"Misunderstood? He tries to hurt people and that's not very nice," Seripan points out. "Those traps him and his friends set out in the forest, they sometimes hurt people who weren't doing anything besides just passing through."
"Look, it probably wasn't nice of Reckless Rhona to come in and build her clock tower where she did either but that was a long time ago," the grig adds, awkwardly rubbing the back of her neck. "The town's not going anywhere - well, mostly not - and it takes waaaaay too much energy to hold a grudge, you know? Besides, fey like Cerotious and I, we like it here and we've made friends. We try to help out where we can and none of us would want to see anyone hurt for something that happened ages ago."
"And besides, I-whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute."
Seripan stares at Frankie.
"You met a goblin that was nice? You've got to be joking, right? You're pulling my legs, right?"
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Jan looks nervous as his suspicions of the existence of a fairy mound is confirmed.
"An actual fairy mound? And it was tampered with by the person who created the clock tower? I understand that you aren't MAD about it, but I am sure that some of the FEY must be livid."
Jan looks at Lazarus and pauses briefly.
"Fairy Mounds are very sacred places... I don't know if this clock tower being here...regardless of how long it has been in this place isn't some form of sacrilege. We need to speak to the Druids of the area... or the local Fairy Queen... or even a dryad or some other FEY creature who might not be as inclined in forgiving the tower's presence as our good friend here is."
Jan's voice becomes very cautious...
"What if this 'experiment' invokes some magic that we don't understand? What if it does something sinister to the local Fey? What about the humans who aren't Fey? This whole endeavor might spell disaster."
"I am no wizard or scholar of the arcane. I serve a higher power... Gozreh and the Spirits of Nature. We must ensure that we aren't the reason for some calamity."
"Fairy Queen? I don't think we have one of those here," Seripan remarks, seemingly unconcerned by Jan's sudden nervousness. "Or at least we haven't in a long time. But that's a very nice thought - most humans aren't that thoughtful about such things unless they've been to wizard school or serve a god, like you do."
"Oh. Yes, yes, it's not worth saying the name after sunset." Denair nods. "Building the tower on the fairy mound would be contentious. But destroying the town..." she shakes her head. "We can't control everything, and that's okay. Sometimes you need to go with the flow."
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Some of this information is beyond my ken and warrants further research either here or elsewhere, when the opportunity arises.
"Seripan, your tales fascinate me. I was so lost in thought that I forgot to simply enjoy the story."
The samsaran glances at the door to the inn, looking for the pixie.
"Cerotious should be here soon to take us on a tour of the clocktower. Care to join us, Seripan?"
"Oh! Sure thing, my legs could use a stretch," the grig responds amiably. "I know you're here to help Mayor Ogden but I'm sure Cerotious is tickled salmon to have new folks here to see the tower. He's been doing some research of his own, you know, about the fey circle, and I'm sure he'll be happy to tell you alllllll about it."
She glances at Jan. "Maybe that'll help you feel a little better? The only angry fey I personally know of is...is...well, You-Know-Who, and you probably don't want to go looking for him."
"Don't worry, Mayor Ogden has this under control and I'm sure the rest of you do too! She wouldn't have brought you here if she thought it'd make a problem. Well, besides with Mayor Mieren but he's always been a bit of a stick-in-the-mud anyway!"
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"It's certainly possible the clocktower was built upon something it shouldn't have been. We'll ask Cerotious. Unless we see some evidence of an earlier site, we'll have to wait until after Mayor Ogden's experiment, before we can begin a thorough archaeological excavation around and beneath the tower."
When the pixie meets the party at the inn, Lazarus asks, "Cerotious, are you aware of what might have been at the site of the clocktower before the present structure? Jan expressed concerns about a connection between the more recent troubles and something perhaps buried there in the ancient past."
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Jan gives a stern glance at Lazarus,"Maybe we should look at the tower and try to figure out what stones or other pieces of the mound have been used in the towers construction... I mean you and I both can detect magic and know about spells and such, but I must admit your knowledge is far greater than my own."
"All I know is what I have learned growing up in a land where FEY were either attracted to the LIGHT or DARKNESS... the later was never good for humans...There are stories of mighty warriors going to fairy mound and disappearing, never to been seen again or coming home after what they thought were just a few hours in the fey realms only to discover thirty years have gone by without them."
Jan becomes sullen...
"I am going to need a few moments to commune with the Spirits of my Ancestors and ask for Gozreh's guidance before continuing."- Jan leaves for approximately one hour.
Jan leaves the group and goes just outside of town where his hastily constructs a simple shrine of piled stones... after burying 30 pieces of silver and small votive (a carved acorn) underneath it-as an offering.
"Spirits of Nature, I seek your guidance.... [go on for another 10 minutes... Father of Nature, Mighty Gozreh, give me some sign of how you would like me, your humble servant, to continue in the matter currently at hand."
Getting no clear answer, Jan returns in a somewhat bewildered state.
"The gods are silent of this matter, which means we should proceed with caution as not to offend them or the balance of Nature."
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Cerotious seems a bit flustered by Jan's rather abrupt departure as soon as he arrives but he quickly recovers as Lazarus inquires about the clock tower.
"Ah! Well, even as we speak Ogden’s lesser apprentices are moving her timepieces to various places within the Tower, but yes, my focus is on the circle specifically."
Clearly eager to have a fresh audience, the pixie launches into a rapid-fire explanation while Seripan chuckles softly and rolls her eyes.
"You see, most of the speculation up to this point thinks that Reckless Rhona messed up her construction...but I don’t think so. No, I think that the fey circle interfered with her design somehow, and that’s why part of the town disappears...I just have to prove that somehow."
The pixie pauses for a moment. "Aurelia mentioned that an unbiased and fresh set of eyes might reveal insight otherwise clouded by staring at it too long. As the senior assistant researcher and Head Pixie on the Clock Tower Deciphering Project, or the CTDP, I take any potential leads very seriously."
"Since you're officially part of the CTDP, in a roundabout way, maybe the group of you can pick out something that the rest of us have overlooked," the pixie smiles, a slightly hopeful note in his tone.
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Frankie frowns at the news that 'Ma' fey is just plain old mean. He'd met plenty of those types of people before. Some were mean all the time, and some only mean when they drank too much or didn't get what they wanted. Mean is mean and Frankie understood that.
"Dragbog? Yup, he was super nice and helpful! He helped us save this Elf drood guy? He was all tangled up in the fire and Dragbog helped us find him." Frankie nods emphatically "He wasn't too bad at hide n seek either." Not as good as me, but not bad..
As Jan and Laz start getting into serious adult talk Frankie just glazes over and busies himself with a fun game of marbles.
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"So you want us to seek the hidden stuff up in the tower... that sounds really fun and easy. Anything that stands out as weird? Or something specific?" He flicks another marble across the table, knocking another onto the floor.
After another moment of thought, and another shot marble, Frankie looks up "Do you have badges for us? If we're in your CTDP team? I mean, we won't feel like REAL parts of the team unless we have a badge to show people in case they ask.." His eyes dart around at the two Fey for any signs of official badges.
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"Mm...well, there's...actually, I don't think my words could really do it justice. You'd have to see it for yourselves," Cerotious replies.
"Badges?" Cerotious repeats. He turns towards Seripan. "Hey Seripan, do we have any-"
Seripan bellows loudly, causing several nearby patrons to jump. She immediately breaks down into gales of laughter.
"Hee hee heeeeee! Oh I'm sorry, I know that's the oldest of chestnuts but I couldn't resist, you gave me such a perfect opening!"
Cerotious sighs; a heavy, put-upon sigh.
"Well okay, now that that's out of the way...seriously. Do we have any badges?"
Still giggling, Seripan manages a nod. "Yeah, yeah, I think I can whip something up while we wait for Tall, Blonde, and Serious!"
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Jan will search the exterior of the clock tower for any obvious 'fairy stones' using both magical and mundane methods.
Detect Magic.
If Jan finds something- Calling inside to his comrades, "Hey guys come take a look at this."
If Jan doesn't find anything- Jan will join his companions inside after they have long begun their interior search, "So did you find anything unusual on the inside? The exterior was rather unremarkable... magically speaking."
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Frankie races up to the tower with the others "Oh are we ready for the tour now? BOOYAH! Last one to the top is a rotten cabbage!" He races inside, doing his best to be first, eyes darting all around in search of 'cool' or 'neat' stuff.
"Oh cool I found a gear looking thingy!"
"Oh cool, check out that wheel!"
"WOAH! That looks like a petrified sandwich!"
"SO. MANY. LEVERS!"
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It takes some time but around the time that Jan returns from his sojourn out of town Seripan returns with new, shiny badges for everyone, including herself and Cerotious.
"Here we are, our first ever batch of badges! Wear them with pride for the CTDP!"
And with that, it's time to get down to business. You all follow Cerotious back out of the Oaken Knot, Seripan fluttering along behind you. But you don't get more than two steps before a miniscule, green-skinned humanoid wielding a needle-thin rapier flutters up, held aloft by a pair of dragonfly wings.
"There you are," the little fey squeaks, pointing to Zav. "Mister Jamel sent word that there's an increase in both fey and wildlife activity in and around the Embeth Forest's border tonight and he'd like for you to come help them on patrol until after the convergence has passed."
From seemingly nowhere he suddenly produces a hastily-scribbled note, bearing Mayor Ogden's sigil. "I already informed Mayor Ogden and she said that it would be okay for you to go; she has plenty of faith that the rest of your friends can take care of the business she has for them here."
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After parting ways with Zav, just for a little while, you hurry on towards your destination. In the center of "unstuck" Uringen stands the Clock Tower, a five-story edifice constructed of blue-gray stone and mottled with pearlescent white blocks. At the very top, the clock faces align to the cardinal directions, while long arms of weather-tarnished metal click out the hour and minute, but the four faces do not depict the same time. The time on the western face moves the most erratically, with its arms swinging backwards and forwards, while the northern face depicts an accurate time. On each floor, glass windows break up the monotony of stone, but even these are covered with arcane scripts and sigils from an eclectic variety of arcane traditions.
As Cerotious leads you inside you can see that almost every available wall is taken up by bookshelves stuffed with ledgers recording the Clock Tower’s behavior since Uringen’s founding. There's a flurry of activity here as plain-robed apprentices can be seen setting up delicate apparatuses, while others walk slowly up the wooden stairs to the next floor.
"Here we are," Cerotious beams. "Feel free to look around. Oh! And yes, you're free to go all the way up to the top if you like."
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Needing no further invitation several of you do indeed get down to the business of 'looking around'. Jan decides to examine the outside base of the Clock Tower first, scanning for magical auras while Lazarus has a look inside, following the same protocol. Both men quickly see many, many auras that are revealed to be transmutation auras after some additional scrutiny, emanating from the white stone blocks. Closer inspection of the blocks indicates that they are made of the crystalline stone known as quartzite instead of the more common granite.
On the inside, Frankie is too enraptured by the gears of the clock to pay attention to much else but Denair's keen eye quickly notices that the stonework of this floor is inscribed with numerical sigils, along with five repeating shapes. In addition, she notices that one of the five shapes, four-sided tetrahedron, is subtly embedded multiple times in the stonework, glass, and in the clockwork gears that run up the central shaft of the tower.
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Magical fey muzak setting a pleasant mood, Lazarus considers the challenge this fascinating place presents. "To ensure we have an opportunity to examine each floor, perhaps we should move quickly. We can conduct a more thorough search if we have time."
After a prayer to the Song of Spheres for guidance, the wizard-priest gets to work on the ground floor, taking a look at the crystalline stones emitting auras of transmutation.
"Huh. Numbers everywhere." Denair points at the many symbols and sigils around the tower.
"That's a lot of metal." Denair scratches her head.
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Frankie happily accepts his badge, pinning it to his shirt with pride. He loves it so much he gives out hugs to everyone before breaking into 'serious inspector Frankie' persona "Listen up everyone. We need to do this thoroughly and quickly." He models his tone and body language after Laz as he's certainly the smartest and most serious of the crew. He quickly gets to work: pointing, watching, and counting.
Frankie's eyes start to latch on to the workings, but is it enough?
"This place is fun, but I bet the NEXT floor is even MORE FUN!" He grabs up a spare gear lying around, stuffs it in his pocket and races up to the next level. All that can be heard from up above is a muffled "Woah."
After double-checking the time and realizing that you should have plenty of it to spend poking around in the tower, several of you begin to relax and examine its intricacies with a more thorough eye. While the workings of the clock gears seem to be beyond Denair and Meredith's understanding, Yorad is quick to notice an anomaly in the mechanism. It seems that some of the gears should not be moving at all, or should be moving in the opposite direction, if they worked as typical gears. Frankie is able to confirm this as well.
Feeling a bit stymied by the ground floor, Lazarus is the first to ascend the wooden steps up to the second floor. The walls of this wooden balcony are filled with shelves of papers. Three-foot-tall fences are all that stands between the balcony and the intricate spire of gears that extends from the floor below, growing thicker and wider as it ascends to an impenetrable tangle twenty feet above.
Up here Lazarus has a better view and is now able to assess the tower's stonework a little more closely. He notices that each stone seems to have been individually carved and fitted into its resting place, with no mortar used to hold the structure together— merely pressure and gravity. Working together with Frankie he is also able spot more of the same numerical sigils from the ground floor as well as a second of the five repeating shapes that Denair first spotted. This second shape is that of a hexahedron with six sides . They also see that the floor here bears the first primary shape from the ground floor and the ceiling above bears the shape of an octahedron .
While the repeating shapes certainly seem significant, the nature of the numerical sigils is more elusive and Lazarus remains unable to make any sense of them.
The pearlescent white blocks that appear here and there in the stonework of the tower appear to be quartzite instead of the more common granite. They also radiate an aura of transmuatation magic.
Denair noted that the stonework of the ground floor is inscribed with numerical sigils as well as 5 repeating shapes. One of the 5 shapes, a four-sided tetrahedron is subtly embedded many times in the stonework, glass, and the clockwork gears of the ground floor. She also noted that the ceiling of the ground floor was inscribed with a six-sided hexahedron .
Lazarus has noted that the stone blocks that make up the tower have been individually carved and fitted into place, relying on pressure and gravity alone to hold them in place.
On the second floor, Frankie and Lazarus found more numerical sigils like the ones Denair found on the ground floor. There is also one of the 5 shapes subtly present in the architecture here as well, this time a six-sided hexahedron . On the ceiling above is another of the 5 shapes, this time an octahedron .
Denair and Meredith moves up to the third floor. Denair scans the area.
But neither she nor Meredith notice anything.
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The samsaran follows Meredith and Denair up to the third floor, surveying the new level for magical auras first, then muttering more prayers to Desna and taking a look around.
"I wonder what Jan learned in his examination of the tower's exterior?" Lazarus wonders aloud. "We could use his help investigating the tower's interior, as well."
He moves to one of the windows and calls out to Jan below. "Brother, we need your eyes, if you can spare them."
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Hearing his Samsaran colleague request that he join the rest of the group, Jan will venture up to whichever level the rest of his friends are currently on.
Looking around, Jan will use a combination of mundane and magical investigation...
- if any of the structure might fall within this area of knowledge.
- to see if the stones or anything else has religious significance.
"Hey Laz... what about this... do you think this might be important?"
After having spotted and studied the sigils on both the first and second floors, it becomes even more clear that investigating the details of the clock tower is something that really can't and shouldn't be rushed. With this in mind you all begin to adopt a very slow and steady approach to investigating the last three floors...
Third Floor
Much like the floor below it, the third floor is composed of a wooden balcony and stone walls filled with shelves of papers. Three-foot-tall fences are all that stands between the balcony and the intricate spire of gears that extends from the floor below, growing thicker and wider as it ascends to an impenetrable tangle above.
On this level you all discover the shape of a d4 on the floor and numerous d8s that repeat themselves all through the stone and glasswork. On the ceiling, the shape of a d12 can be seen...
Fourth Floor
The fourth floor is much the same as the second and third, though decidedly smaller as the tower narrows the higher one climbs. Wooden steps lead from here up to the belfry.
Here, you notice the shape of a d8 on the floor and many d12s that repeat all through the level. On the ceiling above, the shape of a d20 looms large...
Fifth Floor (Belfry)
The top of the Clock Tower is swathed in bright light and large open windows provide a rather breathtaking view of Uringen and the surrounding countryside. The numerous gears that drive the clocks spin and tick, three of them in time and the fourth decidedly out of sequence with the rest.
Now at the very top of the tower, it doesn't take the group of you very long to spot the shape of a d12 present in the stonework of the floor here. And, as you likely expect by this point, the d20 shape is repeated all through this level amid the stone, glasswork, and gears. There are no shapes to be seen on the ceiling here, which seems to make sense considering there are no further levels beyond this one.
Once you've finished your survey of the belfry you begin making your way back down to the ground floor, confident that you've at least spotted everything there is to spot. But what does it all mean? Jan is certain that there is no religious significance to any of the sigils or shapes that you've discovered, so they seem likely to have some sort of meaning rooted in the arcane, instead.
(1) The pearlescent white blocks that appear here and there in the stonework of the tower appear to be quartzite instead of the more common granite. They also radiate an aura of transmuatation magic.
(2) Lazarus has noted that the stone blocks that make up the tower have been individually carved and fitted into place, relying on pressure and gravity alone to hold them in place.
(3) Denair noted that the stonework of the ground floor is inscribed with numerical sigils as well as 5 repeating shapes (d4, d6, d8, d12, d20). One of the 5 shapes, a d4 is subtly embedded many times in the stonework, glass, and the clockwork gears of the ground floor. She also noted (forgot to include this earlier) that the ceiling of the ground floor was inscribed with the shape of a d6.
(4) On the second floor, Frankie and Lazarus found more numerical sigils like the ones Denair found on the ground floor. There is also one of the 5 shapes subtly present in the architecture here as well, this time a d6. On the ceiling above is another of the 5 shapes, this time a d8 and on the floor is the shape of a d4.
(5) On the third floor, you noted more of the same numerical sigils and a similar pattern of shapes. The floor features a d6, the ceiling a d12, and repeating all through the level are d8s.
(6) On the fourth floor, more numerical sigils and shapes. The floor here features a d8, the ceiling a d20, and repeating through the level are d12s.
(7) On the fifth and final floor, still more numerical sigils and still more shapes. There are no shapes on the ceiling but the floor features a d12 and repeating all through the level are d20s.
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Lazarus considers the pattern of the carved stonework in the floors, walls, and ceilings. "I've seen old tomes describing this pattern of shapes before. The ancient forerunners of the cabal called Wizards of the Coast were a group of misfits organized in a nascent corporation called 'TSR'. They used similar shapes in their occult rituals, having not yet produced the d10. Some critics accused the group, falsely, of being infernal."
"Just a peculiar pattern of the masonry, progressing from 4 to 20 from the ground floor to the top, or does the stonework provide some clue we're overlooking?"
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Jan is still uncertain that proceeding with the experiment is the best course of action, but lacking any stronger evidence, other than a gut-feeling, Jan is resolved to help his companions in their investigation.
Turning to Lazarus, "Is there anything that you can deduce regarding the magics that are at work here?"
Taking a deep breath,"Laz, I know that I might appear overly concerned and even a bit paranoid- but the legends of my people are filled with numerous tales of those who messed with unknown powers... for no other reason than curiosity... which had dire consequences for entire peoples. Again, I must caution us against doing anything foolish as we proceed."
As you all return to the ground floor, still musing aloud on your discoveries and their meaning, Cerotious flutters up to you.
"Ah, there you are! You took your time looking around, yes? Wonderful! I had a feeling that I was dealing with a group of consummate professionals," the pixie chatters away. "What do you think? Were you able to learn anything of interest?"
His eager expression falters somewhat when he catches sight of the pensive expression on Jan's face, however.
"What? Is something wrong?"
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"Well, Cerotious, we noted that in the lowest level of the clocktower, the builders mixed pearlescent, quartzite magical stones that still emit an aura of transmutation among the rest of the stones. We also noted that the builders cut the stones in various polyhedron shapes and used them in construction in a sequence progressing from 4 sides at the bottom to 6, 8, 12, and 20 at the top. We're not sure what that might mean, though a numerologist or mathematician might glean more. We suspect the tower was built upon some powerful fey site. This might explain the clocks' strange rotations in time."
Lazarus queries the rest of the team. "Did I forget to mention anything?"
"Ahhh, you did notice the shapes too," Cerotious nods, sounding pleased. "Shape and form are so much more important to us of the First World than those of this world. I’m glad that you agree that these patterns are significant. Aurelia wasn’t so sure that they were more than an artful design, but I think these shapes and numbers are tied to the nature of the tower somehow."
The pixie hovers, looking thoughtful. "Nothing else that you've noted is new to me but I'm still glad to have fresh eyes help confirm what we already know. There's not really any way for us to prove it now but those quartzite blocks? Aurelia and I have long suspected that Reckless Rhona intentionally took them from the fey circle to use in the construction of the tower. Perhaps Reckless Rhona wasn't actually quite so reckless, eh?"
"Well, at least not in one sense," Cerotious quickly adds, glancing at Jan.
"But anyway, I very much appreciate you coming to have a look around," he smiles. "You've still got a little time before you'll need to take your positions outside, if there's any last-minute shopping or the like you'd want to do. Normally the shops would all be closed by this hour but given that Uringen is about to witness a momentous event, I'm positive that most of the shops will be open for just a little bit longer yet."
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"Cerotious, could you show me the way to one Uringen's alchemist shops? We've been told the town is famous for its alchemical wares, and I'd like to consider a purchase while we're here."
Five floors and a sequence of numbers, 4, 6, 8, 12, and 20. 4 on 1, 6 on 2, 8 on 3, 12 on 4, and 20 on 5. Prime numbers? No. Add, subtract, divide or multiply the number of the blocks sides by the number of the level where they're located? Add the number of sides of blocks on all floors, walls, and ceiling of each floor? 10, 18, 26, 40, 20? Lazarus mulls these possibilities and more, but the samsaran perceives no meaning from the results.
"Some people have a knack for number puzzles. But this one seems beyond my ken. How about the rest of you?" Lazarus asks his companions.
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As the group waits for the appointed time to come, Jan can't shake the feeling that something tragic is about to happen.
The magic of this place is not of this plane... I guess we will see what the First World has in store for us.
Turning to the group, "You guys buy any supplies you might need. I am going to stay here." Jan places his hand on FEYKILLER's haft and looks down at the axe's blade, "We shall see... we shall soon see."
"Oh of course, there's one right down the street," Cerotious explains. "Marduke's Magic Mixology, they should have nearly anything you could need!"
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