Dragonborn, Dragonborn (Measuring the Marigolds)

We went to the North door and walked down the stairs to the circular chamber with the 100 doors. Kale paused to examine the Mantle of Ores again. He explained to us that it protects the wearer -- like (as he put it) "an Amulet of Resolution". Once a day, the wearer could choose his fate.

Kale then turned to Carlagnios. "OK, you can start flipping the coin again. If you need help focusing, I can help."

Carlagnios flipped the coin and said, "Heads!" Nothing happened.

Kale looked painfully annoyed. "You want to visualize both futures."

"Oh," said Carlagnios, "I should think about seeing both heads and tails?"

Kale gave him a sour look and nodded.

Carlagnios flipped the coin again, this time visualizing two of him -- one that saw heads, and one that saw tails. As Carlagnios moved, he became two Carlagnios' that walked apart from each other. Each one held a coin.

"OK," said Kale, "now flip the coin 5 more times."

Both Carlagnios' started to poke at each other and point.

"Will you stop that and flip the coin again?" barked Kale.

Carlagnios continued to flip the coin and divide into more and more Carlagnios'. As he continued, he began to feel like his hold on life was more tenuous. And the copies of Carlagnios began to argue about who should flip the coin.

"Mage!" shouted Carlagnios over the din of growling and muttering Dragonborn. "Make sure that they all flip the coin!"

Irritated, Kale kicked one of the copies of Carlagnios, which promptly fell unconscious. "All right. Flip!" ordered Kale. "Flip again!" He continued until we had enough copies of Carlagnios.

"Now," Kale ordered,"one of you ask the Animata to open the door."

One of the copies of Carlagnios asked the Animata, and the Animata replied, "You can proceed." The doors opened, and we all ran through one of the entrances.

We found ourselves in a damp passage, lined with rusted cells. The construction work was old. We began to follow the passage but were interrupted by a number of growling noises.

"I want meat!" declared one of the copies of Carlagnios.

"Great," muttered Kale. "How do we get back to one Carlagnios?"

"Maybe have him flip the coin and choose heads?" suggested Tiny.

The copies of Carlagnios gathered and began to push their copies of the coins together. As the coins began to combine, so did the copies of Carlagnios. Eventually, they all merged back together, although one copy refused to join the others initially. It took some time to convince the copy to merge with the others.

"How do you feel?" asked Tiny.

"I have strange memories from each of the copies," replied Carlagnios. "But I am glad to be the one true Carlagnios again."