Sunday 10 March 2024

Cold Dead Fingers


Some weeks ago my friend Nick and I agreed we'd play a new game of MÖRK BORG. Nick was running as GM and I was, as usual, a solo player.

This time Nick decided he wanted to do something with a 'snow' theme. Luckily for him there's plenty of options on Ex Libris Mörk Borg due to the collective creativity of the MB third-party licence community and, of course, the frozen realm of Kergüs — the Dying Lands' northernmost peninsula:

"Desolation rolls over Kergüs like a frostbarren wind. The lawless and forlorn trek across its ice-wracked expanse, crawling over the plains or cowering in the cracked earth..."

            MÖRK BORG, page  12
 

Nick picked something from the E.L.M.B. menu called Cold Dead Fingers (by Will Rixon) which didn't look like much at first, for there's almost no art to speak of and it could easily go unnoticed. Yet it turned out to be one of the most thrilling RPG adventures I've ever experienced.

The premise is that somewhere in Kergüs lies the frozen Lake Basvik, surrounded by quiet shoreside fishing hamlets. A few days ago, a colossal stone came plummeting out of the black void, crashing through the lifeless grey clouds in a blaze of flame and punching a hole right through the ice of the lake, where it now sits half-submerged in the centre of the ice, shrouded by perpetual mist.

Naturally, curious folk from the area went to see it. Those who returned alive brought back fistfuls of gold nuggets, which of course resulted in a rapid 'boomtown' economy springing up around the shores of the lake.

Rather than roll up a character manually, for ease I decided once again to use the clever tool SCVMBIRTHER to pre-generate one for me, as I did in my last adventure. Actually, not quite! This time I used its lesser-known cousin SCVMATORIUM which generates (a limited range of) fan-made, 'non-canon' characters only. A lot of creativity has been poured into these fan-made classes and I do recommend them if you want a change from the 'canon' material. There are a great many not included in SCVMATORIUM, but well worth digging up.

This session's character was a Sun Scorched Zealot, Galgenfrid by name, who has this fascinating background text:

Burnt as a Wytch in Galgenbeck, resurrected in radiance, you have been Illuminated. Amidst the shrouded darkness you glimpsed the gestating Sun-Childe, and have been scorched by the LIGHT. Your flesh has been seared and transfigured and you emit an eerie and discomfiting warmth. 
You reject the coming end of all; instead you shall help herald in the birth of a new dawn. Hated and hunted by those of the Basilisk, and tortured by dreams of a howling solar birth, you shall find no respite or succour till all are burnt by the lambent glory of a new god. 

 

I love this defiant assertion of glorious hope in the face of the game-world's bleak, apocalyptic theme! In addition, I thought it would make an excellent contrast to the frozen environment of the adventure's setting.

I began with a gambeson (-d2) for protection, a sabre (d6) for my primary weapon and used my silver to purchase a rope and a grappling hook. Critically important is that my character only had 1 HP, which influenced some of my choices in the game!


Also important to note is that Nick and I have been using the Star Signs rules from Christian Eichhorn's Apocrypha supplement. This time I had the sign known as 'The Priest', which gives you this blessing:

Your voice commands respect. When you speak, everybody listens. Choose your words wisely.


But most important of all to record is that SCVMATORIUM decided to bless me with a pet! A stubborn tabby cat named Narm (this name randomly determined using the name-generator included in the
Den of Disarray supplement by Phillip Teich). I was also given a basket, so I decided the basket would be Narm's means of transportation that I'd carry with me wherever I meant, no matter the personal cost.

Character creation completed, the first thing to establish was Galgenfrid's reason for being at Lake Basvik, determined by a die roll. This was the result:


The stone calls to you in your dreams. You seek a way to silence it.

I felt this corresponded well to the background text for my character, describing him as "tortured by dreams of a howling solar birth". I decided these two things were related to each other, thus the fallen stone was a significant part of the coming of the so-called 'Sun-Childe' whom my character worships. The emerging synergy between my character and the plot was one of my favourite parts of this adventure. 

My story began at a fishing-village-turned-gold-prospector-station, known locally as 'Wolf Ridge' (which would prove an appropriate name in due course). At dawn I set out onto the frozen lake on foot and found myself quickly trapped in a blinding blizzard that disrupted my progress and caused me to wander widely off track.

It wasn't long before I found myself cornered by three hungry wolves! The wolves leapt at me to attack, but thankfully I evaded them and even managed to scratch one with my sabre. Rather than press the attack, though, I chose to speak to them in my best 'priestly' tones and offered them food from my rations collection (I just so happened to have three food rations; one for each of them).

The wolves listened to me and, after failing a morale roll, submitted to my authority, regarding me as their new pack leader. This proved highly convenient for me and my 1 HP!

The wolf-pack followed me around through the blizzard and after a few mishaps, including avoiding thin ice and getting into a fight with a sea creature known as a 'Womanatee' <eye-roll> we stumbled upon a pair of frozen bodies in the snow. Near the bodies, we also found a sled! I quickly harnessed the three wolves to it with my length of rope and before long we were cruising over the frozen lake. I also lashed one of the bodies to the sled as a food source for the wolves.

However, the weather was getting so bad we made very little progress as we tried to head toward the sunken stone. In fact, so turned around did we become in the blizzard we found ourselves sledding right back to the shores of Wolf Ridge, right where we started! However, it wasn't a wholly unprofitable venture: I had the wolves, the sled and I also had managed to find two gold nuggets lying on the ice! A lone fisherman sitting by an ice-hole at the shore hailed me as I came in. I decided the best thing for it would be to rest for the night at Wolf Ridge and set out again onto the lake the next morning and hope that the weather improved.

The sudden gold-prospecting industry that had established itself at Lake Basvik meant that disreputable traders had set up shop in the various hamlets, trading gold nuggets for silver coin at prices they determined. They also had a racket whereby thieves in their employ would rob prospectors of said silver and hand it back to the very traders they acquired it from. All this I learned from the fisherman, who I went to speak to that evening; a grumpy fellow who resented the gold-rush taking over his formerly peaceful lifelong home. Needless to say, I did not trade my gold nuggets with the dodgy fellow named 'Fingers' (missing several of these) who ran the gold-trading business at Wolf Ridge.

I did, however, need to rent a room, rent a kennel (for the wolves) and obtain a meal from the local inn, named The Crusty Friar (this we randomly generated using Karl Druid's Les Miseredibles). It turned out that Fingers ran all of these enterprises himself (surprise surprise).

The Crusty Friar, though, was fresh out of food. I'd given my last rations to the wolves, so there was nothing to eat. What do you do in MÖRK BORG when there's no food? Why you EAT PREY KILL of course (courtesy of Karl Druid once again)!

I set out with the wolves into the snowy woods surrounding Wolf Ridge. Before long we stumbled upon a lone Blubber Gull, isolated from the rest of its flock and sitting in a little hollow. I bade the wolves stay back while I hunted our prey alone. Now, as it happens, despite being small (and alone) Blubber Gulls have a tendency, when they feel threatened, to either flee (meaning no food for me) or attack by swooping at potential predators and BLOWING THEMSELVES UP, dealing d8 damage. With my 1 HP and no other options for food nearby, neither of these options was satisfactory to me. This was a high-risk hunt!

But I had a plan.

As a Sun Scorched Zealot, one of my unique abilities is a random blessing from THE SUN which comes to me each dawn. This day, it was this: 

Once per day your flesh transfigures and a SUN walks the earth. All creatures in 10ft are scorched by your stellar fury and take 2d10 damage. Mortal flesh is not meant to contain such power, so afterwards you may not wear armour and HP is halved, until the next dawn.


I crept into the hollow and made cooing sounds to the gull, acting as if I might have a tasty treat in my hand for it to eat. It approached me, falling for my ruse. When I was within ten feet, I ignited my solar blessing, scorching the whole area around my person with a miniature nuclear blast and flash-frying the bird for 18 damage (it only had 2 HP). I hungrily wolfed down the cooked fowl (saving a little for my cat, Narm) and returned to the inn, where I booked a room until the following morning.

The next day, the weather had not really improved, but I had awoken with a new blessing from THE SUN. This time:

Your head is replaced by a burning mote of the sun, and thine enemies must avert their gaze before your glory. You gain +2 to defence rolls.


I spent the rest of the day walking around with a miniature star for a head! I quickly packed up my things, readied my sled and the wolves, and before long we were back out onto the frozen lake. In addition, Nick kindly decided he'd let me Get Better (the MÖRK BORG equivalent of 'levelling up') which took my health from 1 HP to 7 HP, which was very welcome indeed!

This time, despite the extreme weather, I was much better at navigating through the snow and we made great progress toward the centre of the lake where the colossal stone lay half-submerged beneath the icy water. We found a few more frozen bodies, but no sign of life, other than some gulls flying overhead. 

An hour or so later, we arrived at the jagged edge of the ice hole. We could not see the stone through the blanket of mist that hung over the water. I bade the wolves pull the sled around the edge of the hole, clockwise, until we found a bridge or perhaps a boat.

About half an hour later I came across a lone figure stumbling across the ice. I ran the sled up to him and called out. The poor guy was crying for help and I did what I could for him. I had purchased a portable pot-bellied stove and some firewood from Fingers back at Wolf Ridge, which I had tied to my sled. I unpacked this, fired it up and tried to keep him warm. He tearfully told me his story. He'd been gold-hunting as part of a group that left from another lakeside settlement known as Lygann's Lookout, on the opposite shore from Wolf Ridge. Unfortunately his party had been attacked by some masked, robed figures, who killed everybody except for him; he'd managed to run away and kept running. Now he seemed to be suffering from exposure and didn't look well at all. 

Cold Dead Fingers has you take a test for hypothermia every hour you spend on the ice. Nick and I ran with this, but we replaced the basic hypothermia test written into the game with Frost Fever by Daniel H. Carlsen, which works in a similar way, only with potentially more interesting consequences. Simply put: every hour you check to see if you're suffering from Frost Fever, which gets harder to withstand the longer you're outside in sub-zero conditions. If you fail a test, something miserable happens to you. Unfortunately for Von, which was the name of this poor fellow, he could not be saved from the Fever, and died in my arms.

He did, however, have a gold nugget in his pocket, taking my total up to three! 

The wolves and I (as well as my cat) continued our clockwise circuit of the hole in the ice until we came across a campsite. Several tents, crates and barrels were set up near the edge of the ice sheet, with some kind of mechanical contraption with a long chain disappearing into the mist, toward the stone.

I noticed three men, all wearing robes and skull masks, were standing by a burning brazier near the contraption. One of them was significantly larger and tougher-looking than the other two: a real brute by the looks of things. Confident in my Sun Scorched Zeal, I decided to sled right up to them and ask them what they were doing. They were very rude. Using some choice language, they told me in no uncertain terms to back off. I held my ground, continuing to ask what they were doing while preaching boldly about the supremacy of the Sun Childe, which they contemptuously dismissed, though not as vehemently as expected.

They continued on in their generally rude manner, encouraging me to leave, but they did at least admit to me during this process that they were 'fishing'. I did not buy this story at all, but thought of a way I might win them over to my side. I drew out the three gold nuggets from my pockets and held them out as potential gifts from the Sun Childe.

I had intended to give them one each in exchange for dealing with me favourably, but instead the brute, whose name was Kurg, decided that all three of them were for him! This I had not foreseen. His two companions did not look favourably on this and a fight broke out among them, which quickly escalated to violence. Before long, the two smaller men had beaten their giant companion to death with their clubs, despite his greater size and his wielding of a spiked flail. 

Once they'd realised what they'd done, the two remaining men began to panic. While they'd been fighting, I untied my wolves ready to engage in combat should it prove necessary. The men seemed frightened of me now and just wanted me to let them go. I used this opportunity to question their real purpose and what was going on here at their camp.

It transpired that these were Inquisitors, working, presumably, for the Church of the Two-Headed Basilisk, the dominant religious organisation in the game world. Or, rather, they were irreligious thugs working for the Inquisition. Hired muscle. They said they were part of a group led by an Inquisitor (Vost by name) whose purpose was to destroy the stone in the lake, by means of much gunpowder, which they'd brought a considerable amount of in the barrels and crates scattered about the camp. They didn't know why they were to destroy the stone, as they were merely following orders. I neglected to ask them why they killed Von's team (if indeed it was the same people) because I was mostly interested in the stone itself and their operations concerning it.

Once I had extracted all the information I thought I needed, I set my wolves on them. They tried to run but one was caught and pulled down by the wolves. The other's fate I do not know. I left him running, a wolf on his tail, as I turned away and decided at this point to let the wolves go free. We had found a way to the stone and their service was no longer required. They were, after all, wild beasts, not pets.

I operated the machine which these men were guarding, which turned out to be a winch to haul in a small boat across the water surrounding the stone. I pulled the empty craft back to the edge of the hole where I was standing and climbed inside with Narm in her basket. I packed four barrels of gunpowder into the boat, just in case. You never know when you'll have to blow something up!

I also took the spiked flail from the corpse of Kurg, the largest of the Inquisitorial thugs; a deadlier weapon than my sabre!

Using the winch mechanism, I hauled the boat across the misty water to the edge of the stone. Once we reached the surface of the stone, it became clear there was a fissure in the side of it. The thugs by the shore had warned me that Inquisitor Vost and some more of her cronies were exploring the interior of the stone, so I was on my guard. The area smelled strongly of brimstone. Furthermore, the stone itself seemed to be composed entirely of pieces of broken ecclesiastical masonry, all fused and warped together, as if a giant hand had scrunched up several cathedrals into a tight compact ball. Once reaching the shore, I left the gunpowder in the boat (probably a mistake) and entered the fissure.

The passage in the fissure was completely lightless, but my glowing head lit it up as clear as day. Along this passage I trod — which occasionally shuddered and groaned, with dust falling from above, as if the whole structure threatened to crumble apart — until I came to a junction of sorts. 

The junction split three ways. One passage led upwards, to my left: a steep climb. Another passage sloped downward, to my right, and a third passage continued along the same direction, right ahead, from which a light could be seen.

I chose the left-hand path: the ascent. After clambering upward for a while, I began to hear faint music. Pleasant music, coming from a harp. Eventually, after a tiring scramble up the sloping passage, I came to a door leading into an octagonal room. In this room was a large floor-mounted golden harp, apparently playing of its own accord, as if by an invisible hand. Lying at the foot of this harp was a corpse, wearing a robe and skull-mask, just like the men outside across the water: one of Inquisitor Vost's cronies, no doubt! 

Flying about the harp on tiny stunted wings were a group of six cherubic creatures: little pale-skinned children, dancing and giggling joyfully in time with the music. It was an adorable sight. Though I suspected there might be a hidden threat here, I thought I'd approach them in the spirit in which I found them, so I clapped my hands and verbally praised the beauty of the music. The cherubic creatures agreed with me and encouraged me to dance with them.

That is where things turned south. Suspecting a trap, I politely declined to dance, but the cherubs did not take kindly to this at all. Immediately they turned hostile and aggressive and I realised now why there was a dead man on the floor. They flew toward me, mouths open, bearing sharp fangs, and started gnashing at me! I began swinging my flail about to defend myself but found the children too agile, and my flail-craft too clumsy to be much use. I didn't hit a single one of them, but within moments they had torn off my gambeson and taken some serious bites out of me! 


My cat, Narm, however, did scratch one of the creatures with her claws, but instead of blood, these creatures seemed to leak ash when injured! Curious indeed.

Given the ferocity of the creatures and their superior numbers, I feared I would soon be joining the corpse on the floor, so quickly dashed toward a door on the other side of the room, which I dove through and slammed shut behind me.

Torn and bloody, I took a brief rest to try and heal from my injuries, but only mildly recovered from the severe biting I had taken! I had clearly underestimated the danger of those creatures! I found myself now at the top of a flight of stairs. I descended these, passed through another door and found myself in a collapsed room, the floor of which had fallen through the ceiling of another chamber below. In this lower room, I could see what appeared to be a baptismal font of some description, decorated with carved images of winged creatures resembling those who had nearly killed me in the room above.

Though there were other doors in the collapsed room, leading off to my left and to my right, I instinctively knew the font in the lower chamber would be full of holy water, so scrambled down the collapsed masonry toward it (though slipped and injured myself more in the process). Picking myself up, I rushed to the font and drank deeply of the water therein. My instincts proved correct; the holy water healed me significantly (though not completely), just as I suspected. There was only one door leading out of this lower room, so through it I went.

I found myself in a cross-shaped room, smelling strongly of incense. In the centre of this room lay a skeleton on a catafalque, dressed in ornate golden armour, decorated with cosmic motifs. I had stumbled into the crypt of a forgotten saint from some ancient bygone religion! The room was, curiously, lit by candles hidden behind a stained-glassed mural at the rear. The mural depicted an armoured swordsman being carried into the heavens by larger, more 'adult' versions of the cherubic creatures who had attacked me in the harp room (these, it transpired, were Pale Ones from the original MÖRK BORG rulebook: creatures which could be interpreted as something between an angel and an alien...perhaps both). I sensed I was getting closer to some holy manifestation of the Sun Childe of my dreams!

Remembering that my gambeson had been destroyed by the cherubs ('palelings'), I decided I would borrow the golden armour of this forgotten saint. After all, he wouldn't be needing it anymore. I carefully removed it from the skeleton and strapped it around my own body. It was heavy and probably wouldn't offer much protection, being more ceremonial than practical, but better than nothing, I reasoned!

I assumed that the saint on the catafalque was one and the same as the man depicted in the stained-glass mural, but noted that, unlike the man in the mural, there was a notable absence of a physical sword in the room. I searched high and low to see if there was one hidden somewhere, but found nothing. In the end, I asked my cat to help me find it. She, clever beast, sat next to the stained-glass mural. Using my flail, I smashed the mural and pushed through into a hidden room behind it! Now we were getting somewhere!

This room was tiny, and thick with dust, but sure enough, sitting on a plinth in the room was a sword! This was just not just any sword, but a holy sword, the hilt sculpted with images of Two-Headed Basilisks being slain by angelic beings. I knew I had found something truly holy and perhaps this was the source of my dreams! Perhaps I was becoming the earthly manifestation of the Sun Childe himself!

The sword, I somehow knew, was called Wyrmslayer, and always delivered maximum damage against serpents, wyverns and basilisks! I took it up and held it aloft briefly, before my moment of holy reverie was interrupted by a voice behind me.

Inquisitor Vost had found me! I turned around to face her. She was armed with an iron breastplate, a shield and a spiked flail. Hostile words were exchanged between us before we engaged in single combat.

Fully believing in the guiding force which had led me to find this sword, I was confident of victory! But, alas, it was not to be. Although I smashed her shield to smithereens with Wyrmslayer, Vost proved a superior combatant. In a few rounds she completely overpowered me, despite my wielding of the holy blade.

My last living memory was of her spiked flail embedded solidly in my chest, having shattered the sacred armour, and, as I lay dying on the ground, she mockingly lit a cigar from the stellar fire that was my head, before it finally fizzled out to darkness and my dreams of the Sun-Childe and the stone from heaven were silenced, forever.

THE END

Sunday 12 November 2023

The Shattered Canal

I introduced my friend Nick to Mörk Borg earlier this year and we both proceeded to purchase copies of it, as well as a host of related material. Since then we have periodically been taking turns to run one-shots for each other.


Although Nick and I live in the same city, I have an incredibly busy schedule and don't have time for socialising (I'm also something of a recluse), so we've been playing over WhatsApp, sending messages back and forth, which means we tend to be more florid in our dialogue and descriptions than we otherwise would be in real life.

My friend was taking his turn as GM and he ran a module called 'The Shattered Canal', one of the adventures from The Book of Vile Dungeons. I had purchased this PDF a while ago, but hadn't really looked at it, other than a brief glance, so as Nick was looking for a decent one-shot, I thought he might find something useful there. 

On this occasion I decided to use SCVMBIRTHER to generate a character for me; as it was a one-shot I didn't feel like spending an awful lot of time on the process. This is what it came up with:

Name: Therg
Class: Forlorn Philosopher
Background: Raised by fanatical Theists in a temple beneath Grift’s bridges, you fell victim to the mental virus of 'love', then the object of your affection went to live in a hole. The road an unreasoning maze, every temple soaked in blood, each destination drenched in gloom; you once thought that cold analysis might tame Fate itself, now that dream of reason has decayed to shifting madness and only the cold remains. Cruel and egocentric. Covered in (for some) blasphemous tattoos. You pick your nose so deep it bleeds.
Weapons: Femur (d4), Meat Cleaver (d4)
Gear: Backpack, Unclean Scroll (Te-le-kin-esis), Prism of Ambiguity, Ochre Tablet (Dream Theory)
Silver: 40
HP: 3
Strength: -2
Agility: 0
Presence: +1
Toughness: 0


I immediately sold the Meat Cleaver as I didn't fancy lugging two d4 weapons around and it's worth a whopping 15 silver, while a femur is worth nothing at all despite both doing the same amount of damage (one of the odd quirks of MB). This left me with 55 silver to spend. With that, I bought a crossbow, ten bolts and a length of rope (30').

Nick wrote an elaborate introductory text involving running away from a terrifying beast in a thunderstorm. The beast chased me through the darkness while I was trying to forage for food. I ended up falling into a canal which plummeted through a hole in the ground and I fell down, plunging into a deep pool at the bottom. I surfaced from the pool and found myself in an underground cave lit by blue glowing fungi. This is where the introduction stopped and my agency as a player began.

My first action in the game was to pick up one of the glowing blue fungi and use it as a light-source. The cave had a door at one end and another door tucked behind the waterfall, but this involved traversing a slippery path. I decided to take the behind-the-waterfall path, but I failed an Agility check and slipped right into the pool again, losing my mushroom on the way.

I climbed out of the pool and picked up another mushroom from the same patch. Now, in the original module, as written, this room was supposed to have cages full of snakes in it. Nick decided to omit the snakes and instead he replaced them with a creature (from a MB supplement called Forty Fiends) called the Fungal Geist. This creature has HP 7, Morale 8, is protected by a layer of "crusty mushrooms" for armour (-d4) and uses a "bone knife" as a weapon (d4). Nick removed the knife and had his Fungal Geist unarmed (I suppose to make it easier for me). I also think Nick removed the mushroom armour; otherwise I doubt I would have lived to tell this tale!

The Fungal Geist was lying on the ground, and it turned out that the patch of ground I was plucking mushrooms from was actually its back! It wasn't happy about this, so it stood up and attacked me! I decided to strike the Fungal Geist with my femur bone. This was a mistake as my Strength was -2, so every swing from the bone was at a disadvantage. As such, for several rounds I was unable even to land a hit.

After some to-and-fro the monster got the better of me and ripped out one of my eyes! This can happen in the core rulebook, but Nick and I agreed to use another supplement called Horrible Wounds which creates a wider variety of ways your character can suffer serious injuries, while also adding the possibility of surviving just a tiny bit longer.

Seeing the precariousness of my situation, I decided to leap into the pool to escape the creature, rather than keep on trying to hit it with the femur and likely perish. I asked Nick if there were any rocks in the pool I might grab a hold of. Nick said there was a stalagmite poking up out of the water. I grabbed hold of this and used my rope to harness myself to the stalagmite that I might have both hands free. This all done, I drew out my crossbow, loaded it and proceeded to shoot at the Fungal Geist from the safety of the pool. I missed the first shot but hit it (and killed it) on the second.

That problem dealt with, it was time to swim to the side and take a breather. I untied the rope, swam to the shore and sipped some water. This was enough to restore my health back up to full (with only 3 HP this wasn't hard). Nick also decided, because the fight had been quite tough for me, that it merited a 'level up', or what in MB is called 'Getting Better'.  I think all my stats went up by +1 and my HP went from 3 to 8, which is nothing to sniff at! 

I chose the path behind the waterfall once again and went through the door. I found a guard-room, with a checkerboard tiled floor and a mural on the wall depicting images of knights saving princesses from beasts, but both the knights and the princesses were frog-like humanoids, each only possessing a single eye.

Two creatures wearing chainmail, looking exactly like the characters in the mural, were sat playing dice at a nearby table. They saw me enter and one of them commented to his friend how I looked like them, seeing as I too only had one eye. I greeted them and some moderately friendly banter took place where I learned that they were knights belonging to the Order of Narcissus, which was apparently once great but had diminished in recent times. The Order of Narcissus was dedicated to beauty: specifically, the beauty of their Lord Commander. But, their Lord Commander had, it transpired, started acting strange of late. 

Now, I wished to enquire further about this, but while one of these two cyclops-frog-knights was quite happy to talk to me about their Order and their Lord Commander, the other was not and acted a little aggressive toward both me and his friend. They told me I was welcome to visit their Lord Commander in the next room, or join them in their game of dice, but I mustn't ask any more questions. In fact, I was threatened with violence if I did!

I didn't like this tone so decided I should cause some trouble. Also, I wanted to try out some of my toys that SCVMBIRTHER had blessed me with, to see if I could put them to some good use. The first of these was an Ochre Tablet called 'Dream Theory'. Ochre Tablets are "relics of a forgotten mind-cult, made from the clay of the Valley of the Unfortunate Undead". The 'Forlorn Philosopher' class has a predilection for them. 'Dream Theory', if successfully cast on the mind of a target, causes the victim to begin to doubt it is real. I decided to try this on the more aggressive-natured of the two frog-knights, whose name was 'Slim'.

It worked and Slim started freaking out, questioning his very existence. I then used the Unclean Scroll I had in my possession, 'Te-le-kin-esis', to pick up Slim's sword (leaning against his chair) and make it fly through the air into my hand. This worked, which caused Slim's friend (the more talkative of the two) to get upset. I proceeded to use 'Dream Theory' on him too, which also worked. He then dropped his own sword. I picked up this (manually this time) but this act offended him greatly. He began to fight me, even though he was bereft of his sword and even though he was suffering from the Dream Theory effects (which makes it easier for me to hit him in combat). Perhaps I should have tried playing some verbal mind games with him, but the fight was on and I was determined to beat him in hand-to-hand.

After a drawn out duel, in which I did suffer a light injury (he bit me), I eventually scored a critical hit on this fellow, who promptly died at my feet, his own sword (in my hands) tearing a fatal cut through his shoulder. I then proceeded to march over to Slim, still sitting on the floor confused, and demanded he submit to me as his new Lord Commander. Instead of having the desired effect, this command woke him up from his dream and, having seen his dead friend lying nearby, he had a morale failure and bolted out of the door through which I entered this room. I loaded my crossbow and followed him.

As I stepped through the doorway, I saw he was about to leap into the pool. I fired a bolt at him and wounded him just before he plunged beneath the water. Unfortunately the shot, while critical, wasn't fatal. I waited a while, resting, to see if he would re-emerge, but he didn't. 

I returned to the guard room and stripped the frog-knight I killed of his (damaged) armour and put it on myself. I then dragged his body to the waterfall and threw it down into the pool. Next, I pulled out another toy in my collection: the Prism of Ambiguity. This prism, if exposed to an external light source, can heal the body as well as improve the senses (making all tests easier to perform by lowering the required roll). I tried this out and it worked. I was back at full health and now all tests would be slightly easier for me.

I then proceeded through the door at the other end of the guard room and found a dim corridor. I proceeded along this, but stepped on a broken shard of glass I had failed to notice was there, which made a loud crunching noise beneath my boot. A voice called out of the gloom, demanding to know who I was and what my business was.
 
I answered with my true name and said I came seeking the Lord Commander of the Order of Narcissus. He demanded I step forward. I did, eventually, and found myself standing next to a mirror frame, with broken shards all over the floor. The mirror frame was blocking the entrance to a cave, just off this corridor, and in the cave was the most beautiful knight ever seen, radiant with glory. Because the mirror was broken, I could see through the frame into the cave, otherwise I would have been staring at the back of the mirror and wouldn't have seen him.

The beautiful knight then removed one of his gauntlets and threw it to the ground, challenging me to a duel. As he did so, his glory suddenly faded, and he became a very plain, actually quite ugly man. I asked his permission to talk before we fought. He agreed and explained he was once a poor soul who was shunned by society on account of his disfigured countenance.

He then went on a quest across the lands to find beauty, and in doing so, stumbled across a tribe of one-eyed frog-men in the swamps of Sarkash. Unlike mankind, these frog-men accepted him as he was, and he was able to organise them into a Knightly Order whose quest was to find the perfect beauty. Eventually, after many adventures, they found a legendary magic mirror, hidden in a church, The Mirror of Desire Foretold, which granted its user their greatest desire.

The Lord Commander asked the mirror for beauty, and he was given a magic gauntlet (the very one he just threw onto the ground). After this, the mirror smashed (it only works once). The gauntlet, when worn, would make him the most beautiful man on earth. When taken off, he appeared just like his normal self.

I had also asked him, seeing as he wore (unbroken) chainmail and a shield (with a daffodil painted on it), if we might duel on equal terms: sword vs. sword, matching armour etc. He refused my terms. As such, I decided to use my Unclean Scroll, 'Te-le-kin-esis' once again, to pull the gauntlet from the floor straight onto my hand, thus making me the most beautiful person in the world. This done, I demanded he submit to me as his new Lord Commander, seeing as I had taken his power from him. But, he wasn't impressed with this trick and the fight was on!

He charged at me, but I fired my crossbow at him point-blank and my bolt went through his shield, into his arm, doing no small amount of damage. So far, so good. But then I slung my crossbow and drew my sword and the proper duel began. Not a very long duel, though; my blows kept missing him and he finished the fight with a pommel-strike to my face, which took my health quite low. He then declared himself the victor.

In the earlier conversation, the Lord Commander had confessed that now he had the perfect beauty, he had become bored. I decided, rather than submit to him, I would pull out one last trick from up my sleeve. I declared that, on account of him being 'bored', I would show him "a marvel". I pulled the Prism of Ambiguity from my bag and attempted to activate it. A successful activation would have both healed my HP (possibly up to full) and also made my combat tests even easier, thus increasing my chances of a victory.

Unfortunately, if the Prism of Ambiguity doesn't work, it backfires and actually hurts the user! Well, this happened and I suffered a "Horrible Wound"! Using the Horrible Wounds chart, Nick and I agreed that the appropriate effect was a psychological trauma, which caused me to suffer a convulsive fit before collapsing on the floor unconscious.

I awoke, some time later, my wounds being tended by Slim, the frog-knight I had shot with my crossbow earlier, with the Lord Commander sitting nearby. He told me I had shown him "a marvel" indeed, and he had been greatly entertained, but that now I must admit defeat and leave. He placed the gauntlet back on his own hand, restoring his beauty and undoing my work. I decided, at this point, to submit to him, and asked him, in light of the fact that he was now down a knight (due to my killing him earlier), would he let me join the Order of Narcissus?

The End