Tag: dark rituals

The Book of the New Moon Door: Chapter Eight

Wryght

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

Table of Contents

“I found this, under the bed,” says Isabel, concluding her retelling of the previous evening’s events to Brother Risoven. She hands him the lacquered bead before standing to gather the breakfast dishes.

Risoven holds up the bead and moves his lenses in and out from his face with the other hand. His owlish eyes squint and blink. Finally, he lowers both hands, turning the small object between his fingers. 

“It’s a prayer bead,” he says, with equal measures of confidence and confusion. 

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Chapter Seven

The Old Ghost

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

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She’s starting to think of it as real, this demon of legend, like a living thing she’s searching for in the dark corners of the city. Isabel sits back on the heels of her well-worn travel boots, letting her skirts fall around her and bringing the arm not holding the lantern in toward her chest. It’s cold, and the wind blows freely through the open aperture of the lighthouse. On the positive side, however, the temperature keeps the body from reeking after what looks like a couple of hours since death. 

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Chapter Six

The Lighthouse

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

Table of Contents

Lucian Warder. 

Isabel examines the record. The date beside Warder’s name is today’s, the twenty-first of Isra’s Moon. He must have gone to the library this morning, after word of the murder in the Shell District spread. Nothing unusual about that. Anyone would be curious—Isabel was, after all.

Still, it’s strange that she’s run into him twice in such a short time, and stranger still that he sought her out after everything that had happened last night. What did he say his device did? Banish restless spirits, rather like she does? What she does isn’t banishment, but that’s only the first of many problems she has with the concept of Warder’s device. 

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Chapter Two

Warder

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

Table of Contents

Isabel sits at the small table across from Brother Risoven, her tea growing cold and a piece of bloody-colored fungus lying on a scrap of paper beside it. It’s stained the paper a wet reddish brown, and it’s shriveled a bit, but otherwise it hasn’t changed noticeably from when she pulled it off the side of a shack in the Shell District last night. In the thin early morning light from the high, narrow windows of the chapel’s living quarters, it looks rather like a severed finger, dark and twisted from putrefaction. 

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The Book of the New Moon Door: Chapter One

Mikhail

The Book of the New Moon Door cover image: A book with yellowing, wrinkled pages lies open on an old wooden desk, with a sprig of lavender lying in the center.

Table of Contents

The gods weep when a Son of Galaser dies.

Berend would know. It rained for five days straight after the battle on Braenach Hill, when nine Sons out of every ten were slaughtered in the grass, seven years ago. He stood in the mud, afterward, water pouring down on his bandaged head, and listened to the announcement that he and the handful of others still standing would be out of work, as part of the terms of their employer’s surrender. 

Not many walked off that hill. Even fewer are still around. 

And now one of them is lying in six pieces on an embalming table. 

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Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea: Chapter XXV

Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea cover image: a wide, still river with forested mountain peaks rising on either side, underneath a clouded sky.
In which there is a confrontation with a god of war, and the ritual ends at last.

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Another shake rumbled beneath our feet, but the approaching figure did not stumble. I placed myself between the door and Khalim. We waited, hardly daring to breathe, as the footsteps echoing in the darkened corridor came nearer and nearer. Beyond the arena’s walls, weapons clashed and barricades were shattered as Reva’s miners confronted the city’s soldiers. I prayed to whatever god might be listening that they would be safe, and keep the Ascendeds’ forces from our backs. 

I stood between Jin and Jahan, and each had his sword at the ready. The air hummed and shimmered between their blades. I could almost hear the magic contained within. I felt a lingering fear in the knowledge of the power of these weapons, as much as I was grateful for their presence. If one could kill a god, what would it do to me, should I find myself on the wrong end of it?

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Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea: Chapter XXIV

Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea cover image: a wide, still river with forested mountain peaks rising on either side, underneath a clouded sky.
In which our heroes return to the arena under very different circumstances.

Table of Contents

The city still stood, and was recognizably itself, despite the fires that lit up its streets. Reddish light fell over the plain as the sun rose, casting the landscape in a bloody hue. There was a brief reprieve from the earthquakes, the aftershocks rippling under our feet, but for how long Phyreios would remain standing, I did not know. Aysulu’s horse stood with its legs planted wide, anticipating another shake.

“Oh, no,” Khalim whispered beside me. “No, no, no.”

He must have recognized the horror before him. He had seen it, and walked hundreds of miles to prevent it, and yet there it was, just as it had appeared in his nightmares. 

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Chapter Four: A Home Without Joy (Part Two)

The Well Below the Valley cover image: A dead tree stands on a field of short grass, against a blank gray sky. Bottom text reads, "A fan-made Call of Cthulhu module."

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The investigators have arrived at last at the seat of the cult’s power: the hollow island in the North sea. Already, the Great Mother’s servants are gathering, and they will stop at nothing to prevent our intrepid heroes from ending their evil and saving the world.

In Part One of this chapter, the investigators procured transportation and sailed to the island, hiding their boat and making their way over the jagged rocks to the underground temple. Armed with the spell in the Westmont Text, and possibly some explosives obtained in Dublin, they must now enter the temple and seal the Mother’s well for good.

(All page numbers refer to the Seventh Edition of the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook, published 2015 by Chaosium, Inc. I am in no way affiliated with Chaosium or the writers of the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game system. Content notes for this chapter: eldritch horror, cult activity, forced drugging, abduction, monstrous pregnancy and miscarriage, explosions, and geographic destruction.)

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Chapter Three: The Singer of Tales (Part Two)

The Well Below the Valley cover image: A dead tree stands on a field of short grass, against a blank gray sky. Bottom text reads, "A fan-made Call of Cthulhu module."

Table of Contents

The investigators are in Dublin, seeking an artifact and some information from the late professor’s demolitions team. The cult is here as well, and they are planning something even more terrible than they attempted in Oxmoor. A young woman, Grace Callahan, has already gone missing. The investigators are running out of time.

(All page numbers refer to the Seventh Edition of the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook, published 2015 by Chaosium, Inc. I am in no way affiliated with Chaosium or the writers of the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game system. Content notes for this chapter: violence, kidnapping, murder, blood sacrifice, eldritch horror.)

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Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea: Chapter X

Beyond the Frost-Cold Sea cover image: a wide, still river with forested mountain peaks rising on either side, underneath a clouded sky.
In which plans are made, and Eske catches feelings.

Table of Contents

“You all know why we are here,” Reva proclaimed, and the empty walls of the warehouse echoed her words back to her. “We are here to free Phyreios from the tyranny of the Seven Ascended. The festival has given us a chance to act. I need to know that all of you are with me.”

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