The Blue Beetle Campaign A Beetle Revolution John F. Sasso 4/16/02 Cast of Characters: Helriq the Templar, played by Andrew Walsh Threndor, played by Martin Shaver Starling Oakenbough, played by Douglas Jackson Game Master: John Sasso

"To hurt is essential. To convert is divine."

The Collected Quotes of Sima Black Song,
High Priestess of the Blue Beetle Cult,
by Rivester the Paranoid.
Translated by Ekridane the Thoughtful.

The highest floor of the tower was one large room. Though to anyone inside, it resembled the distant jungle. Green and yellow vines tangled through a lush canopy which brushed the distant glass ceiling. Colorful birds stood on one leg while eating tropical fruits. But the most beautiful creatures in the highest floor of the tower that resembled a jungle were the shining blue beetles.

In this jungle worked a priestly magician. To a casual onlooker he might have been mistaken for a gigantic insect in his shining blue vestments with the yellow antenna which were probably just feathers. He stood near a pedastal on which sat three spherical crystals, each alight with its own mystical prismatic glow.

The priest chanted a few well rehearsed words, and an image took shape within the heart of one of the crystal spheres. He watched intently as three figures stealthfully made their way through ashes and blackened timbers. After climbing through a well disguised trap door in the ground, they descended into a slime covered low ceilinged tunnel. A thin smile creased his face as the three chased and abused a party of shiltings with their own brushes and shovels. After a short time they descended again into dank cyclopian caves. With a show of decorum they strode past a group of goblins with picks, and skirted around a collection of eerie buildings with ungainly and unholesome residents.

After dispatching a thousand eyed beast with a thousand mouths and a thousand arms, and destroying a rune covered door with a blast of black powder alchemy, the three figures spent several hours wandering around a maze of clean marble passages searching for the object of their quest. Every time that one of the figures passed a particular steel shod door with a small barred window, the priest would mumble to himself in frustration. The jungle was growing dark. Shaking his head, the priest left the jungle and turned in for the night.

The crystal on the pedastal in the jungle was still glowing brightly when the priest who resembled a monstrous beetle arrived in the morning. To his amazement, the three figures were still alive and active. They had recognized the metal barred door that would lead to the object of their quest, and had laid seige with a chizel and a hammer and a severly bent crowbar and something that may have resembled a dagger in a former life. Throughout the day the priest went about his duties, occasionally glancing at the glowing crystal and muttering quietly to himself. That night, when the jungle went to sleep, the priest did not. He stood vigil over the crystal and sipped strongly spiced tea to relieve his fatigue.

It was near morning. The night creatures were climbing back into their hidey holes in the jungle when the priest began to grow excited. The figures in the clean marble corridors had broken through the metal shod door and entered the room beyond. The chamber was a necromantic pit of dispair. The dead and dying and sick and insane lay slumped in various steel barred cells. A lump stirred in the shadows. A soft green tentacle slowly entwined itself around the ankle of the priest. With a start he grabbed an ornate silver rod and beat at the tentacle until it released its hold on his leg and slowly retreated into the safety of the jungle. Dawn was breaking.

The priest returned to the crystal sphere to see the three figures dressed in unusual atire making their way through a crowded dinner hall while supporting a fourth who was sick or invalid. They grabbed a waiting rickshaw, dashed down several crowded streets, and went through the waiting doors of the Temple of the Blue Beetle in Vindstadt. The crystal went dark except for a faint inner glow. With a sigh, the priest wrote a few notes into his journal, removed his headdress, whiped his forhead with a hankerchief, took a last drink of lukewarm tea, and, with a satisfied grin, ambled off to bed.