Storythread

“This wasn’t too hard the first time with my son,” Rideirc said as he pulled two more books from the shelves. “It shouldn’t be too hard with you either. Once you know how to read, entire worlds open up to you, Fann. You’ll get to read about…” Rideirc paused to look behind him, seeing a book but no human child on the floor.
“…Fann?!”

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Worldbuilding a bit, decided to write it in a sort of prose form. Hope this is the right place put it.

The human race of the Sundans are said to be the purest and cleanest of all. They were the first to have been born from the shoots of bamboo after the horrid Deicide of Aman Malakas, the Mad Sky God.
Of course, this is all myth. And as such, all things are to be held up to the light of scrutiny, wouldn’t we all agree?
I write under the moniker of Chayim. I am a Sundan Historian, and I try my best to keep my views out of the given evidence. Unlike many other Caellianese Historians, or Qi-rong-qi ni’il, or even the Kikuchian mushi.
But I digress.
Firstly, where I gathered this information. One would be hard pressed to find a scientific, outworldly view from any of the people now living here, and so I seek amongst the non-humans, the ones that are not the mortal. The ones whose memories have been etched in ice and their dreams alive but dust.
And fortunately, in this particular instance, their history had been etched in strange, polyhedral nodes of what seemed to be crystallized dream and memories. They are called Memory Orbs, and it is through here that I’ve managed to regain power and magic beyond mortal ken.
And it is now, I know, my responsibility to keep it away from any other mortal that might want it. This mortal world drenched and steeped in conflict and war. Death is their closest ally, and it is thus.
Once again, I apologize for digressing. I have been used to it as of late.
I’ve been blessed, after touching and absorbing the Memory Orbs for so long with the incapability to lose my memory. They are all there, stored in my mind, every detail clear to me, unfogged by time. Thus, I must use my sorceries to keep numb, lest I succumb to overwhelming despair. Death is my only respite.

The Anito – that is, what we call Spirits in Sunda, and for the sake of this document I will refer to the use of Anito, for it is closer to the First Language – of Memory have blessed – or cursed – me with this talent. And thus I write down these words to calcify such memories. Will this be accepted in the mainstream papers? Most probably not. I can imagine this becoming much too long for the Caellianese or even the Qi-Rong-Rian printing presses! And as such, this is not something that bothers me. Those who seek the truth shall find it. And it is not a very comforting thought that I know not a lot of people do. Most would rather be blind to it, believing in convenient lies.
I continue.
The Anito of Memory have blessed me with both the ability to keep my memories like ossified crystals within the palace of my mind as well as the gift itself of the Memory Orbs. I scoured Sunda then, and most of them were in Sunda, for – as seen in the Memory Orbs – Sunda was the cradle of humanity, albeit not the beginning of everything.
To understand this, we must begin at the closest to the beginning.

The oldest memory orb was dated to be 100 Million Years Ago. Surely, Myndo must’ve looked different back then, and it did. Those that walked the land looked nothing like us humans, they were giant, powerful Elemental Kings. I could see giant winged creatures and seven-legged leonine wolves, as well as serpents that when they swam would create ripples in the earth. Powerful burying beetles that upended mountains. These titans roamed the land and changed everything in their wake.
And it seems, the earliest of those that had Memory walked below them like ants. They hid within the holes of mountains being upended by beetles, they swam in the seas that were actually the pores of giant wyrms.

The oldest memory orb was dated to be 100 Million Years Ago. Surely, Myndo must’ve looked different back then, and it did. Those that walked the land looked nothing like us humans, they were giant, powerful Elemental Kings. I could see giant winged creatures and seven-legged leonine wolves, as well as serpents that when they swam would create ripples in the earth. Powerful burying beetles that upended mountains. These titans roamed the land and changed everything in their wake.
And it seems, the earliest of those that had Memory walked below them like ants. They hid within the holes of mountains being upended by beetles, they swam in the seas that were actually the pores of giant wyrms. These people were humanoid, resembling us. Were they the first humans? No. Of course not. But they were near. They were tall, and much too slender legged, they had prehensile tails that were barbed at the end, and fur covered their entirety, their hair was made of shoots and branches and leaves, their magic was primal, tied to the earth, and they talked freely with the spirits – the Anito, for such it was in the days before the Sundering of the Spheres.
They worshipped no gods.

I like this a lot, but I think the 'voice' is a bit off. Maybe try reading it out loud and seeing what sentences don't mesh well with the rest and rewrite them?

will do! thanks for taking the time to read

The next Memory Orb was 50 Million Years ago. In that span of time, all the giant creatures had vanished. The strange first beings with memory – called by the Anito as the Urima-Huma – had vanished. More precisely, they had changed. Pardon my mix of words, my knack for showmanship precedes me.
The Urima-Huma had become three different peoples. The Urima-Doso worshipped those that they did not see, the Gods in the heavens above, and the Gods – the most powerful of the Anito – heeded their call. The Gods formed, becoming mirrors of their worshippers. And thus were the first Gods formed.
The Urima-Asto believed in none, but themselves. They were a race of hunters and warriors and chiefs, and they sought to fight with only their tools and their finesse. They were quickly bent by the Urima-Doso, who had gained the attention of the beings that underlied Reality.
The Urima-Koro believed in none as well, but decided to begin using tools and inherited the lost knowledge of the universe, the different Arcana of Reality. Soon, they had managed to perform Magic once again. Pure and True Magic, that summoned power from the Realm of Spirit.
One thing was for sure – the Urima Races walked and lived upon the fossils and ruins of the civilizations of old, the Elemental Kings. The Urima Races were the new kings.

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The next Memory Orb skipped ahead 49 Million Years, to just 1 Million Years before us. The Urima Races had almost all died out, save for the Urima-Koro, who managed to immortalize themselves and assimilate ranks amongst the Anito as Gods instead of being part of the Anito Host, like the Doso and the Asto.

1 Million Years Ago, the first humans grew. They looked like us Sundans, except they were not. They were closer to their predecessors, the Urima Doso. That’s right – the humans came from the Urima Doso, evolving from them as time lengthened and changed them, as the Supercontinent of Baara split and Sundered. Most of the Urima Doso were in the Sunda Landmass during this time, and kept a strong connection to the Anito, and they were changed as the magic ebbed, as the Gods took more control, as the climate shifted and forced them to adapt.

The Urima Doso became the species huma. This, in other words and in concepts now lost to us man, is known as Evolution. Unfortunately, the belief that Yavum has created all of us pervades Caellianese society, along with other such myths in every civilization. The only one I know of that knows the truth is the sheltered Sundan Barangay of Itinag-yaro, which resides in the deepest forests and jungles of Sunda. This barangay is said to have been raised by a still alive tribe of Urima-Doso, which have concocted some sort of elixir to give them immortality.

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During those 50 million years of war, civilization, and growth, other mortals arose from what the Urima thought to have been long-dead Lines. The mushi species rose from the Insect Kings of the past, and the ni’il species rose from the Dragon Kings. They didn’t grow into strength until 30 Million Years later on, where they fought world-destroying wars that eventually brought them back to what they once were – primitive savages. This happened again and again, the Paradoxical Cycle of Aeons. Until, well a million years ago, when the first human arose.

And thus, as the great mass continent known as Baara split apart, and the mushi and its subspecies, the ni’il and its subspecies, and the humans and their races – the Sundans, and then sooner the Galadarians, the Saevitarians, and the Alanassians – and much more.

750 thousand years ago, the Diwata – or the Gods – created their creation to perpetuate their mark on the world. The Engkanto races were races born of Spirit. The leaders of the Engkanto races were the tamawo and the daraketnon, the light and dark nobles of the engkanto. The tawong lipod live with the Moon God Bu-an in the Sky. The saranggay guard ancient tombs. The dead walk the night. The Bakunawa preys upon the moon.

200 thousand years ago, the humans became dominant. They rose up to conquer and worked with the other mortal races to wage war against the races that seemed to be more “perfect”. Conflict was in their Soulstrands. They warred against the Engkanto Races. The great magics and technologies of both races were lost. The land itself was uprooted, and then destroyed. The spheres of the Spirit and the Material were frayed, causing manifestation from the spirits to become more difficult. The land dried up, and the split was complete. The Gods would become a bit more silent, albeit still interfering daily in mortal affairs, just now with more subterfuge.

The next memory orb was more recent. Only four thousand years ago. This was after the war with the Engkanto, and everything had settled into place. The Spheres had settled into place. In between the fractured Spheres of Material and Spirit, the residue of the Spirit filled the cosmological gap in between the spheres – Aether, the breath of the gods. This aether seeps into the mortal world, allowing for aetherworkings, or magic by aether.

It is from here that “modern” time begins. This is known as the Last Bakunawa Attack, when the Bakunawa leapt from its abyssal deep and seized the Moon. Halea, the Seventh Moon, defended the Bu-An, the Full Moonchild, while Sui-dapa, the God of Death, arose and kept him safe within the Underworld. Now during the day, Bu-an gives command of the sky to his sister Adlayari, Goddess of the Sun, and he rests in the Underworld.

The Gods have many forms due to being there for so long, but it is known – mostly by me and the Anito of Memory -- that the Bu-an (and by extensions all the Gods) now of the Mortal and Engkanto and all the living races are much, much different from the Gods of the Elemental Kings.

During this time the Sundans scavenged lost relics and tech from their past lives, but not having the knowledge to power them, failed in using them. During this as well, they fought their Million Wars, eventually resulting in a few charismatic leaders of a Tribe – a band of Half-Tamawo – to leave and venture inland with their Bayan, or Lakandom. When they arrived in a land between three rivers, they named it Caellian and populated their land. Soon every Caellianese had Tamawo blood within them, and most of them adapted to the colder lands. Caellianese adopted the lighter skin, hair, and blue and green eyes of their half tamawo forebears. Despite the blood of the tamawo being so diluted, they are now Caellianese – a different breed of Humann.

During this time also, there were other Humanns that existed. These humanoids were under the banner of the Human, similar to the Urima. Thus, the Human-Sunda are those that evolved in Sunda, growing robust brown skin, intelligent capabilities, and the ability to understand deeper concepts and knowledges, allowing for magic and the harnessing of Aether. (Which they call Diwa. The Anito use the term Aether.)

The Human-Galadar, or the Galadarians were so called because of being born from the Galadar Mountain range. The Galadar call themselves descendants of the Urima-Asto, and are incapable of harnessing magic with their Wills. Thus one would be hard pressed to see an Aetherworker, or a Cleric among the Galadarians, but one would be able to see an Aethercrafter, as one who modifies Aether, or a Mangkukulam, as one who uses inherent magical symbols to perform magic. They differ from Sundans in that they are squatter, never growing higher than 5 feet, and have a larger brow. They are capable of thought, and speech, and understanding Higher Mysteries, but something within their Soulstrands disallow themselves from harnessing magic.

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Bump

Well Somebody Had Had To Love Lovecraft


“See, Gladys didn’t I tell you he was a beaut’?”

“How do you know that’s a he!?” exclaimed Gladys

“Pff. It’s a guy thing. You chicks wouldn’t understand. I know he’s a dude. Just look at him.” said Harold.

And Gladys did look at ‘him’. At least 50ft tall the monstrous being towered over them even while sitting down in the cold snow. It seemed to made of a combination of flesh and tree-roots. It’s head??? was more a bunch of teeth-like-spikes sticking out in every direction like ivory branches with a yellow insect like larvae atop it as a scalp. It had 2 arms but 4 forearms and 4 hands to match. She had never quite seen something like it before.

The creature paid them no mind though while it was preoccupied with devouring the corpse of what she hoped was an animal.

“Harold. I thought you had meant you found a dog or something. We can’t keep this as a pet!” Gladys shouted then shot a look at the monster to make sure it hadn’t heard her, Gladys gripping her husbands hand tightly.

(1/3)

“And why not? I let you get a cat!” said Harold defensively.

“A CAT, Harold. Is manageable. We have a flat with no garden. Cat faeces goes into the litter box and is disposed of easily. This THING.” She said placing emphasis on ‘thing’. “Is some Eldritch-like entity from some Lovecraftian Mythos. I doubt they make kitty litter boxes big enough for this monster and have it still fit in our 1 bedroom apartment.” whispered Gladys viciously while eyeing the monster.

“But Gladys..I don’t like Mr Fluffynutters. He keeps peeing on my good shirts and always gives you all the attention. The best I get from him is hissing and scratching.” said Harold sounding dejected.

“Come on Gladys. I promise to feed him and take care of him. I’ll even take him for walks everyday!”

“Harold.. That’s what you said about Mr Fluffynutters. You did none of those things except try leash him and take him outside for walks, regardless of how many times I tried explaining to you that Cat’s don’t go for walks, Harold.”

“But that’s only after I found out Cat’s are boring.”

“This guy’s interesting. Look at him Gladys, doesn’t he make your brain feel like mush.”

“Well yes. But I wouldn’t really call that a selling point though.”

The monster finished eating whatever putrid mash of guts and blood it had been feasting on, turned it’s gaze?? Towards the couple standing before it.

(2/3)

FEEEEEEED MEEEEEEEEE

The thought rang out like a gong throughout both Harold’s and Gladys’ mind.

“OKAY!” Shouted Harold running towards he beast open armed.
Gladys remained frozen in fear. She watched as Harold closed the distance to the monster in a a few seconds flat.

It tilted it’s head?? The giant monster looked almost perplexed.

Harold reached the monster’s second left hand and plucked the pinky finger with both his arms and pulled at the monster.

“You’re coming with us big fella. I’ll call you Eldri. My wife said you were something of that sort.”

“See Gladys!? He wants to come with us. He has my scent now, it’s too late to abandon him, the other’s wont accept him back.”

‘Eldri’ too shocked as to why his command had only effected one mortal was too dumbfounded to think straight and so let Harold lead him away.

The very next week in the city. When the garbage disposal service finally came upon Harold and Gladys apartment’s dumpster. Most of the usual was in their trash. Mostly empty pizza boxes with a few stale slices still left inside, empty beer cans, all of Harold’s salad portions from his dishes that he slyly disposed of when Gladys had her back turned, Kitty Litter, empty cat food bags and the gory combination of the corpses of perhaps more than 7 fully grown humans. But the garbage disposal people didn’t notice.

After all minimum wage and Eldritch brain scrambling had the wonderful effect of negligence and ignorance when it was required.

(3/3)

Synthetic flowers.

I saw them behind a cyber glass barrier inside a flower shop that was getting continually bombarded with raindrops. There wasn’t even any water in the vase. Not that they would ever need it, but it was another reminder that it was just an illusion. A corporate imitation of something that used to be commonplace in the world. Something that was undeniably alive. The flowers would tilt toward the window every now and then and touch at the glass. It looked like the poor thing so desperately wanted water. So desperately wanted to believe it could substitute for the real thing. But we all know better.

These days you would be lucky to even hear a rumor about someone seeing plants. Let alone seeing one for yourself. Sad reality of it is that’s just not possible anymore. The last patch of land, real honest to god ground, had been surgically cut out from mother Earth and replaced with the same synthcrete that makes up the entire city.

Though just calling it a “city” is underselling it by a mile. The Corporation bled mother Earth dry one acre at a time until you could only dream of seeing dirt again. It started in the 2030s with The Corporation declaring itself an independent and sovereign state and using their blood money to build their own country out in the Pacific. It must have been quite the marvel for the sheep that didn’t know what was coming.

You give these blood flies an inch and they take everything from you. They take things away from you that you didn’t even know you had. Didn’t even know you could lose.

The other night I got woken up with gun shots near my apartment. The Corporation sent a team to go round up people on trumped up contraband charges.

They didn’t even bother sending out soldiers from the actual Corporation for this. Just hired guns looking for a paycheck. Which means they don’t have to worry about damaging the Corporations image when they go too far. At least for the few oblivious citizens still believing that the corporation was looking out for us.
Anyway, they made some noise about how they caught an “anonymous” tip that this family had been withholding unregistered food from The Corporation. And by unregistered they mean actual food. Not the processed and cloned garbage they push at the feeding complexes for wage slaves. I swear that stuff gets worse the more copies they make of it.

This anonymous tip isn’t so anonymous either. You see, I know that the food they found was planted. It was the Living complex overseer, Dukain. I could smell it on his breath whenever he opened his mouth for a laugh and revealed his metal teeth. Cloned food has a sterile stench to it that I didn’t find at all when the bastard was barking at me.

Probably bought it off a shadow merchant on the black market and wanted to make some quick cash selling out this family for the reward. His beady eyes had a real self-satisfied look when he watched them get dragged off to a Corporation facility.

I was gonna make him swallow that god damn money.

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This makes me entirely uncomfortable and I don't know why

Probably the corpses.

He paused mid-way through the car lot, his eyes catching sight of what he first thought to be a loathsome giant beast. The skins and heads of dozens of animals covered a truck, tails of raccoons hanging from its bumpers, the gas tank cover replaced with the back half of a raccoon, antlers and pitchforks awkwardly jutting from the truck bed, and a few lone stuffed and mounted animal heads looked at him with an almost shamed dead gaze.

“Ah,” he turned his head to follow the voice to see the gray bushy bearded face of John waddling over with an opened can of Newa’s Lite, he somehow seemed to have gotten even shorter and fatter in the year he had been gone. “This the first time you’ve seen Joe’s new uh… decorations?”

“Joe’s out of prison?” He widened his eyes. “I thought he got twenty for nearly beating Kathy to death.”

“Way I heard it, it was reduced ‘cuz the judge is his mother’s brother.” John sniffed. He then took a short swing from his can, suds getting stuck in the thick hairs of his beard. “Got out two years ago, fucked off, then came back in-“ his gaze turned back to the fur wrapped vehicle. “That thing. Shows up every Saturday now so he can go yell at the apartment door until the cops come.”

He frowned, rubbing his chin, “damn. I feel bad for Kathy. Joe’s always been a cock, bet he’s come out more unhinged since prison.”

“Yeah well I’m sure her husband’s got it handled. He’s one of them woodsy aelder.”

He took another step towards the vehicle, tempted to reach out and touch the sad face of a wolf with a glass eye bulging out. “Is this some kind of ‘fuck you’ to them?” He asked while looking back at John.

“Oh yeah, definitely. Would work better if he knew what the fuck kind of aelder is what though,” John nodded. “Bastard thinks he’s the tree hugging kind.” John waddled his way closer to him, patting him on the back. “Good seeing you though Mike.”

“Good seeing you too, John.”

“You want to come to the barbecue next Sunday?” John asked, starting to slowly move to another vehicle.

“Oh sure. Can I bring the wife and kids?”

“Yeah!” John gave him a snaggle toothed grin, not unlike the bared teeth of the odd eyed wolf on Joe’s truck. He took another swing of the can of beer and tossed it to the ground. “Speaking of kids, I gotta go pick my daughter up from school. I’ll see you on Sunday.”

Mike glanced down at the can, then at John. “Are you sure you should be driving?”

“It’s fine. I’ve got enough dwarf blood in me that I gotta suck down windshield fluid to get drunk,” John laughed, before driving off.

Mike stood quietly, watching the blue truck zip onto the road and out of sight, before he turned his gaze back onto the furred truck. He could hear the soft sound of glue separating as a flank of deer skin slowly peeled away from door panel, before flopping onto the asphalt below.

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Bump

Why bother?

I am a first time DM but I've made a couple modules in Neverwinter Nights. This is a rough sketch of my plot for a campaign that I recently started and wanted to know what people who have actually run a campaign think of it.

My party is almost all new players and I am a new DM so some of the plot points may be a little "on the nose" compared to a more advanced group.

The main plot points are, more or less

>they arrive in an unknown archipelago after their ship is sucked into a storm
>said place is super fucked because a meteor struck one of the nearby islands
>outside of the "mundane" problems that arise from this it also woke up monsters that have been pouring out of the mountain it struck like ants
>this was a generation ago and the players are on one of the last 'safe' islands, farthest from the initial contact

The setting is going to be pretty bleak all things considered. A generation of bad crop yields, fighting supernatural horrors and also regular war with neighboring kingdoms have all combined to make most people unfriendly to outsiders.

To try and keep things interesting for the party, the plot beyond the Starwars intro crawl picks up somewhat.

>the "meteor" is actually an interplanar craft piloted by mindflayers
>their damaged power source is leaking reality altering radiation into the world around them

>dwarves are all but extinct due to the proximity of their kingdoms to the crash site and being betrayed by elves
>the elves present on the island were exiled from their own people before their arrival and will strike any deal to see the Undying Lands

>mercenaries, beasts and even places have been yanked from other realities by "slipping through the cracks"

>several groups of humans have willingly worked with the mindflayers on the promise of power - most of them wind up as shitty Dr Moreau hybrids like flightless birdmen, genetically unstable satyrs and other monsters of the week

cont

Continued

I want the players to have some agency in the outcome of the campaign so I want every faction to have a "win condition". The main factions are

>Karkand, the largest human kingdom
They are currently besieged on all sides by extra-dimensional horrors. Many of their outlying hamlets have been abandoned, razed to ruin or met worse fates. Miles of battle lines and earthworks surround their capital city as they fight off invaders from afield and (more recently) from beneath their feet. Hundreds die each week holding the front or in vicious house to house fighting down in the cities lower quarters. The nearly year long siege has left the air itself crackling with magic as evocations have flown back and forth like artillery barrages for hours at a time.

They are initially going to be the mundane 'big bad' kingdom until the players meet the really ugly stuff. Their desperate situation has left them looking farther afield for fresh bodies and they readily "requisition" a years crop yields to feed their massive army. Stopping them from press-ganging villagers, exploiting "tolls" on roads and protection money, etc is going to be a prominent feature of the early plots.

Their win condition is securing a legitimate claim on the entirety of the island chain and uniting it under the crown.

>Hursk Raiders
Terrible bandits hailing from """not""" Mongolia.

They have the unique advantage of voluntarily crossing through the planes to arrive on the Islands with a repeatable and understood method. When a rift opened on their home plane the greatest of their shamans rose together and contained it into a stable portal. Though the trip only works one way, communication between their planes is possible.

Rather than loose bands of stragglers and lost souls they cross over in tight knit warbands of hardened warriors.

Their win condition is destruction or subjugation of all other powers.
Cont

One second after coming out of G-LOC, a small thought crossed my tired mind.
>Why is the missile alert so annoying, anyway? Bloody hell.
The tortured mass of flesh screaming towards me was no missile, of course, but at least the DASS detected it, and I did not complain too much. The targets didn't have RAM coating or shapes suitable for LO, and the system didn't discriminate between old Soviet shitboxes and abominations from beyond nightmares. To be fair, the targets didn't really have coherent shapes at all, so it had a rather easy job to do.
Anyway, after getting some sense back in me, I increased thrust to minimum afterburner, rolling and launching flares and chaff. The dispenser fired ten miniature suns every second, threw aluminium all around my craft, and illuminated things that I, fortunately, never saw with my own eyes. This was enough to fool the horror following me, which absorbed a decoy before fading back to its hellish realm. Its parent craft, still behind me, tried to get to a good angle, shifting its tissues under unknown forces, murdering the air with its every movement. However, its plan was spoiled when I pitched up, yanking the stick as hard as I could, before returning to a ten-degree AoA as I saw the monstrosity pass to my left. I laughed a bit, as I, a complete BVRfag, just used a Pugachev's Cobra in combat successfully. I laughed a bit, as Jack, the world's most polite buddy, radioed up to tell me to stop being a fucking showoff. I laughed a bit, as I stared down the horror's exhaust, and lined up a shot with the BK-27. I laughed a bit, and opened up the radio to say three words:
>Guns, guns, guns.
The Mauser launched its shells, and they ripped the beast from the inside out. Its agonised screams pierced my mind, and it belched thick, black smoke.
This battle was far from finished, of course. However, as I saw the eldritch flames consume the nightmare, I couldn't help but feel hope. Hope for this fight. Hope for this war. Hope for humanity.

>The Solari
A fanatical cult of sun worshippers. Though unfamiliar with the nature of their foes the effects of sunlight on mindflayers and their creations is well known. On their barren, rocky island the Sun never sets and the beasts from the far ends of the kingdom never come near.

To escape the corruption that has twisted the bodies of 'lesser' men their leaders have managed to transcend corporeal flesh. Through magics divine and arcane they have become sentient clouds of energy, feeding off heat and solar radiation to maintain themselves.

Their win condition is a merger of their Elder Council with the reactor from the Illithids ship. The amount of energy produced is unimaginable and will be used to create a second sun from the consciousness of their Elders. This will be a mixed blessing for everyone since the monsters and their masters will be burned from existence by the watchful eyes of a sentient solar body. Two suns (and no night) is really, really awful for most ecosystems though.

Given that "ending" the campaign is ideally going to involve leaving in the Illithids ship this makes the end scenario kind of unique to this faction. I have no idea where to go with it but extraplanar adventures with an actual sun as one of your allies will probably be pretty fun.

>Elves
They arrived all at once, settled a densely wooded isle, say little to their neighbors and less of themselves. All bear a terrible brand below their left eye. After the meteor struck they entered some treaty with the dwarven kingdoms on the main island. Many saw them march off into the sunset with a great host of dwarves and march back alone.

They are traitors to their own kind who wished for life and power greater than the gifts they were given already. To this end they attempted to elevate their leader to godhood. Their efforts were discovered and would have failed terribly, likely to worse consequences, even left to their own devices.
cont (map next post)

The elves have given up on the dream of creating a new god and now wish desperately to return to "normal" elfhood. To that end they fed the greatest host of dwarfdom to the Illithids on the promise of altering reality itself to forcibly return them to the Undying Lands.

They don't have an actual win condition since their dream is impossible - even the Illithids were telling them the truth they would simply be expelled (or worse) as easily as the first time.

>Mercury Men
A race of sentient, silvery metal slimes that impersonate other sapient species. They have had previous contact with the Illithids and "escaped" by morphing into a form of life alien even to them. They are largely neutral but actively work against the mindflayers at every turn.

They impersonate powerful figures, make nearly undetectable spies, are immune to psionic intrusions and most forms of damage. I am trying to keep them from being mary sues by having them take a largely passive role in the plot and having a mono focused goal of "fuck mindflayers" to the exclusion of all else.
cont

Really nice setting. Some questions:
>How advanced are the factions? Magic, magitech, or tech?
>what about this Port Victory? What does it house?
>What's the name of the Karkandian capital? How big is it? What architectural style does it use?

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Not sure how well this will go, but honestly it's an excuse to write. I run a very hardcore survivalist modern setting in the third world, which starts as paramilitaries, militarizes, and mercs struggling to survive, but unfolds into a massive conspiracy of various mega-powers (Various alignments of Illuminati, UN, or NATO) inferring in the local area.

The following is something a player will find on a dead body, torn several times, but possible to put together. It's only a few pages, most are missing.

(Title) Clearance Code Echo, Ranger Document 114

(Page 1) Memorize and Burn Contents, Contents of Document will be misunderstood by outsiders.

(Page 2) When operating in Yeren, what needs to be remembered is the very strong tribal, ethnic, religious, and economic struggles that dominate the minds and hearts of the local people. Due to this, civil-unrest and terrorism is considerable, this is to be expected. One of the burdens of this kind of society for members of our kind operating in it, is that many of the terrorists will align with us politically and the government itself will other times.

These people are outsiders, you need to remember that at all times. Outsiders were do terrible things for the right cause, and thus end up polluting the cause till it's eviler then whatever it's trying to fight.

Due to these standards, we must prevent the government from incorrectly suppressing civil-unrest and partially suppress such civil-unrest ourselves without getting caught.

>she watched as a small lump of child and red fabric (o) as his finger ran over the colorful objects sitting in neat rows on the shelves.

This sounds clunky to me. See that o in there? That's where the sentence starts sounding wrong to me. It goes from something under fabric to a finger and the tense or noun seems to shift. Also there are things words between other words that seem wrong.

" a green wrapping around pale white insides"

Might want to remove that a, maybe.

"clutching the heavy thing tightly in her hands as he slowly let go."

You say thing a lot, try object a few times?

The rest of this reads very well.

I enjoyed reading this. How exactly would you let me know when you had more?

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After I posted it I realized it sounded off but I couldn't quite place what I was doing wrong. But now that you've pointed it out, I see where the off-ness began.

Also re-reading this I definitly realize how often I was using the word 'thing'. I'm going to watch that more.
Thank you!

Maybe I'll say something on Discord, but I don't know if there's an actual way to let you know outside of that, user. I'm sorry. I can say I'll be most likely posting more tonight.

I'll have to hunt you down. In the event this gets prunged and you look over the thread for my reply.

I think this is very solid, I've been editing and writing for years, take it very seriously. This is something interesting.

Prole Confederation#1966

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Good stuff. Although I agree with that your sentence structure in your first few posts was a bit fractured. It does get much better as you go on, through.

If it has a flaw as a story, it's that it's still obvious that its just exposition within a minimal framing device. It's not bad, but if your goal is to inform people about your setting then you might want to find a hook to keep their interest. None of the names has any emotional resonance for the reader. I'm not sure I know how you'd do this, but a decent place to start might be to give the narrator a character beyond being the narrator.

>Hope this is the right place put it.
This is exactly the right place.

You're coming dangerously close to reaching maximum safe levels of d'awww.

I'm enjoying it, user - wouldn't mind seeing more.

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Fann tumbled through the clustered branches and onto the soft ground before, green sweet smelling grass tickling her cheek before she rolled onto her back to stare into a soft purple starless sky where the whispering lyrical voices moved on the gentle wind. She sat up after a moment, taking in deep breaths of the cool air as she pulled the hood of her red robe over her head. Something tapped her foot and she looked to see a large red ball sitting in the grass. She picked it up and got to her feet to see three other children looking at her.
“Do you want to play?” Asked one of them, “you have to be on my team, because Ketha and Ynae already teamed up.”
Fann blinked, tipping her head. The children were slightly taller than her, with pointed ears and strange white eyes. “Mmmm. Okay.” She tossed the ball to the other child, and as if she had always known the game she found herself running around with the other children, tossing and throwing the ball to each other.
Fann did not know who was winning or losing, but she did know she was having fun.

“Fann! Over here!”
“No fair, Tuathe! You already had the ball!” One of the other children complained, stomping their feet.
Fann held the ball as Tuathe and Ynae walked over to each other. With little warning, Ynae’s small fist connected with Tuathe’s face, and Tuathe replied in turn by kicking Ynae in the knee. Fann gasped, horrified by the violence her new friends were inflicting on each other. “Nooo!” Fann jogged over to them, holding the ball above her head. “Wait! No!” She shoved her way between them, pushing the ball into Ynae’s hands.
Tuathe grabbed the ball away from Ynae and threw it far across the grass. “Go, Fann! Go and get it! We can still win!”
Fann stared at Tuathe for a moment in confusion, before running after the ball as fast as her little legs would carry her. She felt a violent tug on her robe, and fell downwards, her head bouncing on the ball.

Sniffling, she got back to her feet, careful to pull her robe above her feet with one hand while the other arm wrapped around the ball. “I-I got it,” she said, turning around towards the others.
Except the grassy area was empty.

The wind suddenly picked up, and the grass folded upwards upon itself into twisting dark panels that clasped together into a hallway that charged forward, dragging her down its corridor. Fann tumbled and rolled, throwing out her tiny hands to try grasping at the surface. Her heart beat like a frantic drum, blood coursing fast enough for her to hear it in her head. As if grabbed by a hand, Fann felt herself being hurled out of the hallway.
She landed on a dusty white ground, her head lapped at by dark waters. The sky was a bleak gray, and the lyrical voices had been replaced by soft wailing. That wailing was soon joined by Fann’s own as she struggled to get back onto her shaking legs. Through teary eyes she looked at the world around her, a crest of white dirt hugging a infinite black ocean. “I don’t wanna be here,” she hiccupped. “I wannagohome…” her words came out more garbled as saliva and tears filled her mouth.

Her crying became louder, and she found her breath increasingly short. She fell back down to the ground and wrapped her robe tightly around her, rocking back and forth.
So loud was her wailing that she did not at first hear the rumbling from the water, and her tears fell so much that she could not see the increasingly large ripples on its surface. What took her from her crying was the feeling of heat, as steam rose from the water. Using the red fabric to wipe the tears and snot from her face, she took weak little gasps of air as she watched a massive skeletal hand breach the water, blood oozing from it as the rest of the being began to pull itself upward. The world around her was full of its pained angry roars as boiling waves crested over it, its eye sockets lighting up quickly with white flames as it turned its head to look down at her.
Fann’s eyes welled up again as her heart turned to ice, the creature moving quickly towards her and raising its blood drenched hand as if to smash an insect. She let out a short sobbing screech, pulling her robe over herself.

Opening her eyes, Fann stared blearily upwards. Someone was standing over here, but her sight was too hazy to make out much beyond their head and a staff that was poking her shoulder. For some reason, her entire face felt sticky.


“What did you see, Little Mon-Keigh?”


Hands grabbed her, pulling her from the floor and unsticking her hair from her face. “Fann!” It was Rideric’s voice, and Fann instinctively latched onto him. She buried her face into his chest, clinging as tightly as she could as if he could protect her from the Monster in the Ocean.

Holy shit what happened to my formatting.

...

“Don’t look at me like that, Rideric. I found her like this.” The Farseer Aveler was a withered looking man, the eldritch plague had done more damage to him than it had to most other survivors. His hair had fallen out and his skin sagged on his bones.


“What do you mean you 'found' her?” Rideric asked, shaking as the wan light of the heart of the Infinity Circuit cast a baleful glow on them, trying to clean at least some of the blood from her face as a billion terrible scenarios went through his mind. “Look at her! How did a child get in here?”


Aveler shrugged. “The way of our ancestors is a mysterious thing, Rideric. I can’t possibly fathom why your pet is here.” He gazed up at the glow, as if lost in thought.


Rideric held Fann tightly, doing his utmost best not to say something crude about the Farseer.


“It’s a miracle she’s even alive,” Aveler said, as if it were a compliment.


“I need to go,” Rideric said, turning around and beginning to walk away from the other.


“Wait,” Aveler walked after him. “We need to talk-“


“Later. We’ll talk later,” Rideric continued walking, not bothering to spare a glance at the wizened man.


After a short visit to a healer who seemed more than a little offended to waste her skills on an alien child, Rideric half-dragged and half-pulled Fann home.

With a wet rag in one hand and a firm grip on her head with the other, Rideric cleaned the blood that covered Fann’s face with somewhat unnecessary roughness as they both sat in the common room of his home. “What were you thinking!? Running away from me! Do you know what could have happened?” He asked. “I turned my back on you for barely a minute and this happens!”


“I’m-I’m sorry,” Fann hiccuped, although no apology she could say would quell the anger rattling through his worried heart.


“Sorry doesn’t change the fact you did it,” he hissed, pausing for a moment so he could look her in the eyes with a furious dread. “You could have died, you could have experienced a horrible death torn to shreds so there’s not a bit left of your soul! You could have run into one of the Exarchs, who would gladly use you as target practice!”

Fann mutely nodded, lips trembling but no words coming out.


“Never, ever, every run away from me again!” He snarled, almost nose to nose with her. He wheezed, leaning back and letting go of her head now that the blood was gone. Fann stayed quiet and still except for slight shaking, her lips pursed and her skin pale. Rideric felt something crawling up his throat, and it was not a cough this time. “…Fann…” he took a deep breath, reaching out only for her to shrink away from him. He held his hand where it should have touched her cheek as the girl further retreated away from him so that she was sitting in a corner. “Fann, wait. I’m not angry at you, I’m just con-“


“I-I’ll be good. I promise…” she muttered in a voice even he could barely here. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, please don't hate me,
I'm sorry, I'm sorry…”


Rideric’s anger had quickly turned into guilt as he realized that all his hard work to make Fann trust him had instantly evaporated. She was again that little shaking thing they had found hiding under a mess of mechanical bits on a dark empty ship.

He got up slowly and backed out of the room, closing the door behind him and moving to his own small bedroom. He slumped down into a seat and stared at a wall, his mind slipping into thinking what he should have said, should have done, could have done. His eyes moved slowly to look over his wall, where he at one point had pictures but had long left bare. Deeper still went his mind into old memories, the small happy face of a little boy that followed one everywhere, a familiar voice whispering into his ear at night, the passing of childhood and seeing that little boy off on his first sortie. He saw Fann, small and trembling, fading into dust.


Sometime must have passed, because Rideric opened his eyes to find his bed was occupied by Fann, who had still managed to scrunch herself up into the corner, staring at him from under the blankets she had cocooned around herself. He heard a faint mumble from her.


“Fann?” He thought about moving closer to her, but kept the short distance between them.

She mumbled again, before she pulled the blankets down to expose her face. “…Do you not-like me?”


He shook his head and held out his arms for her. Slowly she emerged from the blanket lump to crawl off the bed and climb into his lap, allowing him to wrap his arms around her. “No, no, I was just worried,” he said, stroking her hair. “You have no idea how many horrible things there are, Fann. I have seen so many, I don’t want to lose you. So when you ran away, I could only think of the worst.”


“I... I won’t run again. I promise.” She said quietly. “It was scary.”


“I know,” he rubbed her back gently, laying his head on top of her’s so his long hair formed something of a curtain around their heads. He could only imagine what happened to her, but he would ask another day. For a moment they were quiet, with only the sounds of breathing to keep silence at bay.

Finally, Fann spoke. “…am I still in trouble?”


“Yes.”

In that lonely, silent green field of red
She fooled me, lured me with her final cries
Forced this curse upon me, there as she bled.
I am madness, with flesh that never dies.

It was I who killed my love, proved her dead
To my king. He declared my words all lies,
Proclaimed me a demon, called for my head
While he stared at me, just hate in his eyes.

Then, in that cold hall, I first heard the voice;
My love's first demand was to draw my knife.
Possessed, I charged at him—I had no choice—
I slit my brother's throat, then drank his life.
But now you are here, and I must rejoice.
Come and fight me! Come, and end my strife!

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