Mars of Soa

Mars of Soa
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A Journal Written In Reverse
There existed a stretch of countryside in southern Soa that was ruled by a clan called the Emishi. The head of this clan and ruler of the city of Imile, the Elf Fredrick Diams, lived most of his life as a wandering sword-for-hire, lending his might to all but the most dishonorable, and lending his steel into those who threatened him. As a part of the warrior caste, Fredrick initially had trouble commanding more respect than was appropriate for his social stature, but his worth was soon proven after his voluntary reprisal against a powerful clan of traveling raiders. With many of the old leaders of the area killed or driven back into safer lands, Fredrick found himself at the forefront position in a vacuum of power, and was more than willing to assume the new role. Never one to be molded by socially-accepted standards, he found himself entranced by a Dwarven woman Ismaril, daughter of a large vineyard owner in Imile, and within a year they were married. In the months following their union, the couple made no announcement that they had conceived, and word began to spread that an Elf and a Dwarf simply could not reproduce. But no sooner had Fredrick’s main advisor come to him regarding this issue did Ismaril come with news of her pregnancy. Almost by the will of Fumna herself was Mosurn Diams born in the fall of 935.

Captivity
As a half-Dwarf, half-Elf, Mosurn often found himself the focus of critical speculation in his younger years. The unique blend of two seemingly opposing races gave him the appearance of an out-of-place human, but those who were aware of his lineage could not help but question what this meant for his physical and mental well-being. After seeing how their citizens sharp jabs and whispered rumors affected their son, Fredrick and Ismaril decided to keep young Mosurn enveloped in intellectual pursuits and the study of strategy in warfare. As the bloody fields of Soa are not the place for a civil denouncing of martial arts, much energy was also put into preparing Mosurn for the trials that all Soans must one day face. Fredrick, a now-retired adventurer, had fought the majority of his battles with the relatively lightweight and versatile longsword, and put a heavy focus on dexterity and balance in Mosurn’s combat training. Ismaril, by contrast, knew from her own heritage that the best defense is a good offense, and always stressed that a heavier and more intimidating weapon was the most consistent way to keep an opponent at bay. Mosurn took to heart both of his parents training, and began crafting his own fighting technique, the “Hand-and-a-Half” style, which utilized the reach and raw stopping power of larger, two-handed weapons, with the lightweight, more agile nature of a smaller blade. After many years in rigorous study in both swordplay and the art of forging steel, Mosurn fashioned a blade that perfectly fit his personal style, to which he gave the name “Nonesuch”.

Where the Sky and Soil Meet Lives Death
Many years had passed, and Mosurn established himself as a brave and cunning warrior, one worthy of bearing his fathers name. Soon, the citizens of Imile came to learn of his true nature, and recognized his potential not only as a defender of the people, but as a leader of them. Life, in Mosurn’s mind, was truly turning in his favor.

That is, until a cloaked stranger appeared in Imile.

With a few gestures of his hands and some arcane incantations, great flames spat up from the earth in the center of the city, and an enormous amber cube began to slowly rise up from its ancient seat beneath the soil. Being a well-armed and fairly populous city, Imile reacted quickly and within a minute had an elite team of armored hopilites surrounding the sorcerer. Orders for surrender were passed in an instant from the officer in charge, and in the same instant a wave of dark energy passed over the defense force, causing them to fall to the ground writhing in torturous pain. A sickened chuckle came from the strange man, and Mosurn thought of how it would be the last sound this vile creature would ever make. As his legs uncoiled, he leaped from the roof he was positioned on, with Nonesuch poised for assassination. In the same moment it took him to clear the distance from his perch to his target, a face emerged from the dark hood below, seemingly slowing time as his gnarled grin widened. A boil-ridden hand revealed itself from under the muddied sleeve and a crackling bolt of profane magic arced through the air to where Mosurn was suspended. The bolt held true to its target for the entire time it took the now-unconscious man to reach the ground with a thud. Satisfied with his easy victories, the sorcerer turned back to the half-buried obelisk before him and finished the ritual that would return the amber artifact back into the sunlight.

Upon waking to distant screams and a stifling black smoke covering the sky, Mosurn slowly rose to his feet, intense pain shooting through his body. To his horror, his hands, arms, chest, and most of his face had been warped into a writhing mass of distorted flesh, causing Nonesuch to rest fused to his palm. His one functional eye then rose up to the awesome spectacle that now lay before him. The city he once knew was now being both demolished and rebuilt simultaneously before his eyes, but instead of mortar and brick, the buildings of his beloved Imile were now formed of flesh and sinew. Warped jawbones were jutting out of houses where rafters once were. Greasy hair now lay matted on thick scalp where grass used to grow. Partly out of instinct, partly out of denial, Mosurn’s mind immediately turned to survival, and a single thought now pervaded his mind: run. He bolted through the fresh chaos, mangled arms flailing, struggling to avoid tripping on the many corpses that each could have spelled his doom. Only after he left the city limits and the spongy ground-scalp finally gave way to the normal grassy fields he had become so accustomed to, did the rush from his survival instinct wear off and he slipped back into numbing unconsciousness.

The Pilgramage
Mosurn awoke abruptly as the wagon hit a sharp bump in the road. His eyes slowly opened and were immediately greeted to the oddly unfamiliar sight of the open sky. He then realized that not only was he alive, but he was on the move.

“I’ll have you know, I almost ended you on the spot for the way you look.”, came the voice of an old man. “Figured you looked more like a corpse than a real person, so I’d either be ending your suffering or ridding the world of an abomination. I’m still not sure if I made the right decision.”

Mosurn attempted to rise, and he was suddenly, painfully, reminded of his monstrous condition. “How... how did I survive?” he managed to cough.

“The foremost reason you’re here is the same as why you were able to be born in the first place. You are a broken sword, repurposed. You are something new to this world, something it is not used to.” The man paused, composing himself. He then continued, this time with a slightly altered intonation in his voice that led Mosurn to believe he was being deceived. “The second reason is that I managed to spot you and pull you away from that nightmare before your body gave way to the rot.”

“I.. I cant move.” Mosurn spoke through a warped throat.

“Yes, and don’t try to. The infection sees you as it sees itself, but that doesn’t mean it won’t chew on your soul while it works its way through you.”

The curse that afflicted Mosurn had twisted and pulled at his flesh, blistering great patches of skin, but left his internal organs largely unharmed. In this state he was no more use than a leper, and the extreme state of his body gave little hope that he may eventually fully recover. Much of the extra flesh had been cut off and now left a rugged layer of flaying skin over much of Mosurn’s upper half, which made speaking an option, but still a painful one.

“Who...”. But at this point the force of exhaustion was too great, and he gave up his listless inquiry.

“A traveler. A traveler that can bear the death-salts with his skin intact.”

A pause as the brevity of this grave statement sank in.

“I know you don’t believe what I say,” he continued, “so I suppose you also won’t believe that Soa doesn’t need you anymore. The fate of this place has long been decided, but yours still rests in the winds of uncertainty. And so, I am using what power Ruukina has given me and granting you asylum through Druskos to a land long unseen by your lineage....” The image of the open sky in Mosurn’s eyes faded to black.

As clouded eyes would see through a faded memory, Mosurn recalls himself marching endlessly through a sea of death, water never reaching his skin, and his skin never reaching the ground. Only until his mind rose to meet the sand did he finally wake.

A Profane Step In A Hallowed Land
As a blistering sun revealed itself from behind Mosurn’s eyelids, the keen feeling of intense sunburn overwhelmed his body. “Finally, something that reminds me of home.” A sharp stick then prodded itself into one of the deeper scars on his chest. “Too much like home.”

A young boy leaned over him, spouting “d’ya think iss some sorta d-*hic*-demon?”.

“Naw, the fellah’s t-t-too ugly to be a demon”, replied a second. Both the boys recoil in laughter and one even falls over himself onto the ground.

“Drunk?”, said Mosurn softly, as more of a statement than a question.

“Oh, s’ the not-demon speaks!” said the first boy, “Yoooou’ll have plenny a time to get drunk once you're back home in Ashes... Only thing we got more’ve then booze is goats!”. Both boys collapse from laughter this time, covering themselves in sand. “Oh brother thass good stuff... now, go fetch the shaman!”, the apparent elder of the two ordered. A minute later, a short, elderly woman approached riding on the back of a warrior-type, followed by several others armed with long spears. “Everyone, stay back! Stay back, all of you!” she warned. Her guards spotted the great blade protruding from Mosurn's trunk-like hand, and held their weapons as close to him as their elders words would allow. Mosurn was fully conscious at this point, but his fatigue and the armed men before him were ample reason for him to stay where he was. The shaman approached, and as she leaned in Mosurn could tell by look and intuition that she was a half-Elf. After a moment of inspection she rose, speaking with confidence in her tone “This man is not our enemy. He means us no harm, but I sense a latent evil lurking within him. Do not touch him.” Upon hearing these words, the onlookers lessened their tension, but remained skeptical.

“Quickly, child. Tell me the last thing you can remember.”

Mosurn took a moment of thought, then spoke: “I feel as though I’ve awoken from a months dream… in it, a dark obelisk dropped slowly through an infinite, white sky. It fell across a golden corona a mountain wide, suspended by great cables of warped mahogany. I waited, watching, until the sunburst got close enough to the ground for me to leap onto it and become enveloped in its beauty. As I felt myself sink deeper and deeper into bliss, I found myself standing next to a stone wall extending in all directions for all time. Near its base, I looked upon it to find that it was gently descending to meet the ground. I fell prone to peer beneath it before it finished it's ancient journey, and far away I could see it: pinched between the slick white floor and the aged rock, I could see a light emerge from the black.”

Wordlessly, the elderly woman stared for a moment with a look of deep contemplation in her eyes, as though she had suddenly been struck with a rock but had not yet felt the pain.

“Take him to the springs to recover, but do not let a moment pass where his movements are not tracked”.

Mosurn was brought swiftly, wrapped in bandages, to a small oasis village nearby where he was instructed to enter a large spring in the center of the settlement. Once submerged, he could feel the taint of the evil spell begin to ebb away, leaving the old scar tissue to dissolve into imperceptively small fragments. Curiously, just as Mosurn could see the bits of flesh dissolve from his body into the water, so too could he see them dissolve from his face into the air around him. After a few minutes the transformation was complete, and Mosurn stepped from the pool with nothing more than a faded scar across his upper half. In his hand he found his sword Nonesuch, still grasped as tightly as the day it was sealed to his skin.

“You did not perish. This is good.” came the voice of the shaman.

Mosurn turned his head to meet the one who saved him. “Pardon? Did you expect me to?”, he remarked as he finally sheathed his blade.

“I have seen many strange magics in my time,” came the response, “but never before have I encountered one like that which is holding you together. It is a strange energy that seems strikingly familiar, yet it is that which this land, in all its ages, has never seen.”

“I have heard that phrase once before. The elderly monk who brought me here, I believe he called me a ‘broken sword’”

Upon hearing this, the shamanic woman’s eyes spread wide, a look of fear and awe on her face. “A monk? From the wastes?” An excited tone was now finding its way to her voice. “We must speak, child. Quickly, I must see to you before the magic has a chance to fade.”

Mosurn was led into a tall decorated tent, adorned with shimmering scales and draped sashes of many colors. Once seated upon the great cushions which lay about, the shaman wasted no time. “As I am sure you already devised, the monk who brought you here was no ordinary being. It was a divine entity known as the Grey Saunter, the same name which we derived the title of the spring that you were restored in; Sauntless. He is the Great Wanderer, he who sees to those who know no true home. This place, at the inner edge of civilization, is the final home all true wanderers may one day find.” With a ritualistic pace, she then proceeded to display many fetishes of bone, ivory, stone, and the like upon a cloth laid out beneath them. “Now, child, lend me your hand”

The Dwelf did as instructed, and upon the greeting of their hands, the shaman began a systematic trial of tossing additional trinkets from her cloak in front of them, reflecting off of each other in a strange cryptic pattern to which Mosurn could not interpret. After a minute of this, to which no bauble ever left the splayed cloth, the ancient eyes of the half-Elf turned back to her guest, and spoke “Welcome to Lancerus, Mars of Soa.”

Shortly stunned by this result, he contested “What a strange soothsayer, she who can know of my origin from the middle of a strange land, and yet with confidence claim me a false name!”

“You misunderstand, Broken Sword, the truths given to you at birth are a life already lived. That which we have already experienced is a reality lost; the future, one yet to come. The past has no value except to influence something that has not yet been seen, like long having a key whose lock has not been found. You have been brought to this place during a crucial time in the life of this world... the Godswalk is upon us, Mars, and you cannot escape it.”

“You cannot escape death.”