Posted by Macheath on July 11, 2000 at 21:15:10:
<100%hp 100%m 100%mv> role Perhaps he had been intended for greatness. Perhaps fated for glory in war, or He was indeed slated to arrive in his mother's bedchamber on the sixteenth day Born on the last day of the Month of Futility, held from majesty and repute by a Added Sat Jul 8 15:36:35 2000 at level 11: At the top of the Seantryn Modan magic academy, housed within the awe-inspiring Unlike most buildings, which expand outward or not at all, the Tower of Sorcery The svirf maid cleaning the Tower on that day had heard quite a splendid joke Only as her cleaning tool made the satisfying squishing noise of contact with Added Sat Jul 8 15:37:48 2000 at level 11: As the thaumaturgic circle suddenly snapped into place below Feeble's feet, he He smirked lightly despite his intense level of concentration. Keeping his eyes As he finished the words, he found himself disappointed to have heard neither a Suddenly, remembering the thaumaturgic circle of protection, Feeble regained a When the winged morosa finished its meal, it turned its attention back toward Added Sat Jul 8 15:39:43 2000 at level 11: And so, finally, Roerich slipped away from his overprotective mother for an After this chilling encounter, Roerich found himself stunned and wandering the Squeezing its way through the front entryway of the Tower was a massive creature Added Sat Jul 8 15:42:53 2000 at level 11: -*You'll make a poor meal, human.*- That was it. That was the message that had come specially to Roerich through -*You are Roerich Krumm. I have heard the name.*- Silently, Roerich screamed to himself. He could not have screamed out loud if -*You are blessed, and also very deeply cursed. I smell the taint upon your And then, just as Roerich began to fear that he might suffer either permanent
Your role is:
Added Fri Jul 7 10:14:37 2000 at level 11:
Roerich Gottlieb Klopstock Krumm was born eighteen years ago in the tiny village
of Aturi on the Day of Deception, thirty-fifth day of the Month of Futility.
And that is the story of his life.
renown and celebrity in some other worthwhile pursuit. Surely a boy born
squarely in the middle of the legend-making Month of the Dragon needed no
prophetic declaration of his own. Llorenthos, the famed 'Executioner' of the
Empire... the magnanimous Apostle Saerin... the almost obscenely dedicated
Leader of the Tower, Mijzu... Kantherion, the last paladin of the Iron-Bound
Gauntlet, fearsome and tyrannical Arbiter Lord... all of them were born in the
great Month of the Dragon, were they not? In fact, a great many of Thera's most
influential heroes and villains have their deepest roots in this noble month.
Roerich Krumm does not.
of the Month of the Dragon (or thereabouts) until she took dreadfully ill, at
which time a premature birth was induced by the village surgeon's attentions.
All in Aturi praised the doctor for saving the life of both mother and child,
and when she was well enough to dance, a lavish celebration was held in their
honor. The implications on a certain newborn babe's life to come went largely
unheralded.
tether of ailing flesh only a few hours long, Roerich's life began with a
festival.
-THE CLEANING WENCH-
Tower of Sorcery, a cleaning wench went about her job as normal. Tiny droplets
of sweat formed upon her tiny svirfneblin forehead as she dutifully mopped up
the chunks of flesh and pools of blood which decorated the Stairs to the Astral.
Flesh both mortal and extraplanar was strewn about by the failed conjurations of
the men and women of the guild on this, the uppermost floor.
continually adds new floors. Those who find themselves on Hemlock Road during
the pre-dawn are often shocked to discover a taller tower after such an
expansion. The conjurers' guild was just such a surprise. While Seantryn did
its best to 'grow accustomed' to its new Tower-floor, conjurers repeatedly added
a bit of spice to its life in the form of massive fireballs containing Ancient
Demon Lords materializing occasionally directly over the city's epicenter.
about the guild, in a bar that morning, involving three angels and a homonculus.
She failed to see the humor in it, as svirfneblin are often wont to do, and had
plans to report it to the guildmaster as soon as he arrived. As she was slowly
descending the Stairs to the Astral, she planned how to approach the lofty
guildmaster. While scrubbing at a particularly stubborn stain on the Stairs of
Acid, she quietly composed her opening greeting, and the first few sentences of
her meticulously planned speech were forming just as she finished the Stairs of
Faith. Working her way down the Stairs of Flame, she put the penultimate
touches on what was certain to be one of the finest extemporaneous briefings
ever heard, and it was quite finished as her wet mop met the lobby floor.
cold stone did she realize that in her preoccupied state of mind, she'd left her
mopping bucket at the top of the tower. Horrible enlightening realization made
its slow spread across her mind like a cold blanket. Without fresh water
renewing her mop's effectiveness, all she'd managed to do this whole time was
spread a disgusting trail of blood down the entire length of the tower.
-THE DEMON-
shivered in anticipation of what was to come. He'd show his guildmaster his
true worth, and show the entire guild that he didn't deserve his ridiculous
nickname. Feeble had pilfered a scrap of paper with some terrifying-looking
symbols on it the night before. He'd no idea what it said at the time, but gold
could buy many things on the streets of Seantryn Modan during the twilight
hours. Finding someone to translate the chickenscratch hadn't been a problem.
Finding enough capital to pay the gypsy had proven more difficult, but she'd
grudgingly accepted half the amount originally requested when Feeble brandished
his dagger in her direction.
closed, he began incanting the words the gypsy woman had helped him learn. It
was a powerful chant, a phrase capable of summoning a more fearsome demon than
his guildmaster had yet discovered. Surely THAT would impress the old crank.
thunderclap nor the sound of a roaring Arch-Duke of Hades... but when his eyes
pried themselves open for the tiniest of peeks, he found himself face to face
with a terrible slobbering black-winged demon. Its huge eyes bulged outward
from its misshapen face, glowering at him in a manner which chilled his soul.
His knees quaked as the winged morosa demon grinned morbidly and arched its
horned wings over its head, stretching them to fill nearly the entire width of
the laboratory.
small measure of his composure and demanded that the demon obey him. It
fluttered its huge, heavy eyelashes at him in what he could only determine to be
a confused blink. The zephyr stirred up by this massive motion of meaty demon
eyelids stroked Feeble's cheeks and forehead. And Feeble wondered why the demon
was turning to walk out of the laboratory. He took a step to follow,
overwhelmed by the discordant situation, and abruptly the demon rounded on him.
His last thoughts before being eaten were: 'Ah, yes. Darkbind. How could I
have forgotten? How very feeble of me.'
what had attracted it to the stairway. The scent of blood was heavy there, and
it hungered for a corpse to sustain itself. If it couldn't find a corpse at the
end of this trail, it would merely find a way to make one when it got there.
Simple enough.
-ROERICH-
For the past several months, Roerich had been subjected to every kind of
embarrassment and agony fathomable, and some kinds which were simply
incognizable. Uncanny bad luck seemed to follow this undersized, underdeveloped
boy - barely into his teens - wherever he went. He was by nature small and
frail, a willowy youth at best. Around the time that his thrice-broken arm was
nearly burned off by a very close-by lightning strike (on a clear day,
nonetheless), Roerich began to suspect something. Indeed, he became quite
suspicious about the way fate had laid tragic events upon his doorstep, one
after another.
evening, and warily picked his way along the road to the perilous city of
Seantryn Modan. There, he met covertly with a shamanistic woman of questionable
lineage in order to discover his predetermination. She gesticulated her way
through all manners of archaic, druidic, cabalistic, occultic rituals, finally
heaving her chest mightily with the effort and delivering a resolution with an
uncomfortable shift of her rump: Roerich had been blessed with a great vision -
a vision of unclouded truth. Within him lurked the ability to divine the bleak
sense behind all of creation, weave it together into a logical progression, and
understand what the gods had done with the world. Predictably, some gods of the
mighty pantheon were angered by such an unexpected development and thus, he had
been cursed as well. In order to expedite his demise and the disappearance of
his unrealized talent, he had been smitten with unthinkably bad luck.
streets of Seantryn with no particular destination in mind. As he stumbled
along, his mind raced... how long could he survive, cursed as he was? Why had
he been given such a burden to bear, and what in the name of Asgaard was this
ultimate vision of truth he was supposed to be having? Eventually, and some
might say inevitably given his predisposition, Roerich found himself directly
in front of the Tower of Sorcery, staring straight into the gaping maw of the
mystical heart of Seantryn Modan. There, he was jerked from his nightmarish
reverie by a scream which made his blood run cold.
with horns and wings, black as night with wispy tufts of shock white hair all
about its person. Hideously, it was busily stuffing a pair of tiny feet between
its jaws. Slowly masticating upon its sumptuous meal, the demon coolly regarded
Roerich, who found himself riveted to the street with fear. Thick tendrils of
fear, in fact, were forcing their way into his every orifice and invading his
already shattered peace of mind with a suffocating grip. The demon, having
newly supped upon two corpses, had no further need for sustenance. Instead, it
decided to save Roerich for later, bundling him up in its massive arms, and took
flight to the north.
When Roerich regained consciousness again some time later, he found that he did
not like his predicament. Sitting in a pitch black cave, his sense of sight
entirely deprived of input, he relied on his ears to sense what might be nearby.
He heard the light rustle of leaves mingling with the sound of crashing ocean
waves, together softly and sweetly underlying the filthy, rasping, rattling
noise of mucus-impeded breathing which seemed to gurgle out from somewhere
behind him. And then, a demon's voice abruptly sounded out. It was an
atrocious screaming sound, which seemed to come from a hundred parched and
bleeding throats all at once. At the same time, however, Roerich heard
perfectly formed words resonating inside his skull:
nine circles of the Abyss, for which he had been abducted and much blood had
been shed. 'How perfectly fitting,' he thought. Roerich began to hope that the
demon would simply kill him, poor meal or not. It would bring him much relief,
and certainly, a little known runt such as himself would be missed by no one.
he'd wanted to.
soul.*- Roerich imagined he could hear the demon smirking in the dark, inches
from his own face. The demon's breath felt like a fist on his cheek. -*I have
made the decision to end your life for you. Are you pleased?*- For a moment,
Roerich's heart leapt with joy... and then cold reality set in. -*It will,
however, not be so easy as that. Inflicting suffering is sometimes much more
enjoyable than inflicting death. Particularly in cases such as yours.*- A
chuckle which sounded like snapping bones ground its way through the air. -*You
will die... but no time soon, I'm afraid. When you come of age, you may begin
to fear for your life. But after that, your death may come in the form of a
murder, or in the form of a falling tree. It may come in a day, or in a
century. When it comes, though, it will be... amplified by my touch. And you
may be assured that I will be there to watch and escort your soul to Hades for
an eternity of torment.*-
deafness from the demon's voice or madness from having its words planted in his
mind, the nightmarish creature was gone. It had not announced its departure,
and its leaving was accompanied by neither flash nor bang nor sudden rush of
air. Roerich took advantage of the unforseen stillness by lying down to weep.