[News] Aftermath: The Battle to Defend Britannia's Heart

[WarderDragon]

Aftermath: The Battle to Defend Britannia's Heart
By WarderDragon​

Written from the perspective of a Britannic Citizen. This should enlighten folks confused about the origin of the 'Mysterious Crystal.'

The last fire has been quenched in the Capitol of New Britannia. Peace has again returned to Our Realm. But many long weeks shall pass before the stench of black smoke lifts and the mangled corpses of our fallen brothers and sisters can be dragged from the vultures claws.

Such is war.

It has been confirmed that the Crystal Shard of Duplicity - said to possess power greater than even Mondain's Dark Ruby - has been stolen from its poorly guarded display in Castle Britannia. The Shard - which our previous liege had spent so much of his own wealth to forever seal - possesses not only the power to shatter the Virtue Barrier that envelops the Continent of Trammel. It has the power to create - and perhaps even destroy - entire worlds. It has happened before in the hands of men we consider 'Virtuous.' He who possesses this eldritch heirloom possesses the power of a God.

Perhaps our glorious Queen would do well to take her advice from men rather than rats.

There is some speculation - rumors exchanged amongst commoner and nobleman alike - regarding who might be responsible for the theft. Who possesses the power to launch such an assault upon the Seat of Britannic Power? Exodus? The Bane Chosen? We do know that the faction has been gathering the dark mineral for some unnamed purpose. This has happened before. The Ophites? Supporters of the Chosen are quick to enumerate that the serpentine race has been mining the dangerous ore for some time in what some would suggest is preparation for their next assault upon the Human Kingdoms. Gargoyles, perhaps? The Golems were - not surprisingly - formed in much the same manner as the Colossus called upon by Gargish Sorcerers.

It would seem that for every lip and listening ear there springs fourth another theory regarding the origin of our nameless foe.

But even more disturbing is how our righteous sovereign came to know of this threat made against the Britannic Capitol. For weeks have the Defenders of Our Realm stood fast against these hellspawned fiends and sacrilegious abominations. For weeks have we hunted the Sons of Beelzebub and the Legion of the Qliphoth. Not one scrap of vellum has been produced to proclaim this 'inevitable assault.' No letter or scroll. No dying scream of an eviscerated Devil.

Only the word of Her Majesty the Queen.

What we do have is the liveried stablemen and palace servants to the Queen whispering tales of her nightmares and portents of evil. Visions of a nameless dark. It would seem - if these rumors prove to be fact and not fancy - that our reigning monarch foresaw the advance of this demonic host. That perhaps the proclamation of 'letters' and 'missives' is no more than a fabrication. We have a Queen who excavated the relic her predecessor sealed so she could 'display for all to see.' We have a Queen who led the defenders away from the throne room and allowed this priceless object to be stolen. She consorts with thieves and has allowed the castle to be plundered twice.

That leaves us two conclusions. Our Queen is either mad. Or an unwitting pawn used by the dark powers she claims to oppose.

Sound familiar?

 

[BajaElladan]

Well if Trammel's barrier of Virtue goes away, I GO WITH IT!!!!!

Moreover, unless Lord British RETURNS, Im getting more than a little sick of and fed up with musical chairs in the Throne Room.

As the rest, whatever!

 

[EMSeppo]

Ha!

Actually, the scouts that attacked Brit did drop some documents. However, it seemed like everyone who got them were not keen on sharing or had no idea what it meant. So, we just made up an imaginary good Samaritan who turned in a copy to the proper authorities!

 

[WarderDragon]

Trammel isn't going anywhere. But our characters don't know that.

All the more reason to be making preparations to recover this priceless artifact. That is what my characters will be doing.

 

[WarderDragon]

This is a letter posted on Great Lakes Stratics. The author takes a different tone regarding the decisions of Queen Dawn.

I found it interesting and decided to share.

"In the Shadow of Virtue: Daggers of Summer, Ghosts of Autumn" by Galen Knighthawke.

It'd been a little while, I forget how long exactly, since the demon assaults on Britain, when the Crystal of Duplicity was stolen.

It'd been a little while, but I couldn't get the battle out of my mind. I'd been in probably tens of thousands of battles, and they all ran together after about the first five-hundred. They all had certain things in common. The sounds of flesh being torn and burned, the screams of agony and the groans of pain and the grunts of effort, the confusion of everything happening at once, the way it was hard to see anything beyond surviving each moment moment. Often, in battle, battle strategy was the last thing you could think about.

The attack on Britain was especially hard. It had a habit of feeding us false endings. The fight would seem to be over, the defenders would share a moment's respite and a temporary triumph, but then we'd hear the demonic roars and the battle would renew. Having a moment's rest is sometimes worse than being in a long, continuous fight. Sometimes, it's harder to shake off the pain and fatigue when you've had a moment to think about how hurt and tired you are. Of course, long and continuous fights have problems of their own too.

Everyone who was at that battle with one exception was nearly dead from fatigue alone by the end of it. Myself, Aranel, Thanatos, Athena, Martyna, Malag, Silverbrook, Ra'Dian, Edon Machiavelli, everyone. None of these people were new to long battles.

When Silverbrook sounded the alarm that the Crystal of Duplicity had been compromised, it was far too easy to not care, at least not immediately, simply because there was too much to care about that was right in front of us. There were multiple times where the defenders were ready to back out, to declare Britain, the capital city, lost.

It was Queen Dawn who'd rallied us, who wouldn't let us quit. She was the exception, the one person I saw whom the attack didn't wear out. The fighting seemed to have made her come alive in a way that being Queen didn't, maybe couldn't.

What most stands out in my memory, though, as always, were the victims. There were always so many victims, so many fallen, and the attack on Britain was particularly bad. I remembered the screams of the innocents, the sounds of their flesh tearing and their limbs being severed and the cries of their violated daughters. I was nowhere near Queen Dawn when Buldur had injured her, but I could swear I heard her blood being spilled, that I was able to pick out those sounds from hundreds of feet away, through or around about half a dozen buildings at minimum, in the midst of the din of battle.

Funny how I didn't remember this, or think I did, until after I'd learned that Buldur had gotten the blood he sought, along with the Crystal. This “memory” was nothing more than a figment of my imagination. It had to be. Actually hearing what I'd thought I'd heard would've been quite impossible, and these days to say something's impossible is saying a lot.

Sometimes, a memory's just a wish by another name.

You can read the rest here.