The City Mountain

Matriarch Solbec announces that celebrations will be held when the psychic warriors return. The heroes are invited to take part in both war and festivities. At night Naida is visited by a reproachful ghost, Satrap 88 attunes to their prophetic crystal snail and Nat prays for profit.

Village of Ghost and Clan

Veterans of the Psychic War

The veterans return led by patriarch Narloc. A ghost passes from him through the elders in a wave of silent ecstasy and possesses the matriarch. Dust Scorpion tells them about the war against the corrupted self-replicating machine they call Ropey Ent. Satrap 88 returns to their room and waits for a vision of the forthcoming battle ... but the signs are bleak: They see themselves being restored in a new suit and begin to hatch a plan. Nat fails to establish meaningful (read: mercantile) relationships with the elders but finds a brewer who sells them barrels of synthetic alcohol.

A Brutalist Arcology

The City Mountain

They travel three days to the city mountain, a brutalist arcology from the Best Forgotten Age. A hundred elders from ghost villages all over the Blue Mountains have gathered on the desolate car park. The heroes are invited to a shaman’s tent where they are asked to drink a dubious looking slime of parasitic eggs that will wipe their memories. They hesitate: What are they about to forget? What is the nature of this war? What are the ghosts trying to hide? Satrap 88 declares that their physiology of light won’t be affected by the eggs but a doubt remains.

The Reactor Core

A Sacrifice

They descend into the bowels of the city: Gargantuan swords of light cut through tentacles, infected vermin is slain. When they reach the power plant Satrap 88 rips out their crystal snail and slips it into Naida’s pockets. Stored on it - they hope - are the memories of past events. Then they leave their suit and enter the reactor’s core. The warriors flee, an explosion of radiant light behind them.

Naida and Nat wake up on the steppe where they met the Greenlanders. The caravan is gone and so is Satrap 88 and they have no recollection of past events. The crystal snail wiggles in Naida’s pocket and Ajax tries to establish a telepathic connection. But the memories are all jumbled up. The vermin have tentacles, there is an explosion of light … but nothing makes sense. Still the realization sinks in that Satrap 88 is dead.

Through the Cinder Wastes

The Porcelain Citadel

They continue their journey west past ruins of the Best Forgotten Age, through the cinder waste where a mechanically infected worm almost chews off Nat’s leg before Ajax intervenes. They reach the Porcelain Citadel. Naida receives a massage from the Legion: The Redlanders are still on the loose. Nat visits the exclusive Black House to strike a deal but the conditions are dismal. He prays in a small Cogflower temple for wisdom alongside destitute workers and servants who should probably spent their meager wages more wisely. Naida sits on a roof absently turning the crystal snail in her fingers.

A new Suit

In the Violet City Satrap 88 is restored to a prior state. They wake up in a new suit wondering aloud as if for the first time whether they do have a soul.

Actual Play: https://youtu.be/niU7trTJ3QU