Session 178 – The Battle for the Legendary Realm (Part 10 – Aftermath) – 2nd May 2019

- Ethan has returned to the balcony along with Isabelle. He has quickly healed the worst of his wounds using Eidolon and he turns his attention to the sparkling blue dust storm. Using sorcery, he sweeps it away from his own troops, again using the Silver Crown to attempt to undo what has been done. To try to save as many as he can. 
- The blue mist is quickly pulled back like a curtain, revealing thousands of lifeless bodies. The ghostglobes appear to have killed everyone, even the undead, and there are no survivors as far as the eye can see. Nothing is moving. Nothing. In the distance, the gigantic corpse of Nicol Bolas lies as still as a mountain.
- But Ethan is still trying. Somehow it must be possible to bring them back. He wills it to be, channelling the power of the Silver Crown. Isabelle can see what he’s doing and she counsels him to stop. She can see that this must be the moment that Ethan warned her about - the point where he would attempt to go too far and refuse to give up the Crown. She tells him that they’re all dead and he can’t bring back the dead. Ethan is adamant that he can - in the Legendary Realm with the Silver Crown, he can do it.
- Abigail joins Ethan at the balcony. She is strangely calm about the situation and tells Ethan that she’s told the men to keep an eye out for Yaeger Zane. They’re sweeping the area. Ethan nods and Abigail asks what he is doing now. Ethan explains that he went too far and he’s going to ‘fix it’. Abigail seems surprised - she thought this is what he wanted. Everyone was just bait for the trap, and Ethan was prepared to sacrifice them all in order to win. Ethan reiterates that he can ‘fix it’. Isabelle immediately challenges him, telling him that what he’s trying to do is impossible and the Silver Crown could potentially kill him if he attempts this. Abigail chastises Isabelle, telling her that Ethan can do it. He’s restored worlds that were utterly destroyed before. He can do this.
- Ethan is trying to reconnect the recently departed sparks back to the bodies of the living but it is a confusing maelstrom of thousands of pieces. Every second, more of the sparks vanish and seem out of his reach. He pushes more power into the Silver Crown to stop the sparks of life from vanishing from the Realm by affecting the gossamer reality of the Realm.
- Isabelle points out that his wounds are bleeding again. Immediately Ethan uses Eidolon to shore himself up but Isabelle notes that he’s losing more of himself - the powers are slowly reshaping him into a more Eidolon-tuned form. He’s losing himself. Isabelle again warns him that even if he survives, he won’t be Ethan anymore. 
- Ethan senses that she is right. He has honed himself almost to the point of being brittle. The weak link in the system is his own flesh and blood and he’s reaching his limit in trying to achieve the near impossible. Time is running out and he can’t do this alone. He asks Isabelle whether Lucien is conscious - unfortunately he is not. He then asks Abigail whether she’d be prepared to wear the Silver Crown. She is but she doesn’t know how to use it. He explains quickly that it moulds gossamer reality to match what the wearer desires. If she wants these people back, then it can happen. He explains that he’ll use what sorcery he can to return the sparks of life to their bodies but this is uncharted territory.
- Abigail agrees and Ethan removes the Silver Crown. Almost immediately he feels his legs buckle - he is exhausted. She takes the Silver Crown and considers it. Part of her wants to put it on, but then she passes it to Isabelle without a word, leaving Ethan stunned. Abigail tells her that it’s over. Ethan reaches for the crown once more but Isabelle has already moved away. Ethan is furious but too tired to chase her. Turning back to the balcony, he tells Abigail that he’ll try regardless.
- Frustrated and angry, Ethan tries to recover some, any of the motes of light and return them to their bodies. But one by one they vanish and are gone, leaving only a battlefield of corpses behind. Ethan weeps. Abigail keeps him company. The others search for survivors within the palace.
- After a while, Abigail confesses that she thought she wasn’t coming back from the battlefield. She knew what he had planned and she went anyway. She has survived so many times and she admits feeling guilty about that, especially the last time when so many Bloodstone soldiers died and she survived. This time, she had done a Divination and confirmed that Ethan wouldn’t be contacting her via Icon to call her back. So she thought there would be no coming back and she was okay with that. She had made peace with it. She admits that she wouldn’t have accepted an Icon contact from him even if he had attempted it. But she didn’t expect that Ethan would contact Macavity to bring her back. So, Ethan saved her again in a way that she did not expect.
- Ethan apologises for not being there when she needed him, and for neglecting her. Abigail acknowledges that she believes Ethan is sorry and she admits to being sorry that things had not been better between them. She thinks that she has grown as a person, but she notes that Ethan hasn’t changed in many ways. She guesses that it is a part of being an Eidolon Master but he still thinks that he can fix everything. Some things just can’t be fixed ‘as good as new’. 
- But, she notes, she was impressed that he seems to have adopted Hilda so perhaps there is hope for him. Ethan asks her what he should do now and Abigail gives a chuckle. She explains that he should learn to accept that he has survived at great cost. There will be regret, there will be pain. People won’t forgive or forget what he has done here. And he will remember what he has done here…..
- Ethan admits that he couldn’t see another way. Abbie shrugs and says that she’s not going to judge whether he did the right thing, or the wrong thing. It is done and he will have to live with the decision that he made. He asks what she will do now and she pauses to think. At last she says that she will return to Lofwyr and become his advocate. She says that she needs time to think. Her father once said that she was “made for gentler things”. Looking at her blood-stained hands, she says that she’s spent a long time trying to prove her father wrong about her. She says that there is nothing left to prove – not to her father, to Ethan, to anyone. She admits that to be a sobering and rather liberating thought. She gets to her feet and notes that she thinks that she finally understands him. 
- Abigail leaves him be. He is alone on the palace balcony. He fumbles with bloody fingers for his Icon of Grant. Making a contact, he asks Grant if it is over. Grant confirms that Nicol Bolas is dead and he is on his way back to Marindar to rest. He asks Ethan about everyone else and Ethan tells Grant what has happened. He tells Grant that he’s killed both armies and pretty much everyone that they were friends with in the Legendary Realm is dead. Grant pauses and asks Ethan if he is okay. Ethan says brokenly that he can’t believe that he actually killed them all. Grant says that he needs some rest but he’ll come to help when he can – he guesses that Ethan will need help to rebuild. Ethan nods numbly and the contact ends….

(GM’s note – and that’s where we end the battle in the Legendary Realm. Ethan has effectively wiped everything out in order to ‘win’. There are so many consequences from this. More of this is explored in Session 179.)