Lundar's Library

Day 336, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Well, the year is certainly winding down to a close, and we’ve less
than a month before it’s the year 543. Time sure flys. My last couple
of days have been a flurry of activity, what with my mapping of Devil’s
Isle, several explorations, and many challenging rescues. I’m barely
finding enough time to devote to my studies. Anyway, today Muzea
returned as she promised, to auction off another museum space. I
attended the auction to see how it would go, but of course I could not
bid, since I’m struggling to pay my library fees as it is. The main
bidders were the witch Prue, the Zo Cutlas, and the Fen Noah, who
seemed interested in a second museum space. When the dust settled
though, it was Cutlas who had won the museum space with his winning bid
of 3000 coins. After the auction, Muzea made a deal with the merchant
Wormtounge, and now he is selling a museum space as well, with prices
starting from 3000 coins. If yi’re interested in displaying yi artwork
in the museum, yi might want to seek him out.

Day 330, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Well, LIFE’s Foothills expedition was cut short today, when our
expedition’s two shovel holders went into the Ash Valley, and got
killed past healing. We still had a large number of people camped out
at the base of Ash Valley, including powerful exiles as Yor and Urgelt,
but it was decided that the expedition would go no where without the
shovels. So, Yor and Urgelt went into the Ash Valley to rescue our
shovel. And fell. At this point, it was decided that the only chance
for the expedition to continue, was to chain out the fallen exiles out
of the Ash Valley. Unfortunately, our whole party got killed doing just
that. Thus, everyone was forced to depart or pendant out from the
Foothills.

Our expedition wasn’t a total failure, however.
Before we fell, Soulmaster and I were able to use our skristals to
learn interesting things about the structure of the Foothills. We also
learned some valuable lessons from the expedition, and and grew closer
to working together as a team. Yor’s idea to camp out in the east end
of the Foothills also proved to be a great idea, and we got a lot of
exploring done, before the unfortunate events in the Ash Valley. I am
confident that our group will do better next time. Departing early from
the Foothills gave me the opportunity to attend my clan meeting though,
and I also got to do a lot of work on my Devil’s Isle map. Best of all,
I made close to 200 coins in the Foothills, so I no longer have to
sleep in the cheap library. Woo!

Day 328, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Whew! Well it certainly has been a long time since my last update! To
tell yi the truth, I simply haven’t been doing anything newsworthy, and
haven’t found anything worth reporting that others haven’t written
about already. Jazz and Babajaga
are back in action, and their diaries are as entertaining and
informative as ever. Seems they’ve been on adventures to the Ethreal
Plane, and witnessed the makings of a new type of healing potion. As
for me, I’m busy finishing up my work on my McBolie Cavern map, and
working hard on my new Devil’s Island map as well. I’ve also finished
my training with Loovma for now, and my chain has over 80 pulls on it,
without a break yet, and good thing too. My bank account is empty, and
my purse is like a deflated Thoom air-sac, which is to say empty. This
has forced me to sleep in the old, free library, and has cut down on my
ventures to Devil’s Isle, since I can’t afford the boat fare. So, as yi
can see, my last couple days have been pretty dreary.

All that changed today though. The Lok’Groton
Islands’ Foundation for Exploration(LIFE), which I am a member of, made
an expedition to the North Eastern Foothills today, along with such
powerful exiles as Urgelt and Gurgi. We successfully navigated the Orga
Outback and Dread Passage, and we are now camped in the Foothills,
searching for a way to Trillbane’s Library and beyond. So far we’re
doing pretty good; even though three people were forced to depart, we
got to cover a lot of ground today. Our fearless leader Yor thinks that
something significant might happen at noon, so that is when we are
conducting most of our explorations. LIFE intends to camp out in the
Foothills until the next Chaos Storm, so we’ll be here for a while.
This time though, unlike all previous expeditions, we have decided to
camp out at the foot of the Ash Valley, instead of in Katpus’ safe
cave. This puts us in a much better position to explore the Foothills,
since Trillbane’s Library lies to the east. Hopefully we will be able
to discover where the reclusive pathfinder is hiding out at.

Day 278, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Today the full moon hung high in the night sky, and a large party of
exiles led by the Mystic Zorton tackled the Orga Camps, in an attempt
to attain yet another Teleportation Stone. The orga provided a lot of
resistance, and many times the party was forced to retreat, and get
reinforcements. I however, had nothing to do with the raid. I was too
busy exploring and mapping the McBolie Cavern.

The McBolie Cavern is in truth a system of
interconected tunnels, that run underneath the lake of Devil’s Isle.
The Cavern is filled with many twisty, maze-like passages, and there
are many advanced paths hidden amongst the tunnels. My theory is that
one of the paths in the Cavern might lead to some yet to be discovered
area. So I set about the dangerous task of mapping the Cavern and
testing the paths. I explored and mapped the tunnels alone, which made
my work perilous because of the deadly rock formations, and violent
creatures such as Deadly Adders and Pumaces. Yet, I managed to overcome
these challenges, and discovered where many of the paths in the Cavern
led, though there were many paths I could not open. This went on for
quite some time, until I made a wrong turn in one of the tunnels, and
ended up flat on my back. Now, the McBolie Cavern entrance is one of
the hardest paths in the lands to open, so I knew I was in trouble.
That’s when the Magi arrived.

The cloaked figure suddenly appeared out of
nowhere, just a few feet from my body, and nearly scaring the wits out
of me. The figure blinked out for a few seconds, then appeared again,
then disapeared yet again. The figure seemed to be flickering in and
out of reality, before it finally materialized fully. The Magi stared
at me intently, and suddenly my body began to give off a faint glow.
Then, the Magi made a sudden sweep of his hands, and I was back on my
feet again. The Magi was gone before I could even get out a few words
of thanks, leaving me to stare open mouthed at nothing. This Magi is
definately an enigma; only a few scattered sightings of him have been
reported, where he performed rescues similar to mine. Who this Magi is,
no one seems to know, though he certainly seems to be a benevolent
being. Perhaps he is a powerful healer, that has learned how to
teleport himself to those in need. Time will tell.

Day 269, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

The past two Ethreal Plane expeditions have been magnificent failures.
The problem hasn’t been that we’ve been unable to garner enough
support, and indeed, a powerful array of exiles showed up for both
raids. Nai, the problem is that the Ethreal Portal Stones, that are
vital to our plans, simply won’t work. Exiles of all professions have
tried tinkering with the Stones, but to no avail. The failure of the
Ethreal Portal Stones seemed to have a disheartening effect on the
party, causing most to give up in frustration, and leaving those who
were left with too few exiles to continue the EP raid. On the plus side
though, the knight Sleipnir, and myself, have finally managed to open
the exit path of the McBolie Caverns. Both of us have spent long hours
over the past few weeks in an attempt to open the path, and indeed,
Sleipnir had even camped out in the Caverns for a while. It is great to
be able to open the path again, and now I’ve set myself to try to open
the other difficult paths in the McBolie Cavern, which there are many.
Maybe one of them leads somewhere yet to be seen by exiles…

Day 265, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Today I got to be part of an expedition to the Ethreal Plane, led by
the strong leader Urgelt. The trip was quite a success, though we did
have our difficulties. When we first decided to head to the Ethreal
Plane, two of the crystal fragments neccessary to create the guiding
cystal could not be found. Still, we scaled Tenebrion’s Tower anyway,
attaining the myst key, and two crystal fragments. We decided to wait
until the next day for the remaining crystal shards to appear, and sure
enough, they did. With the guiding crystal and myst key in hand, we
headed into the Zodiac Room, which leads to the Ethreal Plane. I
managed to operate the guiding crystal, which was a bit tricky to
handle at first, but grew easy enough to operate with use. Using the
crystal as our guide, we managed to navigate the Zodiac Room
successfully, losing only one of our party members. Then we faced the
challenges of the Ethreal Plane.

In the Ethreal Plane, we were assaulted by all
manner of powerful undine, yet our strong and tight-knit group managed
to persevere. Our party defeated the powerful Sword Guardian, and
attained an box, containing an Ethreal Sword– our objective. As soon
as the Sword was taken out of the box, the crystal and mystic key
vanished in a puff of mist. It was time to leave the Ethreal Plane, and
it was then that is when trouble struck. The signs of the Zodiac in the
Ethreal Plane seemed to have moved around since last it was visited by
exiles, and half the party took the wrong sign. As a result, half of
our party found themselves facing Astral Guardians and Drakes in the
Ethreal, instead of finding themselves in Purgatory. Only Yor, J’jh,
and myself were left within the Zodiac circle, confused as to which
path to take. By questioning those who had made it out successfully, we
found the right sign, but too late– lightning from Astral Drakes
felled me past healing. J’jh and Yor tried there best to push me out of
the Plane, but it did not seem to work. Thus, I had to make it back to
Purgatory the old fashioned way.

Despite all our difficulties though, our mission
was a success. After we made our ways out of Purgatory, we met back at
Tenebrion’s Demense. There, we took our turns playing around with the
Ethreal Sword, testing it’s blade out on some of Tenebrion’s
unfortunate guards, before we headed into Tenebrion’s Keep, to speak
with one of the Necromancers’s servants. We spoke with Tenebrion’s
servant, Sorer, and he agreed to trade us an Ethreal Portal Stone for
our Ethreal Sword. With the Ethreal Portal Stone, we can teleport into
the Ethreal whenever we like.

We decided we should make another trip to the
Ethreal, this time to explore the plane’s secrets fully. The raid on
the Ethreal Plane is scheduled for tomorrow, and two parties will be
needed to explore the vast Plane. One party will enter the Plane from
the Zodiac Room to draw monsters, while another party will use the
Ethreal Portal Stone, and lure away the undine. Once the snell is
sufficiently clear, both parties will join together, and explore the
mysteries of the Ethreal Plane. This shall definately be a most
memorable expedition, and I can hardly wait ’til tomorrow!

Day 244, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Today two of my clanmates, the healer Firebird and the mystic Anfyr,
were wedded together upon the Meadow in TW. Ufortunately, I missed most
of the ceremony, but I caught the tail end of the wedding, as well as
the celebration afterward. Gifts were given to the bride and groom, and
we enjoyed ourselves by getting drunk with alcoholic beverages. After
the party, we all headed to Orga Camp for some hunting, and
successfully took the first two Orga Camps. Then we hunted some
Baltoise and LSWs off the coast of Kizmia’s Isle, and finished off with
some hunting in Jannar’s Grove. All in all, it was quite an exciting
day.

Day 239, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Today an Darshak invasion swept over the lands, as has never been seen
before. Wave after wave of Darshak pirates, including the feared elite
Darshak, arrived on the shores of Puddleby, and proceeded to do battle
against us exiles. The waves seemed to keep coming and coming without
cease, and it was all we could do to keep the Darshak at bay, if even
that. It all started with the spotting of a single Darshak Scout, and
escalated into a battle that lasted several days. It was a long and
weary fight it was, but after a day of exhausting battle, the Darshak
were finally pushed back. Puddleby breathed a collective sigh of relief
at that, but there was still one more force to be dealt with: the Elite
Darshak Warship. Never seen before in the waters of the Lok’Groton
chain, this powerful Wasrhip killed any and all exiles fool enough to
approach it with a single blow. Luckily, the ship disapeared after a
few hours, but those who had tried to attack it could not make even a
single scratch to it’s massive hull.

This was certainly the most frightening Darshak
invasion that Puddleby has ever had, and even more so because of the
knowledge that the Elite Darshak Warship still lurks somewhere in the
waters of Ash Island, perhaps one of many. Even now, elite Darshak are
traipsing around the Darshak Horde, and the few exiles that have tried
to exterminate them, have ended up exterminated instead. The Darshak
forces are definately growing stronger, and if we do not put an end to
them, they may grow too strong for us to keep them from our isles any
longer.

Day 233, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

Today a Dun’ilsar was held between E’las Loth’mon Ferindril and the
Brotherhood of Independants. The contests was a unique one: each clan
had to designate a “bunny”, and that bunny would have to fall to a
Darshak Thug, a Large Sand Wurm, and a small rock. The clan who’s bunny
fell to these the fastest would be declared the winner. I was chosen as
the bunny. We were outnumbered 10 to 7, but we still felt we had a good
chance at winning this Dun’ilsar. The healer Healery was chosen as the
neutral exile that would act as a ref, and on her command “Go!”, the
contest was started.

The first place that my clan went to was Ash
Island, hoping to fall to the Darshak Thug first. BoI seemed to be
thinking the same thing. Both clans rushed to the Darshak Outpost, neck
in neck, trying to get their bunny to fall to the thug the fastest.
However, a stalemate soon broke out, as the opposing healers from both
clans would heal the bunnys of the opposing clan, making it almost
impossible to fall. That was when we decided to break the stalemate,
and I jumped into the Darshak Horde. Inside, Vequalir had managed to
trap most of the Darshak, and there were few Darshak to menace me.
Before me stood three Darshak pirates in green garb, and I decided to
take a chance by jumping into their midst. Luckily, one of the was a
Darshak Thug, and he chopped me up into nice, neat pieces, putting my
clan ahead. However, BoI’s bunny Boing soon arrived, and was felled by
a Thug as well. Magnels managed to chain me out of the Horde, and we
headed off to fall to an LSW.

Our next destination was the tiny LSW island,
which lies next to Kizmia’s Isle. However, once we had paddled our way
to the island, we again found that our opponents had been thinking the
same thing, for an entourage of BoI awaited us. I still managed to land
upon the isle easily, and get felled by an LSW. However, getting off
the isle was another matter entirely. More and more BoI arrived at the
LSW island, and made it difficult for me to leave. Boing soon arrived,
and tried to get felled by an LSW as well. Luckily however, a Deadly
Crawler got to him first, and his clan mates had to struggle to rescue
their fallen bunny. That gave my clan mates a chance to use their cads
on me, and I was able to flee the LSW island, and look for the final
obstacle, the small rock.

Magnels and I were the only one that left the LSW
island, while the rest of my clan mates distracted BoI. We decided to
look for a rock in South Pass, and Magnels had the bright idea to take
a shortcut through the Marsh. We reached S Pass in not time, and
proceeded to look for a rock throwing greymyr. However, the South Pass
was infested with wendecka, and that made it very difficult to stand
still, and get hit by a rock. To make matters worse, and Day Wendecka
arrived, and pounded me into the ground. Before Magnels could even get
a chance to heal me, I was hit by two rocks thrown by a greymyr, and I
was rendered very fallen. Magnels managed to wrap his chain around me,
and dragged me back to town, where I was healed by many healers. Then
it was off to the Passes again, to look for a small rock.

This time we decided to try North Pass, since the
S Pass was so plagued with wendecka. We traveled swiftly through the
forests, and reached N Pass in no time. There, we met Astor, and
proceeded to look for a rock to fall to. A flock of Blood Hawks decided
to give us some trouble, but we managed to drive them off with some
difficulty. Then we stood around waiting for a greymyr to throw a rock,
and it came soon enough, felling me with one blow. We had won the
Dun’ilsar! It was a great contest all in all, and it is nice that we
are finally moving up the tiers of the Mountain Forest again. Tav’riel
Ferindril, and for the glory of all clans! (Check out a Vision Stone of the event.)

Day 228, Year 542 of the Ascendancy

The 189th Chaos Storm has swept the lands, and so far little new has
been discovered. The T’rool Outpost in south forest still remains
unopen, and no new areas have been discovered thus far. However, I have
heared that the Valley has grown much more difficult, and all
throughout the day desparate cries for help in the Valley could be
heard over the sunstone. Personally, I had greater things to worry
about, like my financial troubles, which have yet to improve. I am now
so poor that I have taken to studying in Parric’s cheaper library,
instead of the more costly extention. At least my chain has been
holding up pretty well, and I’ve managed to get 63 uses out of it so
far. Master Loovma Geer also says that I am progressing well in my
training, so I am happy.

Anyway, today I decided to revisit the Volcano on
Devil’s Isle, to see if the Chaos Storm had brought anything new to the
domain of the Fire Drakes. I managed to convince the healer Aethelred
and the fighter Johan to accompany me, and we headed for the entrance
to the McBolie Caverns. However, when we arrived, I could not open the
path into the Caverns– I couldn’t even see it! Frustrated, we tried
everything from banging heads to whispering prayers, but it was all to
no avail. Thus, our party was forced to turn back, with the Volcano was
left unexplored. At least my new map of Devil’s Isle is coming along
nicely. Hopefully I will get a chance to revisit the Crater soon.