Clip's Notes: Arisetsu and the Puzzle Box of Ormorek

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Clip’s Note: “Frequently, stories about the Gods of Alharth are highly conjectural and apocryphal. However, in this case the story comes from an unusually well-placed source, and might be given more credence.”

Arisetsu and the Puzzle Box of Ormorek, Part 1

Deep in a cave, lit just enough to emphasize the lack of lighting, Ormorek, God of Bitterness, formerly God of Dwarves, grudgingly worked at his task of creating undead monstrosities. “Why do these dwarves keep coming?” he muttered to himself. “At this rate, it’ll take days to replace the mummies they destroy.”

As he finished wrapping a corpse in dried and brittle bandages, he reached again for the power gleaned from Zek’s chalice and intoned “Arise, slave, and serve me.” Immediately, the newly created mummy gasped and sat up.

“Auugaahhh,” coughed the mummy and looked directly at his God and master. “Sure. Fine. Whatever.”

“Yes, my slave, remember your mortal life and despair! Remember your mortal name and your lost existence. What was your name, slave?”

The mummy stared blearily at Ormorek before croaking, “Phil.”

“Well... Phil. Some dwarves are coming. Go kill them before they try to lecture me about making undead. Things are bad and getting worse.”

Worse, from Ormorek’s perspective, was that dwarves killed by his mummies had developed an obnoxious tendency to come back from the dead, healthy and whole, and charge back into the fight, requiring even more mummified effort to kill again. He continued to grumble, “since when do mortals decide to not stay dead? Whose bright idea was that?”

At that moment, warmth and light suddenly flooded the dingy cave. Ormorek turned, squinting resentfully at the glowing form that had appeared.

“Oh. Of course. Who else? That’s just great.” Ormorek moaned.

Arisetsu, Goddess of Hope, Light, Warmth, and Setting Undead on Fire, had arrived.

Phil, the newly made mummy, fidgeted nervously with his dry wrappings.

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Arisetsu and the Puzzle Box of Ormorek, Part 2

In a cave that would otherwise have been dreary and dark, Arisetsu, Goddess of Hope and Warmth, faced Ormorek, once God of Dwarves, now God of Bitterness and Giving Up. Phil, newly minted mummy and highly flammable abomination, continued to slowly edge away from a goddess renowned for her fiery dislike of undead.

Arisetsu swept her hand toward the cave wall and spoke sternly, “Watch! Watch and see what befalls these undead perversions.” Ormorek wearily obeyed, knowing what would come next.

The wall of the cave flickered and became a view of a mummy, hurriedly shambling through a similarly dreary section of cave, midway through an angry moan “-ill all die! There, I said it.”

An instant later, an amber bottle shattered on the mummy’s head, dousing it in liquid. The view shifted to a reveal a dwarf, rapidly backing away from the mummy and throwing another bottle of liquor, laughing and yelling, “Ha! That’ll do it!”

The dwarf’s retreat brought him nearly abreast with two wolves, one of whom gave a coughing bark that somehow sounded like two words. “Flame Strike.” In an blinding instant, the mummy vanished in a gout of fire and the picture faded back to a featureless cave wall.

Slightly farther away, Phil the mummy continued to do his best to look non-threatening.

Arisetsu turned the searing light of her eyes back to Ormorek and advanced. Ormorek, for his part, slumped against a rock. “See?” she continued, “See how little that dark power avails you? Give up the-” She paused as her foot bumped a small object, almost completely hidden in the dust.

Arisetsu leaned down and lifted the object, revealing it to be a perfect cube. “What is this?”

“Don’t touch tha- …. oh never mind.” said Ormorek from his morose slouching position.

Arisetsu gently blew the dust off the cube, revealing deep incisions on all sides, and that each side of the cube had been painted in a grid of brightly colored squares. She held it in both hands, and was startled to see that the cube was made of smaller stone cubes, ingeniously held together by some hidden pivoting mechanism.

“This is fascinating. It seem so …. different than mummies and death. What is it?” Arisetsu said, fiddling with the cube, twisting it so the pattern of colored squares changed.

“Nothing. Just a stupid puzzle box. The dwarves make them. It’s worthless.” muttered Ormorek, still glowering at the wall.

“It’s wonderful! How does it work?”

“I don’t know!” Ormorek shouted. “I don’t know! I taught them how to make the damn things and I can’t remember how to solve them anymore.”

Aristestu paused, regarding the broken God before her and the intact toy in her hands, simply listening.

Ormorek turned back to the wall. “Feh. Keep it. I don’t remember anything about it.”

From not far away came the sound of breaking glass, a loud, dull foomp, and a gleeful cackle.

Phil the mummy was nowhere to be seen.

Arisetsu looked at Ormorek thoughtfully. “Some dwarves are coming now. It sounds like they haven’t forgotten you. Maybe you should ask them.”


Clip’s Note: “Truly obsessed scholars of Dwarven lore will note the connection between the puzzle box and the profession of cheesemaking. Could this history have something to do with why cheesemaking is so powerful a skill in Alharth?”

[Citan]

(I have no idea where you're going with this one, exactly, but I've enjoyed seeing your take on Ormorek and look forward to reading more! You made me dredge up my lore notes on him, and see how I can get the remaining important bits into the game. But anyway, I think you've got a decent read on him -- Ormorek does have some followers -- although a lot of them are really just drinking buddies -- and followers do annoy him, at least superficially, but you get the idea he's secretly pleased...)

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Thanks! It's been fun to play around with game lore ideas. As for "where you're going with this one," that's massively overthinking the Church of Ormorek, Reconstituted. The idea came about because the Priests of Arisetsu are awesome, wonderful people, but even in a game world, I can't role-play being authentically pious. So we wanted to be "priests" and help people out with curse removals, etc, but also make it a drunken tongue-in-cheek worship of a god that doesn't want worship.

The only serious bit is, I absolutely hope that Ormorek becomes the God of Respawning Over and Over Again in addition to being the god of quitting. If there's a single thing we Prodigies do enough of to justify a new nature spirit sphere of influence, that's it. Plus Mox says Ormorek is changing. Maybe "Enter the Light" has a little bit to do with Zek's Chalice power, too, because Arisetsu talked Ormorek into helping? Even Zhia Lian might have pitched in, if nothing else to make sure the random portal sometimes drops you on top of the Sun Vale tree.

This story exists because I promised Seya that "Arisetsu and Ormorek are totally BFFs." Other than that, I try to avoid fan-fiction with other people's characters.

Which brings me back to "where you're going with this one." After writing this, it was glaringly obvious that the REAL hero of this story is Phil the Mummy. What adventures does Phil have next? Does he escape without catching fire? Does he make it out to explore Alharth?

Any future lore-sized mini-stories should definitely star Phil, until it becomes inevitable that he shows up as an NPC.

(ps. All stories posted by me on this forum are public domain and may be used without attribution.)

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In case anyone's wondering, the "puzzle box" that Ormorek claimed he didn't care about is connected to a pretty significant figure in dwarven cheesemaking fan-fiction. It once belonged to Mistêm "Wheeldream" Kolnåzom, (Misty), the GREATEST CHEESEMAKER EVER.

Okay, nobody was wondering, but it's totally Misty's old puzzle box.

Also, Dwarves were making cheese before it was cool. Praise Ormorek.