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Long Game 3: Blackwater Village


Peng the Just

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You seem oddly chipper about the whole thing...

It's my ingenious strategy. I act so pleased about it that it becomes clear that I couldn't possibly be spiked and in doing so save myself! Or, more realistically, I confuse everyone!

 

Really it is just because why not? There is absolutely nothing I can do to prevent it so why be upset about it?

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Wark was on the floor shaking. This was the longest he had ever been without a drink since he has five. He almost reached for eh black faryn to get him through but stopped himself. If hew was going clean, he was going clean. End of.

 

Clan walked past his hovel and Baldrick started growling. That was as good a reason as any he thought. Also, if Clan died, maybe Wark could take over his tenements. He had a good working relationship with Maw, he would treat him fairly he hoped. Wark pulkled himself up and went oput into the fields. With all this killing, precious little work had been done, and none on the land. How would everyone eat? The ash was thick and the crops dying.

 

"If ahny one wahnts moi, Oi'll be in tha fields. Clan Oi feel it fair to warm yer that Oi'm after yer land when yer gone, soumh hours frum now."

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The cold corpse of Lents was somewhere it shouldn't - couldn't - be.

A heavy humidity filled the air, though the stone bunker was nearly buried in mud and greenery. Birdcalls echoed outside, and the stink of the Bloodsealer swamps washed over the room of scurrying attendants like a giant's yawn.

Golden ichor-alcohol was pumped into dessicated limbs, fabric was sewn around wounds, rods of wood and bone were pushed into the place of crushed bones.

A figure, swaddled in a red linen robe, entered the dim room, brightening it. Instantly, movement ceased as surgeons, taxidermists, and others in the business of making a Lifeless stood to attention. Colours bloomed now even in that stark and utilitarian place; the pallid hue of the corpse blazed suddenly ripe, nearly lifelike.

"Sir, it is prepared," the head surgeon, a tall, dark haired man said.

A nod from the one in red.

He stepped to the slab and spoke a few words.

Immediately, the colours of the corpse flushed into a uniform grey. The aura of brilliant colour washing through the room diminished by an imperceptible fraction.

And the corpse moved, each limb jerking slightly.

The attendants, foreign to the country, if not the planet, stepped back a little. Bloodsealing was a dark subject, outside of the marshes, and you only heard faint rumours of it. Perhaps exaggerated - clearly, a bonesealer couldn't just pick up your skeleton and send it off hunting like a hound; it took so much work to prepare a corpse for the ritual. And the colour draining, that wasn't in any of the stories either. Still, the body was reanimated, no doubt about that, and they were paid enough to remain silent.

"Leave," spoke the red-garbed man.

And that was that. They did. There was something about the man, the way colours bent in his presence and the way he walked, that made it obvious. You did as he said. End of discussion.

He deep pockets helped.

He was reaching under the slab now, pulling out a small wooden case. The man opened it, exposing a sheet of engraved metal on a loop like a medallion and a single soul stamp - a large one. An inkstone and dish were withdrawn from the same space beneath the slab, and ink was produced in smooth, rhythmic rubs.

The red-robed man finished with the ink, still in silence, and hung the medallion around Lent's neck. He dipped the stamp in ink, pushed it into Lent's navel, and gave it a twist. The seal rose, red and ridged.

The corpse's eyes snapped open, filled with gold ichor. He was blind. He tried gasping for breath, but he did that by choice; he felt no need for breath. The seal had changed something. He was Lifeless and living, broken beyond repair and mended to a something less and more than human.

As a tinker, Lents appreciated that. Sometimes, fixing things meant turning a mass of broken components into something new and better.

He took a deep breath, clearing eyes running over the sharp red of the seal on the colourless gray of his body.

"Clan," he whispered.

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You played a good game though still, Clan. At least you'll die with dignity. :D

Is it possible for us to maybe end the Day Cycle early? Maybe give a little bit more time for a few more votes, but I don't see anybody raising any major objections to us lynching Clan at this point...

"Those likeable bastards," Gamut found himself saying. "Those are the worst kind. When you kill them, you end up feeling guilty for it."

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Lents swung his legs over the side of the slab, and spoke to his saviour.

One short exposition later, he learnt several things:

First, that the residents of Blackwater knew where he was and what happened.

Second, that he would be kept abreast of events there.

Third, that he could communicate his words and votes back.

Fourth, that he could not leave the region, or the Forgery would fail and he would become again an automaton.

Lastly, that he was still subject to their laws. The Skybreakers were above no code, and he was not so valuable they would abondon themselves for that. If he was voted dead by the village, he would be slain on Sel. If someone who had the capacity would kill him there, he would be killed on Sel. Until the murderer was found, Lents was sitting beneath a spinning sword, even in that marsh among the stars.

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Clan, have you considered the Shaggy Defence TM. 

 

As in:

 

The goodie tineye scanned me

 

"It wasn't me"

 

Saw I was a spiked tineye

 

"It wasn't me"

 

Witnessed me killing villagers

 

"It wasn't me"

 

Heard Ruin mentioning lynches

 

"It wasn't me"

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Clan looked around at all the angry faces then shrugged. "When you need me, I'll be catching up on sleep."

 

Clan considered trying to fight the villagers, but he knew it was hopeless, he could never return to being what he once was.

"And maybe once this is all o'er I'll finally be able to get a proper storming rest. That'll be nice." A faint smile touched his lips as he walked away from the villagers.

 

@Gamma, I did enjoy our chats :) I believe we both successfully withheld giving the other any particularly useful information.

Edited by lord Claincy Ffnord
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Raubber sighs as the next body is brought forth "when will this nonsense end," he grumbles as he starts on the measurements. He had run out of coffins three bodies ago and had to resort to digging deeper holes as to make sure nothing could smell them and decide to dig them out. He decided then and there that, after this little farce is over, he will get himself an apprentice.

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Night 6
 
The villagers of Blackwater, led by Gamut, came to kill Clan as the sun set and the mists appeared. They found the old man lying on the floor of his room, a small glass phial lay empty beside him and on the wall was a final message:
Clandeathmessage_zpse782d37e.png
---------------------------
Clan was a spiked tineye!

 

the votes:

clan(9) clan, joe, meta, gamut, wark, selvar, swim, dane, chid

no vote(5) maw, alon, raubber, vizzini mabi

 

Night 6 begins now and will last about 48 hours! (yes, 48)

 

Notes: Clan insisted this be his death write up, so any up-votes for a cool write up should go to him. I will still gladly accept up-votes for running the game, however ;)

 

PMs are still allowed, as there is still at least one living tineye

Edited by jasonpenguin
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I have to say I totally called Clan being a Tineye. I messages Gamut a while back asking if he was suspicious of him at all. Clan, you were great at using the Steel Alphabet, but the Alethi was lacking a bit. Sorry. I was guessing it might be you based on your history with the Steel Alphabet.

Edit: I will post the translated messages here.

The first Tineye message: I started translating it and I discovered it is a song from Les Mis. There might be some changes from the original, but I got a stanza through and it was the same so...

The original song:

There, out in the darkness

A fugitive running

Fallen from god

Fallen from grace

God be my witness

I never shall yield

Till we come face to face

Till we come face to face

He knows his way in the dark

Mine is the way of the Lord

And those who follow the path of the righteous

Shall have their reward

And if they fall

As Lucifer fell

The flame

The sword!

Stars

In your multitudes

Scarce to be counted

Filling the darkness

With order and light

You are the sentinels

Silent and sure

Keeping watch in the night

Keeping watch in the night

You know your place in the sky

You hold your course and your aim

And each in your season

Returns and returns

And is always the same

And if you fall as Lucifer fell

You fall in flame!

And so it has been and so it is written

On the doorway to paradise

That those who falter and those who fall

Must pay the price!

Lord let me find him

That I may see him

Safe behind bars

I will never rest

Till then

This I swear

This I swear by the stars!

Edited by Mailliw73
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(Yes! High Prelan!)

Second Tineye message from the night:

Alethi: Tineye decoder you have not decided all of my last message. There is more. Aluays another secret. (Again, the problem with the sh and th)

Thaylen: Trst(Trust?) s(us/is/as?) nssr. (I know that Thaylen cuts out vowels)

Taravangian's code:

My reson with

These messages is to

Aid

You

With your killing

This way death ha meaning.

And Clan's final message:

I wil bring judgement to ______ dsrwt.

I couldn't figure out the numbers. It didn't fit with T's code. So... And I think "twrst" is trust.

Edited by Mailliw73
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Single ghost post.

 

@Mailliw73, I'm not surprised that my usage of the steel alphabet gave me away. You are completely correct about the Alethi though, my Alethi is very rusty and I had forgotten some of the keybindings in the font.

 

"but I got a stanza through and it was the same so" ah but was it? Do not automatically assume that what seems a spelling error is one. I don't often make them in Steel Alphabet ; )

 

I think you are trying to read the Thaylen upside down. So you know, you have not discovered every secret in any of my messages except the first. : )

 

Kudos to anyone who works out Clan's history before the game ends.

 

Cya later guys, it's been fun =)

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@Mailliw73, I'm not surprised that my usage of the steel alphabet gave me away. You are completely correct about the Alethi though, my Alethi is very rusty and I had forgotten some of the keybindings in the font.

"but I got a stanza through and it was the same so" ah but was it? Do not automatically assume that what seems a spelling error is one. I don't often make them in Steel Alphabet ; )

I think you are trying to read the Thaylen upside down. So you know, you have not discovered every secret in any of my messages except the first. : )

Kudos to anyone who works out Clan's history before the game ends.

Cya later guys, it's been fun =)

It helped that you have a link to the font I your sig that reminded me. ;) yeah, Alethi's what I've personally studied most so that's why I noticed those.

It probably isn't the same, I just really didn't want to go through and translate it all :P

Oh, I am.

Edited by Mailliw73
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