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Well done and good screenshots!

The mice shall rise again.

Well done. And not only for posting a screenshot thread with excellent screenshots.

He was an interesting, layered character.

[Sorazin BeyAl-Komayyad]

Legate Ahmet Yildirim,

I write to correct certain misapprehensions in your letter and state the position of the Fourth Legion to the Legates of Ephia's Well. You may provide this letter to your counterpart if you see fit to do so.

The Fourth Legion does not, will not, and will never support a trial of any man or woman of the Janissaries in Ephia's Well with the Rose sitting in judgment or as prosecution. And I will not surrender my authority over the service and punishment of my own men.

You invited a conflict between the law: My own, derived from the Sultan, and your own, derived from the Sultan. It cannot be that in a time of war the fate of a Janissary, for actions performed internal to the Fourth Legion, shall be decided on the whims of an Ephian court. I will not allow this. I trust that you understand my reasons. Had you convened your show trial, I would have been forced to announce my own contemporaneous judgment under my authority. And our Well would have been mired in conflict over which law should stand supreme, likely requiring the intervention of Baz'eel to sort out another failing of this factitious satrapy.

Your plan was a failure from the moment of its creation. And I add, that we of the Fourth Legion heard nothing of it prior to your hasty, closed-door meetings with the Rose. You should reflect on why it is that you promised much to the Capitana, and swiftly bowed to Cinquefoil pressure without consulting us. Just as you should reflect upon the absurd decision of your Magistrate and your choice in vesting an untried, untested man with such power to oversee so great a trial as the brooking of Emilia Laurentis.

And yet.

It is indisputable that Sergeant Grimes gave an order that usurped my lawful authority of life and death over one of my own women, however new her conscription. What has passed is a matter of military discipline. Whatever the Banda Rossa may believe, I had resolved to the potential of this course of my own accord before any meeting was had with them.

Sergeant Carrot Grimes will march as is his duty in the vanguard of the column that undertakes the Scald. The Wroth watches him, as it does all of us.

I ask that you direct all further correspondence in this matter to Lieutenant Rennik Colmes. If you convince him of the merits of your "plan", and it has changed so as not to involve a trial, and the peace of Ephia's Well shall not be threatened, and the war effort shall not be imperiled, I will hear him. All pious men and women respect the mercy of B'aara. But I weigh the actions of Sergeant Grimes against these considerations, and observe that his failure in his duty has more than justified my course.

Sorazin Bey
Al-Komayyad

Dictated.

Look, sometimes floating dartboards are necessary tools of leadership.

It'll be fixed.

These should be fixed next reset.

Consistently engaged with the lore and sought out server mysteries while never spoiling them. It's a hard line to walk and you did it well!

Great work!

A magnificent storyteller. If you want examples of intricate, well-crafted mysteries and secret lore, look no further.

Great work!

[exactly one]

Season's Greetings from the EFU DM Team,

The holiday season is already in full swing and we know this can be a stressful time of year. We would like to say thank you for being a part of our little community in the best way that we know how. Loot!

Here is a link to a submission form for EFU Holiday Loot: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfiUaf33KDESW-o0Iu7rF61UyrUGiTqQY6Fy-t9OZjl0vtsYg/viewform?usp=sf_link. Just fill out the form, select exactly one of your PCs to receive loot, and provide us with a little bit of information about the PC to help tailor what we make for you.

Please contact me on discord if you have any questions. If you're not in the discord, you should be, as we might reach out to you with questions.

Good work!

[Maps of the battlefield]

Maps of the battlefield are on display in the Krak des Roses courtesy of the Balladeers. One Narwen Alendiel, a veteran of the conflict, is said to have prepared them.

First, the course that the army took into the ashen wastes:




Second, the battlefield itself and the disposition of the forces of both sides:

[War]

Illul 30–31, IY 7787

The road from Kardesler led inevitably to one destination: War. And what a terrible thing it was.

Over the past month, the Well spent its time in a fitful struggle to prepare itself for the conflict. The very conventions of Asterabidian governance were put to the test as the Legates sought to push the unruly members of the accord to cooperate. And of the Legates, indeed, much can be said.

Legate Qari Alriyh, who was not in office at the time of the great meeting at Kardesler, played little to no role in the preparations. For his silence he is now equally derided as a wallflower and a coward, who did little to muster the Well to the great task. Though in truth, with the benefit of hindsight, there are those who think he emerged the wiser.

Legate Marcellus Saenus, the aged Izdur who had rallied the disparate peoples of the sands and the Well, took to the task of preparing the Well with the energy of a much younger man. He held councils, pushed the Accord to prepare, and did his utmost with limited resources to make an unwarlike people ready to face the sibilant. In the end, he took the field directly, and commanded the battle. For all his work, for good or ill, this was to be remembered as Marcellus' war.
 
 ~----~

The great host departed the Well on Illul 30th, IY 7787. The Janissaries in their legion, the Astronomers with great arcane preparations made, and the Cinquefoil Rose amid clattering swords and storied songs.

Through ash and ruin they trudged toward the battlefield-to-be. A sundered ringwall passed. On a blasted hill the Well's army met a caravan wounded and reduced by repeated sibiliant attack. On their last legs, thousands reduced to hundreds, the Tonsure parlayed. A great man of inhuman stature, half again as tall as an ordinary man, he listened in silence as bandied words were joined between the Legate, the people of the Well, and the ruins of his court. When he could bear it no longer, he spoke again: "ENOUGH." And the Tonsure made a promise. If his people were saved, if the Well would fight, then he would give them that storied thing he carried: "DAKHWAR."

The very word, resounding in the ruins, brought all to silence.

And march they did. Diplomacy, a brief attempt to come to terms with Constantine Diakos, was a non-starter. The sibilant demanded surrender and enslavement; the Well rebuffed them. And both sides marshaled to battle.

Upon the western flank, in a series of trenches, the Fourth Legion took up arms. Jannisaries freshly minted, led by Sergeants, made ready their positions upon an ancient battlefield.

Upon the center, atop a great hill, a scant few Astronomers and great many of the people of the Well prepared to defend a great ritual. Much had been whispered about their preparations and they had brought a device of strange power with them, fueled by baubilium.

Upon the eastern flank, within a long-dead forest, the Cinquefoil Rose hung their banners and chanted a mighty war-song. Six of the Banda Rossa, Four of the Balladeers, and one of the Sibylline are said to have made their stand there.

Even farther east, Battlemages from Kha'esh would hold against dragons and wyverns in the mountains. Their terrible Vizier resplendent in his power.

The Thousand Clans, who had died in droves to offer of alliance to the Well, rejected a painted banner of a groknak skull as inadequate to the real article. A single rider paraded their own, mocking banner, and left the Well-folk to fight their war alone.

Qadira's promised fleet of ships was nowhere to be seen. There was no water for them to sail upon, in any case, and more than a few imagined the Maharaja laughing from his piratical court.

 ~----~

The odds were great. Sibilant banners upon the hills in three great formations. Flying columns of land-bound lizardriders and flying wyvrens with sibilant knights readied to put every one of them to the sword. Marcellus, in command from the rear, watched on as the battle lines took form. The Torchbearers his runners and scouts upon the field, his eyes, and what they would come to see!

The Janissaries fought as only a legion can. Keeping to the trenches, slogging in the ash turned to quagmire by the blood of dying man and lizard both, they held as long as they could. The lizards came in numbers, commanded by a shadowed monstrosity: General Sllyssyr the Gaoler. And at last the Janissaries were forced back from their western trenches, rallying to the great hill upon the center.

The Rose kept the ragged edge of their position on the dead forest firm. Raging against their foe, which came upon the ruins of a barricade en masse, and with shadowed strikes from the flanks, Banda Rossa steel stood with Balladeer heroism and Sibylline vision to keep that front from collapsing. Only when the Sibilant focused forces that were originally on the west, General Sllyssyr joining the sorcerer-General Shr the Glorious in massed assault against the battlements, did a Cinquefoil champion fall and their lines at last break. The Rose, too, retreated and rallied to the great hill upon the center.

Of the center little can be said but the tumult was terrible. A great open field, a killing ground, where the lizards used their advantage of numbers to terrible effect. Fifteen or more had died by the time the Janissaries rallied and joined that fray, and another ten were gone by the time the Cinquefoil did the same. All the Well assembled for one great, last stand against their bloodied foe.

In this moment, the Astronomers called down that red star. A thing of blood and horror descended upon the world, scattering tonnes of ruin from the Well to the desert and to the battlefield. The scene glowed red and the lizards died in droves as the Sibilant drums beat the call to charge.

General Sha-Trol, of the Profane Union, a three headed monstrosity ten times the height of a mortal man, took the field alongside Shr and Sllssyr. The survivors of the Well routed, rallied, routed again, rallied again, and died upon a field in a dozen little wars that can hardly be imagined for their ferocity. All was chaos. Heroes died. Kha'esh descended and rained fire upon the lizard and the battlefield. And for all the blood, all the carnage, the tide turned. The sibilant generals, slain.

The battle was won on a knife's edge. There was no remaining fight to be had. Crying "FOR THE SHAME", great men in the image of the Tonsure's own stature walked forward through the routing lines of the sibilant. Their aims were inscrutable. They spoke little of their purpose. It is said they came for a dozen things, but their eyes were fixed, implacably upon the court of the Tonsure.

Yet, whatever they wished, these mysterious men would not have it. The Tonsure was gone from his holdfast. Only his court and his refugees remained. They would go to the Well. To the outskirts. Before the Gate of Roses in their throngs. The Well would keep its promise.

The army marched home, heroes, but with a victory purchased at a terrible price.

 ~----~

A great red wound has been dealt to the world. Celestial rock descended upon the shade and shattered it. Though it is now restored, ash poured through in gouts and has buried much of the Well. The Astronomers are half-reviled, half-feared for what they have done. The architect of this horror, Mae Stern, is derided as "Meteor Mae" by some, called a mass-murderer by others, and a shortsighted fool by most.

The Cinquefoil Rose and Janissaries alike lick their wounds; the Banda Rossa's entire contingent, slain, while the Balladeers' Lyrist Lynneth Lywarch died a hero in her last stand upon the central hill. They have both been cut to the quick.

The Third Legion was forced to rally to the Well itself and fight off an attack. Already, there is discord between the cavalry of the "Fighting Third" and the Fourth.

The Well now looks to rebuild. To dig out from this tragedy.

But what to make of that red star?

And what to make of dread Qa'im?

And where is the Tonsure and his storied Cup?

The Wheel turns on.

[Baz'eel]

Illul 1st, IY 7787

Report arrives from beyond the Valley of Wisdom where the great powers of the desert gathered at an ancient site. Reposed in the Canyon of Kardesler, a structure of ancient days. Where the Caliphs once held court over their satrapies and dominions. Where voices argued, proclaimed, denounced, debated, commanded, and resolved.

Silent for a long age. Cracked and ancient. A crumbled throne with seats about the dais.

For Baz'eel came Princess Hasheema at the command of the Sultan, his youngest daughter, driven and fair, of renowned compassion and charity.

For Qadira-on-the-Sea came the Maharaja Ravindra Namahedu, resplendent in his plundered glory and flanked by his Raja Guard, bearing tigers' coats.

For Kha'esh came its great and terrible Vizier, Azarmidokht the Golden, archmagister of immense repute and power. Shaming, by his arrival among them, the Exiles of Q'tolip.

For Ephia's Well came the Legate Marcellus Saenus, recently appointed to the seat won by the League of Purple after the terrible assassination of Legate Zaniah Amirah, and the interim-Legate Rashid al-Rashid.

All was set for the Congress. Yet one other power was to arrive: Iron Men and Saints ascended the stairs, armor wrought of fine and heavy steel, helms bearing the immaculately crafted face of a man. All the face of the same man. They were silent. They marched in unison. As one.

For Qa'im came this strange and terrible delegation. Bearing a curious granite box.

The Congress began. All the powers sought of Ephia's Well the answer to the question of what came through the desert to meet them. Words were spoken of the Tonsure, of the refugees, of their claim to have recovered the Dakhwar, of Ibthial, of Constantine Diakos, of the Sibilant horde he leads, of the Thousand Clans that are said to march also.

Principled positions of Lieutenant Rennik Colmes of the Fourth Legion, Lyrist Lynneth Lynwarch, and Torchbearer Sephidra Niridhe were stated. It is said in hushed tones that the Fourth Legion would have cursed the refugees to die at the hands of the Sibilant. It is said the Rose would have risked flights of fancy and heroism to charge forth and slay dragons. It is said of the Torchbearers that all the Well should open its gates to an untested throng.

And dread Qa'im. By terrible artifice spoke without speaking four words that silenced, for a brief respite, the gathered Congress: "Give them to Qa'im."

The positions of the speakers for the Well were cast and recast, bickering ensued, and all principle and reason was swiftly overwhelmed by horror, disdain, argument! Sound and fury reigned over what was to be done.

And at this moment of chaos, when the Congress was near to disbanding, that at a whispered plea the Legate Marcellus Seanus rose to speak again. An old man, Izdur, he had given a long-winded tutor's speech to commence the proceedings. But now he spoke with the vim and vigor of a younger man.

With a thunderous voice and a doddering hand he demanded of the Ephians! Would Ephia's Well abandon the refugees, in dire need, to the hands of a sibilant horde? Would Ephia's Well permit the traitor Diakos to threaten her again?

And with tears in the eyes of some, the response to his fiery words was the swift chorus of an answer: NO.

The Well is pledged to ride forth and meet the Sibilant horde. Kha'esh has pledged a squadron of mages. Qadira has pledged... warships? And perhaps, sundry goods to provision these thousands in their new home. At what cost, one wonders?

But that is a question for another day. The bells toll out a call to arms. The Banda Rossa sharpens their swords; their Grandmaster shall surely order them out. The Balladeers compose their storied songs. The Sisters their hymns and poetry. The Fourth Legion seeks about the armory and prepares as only a Legion can to muster. The Astronomers, disdained as followers of the Exile at the Congress, retreat to their tower... but shouts of support were heard among their number also.

An incredible thing wrought by an unlikely man. For now, in one brief moment, the Well is united.