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Akasha's Journal

NFO - NOT FOR OWEN

For next session: Qotho's upset and in a funk over the handling of the burning village and Akasha getting hurt. Notice and talk to him. Point out he was a hero and rescued ponies, even if the crew and Emerald don't see it. That he's a hero.

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http://ferazelhosting.net/~bryce/secret_message.txt

Rubber Hose's translation: "SW knows about wand. Is using wards vs lightning. Use ice. Leaving at Dawn."

Teeth of Hardened Steel's translation: "This plan is dangerous. Saltwithers is not so bad, just be patient and he will come around to our point of view in time. And opposing him will be bad for all of us. Just trust me on this one and be safe. He has spies everewhere [sic] and there is no chance of a successful ambush."

WE HAVE FOUND SOME OF THE MASTERS ENEMIES AND NEED YOUR HELP IDENTIFYING THEM REPORT TO US ON THE MOVEMENTS OF REDRING AND DUSTY DREAMS

KEEP THIS MESSAGE A SECRET THE MASTERS ENEMIES ARE EVERYWHERE AND THEY MUST NOT KNOW WE ARE ON TO THEM I HAVE LURED THEM IN TO A CUNNING TRAP HOWEVER WHICH I WILL DESCRIBE TO YOU IN THE FULLNESS OF TIME FOR NOW BE CAUTIOUS AND DO NOT SAY ANYTHING THAT MIGHT TIP THEM OFF

I BELIEVE RUBBER HOSE MAY BE PLANNING TO BETRAY THE MASTER BUT WE CANNOT PROVE IT YET WATCH HER CAREFULLY AND WORK TO KEEP OUR LORD SALTWITHERS SAFE

MY FAVORITE FOOD IS VIRGIN NEVERSHYED PUDDING AND THAT IS MY DARK SECRET ALSO SPARKLE CONE AND FENNEL FLEECE ARE DOING IT

137

((<Emerald> It would be that Akasha thinks that deciding who's a monster has to be done case-by-case and rules are very hard to find. The totality of the past and harm to the victims matters. But Akasha also thinks that it's best if she isn't the one making the judgments or trying to punish people. <swicked> Kay, yeah, that works. <swicked> Rules go out the window when someone is a clear and present danger, like a vampire on a rampage that's lead her party to kill police, but she's not going to judge and jury someone in cold blood. <Emerald> Yeah. <Emerald> Does she think that as long as they aren't being an imminent danger right now, it's best to just watch and let them prove who they are now? <swicked> Probably <Emerald> If that's what she thinks, that'd be helpful to mention too.))

133

• I think I’ll just give Emerald the silent treatment for the rest of today. I mean, why bother talking to someone who's just going to lie to me?
• Emerald is a jerk. She and Elly had their teaparty “fixing” Merihu. It wasn’t just about helping Merihu, too.
• Emerald talked to Elly last night, alone. When Emerald returned she asked if I’d finished the potion to help Merihu and, when I said I hadn’t worked on it, she did NOT tell me not to bother. She then took a bath. Maybe she was asking if she if she was a monster or not last night because she planned on learning this mind-invading magic today? Is this some kind of dark magic they are doing?
• Anyway, next day she claimed she came up with an idea on how to help Merihu during the bath. She then insisted Elly and her do this work on Merihu alone. When I insisted I wanted to be present, Elly reeked of a lie. When I confronted her, Emerald admitted this “experiment” had to do with what happened last night, IE BEFORE the bath. Emerald didn’t bat an eyelash while Elly looked ashamed at having tried to deceive me. No, Emerald just insisted they press onward, and didn’t spare a word as I left.

• BUCK HER

• I finished my invisibility cloak and definitely did NOT finish anything like one for Emerald. To heck with her.

• We’re now at Mewcloven’s to ask where the false baron of saltpillars lives. Then to ask him to advertise my show. MY show. We can pay him for the trouble.
• Then we do the theft, then we meet with Malign to try and convince her to play a part in my show.
• Then we see Libby about trying to scout out Saltpillar’s place.
• Then we see Scarflanks about her maybe asserting control if we’ve discovered Saltwithers is really dead.
• Then we’ll prepare for my show!

122

• Gene is pretty nice. Real driven to make his cousin goddess-queen of the world, though, though taboo magics. At least Emerald got him more focused on the elements as the way to save the world, and working with us to make sure they succeed. Though he REALLY wants Emerald to be in his three-lord band.
• The next morning we met up with Elly and Sparky. Hopefully we can get Elly to give appealing to Gene one more try.

121

• Some secret police spooks showed up at the bookstore. I tailed them and they jumped me. Luckily Qotho appeared out of thin air (was he following me?) and helped take them down, even if he did get all tied up and knocked out cold by the end. But it's the thought that counts!
• We tried to interrogate them and, gosh, was that ever a bad idea. They couldn't even say WHY they attacked me, and one guard burned up as a result of my trying to force it. I've gotten rid of the truth smoke stuff, now. It's just not worth it.
• We talked to Numinous Spirit and arranged for the other guard to be assigned somewhere far away... fort junechase, to be specific. Then we said a last goodbye to Opal Shine as she flew off.
• Last we met with Numinous again and talked to Baleful Gaze with her to have Baleful leave us alone. She was a real jerk, too. Then we crashed in Numinous' room while watching Elly's arrival at the city, followed by Baleful having to fly out to geas their entire group.
• Why does she need to geas Elly's entire delegation now? I don't know, she didn't geas us, but I'm not really going to question it at this point...

120

• RISEN BONES IS DEAD
• And I mean actually dead. Gone. Not existing on this plane of existence. Biting the dust of the bucket he's kicked.
• Specs told us after we told her we knew she's Elly's mom. She had us promise not to tell Elly... or anyone, really. At least, not to unless we found a way to figure it out ourselves, so as not to implicate her. But particularly to keep it from Risen Bones' organization, who all think they are still under Risen's control. 'Cause, you know, that'd be bad.
• We gave her the portraits of her daughter Qotho and I had, and I gave her the boring shiny book Qotho stole that had White Eyes' testimony in it about his alicorn daughter.
• We also learned Elly will be showing up tomorrow.
• ...and I'm pretty sure that's it. Probably gonna just hang at the book shop now, maybe get some new clothes for the summit, and sleep until more important people show up to talk to.

119

• Set out to meet with Numinous Spirit, Genius Loci, and then Baleful Gaze in turn. The first and last were at the tower, but the middle won't be in until tomorrow. Talked with Numinous, got good info, filled out more of the table below. We told the shy city planner basically everything, including that we are element bearers. It's nice to have Honesty on my head again. Then everyone joined her delegation (so we can get into the summit). Baleful, apparently, is who geases everyone for the summit.
• Before we left, we got authorization for "Opal Shine" to skip town down to New Canterlot on a glider. Hope she enjoys her new life there.

(((OOC, Flint Spark is arriving tomorrow, but Akasha doesn't know that yet)))

(((Currently we have left the tower of the three mages, will be stopping by the hotel to give Opal her get-out-of-Nevershyd-free pass, and then heading to see the gate guards and ask them what wizards are present in the city)))

118

• Met "Wired Spectacles", marefriend of Gray Union, who runs a bookstore. Looks to be "Specs", IE Elly's mom. Might need to talk to her about that. Also read that diary of White Eyes' again. Gonna go talk to Genius Loci now. Try and get Numinous Spirit in the same room and convince him he will not suffer consequences for his studies as well as find a way to convince him to stop said studies.
• Need to fill in my plans for each warlord below...

117

• Got some fresh reagents, Qotho got a new cloak, got more info on the warlords from a bartender, then traveled to Nevershyre to meet with Mewcloven, a goat that worked with Scion, at his inn. Need to talk to him about his old boss.

• Met with a bandit on the way. Carnation C-something, now Opal Shine. Directed her to head for New Canterlot. If we succeed in saving her and her family from this life in the north, it'll be a good start

(Stuffed in the journal is the following poster): "WANTED. "RUBY RUSE" Baleful Gaze offers a bounty of 1000 liters of virgin pudding, or the value of the same of gold, for the person or corpse of the aforesaid unicorn illusionist, and half as much again for her distinctive multi-armed monkey familiar."

116

• We talked with Nova (after talking to Glassy Fracture, her secretary... I think)! I added to my notes below about each warlord. We're going to go meet Nova and Flint Spark in Nevershyed. Flint will stay with us and Nova will hand dossiers about each warlord over. In the meantime, we convinced her to put off the execution to the end of the summit.
• Then we kinda badgered Nova for a while about how she was too willing to resort to trickery and murder. I feel like we got through to her in the end that it's important to always try to do better, to expect to do better. Never to resign yourself to evil.
• Gabrio also got Elly to give us a passcode for when we meet so that we know it's each other. Then she got called away for something that deeply disturbed her but that she was confident we couldn't help with. Sigh... she has a long way to go before become the bearer of magic.
• Elly's passcode: "The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit, shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it."
• I think it means, uh... fingers... that move... write stuff, then don't erase it, even when they cry. What?

115

• We were on the glider and in the air, headed for Free Town, before I even knew Emerald had changed our flight plan to there instead of Nevershyed. It was a good decision, but she didn't really ask anyone, so... yeah. It was a nice flight, though. The pilot had his kid fly the glider partway. Otherwise we went between exposition and sleeping. Which is often one and the same.
• Things picked up a lot more when we finally landed. We were immediately greeted and taken for bad guys. The guards took our titles (Dr. Dame Akasha the Sexy and Marvelous, and there could hardly be a better or more appropriate title to be found) and lead us to Sootstreaks, who almost immediately revealed himself to be Nova's "inside warlord" via blatantly and obviously lying that he didn't know her. Still, he gave us some great food (which tested non-poisonous) and accommodations. Talking with him gave me a bit of a greater understanding of the people we're up against, though there's obviously still blanks:

Nevershyed

In any case, after we got back to our rooms, plans were laid out.

1. Nova's plan: We distract and diffuse the armies while Nova kills the warlords and solidifies Sootstreaks' rule over them under her and Risen Bones.
2. Farrisia's plan: We kill Malign Gaze Jr., work out an alliance with the lords of Nevershyed, and resolve all other conflicts through diplomacy.
3. Gabrio's plan: We tell the warlords about Nova's plan and leave to them to sort everything out.

...I am not in favor of any of these plans. Luckily, we don't have to decide yet. Emerald's going to skry Nova later and we'll talk to her. I hope to get more info on these warlords, why they "deserve" to die, and what she expects of us (like, when do we need to be where). If possible, I'd really like to convince her to take some alternate route than all this backstabbing and murder... but I really need to better understand WHY she's doing this, first, to really argue with her about it. So hopefully we can figure this all out soon.

So, in summary, I need to ask:

1. Where do we need to be when while you do what, exactly, where?
2. Why do we have to kill them all? Can none of them be spared? What are their crimes?
3. When you said you needed us to prevent the armies from turning on each other after you kill all the leaders... just how long will we have to be doing that? How long are we really committing to this? How will you be stabilizing and consolidating power up here?
4. And, last but not least, where is Flint Spark and can he join with us? It'd help a lot given we still sport an incomplete set of elements.

Oh, and one last thing: DON'T BOW TO ANY WIZARD! Sootstreak made it pretty clear that was a big no-no.