Chapter XLVIII
in which the Westerners invade once more
Two Sentinels, An Archon, and A Dragon
Haas spirit walks en route to Kingsport. She follows a trail of bleeding sand in the spirit world and happens upon a beautiful figure of gold sapping Chracio's raw power and handing it out to various people, while Chracio looks on without doing anything. She's offered some of the power, but declines. In the waking world, she shares what she saw. The Silver Foxes decide that this is the more immediately pressing matter. They disembark on Doug and land in a nearby village. Then they teleport to Chracio. Upon arriving, they see a scene that almost literally matches Haas' spiritual vision. A Gold Man hovers above the pit, siphoning Chracio, amid a field of dead bodies ... the aftermath of a recent battle. Glad launches into an attack on sight, hurling an explosive at the Gold Man. Ra'jira, still confused about why they've come to Chracio, prevents the attack from hitting the Gold Man, who turns his attention to the new arrivals. His compelling presence is almost enough to overwhelm the group.
While Frax, Red, and Ra'jira hold the Gold Man down with archery, vines, and earth magic - almost all of which he's able to easily brush off - Haas protects Glad while he gets in contact with first Imbri and then Gaskim. He'd already requested help from Encatus but they're at least a day away from arriving. When the others attacks break the Gold Mans concentration, Gaskim is able to hear Glad's summons. He teleports into battle on arrival and understands, through a mental link, Glad's next steps. As the only other representative of Chracio around, Glad jokes that he'll be Gaskim's makeshift sentinel today. Haas joins the others and they work towards helping Gaskim drag the Gold Man into Chracio's Pitt, with Red and Gaskim utilizing the massive amounts of loose sand to smother and drag him in. The Gold Man fights against it. He makes a move as to escape the attack when Glad sends down lightning from above, glassing the Gold Man. Gaskim leaps from the pit and finishes their foe by biting his head off.
After their victory, Gaskim uses the Silver Foxes to offer up quasith to the pit, allowing Chracio to drop down to their world. Everyone is in awe, both because they're seeing a real dragon in person and because Chracio is decidely meaner looking than any depiction of a dragon any of them have seen. Not long after, two new Sentinels are christened. Kaskas becomes Sentinel of Chracio (the location/pillar) and is summoned by Gaskim. Glad inexplicably becomes Sentinel of Chracio the dragon itself and receives a blessing for his sword. Once the group collects itself, they debate what to do next. Glad issues orders to the still travelling Encatus group to send recruits immediately to the pit so that their offerings help Chracio heal. Red, directed to do so by the First, attempts to talk Chracio out of getting directly involved in the coming Western invasion rather than sending fighting by proxy of Sentinel. This doesn't go over well and leads to Ra'jira knocking him out with a dart. Then the group blink back to the town they anchored Doug in.
An Overwhelmingly Strong Enemy
They make haste towards Kingsport, stopping to alert villages along the way of the incoming invasion. Approaching from the shore, they spot the last dregs of a successful invading force and a massive warship anchored at a vulnerable part of the city's perimeter. Haas shapechanges into a dragon and takes off with Ra'jira, who disables a guard tower with lookouts using explosives. The pair soon find themselves fending off anti-air attacks and a persistent, unseen mage. Haas takes a lot of damage, despite skillful evasion, and gets further injured by a magically controlled hook. Eventually, Glad is able to disable the anti-air stations with lightning and the two track down the mage. Before they can finish him off, he disappears.
Simultaneously, Doug is taken out of commission and the beached Frax, Glad, Red, and mercenaries take on some land forces. They ably handle those crewing the anti-air weapons, but have a harder time with the reinforcements that follow. Red puts up protective barriers that provide some defense, but those only delay the inevitable. Frax takes on a heavily armed Westener and loses both arms in the resulting fight. His opponent ends up fried by Glad. Red uses sand and earth attacks to bind and blind enemies but takes a lot of direct damage and passes out. Glad, having hulked out on War Strength Potion, dissects and fries a good number of Westeners before the remaining forces try to retreat into the city.
After regrouping in an abandoned warehouse, the Foxes decide to fly to the Felspar army for reinforcements, having done as much as they could. Before they can, they're surrounded by enemy troops and are forced to treat with the legionnaire Tyrus. They're unable to gain any concession about the pillar of Emeri, though they learn its sentinel is probably missing. Because of their valor and display of strength, Tyrus allows the group to leave, but not before almost coming to blows with Glad because their 'treating' is so one sided. He only stops his suicidal attack at Haas' behest. Tyrus lets them leaves but gives orders to kill them on sight if the Foxes ever return.
Not All There
The Silver Foxes regroup with Tilly, Prixus, and the remains of dog. Haas notices that her message from Cadence about speaking with a representative of Chracio still stands, despite telling Cadence that the pit was already rescued by their group. Cadence wants to talk with Chracio immediately, so Haas does what healing she can and shape changes, helped by blessing from Chracio given from Glad. She flies everyone there, collapsing when she lands after a day of travel. They're escorted to their meeting with Cadence where they discuss all that's happened with her and a consultant of Okmark's named Syntyria. This consultant is conspicuous from the first, communicating with unseen parties and taking part in some obvious blood magic. Eventually, the gang deduces that her precognitive abilities are akin to a time-travel like mind magic which is why her advice is so contradictory and hard to follow.
The goal of the meeting is to impress upon Glad his need to reign Chracio in and not allow the dragon to begin directly warring with humans. Glad promises to do what he can but indicates when push comes to shove, he is not going to stop Chracio from doing what Chracio is want to do. But he remains confident the worst case scenario won't come to pass. He's the only one. The group also discusses some next steps:
On Emeri: Cadence and the Felspar forces will be redirecting there from Krios, lifting the siege on the city. The Silver Foxes will go off on their own tasks in the hopes of providing some tactical advantage or figuring out if Shul is setting a trap. To that end...
On the uncompleted dragon map: The group is going to try to update the Azzur map or get their hands on the Dionastran map travelling around by bartering with a Dionastran with access to their map or bartering with a Troll who in the past stole a map making tool from a Dionastran. Most of the group is very much for bartering with the Dionastran, with Red and Haas being particularly enthusiastic about this possibility, but Glad states his abject refusal to treat with Dionastra's followers until they make right the attack on Chracio. He warns the group they might have split goals when it comes to this point because...
On Dionastra: Chracio considers Dionastra an enemy. Either it would have gone through with its successful attack and broken Chracio or it is using Chracio as bait to lure Shul away from itself, neither of which Glad considers acceptable. He won't treat with or trust Dionastra until the guilty party is dealt with.
On the Heretic: Cadence wants us to use our influence with the Heretic to deduce his motives. The timing of Emeri's attack is suspect and she worries about what he plans.
On other players: Cadence reveals that, like Cyax and Kai, she is one of those new dragon-like entities who draw power from themselves rather than a pillar. She was gifted this by Den as a balancing act but surmises there are others there likely gifted this influence by Shul or other actors.
On Mercayen: Glad mentions that it is possible for her to return, which Cadence agrees with. But she doubts it would happen because Mercayen would be very vulnerable, having to restart the follower process from scratch.
The main takeaway from Syntyria is that the Silver Foxes and their allies need to stop playing the game and transcend the rules of play if humanity (using a catch-all for all non Dragons) is to have any chance of surviving this cycle. Which means Chracio's rage needs to be tamed. And the Foxes need more intel.
After the meeting, Haas gifts Glad a present to honor him for becoming Sentinel, the sword of a previous Sentinel of Chracio, Saren, embedded in the helmeted skull of the legionnaire he slew. On grabbing the sword, Glad has a vision of Saren's last moments which he keeps to himself. He thanks Haas for the gift.
Big Spenders
The next morning, the Silver Foxes decide on a course of action. First, they'll get Doug fixed up. Then, they'll find transportation, probably an airship, to take them East to the deserted Azzur map tower and then North to find the troll. Before taking care of business in town, the Foxes finally count up all the money they took from Encatus: ~11K in gold and somewhere between 2k and 6k in gems. This money is immediately all spent over the course of two hours. In return, Frax and Red get some much needed enchanted items to ward of fire and lightning, Red and Haas get items they can heal Fraxinus so that he can rely on others to help him heal, Red and Maus get savorite wands, and repairs begin on Doug. Maus and Glad note that the recent war has probably really upset the economic climate, leaving some poor merchant down on his luck and amenable to selling an airship at a decent value. The gang track down such a schulb and spend their remaining gold and half their gems on buying the airship, which is a pretty decent size able to comfortably house everyone, and its crew for a year.
Filling in the Blanks
After a night's rest and day's travel, they arrive at their first destination. Haas leads the way into an abandoned and partially ruined and rebuilt tower. She points out the spot on the first floor where she chanced upon a long dead Azzur Sentinel's body. Believing that the Azzurite's spirit might provide some knowledge of the map, Glad attempts to reach out for his spirit with a hastily conceived blood magic ritual. As expected, the magic goes awry and keys into some lingering necromantic magic in the area that should have dissipated centuries ago. Glad attempts to talk to the creature without much success. Haas succeeds by side-stepping into the spirit world where she convinces him to join them in the living world. When he arrives, his pestilent presence affects all the party members aside from Haas and Fraxinus, forcing everyone else to flee to safety outside. Glad wards himself against the miasma temporarily by voiding the air around him, but he has too retreat eventually as well. They learn that the creature is a servant of Baishu. No one is able to learn much about its master aside from him being a cult-like being that may be a Wraith. When they're finished talking, Glad banishes the servant.
In the basement, the Foxes try a few things to update the map. Haas is the first to effect a change. She can place a dot on the map to symbolize Vulsh's pillar. She can't change Vulsh's area though. She is able to to change the Mercayen region to a chaotic swirl representing the Ruined Land. Glad asks Chracio about the dragon's territory. In lieu of answer, Chracio teleports over and updates the map himself, expanding his territory but also turning some of his previous territory into uncolored land. Glad is able to get this to change to Red in the Serac Volcano and pillar and the fissure as well, but a good bit of the uncolored territory remains unconfirmed. There are also specs of red in Equinos' region. Glad sends out for Imbri to help update Thisius territory. He plans on teleporting him over when he's ready around midnight. All the gang contribute what they can. Haas shows them the 3D visualation of the map in the spirit world. And Glad notes that the First's point on the map looks similar to the clockwork color room he visited in the dream world.
The Blood Price and Words of Power
The Silver Foxes fill in all the area of the map they can, and ask Tilly to try fixing Xisben's. She's unable to, so Glad suggests praying to her dragon. Coached through it by Haas, she tries again but it fails to do anything. At this point, worried about Xisben's silence, the Foxes agree that Xisben should be the next stop on the trip. First though, they wait for Imbri's arrival. He isn't able to change much of the map, but they are able to convince him of the serious of the upcoming war and Shul's ambitions. When he leaves, Frax, Glad, and Maus enter the dreaming where they meet the Weaver, whom Glad had earlier paid in blood to ward the map from any followers of a gold-tinged dragon. In the dream world, they find that the Weaver has pacified the Servant of Baishu. The Weaver wakes the Servant up and acts as proxy for the Foxes who attempt to ask it questions. It responds that it will only answer if paid in life, something no one present seems willing to do ... until Glad disappears.
Unbeknownst to the others, Glad had set aside a sacrificial life for such an occasion, on a visit to Chracio the morning after their meeting with Cadence and Syntyria. When told of the Troll, the stolen Dionastran orb, and the offer to retrieve it for its original owner, Glad had made explictly clear to the rest of his party that he wasn't going to treat with or participate in treating with any gold dragon representatives until he learned which gold dragon was responsible for siphoning Chracio. The missed implication being that rather than retrieve the stolen orb, he was far more open to paying the Troll's price of life. So on his trip to the pit a couple of days prior, where Chracio was casually tossing attunees into the pit without regard for whether they'd survive or not, Chracio set aside one of the attempted attunees who very obviously would have drowned in sand. Glad loots the sleeping Frax for his diamond, blinks inside the tower to be unseen, and then blinks to Chracio to fetch the kid.
On returning, he brings the kid to the dreaming and immediately offers him up as payment to Baishu, reasoning the the kid was effectively already dead and that he was simply changing the implement of his death, since he would otherwise not interrupt an attuning ritual. Obviously, Maus and Frax both take issue with this. Frax slams Glad into the ground but realizes the kid is in immediate danger and changes tacks. There's nothing he can really do to free him from the Servants clutches. Maus has the Weaver wake both Glad and Frax. In the waking world, Haas, who became suspicious when Glad looted Frax, finds the kid in danger. She forces him out of the dreaming and, with Red's help, tries to flee with the kid, who seems to be choking and suffering some health effect. She can't pull him out of the keep. The Servant has materialized and grasped the kids ankles. By some miracle, Red is able to revoke the grasp, though it doesn't really work as a revocation since the creature isn't a construct of quasith. Glad watches passively from a safe distance, okay with either outcome of the skirmish. Either the creature will be banished, or they'll learn more about its master. Red is able to trap the creature under earth, but the effect on the kid does not stop, even with Haas trying every form of anti-venom and self-healing transfer she can improvise.
At the very last second, Glad has a thought, remembering a tale from an old book about words of power. The only record of a known word of power was one used to dispel a certain pestilence in ancient times. He shouts this word and it surprisingly emanates with a power that weakens the trapped Servant and begins dispelling the effect from the kid. Glad repeats this chant until the kid is revived and the creature dispelled. Red erects a strong fortification of earth around the trap just in case, with an added warning about possible spirits. Glad isn't able to offer the kid attunement or anything in return for his efforts. Haas does try to set him off on a path to a pillar that would care for him, sensing that may be Losken, but eventually they settle on dropping the kid off at the First where he'll later attune. Red, Haas, and Frax very vocally disapprove of his methods, but Glad isn't bothered, seeming to consider the kid not more than another failure that would have been swallowed by the pit.
Xisben's Return
After the ordeal, Maus finishes up his business in the dreaming, trying and failing to change the map from there. He also learns more about the dragons' effects on the dreaming from the Weaver. The Foxes set off for Xisben. On the way, they encounter the condors of the Paraxos pillar, including the giant condor sentinel. They have a friendly back and forth, displaying their abilities and keep on their way. Tilly is able to get an answer from Xisben and confirm his return and safety. The group decide to continue on anyway, but are relieved that Xisben didn't face the same danger Chracio did. Glad says something about a third dragon soon to return, which is later revealed to be Kalmer.
They land at the first and watch the image of Xisben racing around the pillar. Talking to an old scholar there, Jeremiah, they are able to commission a collection of past images displayed by the pillar and their analysis, learning that the First has shown many important events not understood by its followers because they lack the context needed to interpret them. Sample images include Equinos chained, Equinos freed by Elias, Shul making a new pillar, and Chracio's return. They talk with the scholar while they wait for Father Benjamin to return.