Session 182 – Decoding the Records – 6th June 2019

- Ethan shares what he has found about the Red-Eyed Dwimmerlaik with Macavity and Hilda. Hilda is very interested in the journal that Ethan found. Although he cannot remember what was written in it (part of the magic of the Forbidden Library), she believes that a sample of the handwriting alone will tell her a great deal.
- Ethan has the gnawing feeling that he has found something extremely valuable in this Library – knowledge that others would kill for. He uses Divination to look for potential threats on a regular basis and finds that even though he is not directly being threatened, the people around him are being targeted by something or someone. It is not proximate but it is coming. It is not the RED. It is something else.
- Ethan still has an Icon of Grimples. He uses it as a focus and tries to determine his whereabouts. Grimples is somewhere dark. He is surrounded by water and there are no fish. Ethan believes that Grimples is in danger, but not being immediately threatened.
- He turns his mind to the problem of being able to recover knowledge from the Forbidden Library. He assumes that Wrighting can be used to hold the information – to create a copy that is not a book. Perhaps music or some other method of encoding the information in a different form. Ethan spends time in Westgate manor thinking over the problem. Abbie joins him for a while and keeps him and Hilda company. After due consideration, Ethan travels to Clockworld to work in one of the many workshops and try to leverage some of the technology. After all, Clockworld has many ways of storing information as part of the machinery that makes up the place. He figures that he can take a piece of it and adapt it.
- Ethan starts working on building his own recording device, but a recording device that can be split apart before leaving the Forbidden Library and then reassembled on the other side. He thinks that this mechanism would be faster than using a Memory Orb from the Agora (which he considers).
- After two days of work, Ethan makes an unexpected discovery in the Clockworld workshop. Hidden away, he finds a letter and two Icons – one of himself and one of Isabelle. He doesn’t remember writing a letter or making this Icon of Isabelle. (GM’s note – because they were placed there as part of the alternate timeline in Session 151) He is quite astonished as he reads his own handwriting. The letter tells him that Isabelle is a very special person and that if he hasn’t met her that he should use the Icon to make her acquaintance. Ethan can tell (using psychometry) that it was written by him. It is not a forgery. He can also tell that in that timeline, there is no confusion in his other self’s mind regarding Abbie or Isabelle. It is Isabelle, plain and simple. Ethan pockets the letter and thinks over the message. He had already made up his mind to pursue Abbie, not Isabelle. The letter makes him think twice.
- Ethan keeps working on the memory device. It takes time to figure out how to create a device that can be one-way disassembled, the captured information destroyed and can only be restored using Eidolon.
- In his first attempt, he manages to record ten pages of the journal then runs out of space on the device. The concept appears to work but the process needs more refinement. He tries again. The second attempt works well and he captures a larger section of the journal. It is all in the Dwimmerlaik tongue but it has been captured.
- Ethan heads to Agenor, Lofwyr’s base of operations to see Abbie and Hilda. Abbie is pleased to see Ethan as is Hilda. Hilda is fascinated with the journal and she begins translating it. Ethan spends time with Abbie. She appears to be far more settled down but the old spark between them is distant. They enjoy each other’s company as friends.
- Ethan continues to check for threats using Divination. Something is still coming. Something is closing in. He doesn’t know what it is.
- Ethan continues to work on the recording device. He spends time in his workshop on Clockworld. He spends time on the Legendary Isle helping the people of Bloodstone to settle. He spends time with Hilda, looking after her (she loves the gnomes on the Legendary Isle). Talking to Grant via Icon, he is told that the next friendly poker game is only a week ago. He avoids going to Marindar as he worries about running into his brother Marc (he still hasn’t dealt with him since his parents were killed). He thinks hard about the ghostglobes of Boraelis and decides that he has to deal with those weapons of mass destruction soon before someone else finds them.
- Ethan contacts Isabelle. She is a little guarded, treating him as an old friend but someone that she can’t quite gauge as Ethan has changed. He is not the same person that she knew. Ethan decides not to tell her about the letter than he has found. The conversation is short and Isabelle is clearly cautious about this new Ethan.
- Returning to Boraelis, Ethan inquires after Tess and Old Sam and finds that they are completely oblivious to what has happened in the Legendary Realm. Old Sam is sick (he’s getting old) and Ethan helps restore him via Eidolon. They talk about where the ghostglobes come from but no one really knows. There is no scuba gear or submarine here for Ethan to investigate. There might be a wreck on the ocean floor producing the ghost ship but they really don’t know. They last offloaded the ghostglobes a week ago so the next full moon is three weeks away.
- When the ghostglobes are sent to another world, an Icon is assembled. Ethan figures that there must be a living mind on the other side. He prepares a ghostglobe chest and places a sorcerous marker on it. The chest is passed through – a chest comes back but it is not the same chest. Ethan can sense the presence of the sorcerous mark that he has placed but it is very faint and fading fast. He tries sending a chest with apples, a chest with coconuts. A chest is returned, sometimes with different contents. There is definitely an intelligent mind on the other side.
- Ethan decides to mull over the problem and takes Tess and Macavity with him to Realm 0. They visit the Legendary Isle, then head to Britain and finally to London. Tess is blown away by London. He takes her to see a musical production. They watch ‘Cats’. Macavity seems to enjoy the show, particularly the song about his own namesake. Ethan is recognised when walking through the streets by the locals. 
- On Earth, Ethan checks as to how the various nations are going with the samples of High Technology that he has provided. They have made limited progress in reverse engineering the pieces in order to replicate them. He notes that the sorcerers around the world who are good at healing magics have been hard at work. Magic is starting to be accepted in this world and generally the sorcerers are doing positive things for the people of Earth.
- One evening, Ethan contacts Abbie to find out how she is. She is pleased to hear from him but comments that Hilda is running out of material to read. Ethan takes this a cue to return to the Forbidden Library and get the rest of the journal.
- Leaving Tess in Macavity’s capable care, Ethan returns to the workshop and creates a new device. He experiments in the Forbidden Library as to whether it is possible to capture a page, put the recording in his dimensional cube and retrieve it – this does not work. He has to using Wrighting to store the information (copy it) whilst in the Forbidden Library, then break the device in such a way that the information is effectively lost. Only once outside the Library can the device be reformed and the information be recreated without being immediately wiped by the Forbidden Library’s magics.
- Ethan successfully copies the journal and the other two works relating to the RED onto a series of disks that have been crafted with Wrighting. He then breaks them. He keeps one broken set in Clockworld as a backup and takes one to give to Hilda. In returning to Agenor, he finds that Lofwyr has posted guards. Abbie explains that there is something coming. Magic is being used by people who are known not to be sorcerers and they are doing a lot of damage. One of Agenor’s nine global council members was killed by a lowly accountant who should have had no such powers. It has Lofwyr spooked.
- Hilda is very pleased to see the information that Ethan has brought her. Ethan restores the broken disks and she starts work on them immediately. Ethan spends time with Abbie but they are both distracted. Both sense that something odd is going on – that there is an unknown threat here.
- Suddenly the Divination signs worsen, suggesting that Abbie and Hilda are directly threatened and the threat is more urgent. Ethan decides that they can’t stay here as he has no idea what the threat is. Abbie seeks leave from Lofwyr for a leave of absence and he agrees.
- They leave to go on a trip. Ethan heads back to the Legendary Isle with Abigail and Hilda where they pick up Macavity and Tess, then head to Boraelis. However, along the Stair they walk into …. Grimples.