MP Game - Yarnspinners

[puffyn]

---- Arcoscephale, Turn 60 ----

The waters are rising every minute, and every hour it gets noticeably colder, though spring is long overdue. Scouts from the north say that giants have awokken there and are rampaging through the lands unchecked. The river which separates us from the isle is choked with the tentacles of random spawn-things which have been constantly harassing our army. Their ichor turns the once clear waters black as the Styx.

The symbolism is not lost on me. Tomorrow, Maude tells me, I must cross that river before dawn and seize control of the isle, or the world will be lost to the gibbering madness that crouches there. I will not be alone. My army has been reinforced several times over by mystics who suddenly started walking out of the laboratory with phalanx after phalanx of troops. I tried to get in there to talk to Balachandra and figure out how he had managed to pack so many men into such a small building, when the doorway was shattered with a deafening roar and a long string of elephants wandered out and started munching on the grass. I decided I didn't really care to know.

Anne (a magician from the Sinking Lands who I had not previous met), ran up to me, sopping wet, with shellfish and seaweed in her hair, and clutching a pair of those blasted flying boots. "The army in the sea has arrived, Pandokos!" she exclaimed with a huge smile, as if I would be glad to find myself talking to a crazy person. I attempted to smile and back away slowly, but she grabbed me, and dragged me down to the shore (which was even closer than I remembered). She pointed out into the chilly, crystal clear waters, and it seemed as if I could see men moving under the sea in full armor, along with some huge, ghostly giant.

Maude startled me when she snuck up behind us. "For is it not written, 'and, in an hour unlooked for, those who took the paths of the deep shall arise and claim their part on the isle'?" To which I could only reply that if it was "written" no one had ever showed it to me, and it seemed mighty convenient that I was only ever told about most of these prophecies after the fact. Maude looked at me with a little sadness in her eye and told me in a soft voice that I am going to die tomorrow.

I already know that.

I feel it in my weary bones, which have marched on too many rugged, dusty paths, too far from home. I see it with the eyes of an old soldier from the great campaign (may you have found rest Alexandros, though I did not) when I look at the scuttling opposite shore and realize that everything there waits to kill us. I smell it in the chill sea air, harsher and piercing than the warm waters of Pagasae. I hear it in my dreams, as Thymbre urges me to come home to her. I taste it in the butter - does this pinnacle of food exist on the other side of the river Styx?

I will bury this book, along with the "Collected Sayings" before marching tomorrow. At least then it will survive, though for what hope I do not know, if we should fail. At least it will have the proper burial I will be denied. Yet these is some solace... Andron epifanon pasa gi tafos... For heroes, the whole world is their tomb.

But these are unbecoming thoughts. I have the finest army of friends in the world to lead tomorrow. My sword lies gleaming beside me, ready for battle. And there is still one last sunset to watch, and one more loaf of freshly-baked bread to spread with the finest butter.

[djo]

+10 pearls to both for the last few turns. The sense of doom has been palpable.

Would someone please post the turn file for the apocalypse?

[Alneyan]

I will post this turn (and all turns from turn 6 onwards) as soon as the game is over. Once I get the turn files for Arcoscephale and Caelum, it shall be over, and Cthulhu shall rule over the world. Bow down to the Elder Ones!

[Alneyan]

We have now reached the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. The score file has been attached to this mail, and I will upload all the turn files later, if my connection behaves.

Points given for the ranks:
- Provinces: R'lyeh, Caelum, Arcoscephale
- Forts: R'lyeh, Caelum, Arcoscephale
- Income: Arcoscephale, Caelum, R'lyeh
- Gem income: R'lyeh, Caelum, Arcoscephale
- Research: Caelum, Arcoscephale, Man
- Dominion: R'lyeh, Arcoscephale, Caelum

Which would give us the following totals, for ranks alone:
- R'lyeh: 4X20+1X5=85 points
- Caelum: 1X20+4X10+1X5=65 points
- Arcoscephale: 1X20+2X10+3X5=45 points
- Man: 1X5=5 points

[Alneyan]

All the turn files from turn 6 onwards are attached to this mail.

[puffyn]

---- Arcoscephale, Turn 61: Epilogue ----

It is said, about the final battle of some-or-many armed persons against the some-or-many tentacled things, that the tentacles won the day, and few persons escaped alive, with or without their arms. It is said that when they saw the battle turning against them, the persons of spear did not flee, preferring to die in battle than turn and forsake their friends. But earthworms, in addition to being slimy and having little respect for an important historical document such as myself, do not make the most reliable of sources. Even the most cunning chronicle scroll must wait patiently in such circumstances until whichever side has won realizes their sore need for the brilliant insights of a quality book of collected sayings, and then I will be dug up with much fanfare and charged with writing the history of that epic battle.

A few worms tell a different story, that some men have escaped, like the crafty Odysseus and the lizards-of-many-names-starting-in-Golan. They whisper that even though the rest have not come out of the cave, yet they were victorious (but not in the winning-the-battle kind of way that one normally thinks of as victory): the mad god was turned to stone (some say also to mist and to fire and to frost, but others say that was the other god, who spilled butter on my pages, and who could probably use some time as a statue to atone for his errors). Thus, they say, mad-tentacle-god was prevented from reaching the exact right spot in the caves before the window closed, and failed to gain ultimate power. The worms were unclear why there should be a window in the depths of the caves, but such informants are my lot for the foreseeable future.

I am a very patient book of collected sayings, although spending so many months buried next to the scroll of the sayings of the prophet Sokodnap makes me long to give someone a good paper cut. He likes to go on about how his prophet carried him into every battle, and how he was there at the very last; that he felt the spear thrust that felled his prophet. I say the blood stains and jagged holes make him a much less helpful and informative scroll. The worms say of Pandokos that he stood his ground in the center of the storm for the twelve long hours of that final day, guiding and comforting his troops and friends as they fell one by one, and slaughtering in turn a hundred foul-tentacled-things before the spirit of the river arose and dragged him down. I am sure the mystics will be grateful that my pages were not ruined by the river water when they come to dig me up.

... Hello?.... Is there anyone out there?.... Important book, down here!....

... guys?

(From the lost work The Collected Sayings of Pandokos the Prophet: In his final incarnation)

[Alneyan]

Silly me, I have forgotten to give the master password. It is hoohah; most players should already know the master password, but not our other fans.