Solo session for Vael: Descent

These are the notes and plans for a solo Session for one of my players. Just a couple sessions that they are going to maybe tell the group about, or perhaps not:

The labyrinth there is an easy access to it close by, the entrance into the lowest levels where the Old Gods, the Forbidden gods live has a mirror in the underworld and it is the labyrinth.  Unlike the creation analogue, this one drops deeper into darker depths.  In fact it does not stop.  There is a spell that will get here sooner and faster, but that is not the point, because Minister of Loquacious Trials, knows she is being followed.  She knows because she was told.  She knows who it is but also knows that she won't be able to see Vael.  She is useful but no as useful as turning Vael.  Still she is on her own until she gets to the labyrinth.  There she is to give Vael the book.  The treaty of the Black Sun.  It is written in Old Realm, but there is a small translation available that the Minister can give to him too.  The text is old, over five hundred years, but it looks older, the script and the vellum appear older.  The script tells about the frustration that the writer sees in the world how the Solar Exalted have left the world weak and the people that took over even weaker.  How creation is a never ending torture to the inhabitants.  Common diseases kill and slavery is everywhere.  He book is a treaties on the misfortune in the world and the sorrow that was everywhere.  The book is a suicide note.  And it is the work of a Solar Exalt with a ten essence and full of many social charms.  It was his last work as a mortal…. It is rending and it describes many things in the world around anyone who reads it.  The compelling nature of the text rivets the reader for days while it is read, preventing the reader from going to sleep unless they spend two will power, if they do sleep, the book sends them dreams that reenact the worst of the book as real life.  At the same time, the book makes them tired and listless, requiring them to spend a willpower to continue reading.  If they continue to read to the end they recieve a point of Whispers background—and they are rewarded with new script that describes that he died but he was now a ghost until he saved creation from all that he had seen, only then could he go to Lethe and be reborn.

Minister of Loquacious Trials tells him that this is the master who she follows.  It is his direction that she follows to save creation from the woes that beset it.  If Vael does not have the skill to read the manuscript she tells him that she has a primer, that she used, but the original words are far more eloquent.  She offers it to him and after a few hours of use, he will have additional skill in reading the Old Realm script.  Also he will gain whispers rating of two that will boost his reading ability a bit.  When he gains whisper rating up to three he will be able to see how poetic the script is.  

When he is done he will have questions.  If his questions are about the how and the why, she will tell him instead that his concerns can be answered by showing him instead.  She says that they raid the Slave states much like he has in the past, only they do it to free the slaves and to resettle them, not to enlist them into any army.  He will come to see that their methods are far more effective.  They launch an surprise attack on a latifundia deep in the state and create a portal which they usher the slaves into the underworld, where they are free from any reprisals and then they feed them and they travel in safety to towns set up in the north far from the slave states in villages that have been built by Zombie labour.  

The raids are much more effective than the ones that the Solars engage in.  Instead of taking as many slaves that can fit on the Storm-Wind-Rider and leaving the rest, the entire surviving population is evacuated and the neighbouring settlements as well, all funneled through the Shadowland and after a week of journeying out into Creation into waiting towns.  The populous is split up into new towns and villages.  

If he goes on the raids, Lady of Squalor will be there.  She and her cohort will treat Vael like a friend and a comrade at arms.  

If Vael wants to know more about their boss she will say of course, I will bring you to him, but first i have a time table with things that need to be completed.  She will then tell him about the raid and how it needs to be completed before she can make a meeting for him.  Everything is set and they need to get going, otherwise they will be behind schedule.  Everyone needs to do their part.

If he still wants to meet the chief after, Marama will come to him.  She will claim to be the co-author of the manifesto. The meeting will be about assumptions.  She will let Vael tell her what he thinks and she will tell him the truth every time.  If he asks things about her future plans she will say, that information is only available to the inner circle, not even Squalor is privy to that, because the salvation of creation is at stake and there is only one chance to do everything correctly.  The planning has been going on for nearly eight hundred years and only now that things are so close.  Soon she can tell everything, now that things are falling into place.  But she needs help to make things run smoother.  The more help the better.  

She is truthful that Squalor and her group are not Solar Exalted, but that is a good thing, because if they were they would be the pawns of an uncaring God that can't pry himself away from his own self pity, to see the misery in the world.  If he wants to join, she will show her appreciation in ways that the Sun, never would.  He asks, that she will personally show him ways and techniques that will increase his Essence.  There are lot of overtones as well, she also says that the Panoply of heaven has been closed to him, but not so here, he will gave all that he needs.  Including an extensive network of spies and informants, and artifacts and equipment.  

But the price will be steep.  She is not shy about that.  She tells him that the sun is jealous of his children, even though he refuse to acknowledge them or use them effectively.  But when he joins, he will need to prove himself as worthy

Why was Minister of Loquacious Trial in the labyrinth?  To see the wealth of the underworld along the way?  To manage the mines that mined underworld iron.  To pick up missives from the underworld spies and informants?

1) to allow Vael to see the Underworld that the Black Sun controls

2) to pick up a number of missives from the Black Sun's information network

3) to look into the production of the mines in the labyrinth

Research into the Labyrinth all talks about it all coming from the Mouth of Oblivion in Stygia, but further reading tells a different tale about how it is accessible from all over creation and that there are multiple levels, ten levels, and wormholes that lead to various parts from multiple locations.  It talks about how the labyrinth is constantly changing and moving.  

4) Ministry of Loquacious Trials is heading to the site of the next Slave break and from that location is going to take the freed slaves and bring them to the New Towns.  The names are already chosen, the towns are already built, each has housing for 500 people.  The location of the raid is in Amber River, they are taking five Latifundia in a cluster, each has 1750 people in them, 250 guards and administrators and 1500 slaves in pens.  The idea is to attack each latifundia in the hour before dawn and destroy the guards and administration then lead the populous to the entry position for sunset.  Each raiding party is lead by one from the Circle, 100 zombies wielding swords and 25 former slaves.  There are spies that will tell them if things have changed in the past few days.  The deaths of 250 people in each location, mostly killed with the swords that leave agonizing wounds is more than enough to create a Shadowland that will engulf the latifundia—not that they will inform Vael about this fact.  They will say if he asks, that the wounded will die soon and they can use this time to rethink their actions and become better citizens when they are reborn in the next life.  Also, they are on a time table to get the rest of the slaves out of there before the Realm comes down on them.  All plausible reasons.  

• there will be complications. Five junior Dragon Blooded have been enticed into the region by informants of the Black Sun, because he wants Vael to feel that the operation is riskier than it normally is.  

• there is an Immaculate Monk in the area that the Black Sun did not know was in the area and needs to be taken out or there will be some disruption to the plan.  

• on the way through the Labyrinth, there is an encounter with a few ghosts and a nephwrack not aligned with the Black Sun and for secrecy sake they need to be scilenced.  The Circle will actually treat this encounter with a lot more concern than any other 

They will arrive and exit a Shadowland near the newly set up towns.  The fifteen towns are spaced over large area, but with interconnected roads, they will be called Freedom in five languages, Home in five languages and Safety, also in five languages.  Certainly better than Elsewhere, Somewhere, Someplace Else and Nowhere.