Stormbringer – The Void Trilogy – Finale Teaser – The Roads Not Travelled

In the relative calm of the realm of the Grey Lords, 2 beings of enormous power, housed in forms that do not show it, watch different images splash across a pool of water beneath them.

A young child with skin of gold stares into the shimmering portal of water. “So, old man. These are the planes where they took different choices?”, he says to the other figure in the Grey Lords’ chambers. An elderly man, almost doubled over, leaning on a gnarled walking stick shoots the child an impatient look.

“Lord of Entropy, you know full well what you are seeing. These are the roads not taken, by the ones who seek to disturb the singular pathway of order.”, the old man splutters angrily at the child.

They both stare into the pool and the vision before them swims into a series of images…

The first image shows the Isle of Melnibone, transformed into a prison by the forces of Law. It shows Leto and Trip climbing out but, this time, Trip manages to survive and they both end up escaping off the Isle together. The image swims and changes once again…

The vision is still of Melnibone, but this time it focuses on the beach. In the distance, the original Merciful Servant has successfully navigated through the coral maze outside Imryrr. The full crew manage to get to the shore including Donny. They manage to rescue MakAye and they all leave the Isle of Dragons, alive. The vision swirls once more…

It shows a jungle setting. Our crew are being chased through the dense vegetation with crystalline discs thudding into the trees beside them as they dash away from the creatures that are chasing them. Strange reptilian creatures, using clubs that appear to propel the crystal discs. It shows them escape into a huge crystal building, where they find primitive Law Machines that they are able to fashion into basic vehicles and weapons in the war against 2-Scratch. The image blurs once more…

This image appears to show Vilmir, but this is the version of it that has been changed by the machinations of Law. It shows our crew, atop one of the white metal worms that speed across the land. They are escaping from Manfreds, who are chasing them across the top of this thing. In the distance behind them, a huge building is in flames, the team having just destroyed the factory that built the thousands of Manfred. The image ripples yet again…

The next image shows our crew approaching a keep at the edge of the world, surrounded by mists that drive anyone within them, insane. The crew, using Orto’s spells manage to get through to the keep. After some struggles, the crew march back out with some of the Young Kingdom’s oldest and most powerful sorcerers, all once thought long dead. The image wavers and changes once again…

This time, the image feels different. “Old man! This is our plane, is it not?”, the golden skinned child asks.

“Yes, this is the version where none of those earlier things happened.”, the old man says wearily.

For the first time in this exchange, the Grey Lords of Balance speak, “This plane still has hope, however slim and tenuous it may be, hope remains. It will all depend on choices made and battles to be won or lost.”

Upon hearing this, the child starts to clap and laugh, while the old man mumbles and shuffles away from the pool. In the pool itself there is an image of a huge fleet of boats, above it, a flight of Dragons soar. Underneath the water, 100 demons stride onwards, and the final image shows a huge crackling doorway opening in the side of a mountain, with thousands of men on horseback waiting to burst through the portal.

“The Battle at the End of Time is nigh.”, says Lord Arioch

Stormbringer – Season 3, Episode 6 – The Drums of War Begin to Sound

The crew writhe around in pain on the library floor. Their bodies being changed by the entropic waves emanating from Balo into them.

Grof and Malrak come off the worst as Balo has deemed them to have failed the trials. They suffer the Curse of Hoss-Hair. Their hands and feet are swapped, giving them the appearance of walking upside down.

Nanny also suffers the same fate, but she appears to be grinning throughout it all, as if she’s enjoying it! (REF NOTE – Nanny/Chloe and Daym/Jamie had also failed the trials, but Balo had not taken into account that the end result was the same. The Balance intervened and gave them the choice of whether to accept the curse or not. Chloe wanted it!)

In addition, the Chaos energy infects all of them. In addition to the curse, Grof has huge sharp quills that sprout out of his back, piercing through his wooden armour. Malrak holds his head in severe pain but has no obvious physical side effects.

Uschi’s tongue grows extraordinarily long, lapping at the air and undulating like a meaty pink snakedance. Shan’s fingertips start to crack and blacken, while Daym appears to have a dark glow all around his hands.

They are all marked by Chaos and, as bad as it seems, it feels like the last time they will have to worry about this happening…

Once they recover and gather themselves, they realise that night has fallen. They have no way of knowing how much time has passed while they were in that infernal jokers realm. They set off back to the town hall back in Menii. When they arrive, they discover that 6 weeks have passed and a lot has happened in their absence.

They are informed that the demons have arrived on the Western coast of the Isle. One of the guard captains leans into the Bear and on tiptoes (to reach her shoulder), he whispers, “They have eaten and they already grow restless.”

“It won’t be long before the population gets wind of this and starts to panic.”, Bear mutters to herself.

In addition to the arrival of the demons, they are informed that 3 messages have arrived for the Jadmiral, all bearing her crest. They think they must be from some of their spies who they had presumed dead.

The scrolls, complete with Bears wax sigil!

The first note she opens is from Silk, one of her best spies. He had been sent to Pan Tang, so had been presumed dead, given the situation there. The message read thus:

The second message was from Cobalt (all the spies were codenamed after materials/minerals). Cobalt is a loyal servant with a very formal air about him. He was sent off to infiltrate some merchant vessels of those that had decided to ally themselves with 2-Scratch. From what had been reported and what she had seen, Bear thought these spies to be a thing of the past as the Manfreds were all but replacing all human agents. The message reads as thus:

The final message was from Copper. Bear really liked him. He was handsome, charismatic, and one of those people who just plain seemed to be good at everything he did. He was always flirtatious around her, and that comes through in the way this message is written. She hopes that he was wrong and somehow survived. The message reads as follows:

All 3 of these messages have huge connotations and must be pondered over, so there aren’t any rash decisions made. Potential allies in Pan Tang, something big being built under the waves of the Oldest Ocean, and notice of many many armies being formed by the forces of Law.

While Bear considers what she has been informed of, the rest of the crew look at the 2 journal sheets that they have already found. The clues are there to be found, and they think they have worked it all out. MakAye, clearly paranoid of all of the 3 main churches, hid the 3 pages in an area that was initially governed by either Law, Chaos, or Balance. The tavern was a place of Chaos, the Library (at least before Balo intervened), which was a place of Balance. This left only a place of Law. With a little thought from those who were native to the Isle, Grof remembers a place out in the northernmost tip of the Isle that was renowned for having an aura of Law. Grof begins to tell them of the Springs of Donblas!

Rodders enjoying the curse of Hoss Hair!

The Springs of Donblas – A natural occurring perpetual motion cycle. At the northernmost tip of the Isle, there is a mountain with a waterfall that pours off the end of it. In the ground at a mid-plateaux is a sinkhole that collects the same water. This apparently leads to underground hot springs that heats the water super-fast where it turns to steam, which rises back to the top of the mountain where it cools and reverts to water, that leads back to the waterfall.

Its calming nature and aura of Law negates all Chaos magic in that area. Back in the days before 2-Scratch, the churches of Law would go on pilgrimages there, taking the neophytes there for early trials. If this is where the last page is, whoever goes there must not have to rely on any Chaos magic.

Bear comes to a conclusion and gives out the orders. Daym and Shan will go north to the Springs. Daym has no affinity with any church and is a capable warrior, and Shan, although he is a worshipper of Chaos, he is a capable warrior without any of the boons bestowed by his weapon crafting. Bear will take Grof with her to travel to the West of the Isle, where Gaynor and his demons now reside. Malrak will remain in Menii, with the churches of Chaos where he will work up the ritual for the Hells Gate.

Daym and Shan set off immediately for the Springs. It is a fair distance, but on horseback and at speed, they can be there within the day. Due to its nature, as a merchant hub, the bulk of the population is in Menii and around it. There are some villages further out, but they are rare and are set in beautiful countryside. Unfortunately, a lot of it has been ravaged by the occupation of the Forces of Law from last year. As they travel through the Isle, they come across a few abandoned villages, some still with dead bodies decomposing away in them.

They travel through these without waiting around to look any closer, remembering Bear’s words before they left, “Remember, the forces of Law are ready to attack any moment. I need you back as soon as possible. If you get distracted along the way, do not bother to return.”

Just as the sun starts to set, they reach the mountain that Grof described. It is awe inspiring to look at, especially as the waterfall hits some ledge further up. This will be their destination. It is an arduous climb, but between them both and some use of rope, they make it up without any issue. Once they get to the ledge (a misleading term as it is a huge area), they are struck by the magnificence of the waterfall and the feeling of serenity, emptiness and order that overcomes them both while standing here.

Daym and Shan, between them, discover a whole mess of footprints in the mud around the lake that forms there. Daym recognises one of the sets as MakAyes’ (He travelled with him for many years), but the rest of the footprints look like those of the Manfreds. In particular, they work out that the Manfreds must have been injured as some of the tracks are dragged lines as if pulling an injured leg behind them. They guess correctly that the injured units must have been attracted to this place due to the aura of Law here.

All tracks lead underneath the waterfall itself, which appears to be a cave of some sort. They have come this far and can’t return empty-handed. With a resigned sigh, Shan and Daym follow the trail underneath the waterfall.

Bear and Grof travel to the West of the Isle, where Gaynor and his demons currently reside. As they get close to the outskirts, they can already hear the screams of the women, elders, and children that Bear had sent here as food for the deal she made with these infernal beasts. One of these creatures, a pale grey-skinned creature with many sickly looking tentacles that undulate above it’s blob-like torso, starts to slither towards them. It lets out a high-pitched gurgling sound that attracts the attention of another one. This type looks like an 8 foot tall bear, but in its body are many mouths, all of which say in a whispering mess, “FRESH SOULS!!!“

It is only then that Bear realises what she will have to do. She will have to let Nos Fera take the wheel. (REF NOTE – Sara genuinely had not thought this through, and this moment was a very unwelcome shock. She loses POW points directly to the beast when she let’s it take over and this particular occasion shifts the balance so that it now has 2 thirds of her soul (12 POW), leaving her with only 1 third (6 POW). It will now be able to start forcing takeovers…

Grof had heard of this situation happening, and the rumours were such that the demon that lives within Bear had once tried to eat Nanny! He looks at Bear’s now transformed face, with her eyes now like smouldering coals in her head, and she says one word as she turns to him, “LUNCH!!!“, and she pounces towards his neck!

Grof, having readied himself for this, is able to sidestep out of her/ its reach and, without a second thought, he turns on his heel and runs back towards the road to Menii. He successfully gets away from being Nos Fera’s lunch! (REF NOTE – I award Richie some on the spot Chaos points as a reward for not trying anything silly and putting himself at risk.)

With the human gone, the Bear-like demon approaches Nos Fera like a friend. Nos demands to speak with Gaynor, and the Bear creature tells it that he is down on the coast, corrupting the wildlife. Nos Fera makes its way through the village and smiles as it sees the demons have continued to torment the souls here, much like the ones on the Sorcerer’s Isle. They keep them on the brink of death through painful torture and then lay on healing hands to return them to full life. This allows them to drag out the cycle of torment forever.

As it strides past this and onto the coast, it can see Gaynor in the water up to his waist. He appears to be summoning large marine life to him, only to somehow infect them with the raw stuff of Chaos. As Nos approaches him, he is releasing a dolphin that has been blackened and warped by his efforts.

“I grow bored, mortal. We will need war, or we will need to feed once more.” Gaynor says as he strides back out of the water onto the beach where Nos stands waiting.

They speak for a while, Bear asking Nos Fera to ask some specific questions for her, some of which he refuses, just to show that he is more in power now than he has ever been. It asks Gaynor to take some of his demons and attack the ships of Law outside Pan Tang. Gaynor laughs at this, and outright refuses. “It is not because I want to make you suffer, although I do enjoy that,” Gaynor says with what Nos guesses is a grin beneath the helm, “But the engines that keep the mortals trapped would also render my demons powerless. This will not work.”

Nos, realising that not only does he realise that what Gaynor says is true, he also does not even care in the slightest about any of this. It decides to make the most of the amenities around it and spends the rest of the night feasting and torturing the poor souls of the Isle of the Purple Towns. It will be morning before it will give control of the meat sack back to the Bear and allow her to stagger back to Menii.

Meanwhile, back at The Springs of Donblas, Daym and Shan venture inside the cave underneath the waterfall. It is extremely dark underneath, but the light from outside is strong enough to give them a minimal amount of visibility as their eyes get used to it. Unfortunately, this is at the same point as they notice something moving at the back of the cave, clearly awoken by their entrance to the cave. What they see is hard to comprehend and strikes fear straight into their hearts.

It would appear that several Manfred had crawled into the cave and tried to repair themselves, only to end up attaching themselves to each other. The thing before them had many legs, giving it the appearance of a large white metal spider. Atop it are several bodies, all sticking out at odd angles with arms all over the top of the thing. Luckily, only 4 of the arms appear to be operational. 2 of them have the usual vibrating blades that the crew are used to fighting against, but the other 2 were things they had never seen before. Both are strange barrels of metal with many holes in. One of them has a black and charred edge, while the other has a cracked and white frosted look to it.

As it suddenly and surprisingly quickly scuttles towards them, they both react instinctively. With a loud and simultaneous shout of “CHEESE IT!!!”, they turn and run out of the cave, away from this confined space.

Shan runs out and jumps nimbly to the rope that they have left that leads to the very top of the mountain. Daym, not quite as nimble as Shan, starts the slow climb of the mountainside itself. They glance down from the mountain at the waterfall and, peering out from underneath the water, stands this huge metal monstrosity. They see before them, the Many-Fred!

The Many-Fred attacks the one closest to it, Daym. The MF swings with the blades first and manages to slam into the shield on Daym’s back, damaging it but protecting him from the brunt of the swipes. The attack from the barrel-arms still takes them by surprise as one of them belches out a huge fiery cloud while the other produces a freezing cold cloud of death! Luckily for Daym, the cold burst misses him, although he does feel the icy chill all over him. The fiery cloud, however, connects fully with him and although his shield manages to protect him from most of it, he does feel some of it harm his skin and, most worryingly, he is still on fire as he climbs!

Shan sees the opportunity as Daym draws its attention and drops back to the mid-plateaux, hitting the ground and runs back into the cave. He begins looking for the journal page, knowing that he will have to find it and get out as soon as possible, or Daym will fall to this thing!

Daym manages to climb back up to the top again. Instead of running, he stops, turns, and unstraps his shield from his back. Still burning in his hands, he jumps astride it and launches himself straight at the Many-Fred that is still reaching for him. The plan is extraordinarily successful!

Riding the burning shield like a sledge, he dives off the top plane, gathering speed and then striking the MF directly in its centre! It creates a huge shower of sparks and flames as it strikes, the inertia of his body and the burning metal managing to crack lots of the limbs and bodies. It hits with enough force to take it off the edge of the mountain, and it falls burning to the floor, causing even more damage. Daym manages to jump free but does take a little damage himself as he rolls back across the plateaux floor.

Shakily, it rights itself and turns back to face Daym belching angry clouds of fire and ice at him. As he no longer has a shield, Daym scrambles backwards away from it, feeling intense pain as the clouds simultaneously burn and freeze his skin.

Shan, back inside the cave, manages to find MakAye’s tracks, leading him to the final page of the journal. Resisting the urge to stop and read it now, he is reminded of the predicament outside as he can see the sky light up orange and the silhouette of Daym in the middle of it. He runs straight out of the cave and past them both as he strides for the edge of the waterfall. Daym, seeing this and clocking the page in Shan’s hand as he puts it into his tunic, begins to run towards the edge of the cliff face, too.

Shan, surprisingly manages to do so extremely nimbly, his feet finding all the smooth flat areas under the water, allowing him to get to the edge and jumping off within seconds (REF NOTE – Ceirun manages to roll a critical success at just the right moment). Daym is not so lucky and yet again feels the pain of the clouds and one of the blade arms as the Many-Fred takes out its frustrations and pain on him.

Daym runs as fast as he can towards the edge of the cliff, and the world appears to slow down around him. The MF slices with one of the blades but misses him, swiping above his head and causing him to flinch instinctively away from it. The next arm-blade is coming straight at his neck, and Daym thinks that this is the end (REF NOTE – I have rolled a critical success for the attack roll. Double damage will make mincemeat of his armour and will very likely take out what is left of his hit points).

Seeing this coming at his head, his only hope is to launch himself forward and hug the floor, which will slow him down, but give him a chance of keeping his head. He tries it, and it works surprisingly well, even managing to roll forward back onto his feet and into a dive off the cliff, as he avoids the blade altogether! (REF NOTE – If you have a critical attack incoming, a successful dodge will bring that damage down to normal, and a critical success Dodge roll will negate it altogether. That is what Jamie managed to do! The room went mental, including me. I am not a REF who sees himself as the ‘enemy’ of the players).

Shan, by now, has managed to swim out of the lake and stands ready to go. He looks up and sees Daym, who has managed to jump but he can see that he has landed awkwardly in the water and doesn’t look like he is able to come up (REF NOTE – After all the good rolls, Jamie managed to roll a critical fumble for his Swim roll). Shan stops and considers things for a moment. The MF is starting to slowly climb down to the bottom lake, so if he stays to help Daym, he puts the journal at risk. If he leaves Daym to likely die, he will ensure the journal is preserved.

Shan turns and leaves Daym to his fate.

Daym struggles as water fills his lungs. His vision blurs, and his awareness starts to blink out as he can feel his arms and legs become too heavy to move. It is purely by the power of his stubborn belief that he needs no gods and has all the power he needs that he somehow manages to drag himself out and miraculously escapes intact.

The journey back is uneventful for Shan, despite how exhausted he is having now travelled for nearly a whole 24 hours without sleep. He staggers back into Menii and hands the last page over to Bear before collapsing. Bear proceeds to read the last page of the journal out to everyone, giving the last page to Bear, who reads to everyone:

REF NOTE – I use music as an integral part of my sessions, and for every time a player reads out a journal page, I play “Exit Music For a Film” by Radiohead. On this occasion, the speed of which Sara read this out, combined with the timing of the song meant that the ‘dirty bassline’ came in from the song just as she read out the paragraph where Lilith Moonsong swears to kill all the gods. For me, it was a chefs kiss moment.

Grof is unable to accept the curse that has been laid upon him by Balo. His ability to fight has been heavily affected and feels that he will be unable to contribute to this magnificent war that he feels he has been training his whole life for and decides to see if he can play the gods off against each other. He is desperate to reverse the curse and is ready to promise whatever is asked of him. Hearing that Xiombarg and Arioch are looking to embarrass each other, he heads for the temple of the Queen of Swords.

As he approaches the temple, a woman in armour that barely covers her naked flesh strides seductively down the steps towards him. She introduces herself as the high priest of the temple and tells him that she knows who he is and why he is there. She offers to reverse the curse to annoy Arioch, but in return, he must serve the temple of Xiombarg after the battle. If he survives, his soul is theirs, and he will never leave the temple again.

Grof considers for a second and then spits on the floor between them, turning away from the now laughing priestess. He strides from there directly to the Arioch temple. He explains what has just happened and how he was tempted by the Queen of Swords. This attempt to lie to the priest of Arioch works! He is taken into the bowels of the temple and is the centre of a ritual that takes all night.

The next morning, Grof emerges fully restored!

Everyone eventually reconvenes at the town hall the next morning, even Daym, who surprises everyone with his return. He is promptly patched up by the court sorcerers, and his shield and armour are replaced. The Bear states that she now has a plan for what is needed, but primarily, preparations are now in place to set sail within days. Malrek has worked out the ritual for Hells Gate, and, as vile as it is, the Pan Tangian sorcerers that remain believe that it will work. They have also heard from the ship that they sent back to the tribesmen of the Weeping Wastes, and they stand ready to come through the gate when it appears.

The Bear looks across the room at all of her friends, the Sea-Chiefs, and the sorcerers and says solemnly, “By the week’s end, we will take the fight to the enemy. We will fight for the very soul of the Young Kingdoms!”

Thus ends the penultimate episode of the final season of Stormbringer, the Void Trilogy. How will Bear decide to assign troops? Will she prioritise the attack on Vilmir, or will she go all out on the new dig site? Will she try to free Pan Tang, or will she not risk the troops in case of failure? Most importantly of all, have the crew managed to get enough armies to stand a chance against the forces of Law and is MakAye right about being able to redeem someone at the very heart of this story? Find out in the season and story finale – The Battle at the End of Time, at Newport Games Club on April 7th.

Stormbringer, Season 3, Episode 5 – The Trials of Balo

We catch up with our intrepid crew as they hunt for the pages that MakAye found important, even though it is not obvious as yet why he thought so. Their journey took them to what was once the ruins of a great library. A place of Balance, but it has been corrupted. A void of pure Chaos now resides in the main courtyard. One by one, they were either pulled in or jumped in to rescue others.

They each find themselves falling through the void, seemingly random images all around them, ever changing. This is the stuff or raw Chaos. Again, they hear that sound, like the bells at the end of a Jester’s headpiece followed by a cruel laugh. Nanny can now see Daym falling beside her, and he is drifting dangerously close to her. They are about to hit each other at this speed, and Nanny will definitely come off worse for it!

As she braces for impact, closing her eyes (a futile gesture as she is already blind!) and waits for the pain, something altogether unexpected happens. They start to slip through each other as if they were made of water! As trhis happens, each starts to see confusing and horrific images from each other’s pasts and present. They each can feel that the Chaos god of mischief, Balo, is playing with them as the curse sets in.

The same happens to Bear and Shan and to Malrak and Grof.

REF NOTE – In tonight’s episode, I decided to use a story mechanism that I had used once before with a different player group for Deadlands, probably over a decade ago. I told each of the duos to swap character sheets and that, although they were still themselves in terms of memories and motivations, they were in the others’ body. I told them they had to adopt all of the other characters’ features, body language, and voices. I can honestly say that this was hands down the funniest session we have played to date. We laughed until people were sore. There are videos of some of it, but one of the people in them is away in India at present, so I won’t post them until I can get permission to do so. It is hilarious, though.

Each duo wakes up in an unfamiliar place and, what is worse, in an unfamiliar body!

Daym and Nanny awake in what Nanny recognises as Vilmir, but it is clearly free of the clutches of Law. She has a faint memory of this place and even this time. This is a moment from her past! Unfortunately, every time she reaches into her memory for the event, it seems to squirm away from her. This is the work of Balo. This god likes to play games, and they are the pawns in this game today.

Daym is not the brightest spark normally, but he finds himself in a much more intelligent but decrepit body! On a positive note, this appears to be before she was marked by Balaan and is therefore not blind. Nanny, however, is feeling the effects of being considerably dumber than usual and unable to speak properly. She tries her best to explain what she thinks is happening to Daym, who is in the body of Nanny (REF NOTE – Part of this conversation is the aforementioned video and you can hear me laughing until I cough up a lung.).

Once they understand this insane situation a little better, Nanny realises that this is a large grassland in the estate of the Hazzard family, who she served for many many years, and in the distance is Hazzard House. To make movement quicker, Daym carries Nanny on his back (REF NOTE – “Yoda style” were the words used) and starts to walk towards the manor house. They are soon seen by one of the guards there and told that Lord Hazzard wants to see her. Again, Nanny has faint memories of this day but is not allowed to remember any of the details.

Meanwhile, Shan and Bear come around chained by the hands and feet in the galley of a Pan Tangian slave ship. Bear, now in the body of Shan, remembers something of this time, but the events of this particular day escape her. Shan, now in the very large female body of Bear has no idea what is going on at all! (REF NOTE – Sara does a very decent and extremely consistent Russian accent for Bear and Ceirun who is not normally one to do any voices for his characters at all now has to try and do what Sara would. The result is something like the Count from Sesame Street and is also one of the funniest things I have heard. Cue everyone laughing until almost injury).

The slaves sat in the oar positions behind them, start kicking the duo. Shan, in the body of Bear, decides to inform the guards of this behaviour, earning the slaves behind a vicious whipping and making the Bear a new pair of enemies. They both realise that this is not a good place to be and try to break the chains that bind them. Shan, now able to use the massive size and strength of Bear, pulls mightily on the chains but still has no effect. Bear, in the body of Shan, also tries (REF NOTE – Sara rolls a critical fumble) and only manages to pull their head forward into the oar, dazing them momentarily.

Bear knows that this day is important but can not remember why it was so. Something is playing with them. She has a bad feeling about this.

Malrak and Grof come around in a very noisy and joyous environment. They appear to be in a tavern on the outskirts of the Isle of the Purple Towns. They, too, go through the same confusion as they realise that they are swapped. Grof has faint memories of this place and time. This was from a key part of his life, the trials of Chaos that he passed and was given the mark on his face from. He can remember that he passed, but he can’t seem to remember how. This was the drink he had with his friends the morning of the trials. He is overcome by a feeling of guilt but has no idea why.

As they are in a tavern, and as they have no idea what is happening, they each decide to get into the swing of things. It will be easier to explain why Grof is acting so differently if her is drunk. They start quaffing drinks and singing with their friends (REF NOTE – I tell the rest of the players to feel free to play all of Grofs drunken friends, and they don’t hold back. They start chanting his name while peer pressuring him to down his ales, etc).

Back in Hazzard House, Nanny, in the body of Daym, finds Dukesa crying in her room. Dukesa was one of the twin children that Nanny brought up for the Lord and Lady of the manor. She tries to comfort her and find out what is wrong, but Dukesa sees this as something else and starts to flirt with Nanny/Daym. It is very odd and awkward, with Nanny being relieved to be summoned away again by the guard. They are called into the lounge where Lord and Lady Hazzard are sat waiting for them.

“Ah, Nanny. There you are.”, says Lord Hazzard while swilling a large, expensive brandy in an ornate carved glass. “These bloody kids have been out causing trouble again. Aren’t we paying you to stop this from happening?”

Daym, in the body of Nanny, opens his mouth to protest, but Lord Hazzard doesn’t give him any opportunity to speak before starting again. “One of them, it would appear Dukesa, has been gambling in that rowdy tavern in town. You know the one, it’s run by that horrid woman, Belatrix. She has lost a lot of money that she didn’t have and has come crawling to me to pay it.”

Again, Daym/Nanny starts to say something only to be cut off while his/her mouth is still open, “As this is your bloody fault for not keeping an eye on them, you will take this bag of money back to the tavern and pay this woman off before it gets out of hand. Understand?”

Again, Daym/Nanny opens her mouth but knows what’s coming as he cuts her off, “Jolly good. Here, then. Off you pop.”, he says as he throws a leather bag full of large bronze. They both leave Hazzard House to set off for the tavern. Nanny in the body of Daym knows the way. It is then that they both feel their consciousness slip away to somewhere else, and they both feel the presence of a Chaos god before them. Balo speaks…

Meanwhile, back in the Pan Tangian slave galley, Shan and Bear have just about gotten used to their swapped situation and are now trying to work out why this has happened and what they need to do to get out of it. As they are planning how to do this, the guards come back and begin to unchain them from the galley. They are still chained together by hands and feet but are at least able to move. They are taken above board and onto land. Bear, in the body of Shan, stops suddenly in her tracks as she sees a face approaching her through the crowd of slaves that she remembers. It is Salazar the Handsome! He was a beautiful man whom Bear was once deeply in love with through this horrific period of her life. He strides towards her, and she instinctively gets ready for an embrace. Of course, he walks straight past her and hugs Shan, who is in her body. Shan looks petrified.

“Bear, my love! Today is a day that we may be able to leave this place behind! I have overheard the guards talking, and it would seem that a merchant will be coming to us today in search of slaves with sailing experience. If you can convince him that you have these skills, you will be taken. We will be taken! You must convince them, my love! Our life on the open seas can begin properly!”

Shan tries to answer as best as he thinks Bear would but falls over his words as he realises that this man had relations with Bear and does not want to encourage this happening while he is in her. Luckily for him, the guards usher them into a huge dockside warehouse where they are to wait until they are summoned by the prospective buyer. As they wait, they both feel their consciousness slip away to somewhere else, and they both feel the presence of a Chaos god before them. Balo speaks…

Back at the tavern in the Isle of Purple Towns, Malrak and Grof are taken out with the crowd as they set off for the location of the trials. Grof, still in the gnarled and wizened body of Malrak, can’t quite remember the way as he was indeed very drunk at this point in real life. Following the crowd is easy, though. They travel out to the Western side of town, into the wilderness, until they eventually find a campsite full of tents and others who are here for the trials.

As they start to get comfortable and try to sober up a bit, a large man in a black cloak and high collars strides into the centre of the field. His voice is unnaturally loud and clear, and he states, “Welcome one and all to this day of challenge. Today, you have been chosen to see if you are worthy of Arioch himself! You will soon be allowed to wander these plains, where you will find many challenges. Beasts of ferocious Chaos that will seek to tear you limb from limb. If you survive this day, by whatever means necessary, you will be deemed as being chosen by Arioch and will become a warrior for his cause. He may even bestow upon you a gift. Good luck, and may Arioch be with you!”

As they start to take this in and as Grof tries to remember what happened that day and why he is feeling a little guilty, they both feel their consciousness slip away to somewhere else and they both feel the presence of a Chaos god before them. Balo speaks…

REF NOTE – It is here that the trials themselves begin in earnest. I give a handout to the players of Nanny, Grof, and Bear and have a chat with them as they read it. These notes are below:

Nanny’s Memories

You remember this day well, and despite who you are, you do feel some guilt about this one.

Dukesa had lost a lot of money at gambling, and even if the debt is paid, she has insulted Belatrix, and someone has to get hurt. Despite doing everything you could to resolve the situation, taking the money back to the gangster’s lair, you could not resolve it.

Unfortunately, you knew that the Lord and Lady would not punish Trip as he was the favourite, so you got him blamed for it when the decision came around. The price was that the lord and lady got beaten for the trouble, and Trip was sent away to find his life.

If it was left as it was, the lord and lady would have let Dukesa get killed “To teach her a lesson”.

Hopefully, Daym will know you well enough to know that this is what you would have done. Despite being a Chaos sorceress, you loved those kids and would’ve done whatever you could to save them.

Somehow, you know that if he takes a different path to you, you will both be punished by whatever force has you kept here…

Note to Chloe!

You must not speak to Jamie or give him any clues as to what choice he must make. Feel free to react to his choices, but other than that, just watch it and have fun with seeing how they interpret how you would act. 😊

Grof’s Memories

You remember this day well, and despite who you are, you do feel some guilt about this one.

This is the day of your trials to be accepted as a Chaos warrior. You made your way through it and used all of your friends around you. You sacrificed them, one by one. Your reward by the end of the day was to be warped by Chaos and accepted by your god.

Hopefully, Malrak will know you well enough to know that this is what you would have done. Despite being a loyal friend, you would have done whatever it took to pass these tests.

Somehow, you know that if he takes a different path to you, you will both be punished by whatever force has you kept here…

Note to Richie!

You must not speak to Rodders or give him any clues as to what choice he must make. Feel free to react to his choices, but other than that, just watch it and have fun with seeing how they interpret how you would act. 😊

Bear’s Memories

You remember this day well, and despite who you are, you did do something good here.

This day was one where you did whatever it took to be picked by Leto. You murdered several friends of yours in some very different and colourful ways. The bit that stood out was that you had the chance to kill your loved one of the time (Salazar the Handsome), but your love for him stopped you from doing that.

It didn’t matter as Leto still chose you anyway, but you didn’t know that would happen.

Somehow, you know that if he takes a different path to you, you will both be punished by whatever force has you kept here…

Note to Sara!

You must not speak to Ceirun or give him any clues as to what choice he must make. Feel free to react to his choices, but other than that, just watch it and have fun with seeing how they interpret how you would act. 😊

I then speak to the players of Daym, Malrak, and Shan and explain that they must now ensure they make the same decisions as their counterpart, or they will suffer the price from Balo. They are now on their own.

Daym, now alone in the body of Nanny, walks angrily into town in search of a tavern that she has no idea of the location of. She gets lost and nearly into a fight with a surly local, forgetting that he is no longer in his big, strong body but eventually happens to stumble upon it. She marches inside and is greeted by several swords levelled at her, along with what she can only assume is this Belatrix woman. Very haggard, almost skin and bone with messy brown hair and very few teeth. She grins at Nanny and says, “So, do you have the money from your brat? Yes, I know who you are. I know everything about you all.”

“You’re a very rude woman,” says Daym, trying his best to act like she would have. “If you were my child, I would give you the itch!”, “As it is, I shall just give you the money and be on my way.”

Daym throws the bag onto the floor in front of the rude woman, and before she can even check, the contents are correct, turns around, and walks back in what she hopes is the direction of Hazzard House. In his head, Daym, once again hears the voice of Balo saying, “She did do this.” “Is this it?”, he thinks to himself. “It doesn’t feel like anything has changed. It can’t be that easy, can it?”

Shan, still stuck in the body of Bear, but now alone amongst all of these slaves, sees the ones that she got a beating for earlier in the galley. They are striding towards her with clear violence in their eyes. Shan reacts instinctively and, using Bear’s magnificent size and strength, manages to avoid a blow coming at her and grips the attacker by the neck, snapping it like a dry twig. The body drops to the floor, still attached to another slave who seems to have lost all energy for a fight…

In his head, Shan once again hears the voice of Balo saying, “She did do this.” He is making progress! He can get them out of this! He starts to kill slaves indiscriminately but suddenly hears that voice again but with a mocking gleeful tone say, “She did NOT do this.” Then, the fear of the unknown starts to creep in as he realises that he has no idea what she did that day. “We’re fucked.”, he says to himself.

Meanwhile, the trials begin for Malrak, now alone and in the body of Grof. Everyone splits up and heads in different directions. Not knowing where to go, he follows some of the friends that he recognises from the tavern. He can see his friend crouching behind a tree that overlooks a pit below. Inside the pit is a Chaos Butterfly. One of the most fearsome creatures that walks this land! His friend has not seen him as he studiously watches the creature below.

Malrak wonders what Grof would’ve done in this situation and decides that he would have faced the creature head-on. He jumps into the pit, misjudging how deep it was and injuring himself as he lands. He hears a voice in his head, Balo, saying, “He did NOT do this.”, The vicious creature immediately swings towards him and approaches, its long metal claws glistening in the sunlight. Malrak/Grof draws his weapon and swings a mighty blow that connects into the creature, causing it to screech in pain but doesn’t stop it. It swings both sets of razor-sharp steel talons at him, connecting across his belly and the second at his throat. It kills him instantly (REF NOTE – I rolled a critical success).

The last thing he hears is the mocking voice of Balo stating, “He did NOT do this. You will suffer the curse of Horsehair.”, followed by maniacal laughter.

Daym/Nanny makes her way back to Hazzard House, but unfortunately for her, Belatrix and her goons have followed closely behind her. Belatrix shouts from the grounds outside the house that she has lost face due to the situation and demands more recompense. She demands that the one responsible for the debt is sent out to face punishment. Lord Hazzard turns to Daym/Nanny and asks, “Nanny! This is unacceptable! One of these children is to blame for this and will have to face up to it. Which one goes out there? Is it Dukesa, who is likely to be at fault here and deserves everything she bloody well gets, or is it to be Trip, my darling boy, who was likely duped?”

Daym now realises that this is the moment. This is the choice that will dictate whether he succeeds or fails the Trials of Balo. He thinks and realises that Nanny loved those children, both of them. As clearly and as confidently as he can, given he is speaking with an old maid’s voice, he says, “I am responsible for their behaviour. I will take the punishment. Not one hair will be harmed on either of their heads!”.

Daym then hears that voice in his head again, Balo, “She did NOT do this. You will suffer the curse of Horsehair.”, followed by maniacal laughter. Everything goes black as the Hazzard House fades away from his vision.

Shan/Bear finally realises that Bear would’ve eliminated any and all competition by killing slaves that she knew had sailing experience. He starts to methodically take them out in the crowded warehouse, one by one. Each time he does so, he hears Balo’s voice, saying, “She did do this.”

He has now nearly completed his task when something hits him. The last person on the list that represents a risk to her being picked is none other than Salazar the Handsome, the love of Bear’s life. He realises that this is it. This is the choice that will dictate whether or not he passes these trials. Would Bear have killed the love of her life just to make sure she was freed?

With a heavy heart, he calls Salazar to him and asks for his hands. (REF NOTE – I thought he was going to kill him and fail here). As Salazar gives his hands freely to the woman he loves, Shan/Bear twists them awkwardly and, with a loud cracking noise, breaks both of his wrists. “It is for the best, my love. It is better than the alternative.”

As he does this, he sees the Captain of the boat who is looking to buy crew, and he recognises a younger looking Leto. This was the moment that he brought her into his crew, into his family, and into his heart. His vision fades as he hears the voice of Balo state, “She did NOT do this… but the result was the same. You have passed the trials of Balo.

The crew all wake up on the ground inside the library. The Chaos vortex has now gone, replaced by the second page of the journal. They all check to make sure they are themselves, which they are, and there is no evidence of any curse to be seen. “Maybe we all passed?”, says Shan, looking around at everyone.

Grof, happy to be back in his own body but worried that something bad is coming their way, picks up the journal page, and begins to read it out loud:

The Unknown Pages

Scribbled in what must be MakAye’s handwriting on the front page is the sentence – “The more I read of this journal, the more I realise that this is vital. I know that ‘my’ crew almost went down this road but failed. I must try to do it better this time, even if I have no memory of what it is I must do!.”

It is the 17^th year since my birth. The gods appear to like what I do. I have an affinity for killing and the priests of the temple of Arioch keep telling me that I am belov’d of our god. I will be given my first official task soon. Mother and father are very proud.

I feel nothing.

On the following page, in clearer handwriting:

My first ‘real’ kill was easy. As I slit his throat, I saw the fear in his eyes and I felt nothing. Did he have family? Children who will miss him? A wife who loves him?

A brother or sister whose life will be empty when they are gone?

I miss Terrayne.

The third page, written in much clearer writing is the following:

The 19^th year of my life. Mother and father are very proud of my work for the church, but I do not want this! I have lost count of the kills I have carried out. My parents tell me that every one of them was the will of Arioch and needed. “who are we to question the ways of the gods?”, father would always say when I challenged him.

I continue to kill.

The fourth and final page has this along with some further words from MakAye:

I had to murder a family today. Their only crime was that they worshipped the church of law. I saw the look on the young girl’s face as I slaughtered her brother in front of him.

I told father that this was the last time. I saw Terrayne’s face on the boy I killed and my own on the girl, just before I cut her head off. He has convinced me that my feelings are insignificant compared to the work for the church.

My love for him and mother is too great. I will close my feelings off and do as they wish.

Makaye has written here – “My feelings of frustration are so great that I cannot express it in words. I have to trust that I have some success in finding this plane’s version of my crew. They may know what all this means but I have to be sure that this does not fall into the wrong hands. I will separate the pages into the 3 different points of the universe, that way, there is a hope that there is enough diversity of faith to protect the whole journal. I worry that I will not survive this time. I dream of severe head pain and giant bat ears.”

As he finishes speaking, he looks around at everyone and is about to speak when he is suddenly wracked by pain all over his body. He can see that everyone else is experiencing the same pain and that their bodies are being warped by raw, primaeval Chaos.

The curse of Balo is taking effect.

What does the second journal page mean, and why is this so important? What will the curse of Balo represent, and why is it happening to everyone? How close is war now, and will they have time to get the 3rd and final journal entry? Find out in the next episode of Stormbringer, The Void Trilogy, Season 3, Episode 6 – The Drums of War Begin to sound, to be aired in Newport Games Club on Sunday March 10th

Stormbringer, Season 3, Episode 4 – The Legacy of MakAye

From the side of the mountain, there can be seen two men struggling to keep their footing as they descend, holding the ends of a huge kite-shield. Lying on that shield is Shan. He has been stabilised but has lost a lot of blood from the horrific wound in his leg. They eventually manage to get to the plateaux where they found Galadreak’s tent and decide that this is probably a good place to rest. One of his remaining men takes the top branch that keeps the roof of the tent stable and begins to whittle away at it, covering the top with some cloth ripped from his dirty cloak. He hands it to Shan, “Here. If we are to face the Last Clan, you should really be on your feet, especially if you are to face your death.”

Reluctantly, but with a resigned agreement, he takes it and struggles to his feet. The rest of the trial takes a bit longer to traverse, but they soldier on. As they get closer to the ground, they can see the tribesmen below. The lights from their burning torches show much activity, like demonic ants in motion after their home has been kicked by a god.

At the base of the trail, where the pathway leads into the tribe’s camp, they get the reception that they were expecting. Hundreds of tribesmen are all holding weapons of many varieties. *THWUP-THUD*, an arrow is released and strikes the ground mere inches away from Shan’s foot. The tribe’s chief steps forth, a man wearing a complex headdress and a painted face standing by his side.

“You have accepted your fate, I see. Throw down your weapons and kneel to allow yourself to be bound. Your sacrifice in the camp will be swift this time.”, the chief says. Shan tries to explain what they have done and how important it is that they are allowed to leave, but the chief will not be swayed. Shan knows that if the chief was to allow them to go unpunished, he would look weak in front of his tribe.

Realising how futile it is and knowing that they would be killed here and now if they didn’t comply, Shan throws his great claw-sword to the floor and nods to his men to do the same. Within seconds, they are bound by the hands and being taken to the stakes that Shan was held at previously, only now, there are another two prepared.

A large crowd begins to gather around them, here to see the strangers sacrificed to the elements. Tinderwood is being carried towards them. The chief really is wasting no time at the risk of them somehow escaping this fate. Shan knows that he has very little time to turn this around.

“I killed him, you know. The Sad God.”, Shan shouts coldly at the chief as he walks away with what Shan now realises to be his Shaman.

“Do you not see that the curse has been lifted?”, he follows up.

The chief, currently walking towards his great tent, is stopped in his tracks by the Shaman, and they speak quietly. Shan focuses on them and tries to listen to the conversation. He catches the gist. Essentially, the Shaman this could be connected to some prophecy of theirs. Shan can use this.

“I have killed the god, as he had asked. He has gifted me the Shield of Law. He said that it was as written.”

The chief, clearly now in a difficult position, makes a decision. He nods to his men, who light burning brands. The Shaman, however, does not seem so sure. He is visibly angered by the chief’s decision and leans in again. This time, his words are louder, angrier.

“My lord. If this is the prophecy and you kill them, you will bring the wrath of the gods down upon us! I implore you to take some time to think this through. You will lose the respect of the tribe and you will lose me!”

With a look of utter hatred, the chief orders his men to douse their torches. Shan and his men are untied from the poles and taken away to a tent. They are left there for hours, but at least they are fed and watered. Eventually, the chief and the Shaman return. Shan takes one look at the chief and realises that they are safe. The chief’s face is one of a man who has been forced to look weak but has no choice.

“We have sent men to the castle, and it appears that what you say is true. The curse has been lifted. The prophecy states that I must hand control of my armies to the one who killed the sad god. I would love nothing more than to see you burn, though…”, the chief says but is cut off by the Shaman.

“Yes, lord, but if you do so, if you ignore the prophecy, the men will revolt and have your head. I will make sure of this.”

Shan is told that he now has 45,000 men and 20,000 horses at his disposal. This is huge and could finally give the forces of Chaos the upper hand in the coming battle. If Nanny is to be believed, this will be their last stand. They waste no time and travel to the coast. Shan orders them to set up a temporary camp there, and he will return for them with many boats. He takes a hundred men and a handful of horses with him as they set off for the long journey back to the Isle of the Purple Towns.

The crew of the Leto have a long and uneventful journey back to the Isle. The flag of Donny still has the glamour of Balance on it and protects them from any concerns with Law vessels. They each get to spend time training, the Bear is not even close to as good a sailor as her late father, so, instead of dwelling in her own self-pity or risk hitting the bottle, she throws herself into lowly duties on the ship in order to learn as much as she can.

They do see some disturbing things as they travel the seas. The volume of Law ships they saw on the way here was high, but now it is so much worse. There is MUCH more of a presence of the Law vessels – They are clearly able to build more and more. They have not been idle and are preparing for war.

Even worse, they appear to have built metal whales! The crow’s nest gave a whale warning off the aft of the Leto, but upon closer inspection, it was clear that the huge thing was an underwater vessel of some sort. They see a few of these as the journey progresses. Sometimes, a metal tentacle with an eye at the end appears to rise as it breaks the waters surface before descending back beneath the waves.

As they pass Melnibone, they are horrified to see that the void that Leto described at the centre of the isle has spread! It now appears to have enveloped the whole Isle! Bear is worried as there were some Dragons there that she planned to summon with Leto’s horn. Are they gone now? Has she lost yet more allies? She can not handle any more bad news.

Unluckily for her, there is more bad news to come. As they sail past the Southern coast of Vilmir, she is alerted to a sight that nobody wants to see. In perfectly formed and symmetrical formations stand thousands upon thousands of Manfred warriors. Totally still yet somehow dangerous looking, they stand ready to fight. It will not be long before the war will happen, whether they like it or not. Time is running out, and they currently have some allies, but it doesn’t look like it will be enough.

“Shan had better have had some luck, or we are lost.”, Bear mutters to herself as she stares through the seeing eye at the army of Manfreds.

As the Leto docks back at the Isle, Bear strides off and heads straight to the Town Hall that has become the War Room. Remembering her pact with the demons at the Sorcerer’s Isle, her first order is to send a thousand non-fighting citizens to the west of the Isle. Women, children, the maimed, and the elderly are taken there and told that it will be a protected area from the coming battle. The worst part is that Bear does not feel any shame in doing this. Their sacrifice is needed, and their souls will be a small price to pay for the help that they will receive.

Bear doesn’t even realise that this war and the losses she has experienced fighting it has changed her on a fundamental level. Is she any worse than 2-Scratch? It is debateable. They are sent to a fate worse than death.

As she strides through the town hall, she passes 3 figures who appear to be waiting for her. One of them is an old man in dark robes who has the stink of Chaos magic about him, the other two are huge lumps of men, clearly the muscle of the trio and both wearing the symbols of Chaos . One of the lumps has been warped by Chaos, too. He has a disfigured head that makes it look like he has only one eye. All of them have that weathered look that shows they are travellers, probably killers for coin.

“Ah, you must be the…Jadmiral, I believe they call you? Lady Bear?”, the sorcerer says with an old and cracked voice. “I am Malrak, this is Daym, and this is Grof. We are here in search of our friend, MakAye? We believe that he travels with you now?”

“I do not care”, she replies without even looking at him and striding straight into the War Room, slamming the door in the faces of the three stunned men.

REF NOTE – These are the three new characters rolled up by Rodders, Richie (both of whom lost their characters last session), and Jamie Brennan, who has joined our motley crew in this session. New blood for the blood god! A Chaos Sorcerer and 2 Chaos Warriors, all of whom spent a lot of time with MakAye before he found the crew of the Leto.

Looking out the window of the War Room, Bear can physically see the word is spreading about her father’s death. With a heavy sigh, she realises that this will be yet more destabilisation in the Isle at the worst possible time. They need some good news. “Why have the gods forsaken us when we are trying to save the Young Kingdoms?”, she thinks to herself.

Then she remembers exactly why the gods have forsaken them and how it is partially due to the actions of this thing that lives inside her. It laughs at her as she thinks it.

They really need some good news. Where the fuck is Shan?

As if she actually summoned him, she sees the boat that Shan left in appear on the horizon.

Shan disembarks his ship and immediately sets to work in trying to secure the navy. He wants to task them with setting off for the Weeping Wastes to go and get his armies. It doesn’t take long for him to realise that he has no authority here. Nobody will do anything without Bears say so.

“Best I go and see her, then.”, he says to himself and heads for the War Room.

As Shan walsk through the entrance hall, the three men start to tap each other and point at him. Shan hears them say something about MakAye, but he is too preoccupied to pay them any time. Bear opens the doors to the War Room and walks out to greet him. She looks terrible, like she has suffered a terrible loss. Shan looks for Nanny and Leto and, seeing neither of them, fears the worst. The three men walk to step between the two old friends, and Shan realises that Bear is on the verge of ripping them apart with her own hands.

“Excuse me, gentlemen. This is not a good time, I suggest that you leave us now.”Shan says to them with a warning hand raised. One of the larger men introduces himself as Daym and says, “We just want to talk about our friend MakAye. We are told he travels with you?”

The other big one with the one eye interjects, “Yes, he has information for us, and we wish to speak to him. He said it was important to the war. Just tell us where he is, and we will leave you in peace.”

Bear is tempted to have them escorted out but thinks that MakAye knew things even if he didn’t realise he did. “We have some bad news for you. Come with us to the War Room, and we will tell you about it, but we want to know what he had told you and why you are here.”, she says without the slightest hint of sympathy or emotion.

Within minutes, Nanny arrives, and all developments are shared. They talk of the Sad God, the shield, and the loss of Galadreak. They talk of the demons on the Isle, Gaynor the Damned, and the loss of Leto. They tell the three new men about the passing of MakAye and what he had told them about where he had come from. Leto is mourned, but they know that they are running out of time and planning needs to happen.

The one-eyed brute that calls himself Grof tells them that MakAye travelled with them for years clearly before he met with the crew. He remembered even less when he travelled with them, but he was looking for something, a journal. He had sent word to them that he had recovered all of the 3 pages of it, and they should come to him as soon as they received this message. He was paranoid about it as he knew it was important but had no idea why. He also said that if anything happened to it, they were to come and get it. He had separated it into the 3 pages and hid them in the places that he treasured on the Isle.

This gives the remaining crew food for thought. If MakAye thought this was important to the war, then they really should pursue it. They don’t have much time, but if they could get these pages quickly, then what harm would it do? What could possibly be so dangerous about finding 3 pages…

REF NOTE – The players know that this is a plot hook and they know that it is a good way to get the new characters into the game, but they also know that it will not be that simple…

Shan aggressively pushes Bear for the boats to get the tribesmen back from the Weeping wastes. It is clear that they simply do not have enough boats to get them all. “You can have 80 boats as we have had 65 more turn up while we have been away. This is the most that I can spare.”, Bear says in her Pan Tangian dead tones.

“It is not enough Uschi! These me can turn the tide of the war for us!”, Shan insists angrily. Bear knows he is pissed off as he never calls her Uschi unless he wants to get at her. Nanny, uncharacteristically quiet up to now, chimes in with her distinctive voice, “Let’s not forget what happened to Dharijor when we took boats away from the defence of their nation.”, Bear and Shan both detect a strange sadness in Nanny’s voice. It would appear that her gruff exterior is still susceptible to loss and that Leto’s death is affecting her more than she is letting on.

They argue for a while longer but ultimately come to the conclusion that another solution has to be found. That’s when the crackly voice of the new sorcerer pipes in, “I think I may be able to help you there. I have a spell, but I will need a lot of power to do what you need.”, “What sort of power?”, asks Bear.

“Souls.”, Nanny says quietly to the room.

Bear realises that this is the only way they’ll stand a chance against the forces she saw on the coast of Vilmir. Reluctantly, she agrees to supply whatever is needed. How many more lives will she sacrifice for what she thinks is the greater good before it becomes too many? In the dark recesses of her soul, she can hear Nos Fera laughing again…

Suddenly, for no reason that Daym, Grof, and Malrak can discern, Bear, Shan, and Nanny instantly go into defence mode. They all look to the window and start to move towards it. The town has descended abruptly to silence. Something bad is happening.

Out in the streets of the Isle, black flags, sheets, and clothes are being hung everywhere. On the large wall of the Merchant’s Guild, a painter has started a huge mural of what is clearly Captain Leto. The Isle is now in mourning.

The citizens of the Isle are travelling down to the coast where priests of Pyaray are preparing a ceremony to ensure that his soul is taken to Pyaray, the Tentacled Whisperer. Bear, Shan, and Malrak all travel down to the beach to pay their respects, too. The rest of them have decided to chase up on a hunch. Grof syas that MakAye used to spend a lot of time in a tavern on the Isle known as the Merchant’s Entrance. Nanny is well aware of this place and drinks there too herself. It is one of the most Chaotic places on the Isle. Very rowdy, live sex shows, bestiality, death, and debauchery. It got so bad that Bear had to enforce that all weapons had to be held at the door.

It is Nanny’s idea of heaven.

Grof, Daym, and Nanny head to Merchant’s Entrance. Nanny gives a prayer to Balan, to wish them luck and is rewarded with a vision (REF NOTE – Chloe rolled under her current Chaos Points and managed to get a critical success. For this, she gets a vision). Her vision swims and she falls backwards, luckily, Agatha Crispy (REF NOTE – Chloe has named her undead boar this and who am I to argue with such a good play on words?) is there to catch her before she hits the floor. She sees metal whales deep under water attacking and killing the physical manifestation of Pyaray and also destroying his fleet! She decides not to share this with anyone else. They have had enough bad news.

Nanny, Grof, and Daym head off to the Merchant’s Entrance. They are struck by the size of the building. It appears to have 3 floors, all of which are bustling with life. Even as they approach it, a man flies out of the middle floor window and hits the dry ground beneath. He struggles to his feet, mutters a curse under his breath, and strides purposefully back inside.

The painting hanging on the wall above the door appears to show a cherub-like merchant, seen from the back with his troos around his ankles, baring his ‘entrance’ while looking over his shoulder cheekily. Stood outside the door is a 7 foot demon. It has jet black skin with yellow cats eyes and along with muscles on top of muscles, it has vicious looking spikes that jut out from many angles. “Hey, Nanny. You’ve missed the start of the show.”, the creature says in a deep baritone but surprisingly eloquent voice.

“Hey, Clive. I’m not here for the show today but instead some information for my new friends here. Is Valaar about?” (REF NOTE – Its real name is unknown, and even the name it uses for the clientele is too long and unintelligible to pronounce, so Nanny decided to call him Clive, and it stuck).

“Yeah, he’s about. I’ll have to take all of your weapons, though. Agatha will have to wait outside, too.”, Clive says while staring Grof and Daym directly in the eyes. They concede without any argument as even they feel that this is a fight that they won’t win.

Once inside, they take in the majesty of this tavern. It appears that whoever built this place had some grand ideas but no taste! It does indeed have three floors, with a winding staircase taking people to the upper levels. Each upper level has a ‘balcony’ that holds tables and chairs but also looks down on the main room. The ground floor has many tables and chairs across a room the size of half a football field. Adorning the walls are all manner of stuffed sea creatures with mock rigging ropes set against some of the walls. The drinkers here eat and drink from wooden mugs and plates. The stage that is set in the corner of the room has a naked man and a goat on it. Best not to think what this show will evolve into…

REF NOTE – Yes, that’s right. This scene was designed to be a good old fashioned barroom brawl, with plenty of props to make it as interesting as possible!

Once inside, Growl and Daym start asking around. The place is packed full of people in various stages of drunkenness. Fights break out on a regular basis but appear to get resolved just as quickly. One of the scantily clad barmaids tell them that they remember the ‘quiet old fella’ that loved the Chaos of the place and would sit reading while fights broke out around him. She hasn’t seen him in ages, though.

Nanny sits at the bar and manages to get a strong liquor and the attention of Valaar. Valaar of Nadsokor is a stick insect of a man, all skin and bones, but he has plenty of money and can afford enough muscle to get whatever he wants. He has many revenue streams here aside from the tavern itself. Prostitution, gambling, assassins, robberies, but it is the information that he deals in that Nanny is more interested in.

He isn’t very helpful and brushes Nanny aside, claiming he is too busy for her nonsense today. She notes that his face betrays that he knows more than he is letting on, though (REF NOTE – Chloe makes a very rare Insight check!). As she is about to follow him up the bar, she feels a hand grab her shoulder, which she can feel is huge and heavily scarred. “Hey, pretty lady.”, a gruff voice says. “Are you looking for a good time? I like ’em when they can’t see me.”

“I’m not interested, young man.”, Nanny replies. Then, from behind her, she hears another voice say “OY! She’s not interested. Leave her alone, ya drunk feck!”. Nanny, knows the early signs of trouble and tries to calm it down, but within seconds, she hears the all too familiar sound of a fist hitting a face and a body hitting the ground, taking someone else’s table full of drinks out. With a heavy sigh, she says to herself, “Another barroom brawl.”

Grof and Daym start looking around for anything that MakAye might have left behind, hidden somewhere for them to find. Their search takes them to the top floor of the tavern (REF NOTE – A Fumble on a Search roll doesn’t help). It is from up here that they hear the commotion as a table gets totalled somewhere below. A quick glance shows them a bird’s eye view of a fight and how it spreads like a virus across the whole of the bottom floor. They see Clive curse as he shuts and bars the doors so as to ensure nobody else sees the ‘fun’ and tries to join as has happened many times before. In the middle of it all, they can see Nanny!

REF NOTE – The next 2 rolls from Jamie and Rich are critical successes, making their passage from the third floor to the ground level extremely cinematic and stylish. I love it when that happens.

Grof, not knowing that Nanny is more than capable of handling herself in this situation decides to grab one of the ropes from the side of the wall and use it to swing out and down to where she is. Miraculously, he manages to do it and with some style! He grabs it, using his legs to swing himself away from the wall and in a circular spiral fashion, manages to gracefully swing out and down to land directly between Nanny and two particularly nasty looking bruisers, one of which is armed with a table leg!

Daym, now with no rope near him and not wishing to be outdone by his friend, decides to jump down all 3 floors (REF NOTE – Jamie had not truly understood how big a drop it was, but thankfully, he managed to roll that critical I mentioned earlier or that could have been an embarrassing first combat for Jamie…). Again, by a miracle, he manages to direct his jump into one of the larger drinkers, which breaks his fall and allows him to roll off and up into a fighting stance just by Grof’s side!

They find themselves up against four attackers, one of which is ‘armed’ with a chair leg. There is much wild combat with wild swings taken at Grof and Daym, all of which they either dodge or take without any damage to them. People fly at them from table tops, and some of the swings are so erratic that one of them misses the boys but manages to take Nanny unawares. She hits the floor, unconscious!

This sends Grof into a wild rage! He swings at two of his attackers, knocking one of them clean out and hurting the other. Unfortunately, this leaves him open, and ‘chair leg man’ manages to hit straight across the temple (REF NOTE – A critical hit from me), knocking him out cold.

Around them are similar levels of chaos. People are bludgeoning each other as tables, chairs, and various other ornaments are thrown around. From the corner of his eye, Daym sees someone run past in flames but still laughing maniacally! Clive is slowly working his way through the room, and people are either standing down or getting knocked down. Daym manages to take all three of his attackers down but sees two more approaching. He grins.

Grof manages to wake up. He rouses Nanny, picks her up, and runs toward the door of the tavern, hopefully to safety. Nanny, now close enough to Nanny to do so, connects to her sight from the creatures eyes and instructs it to start ramming the door. If she can smash it open, they can escape to safety.

Meanwhile, back on the beach, while the death of Leto is being quietly honoured by the population Bear speaks to Balthazar, the Pan Tangian high priest of the church of Pyaray and learns of how 2-Scratch has managed to destroy the physical manifestation of Pyaray on this plane. Deep down, she knows that this is because she failed to get the Horn of Fate.

Eager to talk about something else, anything else at all, Bear asks Malrak to share his idea of using his spell with Balthazar. Between them, they conclude that it may be possible to use a ritual to create a Hell’s Gate big enough to bring the tribesmen across the Young Kingdoms but it would need many sacrifices, at least 100 innocent souls. Bear and Shan start discussing between themselves, who of the population of the Isle should die for this. It is a cold conversation.

REF NOTE – This is happening a lot more as the campaign goes on, and I point this out to the players. It is worthy of note how much their characters have been changed by the events that have befallen them.

Balthazar says he will consult with his church and start to make arrangements for this. Bear, Malrak, and Shan decide that sticking around for another tribute to Leto will not improve their current moods and decide to go and catch up with Nanny and the other two at the tavern. By the time they reach it, the fight is in full swing. They see Agatha ramming back and forth into the door and a man comes flying out of the top floor window (REF NOTE – I tell them it is the same poor chap that had been thrown out earlier, not that they would know that).

At the tavern, the fight continues with two more attackers approaching Grof. He places Nanny down and rolls underneath one of the attackers blows and into the door, weakening it further. As he does this, Agatha has managed to hit the already weakened door hard enough to break it open! One of the attackers gets thrown through it by Daym and rolls out into the street with Grof following him.

Bear approaches him, demanding to know what the hells is happening. Daym picks Nanny up in order to take her out of the now open door to dafety. Agatha, not knowing his intentions, thinks he is trying to hurt Nanny and barrels towards him! Daym just about manages to get out of the undead beast’s way, but it is close! Thankfully, Shan and Malrak manage to step in and defuse the situation, assuring Agatha that he is a friend.

Bear has not had a good day. Not at all. Her mood is evident as she strides into the tavern and, amongst the chaos, slams her great axe into the floor with a huge crash, her voice rising above the tumultuous sounds to shout, “ENOUGH!!!!!”.

The whole room stops, and it is silent, with one of the stuffed fishes from the wall falling to swing from one nail and then falling to the floor, causing everyone to snap their necks towards it. Valaar, looking extremely concerned by the amount of damage that has been caused today, whimpers, “Here, take it. MakAye paid me to hold it for him and not to give it to anyone, but I want you all out. Take it and leave!”

He hands Bear a piece of parchment. She looks him in the eye and says, “Aren’t you glad that I changed the law so weapons weren’t allowed, now?”. He grunts at her and then, shouting over her shoulder, “CLIVE! MAKE SURE YOU GET TIDYING UP TAX FROM EVERYONE WHO LEAVES AND GET THIS PLACE TIDIED UP!”

Stepping outside into the daylight, Bear reads the parchment aloud for all to hear:

Scribbled in what must be MakAye’s handwriting on the front page is the sentence – “This appears to be the journal of a young girl named Lilith Moonsong. I have no idea why it is important but I know it is vital. There must be clues here and they must not get into the wrong hands.”

Today, celebrating the 6^th year since my birth, father took me to the temple with him. I’m so happy that he now sees me as old enough to join him.

We lifted or voices in prayer of the mighty lord Arioch! Mother was there, too. She looked like an angel when she stood to lead the song. My heart is filled with pride.

On the following page, in clearer handwriting:

It is the 10^th year since my birth and I have been brought in for the initiation ritual. Father say that I do not have the strength of soul to be a wielder of magic. Instead, the high priests have decided that I am to be a warrior. High Priest Garath has named me the Flaming Blade of Arioch. He says it is due to my sharp wits and red hair. I like this!

The third page, written in much clearer writing is the following:

It is the 13^th year since my birth. Today is a sad day but also a joyous one. My brother, Terrayne, has been chosen to be given over to our lord Arioch. Mother says not to be sad, as his soul will go on to serve our Lord. I can’t help but feel that this is wrong, but we must worship as is asked of us.

The fourth and final page has this along with some further words from MakAye:

Father took me aside today after I maimed one of the fellow students from the church. He called me “Little Mite”. He hasn’t called me that since I was a child. He told me that no matter how angry I get, I must control my temper. He told me that we exist to stop the forces of Law and we must always remember our humanity and compassion, even when serving our dark lord.

Makaye has written here – “The name ‘Little Mite’ is important. My frustrations rise as I know not why! I must find this plane’s version of my old crew. They will hopefully reignite my memories. I will hide the second part at my place of knowledge, just in case this gets into the wrong hands.”

Not knowing where MakAye’s place of knowledge is, Nanny gives the page to Agatha. She sniifs it and sets straight off towards the Eastern Wilderness outside of the town. Everyone follows it. If this this journal is as important as MakAye thinks it is, they need to know more. Agatha sniffs page and sent off. They all follow.

After an hour or so of trekking outside of town, they find what looks like an old Balance temple. Normally, a place of nature, this is a place of learning. The ruins of an old great library. Unfortunately for them, as nothing is ever that simple, they find that there has been some form of Chaos taint here. They find a swirling black Chaos void that leads… somewhere else.

After some minor experimentation involving throwing in rocks and ropes, Daym starts to get pulled into the void! Being the impulsive adventure seeker he is, he resigns himself to this and dives into the hole. He disappears without a trace that he was ever there!

One by one, each of them dives into it and also disappear into the hole. There is silence at first and then the sound of a jester’s bells and the maniacal laughter of a god that revels in testing and tormenting mortals.

Thus ends episode 4 of the final season of Stormbringer, the Void Trilogy. What will the crew find through the black rift? What tests await them, and will it bring them closer to the mystery of MakAye’s journal? Find out in episode 5, The Trials of the Jester, airing in Newport Games Club on Sunday, February 18th.

Stormbringer – The Aftermath

Piglet was scared. Ever since he was promoted to First Mate aboard the boat, he has felt a loyalty to the Captain like no other. Leto was a good man and he looked after Piglet. Piglet would die for this man and his crew, especially Bear.

The problem was that Leto was dead now. Slain by some beasts on that accursed Sorcerer’s Isle. Bear carried his body back to the boat and. once we were able to set sail, gave him the most beautiful burial at sea he had ever seen and heard. It was a silent ceremony. Bear said “My father was a loud man in life. A proud servant of Pyaray the Tentacled Whisperer and he would be heard shouting his love for him at any moment of his life. His service will be silent in reverence of that.”

But the rest of the journey home was a dour affair. Bear did not look herself. Her normally bright and beautiful eyes were sunken into a pale face. Dark rings underneath them betraying more than just a lack of sleep. It is said that a great beast now resides inside of her. One that whispers dark orders in the night. Piglet himself had seen this. He had seen her feed on the blood of a hapless victim. It was not good. He feared for her soul.

Then there was Nanny. That hag had always been a scary one but since she gave herself fully to Lord Balan, she was even scarier. That stone mask that was riveted to her face didn’t help, nor did the skeletal hog that accompanied her everywhere she goes. The crew refer to them as ‘The Hog and the Hag’. Not loud enough for her to hear, of course. She would give them ‘The Itch’, which was not a pleasant experience!

The crew whisper that there is also a curse on them and, if one should die, then the wrath of Balan will befall anyone close to her. No, thank you.

The main thing that the crew are now worried about is that the mission was a failure. Leto had sworn that they would get a fabled horn at the Isle. He told Piglet once over a late night rum drinking session. Piglet remembers it well as it was the last time he had spoken to him. He was alone on deck one night on late watch and Leto came to keep him company, himself being unable to sleep.

“Piglet! For a small lad, you are surprisingly capable of putting away the rum!”, he said in his usual loud booming voice, causing them both to laugh.

“The Horn of Fate, Piglet. That is the key to our success against 2-Scratch and her damned armies of Manfreds. Pyaray himself told me this!”, he booms while pouring them both another healthy draft of rum.

“If it is blown at the final battle, the gods themselves will be summoned to the Battle at the End of Time!”

They talked over this throughout the night. They imagined the battlefield when this would happen, each describing how the mighty lords of Chaos would smite the inferior metal men and their leaders. They did this until the sun came back up from the watery horizon. It was a great night. He was a great man and I will miss him greatly.

But, this means that the gods will not be there. They did not get the horn.

Piglet, his eyes wet with the memory of his beloved captain, stares off into the dark waters and says out loud to nobody in particular, “Without the gods, what hope do we have now?”

Stormbringer, Season 3, Episode 3 – The Sorcerer’s Isle – Co-written by Rodders, who plays Leto

When we last saw this part of the crew, they had set off for the Sorcerer’s Isle in search of some allies in the war against the forces of Law, led by 2-Scratch Dickens. There had been rumours that something bad had happened there, along with some disturbing communications from the Pain of Makaye, that had been sent there by Admiral Bear. Leto, when he returned from beneath the waves, had also claimed that Pyaray himself had told him there was a significant artefact on the island. The Horn of Fate. This was alleged to have the power, once blown upon, to summon the gods themselves, physically to the plane of the Young Kingdoms, for the great battle.

They had spied the Pain of Makaye floating listlessly off the coast of the isle. The adrift ship had a lowly cabin boy cowering against the ships portside edge. Leto volunteered to board the boat to go and save him and took a small boat across. Just as he was boarding it, Nanny, blinded by Balan, but gifted with the sight of the undead beast familiar she has, used its ‘death-sight’ and can see that 2 greater demons are hiding below decks in order to trap anyone who comes to rescue the cabin boy.

There is an explosion of the decking as a cloud of splinters erupt along with 2 huge black-skinned oily monstrosities. They are huge muscular beasts with many tentacles that seem to end in many different horrors such as sharp beaks, claws, and gibbering mouths full of sharp teeth. Merely to look upon these things evokes a feeling of sickness.

Leto is in great danger.

One of the demons, who are both impossibly fast, lashes out with a tentacle at Leto. He tries to move out of its way but is taken by surprise so it manages to coil itself fully around his body, pinning his arms to his sides, stopping him from being able to use his sword.

Back on the Servant, Bear springs into action and begins ordering the crew to ready the catapult, which although she is nowhere near the same calibre of captain that Leto is, (REF NOTE – Sara’s skill in Sailing, of which all boat operations spring from, is decidedly below average…) it works, and the catapult is quickly set and aimed at the huge creatures! Nanny, having to pour more of her power into the beast to give her sight, starts scrambling through her list of spells, worryingly assuming that, like Nos Fera, the bulk will not have any effect on demons of this level of power.

Leto struggles valiantly against the grip of the creature as he can see several other tentacles rearing up in readiness to strike at his prone body. Unfortunately, the beast is way too strong (REF NOTE – on a STR Vs STR roll, he is outmatched and needs to roll beneath 10%), and he is unsuccessful. One tentacle with a slathering maw whips towards him but it shoots past him, dribbling demonic saliva across his head, but a second tentacle form the other demon whiplashes across the deck, hitting him directly across the shoulders. Pain wracks across him, and his mind instantly realises that, unless something drastic happens, his story is likely to end here and now! As if by magic, something drastic happens. Suddenly, he can hear an all too familiar loud whistling sound. “Good girl”, he says to himself as he realises that Bear has set off the catapult.

“FIRE!”, Bear shouts, and the catapult is released, firing a heavy iron ball at great speed towards the second demon. She didn’t want to risk aiming for the one that held Leto as it would kill him outright if she had even slightly miscalculated. It flies through the air and thankfully hits the demon directly in what they guess is the main part of its confusing body. (REF NOTE – Sara is rolling on her as already established low Sailing skill, and if she had failed, Leto would have taken at least part of the 6 D6 damage. She was, however, successful). The force of the iron ball hitting the demon knocks it flying across the deck. Black flesh, tentacles, and green ichor fly in several different directions as the beast slumps and slowly slides lifelessly off the deck of the Makaye.

A huge cheer goes up from the crew of the Servant as they see that they have vanquished one of the beasts outright! The Bear (REF NOTE – With a gentle reminder from her friendly neighbourhood REF) dedicates the kill to her lady Xiombarg.

The demon that has its grip on Leto is distracted by this turn of events and gives the trapped captain an opportunity to break free from its grip! Bear, building on the high morale that the crew are experiencing (REF NOTE – This has given her an ad-hoc additional 10% to her Sailing skill for the time being), orders them to bring the Servant around swiftly so they can bring their only other catapult around to bear on the demon, especially as they can now see that Leto has broken free. It works, and the boat will be in position in less than a minute!

Seeing that Leto is much slower than the creature, she thinks on her feet. She hasn’t used the enchantment in her axe since Oin, but now it feels like the right time to release the crab horde. She aims the axe in the direction of the creature and speaks aloud the High Melnibonean phrase that activates the power, reaching deep inside herself and the weapon.

It fails.

REF NOTE – A reminder that the axe is partially combined with shards from the Mirror of Forgetfulness, and a fail means that the user suffers from temporary memory loss…

Leto runs towards the prow of the Makaye and performs his now legendary salmon-leaps off into the water. Using the boons bestowed upon him by Pyaray, he begins to glide swiftly through the water. Unfortunately, the demon is still faster and is gaining on him! The tentacles dart through the water, no longer aiming to trap him, but to hurt him. Leto manages to fend off two attacks from these oily appendages by swimming away from them, but he knows that he can not keep this up. He will never reach the Servant at this rate.

The 3 stages of Captain Leto’s legendary Salmon Leap

Meanwhile, the Servant has been pulled around, and the catapult is now ready. The crew look to Bear for the order to fire, but her memory loss has caused her to look back at them confused. Realising that they are waiting for an order from her and not knowing what that is meant to be, she panics and shouts, “READY YOURSELVES FOR HAND TO…TENTACLE COMBAT!!!”. The crew, utterly confused by this but also painfully obedient, obey her commands and abandon the catapult (REF NOTE – Sara loses her 10% morale bonus with this situation).

Nanny decides that she has to do something and takes a chance on one of her spells and begins to chant the required words to unleash it on the demon. Leto is not getting close enough to the Servant because of how much he is having to dodge the tentacles and begins to fear the worst. He can see that they’ve readied the catapult but can’t work out why they haven’t fired it yet?

Bear is confused. She has this nagging feeling that she is meant to be doing something else. She looks at the catapult, looks at the demon about to engulf her father, and then back at the catapult. “CREW! BELAY THAT LAST ORDER! FIRE THE CATAPULT AT THE CREATURE! NOW!”

A cheer goes up from the crew, and they pounce on the catapult. With a few quick adjustments for the movement of the creature, they release the shot. Leto hears that whistling noise once more and, for a split second, at least, feels relieved. This turns into worry as the noise gets too loud, and the shot just misses him and totally misses the demon, splashing harmlessly into the water by their side. The adrenalin burst of nearly being smashed to a bag of broken bones gives Leto the motivation he needs to swim faster towards the boat. He once again manages to salmon-leap back onto the rigging on the side of the Servant and scramble as quickly as he can up to the deck.

Nanny manages to finish her spell but is forced to peer directly over the side of the Servant at the demon that is now reaching up to grasp her and Leto. The spell, Agony, if she is able to overcome the power of the creature, should theoretically cause it great pain and, hopefully, make it recoil away from them. It works!!! The beast makes a noise that they can only guess is a scream, a guttural whelp that sounds like it comes from a choir of dying animals. The tentacles fall back heavily into the water with a splash. This gives Leto the chance to get ‘safely’ back on deck.

The reprieve they have is short-lived as the creature angrily launches itself onto the Servant, draping itself along the whole of the Port-side. A black tentacle with what looks like a pulsing cancerous growth at the end swings at the sorcerer that just caused it pain. It hits with such force that Nanny is lifted clean off the deck, and smashes with a sickening crunch. Her frail old body slides to the deck and worryingly does not seem to move, even looking like she isn’t breathing anymore…

Leto, now feeling much more confident, slips straight back into the shoes of Captain and confidently orders the crew to attack as many of the tentacles as they can in order to distract the demon for long enough to allow him and his daughter to strike at its body. Bear, meanwhile, has had an idea. She remembers something that her father had done at the very beginning of all this madness, when he cut some specific ropes and swung the mast across the deck to hit a Manfred off the boat (REF NOTE – See Season one, episode 3). She will replicate this and kill the demon. It will look amazing and it will impress her father! She uses her skill in sailing to work out the right one to cut and readies herself to do so at the right time.

The demon edges forward further onto the Servant, and Bear shouts to her father, “FATHER. WATCH THIS! YOU ARE GOING TO BE SO PROUD!”. She cuts the rope, but, to her horror, it appears to be the wrong one as within seconds, the main mast starts to lurch forwards, across the whole deck of the Servant! (REF NOTE – Sara had rolled a 00, the very worst roll that you can roll in this game, earning her a critical fumble)

The crew look up and see the impending doom coming at them. They scramble away from it, dispersing left and right away from the huge main mast support. There are almost comical ‘twanging’ sounds as the other ropes holding it in place all snap, unable to hold against the sheer weight of the main mast. It crashes into and partially through the deck of the Servant. Miraculously, only one crew member was killed by the fall, but the boat is now severely damaged, and the demon remains unharmed.

The crew rallies and continues with the original order, attacking the tentacles, allowing the captain and Bear to strike hard at its body. Bear, feeling very angry (Mainly at herself) for the disaster that just happened, channels that anger into a mighty blow from her axe, managing to smash what she learns was the demon’s skull into several parts as she swings it into its central frame.

Finally vanquished, the demon slumps back and slides off the boat into the water. Bear spits at its now dead body and dedicates the kill to her god once again. Leto, realising that Nanny is on the verge of death, orders Piglet to tend to her. The young lad vaults over the mast pole and past several sailors to Nanny’s side. She is bleeding badly but is clinging to life. He staunches her wounds and manages to stabilise her. She will live.

The sailor who was in the crow’s nest has managed to survive the fall he just took and weakly says, “Someone is trying to board, captain.” Over the side of the boat swims the cabin boy from the Makaye. He tells them that he was under the influence of the demons but now was free of their glamour. With some trepidation, he is allowed to board the Servant. Leto orders the crew to break out the oars and take them to shore where they will have no choice but to moor up for repairs. Shan normally coordinates this so it will take longer and in a place of great danger. Leto prays to Pyaray to protect them from any unwanted attention.

The cabin boy is questioned, and he tells them the tale of the Makaye.

Armed with many spells, protective charms and enchanted weaponry, the crew of the Pain of MaKaye moored on what looked like a quiet island, hoping that the Pan Tangian sorcerer still remains and can be persuaded to join the fight.

Within minutes, the captain and one priest of Arioch were all that remained. The crew found that the demons had indeed taken the Isle, and it is now a hell plane in all but location. Demons stride the land and endlessly torture the inhabitants unlucky enough to go there looking for power and riches. One particularly large creature that looked like a bear but with eyeballs peering out from every inch, spotted them when they approached saying “FRESH SOULS”, and with a wave of its impossible appendage (it looked like a tentacle but had many mouths screaming where the suckers may once have been), all of the protective charms and spells immediately fell.

The crew were either captured to be tortured, swallowed whole for their souls, or driven immediately insane. As far as the cabin boy knows, the captain and the sorcerer are still alive as they went back to the isle to try and rescue as many of the crew as possible but shortly after they left, the 2 demons took the boat and he can remember very little after they made him into a meat puppet.

The crew set to work on the repair of the Servant. They have no idea how long they have before something horrific finds them, so they need to waste no time. Bear and Leto are swiftly informed that repairs of this magnitude will take around a week, especially as their craftsman (Shan) is not on board. Bear is now furious with herself, much to the delight of Nos Fera, who laughs uncontrollably at her expense.

The cabin boy makes an offer that he says he really doesn’t want to do, but he feels guilty for his part in the trap they just lived through. He offers to take them to the plain where the demons reside. Leto, remembering what Pyaray had told him, knows that this is the right path. The problem is that the demons will devour them on sight, that is, unless they recognise them as one of their own. They all look at Bear, who has her hand up. In her stiff-sounding Pan Tangian accent, she says:

“I will have to let this thing take control. It is the only way that we will be able to live through this. I do not wish this to happen as every time I do this, it takes a bit more of me for itself, but I feel we have no choice.”

Leto drills into Bear the importance of the Horn of Fate. “The battle will be hard fought, but the gods of Chaos will be a huge advantage! You MUST get the Horn. Whatever happens, the Horn is the priority. Do you Understand?!?”. Bear nods emphatically, “I understand, father. Enough.”

For everyone else’s safety, Bear disembarks the Servant, and while hiding in the shadow of the vessel, she gives in to the constant clawing of Nos Fera that she has to endure every day. Her face changes instantly from a worried and pained visage into a wide and unnatural grin as her eyes transform into the smoking pits of the greater demon of the night. It waits for sunset.

REF NOTE – Normally, I play Nos Fera and randomly taunt Sara at the worst (best) possible times, but when he ‘takes the wheel’, we decided that she can play him. Sara is a veteran gamer, and I know she is more than capable of playing an aeons-old creature of darkness without issue. This does mean that she will likely make decisions based on the demon’s desires, which is not always going to be in the benefit of the players’ interests. This is what happens when you roleplay correctly, but more on this later…

As night falls, Bear, Nanny, and Leto leave with the Cabin Boy. He leads them further into the centre of the island, and the crew remember what they were told about the isle. They ‘should’ be able to see the Octagonal Citadel, a huge building that would house the Sorcerers who went there for their final tests. They can not see it, and this does not bode well.

They approach a hillside that the cabin boy tells them looks over the place where the demons reside. As they crest the hill, they start to see the horrific fate of the crew of the Makaye. They are first greeted by the remnants of The Octagonal Citadel, Jagged and destroyed against the horizon. The smell of burning flesh and brimstone fill the air, and acrid smoke permeates the air along with the sounds of distant screaming. The landscape itself is scorched with craters and still smoking vegetation and demons of all shapes and sizes stride the land, hundreds of these things, each one more nightmarish than the one they looked at before.

Below them, they see hundreds of men and women, all in various stages of being tortured, the demons are taking souls but not altogether, bringing the poor sailors to the point of death and then reviving them, dragging the whole painful process out for what they can only guess is weeks. Some of the mortals who are dead are being used as ghoul slaves, tending to the perverted wishes of the demons.

Underneath the shadow of the Octagonal Citadel, sat on a throne made from dying, screaming men, is a huge knight dressed in magnificent purple plate armour inscribed with symbols of Chaos. He looks bored

Bear/Nos Fera strides confidently into camp while Leto and Nanny wait behind. The smaller demons take one look at the aura of Nos Fera and cower away, whilst the bigger demons stand aside and nod at him. Gaynor sits forward on his screaming throne as if to get a better look at this creature that has the balls to walk into his domain without fear. Nos Fera knows all about Gaynor. She can see through the grills of his helm the ever-changing faces. Gaynor was once an Eternal Champion who betrayed the gods of Chaos and was cursed to experience all of the failures of every Eternal Champion across the multiverse.

Despair.

That was Captain Liraz Leto’s feeling as he stood at the top of the hill looking down at the carnage before him, Demons innumerable covered the valley and were gorging themselves on the flesh and souls that was once the human population of this island. It wasn’t the feasting and torture that made him despair, it was the fact that his daughter was truly lost to the Demon that inhabited her body and that Demon was the only creature that could acquire that bastard horn.

Bear stood before Gaynor. They traded insults at first. Very normal for creatures such as them. The insults soon turned into threats. Gaynor thought that he could make Nos Fera bend the knee to him if he threatened the lives of those dear to the mortal it possessed, but it was clear that the demon cared little for them. Gaynor was intrigued. This looked like something that would bring some interest. His current status lacked Chaos.

The leech wanted his Chaos army to fight for them. This would be a laughable prospect normally, but the leech describes a powerful army of Law that threatens the Young Kingdoms. He tells it that he could just move onto the next plane of existence with his army, but secretly, the thought of a battle of this scale would be magnificent! The helm he wears easily hides his eagerness to join this cause.

He could see the leech looking around while they talked. What is it looking for? The likelihood is that it seeks the Horn of Fate. If the gods were to be summoned, the destiny for Gaynor would be to be forced to continue to live. This can not be permitted. He must end this conversation now, before his glorious death was stolen from him. He must have this release.

Much as though he would have joined their cause for free, he must make it look like he is being forced. “We will join your battle, demon, but there will be a cost. 1,000 human souls. An army fights on its stomach. Feed my army when we arrive at the Isle of the Purple Towns, and my army will fight for you.”, he posits to the leech.

The leech does not even hesitate before it responds, “Yes, I care not for them, and your army will be worth a hundred times of theirs.”

“Excellent! Then please, feast upon my thralls to celebrate.”. Gaynor waves his hand, and the poor cabin boy who led them here is brought out by the demons for Nos Fera to feed upon.

Leto watched the exchange between his daughter and Prince Gaynor with fists clenching. He strained to hear but was impossible with the cacophony that came from below, his heart pounding as he stood motionless. It seemed like an age had passed, but the only thing that was exchanged was words on much, but judging by her empty hands, not the horn…

It was then that the Demon that possessed his daughter joined in the slaughter of the innocents around her and was revelling in it! Leto wanted to weep. He had lost the two things that were most valuable to him, the horn that could have turned the tide against this war with Law but most importantly he had lost his little Bear, albeit that she wasn’t his actual daughter, but he loved her still.

Nanny was talking to him, but Leto didn’t hear her. He was too fixated on what was happening before him. Eventually, Nanny trotted off on her undead boar, and Leto stayed by himself, his mind plunging ever further into despair.

Leto made his way back to the ship with his mind churning. He pondered on what to do next and how to get his hands and that blasted horn. Pyaray. Praying to his God could give him answers, Pyaray has guided him through these hard times, guided while he was in that sodding gaol, guided him when he defeated the giant Manfred! Leto found a secluded area near the ship so he wasn’t disturbed, after he saw no one was around to interrupt him, he waded into the sea and stopped when the water was waist height, he took out of his pocket a small wooden idol craved in the shape of Pyaray and clutched it tightly in left hand, then proceeded to baptise himself. Leto held himself under the water for one of the gracious gifts that was given to him by Pyaray were gills. After 10 minutes of meditation, Leto prayed to Pyaray:

“Pyaray Pyaray,
I pray to thee,
Grant your wisdom to me,
Guide me to find the horn,
So this quest isn’t forlorn!“

Leto waited for a reply, only to be greeted by silence. He stayed submerged for an hour but still heard nought but the sound of the sea, gently swaying back and forth. Eventually, Leto rose from the water, feeling lost and alone. While making his way back, a thought creeped into his mind. “Has Pyaray forsaken me?”, Leto had always been sure of himself, sure of his God.

For the first time in his life, Captain Leto felt doubt.

A restless night of sleep is had, but Bear assures the crew that the demons here will not harm them now. An accord has been reached, and they are now as close to allies as one could describe a horde of demons. In the morning, now back in control, but knowing that part of her soul has been traded, the Bear finds Nanny on the deck of the boat.

Nanny has been using the enchanted sight of her undead familiar to see the Isle better. She has seen that there is a great vortex of power in the Octagonal Citadel. The other gathering of power that is present here appears to be somewhere off to the west. Leto is nowhere to be found. Bear knows full well that her father will be very upset with her for not getting any closer to finding the horn. The problem was that although she was trying her best to whisper to Nos fera to pursue it, it is a demon, and it has absolutely no care for this. It did get them a demon army for the fight, and it felt that this was enough.

REF NOTE – This is the beauty of someone who understands that they are playing somebody different. Sara absolutely knew that the Horn was important to her and to the crew but not to the demon. She played it right, despite it not being a great help to the party.

Nanny and Bear debate if they should explore, now that the demons will likely leave them be. They toy with the idea of seeing what the vortex is at the Octagonal Citadel, but they are worried that the demons would see an intrusion by them as hostility. They wouldn’t stand a chance unless Bear let Nos Fera take over again, but she does not know how many more times she can do this without losing herself to it for eternity. They decide to investigate the source of power in the West instead.

They set off across the Isle, away from the demon horde. It takes it’s toll on Nanny, but she continually uses the enchanted sight until they reach what looks like a fairly dense wooded glen. They decide to proceed inside. Once inside, they hear some strange sounds both in front of them and behind. They are being hunted by something!

From the treeline outside of the track they are following, burst 2 creatures! They were horrific creatures of Chaos! Half dog and half bird, with the lean shaggy body of and legs of a dog but possessing razor-sharp birdlike talons where paws should be and nasty curved beaks where muzzles would live. Nanny is aware that these are known as the Hunting Dogs of the D’Harzi. Once they had got over the initial shock of what they were seeing, with the help of the undead boar, which proved to be incredibly effective against them, Bear and Nanny made short work of them both (REF NOTE – I played it as per the prep and the players ran rings around them. The combination of the Boar’s abilities and Bear’s damage potential wiped out my bad guys. It happens, sometimes.). The rest of the pack retreat when they see what they are up against.

Leto is desperate. He needs that horn, and he can not get it without his daughter. She WILL do this for him. She MUST do this for him and the rest of the Young Kingdoms! She was nowhere to be found though. After asking around, he learns that her and the crone have set off towards the west of the island. He sets off to track them. This is not his skillset. This is the art of the land, and he is a master of the sea! It takes him some time, but eventually, he finds the wooded glen.

He knows it to be dangerous, but his desperation drives him. He enters alone.

REF NOTE – What Rodders is about to do is genuinely dangerous. He has played in enough of my games over the last 20 years to know that I won’t fudge anything. If he enters a dangerous situation alone, he may not make it through. I ask him the extremely obviously loaded question of “Are you sure that you want to do this?”. He replies that he feels his character feels like he has no choice. I will never ‘make’ a character do something that they don’t want to do. We proceed.

Nanny and Bear reach the centre of the glen. Inside it, there stands 8 mighty stones, each with glowing runes on them. The intensity of the power here is overwhelming. Sitting inside the stones are 2 people who are extremely glad to see the Bear. It is Captain Varaash and the Arioch Priest Halbeck Norash of the Pain of Makaye. Nanny tells them that they will be safe now and come back to the Servant with them. Bear is distracted by what sounds like the noise of battle from back in the woods. She instantly realises that her father is pig-headed enough to follow her here, despite the danger. “I must go, now!”, she says and runs back into the trail.

Nanny is a lot less bothered about this and is more intrigued by the huge amount of power that she can see springing from the very earth into the stones. The Pan Tangian sorcerer had tapped into this power to fuel the runes of protection that he had inscribed on them to save them from the Hunting Dogs. She wants this power for herself! She tries to work out a way of removing it before she comes to the sad conclusion that it was connected to this place. To remove it would be to destroy it.

Leto, unsurprisingly, has come across a pack of the Hunting Dogs. He bravely faces off against all 3, but, being alone and without the strength of attack from his daughter’s axe, he is slowly being sliced to pieces. The dogs are playing with their prey. He realises that he has no chance and seeks to roll past them and run towards where he hopes his daughter is. She will aid him in this attack! Leaking blood, now, he runs through the woods, but he can feel the wounds starting to take their toll. “Is this it?”, he thinks to himself.

Bear is running as fast as she can along the trail. She can now hear the sounds much more clearly, and whatever the dogs are hunting is losing this battle. If this is her father, she may be too late.

Leto is now staggering through the trees and can see a glint of something or someone running up the trail from the other direction. The hope gives him a burst of life, and he reaches out to the oncoming traveller. It is at this point that one of the hunting dogs decides that the hunt is over. It leaps through the air, the beak of the beast puncturing his back, erupting through his chest, spraying the tree in front with his blood. Leto slumps to his knees and falls forward. Two last words that are gurgled as blood pours from his mouth. “Forgive me.”

Thus ends the story of Captain Leto.

REF NOTE – The last attack I rolled was a critical success which doubled the damage. There was nothing that could have stopped that.

Bear comes running through the woods only to see the body of her father being pulled apart by the dogs as they fight over their prize. With a scream that was as bestial as it was full of despair, “NOOOO!”, the pack dispersed, leaving her with the shock of what she was seeing.

Carrying his dead body in her arms, she demands through the tears that the Pan Tangian sorcerer heals hi, but he explains that he is gone. There is nothing that can be done.

They take him back to the Servant. They bind the body, and once the ship is seaworthy, they give him a full burial at sea. Bear decrees that he was a loud man in life, and his sending off should be one of silence, for contrast.

Bear renames the Servant in his honour, and they sail the newly christened Captain Leto back to the Isle of the Purple Towns.

Thus ends episode 3 of the final season of The Void Trilogy. What effect will the loss of Leto have on the crew? How will they cope with leaving the Horn of Fate at the Isle and losing the ability to summon the gods to the final battle? Find out in episode 4 of the final season.

Stormbringer, Season 3, Episode 2 – The Sad God

Glad and Shan, along with a handful of men begin their arduous journey through the desert lands on the coast of this continent. They endure this travel for nearly 2 weeks before the temperature begins to drop, and the harsh sand dunes and relentless heat is slowly replaced by a more temperate and forgiving landscape. They are finally in the Weeping Wastes themselves.

On the 1st day of being there, they are overcome with emotion as the first rainstorm hits them. The rain itself seemingly washing the strains of the difficult journey from them, just as much as the sand from their bodies. Glad felt more familiar with what he had read about this place now. Vast vistas of green lands interspersed with wooded areas that were home to the many nomadic tribes here. grand steppes with rivers that run through it, creating beautiful waterfalls. It would be a welcome change from the rest of the Young Kingdoms that were under the metal heel of the automatons of Arkyn.

The ponies that were serviceable enough in the desert now came into their own here. They were perfect for this trip and seemed to be happier here. They grazed on the lush grasslands and drunk from the crystal clear rivers. They carry Shan and Glad through this lush landscape for a week, and they did not see any signs of human life, just nature and wildlife that were easily hunted for foodstuffs. Without verbalising it to each other, they both thought about forgetting the troubles elsewhere and just staying here. This could not be an option, though. They both knew that if 2-Scratch was successful, this would be levelled into a void just as much as the rest of the Young Kingdoms.

At the end of the first week, Shan sees something on the horizon. It looks like some sort of huge camp. They approach it carefully, and soon enough, they could see that it was deserted, a burnt out husk of what was once a huge permanent camp. At first glance, they could see that it was once big enough to easily be home to at least a thousand people. All gone. All presumably dead.

They reach the camp and start to walk through it, horrified by what they see. Most of the huts and tents were burnt wreckages with the bodies of the tribespeople scattered all around. Men, women, and children were amongst them, and they knew what this was the handiwork of before they even saw the first Manfred body.

There seemed to be no survivors, but this was expected from the forces of Law. The tracks of the Manfreds led out of the camp, headed north. Unfortunately, this was also the direction that they were headed in. They hope that they do not bump into them. They wouldn’t last 2 minutes against a full battalion with their low numbers.

They set off. Before long, Glad sees that they are being followed. Whoever it is is clearly very talented and knows the terrain well enough to be well hidden, but Glad somehow seems to catch sight of them (REF NOTE – Richie rolled a critical success). Shan orders one of the few men he has to peel off and circle back behind them. This should allow them to capture their would-be followers.

They continue to travel for the rest of the day, but their man does not return. Clearly, there has been some difficulty, and the capture did not go as smoothly as they had hoped. As night falls and the warmth of the sun disappears, they set up camp. Shan, being ever cautious, sets up a few traps around the camp. Nothing fatal, just traps that will capture anyone or anything that tries to enter the camp while they sleep.

Predictably enough, on Glad’s watch, one of the pit traps is heard to have been set off. The camp is alert and armed within seconds as they approach the hole dug into the floor. Down in the pit, muddied and grubby from the fall, sits a man with a face contorted in pain. He wears thick leather garments fringed with wool. A once colourful checked cape covers his shoulders and back, and a metal helm sits on his head with thick black hair protruding from beneath it. His sun tanned skin appears to have scars that look self-inflicted and ritualistic. He wears a small but luxurious moustache and sharp beard.

His piercing blue eyes look up at his trappers with undisguised hatred and snarls something at them in a language none of them understand. Seeing the look of confusion on their faces, the tribesman switches to a form of common tongue and says, “Kill me then! Finish what your metal brethren started!”

It was not long before Shan and Glad manage to explain that they are on the same side in this war (Ceirun manages to roll a critical on his Bargain roll). The man is called Fint Tingo, and he is one of the only survivors of the Letana tribe. He describes the onslaught of the Manfreds under the direction of a human being. They approached the tribe and demanded fealty from them. The tribes are proud and would not bow to any man, especially an outsider, so they attacked. Despite the tribesman outnumbering the Manfreds 100 to 1, the metal men made short work of them.

Fint agrees to accompany them Northwards. He can be their guide, and they can help him to see what the fate of the rest of the tribes is. Although the Letana tribe were at war with all of the other tribes here, Fint understood that they faced an almost invulnerable enemy in these things and would warn his countrymen, even if he was raised to hate them.

They travel further northwards, hunting and foraging for food as they travel. They learn that Fint was attacked by Shan’s man, and he had no choice but to kill him in self-defence. Fint regrets this, now that he knows their true nature, but what is done is done.

After a few days of travel, they see another camp on the horizon. With the help of Fint, they manage to approach it a lot easier, only to find that it has met a similar fate.

Over the next 5 weeks, they travel further north and come across several camps, all of which have been decimated by the Manfreds. They find more survivors as they go, and with the help of Fint, they manage to recruit them for their journey. On the positive front, they see more and more defeated Manfreds. The battalion is finite with no reinforcements to support them. This means that there is a chance that they could be defeated altogether if they are met with enough opposition! This would, of course, be at a terrible cost to the tribesmen who are close to being wiped out.

The survivors who travel with Shan and Glad, now in their hundreds, talk of the biggest and allegedly fiercest clan that sit at the base of the mountain of the Sad God. If there is anyone that stands a chance of being able to defeat the Manfreds, it would be this tribe. They are known only as The Last Clan, and they are now mere days away from them. They will soon know if they, too, had fallen or if their reputation of strength was deserved. As if to prove the point, the mountain of the Sad God pierces the clouds on the horizon in front of them.

Eventually, after a few more days of travel, they are greeted by tribespeople on horseback who escort them to the village. This is a good sign! This means that they have fought the Manfreds and won! As if to answer the question, they are taken past the place where the fight clearly took place. The skeletal frames of many Manfreds litter the path ahead, and they have to ride the horses in and out of their path to avoid them.

The last clan were clearly successful.

The first thing that strikes them beyond the Manfred graveyard is the size of this camp. It is easily over ten times the size of any that they have seen so far. The likelihood is that this place could contain hundreds of thousands of people. It takes them over 15 minutes to get to what appears to be the central tent that Fint informs them would be the home of the chieftain of the tribe. Along the path, both Shan and Glad see the trail that leads up to the mountain, their true destination.

Glad decides that he does not want to wait and risk the chieftain stopping them from going up. He sneaks off his pony into the high grass and makes his way up the mountain path alone.

REF NOTE – At this point, I asked Rich if he was sure that he was sure that he wanted to do this. Anyone who has been a roleplayer for any length of time will know that when a DM asks this question, it is a warning. He was going ahead into a situation that was written as being challenging for a group, and the players all know that I will not fudge dice or de-risk situations. He rolled a critical success on his Sneak roll, so I couldn’t stop him if I tried.

Shan and the remaining tribesmen who have travelled with him are brought before the Chieftain of the Last Clan. Shan tries to enlist him and his clan in the fight against 2-Scratch, but having just defeated a battalion of them, he does not see the risk. He is unable to see that this danger is bigger than just what he sees before him.

Shan is desperate. From his many campfire discussions with Fint, he is aware that the tribes have certain customs that could come in handy here, despite how risky it will be to his personal wellbeing. His last resort must be used. With a heavy sigh, he looks the Chieftain dead in the eyes and says confidently, “I demand a trial by combat to enlist your aid.”

The crowds around them all gasp audibly, and the Chieftain grins as he says, “I accept.”

Meanwhile, Glad makes his way up the mountain. In his peripheral vision, he sees movement in the foliage that covers the whole of the mountain but is unable to see what is causing it. He pushes on for the rest of the day and finds what looks to be a dead creature on the path in front of him. He approaches it with caution but finds that it is a possum that appears to have been fully drained of all blood. Not a good omen.

Ahead of him, he can see a plateau that would be perfect to camp up at, especially as he is losing daylight.

Back at the camp, Shan is readying himself for the trial by combat with the tribe’s champion, but even he was not expecting to see the man-mountain that eventually enters into the pit with him. This ‘thing’ is easily bigger than the Bear, and just one of his arms is as thick as Shan’s waist.

This may have been a mistake.

Before he can even begin to formulate a strategy, the champion bull-rushes him, causing the floor to shake as its heavy body runs at him. Forced to think quickly, Shan decides to use its momentum against it and perform a sidestep trip on it (REF NOTE – Ceirun rolls a 100, a critical fumble). Unfortunately, Shan totally misjudges it, and instead of stepping away, he steps directly into the beast.

The champion’s bowed head slams directly into Shan’s chin, then onto his chest. He is physically lifted off the ground and sent spiralling 15 feet through the air. Luckily for him, he is unconscious before he hits the floor in a crumpled mess.

Back on the mountain, Glad has set up a makeshift tent and is trying to sleep while a storm rages outside it. The campfire that he had warmed around before resting has long since been extinguished by the rain, and the only light he has is from the sporadic lightning flashes that illuminate the mountain for a split second. He is fully woken from a restless sleep by movement near his legs. Looking down as the lightning flashes, what he sees fills him with horror. The foliage from the mountain itself is alive! It has crept into his tent and has already inside the flesh and muscle of his legs and is feeding off his blood! He can actually see the blood travelling through the vines away from his body!

He reaches for his sword and manages to grasp it, his struggling against the plant is appearing to stop it from feeding on him, but he knows that he can’t do this forever. He needs to somehow get it out of his body, or it will very soon drain him as dry as the possum he saw earlier. “Flame!”, he thinks to himself. He swipes at it with his sword but doesn’t quite manage to cut it enough to pry it loose from his skin (REF NOTE – Rich rolls 2 points shy of cutting through it).

He searches for a way of producing flame but, he is painfully reminded that the fire has been extinguished by the weather and while he does this, the plant manages to take another drain of blood from him, but this one is much worse. He can actually feel the strength leaving his body. He stumbles out of the tent with the creature now fully entwined into his lower half.

He does not feel positive about this situation.

Suddenly, he sees a little piece of hope. Underneath some of the larger logs in the fire, there were some embers! Realising the risk, but understanding that if he doesn’t do something, this foliage will fully drain him, and he dives straight into the embers. His guess was right, and the creature is vulnerable to any sort of heat. It immediately erupts into flames and falls away from his body, the flowers along the vines all screaming a high-pitched shriek. Unfortunately, this flare-up of heat also burns his flesh, especially the parts that are already under his skin. This final wound is enough to take his life.

Alone, on a mountain plateau, in the very northern tip of the Young Kingdoms, Gladreak passes away.

REF NOTE – After this, I did start to question myself and my reffing style. Having a character die for a player that has only just rolled it up (He had 2 sessions, one of which was mainly talking) is a pretty brutal thing for a player to handle. After much thinking and some opinion seeking in chat groups, I came to the conclusion that I did the right thing. The prep for that area was already written and was set up as a dangerous situation for a large group of people. To ‘fudge’ the stats of the threat or to downplay it because only one character went up there would’ve been the wrong thing to do. Danger and risk of death is needed if there is to be fun. I’ve played in campaigns where there is no risk, and it loses fun very quickly.

Shan awakes in a very painful and confused state. His head feels like it has been left in a bell and rung with hammers, and he can feel blood dripping down it from what he can only assume is a pretty nasty wound. In addition, he is unable to move his arms and legs. It takes a few groggy seconds for him to realise that he is tied to a straw man that the armies here use as target practice. The arrows and rotten fruit around him tell him that they have been doing so with him attached.

“Great!”, he thinks to himself just as he loses consciousness yet again.

The next day, he is woken with a splash of cold water seemingly supplied by Tingo. “The clan has decided that you are to die, probably by the day’s end tomorrow.”, he says in a loud voice.

In a much lower whispered voice, “We will free you at nightfall tonight.”

The day drags onwards, but as soon as the sun sets, the plan gets underway. The tribesmen on guard are crept up on by the refugees that Shan and Glad had rescued on their trek towards here. It would appear that Tingo has managed to enlist their loyalty. The guards have their throats slit and silently fall to the ground. They creep up to the strawman and free Shan by cutting his bonds. They make a silent gesture of walking and point to the mountain. They all make their way towards the beginning of the trail. Unfortunately, the bodies of the guards are discovered and the last clan begin to chase them but for some reason, probably superstition of some sort, they will not go any further than the start of the trail.

Shan and around 50 of the clan refugees have escaped.

They all make their way up the rough terrain of the mountain pass, the darkness making it doubly dangerous. In the first hour alone, they lose some men as they fall from the pass. Shan, trying to keep an eye on his new friends, notices that some at the back of the pack go missing, but he definitely didn’t see them fall. Is something else taking them?

Eventually, they are all grateful to see the plateau ahead of them with what looks like the remnants of a makeshift camp. “Glad!”, Shan thinks to himself. He rushes forwards to find his friend, but all he finds is a shredded tent and a fire that looks to have been kicked over. After a small search, Shan and the men fear the worst and decide to proceed up the mountain. The terrain gets even more dangerous, and some of the men are starting to say that the mountain itself is trying to kill them. More fall from the causeway and yet more just plain disappear! From what started as a group of around 50 men, Shan can now see that only 13 remain.

They reach a point where the way forward is blocked off by heavy foliage and rocks. Shan works out there is, in fact, a path through the mountainside, which seems to lead directly to the top of the mountain, that is obscured by foliage. Fearing the danger ahead, Shan sends a few men ahead to take the risk for him. They move the trees and leaves and are not harmed. They hand wave the rest to follow, and the remaining men, along with Shan, get up to the peak, just under a huge black castle. A flash of lightning completely lights up the surroundings, and they are all treated to a second of clear vision below them that sends a chill to their hearts.

Covering the whole of the mountainside, they can see the plants that appear to be alive! In amongst the writhing vines and flowers are all of the missing men and even some of those that had fallen. The plants have worked their way inside the bodies of the men and was draining them of their blood, slowly killing them. This meant that they were all still alive and experiencing the horror of what was happening to them.

Shan tried not to dwell on this. Nothing could be done for them, now and the likelihood was that Glad had suffered the same horrific end. He thanks the gods of Chaos that he had escaped this fate.

Knowing that they do not have time to look for an entrance so they opt to climb the outside of the castle in order to get to the main spire. They do so with surprising ease (REF NOTE – Some cracking dice rolls!) and finally reach a walkway that leads to the door of the spire. Above the sounds of the howling winds, a series of cries are heard. As each sob ends, skeletal hands burst from stones. In no time at all, between them and the door to what they hope is the Sad God, stand a regiment of undead tribesmen.

Shan, for the first time in many months, uses the enchanted crab sword and summons a wave of water that cascades onto the undead warriors. It distracts them but does no damage whatsoever. Taking advantage of this distraction, Shan takes a running jump, using the sword as a pole vault. He manages to get over the heads of the bulk of the skeletal horrors but lands between two huge things with axes. They growl at him and swing their weapons at him.

Shan manages to avoid one of the blows by ducking out of its reach, even managing to swing his own blade into it and taking it down. Unfortunately, the cost of this is to take the hit from the other axe. It strikes him across one of his legs, a crimson spray covering the floor in front of them, the strength of the blow also throwing him skidding across the floor just in front of the door to the tower.

The wound on his leg is horrendous, causing him to have to crawl to the door (REF NOTE – Ceirun took a Major Wound, which decreased his DEX by 3 points!) Hearing the sound of the undead giant warrior stomping towards him, Shan hurriedly drags himself across the floor to the door, just about managing to get inside and shut it with seconds to spare!

Shan takes a breath to gather himself using his sword to lean on in order to stand. The sound of soft crying is much louder now, echoing through the halls. Shan makes his way up the tower steps in order to find himself standing in front of a giant set of doors. With a gentle push, they both start to swing open, revealing a derelict throne room big enough for beings much bigger than men. At the far end of the dimly lit cavernous chamber is the silhouette of a huge throne with what can only be described as a giant sat on it. The figure is hunched forward, it’s shoulders heaving as it sobs heart-wrenching tears.

It is the Sad God. It stops its tears only to look up at Shan and says, “Are you here to end it?”

Shan, not truly understanding what the question was, tries to enlist him in the war against the forces of Law, but the giant will have no part of it. He explains clearly that the prophecy was that his pained existence must be ended.

“He who kills me will earn my shield. The shield of Law. It will protect the user from any Law force, even that of a god.”, the giant states.

Realising that he can not fight against prophecy and realising how useful such an artefact would be in the battle that they face, Shan agrees. He staggers towards the throne, with the giant kneeling and offering his neck. Shan, feeling his consciousness starting to escape him, lifts his sword and pierces into its neck, killing him instantly. The giant lets out a final colossal sigh of relief, tumbles forwards, and dies. Shan had used the last of his strength to do this and passes out.

*The camera is above the bodies in the throne room, slowly rising, showing their bodies lying on the throne room floor, like a ‘yin/yang symbol’, led next to each other, a dark pool of the giant’s blood growing around them both. In the distance, a crash is heard, and muffled voices getting louder, shouting Shan’s name. Some long shadows of figures getting closer to Shan’s seemingly dead body.

Shan comes back around surrounded by chaos! He is being carried on the back of a huge shield with a massive symbol of Law emblazoned on it. Tingo and his original guard are all that is left of the 50 men that came up the mountain. They are carrying him back down it. Apparently, the undead creatures and the plants all fell away when the Sad Giant died. They still have hundreds of thousands of angry tribesmen to contend with, but that is a problem for tomorrow.

Thus ends episode 2. Will Shan be able to make amends with the last clan? What will the shield do for the war? Will he ever get back to see his friends again? Find out when Shan returns in episode 4.

Stormbringer – Season 3, Episode 1 – Choice, Preparation and Consequence

It has been 3 months now since the battle of the Isle of the Purple Towns. Pidaklese was discovered to be a Manfred, albeit a particularly advanced one. Thankfully, he was destroyed but not before 2-Scratch (who they now realise to be the one who has been orchestrating it all from behind the scenes) had managed to set off a smaller void machine which banished all demons and brought all spells crashing to the ground. It all turned out to be a distraction, though, as the forces of Law retreated soon after the destruction of Pidaklese and instead set off to take a weakened Dharijor. Pan Tang was also attacked, but they appear to have held them at bay, as you would hope from such a powerful nation.

Bear, now in charge with Leto missing in action, had taken on some new advisors who helped her orchestrate the search for allies. 8 ships, all sent out in the arrows of Chaos, across the Young Kingdoms, all with a clear mission to search out the older denizens of Chaos, with a view to recruiting them to their cause. They know that it is just a matter of time before 2-Scratch Dickens and her forces of Law, will come for the remaining allies. If MaKaye was to be believed (before he died), then a gigantic Void Machine will void the whole of this plane. Bear now feels the full responsibility of the last hope for this plane.

The boats had all reported back now, using the sorceries of the Pan Tangian sailors to communicate via the horns of Mabelrode, with The Isle (which has now become the capital for all of those who would fight against the forces of Law) and Bear had brought all of her captains, advisors and main surviving crew of the Servant to review the findings and decide which to pursue in whatever short amount of time they had left.

The room slowly started to fill. The captains and Sea Kings were all burly middle-aged men with skin brown and weathered by many years at sea. They were not impressed by taking orders from a woman but they suffered it due to how close Bear is to knowing their enemy and also because she is the size of a mountain and could rip them apart with her bare hands if she felt the need! Then there was the scholar of the Young Kingdoms that she had brought in, Geladreak (or Glad for short). He was a tall, thin man, clad in Barbarian Armour from the Weeping Wastes, but had the air about him that suggested he had seen lots of combat. He will be a useful addition to the crew, especially while they decide where to go.

Then in came Nanny. She has told Bear that she has had an audience with her god, and the changes that she has undergone would support that claim. She now wears a stone mask that has been bolted into her skull. The gift of sight has apparently been taken from her, and her voice comes muffled from beneath it. At her side, she has an undead boar, which she claims can be her new eyes when she needs them. The thing stinks, probably from the clumps of stubborn flesh that still cling to parts of the skeleton that unnaturally walks at her side.

The crew arrive

When Shan arrives, he is accompanied by his new men, or some of them at least. Shan has been busy, indeed, recruiting most of Tenaka’s old soldiers. He has been making enchanted weapons for some of them, and, in turn, they had sworn themselves to his service. Acting outside of the Isle’s control or orders, they have been busy taking out stubborn cells of Law followers. They have also been extremely useful in helping to patrol the waters around the Isle, too. Shan himself looks different now. The death of Tenaka hit him harder than Bear would have expected. Shan’s usual wandering ways and demeanour have left and been replaced by what looks more like a general of infantrymen. “Maybe this will be a good thing,” Bear thought to herself.

The huge table in the newly christened ‘War Room’ has Leto’s map of the Young Kingdoms laid out on it, along with some handwritten notes that Bear had prepared, each detailing the ships that had been sent out, along with some notes as to what had been reported back, all positioned where they believed them to be. Bear stands up proudly in front of them all and stares intently at each of them in turn, the gaze making it very clear that whatever conversations they were having between them, now need to stop as she is about speak. The Law Priest that she now keeps chained to her as a slave has no choice but to stand with her. His tongue has been cut from his head, and his once resplendent robes hang in tatters from his thin body. Little do they know that this vessel and his Lawful rituals are all that is keeping the demon that resides in Bear at bay.

“SILENCE!”, she shouts, to which everyone stands upright, almost to attention in complete silence.

“Now, we have 8 ships, each of which have reported back with opportunities that we must debate and agree on the one, or ones, that we will pursue with our meagre resources. Each of you is here because I trust you or because you have knowledge or experience that will aid our decision-making.”

Bear raises an eyebrow as she finishes that sentence as, in the distance, she can hear the town bell ringing. This would normally be used if there was something wrong. Were they being attacked? She stops, turns, and makes her way to the doors of the War Room with a huge sigh. Just as she reaches her hand out to the handle, it swings open, with one of her soldiers standing and panting before her. He has clearly run from the streets, his hands on his knees as he gulps large lungfulls of air into himself. He manages to get out a few words – “He’s here! Leto. He lives!”

“DAUGHTER!!!”comes a familiar bellowing voice from the end of the corridor outside the War Room.

Leto, looking very different, stands before them, water still dripping from his sodden clothes. He was reported as being seen trudging from the sea. His skin looks weird, almost translucent, but it appears to change in hue, seemingly in line with his mood? Bear, who knows every inch of her father, also notices that he has some sort of scarring near his neck? Are they… are they gills?!? Clearly, Leto has given more of himself over to Pyayray than he had previously.

What follows is an hour of Chaos as all of the captains who had considered Leto dead, all dote on him. The word spreads fast, and some of the sailors clambering to see him. This was a good omen for them, and they didn’t hide it.

All of this angered the Bear.

She had to make decisions that would potentially determine the fate of the Young Kingdoms, and she did not have time for this grandstanding. Her father, as predictable as ever, was loving the attention that was being showered on him. What was worse is that he was already starting to assume the role of Admiral/General, and that would not do. She was in charge now, and she would not have him waltzing in and trying to take over the planning.

“ENOUGH!!!”, Bear shouts. “WE STILL HAVE A JOB TO DO! DO YOU THINK 2-SCRATCH DICKENS WILL BE WAITING WHILE WE FAWN OVER MY FATHER? NO! HE WILL NOT! BACK TO WORK!”

Everyone jumps back to attention. The sailors who had come to see Leto all hurry away, scared for their lives. Before long, they are back around the map, while Bear starts to read out the notes that she has prepared on each of the boats. Bear can see Leto staring at her from the corner of her eye. He appears to be looking at her with a mixture of pride and love. She did not like that.

REF NOTE – The prep that I had written for the bulk of this first session was sparse. I wanted the players to be able to get reacquainted with their characters with the intention being for them to debate the choices they had, in character. They did not disappoint! What follows is a written summary of the session, but in truth, this was over 2 hours of uninterrupted roleplaying. All of the voices, mannerisms, and nuances of each player were out and proud. It was like we had never gone away.

Bear’s map and 8 missions

One by one, the crew and the advisors started trying to eliminate those places that did not appear to hold opportunity or were too dangerous to pursue. The Donny’s Pride is dismissed first as although it is amazing that the mythical city of Tanelorn has been found, they are clearly followers of the Balance and do not wish to have any part of their war.

The new man, Glad, proves to be invaluable as he offers further detailed information on all of the locations found. The Bloodlust of Leto is discounted after much debate. This is primarily due to the dangers described by the crew but also because Glad tells them of his knowledge of the Unholy Fortress that is rumoured to exist there.

The Blacklock’s Fury that discovered the tribes of Dorel is championed by Shan. “These infantrymen would be invaluable to us. We just need to work out a way of convincing them that we are not of Chaos. Surely we have someone with negotiation skills that can achieve this?”

It is discussed at length, but eventually, it is regarded as too much of a risk. If they were to succeed in bringing them to the war and they discovered they had been deceived, they would then be fighting a war on two fronts, and they would not survive it.

The Toast of Trip is discussed, and Glad informs the crew that what they have probably reported is Kaneloon. A city that houses a great Sorceress of Law named Myshella, who has rumoured to have fought alongside Elric of Melnibone. There is much discussion around this, and it makes the shortlist for a time but is eventually discounted due to the risk of a Law sorceress reacting badly to a request of an alliance with a Chaos army…

There is much talk and excitement about The Magnificence of Malachi. Glad, in particular, excited by the prospect of enlisting the Myrryhn people. They are sorcerers and can fly as well as being fierce warriors. To have them fight alongside the Chaos army would be a huge advantage! There is much discussion, but eventually, it is agreed that the apathy for war that is described by the crew would potentially make this journey wasted time, and that is a luxury that they don’t have. It is discounted.

This leaves three boats that a plan is formed for. Shan and Glad will take one of the merchant vessels, North East, to the Weeping Wastes and then on to the castle where a mad god exists. They will trek to try and enlist Mordaga from his castle. The rest of the crew, led by Bear, will travel to the Sorcerer’s Isle. This is a choice that confuses the captains as it is clearly one of the most dangerous choices. Leto has had some influence on this as, at one point, it was discounted by Bear, but after a private conversation with Leto, it was made a first choice.

The captains do not like secrets, but they also respect Bear enough to know that she would not make this call unless it is was important to do so.

Finally, if they are successful at the Sorcerer’s Isle, they will move down to the South East, where they will explore the crystalline structures and aim to enlist the reptilian men that were sighted there. Specifically, they are eager to see these projectile weapons and use/emulate them for their own causes.

REF NOTE – The player dynamics had changed so much since the events of the last season, and the players were really feeling it. Rodders commented about how Leto was feeling redundant since coming back to find the Bear in charge and all of ‘his men’ now going to her. Ceirun talked about how his loyalty was more to his men now and how he feels he has to live up to Tenaka’s memory. Richie was really happy that his new character had the knowledge to be of real use to the team. Bear talked about how it is hard to be responsible for it all. A special mention has to go to Chloe, who roleplayed the whole thing with her eyes shut and so in character of Nanny that she had all of us in absolute stitches. As a REF, I am blessed.

Chloe in full swing as the newly blinded Nanny

Bear then gives the final orders for her spies, boats, and infantry to guard the Isle in her absence. They will only take a small contingency on these missions as they can not afford to make the same mistakes as last time. To lose Dharijor and Pan Tang was a huge blow. They will not lose the Purple Towns, too.

Leto, feeling particularly redundant, does what he knows he can do. He calls upon his strengthened alliance with Pyaray and sings a song of praise to him:

“Pyaray Pyaray, I pray to thee
Give me parley with an emissary
Grant us protection for the Purple Towns
So we can leave to be your hounds
Drown those who serve Two Scratch Dickens
So their morale sickens.”

REF NOTE – Rodders is starting to realise now that he is more akin to the crew of Pyaray than he is to the physical world. He rolls underneath his current Chaos Points, along with his fealty bonus, and his prayer is answered.

The waters around the Isle begin to broil and, rising up from beneath the waves come mer-people. Strange half-men half-fish, all armed with sharp blades of various shapes and sizes. The defence will indeed help the Isle but it does not help the Pan Tangians, who all have strong beliefs that these things (that their ancestors allegedly slaughtered to extinction) being seen are a very bad omen. It is a trade-off that will soon be put to the test as to how worth it it all was…

They are all dismissed by Bear. “This will be your last night of relative comfort.”she says. “I suggest that you go and do whatever it is that makes you happy, as this opportunity may never come again.”

As the chamber empties out, Bear ignores her own advice and continues to plan and manage the fallout from Leto’s ‘help’. “Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” she mutters to herself. A voice inside her head laughs as it knows that soon, there will be blood and souls aplenty for it, followed by full freedom.

Nanny and Shan decide that their last night will be one of physical pleasures. They head to the most expensive whorehouse on the Isle. The less said about the debauchery that this pair got up to, the better. Rest assured that it was vile and twisted.

Glad heads back to his chambers to rest up and prepare for another journey. He has felt more use in these last weeks than he has in his whole life. The knowledge he has amassed on the Young Kingdoms has always been used as good advice, but it has never been as important as it is now. Within weeks, he will be headed to find a god. A GOD! Life can be unexpected at times.

Once Bear has finished her work, she knows that sleep will be impossible and goes to a secluded patch of beach that she has found. Here, she knows she can practice her battle skills in almost perfect solitude (the demon is always with her). Once there, she begins to go through her training sets but is interrupted by the one person she did not want to see right now. Leto.

Leto, who had gone to the same stretch of sandy shore to get closer to the sea and pray, hears his daughter and approaches her. For a reunion between father and daughter, the atmosphere is a cold one. Bear is unhappy that his appearance is disrupting her planning. The men are now confused as to who is in charge. Leto tries to defuse this by stating how happy and proud he is of what she has become and that all he sees are men who follow her unwaveringly.

They eventually go their separate ways, but the relationship has changed, and they both know it.

REF NOTE – This sort of thing is why I roleplay. To be able to have a couple of players who are so committed to their characters that the events around them change their relationship and be able to play it out in such a way, is an amazing thing to see and to be a part of.

The sun rises on the new day, and all of the crew are ready to set off. The boats have been prepared through the night by the loyal sailors of the Isle. The mood is sombre, but there is an undercurrent of hope.

The Merciless Servant and the Orto’s Hope (the merchant vessel that Shan becomes Captain of) set off in different directions, but there are some common sights that both vessels see. The seas are unnaturally calm, almost as if this plane is heading towards a more Lawful state and the world itself is being affected by it. It makes for a much easier and faster sail, but the lack of any particularly strong wind takes all of that benefit away. There is also a much higher Manfred presence on the waters, making for a slower trip for The Hope. The Servant still has the enchanted flag from Donny, so they are left unmolested. Thankfully, for the crew of the Servant, they have further to travel. They both see dead sea creatures that show signs of Manfred boat spears sporadically floating atop the water. The forces of Law are ‘cleaning’ the seas of anything that they see as untameable to the ways of Arkyn.

They see that there are fewer other vessels at sea, much lighter traffic of all other boats and those they do see are flying the altered symbol of Law – The Pidaklese version which is extremely worrying to see. The Servant sees many slave vessels, all headed towards the direction of Vilmir.

The Hope finally gets to the shores of the Weeping Wastes. The weather has been slowly getting hotter the closer that they got this part of the world but when they moor, the sun is high in the sky and beating down on them like a scalding hot slaver’s hammer. Shan, Glad and a handful of Shan’s forces, take the desert ponies off the boat with them, get dressed in desert robes, and set off into the sandstorm. Their silhouettes fade into the horizon as they begin their journey into the unknown.

The Servant finally reaches the waters that surround the Sorcerer’s Isle. Off the coast seemingly adrift, they see a familiar looking ship. Bear takes out the Captain’s seeing eye (telescope) and examines the boat. Through it, she confirms that it is indeed the Pain of MaKaye. The ship looks deserted, but she can see what looks like one of the young cabin boys huddled and scared in the corner of one of the parts of the poop deck. “I will board it and bring the boy back,” says Leto. Bear stares at him and wordlessly. His look tells her that he wants to be useful. “As you wish. Be careful. I do not like the smell of this.”says Bear.

Leto takes a small boat and rows across the sea to where the MaKaye lists lifelessly. As he climbs up the rigging on the side of the prow, Nanny decides to use Agatha (this is what she has named the undead boar) to use the sight of Balan. Her sight suddenly awakens as she sees from the eyes of the undead beast. The vessel itself is indeed empty on the deck, but underneath those decks, she can see 2 large red, tentacled grotesque creatures poised and ready to strike. She starts to scream at the boat, “LETO, IT’S A TRAP!!!”, but it is too far for the words to reach him.

Leto steps onboard the Pain, and as he does so, the deck explodes into a shower of splinters all around him as he feels himself falling below decks into a mass of black leathery skin, tentacles and sharp razor-like claws and teeth.

Thus ends episode 1 of Season 3 of Stormbringer – The Void Trilogy. What will Shan and Glad find in the deserts of the Weeping Wastes, and will they make it through to the keep of the Mad God? Will Bear, Nanny, and Leto make it as far as the Sorcerer’s Isle, or will the demons’ trap be the end of Leto’s story? Find out in episode 2 of the final season coming to Newport Games Club very soon!

Stormbringer – The Final Teaser – The Crew

The Trials and Sacrifice of Nanny

Nanny has been through so much of late, and the effects of Nos Fera have left her feeling even weaker. She feels her end getting closer and fears that she will not live to see the final battle. She resolves that she needs to be of use somehow and if she gives everything that she has left in her soul to Balan, maybe he will give her the power she needs to last that long and still be of use.

Nanny uses one of Malachi’s spells to summon a spirit from the sphere of the dead. She searches for that of an animal. At the end of the day long ritual, a spirit of a hunting boar arrives. Using the careful and tricky spell, she bids it to do one task for her.

To take her eyes.

Using her own blood, she inscribes the 8-pointed star of Chaos onto her summoning room floor, deep within the Isle of the Purple Towns. Sitting in the centre of the symbol, she begins a prayer to Balan:

“Balan, the handsome and kind, the beautiful and the merciful. I beseech thee listen to my song, only for you from my soul.”

The song that follows is that of agony and pain. It is filled with the many years of regret and sacrifice that Nanny has endured in a life in servitude of a noble family. Every note drips with the tears she has shed for the children she has cared for and who have died in this harsh existence. Every syllable aches with the longing to serve a greater purpose, to serve Balan one final time in service of the
gods of entropy.

At the crescendo of this litany of anguish, she bids the spirit to do as it is asked. It reaches through the veil and digs its tusks into her flesh, which yields like soft clay and drops them into Nanny’s cupped and waiting hands. Nanny crushes them between her own blood-soaked hands and whimpers:

“Oh Balan, lord of lords, my eyes are now with you so that I may gaze upon thy beauty for eternity. My flesh is with thee so I may feel thy warmth until the end of all. Do with them as thy will and as thy please as I give them to thee freely. For thee, I give my body and soul and I give them freely.”

With the last of her strength used up in the ritual, she collapses backwards and lies prostrate, waiting and hoping for her lord to answer.

And answer he does.

In the darkness, there is no sound nor light, yet Nanny can hear something. Quiet at first as if some distance away. Whimpers can be heard, but they soon raise in volume to become screams of pain and pleasure. The true litany of agony and ecstasy fills the air. Even through the darkness of her sightless skull, she sees him, his power and presence reaching her on a metaphysical level. A tall, muscular naked man, blood still dripping from his claw-like hands. He wears a stone mask that is bolted upon his skull, blood dripping from each piton.

Its presence comes close as he lowers his visage to hers. The pitons come away from his mask without aid. It falls away to reveal nought but muscle, bone, and blood ‘neath it. He brings his claws to her face and peels her flesh away. He raises this to his own skull to wear it, like a prize. The mask then drifts over Nanny’s mutilated skull, and each piton is hammered in by the same unseen force. Nanny now wears the stone mask of Balan.

The agony and ecstasy are too much, even
for a deviant such as Nanny, and she succumbs to the darkness.

When she awakes, she is greeted by abject darkness. In a dizzying moment, she is suddenly able to see herself lying on the floor through a haze of red. It is disorientating, but soon enough, she realises that she is seeing through the eyes of something else! Balan has gifted her with a skeletal companion! That of a Hunting Boar!

She finds that she can only do this in short bursts, but she also feels something else. She is linked to this thing in a way that she is yet to fully understand, but she will learn, as will her enemies and, maybe even her allies…

Whatever Happened to Captain Leto?

The scene is one of unbridled Chaos. Smoke, brine, and blood fill the air with the flames of the burning fleet, causing orange light and shadows to dance across the bridge of the Merciless Servant.

Leto can see that all looks lost and with the image of Tenaka being ripped apart by Manfreds still fresh in his mind, he takes the dying request to heart.

He jumps overboard.

As he hits the water, the shock of the cold causes him to stop breathing, and his heart freezes. Around him are the already bloated and burned bodies of his comrades, along with debris from the many destroyed boats.

“We were so close to winning!” he thinks to himself. “That damn void machine turned the day”. He was outmanoeuvred. He sees that now, but it will not happen again. He will learn from this loss and will win the day next time.

He begins to swim towards the shore, he has to hope that Bear, Shan and Nanny were successful so that this battle would’ve meant something. As he begins to slowly make his way through the hazard-filled waters (He never was that good at swimming), he swears he felt something brush across his
leg. Something that felt slimy and cold. “It’s just my imagination.” He says to himself again.

Then he feels it once more, but this time it is sustained. His eyes widen in fear as, in that split second, he wonders if the Manfreds can work underwater.

As that horrific thought floods his mind, so too are his lungs flooded by the cold waters as he is dragged underwater at speed!

Leto is gone.

Leto starts to panic but soon realises that he does not need to breathe. There appears to be an enchantment cast upon him, likely by the mermen that are carrying him down to the seabed. He remembers these things. They are the same ones that he saw off the coast of Pan Tang. Around him, dead bodies are being carried to the depths by the rotting servants of Pyaray. He is being taken to the darkest of depths with debris from the burning boats of his destroyed armada, which are being taken to the fleet of the dead. That is when he sees it in all its majestic dread.

The Fleet of Pyaray, the Tentacled Whisperer.

Surprisingly, there are only about 20 vessels, but they are huge, much bigger than even the Manfreds boats. Surrounding them, there is a haze around each of the vessels that appear to be born of Chaos. He knows that if he was not under some sort of enchantment, he would be affected by this power. His dead comrades are dragged into these fields, and as they pass through it, their mouths, nostrils, and eyes all emit a strong green light as their mouths appear to contort into a silent scream and their souls are committed to the service of the dread fleet for all eternity.

He passes through the fields of Chaos without harm but is taken past the dreaded vessels. The mermen take him through a series of vast underwater caverns and tunnels until he is eventually deposited on land, in the mouth of a huge underwater cavern. He coughs and splutters as his lungs appear to become used to breathing air again.

From deep within the shadows of this huge cavern, high in the air, Leto can see a blue diamond shape glowing in the darkness. It gets bigger, and he can now see how vast it is. He can feel it in his very being.

He stands before Pyaray himself.

Pyaray is vast. His form that Leto’s human mind translates him as is a monstrous red octopus with the blue soul-diamond in the centre of its head, but Leto knows that his true form would cause him to go insane or even to pop like scum filled water bubble. Then he understands why Pyaray is called the name he is as he hears a whisper in his mind. If Pyaray were to speak directly to him, it would destroy a mortal mind.

“You have been a good servant, but you have failed too many times to be rewarded yet. The forces of Law are getting too strong and could now potentially destroy my fleet.”

“I am now unable to surface, but instead, I gather my forces together, as the next time I surface, will be for the final war that will decide the fate of this sphere.“

“The gods are, even now, still unable to intervene directly or risk the wrath of the
cosmic balance. Destiny, however, decrees that the gods will rise for the battle at the end of time, if the horn of fate is blown.”

“It is said that Elric of Melnibone is in possession of the horn but that he has been
vanquished by a rogue agent of Chaos – Prince Gaynor the Damned. If you can find Gaynor and convince him to ally himself, he can blow the horn as the final battle commences, and I will rise.”

“What say you, servant? Will you do the bidding of your lord? Or will you be forever cast out from the gods of Chaos? Your reward will be great, and the fleet will be yours to command.”

Leto, on one knee and with his head bowed in reverence, just says one sentence.

“Your bidding is my command, oh lord.”

REF NOTE – Had Rodders decided to take offence at being told he had failed his lord in any way, no matter how slight, he would have been banished from worshipping any Chaos lord and would have had a much harder (if not interesting) final season. Luckily, he knows better, but then, he was sober at the time. Who knows what would have happened if Rodders had had a beer or five before this solo…

With that, Leto is taken back through the waters by the Mer-Men and back to the Isle of Purple Towns. He is told that time moves very differently where he has just been, and much has passed since the battle. He must be prepared for this upon his return.

* The camera shows the last shot of the back of Leto, stepping out of the water on the coast of the Isle of Purple Towns. Nothing but a dripping silhouette staring at the magnificent purple buildings, a full moon hanging high in the sky with the sound of crashing waves behind him.

He has returned.

The Legacy of Tenaka – Shan

Shan has surprised himself. Not normally one to be hampered by emotions, he is shocked by the immense sadness that he feels when he is told that Tenaka did not survive the battle, even more so than Leto. Shan had gotten quite close to Tenaka over the last few months. They had talked about how his crafting skills would be put to use for Tenaka’s loyal men. They had laughed, whored and drunk together. Shan could finally see a place where his wandering soul could rest, at last.

But now, that was gone.

Ever the pragmatist, he sees that this could actually be an opportunity. Over the coming months, as they wait for news from the ships, Shan gathers all of Tenaka’s men. He trains with them and crafts great weapons and armour for his lieutenants. He bonds with them in the way that Tenaka would have. It works, and they begin to treat him as their leader.

He ensures that they know he is not a leader who sits at the back of the battle and barks orders at them. He is a leader who leads from the front. Their risk is his risk. Their loss is his loss. Their victories are his and vice versa.

Before long, Shan has near 100 men, strong and true, who are loyal to him. They are named by others as the Dark Legion as they root out the remaining groups of Pidaklese’ loyalists who remain on the Isle, in the wilderness. They are named, such as nobody sees them coming, and no witnesses are left to tell any tales. They gain a reputation of such note in this short space of time that the womenfolk mutter stories of a shadow army, ghosts of dead sailors who return to claim revenge on those who have wronged them.

Shan and his men are ready for whatever comes next.

Heavy is the head that wears the crown – The Bear

When she lost Leto last time, she was adamant that he survived, and she was proved right. She is even more sure this time that he lives. Even if he was dead, who has time to grieve? Not her, that’s for certain! Everyone, and she means EVERYONE, now looks to her for leadership and guidance. They have even started calling her the Admiral or the General (depending on whether it was sailors or soldiers that addressed her). Every single problem is brought to her, no matter how inconsequential.

She hates it.

That being said, she does not trust anyone else with this. If the fate of the Young Kingdoms were to be left to someone else, then all she would do is disapprove and want it done right. She hates it, but it must be done.

It was her plan to send the boats out to the 8 ‘corners’ of the map, and slowly but surely, they started to come back with reports. A decision will have to be made soon that she fears will have much resting upon. If she chooses unwisely, it could very well mean the end of everything, and this plane will become nought but a void.

No pressure there then, eh?

On the positive side, she has been forced to get better at skills she was pretty poor at. She leads some of the reconnaissance fleets around the island, improving her sailing skills. In addition to this, she has to address the sea-kings on a regular basis to give them their orders. She has gotten quite good at inspiring speeches and controlling the crowd. She feels that even Orto would be proud of how good her orating skills have become.

Then there is that voice in her head. The one she hides from everyone else. The one that tells her to kill, to sow Chaos amongst her own troops. The voice has unfortunately worked on a few occasions now, and she has fed upon innocents. Her most loyal friends have managed to cover this up, but it is fast becoming a risk that she does not know how to handle.

Some of the prisoners, who were worshippers of Law (the ‘old Law’ as opposed to Pidaklese’ version) have been consulted in private, and in exchange for better treatment, have been assisting her in keeping the beast at bay. All in private, of course. The troops can not and must not learn of this weakness.

She now has one of these priests close to her at all times. He is chained and gagged with a metal mouth plate, but without his rituals close at hand, she could succumb to the creature at any moment. It is a huge risk and is not easy to explain. (Why, in Arioch’s name, does she need to have a Law priest near her at all times???), but the alternative is so much worse.

She will have to think of a good reason for this. (REF NOTE – Sara will have to think of a good reason for this, but she can do so in play because I am an evil REF and nothing comes without a price).

The last thing she does is summon her closest advisors, the remaining and new crew of the Merciless Servant, to the War Room to discuss and take advice on which mission they should pursue for new allies of Chaos for the coming war. It feels like this time, the battle will be final.

Thus ends the final teaser trailer for the third and final season of Stormbringer – The Void Trilogy. Episode 1 will ‘air’ on Sunday, October the 8th, with the write-up following shortly afterwards. Join us for a story of epic proportions!

Stormbringer, Season 3 – 0.5 – Contact! pt 3

It has now been 2 months since the 8 boats left the Isle in order to find potential Chaos allies throughout the Young Kingdoms. Most of them have reported back with lots of mixed messages, but now, the last of them have reached out…

The Master En’s Reward

The captain of this vessel brings tidings of a continent lost in time. It is made up of wild vegetation, with flora the likes of which the ships sorcerer has never seen before. They have followed a river that leads from the Boiling Sea and takes them deep inland, where they have found a huge crystalline structure!

All attempts to gain entry into this vast structure have proved ineffective, so they started to explore the surrounding area. This was where they made some disturbing discoveries.

They have found many ruins, all of which are both familiar and alien, simultaneously. The ship’s sorcerer believes them to be similar to those described as being on Melnibone, but much older. He theorises that this could be the ancient home of the race that went on to become Melniboneans.

On the 4th day of looking around these lands, the sorcerer tempted the gods by wondering aloud if there were any inhabitants of this strange land. That was when there was a strange whipping noise followed by his head being split in two by what appeared to be a metal disc the size of a plate.

They were chased through the forests back to the relative safety of the Master En by scaled humanoid creatures with large eyes and a ‘mohican’ of flesh atop their heads, similar to that of a chicken.

They have not left the Master En since then and now await orders from General Bear.

The Pain of MaKaye

This crew knew where they were headed and thought they had prepared enough. Their mission was to travel to the Sorcerer’s Isle. This place was once recognised and run by the churches of Chaos. It would be a final rite of passage that all sorcerer’s would go through in order to achieve full priesthood.
It was dangerous, even then, but much more so since the catastrophe.

Over 100 years ago, a sorcerer of Pan Tang took the trials and survived them. Unfortunately, his greed was so great that he decided to lead a band of rebels under the banner of Mabelrode to usurp the Isle. It is said that the battle that took place was so vast that it ripped holes in the very fabric of the Spheres itself and let loose demons that flooded the isle.

Armed with many spells, protective charms and enchanted weaponry, the crew of the Pain of MaKaye moored on what looked like a quiet island, hoping that the Pan Tangian sorcerer still remains and can be persuaded to join the fight.

Within minutes, the captain and one priest of Arioch were all that remained.

The crew found that the demons had indeed taken the Isle, and it is now a hell plane in all but location. Demons stride the land and endlessly torture the inhabitants unlucky enough to go there looking for power and riches. One particularly large creature that looked like a bear but with eyeballs peering out from every inch, spotted them when they approached saying “FRESH SOULS”, and with a wave of its impossible appendage (it looked like a tentacle but had many mouths screaming where the suckers may once have been), all of the protective charms and spells immediately fell.

The captain and the remaining sorcerer are now back out to sea and await orders, although they have refused to go back to the isle under any circumstances.

The Magnificence of Malachi

In addition, the Malachi reports back for a second time. Having traversed the mountain range (that they now know is called The Vale of Xanyaw) and high up in those craggy mountains, they have found a huge city, of sorts.

Living in primitive yet beautiful cabins literally nested in the trees there, are the race of winged peoples known as the Myrrhn.

The crew are welcomed with open arms and given all of the hospitality of these intelligent and deceptively advanced and enlightened people. The bad news is that they are worshippers of the cosmic balance, and as such, they have categorically stated that they will not take part in any war. Their most common phrase is “What will be, will be.”

The captain feels that they could be convinced to join the fight, if someone with better negotiating skills could be here to try.
He awaits orders.

Season 3

What will the crew choose to do? Which ally do they feel is right for their war? Which option represents the right balance of risk and reward? Who knows? Certainly not me (REF NOTE – Player agency is a bummer for session prep!), so I will be just as eager to find out as you are, dear reader. Let’s all find out together as the final season of Stormbringer – The Void Trilogy begins its conclusion at some point in late September 2023!