Atlantis: The Snakey Finale

Tonight was the final session of Atlantis: The Second Age, which we started playing way the hell back here. Some thoughts on the game before we proceed.

I really enjoyed this game. It holds up to long-term play (with a bit of a caveat, which I'll get to), and the character creation system with its lifepaths and all (which I tried out for my project here) is just amazing. The setting is layered and just chock-full of story hooks, and it actually has a bit of adventure support. The Geographica and Theragraphica sourcebooks likewise have a lot to offer.

With that said, it's got some niggles. The Renown system, in particular, really needs some love. There's not nearly enough information on how to award Renown, and the levels and what they mean don't really work long term. I actually wound up rewriting the Renown system (piggybacking on Werewolf: The Forsaken in some ways, actually) so that we could keep playing and have it make sense even after characters got up in the "eight advancements" territory. 

But all in all, I'm really happy with how this campaign turned out. So let's get into it!

Our heroes are in the Flying City, and things have well and truly gotten dire. Imani has been poisoned by Set, and can feel herself slowly dying. The heroes have saved Allunga from the Set-house, but now it's the morning of 15 Nisanu, the Council is going to make the decision about the King of the Skies today, and they turn their attention to saving their friend.

Eithne points out that if she calls upon her Soul Name (as she once did in the nation of Dabba, way back here) she might be able to save Imani, but isn't sure. Akala spends hours in prayer to Orunmila, and the god finally gives her audience. He remarks that some supplicants make sacrifices or dedicate heroic deeds to His name, but Akala seems to be the only one who gets his attention by just talking until he notices. 

He grants her answers to a few questions. She asks if there's a way to save Imani, and Orunmila notes that there probably is, but doing so without being able to teleport somewhere and obtain a cure is going to be nigh-impossible. He says that divine intercession might work, but the god most likely to cure the poison is Set, and they probably wouldn't want to do whatever he'd demand of them. Obatala probably has the power to cure the poison, but he's a stickler for "purity" and might not appreciate some of the company Imani keeps (Akala is offended, but Orunmila isn't talking about her). 

Ultimately, Orunmila says that he can see the web of fate and can see possible futures where Imani is saved, though he's not keen to look too closely at them lest they solidify and become reality. He also notes that in many of those realities, everyone in the Flying City winds up dead within a dead. Akala, obviously, is concerned about that, but Orunmila isn't able (or willing) to give specifics. 

Akala returns to her friends and explains the situation. They decide that this must take precedence, though Eithne does repeat her offer to invoke her Soul Name to save Imani. They decide to split up - Imani and Jengo will speak to Allunga, and then check the Vril engines of the city, while Akala and Eithne will search for Akala's uncle Inkata. 

It takes them a couple of hours, checking the various places that Inkata said he lived, but they eventually find a cottage on the outskirts of the city, held to the city proper by a single chain. They burst in the door and find Inkata sitting and drinking tea. They try to question him, but he refuses to answer, even when Eithne summons up kinetic magic and binds him. He just looks amused. She checks the room and notes that it doesn't look lived-in - he's not actually been staying here.

Akala accuses him of Set-worship, but he just chuckles and says she's off-base. They eventually decide that he's just stalling, and leave him tied up in the cottage and drop the whole cottage into the ocean. They head back into town...

...meanwhile, Allunga, Jengo, and Imani go into the city to the place where the candidates are awaiting the verdict. They talk to Callimachus and Chizoba, who are of course just as concerned as Allunga about the dire portents of doom for the Flying City. Callimachus flies off to check the Vril engines, while Chizoba goes to do some math on the city's trajectory. She returns some time later in a panic, and tells them that the city has dropped considerably. It's much lower than it should be, but the strange thing is that at its current rate of descent, it'll crash in a month or more, certainly not just a day.

Callimachus still hasn't returned, so they head out to the Vril engines. They get there just before Eithne and Akala, and together the group of them enters the watchtower where guards keep an eye on the Vril engines constantly. 

There are two Uluka in the watchtower, lying on cots...both dead. One has been dead for a few days, and his body has the same sickly sweet smell that Imani's wound gives off. The other is much more recent...and that body is Callimachus. As the heroes react to this, both corpses explode, revealing a Naga warrior that grows to full size in seconds! One bites Eithne, the other strikes Jengo!

But Jengo keeps his cool and fires a volley of arrows at the Naga attacking Eithne. It falls dead, and Imani draws her dagger and stabs it. Akala hits it with a chakram and it lets go of Jengo, and Eithne summons fire and burns it to a crisp. 

The characters search the room, and have Chizoba use her sensory magic to determine what happened to these Uluka. She reports that Callimachus entered, found the body, and was heading out to get help when a snake slithered out from under a bunk and struck him. He stumbled to the cot and died. She looks further back and sees the death of the other worker, and sees that the other folks here were also sick. Allunga dispatches some of his guards to check on them, and to wake up the night shift so someone with some knowledge of the engines can be here. 

The other worker, unsurprisingly, is dead of a snakebite. Worried that he might also burst into a Naga, they build a pyre, and Eithne joins Chizoba and some other sorcerers to cast a spell over the city to magically compel any snakes therein to slither here and into the fire. The snake menace appears resolved, but the city is still descending. 

Akala tries to keep calm in the streets, but the city has descended below the cloud cover and people are panicking. She looks down and sees a huge silhouette in the water - a snake almost as big as the city itself is following them. She reports this to the others, and Chizoba does some math. If that snake leaps, it could smash into the city and drag it down to the sea.

Eithne asks whether raising the city would keep it out of the Makara's reach, and Chizoba says it would, but what kind of power could lift the whole city? The engineers haven't been able to get the Vril engines to lift it (and they've tried!). Eithne tells her compatriots that she could do it...but if she does, she won't be able to save Imani (she can only invoke her Soul Name but rarely, and she sleeps for a week afterwards). 

Imani, of course, doesn't even have to think about it. "Save the city," she says. She's already written to her wife and her mother. Her affairs are in order.

Eithne stands in the center of town and invokes her Name. Loud, discordant chimes echo through the city and everyone is buffeted by winds. The city rises 100 feet, everyone's ears pop, and far below, the massive sea serpent leaps from the water...but its jaws close on empty air. It falls back to the ocean, and everyone cheers!

Akala is made King of the Skies, and Eithne, drained of color and spent, collapses into sleep. When she wakes a week later, she finds that Imani has passed away. Before she died, Jengo confessed to her and Akala that he ate Thanos' heart, and Akala forgives him as he lived up to Thanos' ideal while he traveled with them.

Akala declares a day of mourning for Imani, and appoints Chizoba an advisor to the king. She orders honors for Callimachus as well, and makes Allunga a head of a guard battalion. Chizoba refigures the math on landing the city in Khem, and the Uluka make their preparations. 

Akala, Eithne, and Jengo take Imani's body home to Gorgos, where it is interred in a tomb with honorifics to her (and curse to Set) inscribed on it. Akala returns to the Flying City and begins work on a new volume of her memoirs. Jengo takes a set of golden wings and continues on his adventures through the world. Eithne returns to Sora, her lover, and the two of them farm together for years. When they finally part, Eithne sets herself on fire (as is the way of Jinn), reconstituting herself with a new name and face, and sets out into the world once more. 

FIN

Atlantis: The House with the Snakes in Its Walls

That pesky Set. Here's last time.

Our heroes travel up to the house. Like many in the Flying City, it's connected to the rest of the city through some chains and some old rope bridges, but it's pretty isolated. Eithne casts a spell to make her partially weightless and bounds up, while Jengo and Imani take the rope bridges and go hand over hand (or, in Imani's case, hand) until they get there.

The house looks empty - no lights, no activity. It's oddly warm here, too. This high up, it should be cold, but the air is humid and Jengo notices a distinctly reptilian smell. This seems to be the place. Eithne casts a spell and makes huge words appear in the air to call Allunga here, and the door opens on its own. The heroes figure that there's no point in standing on ceremony; whoever is in there, obviously they know the heroes are here.

They enter and find themselves in a foyer with three exits (Akala notes that this isn't typical Uluka architecture). There's also a huge serpent coiled around the room. Jengo, lusting for glory and figuring that killing snakes is how to get in good with these people, nocks an arrow, but the snake strikes and bites his shoulder. Eithne casts a ward against snakes on the front door, so that they can fall back if they need to, and Imani and Akala strike at the snake with mong and javelin, respectively.

But then the ground shifts! Eithne tumbles into the corner, Akala and Jengo keep their footing, but Imani goes sliding out the door and towards the edge! Akala flies after her and throws a rope. Imani loses her mong, but catches the rope and doesn't fall to her death. Meanwhile, though, the snake strikes again and coils around Jengo, starting the death squeeze. 

Eithne goes and helps Akala haul Imani back up, and Imani charges, burying her horns into the snake (but avoiding skewering Jengo in the process, which appreciates). The heroes take the snake's head and press on through the right-hand door, and find themselves...in a desert. 

The desert is familiar, and Akala recognizes it as the desert of Khem not far from the slave-quarry that they liberated a long time ago. Every now and then a snake slithers by, and Imani finally gets annoyed, stomps a snake, and curses Set. Set apparently responds - the sands all around them turn into a mass of snakes. Jengo manages to jump before the strike, but the other three get bitten on the ankles. The snakes disappear, and the heroes walk on, but the wounds are starting to swell and ache. Imani's, in particular, has started to discolor, but she keeps this a secret for now.

They arrive at the quarry, and see slaves working it while Ahl-at-Rab overseers beat them. A man with beady, reptilian eyes sits on a stone throne, watching it all, but they can't quite get a look at him - light seems to fall into him. "Set, I presume," says Akala, and the man floats over to them. 

Set tells them the they've annoyed him for a long time, but what they're doing now is very different than killing the minions of his "idiot younger brother." He tells Akala to drop out of the campaign for King of the Skies, and that she, since she's seen the Web of Fate, has some inkling of how intricate and layered the divine agenda can be. 

Jengo speaks up, and Set addresses him tersely ("are you still here?"). He also alludes to Jengo only hanging around until he's "finished digesting," but once again, the others have bigger things to worry about than this and don't question what it means. In the end, of course, Akala refuses to drop out, and Set vanishes. Imani's ankle aches, and she feels sick.

The heroes find themselves back in the foyer, and go through the middle doorway. They see Allunga, blundering around as though blind. He doesn't respond to their calls, and they can see his beak moving, but he's not making a sound. Figuring this is a curse from Set, Eithne tries to counter it. It goes...poorly.

Forbidden knowledge floods her brain, and smoke and blood pour from her ears. She stumbles backwards, seeing the Web of Fate in her mind's eye and quaking at the complexity and infinite nature of it all. Akala and Imani grab Allunga (carefully, since he's probably prone to stab people if surprised, especially in this circumstance) and bring him back into the foyer.

Here, the curse seems to fade, and Allunga returns to them. He doesn't know what happened, he just came here, walked into that room, and everything went black (from his perspective). The heroes explain what's happening, and together the five of them enter the last doorway.

They immediately fall into a pit! Eithne turns into a roc and catches Imani, while Jengo speedily ties a rope to an arrow, fires it into a wall, and swings over to lower himself to the ground (it's not graceful, but it keeps him from going splat). The heroes see that the ground is full of chains, latched to the ground. Each chain is clasped to the ankle of an Uluka, and sometimes they fly up, trying to escape. Jengo takes his club and strikes a clasp, but the room shrinks and the crowd of Uluka tackle him, screeching "NO!"

As the heroes ponder this, they realize that clasps are forming around their ankles, too. Akala and Eithne take to the air, and Imani jumps up to the wall and drives a dagger into it. The other Uluka aren't really able to talk or answer questions, but Akala gets in front of them and demands their attention (Allunga backs her up, calling her "the next King of the Skies"). The heroes realize that they can't stay here or they'll eventually be chained up, too. Eithne gathers her power and tries to counter the magic again, and this time she succeeds.

The spell ends, and all of the Uluka end up in the foyer. They leave the Set-house, and Akala coordinates the others to break the supports and chains holding this house as part of the Flying City, sending it falling down to the ocean below. She reports to the city's authorities about why that was necessary, and Imani reveals her ankle, now even more infected and corrupted. They need to find her a cure, and soon. Today is also 15 Nisanu, the day that the Council will make its decision about the King of the Skies. 

The heroes ponder, though, that Set telling Akala to drop out is probably the best way to make sure she wouldn't. But does that mean he wants her to be King? If that's the case, why do anything at all? What is Set's end goal, here, and how do the heroes fit in?

Atlantis: When Gods Get Involved in Politics

Here we are in the Flying City of the Uluka once again.

The heroes continue their investigation of the death of Yog-Ulum, the Ahl-at-Rab companion of Allunga, who (like Akala) is campaigning to be King of the Skies. They sketch out a map of Allunga's home and find where everyone was last night, but don't find any suspects. They find, however, that the back door's latch has been broken, so someone got in that way. That back door leads into the kitchen and opens to the outside onto a platform with no other access, so whoever did this can fly. They find a small feather in the broken latch, suggesting this was an Uluka.

The characters split up. Imani and Jengo go to talk to Callimachus, while Akala and Eithne find Chizoba. Callimachus is at his campaign headquarters, abuzz with activity, and he makes time to talk with them (if briefly). He knows nothing about Yog-Ulum's death, he says, and claims that he was visiting a hospital last night at the time of the murder (recall that Callimachus has helped bring in Uluka with medical training to the Flying City). He says that folks there can vouch for him, and the heroes are welcome to ask around. Imani and Jengo consider this, but getting to the hospital without wings is difficult and Imani is not comfortable tempting gravity.

Meanwhile, Chizoba is doing a demonstration on her sorcery kits. She tells them, once they get her attention, that the kits don't possess enough raw power to kill someone, though of course they could be used as a kind of scaffolding to cast a particular spell (as Eithne did to bypass her usual difficulties with sensory magic). They ask her to come over and have a look at the crime scene, and she agrees, but it's going to have to wait till this evening.

Akala spends the rest of the day campaigning, and discovers that there are weird rumors spreading about her time in Dabba (while there, the heroes attempt to stop the Lotus Cult, but it was dug in too deep to root out at the time). No one is outright saying that Akala is somehow involved in lotus trafficking, but people are making weird grumblings about it, and she isn't sure where these rumors are coming from...

That evening, Chizoba...doesn't show. She sends a note saying she can't make it, and the heroes track her down; she's doing a Q&A and trying to defend her "fly over Vril pyramids to siphon energy" plan. Jengo points that doing this might bring them into conflict with whoever controls these pyramids, and Chizoba claims she chose the pyramids in question carefully, but the question does put her on the back foot a bit.

After the Q&A is done, she returns to Allunga's house and looks at the room and the feather. She casts her vision back in time, and sees an Uluka, but not one she recognizes. She casts an illusion and shows the characters, but the Uluka just looks...generic. Maybe some similarity to Akala's uncle Inkata? But not exactly. They suspect some magic might be involved, and Chizoba doesn't know from divine magic. 

Akala does, however, so she settles into prayer to Orunmila while the others take up guard positions. As they're watching, all of the Uluka in the household just...collapse. The heroes head inside, and Eithne sees a shadowy, wraith-like Uluka flying through walls. She gets to Akala and puts up a ward around her, and the shadowy figure turns and addresses them, briefly, before vanishing.

Akala does finish the prayer, and now armed with magic letting her be in the right place at the right time, lets instinct guide her. She winds up at the bar where she met her uncle yesterday. He's not there, but talking to the bartender, they learn that this bar is one of the few that serves snakes (as in, gives the Owl-people patrons snakes to eat; they're not native to the Flying City, obviously). Inkata is apparently a big fan. Imani buys a snake for Jengo and he eats it raw ("very crunchy! And wriggly!"), and the heroes speculate that maybe Inkata's predilection for ophidophagia might be relevant?

Akala asks around, and learns the Inkata always claims to have flown a good ways to get the bar, but he's not consistent as to where he's flying from. Trusting her instincts again, Akala takes the heroes toward one of the places Inkata has mentioned, a house high up in the city, accessible by rope bridges (and, of course, flight). The heroes are going to have a somewhat arduous time getting there, but perhaps Orunmila will guide them?

Atlantis: Campaigning Can Be Murder

I did not deliberately set up winding down this game during an election year and having an election-related storyline, I swear. Here's last time.

The heroes are in the Flying City, and as the second week of the month of Nisanu winds down, the other candidates put forth their platforms.

Chizoda, the sorceress, constructs a model similar to the one Eithne made, showing the Flying City landing in the mountains as Eithne depicted but crashing and breaking apart. The intent here is to discredit Eithne and Akala's ideas, but Eithne points out the flaws in Chizoda's math and pokes holes in her theory, and Akala doesn't lose any cred. Chizoda does, however, put forth the idea of taking the Flying City in a specific route over three Vril pyramids and siphoning energy from them, which should give the City enough power to keep flying for another century. This actually works and warms the people up to her position somewhat.

Callimachus, the diplomat, attacks Akala's politics and deeds, if indirectly. He points out that Khem (Akala's proposed landing point for the City) and indeed the whole of northern Gondwana, has been unstable for decades, and indeed Akala herself has a price on her head from the Queen of Sheba. He, meanwhile, unveils a decree from Atlantis pledging help with getting the Flying City fully functional again (provided that the Uluka permit Atlantean scientists access to the crystal matrices of the City to allow study and possible replication). Akala refutes all of this - for one thing, the reason she has a price on her head from the Queen of Sheba is because she was directly involved in freeing the slaves of Khem, and while the Uluka are not necessarily freedom fighters as a whole, they do appreciate that fighting against the slave economy is fighting against Atlantean oppression, if indirectly. Also, Callimachus' promise from Atlantis isn't received warmly. He kind of misread the room.

Allunga, the warrior, also proposes putting the City down in the mountains in Gondwana, but suggests Mount Tama, in the nation of Okalo. Mount Tama has a fearsome reputation - supposedly the ghosts of Hesperian warriors guard it - but Allunga puts forward evidence that it's not ghosts but a displaced tribe of Hesperian Amazons who were left behind when Okalo gained its independence. He suggests driving the Hesperians out; they might be able to repel an attack from below, but they won't be able to survive a hail of arrows from the Flying City! Imani, however, herself a general, queen, and warrior, decries this as dishonorable. And besides, even if it's possible, why pick a fight you don't need? This resonates with the generally peaceful Uluka, although Allunga's appeal to sympathy for Gondwanan Uluka does as well. 

With all of this in mind, Akala appears to be the clear frontrunner. Her plan for the City is concise and achievable, and while the other contenders have put forth strong ideas, she's managed to stay ahead of them. She discovers one day that rumors are spreading about her family's involvement in the slave trade (which given her reputation is a bit of a shock), but she holds a conference and explains that her cousin Burrill (no relation to the lost King of the Skies, they just share a name) was involved in the slave trade and brought shame to her family, and that branch was basically shunned. 

Later that evening she and her posse meet up with an Uluka holding court in a bar. He introduces himself as Inkata, Burrill's father, and so Akala's uncle. He apologizes for talking about his son and Akala's potential involvement in slavery - he should have stopped to check facts first. Akala grudgingly notes that if he was acting in the interest of the City and trying to keep a possible slaver out of the office of King of the Skies, she can kinda see where he was coming from.

And then the morning of 13 Nisanu, two days before the end of the campaign, Akala awakens to find a messenger waiting. The message he delivers if from Allunga, asking for her to join him as soon as possible. She heads across town to Allunga's house (we'd started calling them "Berbos") with her comrades, and he informs them that his assistant and companion, the Ophidian Yog-Ulum, was murdered last night.

The characters are shocked, of course, and Allunga asks for their help. The authorities in the Flying City aren't going to care much about a dead snake, and everyone's preoccupied with the campaign anyway. Once the campaign ends, many of the people in the City will leave, and finding the killer will probably be impossible. He has no head for investigation, he knows that Akala does, so he asks for her help. In return, he is willing to abandon his campaign and throw his support behind her.

Akala tells him that the offer isn't necessary; she'll try and figure this out anyway (she doesn't approve of murder). Allunga shows the heroes to Yog-Ulum's bedchamber. He's lying in bed, but has been frozen solid, clearly by magic. Eithne pokes around a bit and figures that this was a fairly powerful attack spell, but not unique in itself (if she was going to kill an Ahl-at-Rab, this is how she'd do it, too). Jengo finds a box on the floor - one of Chizoda's sorcery kits. Eithne looks it over, and yes it's meant for creating cold, but only enough to chill a drink (Chizoda has been handing these out, but they're all minor magics). 

The heroes figure that the box might have been used as an amplifier or a timing device, or it could be a coincidence, or it could be a red herring. Imani asks Allunga to gather his house staff and she asks them if anyone heard anything. One of them remembers hearing a loud hiss around the midnight bell, and imitates it. Imani recognizes the sound - when Ahl-at-Rab are going to die and they know it, they sometimes emit this hiss in defiance.

Eithne can't usually use sensory magic, but she goes and finds a Chizoda-box that allows it and uses that piggy-back her magic so she can see into the past. She views the murder - someone enters the room and Yog-Ulum awakens, gives the defiant hiss, and reaches for his weapon, but is flash-frozen and knocked back onto the bed. The killer, whom Eithne can't quite see, looks through time and whispers "Eithne." She terminates the spell (and the chaos of the magic affects her, but instead of doing something terrible like turning her teeth to butter it just makes her more beautiful, lucky duck). Eithne feels something familiar and terrible about the mysterious figure, something divine...it reminds her of Set.

The heroes discuss this - why would Set kill an Ahl-at-Rab in the Flying City? Sure, he abandoned the faith, but that seems a little hands-on for Set. It seems arrogant, but might this have something to do with Akala, against whom Set certainly bears a grudge? But then why not kill her? Eithne, going with today's theme of using magic she doesn't usually try, summons up the ghost of Yog-Ulum and asks it who killed him.

Yog-Ulum says that it was Set ("father"), but wearing the form of Allunga. That explains how the killer managed to move about the house without being noticed, but it still raises questions. To wit: Why kill Yog-Ulum at all? Why such an elaborate method? Why plant the Chizoda-box? The heroes have a very strange investigation, and only a short time to complete it.

Atlantis: You Don't Vote For Kings

Strange birds in a flying city is no basis for a system of government. Here's last time.

Our heroes have arrived in the Flying City of the Uluka. Akala rents them a dwelling (finding one that has stair access, which is no mean feat; most of the structures in the Flying City are designed for those that can fly). The three sets of Wings of Burrill that the heroes have been using are also...maybe not confiscated, but taken away to be recharged and to avoid visitors who don't know the traffic patterns flying around. 

They settle in, and the next night they attend a kind of state dinner for the candidates for King of the Skies. Akala is the latest competitor (technically you can throw your hat into the ring right up until the Council makes the decision, but in practice it's better to get in early so as to drum up more support). The other three competitors and their entourages attend, giving the heroes - especially Akala - a chance to size them up.

Chizoga is an Uluka from the nation of Dar, and is a powerful and practiced sorceress. She has studied for the past few years at the Institute at Dardanus. Her Wisdom deed is the construction of "kits" for sorcery, basically small boxes that contain glyphs, components, and instructions for casting spells. She talks with Eithne (a fellow sorceress) about them, and explains that basically these are meant as a teaching tool, or a scaffold for people with magical talent but little ability to improvise. Chizoga also infiltrated the slave pits of Raz-Mar and extracted an Uluka noble who had been kidnapped and sold into slavery; this was her deed of Bravery. For her deed of Compassion, she has traveled to Eria to sing to the Screaming Giant (a gigantic wolf chained near a geyser) every year.

Allunga hails from the Curracurrang mountains, but was captured and sold into slavery in Yallock, and fought in the gladiatorial rings. While there, he performed his deed of Compassion: he spared the life of his Ophidian opponent, although doing so cost him an eye. That Ophidian, Yog-Ulum, is now his companion and assistant. Allunga's deed of Wisdom was mapping the jungles of Yallock, including a few of the Ophidian settlements (as a cautionary measure so other Uluka can avoid them). For his deed of Bravery, Allunga entered the cave at the top of Mount Skardor, a mountain in Mu made of a mysterious metal. He retrieved some of that metal and used it to fashion a machete and to plate his chakram. 

Callimachus, from the Atlantean capital of Olokunia, built himself up as a merchant and translator. He is expert at navigating Atlantean culture, and in fact his deed of Wisdom was negotiating with the Ruling Council of Olokunia to construct housing for Uluka in the city. His test of Bravery, in a related matter, was addressing said Council in common Atlantean rather than High Atlantean (this may not seem like much, but it's actually a big deal - you don't address people of "greater" social station in the common vernacular, and Callimachus was actually caned for it). His test of Compassion was using his family fortune to train doctors and teachers among the Uluka outside the Flying City, so that they could return to the City and work with the Owl-people there.

Akala, meanwhile, firms up her deeds. Her deed of Compassion is easy enough; she (and her companions) freed the slaves of Khem, Her deed of Bravery was the infiltration and liberation of the Isle of Gorgos, and her deed of Wisdom was the reactivation of the Vril pyramid in the sunken city of Elapi. After the dinner ends, the heroes retire and plan their next moves.

Part of "campaigning" for King of the Skies is demonstrating and explaining one's plans for the Flying City. The biggest concern for the City, of course, is that the city is falling. It's doing so slowly, but the Vril power supply is waning, and so the Owl-people either need a place to set the city down or recharge the Vril engines. Chizoba favors recharging the city, harnessing magic and Vril to restore it. Allunga favors putting the city down, and is willing to undertake a military action to find a suitable place. Callimachus puts forth the least popular notion: get help from Atlantis to fix the Vril tech. Akala talks with her companions, Eithne especially, and firms up her plans. Basically, they want to find a place to "dock" the City, but also attempt to recharge the engines. They decide that the mountains in Khem are a good place, given Alaka's political connections there.

Eithne spends the next couple of days working with Akala on a model of the Flying City and a working "dock" in a miniature mountain range. Jengo and Imani talk with Allunga, and Imani brings up the fact that Uluka aren't typically known as a warlike people - is taking a resting place for the city really a viable option? Allunga explains that it's not his first choice (war never is), but he views it as self-preservation, and killing in self-preservation should be pretty understandable. (Imani concedes that it is.)

Akala unveils the model, and it's very well-received. Of course, there's more to politicking than just making oneself look good, and the other candidates are not idle...

Atlantis: Just Flew in from Altjira...

...and boy are my arms tired! (drum sting) Here's last time.

Our heroes are in the flying temple of Altjira, and are preparing to fly cross-continent to the Flying City of the Uluka. Doing so requires learning to fly, using the "wings of Burrill" (the golden wings created by the present King of the Skies, allowing non-Uluka to fly, before said king got turned into sand and sucked into a bottle. Everyone caught up? Good). Akala teaches the other three how to use their wings, and they all catch on pretty quickly - Eithne and Jengo actually take to it really skillfully (Imani gets it, but it's more effort, partially because she's so heavy and partially because of her missing arm). 

The quartet takes off on 3 Wayeb. It's about 2700 kilometers from here to the Flying City's approximate location, and they figure if they fly 10 hours a day, they can do the trip in about 10 days. That'll put them there on 7 Nisanu, about a week before the new King of the Skies is determined. That should be enough time.

(Side note: I really love this game, but every now and then there are little things missing that are just weird. Like, there is no information on the Flying City in any of the books, aside from the fact that it exists. It's not detailed in the Geographica book, which seems like an oversight because it's a flying city. Also, there's no scale on any of the maps. I eventually just assumed that the continent of Mu is roughly analogous to the continent of Australia and used that as a rough model. Anyway, back to the action.)

The heroes fly all day, land at night, and then in the morning Eithne casts a spell that yeets them into the air. This works pretty well, and although the trip is exhausting, they're making good time. As they come to the end of the third day, they're seeing the topography change from the lush jungle of Yallock to the more arid terrain that eventually leads into the harsh, unforgiving white hell of the desert of Kanawalla. 

And down below, not far from a river and about a kilometer from the coast, they spot a village. Figuring that's a good place to rest for the night, they swoop down. Akala gives out a cry (traditional for her people - it's polite to warn people before you drop on them from above!), and Jengo notes people moving around in the buildings. Eithne, too, notes this, and also has the presence of mind to wonder why she can see into the buildings from above. These roofs aren't in great repair...

The heroes land, and see immediately that the village is falling apart. It's not uninhabited, though; Akala clocks multiple footprints, many of which are clearly Ahl-at-Rab. The heroes toy with the idea of just flying away, but then they hear a voice calling "help" from a nearby building. Akala listens to determine if it's someone in trouble or someone mimicking a distress call, but it sounds genuine. The heroes approach.

Imani doesn't go for the front door, though. She just crashes through a wall ("OH YEAH!"). Unfortunately she forgets to take off her wings first, and winds up stuck and caught up. She sees a bunch of Ahl-at-Rab inside; they immediately hurl daggers at her, which bounce harmlessly off her armor. But the leader, a hooded serpent-man, pulls out a blowgun and puts a dart in her neck. She immediately starts to feel sick and woozy.

Akala enters the front door and hurls a javelin at the snake-man with the blowgun, pinning his leg to the floor. Jengo follows and unleashes a volley of arrows, killing all but two of the snake-men, and Eithne uses a variation of her "gains some altitude in the morning" spell and yeets the last two through the roof (the heroes hear two distant thuds). They look around the room and spot a tunnel dug in the floor. Akala determines it was made by something very large, and the heroes fall back. As they do, they hear a rumble from the tunnel, and a large, claws paw reaches out, snags the body of one of the Ahl-at-Rab, and pulls it into the dark. They hear loud crunching, and again discuss the idea of just flying away.

They decide, however, that monster slaying is very much in their remit, so they brace themselves as they hear rumbles from beneath. Jengo and Akala take to the air, but Eithne and Imani get caught up by the dragon as it bursts from the ground! The dragon has six legs, sword-like fangs and immense claws. It knocks them down and bites into Imani, shaking her! Jengo rains down arrows on it, but they can't pierce its hide. Akala hurls a javelin at its eye and it lets go of Imani. She also yells to Eithne to "make it cold!", recalling that Ahl-at-Rab and their draconic brethren are vulnerable to low temperatures.

The dragon lets Imani go, but Imani has other plans. She grabs her spear, leaps into its mouth, and jams the spear upwards. She's drenched in blood and the dragon thrashes around, but she stays firm. Eithne conjures up a howling, icy gale and blasts the dragon, and the dragon spits Imani out and tries to burrow away. Imani isn't about to let it go, however - she drives her mong into its back, killing it.

The heroes take a moment to rest, and then go back down into the tunnel. They find the dragon's lair, but no treasure awaits, just rotting flesh and corpses. Some are Ahl-at-Rab, but most are human, sailors or pirates, based on the scraps of clothing they still have. It looks like the Ophidians took over the village and have been using it as a decoy, feeding anyone who stops here to the dragon.

The heroes return to the surface and chase off the Ahl-at-Rab who had come out of hiding to wail over the dragon's corpse. They harvest a few fangs and scales, and Jengo cuts the beast's heart out. They fly off and put some distance between them and the village, but not before Eithne hurls fire down and destroys it. No more decoy village. 

Jengo eats the dragon's heart, and in the morning, the others find that Jengo has changed color to match the ground he's sleeping on (Nethermen can absorb traits from those whose hearts they eat). Eithne launches them into the air, and they fly on their way.

A couple of days later, they're flying along the coast. As they fly over a bay, they spot a ship - sails tied up, not moving. They circle once, and Eithne recognizes the ship as the Dorothea, the ship that carried them to the foot of the mountains when they were searching for Altjira. The land on the deck, and the captain, Hesper, emerges to greet them, hugging Imani. "Oh, I'm so glad to see you!"

She explains. The ship is damaged, and they can repair it, but there are Makara (aquatic Ahl-at-Rab) lurking around. They've already lost a couple of crew members. The heroes are happy to help, of course; Eithne casts a ward on the lifeboat so they can get to the damage without the Ophidians attacking, and Imani accompanies two crew members on said lifeboat. 

Hesper asks about the wings, and offers the heroes passage to Port Serpentslice, if they're tired of flying. Akala does some mental math and figures that riding on the ship will save them a day (it's not any faster but the ship can travel constantly, whereas they have to stop to rest). The repairs complete, they set out.

It's dark as they're approaching Port Serpentslice, and Jengo notes a crewman standing at the railing with a strange device that clicks and flashes lights. Jengo puts a knife to the guy's back and demands to know who he's signaling and why. The crew member, Gafar, tries to say that he's telling his brother that they're arriving, but Jengo can tell he's lying and presses the issue (and the knife). Akala flaps down and advises Gafar to come clean, and he does.

There's a Tharshi (that is, a man from the nation of Tharshesh) in Serpentslice who's looking for the characters (well, "a Jinn, a Taurean, and an Uluka - he didn't mention a Netherman"). Gafar knows his name as "Aleksandro", but doesn't know what he wants. He wears a cowl and carries a spear, but wrapped in a cloth - very strange. Akala thinks about this and realizes that Aleksandro is probably the mysterious assassin who tried to kill them in Dardanus nearly three years ago (and almost succeeded!). They never managed to figure out who he was, and they'd lost track into the ensuing years. Gafar reveals that he managed to send "TELL THE THARSHI THEY" before Jengo stopped him, and Akala makes him send "AREN'T HERE". They also tell Gafar that he can lead them to Aleksandro when they make port.

They decide to have Gafar lead Jengo to find the assassin, since he's not looking for Jengo and hopefully won't recognize him. Jengo follows along behind Gafar into a marketplace, and he's soon approached by Aleksandro - cowled, and carrying something long and staff-like wrapped in cloth. They talk, and Gafar tries his best to keep from telling Aleksandro anything, but his stories about the heroes landing on the deck with golden wings just don't seem credible. Finally Aleksandro hands Gafar two coins and says something in Tharshi, which Jengo recognizes as "for your eyes" - it's a Tharshi threat. Gafar takes the coins and rushes off, and Jengo follows Aleksandro.

He goes down to the dock, and Aleksandro walks by the Dorothea, checks it out, but doesn't linger. He finds a taller building and slips the owner a couple of coins, and Jengo heads back toward the ship, but hears a commotion from the marketplace. He pushes his way through the crowd and finds Gafar dead, clutching the coins, his hand turning green. 

Jengo goes back to the Dorothea and informs the others. They decide that rather than wait for Aleksandro to find them, they'll confront him now. Eithne casts a ward versus bronze on the four of them (the projectiles he fired at them were bronze), and they leave the ship.

No sooner have they made the dock than they hear a crack and a bronze spike strikes Akala...but the ward works and it falls harmlessly to the ground. They take to the skies, and Akala spots a plume of smoke from a rooftop. She lands, but does not see the assassin...until he appears behind her and garrottes her!

She whacks him with her wings and knocks him off balance, but this would still have ended badly for her had her compatriots not followed! Imani lands on him, and Aleksandro rolls out of the way. Akala hurls a javelin and he bats it away, but Jengo unleashes a volley of arrows. He dodges a few, but one sticks him to the wall. He yanks out the arrow and rolls over the edge of the building, but Eithne casts the yeet spell again and launches him up.

He lands on the roof again, and Imani charges, slamming into him and pushing him toward the wall. Akala tells him that if he's being paid, there's no point in dying for the coin, and if he's not, maybe they can come to some arrangement. He puts his hands up, and tosses a handful of straws on the ground. He promises to tell them the truth if they promise to let him live, and he snaps the straw. Eithne feels a ripple of magic - this is a common promise-binding in Tharshesh, probably not powerful enough to do serious harm but enough to be unwise to break the promise. The heroes agree, and Aleksandro slumps to the ground.

He reveals that the Queen of Sheba was his client. Akala asks why she wants them dead, and Aleksandro says that they free slaves wherever they go - there are serious economical ramifications to that! The Queen apparently paid his fees for all these years, and he's been hunting them since Dardanus. They ask if he's going to cancel the contact, and he says he can't do that, but he points out that he's not coming after them until he heals up, so they've got time. He gathers up his thunder lance and heads for the stairs.

Jengo, not willing to let an enemy live, swings his club, but Akala blocks the shot - they gave their word. Aleksandro scoffs - "that's just what Thanos would have done, huh?" as he leaves.

"What did he mean by that?" wonders Eithne. Jengo shakes his head. "I don't know, maybe just that you were four when he was hunting you and now I'm the fourth?" No one thinks to question this logic...

The heroes gather up their stuff and take to the air once again, flying over the boundless ocean until they see the Flying City in the distance. They land and the welcomers meet them, surprised to see non-Uluka, and even more surprises to see them wearing the Wings of Burrill. 

The heroes are finally in the city of the Uluka. Next time, Akala campaigns to be King of the Skies!

Atlantis: No King, No King, La La etc

Last night, Atlantis! Tomorrow night, Treasure Planet, I guess! Here's last time.

Our heroes are in Altjira, the Flying Temple of the Owl-Men. After being shown to their quarters and changing into some nice comfy robes (and leaving their weapons behind, though Jengo and Imani both keep daggers in their robes for eating and any incidental stabbing that might need to happen), they meet back up with Otayba, the lead owl-monk.

Akala tells him about the vision she had that led her to Altjira, and Otayba reiterates that only the King of the Skies can open the temple doors here. The King of the Skies, as Akala winds up explaining to the others, is determined every 10 years. Contenders must complete three tasks: a task of bravery, a task of wisdom, and a task of compassion. The king "reigns" (the king does wield authority, but the Uluka are a largely self-sufficient people and so the King of the Skies is only concerned with day-to-day head of state kinds of things to the extent they wish to be) for 10 years, and at the end of that time, on 30 Adaru, the king's reign ends. For the 5-day month of Wayeb and for the first two weeks of the year (the first two weeks of the month of Nisanu), there is no king; the Uluka refer to this time as "the Storm" or "the Untamed Skies." By 15 Nisanu, all contenders must submit their deeds in the Flying City, and a new King is decided. 

Whew! So, given all that, it's now 27 Adaru. In a few days, Wayeb happens ("no giant snakes, this time, right?"). Weirdly, though, no one at Altjira has seen King Burril since the first year of his reign. It's strange that he hasn't come back, but again, the king isn't really bound by strict rules, so he doesn't have to come here.

As Akala talks with Otayba, Imani wanders and tries to see where the mechanism for steering this temple is. At the top of the temple, she sees Uluka flying in and out of a structure, and figures that's where the mechanisms must be. She decides to climb up and take a look, and gets about a quarter of the way when a loud BRAAP noise sounds and a blast of Vril throws her off the side of the building...and off the side of the flying temple.

Thinking quickly, Eithne casts a spell summons a pair of magical cloudy hands, scooping up Imani and dropping her back on the temple grounds. An Uluka flies down from the temple and asks if everyone's all right, and more important what's going on. Imani apologizes, and the Uluka, Ranwul, says that if the heroes wish to come to the top by other means (magic or whatever), he's happy to show them the Vril works and how the temple flies.

They get to talking, and Ranwul reveals that King Burril was here in MK 509 and was working on something important, mapping out a destination, and then left abruptly. His notes are probably in the temple, but since he hasn't been back none of the monks have looked. Eithne notes that during Wayeb and the first two weeks of the year, there's no king - does that get around the rules? Ranwul confirms that during Wayeb the doors open, but Otayba never let anyone in (by tradition). But yeah, maybe checking it out would be a good idea? 

The heroes busy themselves for a few days. Akala starts drafting campaign speeches - she's planning on throwing her hat (feathers?) into the ring for King of the Skies. Eithne meditates, Imani walks the grounds but stays far away from the edge, and Jengo fashions arrows. And as the sun rises on 1 Wayeb, everyone hears a thunk as the temple doors unlock.

Jengo, Imani, and Akala enter the temple; Eithne stays out front, as this place is full of powerful magic and her Jinn form is already unstable during Wayeb. As they enter, Akala notes that this place is weirdly bright - Uluka can see in the dark so the light is odd. It seems to be coming from the ceiling, so she flies up and has a look. She discovers that there are very thin Vril-powered panels glowing brightly, and determines these to be some kind of emergency measure.

Back on the ground, Imani spots a long, furry, sinuous arm reaching for Jengo from the shadows! She hurls her dagger at it, and Jengo spins around and stabs at it. It tries to bite him and he stabs it in the mouth, and he calls for Eithne. Eithne runs in and, not wanting to make the situation worse by accident, touches Imani and makes her faster. Akala pulls off one of the panels and aims the light at the unseen beast, illuminating it.

WHAT THE HELL IS THAT

 

Imani, seeing her target, charges the thing and rams her horns through it. It roars in rage, but she lifts her head, goring it further, and then tosses its corpse on the ground. Eithne and Akala look at the beast, but neither recognize it. They call for Ranwul, who flies in and identifies the creature as a "grindahl," a predator from Cimmeria. "So what's it doing here?" asks Imani. Ranwul says that it was in display case. "Alive?" asks Eithne, horrified. "No!"

Ranwul shows them - this thing was stuffed and mounted in a glass case. The case is broken from the inside, and there's no obvious magical mechanism. There are other dire creatures in cases - an Alban ogre ("oh, I've seen those, they like to eat peaches," muses Eithne), a shark-like beast from Elyisum, a rat/possum creature from Eria. Ranwul explains that in past years, it was common practice for Kings of the Sky to bring creatures from their travels here to be displayed, though that's fallen out of favor somewhat. As far as the heroes can tell, the general chaos of Wayeb plus the powerful Vril of the temple plus maybe the presence of a Jinn might have reanimated this grindahl. Just a freak accident.

The heroes find the library and discover that King Burril's notes and maps are still all spread out. Akala finds his journals, and learns what happened: He had a vision from the god Orunmila in which he saw "a group of liberators, an Uluka, an Anubim, a Taurean, and a Jinn, traveling together in the desert." He knew that these "liberators" would one day do amazing things and wished to meet them, but didn't know where to look. A later entry describes the "black sands of Joktan," which allegedly hold the power to grant intense visions of the future if mixed with wine. Burril therefore intended to leave Altjira for Joktan to find these sands.

Akala does some quick math. Burril would have left for Gondwana in time to put him in the area of Joktan not long after the heroes - obviously the group of "liberators" that Burril saw in his visions - actually obtained the Black Sands (waaaaaaaay back here). They eventually gave that urn of sand to Masamba to take to Queen Nyavinghi, but haven't asked after it since. 

Akala spends time in prayer and sends a message to the Mercenary Queen, explaining the situation and asking if she ever met an Uluka who wanted to know about the Black Sands, She receives a message back; the Queen did in fact receive such a visitor nearly 10 years ago. He opened the urn, but then something weird happened - the sand disintegrated him and sucked him into the urn. Nyavinghi hasn't opened it since.

This clearly explains what happened to King Burril, and obviously the heroes need to free him. But then, he's not King anymore and he won't be again in any event, and if the heroes were to leave now, there's no way they'd wind up getting to Zin (where the Queen is now based) and back to the Flying City (over the open ocean west of Mu) before the middle of Nisanu. Instead, they decide to have the monks of Altjira send a contingent to Zin to retrieve the urn and bring it to the Flying City, while the four of them will head directly there so that Akala can make her bid to be King of the Skies.

But how to travel there? Ranwul opens a panel reveals several sets of golden wings, based on the designs that King Burril created as his deed of compassion (to allow non-flying races the freedom to fly). The heroes start practicing flight. They'll have a long way to go to reach the Flying City of the Owl-Men!

Atlantis: The Bunyip Is Going to Get You

Last night was Atlantis, and we delve ever deeper into the mysterious continent of Australia Mu. Here's last time.

The heroes are left, after the ghost-ship battle, with a glittery feather, all that's left of Akala. They head back to Port Serpentslice and consider how to get their owl-friend back. "Sounds like a magic thing," muses Jengo, and Eithne considers what kind of spells she could throw at this situation. 

Meanwhile, Akala looks around and sees that she's standing on the ocean. Everything is glowing and slowed down; she assumes she's hallucinating (it happens). She turns and walks across the ocean to the continent, and sees that Mu is flat and alabaster, like polished marble. She looks to the sky and sees flying cities - maybe the City of the Owl-People, which she's been to, but also other ones. She sees one crackling with Vril energy and flies to it, preparing to land.

Back in the waking/living/real world, Eithne invokes her soul name and summons Akala back with the powerful magic it unleashes. Akala appears in a column of light and sparks, and blinks in the sun. She relates what she saw, and laments that Eithne didn't wait 20 more minutes. But at least she has something to study. 

Looking into her books and histories, she finds descriptions of the Sky Temple of Altjira, a Vril-powered structure that flies around the continent of Mu, making a full circuit every 90 days. It crosses ley lines on solstices and equinoxes, drawing power to keep its Vril engines charged. Akala decides she would like to visit it, since she saw it in a vision, and starts plotting out where it would be. She figures that it's just about to cross the Taran Mountain range; the heroes can catch up with it, but they need to leave now. Otherwise, it would faster to just wait the month until it comes back around.

Imani goes to the port and hires the Dorothea, a small ship with a very enthusiastic Atlantean named Hesper as the captain (and first mate, and cook). The characters board and it becomes quickly obvious to Imani that this woman has never captained before. Taking her aside, Hesper confirms to Imani that she won the ship in a card game and doesn't actually know what she's doing. Imani graciously agrees to help her find her feet as a kind of informal first mate.

They ship rolls merrily along, moving northeast around the Mu coast, and then sailing inland up a river. Akala spots trouble - Ahl-at-Rab hiding in blinds along the riverbank, clearly planning a raid. She points this out to the others, who decide to nip this shit in a bud. 

Eithne hurls a blast of fire at one of the blinds, not seeking to kill the inhabitants so much as scatter them. The blind goes up in sparks and fire, and the Ahl-at-Rab within slip out into the water...but then a bunch more stand up and hurl throwing weapons at the heroes.

Akala takes to the skies to look out and hurl javelins, while Eithne calls up a shield around the ship. Imani stands on the bow and bellows at them to let the ship pass, and that would be intimidating enough, but Jengo lets fly a volley of arrows at the Ophidians. They officially decide that this isn't worth the trouble and retreat, and the ship continues down the river.

A day or so later, they arrive at the falls at the foot of Taran Mountains, and the heroes disembark (Hesper and her crew mock up some quick facsimiles of the characters so that maybe they can get through Ahl-at-Rab territory without getting hit on the way back). 

The heroes camp; Akala tells them the Flying Temple should be crossing their path tomorrow morning. In the middle of the night, they all wake with a start, and find this thing:

Eating food out of one of their packs!

Akala recognizes it as a bunyip, a creature native to Mu that lives in lakes and rivers and comes out to hunt. They try to scare it away, but it sits back and lets out some loud chirp sounds...and the characters hear more chirps in response. 

Eithne flings sparks at the bunyips to try and drive them off, but though they hesitate, they don't flee. Several of them leap forward to attack, but Jengo lets a volley of arrows loose and hits most of them. Akala flings a chakram and bounces it off the head of the one in the camp (which is currently trying to eat Jengo), and Imani grabs a torch and tries to drive them off. That doesn't work; these things only show marginal fear. She instead grabs a spear and impales one to the ground.

Eithne hurls fire at one, finally scaring it off, and Jengo bonks the one clawing at him with his club. The one Imani skewered pulls itself free and decides that this prey isn't worth it, and the creatures flee. 

The characters keep watch, not wanting to find bunyips in their stuff ("Guess we should have tied up our food in a...bunyip box"). 

The next morning, Akala points - a cloud is moving toward them, pearly and colorful in the rising sun. The Flying Temple of Atljira. Eithne summons up her magic and turns Imani and Jengo into adorable kittens, and then shapeshifts into an Uluka. Together, she and Akala fly up to the temple and land. 

The stewards of the place recognize Akala's name and have read her chronicles, and tell her that she and her friends are welcome. The temple can only be opened for the King of the Skies, however, the chosen Uluka leader. They offer to help the characters to their quarters and change out their armor and weapons for robes and books. 

Next time, owl-king politics!

Atlantis: Ghosts Everywhere!

Seems to be a theme. On we go!

Our heroes, having helped the crew of the Julana harvest a heaping helping of horrible...hspider hsilk, continue on to the First City. The ship sails into the interior of Kanawalla on a river, and after a while see the remains of the City. It's largely covered by the sand, but they can see chunks of buildings jutting out of the ground in places...and every now and then, they see ghosts flicker in and out of visibility. 

They arrive at river's end in the middle of the day, and Akala, a native of this unforgiving continent, does some quick assessment. Going ashore during the day is unwise; the heat is too intense. They have water on the ship, but drinking river water without purification is unwise, so they'd best not overstay their supplies (Eithne can create more water if they really need it, but relying on magic in the middle of a severely haunted area isn't necessarily the first choice). That evening, when the weather is cooler, the heroes disembark and start walking through the First City.

Eithne calls up a ward to surround them to keep ghosts away, and that works pretty well. The ghosts aren't very powerful - mostly just echoes - but there are a lot of them. Akala takes off and scouts the city from the air, while the others decide that the best option here is to see if the ghosts know anything. That involves dropping the ward, yes, but Eithne can put it up quickly.

She drops the ward and engages a ghost directly, and asks about the Skartorius, the ghost ship they're head to find. The ghost rasps "Skartorius...below...sea...crevice" and waves in a general motion further into the city. Imani notes that when the ghosts flicker "on", there are suddenly more of them, a throng of them, and they're all paying very close attention to Eithne. 

Eithne thanks the specter and raises the ward again, and Akala, armed with the information, looks for a "crevice". She finds a place where two buildings seem to have collapsed into each other, maybe with some kind of sinkhole, and the heroes head in that direction. While climbing up an embankment, Imani's grabs the wrong rock chunk and goes falling to the ground. She's unhurt, but she's uncovered a nest of julana!

(Recall: a "julana" is a gigantic desert scorpion.)

Jengo gets stung in the heel, but the poison doesn't take and he smooshes one with his club. Akala hurls a javelin and spears one, but Eithne decides to take a wider approach. She lifts up debris and rock and just drops it onto all of them (cronch). Imani sadly puts away her mong.

The heroes move on to the crevice, and if they listen very carefully, they hear waves. Akala tells them that there were legends about the "Undersea," a vast ocean beneath the sands of Kanawalla, where gigantic creatures swim - apparently it's also the resting place of the Skartorius. With some searching, they find a gap they can clear off and peer down into the depths. They lower a lantern on a rope, but it's just an ocean - vast, dark, deep, unknowable.

And then Jengo, perhaps still channeling the heart of Thanos, leaps in. 

He treads water a bit, and can't really see anything, but then above him Akala sees something very large swim past him. They lower the rope to him ("Jengo, grab the rope." "Why?" "We'll tell you when you're back up here"). As they raise him up, he looks down and sees a shark, longer than the ship they came here on, swim by. ("OK, so maybe we can summon the Skartorius from here?")

Imani spent some time on a ship, and remembering that the Skartorius initially made port in Massawa, gives a loud hailing call common to the ships of southern Gondwana. And the Skartorius answers! The spectral ship rises out of the depths and comes to rest in the sands, and the captain halloos them. 

They ask after "Faraji," the beloved of the ghostly Jinn who commands the other ghost ship, but the captain has no idea who that is. They tell him to check the hold (Faraji was kidnapped as a slave), and he says he has such a person, would they like to buy the cargo? The heroes try, but the captain doesn't recognize the coin, and they get the feeling that separating one soul from this ghost ship might be beyond their power. Better to get it out to sea and let the Messenger take care of it.

Akala boards the Skartorius and, remembering that it sank en route to Vedda (a port on the southern end of Jambu), asks where they're going and then points out they're going the wrong way. The captain thanks her, and allows her aboard as the new navigator! The Skartorius takes off down the river, and the heroes scramble after it, but of course they can't keep up. They get back to the Julana and follow, but by the time they reach the ocean, the Skartorius has already been found.

The Messenger, with the Jinn Sauda at the prow and a typhoon behind, bears down on the Skartorius. Akala tries to fly free - over the last couple of days sailing on the ghost ship, she's seen her flesh become translucent and she's had to consciously stop herself from speaking their dialect rather than hers - but the winds catch her and spin her back. The Messenger and the Skartorius do battle, but the Jinn is far too powerful. Both ships sink, and Sauda and Faraji embrace, floating over the ocean, and then vanish.

On board the Julana, one shimmering owl feather falls at Imani's feet. Akala is...somewhere, and the heroes will need to act quickly to get her back.

Atlantis: SPIDERS EVERYWHERE

As you can probably tell from the title, this episode is not arachnophobia-safe. Here's last time.

Our heroes have successfully bought some time for the town of Port Serpentslice; the mysterious ghost ship Messenger having sunk into the waves whilst the heroes go looking for its target, the other ghost ship Skartorius. The heroes head to the local tavern to have some drinks and consider their next move. The problem they have right off the bat is that all they know about the Skartorius' location is "the Kanawalla desert" and like, that's a quarter of the continent. Akala has heard stories of the Skartorius, but nothing that would help narrow down how to find it.

They decide to ask around, figuring that the residents of Port Serpentslice might have heard something more specific, and indeed, they wind up talking to a woman named Gheta. Gheta is the first mate of a ship called the Julana, and tells the heroes that she's actually seen the Skartorius and would be willing to guide them to where she saw it. But perhaps they could help the Julana with a little job? 

The Julana's crew harvests spider silk in the Pits of Haal, volcanic tunnels infested with peraka-i, giant cannibal spiders. The work is lucrative, but dangerous, and they'd love to have a bit of backup for their upcoming job. The heroes aren't crazy about the idea of going into tunnels full of man-sized venomous spiders, but they admit that it's a job that they can handle, and they need Gheta's help.

On the morrow, they leave on the Julana. Everyone is jocular and game, but they don't sugarcoat the danger - it's typical for a few of the crew to get dragged off and eaten. Eithne makes some wax figures and binds into them a "ward vs spiders" spell, and hands a few out to the crew. She also casts a spell on a couple of Jengo's arrows, which will cause the arrow to split into multiple arrows when its arc reaches its zenith. 

After a couple of days of sailing, they arrive at their stop on the western coast of Mu. They disembark and the harvesters don their face wraps (to combat the sulfurous smell) and gloves (to prevent getting stuck to the silk). They enter the tunnel and the harvesters get to work, while the heroes brace and wait. They don't have long to wait. 

The spiders boil up from apertures into the tunnel and start swarming, but the spells that Eithne has prepared work - they don't keep the spiders away entirely, but they have trouble pushing their way through the barriers. Jengo fires arrows and lays spiders low, while Akala discovers that if they maim, rather than kill, a spider, the other spiders attack it. Eithne throws blades of force and then plugs holes with ice to reduce the swarms. Imani lays out with her mong, preventing the spiders from entangling harvesters and compatriots.

The battle is intense and Eithne and Akala suffer a couple of painful bites, but the heroes keep the spiders off the harvesters long enough for them to fill their sacks and fall back to the ship. 

Once there, they clean the bites with oil from an amphora (which also contains a small, drowned spider, but the stuff draws the gunk out of the bites and makes them feel better almost right away). Gheta has the the ship set course on a river going east into the continent, and tells them that they're going to the First City.

The First City isn't actually a city, it's the ruins of one, remains of civilization bleached clean by centuries of sand and erosion. No one actually lives there, but Gheta informs them that it's infested with ghosts (and probably scorpions). But it's there that she saw the Skartorius. 

With that cheery thought in mind, the heroes sail on!

Atlantis: Meet Jengo

Last night was Atlantis, and the beginning of a new, and probably the final, adventure. 

Recall that last time, Thanos perished rather than suck down some demon-god-brain and become corrupt. Since then, 16 months have passed, and the heroes have pursued their separate interests. And now, in the month of Adaru, they have met back up in the fortified port city of Serpentslice (look, I didn't name it) on the western coast of the continent of Mu. 

Port Serpentslice is an interesting place. It's the only human settlement on Mu, which is largely populated with Uluka and Ophidians. It's also mostly escaped or freed slaves, so the heroes have a bit of a soft spot when they here of the city's predicament. 

About a year ago, a strange, ghostly ship rose from the depths of the ocean and passed nearby Port Serpentslice. It brought with it violent storms and huge waves, but then went back out to sea. And then, six months ago, it came back, this time closer. The storms returned, and in addition, undead Tritons crawled out of the ocean and grabbed citizens, dragging them down into the depths. And now the mysterious ship is coming back, and this time might actually reach the city's port. 

Imani has rented out a suite in the city's best inn, and greet Eithne and Akala warmly. Eithne has calluses on her hands from a year of farming, while the furrows under Imani's eyes have grown deeper and darker from grief (her father died in battle in Nubia not long ago). Akala, too, looks more focused and serious than usual. She witnesses the flying city of Ankat crash in southern Gondwana and worries about the implications for her own home, the Uluka City.

The heroes talk amongst themselves, catch up, and then someone drops in through their window. A Netherman has been listening on an awning, and he introduces himself as Jengo. He offers his services as a sword and a thief - he has followed coin most of his life, but recently had a change of heart and wants to do something for the world and the people in it. 

The heroes are skeptical, but the deciding factor proves to be Thanatos, Thanos' jackal. He cocks his head at Jengo, sniffs him, and then cautiously allows him to pet his head. The characters decide to let him stay - they'll need the help anyway. What seals the deal is that Jengo mentions that her knew Mosi, Imani's brother, and in fact gave a eulogy at Mosi's funeral service. Imani asks how that was possible - Mosi was executed in Gorgos, and a Netherman walking around in Gorgos, much less delivering a eulogy for a political prisoner - would have been noticed. Jengo allows that he might be confusing some things, but he did know Mosi, just maybe from before he was imprisoned.

What they don't know, of course, is that Jengo had been stalking Thanos for some time before his death. When his body was being prepared for entombment in Khem, Jengo crept in and ate his heart. This is something that Nethermen can do - they eat the hearts of another and gain some ability or attribute. In Jengo's case, it granted him some of Thanos' memories and his love of freedom. Sometimes he confuses those memories for his own. I suspect this may become a point of contention at some point.

Anyway, the heroes talk about their options and determine that they need to know more about this ship. They go down to the docks and talk to the sailors, who are mostly in the process of battening down the hatches in preparation for the coming storm/zombie plague. They meet a man named Eehu, who agrees (after Imani greases his palms considerably) to take them out towards the ghost ship in his skiff. They decide to wait until morning, both because none of them fancy being out on the ocean in a small boat at night, and because Akala wishes to pray to Ochosi for help with the winds.

Akala spends most of the night in prayer, and Ochosi eventually answers, though she gets the feeling that Ochosi sees this as a people-related matter (and this particular god is more interested in animals). She does, however, gain the ability to influence the winds, which she figures will be useful for the storms get too intense.

On the morrow, the heroes set out. They can see dark clouds on the horizon, which Eehu tells them is the ship incoming. They sail up near it, and see the spectral ship coming closer to Port Serpentslice. They can tell that the ship is older than the current era, but none of the heroes are really historians so more detailed analysis eludes them. Akala does notice two things of especial note, though: The ship's name along the side (Messenger), and what looks like a ghostly Jinn standing at the bow. 

They also see shapes moving in the water. Jengo fires an arrow at one, and an undead Triton (with an arrow in its back!) leaps onto the boat and lurches for them. Eehu screams, and Jengo brains it with his club, knocking it lifeless to the deck. 

Akala points out the Jinn, and Eithne whistles a greeting in Chaos Speech. The ghostly ship stops short, and the Jinn looks down and responds. Eithne asks her name, and she tells her it's Sauda. Sauda claims that she is pursuing a slave ship called the Skartorius, carrying her lover Faraji. 

The heroes are, of course, no fans of slavers, and they'd be happy to help Sauda, but ask if maybe she could refrain from getting too close to Serpentslice. Maybe they could bring the Skartorius out to her? She agrees, and the Messenger sinks into the ocean. Akala notes that she's heard stories of the Skartorius, but can't quite recall the details. When they discuss it, Eehu fills in some gaps. The Skartorius is rumored to sail the Kanawalla Desert in the southwest of Mu. He's heard it's crewed by spectres in service to some dark god, harvesting the souls of the living. But that's just what he's heard. And anyway, the desert is much more dangerous than a ghost ship.

The heroes head back to Serpentslice where they are greeted with celebration (because Eehu tells everyone they sank the ghost ship, which is technically true but missing some important context). They begin planning their trek out into the Mu interior, which they know is populated by vicious predators and bands of Ophidians.

Atlantis: The Death of Thanos

Tonight we finished an adventure in Atlantis, and, for the first time, saw the death of a hero. Here's last time.

Thanos, the Anubim magic-user and fervent freedom fighter, rides out to the Burning Pit. He arrives and finds the Magog tribe surrounding the pit, cutting their flesh and screaming for their nameless god, and he moves through the crowd carefully, cutting his own flesh and howling. The Magog, for the most part, don't pay him no mind, but as he gets closer to the pit, they start to notice the tail and yell at him. They warn that their god will eat him, and he ignores them, descending into the Pit.

He stops to look at the mysterious writing around the Pit, and realizes that it predates the Atlantean language - it might even predate Saurian. He roughly translates it as an exhortation to rejoice in one's imminent death and corruption at the hands(?) of the nameless god. With this cheerful notion in mind, he continues down. 

He reaches a platform, and notices a symbol carved into the wall similar to the glyph commonly used for the Fire Atman. And then the whole platform bursts into flame! He soldiers on, though, charging through and shedding his burning clothes, and continues down into the dark.

He reaches the next platform, and hears the familiar sound of slaves being whipped. He sees Gallu and Khem slavedrivers beating people who are mining, maybe? Carving something into the wall? He doesn't stop to investigate, just summons up a stinging wind and sands and flays the flesh from the slavers' bodies. The grateful slaves surround him, grabbing at his fur and flesh, but he pushes through.

The next platform is narrow, and contains only a single rock, upon which sits...Set. Set tells him that he should go back, that he has no chance of succeeding in this quest, and besides, he's already failed one test. Thanos points out that Set should be happy to see him fail, and Set notes that he and Baal aren't really friends, and he doesn't want to see Baal consume Thanos' powerful soul, not when he (Set) should do it. Thanos tells him that he'll see one or both of them choke on his soul, and jumps into the Pit.

(Thanos doesn't know it, but this neatly bypasses the fourth test, which would have required him to jump off into the Pit.)

He lands in an ankle-deep pool of filth and corruption, and Baal Incarnate stands up out of it. Thanos forces himself to look upon the evil god, and while he does so without burning, he feels his resolve weaken.

Meanwhile, back at the camp, the other wake up to find Thanatos, Thanos' jackal, whining. The immediately realize what he's done, and Akala gives a loud screech to attract the attention of the tribesmen. She gives a rousing speech and rallies the Tribes of Zin to follow her to make war on the Magog, and they all ride out. They don't know it yet, but they are too late.

Back in the Pit, Baal mocks Thanos, telling him that he won't survive. He reaches into his gooshy head and pulls out a chunk of brain, and sticks it to the wall, telling Thanos that if he survives, he can learn the true nature of the tests and the Pit. And then he raises his hands and burns Thanos to a crisp with hellfire. 

Thanos survives the blast, barely, and rushes past Baal. He grabs the brain off the wall and pops it in his mouth, and feels the power of the dark god coursing through him. He absorbs the power, just enough to make him strong and heal the damage, and summons up magic - he winnows away Baal's body, boils the sludge around him, and throws stinging sand at him.

But Baal takes this damage and retaliates, throwing fire, and then just touching Thanos' face and causing his flesh to boil. He drops Thanos to his knees, and implores him to just eat the chunk of Baal's flesh that he took - take the power into himself, survive, and become the slave-master that he was always meant to be. Thanos feels his Fate encroaching, knowing that forcing others into bondage would save him.

And he spits out the chunk of putrid god-flesh, and dies with honor.

Up at the surface, the heroes and their army arrive, but the Pit boils over with corruption and foul liquids. It flows out and consumes the Magog, skeletonizing them, and Baal steps forth. He throws Thanos broken body at the heroes' feet, and falls back into his Pit.

Imani rages, and begins to charge to the Pit, but the tribal elder of Elishah stops her. Is this the way a Queen should die? The Magog are gone, and while that isn't a victory, it's enough to ensure the tribes unite. Eithne asks Imani to come back and bury Thanos before doing anything rash, and she grudgingly agrees.

The peace holds with the tribes, and Queen Nyavinghi's mini-nation begins to take shape. Former slaves in Khem come together to build a tomb for Thanos, with carvings of broken shackles on top, and a relief of Thanatos outside. The heroes separate to mourn. 

Akala goes south to the Broken City of Ankhat, and is present when it crashes to the ground. Many people die, but she is able to be of assistance, and more to the point, to learn from the tragedy.

Imani, too, suffers tragedy - her father Desu is killed in battle in Nubia. She travels there to bury and to mourn him.

Eithne goes back to Hesperia and her lover Sora, and for the next year takes on the life of a farmer, eschewing magic and heroism. 

The heroes are apart for 16 months, and during that time hear rumors of a ghostly ship rising from the waves and drifting aimlessly around the Saharan Sea. What this means for them, if anything, remains to be seen on their next adventure.

Atlantis: Unite the Tribes!

Last night was Atlantis, here we go!

Our heroes' next project is to bring together some of the most populous of the tribes of Zin, in order to negotiate a bit of land for the Mercenary Queen in the southern part of the Zin wilderness. They therefore set out from Khem and send emissaries to the tribes of Elishah, Shagar, Tubal, Danan, and Javan. 

They get back kind of a mixed bunch of responses. Elishah is happy to attend a gathering and responds enthusiastically. Shagar is more guarded, but willing to attend. The Danan are busy making war on the nation of Yalak in the northern part of Zin and aren't interested in leaving. Tubal fires arrows at the approaching emissaries and drives them off; they'll probably need a more direct approach. But by far the worst is what's left of the emissary to the tribe of Javan.

One member of the emissary delegation survives, and he returns, horribly traumatized, with a bag containing the heads of the rest of the delegation. In the mouth of one of the heads is a note: "Send more." He explains that they never reached the Javan. They were ambushed by the outcast tribe of Magog, set up, slaughtered, and he was forced to sit in a tent and listen to the rest of them being butchered and eaten. He begs Eithne to conjure something to make the memories of this fade. She can't (rather, she could, but the magic wouldn't last long), but makes an alchemical potion to help him sleep without nightmares. 

The heroes confer. Obviously they're not going to let this stand, but they need to approach the Tubal as well. They decide to split up - Eithne and Imani will go to find the Javan (since doing so is likely to involve a fight with the Magog), while Thanos and Akala will bring the invitation to the Tubal personally. Eithne and Imani travel alone, while Thanos and Akala bring a contingent of soldiers from Queen Nyavinghi's army and a gift of metal weapons for the Tubal tribe.

The two groups travel north together for a ways, and then split. Imani and Eithne head east through the foothills, and in the distance see a copse of trees - unusual in this part of Zin. When they get closer, they realize that those aren't trees, they're wooden spikes, on which are impaled human beings. There are prayers to some nameless god written on the base. Imani can't quite translate it, but the gist is clear - these are sacrifices. 

Imani checks the area and determines that the Magog have a good four days head start and they seem to be heading in the opposite direction, so the two of them press on. They make camp and Imani spots people in the shadows, watching them. She has Eithne conjure up a ward and make it obvious, and then steps forward and bellows a challenge to whoever's waiting in the dark - step out and be recognized by the Queen of Gorgos!

Two teenagers step forward, terrified and tired. One of them, in broken Khem, says that his family is trapped in the caves up the mountain. He gestures to indicate that the Magog have set up camp nearby, and are using the caves as a larder.

Imani and Eithne head up the mountain path and see Magog encampments, and smell cooking meat (don't think about it too hard). Imani has Eithne cast a ward on her, making her impervious (or nearly so) to wooden weapons, since the Magog generally don't use metal. She then has Eithne conjure something big and impressive.

Eithne, rising to that challenge, creates a big rolling ball of fire and sends it crashing down the mountain at the Magog. It's not moving fast enough that they can't get out of the way, but it does what it's intended to do - distract them. Imani identifies the leader (it's easy, he's the one with the most impressive hat) and charges from the dark, impaling him on her horns and throwing him down the mountain. 

The battle is swift - the Magog's weapons bounce right off Imani's warded hide, and Eithne throws lightning into their midst and scatters them. The Magog flee, and the Javan emerge from the cave, very much willing to join the heroes' convocation.

Meanwhile, Thanos and Akala travel west and come up over a rise to a battle! The Tubal are attacking the Togarmoh, a smaller tribe, probably intent on taking their livestock. The heroes debate just letting this play out, but then they realize that the Tubal might sell some of the Togarmoh as slaves and Thanos just isn't letting that happen. He conjures up the illusion of an immense firebird in the sky and sends it screaming over the battle, and then Akala lands and demands a stop to hostilities.

Some tense negotiations follow, but fortunately the heroes were planning on delivery a gift of metal weapons anyway so they have some bargaining power. The Togarmoh agree to come with the heroes and guide them back to southern Zin unharmed, while the Tubal agree to take part in the convocation in exchange for some livestock and the weapons. Everyone returns to Nyavinghi's camp, where the Elishash and the Shagar are already present.

Over the next couple of weeks, the tribes in attendance take part in games and revelry while the leaders of the five tribes (Elishah, Shagar, Tubal, Togarmoah, and Javan) confer with Queen Nyavinghi and the heroes over points. The tribes are generally willing to allow the Queen to take some land here, but they all have their own little demands. They also ask if the Magog could be destroyed as part of this arrangement, and the heroes consider that wiping out a tribe of demon-worshipping cannibals is pretty on brand for them. 

The elders of Elishah tell them that in the past when the Magog have come up against determined and stronger foes, they've fallen back to the Burning Pit. This Pit, a literal hell-hole in central Zin, belches up poisonous smoke, and people who enter emerge...changed. Apparently Magog tribesman even gouge out their eyes before entering the Pit, as a symbol to their devotion to their dark god, and come out again as monsters. Unraveling the mystery of the Pit (and/or shutting it down) would certainly cement the heroes' status with the Tribes of Zin.

Akala confers with her companions, and then retires to her tent and prays to Orunmila for answers about the Pit. She learns that the Pit contains "the Breath of Hell," and that anyone who enters will change. Some change into monsters, some merge into flesh abominations, some simply melt away entirely. No Jinn has ever entered, however; Orunmila says that so much chaos together might "have an effect upon the world." Getting the bottom would be a matter of resisting the changes, or just accepting them and becoming whatever the Pit turns you into. Destroying the Magog would require killing them all (and are the heroes really willing to put 300 men, women, and children to the sword, even if they are demon-worshiping cannibals?), but destroying or closing the Pit would break their power.

Akala shares all of this information with the others, and they decide to ride out to the Pit and see if they can solve its mystery. But Thanos leaves Thanatos behind and rides out early, in secret, pursuing some destiny known only to himself...

Character Creation: Arcanum 30th Anniversary Edition

Live and learn. 

The Game: Arcanum 30th Anniversary Edition
The Publisher: ZiLa Games
Degree of Familiarity: More than I thought, I guess, but still not much
Books Required: Just the one

I started playing RPGs in 1985, and it was pretty much all Marvel Superheroes (from TSR) all the time until maybe 1987 or so. At that point I started buying (well, obtaining, since it's not like I had much of a revenue stream at 13) other RPGs, and my criteria for buying them was mostly: 1) does the cover look cool? 2) Does the back cover text sound cool? and 3) Does this game require me to buy a gazillion books? It's that last one that kept me away from GURPS, D&D, and even Vampire for a long time (I mean, not Vampire in 1987, obviously, but the principle was the same in 1994 when I started looking at WoD games). 

All of this to say: I probably saw Arcanum kicking around Mind Games in the mid/late 80s or early 90s, if I did, the plain black book with the big pentacle on the front might have turned me off just because it didn't mean anything to me. (Also: Man, ballsy move to publish an RPG with a fucking pentacle on the front as the Satanic Panic was still going on!) And now I have this 30th Anniversary Edition as part of some bundle or other, and started reading it this morning.

And I was surprised to realize that Arcanum was the precursor to Atlantis: The Second Age! (I mean, it's mentioned in the Atlantis book, but it's in a sidebar and it's easy to miss.) Khepera owns the rights to the Atlantis setting, but there's still a lot of stuff in Arcanum that looks familiar (some of the races, the geography, the history...). 

But man, this book. It's 366 pages. Four (4) of them are setting. Well, in fairness, the race and class sections do give us a little setting, but mostly this comes off as "here are some races and classes, go play D&D." There's no attention given to style or genre of play, and the mythology basis for the races that are included are all over the place (dwarves! Elves! Selkies! Aesir! Halfings!). But then there's also shit like this:

I mean, minor in the scheme of things, but wtf? That's not even counting the rules for addiction and abuse of drugs. But my favorite "huh?" moment in the book is this one in the "what is an RPG" section:

The word "schizophrenia" appears nowhere else in the book. It's not contextualized in a later paragraph any better. The only thing I can think of it is that it's a clumsy way to say "the GM wears a lot of hats lol" but like...what a shit way to say that. Oh, also, that "what is an RPG" section is 3 pages. The setting section, remember, is four (4). 

OK, well, this character ain't gonna make itself, and I want to do game prep for Pugmire. 

OK, first we choose a race! Hmm. Oh, I don't know. I love selkies, but these ain't selkies. They're just aqua-people (seriously, why the hell call them "selkies" if they don't have any of the mythological underpinnings?). Let's make a Zephyr. They have wings, that's pretty dope. 

Oh, you know, it occurs to me that when I made a character for Atlantis, I made an Owl-Man assassin. Well, I'll stick with Zephyr, but I'll pick a different kind of profession, how 'bout. Anyway, for being a Zephyr I get:

I can see fine details within a mile, good grief. Next up, we pick a Profession. I'm limited to the ones listed, which is stupid, but whatevs. Let's not do Warrior, Bounty Hunter, or Hunter since those are a little too similar to my Owl-Man...oh, hang on, Necromancer? I do love me some necromancy. Oh, wait, hang on, they're evil by default. So why are they PC options? Jesus.

OK, well, what's that leave? What's "Enchanter?" Can I summon up fire without flint or tinder? Maybe. Ugh, but I don't know if I feel like fucking with the magic system. What's that leave? What about Corsair? Eh, pirates, and they really lean into the "rogue" side of things. Blah. You know, I think Shaman would be fun. I have visions of my guy kind of flying up to meet the sunrise, silhouetted with the wings outstretched. That does mean I have to do magic, but I'll figure it out.

Next we choose an alignment. As a shaman I don't have restrictions there. I often lean toward Chaotic Good, and for a nature-focused character that makes sense anyway.

Background. Doesn't seem like these are restricted, so could I pick City Dweller? Seems like I could. Sure, Shamans seem like Barbarian would be a better fit, but I'd like to mix things up. So we'll say my guy was raised in a city, but somewhere along the way he had a "Constantine on the road" moment, left the city, rededicated himself to the deities of the natural world, and moved out into the sticks. I get two Skills from the City Dweller list, so let's take Language and Haggling (this guy maybe ran a stall in the city's market or something). 

Renown...hrm. It says I start with 1-4 Renown, but there doesn't seem to be a way to determine that. In the example of chargen, the GM has the player roll a d4. I don't see this guy as having much, though, so let's just say 1 and move on with our lives. 

Attributes! Oh, lort. I get 2d6+100 points to throw around (thank you so much for slimming this down, Jerry). I roll a 4 on 2d6, ugh. 104 points to throw around. 

OK, so, I can't go lower than 6 or the Profession minimum (whichever is higher), and I can't go higher than racial maximum. My max in Str and Con is 14, but everything else has high maximums (18 or more). I have to put at least 12 into Intelligence, 15 into Will, and 14 into Perception. Let's start there. That's 41 right there. 

15 is the break point for when you start getting bonuses, good to know. Let's start at the top. I'll put 12 into Strength (53), 15 into Dexterity (68), 15 into Speed (83), 14 into Con (97)...ooh, hell, too much. OK. Let's bump Strength down to 10, Dex down to 12, Speed down to 12. That gives me 89 spent. 15 left. I'll put 13 of those into Charisma and bump Perception to 15 and Intelligence to 13. That gives me:

Strength 10
Dexterity 12
Speed 12
Constitution 14
Intelligence 13
Will 15
Charisma 13
Perception 15

Hit points! Con + 2 because I'm an untrained fighter, so 16. 

Saves! I get a +1 to Will and Perception saves. Easy.

Encumbrance! Fucking seriously? 50lbs, because I'm a zephyr and they're weak.

Wealth! Roll a d100 and that gives me...Flourishing! 10d10+200 monies! Jesus. 258. 

That's really everything except the "details," you know, that pesky backstory stuff that got shunted to the end. So sure, let's do that.

Hylee Mellezho was a zephyr living in Atlantis, and was doing very well buying, selling, and trading goods. He never did anything really illegal, but wasn't above making shady deals. And then one day he made a deal that was a little too shady and wound up getting grabbed and stuffed in a box on the riverfront while some very tough Nethermen decided what to do with him. 

The box he was stuff in was facing east and had airholes in it, and so Hylee watched the sun rise over the water. And in doing so, he felt a sense of peace that he had never felt before. The scents and sounds of the city were gone, and he watched the sunlight burn away the morning mist. When the Nethermen eventually let him out (it was all a big misunderstanding), Hylee liquidated his goods and left the city. He traveled in the outlands for weeks, and finally met a shaman greeting the sun. Hylee asked her to take him on as an apprentice, and spent the next four years living under her tutelage. 

Hylee has coppery skin, flaming red hair (it used to be dull and brown, but has gotten brighter as he's lived outside), and brilliant yellow eyes. He's not interested in violence - he'll hunt, sure, but he's most focused on reverence for the natural world. He has, let's be honest, an unbearably naive view of the wilds, even after his apprenticeship, and his mentor has never quite managed to instill the whole "red in tooth and claw" thing into him, but she's now released him to go and find a path. So he'll figure it out, or something will eat him, either's good. 

Done!