382YE Autumn Equinox winds of war

Prepare for difficult choices.

Overview

Summer ripens the fields, lades the trees with blossom, ushers in long days and short nights... and lets loose the wildfires of war. As the days lengthen toward Autumn, human and orc clash across the boundaries of the Empire. Peace is secured with the Thule of the north - for now - but that may offer scant consolation as the wars continue in the east and the west.

...

Only actions are virtuous.

Lost in the Echo (Morrow)

Highborn soldiers watch the passes between Morrow and Zenith. The Granite Pillar, the Seventh Wave, the Valiant Pegasus stand ready to protect the Urizen from the wickedness of the eastern orcs. Perhaps twelve thousand strong, give or take, they do not stand alone. As well as the people of Morrow, they are supported by a enchanted castle of glacial ice and pale stone. Raised by the Eternal Family of Navarr to stand vigil over the ancient spires of central Operus, it is garrisoned by pale knights in moonsilver plate, armed with great two-handed spears. The Highborn forces make great use its central position to bolster their defences. They believe themselves ready for the Druj, should they come.

And come they do.

There is a trod that runs north through Peregro from Proceris in Zenith. Once it brought Navarr stridings, and scholars from Therunin traveling south to study at the Arch of the Sky. Now, it brings only ruin.

The Wretched Druj lurk across the border and threaten to spread their filth into Morrow. If they should dare to move upon our positions, we will find and destroy them. Hold the border defend at the fortress of Operus and resupply so we can be ready to sweep them before us.

Cuth, General of the Seventh Wave

For the last three months the Druj have held their position in Zenith, consolidating their gains. Enslaving, butchering, burning, devouring everything that comes within their grasp. It seems that they have slaked their cruel thirst, at least in Zenith. As dawn breaks three weeks after the Summer Solstice, some twenty thousand Druj orcs pour northward along the trod from Proceris, down from the peaks where the Arch of the Sky now stands in ruins. A Seventh Wave patrol manages to get out a warning of their approach before being overwhelmed, but they are utterly unable to slow the flood of orcs as it washes down into Peregro.

At roughly the same time, another twenty-five thousand orcs, more or less, push north from the sodden lowlands of Proceris and Clypion into Caeli. Here again the patrols are quickly overwhelmed, but the great central heliopticon tower is able to send a warning to every spire in Morrow within hours of the first reports of orc movements.

The three Highborn armies move to intercept the orcs. The Granite Pillar takes the lead again, precisely orchestrating the defence of eastern Morrow. The Seventh Wave provide intelligence about enemy movements, working to identify opportunities to counter the Druj advance. Sadly, they are unprepared for the sheer numbers of orcs pouring into Morrow from Zenith - all the strategies in the world are no help when one is outnumbered four to one. For their part, the Valiant Pegasus are well prepared for the bloodbath that is to come. They have seen what the Druj can do, and have erected a central hospital in the shadow of the magical fortress in Operus. Their physicks and healers are overwhelmed, however, by the sheer number of casualties they must deal with and stretched almost to breaking by the need to offer succour to frightened refugees as well as injured soldiers.

The Highborn are able to slow the Druj, but not much more. The Granite Pillar have the upper hand, up to a point, but much of their strategy is undone by the presence of orcs fighting beneath a scorpion banner. This is not the first time the two armies have clashed. As in Zenith, the scorpion army is adept at countering the disciplined strategies of the Highborn, ruthlessly outmaneuvering and flanking their defensive positions. Still, in this regard at least, the fact the Druj have greater numbers plays into the Highborn hands. The Druj find it difficult to coordinate their strategies among so many troops, while the Highborn are more able to respond to the shifting Druj advance...

Make a strategic defence of the Morrow. The Druj may try to beachead so keep your eyes open. Make use of the Fort at Operus. If we are not attacked, resupply.

Mathayus, General of the Granite Pillar

But it is not enough.

Caeli falls first. The Seat of the Arbiter, and the spire that watches over it, are claimed by the Druj after a vicious battle with the Pillar and the Wave that sees five hundred Imperial soldiers fall beneath poisoned blades and withering arrow-shot. Work had already begun here on a central stelae, part of Lorenzo Macelliao von Temeschwar's most recent great work. The site is overwhelmed, defiled, the stelae destroyed. The workers at least are spared - when it becomes clear the Druj advance will not be stemmed they are evacuated west to Operus along with most of the magicians of the nearby spire. Sadly, there is not time to bring the grand library of divination magic, collected over centuries by the magicians of the Arbiter's Seat. It burns, along with the spire.

At the same time the Highborn fight to defend the Seat of the Arbiter, the Druj attack the Gardens of Morrow. As with the Gardens of Pallas before them, the Druj loot the herbs and then fire the beds, reducing the once beautiful garden - and its defenders - to winds-bown ashes in a matter of hours.

The Highborn fall back to the foothills beneath the heart of the Heliopticon. The relentless rush of the Druj cannot be stopped however. Lead by those who march beneath the banner of the great crane, the orcs lay siege to the tower and after five days of bloody fighting the central pillar on which the entire heliopticon hangs... is lost.

The magicians who operate the tower, inspired perhaps by the example of Hadrian of Apulian, refuse to leave. At the last moment, with the Druj breaking down the doors of the central chamber itself, they draw down a column of burning light in an outpouring of energy that shatters the tower and immolates two hundred orc soldiers in a single instant. Nothing remains of the tower, the orcs, or the courageous defenders save a perfect circle of black glass.

The Heliopticon goes dark. For years uncounted the Urizen have relied on it to communicate between their spires, separated as so many of them are by the broken land and treacherous mountain roads. Now, the voices of the magi fall silent. For twelve days, there is nothing. Then, a fortnight after the loss of the central tower, the heliopticon flickers into life again. There have long been contingencies in place for just such an occurrence, unthinkable as it might once have been, and as soon as the Druj cross the borders into Morrow the preparations began. The Heliopticon is much reduced, slower, more limited in scale - but the light of Urizen refuses to be extinguished.

For the time the Heliopticon is silent, the Imperial armies are forced to rely on more mundane means of communication. Runners from the Seventh Wave, and sentinels from the citadels of Morrow, carry messages by hand between the spires and the Highborn defenders. Some are intercepted - the war of crane-and-frog that has been played in the mountains of Morrow becomes increasingly bitter in the absence of the towers of light. Where most of the Druj forces seem to be focused on death and destruction, on butchering the defenders of Urizen and destroying their hope, a faction among them is sending tendrils out across the territory gathering information. Probing for weakness. Hunting their next target. Desperate encounters between the scouts beneath the winged-serpent banner and the Seventh Wave take place as far afield as Ravion in the far west of Morrow. Indeed, there are reports of spies in the foothills below Canterspire - most likely leading to the regretful decision by the Academy to relocate to Astolat. While the Seventh Wave do their best, gathering vital battlefield intelligence of their own, it seems inevitable that the Druj scouts have likewise discovered a great deal about the forces arrayed against them.

Further east, in Peregro, the fighting is no less fierce. The wonder that was the Glorious Fountain of Dawn and Dusk falls quickly before one band of advancing orcs - those who bear banners showing a baleful lizard. They seize its mana, and then tear the beautiful pipes and basins apart in search of more. A beautiful, unique work of art and artisanship destroyed in a day, the hot springs permanently damaged by the rapacious onslaught of the Druj.

In Peregro, the Highborn are aided by warriors from an unlikely source. The once-scattered sword scholars have gathered in the foothills to oversee and assist in the rejuvenation of the Temple of the Winds. Once a centre for their particular philosophy of Wisdom, and the study of their false-paragon Sulemeine, work had already begun on restoring the place when the Druj began to move. Five hundred sword scholars, give or take, are camped around the construction site in tents and pavilions. As the Druj inch closer, they help the Valiant Pegasus set up a field hospital to deal with the stream of injured soldiers fighting desperately to slow the orc advance. Then, when the Druj come in force, they fight courageously to keep the Druj at bay. Scores of sword scholars give their lives to protect their sacred place - and to allow the injured to be moved to safety. Arrayed in mithril plate and wielding great two-handed swords, they fight alongside the Highborn slaughtering every Druj that comes before them. In the end though, it is not enough. The Druj overwhelm the Temple of the Winds. The warrior-priests are devastated by the attack - easily two-thirds of their movement lost. Dozens of scrolls concerning the teachings of Sulemeine are seized by the Druj. Those sword-scholars who are captured are forced to watch as the cruel orcs tear apart the Temple of the Winds; they are then impaled in a rough ring of wooden stakes around the rubble.

The final most vicious battle of the campaign is yet to come. Until a year ago, the Halls of Knowledge stood in Clypion to the east. Between the Autumn Equinox and the Winter Solstice last year, the premier college of Urizen magical thought somehow moved from Zenith to Morrow - just ahead of the Druj armies sweeping west through Zenith. Since then, the Halls have stood on the shores of the largest of the hot lakes of central Peregro. The Druj were furious when they discovered the Halls had escaped them, so it is perhaps no surprise that the orc strategy seems focused on them, now that they have rediscovered their location.

The army will be preparing in case the Druj try to invade, we will be ensuring that field hospitals are ready for any casualties that occur. Making use of the fort at Operus to strengthen our defence.

Brother Lucifer, General of the Valiant Pegasus

The Highborn make a stand here, draw a line in the sand in the hills south of the college. The Druj smash against the Highborn wall, and after two days are pushed back... but only for a day. A trickle of reinforcements from Caeli becomes a flood, nearly the entire force of the orc invasion brought to bear against the beautiful, ancient buildings of the Halls of Knowledge.

Over a week of bloody fighting two thousand Highborn lay down their lives to secure time for as many of the professors and librarians time to escape west to Altis. Many refuse to leave their books, desperate to carry with them as much of the lore accumulated here as they possibly can. Among their number, architects and builders engaged in expanding the college to allow for an increased focus on Autumn magic - indeed work has already begun when the Druj are first sighted. By the time the Temple of the Winds falls, however, most of the labourers have already fled. They are forced to abandon much of the white granite, mithril, and weirwood dedicated to the new construction however.

A week of fighting follows, in which the Highborn battle first in the foothills, and then in the Halls themselves. This open, airy college was never intended as a fortification. Beautiful glass domes and windows, wide arcades, and sweeping balconies alike were designed to allow the students and scholars to bask in the majestic views of the heavens, to contemplate the intricate order of the natural world, to engage in grant debates about the nature of magic. The libraries were built for ease of access, to hold great collections of books, scrolls, and works of art. The site is practically indefensible.

In the end, with librarians still loading the scrolls into ox wagons, the Highborn are forced to retreat.

Those who remain behind are butchered in a frenzy of bloodletting and torture by the Druj as they pour through the beautiful building like ants. Several civil service prognosticators are among those unaccounted for - brave people who would not leave their fellow scholars behind to face the Druj alone.

The Highborn regroup, preparing to launch a counter-offensive to reclaim the college... but before they can do so the first smoke is seen. A white pillar, then a second, rise from the shores of the hot springs. After a single day of murder and looting, the Druj set the libraries and galleries aflame. As they have done so many times before, it seems they are more interested in destruction than conquest. The fires burn for two days. Two and a half centuries of learning lost to the flame, turned to ashes. The survivors can do naught but weep in silence, and then turn to begin the long trudge west towards the dubious safety of Highwatch.

The Halls of Knowledge burn, but the Druj are not done. They harry the retreating Highborn armies from Peregro, and from Caeli, and push forward to Operus. There at last the Druj advance is slowed, and stopped, and reversed. With grim determination, in the shadow of the frozen citadel, the Highborn fight. The orcs are understandably hungry to take Operus, to claim no doubt the bounty of the Canterspire Circle. Their hunger remains unsated - for now. Aided by the Auric Horizon, the knights of Cathan Canae, and the magicians of Canterspire, the Highborn are finally able to hold against the Druj.

The bulk of the orc force withdraws to camps in Peregro and Caeli, no doubt preparing themselves to renew their assault. A pall hangs over Morrow. The Halls of Knowledge are gone. The Glorious Fountain is gone. The great central tower of the Heliopticon is gone. The Seat of the Arbiter is in the hands of the Druj. Four thousand Highborn soldiers lie dead or captured by the Druj. More than three hundred sword scholars have been slain. Many of the scholars of the Halls of Knowledge have either been killed or enslaved. Spires across eastern Morrow, spires that had stood since the height of Terunael, are in ruins, their people scattered, or enslaved, or living their final moments in agony as the tormented victims of the wickedness of the Druj.

Game Information - Morrow

The Druj have conquered Peregro and Caeli, but have managed to take only a fingerhold in Operus - a few spires on the south-eastern borders of the region - representing barely a tenth of the region. The Empire still controls the territory, but if they lose a third region Morrow will fall under the control of the Druj.

The Urizen have already lost a great deal in the fall of Zenith. Now they have lost even more.

The Halls of Knowledge have been destroyed. While the Provost still technically possesses their title, their powers were based entirely around being custodian of the Halls themselves and thus they are Provost in name only. The title will not be reappointed again. Any work that was being done this season on formulating rituals has been lost along with the college of magic. Likewise, the expansion to the Halls of Knowledge has failed. Half the materials provided by Agrippa had already been assigned to the project; the remainder will be refunded. With the destruction of the Halls of Knowledge, the commission cannot now be completed.

The sites of the Temple of the Winds and the Legacy of Wisdom have likewise fallen to the Druj. These commissions have thus failed. half the materials and monies contributed by Lorenzo, Nikolovich Drakov, and Edmundo of Damakhan's Forge have been lost. Again, the remainder has been refunded to those characters. If the regions of Caeli or Peregro are recovered before the start of the Summer Solstice 382YE, work may be completed without the need for another commission but must begin from scratch.

The Glorious Fountain of Dawn and Dusk has been destroyed. The Keeper retains their title (unless they choose to step down), but the sinecure of which they had custody has been destroyed so their title likewise is now an empty one. The title will not be reappointed.

The Gardens of Morrow have been burnt to the ground by the advancing Druj, destroying that great work completely.

With the loss of both Peregro and Caeli, coupled with the loss of the entirety of Zenith, the already precarious ability of the Urizen to support the Citadel Guard is again in jeopardy. Until at least two more regions of Morrow or Zenith are recovered, the Urizen are considered to be exceeding their ability to support armies.

The central Heliopticon tower has been destroyed. The Heliopticon still functions, albeit barely, but its ability to quickly convey messages across the whole of Urizen has been impeded. Messages are slow, and can no longer be routed quickly though a central point rather relying on individual spires to pass them along. This leads to more miscommunications and garbled messages going forward.

There is plenty of evidence that this situation could have been considerably worse - without the frozen citadel in Operus, and the strategic defence of the Granite Pillar, the massive orc force would have been well on their way to taking the third region this season, potentially destroying even more of Urizen.

Born to battle.

Keys to the Kingdom (Sermersuaq)

As Summer lengthens into Autumn, Imperial forces withdraw south from Sermersuaq into Kallavesa, the Mournwold, and even distant Astolat. That is not to say there is no fighting on the plains of the north; Winterfolk of all three traditions do their best to hold back the Jotun advance - but without Imperial forces they have little hope of victory. Refugees fleeing across the border into Hahnmark bring bold stories of the heroism of those still fighting - but they do little to mitigate the grim reality of absolute conquest. Tens of thousands of orcs, sweep through East Floes, Suaq Wastes, and Suaq Fount.

The halls of Sermersuaq are swept before the Jotun like leaves before an Autumn storm. Fjellreven, Saker, Sussivari, Nanuk - none can hold against the orcs for long. One by one, they fall before the western barbarians, just as Atalaq before them fell.

Within six weeks of the Summer Solstice, all of Sermersuaq is in the hands of orcs. Everything save the Silver Peaks, where the Thule continue to hold dominion, is under the control of the Jotun. Word-of-mouth suggests that while the loss of land has been absolute, the loss of life has been comparatively light. True to an agreement forged in the recent peace treaty, the magicians of the Thule have laid down a veil of Spring magic across the territory, filling the lakes and rivers with healing power. For their part, the Jotun have come as conquerors and not butchers; their focus is on claiming the territory not on slaughtering its people. All Winterfolk who come under the aegis of the Jotun are given the Choice: some choose to fight - and die - but many submit to live as thralls. Their lives will be hard, but they know the Jotun will not harm them as long as they honour their choice.

Along with news of conquest comes a stranger tale. According to those fleeing before the orcs, on the first night of the new moon after the Summer Solstice, the dead rise in Sermersuaq. There have been recent problems with the unquiet dead already - the still unresolved matter of the Finfolk and the drowned dead - but this is something different. From beneath fresh barrow mounds, dead orcs and humans alike tear themselves from the soil and lurch in search of warm flesh and hot blood.

Conquerors by nature.

At first the Winterfolk wonder if these are dead heroes returned to aid them, but this optimistic fantasy is soon dispelled. The husks are ravenous, without thought, as eager to feast on the Suaq as on the Jotun. They are a terror in the night, drawn to the gathering places of the living - Jotun camps and Wintermark halls alike face their unliving fury. Many of the fleeing Winterfolk weep openly - the men and women who died as heroes in the fall of Atalaq are among the first to rise, the first to assail the very people they gave their lives to protect. By all reports the Jotun in Sermersuaq are filled with fury, enraged by the dishonour shown to those who have died, whether human or orc. They fight as keenly to defend their new Winterfolk thralls against the blood-thirsty horrors as they fight to protect their own people.

It is clear who both groups believe is to blame - and the Empire's decision to withdraw its armies just ahead of the dead rising is seen by many to provide conclusive evidence of Imperial culpability. Luckily, the magic of the Thule minimizes the slaughter - but many lives are still lost on all sides to the ravening dead.

There is some minor good news. As the Autumn Equinox approaches, word comes that the miners at the Pride of Ikka's Tears have escaped the Jotun advance. Continuing to work until the final hour before being forced to withdraw, a huddled caravan crosses the Suaq Fount eastward, a bare handful of miles ahead of the or advance. The mine itself has fallen into Jotun hands - there was no way to prevent it - but this season's bounty of mithril has not. Reports filtering south are confused, but it seems that the miners are now guests of the Thule in the Silver Peaks, and they have received significant aid from heralds of the eternal Ephisis in reaching this (slightly dubious) safety. By all accounts, thanks in part to negotiation by the representatives of the City of Gold and Lead, the Thule have agreed to allow the caravan to pass through the peaks to Crow's Ridge and thence to Torfast, without exacting a toll or a tithe for their trouble. The Ambassador to Otkodov may know more.

Sermersuaq is clenched firmly in the fist of the Jotun, but it is clear that they are by no means finished. Three weeks before the Autumn Equinox, bands of raiders begin to press into Pakaanan's Pass, Northspires, Bruckland, and Skymark. Unliving horrors notwithstanding, the western orcs appear committed to continuing their conquest of the northern Empire.

Game Information - Sermersuaq

The entire territory of Sermersuaq is now in the hands of the Jotun. As such, any personal resource owned by a player in Sermersuaq now suffers the conquered territory penalty going forward.

Many of the inhabitants of Sermersuaq have chosen to flee south rather than surrender to the orcs. Any player whose character controls a personal resource in Sermersuaq may choose to e-mail admin@profounddecisions.co.uk and swap their existing resource for one in either Hahnmark or Kallavesa without paying the usual 2 crown penalty. Bear in mind that this will, of course, be an undeveloped rank 1 resource and that the previous resource will be lost.

The Pride of Ikka's Tears has fallen to the Jotun, but thanks to a combination of plucky miners and the aid of an eternal, enough mithril has been transported east that a final shipment has been saved in its entirety. The Thule are not claiming any of the mithril - perhaps due to residual good will from the recent peace negotiations, perhaps due to a desire to stay on Ephisis' good side. The seat will be appointed as normal during the coming equinox, via its current method. After that, there will be no more mithril forthcoming unless it is liberated from the Jotun - at which point it will again need to be allocated by the Imperial Senate.