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Sunday 19 August 2018

Lords of Olympus Campaign Report: King of the Sea, Lord of War




This week's session  of Lords of Olympus is written not by my guest-writer player, because he was absent this session, but by yours truly.  As such it will be a bit more point-form than the usual.


-Paneb and Ralph attended a grand ball in the underworld, in honor of Paneb being shown to be Hades' heir. All kinds of luminaries are invited, including some major undead, and dead historical figures.  Bob Shoggoth the dog shows Ralph how to get to the back garden where they smoke up with Bob Marley, Biggie Smalls, and Jim Morrison; he later dances with a zombie duchess, and gets introduced to Count Dracula and Albert Einstein.



Paneb, meanwhile, had confided in his father that he doesn't trust Hecate; his dad seems unconvinced, given that Hecate is basically his prime minister. At the ball he dances with Hecate, and the two share a great deal of menacing innuendo. After that, he hits on Dou-mu, the pretty Chinese death-goddess, and ends up sneaking out of his own party (being noticeably absent at the toast in his honor) to sleep with her.



-Elon Musk, Fito, Hudson (and his weird human pet Daffyd), Arrit and a badly-injured Brontes were stuck in the middle of the ocean, their submarine destroyed by a fight with a horrific sea-dragon. They manage to swim up to the surface of the water, where Elon pulls out an instant raft, and then they start to swim along the Atlantean Road until they get to an Island where they can rest.  While resting on the island, on a hunch, Fito creates a tiny Daemon that he will later tell everyone to contact via scrying instead of him.  Eventually, they decide to row out and back onto the Atlantean road, heading for Thalath, the city of the titan Pontus, in the hope of being able to finally contact Poseidon from there. Along the way, Briareus the Sea-Goat finds them. He reveals that the great sea-dragon was sent by Hera, who has found out about Arrit eating one of her (illegally obtained) apples, and she's out for revenge. He explains that it's essential that Arrit receive sanctuary from one of the three Olympian kings, for her own protection.

-Aetos, which is mostly not appearing in this adventure, was instructed by Athena (who pulled him out of The City earlier) to prove he truly believed in the self-determination of a people (what he was selling while he made war on the government of The City).  She wanted for proof that he return to his home realm, now fallen into chaos and civil war after his down disappearance, and not just stabilize his Greco-roman empire but make it a democracy. After some hemming and hawing, he agreed, taking the Minotaur with him.

-Meanwhile, Moon Girl had taken Helena out of the City and they were about to get out of there altogether. But first, an owl appears and starts talking to Helena in Aetos' voice, telling her a great deal of important intelligence that would be of vital importance to the rebellion. Without enough time to go back physically to tell Corey, Helena is obliged to use her scrying power (and reveal as much to Moon Girl) in order to contact Corey and pass her the info-dump.  That done, with the moon straight up in the sky, Moon Girl flies Helena up there, and Helena finds that the moon is being pulled along by a carriage driven by a quartet of flying oxen. The driver is one of Moon Girl's sisters, one of the menae, the 50 daughters of Selene. They fly slowly along the sky, the chariot pulling the moon behind it, until at dawn they dive under water, dropping off the moon in the deep and entering a great cave complex where the menae live with their mother, Selene the moon goddess. She is the one behind Helena's rescue, and tells her she'll try to answer all her questions.



-Corey, meanwhile, is the only one left in The City.  She's forced to organize the rag-tag rebellion only with help from Toilette, the daughter of Cloaca the sewer-goddess. They decide to prepare a bold concerted attack on all of the Ministers of the City and all the main Ministry buildings, trying to decapitate the whole of City government (except the Architect himself, who they can't find) in one fell swoop.

-Elon Musk's crew get the protection of Pontus and manage to contact the Nautilus with an old radio; Poseidon is on his way. Pontus has a chat with Hudson about Primordials, where Pontus advises him that if Hudson is looking for a specific primordial he may be able to speak with some of these alien gods, but if there's a later god that can help, the best choice would likely be Hecate.
That night, Hudson dreams that he is with Hypnos the god of sleep (after invoking him). Paneb is there too, it is the first time they meet. Morpheus (the god of Dreams), who is also there, tells Paneb that he has a brother. He also reveals that Hudson is somehow key to finding him, if Paneb wants to find him.
Paneb asks which of them is older; and Morpheus says his brother is, by six minutes. Paneb asks his name; Morpheus tells him that he can reveal his brother's current name, or his True Name. Paneb asks for his current name, and Morpheus says his current name is "Frank". Meanwhile, Hypnos tells Hudson some advice about being a Primordial, and warns him that there would be people who might try to abuse him. Hudson is advised by Hypnos that he should never let Hecate know about him, and that he should speak with Themis instead. The two PCs are told they should find each other.
When Hudson wakes up, he tells Pontus about this dream. Pontus disagrees with Hypnos; he warns Hudson that Themis has dangerous power, to control Primordials, and he should trust Hecate instead.



-Paneb wakes up, in his bed, with Dou-mu at his side. He remembers his dream and dismisses Dou-Mu and then goes to talk to his father. He tells Hades all about the dream, including the fact that Paneb would be the younger brother and thus NOT the heir to the Underworld. Hades is very impressed by the fact that Paneb cares more about finding his brother than ruling the Underworld.  Hades is disappointed that Paneb didn't obtain "Frank's" true name since that would have made finding him easier. He wants to ask Hecate for help, but of course Paneb still distrusts her intensely; this bothers Hades quite a bit, arguing that she is his best and most trusted advisor.
But he agrees not to tell her, for now, as there's one other recourse they could take: Paneb could make a show of touring his father's lands, and go to Erebus, the world of shadows, which is also a Primordial. If Erebus will answer Paneb's questions, then they won't need Hecate, but otherwise they'll call on her.

-Helena is in the cave of Selene. Selene explains to her that she is not Helena's mother, but that she is someone who wants to help her. She gives Helena a choice: if Helena wishes to forget forever about finding her true divine parent, Selene would be willing to claim that Helena was her own daughter, and thus petition Zeus to grant Helena  immortality.  On the other hand, if Helena wished to get the real answer to her parentage, she'd need to fulfill an epic quest.
Helena agrees to the quest, she wants to know who her true parent is. Selene offers her the chance to stay as long as she wishes before beginning the quest, and if she wishes, to train. Helena decides to learn some magic, training in Glamor and Enchantment.

-Ralph has been made Hecate's apprentice. He wants to learn primordial magic, eager for the most powerful magic Hecate says he could learn. But first, he needs to activate his innate metamorphosis. To do that, Hecate takes him to the river Acheron. Along the way she says that she has every confidence in him, that he is a skilled student and of powerful stock (implying she knows who Ralph's divine parent is). Then, when they get to the lethal river, Hecate uses some kind of telekinesis and throws Ralph in.



-In Thalath, the Nautilus arrives. The PCs meet Poseidon, king of the sea. Also, Captain Nemo. And various members of the nautilus crew, including Jacques Cousteau, Norbert the supply officer, and a "particularly stupid walrus". Poseidon is a dashing loud-mouth, ostensibly on a quest to slay The Kraken to avenge the death of Poseidon's best friend, Aquaman.  The PCs suspect he's also on a quest to get away from his nagging wife.  They tour the Nautilus and its various wondrous facilities: the nuclear engine, the highly-advanced gym and sauna facilities, the film studio for the documentary movies Cousteau makes about Poseidon's adventures, the Ping Pong room and bar, the walrus habitat, the hydroponics lab, the hangar for smaller subs, the hangar for the helicopter, the dorms, the officer's quarters, and the bridge.
Arrit speaks with Poseidon, and begs for his protection. A macho sucker for a damsel in distress, Poseidon agrees to grant the girl his protection, and that he'll have a word with Hera, since Arrit clearly had no idea what the power of the Golden Apple was, nor does she seem to know anything about the man who gave it to her.
Fito also speaks with Poseidon. He presents the theory that he's Poseidon's son. Poseidon (eventually) realizes their family resemblance. But he's not entirely convinced; he asks the ultra-paranoid Fito if he can look into his mind. Fito eventually and reluctantly agrees. There, Poseidon remembers the image of Fito's mother from his earliest infancy; Fito really is Poseidon's son!
The whole Musk team joins the Nautilus crew. Elon becomes the new engineer; Fito becomes 3rd mate, Arrit becomes the Walrus Liaison Officer, and Hudson becomes the janitor.

-Finally, Corey led the resistance assault on the government of The City. She and Toilette took an elite strike team to try to take out the Ministry of Justice, the central headquarters of the cyborg-zombie police force. After a massive shootout, they took out the soldiers kept in stasis, got into the armory, and then made their way up to the control center that allowed the government to transmit the orders to the zombified soldiers throughout The City. After another big firefight to get into the control center, by which time most of the rebels were dead, they arrived to face off with one of the non-zombified elite soldiers, and a super-cyborg. Corey faced off with the cyborg in a moderately difficult fight. At this point, a video transmission of The Architect, the governor of The City, manifested. The Architect claimed that The City was a necessity, that it guarded against the Door that Must Not be Opened, and that by disrupting the stability of the The City, Corey placed not only The City and its people at risk, but the multiverse and even the Gods themselves in danger.
Corey decided to shoot up every console in the room.



At that point, the door burst open and a powerful boisterous-looking man burst in, congratulating and praising her.  He identified himself as Ares, the God of War, and claimed she had exceeded his expectations. She was finally not just the warrior but also the strategist he'd been looking for and he couldn't be more proud of her. He also praised her that when, faced with the rational arguments of The Architect, she didn't let his reasoning persuade her but stuck to her destructive gut instinct.  The satanists who raised her clearly raised her well, Zeus bless them.
Ares wanted to take Corey away from The City, and would train her to be his new protege.
Corey didn't want to leave, however, until the revolution was assured. She still needed to find a way to 'light the sky on fire' as the signal to the people to rise up and join the rebel cause.
Fortunately, Ares said this would be no problem. He called down his flying chariot pulled by black steeds; black stallions who breathe fire. As they flew off, his horses spat out fire into the sky, giving the people the signal they sought.
To escape the prison-realm of The City, they passed through a portal, being maintained on the other side by a slim petite woman who was later identified as Eris, who also seemed enormously pleased with the work Corey had wrought. Leaving Eris to now begin her own work on The City, Ares flew off with Corey promising her training and a glorious new life as his general.

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