Wards of CoinsOn one particular expedition with a merchant, we ran into things of a darker dissent, and shadows of a kingdom no longer with us. With this expedition came many a slaying of different beasts, of violent creatures, and even those of an undead nature (I use the word ironically).At one point in the evening: Harlest, myself, and other adventurers came upon wards that required 'coins' and ritual to open them up. For you see every monster culled (and every task performed) would generate 'essence' in the shape of coins. The merchant (whose name is lost to me now) could take these 'coins' and generate small artifacts for a one-time use, or somehow push past a soul's protection to imbue a person with a mish-mash of the essences, sometimes granting power (and sometimes over-loading energies and killing them, as I believe happened to Gryf once). At any rate, the wards had a list: No living shall pass: Protection + Hatred + Body THE PLANT Harlest discovered that a random plant, when broken down and sprinkled on the ward, destroyed it, after giving over those 'coins'. No unliving shall pass: Protection + Undeath + Body NO UNDEAD This was actually easy to do because at the time there were not as many with Embrace Death, so they just waited outside until the rest of the wards were broken. There were many, many UnDead 'coins' to go around that day. Lightning Ward: Protection + Air + (Body + Detriment) EARTH We needed to be well grounded to pass this ward, and thankfully most people could find a good enough spot to survive a lesser lightning strike. There was quite the awful smells of singed hair and fur, however. None without Free Will shall pass: Protection + (Mind + Obfuscation) + (Soul + Obfuscation) CHAIN We didn't have any chain, nor did we find any on our travels. We also discovered that those who had gained 'Obfuscation' as 'coins' had already spent them. So, we improvised with a lot of rope and I believe an intervention was used. No weapons shall pass: Protection + Battle + Reality WAR This was less hard to accomplish than the fourth, for we had a Reality Mage with us to make up for the fact we had no 'coin' for Reality (that anyone was willing to cough up, anyway). Soon after this, a fight did indeed break out, which involved keeping a fire going, and fighting off both wights and ghosts and other creepy monsters by night. In the end, we never truly figured out what the mystery was there, and instead found we were too late as a demon had somehow been summoned two hills over, and the merchant was leading us there to stop it all along. At least, that is how I recall it. I still have over forty 'coins', in the hopes that merchant reveals himself again and thus we could build a 'wight-healing' artifact to be left in Ivory when we get all kinds of screwed up from them. - Iawen Penn |
Created by Janna Oakfellow-Pushee at 05-17-11 08:11 AM
Last Modified by Janna Oakfellow-Pushee at 05-17-11 08:11 AM