Log7th Sea: The Search for Salvation-2013/07/18-Jason-1

Game log for the 2013/07/18 session of 7th Sea: The Search for Salvation, as taken by Jason

Outside the palace gates, the mob is at a fever pitch. Reginald helps rile them up, while Felix circulates to make sure our revolutionary cadre stand ready to ambush the charge of the Lightning Guard. Once the Guard assemble and order the rioters to disperse, Reginald preempts them by throwing poo. The crowd follows his lead and instead of listening, they throw crap. The Guard charge the crowd.

The peasants have been better fed than expect due to Léon's work in the soup kitchen, and better armed due to the weapons smuggled in by revolutionaries. We end up with 8 free raises for mass combat, while the Guards' training gives them 7. Léon and Benito get stuck in to the fighting, determined to strike a blow for social justice in Montaigne. Felix and Reginald sympathize and all, but dude, we have a palace to infiltrate. Felix gets crowded in and ends up charging the Guard to break their line.

The Guard never see the ambush, riding fecklessly into our concealed wall of pikes. A concealed cannon hidden in a wagon fires and rips right through the charge. The surviving Guard stop trying to charge down the riot and act like it's a cavalry engagement instead. Léon ends up in a duel with a lieutenant of the Lightning Guard, who's been pulled off his horse. Léon has trouble penetrating his opponent's guard, the main-guache making a very effective parrying weapon, but leaps skillfully out of the way of his foe's counterattack. He's not so lucky the next time, the Guardsman striking twice with such quickness that Léon suffers a dramatic wound. Our Hero regroups and runs his foe right through, causing a pair of dramatic wounds. The lieutenant backs off a bit, having learned a little respect for Léon's blade.

Still, there's no way out of this mid-riot duel, and Léon is only barely able to parry the renewed attack. His counterstroke drives the defender of the privileged few to double parry with rapier and main-gauche, but to no avail. The proletariat stands victorious, at least insofar as this duel means anything.

Felix, heavily engaged, charges in and wins a little more renown. Benito stands his ground and collects a few more scratches. Reginald's luck with cobblestones deserts him.

The battle swings to a stalemate as Felix's command of the battle fails.

Felix pushes through the lines but collects a rich portion of flesh wounds, but the battle begins to turn against us. Léon also gets hit several times and takesa dramatic wound, crippling him. He sees one of the rioters struck down and chooses to rush into the fight to save the poor fellow. Felix, having made it close to the gate, sees the standard bearer for the Lightning Guard and rushes to take the banner. Felix rushes in in high stance, lunges, and takes him out on his reset stroke. Poor bastard never got a shot off. Now Felix has the banner of the Lightning Guard! He shoves the banner in his scabbard and begins moving back to deliver it into the hands of revolutionary leaders.

One of the cadre members steps up to heal Benito. Sadly he can't get the man's attention to go heal Reginald or Léon. Our successes even the battle out again.

Medics find Léon and Reginald. Apparently this peasant army is well supplied with wise women. Or maybe it's just that we have an entire city to fall back on. Felix uses all his drama dice to sprint through the battle and deliver the banner of the Lightning Guard to the leaders of the revolution. The Guard become bogged down in the midst of all this fighting, and become completely unable to control the city. The Musketeers didn't intervene because the Lightning Guard were handling the situation, so we can get through the gate free and clear.

Inside the palace, we're awed by the opulence. Mirrored walls, gold everywhere, and ceilings high as some cathedrals. Felix loots a few nicknacks and begins fantasizing out loud about burning the palace down. Eventually Léon recognizes Andre Leveque's voice around the corner and we have a brief discussion about whether we want to flee from him or solicit his help. Léon enters into a courtyard and finds Leveque, a platoon of Musketeers aiming in the other direction, and the sound of steel on steel fighting. The rest of us follow, keeping behind so as not to present too obvious a threat.

"Leveque! What is up, mon ami?"

Leveque briefly points a pistol at Léon but then lowers it. He then gestures to let Léon see a duel between the Captain of the Musketeers and the Captain of the Lightning Guard. Yowza. Léon asks for directions to the orb chamber. Andre agrees to tell him but not show him. The Musketeers have refused to fire on the crowd and Leveque must thus remain here to make sure that decision stands. As we follow the directions, we hear the report of mass musket fire. Oooh, that's bad.

It takes us some time to get to the chamber. Many doors in this area have been locked. We also find torture rooms, which cheers Felix not at all. We free every prisoner whose lock Felix can break. Still, we eventually get to the last door, which Reginald carefully opens. As he does so, he hears the clicking of a pistol hammer and a nervous voice asking "Who is it?" Reginald identifies himself and the other man turns out to be the Professor. There are about a dozen researchers down here and a few Musketeers.

The orb has grown and is almost touching the structure. It seems like it might be pulsating. Reginald begins going over the available scrolls and comes across one referring to the Well of Souls. If the fight upstairs is sending souls to this thing, that would be very bad. Henri recognizes that some of the markings on the scrolls correspond to marks on the controls for the orb. Léon uses sorcery to pass a note to his mother asking for help, and the Orb immediately pulses. We ponder the idea that the Orb is the gateway we use when we travel by Porté. No way to prove that. Anyway, Léon passes his mom a note asking her to come through. He then starts trying to blood the Orb. Oddly, his blood doesn't freeze. Neither does Reginald's. Henri confirms that the blood of convicts did freeze, so that's a clear difference right there. Reginald reaches out to touch the Orb and his hand passes right through it. We have a collective whoa moment. Reginald feels someone caress the back of his hand, and as he pulls his hand out the blackness stretches and sticks to it for a foot or so before snapping back.

Léon's mom steps through a Porté gate, and immediately wonders what the heck the Orb is. Reginald demonstrates how he can put his hand right through the orb. This time, nothing past the first knuckle of his hand comes back.

Léon and Pascal Bisset de Villanova go looking for other Porté sorcerors to help. They're running through the hall, along with Benito and Claude, when they spy the Captain of the Musketeers and his wife. They lead both back to the Orb chamber.

In the meantime, Henri has been messing about. He closed all the irises, which creates a platform under the orb one could use for study. He asks Reginald where to go from there. They try adjacent controls and various lights and indicators change, and then eventually the chandelier thing above the orb begins to change shape, branching out. As it expands, the orb begins moving down.

Reginald writes out a note asking for his fingertip back and sticks it into the orb. Nothing comes of it.

Léon, Pascal, and the Captain's Wife begin opening the portal below the orb. With superhuman focus, they begin opening the Porté hole in the universe wide enough to fit the orb. The sound is appaling, like millions of babies screaming in pain. Léon feels tremendous pain and the room begins shaking so much that it's difficult to stay upright. When the hole is just big enough, Henri yells for Reginald to hit the controls again. When he does so, the orb begins sinking down toward the portal. As it's about to go in, Reginald sees a face push out of the orb and look at him. Then it drops through the gap in spacetime, the hole snaps shut, and the impossibly horrible noise stops.

We sneak out, thanks to the more than ample diversion caused by the revolution. Felix does throw a candle toward some drapes at one point, but the Musketeers are on it. We get back to our hideway and hunker down.