They found Yasemi the dwarf waiting for them in a small camp not far where he had told them they could find the House of Mirrors. He gave them directions, but had an odd look on his face. And made a number of cryptic comments about his plans for them. It was not clear what he meant, but it was a bit unsettling.
The house itself did not look particularly inviting. Yasemi had told them that it had once been a trap to lure mortals into the fey realms. But it no longer looked like the sort of place likely to lure in anybody sane…
It didn’t look much better inside – decrepit, dark, and dusty. The halls were lined with mirrors, but the mirrors didn’t quite seem to reflect what was in front of them. Instead they seemed to portray the House in its heyday. And the angles they reflected never seemed quite right.
They had the strong feeling of being watched as they explored, and heard barely audible whispers with no obvious source. Whispers that “The Quing is coming!” And then a more imminent threat appeared. Vampires.
Appearing out of the shadows. Attacking from all directions.
But Marty and Winny were both *quite* well prepared to deal with that.
Past the ambush they found a mirror that did more than merely reflect another version of the dark hallways. Its surface actually lead there…
And the other side, while clearly technically the same hallway, was like nothing they had ever seen before. Not only was the House far grander and more luxurious than they could have imagined, but even the air was different. Light was brighter. Colors were more intense. *Everything* was just… more.
The House seemed to be inhabited by lost spirits. Some raging. Some sobbing. They wanted to help, but it appeared these were merely echoes. Faded impressions of people and events that had passed on long ago.
Then they stumbled upon the true inhabitants. Fey. All of whom instantly stopped what they were doing and turned turned to stare. Hungrily.
A trio of Fey harassed Yana from all angles. She could cleave them in two if they would fight her straight up, but instead they danced around her. Dodging about while poking, prodding, and mocking.
They tried the same thing on Marty, but he had better tools for dealing with that sort of harassment.
They fey wolves followed their instincts to slink around and pounce on the weakest. Unfortunately for them their instincts had failed to properly identity “weakest”.
But while the others were tied up, the Master in back was summoning a massive, undoubtedly unpleasant spell to wipe them out. Until a crossbow bolt spouted from his forehead.
After wandering the area they could find no exit except another mirror… which took them back to what appeared to be the House they had first entered. A particularly dark area of the House. With a particularly unpleasant occupant. They vampires they had encountered previously had been mere spawn. Their mistress was something else entirely.
Marty and Winny tried to hold the Vampire’s focus, but she was too fast and too strong. She toyed with them as she evaded all of their attacks.
Hans and Yana were similarly frustrated by the Vampiric Mists which accompanied her. They seemed to flow around their weapons and attack from everywhere at once.
But eventually the vampire’s luck ran out, one of Winny’s vines got a solid hold to pin her in place, and Marty gave her a solid taste of concentrated holy sunlight.
That was not the only horror waiting for them in the Solasta side of the House of Mirrors. In a twisted library they were ambushed by a horde of blacklight walkers – shadowy yet solid undead formed by being drained of life by the Vampire’s foul darkness.
Eventually they came to an odd round chamber with a large crystal in the center – embedded in a rotating platform device. With dark mirrors spaced along the wall. Winny and Hans tried to work out what it did and how it worked, but it quickly activated on its own…
And throngs of angry phantoms streamed out and beset them from all sides!
After they dealt with the spirits, Winny and Hans got back to experimenting. They eventually figured out how to use it to open another portal..
As with the mirrors the portal took them to a similar looking chamber in the other world. A chamber which was currently occupied by a Fey Sorceress, who immediately took exception to their intrusion!
She summoned a never-ending stream of fey animal spirits which threatened to completely overwhelm them..
Until they had had quite enough. Winny dismissed the spirits, Marty gave her a tasted of lightning, and Hans introduced her to one of his axes..
Past the sorceress’s chamber a passageway led outside, to a courtyard where the fey had set up a banquet. And the guests of honor, were them!
The Fey Chancellor welcomed them as the new “Quings” ( it would be insulting to call a King a Queen or vice versa). He invited them to take their places at their thrones while the Fey began the celebration. Marty asked why the thrones appeared to have manacles built in… And the Chancellor answered that few mortals could withstand the full experience of a Fey celebration. But he promised that they would enjoy their deaths immensely!
At which point Hans cut in to start bargaining. He offered an alternative. A story. If the assembled fey agreed that his story was unique enough, then the Raccoons would be free to go. The Chancellor looked doubtful, but the other fey insisted. And so Hans wove a spellbinding tale… the *real* story of Rosamund and Albertando. Marty just shook his head as Hans soon had them spellbound – delighted at the twists and turns of what Rosamund and Albertando were *really* like behind the legend. The Councillor was overruled. They were released.
Outside one of the most beautiful sights they had ever seen awaited them, as sunset over the Great River through Terralba was truly spectacular.
They followed a path along the river until they came to a ruined camp. It had clearly been attacked quite recently, as dead satyrs lay in the ruins.
They heard a voice, and found a young girl hiding in the wreckage. She gave her name as Mae. Of the great satyr Clan Isy. She was the only surviving member of a her group, as they had been attacked by the fey of the House. She saw them looking doubtfully at her clearly non-satyr legs, and she explained. She herself was half-satyr. Satyr upper-half and elven lower-half. Hmmm…
She told them there was a Port City – Port Buttercup – two days further down the path. And if they could take her with them that far she could find help there. Hans felt there was something oddly familiar about the girl, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was.
About halfway to Port Buttercup they came across a stone guardhouse, manned by a large man in solid red armor. “Concordants.”, Mae explained. “Peacekeepers. They’re always popping up at places like this. They just can’t *stand* to see a guard post go unmanned“. But when they approached to speak to the man Mae burst into tears and pointed at them! She told him that *they* had slaughtered her clan and taken her prisoner!
It took some fast talking by Hans to convince him that she was distraught and confused, and that they had done no such thing. But by the time he was convinced Mae had vanished.
They continued on until they came to Port Buttercup, just where Mae had said it would be. The city was amazing, with all manner of odd beings going about their business. They were directed to see “Mayor Isaye” if they wanted directions and information.
On the way they spied Mae again, watching them from above and smirking.
When they found the mayor she seemed quite familiar, but they couldn’t quite put their fingers on why. “Welcome Raccoons“, she said, “I’ve been waiting for you“. Hans realized it first, staring in shock.
“Mayor Isaye“, he stammered. “Mae Isy“. “Yasemi“.
She laughed. “My clever boy, Hans. Took you long enough. Yes. Its me“. And revealed herself. Misaye. Goddess of Luck and Mischief, Thieves and Gamblers.
The one and only.
The House. The Fey celebration. The Concordant Guard. All of it had been part jest, part test… and part misdirection. Nezbal knew they were trying to beat her to the Purple Wolf. She had already sent forces to the Wildlands. If they did not chase after them… then she would know she was looking in entirely the wrong place!
Misaye told them that Nezbal was not the first powerful entity to seek the Purple Wolf. A demon lord named Vaelgoroth the Unmaker had captured it centuries ago, and held it in the citadel of Vaelshadow. On Tartarus. Vaelgroth was powerful. He had held the wolf in his collection securely and secretly for centuries. But Misaye was not prepared to bet against Nezbal being crazy enough to assault a demon lord in his home… Nor that she was not resourceful enough to succeed.
Marty asked why she was helping, and she laughed again.
What does Nezbal want? To burn Solasta to a crisp, leaving only her “chosen” alive. That would be the end of almost all mortals on that world… with none left to remember and worship *me*.
Her fellow deities believed Nezbal had little chance of success in her mad plan – even with the power of YinYue. Misaye was the one god would never discount impossible odds.
But Tartarus was not to be their next destination. First they had to finish selling the con. Nezbal had sent two of her Chosen to the Wildlands to collect the Wolf. One that they had never met. And one with whom they were intimately familiar. Baylan. The traitor. If they did not appear in the Wildlands and confront them Nezbal would know something was up.
Marty asked if Baylan still had Margarete, but Misaye only smirked. She said Margaraete had long since caught on and slipped away by herself. He asked if Misaye would keep her safe, but she laughed again.
Of course not! At this very moment she’s probably poking a hornets’ nest just to see what happens. I will teach her some tricks… if she needs them. I’m fond of the girl.
Marty had the sinking suspicion that he now knew *exactly* how Margarete had gotten into the “sealed” tomb of Thalorel in the first place…
So. Two missions. Find and defeat Nezbal’s chosen in the Wildlands. Then resecue the key to godlike power from a demon lord in Tartarus. Sure. No problem. But from the goddess’ smirk they could already tell there was yet one more twist.
To bargain with a demon lord – to even survive the approach – you need a reason to be there. Vaelgoroth is a collector of ancient artifacts. You will present him the Black Grimoire of Malzareth. That will be enough to gain an audience. After that… you’ll figure something out.
And the book? Held in the Iron Archives. On Clockwork – the plane of Law. Where the Army of Concord itself secured artifacts considered too dangerous to roam free.
Step one, travel to the living embodiment of untamed wilderness and hunt down the two most powerful Chosen of a fanatical Dragon who wanted to become a god.
Step two, infiltrate one of the most highly guarded vaults in existence and abscond with an ancient Evil Tome.
Step three, use that Tome to bargain with an ancient demon lord to secure the release of the key to godly power. Preferably without actually in the end allowing the demon lord to HAVE said tome.
Step last, use that key to enter the ancient prison of a corrupted goddess and figure out how to protect her from said fanatical Dragon.
Just another Tuesday.
Author’s Notes:
I made an interesting discovery with this set. I wanted to re-render the Raccoons in the Fey art style to use as references while in that world. I asked Gemini what it thought about that, and it gave me some prompts for each of the characters. The one for Marty came out very, very interesting… with a single image showing him from multiple angles. With closeups on his face and equipment. That seemed “perfect” for reference images going forward!
Each of the images below links to the full GPT prompt and reference images, so that you can see how they were made. Judge for yourself if you think the results (all the pics above in the Fey world) do a better job of character consistency. The main inconsistency I saw was that Marty has a hammer in this image, but I mostly used his mace for these fights. So his weapon isn’t very stable.
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