CHAPTER 26: WHERE TIME STANDS STILL
This chapter is one of transition, where all the dots are connected with what you have experienced so far and the events at the end of War in the Sword Lands. In addition, you get to recover your full identities and your original equipment! However, you will come to realize that your travails are far from over ...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
after stepping out of a strange portal within a silent room,
Oberon enjoins you to follow him as he walks down a corridor to
the west.
- you finally end up in a study hall of some sort , where Oberon
begins to explain what has occured. He tells you that he is part
of the Order of the Hourglass,
as secret order of priests and chronomancers (wizards) who serve Quanthaas
(the God of Time, Cycles and Eternity). The Order is comprised of
scholars of temporal mechanics and of history - but they also act
as guardians of time, their primary responsibility. The Order
dwells within a huge fortress called the Towers
of the Hourglass, a gift by Quanthaas, which
also happens to stand apart of time itself - i.e. nothing within
the Towers is affected by temporal mechanics or the passage of
time. This allows members of the Order to easily travel from one
historical period to another, as well as from one timeline (or
reality) to another. This sounds rather familiar from what the
Oracle of the Temple of Infinity aluded to (see Chapter 25).
Oberon then stops there, enjoining you to take a much needed rest
and to come back to him, so that he may explain further what has
been happening.
Key
to Oberon's appartments within the Towers of the Hourglass:
x83y5 - Time Portal.
y58y12 - Guest quarters.
51y17 - Bathroom.
-
to reach your quarters, take the south-west door (x62y9) of
Oberon's study hall and walk down the corridor to the door at
x58y12.
- once in the large room walk over to the chest at x54y11: there
you will find your original equipment and
that of your NPC friends. Having stood apart of time for a while
now, and the sight of your equipment, triggers the full return of
your true memories and identities as follows:
A) if you played TiSL + WiSL: your identities as the Heroes of the Sword Lands and of the Great War is restored. A synopsis of the storyline that occured in those scenarios is recalled, along with the final event in WiSL when Primus jumped into a strange portal after killing Naryl Thezzat and bidding you "see you yesterday, today and tomorrow!". Then, everything stopped and changed into an alternate timeline with you being born as slaves.
B) if you played TiSL only: your identities as the Heroes of the Sword Lands is restored. A synopsis of what you did in TiSL and how you attempted to return to the Sword Lands to help in the Great War is recalled. But before you even reached the Sword Lands, everything unexplicably stopped and changed into an alternate timeline with you being born as slaves.
C) if you played WiSL only: your identities as the Heroes of the Great War is restored. A synopsis of the storyline that occured in WiSL is recalled, along with the final event when Primus jumped into a strange portal after killing Naryl Thezzat and bidding you "see you yesterday, today and tomorrow!". Some time after, everything stopped and changed into an alternate timeline with you being born as slaves.
D) if you played none of the previous SL scenarios: your identities as adventurers native of the Sword Lands is restored. Background information about what occured in TiSL and WiSL is recalled (as news heard, tavern talk and gossip), along with you participating in the Great War against the forces of Sharranth. But not long after the end of the Great War, everything stopped and changed into an alternate timeline with you being born as slaves.
- the same phenomenon happens to those NPCs that have tagged along with you (depending if you started with Chapter 23 or Chapter 25), as follows:
Nasslass : he is still named Nasslass but is in fact an easy-going kobold adventurer. Having recovered his true memories, he will tag along with you to get his revenge on the Mentarchs for what they have done.
Nerylka: her real name is Nerylka Dhan and she is a kind, good-hearted witch adventuress. Having recovered her true memories, she will tag along with you to get her revenge on the Mentarchs for what they have done.
Starina Tearmoon: her real name is Starrune and she is an aloof, haugthy sorceress. Having recovered her true memories, she will tag along with you to get her revenge on the Mentarchs for what they have done.
Riel Half-Elven: he is of course Riel Moonsong, the happy-go-lucky half-elf minstrel of WiSL fame. If you played both TiSL and WiSL, or played WiSL only, he will remain with you as your "good ole" adventuring companion. If you played TiSL only, or played neither SL scenarios, he will tag along with you to get his revenge on the Mentarchs for what they have done - with an extra desire of revenge against Primus for having killed Naryl Thezzat.
-
once all of this dramatic turn of events is done with, go over to
the table at x54y16 and take whatever food and water you need:
the table will replenish itself magically. If you need scrolls
and parchment, go check out the workdesk at x60y15.
- take a much needed rest while healing and/or preparing scrolls.
Take your time: you have plenty of it from where you are at!
- having rested well and all, return to Oberon's study hall: he
will be waiting for you. He then goes about explaining exactly
what happened:
Back it the glory days of the Lankarhan empire, technomages
created/engineered 12 super-psionicists - the Mentarchs -, with
Maximus as their eldest and strongest, to act as their
"first among twelve". However, their design was flawed:
their minds could not cope with the tremendous psionic powers
they possessed and thus slowly became mad. Only three of them
recognized what was happening and found the magical means to
prevent this. Unfortunately, the other nine (Maximus included)
were already too far along the road of madness and convinced
themselves that the three were trying to trick them. At the same
time, the nine had begun warring among themselves - thus the War
of the Mind Lords had begun. The three (which included Kith
Khanaan, of TiSL fame) brought together most lankarhans and
non-psionicists, to forge a united front against the mad/evil
nine. Maximus in turn realized that he and his eight siblings
should strive to dominate the world, as they were in truth Gods
(in their own, warped minds, that is ...). The War of the Mind
Lords thus became one of racial supremacy. In the end, the Evil
Nine lost out, the war leaving the lankarhan empire ravaged and
in chaos. Of these nine, four were destroyed while four others
had their long-living essences imprisoned in containment globes.
Maximus was presumed destroyed. Of the Noble Three, only Kith
Khanaan survived, leading what was left of the lankarhans to
another land on Anarym in order to found Keryndhor. Kith then
left his people, travelling to the Realmz continent in order to
secure the containment globes of his four surviving, mad
siblings. He arrived in the Sword Lands, which were still
unexplored by either elf or man. In the forest of Aurystan, he
built a small tower in which he secured the four containment
globes. Eventually, elves came to the forest of Aurystan and
settled there. After centuries of further exploration, Kith
returned to his tower and met the elves there - his body being on
the verge of death, he transfered his own essence in a globe for
preservation and the elves built him a crypt in the volcanic
rockies (this was told already in TiSL). As centuries passed and
men settled in turn in the Sword Lands, the tower remained
untouched. However, it came a time when the forest was ravaged by
a succession of natural disasters and magical battles, destroying
Kith's tower (along with the essences of the four surviving mad
mentarchs).
This is where Primus/Maximus comes in: his plan was to return to
the past, before the tower was destroyed, in order to retrieve
the four. And from the Sword Lands of the past, to re-establish
the lankarhan empire. This was achieved at the end of WiSL, and
thus your awakening as slaves in the Neo Imperium of Lankarh in
WoML!
- thus, Oberon gives you the outline of your task: in order to
restore the timeline, you must go into the past and prevent
Primus/Maximus from doing whatever he did to alter reality. You
will be sent a couple of months prior to Primus/Maximus' arrival,
and thus you will have time (no pun intended) to kill - Oberon
warns you of being very careful as to not cause alterations of
the timeline by your own actions. To help you with that, he casts
a spell on you which will warn you whenever you undertake an
action that can alter time. The spell will also allow you to
understand any languages.
- lastly, he gives you an orb
that will bring you back once you have managed to stop
Primus/Maximus, in addition to a small history handbook
concerning the era where you will land.
- Oberon then enjoins you to step into the Time Portal and travel
back to the Sword Lands of 529 R.R., the year Primus/Maximus is
thought to have gone in order to change the timeline.
Onward to Chapter 27!
Realmz and Divinity are © and ® products of Fantasoft LLC and Tim Phillips.