#found out about this from a pamphlet handed out to me at a vigil organized by local Palestinian Americans

[nappingpaperclip]

PLEASE REPOST

MARCH ON WASHINGTON AND CENTRAL LONDON FOR GAZA

1:00PM Saturday January 13th, 2024 @ The National Mall 1600 Constitution Ave. NW, Washington DC

12:00PM Saturday January 13th, 2024 in Central London

Please wear a KN-95 mask, and wear layered nondescript clothing and cover your face/hair! I have seen many people use keffiyehs for this. People will be recording and taking pictures!

Dress for cold weather but know marching warms you up quickly, so dress in layers you can remove and carry without uncovering your face and hair. Ideally you should bring a backpack to carry food, water, first aid, ID, etc. It may be good to bring multiple or removable parts of your outfit if you plan on walking from your residence or car.

Please blur out peoples faces before posting to social media!

Bigotry & hatred will not be tolerated.

Even if you are unable to attend, please reblog and repost the graphics to other social medias to get the word out. You may have a follower or friend who can attend.

If you live outside of DC or Central London: talk to your local organizations! They may be able to organize transportation to this event. For buses to DC, you will likely have to pay a fee, but it is probably going to be cheaper and safer than driving to DC and parking in their $40-$50/hour parking garages. Also look into Amtrak, Greyhound buses, trains, or other means of transportation.

[cursewoodrecap]

Session 20: Super Exciting Library Adventure

We fight so many monsters in this one you guys.

Last time on the Cursewood: We ended up in the headquarters of the Cursebreaker Knights, which also turned out to be a vampire’s house. We were also given literature on how to care for large reptiles in cold climates. Ser Boris was concerned.

In the reading room at Castle Hoeska, Valeria shows Ser Brigid some of the arcane components we found while looting the spooky circus. “We have people who can examine it. Ludwig’s lovely descendant Isadora might be able to do an arcane analysis. She keeps to the library wing; she’s a mage and researcher of considerable knowledge and skill. We’ll have someone take you there.”

“Do not traverse the castle without a guide,” Ludwig warns. “This place is…tricky sometimes.”

“Does it also have outer space in it?” Shoshana asks, well aware of the Key’s nonsense.

“To be honest, my descendants have layered a lot of enchantments on it. It’s constructed on an arcane nexus, so the enchantments can intersect in odd ways. It respects me; it’s mine. But you are outsiders. I must confess that while I am the master of this place, I have perhaps not fully mastered it.”

The DM lets on that this is a Taint Free Zone, ironically. Already occupied! By hipster ghosts, they were undead before it got all popular.

Ser Quentin is waiting for us out in the hallway. “I must ask: how fares Mornheim and Lady Aubrey?”

“…I understand they’ve been better,” Clem allows.

“Please, as much detail as you would give me,” he says, uncharacteristically sincere. “I made a promise to carry a burden that her father could not. In my own way, I consider myself responsible for her. Therefore, I must ask how is she faring. She has been forced into a situation she was never prepared for, though she seems to be handling it admirably.”

“I mean, she did glass me in the face, and is kind of maybe drinking heavily? But considering the circumstances, that’s pretty good.”

We give him an update on Mornheim, and explain Lady Rosalind’s druidic ritual.

“We have yet to make friendly contact with druids,” he muses. “Ser Boris has tried, but they are a reclusive bunch. I knew Lady Rosalind for many years before this Curse began. To think she was hiding such a secret from us all…”

“A cynical man might say reclusiveness is a lie that druids find convenient,” Gral observes.

“Perhaps. I must confess that until today I assumed I had never met a druid in my life. If they do in fact operate in more populated areas in secret, there are likely far more than we anticipated, with much more complex motives…”

Maybe that’s not a bad thing, since they seem to be fighting the Curse. We describe how the artist’s Key ritual was disrupted by a druid, and what we know about the druid we met in Bad Herzfeld. Unfortunately, we know druids are just as susceptible to corruption as the rest of us, since the cult leader Zelig in Bad Herzfeld had once been a druid as well.

“Fear of corruption within their own ranks? Certainly an issue I couldn’t possibly be familiar with,” snarks Quentin tiredly. “Speaking of which! Sgt Haxan! I have some bad news for you.”

“Uh. Okay?”

“As you know, I have been following the members of the Red Hand who are active in Valdia. My agents in Schotzengrad spotted your former comrade Sergeant Rusalka leading a mixed group of Red Hand veterans and others into the city. A few days later, there was an attempted break-in at the Kevan embassy. The ambassador was unharmed; he had received a warning ahead of time, and had taken precautions. The Ambassador was secured, though half a dozen guards were killed.”

“Were any of the intruders apprehended or killed?”

“No. Three intruders were discovered by the additional patrols and arcane wards, but they fled when the Greencloaks arrived on scene, accompanied by a dozen additional soldiers.”

“All things considered, that’s a bit of a relief,” Clem admits.

“The same night, our agents lost track of Rusalka and her group, and have been unable to pick up the trail again.”

“That’s…less of a relief.”

“Any insights you’d like to share into their tactics?”

Clem sighs. “If you’ve already lost track of her, you’re not gonna find her. She’s an experienced rogue; I’m surprised that even with forewarning she was unable to slip past the guards. Aside from keeping up the increased vigilance, there’s nothing else I can really tell you.”

“Very well. I will redouble my efforts on that front. I’m considering going to Schotzengrad personally to follow up.”

“I’d be astounded if there was no follow up attack.”

“My thoughts exactly. I assume their assassins left largely because they were not properly prepared for the increased security. They were caught by elven veterans of the Ascension War, a particular group focused on special ops deep within cultist territory. They have some techniques that Rusalka might not have been aware of, including their methods of securing an area. But now that Rusalka’s aware of that, the next attempt may be more successful. As always, I would appreciate assistance, but I understand if you have other priorities.”

We have reached a central room hung with tapestries and stuffed hunting trophies, where Ser Boris’s dogs are lounging in front of the central fire. Bjorn and Ingborn are sitting there as well, playing a game with a bunch of rocks carved with runes. Valeria initially thinks it’s her favorite game, Man-go, but the board’s the wrong shape and everything is in Jotunn. Valeria immediately wants to learn how to play.

Ser Boris, to the dismay of several servants, has spread out a mess equipment and is performing some sort of science. He’s squeezing foul smelling juices into various containers and generally making a stench.

“Ah hello! Yes come in!” he greets us. “How is commander?”

“She’s pretty cool.”

“Yes. Kyr Argent, over here please.” He hands her a pamphlet. “I write quick instructions. My Valdian is not great but I do not believe you speak Elven. Read this for your beastie. And if you would, smell?” He lifts a bottle, and Valeria dutifully sniffs.

“Ugh! Gross! What is that?!”

“Ah! Bits of Shusva!”

“E-excuse me?”

“The fiend! I have distilled scent!”

“You…certainly have,” she agrees ruefully.

“I am surprised you did not recognize, after it bit you so much. But tomorrow, I will track it back to lair and end it once and for all. Wounded it much today, yes? Tomorrow I will assemble hunting party. We will be able to reopen road!”

Gral asks Boris about what the Shusva’s weaknesses might be. He’s not sure. Ser Brigid told Boris it was probably a Shusva, and that there were books available in the library for further research. But Lady Isadora won’t let dogs in the library. “She say no to Xander face! He do the big eyes! She is clearly monster.”

We’re gonna head over to the library, then. Ingborg tells us that’s where we’ll find Lucinius, too. “It’s nice to see him not throwing himself face first into ghost filled tombs, for once. He is not an easy client for a bodyguard. Still, if you’re in there, make sure he eats? He forgets.”

Valeria channels her sister’s party planning instincts and talks to one of the servants about getting some nice spicy food like how you get in Draconia. They sniff about “decadent” foods with too many herbs, but it’ll be a nice taste of home for her and Lucinius.

Lady Isadora apparently has VERY strong feelings about food or dogs in the library, so we’ll have soup sent up to Lucinius’ room and try to drag him away from his research.

With a von Hoesk servant as a guide, we go down some stairs and then up some stairs and then down stairs that look identical to the first ones. Did we go through a basement at one point? But that was when we were like three levels up? This place does not make any kind of geographic sense. Eventually, though, we arrive at a grand doorway labeled Library.

When the door opens, we find ourselves in a tower, with ringlike floors leading upwards and downwards from the entrance. Each floor has shelves of neatly organized books and a small reading area.

A sharp woman in a dark dress levitates up to the floor we’re on, scowling. “I told you, Boris- oh. Are you here for the Professor?!”

We assume this is Isadora the arcanist. “We wanted to talk with you first-“

“I might have to talk to YOU. He’s taking books between the FLOORS, I have a SYSTEM. And who are you anyway? You’re not dressed like those damnable knights. You’re dressed like a completely different sort of damnable knights. I have no idea what you’re supposed to be.”

“Clem Haxan, a damnable knight, apparently.”

“Kyr Valeria Argent, a damnable Knight of the Rose, at your service!”

“I am Gral Omokk’du, a bard in service of Duke Shieldeater.”

“Uh, I’m Shoshana, I just hang out with these guys?”

“I am Isadora von Hoesk. This is my library – my family’s, currently mine, despite a certain LIZARD who is MESSING UP MY SYSTEM.”

“I mean, you could hire librarians?”

“No, they’d get it wrong. I have a system. I have magic to help keep it organized, but it ASSUMES people FOLLOW THE RULES. I’m informed he is a guest of the castle, so I won’t destroy him where he stands. You, though-“

Valeria interrupts gently. “First of all, I hear you’re an expert in arcane analysis, and I’d be grateful to get your opinion on something.” She hands over the crystal dust from the circus and gives a brief rundown of its origins. “I thought knowing its properties might be of interest to the Cursebreakers?”

“Well since you asked so nicely, I can take a look,” she snaps. “Like I don’t have anything better to do than be a walking Identify spell for Cursebreakers, I’ll be upstairs in my lab, at the top of the tower.”

Gral politely stalls her. “Before you go, can I have directions for proper library procedure? We are helping Ser Boris hunt a Shusva, and we’d like to do some research for him. He can’t, because dogs.”

“Floor 6, demonology. Leave the books you use on the table on that floor. Do not take the books to a different floor. Floors are organized by subject matter, which is a perfectly reasonable system that anyone should be able to understand. It has never occurred to us that somebody would wish to CROSS CONTAMINATE the FLOORS.”

“We’ll, uh, see if we can have a word with Professor Galvan.”

“Please do.” She snaps her fingers. A trapdoor opens at the top of the tower, and she floats up and through.

A helpful guard points us to the library’s Index, which consists of several large tomes.

The index lists an enormous amount of books in an impressive number of languages, categorized by subject matter. There are many books on fiends, outsiders, demonic influences, and the like. Kind of a troubling amount about those subjects, to be honest? No, we don’t want how-to guides!!! But given that we don’t know much about the creature we’re researching, it’s hard to tell which books will specifically have information on the Shusva.

Shoshana goes with Gral to help translate Elvish and Old Valdian. The tanks, meanwhile, will go fetch Lucinius and attempt to cajole him out of the library.

“Can’t you guys just, like. Pick him up? Throw him over your shoulder?” Shoshana asks.

Valeria shakes her head. “We’re not gonna do that.”

“But it would amuse me!”

Looking down through the rings, we see Professor Galvan down on the third floor. In the quiet of the library, we can kinda hear him mumbling to himself down below.

There are staircases and ladders between floors, but it’s a hike down all those stairs. We can see why Isadora levitates around! Valeria has a ring of moon bounce, so she tells Clem she’ll meet her there and hurdles over the railing, landing several floors down with an enormous CLASH BANG CLATTER of armor.

“GOODNESS ME WHAT WHOA OH DEAR ME what’s that?! Hello? Is everyone okay up there?” we hear Lucinius shout.

Shoshana leans over the balcony and does an extremely sarcastic SSSSHHHHH.

We assume Valeria would be blushing, if scales could blush. “I’m fine, I’ll be there in a moment!” she calls, and walks the rest of the way normally.

Lucinius is barely visible behind teetering stacks of literature. “Ah, princess!” he greets Valeria in their native tongue. “Please, sit down!”

“Actually, we had some things we wanted to show you. First, I’d be remiss if failed to let you know that Lady Isadora-“

“Ah, the librarian! So kind, isn’t this place wonderful?”

“She would really rather-“

“She had a copy of the Treatises! The TREATISES! All six volumes! I didn’t think I’d see a copy of this outside Aurentium, and in such good condition! Annotated, even!”

“Isadora would really prefer if you kept the books on same floors they’re shelved on.”

“Oh, dear me. I don’t see why that should be a problem? My work really calls on multiple disciplines…”

“Uh, maybe put them back when you’re done with them?”

He looks around at the stacks and stacks of books spread across the table. “…that might be a difficulty. They should have put a sign up.”

The rules of the library are clearly posted on every floor, in large print, in multiple languages.

“Oh, well, I didn’t have time to read THOSE, this place is far too miraculous!”

We found some very interesting things we’d like to show you. And I managed to get cook to make something Draconian - not as good as what you’d get in Aurentium, I’m sure, but with the same ingredients! C’mon, come back to your chamber to look at some artifacts and eat soup!”

It turns out soup gives advantage on Persuasion. “I suppose I will reach a stopping point shortly,” he admits. “To be honest, I was worried I wouldn’t find any source like this about the history of Valdia. It appears my research before coming to the Greatwood was quite lacking in the intricacies of local culture. Luckily this library is a veritable trove of knowledge! There are some tomes here my colleagues back home would be very jealous of. I don’t know what this von Hoesk family DOES for a living, but they’ve amassed a collection of very fine books! Now, I believe there was soup!” He gathers up some books for the road. “A bit of light reading for my quarters.”

We decide not to tell Isadora, because we’d probably die.

Meanwhile, Gral makes a research investigation with the advantage of Shoshana’s translation help. They find a book that contains information on the Shusva!

There’s a sketch similar to what we saw in the forest. Apparently, they’re formed when a wolf or similar predator becomes engorged with demonic energies and becomes a fiend. Some are purely extraplanar, but most are regular planar creatures that have been corrupted. They’re immune to charm, fright, and poison effects, unfortunately. The book describes an “unwavering hunter and predator that knows no fear and cannot be beguiled or charmed away from its target.”

The book then goes on to describe the proper care and feeding of a Shusva. Due to the charm resistance, they are “remarkably difficult to bind to one’s service.”

Shoshana nods. “Huh, that’s a good tip – wait.”

(Maybe it would be neat to have a cool-ass animal, she thinks…)

On a whim, we also look up dybbuks – if anyone’s gonna know about spooky undead nonsense, it’ll be the von Hoesks. We find “Dybbuks: As Troublesome as they are Terrific” by [bloodstain].

There are plenty of descriptions, but we’re looking for weaknesses. Unfortunately, it looks like there aren’t many. In their true form they have resistance to acid, cold, fire, lightning, thunder, and nonmagical attacks, but their biggest strength is their ability to flee, willingly abandoning their host bodies and disappearing in their ghostly form. Several techniques are described for potentially trapping one within a host body, to prevent it from running when it feels trapped. Unfortunately, we’d probably need a squad of clerics and paladins.

Clem, meanwhile, wandered off when she came across a medical textbook section, and tells us she’ll catch up with us later. Somewhat ominous looking doorway to basement of some sort next to that. Door is stained in some ways you find mildly disturbing. Her scalpel shudders as the ghost of Dr. Wendell emerges.

“I recognize some of these books!” he exclaims with interest. “That one, on the third shelf, the large one. Is that…hah! Check the inside cover, could this be-?”

Clem flips open the book. It’s Lessons from the Plague, by Dr. Leonard Wendell, Sturmhearst University Press. And it’s signed! “To my friend Ludwig. Thank you for your contributions!”

“You knew Ludwig? The vampire?”

“I knew a Ludwig! He helped us acquire Sturmhearst Castle for the school. It was originally intended to be a hospital during the plague, but he was very on board with it becoming a university after the sickness died down! He provided a lot of money and quite a few books, though I only met him a handful of times. Wait. Did you say he was a VAMPIRE?!”

“Dunno if he was when you met him, but he seems like one now.”

“I mean, that would explain a few things,” the ghost admits. “He did seem remarkably unconcerned about catching the plague.”

(“Some people are just LIKE THAT,” yell several Essential Worker players.)

“Baron von Sturm was resistant, then Ludwig met with him and he was totally amenable. I assumed it was just regular old powers of persuasion and a hefty bribe. I didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.”

Clem pages through the medical books, looking through a volume titled “Plant and Animal Toxins of the Greatwood” to see if there’s any way she can use her med kit to craft an antitoxin for the Shusva’s venom. Valeria, meanwhile, looks for Order of the Rose books because they have guides to fighting fiends, but doesn’t find anything she hasn’t read before.

Isadora meets us outside her lab. “Find anything interesting?” Valeria asks.

“Where did you find that powder?” Isadora demands, skipping the pleasantries.

“A cursed circus of the Pale King.”

“Well, it had powdered bone as its central component, interwoven with illusion and enchantment magic. Definitely a ritual component.”

“That tracks with how we saw it used.”

“As far as its magical origin; this is quite old. It hasn’t been crafted with a Valdian arcane technique, but I can’t quite put my finger on its origin. I’d be curious to see the process of how it was created.”

Nothing we didn’t already guess. Valeria still graciously thanks her for taking a look at it.

“Oh, you’re making him leave,” Isadora observes frankly, seeing Lucinius trailing us.

“Ah, Lady Isadora!” he exclaims. “Thank you for your assistance!”

“I literally told you to go away.”

“Yes, but you curated this wonderful place! Please don’t touch anything I left on the table on the third floor, my research is still in progress-”

Isadora stares daggers as we drag him off. At least he didn’t try to bring dogs in here.

We head to Galvan’s room. There’s soup! The soup is EXCELLENT.

“My, it feels like forever since I’ve eaten! I suppose I’ve gotten lost in research again. The history of this region is far more complex than I’d been led to believe from outside accounts, or even interviews with locals. I’m quite sure my hypothesis is correct: the story of the Untameable Greatwood does not quite line up with the historical record! Now, I hear you have a few artifacts you wish to show me?”

Valeria pulls out the Aquilian religious icons we found in the Trollstones.

“Yes, these are very well made. Late imperial period, from the looks of things, but pretty standard. I know plenty of collectors back in Aurentium who’d love them. I have a similar set myself. They’re crafted with a nonstandard technique – I say! These are made of Valdian granite, aren’t they? Most Aquilian icons of the time would be made from marble. Fascinating! Where did you find them?”

“Well, we found them in some ruins. Which were inside even older ruins.”

He nearly knocks over his soup bowl. “What? Where?! What type of ruins, from what century? What was their purpose? Tell. Me. EVERYTHING.”

Valeria, whose mom is apparently way into architecture, knows enough technical terms to describe the site’s features fairly well. Lucinius is baffled. An underground structure? For Aarakocra? We recap the purpose of the Trollstones as well, including Urdemak’s story and the blessing against the undead. He paces around the room, firing off questions.

“The ruins were north of Mornheim, you say? Underground? Within an important local site? Such a thing could not have been done without – hmm. I have some suspicions. How accessible was it for birdfolk? Was the site visible from the sky?”

“Well, no, I assume that by necessity-“

“No, you don’t understand the implications. And within the tomb of a king! A troll king, to be sure, but a king nonetheless. A subterranean important local site had evidence of Aquilian development. This proves what I’ve been suspecting for some time!”

He digs in his satchel excitedly, coming up with a handful of notebooks. He flips roughly through them until he’s pointing emphatically to a specific page, which is covered in incomprehensible doctor handwriting in a language ¾ of us don’t speak.

“The classic story is the Untameable Greatwood. The Aquilians attempted to occupy it and were thrown out by the beasts and wild men and trolls that live here, or did not see the land as valuable enough to wage war for. Similar to what happened to the elves, much more recently! But from what I can tell in my studies, that simply does not add up. The Flying Legions did not leave places unconquered – either they took it or completely destroyed it. As proud as Valdians are of their resistance, there’s no archeological evidence of a large scale Valdian resistance to an Aquilian incursion. Such resistances are often hard to locate – on principle, Oberok would obliterate them; Let the Defeated be Forgotten, so they say. But to do that would require them to subjugate the Greatwood, which they did not! And the Valdian records of the period mention no organized resistance or throwing back Flying Legions. So any Aquilian construction would have required some level of cooperation between the Valdians on the ground and Aquilians in the sky!

“And now you tell me of a full installation constructed within a significant cultural site undiscoverable from the air. Now, we saw this before with the tattooed mummy you described to me. He could have been dismissed as an outlier. There are always those who choose to collaborate with their invaders; his tattoos could have been a symbol of local cooperation with his Aquilian superiors. Although once again, I found no mention of such individuals in the histories, which is in itself very odd. If the Empire was good at anything, it was very good at rewarding those who showed the proper deference. The fact that he is tattooed in Old Valdian is another puzzle. The Aquilians considered themselves superior to all others; a linguistic fusion like this would dilute the perfection of Oberok.”

“If they built this place inside a sacred site, it must have been more than a single local assisting them; somebody showed them this place and allowed them entry. What was the structure used for?”

We explain the significance of Urdemak’s tomb, and the blessing of a demigoddess so no dead would rise. Something had been contained in there, and sometime in the last 15 years, there was a “containment breach” from the Aquilian structure.

We show him the scroll we found in the tomb. He translates it for us:

“First Prisoner, Item #5

Containment Procedure: Keep submerged within waters blessed by local spirits with protection against undeath. This should suppress the influence of the Prisoner.

As per request by [unintelligible], we are required to keep disruption of the site to a minimum.

Description: A silver crown, a powerful ritual object of The First Prisoner.

Let the Vanquished be forgotten, let the Victorious reign eternal.

Glory to Oberok”

“Is this ‘Prisoner’ a thing you know of?” Valeria asks, hoping maybe our Curse has answers in ancient Aquilian lore.

He shakes his head. “Well, there’s plenty of mention of prisoners of war, criminals – Oberok, as the god of law, was very into prisons, but not in this context. This document is written with the assumption the reader knows what is meant by ‘First Prisoner.’”

A “powerful ritual object,” huh. Fuck, did we leave that shit in a foot locker? We could probably keep the crown better contained by submerging it in holy water, Valeria thinks, but we’d need a lot. She’s pretty sure she could get a crew of clerics together, but it’d take time. Maybe all those clerics could help with our dybbuk problem.

There’s some other stuff on the scroll Lucinius can work on, seeing if he can cross reference other Aquilian and Old Valdian texts to look for more containment areas. “I suppose I could put a pause on some of my research to look into this; the Cursebreakers have graciously allowed me use of their library, so it stands to reason I should contribute knowledge to their cause!”

Lucinius grills us about everything we saw in the ruins, but eventually it gets late and he’s clearly just come off of at least a fifteen hour research binge. We let him get some rest and head back to the common area for guests, where another goliath has joined Ingborg and Bjorn at their board game, chatting to them in Jotun. He’s far scrawnier than the two berserker bodyguards, though by human standards he’s still enormous. He’s also wearing a familiar bird-beaked mask, which means he’s almost certainly the Sturmhearst professor that Brigid told us about. Assuming that whoever has the most stones in their cup has the most points, the professor is winning handily against Ingborg. Meanwhile, Ser Boris is asleep by the fire in a pile of dogs.

As the game ends and the goliaths exchange a friendly punch to the shoulder, Bjorn notices us. “How is Professor Galvan?”

“He enjoyed the soup!”

“Good. I worry. Although I will admit it is much easier to guard him if he stays here. Tell me you did not tell him about a fascinating monster-filled pit to jump into?”

Valeria grimaces. “Oh we, uh, definitely did that.”

“Is he going to seek it out tonight?”

“Probably not? We asked him to do more reading.”

“Then I am going for a drink,” Bjorn declares decisively. He and Ingborg head off together, presumably to wherever they keep the liquor around here.

“Hallo!” the professor greets us, in our DM’s most half-assed Swedish Chef accent.

“Hi! Kyr Valeria Argent, at your service!”

“Professor Hjalmar Bjork, of the Sturmhearst College of Engineering!”

Bjork has a supersized Handy Haversack, which looks like it’s been mostly unpacked. He has several heavy pieces of metal equipment inscribed with the logo of the Valdian Tree Company and the Sturmhearst University crest. Notably, some sort of short-barreled musket with TC etched on the side and scorch marks around the barrel, with a bulbous metal tank at the other end. There’s a boiled leather helmet inscribed with faintly glowing Jotunn runes, as well as all manner of bombs and some kind of weird gauntlet thing.

He sees us checking out the goods. “Yes, I wanted to stop by and offer the latest inventions of Sturmhearst to the Cursebreakers! I am here to demonstrate our newest innovations, to see if they might purchase or fund future development. I wanted to bring a few with me into the library today, but the woman there-”

“The librarian has opinions about that, yes.”

Clem squints at the gadgets. “By any chance, did you build flamethrowers for a Professor Ulmus?”

“Ah yes, the TC Mark 2’s, with the big packs! This is a Mark 3. They’re named after my Ventallan colleague, Don Toretto Chikal. How is Professor Ulmus, by the by?”

“Oh, she’s doing great.”

“Good to hear! I have designed many weapons. Weapons are not my passion, but they are good business and there is much need. And what good is engineering if not to fill a need? Unfortunately, the Cursebreakers were not very interested in the invention I was most excited about.”

He pulls out the leather helmet, the one with runes on it.

“You’re familiar with the Curse, how it appears to corrupt the mind and exploits extreme emotionality? Are you familiar with the Calm Emotions spell? We put that into the device, to make the wearer resistant to fear and charm effects, so they can resist the corruption. I call it the Mood Cap! Our first test subject was subjected to many terrifying and exciting stimuli with no reaction! I feel the idea has a lot of promise. It just requires a bit of funding for further development, you know, it’s theoretically perfectly safe once we figure out how to tone down the effect!”

That sounds concerning.

“Usually Calm Emotions is cast on multiple people; the runes we originally used turned out to be too strong for one individual for an extended period of exposure.”

“You just sit around doing nothing forever, huh?” Gral asks.

“Oh, the test subject is fine, he mostly recovered after 48 hours. He still occasionally spaces out sometimes. The Dean of Medicine has taken him under observation and expects a full recovery. It will be perfectly safe, once the kinks are worked out! Sadly, Lord Ludwig disagreed, and he’s the one with the money.”

(We don’t like the Mood Cap, but we do liek it.)

“Did you have any trouble traveling here?” Valeria asks politely.

“Yes, but I have a large construct as bodyguard. I built it myself! I prefer things I constructed with my own two hands. And the hands of several assistants and grad students, admittedly. Travel is not especially difficult with those things. To be honest, it’s good to get away from Sturmhearst for a while.”

That piques our interest. “Oh? How are things at Sturmhearst?”

“They’re….fine…” he equivocates.

Everything is definitely not fine.

“Nothing strange is going on.”

Valeria hmms. “That sounds unusual for Sturmhearst, to be honest. Ser Brigid told us to ask you about some strange findings?”

“Oh, she told you. I have to be careful; the walls have ears.”

“Like, literally?” Shoshana asks. “Because I’ve seen stranger.”

“Well. Hmm. The last few times I have been at the university, a package arrived for me. What do you know about Sturmhearst?”

“You have bird masks!”

“Yes, we do wear those.”

“We have a scalpel that helped found it!”

There’s a long pause, while we watch formulas and the volume of a cone float in front of his bird mask. “….okay.”

He presses on. “I received a package on my desk. It contained several equations, a strange device, and some metallic samples, with a note asking for my opinions. The device was incomprehensible, but the equations and samples have been invaluable in my work. The note was signed by Headmaster Trevor Twombly, who has been on sabbatical the last two years. I have only been working for them for the past five years or so, when I was invited as an expert in artificing – a runesmith, as we say in my homeland.

“A few years after I began my tenure, the headmaster went on this unplanned sabbatical completely out of the blue. I have not seen him since. Since then, his second, the Dean of Medicine, Elana Damrosch, has run things. I asked where he had gone, as I wished to discuss funding, and I was deflected, told he was simply traveling. I asked for an opportunity to send a Sending, and was informed that it would be difficult, but they would try. No response. Now, there are any number of explanations for that, especially with the Curse mucking things up.

“So you can understand my surprise when several of my colleagues and I received these odd packages. They’re all distinct, but similar enough that they seem to come from the same source. Since then, I have received three packages of things useful in my work! This,” he gestures to the TC Mark 3 flamethrower, “contains an autonomous refueling mechanism based off one of the samples I was given. The Mood Cap, too – I am applying my own rune lore, but using techniques I’d never seen before I received these formulas.

“As well as making my sales pitch, I came here to use the library for research; Sturmhearst is not a college of magic, though we do make use of it. This library has a much deeper knowledge of the arcane. I’m trying to figure out where Twombly got these techniques. Lady Isadora has seen nothing like them.”

“Do you mind if I take a look at one of those samples?” Valeria asks.

He pulls out a few bits and bobs. One is a metal plate in an odd shape. “The purpose of this one is obvious,” he says, which it is not. Shoshana notices the odd way the metal shimmers in the candlelight, though – just the same as the huge wrench we pulled out of the spaceship in the Key zone.

“And there is this!” he says, pulls out another object, a rectangle with several buttons on it. “This is a fascinating device. My analysis indicates the use of electricity!” (One player guesses a tv remote. It is, indeed, a graphing calculator.) “It can do math – some sort of calculating engine. Very useful in my work. I have had to translate symbols into actual numbers; the characters aren’t an alphabet any of our researchers have seen before. But I have spent long time with device and have been able to determine its function!” Valeria immediately detects magic and uses her divine sense on it. It does not ping them, because it is a calculator.

“If Headmaster Twombly is away, traveling, then where are these coming from? Dean Damrosch says he must be shipping them in – I enquired in the mail room, but nothing from the headmaster has come in. What’s more, I was experimenting with an arcane surveillance system, which indicated that a single individual, who was not fully humanoid, did enter my office and drop off a package. I told Dean Damrosch this, and she told me not to worry, that perhaps my device was malfunctioning. My device did not malfunction! I had tested it thoroughly!”

Valeria pulls out our adamantine wrench to show him the strange metal. He pecks it with the beak of his mask, which is tipped in metal. “This is the same material as one of the samples! Where did you find this?”

“Uhhhh. A very cursed house.”

“Here in Valdia?”

“Yes…and also no. It’s complicated.”

“I am very intelligent. I have a degree and a mask,” he points out.

Valeria grimaces. “Well, I’m not sure if I’m intelligent enough to explain. How familiar are you with the different ways the Curse manifests?”

“Not at all. I am an engineer.”

Shoshana awkwardly tries to explain the in-between spaces created by the Key, and how they link to other worlds with other logic. The space between, Gral tells him, is enlightening but toxic to the mind.

“Perhaps the Headmaster is using these portals you describe, then? That’s actually a bit of a relief. To be honest, I suspected that the Dean had killed the Headmaster and was doing some sort of elaborate cover-up.”

Something worrying has occurred to Gral, given that Sturmhearst is apparently having Key shenanigans. “Since you wear masks all the time, would you immediately notice if someone had more eyeballs than normal?”

“…No? I suppose that would be an odd thing not to notice. This habit of masks – I’m surprised how much Sturmhearst has adhered to it; I understand it is a tradition from the school’s origin as plague hospital. I suppose it’s become a symbol of our profession!”

“Okay, but like. Could you TELL if someone had too many eyeballs. Especially in places where eyeballs don’t usually go.”

“Well!” he says, clearly a little unsettled by the question, and noticeably not answering. “Perhaps I might try to stay at this castle for a bit. I may want to stay away from Sturmhearst for a while.”

“I mean, has other weird stuff been appearing at Sturmhearst besides the packages?”

“Well, there have been stories of things in the catacombs. Experiments that have escaped, that sort of thing. And as long as I have studied there, the hallways have been a bit illogical to navigate – rather like this castle, in fact.”

“…Is that normal for Sturmhearst, or what?”

“My understanding of the school – I am a recent arrival, after all – is that until recently, it was substantially less odd. Their work was more practical, less experimental. I admit my own work has advanced by leaps and bounds with the insights from these packages; I’m doing far more experimental work of my own than I ever have before. But monsters in the basement? That’s relatively new. If it had to happen anywhere, though, Sturmhearst is certainly much better armed than any other university I’ve visited…”

“Speaking of weapons, is there perhaps any chance you might be willing to part with a flamethrower for a few brave adventurers fighting the Curse?” Clem inquires hopefully

“Well, I did come here with intent to sell. The Cursebreakers were not interested, so I suppose I could part with a mark 3. You would like a demonstration, yes?”

He provides us a rather exciting demonstration of the flamethrower out in the courtyard, unfortunately for several training dummies, spouting off facts and stats about its refueling capabilities and its range and how reasonably the fuel is priced. Clem’s counting her gold.

(Bonus: Did you find Professor Bjork’s – or should I say, Birch’s – starters? Toretto Chikal = Torchic; Tree Co. = Treecko; Mood Cap = Mudkip.)

It’s late, so we head up to bed. We are waited upon by a few of the von Hoesk servants. Clem, Gral, and Shoshana are absolutely unused to this level of luxury, and amazed that there are people who actually live like this. Valeria is like finally, some civilization.

The next morning, Ser Boris kicks down our door at the crack of dawn, blowing a hunting horn. As we all groan and retreat under the covers, we cut session for now.