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It is the next day, and the tribe looks to you for guidance.

The chieftan's men have not returned, although your previous mission suggested to you that they're alive. His daughter, barely of age, and her guardian nominally stands in a position of leadership, but you are not sure if she is up to the task.

"What do the spirits tell you?"

she asks.

>>1574722
>"What do the spirits tell you?"
>>1562955
>>Send: "Uncountable dark-skinned warriors are coming for our lands. They're very close" Add their current position.
>>1574649
>and revealed that the wolf of the vision was a foreign army.
We got a vision that we're going to have to go to war soon.

Hey QM, did you remember to link the previous thread to this one?

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>>1574773
"Most of our warriors aren't here. How can we prepare for war without our men? Without father?"

"What" she asks, a tear welling up in the corner of her eye, "are we to do?"

>>1574795
>>1562772
>Ibto is back,
>>1562820
>"I left the others." he cries. "I do not know what came of them."
Was Ibto with the original hunting party, or the search and rescue party?
Nevertheless, I'm sure the rescue party didn't try fighting an entire army all by themselves, and tried retreating the same as Ibto here.

>>1562950
>>tell A'un what he should tell a shaman in his dream.
>>1562932
We already requested A'un to warn Valestone, we should warn the other villages and band our forces together. Possibly try recovering the rescue party as well, unless they're already on their way here.

>>1574797
Got the link. If you're wondering what the linking is for, it's for those with thread notifications.

>>1574649
>One of them, Ibto, returned in the night,
>>1574828
>Was Ibto with the original hunting party, or the search and rescue party?
Disregard that, I missed that part.

>>1574828
>>1574834
so is that a vote for more spirit mumbo-jumbo then?

>>1574835
If that's what it takes to warn the others, sure. Send nearly everyone who can warn the others to warn the others.

Curious, is magic real in this setting or are all the shamans just really high?

>>1574795
"Even if all our warriors were here, we wouldn't be able to fight this enemy. Their numbers are larger than many tribes like ours put together. We have to run.

Gather all the tribespeople and start packing up. Meanwhile I will try to find the chieftain rest of the warriors."

Then try to divine the chieftain's location

Which way is the enemy coming from?

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Rolled 51 (1d100)

>>1574847
this way.

Roll 2d100 against my roll. Your smart is +40, the strong(willed) of the tribe is +30, but you are trying to convince them to leave their home, so we call it even.

So the one with the highest first roll needs to be beating this roll here.

>>1574849
How many soldiers would we have if we banded all our tribes together versus the enemy's?
So Valestone's wrecked, or was Valestone the enemy?

>>1574850
Valeston is not the enemy. Before all this, you had about a dozen warriors, and all villages but Bluestream are a similar size (although the Dregrs have looser standarts on what constitutes a warrior.)

Bluestream might have double that, you aren't certain.

>>1574837
>Curious, is magic real in this setting or are all the shamans just really high?

you are confident it's real.

Rolled 65, 57 = 122 (2d100)

>>1574849
Damn, so warning Valestone was probably useless.
It would be nice to know such things beforehand.

>>1574875
Nice.

>>1574853
So assuming the enemy has 100 soldiers, and we have 2 soldiers and 5+ MIA, then at most we'd have 55 soldiers if we had them all together.

>>1574849
Fighting where we are would be pointless, too far away from help and we seemed fairly nomadic from our hunting lifestyle, so not much in the way of defenses.

A contemporary military fortification would take roughly 2:1 odds to be on even terms, roughly 3:1 for victory.
I'd say Bluestream would take 2-3:1 odds to be even if they attacked from the river, I doubt they have much in the way in fortifications besides those neat walls. Coppertown looks like it'd take 3-4:1 odds to be on even terms, accounting for the highly mountainous and forested terrain. Might not be able to sustain our population if we went for them, but they'd have the best chances of defeating the invaders.
I'd say we should either go to Bluestream and hitch a boat outta here, or go to Coppertown and make a combined army to take down the invaders.

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>>1574875
The tribe trusts your advice, and supplies are packed. Of course, not all your food stores will be able to be carried, but at least all animals will be taken with you.

The chieftan's daughter, who deferred to you in this decision, expresses concern nonetheless. What if the chieftan comes back and finds the village empty? Will they have some way of finding you? What if we meet the foreigners on the way?

And most importantly: where to?

>>1574878
>Fighting where we are would be pointless, too far away from help and we seemed fairly nomadic from our hunting lifestyle, so not much in the way of defenses.

hunting is a big part of keeping the coffers stocked, but you have both husbandry and fields. your defenses are, as previously stated, above average.

>>1574889
That's exactly why I said to try and dvivne the chieftain's locaion in >>1574847. To bring him back.

As to where, I'm leainng to Bluestream. As >>1574878 said, Coppertown is probably more defensible, but the spirits did say "thousand teeth". We need to keep a way to retreat open.

By the way, let's also burn all the food we can't take with us to deny the enemy forage.

Rolled 94 (1d100)

>>1574898
alright, roll smarts for divining while everybody is packing up, +40 for you, +30 for the spirits.
Small hint: consider the last divinations you made carefully.

I'll be off cooking for a bit, back later

Rolled 3, 93 = 96 (2d100)

>>1574900
I don't think this will go well...

>>1574900
The last divination seems to suggest one of the rescue party is dead or captured.

I can only hope we find the other ones.

alrtight, this will take a bit longer. I'll be back in around an hour or so

>>1574927
'this' that will take an hur is not the drawing, as I just now have realized how that post could generate undue hype.

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>>1574900
alright.

The spirits are quiet and your passage into their world uneasy. A'un does not greet you as you pass the threshold to it.

But you move your way forward, on the cusp between this world and the next, in the search for the Chieftan, scouring the forests filtered through the eye of the spirit.

What you find is a big, gaping nothing.

Not that what you are looking for eludes you, you are quite certain that this is the chieftans position, but it occupies an empty space in the spirit realm. He is not alive, this much is clear, or his life would glow brightly. But his passover has not happened either, or he would have joined his ancestor's spirit.

Filled with new concern, you continue your examination of the woods, and find four souls that feel familiar. They are moving, rapidly, but not in the direction of the village, but westward.

>>1574956
Take Ibto and go intercept the four familiar souls. Be extra careful in case they have been captured.

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Rolled 69 (1d100)

>>1574962
you and Ibto get ready for the rescue mission of the rescue mission, while the rest of the tribe begins their march westward to Bluestream.

You tell Neda, your apprentice to take good care of the women and children (and anything else?) before you depart with Ibto.

For that, please roll me a fast roll, your fast is +20, the forest's fast is +30.

Maybe I should call fast careful.

Rolled 21, 99 = 120 (2d100)

>>1574966
Don't fail me dice

>>1574967
>>1574966
alright, I'm going to take a break. I'll probably continue when there are a few more people round

>>1574973
Im up and ready my dude.

>>1574973
Eeeey.

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>>1575011
>>1574995
>>1574967
you stalk through the forest, and soon find the tracks of hundreds of feet stamping through the woods, in paths that seem almost erratic to you, as if indecisive, or hunting a rabbit that constantly changes its way.

But at one point, there is a different set of tracks next to the main congregation, which, some time later, split off, and lead you to a runestone. In front of it lies a decaying, black corpse. The tracks move further into the forest, westward, parallel to the way your tribespeople are going.

If they are the men you are looking for, they truly had the spirits on their side.

Do you want to follow them, follow the army tracks or do something different altogether?

>>1575069
Inspect the runestone. Its probably very important to them, if we find its secrets perhaps we can understand how to defeat the thousand-hand wolf.

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>>1575074
The runestone has been here for a long time. While your tribe does not require it for your commune with the spirits, you still know them to be holy sites.

This one is immaculately kept, free even of moss. A cracked open skull of a clearly domesticated ram at its foot tells you that the Dregrs worship at it, or at least have in the past.

The ram very well might even be one taken from the village.

>>1575085
Write the symbols to memory, and follow the army.

>>1575120
Seconding.

Rolled 68 (1d100)

>>1575120
>>1575140
oh right, I'll need another fast roll. your bonus is +20, mine is hidden.

Rolled 38, 43 = 81 (2d100)

>>1575154

Rolled 57, 58 = 115 (2d100)

>>1575154

>>1575154
>>1575163
Hm. Should I make another roll?

>>1575192
You might as well.

Rolled 76, 51 = 127 (2d100)

>>1575154
>>1575197
Alright.

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>>1575158
>>1575163
you follow the tracks through the thick forest but only reach them once they stop completely - at the village.

The storage hut the villagers set aflame still throws up a pillar of smoke, and the gates are as open as you have left them.

Before them, there is the army of black bodies. A few dozen of them are watching a display by some kind of ritualistic dancer in front of a fire, a man with a great, feathered halo behind his head and metal adornments over his body. A massive, lean man on a stool watches the dancer intently.

More of the foreigners are coming in and out of the village walls, and some guard strange horned beasts they have brought with them.

There at the walls, you see a huddle of people in ropes.

>>1575216
The dancing guy is their shaman.
The people in ropes are our guys.
Sent Ibto to observe the men guarding our tribesmen, while we watch our 'colleague'
Pay spacial attention to any hairs or personal possessions he might drop while dancing.

>>1575231
Supporting this

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Rolled 96 (1d100)

>>1575231
>>1575235
Ibto moves further back into the forest to emerge closer to the prisoners, and you focus on what you assume to be the shaman.

The dance is wild and slightly disconcerting, the man seems to distort his body in ways it isn't meant to be. AS you watch out for discarded tiems, you note that small parts of feather fall to the ground from time to time.

More interestingly however, it seems that the shaman is periodically throwing small white pebbles into the fire, which times appear to be of most interest to all present.


Alright, I'll stop here for today I think. I will probably post in this thread with low frequency over the next two days, but I don't know how my free time will look like.

I enjoy drawing things for you guys, so this is pleasant.

>>1575295
Thanks for running OP, this quest is getting exciting.

>>1575295
Thanks for running!

>>1575295
Shit well im excited where this will go.
Have a beautiful time op!

Draw on anon, draw on. Compositions get nicer when you introduced the dark value people to contrast against the light and lines.

boy, life's a bit much right now, I don't think I will be able to run again in the lifespan of this thread. I'd guess at next wednesday for next time IÄve got enough time.

>>1575295
great art. thanks for running

>>1578231
No problem my dude. You do you.

>>1578231
That's fine. Thanks for the earlier run.

new thread

>>1593056