RBF Scenario: The Spiral Path

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This page describes the Spiral Path campaign for Rangers of the Blue Flame. Only Guardians of Mystery should read this page!

What the rangers know at the outset:

• Bishop Chrizon, a Porcian and the highest priest of the popular Oshtan religion, is making a speech in the Senate Chamber proposing that all major religions of the sector should have a vote, just as nations do.
• A terrorist squad arrives at the senate building to try to capture or assassinate Chrizon. The guards can't handle all of the attackers, so the rangers must help.
• If questioned, the terrorists state their motives clearly, that Oshtanism only rewards greed and wealth and is therefore corrupt. In their view, capturing or killing Chrizon would highlight this. The terrorists individually have all different religions.

The MYSTERIES you GUARD:

The following is ancient lore that underpins the events of the campaign. Players do not know any of it at first, and learn it over the course of the game.

Teth Background

• Teth or "The Teth", symbolized by a spiral, is a "real" religion that has existed since the birth of the galaxy. In a language that no longer exists it meant "The Ten", referring to the original circle of cult elites.
• The Teth is worshipped strictly as "The Teth", but in actuality it comprises dozens of "real" gods, each with a portfolio or style such as flesh, fire, hate, etc.
• Individual Teth gods such as Amakthel were once mortal psionics users but, through arcane rituals involving the orchestrated genocide and soul-harvest of many worlds, ascended to a higher dimension, in which they are small, weak beings but experience overwhelming joy, an addiction.
• Every so often, are drained of energy and must return to our dimension to commit new genocides to sustain their existence on this higher plane. They do not all return at the same time but often in small groups to support each other.
• To attract followers and boost their numbers in these soul harvests, they provide rewards and select one aspirant to join their ascension.
• As drained, weakened gods on our plane, their power is only enough to twist space, time and flesh , and spawn horrors in ritually marked areas. Outside of these areas they can only send visions and empower followers. As the murders accelerate, their power grows until they have trivialized all of reality once more.
• Because they are vulnerable in this period, they hide what remains of their physical bodies to avoid being physically harmed or killed. To our perception, these bodies are gigantic, mutated, eviscerated and dead, but destroying or further separating even one of them, using rare weapons and chemicals, could extinguish one of their number and frighten the other Teth enough to go seek genocide elsewhere.

Zerai Background

• Zerai, symbolized with a "Z", is the name of a mortal religion in the Blue Flame Sector which is not entirely "real". Adherents of Zerai are called "The Zerai" and their god, who does not exist, is also called "Zerai".
• Zerai was created over a million years ago, after the Lapins' home system was destroyed by Krysh, pulled into a star, killing 10 billion and resulting in the Demon's Eye black hole system.
• A being of the 5th dimension, taking pity on the innocent, shared some of the above information with a Lapin governor named Talla who had some teleportation ability. Talla misunderstood the words, however, believing Zerai to be a god when in reality it was simply a word of warning.
• Still, Talla understood that the Teth were vulnerable to the right materials. Organizing opposition into a patchwork fleet, Talla was able to nearly kill Amakthel by taunting him to show his physical form, and then cutting it into many pieces, scattering them into suns and gas giants, ending the Teth's rampage of her time.
• Amakthel was nearly destroyed, though his surviving limbs still sustain his astral body.
• Believing that the Lapin would soon die out, Talla taught of Zerai, specifically intending to teach many people and not tie the religion to any one nation.
• Today, Talla is only remembered in a Lapin folk song which has lost most of the details over the years. No Zerai or Alliance archives recall any of the saga of Talla. The information exists only in lost and obscure places.
• The Zerai exist today in a similarly degraded and misremembered fashion.
  • Zerai today is a minority religion of psionics who try to do good in all ways and track down criminal psionics to aid local law enforcement.
  • Because their work is charity, Zerai today are often poor. Occasionally, a deceptive enterprise will steal their brand name for nefarious ends.
  • Zerai teachings only tell adherents that misuse of psionics, and the study of necromancy, is evil and dangerous. They believe that the spiral symbol indicates necromancy or vampirism, which is not necessarily true.

  The Teth's Current Cycle

  • Amakthel, Sep, and Krysh's astral bodies were severely beaten when they challenged a higher dimensional archon named Aryel in an attempt to gain control over part of the 5th dimension, sending them back to the pain of existence in reality.
  • Sharing thoughts, they plan a more coordinated harvest this cycle.
  • Sep will use his necromancer cults to distract and tie up security forces with repeated raising of the dead into undead horrors.
  • Amakthel will infiltrate followers into every major religion of the sector, aiming for high positions. First, they will promote increased sympathy for religion, then the prominance of religion in general, then the primacy of religion, then, pious conversions of Zeth, with a fixation on pain and suffering.
  • Krysh will use his cults to ground spacecraft, destroy satellites, and trap the unrepentant in arcane mazes, ruining the ability of different worlds to communicate and warn each other.

  If the Rangers do nothing:

  • Key leaders who are competent and care about society in the Sector disappear at an accelerating rate, without any trace. This includes:
  • Corrupt and selfish religious leaders come to power first in religions, then in politics in all powerful positions.
  • Propaganda paints politicians, academics and psionics as lying enemies, defunding and eliminating them from prominence in public life.
  • The image of Teth is rehabiliated as "we are all one religion in suffering." Large gatherings result in large genocides via poison or other methods.
  • Due to rituals of Krysh, ships are unable to launch or travel, making coordinated resistance impossible.
  • The undead kill randomly, until the Teth are satisfied.
  • After the Teth leave, the undead focus on destroying all records and data for another year, until they collapse once more. Most of the only survivors are Teth followers, whose prayers are ignored for the next 100 generations.

  The Rangers' Missions

  Phase I

  The first three missions may be undertaken in any order. Once two are complete, the third goes to its bad ending, and the players have enough information for Phase II.

  • The Oshtanian Refectory
  • The Tears of Holon
  • Kal Rassal Crisis
    • Admiral Holland asks the Rangers to investigate a series of sabotage and disappearances on his flagship, the carrier Luminous.
    • The carrier took heavy damage in an engagement with the Kaldarians and is en route to the Kal Rassal shipyards for repair and refit. He is concerned that there was some sabotage.

  Phase II

  Teth cults on many worlds are large enough to be known under various cover , and promote a mix of universalist propaganda and nihilist mockery of established institutions. Ship malfunctions and anti-Zerai propaganda groups complicate players' plans.