Magni Doesn’t Explode

Aedan informed Raj and Gabriel about everything they ever needed to know about recent shenanigans in Amber. Then he told them a few facts and let them mull it over, like cider. They promptly proceeded to the Patternroom. The Pattern was lacking a big monster, but it wasn’t exactly back to normal. Several parts of it were noticeably dimmer than before. These parts probably coincided with where gouts of beasty/elder blood had spilled.

Gabriel sketched the Pattern, concentrating so hard that he failed to notice something. Raj sat beside him and kept him from exploding. Soon enough, Magni and Aedan showed up. They ignored Gabriel and Raj. Aedan showed Magni that the Pattern had two ends: a beginning end and an end end. Magni set foot upon the one, proved he was related to Oberon somehow, and began to seriously monopolize GM time.

Magni walked the Pattern, although that is an understatement. He grappled with the biggest bowel movement of his life. He climbed a mountain of Sisyphian dimensions using only his tongue and teeth. He crawled through a tunnel filled entirely with oogy snakes that didn’t like him very much. He kept walking.

The others watched. At one point, Magni had four arms, although that could have just been a hallucination1. Gabriel drew. Raj shouted encouragement. Aedan just shouted. Eventually, Magni reached the center of the Pattern. Despite what that other chronicler may have written, he didn’t do a hundred jumping jacks, squat thrusts, and sit-ups at that point. After a moment of shouting back and forth to his audience, he disappeared.

Old Acquaintances

Aedan checked in on his old buddy Gwydion the Alchemist in the not-so-secret Alchemy Labs beneath the castle. Gwydion had survived the foliating of Amber, but his labs still contained a remnant of the jungle: a fae wizard with extremely tufty eyebrows. Aedan interrupted Lord Tufty’s experiment and didn’t cause an explosion.

The next morning found Gregory, Gabriel, and Aedan hard at work converting the food in the pantry into fertilizer. Gregory extolled the virtues of fried, greasy bacon so well that Aedan ate Muesli. Gabriel displayed his sketches of the Pattern, explaining how one could tell the different “moods” the Pattern had by its subtle nuances. Gregory displayed great tact and made the soon-to-be regretted “elven bimbo” remark that caused him to spend the next game two thousand miles away hiding from said bimbo’s player.

Magni stumbled up long enough to pronounce that the black areas on the Pattern were more difficult to traverse than the other parts, presumably including the veils. He expressed his belief that an entity of some kind opposed his walk—a twenty-foot tall blue, greasy-skinned bad guy who only bore no resemblance whatsoever to Mark Johnson.

Trump Codes Invented

There was some speculation over the safety of using Trump. Gregory, Gabriel, and Aedan worked out a series of Trump Codes:

            I have information

            I need assistance here now

            I am in trouble but don’t try to rescue me

            Pull me through

            I am lying

            We are being overheard 

And one or three others which immortals with high warfare would have thought of but we didn’t. These codes were phrases and gestures which would be used when speaking with someone via trump to convey secret information and will undoubtedly save our asses in the near future—or get us killed. In fact, this is a good “How Cruel is Our GM” litmus test.

Magni left a note for Martin informing him that he was leaving for the Courts of Chaos immediately and subsequently passed out for a couple days. Gregory slandered poor, innocent Mandor before riding off into the sunset. Gabriel investigated Shadow and discovered that Trump could be eaten off of with minimal hassle as the cards came perfectly clean when run under a faucet. Aedan trumped Caine and the card went cold like he was going to get through.