GoCorral

Fatherly Justice

Zeus blessed the adventurers with eternal life on Mount Olympus after they died. He sat in his Olympian throne. The thunderbolts lay by his right hand, Poseidon’s trident by his left. He turned upon those who had betrayed his trust, Alkmene, Poseidon, Triton, and Demeter.

“ALKMENE HALKIAS! You have allied yourself with Hades and failed him. I shall spare you from his justice…for now. You will be tortured by the furies for the rest of your natural days.” Zeus snapped his fingers and electric sparks flew. Two of the angels flying over the mountain glowed a deep blue for an instant and then descended to float above Alkmene’s bowed head. “These two furies will follow you invisibly. I have given them a portion of my power so none can stop them from beating you with hot iron rods for all your days.” The furies pulled iron rods from behind their backs and dipped the ends into the cauldron fire. The rod ends swiftly burned red hot. The first fury took the rod and whipped Alkmene across the face with it. The second beat her back. They took turns. Alkmene tried to maintain a dignified silence, but the pain overwhelmed her and she grunted and cried.

“They will not kill you!” Zeus said, “You will live and be in pain and misery and suffer. The furies will prevent your suicide.” The iron rods continued to fall on Alkmene’s back. “They will prevent others from ending your torment.” Alkmene could no longer muster the energy to cry. She only moaned. Zeus continued, “And when your natural life concludes, Hades will have you. We will see if his punishment for your failure is worse than mine.”

Zeus snapped his fingers once again. Alkmene and the furies disappeared, teleported off of Mount Olympus.

“As for you!” Zeus hefted the Trident of the Sea and thrust it towards Poseidon and Triton. They were on their knees, bound and gagged with golden cords. “I shall need more time to think of a suitably excruciating punishment. For now you will be confined to Tartarus where a thousand eels will eat out your eyes everyday.”

Zeus laid down the Trident. He stood with a thunderbolt in his other hand. He raised the bolt up then let it fly to the ground before him. A zap, a blinding flash, and a terrifying boom! A hole opened up in the rocky ground of Mount Olympus. The pit descended down and down and down, far below the Earth’s surface. Heat washed up out of the pit along with the smell of brimstone and burning flesh. Zeus grabbed his brother and hoisted him over his head. Poseidon grunted through his golden gag.

“Into the pit with you! Perhaps the others we have condemned will forgive you.” Zeus dropped his brother into Tartarus. “But I doubt it.” Muffled screams blew out on a hot wind. Zeus nudged Triton into the pit with his foot. An afterthought.

Zeus returned to his throne. Hera leaned in and asked him, “What of the Trident? And command of the sea? Who will take our brother’s place?”
“Yes, I was getting to that, woman. Must you always nag me? I will rule the sea, but only for an interim period while another god is chosen for this task. I swear this on the River Styx. A new god of the sea will be chosen within seven years from the lesser gods who are not among the Olympian Pantheon.”
“But how will this new god be chosen?”
“I… There is no need for us to discuss this in front of the mortals.” Zeus turned to look at the group in front of him. “Return to your world, mortals. Thank you for your service to me.” Zeus waved his hand and the party found themselves back in Lakatia outside of the magnificent mansion that Hektor made anew every day.

An Old Friend’s Confessions

The party knew that Amalius had done something to the ritual and siphoned off a portion of Zeus’s power. They kept him under the dominate spell and began interrogating Amalius. A number of questions and follow-ups yielded interesting information.

What did Amalius do? How did he steal the power of Zeus while subject to Hektor’s dominate?
Soon after resurrecting the Alliance army in his deal with Hades, Amalius summoned a planetar angel. He used true mind switch on this planetar, putting his mind in the planetar’s body and the planetar’s mind in his body. He then cast mind seed on his original body that housed the resistant planetar. The mind seed created a copy of himself in his original body, overwriting the planetar’s mind. Now there were two Amaliuses.
Divine Amalius (or Amaletar) who was the original mind in a planetar’s body.
Copied Amalius (or Fauxmalius) who was a weaker copied mind in the original body.
When the Druid’s Prophecy was performed on Mount Olympus Amalius was present. The angel that swept down and knocked the Lots out of Alkmene’s hand was Amalius! While everyone was distracted by Alkmene and the Lots, Amalius slipped an extra item into the cauldron. Into the cauldron he dropped the glass orb Devanane had given him to steal his soul (Xorian Wars 21/Alliance 13). This was an item that had “caused him to die.” Along with some additional modifications this allowed Amalius to benefit from the ritual and siphon off a bit of Zeus’s divine essence. The power went into his planetar body which had been conveniently injured and then fled from Mount Olympus.
I reminded the players that I had asked for them to make a Spot check to see where the Lots fell when Divine Amalius knocked them out of Alkmene’s hand. This was a cover. The Spot check was actually for them to notice Amalius putting the orb into the cauldron.

What are Amalius’s goals?
Both Amaliuses are united in their goal of bringing about a utopian anarchy in Cimmeria. A world without oligarchs, dictators, or gods who steal what you produce with the threat of violence if you do not comply. A world without slavery or conscription. A world without the walls of ignorance and inability. Anyone can do anything as long as it does not harm any others.
The Exiles were skeptical of how such a world could exist in reality.
Fauxmalius replied, “The other me will make it work using the divine power he takes from the other gods.”

Tell us all the useful information you have.
Fauxmalius admitted that Divine Amalius had altered his memories so he recalled little of the plans his Divine self had laid. Not willing to leave things at that, the group decided to restore Fauxmalius’s memories. The best man for the job was the Björn of Dalleer who previously assisted in restoring memories to Amalius (Xorian Wars 25/Alliance 17 and Xorian Wars 27/Alliance 19). The group went to the Björn. He restored Fauxmalius’s memories, taking a short break to skate around on his magical shoes. The party thanked him and then returned to the mansion to continue their interrogation.

Fauxmalius told them a few useful things..
1. Aldarian is not dominated, but has a few sleeper codes that Amalius (either one) can use to turn him into a killing machine. Aldarian also has a sleeper code to do whatever Amalius says.
2. Amalius has dominated Junai and Lieutenant Tracker on the Alliance Council. He’s using them to get support among the other Council members for his ideas of educating and training the populace in the use of arms as well as in the use of their minds. Astute observers might realize that these are different people than what was revealed via commune in a previous situation.
3. Fauxmalius is only 14th level due to the mind seed.
4. Amalius needs more divine power before he gets more serious about acting against the gods. Taking it directly from existing gods is probably beyond his ability. Divine Amalius will be looking at other ways of stealing divinity. Blendegad is a prime choice. Divine Amalius plans on dominating Eathirilu, the only party member who isn’t regularly mind blanked. He will do absolutely nothing with this domination. Eathirilu will accompany the others when they inevitably confront Blendegad. When they defeat Blendegad, Amalius will command Eathirilu to not use the Touch of Nature to purify and erase Blendegad’s essence. Amalius can then swoop in and absorb the divine power that leaves Blendegad as he dies.
5. Fauxmalius will be going through with his wedding to Denara. The wedding is on December 10th in a few days. Despite his fake nature Fauxmalius still loves Denara and it was part of the original Amalius’s plan that Fauxmalius would live a “normal life.”
Tagenadi will be in the wedding and Fauxmalius hoped that Torin would officiate. Overlooking the weird circumstances of the request, Torin said he would. The others had already accepted their invitations to the wedding previously.
6. Amalius had predicted that Jevaninada would approach the Alliance on December 15th and request a showdown, the best of Xoria against the best of the Alliance to end the war and stop future bloodshed.

Turning Gears

The party didn’t want Divine Amalius’s plan to succeed, but they feared his psychic powers would predict any possible action they attempted to stop his plans. How could they evade his predictions? Should they act randomly? Counter his predictions with those of their own? Ward their plans with powerful magicks like wish or miracle? It was decided that the party would adapt as best they could, but take no real actions against Amalius until after confronting Jevaninada II and Blendegad.

At the end of Amalius’s interrogation Hektor asked him, “Are there any secrets you’re holding back?”
Amalius answered, “No,” but Eathirilu’s supernatural sense of smell picked up an increase in how much Amalius was sweating. Amalius was lying.
Eathirilu said, “He’s holding something back.”
“Tell us!” said Hektor.
Amalius shook his head.
Gorwinua indicated that the party should leave the room and discuss this. Outside she said that she could get the truth out of him without magic, just by singing him a song.
Gorwinua returned to the room and sang Amalius the perfect song. She sang of freedom for all the people of Cimmeria. All the humans, all the elves, and all the orcs. Free without gods or men controlling them. Gorwinua could help Amalius achieve his goals. They could work together to bring mortals into a new age of prosperity. Gorwinua would be Amalius’s agent within the Exiles. All he needed to do was be completely open with her about what he had held back before.
It worked. Fauxmalius now felt that Gorwinua was his ally. He confided her, “The other Amalius has a weakness,” he paused, “me. A bit of his soul is still in me. If I die, he is weakened.”
“I understand. I’ll keep this between us,” Gorwinua said.
Gorwinua left the room and told the others what Fauxmalius had said.

After his interrogation Amalius was released unharmed, but with the dominate still in place. Hektor predicted that Divine Amalius would free Fauxmalius from the dominate at some point. Hektor wanted the group to be constantly ready. The second he felt the spell go down, the group should teleport in and apprehend Divine Amalius.

This session crossed over with an odd part of D&D metaphysics. Mind switch swaps the mind and soul of the user with the target’s mind and soul. How does that work for an outsider such as a planetar whose body and soul are one? I decided to leave that question unanswered in my campaign. Interestingly, around the same time I played this session there was a discussion on the Order of the Stick forums about this exact problem. If anyone is interested you can read more about outsider souls and mind swapping at this thread.