A History, Told in Pictures and Figures

The statue allowed us to pass, and we entered the narrow vestibule. We walked through a hallway that ended in two tall, brass doors. As we approached the doors, they swung open by themselves, as if the room on the other side were eagerly welcoming back Carlagnios, one of the 100.

Beyond the doors, we saw a broad, tall room. Light from a distance illuminated the room. Carlagnios casually strolled forward, without any sign of fear or caution.

The room seemed to be shaped like a rotunda. It was vastly tall and broad. Above us, in the distance, we could see 100 hovering orbs. Most of them glowed with an unearthly light. Oddly, 7 of them did not shine, and 3 of them were blinking.

"This looks like a civic building," declared Kale. "Note the murals along the walls and the statues in the center."

We approached the wall and examined the murals. There were 9 of them.

The first, "The Release of the 100," depicted a number of individuals being released from a jail.

The second, "The Age of Service," showed these individuals battling wraiths.

The third, "The Harrowing Ordeal," was a familiar scene. The tree that we had faced was shown killing a woman. Carlagnios gazed at the mural thoughtfully. If the memory had caused a shiver to run down his spine, his steely Dragonborn face did not reveal it.

The fourth, "The End of Service," illustrated these individuals slaughtering the Judges.

The fifth, "Life Everlasting," depicted an angelic figure bound to the ground. Something terrible was about to happen to the figure. I suppressed the urge to quickly shuffle over to the next mural.

"Is this Gamerat itself?" Kale wondered aloud. "It has power over life and death. Perhaps this is showing the time when the Lover of the Raven Queen imprisoned him, in order to harness his power." He turned to Bran and asked, "Is the angelic figure Gamerat?"

Bran shrugged. "How would I know that?"

Carlagnios snarled, "Don't be so sleazy, Bran. We know who you are. We know you follow the Raven Queen." Carlagnios huffed and impatiently moved on to examine the next mural.

The sixth, "The Seed of Contradiction," showed a man in peasant's clothing. He held a coin. In the mural, there were 5 "copies" of the man.

The seventh, "The Whale," was a drawing of the Cthona that we had seen in one of the Focus Houses so long ago.

The eighth, "The Torment of the Chained Man," was an illustration of a man being held underwater. Chains bound the man to the floor. Curiously, the man closely resembled someone we had met long ago. "Isn't that Brother John?" I asked. Kale scowled, as though this was no revelation to him. "Of course. He is the Assassin. The Chained Man. The 101."

The ninth, "The Patron," depicted a wise man, staring in the distance. This particular mural had been vandalized. Someone had scrawled the word "BETRAYAL" across the wise man's face. Beneath this word, someone had written a curse in Old Warrior. "He lies in his shit."

"That doesn't seem very good," remarked Firinne. Bran shrugged, looking somewhat bored. "Let's look at the statues," he suggested and scampered to the center of the room.

There were two large statues, perhaps 3 or 4 times larger than the people they depicted. To the left, a statue labelled "Gezu" stood. The figure was slumped, as though Gezu was falling down. He had a javelin piercing through his chest. One hand gripped the javelin. The other hand was outstretched.

"Gezu sacrificed himself to save the 100," Kale reminded us.

The status on the right was labelled "Ores." The statue depicted a man in a rough spun. He crouched, as though he were sneaking somewhere. In one hand, he held a dagger. In the other, he held a coin.

Kale noted, "This depicts the time when Ores stole the Seed of Contradiction from the Stone Men."

Carlagnios frowned. "All of this seems dimly familiar. It's as though I somehow know this."

"Well, you are one of the 100 now," Kale said, carefully resisting the urge to make a remark about the choice of the word "dimly."

There were three doors exits leading from this room: one to the West, one to the North, and one to the South.

"Shall we proceed West?" suggested Bran.