Concern for Ramkus

DM NOTE: Private messaging between multiple people is currently broken, so this will have to do instead. Ondraedon: "I am concerned for Ramkus. His inability to successfully cast heal wounds is troubling. There has been talk amongst the group, there is concern of what he is evolving into. I need to meet with him privately and talk this through, we are both men of Krotus I hope he can open up and talk to me. While the party is troubled at the idea of losing a high level cleric, we are more concerned with losing our friend to whatever this is possessing him. If he will not speak with me, I will have to take the matter up with Krotus during my next commune. I only hope we are not too late to save him if that is what is needed."

Ramkus will open up to Ondraedon. Ondraedon notices I am currently not wearing my armor: "I have experimented with my waning powers and it appears that my abilities only fail when using them on myself. This is indeed perplexing, this is why I am closely monitoring myself this week while I do not wear armor. I also attempted to Commune, with mixed results. I will keep you posted as my investigation to my visions and changes carry forward" ooc: If you want to publish my armor adventure Steven you are welcome to do so. I may benefit from new eyes on my problem.

DM NOTE: Ramkus asked me to share the records of the past few weeks. These records are written from the perspective of the DM to the player. RECORD OF THE 1ST WEEK After putting the armor on last week, you feel stronger, younger, and full of life. +1 to your strength while wearing the armor. RECORD OF THE 2ND WEEK During this past week since your last adventure, your health and well-being continues to improve. You feel as though you are in the prime of your life. Even when you aren't wearing the armor you feel an inner new-found strength ebbing through your veins. Instead of receiving +1 strength while wearing the armor, you now receive +2 strength permanently to your strength score (should bring strength up to 11). You also receive +1 to saves vs disease permanently. When saving vs a disease you now add the bonus vs poison and the bonus vs disease. When you look at yourself in a mirror, you features appear slightly more chiseled. +1 to your charisma score, permanently.

RECORD OF THE 3RD WEEK The dreams have started during this week. At night you walk through a strange alien city that sprawls around a central impossibly tall tower of iron. The city is empty as you navigate your way down streets and corridors, plagued by a disconcerting feeling of familiarity. In the gulfs of darkness between dreams, you witness strange rituals and blasphemous incantations fill your head. These dreams continue night after night, and you feel as though some sort of forbidden knowledge has embedded itself within your mind. You receive a permanent +1 to wisdom from these experiences, but you must also roll a saving throw at a +4 bonus (this is not against a specific effect). You feel safer and more comfortable wearing the armor; you feel as though it has changed in size and shape to better fit your form. You have even taken to sleeping in it at night, and awaken refreshed every morning in spite of the dreams. You may now wear your armor while sleeping/resting at night with no ill effects or penalties. It started off as barely perceptible, and you wrote it off as imagination for the past few weeks, but you are undeniably taller. You are now 6’8” in height. You also have begun hearing noises you never noticed before; the creek of floorboards downstairs in the inn, the rustling of wind in the trees at night, the whispering of words spoken by tenants in nearby rooms. When you examine yourself in a mirror, you notice that your ears are now slightly pointed, and your eyes (irises) have begun to turn amber in color. Your facial features look slightly different as well, even more defined and chiseled. You receive another permanent +2 to charisma, and you now also receive a +1 to listening checks. You had never been in that great of shape, your body had always been soft and well used to the life of a clergy member, but now as you look in the mirror your muscles appear lean and taut. You wield your mace and shield with ease. You receive another permanent +1 to strength. You continue feeling like you are the peak of your health. You receive another +1 permanent bonus to saves vs. disease. ******************************************************************************* You are able to bath as normal without the armor. The armor is composed of several layers. The first layer is leather and wool (or other soft material) padding that you wear underneath the armor for comfort. You've worn this underneath all the platemail you've worn in the past, and it was something you bought when you first purchased platemail. The second layer is a scaled hauberk of brass, to which you attach and cover with several large pieces of alien-looking pieces of brass plate armor (3rd layer). The plate armor is of odd style, with strange filigree and engravings upon it; shapes and symbols you do not understand nor could attempt to understand. Also it has a helmet of similar strange design. You feel comfortable while bathing, but having worn the armor so long you feel safer when wearing it, it hardly gets in the way of anything you do now days. Similar in style to this I suppose, except without the bottom pokey things, instead the scale hauberk hangs down from the armor, and covers the joints between elbows, and other exposed parts of your upper body: <a href="http://www.american-heirlooms.com/images/ImagesBRASS/armor-1.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://www.american-heirlooms.com/images/ImagesBRASS/armor-1.jpg</a> ******************************************************************************** You travel to and from Strongmoor via boat with no encounters. Upon seeking to have the armor examined by the Wizard, he is puzzled by its appearance and properties. Everything you describe seems beyond the magic of mortal men, and he suspects it is perhaps an ancient artifact. He offers you a tidy sum of 40,000 gold pieces to purchase the armor, but he says studying it would probably take more years than he has left on Eris and even then he feels he would only begin to scratch the surface of its mysteries. Paying 100 gold bribe to the palace gatesmen, you are able to obtain escort to the royal library. Within you spend the week researching the oldest texts trying to find some mention of your armor or the man you slew, but no trace of history beyond stories and myths of the declining days of the Elven Empire exist within this library. You don't feel confident enough to rule out the armor is of Elvish origin, but nothing has come close to describing what you've seen in both dreams and in your encounter with the giant-man serpent rider.

RECORD OF THE 4TH WEEK The dreams at night continue. In the dreams you wander the confusing but familiar metropolis; this time you walk among a strange and alien people, but the city remains silent and you are unable to hear what anyone is saying. One set of people are soldiers and servants of dark red skin with slightly pointed ears and black shining hair, they are scantily clad wearing ornamental harnesses, their men are fierce and savage while their women are beautiful and buxom. You also see elves unlike any you have seen before; they are robed in exquisitely embroidered silk, and possess thick eyebrows which are upswept at the outside corners. All the elves possess neutral and emotionless expressions as they speak together in clusters here and there, occasionally directing a servant to perform some unknown request. Other animals and creatures all walk the streets, appearing as pets and farm animals, but none are familiar to any you know of today. Perhaps these were the ancient ancestors of the species of dogs, cats, rats, goats, pigs, horses, and cows. The city itself is more expansive than any you have ever laid eyes upon or heard of on Eris, it sprawls nearly to the horizon, and once again you look up and see a massive iron pillar towering over the city. Each time you look at it, you are filled with a feeling of peace and rightness in the world, as if it represents some hidden power of lawfulness. You pass through a market area, and see a red-skinned merchant arguing with an elf; the merchant growing more and more angry and frustrated as the elf attempts to make their point in a calm but direct manner. Suddenly crowds of people start streaming past you heading towards a major thoroughfare, causing others near you to do the same. You follow, your curiosity piqued. You arrive at a wide street lined throngs of elves and red-skinned people, all watching a great military procession pass. You see rows upon rows of expressionless elves armored in brass and silver pass by, holding spears and poles with streaming banners. Following behind them is a gigantic brass-armored serpent winding its way down the street. Seated atop the serpent is an 8 to 10 foot tall figure in brass armor not unlike the suit you have been wearing for the past few weeks. This figure is not wearing a helmet, and as he passes the red-skinned people shower him with flower petals and the elves salute him with expressions approaching awe on their normally indifferent faces. The serpent rider is unnaturally handsome and possesses dark grey skin, pointed ears, black flowing hair with thick black eyebrows upswept at the edges much like an elf's, and his eyes shine a brilliant golden amber in color. As he smiles to the crowd and raises his hand in passing, you glimpse that he possesses a pair of fangs where a human's canine teeth would be. They procession continues for some time, and appears to be making its way towards a glittering palace of such wealth and beauty that all the wealth in the world could not equal it in cost. You continue wandering the streets and see many more things during your dreams, but you can't recall anything else of note. Also mixed into your dreams are the weird and disturbing rituals and symbols; different ones this time. You feel as if you are unlocking the secrets of the universe through some sort of forbidden means. Many of these experiences in particular are so disturbing you feel uncomfortable recalling them. These parts of your dream are audible to you, and you hear blasphemous names, never before uttered by human lips, calling upon powers best left sleeping their long eons. Make a base saving throw with a +3 bonus to see if this has an effect on you. Throughout the week you continue to feel stronger, faster, less out of breath, and you regularly peer into a mirror from day to day to monitor the changes taking place. Add a permanent +1 to your strength score, and +1 to your saves vs. disease. You notice that your ears have fully grown into distinctly elvish pointed tips, and that you have grown to a height of 7' tall. You also notice that your hair has begun to darken in color (if it wasn't already black). Your facial features and manner of walking and moving have also changed. You are far more graceful and your appearance would now be considered of average beauty or handsomeness. Add a permanent +2 to your charisma score. The most startling change to overtake you this week is your eyes. They have turned from natural amber in color to a golden amber, and light reflects back from nearby candlelight when it catches your eyes. You now have 30' infravision and search and passively find doors as an Elf (when I ask if there are elves in the party just say you are).

RECORD OF THE 5TH WEEK During the week your dreams become clearer and clearer. You've started hearing the sounds of the city, and the strange but familiar language they speak. One night as you lay sleeping, you wake to find an arm draped over your chest. You turn to look and realize you are surrounded by small elvish women, their naked forms breathing softly in the night. You sit up and see that you are laying upon a massive circular mattress covered with silken sheets, a large awning hangs over you, red shear silk draping you from outside eyes. You carefully move the arm from off your chest and stand, parting the drapes and peering into the room beyond. A great serpent lays partially coiled around the bed which sits in the middle of a room of extravagant wealth. Ornate gilded woodwork covers nearly every surface of the room, and a warm tropical breeze blows strange exotic smells into the room from one of the archways that opens to an outside balcony. The serpent lifts its broad head, watching you with dragon-like eyes as you make your way through the curtain of silk lazily blowing from the doorway, and find yourself staring as if from some great height above the city of your dreams. The sun is just now rising, but you can see that the balcony sits upon a palace built upon a cyclopean ziggurat below. To your right stands the familiar tower of iron, the rising sun glinting off the morning rays of light. Even given the height of the palace, the tower still reaches much further into the sky; beyond even the highest clouds. You feel the power of the tower from here, and find yourself frustrated with your inability to command its power. "It shall serve me, or I will break its power," you say to yourself; your voice is booming and powerful, filled with authority. You spend the rest of your day administering the realm, listening absent mindedly to your elven advisors and toying with the entrails of one of your personal slaves. By Krotus, this isn't right. The thought startles you, and you look about for the source. You call your elven magister to attend you, eyeing him with great suspicion. "Magister, earlier I heard a thought that was not my own. What do you know of this? None within my palace may practice magic but yourself." The Magister falls to his knees sputtering, "Oh great master! None of the wards have been broken. I do not know what afflicts you but it is not by my actions! Please master, you must believe me!" You find yourself sickened by the display and pick him up as if he were a child. The magister lets out a soul shattering shriek as you toss him towards your serpent whose great maw opens to catch the body in a single gulp, showing rows of needle-like fangs with great strands of slime and saliva dripping from its mouth. Is this a dream? What is going on? Recognizing the portent of these thoughts you snarl, "Begone spirit! I do not know from where you came, but I cast you from this place!" As the words are spoken, you feel yourself ripped from the dream, awakening in terror. The rest of the week you fear falling back asleep, and day after day you watch yourself in the mirror, looking for what else has changed. You now stand 7'4 in height, towering above all others. Even when you walk the streets you stand out clearly in a crowd. Your lanky arms are beginning to fill out in spite of your growth in height, you receive another +1 permanently to your strength. You feel incredibly healthy, and receive a +4 to all saves vs. disease. Looking in the mirror shows you that you clearly have elven features such as pointed ears, but golden amber eyes shine back at you from the reflection, and your hair color (even the eyebrows) have darkened considerably. You feel as if your skin tone has started darkening as well, but it is not as noticeable. Your facial features are much noticeably changed now. You possess a strong chin and a chiseled jaw, your brows are fierce and by now you realize that the very bones of your face must have changed. You receive a permanent +2 to your charisma. During the past week you recognize that you were able to understand what others were saying in your dreams, and you realize that you must now somehow be able to speak the "Ancient Elvish" language. The dreams of the past week are clearly troubling, make a saving throw with a +2 bonus to see how you are affected.

RECORD OF THE 6TH WEEK DM Note: You may act during your dreams, but I'm moving things along due to in-game time reasons. Based on your prior experience, you must be careful with your thoughts, and you get the feeling that you could try and take control of the dream-body if you wanted. You have difficulty telling what is dream and what is real these days. Between the regular dungeon delves into the Palace of Baalor and the dreams or memories you are experiencing, your head is awhirl. During the week you are walking along, talking to one of your friends in the party when suddenly the world tilts and spins and you find yourself lounging upon a dais in a richly appointed throne room; one of your elven advisors is kneeling before you, droning on and on about some such matter. You look and see your great serpent, "Grootslang" coiled about the dais, his eyes closed in contentment. Unbidden, a painful memory comes to mind of the day you were gifted the serpent by your mother. You were but a young man, and your father, an Elven King named "Cian", had passed away from a mysterious illness the day before. Your normally distant mother, Ethniu, had you brought into her private chambers. With the door to the chamber secure, your dark-grey-skinned mother turned to you and said, "At last, it is time that you know your true lineage." With those words, Ethniu was enveloped by a cloud of magical smoke. Stepping from the smoke was revealed a giant utterly alien humanoid possessing long wiry black hair and inhuman eyes of scintillating ruby. "My true name is Feada, daughter of Balor son of the great Chaos Lord Orcus! I am of the Fomorian, and in your veins runs the blood of the gods. Like myself, you are immortal; disease and age have no claim to you. There is but one difference: you may be slain by mortal hand." You remember the shock of it all, of your world turning upside down and the foundations crumbling beneath you. Feada was not done however and she continued, "Akurra, you are part of a much larger plan," her eyes blazed with fervor and excitement, "Your purpose is to bring the Tuatha Dé Danann [Elves] under our control without them realizing it. You are not alone in this endeavor as you must now be aware; others of the Tuatha nobility have intermarried with what they mistook as the peaceful Sidhe. Together you shall rule and enslave the Tuatha! But think not to turn against your true masters as we once did against the Chaos Lords. The power of your blood bestows many blessings, but it is also your weakness..." You remember pain like no other searing through your insides; your screams echoed unanswered off the walls of the chamber. Panting between screams, you pleaded with Feada for mercy. "You shall have mercy for now. But you will well remember this lesson: disobedience will be punished. Now I have a gift for you." Feada produced a wooden chest which she placed before you. "Open it. Within you will find one of the great serpents of Eris. He will be your constant companion and a reminder...you are but a worm beneath our feet, but serve us well and we shall reward you richly." You remember clearly the feeling of powerlessness in her presence, and that feeling now wells up within you as wordless rage. You who are master of not just an entire kingdom, but ruler of an entire race of lesser beings; you will one day be free of the Fomorians. You must first find their weakness. They can be imprisoned, but not slain by normal means. You have trafficked with dark spirits to try and find a weapon that can slay the immortal Fomorians, but your efforts have proved fruitless. You have all the time in the world to find the answer, you think to yourself with a smile. Your attention returns to the advisor before you, "...your kinsman Lugh of the Seventh Spire has requested aid in fighting off the rebel Tuatha Dé Danann. They have allied themselves with the Dwarves of Skyreach Mountains and are proving more difficult to overcome than first estimated. What would you have us do?" **************************************************************************************************************** "Send them what they are requesting," you say. You pause in a moment's thought about your own city's growing unrest. "Also let it be known that dwarvenkind will not be tolerated in my kingdom. Close the gates of the city and slay any found within. Their usefulness in trade and metalwork is at an end. Send my armies to root them out of the nearby mountains, and burn their valley settlements. Bring me their nobility for questioning..." a sudden thought blooms in your mind, yes perhaps one of the dwarves knows of a weapon that can slay the Fomorian. You dismiss your advisor and mull over thoughts of Fomorian history in your head for some insight. The stories of the elves tell of great horrors that once lived when the first Tuatha came to Eris from the stars. The ancient Fomorians were blasphemous demons that defied form and categorization, and in-spite of the power of the Iron Towers of Law that the first Tuathan constructed, the colonies were destroyed and King Nemed slain. In the end, four Elven ships escaped to the stars, finding safety among the Four Stars of the North where they learned the arts of magic. One legend to survive this era, tells of a king of the Fomorian named Balor. He was described as a giant creature possessing a single closed eye within the center of his face. When opened, the world burned before his terrible gaze like kindling upon a fire. Perhaps this creature, your supposed grandfather, might be the key to destroying the Fomorians. It is said they feared his gaze and spent great effort to keep him asleep. The curious thing is that when the elves returned to Eris, they found their Towers of Law still standing, but only the red skinned primitive Barsoomians and Dwarven Kingdoms living upon the world. Eventually the Fomorians made themselves known as the Sidhe under the glamour of powerful illusion. But still, having see many of the Fomorians yourself since becoming part of the conspiracy, you have seen that they are more humanoid than shapeless. A thought occurs to you that the Fomorians may have somehow been changed by contact with the first elves. These thoughts slide from your mind as you find yourself once again slipping into darkness. The sound of your concerned friend reaches your ears and you blink awake to find yourself on the docks of Stilt Town. You stagger to your feet, a hand to your head, but otherwise you feel fine. This week you noticed that you grew another 4 inches, and now stand 7'8 tall . Your strength continues to improve, you are now able to toss a dwarf with ease and receive a permanent +1 to your Strength score . Your appearance continues to change as well: your hair is now completely black, and your complexion is noticeably darker, your natural pinkish color seems to be draining from your skin tone. When you glimpse yourself in the mirror, there are still traces of the original Ramkis, but you are now considered "very good looking" and receive a permanent +2 to Charisma score . After your strange experience that day, you suspect that you are immune to Disease and Aging as well, and realize that you can understand and speak/read/write Fomorian in addition to Ancient Elvish. Alien thoughts occasionally fill your head from time to time, and you sometimes see flashes of ghost-like people walking past you as if replaying themselves in the waking world. Make another saving throw with a +1 bonus.

RECORD OF THE 7TH WEEK Your first day of testing out spells shows that you are able to heal animals and cast protection spells on them with no issues; however when you attempt to cast heal, detect, and protection on yourself, you notice that it fails approximately 3 of every 5 times you attempt to cast it. You also discover that your wounds are naturally recovering at a faster pace (1d6 per day of rest instead of 1d3). You may have occasionally noticed a healing spell failing a time or two between adventures, but it never occurred to you that a deeper issue might exist until now (I generally track these things in adventure, not when you auto-heal between adventures). ************************************************************************************************************** So, to commune with Krotus you need to find a secluded area to fall into a deep meditation in. You know of a high up place upon the cliffs of the island facing Stilt Town. You have the ferryman take you out there, and spend the day in deep meditation, burning incense and trying to fall into the proper trance. Wild and incomprehensible alien thoughts occasionally intrude, breaking your concentration from time to time. You grow frustrated throughout the day, unable to achieve the meditative trance required. Suddenly a distinct thought pierces your mind. Where am I? Who are you?