Lost Galmagia Game Write Up session 1.1

Aethra Chatoyant [Magic-User 1 – apprentice of a famous master / elf-sister]; Ayleton the Cat [Familiar 1 – animal familiar / ship cat of unknown port]; Oland [Rogue 1 – Spy / personal keyword not yet defined]; Dungar [Dwarf 1 – Dwarf-raised / Treasure Hunter]; Brömm [Dwarf 1 – Dwarf-raised / Bonded Clockwork Guilds-dwarf]; Azric [Rogue 1 – Assassin / leatherworker]; Richard Stockworth [Hairfoot Halfling 1 – Satyr / Tavernkeeper & Cook]

It’s the week before the first day of spring in Amethyst Spire – once the first of the human refugee camps in the flight from the Giant’s Shadow, now a three-ward town above the snowline that looks much like a wild west boomtown in wood and tarp construction. The PCs are making their final plans for an insane venture – crossing back into the Giants Shadow to recover treasures lost under Galmagia – that they are the first people to contemplate in the 25 years since the giants flattened it. The bulk of our party are people gathered by Aethra to aid her personal goal of recovering the magic of her master's master, Sregor Viridian. To this end she has employed the services of Oland and Dungar, who is looking to recover knowledge from the lost cities ostensibly to repay the dwarves for their charity to the humans.

Brömm is a bonded Guildsdwarf who had argued long and hard to the remaining members of his guild to mount an expedition to the lost cities to recover the clockwork secrets under there. Ultimately the guild financed just his going, and he latched onto Aethra’s group for strength in numbers. Azric just joined the group, her motivation and background are undisclosed. Richard has been hanging out with the adventurers as they made their plans after hours at the Axe & Thistle, feeding them with whatever scraps are left from the kitchen. At the 11^th hour he invited himself along.

The group shared what rumors they had managed to acquire: everyone knows that the city was built into 8 wards (Acolyte, Ancestors, Mages, Moon, Nobles, Park , Swords, and Trade) radiating out from the canal, and it has undercity trade roads. There is apparently some life there as on clear nights the denizens of the Axe & Thistle can see lights moving around the southernmost canal-side of the ruins. Aethra had consulted an Ophidomancer to learn that dawn of the first day of Spring was the most auspicious day to begin. Richard added helpfully that groups – some nomads who live under the Giants Dictate, but mostly clans of Orcs & Ogres or tribes of Centaurs – sweep across the North Vale in summer and fall; sometimes you can see them camp in the city. Spring seems safest to avoid such encounters.

Oland rolled out the maps of Galmagia’s surface level and the overlay of the Custom’s House roads. Many thanks are given to the resourceful rogue as the group contemplates pathways, assuming they can get to the road network and it is still intact. Brömm and Dungar relate that cities of Lost Tarmalania hold many mechanism and clockworks that were either never known to the dwarvish guilds (to their chagrin) or were lost when the Giant’s Shadow fell. Treasures of design and ingenuity abound under there. Aethra expands on that: as a magic-user she knows the cities of Lost Tarmalania used bound spirits of air and water to drive their great machines. Unlike standard runes, these can be corrupted over time, becoming angry and violent. Be wary of clockworks unless you know exactly what powers it.

Azric and Oland both know that those condemned of crimes in Amethyst Spire are exiled and marked with runes that prevent their leaving the Giant’s Shadow. It is assumed their lives are short, but these are rogues, and the survivors’ memories may be long. Neither chooses to disclose this to the group. Likewise, Azric does not share her own search for cures to curses, and how that has brought her knowledge of the nobles ward: The noble houses were in the far west of the city, and they had extensive under-levels full of family heirlooms, and The Galmagian noble family was… unstable from inbreeding and constantly laid curses laid on one another; neither they, nor their treasures, ever left the city.

The bulk of their rumor-gathering has been on the northwest corner’s Mage’s Ward. Its ground was turned to indestructible glass - the Amber - by Sregor Viridian and is covered with eroded debris that is not yet soil. The mage’s tall towers collapsed and leaned into each other, making helpful shelters for pilgrims and travelers.

Much to Aethra’s displeasure Richard is able to relate how he overheard another wizard, Annetha O’TheLastDays (aka ‘Apocalypse Ann’) discuss how she had heard that the Amber stretches down into the undercity and can only be breached by arcane magic. Maybe Ann was wrong. Or maybe the answer will present itself. But Aethra knows that Sregor’s workshop was there and holds spells and magic items likely unknown to any other wizard. And if no one else has breached the Amber then it should all be waiting for them….