The Bloody Hands REBIRTH: The Stone Crack'd, Part 7. The Battle for Oone. [Tricube Tales] [Gamemaster Apprentice Deck]
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| Probationary Guardian, Natalia Wilson Image © Dean Spencer. |
- "Previously..." and Campaign/Arc Summary
- The Stone Crack'd 7. The Battle for Oone.
- Return to Izzia
- Natalia Arrives
- The Way Crumbles
- Caught between Evil and The Hand
- Clearing the Way
- Protecting Those Who Need Protecting
- Facing The Truth
- Doug's Commentary
- Mechanical and Story Notes
- Credits
Previously, on The Bloody Hands REBIRTH: The Stone Crack'd
Arden and Jalmar approached Oone, where they were accosted by Fern and Elric. As they fled with a captive Fern, they learned more about the terrible happenings going on in the town. Fern asks them to help but Arden has a terrible vision that shows that someone in the town has laid a trap. Arden is to unleash a great evil. Fern allowed herself to be recaptured by the townsfolk while Jalmar and Arden made their way back to camp. Unknown to them, Natalia has already left camp and has gone to try and help.
About The Bloody Hands Rebirth: The Stone Crack'd
The once great Khelia Empire has crumbled due to a long war between mages. Now, after five generations, the world is starting to rebuild. Arden Ulet leads his team - beast-master Jalmar Dax; Probationary Guardian and explosives expert Natalia Wilson; and the Scholar Izzia Kor - on an expedition across The Shallows, a vast plains long abandoned by the Arcane Order. Their goal is to find a magic site of potential once great power to help Arden to understand the lost ways of magic that the Arcane Order are working to stamp. Along the way, they encounter places of great power, ruined villages, long-term feuds, and other strange things.
Content Warning: Mostly fantasy violence with occasional dives into harder horror [including body horror and cannibalism]. Mild and infrequent substance use, often with a fantasy twist. This is a world where a lot of people suffered and died for many years even as it tries to rebuild itself.
This post is in the standard Doug Alone post style. See Anatomy of a Post for more details. The Image Oracles described in the post (gamemaster phases and mechanic notes, especially) are from the Guardians of the Shadow Realm one-sheet. They can be seen on the Tricube Image Oracles page.
Attribution for the tools and materials used—including the splash art—can be found in the Credits below along with some details.
The Stone Crack'd 7. The Battle for Oone.
Setting the Scene: Return to Izzia
Doug's Note: I'll be using the Gamemaster Apprentice Deck: Base set for this one. I'll encode the card number drawn as a number in square brackets like this: [c0]. I'm not really going to shuffle too hard to start since it's all new to me and this is kind of a test run so consecutive cards might show up in this first pass.
Arden and Jalmar are going to return to Izzia at the base camp. Natalia has ran on ahead, but she will take the original path and so they will not have spotted one another in the rain.
Are Arden and Jalmar being pursued? (Even) → [c101] No. For some reason the villagers are not actively tracking the two. Fern maybe? Some other plan on the villagers behalf?
Izzia will potentially be upset or disturbed. Let's try out the runes and catalyst. [c102] Catalyst: The Breakthrough. Izzia has discovered something! [c60] ᚫ (Ansuz) - Ancestral Spirit. The power of words, names. "Oone" is going to be related to an ancient entity. One linked to the current state, maybe why "The Wizard" has come here and allowed herself to be captured.
Image Oracles: 3,2 Fishing Pole + 2,3 Uprising. Nice symmetry. Let's go a bit more nature spirit. A spirit of dark water and hidden springs. A being once worshipped at this site because it could bring water to the Shallows even away from the river. Its worshippers felt that it was tied into the Shallows itself, that the spirit swallowed the flood waters brought the land forth but brings the rains every year to remind the folk that it can release the flood once again. Since the spirit is tied to dark and hidden things, magicians felt it tied into the hidden magic deep beneath the soil. Since the villagers have been dumping their victim's corpses into the water, it has tainted what should actually be a holy spring, causing the connection to grow worse and darker.
The Spirit's name is Uunne of the Dark Spring.
Izzia thinks that Arden might be able to break the magical miasma if he can clear the waters.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐
Return to Izzia
Arden and Jalmar ride their horses hard into their base camp. A few heavy canvas tents up against a small hillock to block out some of the weather and let water drain off if more shows up. The remains of a campfire moulders in the rain. Izzia has taken himself inside one of the tents and has his large journals out, digging through it. Kif is by his side.
"Where's Natalia?," Arden asks.
"Oh. Oh! I thought she was with you guys. When I heard you returning, I figured she had managed to get you."
Arden and Jalmar discuss plans very rapidly and prepare to ride off before Izzia calls them back.
"Wait, I thought the name sounded familiar. My records of the Shallows show there is a place that was once near here where people worshipped a great nature spirit called Uunne. A spirit of hidden waters and underground rivers. Mystical mumbo jumbo, connection to shamans. All that. No temple in the traditional sense. A holy spring that never ran dry in months of drought and never flooded during the rainy season."
"I think I know the place," Arden says, "A pond that gives off a strong spiritual energy, but a very bad one." [1]
"Hmm, that might not be good. The ancient texts suggest Uunne was fairly powerful being. Even if you take away the..."
Jalmar interrupts. "No time to talk. Natalia is walking into a place of evil with several innocent lives at stake! She'll have no chance if we do not get to her!"
Arden agrees. "You are right, we need to ride. First priority is protecting Natalia. Second is protecting as many of the children and other victims as possible. Izzia, I can't force you to come into danger but if you have insights..."
"Let me pack my books away and I'll join you!" [2]
Setting the Scene: Natalia Arrives
Before we figure out the exact approach that Natalia will use, let's pull a card or two.
First, the Card: [c99] The first thing that pops off the card to me (besides the promise of a wild gazebo appearing) are the three prompt words: Poison, Haphazard, Beast. The Wizard has been summoning the beast to help the villagers while waiting by the tainted holy spring. Now that Arden is near and the villagers have essentially let him go because of Fern's meddling, the Wizard has snapped and summoned the Beast against the villagers. The very large insect (Size → [c60] 3 so not house-sized big but more like cow-sized big) is ...well, is it trying to free the Wizard? (Good) → [c77] Yes. It's attacking the larger stone structure that Arne imprisons and slaughters the victims in.
Are there clearly people in danger that Natalia can see? (Even) → [86] No. She sees the bug and ramshackle houses and likely hears screams and such. What does she hear? → [c42] Sloshing liquid. The pond is starting to gurgle and rise up in reponse to all the dark magic being woven.
Does this mean the Oone folk are holed up in the only fortified place? (Good) → [79] Yes.
Final question (this is mostly just to get me used to GMA): What sort of defense are the Oone folk using? Let's lay Card #35 Out. We have ᛢ (Eihwaz) → Yew Tree, reliability, trustworthy, goals. We have Restore | Physical | Foe. Catalyst is weaponed shattered. Element is water = nuturing calm and exploding depths (you don't say). Symbols are Wand + Sword + Shield. Strife and magic and goals. Heart rending shrieks. It grows dark. The group is well used ot assault. They gather in the Arne's building and follow the rules. They summon a guardian. A carrion golem. It rises from the pond to attack the bug beast. Inside, they are trying to assault the witch. Let's draw two cards, first for them and second for her to see their relative power levels Oone = [c88] 2 vs her = [c93]. Not worried about the value out of 10, just a way to contrast. So they are equally matched (at least her vs Arne + Alma + Elric are matched, since Fern has gone against the group to protect her children).
I'm good, let's roll it.
We'll set a d8 clock on Uunne's holy spring exploding outward. Each scene roll the die and a 1-2 = decrease. After d4 fades it equals boom. It is very close.
Does the Witch want Arden to blend his mind with the spring? (even) → [c33] Yes. While it might be the solution, it is also a trap.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐☐☐☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d8
Natalia Arrives
Natalia rides up near the small, cursed town and leaps off her horse. As she runs into the ring of ramshackle houses, a strange sight is before her. A large, man-like creature is attacking a giant bug beast. The creature towers over most of the houses and seems made of mud with bones and skulls and reeking, rotting flesh inside. At least the skeletal bits look majority human. The bug is blue and black like a beetle with large mandibles but sharp bladed front claws like a mantis. It is only roughly the size of the creature's head but the mandibles keep lopping off chunks of the creature's molded-carrion flesh. It is clear the creature is losing.
The carrion golem is protecting the most notable building in the town: a large stone-brick structure. The mantis-beetle is trying to get inside. Behind the building, a pond of rancid water burbles and swells. Between it and the carrion golem, the air is filthy and disgusting. Rot that you can practically feel entering your nose and your mouth.
Natalia does not feel like Arden would work with such a thing as the mantis-beetle — she can detect the shadow beast nature in it — but she knows someone is fighting someone else and whoever brought forth the carrion golem is definitely worse. It does not occur to her that this might be two villains hashing it out. She is young and still very new to the field and all she knows is that her commanding officer, and his well-trained, long-term partner, have gone missing. And there is this. She runs full tilt towards the carrion golem and channels her blasting sigils into a punch at the golem's weakest spot: what would be knees in a human. The bright silver flame of her arcane energy travels down her arm and swells into the decayed human flesh of the creature and arcs up through it, destroying not just its knee but causing the whole structure of it to erupt into burning flames. Making the smell much worse. [3]
She turns to see what the mantis-beetle does, now. It returns back to the building and starts breaking out chunks of the wall. Soon enough a hole is open. [4]
She hopes to see Arden and Jalmar emerge even though she knows it is foolish. What she sees is much worse. A woman of Arden's age steps forth. Black haired. Strikingly beautiful. Deep violet eyes. Skin pale and drawn from her weeks of "capture." What worries Natalia the most is that the woman has as many sigils as Arden and Jalmar. Only the woman's are warped and glowing bright red.
The woman is one of The Bloody Hand!
Setting the Scene: The Way Crumbles
I want to give Natalia a bit more screen time before the other three show up since she had an astounding success against the golem, but let's cut back to the other three. Something is going to delay them a bit.
Card #22 says "Dangerous Ground" for location and "Rabid Animal" for catalyst. The sound of a fight. Moist earth. An electric jolt. I say skip the rabid animal and just focus on the nature. The presence of a corrupted avatar of Uunne is approaching. As it pushes up through the already rain soaked dirt, geysers of fetid water are spraying. The Shallows are starting to crack.
Getting past them will require an Easy Brawny roll. Mostly to resist the terrible smell. Izzia will only roll one dice, though. In the distance, they can hear the explosion as Natalia punches the creature.
The Awakening die did not decay. Still d8. Two points of progress for taking out their biggest guardian beast.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d8
The Way Crumbles
Lightning arcs down from the storm and crashes into the water saturated soil, exploding a large ball of muck into the air. Geysers are erupting around the trail. To add to the danger, the water spewing forth is yellow and vile. Frothing. Almost like a thin, sickly mucus. The smell washes over the three trying to ride forth at full speed towards Oone.
Jalmar has been in the field for too long to be fazed. He pulls his cloak up slightly and expertly rides his horse through the increasingly dangerous ground.
Arden does not fare as well but still maintains control of his steed. This is the most nauseated he has felt in a good while but in the distance he hears an explosion that is not thunder by something else. Natalia. Fighting loudly. Whatever battle is up ahead has already commenced.
Behind them, Izzia falls from his horse. The beast is acting nearly rabid between the scent of decay and the loud thunder and explosions. He shouts to the others, "No, don't stop. I'll follow. I can hear the damn...," and proceeds to start vomiting. [5]
Arden looks back and debates going back to help or going forward. Natalia is up against something rough but Izzia is a sitting duck if the trail gets worse. He turns and rides hard back to snatch up the scholar into his own horse. He manages to grab Izzia's protesting arm and pulls the scholar up. Then turns to race after Jalmar. [6]
Setting the Scene: Caught between Evil and The Hand
Now the Wizard and Natalia are facing off against the Oone hedge mages, especially Elric and Arne.
Does Oone have something to stop the mantis-beetle? (Even) → [c24] Yes. Image Oracle x2: 1,4 Haunting + 6,1 Wolf (I've seen this one!)
This means that the collected Oone people will now, turning against "The Wizard," are fighting on exactly equal footing. If Natalia does help, it becomes a (3+1)d6 = Agile + Brawny. Easy. No effort fight. A pair of en-sigiled people are too strong for them.
The Awakening die did not decay. Will add in an extra test die (2d8, take lowest) to represent the worsening magical aura. Decays to d6. No progress for the last scene.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d6
Caught between Evil and The Hand
"Ah, a little helper. I do so like a good assistant," says the dark-haired wizard.
Behind her, others are coming out of the hole in the wall. An old man. A fat, younger man who looks much like his chubbier copy. The younger man has an old woman holding her head and swaying. Natalia suspects the old woman might have been controlling the golem. The explosive feedback has shorted out the controller's head for the moment. Others are behind them. Some are now fleeing out into the other buildings. Still, some are standing behind the two men. The Hand wizard might have her work cut out for her.
If in order to prove the point, the mantis-beetle, obviously following verbal commands of the wizard, flies at the group but the fat man pulls out a whistle carved on the shape of the wolf's head and blows upon it. A great shadow wolf explodes from the end of the whistle and slams into the insect, causing it to crash down into the building, caving in part of the roof.
The wizard screams in anger and pulls from her torn and battered robe a black mirror. She faces it towards the fat man and speaks words in Hordulan — the ancient dark magical language. Natalia cannot see what is happening from her vantage point, but to Elric he sees his reflection — and only his reflection — in the ebony glass. Then the wizard punches the back of the mirror and shatters it. Elric himself breaks like meaty glass into many shards of flesh and bone.
"YOU KILLED ELRIC, YOU BITCH!," screms the old man.
"I killed a lot of people, you old fool," laughs back the wizard, "You were fine with it when you thought I was serving you."
Natalia realizes she cannot help either side and so turns to run. The wizard stomps a foot and a great hand of wet earth surge up to grab Natalia. Natalia twists as she is yanked back and slaps down into the hands while once again powering her sigils. The hand releases her as its thumb is blown off and she scrambles back into the rain. She needs to regroup and figure out what to do. [7]
Setting the Scene: Clearing the Way
Jalmar joins and now they have to figure out who to fight first. Arden and Izzia are still one scene behind.
d6 vs d6 = 3 to 1 → The Oone group are winning. The wizard is tired from the capture even if she was allowing it. If they win twice in a row, they will have killed her.
The Awakening does not yet progress, but will get 2d6 next turn. No progress, yet. In fact, the only way to get the last 4 points is if both groups of evil are vanquished and the spring is restored. Once d4 decays, the spring will erupt and the balance will be up to a single die roll.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d6
Clearing the Way
Jalmar leaps off his horse near a retreating Natalia, bow already in his hand, and demands to know who to shoot. Natalia points back and explains the woman is one of The Hand, something likely obvious to the beast master since he can clearly see her glowing sigils. "And the rest are just plain bastards," he says.
The wizard is backing up as the various hedge mages continue to bring out their relics and unleash various attacks on her. A swarm of stinging insects fly forth from a bag. Shards of bone sling out from the mouth of a cloth doll. A pair of dice whips the wind into a stinging fury.
For her part, she has killed several of the lesser mages by shadow whips and blood magic. One's face has ruptured from his own blood boiling. Another is cut in half.
Jalmar takes a deep breath, and shoots at the wizard. Though the others are still more numerous, she is the real threat if she can regroup. Her power level is on the same tier as a Guardian. And Arden is about to be busy. The pond has strange faces and weird pulpy masses pushing to the surface, like a great cancerous entity is trying to be born.
His arrow covers the distance and embeds in her back. She turns as her sigils glow even redder and her purple eyes begin to shine, but the old man — still enraged about the loss of his son — brings his butchering axe down into the back of her head. The wizard crumbles and her sigil goes out. [8]
The old man and the still standing folk stare at the Guardians, their long-time hatred grows, and they start to charge.
Jalmar lets out shot after shot and folks fall. The reign of terror of Oone is nearly over. Natalia, now knowing how to hit, charges in and brings her fist down hard into the ground, channeling a shockwave into the group as a whole. The old man is caught in the explosion and collapses back. Though a few stragglers remain, the leadership is destroyed and Oone is broken. [9]
"I don't feel good about this, Jalmar, so much...," Natalia starts to speak as the pond in front of them erupts upwards and a loud voice screams out, "AHN RAH SHA AHN UUNNE!" The sound slams into her chest like a fist and she sees the stone building crumbling even more. [10]
Setting the Scene: Protecting Those Who Need Protecting
Doug's Note: Between this and the last scene, I created a super simple script (Javascript and HTML) to pull up a random GMA: Base card and to give me a quick explanation — as provided by Nathan Rockwood in the Gamemasters Apprentice Deck Quickstart Guide — at a glance without having to use anything else. If you want, feel free to take it, improve upon it, etc. It does not provide any of the images but if you bought the Base Deck from DriveThruRPG then you can unzip the VTT folder and drop the HTML file in there. Then open it in a browser. Either hit refresh or click the card to bring up a new one. With very little addition, all the text comes from Rockwood's guide and is copyright to him.
A side effect of this change is that cards are so completely random that it is entirely possible a card might show up almost back to back.
Arden arrives and assesses the damage but he will, eventually, allow himself to fall into the trap before potentially the entire Shallows are swallowed by the spreading wrath of Uunne.
Jalmar and Natalia had such astounding success that the Oone folks that are not hopeful of rescue are going to just outright flee or hide.
Fern will be protecting at least the children and some others inside the now crumbling building. How many adults of Oone are actually in the more innocent side, staying with her? → [c36] 4 (out of 10). A sizeable chunk, but not the majority.
How severe is the building collapsing? → [c54] 6 (out of 10). Pretty severely but it might have a scene or two left.
What is the first goal of the fleeing bad-Oone-folk? [c77] Deviate [c108] Sacrilegious [c31] Crime. Ok, their plan is, without Arne + Elric + Alma to flee their crimes and have nothing more to do with the spot. Fair enough.
The Awakening still does not progress. Next scene it adds another dice and goes to 3d6 test. The only task left to accomplish (which is a possibly big one) is calming Uunne.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d6
Protecting Those Who Need Protecting
Arden runs and checks on Natalia and Jalmar.
Between the aggressive attack in which people were killed — she has seen death before but is still new to the experience of being a direct cause of it — and the loud voice that shook the ground, Natalia has lapsed a bit into a daze. Jalmar on the other hand is staying more active. He keeps an arrow notched into his bow and aims at any townsfolk that even so much as start to approach. Ruk, overhead, keeps an overview and tracks the people who are not sticking around to face Jalmar's bow. The short fight has broken the town and it will possibly never recover.
Arden checks they are both ok and looks around at the aftermath. "Jalmar, Natalia, what happened?"
Natalia has the most information so explains about the wizard fighting with the Oone folk. And the voice. She points out the pond that has somehow swelled upwards like a pestilent bubble full of swamp scum. Cannot be long before it bursts.
Arden looks around. "What about Fern, have you seen her? She might be protecting several children." He describes her to Natalia but both Jalmar and Natalia shake their head.
"I don't know. Stuff was underway when I got here. Maybe she was able to flee." [11]
"Ok, hopefully so. Natalia, protect Izzia and yourself. Do not attack anyone needlessly but do not let them get closer than you can throw a rock. If they refuse to acknowledge your authority, do what must be done. Got it? Good. Jalmar, I am going to try and make contact and I could use you to protect me."
"Arden, what if that," pointing his bow at the pond, "is the trap. You'd be walking into whoever it was that brought us here."
"I think it might be. Unfortunately, the trap is sprung. I once saw the death caused by a group of tomb robbers being incautious. My very first mission. This is that trap but on a much larger scale. It won't be a small handful of greedy folk but miles and miles of destruction."
Izzia speaks up from several feet back where he has stayed by the horses. "He's right, Jalmar. Legends suggest this entity is what swallowed the flood waters so that the Shallows could rise. Even if that is a massive overstatement, we could be looking at a flood might kill thousands."
Jalmar sighs and nods. "A flood of filth instead of water. Making the whole Shallows into this accursed place. A perfect breeding ground for new horrors."
Arden asks, "Are you ready?"
"Aye, but just know I can shoot a lot further than I can throw a rock and I am not in a good mood."
"Good man! Everyone, let's go!"
Setting the Scene: Oone Falls
Fern is inside a crumbling building and it is quickly becoming too late to leave.
What will Fern do? → [c62] ᛖ (Ehwaz) - Horses/Travel. Physical transportation; slow but steady progress; teamwork, trust, ideal marriage or partnership. She is going to gather up the people trapped inside and start working together to get them moving.
Will the building collapse during this scene? (Good) → [c89] Yes. The people will need help getting out alive.
What will it take for Natalia to help? → (3+1)D6 Standard Brawny. 2 Effort.
The Awakening *still* does not progress. Amazing. Ok, reaching Uunne will then be set to Standard/2-effort since the danged water spirit is content with just waiting around.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d6
Oone Falls
As Arden and Jalmar disappear around the back of the stone brick building, another of those great AHN UUNNE shouts slams into the world from out of the pond. This one with more force. The rain wobbles in its passing. Water and mud splatter into the air. Snaps and cracks can be heard as some of the smaller houses go.
The stone brick building starts to lean. As Natalia watches, she sees movement inside. She readies her sigils and prepares to defend herself and the scholar when she realizes the people are children. Four, five, more. Unfortunately, right at this time, the building lets out a loud growl as stone grinds against stone. The structure is failing.
Natalia runs straight for it. Arden had given her a command to stay back but she knows he would be the first to dive face first into the situation. Her expertise is in tearing buildings — and giant beasts — down, not stopping them from falling, but in principle to know where the weak parts are you must know which parts are strong. You know how to tear it down because you know how to build it up. She has a plan. A terrible one that has no field testing, but she is trying to think on her feet.
She runs past scared children, illogically clinging back into the presumed safe place of the building, and enters into a structure that represents years of depravity. Human sized cages. Boxes of stuff that has been stolen from victims. A warehouse of horrors. And also the place that those Oone folk who did not fear the Guardians have stayed, because they were following Fern. Fern who promised them that someone was coming to help.
Natalia reaches once more into her core and pulls forth a blast that is wide rather than focused. Her plan is to push back against the building with a very controlled, very slow explosion of energy outward. If she can time it right, she can counter the collapse just long enough to buy people time.
She pushes up and out, arms and shoulders glowing bright silver, but the building is of heavier stone than she accounted. A large wooden beam slams down and kicks up chunks. One hits her in the head and knocks her sidewise. [12]
"No, come on." She tries again, more force. Yes, maybe it is holding. Only then she hears it. The worst thing to hear at this time: AHN UUNNNNNNNEEE AHN UUUUUNNNNNNNNEEEE. No longer a shout. No longer a loud cry of a ancient entity whose life essence is being choked by a wave of negative emotion. This time the shout is a fist of an angry, confused god. Right as Natalia is unleashing a blast to try and hold the roof for just a moment longer, the words crumble the building and the whole structure comes crashing down. A stone the size of a saddle hits her in the back and knocks her face down. She knows she is at the end. [13]
She closes her eyes and hopes that Arden can finish this but a new sound erupts. A woman's shout and with it the roar of rain and thunder and lightning warping and bending. Natalia does not see but Fern has reached out and grabbed hundreds of yards worth of the storm and yanked it hard like an unruly beast, channeling all of her weather controlling magic, and she pulls all that wind and fury and yanks it into the collapsing building. She is following Natalia's lead only on a much large scale. [14]
As Natalia slowly realizes that she is not dead, she also realizes she can feel the rain on face. She looks around and stands up to see the building is gone. She sees Izzia running towards her. Jalmar shouts as he approaches from the other side. Natalia is very bloodied, but she, and several of the others that were around her are alive.
Not everyone made it, though. She spots Fern buried under the rubble. At least one of the children is beside her. Natalia shouts to Izzia and Jalmar and starts pulling the stones off. It is too late. Right as they manage to get Fern's face free, the Oone woman smiles. "Thank you for trying." And dies.
A young boy starts wailing. Natalia collapses beside the dead woman's body and begins to sob, herself.
So much death, and the real fight is just about to begin.
Setting the Scene: Falling into the Trap
Arden prepares to contact Uunne.
What does Uunne need? Let's get a Rune, a pair of image oracles, and maybe a short random phrase.
Rune → [c5] ᛇ (Eihwaz): Yew Tree/Reliability. Dependability, trustworthiness; protection; honesty; well-chosen, achievable goals. Hmm, a second one...
[c66] ᚠ (Fehu): Livestock/Wealth. Property, prosperity, fertility, increase, social success.
These together both bring up a sense of interconnection. Uunne might be a spirit of deep and ancient waters, but their connection to the surface is through a sort of communion. The fertile soil of the Shallows nurtures Uunne while Uunne's waters nurtures the soil.
Image Orace → 6,4 Magic Potion + 4,3 Bottled Shadow. Both are containers known by what they contain. Uunne's water is likewise a container. The corruption of the holy spring is causing a corruption in Uunne's waters. Uunne is about to open the bottle, so to speak, and pour them out.
And here is an attempt at a phrase. [c26] Weaken [c76]Angelic [c83] Dream.
Ok. All this ties into a few elements. Arden has some fragment of the spirit Kalbarn-Karn in his spirit-self. Karn is a very power wizard of light, one of the last great wizard of light (maybe the last great, I slightly forget the self-created lore). They are seen as an angelic figure in depictions, a beautiful person at dawn's horizon. Uunne is a water spirit but one that works through communion between the deeps and the surface. There were generations of time in which this spot was abandoned, disrupting it. Then, when it restarted, the people at the surface were corrupt. The spring became a dumping ground for murder victims. The Oone folk might not have even noticed that they were pulled into the communion. They just felt that the pond was the best place to store their carrion. As Alma pulled forth the great carrion golem, it was like pulling the last plug on a giant sink.
Arden is just a person, but Kalbarn-Karn has transcended death to a degree. If Arden can clear the way, Kalbarn-Karn can combine with Uunne to burn away the darkness.
The Awakening finally decays to a d4.
Solving The Dire Situation in Oone (d12)
☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☑☐☐
Uunne's "Awakening": d4
Falling into the Trap
As Arden takes three deep breaths to begin his visionary connection to the increasingly swelling spring — now bulging over a dozen feet from its old surface with strange shapes like screaming faces become more distinct in the filthy water — when one of the many faces lets out another shout of AHN UUNNE! The shockwave this close is nearly defining and Arden and Jalmar are both pushed back. Behind him, Arden can hear the deep groan as the stone building begins to topple. He cannot wave at this point, the time is too short.
"Arden?," asks Jalmar, aware that he can hear shouts coming from inside the building. The sound of what might be a muffled explosion.
"Go, old friend, follow your instinct."
Jalmar wavers. In that brief moment, the faces start to gather into one. And that screams out AHN UUNNNNNNNEEE AHN UUUUUNNNNNNNNEEEE and the world begins to buckle. Now the shout is a fist and punches Jalmar over. Smaller buildings around the spring explode into debris and people hiding inside are tossed carelessly into the air. Only Arden seems unaffected, his body already half into a vision state.
With a final crashing sigh, the building behind Jalmar comes down and people cry out in terror. Before he has fully recovered, Jalmar's long years of instinct have him on his feet and running towards the fallen building.
Had he glanced back, he would have seen Arden tilt forward and fall inside the water and disappear beneath the dark water.
Down and down for miles and miles. Days and days. Years and years. Flowing down a debris choked stream into primal space that was buried by soil before mankind ever set forth on the Shallows.
Now down is up and Arden is rising, at least his shadow-spirit is. Where Arden has silvered sigils upon his skin, this version is moon-pale with black lines drawn in ink. An water-saturated impressionistic drawing of Arden. Floating in a place made entirely of white ink on black parchment. Arden pulls him up and up until he is floating over a vast body of water.
Below him is a great beast. A leviathan. A whale the size of several mountains. An entire island of flesh. Around it, thorns vines made of human spines and entrails wrap and bind it. Cut into it. It thrashes and thrashes. With each mighty spasm of its great flukes, tsunamis are generated that shove the ocean of water and reshape it. The creature is starting to sink down below. Not truly a creature of the water, it needs the surface to complete its great migration. But it can barely find the solace it needs to live in both sea and air at the same time.
The ink-drawing Arden reaches out and in his hand is a sword. A blade attuned to his sigils. As he lifts it high, it shines darkly with black ink. With one last command word, telling the sword to cut, he brings the blade down and it is no longer a sword but a crepuscular ray. A shadow in a shadow sea.
It slices through the great beast but does not harm its flesh. Instead, it severs the many tendrils and decay that threaten to destroy it.
As soon as it is free to arches its entire body into a great act of triumph and pushes forth to the surface. A great laughter can be heard mere moments before Arden opens his mouth wide and a being of light crawls forth like being sung into existence.
Soon, this Brightness stands many times larger than the vision of Arden. Once it has pulled itself nearly completely from Arden, it twists and falls and flows directly into the great beast. An entire series of voices ring out — KAL BARN KARN! — and the light and the beast become one.
As the vision body of Arden falls back into the sea and sinks down towards the surface, a single mote of light from the angelic being returns and alights on Arden's lips before finding its way back inside. Arden's vision self flies up and rejoins his physical being.
Setting the Scene: One Last Miracle
The others bear witness to the aftermath and Arden makes plans for the survivors.
There's only one question I'm going to ask for this short scene. Can Fern's unborn baby be saved by this miracle? (Good) → [c14] YES!
I'll leave the particular biology out of it, but Fern's child will be born with as Kalbarn-Karn calls the child forth. The baby is essentially a rebirth of Kalbarn-Karn who might one day return to tend the spring. A baby with blonde hair the color of sunlight on a summer dawn as it reflects across the grass of the Shallows. And eyes the color of the bright sky in the morning.
This will be a lot of micro-scenes pushed together rather than dwell too much on setting two to three complete things. It will also represent something of a change in direction for the finish of this arc and the campaign as a whole.
One Last Miracle
Natalia, Izzia, Jalmar, and some of the Oone folk are in the middle of pulling rubble off of the buried and trying to find more survivors when a bright light pours into the sky behind them. Turning to look, the great sludge bubble of the pond has popped and now a beam of liquid sunlight is flowing up out of the pond into the clouds. When it connects with the heavy storm clouds, the latter parts and a bright fall day washes over the ruined place.
Many blink their eyes but Jalmar, who refuses to look away, sees Arden step out of the beam of light and start walking towards them. "I see you came up with a solution, lad."
"Not me, I was just there to help this time."
Jalmar hears a newborn cry out from behind him and he and Arden look over to see Natalia holding a very young baby next to a young Oone woman. Natalia is confused by what just happened. "She...Darys...said that she was just trying to finish uncovering Fern's body when the body start going into contractions. Thought it might be death spasms but then the baby came out and is quite healthy. I..." Natalia is at a loss for words.
"One last miracle," says Jalmar, as the light continues to flow up into the sky.
The next few hours are spent gathering and burying the dead. Fern and a few others get individual graves. Unfortunately, due to the ferocity of the battle and to the many corpses of victims, it would take too long to sort the rest so a mass grave is made and marked with stones from the ruined town hall — Arden refuses to call anything but. The one blanket exception is the bodies of the dead children. Arden asks them to be buried on their own away from the rest, nearer the holy spring. Jalmar oversees those graves himself. It is never easy to survive as an outsider, but children bear the horrors of the frontier differently. Jalmar, raised in the Ord where death was frequent, is uniquely qualified to appreciate the struggles of childhood cut short.
Not many of the Oone folk who fled return. Some who did stared into the light and stayed to help. Others saw the light and fled even harder a second time.
The one body that they were unsure what to do with was the wizard. Jalmar and Arden discussed it.
"Who is she, Ard?"
"Don't know. I met her years ago. My first mission. I guess I know why I kept thinking about it, now. That first failure of mine. She fancied herself the rebirth of Komodulus, an evil wizard who tried to destroy Khalid City at the very end of the War. Stopping Komodulus and the ice horde was The Arcane Order's first real victory, those Five Generations ago. This one took on the name and I was sent to stop her or die trying. Instead, we both lived. I don't know her real name or what she called herself, here. Fern maybe knew. Fern had the powers of a true mage. One of the great weather weavers. Instead, she lived as some demented farmer's wife helping the village to lure in victims."
"Those sigils. Its worse than what you reported in Yarlkin."
"Yes. And The Bloody Hand are getting better at them. It might not be long now before an entire army of The Hand are able to march fully sigil'd into the Veil. While most of the population are held back from their own magical abilities to defend themselves."
"Where should the wizard's body, go?"
"Put her in the mass grave. I don't know what she thought she was playing at, but a lot of this death is on her head."
With sunset, the flowing beam of light finally ceased, but the storms did not return. Maybe they will not return the rest of the rainy season. The effect of the light has been to burn away much of the corruption of the place. The spring itself once again looks like a tranquil pond of deep blue waters. Gold fish swim down in its depths. Depths that might be a few feet or a few miles depending on the angle you tilt your head.
Darys, who turns out to be Fern's younger sister, has taken on the child. Darys has a newborn herself and her and Fern had been working to protect the children. Darys does not have Fern's extreme gift of magic, but has the power to shift and flow water. An effect of growing up in such a holy place.
Arden has given the remaining people an option. He is going to oversee taking the children back to Tyv and Jorn and will let Wren and the priests know of this place and work out a plan to bring soldiers and others to protect it.
"Those who might be less innocent are free to join but just know I am a seer. You will not hide the truth from me. There will be trials. It will not be easy to just pretend you never took part in any of...," he waves his hand at the aftermath, "This.
"Still, I will explain as best I can and you can help tell your story. I know someone who will do her best to make sure The Shallows always remember those died here today. On both sides."
Arden doesn't need his seer powers to know the number of takers will be low. There are a lot of crimes to answer for, eventually. For now, focus on life and taking care of people and repaying Uunne for the long suffering they endured.
Jalmar is riding behind with Arden as they make their way slowly back across the Shallows. A place that is a lot nicer now that the clouds have been driven from the sky. Arden will not be surprised to see a lot of farms in the region reporting extra bountiful harvests over the next few seasons.
"So, Arden, this might throw off your plans of meeting with Marel."
"Khel wills it, the meeting will be made, but for now the important thing is the people. An entire area abandoned by The Order and left to struggle in the aftermath of the War. The least I can do."
"What's on your mind, Arden?"
"I had a vision back there. Before the fight. That wizard planned to bring me over to her side. To use my powers to help launch a new wave of terror."
"You took a hell of a risk, then?"
"Hah, no. It's us. I am not alone and that was her deepest mistake. I have folks like you and Natalia. I knew we'd come up with something."
There is silence but for the slow walk of the horses and some laughter of children. Happy to be leaving their cursed childhood behind and maybe finding a chance at a real one. Lots of the kids are now orphans or abandoned and grief will catch up, but for now Uunne and Kalbarn-Karn have reached a bit into everyone's soul and lifted spirits.
A little bit later, Arden has called Natalia and Izzia back to join them. The two younger members of the squad had been carrying some of the younger kids and enjoying themselves.
"I need the three of you to know that this incident has made it painfully clear. It's not just The Bloody Hand. A lot of dark forces are gathering. A lot of ancient dead are resurfacing. Another War is coming. One that has learned from its past mistakes. It will start here in the Shallows and wash over New Khelia at speed. While the Order sits back and thanks it is safer by doing nothing."
Natalia asks, "What are we going to do?"
"What we always do. We are going to fight. Only, this time, it won't be from cloistered halls. This time, I am going to be bringing friends and joining the fray. Are you in?"
The other three barely hesitate, even Izzia, before nodding and telling Arden they will follow him.
"I am glad to hear it. Let's go gather up an army."
DOUG'S COMMENTARY
January 18, 2025
Played on January 16-18, 2025.
These scenes, around the 50%-60% mark of "journaling" are just about right. Maybe a little too abrupt. Next time I'll keep them about this short but work in sligtly less utilitarian dialogue. It is a nice break from the long dialogues in Eustace & Hitomi while still allowing me to develop scenes, characters, and situations.
While I stick by my decision to consider The Bloody Hands on the way out, this "session" (which was actually around 5 short sessions over 3 days as I continued to recover from Covid) reminded me of a very important fact. While The Bloody Hands started as a "Late-Victorian Adventure Romp with side-order of magic," it has essentially drifted into Arden + Jalmar + Natalia being superheroes in a fantasy post-apocalypse. Sure, some of it is just the luck of the dice, but Arden and Jalmar took down an ancient shadow beast by themselves. Jalmar and Natalia were clearly above the power level of others in Oone. It is actually what makes this series fun and different. These are the heroes who would deflect a fire ball with their sword. That's what makes this series such itself, it left behind anything like common sense and just leans into the sort of over-dramatic high-fantasy that campaigns don't tend to reach until higher levels.
The decision to end it is the right one, but how I will end it has changed. And some of that is trying to figure out what "The Stone Crack'd" even was. It started as a quick adventure romp to maybe figure out some magical lore. It has grown into a series of sub-adventures about various ancient entities that were lost in The Five Generations. We just had a full on horror scenario with a powerful evil wizard versus inbred hillbilly cannibal mages. We haven't even gotten to the magical portal and the other realm, yet. What could any of this mean? It occurred to me that I had been building up to The Bloody Hand growing in power and capability since the beginning. Each success of Arden and Co to stop it does not detract from the fact that outside of the Veil, the Hand have been maneuvering for years while members of the Order are working directly with the Hand or merely trying to downplay the threat.
With "The Late Returners," the Hand clearly have built up an army of sorts and have been calling forth new shadow beasts. So now the title is not just about the missing Marel stone, but about the temporary peace of New Khelia cracking. The Hand is gathering an army to prepare for a second War. Now Arden is going to gather up his allies and fight an enemy that takes advantage of the very Veil he has sworn to protect. The young reluctant hero turns into a realm-changing hero is one of the classic tropes and this series has reached that point. Missions about reclaiming sites of power for the forces of good rather than leaving them unguarded. Missions about uniting people of the plains. Maybe even missions about taking down resonance towers so people have magical defenses, again.
It was a lot of fun just running the bad guy vs bad guy fight. I was wondering how to handle it fairly and then realized it didn't really matter as long as the Oone folk and The Wizard were around the same power level. Just go for it. Just make a fun over the top story only this time lean a bit more into the horror of darker magic.
On the other side, Fern's death probably hit me about as hard as any character death in my solo series has. I kind of liked the idea of trying to redeem her but once Natalia crit failed saving everyone I realized that we had already stated that Fern was a fairly powerful natural mage and so it made sense. I did toss it to the oracle, that and saving her unborn child, and would have allowed it to stand. Natalia definitely could have died there. But Fern is another person inspired by Arden to fight back against the encroaching darkness. I feel like we might meet more like her. The name of her son, just in case I never get to it, will be Cal, by the way.
One slight change is the event that lead to the "Five Generations of Despair" will almost entirely be called The War or the War of the Wizards instead The Troubles. I used the latter phrase because of some other property (maybe Fighting Fantasy's extensive background lore) but it has real world connotations that I'd like to avoid as we now shift towards a repeat.
MUSIC SHOUT OUT: While the multiple short sessions as I overcame the sludge meant that music was more varied behind the scenes, wanted to give a particular shout out to Orcus's Berserker for being the inspiration music for the final moments. It's an excellent piece of high energy dungeon synth that fit into the more super-heroic actions and is highly recommended. It will likely remain, along with a couple of other additions, for the next session or two.
Mechanical & Story Notes
- Brainy Challenge. Let's see how hard. [13] = 7 → Standard Brainy Challenge. Arden gets 1 success and remembers the feeling he got from the 'pond.' Plus 2 to Oone track.
- Does Izzia join? (Even) → [15] = Yes.
- Crafty to detect the shadow beast nature of the bug beast. Standard. She gets 1 success. Attacking the carrion golem is (3+1)D6 = Brawny + Crafty. Standard. No effort. She gets the most ridiculous result of three damned 6s. This is probably the greatest result in the entire campaign, all to explode a golem that was dead by the end of the scene. Well, now it is!
- Does the mantis-beetle attack her? (Bad) → [c46] No.
- Jalmar gets two successes. Arden gets one. Izzia gets none and takes one Resolve from the fall. He's down to 2.
- Standard Agile. He makes it with one success.
- Nah, Natalia definitely wouldn't help either side. Card #24 had the key words 'Relase Unlikely Wreckage' and just made think of the earthen hands. Standard Brawny. She spent one Karma against her Concept as a Sapper, she is good at knowing how to breaking things. RAW states against Perk but I like playing it against both since it matches more how I think. Gets one success. Down to 2 Karma.
- Standard Agile to hit a distracted foe. Two successes. This drops her.
- Easy Agile against common folk: 3 successes. Using the established difficulty from earlier, Natalia gets 1 success.
- Pulled a card for sound. [c106] A booming, unnaturally loud voice.
- Standard Crafty to work out the logical location. Natalia gets 0 successes.
- No successes.
- No Successes + Crit Fail.
- Will Fern be able to stop the collapse even at the cost of her own life? (Even) → [c22] Yes.
- Arden gets 3 danged ole success just right out the gate. Two 5s and One 6.
CREDITS
The absolute core of The Bloody Hands REBIRTH: The Stone Crack'd remains Richard Woolcock's Tricube Tales one-sheet: Guardians of the Shadow Frontier. The in-game terms "Khelia," "Guardians," and "Arcane Order" are all derived from the initial one-sheet. Most have changed greatly since their introduction and several related phrases are creations by myself.
The Bloody Hands, as a whole, is a series of exploration with one of the things explored being various solo framework. It started using Tricubes Solo (also by Richard Woolcock), switched to Mythic (by Tana Pigeon), and at this stage is using Gamemaster Apprentice Decks (by Nathan Rockwood). Elements from both previous solo frameworks remain in the series.
Other sources used include:
- Zach Best's Universal NPC Emulator.
- Cesar Capacle's Random Realities
- Kevin Crawford's {Worlds | Ashes} Without Number as well as Scarlet Heroes
- Matt (& Erin) Davis's Great Book of Random Tables, Book of Random Tables: Dungeon, and Great Book of Random Tables: Quests [with potentially some others, but especially those three]
- Madeline Hale's Table Fables 1 and Table Fables 2
- Ben Milton's Knave
- Raging Swan Press: Various tools from the GM Miscellany series.
ART CREDIT AND EXPLANATION
Some images © Dean Spencer. Used with permission. All rights reserved.
It was fun turning Natalia from a sapper who specializes in finding weaknesses in structure to a full on boomer mage. I've missed playing with those.
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