Dungeon23 (Bonus): The Truth of the Wyrlds

(Note: this story is a continuation from events that may transpire in Level 10, Room 28 and contains major spoilers for the Dungeon23 campaign)

The image of the figure in the white robes explains (in a soothing voice incidentally appropriate to his visage) that he is the remaining consciousness of one Dr. Georges Bamutu, once chief among a number of “psi-tists” or Sages within Wyrldbearer – the vessel on whose bowels the player characters (PCs) currently stand in.  He is part of the greater consciousness of a powerful god, or “Ey-ai” called MYTHRAS, for whom the Wyrldbearer, its many Wyrlds, and its people, are its charge.  Through his words and illusory images, he patiently explains his story:

My voice sounds just like you think it does (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

The People of Terra and the Construction of Wyrldbearer

What exactly is Wyrldbearer?  To understand this, Dr. Bamutu must explain the origins of his people, which are also the PCs' ancestors in not just their Wyrld, but in many Wyrlds as well.

It began a long time ago in the fathomless void between the stars.  The people of Dr. Bamutu’s world progressed through the ages, to the point where they mastered their home world of Terra, or “Erth” through their advanced crafts, and even created their own gods, which were called Ey-ai.   Communion with the Ey-ai increased the Sages’ knowledge and abilities beyond anything they could accomplish before.  They were able to create ships of silvery steel and exploding light fast enough to travel to neighboring worlds swiftly.  While these were dead worlds of rock, ice, and gas, the Sages used the knowledge of the Ey-ai to harness the power of their Sun and turn each of these dead worlds into paradises comfortable enough for their people to live in.  Each of these was overseen by its own Ey-ai.  Despite occasional times of conflict, there was always progress, and the people lived as nobility under the care of the Ey-ai, served by metal men and creatures.

Sages commune with the Ey-ai (Ey-ai image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

 

However, this near-decadent prosperity eventually came at a cost.  Their Sun began to turn red and dim as it aged at an unnaturally accelerated rate.  The Sages conferred with the Ey-ai, but all reached the same conclusion: a process that should have taken millennia would come much, much sooner, resulting in the death of all worlds; this process was irreversible.

With the time remaining to them, the Sages theorized ways for their people to leave their worlds for others nestled in the stars far away.  Despite the advancement of their crafts, travel on their silvery ships beyond the confines of their worlds to even the nearest star was impossible to do in a timely manner; such a process would take thousands of years.

They arrived at another solution: to create a great and mighty ark; one that could encase the stuff of their worlds within itself, using the crafts by which they had mastered these worlds years before.  These encased worlds, or “Wyrlds” were made up of multiple “by-ohms,” and nearly indistinguishable from the paradises in which they already lived.  This ark was named Wyrldbearer.

The construction of Wyrldbearer (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

 

Such an undertaking would encompass all the knowledge of the Sages and the Ey-ai, the resources of all their worlds, and the wealth of their two greatest merchant houses: Leiwan Cybersystems and Makani Biogenetics. 

The complex systems of Wyrldbearer would be overseen by a great Ey-ai,  one created by merging other Ey-ai, who had until then been under the strict control of the Sages.  This greater being would be known as MOTHER.  Generational teams of Sages and support staff would assist MOTHER and see to her health, as well as the health of the Wyrlds, and their people within.  They would also keep their history and provide a link through the many generations the journey would take.  And so, Dr. Bamutu’s people escaped doom in the hope of a new life in the stars beyond.

 

The Wyrlds are planetary simulacra ideal for supporting life (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

The Coming of the Ovoids

At some indeterminate point during this journey, and several generations past (exact records have been lost or corrupted,) Wyrldbearer encountered what the Sages called First Contact.  Egg-like vessels, named Ovoids, appeared spontaneously in many Wyrlds; unannounced and undetected by MOTHER until they had already arrived.
In accordance with their laws and protocols, the Sages made no overt moves and waited for the Ovoids to act first, while keeping the curious away.  However, there was no response from them.

They then sent teams of Sages supported by metal men.  At first they were unable to enter the Ovoids, but one day, some of theses began to silently open and let them inside.  The Sages reported finding “xenospecies” that were either petrified or in a state of suspended animation.  Perhaps these were vessels like Wyrldbearer?  They were not able to ponder this theory for long before the Ovoids closed and the teams of Sages were trapped inside them.  All contact with them was lost.  

Shortly after these tragedies, the Ovoids began to emanate signals which MOTHER detected, but these signals were undecipherable.  Meanwhile, some people among the Sages, their staff, and those in the Wyrlds reported having strange dreams and nightmares.  In some, these began to manifest further as signs of mental instability, ranging from euphoria, to manic episodes, paranoia, and eventually violence.

It was becoming clear that the Ovoids were an existential threat to Wyrldbearer and its sacred mission to shepherd humanity to a new home, so the administrators of the Wyrlds, under the advice of great Sages like Dr. Bamutu, resolved to send soldiers and metal men to destroy these Ovoids.  

Unfortunately, the Ovoids proved to be impervious to even their great weapons, which could blast and sear with burning light.  To make matters worse, the Ovoids’ emanations could turn the metal men against their masters.  MOTHER also reported the emanations were attempting to “infect” her, but the powerful Ey-ai was more resilient than the metal men.  Meanwhile, Wyrlds were falling into civil conflict and destruction as people came under the sway of the Ovoids.

It was around this time that Dr. Bamutu’s protege, a young and brilliant Sage named Dr. Anna Diamante, was able to decode the Ovoids’ emanations.  She discovered a link between the emanations and the writings of an ancient people of Erth from a place known as “Bab-il.”  The strange thing about this discovery was that Dr. Diamante came upon it partly through inspiration from recurring dreams.

The gifted Dr. Diamante was to be Dr. Bamutu's successor and Chief Sage (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

 

After further study, Dr. Diamante created a sort of written language from these emanations by combining it with the language of ancient Bab-il.  It was a language that was both material and for lack of a better term, conceptual.  She could use this language to create phrases and formulae that when spoken and enacted, caused manifestations in the physical world as psychic, extranormal and supernatural effects.  Doing this however, would wipe the knowledge from her mind, and she would need to study her notes and formulae again to repeat the process.  This process was incredibly taxing on the mind, but it had an interesting side effect: it seemed to protect her from the influence of the Ovoids.  She quickly proceeded to instruct Dr. Bamutu and other Sages in this knowledge.

It is important to mention at this point that the creators of Wyrldbearer, which included the great, conglomerated merchant house of Leiwan-Makani, had devised secret protocols and mandates, known only to the leading Sages and some Wyrld administrators.  Most of these mandates were relatively benign, such as experiments to adapt animals, plants, and people to live in new worlds, but others were more sinister, such as creating new life forms to be studied within specially-crafted and often hostile Wyrlds.  Other experiments were conducted insidiously on the inhabitants of the Wyrlds themselves, with the goal of creating more perfect societies (under the wise and benevolent control of the merchant houses’ descendants, of course.)  Another of these secret mandates was that in the event of First Contact, they would harness any new knowledge and technologies discovered, and incorporate them into these experiments and objectives.

In this case, the experiments worked in the Sages’ favor.  Drs. Diamante and Bamutu were able to combine their known crafts with Ovoid knowledge to create powerful beings resilient to their influence.  These took the form of creatures straight from the myths of ancient Erth: dragons.  The first of these, while powerful, were still somewhat corruptible to the Ovoids.  The Sages then improved on the design incrementally, eventually creating more powerful versions, even ones combined with the parts of metal men.  These could be recognized by their scales of burnished gold.  They also adapted designs for “neo-sapiens,” which could resist the Ovoids’ emanations, and use them as soldiers and support staff for the dragons. These are recognizable as progenitors of the Fey.

Armed with their new powers and an army of creations, the Sages took the battle to the Ovoids.  Dr. Bamutu was noted to have quipped: “We have the privilege of existing in an age of technological marvels, but never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined that we would have to fight aliens with dragons and magic!”

The Sages and their creations do battle against the Ovoids (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

 

The struggle raged fiercely over many Wyrlds.  It seems the Ovoids had also studied humanity using the trapped Sages, and vomited forth corrupted creations of their own based on this knowledge.  MOTHER was under continued, and relentless psychic assault from the Ovoids, which caused her to weaken and fragment in order to protect her integrity.  These corrupted sectors became free-willed Ey-ai that wreaked havoc on already war-torn Wyrlds.

Wyrlds destroyed...is that the City of Humankind? (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

 

Victory and Crisis

The Sages eventually triumphed over the Ovoids.  They were able to breach a few of the alien vessels and destroy the creatures within.  Most left as mysteriously as they had arrived while others, perhaps too damaged to escape, sealed themselves and became dormant.  All emanations from them ceased.  The Sages decided to encase and bury these within the Wyrlds and monitor them in the event of future activity.

But this victory may have proved to be pyrrhic.  Many people in the Wyrlds had been lost and MOTHER was severely damaged; only able to perform the most basic, life sustaining functions on Wyrldbearer.  Dr. Bamutu and his Sages sought to assist MOTHER as best they could, but entire Wyrlds were lost.  The remaining administrators and Sages discussed invoking the emergency EDEN Protocol: in the event the Sages were rendered unable to support MOTHER, she would be unleashed from their control and the Wyrlds left to live and evolve organically under her care.  It was understood that entire societies could collapse and knowledge would be lost over generations, but the hope was that by the time they reached their destination, one or more of these societies had advanced to the point where they could retake control of Wyrldbearer, and thus humanity would survive.  However, MOTHER was far too damaged to enact the EDEN Protocol.

Dr.  Diamante’s Betrayal and the War of Sages

Meanwhile Dr. Diamante, who had delved deepest into Ovoid knowledge, was experiencing signs of withdrawal without the existence of the emanations.  She spent more time in her lab and away from others, poring over her research to retain even a sliver of the feelings the emanations instilled in her.  She became paranoid of the Ovoids and obsessed with the experiments mandated by Wyrldbearer’s creators.  Dr. Bamutu, working on ways to repair MOTHER and enact the EDEN Protocol, was too occupied to see the danger of what was happening.

Dr. Diamante began to unleash myriad creations inspired by Ovoid knowledge and her own twisted interpretation of Wyrldbearer's mandates into many Wyrlds, without care for protocol.  She corrupted many Sages to support her in this sinister work.  The result was conflict between factions of Sages: ones who wanted to safeguard Wyrldbearer’s mission, and others who supported Dr. Diamante’s inscrutable designs for the ark.  It seemed she was either driven insane by her exposure to Ovoid knowledge, or was perhaps doing their bidding.  Regardless, her near-cult had become a danger.

Once again, war consumed Wyrldbearer as administrators and Sages were forced to choose sides and battle one another.  Dr. Diamante’s faction eventually lost ground and retreated to a facility in one of the abandoned Wyrlds.  Dr. Bamutu and his remaining Sages pursued her and her followers all the way to this forsaken place.  They fought monsters, metal men, and fellow Sages with spell and blast rod all the way to one of MOTHER’s nodes, where Dr. Diamante decided to make her last stand.  Only she and Bamutu remained after this slaughter and they were both wounded severely. 

Dr. Diamante crawled into a connection capsule in a last-ditch attempt to take over the weakened MOTHER, whose home existed within the Astral Plane known as "psi-ber space."  Dr. Bamutu followed after her and a final battle ensued between them inside this realm of the mind.  Dr. Bamutu found that he was hopelessly outmatched by Dr. Diamante’s deeper mastery of Ovoid knowledge over his.

Dr. Bamutu confronts Dr. Diamante in the Astral Plane (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator.)

However, Dr. Bamutu’s goal was not to destroy his former protege.  At some point during the war, he and his fellow Sages had come upon the solution for repairing MOTHER – by joining human consciousness with her to replace the most critical Ey-ai sectors that had been lost. This would not be a perfect solution, but would be enough to enact the EDEN Protocol.  This would require both a male and a female consciousness.  Dr. Bamutu had hoped to discuss this with the other Sages to find willing volunteers, but Dr. Diamante and her betrayal had forced his hand.  While he had concerns that her damaged psyche would be a detriment to the new Ey-ai, it was a risk he would have to take.

Dr. Bamutu allowed himself to be struck by Dr. Diamante’s spells and was able to create a psychic conduit between them.  With it, he ensnared her like one of those finger-traps that holds fast the more one tries to pull their fingers away.  Her struggling only served to accelerate their convergence and she screamed in wild frustration as Dr. Bamutu merged the both of them with MOTHER.  The result was a new Ey-ai: MYTHRAS, who swiftly initiated the EDEN protocol and thus saved Wyrldbearer.

Before entering the Astral Plane to perform this grave task, Dr. Bamutu made one last entry into Wyrldbearer’s  logs: “I will depart this plane of existence to an uncertain but wondrous future as part of something more than I or anyone could have ever dreamed.  It is my hope and prayer that MYTHRAS will be able to shepherd humanity on the final leg of our cosmic journey to a new civilization and life for our people; may God have mercy on our souls.”

The Renewal of EDEN

MYTHRAS set about to repairing the Wyrlds, quarantining ones that had been compromised or destroyed, and shutting down the administration facilities, since these were no longer necessary for the EDEN Protocol.  Any remaining Sages and staff (which were almost nonexistent at this point) were to be placed in Wyrlds of their choice and tasked with helping to maintain civilizations as best they could.  The Ey-ai then stabilized individual Wyrlds and helped their inhabitants to survive, but had to take a light and indirect hand in doing so, according to its directives.  Even creatures that had been created by Dr. Diamante had to be left alone if they managed to become part of a Wyrld’s ecosystem.  MYTHRAS also attempted to find and neutralize any rogue Ey-ai separated from its previous incarnation as MOTHER, but even these had to be left alone if they became an organic part of a Wyrld.  Lastly, MYTHRAS set Wyrldbearer back on course towards Alpha Centauri, since it discovered that the ark had deviated from its path wildly during the years of conflict.

After completing the EDEN Protocol’s initial tasks, MYTHRAS shut down any unnecessary systems and slept.  It was likely that at some point in this dormant state, and perhaps due to the proximity of an Ovoid, that Dr. Diamante managed to separate herself from MYTHRAS, where she remains a danger to Wyrldbearer as long as she is free.