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>>5718998
You press your tongue to the inside of your cheek, “Alright…$300, that’s the rate.” Whittier splutters wildly, “The Lord himself could reach out and smite all the wickedness of this place and it would not be worth $300!”

“No need to blaspheme foreman, it’s only yer own relation that means so little to ye.” you say, sending him into further apoplexy, “Relation by marriage!,” he exclaims, “and I would have thought factors of survival would necessitate a more demure position from you!” You arch your brow, “What ‘factors’ might those be?”, “Yer impendin’ starvation for one! I know ye don’t got money, that Mary girl told as much.”

God dammit woman. You try not to let the despair show on your face. You do not, in fact, have anything to your name aside from your effects and Three Silver Dollars. “Alright,” you say, “We will table any talk of remuneration for now, until I know more of what I might be doin’ for ye,” You shift yourself towards Whittier’s tent, “You said there’s a witness left alive?” “Yessir, my deputy foreman, Anson Collier.” He looks down at the ground, choosing his words carefully, “He…is not in a good way mister, he came back just before dawn and I’ve kept him here in my tent since, so as not to spread any ill omen.”

You take a moment to regard yourself, the old fear lumping your throat, the old tremors quaking your hands, the memories of being out in the dark and the cold, things passing before your eyes . Iridescent horrors, their breath, the texture of their fur, their skin, the dull shining of their teeth. A small voice sobs inside you, not again please, please never again, never. Whittier sees your face turn black and sober, he pulls the tent flap aside and you both walk in.

On the bed is the man, Collier, rank fear and sweat pouring off him, he stinks like urine and like one of them. Pale sick is pooled on the ground by his cot, fresh, and still dripping, drop by drop from his overhanging mouth onto the dirt floor. He’s crying, and for a moment you’re afraid he might set you off too, the tiny voice inside you keeps pace with his hiccups and the sounds of mucus bottled in his throat. Whittier picks up a bottle of laudanum, feeding it gently into Collier’s open mouth. “Now, Anson, I’ve brought a man to see ye, tell him what ye told me, it’s alright now boy.”

>>5718998
It takes a moment, you both wait for the laudanum to line his gut, five, ten minutes, in the meantime you take him in. He’s uninjured, except for a pair of gashes on his left arm, above the elbow. They’re blunt and heavy, not like a cut, like a rip. Big too, deep, each at least 4 inches across. His arm is in a linen sling, as you approach to inspect the wound more closely he screams at you, “NO DON’T!!”, and tries to move away. He manages, pathetically and despite Whittier’s attempts to pacify him, to force himself off the cot and into his own vomit, dragging himself through the mud towards the back of the tent. His breath comes double quick, and you could swear you can hear his heart all the way from where you’re standing. He looks at you with owl eyes, huge and terrified.

You’ve seen enough. You motion Whittier outside and step back into the frost. After some time spent corralling young Anson back under a blanket he joins you. The air is very still, very quiet, this far away from the lumber men and the thoroughfare. The trees crackle, the sap contracting from the temperature.

After several minutes of silence you speak without looking up, “I want the money in advance,” He looks through you for a moment, “Do ya know what he saw?” You turn your gaze back towards the tent, then to him. Slowly, you nod once. “I think so.”

He gives a long, tired sigh, rubs his eyes, then looks at you.
“Alright then, now pardner, remind me of yer name.”

You were born here, in America. You are a 36 year old veteran of the Mexican-American War, much of your past is yours to choose and discover, some of it is not. For now,

>>5718998
Choose A Name
>Maurice Campbell: Your people are Scottish, from Fife, and settled in Appalachia, in Virginia.
Advantages: To Be Discovered
Drawbacks: To Be Discovered

>Emmanuel Stieglitz: Your people are German, from Hesse, and settled in Pennsylvania
Advantages: To Be Discovered
Drawbacks: To Be Discovered

>Ptolemy Price: Your people are English, from Kent, but have lived in America since before the revolution, in North Carolina.
Advantages:To Be Discovered
Drawbacks:To Be Discovered

>Titus Hendricks: Your people are Dutch, from Utrecht, and have lived in America since before the revolution, in New York
Advantages: To Be Discovered
Drawbacks: To Be Discovered
Relationship Established
John Whittier: Tahoe Lumber Camp, Foreman

Now, there’s matters need attendin’ to…

>Argue with Whittier again about that rate. $300 may be too high, but he doesn’t know what he’s asking. You deserve something more than a Foreman’s quota bonus.

>Make your way to the thoroughfare. There are 3 buildings, the rest are tents. You need many things, but it’s questionable which, if any, you’ll find.

>Try and round up a posse. Do your best to bribe, cajole, lie to, or bully anyone with a gun to go out with you tonight.

>>5719003
>Maurice Campbell: Your people are Scottish, from Fife, and settled in Appalachia, in Virginia.

https://youtu.be/VTW30Q4B3Go

>>5719005
Oh and >Try and round up a posse. Do your best to bribe, cajole, lie to, or bully anyone with a gun to go out with you tonight.


Gather the boys

>>5718998
It's bedtime Scot, I'll be back in 8 hours.

>>5719003

>Maurice Campbell: Your people are Scottish, from Fife, and settled in Appalachia, in Virginia.

>Argue with Whittier again about that rate. $300 may be too high, but he doesn’t know what he’s asking. You deserve something more than a Foreman’s quota bonus

Let’s see if we can get $100 for supplies and sundries.

I have the feeling that collecting a posse won’t be much help until we know what we’re hunting and how to kill it. If we get a whole posse killed our job becomes much harder.

Better maybe to scout things out, set up an ambush, and kill the devil/monster/beast with overwhelming firepower.

>>5719003
>Emmanuel Stieglitz: Your people are German, from Hesse, and settled in Pennsylvania

>Try and round up a posse. Do your best to bribe, cajole, lie to, or bully anyone with a gun to go out with you tonight.

>>5719003

>>Titus Hendricks: Your people are Dutch, from Utrecht, and have lived in America since before the revolution, in New York
>Advantages: To Be Discovered
>Drawbacks: To Be Discovered
Eyy im walking ova here

>Relationship Established
>John Whittier: Tahoe Lumber Camp, Foreman
>Now, there’s matters need attendin’ to…

>>Make your way to the thoroughfare. There are 3 buildings, the rest are tents. You need many things, but it’s questionable which, if any, you’ll find.

LOCKED
>Maurice Campbell: Your people are Scottish, from Fife, and settled in Appalachia, in Virginia.

>Try and round up a posse. Do your best to bribe, cajole, lie to, or bully anyone with a gun to go out with you tonight.

WRITING

>>5719003
>Emmanuel Stieglitz: Your people are German, from Hesse, and settled in Pennsylvania

>Make your way to the thoroughfare. There are 3 buildings, the rest are tents. You need many things, but it’s questionable which, if any, you’ll find.

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”Maurice Campbell,” You put out your grip and he meets it with a single, firm shake. “Now I’m about my business, tell me where could a man find some others willin’ to traipse about them fir trees in the dark?”. Whittier scratches his beard thoughtfully and motions back down towards the camp. ”Got men swingin’ axes and saws all day down there, we get some indigents but by and by they’re more decent than any ye might find wasting themselves in drink at the saloon this time a day.”

”Well I’ll go about poachin’ then Foreman,” You say, adjusting your satchel strap and starting back down the road to the camp. You hear Whittier’s voice shout after you, ”You go about doin’ as ye like but I ain’t payin’ ya anyone else!” You smile to yourself as you walk on, hypnotized by the inhalation and expulsion of the razor air. Your thoughts turn towards whatever it might be. You know some Indian, but the names were hard to remember. Mostly, there were no names, but you think you have an idea. Claws didn’t hurt that boy, antlers did, his arm was near enough run through by some.

That narrowed it down but little. Still, Whittier had said no bodies. Even they usually left some pitiful remnant of the human form, if only to leer from the shadows at the wailing of any kin unfortunate enough to find it. Yeah, you probably know what it is. What you don’t know is if you can kill it with a rifle. Cornelius was with you last time, probably the only reason you survived.

Your eyes refocus, and suddenly you realize you hear the call and response of men at work. A half dozen enormous sugar pines are on their backs, getting worked over by teams of almost a dozen planers. You make your rounds, talking to any man who looks capable and isn’t busy, and waiting until some that are busy get on break. After an hour or so you figure you’ve reconnoitered the whole of the camp and have come up with three possibles.

One, Mack Donnelly. A short, wiry man with a head of red cow licks. His cousin Sean was on the first wagon to disappear. He has an old Barnett Trade Gun, A muzzle loading smoothbore with a 36” barrel.

Two, Quinton Aimes. Short as well, but bald and mustachioed. His nose is crimson in the sun and his breath makes it clear that he does not leave his drink for the end of the day. He is one of the most muscled men you have ever seen, and he speaks to you while cleaving through wood as though it were already paper. He does not own a gun, and mutters something about the depravity of the Faro table.

Three, Edgar Welles. Medium height, brown eyes and brown hair. He shares his coffee with you and regales you with stories about his time as a Captain in the Army. To hear him tell it he single-handedly set the rancheros to flight in ‘47, marauding his way from Monterey to Mexico City. You ask if he was in Sonoma at the Bear Flag Revolt. He nods and smiles. He does not seem to know what that is. He carries an underhammer Blunt & Syms pepperbox carbine, .36 Caliber.

All you say at first is that you need some people to go into the woods tonight on an errand. All three men are willing to range out, but they won’t do it for nothing.

First, decide whether to

>Tell the truth. There’s something out there, something unnatural, and it needs to be killed. None of them will be safe in such an exposed place as this, things will just get worse.

or

>Lie. You need a posse to search for an errant cougar that lamed your horse. You don’t know the area, so you figured you’d ask some locals.

Then, decide what to offer

>Money. You have the $100 Whittier promised you, you can promise what you like of it to any or all of them. This is the most likely to work in almost any situation

>Favors. Sometimes people need things done that they can’t do themselves. See if any of the men need a favor. Maybe they don’t, if not, your shit out of luck.

Note:You can approach as few or as many as you like, you can also take separate tacks with each of the men, but understand that not having everyone on the same page might not turn out well.

>>5719318

>Tell the truth. There’s something out there, something unnatural, and it needs to be killed. None of them will be safe in such an exposed place as this, things will just get worse.

Don’t hold back - you’re hunting something worse than wolves and bears. Be clear with all three that teamwork is critical to survival and the THING out there doesn’t care about bravado. Make it clear to Quinton that he stops drinking the moment he accepts the job - if he doesn’t like those parameters, you won’t take him on and you’ll leave him out there drunk otherwise.

>>5719318
>Tell the truth. There’s something out there, something unnatural, and it needs to be killed. None of them will be safe in such an exposed place as this, things will just get worse.
>Money. Maybe a favour to sweeten the deal if not enough?
>Quinton Aimes.

>>5719668
+1

Locked
>Tell the truth. There’s something out there, something unnatural, and it needs to be killed. None of them will be safe in such an exposed place as this, things will just get worse.

>Money. Maybe a favour to sweeten the deal if not enough?
Writing

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The sun stabs from the center of the blue. It’s a curious thing to muse on, there you are buttressed by chill, as the great, burning thing goes mad trying to pierce you with at least one of its speartips. You look back down to the cookfire in front of you. You’re seated in a ring, staring at the three men who’ve took you up on your offer. The girls who work for the camp prepare the lunch in big batches for the laborers. Sausage, tomatoes, cornbread, coffee, a ration of whiskey, and some smoked venison.

A woman brings you a plate, assuming your business with three of the lumberjacks entitles you to something like an official position for the day. You all eat in silence for a while. Quinton downs his ration and produces a flask. ”Can you hold that pardner?” you say, chewing some gristle. ”I don’t take on sick men, if you can’t stuff that drink for tonight then there won’t be no happy endin’ for ye.”

You’ve dealt with hard men all your life, and you’ve grown accustomed to how they might react to a laying down of things. What you do not expect is for Quinton to sleepily nod, and without comment stow his flask back under his goat hide vest. Mack eyes you somewhat warily over his plate. Edgar keeps his head down. Still, head down or no, he’s the first one to speak, tapping his heel on the ugly wood chair he’s laid up in. ”Alright now you know I gots me a very fine eye for men of quality and a fellow man of quality you is sir yes sir but I do need to be knowin’ now what exactly this nightly thing we doin’ is gonna be about now.” Mack breaks off from looking at you to look at Edgar. He seems about to speak, then decides against it and looks back at you expectantly.

”Well now,” You take a deep breath, and let it out. A lick of the fire shies away from you. ”There’s somethin’ been killin’ people these last two weeks. That’s told to me by yer foreman. I think I might know what that somethin’ is-” Edgar peals out a high-pitch guffaw.

“Ah that ain’t no nothin’ man that ain’t nothin’ just some mean coyote, some dog or sumpin’ dressed up big and scarin’ folks, folks piss they pants and run and hide and get mauled by nothin’ hell”

”Shut up” Mack’s pair of words take up as much space as Edgar’s tirade. His freckled gaze turns again. Incensed, Edgar spits back, “Donchu talk to me that way you mick bastard I was a decorated Captain the Army of the United States of America I was and yer poor cousin Sean got et by some little wild dog he did and got shit out all over the-”

”ALRIGHT” You bellow, ”Quit bitchin’ and listen up now! This ain’t no god damn coyote, this ain’t a bear or mountain cat neither. This is somethin’ more dangerous and if we don’t get to killin’ it, mark me feller it will get to killin’ you. Every last one of ye. Now we may yet forestall that outcome, but we must work in tandem to do so. I have money, good money, and for that money you can save the pissin’ for afterward. Now, meet me north of the road out of Martyr’s Valley, on the east slope at midnight. Bring yer iron.”

Mack looks at you and nods, slowly. ”I’ll be there.” Edgar nods as well, much more vigorously, ”Oh my good god damn man we are makin’ out to be heroes now I tell ya you have bought the service of a genuine Captain of the Army Rangers now and I will see you in the evenin’ strapped and ready for hell.”

Apparently deciding to finish lunch without breaking silence, Quinton also gives you a vacant nod, his face flushed red from the fire and booze. As he turns to get back to work you call after him, Quinton! I’m tellin’ ye, you lay off that liquor. You come sauced tonight, you do not get paid.” He shuffles off without a reply, but the flask stays holstered as far as you can see.

You make your way back toward the thoroughfare. This is not the first time you’ve gathered a posse, but you do usually go it alone. It’s easier that way, harder to, but you suppose you prefer one set of difficulties to the other. Most of the time anyway. You can count on yourself more than most people can claim to, particularly because of

>Your great size and strength. At 6’4” with a barrel chest and broad shoulders you have beat men to near death without trying. You were the boxing and wrestling champion of your entire Brigade in the army, you still carry the tooth of your gunnery sergeant. Out of ammunition and charged by lancers, you still shoved a tent stake through a Mexican's skull at Resaca de la Palma.

Advantages:Heraclian Form:+5 to all rolls involving strength, fortitude, or endurance.
Disadvantages:Towering:-5 to all rolls involving visual or social concealment. Cover is less effective.

>Your keen senses. Whether it be smell, sight, or sound you can cut the sign like few others. You were a scout in the army and brought back a dozen bounties for Guerrillo positions. At El Embudo, you were the one who spotted the snipers before the company blundered into the canyon, something General Price never forgot.

Advantages:Emmetropia:+5 to all rolls involving sensory information. [Patronage]:General Price is now Governor Price of Missouri, a long way away, but one can always write a letter.
Disadvantages:Hyperfixation:-5 to all rolls while under any kind of extreme sensory shock.

>Your unnatural pain threshold. You do not feel pain as others do. You feel it of course, but it is a dull ache, you are its master. You’ve been shot, stabbed, drug, burned, and beat. It’s all the same to you, and at Mexico City you went over the wall of Chapultepec, got shot, went over again, were shot again, and went over again. The third time there was no one left to shoot you, and you still dragged yourself inside the city proper with Quitman’s division to accept the formal surrender.

Advantages:Schmerzromantik: Any time you would be incapacitated from an injury, unless it’s extremely severe, you instead get another action.
Disadvantages:Schmerzromantik: Be careful.

Dwelling on your gifts helps, at the very least it keeps you from dwelling on the woods. You’ve got time until midnight but you’ll need some of it to prepare. Meanwhile, there’s still enough daylight for one more errand.

>Go back to see the witness. Anson Collier was not helpful last you spoke, but it’s been several hours and surely several more doses of laudanum. You could see if his head is clear enough to get more information.

>Go to the thoroughfare. you are still in need of much, and taking stock of whatever you have left from your journey here is an important task, if unexciting.

>Scout the wood. In the daylight there is little worry of anything truly dangerous. You are, as of now, wholly reliant on the three men you’ve hired for the lay of the land, changing that may be prudent.

>>5719697

>Your keen senses. Whether it be smell, sight, or sound you can cut the sign like few others. You were a scout in the army and brought back a dozen bounties for Guerrillo positions. At El Embudo, you were the one who spotted the snipers before the company blundered into the canyon, something General Price never forgot.

>Scout the wood. In the daylight there is little worry of anything truly dangerous. You are, as of now, wholly reliant on the three men you’ve hired for the lay of the land, changing that may be prudent.

Full scout mode

>>5719697
>Your keen senses.
>>5719698
>Go to the thoroughfare. you are still in need of much, and taking stock of whatever you have left from your journey here is an important task, if unexciting.

>>5719697
>Keen Senses
>Scout The Wood
Leave no trace, kill all you see

>>5719697
>Your keen senses. Whether it be smell, sight, or sound you can cut the sign like few others. You were a scout in the army and brought back a dozen bounties for Guerrillo positions. At El Embudo, you were the one who spotted the snipers before the company blundered into the canyon, something General Price never forgot.

>Scout the wood. In the daylight there is little worry of anything truly dangerous. You are, as of now, wholly reliant on the three men you’ve hired for the lay of the land, changing that may be prudent.

Its really tempting to go back and see if this victim is going to turn but knowing the terrain is essential and daylight is fading.

>>5719697
>Your keen senses. Whether it be smell, sight, or sound you can cut the sign like few others. You were a scout in the army and brought back a dozen bounties for Guerrillo positions. At El Embudo, you were the one who spotted the snipers before the company blundered into the canyon, something General Price never forgot.

>Scout the wood. In the daylight there is little worry of anything truly dangerous. You are, as of now, wholly reliant on the three men you’ve hired for the lay of the land, changing that may be prudent.

Locked
>Your keen senses.
>Scout the wood.
Writing

[Spoiler]Your accrued character choices will be compiled into a full sheet in a couple more posts. Anyone who would like to suggest a general physical appearance for Campbell is welcome to do so.[/spoiler]

You will not be caught unawares again. Not with one of them. You commit yourself to a survey of the grounds where you will be killing tonight. You look at the sun. Two hours to make it down the trail from the lake camp to the edge of the wood, a half hour to the area of the disappearances, and another hour or so to thoroughly take in the varieties of the location. That would put you done and dusted at around 4:30. So be it.

You set off north down from the lake, prickled pine breeze tickling your nose, the sovereign sun at full glory for an hour or so, slowly melting some of the rime that’s settled into your bones. You measure your time at first in the cut outs of conversation you make from the comers and goers of the area. This place looks like a colony of termites. The three buildings in the thoroughfare fade into the background, as do the small, overherd problems of people’s days.

You haven’t walked this much in a while. Two weeks in that wagon from Sutter’s Fort seemed a blessing at the time, but it feels good to be on the scout again. You reach the road to Nevada and head down, examining the forest around you as you go. More of the pine those men at the camp were working on. You reach a mile down the road from Silver Stream, and enter into the forest.

The smell shifts from pine to cedar, but immediately you feel something else. The grime, like grease fat sliding down your fingers, smearing across your cheeks. Your hackles stand attention, raising and lowering with your heartbeat. The air tastes of cedar, but the further in you go, the more rust and copper fills your mouth. There are no animals here, no birds, squirrels, foxes, or anything else. You set on to your work as quickly as you can.

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The terrain is sloped, trending downward at a mildly sharp degree, you make a note to stay on the south side if you can. The trees are spaced apart, at a good twenty feet on average. Silver-tip fir, white pine, and lone cedars. Plenty of space to maneuver, not many places to easily hide for longer than a minute. The trees themselves have weak branches from the season, and would not support much weight. The ground is frosted, with some snow cover, but small battlefields of green rage on every so often, especially further down the slope. A few snow drifts have settled, but not enough to worry about hampering movement, and none big enough to hide behind.

You spit, trying to get the god damned copper off your tongue when blood floods to your ears. You whip yourself around at a small shuffle of something behind you and with half a dozen long, loping strides you’re behind a gnarled lodgepole pine. You wait as the irregular crunching of frost gains ground towards you. You are too experienced to peek your head around the twisted, dead tree. You hold still. Silent. A large animal, but not large enough to be what you’re after. Besides, the sun is out. Flagging maybe, giving up its supremacy of the blue to the other celestials, but its power still holds sway for a little while.

You finally make a decision. Too loud for a cougar, too light for a bear, a wolf wouldn’t make any sound. A deer then. You slowly make your way out from behind your guardian tree. As you thought, a deer, but small for a buck. It stops its shambling steps and raises its head. Blank. No eyes, no nose, no mouth, simply smooth fur up to its head. Something pushes through the skin of where its face should be. Not quite breaking through.

Like seeing fingers pushing on the other side of a canvas tent. It stays in place, but whatever it is pushes the face skin out further. Towards you. You keep your eyes on it and back up a foot at a time. It tries to take a step towards you. A step towards you however, is a step towards the sun. It fails, placing its hoof back down in the same spot. The shadows pull around it, uprooting themselves from the nearby trees that cast them, leaving them empty, and rush to cloak it. The thing inside reaches further, the buck’s empty face pushed out now at least three feet towards you. A movement, then the outline of a human hand. Pressing towards you from inside. The sun is going down behind you. Autumn, the days are shorter now. You back up another step. It tries again to follow. One hoof up, and out. It cannot. The hoof comes back down. The sun is warm as you step back once, twice, three times, again and again and again. It does not move. It never looks away from your face. After it’s out of sight you turn and run, sprinting back to the road.

You spend the whole way back to camp looking over your shoulder. It should not be out here during the day. That should not have been possible. Your heart beats bruises into your ribs. The old fear courses through you again, replacing your blood with ink, your marrow with gelatin. As you spot the early evening fires of the logging camp, you know you must kill it. There is no other way, it’s what you are for. This is not the life you chose, but you are not an average man. Seven hours till midnight. It is time to prepare.


You are not an average man, through the events of your life you have gained a degree of power, choose what that power is.

Note:Each of these disciplines permanently precludes the others, a man may only follow one throughout his life.

Faith in Christ
”...and they shall know that I am the Lord, when I shall lay my vengeance upon them."
The power of Christ shall defend against the wicked. Channeled most often through a cross, it is defensive in nature. Things that are beyond the scope of nature are outside of God’s intended creation, and will be repelled by light of the true faith. The power of this light is all but impossible to pierce as long as one’s attention is fixed to channeling it. However, it does nothing to stop your fellow man, and smarter things in the dark may figure out that faith does not stop a thrown boulder from crushing your head. As this is the accepted and expected faith in America, it requires no secrecy and genuine devotion is a form of serious social currency.

Occultism
The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.”
The power of the Occult is the power of the human soul to shackle the hidden things of the world. Occultism is an arcanum of rituals, implements, and knowledge that serve many functions. The most versatile form of power, it can be used for anything from ensuring a woman lives through childbirth, to locking a man’s soul into a piece of jewelry. The Occult costs, and the costs are vile. Others may pay them for you, but who would willingly suffer such things for your sake? Of course, the unwilling pay just as well. Occultism is reviled in society, not only among the white man, but among the Indian as well. One must keep their methods a secret. There are a few however…a few who share your journey, even out here. The dark things of the New World can be affected by Occult magicks, but they cannot be commanded by them.

Mukua
”I was a warrior in this land when the sun rose. Now I come from where the sun sets.
The power of the great spirits of the land is the power to channel the earth, sun, and spirits of the air. To bind and banish, to know the rules. The rules of the land are intricate and varied, but they must be obeyed. Even and especially by the things in the dark. You may speak to the dark things and hear them only with this path. However, you are not a shaman of the blood. You do not follow the blessing way. You will never have the true power, the power that they have to channel the truly mighty spirits of the earth, sun and air. You must make do with second hand power and use your wits to make up the rest. The Indians will respect you for following the Mukua, though the spirits of the land do not require you to treat them in any specific way. The white man will find you strange and gone astray, but you will not be outcast or barred from society.

>Faith in Christ
>Occultism
>Mukua

>>5720093
>Faith in Christ
Yeehaw! Also fine with Mukua.

>>5720093
>Occultism

>>5720093

>Mukua

Honestly these are all cool options.

This whole quest sort of reminds me of that Apocalypse movie with Natalie Portman in the bayou of Louisiana, which is a good thing.

Also the deer creature was mega freaky, good job QM

>>5720093
>Faith in Christ
Have you done other quests before, your name sounds familiar

>>5720093
>Faith in Christ

>>5720093
>Mukua

>>5720093
>>Faith in Christ

>>5720093
>Occultism

>>5720093
>occultism

So here me out. Occultism because we are likely poor and in need of funds. We use our knowledge of the occult to help like in Ghostbusters.

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>>5720093
>Faith in Christ
We can throw ourself to the deamon, or we can only stand our ground?

>>5720730
>So here me out. Occultism because we are likely poor and in need of funds. We use our knowledge of the occult to help like in Ghostbusters.

Why not become priest? We will be paid by the power of our spirit and our words.

Although I really don't know why we would need money in a quest. We always end up in more debt if we do that.

>>5720237
I'm happy to hear that, it's what I'm here for.

>>5720320
I don't know if someone else had this name before but this is my first quest.

I start writing at 8:00 PM (PST). I'll keep the voting open until then.

>>5720737
So we could afford train tickets, room and board, buy exciting things we find during our travels, to avoid ending up a time stereotypical christian, etc...

>>5720732
The power of Christ will keep most dark creatures from being able to harm you physically, and it will damage them while doing so. However, it is not meant to smite, and is universally less effective offensively as Occultism or the Mukua

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>>5720744
>he doesn't want to recite bible verses while beating the shit out of evil, and people possessed by evil, and things that aren't evil, and honestly everything

>>5720745

I see.

I wanted to ask why many times the powers that only work to repel monsters and escape, not to fight.


>>5720744
People who do not believe and do not know about occultism will not give us money because Occultism Bad.

People who believe in the occult but don't know about it may offer us money for work, but when it's all over they can turn their back on us without a second thought because otherwise we would have to explain to the police why we are threatening normal people. And saying that it is because they owe us money for doing rituals will not make us look good. Dresden suffers a lot from this.

People who know about the occult are nice, but they know how to fix their problems and some shithead may try to scam us and hurt us to get power or just because.

Only people with political connections succeed in being an occultist.

Because, not why. Sorry

>>5720761
Do you know who studies the occult without consequence? Rich people with disposable income. Do you know what bible thumpers don't have? Actual knowledge of the rules governing what they hunt. The difference is one is a casual observer with bias and the other has knowledge of fundemental principles and structures.

>>5720780
>Do you know who studies the occult without consequence? Rich people with disposable income.

>>5720761
>>Only people with political connections succeed in being an occultist.

>Do you know what bible thumpers don't have? Actual knowledge of the rules governing what they hunt. The difference is one is a casual observer with bias and the other has knowledge of fundemental principles and structures.

No. The occult is old world knowledge. It's like taking a rhino expert from the time and sending him to investigate poisonous snakes in the Amazon. He can surely use some of the investigative techniques and skills he learned in Africa, but all of his rhino knowledge can only be used to compare behaviors and make assumptions based on that.

So the best that the occult offers for now is knowledge of how deamons exist and how they behave, plus maybe, maybe, an offense or defense worth the sacrifice. Because there will be sacrifices. And it seems that, if they are worth of it, they will surely be specific or/and weak.

With faith any magic or trick to attack us physically becomes ineffective, being the weak point if a rock the size of a bear is thrown at our faces, faith will not miraculously defend it. Something so far I don't see the occult offer much protection either.

>>5720798
I think it's clear that JESUS is the full defense option, (maybe at some point there'll be some buff like options to help offensively but no direct DPS shit) with De power of de Devil being full tilt offense with some shitty defense options, and leaving Peace Pipe enjoyer being the balanced choice.

They probably all are extremely conditional. With bible-boy requiring focus and not affecting the material world in the slightest. Witch bitch needing grisly sacrifice and probably watching your butthole to make sure Satan doesn't tickle it. The dank toker probably needs you to convince the spirits to actually help you, and spirits are mischievous and aloof as hell, so who knows how viable that'll be at times.

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>>5720832
>who knows how viable that'll be at times.

I know what will be viable.

>"Wanting to kill something, huh?

>Look no further then good man, I present to you Little Wills.

>This beauty can pierce the bow of a war-ship as easily as a rifle can pierce your little head.

>The bullets it uses are heavy and rare, and you can only shoot once before you have to reload. Don't worry too much about that though, because you'll only be able to fire it twice.

>One per arm."

>>5720883
God bless America.

Locked
>Faith in Christ
Writing

>>5720952
Ignore that guy

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>>5720953
>B-but he is the duke!

>>5720093
>Occultism

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The dying light goes down in the west, shoving sunset lances through the trees. It seems to flail, drawing down into the enormous gullet of pitch that waits for it behind the mountains. The streams of red, its waving arms, desperate for someone to help. You watch the monstrous night close its jaws from the outskirts of the camp. Your cheek is twitching. No wind blows through you and for a moment you can’t move. You hear a voice speak. Your own. “Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet will I argue my ways to his face.”

The words ignite inside your mouth, smothering your fears behind His enormity. It is time to prepare. A cross, a wooden cross. You remember well what Cornelius taught you, Pine, Olive, Cypress, or Palm. Any would do, all had been a part of the True Cross. There are places in the world where this is difficult. Here however, you pick one pine out of hundreds and set about it. Two branches flayed of bark. Cut to a two foot length and a one foot width. A long nail through the center.

You borrow tools from a tent by the outskirts. You do not have long, you can feel the pulse from further north, the smallest whisper of rot blowing towards you. You’ve become enough of an adept to finish these quickly, but there is one aspect that is always difficult. The lumbermen have all gone to drink and gamble by now. You take out a small tin from your satchel, filled with turgid red jelly. Weeks old Lamb’s Blood, but some water will loosen it up enough. At least you hope so. You smear the rehydrated blood on the cross and it’s done.

You’ve always hated that there was no way to tell. No hum of energy or blessed hymnal from above. You simply have to have faith. You’ve been doing your work by that first tent’s lantern. It has stayed unmanned so far, but the oil light casts tall and gangrel shadows through your face. It’s enough to summon a distant hail.

You look up and see Whittier walking towards you. ”Campbell! Hell, where have you been pardner?” “Scoutin’.” you reply. ”Right…” He runs his hand through his hair, looking at the ground. ”Listen uh, I was feelin’ a bit put out by not goin’ out with ye. I ain’t got any facility with weaponry. I have shot myself twice in fact.” ”Twice?” you ask. He glumly holds up two fingers. ”Two times”. He furls his brow looking you over. ”Anyways. I want you to know that I will be good for it. The money I mean.” ”I believe ya.” You say softly.

”That all? I best be goin’ on out” you say. Whittier nods and begins to walk away, “Actually,” he stops, sighing into the cold wind, ”I didn’t wanna say nothin’ before you left but…that boy, Anson. Well it don’t look like he’ll be convalescin’. His voice breaks a little, he doesn’t meet your gaze. ”Wound spiked hard on ‘im, swollen three times the size, scarlet like the devil ‘imself. Smells sweet like rot. He stares empty past you, down the north road. ”I hope whatever did it to ‘im dies tonight.”.
Whitter slaps you on the shoulder and trudges off. You stay mired in place. The flickering lamp playing out puppets on the ground. The wind blows fierce into you as you clutch your jacket tighter. No, probably nothing. You close your eyes and hold the cross to your breast. The cold dies down a little, and you survey what you have to hunt with.

Colt Patterson Revolver
.28 Caliber, single-action, 5 Barrels. It was a revolution in firearms and has served you well since you were in the army. Out of date nowadays, not to mention a small caliber model. The ammunition is easier to find that way at least. You had a carbine as well, but that was sold to pay your way onto Paddy’s wagon train. You thought the road to Nevada would be more straightforward. The gun is fully loaded and you have 25 Rounds in your satchel.

Rifleman’s Knife
Straight, double edged blade. 12” length, 5” oak handle. Sharp, serviceable, and dangerous. Even though it’s a combat knife by design, you have used it for a hundred miscellaneous purposes. Currently residing in a leather sheath on your hip. Another gift from the army, or at least from the drunk warrant officer who traded it for an old Zuni headdress you found in Santa Fe.

Makeshift Cross
Slapdash, but competent. It’s consecrated and you’ll be happy to have it tonight. Beware, it will not be difficult to break.

What a sorry state. All you had to do was make it to Nevada. Yet here you are, waylaid and going Hunting with an old pistol, three lumberjacks and a beggar’s cross. You straighten yourself up and look at the stars. You are afraid. The Lord can only do so much. This is what you are for. You begin to make your way to the meeting spot.

Midnight replaces the thrushes with snowy owls on their silent wings. You hear their peculiar questions, repeated in intervals of three or four to nobody in particular. The wind is up tonight, blowing pine needles in swathes. The road narrows, you pick out flying squirrels gliding from branch to branch. The wind makes the trees shiver and they heave themselves about, their arms beckoning you.

You see figures outlined against the forest by moonlight, and your heart immediately falls. There are only two. You hope that somehow you’re wrong, that there’s some explanation. No such luck. Quinton Aimes and Mack Donnelly turn and walk to meet you. Edgar is not here. You try and stay polite, but the words come out clipped and brusque regardless, ”Where is Welles?” Mack responds, his smoothbore over his shoulder, ”That man is spit in the wind, my guess would be he turned yellow the moment he heard the plan wasn’t quail huntin’.” Your teeth clench so hard you can hear them. “That little shit.” ”Forget about him.” Quinton’s deep voice rumbles over the wind. He has a large, single edged lumber axe. On the bright side, he does not appear drunk, even partially.

”So, what is the plan Campbell. Where do we find this thing?” Mack asks. Quinton follows up,”And what do we do if we find it? Well, you think to yourself. That is a question.

You could have everyone split up. The quickest and easiest way to find what you’re looking for. Also the biggest chance you’ll be able to surprise it.

You could have everyone stay together. No chance of getting picked off, but if one of you is caught, you’re all caught. Combing the woods at night is also tiring, take too long and you might be tired when you find what you’re looking for.

You could send Mack and Quinton aheadwhile you trail them. You know how to hide yourself and you have a great degree of skill in forestry. Making yourself veiled and silent will all but ensure that you personally have the advantage, but it will also almost certainly render Mack and Quinton vulnerable.

There is something else…just a feeling. That kid that was attacked. Whittier said he would be dead by morning but… you could Send Mack or Quinton back to camp. Just to check on him. Though that would leave only two of you out here in the cold and dark.

>Split up
>Stay together
>Send Mack and Quinton ahead
>Send Mack or Quinton back to camp

One more thing. Just as there was something that put you above the common man, in your case all five of your excellent senses. There is something else that happened to you, something bad. A piece of your past that has marked your body. What is it?

A Disfigured Foot.
When you were eight years old your family took you out of the Virginia hills out west. You made it all the way to Oklahoma before your wagon train was set upon by Comanche. You saw your family butchered, not just for robbery, but for the sheer joy of cruelty. You were saved till last, the Comanche braves dragged you into a circle and skinned the sole off your left foot. They would’ve done the other too, and made you dance on them if a combined force of Cherokee scouts and U.S Army Cavalry hadn’t appeared and put them to route. Against all odds the foot never succumbed to infection, and you were young enough that it eventually scarred over, white and thick. It throbs with the seasons, but doesn’t hurt much anymore, though it does make keeping up with groups at speed difficult
De-soled:-5 to all rolls involving running, or long distance travel at a fast pace.
Enemy of All:+5 to all rolls involving combat against Comanche tribesmen.

A Disfigured Face
At 14 you worked as a ranch hand in Oklahoma. You were not paid well, and you were not treated well. Still you did your job, and when cattle thieves set upon the ranch you were given a rifle and told to return fire. You did so without success, but one of the rustlers shot you in the face. Through one cheek and out the other. Fortunately you were screaming as it happened, and the damage to your teeth was manageable, and in the end only a few in the back had to be pulled. The shot did leave an inch and a half hole through both cheeks, which scabbed over and eventually scarred with a hideous amalgam of cracks and rivets. It is something people notice, and civilized places will treat you differently for it.
Cattle Brand:-5 to all rolls involving persuasion or diplomacy with city folk and townspeople.
Black Yawn:+5 to all rolls involving intimidation or coercion with city folk and townspeople.

A Disfigured Hand
At 19 you were herding cattle for the Rancheros in California. You and a few fellow cowboys got into it with some friendly Cauhilla as to who could best rope a wild stallion. When you took your turn you rode one down well enough, but while you were tying your lasso to your saddle horn he made a break right. Two fingers on your left hand were caught in the rope and ripped off. The Cauhilla felt guilty and took you back to a shaman who managed to save the hand, but you’ll always have an awkward grip and reduced dexterity.
Three-Fingered:-5 to all rolls involving the use of items in your left hand, including two-handed items and weapons.
Horsewise: +5 to all rolls involving horsemanship.

>A Disfigured Foot
>A Disfigured Face
>A Disfigured Hand

>>5721016
He's also a loser who rolled a 2 on his first project

>>5721076
>Send Mack and Quinton ahead
>>5721080
>A Disfigured Face

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>>5721080
While I regret that occultism was lost I think the best option here is
>disfigured face
The other two malus options will have too much of an effect on combat. Most notably dodging and shooting.

>>5721076
>>5721101

>Send Mack and Quinton ahead

>>5721076

>Send Mack and Quinton ahead

They are bait, unfortunately.

>a disfigured face

I want to preserve our DEX given the scout background

>>5721076
>>Send Mack and Quinton ahead

>>5721080
>>A Disfigured Hand

>>5721080
>A Disfigured Face

Part of my post got ate.

>>5721123
>Send Mack and Quinton ahead

>>5721076
>Stay together

>>5721080
>A Disfigured Hand

>>5721076
>>Send Mack or Quinton back to camp
>>5721080
>>A Disfigured Face

Or faith may balance the malus of the scar

Locked
>Send Mack and Quinton ahead
>A Disfigured Face
Writing

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The Hunt Begins
Both men look at you expectantly. You set your jaw firm as you come to your conclusions. These men are not Hunters, they are truly here for but one purpose; to allow you to do the work of the Lord. You meet each of their eyes in turn. ”We’ll be lookin’ for any corpse sign, that means bits of gut, loose skin, teeth, anything. Also, you see any doe or buck, discharge. Now you fellers stay up about 10 feet in front. This creature is fond of pouncin’ unawares. I’ll stand rear and holler first flash of its imminence.”[i/]

You expect questions, but whether it’s the chill that leeches them of it or they are simply not interested in particulars, they both nod and turn toward the forest. A few minutes pass, your party hesitates. You stand showered in starlight, loathe to leave it. After an uncommonly long pause Quinton reaches inside his jacket, ”Ah, hell”. He unsheathes his flask, relieves the cap, and takes a long swig. Just the one, then he passes it to Mack. He takes a series of gulps, each deeper than the last. Mack passes it to you. There’s about a quarter of nectar left. You stare at Mack, then Quinton, then the almighty flask. Finally, you make your stare toward the deep empty within the trees. Pointing the flask like a saber you whisper, ”Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel.” You drain the rest, and toss it to Quinton. ”Hosanna.” he says. Mack grunts, and the three of you take your first forward steps.

The moon illumineth. A spider’s web of shine between the trees. The very act of piercing this place seems to wear the light thin. Mack and Quinton press forward, crunching the settled snow with their heavy footfalls. To a voyeur, they would be the only men in view. You keep behind. The trees are wide apart, but you spent the afternoon making your piece with this land, feather fleet and swift as sin, you pass without sign to eye or ear.

The air stills just like before. The wind that whipped your blood into your cheeks and ears evaporates in the course of a minute. This awful stillness. The settling of something on your soul, running down your chin, staining your belly. The Cheyenne fog rolls around your ankles. You watch the jerked motions of Mack and Quinton ahead of you. They walk like puppets with strings on their knees. This feeling to them must be the feeling of the rat, the hare, the robin. There is something here.

A crack. In the distance. A crack. The two men in front keep on, the sound unheard. A crack. This time Quinton lifts his oil, the only manufactured light your posse can claim. A crack. Ahead and north-east. Mack looks back for you. You make yourself known to them. Quinton is breathing hard. A crack. Mack opens his mouth, but Quinton and yourself motion silence. A crack. It’s rhythmic, no doubt about that, a purposeful rhythm, not just some tree sap bursting from the cold.

Mack confirms the shot in his Barnett, unslung, Quinton chokes up on his axe, all three of you nod to each other and move for the noise. As you move on it gets louder. Crack. Yet as you close in, there’s something else. Very sparse. Just a small, lonely sound. You prick your ears to make sure. You think…yes. Crying, a choked sob, to the north. The others can’t hear it. You unholster your Patterson, and half-cock the hammer.

You can Move towards the steady sound. Something is making that crack, it’s too regular to be natural.

Or you could Move towards the crying. Alert the others and make north. Maybe human…maybe.

Note:Dice rolls will be a standard 1d100.
Each poster can roll once, best of the first three rolls will be taken. Modifiers will be explained in the notes if they apply.
If I forget a mod that you think should apply let me know
For this roll, putting Quinton and Mack in danger has guaranteed Campbell will keep stealth, so you’re rolling for those two’s stealth.
Critical successes and Critical Fails will happen on 1’s and 100’s
The higher the deviation is from the DC will have a further effect on how much of a success or failure the roll is.

Now,

>Move towards the steady sound
Or
>Move towards the crying

Whichever you choose, roll me three 1d100’s

Stealth Roll, DC 60(DC 40, Live Bait:+20)

Character Sheet so far
https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQrgAfW3HDDpPDQjGBmim1bLygbLBJHRYEALENLK4XqKA30qTL8aPFcyDNotboTRwcvZJvpELqNKd9e/pub

Rolled 48 (1d100)

>>5721823
>>Move towards the steady sound

Rolled 51 (1d100)

>>5721823
>Move towards the steady sound

Rolled 49 (1d100)

>>5721823
>>Move towards the crying

Rolled 19 (1d100)

>>5721823
>>Move towards the crying

We'll give it 30 minutes for another vote until I roll a tiebreaker.

>>5721823
>steady sound

Locked
>Move towards the steady sound
Stealth Roll: Failed by -9
Writing

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You think it over, and determine not to tell your fellows about the crying. It doesn’t fade, but it doesn’t gain any ground on you three either. You approach the sound. Crack. The pressure mounts. Crack. Just ahead. Crack. You slip back behind Mack and Quinton, off to their south, capturing the incline of the sloped forest ground. You hear…words now. You’re short on clarity, but you can parse that they’re the same words. Repeated right before each crack. Your companions have decided to angle their approach from the north, down slope, where the trees give them extra cover. You edge forward a foot at a time. That foot is your entire world. Breathe in, breathe out, step. The words render clear now, at least as clear as Indian can be to one who does not know it.

”Deeu Yúli jit náwaya.” Crack. ”Deeu Yúli jit náwaya.” Crack. He shuffles around a broad-branched cedar, barely lifting his black, oiled moccasins. His head is down, his face hidden. ”Deeu Yúli jit náwaya.” Crack. He carries a staff of black oak, the head a gnarled, club-like knot. He circles the tree once. ”Deeu Yúli jit náwaya.” and cracks the head of his staff on its trunk. His voice sounds as if it were being torn from ragged remnants of hide, from his head and shoulders sprout enormous black feathers.

Each crack, and your muscles tense, each crack, and your spine is held rictus, each crack, and your ruined cheeks draw tight. You notice the great cedar twists to the ground like some grandfather with a boot on his back. It does not move, but you’re sure with every crack and strike of the Indian’s black oak staff, its crown is somehow lower to the ground. You grab hold of your courage, and decide to take your chance to move closer, when you hear the unmistakable sound of a twig snap from the vague position of your two partners.

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The snap is wildly violent in the obscene quiet of this place. The Indian’s face heaves up from its downcast gaze, and you take him in. A white mask, whether skin or lime chalk you couldn’t say. Soot around the eyes, red eyes. He drips corruption from his face and nose, scars and stains where it has dug itself in. He is of medium height, his body spindly, his shoulders slumped.

He leans his staff into the crook of his arm and stares south, towards Mack and Quinton. You pray they don’t step out. They step out. Mack’s gun leveled and ready. You can hear Quinton’s labored breathing from twenty feet away. The Indian’s mouth turns up into a small smile. ”Deeu Yúli jit náwaya.” The words seem more focused somehow, more directed. Quinton clears his throat. If he’s looking for your position at least he doesn’t make it obvious. ”Adwai’il”, he says, the language sounding uncomfortable and un-practiced coming from his mouth. ”Adwai’il, Obot núwya.” He gestures to Mack and himself.

The Indian smiles wider, then wider, looking at Mack. He points towards him and cocks his head. He laughs, a hoarse, breathless laugh. He points towards Mack again and holds up a hand, the universal sign to wait. He puts his hand to his face, and like tearing off a rag, tears off his face. Underneath is another, one that looks much like Mack, eyes sodden with tears, mouth open, screaming. The screams go on and on. Horrible, inhuman things. Then he puts his hand and its short yellow nails back to the screaming face and rips it off again, to reveal the original Indian behind it. Both of your men look shocked, mouths agape. Mack’s eyes are bloodshot. Still chortling to himself the Indian looks off far into the darkness past them, and clicks his tongue. The faint crying that’s been on the edge of your hearing for the past while begins to grow slightly louder.

Before you can sort what just happened you hear Mack bellow out, ”GOD DAMN YOU!” and the report of his smoothbore thunders forth. The Indian turns at the shout and as the ball erupts from the gun he opens his mouth, and eats it. The skin of his cheeks split, his jaw dislodges from its perch an extra foot and a half, and he devours the bullet in flight. He chews on it for a moment, and spits a black slime that catches Mack in the face. He topples to the ground, clawing at it. Before he falls Quinton is already charging, shoulders forward and axe in both hands. The Indian is turned away from you facing Quinton, and you have the slope on him. That crying is getting louder. God help you.

You could Charge the Indian with Quinton. You aren’t a serious knife fighter but you’ve killed with it before, and there must be an advantage to both of you dividing his attention.

You could Try and pin him with prayer. A cross has never worked for you on a human before, but you’re not sure what this Indian is. At the very least you might drive him off.

You could Try and distract him from the trees. A whistle, a thrown voice, these are tricks you’ve used before. Perhaps the Indian does not want to deal with any more than two people tonight.

You could Just fuckin’ shoot ‘im. Whatever he did to Mack’s ball, he’s facing away from you and doesn’t know you’re there, you figure you have a better chance at doing some injury.

>Charge the Indian
>Try your Cross
>Try and Distract Him
>Shoot Him
>Write In

>>5721916
>Charge the Indian

Save the gun for the follow-up attack. Harder to miss a shot in close range.

>>5721917
>Charge the Indian

>>5721917
>Try and Distract Him

>>5721917
>>Shoot Him
Hate monsters, hate frenchies, hate redskins

>>5721917

>Charge the Indian

2spooky4me

>>5721917
>Shoot Him

>>5721917
>Shoot Him

I'll wait another hour and a half, then roll to break the tie

>>5721917
>Charge the Indian

This quest has potential.

Locked
>Charge the Indian
Writing

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As Quinton bullrushes the Indian you break from cover and sprint to help him, your feet falling in tandem over the cold, hard snow. The Indian whips around, his braids slapping against the feathers on his cloak, genuine shock fixed on his face as you emerge from hiding. Quinton is almost on him, he whips back and cuts his staff through the air. As he does the snow under Quinton blackens, shimmering oily in the moonlight. Quinton tries to break through the newly formed tar, heaving his legs up, up, but he falls forward hardly a foot from the Indian, one hand caught in the tar.

Quinton bound, the Indian spins to deal with you, but there wasn’t time enough for the both of you, and you slam into him, picking him up and heaving him downward on his back. He’s spry, trying to get out from under you, but your knife is drawn, pale in the moon. You hear Mack pick himself up, moaning, ”God damn you my eyes, god damn you, god damn you my cousin, god damn you cunt. You fuckin’ heathan cunt!”. You can’t spare a glance for him as the Indian manages to crack you in the head. Your vision slithers from the blow. You try your best to bring your blade to bear, but he’s scrabbling good, and you only manage a few cuts, one of them fairly deep on the chest.

You think you hear the sound of Mack blindly putting powder and shot back into his Barnett, Quinton is trying to strain out of the pitch, trying to grab one of the Indian’s legs to hold him down for your knifework. The crying is loud now, both men hear it too. More than one voice, but they’re all coming to you. You summon your strength, reverse your grip on your knife, and stab.

Note: Please roll 3 1d100 for each of the following actions.

Mack is trying to reload, DC 70(DC 20. Blind+50)

Quinton is trying to break from the tar slush and help you. DC 40(DC 60, Bear of a Man-10, Fighting for his Life-10)

[b[You are trying to seriously wound the Indian. DC 50( DC 30, Better Position-10, Stronger-10, Oily Feather Cloak+40)

Rolled 31, 20, 87 = 138 (3d100)

>>5722451
Do we each roll 1 1d100 (for 9 rolls total), or do we each roll 1 3d100 (for 3 rolls total)?

>>5722455
Also, are we rolling over or rolling under?

>>5722455
I require a total of 9 rolls of 1d100, though since 9 people may not respond to this thread, one Poster may roll up to 3 times. If you choose to do this please state which outcome you are rolling for in the relevant post.

You are attempting to match or exceed the given DC.

Rolled 53, 95, 97 = 245 (3d100)

>>5722451

>>5722451
Fuck I'm happy this is a rollover quest!

>>5722451
>>5722486
I like your cloak. Would be a shame if something were to happen to it.

I am rolling for us to attack or in the alternate first roll for Mack, second roll for Quinton, and third roll to attack.

Rolled 54, 78, 10 = 142 (3d100)

>>5722451
Here goes

Locked
Mack, DC 70: Rolled 54, Failure
Quinton, DC 40: Rolled 95, Success
You, DC 50: Rolled 97, Success

Well Done
Writing

Well done

Mack tries to fumble for his powder and another ball to go back down his barrel, his hand shaking from cold and infirmity. He cannot see. That Indian spit is soaking into his skin like lye powder. Instead of burning he starts hyperventilating, the world becomes a terror in the smallest ways, the trees, Carpathian giants, the snow made up of funeral ash, the moon a hell-light bleaching his skin to a ghoulish tallow, sucking every tranche of marrow up to the infinite, terrible black sky. ”Oh god..oh Jesus, oh Jesus Christ.” He whispers to himself. His hand spasms, and his powder drops straight into the snow. With a wail he drops to search for it, but stops when the crying turns familiar. He cocks his ear to the dark, not daring to breathe. Multiple voices gnashing their teeth, sobbing in pain, crying out the lining of their throats. One familiar. ”Sean?” Mack’s voice is so small even he can hardly hear it. ”Sean? Is that you?”

Quinton watches you and the Indian jostle for position helplessly. Stuck in the black, quicksand slush. He heaves himself with every thread of sinew at his considerable disposal. This is not about money, this is about the overwhelming certainty that dying here is a death unlike anywhere else, a death beyond death. This is a primal understanding. He heaves, he…heaves. His left arm is free but his right arm and both legs are still stuck. He heaves, the thin strands of thick slush give almost imperceptibly. His right arm is shaking with the effort. The slush sticks like tar, small patches of skin ripping off with each pull. He heaves!

The spit freezes brittle on your lips as you sputter in the struggle to end the Indian. He kicks, he bites, and your head is rang more than once by the blunt knot on his staff. You smash him in the nose with your fist. Again. The Indian’s leg catches on the back of your knee as he flips his weight to the right. You almost topple, your hipbone smacking into a rock submerged in the snow, but he isn’t strong enough to send you over completely and you flip him back to your superior position. You backhand his face for his attempt. Hard, but no blood.

He’s stunned and you take your opening, stabbing down with your Rifleman’s knife. He twists at the very last! You don’t get his heart, but his shoulder, piercing a good eight inches into his gristle. He gnashes his teeth, screaming in rage. ”WUAWUA P’ALIYA!” God dammit, no blood still! You do see more corruptive bile in between the ruins you’ve made of his face. It’s spilling now from his mouth, his eyes, his nose. Blue and black. Those same eyes narrow in abject hatred and he purses his lips. Black spit comes flying from him, but you see it in time! Ducking your head down under your coat it splatters against the collar.

The Indian takes his chance as you’re forced to look away, digging his fingers into your bruised hip. You curse as he uses the extra leverage to flip you again, successfully this time. He’s up! Unsteady, but on his feet. He runs.

Or he would, if Quinton’s thick hand didn’t catch him by the ankle, the momentum sending him toppling onto his face. Quinton slides forward, prone, but finally free of that evil slush. ”COME ON YOU!” He drags the Indian back towards the both of you and you seize his feathered cloak, ripping it as you force him onto his back. Your hand clasps around his throat. With both of you holding him down, this time, there is no clemency. You thrust up the full foot length of your blade under his ribs, and into his heart.

The Indian opens his mouth, working it in silence as his eyes go wide. He spits up blue and black. More follows, even more after that. The chest wound does not bleed. Your heart leaps heaven-high. Then, It appears.

The rushing of blood drains from your ears, and you realize that the sounds of misery bloat the forest. You and Quinton both look back from your grisly work towards Mack, and see it. The size of a house. Twenty feet, maybe taller. Crimson crowned antlers broaden into a black horn mask. The eyes are visible, the mouth is a maw built into the chest. Wet, hanging limbs drool from the vacancy where its lower jaw should be. Faintly visible arms beckon into the terrible emptiness. Nooses of flesh dangle like crimson, pale cousins of some morbid, creeping, Spanish Moss. Itis scaled. Rust colored skin staining the spaces between its armor. Behind it trail four bloody “limbs”. Attached to each of these is a corpse. Corpse is the wrong word. They are still alive.

You see a man who looks like Mack, and from there you can infer. Whittier said nobody had ever found any bodies. Each of them, three men and a woman, are crying into the darkness. It’s limb goes in through their stomachs, the bloody entrances flowering with Daffodils, Yarrow…Mule’s Ear. ”I’m sorry” one of them whines. ”Oh god I apologize”. The rest of its limb spills out of each of their eyes, the torn sockets also flowering with field mustard and bistort petals. The woman this time, ”I am sorry, please. PLEASE.”. It does not make a sound, it stares at the three of you, silent. Quinton picks up his axe from the ground, and stands. Mack looks up, ”Hello?”It turns its head towards him. ”S-Sean?”. You slowly stow your knife, and bring out your pistol.

File: Oiliot'e.jpg (212 KB, 1920x1235)

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”CAMPBELL!!!” Quinton roars. You jerk your head around. The Indian is on his feet! Spewing that bile and clutching his chest. You reach out and grab for him but he twists. A hideous mock of flesh writhes before your eyes and suddenly a Raven is flying away into the night. ”CAMPBELL! Quinton shouts again. “WHAT?” you shout back. You turn your head around and see it take a wide stance, and scream. An unearthly whine, a horrible sound that perforates you, flesh and bone. Each of the people attached to it begin to wail too, their volume twinning with its, until their pitch becomes perfectly in sync. The Cross grows hot as fire under your coat as it rears back on its hooves and tramples towards you and your companions.

You can Charge the creature with Quinton. A dangerous, dangerous prospect, but then again, aren’t they all? Quinton has no gun, and will likely die if he is forced to go toe to toe with it alone for long. It is possible that he might surprise you.

You can Keep your distance and Shoot. The creature is huge, and your .28 caliber is hardly a cannon. Still, enough lead will always do the job if you manage to place it in the right spot.

You can Make for Mack’s Barnett gun. A proper scattergun. It could take the head off a black bear. It is also far away and unloaded, not to mention taking it would leave Mack blind and defenseless.

Special Action Unlocked
Unlocked via your skill; Emmetropia
The Indian is gone…flying up high, a black distortion out in the dark. Except…you narrow your eyes. You think you see him, you think. You think you could even Take the shot.

You could also Write in your own suggestion.

>Charge the Creature with Quinton
>Keep your Distance and Shoot
>Make for Mack’s Barnett Gun
>Write in

>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)

>>5722612
>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)
Nothing ventured, nothing gained. you're a good writer OP

>>5722613
Thanks bb. Without you guys I'm nothing

>>5722613
We appreciate you.
>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)
This may be a trap option, but he may be controlling the beast.

If this is what occultism can do then I am glad we did not start out with option. We can still learn secrets of the universe but I did not expect to encounter this level of dark magic so quickly. I also feel that this is not a tutorial.

>>5722691
With the difficulty, I suspect the "take the shot" option is = "win the fight" if we succeed the roll.

>>5722612
>Keep your Distance and Shoot

>>5722612

>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)

This quest is my nightmare OP

>>5722612
>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)

Locked
>Take the Shot(Very Difficult)

This is it, I need 3 1d100s

DC 90(DC 40, Dark+10, Far+20, Small+20)

Rolled 60 (1d100)

>>5723232

Well this seems intimidating

Rolled 78 (1d100)

Rolled 60 (1d100)

>>5723232
:(

>>5723232
C-can we have a bonus for rolling two of the exact same number? That's rarer than passing a DC 90!

So sorry, tomorrow will be an update when I get up in the morning.

>>5723321
Yes, we will add a +5 to the roll

>>5723492
:(

Locked
DC 90: Rolled 78(+5), Failure

You miss every shot you don't take gentlemen.

Writing

File: Raven.jpg (56 KB, 800x500)

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Yes…you think you can end that blighted heathen. He was near the end before he changed and as a raven he’s lilting wildly. You close an eye and level your gun, ignoring Mack’s screams, its thunderous hooves, Quinton’s battle cry. Focusing on that one speckle in the night…crack. The bullet races out, but the raven flags downward just as it pings into the branch a few inches above him. Miss! ”Shit!” You lower your gun as it flies out of range, away somewhere down the mountains.

A shriek pulls your attention downslope, just in time to see it encircle each of Mack’s arms and legs with one of the grotesque limbs dripping from its chest. He runs the palette of human expression from whine to whimper, squeal to screech as he’s lifted up, up, all the way up to its face. A fifth limb comes forth, encircling his waist. Mack and the world return to silence for one, eternal moment. Then it pulls. Ripping each of his limbs off in rapid succession, and pulling his grotesque trunk with head still attached into its waiting cavern.

Your mouth floods with hours old liquor, but there’s no time to let it out. The wails of the corpses impaled on its hideous tails synchronize again, and as one they’re puppeted upwards and set down on the ground. Still attached, they shuffle feebly to its defense. Quinton, head down and ignoring Mack’s death agonies, reaches its legs axe in hand. Raising it up past his shoulders, he lets loose a double handed chop to the back of its leg just above the hoof. You take in the situation, and rush to action.

You could Join Quinton up close. You do not need to necessarily use your knife, but taking some focus off of him might lead to both of your surviving for longer.

You could Shoot from where you are. The slope provides you a height advantage, and gives you a decent lay of the field. Quinton is doing what he was brought to do, it’s no concern of yours.

You could Try and drive it off with your cross. Though this would require you to be right up to it, in front of its face, you could attempt to force it to flee from the two of you. You wont kill it, but it may buy you another few days.

You could Write in your own suggestion.

>Join Quinton up close
>Shoot from where you are
>Try and drive it off with your Cross
>Write in

>>5723836

>Join Quinton up close

Focus on hacking at its legs to destroy its mobility. Once we hobble it, we can stay at a distance and wear it down with some gunfire.

RIP Mack

>Join Quinton up close
I sure as fuck hope we learn some lore or knowledge of some sort if we survive this shit.

>>5723836
This thing needs to die it is a horror.

>>5723836
>Join Quinton up close

>>5723836
>Join Quinton up close

Locked
>Join Quinton up close
Writing

You race down towards the melee, feet flying over jutted up roots and bristled, cold air brush.. Whatever happens, you decide the only real chance of survival is with both of you working together. Quinton’s axe hews into the black fur above its hoof, the wet snap of flesh and tendon audible throughout the grove. It snaps an ear-splitting whistle of pain and trots sideways away from the dull iron broadhead. As it raises its hoof to crush Quinton underfoot your gun retorts twice, your target the black horn mask enshrouding its eyes.

A spineless thump as the bullets make purchase, but fail to do so much as rattle the creature. No vitals will be punctured through that mask with the arms at hand. You may not have injured it, but its attention seizes on you as you make your way near it. Its hoof comes to rest instead of flattening down onto Quinton as it braces itself for the charge. The tail-limbs withdraw from the stomachs of the “corpses” as they reach Quinton. He undercuts one in the stomach, slicing through the bouquet of blooming flowers and lifting the shambler off its feet. It collapses on the ground as he swings the axe head around horizontally, smashing it into the head of another, breaking its neck and leaving it stuck hanging over its shoulder.

You think of some way, any way to bring it down with the implements at your disposal. Quinton’s axe felling the shamblers brings it to you. Like a logger hacking down a tree, cut the legs and take it to ground. Quinton’s first hew seems to have made an ugly mark behind one of its legs you wonder if-. It charges, its antlers low, each one as big as a tall man. As close as you are there’ll be no sanctuary from the trees. You take your own stance, shifting onto the balls of your feet as it snorts out red dust into the cold night air as you prepare yourself to roll out of the way best you can.

Roll 3 1d100’s for how Quinton deals with the shamblers. DC 30(DC 50, Full Attention, -10, Two Down, -10)

Roll 3 1d100’s for whether Campbell dodges the creature’s charge. DC 50(DC 40, No Cover, +20, Semi-Hobbled, -10)

Rolled 71, 72 = 143 (2d100)

>>5724133

Locked

Quinton, DC 30: Rolled 71, Success
Campbell, DC 50: Rolled 72, Success

I was going to wait for three but you passed anyway and I wanted to update again before bed.

Writing

File: Dark Forest 2.jpg (28 KB, 612x211)

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You stand at a center, ready to spring, the horrible thing bearing down on you. Scarlet antlers protruding wickedly from its horrible crown. You do not seem to notice the world as is, the creature, the decision, the angle of the spring, the flecks of dirt torn up by churning hooves. All are smashed down into a moment of time so paltry, an experience so minute, that it happens to another man in another place. You watch the antlers run up from the ground. You watch yourself clear them, up and over and to the side. Just in time. The antlers stick in the roots of an old pine, but the creature strains its neck and half uproots the thing, scattering a rain of dirt clumps and needles all around the grove.

As it jerks the debris off of its head and back you find yourself anterior to the half-wound you spied earlier. It pulses slowly, leaking a rust colored stream into the ground, devouring the native white of the snow. Two bullets left. You doubt you’ll have much effect on it with this old pistol unless you hit an eye, or find some other course to its vulnerabilities.

Out of the corner of your eye Quinton strikes down hard with his axe blade, splitting the head of one of the still alive, yet long dead victims down the middle. The former woman slumps kneeling to the ground. The very last of them makes to embrace the lumber man for some no doubt nefarious purpose. Both hands low on the haft, holding the weapon up by his shoulder, the resulting swing decapitates the last of the shambling victims as much from the force of the blow as from the weapon’s cutting edge. Panting, the big man makes his way over to you as fast as his heavy breathing and wet, bloody strides will allow him to. He looks at you, one eye swollen shut from some wallop suffered by his recent struggles. You speak low, ”Circle it, take the legs.” Your voice is alien to your ears, low and ragged. Quinton doesn’t respond, but he does circle around to its left as you take its right. Small, low droning comes in waves from the creature’s central cavity. You pop out your chamber and fish for three more bullets in your satchel, fitting them in as fast as you can manage.

Advantage is a strong word, and not proper to the situation. But…you no longer feel beset by ever increasing impossibilities, and now it’s your time to rend it from a world it has no place in.
Your strategy is set, now all that remains is the execution, please roll a general combat check of 3d100, First three posters to roll will be counted.

Rolled 36 (1d100)

>>5724376

Rolled 18 (1d100)

>>5724376

>>5724376
Let’s go!

Rolled 82 (1d100)

>>5724376
First good quest I've seen since Rage Across Pennsylvania. Good shit QM.

>>5724411
Agreed! Great roll!

>>5724411

Nice work anon

Locked

General check, Rolled 82

Writing

>>5724411
I miss that quest a lot, I hope he's doing alright

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The tension snaps clean in half as you sprint right, drawing its beaded eyes to the whip of your coat. Between its legs you can see Quinton keeping pace, jerking his head from side to side, following its twitching tails-limbs. You take aim at the eyes, one shot sweeps wide and you don’t try a second, running instead to clear an angle on the seeping wound left by Quinton’s first blow. You fire once, and fan the last three into the left foreleg. Each bullet accompanied by a rich splash of rust. It picks the leg up and drones a shrill whistle cracking the glass of the clear night air.

Seeing his moment Quinton rushes underneath, and finding his balance among the shifting trot of the hooves, drives his axe full weight into the right foreleg. Its whistle raises timbre, filling your head with resonant splinters. You circle around its front, reloading your cylinder as fast as you are able. Quinton makes for a way out from underneath it, but the tail-limbs drag wildly on the ground, hunting to answer its injury. He doesn’t see them. One pierces through his calf and he falls face down before he has time to scream. The tail-limb drags him over the frosty ground out behind the creature, hurling him like a child. You see him smash back first into the thick, half-uprooted pine tree.

You can spare no more thought for him as its full attention rounds on you. It rears up, droning its tin needle song, scales rising and ruffling like the hackles on a dog. The creature’s chest limbs stretch out towards you as you unsheathe your knife to meet them. You hack at the things, shoulder sore with the force you bring to bear, but they neither bleed nor give way to the mundane steel. You’re nimble enough to slip the ones that go for your neck and waist, but a stray catches your left leg, and two more catch your knife hand, winding themselves tight around your entire arm and hauling you closer. You dig in your unconquered right foot and try to pull back, a foolish thing to do and one you know well to be futile. Still, you remember Mack’s fate, and however foolish, you try to resist as mightily as you can.

In the end, your sinew is no match for it and you are pulled up, up to where it rears back on two legs, in front of its great horn mask. In front of its milk pale eyes. Your revolver is jarred from your grip, falling to the snow beneath. With your newly freed hand you reach for a fire on your chest. More limbs slither around you, trying to pin your last free arm and leg, Your hand scrabbles in desperation. Under your coat. It burns! It gives up trying to restrain you. A single, great chest-limb latches onto your head…and begins to pull. Your hand reaches the flame.

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It is a curious thing when noise exits the world. There are places of great silence, but there is always something. Some flutter of wings, some droplet of rain. Something to remind you that you are in the world, you are of the world. Your experiences are of this world. There is a…voice, as the chest-limbs grow slack, and as you retrieve your makeshift cross. You do not hear this voice, you feel it. There is no sound, only the vibration of an impossible basso staccato. It fills your ear with low motion. You feel it roll through your body, your bones. One word, one short word. What it is you do not know, you can’t hear it.

The cross ignites, throwing a blasting, interminable shine out into the grove. The Divinity pulses, you see half of the Lamb’s Blood which consecrates it melt to droplets in the air, up towards heaven. The Divinity turns a terrible hue, a trumpet of light. It pulses again, and like a rushing river half of its chest-limbs, including the ones holding you aloft shiver into ribbons of white powder. Sound cleaves its way back into the world as you fall. Fifteen feet, maybe more. You land on your back right next to your Colt, the wind knocked out of you, and retrieve the weapon. You get up, you take your time. It thrashes about in abject agony, noticing nothing else around it. You look for Quinton, you see him lying still. You cannot tell if he’s dead, his back is broken, or he’s unconscious. Your head clears itself and you move for him just as the creature crashes both its forelegs back down. The resulting quake topples the pine tree onto Quinton, obscuring him from view.

There is no time to think, the creature froths that peculiar rust-blood. It carries itself gingerly, bringing its legs down so hard seems to have broken something in one of them. Its still spry enough to lash its tail-limbs out to scourge you, but you see it coming and roll under the flailing things. You come up and fire again into the right foreleg this time. One, miss. Two, miss. Three and four, hit. One bullet left. Before you can place it the creature twists its neck, digging its antlers into the ground, and rakes them towards you, screeching.

This time, the fire is in your hand, and ready. You hold aloft the sign of the Lord as the tremendous Divinity spills forth. “Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand;” Your tongue forms the words, but they are spake with different voice. “A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.”

The antlers, the creature’s whole momentum, roots in place. It cannot pass the threshold of the Divinity. The last of the Lamb’s Blood filters heavensward. “And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.” A great bell tolls in silence. Ribbons of white grain run up from its antlers, and with a final wave of light the Divinity blasts away the entire right half of its head.

The cross is cold now, simply a piece of wood. Your hand is smoking.It slowly picks itself up, somehow still alive. With the rest of its strength it rears up on its hind legs. You aim your last shot at the kicking foreleg and fire true. The shot surprises it, and letting out a slow, low droning, it stomps back down. It’s a simple enough thing to run clear, and as it comes down there are a pair of distinctive snaps. Both hooves on the forelegs are bent off at an angle, its weight too much to bear. It lays down, taking in breath slower and slower. It’s done. All that’s left now is the true killing.


You can Finish it immediately. A creature like this requires a true killing. The fight is out of it for the most part, but wounded creatures have a reputation.

You can Check on Quinton. He may be dead, he may not be. Best to make sure and do this together.

You can Inspect the bodies of the dead victims It’s grim, but you are a poor man. The creature obviously didn’t care about any possessions they may have had on them, so they are almost assuredly still in place.

You can Write in your own suggestion

>Finish It
>Check on Quinton
>Inspect the Bodies
>Write in

>>5725039
>Finish It
Quinton was at best unconscious and then had a whole damn tree fall on him. Guy's dead or an inch away from it-- I'd be shocked if he lived long enough to get back to civilization.

Grave robbing isn't a good look for a man of God, and imagine the consequences if we slipped up and let it go or heal back up after all this.

>>5725039
>Finish It
No half measures.

>>5725039
>Finish It

>Finish It

One last roll.

>>5725039
>Finish It

>>5725039

>Finish it immediately

I don’t like the idea of leaving this thing time to recover, get it done

>>5725039
>Finish it

[b]Locked[/b]
>Finish It

[b]I will begin writing at 9:00 PM(PST)[/b]

There is no time to waste, a true death must be dealt out. You approach the creature, with beleaguered step, feet hardly leaving the earth. It breathes in fast and breathes out slow, the snorts buffeting your aching face. Its eyes look smaller than they did, vacant and staring straight ahead as its breath slows. In…and out. In……out. In………out. There is just you, and it. You approach the black horn mask taking your knife in soiled hands. You cut a grin in the palm of your hand and tamp two fingers in the blood.

The eyes lazily focus on you. In………….out. For a moment you could swear they turn azure, a gleaming peace that does not belong in this horrible place. In…………….and out. You approach it. It does not flee, the eyes follow your hand as you touch it. The black horn is unnaturally smooth like polished glass. You paint the sign of the Divinity with your blood. A pair of lines dragged slowly across the creature’s mein. The sun is rising.

It begins at the hooves, a silent white spreading across the fur, the strange skin, the jagged joints. Then up to the center mass, the scales, the tail-limbs, the chest-limbs. The eyes begin to close as the white reaches the head. It takes one more rattling breath in, and breathes out. A marble granularity lays before you, then the wind comes up, from the East. First one by one, then two by two, the white floats away, a gentle surety gusting north and west. Over the next few minutes the entire creature leaves you, sailing in the breeze to a thousand corners of the land.

You limp over towards where you last saw Quinton, unsure of when you developed such a stiffness in your left leg. You can already see a twisted arm and further investigation drives any relish of victory further beyond you. His arm is broken and twisted round, but the falling tree smashed his ribs. There’s blood around his mouth where he tried to expel the blood filling his lungs, but he succumbed in the end. He lies dead under the tree. You cross yourself and reach down to close his eyes.

It is common practice on the frontier to try and ensure a dead man’s accoutrements are returned to the closest family possible. You pat down the pockets of his vest and find two things, a picture, and a letter. The picture is of a woman and a boy, the woman is handsome, dark haired and dark featured. The boy is short and thin, with big ears and Quinton’s hooked nose. The tag on the back says Cheshire, Montana, 1855. Four years ago.

The letter is less wholesome. A one McMurdock & Ellory banking house demanding a repayment of a considerable sum of money in terms as unpleasant as they are cordial. $2,300. Jesus Christ, if the woman in the picture was his wife it’s all on her now.

Getting the man out from under the tree would require more men than yourself, or at least yourself in a more virile state than present, so you make your way back to the Lumber Camp, the rising sun warming the left side of your face. The robin and the wren don’t sing for you, but it does sure feel like it.

You have several choices for what to do with your morning. You could Find Whittier. Whittier owes you money, and arrangements need to be made for Mack and Quinton’s body. He’d be the one to see.

You could find Edgar Welles. Welles stood you up with rank cowardice at the beginning of the hunt. His pepperbox might have very well meant the life of Mack and Quinton in the end.

You could poke around either Mack or Quinton’s tent. There are nefarious reasons to do this, but also noble ones.

You could Write In your own suggestion.

>Find Whittier
>Find Edgar
>Poke around Mack or Quinton’s Tent
>Write In


Finally I apologize for the update. I've just moved today and it spaced my mind that my IP would change. I'm going to make a new thread tomorrow to regain control of the formatting.

>>5726099
>Find Whittier
He's the foreman, right? He needs to be told about the whole deal (plus we need to get the money). Maybe we can ask for permission to search Mack and Quinton's effects, to see if anything could be sent home to their families. If nothing else, the families ought to be sent letters that the men of the households died as heroes.

>>5726099
>Poke around Mack or Quinton’s Tent

>>5726099
>Find Whittier

>>5726099
>Poke around Mack or Quinton’s Tent

>I'm going to make a new thread tomorrow to regain control of the formatting.
That really isn't necessary. We can cope without fancy colors.

>>5726097

>Find Whittier

We can hunt around their tents once they’ve been laid to rest

>>5726099
>>Find Whittier

>>5726099
>Find whittler
Welles is next, that sumbitch

>Find Whittier
If he betrays us we will have to correct his misjudgment.
Congrats to us for our first successful hunt. (I'm not counting the background one since we were probably hard-carried in that fight). Did we gain anything from killing this thing?

>>5726099
>Find Whittier

Locked
>Find Whittier
Writing

We'll go ahead without any formatting for the time being but let me know if it starts bothering you guys and we'll start a new thread.

>>5726307
You have gained something, though it will take a little story advancement to find out what. Utilizing the actual body of the creature is a part of the Mukua, whereas powerful, deeper knowledge of how and why the Black Shaman corrupted the area is something an Occultist may have utilized.

The morning seems brighter than usual to you, though you have no proof to ascertain it. The frost holds less sway over the ground, the clouds thin out in the grand blue sky, and the sun holsters its spears for gentle hands cupping the face of the land. You are tired. You haven’t slept for over a day straight, and had you caught a ten hour spell this last night would’ve still left you bleeding vigor on the ground. You force your legs to locomotion and bring yourself to Whittier’s tent. The sight is not easy on you.

Slashes and rips swirl the canvas, blood stained outside and, as you soon find out, inside. It’s empty of life, but coagulations abound, brown life splashed carelessly on every surface. In the middle, a severed arm, strung through with antler. Growing from the inside through the fingernails, through the top and through the palm and elbow. It lies in the center like an Indian fetish, but its owner is nowhere to be seen. You look for any identification as to the event and find none inside. You return to the fresh air, the glorious morning made an object of fun by the murderous scene. Outside, you circle around the tent and find four graves, dug out and filled. Thin branches lashed with rope make splintered crosses above them, each with a name engraved. You hold your breath and bend down. You only recognize one name, Anson Collier, the young deputy foreman you met when you first arrived here yesterday morning.

If Whittier isn’t here, and isn’t in a grave, there’s one other place he’d most likely be. You drag yourself to the lumber camp where some scant activity catches your eye. Only a few of the lumber men take to their trade today, the still attitudes in competition with yesterday’s loud and confident action. Smoke rises from the Foreman’s tent and you make yourself known outside of it. Whittier’s voice is watery as he welcomes you in. He sits on a chair in front of a cobbled desk, a safe by his feet. His seat is uneasy and though he wears his usual double coat and muskrat hat there’s no missing heavy bandages wrapping around his stomach.

“You’re alive? God damn and then some pardner I ain’t never been so glad to see a face!” He tries to rise from his chair and thinks better of it, grunting as he regains his original posture. He motions you to the one other chair in the tent and you drag it across from him and sit yourself down. He holds his stomach in one hand and puts a rosewood pipe to his mouth. He tries to strike the match on the table but his fingers fumble and jerk. You finally take a match from his case and strike it in one smooth motion, holding it over his pipe. He puffs as erratically as he handled the match, and it takes a solid minute before his smoke is on. Whittier takes a moment, and you reach into your satchel and pull out an incalculable treasure, a Partagás cigarillo, one of five you have left from New Mexico. You take another match from Whittier’s box, and light it up.

You lean in slow and careful, the table creaking from the weight. “What happened Foreman, I been to yer tent. You look like Cain when the lord asked for Abel.” You can mark Whittier’s sand in pipe breaths. He takes one, two, and three, then meets your eyes and speaks. “The boy, somethin’ were wrong with ‘im. I don’t right know what, I’d guess you would be one who might. We were at ‘is death watch, only he didn’t die correct. He lingered, and after that he changed, changed to some beast from before the flood. Killed three and almost did for me, but for some true luck.”
You puff your own smoke, turning the cigarillo from one corner of your mouth to the other. “Did ye kill it?” “No, one o’ them fellers that went to the Lord did ‘im in with an Indian Musket. The arm I left, and I will not go back to that tent fer my life sir.”

You straighten up in your chair and look Whittier over. From the cut through stomach, to the shaking hands, to the haggard and sleepless eyes. “You been through it alright. I’ll say only this Foreman, that arm’ll do ye no harm now, but I wouldn’t mind if ye burnt the whole tent regardless. Other than that, our deal is honored and the beast that done the real killin’ is killt itself, I’m here fer services rendered.” Whittier doesn’t seem to hear you at first, eyes flashing back pictures of the event. He starts suddenly and bends down towards the safe. “Aye aye Campbell.” Unlocking it and counting out a flurry of bills.

“Here’s a hundred for ye, as agreed.” He hands you the money. As you reach out and take it your heart grows heavy. “You didn’t ask ‘bout them boys o’ yers Foreman. The ones I borrowed.” Another puff swirls ip from his pipe as he stares ahead. “I figured they been done fer when ye come back alone. After what I seen, I’m just glad ye brought yer own self back.” You stow the money in a pocket sewn inside your vest. “Well…they died fer sure. Both in brave fashion, their people should be told as such.” Whittier reaches back down to shut the safe. “Well I know Mr. Aimes were from Montana, and Mr. Donnelly, he were from back East quite a ways. Neither o’ them boys talked about it much, but I do have me an address. Thing is, mail is slow up here, could be as much as three month ‘fore any pony comes lookin’ fer it.”
“Well I’d ask ye to trust my lack o’ rougish humors when I tell ye I’d like to search them tents for clues regarding any deeper details. In cause o’ puttin’ their memories to justice.” He waves the thought away with his hand, “Hell Campbell, ye can do as ye like, I trust yer demeanor plenty. You oughta think about runnin’ the mountain mail to the city. There’s $250 in it if ye make collections all down the Sierras and bring it to San Francisco.”

A muscle in your face twitches. Just one. You refasten your mouth on the fading cigarillo. He is back West. You can’t go back there, not ever. You just need to keep running East, don’t let him catch you for the love of God. Whittier enough in your face that he changes topic. “Or ye could do me a favor. I have in my possession two carts o’ lumber ready fer Virginia City. I could use a man to get ‘em down there, and to see a friend o’ mine with a message. There’d be $30 in it fer ye, half a month’s pay fer two days work. You take the day, and let me know.”

You rise from your wobbling chair and meet the Foreman’s proffered hand. “I’m glad yer not in the ground Whittier.” He gives you a single, hearty shake. “Likewise.” Brushing the flaps aside you step out into the muted logging camp as the embers of the cigarillo fall out of your mouth. Time to go, but where?


NOTE: Please decide two things,
ONE: Where does Campbell plan to go next. This can be anywhere you like in the country really, here are some ideas.

You could head deeper into the Sierra Nevadas. That Shaman is still alive, and you doubt that any settlements around here will be permanently safe until he’s dead. The Indian tribes in the mountains are the Mono, Maidu, Miwok, and Washoe. They are all reclusive and unwelcoming to white men. However, you happen to know that the type of perversion that Shaman practiced is seen as a terrible, terrible sin among them all. They would be the place to start.
You could head to Virginia City. The Comstock Lode is the largest silver mine ever discovered in America, and it’s only been half a year since the first shafts were sunk. There is certainly money to be made, getting there comes with a ready job offer, and you were going there anyway. Unfortunately the Shoshone will not be pleased about the drastically increased urbanization in their land, and the United States Army currently has a very bare presence in Nevada. Cornelius told you stories of the Shoshone holy men and their night giants that ate dreams.

You could try and follow your original plan and head to Texas. Your cousin Eustace is a Methodist circuit rider near Lyle, Texas. There are usually settlers coming out on the Oregon and California Trails who will pay good money for a hard man to guide them down to Oklahoma and Texas. To do so, you’d need to travel through Zuni and Navajo land. There’s something there that owes you a death, and it will go as far as it needs to in order to collect.

TWO:What is in Campbell’s immediate future

You could look around Mack and Quinton’s tent. As before, something, anything would help in identifying and reaching their families, and who knows what else you might find.

You could restock and refill on the thoroughfare. With some money now, you can afford some sundries you’ve desperately needed. You could take a drink in a Saloon, or find a bed to sleep in.

You could settle your score with Welles. Maybe other men might let him off, but you’ll see him bloody for the memory of the two men who died beside you.


One:
>Deeper into the Mountains
>To Virginia City
>To Texas
>Write In

Two:
>Look Around the Tents
>Restock and Refill
>Settle up with Welles
>Write In

>>5726977
>Deeper into the Mountains
>Look Around the Tents

>>5726977
>Deeper into the Mountains
>Look Around the Tents

This is a hard choice. I really like the get-rich option, but we need to finish this.

>>5726977

>Deeper into the Mountains
>Look Around the Tents

“The thing ain’t done yet, Whittier. The mad bastard who called THEM through it out there.”

>>5726830
Thank you for answering my question. The combat was great by the way. It just occurred to me that the Abrahamic option while boring can really help offset our social flaw.

>>5726977
Deeper into the Mountains
Look Around the Tents

Apologies, update will happen around 12:00 PM today(PST)

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You step outside the bounds of the logging site, eyes fixed on a series of squat tents that house the lumber men. You hardly put together a dozen steps when a caw strikes the drum of your ear. Your neck snaps attention to the sound and you see a large raven fly over you, bathing you in a second long shadow. It perches on a low branch, staring down the barrel of a freshly drawn revolver. The raven does not seem perturbed, turning its head to pick at a few feathers, all the while staring at you with one unflinching black marble. A bead of sweat runs down your wrist as you remember the Indian from last night, the memory of his cruelty and power dragging your trigger finger closer to the bird’s early end.

You gain control over yourself with a breath, and holster. The bird takes flight without a sound. You haven’t had time to think about that Indian, or maybe you just didn’t want to, but he’s still alive and still up to whatever he was doing when you found him in the forest. This camp is just the beginning, there are more and more people making for the area. It’s one of the only natural passes in the Sierras to Nevada, it’s scenic, unsettled, and for the most part rich in timber, hunting, and fishing.

More and more people will be coming, and these won’t be frontiersmen running from warrants or looking to get rich in a place with no law, they’ll be families. Families trying their best to make a way under their own strength. You’ve seen what that Indian conjured, what he perverted in this place. Nobody who lives here will be safe as long as he is allowed to further his heresies. He needs to die, and what’s more you need to kill him. This time, you won’t stop at his heart, you’ll gut him all the way across.

For now though…you have some investigating to do. Your thoughts have carried you faster than expected to the worker’s tents. You start with Mack’s. A homely place, a cot, a table, a knife and candle sitting on a tin plate. Little else in view besides a malformed chair, apparently a tradition in this place, and a water pot with a smaller coffee pot inside it. He must’ve had somewhere to keep his money at least. You check in the corners and under the cot.

“There.” You grunt and pull out a small, foot long metal box. Inside are small, folded pieces of paper, a money clip, and a book. The book is titled ‘Alphabetics for the Self-Starter’ and more small rectangles of blank papers fall out from inside. There’s $30 in the money clip, which you stow for Whittier’s safe until the foreman sends those letters he promised. At the back of the stack of blank papers there’s an old daguerreotype of four boys. They all look alike, and on the back it reads Sean, Liam, Mack, and Brian, Willem, MA, 1840. There, you’ll tell Whittier to send a letter to the Willem post office back east. You straighten up and cross yourself, head to chest and shoulder to shoulder. “I’ll meet you later pardner, walkin’ the streets of glory.”

As you back out of Mack’s tent you turn to Quinton’s across the way and down some, only to find it already occupied by a trio of men. As you approach you’re washed by a current of fatigue. It’s been more than a full day since you’ve slept or eaten. The thick adrenaline pumping through your heart has kept you on your feet but it’s watering down now. This one last errand, then you’ll find a place to rest. One of the men is eying you from your position. You step forward and make yourself known.

“Whatchu be doin’ here at this tent gentlemen?” The man holding Quinton’s tent flap open does not respond, but the two others you see inside turn sharply at your voice. “Well hell’s bells do I see Mr. Quinton Aimes here before me? No? Must be one o’ them famous mountain police we got ourselves up here.” The man’s friend chimes in. “Naw now Henry there ain’t no police of any sort up in these mountains.” The other continues to draw out the mockery, “No police? Well if you ain’t the man who this here tent belongs to, and if you ain’t any no policeman, then you must be the Lord hisself risen to preach against our sinnin’. Funny…I thought you’d look more like the windows in church and less like a bedraggled fuckin’ bum with a shot up face.”

The third man stays silent still, watching to see what you’ll do. You feel the angry heat in your chest, and have to work mightily at calming your words. “Listen. Feller. I will ignore you to the extent I am able, which is fast approachin’, now I had a spell o’ business with Quinton and I will ask again, what the hell are you doin’ here?” The man called Henry smiles. “Well everyone had a spell o’ business with Quinton. The man was a degenerate drunk who pissed away every dollar he made here. He owes me money, it is that simple. Now that I have satisfied yer curiosity why don’t you-” “Do you know where his body is? The third man who hadn’t spoken suddenly inserts himself.

Your eyes shift to him, “I suppose the gossip might’ve made round that he is dead. Still, why do you care about the corpse? That good a Christian are ye?” “That’s right,” the third man says, “Most important thing for any man is proper care in the afterlife. Many of us need help making our way to our proper place. That’s what I do.” The man’s eyes do not blink. “What is yer name friend?” your question is almost drowned out by a cry of eureka by the two unsavories inside. It seems Quinton had a lockbox of his own that they’d finally forced open. The jubilation immediately turns sour as one of the men throws the thing across the inside of the tent, a flutter of smaller objects falling out as he does so. “There ain’t no fuckin’ money in here Henry!”

“Wait now.” Henry says, collecting the ancillaries that fell from the box. “There’s…some letters here, maybe they say somethin’ ‘bout some money, some pictures too, of a woman. Those always sell ‘round here.” The two begin to make their way out of Quinton’s tent, shouldering you aside and heading toward the thoroughfare. You start after them but the third man they left behind grabs your arm. “Sir, would you mind taking me to the man’s body? There would be money in it for you.” You stare at him, then stare at the two down the road fading into the distance.


You could Follow the two men with Quinton’s things. Whether it be the memory of a comrade at arms, or the unquenchable desire to answer their insulting tone, something needs to be done.

You could stay with the insistent man. The man offered you money. You need that. You don’t know what he wants with Quinton’s body but it does need to be recovered sooner rather than later.

You could find a place to Eat and Rest. It’s been about twenty six hours since you’ve slept, and about twenty since you’ve eaten. You are about to drop, it’s time to find a cot.

>Follow the Two Men
>Stay with the Insistent Man
>Find a spot to Eat and Rest


NOTE: I'll be back in about five hours to update again.

>>5728153
>Follow the Two Men

>>5728153
>Follow the Two Men

>>5728153
>Find a spot to Eat and Rest

>>5728153
>Follow the Two Men

Locked
>Follow the Two Men
Writing

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You tear your arm out of the grip of the insistent stranger with a glare and stalk off to the two men. The crunch of their shoes on the frosted mud covers your approach like a woolen blanket and you gain on them, unholstering your revolver in the process. You take a grip by the muzzle and whistle through your teeth, “Hey pardner!” The man called Henry turns with a sneer on his face and you drive the hilt of your gun straight through his nose. You feel the solid cartilage writhe and flex under the force of your gun butt, until all that’s left is soft, skin-toned gel.

Henry’s companion grabs your arm far too late and tries to jerk the armament out of your hand, but he fails to account for your middle finger driven straight into his ear. As he releases your hand to try and suppress his wound you reconfigure your grip and crack him upside the jaw with a sound like a pine tree in a logging camp. The blood wells up out of his mouth like a seep and you hit him again. He manages to cough up a trio of teeth before you hit him a third time, whereupon he fails to act at all, lying still and stupid in the road. You reach down and retrieve the Quinton’s lockbox from the dirt and kick a stern farewell of cold mud over both of the men’s faces as you march off toward the thoroughfare, prize in hand.

On your way, you flip the lid on the box and find the two pictures the men mentioned, both of the same woman you found in Quinton’s pocket. One has her pregnant with what you assume is the boy you saw in the previous picture, the other has her much younger, smile all aflutter. Three letters round out your discoveries, one half finished, begun by Quinton himself in a small, tenuous hand. You read enough of it to construe a typical letter home, but incomplete and half-hearted.

The other two letters are both violent enumerations of Quinton’s debts, one ending in a firm request to contact an agent in order to negotiate a different rate of interest. The other loses any sort of confrontational tone, limiting itself to a set of factual outcomes. If Quinton does not present himself at the letter writer’s place of business, and does not bring a substantial premium of interest, the letter writer will take substantial measures to produce said interest from his family. Both letters are signed M & E.

As much light as this has shed on Quinton’s desire to find gainful employment in a dangerous, fast-paced, frontier environment, it has done little to elucidate any other aspects of the man. You are not so far from chucking the lockbox to the side of the road as that fool Henry’s friend had when a thought occurs to you. It is a scant chance, but worth at least investigating. You run your fingers along the bottom of the lockbox searching for any sort of uneven pressure. Slowly you cover first one side, then the other. A small imbalance in the back left quarter of the box lifts your spirits, and the subsequent press, reveal, and removal of the false bottom sets them to further heights.

They descend again unto depth however, as you spy the lone fruit of your labor. A bullet. One, single bullet. Made of a substance other than lead, your discerning eye brings out an etching of four letters, and a scrawl of script you’re unfamiliar with. You cannot read the letters, your eye squirms past them no matter how hard you try. At first you think it’s the light, but after a dozen attempts and no further progress you ignore the letters. Neither money nor gold, neither deed nor debt, a strange bullet is all you’ve found. You stow it in your satchel and decide that it’s better than nothing.

Looking up, it seems you’re in the thoroughfare. What passes for a market in this place. A long strip of churned dirt with tent stalls and three log buildings. You have a long journey ahead of you, to a wild place with little recourse. There is money in your pocket, and need to be fulfilled. Weaponry, supply, clothing, animals, you can search for it all, but finding it is another matter.

NOTE: Pick a general type of good to search for, such as food, guns, or animals, then roll a 1d100 to see what’s available/how well Campbell does finding those things.

Rolled 56 (1d100)

>>5729018
Food and basic medical supplies, we'll be needing that a lot in our build

Rolled 93 (1d100)

>>5729018
Got a gun for that bullet?

Rolled 42 (1d100)

>>5729039
great roll

>>5729018
>>5729091

Rolled 19 (1d100)

>>5729091
books.

>>5729093
I doubt we'll find any useful titles. This place doesn't feel major.

>>5729157
I am not expecting skill books and am willing to settle for something other than the bible. Maybe a book on jokes or an intro to what plants are not poisonous.

Rolled 67 (1d100)

Generally, beartraps and some spare powder, some empty and solid vessels as well. We can probably use pebbles as shrapnel. Next hunt we'll be rigging the battlefield as a bootleg witcher.

Rolled 35 (1d100)

>>5729033
Support.

LOCKED
Food/Medicine: 56
Guns: 93
Books: 42
Beartraps/Powder, etc.: 67

Will post around Noon

File: General Store.jpg (93 KB, 661x533)

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You survey nine rickety stalls trailing down the main thoroughfare, each leaning in some random, askance direction. The three, sturdy, pine wood permanents that serve as the first real fixtures of the oncoming humanity stand attention at the end of the quarter mile commerce row. Stepping in among the three dozen men milling to and fro among the market, you begin to search for what you’ve decided this place might be able to offer you.

You need food. The last crumbs of the cornbread in your satchel are stale and pathetic. You need a gun. Your Patterson is reliable but low caliber and outdated. You need some traps. They and preparedness are all that keep your guts from being strewn across the night sky. Finally, you need books. You like books, always a reader, you’ve had little time to pursue the hobby in the past several years, and you’ll be damned if another season will pass without you setting eyes to a page for pleasure. All told, the $100 clip sewn into your vest will cover your considerations with nary a care. Still, the deep mountain beckons, and there will be little opportunity to take in greenbacks on your road to the Shaman’s exsanguination. This money may need to last you a long while. On the other hand, death due to dismemberment that could have been avoided by some considerable purchase is unappealing as poverty.

Your mind sharpened to its purpose, you pierce the first of your objectives; food and medicine. The stalls you pass mostly hew to this purpose, two of them dedicated to fresh meat brought in from some early morning hunt. Another stands for vegetables, dark green roughage and spots of color buckle the distraught wooden counter. One last purveys canned, salted, and preserved foods, the bounty of nature in this place precludes much popularity, but he serves his function, and you in particular have some truck with him.

The rest of the stalls provide a true variety of commonware: sewing kits, soap, gloves, combs, pommade, tobacco, and whatever else the merchants in question managed to steal, trade for, or buy from the ever-revolving labor coming and going to work at Whittier’s logging camp. There is one last stall situated away from the others, at the back end of the thoroughfare, but you ignore it as you reach the first of the pine buildings; the general store.

Inside is the proprietor, a man named Brown, who takes little care to engage with you other than a perfunctory garble of “Fternn.” which you take to mean Afternoon. The floorboards let loose quiet protests as you browse but the building is an order of magnitude more put together than those outside. The general store doesn’t have much you can’t find at the stalls, but there’s finer tobacco, chewing gum, whiskey, sacks of flour and meal, and holy of holies, chocolate.

File: Chocolate.jpg (268 KB, 1024x640)

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Your first introduction to the cocoa plant was down in Mexico, and you’ve always taken it as the Mexicans have, boiled with chilis until frothing and drank, instead of eaten solid. The sight is magnificent out of proportion to itself. Somehow an 8 oz. cloth packet of cocoa powder massages every knot of fright and worry into a placid tide of carelessness. Aside from the canned goods, there are also empty tin cups for sale, along with a trail kit, consisting of a fry pan, stew pot, coffee pot, and other necessaries. You make your purchases and inquire as to firearms in the camp. Every man has one but you saw no stall proffer them, and elsewise from the general store there’s but a Marshals office and saloon.

Both hands heavy on the counter Brown leans over, “Gots me’n baffalo raffle i cud port wit fer fitteen er dust.” Not what you were hoping for, a Plains Rifle was a muzzle-loader and at .50 caliber it packed some wallop but was as overlong as the ammunition was overheavy. Another customer in the store hears an opportunity for commerce and chimes in, “I got me one o’ them kentucky rifles, ain’t failed me yet pardner.” The man sucks on his mustache, “Now that’n I’d let go fer $17, seein’ as it’s newish and all.” Newish…the longrifle, or as you first knew it the Pennsylvania Rifle was another muzzle-loader, .45 caliber, used back in the Revolution. You very much doubted it was ‘newish’. Not only that but both men were overpricing you by about $10. You tell them you’ll consider it and let them know by the end of the day, then make your leave.

Back out in the crisp you decide to meander to the odd stall out at the end of the thoroughfare that you’d ignored. As you approach you see it’s manned by an Indian. He stares level, as if looking past you, even as you approach within twenty, ten, five feet. Even as you step up to him behind his wooden stall. He is possibly the fattest man you’ve ever seen in your life. He stares straight ahead still, passing breath after labored breath through his open mouth. He sits on some tortured construction that could loosely be considered a chair, its screams muffled under the press of his bulk. He is almost as wide as the stall itself and what little space left around him is filled with various plants, seeds, and powders. From the ceiling of the stall hangs herbs, flowers, and various groupings of bark.

File: Medicinal Herbs.jpg (105 KB, 1300x539)

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“What are you looking for, partner?” Your eyes snap from the assortment of herbs to the Indian as he speaks. His words are slow and measured, his pronouncements obviously learned second-hand. “I have your people’s medicine too. Some, at least.” He gestures to an inward built shelf with four glass bottles. The action seems about to tip the entire stall on its side. “I know me some trailcraft, yarrow an’ the like. I’ll take me some ether if ye got it. Other’n that, what do ye recommend for a long, lonely course?” The Indian doesn’t move his body, just his arm, and without looking transfers one of the glass bottles from the shelf to the counter between you. “Yarrow is good. Lavender for headaches, Foxglove for Dropsy, Mint for stomach pain. Got them all, partner. .50 cents a bushel. Where are you off to anyway?”

You pocket the ether and give him a long look, “Goin’ up mountain, on some business.” The Indian leans forward, the stall seeming to lean with him. As he does so you see a series of tattoos on his arms, tusks or fang, about half a dozen in varying length. “You going up to see the People eh? Could give you something to help. Ain’t cheap though.” He reaches down at his feet and brings up what looks like a series of tiny elephant tusks, beaded into a sheaf of about 30, maybe just under three feet in length. “$30, think about it. Could save your life.” Thirty dollars is a sum of money. Granted you know little about the tribes up here other than a few basics, but this is still a wild place, and its isolation causes a severe lift in the price of even basic goods. If the Indian wants thirty it is probably worth twenty, if that. “We’ll see pardner.” You turn to leave with your things when you spot three metal glints hanging in the back of the stall.

“Those back there medicinal as well pardner?” You flick your head to the three jaw traps of varying sizes. “Sure.” He answers, “Cures leg pain, anything below the shin.” He laughs at his own joke, jiggling the wooden frames around him. You give a quick smirk despite yourself and walk on to the saloon across from the Marshals office. A man sits in a chair, spurs on the banister in front of him. He tips his hat as a slight regard. You assume this is the Marshal. You have no trouble with the law but you have no love for it either. You give equivalent respect to the man with a slight incline, then about face and enter the saloon.

It is an empty place. One patron sleeping in a chair across from the entrance is the sole occupant of the two story, other than the barkeep. The dust hangs in the air, for a moment you mistake it for gold, glittering off the stack of bottles behind the bar and their molasses colored liquid. Your steps are over loud on the planks, and you feel almost embarrassed as you make your way over to the barkeep, echoing step after step up to ring around the high ceiling. A towel over his shoulder he stands from his chair, uncorks a bottle of whiskey and pours a finger in each in two glasses. “Here’s a welcome fer ye mister, on the house seein’ as I ain’t seen ye before.” You lift the glass to your lips and shoot, the burn well worth the taste. “Obliged”, you say as you suck in.

You don’t ask his name and he doesn’t give, the both of you comfortable with the silence that settles in. After a minute he pours you each another, you both drink. You’re the first to kill the quiet. “You know where a feller can get a book ‘round here?” He cranes his neck past you to the sleeping customer. “Well I gots me a digest, I believe it to be the words of J. Quincy Adams, it does me good but it ain’t no novel.” You scratch the rough on your chin, “Huh…which one was Quincy?” “Number six mister.” “Well I trust no man who insists on usin’ three names to speak any sort o’ wisdom.”

The barkeep pours another drink for the two of you. “Now…don’t say that mister. Every general in the Union goes by three names er more.” You knock back the third shot, “I rest my god damned case. Now you know anyone with a lick o’ poetry in their clutches round here? Mayhap some Longfellow?” The slosh of a fourth shot fills both of your glasses. The barkeep looks up, “You mean Henry Wadsworth Longfellow?” The glass goes up, the glass goes down. “I will not be undone by a man who has intentionally obscured me with free whiskey.” A loud crash sounds out back. The barkeep looks up to heaven and mutters a prayer. “That shit eatin’ Irishman and his shit eatin’ grin and both of their shit eatin’ midday boozin’.”

You smile, “Now I do believe I know that man.” A second crash. The barkeep throws up his hands “Well I am sorry for ye.” You start off toward the sound, “Allow me to offer ye a kindness and route ‘im from yer property.” You fling the backdoor wide open to a depressingly familiar site.

Patrick Flynn, leaking alcohol from every pore, staggering around a collection of brooms, sweeps, and buckets, laying fists into anything of vaguely humanoid shape. “Ye fackin’ rat arsed Gallovidian corsairs Oi’l pin yer ears back wit a trio o’ nails.” He makes his way back up to his feet only to misplace a swing at a supporting wood column and rush back to the ground. He flails around in the mud for a moment before you reach down and grab him by his shirt and haul him to his feet. He seems confused at your intrusion into what seems to him a very private affair.

He blinks and summons a hock of spit no doubt meant for your face, only to have it dribble furiously down his chin. He repeatedly attempts to coordinate his check muscles to spit in your face to no avail. “OH FACK YOU THEN!” You grip him by a bunch on his collar and march away from the back of the saloon. “Paddy god dammit its me, desist with yer fuckin’... projectiles!” His eyes attempt to focus on you. “Who is me ya salty tart, ya unhooved crusted kelpie, ya belted, ungodly lamentation of a man, ya-” “Campbell god dammit and don’tchu make me take the Lord’s name in vain a third time!”

“Campbell? That fackin be o’ the Caledonians east o’ Strathclyde?” Paddy’s old, gnarled hands shake you off from your grip on his shirt. He moves away from you on jagged stilts, finally turning to plant both feet and stare back at you proudly, hands on both hips. Mid 50’s, a thick bushel of gray hair, clean shaven, whip thin with a big mouth and big eyes. “Oi woulda never carried no man named Campbell up here in me wagon ya punting cunt-lace.” “Ye called me yer brother in arms ‘gainst Saxon tyranny ye drunk old Irish bastard!” He rails against you with mighty waves of both arms. “Ah yer from the lowlands ya sheep fuckin’ half-an-Englishman!”

You hold up both hands in front of you, “Be that as it may you are still, somehow, the man I wish to see. Do ye still possess that copy o’ Endymion?” He takes a comical length of time to answer. Swaying in place all the while, no doubt gathering his faculties at the mention of a possible transaction. When he does speak his hoarse, old voice is as steady as he can make it. “Oi might possess that and other o’ the Keat’s luminations. That’s me readin’ material boyo, the source o’ me gab and the foundation o’ me charm. $100 at the very least.” You splutter a sigh out in impatience. He is in no position to seriously negotiate. You’ve seen him get entrenched in a mystical position like this, not caring for realities. Time to respond in kind. “Well I could offer ye the hundred Paddy, or we could shoot fer it?”

Paddy scoffs, hand to his heart as if struck an unconscionable blow. “Ya strike yer own misery Campbell, any man o’ the Isle could outfight and outshoot any yellow Caledonian with an eye and a leg lost t’ the devil.” He staggers his way over to what you now recognize as his wagon, stowed away from the thoroughfare toward the lake. He rifles through the back of the wagon, retrieving a jug of alcohol from some compartment which he promptly opens. After guzzling for a good 10 seconds he hands it to you. “Don’t say Paddy never gave ya nuttin’.” You down as much as the old man, shake your head to clear the cobwebs, and hand it back to him. He takes another cyclopean gulp and sets it down on the ground.

Reaching further into the wagon he pulls out a very familiar, very harried looking gun. “Is that my Sharps you god damn indigent? Fuckin Christ look what ye made me do!” Paddy taps it on his shoulder “Ya better believe it ya prissy maid.” He returns to the back of the wagon and brings out a pair of weathered, leather covered treasures. “Here we are boyo, and ya know wut, since yer so flush ya can afford to be a bettin’ man, Oi’ve got anudder fer ya.” Fishing out a glass bottle, Paddy sets it out at about thirty yards. You raise your eyebrow but he ignores you. “One shot rule boyo, The first man to hit it, wins the lot, and if you win, I’ll even sell ya back this bit o’ passage you paid me.” He extends his hand.

If you fail, you’ll lose everything you have, but if you win you’ll get your gun back, and the books you’ve been looking for at no expense. You eye Paddy’s outstretched hand recollecting the hardships of poverty. Eventually, you meet his grip with your own. He pulls you in close as you do so. “Remember boyo, a man’s word is his bond.” Without waiting for a response he walks a few feet away. He takes aim with your rifle, steadying himself. You don’t know how good of a shot he is but your heart drops as he checks the wind. He takes a drink from the jug at his feet. He adjusts the sight, and takes another swig. He breathes in deep and hoists the rifle to his shoulder. He thinks better of it, reaches down and polishes off his jug. He cocks the rifle, brings it back up to his shoulder, closes an eye…and in slow motion, like a sawn-through tree, falls over.

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You approach slowly, tapping the Irishman with your boot. He weakly pushes your foot away, snoring loudly. You look around at the empty meadow where he’s parked his wagon. Gently, you wiggle your rifle free from his arms. It’s been a month since you’d given it up, and it is beaten as though it’s been a year, through all that though, it is still a thing of beauty. You sidle up to his wagon and take the two books off of the lip where he left them. Endymion, and Hyperion, beautiful. You return to the man’s bed of grass, “Well Paddy, ye gave a tough fight. I’ll see ye somewhere down the trail pardner.” You pluck $10 off your clip and toss it onto his sleeping form. Half of what your Sharps is worth, but you had to give him something. Whistling to yourself and thinking of the chocolate waiting for you, you walk back to the thoroughfare and to a well deserved rest.


GAINED:
Sharps Rifle:
An 1851 Model 2 Breech-loading Rifle, .52 caliber, Rimfire cartridges, and an effective shooting range of 1,000 yards. The trigger sticks slightly, weathering on the barrel has given it range fall off, and at 30 inches the barrel length is fairly unwieldy in close combat, but it is easily one of the best mass produced rifles in the country.

One copy of Endymion:

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkened ways

One copy of Hyperion:

Along the margin-sand large foot-marks went,
No further than to where his feet had stray'd,
And slept there since. Upon the sodden ground
His old right hand lay nerveless, listless, dead,
Unsceptred; and his realmless eyes were closed;

Relationship Established:
Patrick Flynn, Caravaneer

NOTE: You currently have $93, technically $123 if you decide to use Mack’s money you found for yourself instead of sending it to his family.
Please vote on what Campbell ended up buying, please remember that without a horse, donkey, or mule if you’d like to move at any speed through the mountains limit yourself to 45 lb. worth of items. Items without a marked weight are of negligible weight.

FOOD:
1 Weeks worth of Rations(Salted Meat, Fry Bread, Flour Beans)=$5, 10 lb.
1 8 oz. tin of Chocolate= $.50
1 Whiskey bottle= $6, 3 lb.
1 Coffee tin= $4, 2 lb.
1 Trail Kit(Cookware): $10, 10 lb.
1 Tin Cups: $3, 1 lb.

GUNS
30 .28 Caliber balls(Pistol)= $8, 4 lb.
30 .52 Caliber cartridges= $12, 3.5 lb.
1 Plains Rifle, .50= $15
1 Kentucky Rifle, .45= $17

MEDICINE
1 Bushel of Herbs(Any): $.50
1 Bottle of Ether(10 Doses): $5, 1 available
1 Splint Kit(For setting broken bones): $5.00, 2 lb. 1 available

MISC.
1 Wolf Trap w/ Chain(8 in. jaws): $10, 9 lb. 2 available
1 Beaver Trap w/ Chain(6.5 in. jaws): $6, 3.5 lb.
The Indian’s strange braided tusks: $30, 10 lb.

If you’d like to purchase something else please ask and I will provide information. I know there was a roll for black powder but without a dedicated arms store or a nearby mining site it is not commercially available at this particular camp.

>>5730712

Can we buy a horse or donkey though? I presume that we can’t afford one

>>5730712
Neither of the rifles for sale are worth, but what else... Hmmm.

>>5730712
FOOD:
2 Weeks worth of Rations(Salted Meat, Fry Bread, Flour Beans)=$5, 10 lb.
5 8 oz. tin of Chocolate= $.50
1 Coffee tin= $4, 2 lb.
1 Tin Cups: $3, 1 lb.

GUNS
30 .28 Caliber balls(Pistol)= $8, 4 lb.
30 .52 Caliber cartridges= $12, 3.5 lb.

MEDICINE
1 Bushel of Herbs(Any): $.50
10 bushel yarrow
10 bushel foxglove
2 bushel mint
2 bushel lavender
1 Bottle of Ether(10 Doses): $5
1 Splint Kit(For setting broken bones): $5.00, 2 lb.

1 Wolf Trap w/ Chain(8 in. jaws): $10, 9 lb.

Just a tin cup, the coffee, and a bandanna is just fine.
Foxglove is poisonous, but poison is a fine weapon when outnumbered. Yarrow is good to boil up and use on wounds as an antiseptic.

>>5730754
You may look around for a pack animal if you like, nobody rolled for that. A very paltry nag could cost as little as $10, the average riding horse cost between $110-$150. A mule or pack horse could cost anywhere from $40-$100.

Keep in mind this is a very small frontier camp and despite how high you roll the options are ultimately limited.

Rolled 11 (1d100)

>>5730800
Rolling for a paltry nag please. Gets us some distance with a lighter load before we eat it. Too weak to run off. Lets us carry an extra week of food.

>>5730812
Hell yes! Hella paltry!

>>5730812
Alright

NOTE: There is a new item available for purchase, if a majority decide to purchase it I will write it in the next post.

Brown Nag: $20
Includes a rotted pair of saddle bags, no saddle. The horse is very overpriced, and looks very unhealthy. Purchasing it will expand your carry weight by a further 200 lb.

>>5730712
Don't get the nag. We are a scout and the ability to move quickly and silently is of the utmost importance. We need to think in terms of stealth.
>food
2 Weeks worth of Rations(Salted Meat, Fry Bread, Flour Beans)=$10, 20 lb.
32 oz. tin of Chocolate= $2
2 Coffee Tin: $8, 4 lb.
1 Tin Cups: $3, 1 lb.
>Medicine
5 Bushel of each herb he has: $10
1 Bottle of Ether(10 Doses): $5, 1 available
1 Splint Kit(For setting broken bones): $5.00, 2 lb. 1 available
>Misc.
The Indian’s strange braided tusks: $30, 10 lb.
2 Beaver Trap w/ Chain(6.5 in. jaws): $12, 7 lb

total = $86 and 44lbs

I strongly suggest that we get the braided tusks. He knows that if he tries to scam us we will come back and ruin his ability to trade since our word carries far more weight and if we say he scams us he gets run out of town or worse. Also, they must stop us from being killed on sight by The People or provide some method of warding off spirits if they are legit.

>>5730920
I am also willing to substitute a tin of coffee for the 30 .52 Caliber cartridges $12, 3.5 lb which would put the new total at $94 and 45.5 pounds.

>>5730920
>>5730927

Let’s do as this anon suggests, all reasonable.

The sick horse is probably not worth it

Alright we will be going with this list of purchases

>>5730920

Writing now.

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Your hand hesitates, hovering equidistant between your chest and the outstretched palm of Brown, the proprietor of the general store. His gaze is unflinching, you see his mouth stay very still, very still. You slowly shift your eyes without moving your head to the stock you’ve brought to the counter. You slowly shift your eyes back to Brown. Your last dollar, the very last of your power to manipulate man’s world.

Almost imperceptibly at first, your hand crawls through the air. So…slowly. You’d just made your hundred, you’d just climbed out of the shit for what seemed like the thousandth time in your life. Your hand only just shifts over the countertop when Brown relieves you of the paper. Hands like lightning. Broke again. Figures. Your humors do rise as you pick up the victuals and place them in your satchel. With a deep sigh you leave the store, back into the air. Past noon and much more importantly past supper. The sun is lazy, in no great rush to find the bottom of the world, but it plods along. Finally, it’s done. You are prepared with weapon, shot, food, treatment, and poetry for your ascent to the deep, high places in these mountains.

That can all be held at bay until tomorrow, until you fill your stomach and lay down your head. Whittier promised you an empty tent just cleared out by a seasonal. It stands at the end of one of the rows, and is nothing smart to look at. It does have a cot, with fresh linen, and a mirror and table. In your sorry state, you’re happy to have it. You ply the cook woman at the logging site for another plate of bacon and tomatoes. She acquiesces with little protest, her eyes avoiding your cracked cheeks while doling out your meal.

The bacon is hot, as is the grease. You devour it mercilessly, along with cornbread and a dram of whiskey. Little swirls of grease and tomato juice fall pink and brown down your chin. Full up, you retire. In your tent, you strip off to your long johns, stowing your satchel as a pillow behind your head, and pulling the triple linens up to your chin. It’s around 4:00 in the afternoon, the sun is touching its nose to the horizon, the late birdsong chatters. You are warm. Your belly is full. You haven’t slept for almost two days, and you’re speared by old Morpheus in less than a minute, his harpoon dragging you deeper and deeper down.

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You open your eyes to a stifling white. It passes through your eyes and spills out in every direction, an endless plain. Sea, sky, and land, all a perfect, featureless white. Two exceptions. Yourself, dressed proper in your denim pants, long sleeve, ascot, vest, and coat. You are seated on a white wooden chair. Across from you is the other exception, also seated in a white wooden chair and looking exactly the same as the day he died. Cornelius.

“Finally awake? Well…I suppose that’s unfair.” one hand wanders aimlessly over the text of his thick, open bible. He crosses his legs and takes off his hat, hanging it on his front foot. “Where exactly are you goin’ boy?” His voice always was a little high, nasally too. You’d heard it more than once soaring above gunfire and other, unmentionable sounds, remanding terror to its place beneath the world. “You’re dead.” Your statement sounds stupid even to yourself. Cornelius looks at you with very pale blue eyes. He looks at you for a long time, then without speaking he turns to look over his shoulder. Drawing your gaze to one black spot in the vast infinite of white. You are certain it hadn’t been there.

He turns back around to face you. “I always was fond o’ bluntness in a man. Find a problem, shoot it. I like you Campbell. You’re sincere. Whatever you do, you believe in it. Keep that one in ya son.” He blinks, his heavy, wrinkled lids make the motion seem laborious. You suddenly notice that the spot is no longer a spot. It’s an oil spill at the edges of the universe, slopping in uneven forays a hundred thousand miles away from the two of you. Covering the corners of the sky. Cornelius snaps his fingers. Your attention is back on him. “You been runnin’ boy, but as clever as you are, you can’t run from this ‘un.” Each of his words rings your head like a bell. Your eyes glaze over and memories from long ago fountain up unbidden.

A younger you, clean shaven. A ripped army uniform, ragged desert vegetation catching your boots. A shaking rifle in your hands and the other three in your scout troop even more raving and unmanned than you. Pitch black night, the Navajo tossed back from the dark into your tiny circle of light. He had ran first. Its chest filled with small, screaming faces of every animal imaginable. The Navajo’s now among them. One of your troop vanishes into the night.Tall. Too thin. Another is hauled up high, into the sky. Nails like knives, four feet long. The third makes a run for it, like the Navajo. He stops screaming very suddenly. All alone. You had given up your dignity, your pants soiled, your mouth working out gibberish, trying for a prayer. The thing…spoke.

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Then the light, the unbelievable light. The light, and the Divinity, and the lonely old man with his small eyeglasses. With his bible and cross and his absolute faith. “Boy!” You snap back to this, whatever it is. The air is freezing gray. The black is everywhere, you’re reduced to sitting in a room with leaking dark water. It roils, sable fingers playfully tracing the last circle of white that you and Cornelius are sitting in. The ceiling is bowing in, both your chairs start to rot. “Do you have a- oh no wait I’ve got one.” He reaches into his boot and pulls out a match box. He shakes it to a small, dreary tune. He opens it to reveal one, just one. “You have to bleed son. You have to bleed if you’re gonna learn what’s comin’.” He strikes the match. “You know who he is. You saw what happened to me, in San Francisco.” A pipe is in his mouth, he lights it. “Kill em’ Campbell, kill em’ all. Take your lashes, approach the Lord.” He puffs a steady beat on the pipe, despite himself, his lips tremble and his knuckles are pale clutching his bible.

“He’s done for me son, he’s done for me like I never imagined. I never imagined how terrible…” He reaches forward and claws your shoulder. “Listen boy, this is what I can do for ya, each lash is a victory, find a man who can read, find him! Listen now!” The black starts to cover his ankles, tears start to drop from his eyes. “Listen! The man who can read, and your cousins, they’ll help you. Be careful Campbell, the more you learn, the more things will sniff you out, awful things! God Campbell!” Both hands furiously clasp his bible. He opens it again, and pulls out a revolver. His hands shaking, he cocks the hammer. “Please save yourself boy.” The black begins to funnel into his mouth, and he shoots you in the head.

You fall off your cot, face first onto the freezing dirt floor. You are covered in sweat, wrapped in linen, and in pain. A moment passes, then another. You are convinced you are about to die, the anxiety railed up into your stomach when you see a spark of gold under your tent flap. You steady yourself onto your hands and knees, ignoring the shrieking pain in your back, and open the flap. Sunlight pours in, blowing golden breath onto your cheeks. It’s ascendant, you must have slept all afternoon and night into the next morning. You make your way to your feet, only to double back over at the feeling in your back.

You slowly crawl over to the small hand mirror on the table, unhook your top, and assess the pain. Inexplicably, it’s a wound, a bloody stripe the length of your entire back from hip to shoulder, red, bloody, and raw. That on its own is mystifying, but the true fear returns when you clean away the worst of the blood. Dappled in the crevice of the wound is a pattern, all along the interior. It is nothing you’ve ever seen before, a gruesome branding, raised like woodblocks.

You are in a fugue throughout washing yourself and your wound. You are in a fugue throughout washing and wearing your clothes. You try not to think of the dream, every time some sliver slips through you start to smell that cold gray air. Then you feel as if you’ve been shot in the head, and it recedes. It is…unpleasant.

Finally, you stand ready to depart, packed and as prepared as you can be to find the Black Shaman, somewhere in the mountains. The only thing left to decide is where to start looking.

FIRST: If anyone would like to visit someone in town, do any errands, finish any tasks you can think of before we go, feel free to write in. It may be a while before we are back.

SECOND: Decide which tribe Campbell will attempt to find first in his investigation.

The Miwok are perhaps the most difficult tribe to find, even though they live in the general area. They are incredible at obscuring their tracks. They hollow out underground caves to dance in ritualistic smoke. They share the god Coyote with the Plains Indians and many other tribes.

The Maidu are to the north, even higher than Lake Tahoe. They build dugouts partially in the ground and scalp white men to use their hair in weaving beautiful baskets. They are experts in medicine and herbalism, including poisons. They worship Owl, and kill ravens on sight.

The Washoe are the largest tribe, and the easiest to find. They follow three migrations in a year, hunting, fishing, and gathering. The end of the hunting season is upon them, and the tribe will be very defensive about outsiders looking to take their winter food. They are south, on the other side of the lake, in the deep mountain settlements where they go for winter. Their Braves trade most often with white trappers and are the most likely to possess guns and iron tomahawks. They worship Raven, and kill owls on sight.

The Mono are the farthest south. They live at the headwaters of the San Joaquin River, back in California. They build huts on stilts and farm flies for their larvae. They weigh down men in their river and use the rapids to discern lies from truth. A simple people, they worship Rabbit, who is fast and fecund.

>The Miwok

>The Maidu

>The Washoe

>The Mono

>The Miwok are perhaps the most difficult tribe to find, even though they live in the general area. They are incredible at obscuring their tracks. They hollow out underground caves to dance in ritualistic smoke. They share the god Coyote with the Plains Indians and many other tribes.

I suggest going to town to see if there are any bounties we can collect on, such as artifacts or people.

I think it's a safe assumption that the one we hunt is a possibly rouge Washoe. I don't think it wise to approach Maidu first.

>>5731772
Ah, my guess is those patterns are stigmata written in the language of the Abrahamic faith. It will likely be hard to find someone who can speak/read Hebrew or Arabic in this day and age.

>>5731775

>check for bounties

>The Maidu

I think these guys are probably who we’re after, but they probably are not easy to talk to. Maybe be on the lookout for ravens to kill and bring along (so we can prove that we’re aligned with them)

>>5731775
>The Maidu

>get the braided tusks, ask what tribe the Indian is from and what culture the braid is from, what meaning it has.

I figure our dollars aren't going to do us much good up in the mountains

LOCKED
That's two for Maidu, and two for checking bounties before leaving.
WRITING

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The wound burns in your back. You pace first to one end of camp, then the other, gathering whatever scant facts you can about the local tribes. By mid morning you’re staring at the front of the Marshals Office. He is not out front today, sequestered somewhere in the recesses of the building. The pocket on the inside of your vest is all but empty, all that’s left being money promised to another man. You’ve never done any bounty hunting, but it may prove lucrative in a place like this, and you doubt it could be more dangerous than your previous encounters.

You open the loose fitted door harder than you mean to. The Marshal is hunched over some loose papers on his desk, a series of wooden mail boxes stacked against the wall. “You tradin’ mail, er lives?” There are two posters on the wall, one Miguel Pedrera, last seen southeast of Virginia City. The other, Morgan Quail, last seen north of Sutter’s Fort. The bounties for both are $50, dead or alive. The Marshal sees you looking at the posters, the scars on your cheeks disfiguring the daylight crawling across your face.

“My guess’d be lives.” He finishes writing something on one of the papers in front of him, and sets his pen down. “Don’t talk much do ye?” He gestures to the chair across the table from him, and you settle into it. “Actually Marshal-” “Fletcher, call me Fletcher” “Alright…actually Fletcher, my road travels closer to the mountains. Was wonderin’ if ye had any more warrant for the nearer area.” His face furrows in thought. “There may be. An Injun roamin’ round the mountains, goes by the name o’ Grass-under-snow. Takes pelts o’ trappers. Done fer three of ‘em. I’ll pay $40, plus 10 cents a mile it takes to bring ‘im in.”

You spend some thought on that. You aren’t going up to the tribes to make enemies really…but you might find this Indian in passing, he might not be part of a tribe that you don’t need to ally with. Any number of scenarios…you decide it’s better to take the Marshal’s warrant anyway, so you’ll have it regardless of whether you plan to fulfill it or not. “Write it up Fletcher, I’ll look for ‘im out there.” He does so, scrawling a personal letter empowering you to bring the Indian in under the United State’s Law, however much that’s worth. You take the letter, doff your hat to Fletcher, and begin your road north.

As you pass down Silver Stream into Martyr’s Valley you check over your rations, your equipment, everything you’ve brought for your journey. Your mind wanders to the braided tusks you procured from the fat Indian. He never gave you his name, but after some prodding he told you he was Shoshone. Some of them settled on the eastern slopes of the Sierra Nevadas, but most of them were arid desert dwellers in northern Nevada. They did trade with the Washoe however, that much you knew. Before buying the strange tusks you made sure to question their purpose. The Indian told you that the Sierra tribes don’t trade with white men’s money. The trading they do with them they do by barter, but the trading they do with each other, they do with these tusks.

The value is determined by the length of the braid, and the one that he sold you, at almost three feet in length, is enough purchasing power to buy a dugout lake canoe, or anything similar. You reach Sardine Valley, and stand at the very end of the Tahoe Vale. You look up into the imposing peaks, and begin your ascent.

NOTE: Please roll 1d100+5(Best of three) to see if you pick up any Indian trails.
DC 60(DC 70, Experienced Scout, -30, Unfamiliar Area, +20)

Rolled 99 + 5 (1d100 + 5)

>>5732367
BTW OP I think it might be helpful if you put roll prompts in greentext:

>Like this

It helps make them easier to distinguish from the update.

>>5732374
Yes, I’d been holding them but free texting is better. You bring up a good idea actually, I think it’s time to take stock of things so far.

I would like any player/reader/random thread entrant to do me the favor of telling me what you think of things so far. Compliments are nice if you feel like them but in all honesty I’m looking for criticisms, they are always more helpful in improving both of our experiences.

Any comment related to plot, prose, pacing, characterization, setting, engagement, system and anything else you might have a thought about.

Thank you in advance

Rolled 60 + 5 (1d100 + 5)

>>5732367
>>5732449
Well, the most important advice I have is to pace yourself so you don't get burnt out. Overall you have done great so far in terms of writing, updates, combat, and grammar which we all appreciate. I'm sure more anons will come and this quest will become popular if it continues. As for critiques, perhaps you can implement some means of acquiring one-time rerolls. That would have really helped us in our first fight, but I understand not having them initially because we just completed the tutorial.

>>5732367
>>5732367
Nice we did a currency exchange. This will give access to some rather niche markets that may be worth far more than what we paid.

Rolled 95 + 5 (1d100 + 5)

>>5732367

>>5732374
>>5732367
>>5732678
Can you please count these Unnat 100 and 100+ rolls as a crit?

>>5732449

Ultimately, it’s a great quest! Don’t burn out!

Love the vibes, the thematic dialogue, the plot so far. Basically, great work!

>begging for criticisms on 1st thread
Its so fucking over, Jimbo. You got no confidence. You're not seeing anything through.

>>5732888
I'm still hoping man. It's a common mistake for new QMs.

I would kill to be able to write period-appropriate speech like this guy.

>>5732449
Like other people said, it's a good start! I don't have huge criticisms, because I like the quest, but a couple points:

1) You could think about putting dialogue on new lines, rather than clumped up in big paragraphs. For example, instead of

"You lean in slow and careful, the table creaking from the weight. “What happened Foreman, I been to yer tent. You look like Cain when the lord asked for Abel.” You can mark Whittier’s sand in pipe breaths. He takes one, two, and three, then meets your eyes and speaks. “The boy, somethin’ were wrong with ‘im. I don’t right know what, I’d guess you would be one who might. We were at ‘is death watch, only he didn’t die correct. He lingered, and after that he changed, changed to some beast from before the flood. Killed three and almost did for me, but for some true luck.”
You puff your own smoke, turning the cigarillo from one corner of your mouth to the other. “Did ye kill it?” “No, one o’ them fellers that went to the Lord did ‘im in with an Indian Musket. The arm I left, and I will not go back to that tent fer my life sir.”"


It'd be:

"You lean in slow and careful, the table creaking from the weight. “What happened Foreman, I been to yer tent. You look like Cain when the lord asked for Abel.”

You can mark Whittier’s sand in pipe breaths. He takes one, two, and three, then meets your eyes and speaks. “The boy, somethin’ were wrong with ‘im. I don’t right know what, I’d guess you would be one who might. We were at ‘is death watch, only he didn’t die correct. He lingered, and after that he changed, changed to some beast from before the flood. Killed three and almost did for me, but for some true luck.”

You puff your own smoke, turning the cigarillo from one corner of your mouth to the other. “Did ye kill it?”

“No, one o’ them fellers that went to the Lord did ‘im in with an Indian Musket. The arm I left, and I will not go back to that tent fer my life sir.”"


It's maybe a little nicer-looking to have it all in one paragraph, but it does hamper readability, since we have to put in work to figure out who's speaking. You could keep it in the same line when people are speaking simultaneously, though.


2) As somebody who's been writing a quest for a long, long time, this choice worried me: >>5726977

What it told me is that you didn't have a fixed idea of where the story would go next, and you were basically leaving it up for us to decide. It also implied that you would be improvising a lot of future events, because I wouldn't expect you to have three+ completely separate storylines written out. (If you did, that's awesome! But that means you're putting in too much work!)

(1/2?)

I am going to give it to you straight: "sandbox"/heavily improvised quests suck to QM and often aren't that good. Players are owed meaningful choices and logical consequences; they are not owed absolute freedom. Now that we have a plot hook fully committed to, I strongly recommend you sit down and work out some characters, locations, and resolutions, so you're not driving yourself insane trying to make things up as you go. You can't plan for what the players do, but you can always plan for what they encounter.

>inb4 you have this stuff already planned
Then great! But it didn't seem that way, is all. (By the way, the more you have prepped, the better.)
3) This isn't criticism of this quest or your QMing, just some general tips. You might already do some or most of these already, which is great! Keep it up!

#1: The weak link in the chain is YOU
9 times out of 10, quests don't die because players don't play them, or even because they're bad. Quests die because the QM flakes. This means that the single most important thing you can do to guarantee the quality and longevity of the quest is to take care of YOURSELF.

>Pick an update schedule that works for YOU.
>Take regular scheduled breaks between threads (I recommend at least a week).
>Write what YOU think is cool or what makes YOU happy.
>Plan plot points or scenes that YOU are excited for and can look forward to.
>Note that player count usually increases slowly over the course of a quest, as people catch up. Don't be discouraged early at moderate turnout.


#2: Players are your friends (mostly)
There will always be trolls and argumentative shitheads, but 90% of the time, the people playing your quest are here because they like what we read and want to see more of it. Treat them with respect and 90% will respect you back.

>Communicate. If you need to take the day off, tell us. If you need to delay a thread, tell us. If you write yourself into a corner, tell us. If you need to drop the quest, tell us. People get way more mad if somebody vanishes without saying anything. They're typically understanding if you explain.
>If somebody is being a troll and/or argumentative shithead, politely deflect them once, then ignore them until they get bored. Do not get into public fights. That's cringe.
>If somebody has legitimate concerns or complaints, hear them out, politely respond, and either attempt a compromise/fix/apology or explain why you can't do so. Just be civil.

It's all basic stuff, but you'd be shocked how many QMs don't do any of this, then wonder why QMing is so hard and grueling!


>>5732700
No need to get greedy (a crit on a d100 is a big deal). A solid pass will do us just fine.

>>5718998
Also, while I'm here, I think your OP pic is kind of muddy and hard to read at thumbnail size. You might consider picking something more distinct, or at least slapping a "Hunter Quest #2" on there next time so people know what it is at a glance.

Thank you all for your comments, I appreciate the time, effort, and interest you've taken in responding.

Ive read what you've all posted several times and trust me when I said I will take all your suggestions in hand as I attempt to improve this for all of us.
There will be no update tonight. I am in the middle of moving to a permanent residence so I will be floating around a few IPs in the next few weeks.

Having said that, I plan to continue with nightly updates. I will begin writing tomorrow at around 6:00 PM(PST)

File: Ravens.jpg (417 KB, 2560x1920)

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The roads ended long ago. Up you drive, into the true wilderness of the deep mountains. A raven watches your first steps, its black tar feathers unruffled and poised. You blink and the feathers drip rot down the old sugar pine. You blink again and it’s gone. Your lip curls. You draw and fire in a single movement, the sound of the shot racing joyfully around the lonely forest. The bird is dead before your piece is holstered.
The fat Indian told you whatever tales of the local tribes he thought your purchases entitled you to. One of them was that the Maidu are partial to seeing these birds dead in any manner of way one can manage. You figure you and the tribe are of the same mind, and walk over to pick up and carry the dead bird with you. You hook it into your gun belt, you don’t want it in your satchel with the food, and walk on.

You decide your most opportune course is to keep heading up, circling the peaks. The Maidu live in dugout houses, mostly underground and thus easy to keep warm in cold weather. They do not care about elevation.

Alone…this is what you needed, you are unstifled here in this great solitude. One foot trudges in front of another, always upslope, and the forest bleeds out into anemic huddles and the occasional stiff-backed sentinel. Your muscles are hot in your legs as you conquer countless petty steps. Your hands are cold, especially your fingers. Your gloves are army issue and are not blessed with the constitution for this weather.

You make a good pace and by the time the first spin of the solar wheel concludes you guess you’ve gone around thirty miles. Your beans rattle in their cans on your fire. The bread is for morning, the salt pork for the trail. You eye the chocolate waiting patiently in their tins, but decide against it for the first night. You settle back against a tree, using your satchel as a makeshift pillow despite the lumps, and begin to doze off, the arms of your campfire flailing in front of you.

A familiar caw wakes you. You snort out of your slumber and flip your head up to see a raven alight on a far branch. A second joins it, the sound of its wings a precursor to the tightening of your chest and the catching of your breath. It is dark. Your fire is low. It is unwise to sound yourself in unknown territory. You take yourself to your feet regardless, then fling two more spells of lead, one each. You hit both birds, and collect both caracasses, the reports of the shots still echoing as you do so.

Back to your sleeping posture you close your eyes once again, staying awake for the next hour through thin lids. Eventually you settle, and drift off.

In the morning you douse what remains of your camp after heating some bread and making coffee in your tin cup with snow. Shaking out your legs, you begin the day. Climbing higher, the snow drives fierce, and the real cold settles into your bones. Your eyes pick out a ruined something in the ever taller snow drifts. You make your way to it only to find an abandoned dugout with what must have been a woven roof. A cursory glance of the inside renders nothing of import. A gray and empty interior, a long unused hearth in the center surrounded by stones, a surprisingly large second room. No furnishings or items of value, simply an abandoned dwelling.

More trudging follows, your breath shortens as the air slims to a narrow edge and you find yourself slowing up. The trees are sparser still, small copses smattered like melted snowflakes every few miles. As you breathe as deep as you can and enjoy the sunshine creeping its way through the creases of your coat you notice something small hanging from one of the trees. Drawing closer, it appears to be a small bushel of colors. Bright yellow, green, brown, and purple, tied with and hanging by some root you don’t recognize. It is only about five inches across, difficult to see, but the color clashes with the leeched grays and browns of the trees if you happen to be looking for it.

As you navigate upwards, you keep a lookout, and find that some trees have these bushels, and some do not. You figure that they’re conscious markers, since you find the herbs in at least five different combinations. Choosing the one you originally came across, you identify the trees with those bushels, and proceed in their direction until nightfall.

Tonight, the cookfire is made first, the beans are prepared, and you melt your first tin of chocolate, drinking it out of your catch-all tin cup to great satisfaction. Despite being without any mexican peppers or vanilla, it manages to soothe aches and pains you were not aware of. It is unwise to make one’s presence known in lawless country. After dinner, you douse your cookfire and hike another mile to a separate copse of trees in the dark, using your coat to transport half a dozen stones you set to warming in the fire. You lay them down at your new position, circling close to your body on the ground. Donning your coat again and without a making a second fire at the new location, you slide down to the ground and attempt to drift off.

You hear a caw in your dreams and start awake, into a dozen pairs of raven eyes surrounding you. Your hand is at your gun as you scramble back from the birds, biting back a curse as you run your hand over a still hot stone. The ravens don’t move, and aside from the single pronouncement of their presence they don’t make a sound either. They simply stare.

You sit with your revolver aimed in their general direction, waiting for an action, any action. They disappoint you, continuing to hold themselves idle. The stalemate continues into the morning, broken only by a few seconds slip every hour or so. Despite your broken vigilance, the birds don’t seem interested in doing anything but keeping you in eyesight.

Around false down, one by one the birds shift their weight and depart, flying out into the brightening black. You are tired and unsettled by the experience, but there is little to do but rise and continue as normal. Bread. Coffee. Walk. The small signs persist, the same pattern of bushels standing out like mile markers now that you’ve begun looking until, at last, you find water.

A rushing stream up here is as good as finding a settlement. Snow can only provide so much water and in the warmer months it’s even more unreliable. Now is the time to cover your tracks, and you do so with a two foot tree branch, evening out your stride and making some false trails of animal tracks as you go. It is laborious, but well worth it.

Half as fast as the last two days, it takes you until the sun is coasting westward to find it. The smoke from the fires gives it away at first. You approach from a rather convenient ridge about a half a mile out. Before you is sprawled a village of at least two hundred…Indians as far as you can make out. Numerous columns of smoke rise from the fifty or so dugouts sprawled around a raised central platform. The stream borders it to the west, your ridge is the southern approach, and it’s nestled against steep mountain to the north and the east.

Around the village are poles about six feet tall, littered with the tied bushels of herbs in the same pattern that you’ve followed here. What’s more, bundles of dead ravens, decapitated, hang from them as well. There are also Indians milling about at their daily tasks in no great concentration. There are three poles in the center of the village in front of the raised platform which are decorated much the same as the others, with herbs and dead ravens. Also attached to each of the three poles happen to be white men in western clothing.

You could approach the village openly. Approaching out in the open and letting everyone know of your presence might be suicide, or it might prove your honest intentions. Only one way to find out.

You could sneak into the village. You would need to wait for dark to do this, your objective could be any number of things. If you were found out you would surely be branded a hostile invader. If you weren’t, you could gain information that could save your life, and try a different approach tomorrow.

You could wait and watch. Your position is a good one and seemingly uncompromised. Gathering more information on the village and the people within it is a very good idea.

You could also write in your own suggestion.

>Approach the village openly

>Sneak into the village

>Wait and watch

>Write in

>>5734031
>Wait and watch

The best option here.