M.I.S.T. Campaign: Session 19

The fight didn’t turn out to be that bad.  Sea serpents focused on me while Cindy froze the water around the grindlylows attacking the hull.  They tried to use me as a chew toy…but I was tough enough to get through the short exchange of blows unscathed.  Practically hailing bullets from above…but only one seemed to actually do any damage.  Caught one of them pretty good with Grimmur Klærnar though, put blood in the water.  Just in time for Cindy to finish the thing with a whirlpool of ice shards.  The other serpents, and the grindlylows, didn’t stick around after that.  And, thankfully, the efforts Andrew led in the hold were enough to offset the damage the grindlylows did.

Then the new defense tower the Yazata apparently threw up decided to play the magnifying glass to our ants.  I’m fireproof and that one still scorched me pretty bad, and I hadn’t even felt hot ever since Njord gave me the Regginaglar.  Though it looked like Lexi took it worse, even though she was down in the hold.  I was almost ready to turn the ship around to head back out, try again at night.  But then Claire came out with some shield and shouted that we were bringing Arthur to his final resting place.  And then it…shielded us, apparently.  Smooth sailing into a boathouse from there.

Then as soon as the rest of us all got off the boat it was…absorbed into the shield, or something.  Which dumped her right into the sea, of course.

And that’s where we are now…smack dab in the middle of bloody Yazata territory without nearly enough intelligence to put down solid plans.  Lexi’s asking her music stuff…hopefully that gives us something to work with.

But…damn.  The battle simplified things, pushed stuff to the back of my mind, gave me something to concentrate on.  It was the closest I’ve come to being at peace since Altair showed his godsforsaken…

Enough writing for now.

M.I.S.T. Campaign: Session 18

I helped out a bit to fix the boat, when asked, learned a few things.  But…for the most part just avoided the ranch.  No real inclination to be there, at this point, plenty of reason to avoid it.  I spent most of the time underwater, actually.  Solitude, there are a lot fewer people who could get down there to try to engage me in a conversation I’d have really not wanted to participate in.

Eventually, blessedly, the time came to leave.  Manannan gave us some short, motivational, speech.  I didn’t really listen all that closely, wasn’t in the mood for it.  And as soon as we were underway I went up to the crow’s nest and stayed there.  All the better to keep watch.  Lexi said a little something to try to cheer me up, which helped.  Didn’t override whatever Altair did…but I was thankful for it. 

Though the vigil proved unnecessary, wasn’t long before we entered the mists.  Thick mists, not at all natural, slowed the ship to a crawl.  It seemed to be fairly apparent that we were nearing Avalon.  Whatever the case, they interrupted the conversation Cindy and Claire were having about pirate captains.  We were about to start planning.  Andrew mentioned that Thoth was being held by Tishtrya.  Fucking wonderful…that means we have to get in and out under the nose of a major Yazata God.

Then the ship stopped dead, we could feel something bumping against the side, Lexi could catch glimpses of it.  But the blasted mist kept us from seeing much.  So I went over the side and slipped underwater, mist couldn’t impede my vision there.  And…it was about as bad as we could’ve expected.  There were a ton of little monsters tearing at the boat, and a bigger serpent that hit me almost as soon as I entered the water.  Thankfully I was tough enough to weather it.

And I called Cindy down into the water right away.  Couldn’t help but feel that this one was going to fall even more squarely than usual on our shoulders, too.  I mean, we’ve always been the front-line fighters.  But we’re also the only ones that can handle ourselves in water as well as we can on land.  For our sake, the world’s, the Æsir’s…just had to hope we were up to it.

M.I.S.T. Campaign: Downtime 3

My Mother was consigned to an eternity of solitude in a misted pit practically from the moment of her birth.  Two men she’s ever cared for…one ever out of her reach in Asgard and the other killed by the most treacherous of Yazata.

By all the tales I’ve found my Father was forced to leave the woman he loved behind in Vanaheim when he was sent to Asgard.  Then there was Skaldi…a marriage stemming from a mistake that was doomed from the beginning.

It’s there, no matter which one you look at.

The fate of the parents...how much of it is the fate of the son?

M.I.S.T. Campaign: Session 17

So Odin came bearing dire news.  Fimbulwinter approaches fast, this coming winter, Jotunheim’s brine is apparently set to taint Midgard come the solstice.

And from what Andrew’s discovered those who usurped M.I.S.T. are facilitating the coming of Ragnarok…which means the Yazata.  According to Odin they’re so concerned with enforcing their view of the timeline to keep Zrvan in check that they’d consider the Æsir working to avert the goddamned apocalypse and prevent our destruction an act of sympathy with the Titans they’d destroy us for.

As if I didn’t the impression of them I was left with wasn’t poor enough already.

And more uncomfortable questions are raised.  I’ve never been sure what Vayu’s motivation was for trying to steal me away.  Was it related to this?  Odin seems certain that he can read every twist and wrinkle Fate has in store.  But if he’s mistaken?  He also called me Helsson as though it were an insult.  He had little trouble disparaging her directly as well.  That almost caused me to snap.  But I finally managed to bite my tongue in front of a greater divine power.  Pissing off Odin, of all people, is something I can ill-afford to do.  Though I think I came dangerously close to shattering Manannan Mac Lir’s chair without realizing it.

Anyway, there’s a reason Odin told us what he saw.  He apparently has a way to stop it, but he needs time bought to do it.  Anyone more powerful would be prevented from interfering by the bindings of Fate, so apparently it falls to us.  We need to steal some object the Yazata has that lets them regulate time or sneak back to M.I.S.T. Headquarters and free Andrew’s Father, Thoth, from imprisonment.  Our choice was as quick as it was predictable.  It’ll be no small task now that the Yazata control the island.

But Manannan had a way around that.  He brought us to a submerged shipwreck.  Which was…amazing in and of itself.  Deep beneath the ocean, amidst a small bubble he must have been maintaining for those who needed it.  We could even see whales swimming by above.  As a Scion of a Sea God, being down in the depths like that for the first time…just resonated.

Then he dropped a bombshell of his own.  We were standing amidst the ruins of the ship that had been transporting King Arthur to Avalon, which became M.I.S.T.    And the ship is still destined to complete that journey.  So Manannan brought it back to his dry dock and…we’re sailing the remains of King Arthur to Avalon, which is now likely a Yazatan stronghold, so we can free the Egyptian God of Knowledge from captivity to forestall the end of the world and the death of most of my pantheon.

Needless to say, the enormity of that has not truly sunk in yet.  Gods know I had too much on my mind to begin with.

Oh, yeah, and Utgard-Loki’s influence caused Cindy to grow to about the same height as Claire.  It’s like what happened to me when the Jotunblut in my veins awoke, only a bit more drastic.  I probably should’ve seen that coming.  As is, it’s another worrying sign that the giant’s influence over her is progressing.  And now we have to put finding the cure for that on the back burner to forestall the end of the world.

Had Ragnarok not been prophesied I’d never have been able to anticipate the stakes rising this high.  I certainly never could’ve expected it happening this fast.  We might well be walking into something that makes the danger we’ve faced so far seem utterly trivial.  And even after that there’s apparently a bona fide apocalypse to deal with.  Even Manannan seemed to imply that the specter of death would loom all too closely from here on out.

So it's time to make sure i talk to Ken before we leave...have to make sure that's not put off.  Here's hoping this one goes better than the last two.

M.I.S.T. Campaign: Session 16

I’ve charged into battle against elite soldiers, trolls, wendigo, giants, werewolves, and svartalfar without flinching.  I’ve faced down a dragon, defied a being on the cusp of divinity knowing that he would react in murderous frenzy, and thrown the gifts of a murderous god back into his face; all without an instant’s hesitation.

By all rights what I’ve done should have seen me slain at least twice over.  Not once has it given me pause.

Yet a few simple words, “before we can take any steps forward, if we can,” are simply terrifying.  They came from Ken’s lips, of course.

As I said before, she was not happy with my actions during those last frantic minutes in Thuringia; and she tracked me down along the seaside cliffs to speak to me about them.  But with how I was letting the incessant torments of Altair affect me I was hardly in a reasonable state of mind. Looking back, it was not surprising that nothing productive came of those talks.  They’d barely begun before she left out of frustration.

A call to my Mother granted a measure of perspective, made me realize that I was allowing what Altair had levied upon me to get to me more than it should.  And I was able to pull myself together, to a degree, after that.  Though I was hardly in a more talkative mood, and continued to spend the next three days in isolation amongst the seaside cliffs instead of at Manannan Mac Lir’s ranch.

Then Odin arrived, desiring to speak with us after the disaster at Thuringia.  Or more accurately, it seemed, to hear how we viewed those events.  We spoke with him on the porch, talking amongst ourselves whilst he and Manannan Mac Lir each tried to out-Gandalf the other with their pipes.  Much of the dialogue, at first, was between Claire and myself.  That some manner of conspiracy was behind things was agreed upon quickly, even if the exact details were not.

Then Ken demanded to know why I would discuss such matters with Claire but not her.  The resulting argument was, in a word, ugly.  Everyone else, even the gods, retreated into the house to grant the two of us a measure of privacy. Even so, I did not seem to be able to grasp the point she was trying to make and she was unable to express it more clearly.  In the end she stormed off again, and here I sit with those words ringing ominously in my head.

It was both my date with her and my discussion with my Mother that helped me find myself after Whittier.  The prospect of…

It’s astounding how quickly things can go downhill.

Gods damn it all.