Dark Jack

The Prophecy

"You are reckless," Gerald felt the need to reiterate when Jillian suggested that she did not appear as much so in comparison to this stunt of Crone's. "But I think I've seen enough to tell that you aren't stupid. Don't make me change my mind now; being stupid around this one will cost you much more than just your life."
He had barely even moved a muscle during the conjuration of whatever sort of aspect of the Grand Master this was supposed to be, simply allowing his companion to maneuver behind him and for her to take his arm, and he remained physically inert as the witch released him and came forward anew. Even when he spoke to her he only moved as much as was strictly required of him to do so; he did not even turn his head to look at her as he did so, or shift his gaze in her direction, but simply kept staring stiffly at the apparition on the water. His mouth was dry, and he was afraid that if he ceased to lock his joints into place and freeze his muscles, he would tremble.
Over the course of his life Gerald had had access to a wide variety of literature and research material, and had learned a great deal about many things; science, history, culture and, more than anything, magic. It did not take someone as learned as him to know that the use of Crone's artifact - this so-called "sigil stone" - was not ordinary summoning magic, or in fact summoning magic as technically defined by the authorities at all. Summoning magic required a great deal of sacrifice from the caster, with the price of performing a summoning increasing massively as the entity one desired to conjure came to possess more power. The Grand Master, who was likely the second most powerful being in existence except the Spirits of Union themselves, would take a sacrifice so huge that it would be practically impossible to completely summon him, and even a partial summoning would be enough to kill even someone with magical reserves as vast as those of Crone. It was because of this, the necromancer had read, that the Grand Master had devised several alternative ways to commune with him, all of which dated back to the glory days of the Infernal Empire, before his imprisonment. One particular method of communication, he had read, were some rare enchanted mirrors that allowed the demon to project the reflection of his own nexus-mirror to them, and show the reflection of the recipient mirror on his end, as well as allow sound to pass through the image. Supposedly the Grand Master could even move objects through the mirrors, send lesser servants through them and even manifest small parts of himself through their surface.
The mirrors were ultimately only conduits, however, and while they were doubtlessly useful to the Crimson Dawn, Gerald could not imagine them holding any real power. The Grand Master was still stuck on one side, and his agent on the other. This sigil stone, however... once activated, it had become a conduit of the Grand Master's actual power. It was not just an image being projected here; that artifact was actually channeling part of the deity's sealed-away power here and was using it to manifest this spectral image. He could feel the power even now, emanating from the stone rather than the image produced by it, but frighteningly immense in its scope.
Addressing a demon lord was rarely a good idea at all, but unsealing part of their power was downright foolish. What was Crone thinking?

"He knows who we are already," the warlock pointed out dryly, finally undoing the petrifaction that had gripped him to follow Jillian as she approached the fiend. "And considering that he apparently knows Crone -" Better than we do, he added mentally, having noted the use of a different name when the demon addressed her, "- he probably also know why he is here, too."
"I do, mostly," the Grand Master confirmed with a shrug, his fiery eyes in the darkness of his hood shifting from Jillian to Gerald, then back again. "I know that you, Jillian, knew wealth before you became a fugitive, and that you were the apprentice of Vincent the witch, who taught you the black magic that cost you your old life, and with which you killed him." His gaze moved back to Gerald. "And I know that you, Gerald, are inflicted with the Withering, but are withstanding it through the application of necromancy, which you learned by feigning intention of joining the Black Tribunal and then betraying them once you'd learned their craft. And I know," he added, his voice assuming a hint of amusement, "the irony of that, considering that if you had become the way you are now much earlier, you could have saved the wife and unborn child that the plague stole from you." He chuckled. "In fact I know a lot more about you two than you do yourselves. Quite interesting things, I might add. About your father, Gerald... and your past, Jillian."
Gerald gritted his teeth and clenched his fists around the firmness of his staff, staring daggers at the demon. The Grand Master had had nothing to gain by revealing these things; he must have done it simply to spite them.
"I also know that since Eliza used my sigil stone to call me here, what you require from me must be very important and difficult to obtain," he continued after several seconds of simply observing the two magi. "And since the sigil stone binds me for as long as it is active, I have no choice but to indulge in conversation with you, lest I have to stay here all day. So what do you want? A cure for the Withering? Because people have asked me for such many times already, and I do not have it."
"We know what the Withering is," Gerald hissed, and he would have sworn that the Ancient One's eyes widened in surprise at this. "We need to know where the demon causing it is so we can stop it."
"Oh my." The visage on the water slowly raised its arms in front of it, then started clapping its slender glove-clad hands. "And you have determined the identity of the culprit behind the Withering too, then?"
"No, merely eliminated you and your servants as a possible source. We suspect Himyth."
The Grand Master chuckled gleefully. "I do know who is causing the Withering and where this entity is," he confirmed, which actually surprised Gerald a little. "So tell me: what will you give in return for this information?"

The Prophecy

No, the "story so far" hasn't been updated that recently, so don't worry about that. And even though Shien hasn't reacted to my question as to whether to make the Compendium public... I'm going to make a judgment-call and figure she would agree, and give you the link to the Compendium.

I'll also add it to the OP. It's still very unpolished and especially missing a number of images, but it should serve its purpose. I hope it helps.

The Prophecy

I got in! A Christmas miracle? Nah, that would be that the RPGuild would allow me to reach it at a time when I actually have time to write an IC post.

Still, I'm glad that I at least got the chance to wish you all a merry Christmas.

The Prophecy

A war? I think that I need to confer with the summary in the OP.
...
Okay, I've confirmed that the summary has absolutely no mention of a war - not even the Rodorian civil war, which I would have assumed was where the idea came from - so I can talk pretty easily without contradicting it. There is no outright war going on, though, except the civil war, but aside from Pelgaid recently hiring some mercenaries to for additional guards during the wedding, none of the dukes have the desire or funds to take on hired blades like that (particularly not freelancers who are not even part of a larger band) (I realize this was not what suggested, I merely eliminated the chance preemptively). As for clashes, actual skirmishes between the ducal armies are pretty rare, with the most recent one being the Seclyrian attack on Nemhim City (which was both well out of the way of where any of the characters are at the moment, and happened before your character left in the first place.
The only other major conflict going on would be the Crusader's Guild destroying the Anaxim Forest, which resulted in the near-annihilation of both the attackers and the defenders, where surviving defenders would likely have been burned along with the forest and surviving crusaders would have gone with their leader to escort him back to their base.

As for a better idea of the world; Shien, shall we make the link to the Compendium public? (Even though I still have no idea how to edit anything on there and thus haven't had the chance to do so.)

The Prophecy

Ah, I was finally able to get on the RPGuild again. First the stress of finishing a semester, topped with a nice bit of stomach-infection so violent that I actually burst some blood-vessels in my eyes (can still see, it's just really itchy and quite frankly scary-looking) and then the RPGuild decides to be unavailable when I'm finally back at the minimal capacity required to function... This has not been a very fun week and a half for me.

I'll get to posting IC in response to Ashgan's post when I can; in the meanwhile I can say that I do remember you, Serge, and although the name of your character escapes me at the moment, I remember it as well. I even remember the discussion we had about the credibility and practicality of him having a pair of axes made from Sartal before you settled on iron.
But yeah, you're welcome to reapply your character and try to rejoin the story... whichever branch of it that ends up being.

The Prophecy

Ah, I see; I have just noticed the recurring appearance of the misspelling in your posts and had reached the assumption that you actually thought it was spelled like that. Good to know that it was just a recurring typo.
And the contrast looks good, I think; much better than before, when the hiders were blindingly white. I have no complaints.

The Prophecy

Oh, my post did get through last night? I got the page about RPGuild being down when I hit post then and was sure it couldn't have been posted, so i sat there waiting for over three hours waiting for the forum to come back up only to have to go to bed and have to postpone it to today... But oh well, if it got through, that's great. Although I must say that I am not pleased with how RPGuild has been functioning this weekend.

And yes, Veridis Quo, as Shien correctly stated there is indeed room, and though the OP hasn't been updated for a while it is indeed still accurate in that regard. You're welcome to submit a character any time you want.

Hmm yes, the Compendium... I suppose I could give a quick reply in regards to that and go over the questions you asked me since I'm already writing. The search function seems to work just about as well as I would like it to by now, and I don't think it particularly needs any more filtering as long as it can prioritize the entries it finds properly, which it appears to do. The groupings you've come up with work well enough for the moment - at least I have no better ideas - and you do have permission to correct obvious typos you find (although I would like to point out, since it made its way into the Compendium already, that it is spelled "dying", not "dieing"... so don't change that). I should be able to get used to writing HTML, too, especially if you end up really putting a reference to view while writing it, so no worries about that.
Letting me set up an account and allowing me to edit the Compendium (or at least the entries therein) would be great; I've been itching to tinker with it a little myself, though for most part I suspect i will still have to rely on you. I've gotten a lot better at coding these past several weeks, but I'm still far from proficient at it ("runaway arguments" are a bitch to find).
Putting the guardhouse-collab in the Compendium-archive is a good idea... or at least it beats suddenly inserting over a hundred posts into the IC. Likewise it may indeed be a good idea to store all posts in that archive, though I think we should probably find some kind of system to organize the entries stored there for easy browsing. They could just be divided into different hiders, unless you have a more elegant suggestion. Also, though it is probably going to be a pain in the ass, I suppose we will probably have to sift through all the old posts before we put them in the archive, replacing certain names with (Unmentionable paladin) and (Unmentionable demon), since I am not entirely sure it would be justifiable to reuse them as they are.
Looking for suggestions from others is an obviously beneficial thing, yeah... though I think we should finish whatever preparations the two of us can before we distribute the link. Once it's ready for basic use, everyone will be free to make their own suggestions, after all.

The Prophecy

Yeah, I know not all wolves actually live and hunt in packs, but that example seemed the most applicable in the context the term was used in the IC, namely for it to be unusual for lone wolves to form a group, which is actually what lone wolves normally want. And even in cases where wolves don't form packs, they still usually don't stay alone by preference. It happens, of course; there are lone wolves that fit the definition of the term when used about people, but they are rare, and for most part the term is used about wolves that are simply in temporarily solitude rather than intentionally and perpetually alone.

Rodlins bear the impression of an eagle with folded wings on one side, sized so that it fits on the coin from the chest up, its head turned outward toward the world outside the coin (there as an homeage to the least known of Roland the Ambitious' companions, namely his tame steppe eagle) and the image of a surprisingly simple and relatively humble coronet with three jewels - one in diamond-shape (an elongated rhombus, that is, not the actual gemstone), one round and one oval - distributed in the only three... uh... okay, I have no clue what the spikey extremities on top of a coronet are called, but those (to symbolize Roland's humble origins and the three peoples that came together to name him king: the penin and deigan of Wegam Fermos, and Golerin).

And I know it's my turn, and I'm sorry; I'll get to it as soon as I can.

The Prophecy

Finally! Ugh, I've been meaning to get a post together since Friday, but every time I tried loading RPGuild it seemed like the forum was down for some reason. But now it's done; yay!
By the way... Ashgan? Eh... post?

Interesting tidbit of information, perhaps: literal lone wolves found in nature are usually ones that have left their pack either because they have been driven out by the pack leader, often due to them having challenged the alpha for leadership and failed, leave because there is not enough food for them in the territory occupied by the pack, or because they simply desire to find a new pack or start their own. In almost all cases, the objective of lone wolves is to acquire a pack rather than to stay on their own out of a preference of being so, although there are wolves that do end up spending most of their lives as lone wolves. Lone wolves have a much harder time hunting than ones with a pack and usually can't bring down larger prey at all, but they have the advantage that everything they kill, they keep. Survival alone like that is tough, so lone wolves usually end up stronger, more aggressive and dangerous than others; naturally acquired traits that increase their chances if they challenge the alpha of a pack, and thus likewise make them likely candidates for leadership.

The Prophecy

No words were being uttered as the four members of the Zerulic Ducal Guard hurried down the street, pumping their legs as they ran at a pace chosen as a compromise between speed and endurance, to ensure that they reached their destination relatively quickly without being too winded to handle whatever situation they were urgently need at adequately. They moved much more easily in their padded leather armor than they would have in heavier equipment, and although their brown cloaks did little to keep them warm when they were blown back by the wind as they ran, it did lend them a somewhat theatrical flair that seemed to impress the civilians on their way boundlessly. Startled citizens cleared the way for them as they went, looking more and more unsettled the closer to their destination they got, and it was never an issue to squeeze through crowded streets, even with their halberds in hand. Any normal day without mysterious flashes of light and the like they would only have cleared a much narrower passage, and just ten years ago they would probably have been lucky to get through at all.
Much had changed in all of the chapters of the Ducal Guard in the years since the outbreak of the Withering, and since the death of Paul IV, the Last King of Rodoria. Before then the guards almost never saw actual combat and their duties were much safer than they were today, since whenever they expected a situation to turn violent or otherwise dangerous they would simply call the soldiers from the army to at least support them during the encounter. Back then all guardsmen were expected to do was to investigate crimes that had already been committed, catch the occasional thief and maybe break up a drunken brawl from time to time, and otherwise just act as keen observers to keep the peace. Until the Ducal Army's resources had been redirected to handle the civil war, guardsmen had never needed to hunt bandits or fight off monsters.
There was no denying that the guards were afraid; their jurisdiction was one of the most dangerous in Rodoria nowadays, after all. Some would argue that Nemhim was worse due to crime being as frequent there as it was and due to how few members of the guard there actually cared enough to do something about it, and the argument could also be made that Gilmah or Seclyr were places where assassinations and assaults, respectively, were much more common, but Zerulic guardsmen would pick any of those places over Zerul. They would much rather have to deal with extortionists, smugglers, assassins and muggers every day than face the occasional magical threat here, in the Rodorian center of magical study and research. How were they, ultimately ordinary men and women, expected to face people that could control the elements, raise the dead and conjure demons to do their bidding? They were not trained for that, and for most of the veterans it was not what they signed up for, either. Many had resigned, unable or unwilling to cope with how the world was changing; most had stayed, either because they were dependent on their salaries or because they felt a true sense of duty that would not allow them to turn away from danger only to let others face it in their stead. A lot had been killed. Far too many...
So it was to be expected for guardsmen heading to the scene of an evidently magical occurrence to be absolutely terrified. At least the Blue Duke was sympathetic to their plight, and despite the economy being as fragile as it was he still ensured that the families left behind by guardsmen who lost their lives received some kind of monetary compensation, as well as he had made sure to raise the pay to the remaining guards, albeit not much, but enough to let them know that he was aware of them and that they were suffering from the civil war too, even if they did not have to fight it. Marcus Zerul was a good man; had he been less eccentric about his study of magic and more involved in the day-to-day governing of his duchy, he could have been a great man. Instead they had to make do with the practical rulers being the nobles and merchants of the city, lead by that slick bunch of lard, Remdal. Such a selfish and ambitious prick; the Ducal Guard, especially, hated Dennis Remdal, and although none dared to say it out loud for fear that their words would reach his ears, many wished that he had managed to blow himself up properly back then, or at least that his stepson, Gerald, had had the guts to murder the bastard before being exiled. They all agreed that his son, Thomas, would do a much better job as the duke's right hand man than his father.

Several months ago, at the twelve-year anniversary of the start of the civil war, the guard captain had held an assembly of the entire Zerulic Ducal Guard, as he did every year, although there were much fewer people to gather now than there had been twelve years ago. In his speech this year he had mentioned that more guardsmen of Zerul had been killed in the line of duty during these last twelve years than over the entire last century, but he had also said that fewer guardsmen had died over the last three years than over the first year of the civil war. It was all pretty confusing to them, since none of them aside from maybe a few of the lieutenants had gone to school and been taught any of that fancy math, but the captain had assured them that this meant that although theirs was a dangerous job now, they were getting tougher, stronger and better; that they were adapting well and rising to the challenge, and that their hardships had made them the strongest of the Rodorian guard companies. Said that while they should remember and mourn our lost comrades, those of them that were left had achieved a survivability that rivaled that of the army, if not even the deo'iel.
While Marcus fell just short, the captain was truly a great man. It was him that had convinced the general and the nobles to allow the recruitment of mages into the Ducal Guard, and even now he was trying to shove his way through the tangle of politics to get the duchies to do something about that scourge, the Crusader's Guild. The Ducal Guard was tougher now than it had been twelve years ago, but many of the crusaders were mercenaries; professional soldiers, people who fought and killed for a living. They could manage stopping small groups of them from time to time, or at least manage to dissuade them from causing undue trouble too close to the city, but ultimately the Guild was simply much more powerful than the Ducal Guard. The army needed to forget about the civil war for a while and take care of those ruffians! Why Etlon allowed the Guild free passage across their borders was a mystery, although chances were that they just did not want to provoke their enmity and end up having to fight them and lose resources they needed for the civil war.
In short, the civil war ruined everything, and none felt this more clearly than the Ducal Guard.

It was with dread of a magical confrontation in their hearts and the determination born from a dozen years' fighting to keep the people safe that the four guardsmen entered the alley, already in formation and prepared for the worst. Three men stood in the front, halberds lowered and ready, and a woman was positioned behind them, aiming down the length of a loaded crossbow and with a shortsword at her hip.
"What is going on here?" the middle guardsman thundered, his gaze being immediately drawn to the corpse of the blue-clad woman on the ground. "Nobody moves! You -"
He abruptly stopped himself as he noticed I'on, and he actually moved to a less battle-ready stance immediately, raising his halberd to a less threatening position and staring at the penin with surprise.
"I'on the Noble?" he exclaimed, looking around to see if the others gathered here were of a similar status within the duchy. In truth he really had no way to say whether they were or not, since they both wore masks, which was usually never a good sign. "What's going on?" He looked at the woman on the ground. "What happened?"