- As per my notes at the end of Session 137, Bastiano has achieved his goal and somehow rewritten history. This doesn’t invalidate everything that we have done - it just just another story arc.
- In terms of how this works, the premise is that Umbra Masters are very good at dealing with madness and fragmented memories, and they recall the alternate timelines. We have already seen evidence of this before. Hence Umbra Masters like Grant, Bastiano, Oscar and even Mowbray (boo hiss!) know that something is different and they have memories of the original timeline. This means that Grant will quickly recover a lot of his powers (as a Master of the Stair) and he can use his knowledge of the alternate timeline in order to continue his investigation to find Bastiano and try to reverse what he has done. Right now, Grant doesn’t have information to know why Bastiano wanted to change the timeline, nor does he know exactly how he did it.
- In contrast, Ethan is the same young Lord of Gossamer that he once was. Pre-Einland. Pre-Marindar. Pre-Abbie.
- In game terms, we are going back to …. Session 13 (yes, Session 13) but this time things are a little different.
Major Characters
- Grant, Ethan
Adversaries
- Dwimmerlaik Hit Squad
Adventure Summary
- Grant is lying on green grass near clifftops by the sea. The place is oddly familiar. He must have blanked out. Concentrating he remembers a beautiful woman in a garden (Sophia), a friend of his (Ethan) who is working on a speeder bike whilst a huge white wolf snores nearby (Stolvir), and a regal lady who regards him coolly (Vala). He is surprised by these memories as he doesn’t know where they came from.
- Grant begins to explores and at first, things play out similarly to the events of Session 13. He explores locally, finding abandoned houses, then he explores further afield in wolf-form (which he naturally chooses). He finds there are humanoids in this place who don’t like the light. He makes his way to the Door, which is in a place called Tyndam. He looks for a Dark Tower here but does not find one. He ignores the strange mounds of earth that dot the Tyndam grounds, finds the Door and steps onto the Stair.
- On the Grand Stair, he finds himself expecting to see a red bird (in the original timeline it was a robin) but there is none. He returns to the home landing and checks the Doors. All seems as he remembers it, but he is unable to return home to Realm 0 as he doesn’t have the Key. He produces his pseudo-Icon of Ethan (because they don’t have a real Icon at this point) and tries to contact him. Ethan refuses the contact - Grant is not surprised by this. It is as though this has happened before.
- Walking the Stair, he finds many things are familiar, but he can also feel memories slipping away from him. He decides that he needs to find a way to store his current set of memories before they deteriorate.
- Grant finds a source of gold and jewels (the treasure cave, a short way from Realm 0) and then goes in search of the Agora. (GM’s note - this is something that Grant and Ethan didn’t do until Session 122!!!) He finds the Agora relatively easily, but finds horned warriors (Dwimmerlaik) in many places. He avoids them and finds an entrance to the Grand Bazaar. Interestingly he finds standards of the White Hand and a White Eye displayed prominently on banners made of shimmering black fabric. The locals seem to ignore these as they go about their business.
- Grant finds a blue skinned lady with long white hair who is prepared to sell him a globe of crystal to store his memories. She provides instructions as to how to use it and warns him that memories are slow to transfer into the globe. It may take some time depending upon how old he is. Grant goes into the back room behind heavy curtains to try this, but he is interrupted by a pair of Dwimmerlaik.
- Resisting and heading out onto the street, Grant finds himself running straight into an ambush. This group is waiting for and expecting him. Without Gorgorin, Grant is at a significant disadvantage. He is wounded by the Dwimmerlaik who attack him, and he chooses to run through the shops rather than continue along the street. Crashing through the wall at the back of the shop, he enters another shop, and then ambushes the first Dwimmerlaik to follow him through the breach. Killing one, and then another, he then uses a combination of brute force to smash his way out, and judicious use of Umbra to slip away, shifting into another form. When he is far enough away, he gasps for breath at his lucky escape. He is bleeding heavily from an abdominal wound but he can at least move. He knows that he faced a professional team that was prepared to do battle with him. In this place he is a Marked Man. He doesn’t know quite how, but he is known here.
- Grant takes his time to escape the Agora. He uses the stormwater systems and multiple Doors to evade pursuit. He uses Shapeshifting to close the wounds and accelerate the healing process.
- Grant decides to find a place close to the Agora to lay low. He finds a realm that looks like modern Tokyo. It is nighttime when he arrives but there are huge neon signs here and there are people everywhere. Upon arrival he feels that he is being watched, and he makes it difficult for his pursuer who attempts to follow along from the rooftops above. Gradually he realises that there are different ‘gangs’ here who wear different colours and different symbols. He sees a blue ninja leap from a motorcycle and engage two yellow-clad foes in combat. No one bats an eyelid. Grant notes that someone is following him with a wide brimmed hat. Glancing down an alleyway, he spots a silver samurai facing off against two crouched ninja, dressed in brown.
- Grant stops for noodles. His wounds hurt and he needs time to rest and recover. As he eats, he watches traffic stop as two ninja masters face off in the street. One is dressed in white. The other in black. Both are ‘powering up’, seemingly crackling with energy. Finally, one of the masters faints and is dragged away by his apprentices.
- Finding this realm intriguing, and needing a place to lie low, Grant decides to go and find a dojo.
Other Impacts
- In Sessions 139 and 140 we get to find out what Ethan is up to…. again, history does not quite repeat itself.
- We will return to Ninjaworld in Session 141.
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