assistance" to the other players. (Cue music.) He wandered his way down to Maga Yvonne's Dungeon. It was dark. Very dark. Not in the Gothic architecture (none) or the prison props (few and rusted) but in the complete absence of light sense. Here he met young Alciver, so trusting and naive¹. The "fun" begins as our young friend ponders ways to let light in. Using Intellego Terram (Perceive Earth) he sounded out the ceiling, finding spots that were *not* underneath the temple proper. And then he spun a window. In the ceiling. The subsequent fall of earth (as the basement is a slight distance under the ground and the fields of wheat approach closely to the temple) while disconcerting, would be very useful to the next few people who would "drop in." (Yes, it's funny. Laugh.)

A shaft of sunlight now dimly illuminated the fairly large space. Of course, since the sunlight is going through the functional equivalent of a tube in the ceiling, it's not illuminating much. Or, to phrase the concept in Aristotelian physics, little illumination is reaching objects in the dungeon, meaning they don't give off visual species. (I'm so very glad none of my players is specialized in Imaginem (image) dealing with the concept of species as objects of sensation is a pain.)

And so approaches the ... Merinita. He also gets permission to enter Yvonne's sanctum and promptly acknowledges her request for a window in her ceiling. He happily walks to the center and casts a spontaneous spell.

...

And then a large circle of the ceiling... melts. (Massive overkill on his casting roll, leading to horribly chaotic results.) This melted ceiling still isn't opaque, so he decides to fix the problem by trying again. (Remarkable amounts of overkill on the casting roll later...) and he, instead of turning the ceiling transparent, turns it sentient. (Anyone could make that mistake. REALLY.) This pesudosentience, having just become aware, could speak. It didn't have any understanding of sensation or anything beyond itself.)

About ten minutes of conversation later, the ceiling asks for legs. As a fair number of people have observed, Sentient tools are generally a really bad idea. Sentient structural supports are even worse. The ever "helpful" Alciver casts a bit of rego terram and gives the ceiling legs. Another cast separates the "cone" from the surrounding ceiling and it starts walking around and blundering about, accidentally stepping on Alciver's foot in the process.

A circle of puzzled faces appear around the hole in the ceiling, which is in the direct center of the Temple's sanctuary. Observing the ... cone shaped monstrosity, a quick cast of a spell by Francis bids all life depart from whatever it was. As Calvin ran from the Dungeon, Yvonne and Alciver got a stern talking-to. This lecture, of course, was made worse by a grog falling through the random hole in the ground and landing on the pile of dirt.

Ordered to fix the two holes, Alciver does, which leaves Yvonne back where she started from: in the dark. As Alciver is fixing the holes in the ceiling, Francis comes to Yvonne with an offer: in exchange for an unnamed favor later, he'll provide a globe that's magically bright. After a number of almost certainly well-founded misgivings, she accepts. Of note is his very stern injunction to NOT DROP THE GLOBE. This warning of course aroused the players' curiosity and one of them looked at the globe with second sight. Apparently there's a fire elemental trapped inside.

The globe being carefully emplaced in a corner of the dungeon, the ever helpful (hahaha) Alciver is once again called in to shape some basic amenities. An ominous (though not immediately revealing botch) table creation and lab bench creation later, the lab is once again plunged into darkness as one of the lab benches he shapes engulfs the globe. This is the last straw for Yvonne and she shoos the slightly repentant Alciver out of her space. Carefully "drilling" into the bench with Perdo Terram, she uncovers her globe and rests, now having minimal amenities and space.

The walking locus of catastrophe, Calvin, then went to our humble Alciver to get some modifications to *his* room. A large hearth style fireplace in the middle of the room and, after some negotiations, a chimney completed the modifications. Of course, a hearth demands firewood. Now, the logical thing is to send some nameless grogs out to get firewood. Calvin did nothing of the sort.

Calvin, deciding that he needed a tree to get firewood created four stone homunculi and dispatched them to get a tree from a nearby forest. And off they went. Some time later they came back with a tree. In their zeal they also happened to bring back a tree with a bear in it, which was clinging on desperately. Calvin, standing in the vestibule watched as the homunculi brought the tree, with bear, in. The hapless Bonisagus, still studying the room, blanched and told Calvin to get the damn bear out.

Having his minions retreat out to the "Real World" he followed and heard a slight sound behind him as the Bonisagus locked the regio. Time passed. Meanwhile, Calvin managed to have his Faerie companions shake the tree and get the bear off, which promptly ran away, vowing never to climb a tree for honey again. Around this time, sunset occurred and the spell animating the stone figures faded. Walking back through the now open regio gate, Calvin was disheartened to learn that he wouldn't be allowed to bring his tree through. Sectioning the tree into firewood did the trick and he summoned four more stone homunculi. For the task of carrying the firewood, they demanded a few drops of mother's milk. Each. Negotiations ensued, followed by accusations by the homunculi that Calvin was a member of the bourgeois oppressors and that they were going on strike. He resolved the situation by vowing that he was one of the workers and would help them carry the firewood in.

Fiat Lux!

Having gotten the silly out of their system, the game moved on a day to the Winter Solstice. To celebrate the solstice, the covenant gathered together as a whole. A number of rounds of certamen² were to be fought, to determine resource precedence. The certamen battles will be continued in the next post.

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¹ A note on magi and their labs. Nominally, it is forbidden for magi to do all kinds of nasty things to each other on pain of being splatted. These rules are known as the code (A lovely oath that I'm actually making the magi swear in character. Out loud. ::grin::) The code basically promises immunity against being scryed upon and "depriving of magical power" which is a lovely catch-all that prevents killing and whatnot. However, entering another magi's sanctum/lab means one "forfeits immunity" Of course, the beauty is that the other magi, the one who's sanctum/lab it is doesn't forfeit. Thus, Alciver is quite naive in trusting that Yvonne's word is actually worth a damn when she promises not to magically [expletive] him up in her dungeon.

² Certamen, or game, is a magical, non-lethal duel between two magi of the Order of Hermes. In a house rule, to both make the game more entertaining and to use it as a teaching tool to teach the magic system of the players, each player, on their turn, must use the form and technique to respond to the previous scenario. As an example, consider a Creo Herbam certamen (Create Plant). The first attacker would say "A Great Oak grows in the forest" the second person would then, on his turn go "But an Acorn grows from the oak" The trick is to respond in context of the previous statement using the technique in an interesting way. The audience then votes, giving up to a +3 to either side.

Preparations and Travails

Game 1

Jack, having done the Extremely Detailed and Overly Complex Character Generation (Yes, that's a real option.) is ready. Everyone else finishes up or works on their characters.

Of note are the travails of each set of characters.

Alciver and David go explore his starting covenant, a magic Regionne where instead of matter being the normal stuff it is, things are instead abstract/impressionist reified ideas. (Very odd place) Alciver botches a second sight test and pops back into the "real" (for lack of a better term) world, outside the Regionne. David, meanwhile, encounters the idea of a wolf.

David, being the softhearted giant that he is, wants to play. The wolf wants to savage him. David tussles with the wolf for a while and easily knocks it unconscious. He then brings the wolf, now named Squishy ¹ back to the other grogs and asks if he can keep it. They say yes. He gains a story flaw, Magical Animal Companion.

The focus then shifted to Bonnie and Jen. Yvonne (Bonnie)'s Tytalian master decided to test her by telling her to go rid a village of demons. Bonnie, distaning Jen's assistance rode forth boldy. Jen... followed. Hijinks ensued as they realized that most of the demons were infesting the people of the village as sickness. A cast of Demon's Lasting Oblivion² later and Jen shouting something about demons being begone and the two obviously plague-ridden people were healed. At which point the other demons rushed the pair as a pair of rats. Further hijinks ensued as Bonnie made a ward around the village, trapping the rats inside and Jen wasted the time by crossing and recrossing the ward, just to taunt the rats. Finally, Bonnie spontaneously Perdo Terramed a pit as the ward fell and the rats persued Jen as he ran way. Most of the rats landed in the pit and Jen was (unfortuntely) unharmed. More nuking followed. Bonnie then sent Jen into the pit to retrieve a few of the rat corpses that survived, suspecting that they contained a pawn or two of vis.

Next up was our... touched... Merinita and his companion. A group of bandits³ ambushed them on a forest path as they were traveling to the covenant. Our bard sang a sad sad song with his Enchanting Music. Which worked on everyone but the bandit leader, a born music critic. After again demanding any valuables the pair carried, Calvin walked back to the large sack being carried by one of his Stone Animae ⁴ and, under cover of the sack, cast Pit of the Gaping Earth ^{PeTe 15} which cause the earth under the bandits' feet to briefly disappear. Unfortunately, the nature of Calvin's magic meant that the destruction was only temporary, causing the dirt to reappear in the pit the bandits were already in. None survived.

The final travails included our Syrian? Persian? Mercere Magus (name unknown) and his oh so humble "butler" as they made their way from the Levant through the Mediterranean. Stopping at each covenant they passed, the Magus traded books for books. Of interest was a group of very naughty crusaders who demanded the pair's money and their lives. Misjudging the oh so 'umble servant, the 5 crusaders focused their demands on the Magus. At which point, the humble "butler," displaying a completely astonishing understanding of the blade, slaughtered them from behind. That behind them, they arrived that the covenant unscathed.

The covenant of the Axe and Rods is located near a well-traveled inn on one of the more minor trading roads of the province of Normandy. The inn, an ancient structure (original purpose unknown) now repurposed as an inn is surrounded by magnificent fields of winter wheat. Each set of magi and companion was recognized as they came in the inn and directed to walk out through the field, pick a spike of wheat and walk through two parallel pillars. Each magi, extremely trusting, did so without complaint or question.

Upon walking through the pillars, each pair found themselves in a half-ruined temple to Demeter. Two lamps burned on either side of the altar, prominently illuminating a Fasces standing on the altar. They all found a magi studying the inscriptions in the altar and, after a few false starts, each of them was directed out the temple's door. Of note, the Persian Magus was able to read and easily interpret the ancient Greek writings on the walls.

Once out the door, they came upon yet another Regionne, now cast in sepia tones where the wheat waved in gentle waves and a huge temple to Demeter stood opposite the now small vestibule. Crossing a small stream, each pair, then in turn, met "Francis." A man with a Genuine Smile^TM of the Reverend Moon persuasion. A gentle welcome was had by all. Suites around the temple were allocated with the exception of Yvonne of Tytalus. The Maga was graciously given use of the basement, once a dungeon.

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^[1] An aside about Squishy. Yes, Squishy is a wolf of magic might 11. He's wolf-sized and has the impression of being a painted wolf. (He appears as if he's 2d, and is a collection of brushstrokes. The trick is, you *see* a complete 2d representation of him from wherever you're looking (i.e. many 2d slices of a 3d model) and he does indeed represent the idea of a wolf. This means that many people, just glancing at him see a large dog (Wolfhound). Only people who are trained to actually see what is there realize that they're looking at the idea of a wolf and not the wolf itself.

^[2]Demon's Lasting Oblivion. As Demon's Eternal Oblivion, Level 5, But with a duration of diameter and doing 4 might damage per round. A truly truly evil spell. Does mightily piss off demons.

^[3] (amazing how many generic bandits there are, especially when you walk from one grid square to another and back again a hundred times. ::Grin::

^[4] Animae, pesudosentient faeries created by some of Calvin's spells. Right now he's demonstrated that he can cause faerie homunculi to rise from sculpted stone and clay. Nothing could possibly go wrong here, right?