03- The Apostles of Doom
Contents
Preface: Dates, Time and Previously
Time of Day
Chapter 116
Chapter 117
Chapter 118
Chapter 119
Chapter 120
Chapter 121
Chapter 122
Chapter 123
Chapter 124
Chapter 125
Chapter 126
Chapter 127
Chapter 128
Chapter 129
Chapter 130
Chapter 131
Chapter 132
Chapter 133
Chapter 134
Chapter 135
Chapter 136
Chapter 137
Chapter 138
Chapter 139
Chapter 140
Chapter 141
Chapter 142
Chapter 143
Chapter 144
Chapter 145
Chapter 146
Chapter 147
The First Lacuna
The Second Lacuna
Appendix I: The Localverse
Appendix II: Introduction and Overview of Time, Space and the Multiverse
Appendix III: Introduction to Animus and Mana Polarization
Appendix IV: Orc Social Structure
Appendix V: Hilda’s Saint School Notes on the Undead and the Unlife
Demons of Astlan
Volume III:
Apostles of Doom
By
Jerry Langland
Copyright 2016
Special Thanks and Dedication to:
Michael Begel, Jay Haesly, Sean Jones, Bob Bingham, Jeff Hodapp, Rick Szekeres, Don Meyer
Edited By: http://www.5starediting.com
Cover Art By: Jacob Atienza (http://jacobarts.weebly.com)
Visit http://www.Astlan.Net for Maps, History, Details and Artwork.
Thanks to all the tireless Beta Demons who labored in the Salt Mines of the Abyss to improve this book!
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Preface: Dates, Time and Previously
Reminder from Volume I: The planet of Astlan has two moons. Uropia, the closer moon, orbits Astlan around the axis of rotation from East to West (like Earth’s moon) and Anuropia, further out, orbits Astlan over the poles of rotation from north to south and then south to north.
http://www.astlan.net/Home/AstrometryAstrology/TheMoonsandTheirCycles.aspx
Uropia, the moon with a feminine aspect, has ten months per Astlanian year. Anuropia has five months per year. Thus, for every one Anuropian month, there are two Uropian months. The five months of Anuropia conveniently correspond to the five seasons: Hearth, Winter, Spring, Summer, Harvest.
Anuropian months are not specifically named, given that they also correspond to the seasons which are reversed in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Anuropian quarter months, however, are named. Each named quarter month has two ten-day weeks that correspond to the relative positions of the two moons.
While timekeeping does vary across Astlan, the dates are fairly standardized for trade purposes. Typically, dates are given as Anuropian Quarter Month/Day of Quarter Month/Year. In texts, the quarter month is denoted by either a number 1 to 20 or the name of the month.
http://www.astlan.net/Home/AstrometryAstrology/AstlanianCalendar.aspx
There are multiple calendars that designate the current year depending on specific events. Over the last few centuries, calendars that do not start and stop at the same time have fallen out of favor so that currently, the major calendars in use have years that are only offsets of each other.
http://www.astlan.net/Home/History/Timeline.aspx
The Council States, where many of the humans in Demons of Astlan live, officially use the Post-Vargosian Calendar, which dates from the fall of the Vargosite Empire, 424 years before the arrival of the Dark Lord Tommus. Mount Doom is obviously in the Abyss, which does not have real days, nights or seasons. However, its denizens do use a rough calendar system in which the years seem to roughly correspond to Astlanian years, although this is a completely arbitrary choice made by various demon lords.
As a quick summary of historical milestones:
Mount Doom was founded 54,760 years before the Dark Lord Tommus ascended to the Throne of Orcus.
4,467 years ago, in the final battle of Ragnarök, Asbrú—the bridge connecting Ásgarðr,' Jötunheimr and Midgard—was destroyed by Loki, thus sealing both the Æsir and the Lords of Jötnar from access to other planes of existence.
4,027 Astlanian years ago, Sentir Fallon, an avatar of Tiernon, slew the Demon Prince Orcus on the world of Etterdam. Most of Orcus’s D’Orc army was slain permanently by unknown means.
Oorstemoth was founded by the Anilord Ponchas 1,620 years before the Dark Lord Tommus appears.
The last of the Anilords were slain 1,071 years before the beginning of the current events.
One year later, 1,070 years ago, the first Etonians (a.k.a. the Five Siblings) arrived in Natoor, where they spent approximately the next 200 years eliminating the followers of the Nyjyr Ennead.
The last temple of the Nyjyr Ennead fell 820 years before Lord Tommus’s ascension.
The Vargosite Empire, founded 1,052 years ago after the fall of the Anilords, collapsed 440 years ago.
Three years later, 437 years ago, the Magedom of Turelane was formed by Archimage Turelane Al-Addin.
In 5 PV, 435 years ago, the Kingdom of Abancia was founded; it would last for 300 years until the Abancian War of Dominance, in which Exador laid waste to Abancia when they refused his demands.
Recent milestones:
Approximately 150 years ago, the Archdemon Bess arrived in the
Courts of Chaos, having previously been living in the outer realms due to a feud with Orcus. She claims no one bothered to tell her that Orcus had perished several millennia previously. Her principal fortress near the Courts of Chaos is called “the Outpost.”
Approximately 100 years ago, Bess aligned with the archdemons Ramses and Exador; they began researching legends of a book containing information that would enable them to depose Lilith and Sammael, the Cofactors of the Abyss.
Approximately ten years ago, Lenamare the Great learned of this same book and its contents.
A few years ago, Lenamare ascertained a very likely location for the book and hired a band of interdimensional rogues and bounty hunters to retrieve the book from ruins inside of Oorstemoth.
Lenamare’s agents acquired the book but were captured; Lenamare, however, had planted magic items on his agents that caused them to blame Exador for the robbery.
Exador spent nearly a year clearing himself of the charges, and determined that Lenamare had the book that he and his allies wanted.
Exador and his allies plotted to seize Lenamare’s Academy of Wizardry and more specifically, the book. Lenamare discovered the plot by Exador and began planning his defense.
On Cyclos 7th 440 PV, during a training session with students, Lenamare and his partner Jehenna discovered what they thought was an unbound lesser demon. Upon trying to summon the demon for the first time, they realized it was actually a Greater Demon. With great risk to themselves and the students, Lenamare succeeded in binding the demon to his will.
Cyclos 7, 440 PV is Day Zero for the events detailed here. It is the day that the Demon Tom is first summoned.
Fourteen days later (DZ +14), Lenamare blew up his own school, taking out the majority of Exador’s forces.
The following evening (DZ +15), Verigas, the High Priest of Tiernon in Gizzor Del, had his own demon summoning hijacked by a Demon Lord in possession of a party of humans. This began the Rod’s involvement.
A few days later, an Oorstemothian ship attempted to apprehend a smuggler and was illegally destroyed by one Lord Edwyrd, a powerful animage that also controlled demons. This began Oorstemoth’s involvement.
Within a week, both the Rod of Tiernon and Oorstemothian forces surrounded the city of Freehold, home of the Council of Wizardry and capitol of the Council States. They both demanded independently that the Council turn over the individuals they were pursuing.
The Council reacted by raising the city’s incredibly powerful wards of protection, shielding the city from both magical and physical intrusion.
Talarius, Knight Rampant of Tiernon, while patrolling the city from above, discovered that the city was infested with at least a thousand demons, as well as several Archdemons.
Thirty days after Day Zero, on Electh 17th 440 PV, the Council managed to expel the demon infestation along with the Arch Demons and Lenamare’s Greater Demon. The demon Tom battled Talarius, Knight Rampant of Tiernon, and Tom defeated Talarius by subverting the mana links between Tiernon and his priests, using the mana to take control of the Rod of Tiernon, the holy army. Further, he reversed the blade used to kill Orcus and tossed Talarius “Into the Abyss.”
DZ + 30: Electh 17th 440 PV is known as the “Day of Fight” or DOF.
One day later, Saint Hilda of Rivenrock arrived as part of a scouting party for the Host of Tiernon’s arrival; she quickly determined that things were very odd, and the Archons of Tiernon decided to abort the Hosts' appearance and proceed more surreptitiously.
In the Abyss, the members of the Courts of Chaos celebrate Tom’s victory and try to figure out who and where he is.
The incubus Reggie is summoned by Merit-Ptah as part of a plot to secretly repopulate Astlan with followers of the Nyjyr Ennead.
An expedition to investigate a vision of an orc uprising and the nature of the demon Bess was launched by the Council of Wizardry and the Grove, led by Trevin D’Vils, Enchantress of the Grove.
Within a few days, as the expedition left the Grove in the cloudship Nimbus, it was attacked by a contingent of Storm Lords of Nysegard, undead liches on ice dragons.
Shortly thereafter, the wizard Exador was exposed as an archdemon. In anger he attacked those that witnessed his unmasking. He was driven from Astlan by Randolf, Exador, Gandros, Lenamare, Jehenna, Tureledor and Davron. In the process, Exador launched an unprovoked attack on the djinn, Crispin, thus unleashing the wrath of the djinn upon himself.
Ten days after absconding with the knight Talarius, the D’Orcs of Mount Doom swore allegiance to the Dark Lord Tommus. This day is known as the Day of Allegiance or DOA: Demoni 7th, 54,760 MDT (Mount Doom Time) (DZ + 40).
The following day, the D’Orcs, Lord Tommus and Sekhmekt, the Nyjyr Ennead Goddess of War, defeated two thousand-plus demons sent by Lilith and more spectacularly, destroyed twenty-three Knights of Chaos that arrived at Mount Doom in a Chaos Maelstrom.
Time of Day
Timekeeping in the Abyss, and most of the locations in the localverse, is imprecise. Aside from the cost of accurate timekeeping devices, there are few official authorities. Typically, the ruler of each region dictates the hours of the day in their region. For Astlan, in most cases local scholars base the time of day on observations of Fierd and the moons. These scholars are then charged with synchronizing the sometimes-faulty timekeeping devices.
The most obvious effect of this is that there is essentially no synchronization of time between kingdoms. Most mana users who have an interest in interregional trade typically have a table of offsets so that they can coordinate communication via mirrors or other long-distance communication devices. The same is true for interdimensional traders, where time can be even trickier since different worlds may not only have a different breakdown of time, but often have different periods of rotation, and thus different day lengths.
The Abyss is even stranger since it doesn’t have days. As far as anyone has been able to determine, the Abyss is flat and probably infinite, or at least very large. No known entity has found and reported an edge, nor has anyone managed to circumscribe a spherical Abyss, despite journeys by intrepid explorers lasting centuries to millennia.
Further evidence of the Abyss’s flatness, or extremely large spherical nature, was provided during the construction of the Boom Tunnels. Throughout the breadth and scope of the Boom Tunnel network, Altrusian engineers were unable to detect any sign of systemic curvature to the Abyss. While there were numerous differences in elevation over the vast distances, there was no evidence of actual curvature.
Most demons that visit the localverse use Court time, based on the artificial days of the Courts of Chaos. While there are other cities or regions in the Abyss that have their own time, most copy the conventions of the Courts.
Court Periods
Court Deminutes
Astlan Time (Freehold)
Earth Time
Period 1
000:111
0:00 to 3:33
0:00 to 4:00
Period 2
112:222
3:34 to 6:66
4:01 to 8:00
Period 3
223:333
6:67 to 9:99
8:01 to 12:00
Period 4
334:444
10:00 to 13:33
12:01 to 16:00
Period 5
445:555
13:34 to 16:66
16:01 to 20:00
Period 6
556:666
16:67 to 19:99
20:01 to 24:00
Chapter 116
Slopes of Mount Doom: DOA + 1, Late Fifth Period
Sammael, the Cofactor of the Abyss, Emperor of Demons and Supreme Adversary, stood on an icy boulder overlooking a snow-covered mountain slope. Sammael was in his preferred human form and bundled tightly in his high-altitude furs. This slope, at a relatively low altitude, was far colder than the highest peak he had ever scaled in the Abyss. It was, in short, quite remarkable. The current temperature on the side of
this active volcano was far below anything he had seen in the Abyss during his extremely long reign. The ambient temperature should have been near the boiling point of water; instead, a few minutes ago he had seen his breath start to liquefy as it left his body and cooled. Clearly, it was the carbon dioxide, but as it had gotten colder, he began to wonder about the oxygen, nitrogen and argon. This form liked to breathe and it would be terribly inconvenient if the air suddenly became liquid. His furs would also get soggy.
CRUNCH! came a loud noise from the battlefield he was surveying. He shook his head in admiration; a giant stone sphinx had just squashed another frozen Knight of Chaos. Tom had certainly outdone himself here. He had never expected the two thousand-plus assorted lower ranked demons to do much against the D’Orcs—and they had not. The D’Orcs had always been a true force to be reckoned with, and with an active Mount Doom… well, the idiots should have expected to get buried under volcanic ash and lava. That fight had been almost comical.
The Knights of Chaos, on the other hand? That was quite unexpected. The fact that Tom and his best warriors had been able to kill a few of them under normal circumstances was impressive, but then this freezing business—clearly masterful. Extreme cold was a weakness he would never have expected from the knights. He would have to remember this; one never knew when the tables might be reversed.
Of course, the fact that Tom had been able to freeze such a large region of the Abyss was rather intimidating. Sam had no idea how the demon had managed it. The amount of mana required to do this would be insane. He shook his head as the last of the knights shattered without an explosion. It was the dying chaos stream that usually took out the rare “victors” battling a Knight of Chaos.
Lilith would be shitting frozen bricks when word got back to her of this battle. Sam chuckled. If anyone deserved such a dose of raw anxiety, it was his “beloved” spouse. He supposed that technically, he understood her thinking in doing a first strike; but it had, rather predictably, backfired on her. What he was not sure of was why she felt such an overwhelming need to strike first.