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A Journey to the East

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Rondstat

Rondstat

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So, I was thinking about how I'd ideally want wyrm lore (specifically, lore on the wyrms from the Eastern Lands) introduced into the game, and I sort of ended up accidentally writing a whole quest outline.

I decided to flesh it out as a story instead of a quest, but I might write up the quest and a Runelabs Post depending on when/if I renew my membership. Because of the way it was written, some parts of this will probably feel more like an outline.

Anyways, read and enjoy. Or don't!


____________________________________

The Scythe. Year 155 of the Fifth Age. Bennath

The boy shivers, in spite of himself. It's not a cold wind that raids the streets of Haranu, juggling dead leaves and swarms of dust that invade his lungs. It's warm and stale, sweeping down from the peaks of the Isle that Reflects the Moon, across the narrow strait of tepid water that divides the islands before coiling about the sun-washed denizens of the cherry forests. By the time it hits the village it's a hoarse exhalation, the spectre of some great beast that watches him, indifferent to his fate.

The boy does not raise his head when he hears the conch blower sound her final, keening note. It's a requiem , he grimly realizes. The threadbare crowd inches in closer, but his captor maintains a buffer between the boy and his public. A few extend their hands, hoping to absorb some of his father's infamy by osmosis. He makes the mistake of glancing at the eyes of the nearest onlooker. Was he expecting rage? Contempt? Sympathy? Certainly not the empty, lightless gaze that seems to fix a point a league beyond him. These are the people he said we were trying to help.

“Step forward!” A tall figure shuffles into view, bindings to match the boy's, sinewy cords of muscle scabbed over up and down his chest and arms. A tightly woven hessian sack obscures everything above the shoulders. The figure makes no sign of acknowledgment as the Khan addresses him again.

19-Mar-2015 09:51:35

Rondstat

Rondstat

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“You have been found guilty of piracy, assault, kidnapping, murder, conspiracy, and high treason. You have proven yourself a present and enduring threat against the people of Haranu and their Khan. Given multiple attempts to repent of your crimes or assist in the capture of your co-conspirators, you have refused cooperation, and expressed no remorse for your actions. As the highest authority in this land, I hereby sentence you to beheading by the axe. Lay him on the block.*

This is not his father kneeling down before the stump of a vast, long-fallen tree. Surely it is a great bunraku doll, like those that had made him laugh so much at the puppet shows his parents took him to when he was very young. Or perhaps a trained orangutan, miming its master's motions before loping off into the forest. Or even a dread pirate, some true criminal deserving of this fate.

*Not like this.” The oppressive winds have ceased. The crowd holds its breath. And the air is pregnant with the three slightly muffled words that have seeped out from beneath the hood. *I look mine enemies in the face. This is what has given me the strength to stand against your tyranny. I will not meet my fate from behind a veil.” The executioner stays his axe.

The Khan stands over the condemned man, fit to make an etching of the scars on his back. “Very well.” The bag comes off, greasy locks pouring from its maw and coming to rest about the face of a man that is now, undeniably, the boy's father. The axe is raised high. His eyes suddenly fix the boy's gaze and, soundlessly, he mouths one word. Remember.

19-Mar-2015 09:53:00

Rondstat

Rondstat

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It is a clean arc, almost beauteous, from the top of the headsman's span to the stump, with only a single obstacle to obstruct him. His movements are fluid, practiced, bearing all the grace of a dancer. And, as the axe makes contact, the hot, humid wind picks up again, scattering withered pink leaves – the legacy of fallen cherry blossoms – and obscuring the tableau. The boy coughs violently, for his skin, lungs, eyes are full of dust – but no tears.

“Now the boy.” His bones scream for struggle. His muscles beg for exertion. His vision wanders through a pantomime of skirmish, escape, cases the weaponry he could seize from his captors, measures the walls over which his young limbs might scramble. Yet when a coarse hand grasps his forearm, he follows meekly, eagerly. He is a lost child, an infant being laid to bed. His robe has been discarded, and he ascends the pallet *****. He almost doesn't realize that he has been spread-eagled atop the bloodied tree stump.

Too late, he tries to move his arms and legs, but they are bound to the edges of the block, the four points of a compass, ornamental and useless. They are going to chop me in half. The executioner selects a much more delicate blade, and assumes his position over the boy. The boy shuts his eyes tight, nails digging bloody tracks in his palms. The sound devours all, seeping into his bones. The wind whipping past the edges of the blade, its iron edge slicing the very air in two.

Contact.

“The line of Cao ends with this child.”

19-Mar-2015 09:54:17

Rondstat

Rondstat

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Liu Haranu struggled to hang onto his lucidity. At this point the fever was endless, and he found himself flailing through consciousness like a man drowning in shallow water. Sweat-drenched, he tumbled to the floor, his body damply slapping against the boards. With his son gone to town, the manor was empty, and he would have to wait, huddled on the floor, maybe for hours, until his return.

The island of Haranu had been ruled by his family for generations. Bureaucrats, merchants, soothsayers, warlords had all stood before its cherry forests, their word the only law necessary to buoy their command. Now, the Haranu grasp on power was weaker than it had ever been. Servants and advisers had been abandoning Liu left and right since his illness had worsened, and his subjects were becoming restless. Where there had once been four heirs in his house, there was now only one, the weak-willed and anemic boy who bore his name. Would Liu be the man who killed the Haranu dynasty?

Osu Haranu, firstborn of the Haranu Khan, had wept bitterly and ceaselessly for forty days before she was pledged to wed the Khan of Hanto. And yet, on the morning of her wedding, her face was dry, her manner was austere, her eyes betrayed neither sadness nor rage. She said not a word to her family, nor her betrothed, and took not a single memento of her life on Haranu when she sailed away to her new home. Khan Liu never saw his daughter again, but did see a large trade vessel from Hanto, which moored in Har***'s harbour every month to deliver a vast shipment of gunpowder.

19-Mar-2015 09:56:23

Rondstat

Rondstat

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The Khan of Hanto was a notoriously cruel and paranoid man – the only way to establish this trade monopoly was to bring him into the family. Osu would eventually understand – these were the things a Khan had to do to ensure the safety of his people. She would probably be far happier on a wealthy industrialized island like Hanto than she'd ever be on Haranu. Besides, the Khan of Hanto was a reasonable man. The stories of him killing his own people, torturing innocents for sport * surely these were no more than rumour.

Akira Haranu, eldest son of the Haranu Khan, had never paid his father the respect due to a Khan. His adolescence had been characterized by challenge – challenge of Har***'s mandatory conscription, challenge of the overbearing taxes that kept the common people in poverty, challenge of the random interrogations by his father's guard force. Ak Haranu ultimately challenged his own birthright, and forfeited his successorship for a merchant's license from the Halls of Reckoning and passage to the west. Liu promised his son nothing but shame for living as a commoner, and made good on the promise by excommunicating his eldest son. Ak Haranu would never return while his father lived.

Jeh Ni Haranu, second daughter of the Haranu Khan, idolized her older brother. When Aki would storm from the estate to smoke long draughts of snakeweed from some den of ill repute, Jeh Ni would maintain his argument from wherever he'd left off, and Khan Liu would have the unenviable task of justifying the harshness of his methods. Explaining that other Khans would gladly see his whole family drowned just to expand their own meagre holdings. Or describing the sea orphans, those strange beggars of fin and tentacle, who might be kidnapped, beaten, or slaughtered without his watchful eye.

19-Mar-2015 09:57:50

Rondstat

Rondstat

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When Aki took to the sea, Jeh Ni soon followed, but unlike her wayward brother, she eventually returned home, a full-fledged privateer in the service of the Council of Khans with a crew at her disposal. Liu had moved to embrace his daughter, but her response was cold. Her allegiances lay elsewhere, and she could never move through Haranu as more than a visitor.

Liu Haranu, youngest child of the Haranu Khan, was the only survivor of his birth. Khan Liu, watching the light fade from his wife's eyes, knew no other woman could ever share his duty or his bed, and resolved himself to this truth even before the midwife admitted the failings of her ministrations. As the aging Khan held his infant son, the bawling face gleaming with a light film of gore, he recognized in the tiny visage his last chance at legacy. This child would bear his name. If no one else, this child would keep the Har**** alive.

Now this child scrambled to put his father upright. The Khan surveyed his heir's straining limbs, his shortened breath, his mawkish assurances. He was weak. Far too weak to do what must be done. Too weak to mete out justice to those who had dishonoured their law. Too weak to repel the seasingers who threatened to unleash great serpents on their isle at the behest of any Khan that might promise them fortune. Too weak to quash the occultists that loosed hordes of demons merely to flex their power. Too weak to protect the sea orphans with no other recourse from slavers, purists, and bigots. But there was no other choice.

Another youth entered the room, Shiro, the younger Liu's personal valet and lifelong friend. The two young men finally righted the Khan, and, in his unsettlingly high pitched voice, Shiro inquired to the Khan's health. An inquiry that could be neither heard nor answered.

19-Mar-2015 09:59:32

Rondstat

Rondstat

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The Arc. Year 1 of the Sixth Age. Ire of Phyrris

“You don't understand, I know the high consort personally. She can vouch for me. All you need to do is get me to the docks at Hanto-”

“No, lady, you don't understand. Unless you got a direct imperative from the Council of Khans, nothing gets on or off this boat.”

“But that'll take days, maybe weeks to get here! Do you see the stripes on my collar? Do you see this mark? I command the largest privateer in the Scythe * I'm well within my rights here and you know it!”

The hatchet faced man shifts heavily onto his left leg. “No imperative, no go.”

“Captain, I could negotiate passage.” The speaker is a veteran farcrier from the Hook, and Jeh Ni's first mate. “You could continue to Haranu and I'll bring O*u to the island just as soon as the imperative comes in.”

Jeh Ni looks to her companions. Her brother, Aki, whom she'd not seen for a decade before storming into the ghost port where he made his home and demanding his help. And the other, a quiet mercenary she'd picked up on her brother's recommendation. Ak Haranu speaks. “If island trouble is so many, little time to tarry with bureaucracy in Goshima.” He speaks in the western tongue for the benefit of their companion.

Jeh Ni hands her seal to her first mate. *Be careful. Osu should come if you show her my seal. Just try to stay away from the Khan, and whatever you do, don't let him know that my father is dead. The last thing we need is another madman with his eyes on Haranu.”

Jeh Ni guides the small junk out of Goshima harbour before continuing her story. “It's bizarre seeing your younger brother twelve feet tall and rendered in gold. All around the island are marble statues, posters of his image, calligraphic scrolls bearing his so-called wisdom. He's issued a new currency with his face, even set up a propaganda force.”

“But gold, marble expensive. Haranu never rich land. How Liu pay?”

19-Mar-2015 10:01:05

Rondstat

Rondstat

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“The imperial fleet. Har***'s navy is the whole reason we – they – have been able to resist the other Khans for so long. Some of those ships date back to great grandfather's time. But now Liu's sold almost all of them to a merchant collective. Here's the thing, though. I've never seen these guys before. They've never done any trade in the Scythe. They're certainly not licensed by the Council.”

“So, what you think?*

*I don't know, but I can't help wonder if Shiro's had some influence on him.”

“Shiro?”

“Yeah, that creepy rat who grew up as Liu's whipping boy. He's a couple years older than him. Now he's chief counsel. Already he's convinced Liu to lift all protections for the sea orphans. I never would have thought there was any purist sentiment in Haranu, but, my god, Aki, it's horrible. They're being beaten in the streets, in broad daylight! And the worst part is, the guards just stand by, doing nothing.*

*Nothing? If they don't protect citizens, what they do?”

“It's – there are a lot more executions than there ever were in father's time. Any speech against the Khan is considered high treason. I don't – I can't believe that's my baby brother. I won't believe it.”

The three sit in silence. The choppy waves lap at the side of the boat, yet there's barely enough wind to fill half the sails. The mercenary stands and surveys the horizon, but not another ship is in sight, and they long left any visible shoreline. For all he knows, they could be the last three people left on Gielinor. Jeh Ni speaks again.

“Here's the deal. I recently got word of an attack being planned on Haranu. Not some two bit pirate raid either, I'm talking a full scale invasion. The information's second-hand, so I can't be certain, but it doesn't look good. Har***'s effectively got no naval coverage, and most of the guards are too busy putting up posters to do any training. The island is easy pickings for anyone with the brass to take it on.”

“Sounds like you need army. Not salesman.”

19-Mar-2015 10:02:29 - Last edited on 19-Mar-2015 10:30:15 by Rondstat

Rondstat

Rondstat

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“Look, Aki, you're family. He looks up to you – to both of us. We can change him. We can save him. And we can save our home.”

Ak breaks his sister's gaze. His expression is pensive. *Not my home for long time.”



___________________________________

Liu, you can't honestly believe - This is lunacy!


On this island you will refer to me as Khan.


But why would I -


We have great fortune, yes, that we are able to thwart her attack before any damage is done. Still, mmm, she stands before you so insolent. Such piracy, ah, piracy is no longer tolerated on great island of Haranu. Maybe an example is made, yes? People see traitor dealt with. People know the justice of Great Khan Liu.


Shiro, enough. For your role in planning an attack on Haranu...


Liu, I didn't! I've come to warn you-


You are hereby banished from the island, and may never again set foot on Haranu under penalty of death.


The Khan is too lenient. Would this annoyance not be better taken care of before it is, ah, a danger?


Liu, how can you-


It's Khan. Be gone by sunset. I am sorry sister.


________________________________

Ak Haranu and the mercenary duck into an inn, escaping the luminous, ashy air that hangs over the village. On the beach, the remnants of Jeh Ni's mercantile warship smoulder to dust. Its captain is long departed. The two sit at the bar, and steel themselves to choke down the putrid mass of fermented cherry that passes for refreshment on Haranu. It is all they have until they can secure passage to the west.

A sudden sound rings out. Something inhuman, reverberating through the beams of the inn, through the bottles on its counters, through the slowly cirrhosing innards of its patrons.

19-Mar-2015 10:05:23 - Last edited on 19-Mar-2015 10:10:31 by Rondstat

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
It is intoxicating yet terrifying, and without thinking, the mercenary finds himself in the back room of the inn, his hands around the throat of an evil-eyed crone whose frock is drenched in the blood of animals. Before he can choke the life from the wretched creature, Ak stops him, and manages to incapacitate the witch. The pair turn to face the source of what they now realize was a call of distress.

Hers is an otherworldly beauty. The mercenary has seen several orphans on this island with gills in their neck, a stray set of fins down their spine, but nothing like this. The creature is covered in iridescent blue scales, her arms and legs end in sleek, webbed flippers. Her head is topped by a spiny crest, and her eyes seem pearlescent. She motions to her saviours – she needs a quill.

“A siren,” Ak assesses simply, as his companion fetches paper. The merchant translates as the siren writes. “She is seasinger, Maki. Very strong. Year ago, my father allow her to stay on island, but she cannot speak, cannot say one word. This is first time she make a sound in all that time. This lady-” he indicated the crone with his foot, “occultist. Want to sacrifice Maki. Maki owe blood debt to us.”

The mercenary looks at him quizzically. “Seasinger sirens very powerful. Learn to sing songs that make people follow, obey them. Can make a man jump off cliff. If very strong, can even control sea monsters. Different species than human or sea orphan. In past, never allowed on Haranu.”

“Occultists, many bad. Long ago, Haranu overrun with occultists, but chased out. They learn magic to cheat death, raise dead, control demon. But, they fuel magic with death. Some soothsayer, they only sacrifice fish, use maybe to tell future. But occultist kill people, sea orphan; especially kill siren, their blood give many magic. Sentence for practice occult on Haranu always been death.”

The crone moans softly. She is beginning to rouse. Ak Haranu stares gravely at his companion. “Fate is up to you."

19-Mar-2015 10:06:35 - Last edited on 19-Mar-2015 10:12:11 by Rondstat

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