What Has Gone Before #20

You are in Cherafyr, a low-tech city state in Pranan. Cherafyr, however, is built on the ruins of a pre-fall city; it is a mixture of poorly constructed stone buildings and seamless gleaming buildings of some magically created material. Rumor has it that in some, the pre-fall magic still works (like AC/ heating, anti-mag dungeons, etc). Agrik's palace falls into this catagory.

During your converstation with Vanderhoven, you found out that KNI had placed a warrent for your arrest due to the disappearance of a KNI operative they had sent to infiltrate your group (it is assumed you kidnapped or killed him). The elves, however, convinced the KNI to drop the charges. They could do this because they are central to helping negotiate the peace with the victorious trolls in Kom, and because they agreed to share some unknown information with the KNI. Additionally, you found out that rumors that you had started a war between the Myshavar and Tuga tribes was reputed by Pedwar Pythaen (who appeared in Nol after a year long disappearance) and Anthrax (who appeared in Nol with Pedwar). Finally, you found out that the Hectlac cult has information gathering capabilities that are not as sophisticated or wide in scope as the elvish intel organization, but which is in some ways more flexible (in that they do not have to know where to "look"... they get significant world events directly, like the nuking of Nostrilia).

Vanderhoven agreed to let you use the "common" Hectlac teleportals, to get five "yes/no" questions answered by the great sword ORACLE (basically, one week's worth of information) and to allow you to do research in the the Bythe temple in return for information. You gave him the basics (read "we reserve the right to say we didn't tell him some significant fact in the future).

The Hectlac teleportal network gets you to most human-controlled cities on the Lanotalis sea coast.

Then everyone split up to do research. Ziwa and two others (?) went off to the elves to research Ziwa's lineage. Guido went with Fra Rentec to try to find the Totami. Everyone else went to Bythe to use the Hectlac library.

Ziwa found out that Morgaine's (her Grandmother's) grandfather was named Facinalethvree. She also found out that the elves have fewer and fewer children each generation.

PCs in Bythe researched Changling and the high council. The high council, or council of twelve, was made up of thirteen people, twelve human members and one Elf.

Research on Godslayer revealed little; it was more a desciption of Parisk, who was a minor holder in Tawhiem (near Smagean) with a ^"JSSB^SSSSjil taxation of his subjects. He also was a holder that ignored the Nostnlia magic schools, with a resultant deviating effect on his hold's economy. One of the most strident and fanatical members of the holder's group opposing Gorwell's magic academies. During tne Chen Kunda invasion of Tawhiem Paris' hold was spared for a while, which lead to accusations that he was dealing with the Chen Kunda, but then his hold got nuked as well. He vanished for a while, then showed up in Nol with a lot of other refugees.

While in Nol, he got in a confrontation with Kekamar for reasons that are still unknown; but he ended up hitting Kekamar with a sword, whereapon Kekamar disappeared in a blast of energy that destroyed much of the block and killed almost everyone close by. Paris was the only one to survive. He left Nol quickly, with the Nol honor guard (a unit known as the Ibisi Guard) after him for blood. They never caught him, and he was never heard from again. Everyone was convinced that Godslayer was the sword Paris carried, but how he got it. why he used it, and were it ended up was unknown.

Tallow researched the general history of the twelve great swords. There is not much that talks of their creation. They are attributed to a man named Valgan Tailiffa who lived sometime around the year 7900. The only passage that talks of it is a rendition of an ancient folktale...

Valgan sought the center
but found that underneath lay
the bones of giants
He bound his followers one by one
in the black skeleton of death
and they died by the hundreds
but from the heart came forth
a sword of kings and heros
eleven times did he labor
and eleven powers did he gather
until he had followers no more
then Valgan captured others
an army of thousands
and they died as had the rest
but what came forth
was not his desire
but the sword blackheart
made of the rage of his enemies
blackheart, worldkiller, called
and the dead rose
Valgan fought for a year and a day
to no avail
he fell struck through
and blackheart drank his blood

There are, of course, twelve greatswords, but one of them was Changling, a gift from the elves, and not one of the originals. The other swords are as follows:

Stormbringer - A super Morganti weapon. One hit kills (including the soul, so no raise deads!), +4 hit, automatic 8th level mag pro, can cast several magic spells per day (armour and defense chain mostly)

Pathfinder - A plane shifter. Allows unlimited access the the shadow land, astral and etheral planes, etc. Has detection spells, 1000' raduis, and limited intelligence to provide the capability to filter the information (ie, you ask questions and Pathfinder uses the det. spells to try and answer the questions). +5 hit, +5 damage, automatic 6th level Mag Pro. Several spells per day, mostly in transportation chain.

Spellbreaker - Anti magic. Total immunity from magic inside a 100' raduis, extendable to 1 mile by the user. Inside the field, magic cannot be cast, magic items do not work, etc. (although physical results of magic persist). +5 hit, +5 damage, any hit eliminates a person's spells (they start from scratch)

Godsbane.(Godslayer) - Anti clerical. Stops all clerical magic in a 100' radius. Any hit will kill a Ghods' instantiation on the physical plane. Auto 8th level mag pro, +8 hit, + 8 damage. Several spells per day, in the fire, cold, and electic changes.

Shield - Stops all magic attacks on the user, adds +10 to D, any hit past D the user rolls to attack a 10th level D and on a hit successfully parries the attack up to three attackers. Several spells in the armour and defense chain.

Oracle - there are no notes on Oracle

Demonbinder - Calls demons; exact stats unspecified, but users have had more than a few hanging around, so it is longer term than just a day. +5 hit, +5 damage, auto 8th level mag pro, several spells. Nasty rumors exist that there a price you must pay for summoning a demon, like killing your firstborn.

Earthmover - causes earthquakes, has powerful telekenisis capabilities. Can move up to about 1000 tons of dirt per day. Crushes buildings, destroys bridges, that sort of thing. +3 hit, +3 D. No spells.

Chaos - A weird sword who's abilities seem to change from day to day without reason. Some previous things it has done: Allowed the user to polymorph into anything with the "anythings" capabilities. Caused rivers to run backwards, buildings to rise from dirt and gravel, and in one case made time run in reverse for an hour in an entire hold. Made everything inertialess (so weapons did not work, since they would stop instantly on hitting something). Caused all of the air to disappear from around an army, killing them all. Other things.

Dragonmaster - +5 hit, +5 damage, auto 8th level mag pro, many spells in the fire, cold, and electric chains. No other known abilities.

Death - Autokill on hit. +5 hit. Calls up to one hundred dead back; these people have hits and Ds of half their previous level, three times the hit points, and are simple automatons, following straightforward orders to the letter, no moral or other checks. Dispell undead will kill them. After a few days, they tend to become increasingly independant and bloodthirsty, but the user can "kill" them any time he wants, and they never attack him. They will last about three months if the user doens't destroy them. Several spells in the armour and defense chains. Three death with 4 die save vs. con per day.

In the meantime, Guido and Fra attempted to contact the Totami, but were caught by Agrik's guards. Fra used a comm ring to tell Vanderhoven what was going on before they were both stripped of Magic and weapons. They subsequently learned that Agrik's wizard was most likely the Totami, but had vanished when he learned that someone had found his teleportal.
Finally, Templar contacted Hotherial and suggested that they trade passage for Veskavar back to his home dimension for Godslayer... the elves to get Godslayer, Veskavar to get home, and the players to get whatever else they could wheedle out of Veskavar up to and including everything else he had. Hotherial agreed to try the trade (although he wants to use a standard gate instead of the portable world gate).