Thorendor, 2F: Workshop
The painting-lined hallway that connects the student rooms to Master Arasemis’s quarters is also the way to the great mechanism that raises and lowers sections of the floor in the training hall upstairs. There is also a workshop where Arasemis makes repairs to the mechanism. Sometimes Marlan helps him but usually students are not allowed to go inside.
You decide to take a peek but you know you won’t be familiar with much since you haven’t studied machina arcana.
Map
Gallery 1
You see four framed paintings in this part of the hallway.
This is From the Womb of the Void Emerges Cedelaebos and Aprelaebos. This is a large and highly detailed painting unlike anything you’ve seen elsewhere. Master Arasemis calls it one of his favorite paintings. It depicts the birth of two ancient continents.
You think back to the teachings of Arasemis, about the oldest stories of the world. The Agnesci, who were the forefathers of the Gallerlanders and all the other New World tribes, arose on a continent called Aprelaebos. Arasemis said Aprelaebos is identifiable with our continent of Pemonia. Across the seas was a second continent, Cedelaebos, the cradle of the Brintilians and other Old World colonists, now called Almeria.
That the continents of Aprelaebos and Pemonia are the same contrasts with the teachings from the Messengian Church, which said God created humanity to be divided between two continents, and caused Aprelaebos to sink forever beneath the seas as punishment for sailing the first ships to Cedelaebos.
You recall from studying Rildning's journal that it was heresy to claim that the New World of Pemonia was identifiable with the ancient Aprelaebos, a charge that he and others suffered from the Church. Few quibble over this today, but Messengians still believe that Aprelaebos sank and that Pemonia is an altogether different continent.
This is Vine Tree Hut for Mammoth Hunting. You think this must be located in Lambochardy, where there are two mammoth hunting seasons, both based on the migration of these great animals.
In the early winter, they are tracked through the snows of the southern lands. In the summer, they are hunted as they browse the strangled clusters of branching vines that pass for small trees, as depicted in the painting.
You remember reading in the library that the earliest Lambic people used mammoth bones to build their homes, some of which still stand. Juhl says that mammoth are still hunted for sport and food today, but only by rulers who share the bounty as part of festivals, as the number of mammoths are fewer than in the old days.
This is The Blocklands of the Ossian Mountains. You read upstairs in the map room about the karst hills at the foot of the Ossian Mountains in modern Calbria. There was a particular area of limestone pavements with deep fissures cut by rain and filled with tongue-shaped grasses.
It was settled by the Ossi tribe after they fled eastward to escape attacks by Arukan colonists and their tribal allies. They used simple wooden cranes to lift blocks of limestone to build short towers, which were used to watch over and protect their lands. These strongholds and a cold winter were enough to keep the Arukans out of the new Ossian lands, and the colonists turned south to attack the Welkari instead.
This is a small banner that is framed without a title, but you know what it is. You recall that Master Arasemis said there have been several minor and more serious schisms within Candlestone during its eight-hundred-year history, but none as bloody as the rupture that occurred during the seventh generation of the Order. The schism was prompted by the collapse of the Brintilian Empire and the subsequent rise of many new and independent kingdoms across the continent.
Optimists in Candlestone saw this as an historic opportunity to negotiate a return to the old tribal ways before new kings became entrenched. They also viewed Candlestone in danger of becoming extinct. Others wanted to take advantage of the chaos by preventing the establishment of the new kingdoms, and therefore open a path to a return to the tribal ways. This conflict led to the splintering of the Order, with a new group calling themselves the Enlightened Order of the Candlestone. They attempted to negotiate with various kings, but to little effect.
As shown in this banner, the Enlightened Order altered the traditional Candlestone symbol. In place of the stone is a tree made of stone, and where there was fire there is the sun. The sun is a reference to a new day, which the Enlightened adherents considered to be the new era. The stone tree signifies strength while branching into new ideas. And the eye of the tree represents the alleged foresight of the Enlightened, a reference to their belief that Candlestone needed to adapt and negotiate or otherwise face extinction.
Given his insistence on unity within the Order, you reason that Arasemis has this framed banner as a nod to the contributions of the splinter group, which he has said was accomplished within the greater goals of the one Candlestone. And Arasemis probably kept it simply for its historical value, perhaps for teaching the importance of unity.
Worktable
You see a worktable stacked with schematics. It is impossible for you to comprehend them.
Drawers
Lots of grimy parts and such. Nothing interesting in here.
Chest
Inside the chest you see a letter addressed to Master Arasemis, a sketch, and an opened envelope with the broken black wax seal of the Sable Letter Exchange.
Arasemis,
I have studied your description of the problem. I believe the teeth of the gears are stripping out after too much heavy use. I suggest using a different alloy such as brass (copper 70%, sphal 30%), or you can construct a better punching machine. I have drawn a schematic for you, modeled after my own machine, that you will find to be a better design that what you are currently using. This should solve your problem and permit you fewer repairs in the future.
Oghamroy Snead
Workbench 1
You see a hub of gears that looks like it was removed from the larger mechanism to be repaired. You have never seen anything like this. You wonder how something like this could be crafted, and what uses it could have. You also notice that Master Arasemis seems to be using an oil lamp with a metallic wick, clearly a form of alchemy you’ve not been introduced to yet.
Mechanism
This is one of the great wheels that helps to drive the mechanism under the training hall floor. There are many of these in this section of the room, their lesser gears linked with chains to large blocks of lead weights that Master Arasemis has explained provides counterweights to the mechanism. You don’t understand what that means because you have not learned machina arcana, but you are in awe of it.
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