32nd Jahrdrung, 2516 IC
The orc warlord who last month claimed the traditional
summer camping grounds of the infamous Ironclaw tribe seems to be drawing more
and more accursed orcs and goblins to to him, as if those bleak lands with
their strange idols to accursed Gork (or is it Mork?) are reminders for the
greenskins’ past glories under Gorbad Ironclaw.
Some of my colleagues may scoff that no Greenskin alive today would have
any such knowledge given their predictably short lifespans and that they lack
interest in all but the most rudimentary arts of civilization, and even then
only those which facilitate death and destruction. However, I believe if these same colleagues had
stepped out of their ivory towers and pulled their noses out of their books and
winecups for a moment and listened to the Greenskins’ endless drumming and
ululating during Azhag the Slaughterer’s recent rampage from the Troll Country,
as indeed I did, then they would come to see the Greenskin’s strange collective
memory the way I do.
I tell you this: The orcs and goblins of the Border Princes
KNOW what Gorbad and his Ironclaws did to the Empire. I do not know HOW they know, but they
know. And they mean to do it again. Fortunately, for my colleagues who are concerned
that yet another orcish invasion of the Empire might interrupt their tenure, I
intend to stop them. With a little help
of course.
I have done all that I can here in Aldium now, I shall leave
an apprentice with the Imperial forces here and make my way to Malko to see if anything can be done to save it. I am not optimistic.
-Gavius Klugge, Grey Wizard
Mitterfruhl, 2516 IC [GM
Note: The Spring Equinox, known in Bretonnia as 'Lily Day']
I have spent Mitterfruhl with the Bretonnian force under
Henri du Bois de Balzac, whose retinue have apparently decided to end their
rather leisurely procession along the Silk Road by celebrating ‘Lily Day’ at the crossroads between the Silk Road and the
South Road. While the Imperial farmers
surrounding Aldium are no doubt celebrating by sacrificing a firstborn lamb to
Taal and Rhya, just as would our countrymen north of the Black Mountains, for
the Bretonnian peasantry Lily Day involves decorating everything with flowers
and Morris dancing! For the Bretonnian
aristocracy Lily Day involves feasting, jousting, hunting, singing, dancing and
tourneying… which is really not much different to what they have been doing on
the road thus far by all accounts!
One difference, of course, is the scale of the pomp, excess,
and organized violence (which could probably describe both the tourneying and
the chanson singing, depending on your fancy).
Another distinguishing feature is that for the Bretonnians, ever droning
on about courtly love, Lily Day is a traditionally auspicious day to celebrate
marriages and crown a Lily Queen. Of
course, it was no coincidence that this year’s Lily Queen was the Lady Isabeau
de Quenelles, a daughter of the powerful Bretonnian Duc de Quenelles and
betrothed of Young Henri du Bois de Balzac, heir to the oldest Bretonnian
family in the Border Princes.
What is significant for our designs, dear colleagues, is
that she brings as her dowry a host of her father’s vassals to help reclaim the
Border Princes. Encouragingly, after
winning a joust in which Young Henri bore Isabeau’s favour he publically swore
under the banner of the joint Bretonnian-Imperial Crusade that he would not so
much as kiss his beloved until he had honoured her favour by winning his spurs
in battle against our mutual foes. A
foolish gesture, admittedly, for a youth who might have had so much life ahead
of him, but such ridiculous gallantry will be for the betterment of the Empire
if it stops the Bretonnians drinking and fighting each other and points those
lances in the right direction!
Right, I must take leave and gather my temper if I am to refrain from saying something honest to these incorrigible damsels who pull all the strings here... will the Bretonnians EVER introduce proper schooling for magic? Something which doesn't involve embroidery or newts?
-Gavius Klugge
3rd Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
The Imperial garrison stationed in Aldium has razed camp and
is marching North along the South Road under the banner of the joint
Imperial-Bretonnian Crusade, as I am certain you have already been informed by
the army’s Battle Wizards. Apparently
the Witch Hunters burnt several heretics and Chaos Cultists they uprooted in
the cosmopolitan settlement, though I fear the dangerous ones had probably gone
to ground long before our forces arrived.
Nevertheless, Aldium has been left in good order, and our forces are no
doubt the best equipped in the Border Princes after resupplying there.
-GK
6th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
Word is that a flood of refugees is fleeing Westwards along
the Silk Road to take shelter behind Malko’s stout palisades, and that they
tell of the growing Greenskin threat. It
seems that since the orc warlord reclaimed the Ironclaw lands that orcs and
goblins have begun pouring down from the World’s Edge mountains in a mighty
horde that has swept aside all resistance in the lands south of the Silk
Road. Even as I write my humble
feathered observers are telling me how the drums across the Ironclaw lands have
finally fallen quiet, and how the terrifying warlord has lead his own seething
horde West to seize the banks of the Thunder River. This Green tide has already blanketed the
lands between the Blood River, the Thunder River and the Silk Road, and if it
isn’t halted soon, it will surely engulf all the Border Princes.
I cannot tarry here with the Bretonnians' incessant feasting, and must just hope that our alliance holds with these strange folk (I mean, Morris dancing! Really?! Is there a mind alive that can fathom it?). I have left one of my less hopeless apprentices, young Adolphus, here with the Bretonnians to keep an eye on things in my absence, and will press on to try and talk sense into Malko’s mercenary lord.
-GK
8th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
I have arrived in Malko and have seen for myself the haggard
faces of the countless refugees who have fled there seeking shelter from the
Greenskin tide to the East. I fear that
their trust in the protection of Malko’s lord is misplaced, however: my latest
attempt at counselling the fool has further convinced me that he has neither
the wit nor the will to deal with that which is to come. The ancient foundations of Malko will no
doubt remain, as they always have, but as it stands everyone within them is
going to die. I have advised those
Imperial nobles fleeing from the East to take what remains of their standing
armies not to tarry in Malko but to continue West to join our Imperial forces.
10th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
Adolphus has sent me
word that Tybalt, Thirteenth of his Name, du Bois de Balzac, head of the most
ancient Bretonnian Border Prince lineages and father of Young Henri, has left
his castle with his vassals and is claiming the fealty of the lands to the
North and East as his own.
-GK
11th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
While the most pressing concern for Malko is how to feed the
Greenskins fleeing the orcs and goblins, I
am almost more concerned by how few
refugees have managed to flee the advance of the Chaos horde which is marching
steadily South under the fell banners of the Ruinous Powers. Most if not all of those who do have made it
to Malko are possessed of the vacant look of one who has witnessed horrors
beyond imagining, and unlike the hopefuls fleeing the orcs, these refugees have
no illusions of salvation. Those who
have still some fire in them have become mad, frothing zealots, railing at the
sinfulness of Man and telling all you will listen (and those who won’t!) about
the approaching End Times. I have herded
as many as I can in the direction of our Imperial forces where perhaps our
Warrior Priests can put their madness to some good, but enough remain here to
incite riots and sap morale.
-GK
14th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
Another legion of long-dead Nehekharans is claiming lands to
the South and taking those who lived there as slaves. These slaves seem to immediately be put to
work reclaiming long buried ruins.
-GK
19th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
In the course of my enquiries here in Malko I have also
noticed several suspiciously familiar faces from Aldium. How strange that so many Burghers, merchants
and farmers should be so intent on travelling East when all around them are
fleeing Westwards? No doubt most are
Chaos cultists driven from Aldium by the Witch Hunter’s investigations who are
on their way to join the approaching Chaos horde. I have already quietly dispatched a minor sorcerer
whose blasphemies were revealed in the form of a horrific, weeping eye growing
in his chest, and subtly revealed a few other mutants and cultists to the justice
of the zealots, but it is clear that the battle for the Border Princes will be
fought in the souls of men as much as on the battlefield, and there is a danger
that Malko will fall to the Enemy Within.
-Gavius Klugge
20th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
An Imperial division, newly formed and bolstered by the
forces of Border Princelings of Imperial descent as well as mercenaries from
Aldium, has readied itself for war and marched boldly East under cover of the
woods. Our Imperial Huntsmen seem to
have served them well in guiding through the tangled forest.
-GK
25th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
Better news this day from my feathered observers! A horde of barbarians and cultists lead by
fell warriors of Chaos has been trapped in their dark mountain fortress by wild
stormy weather and mudslides in the mountains to the North!
-GK
28th Pflugzeit, 2516 IC
Strange tidings from the South! My raven friends tell me that the the long-dead
Silent Legion from far Nehekhara have been floundering through the mists and
mires of the Bloodriver Bogs, their rigid square formations falling over each
other amid the fog and their chariot wheels stuck fast in the mire despite the
efforts of countless slaves. After days
of futile attempts to find passage to through the swamps the force has turned
back the way they came. Now ravens are
intelligent birds (probably more so than many people, and, dare I say it, some
wizards!) and through my Art I have been able to Divine from them the
hieroglyphs appearing on the most prominent banners of the force. My knowledge of Nehekharan hieroglyphics is,
I must admit, a little rusty but I gather the general we are dealing with is…
er was… known as ‘Nun’keb the Erratic.’ I am not certain I have translated that last
title correctly: my Ravens keep getting distracted by all the ‘shiny’ objects
of gold and lapis lazuli they have stolen from the Nehekharan’s ornate
armour. I do hope this Nun’keb doesn’t
come looking for them before I’ve thought of a way to return them… from what I
have read the Tomb Kings seldom take kindly to those who remove things from
their tombs, even if they don’t seem to be using them at the time.
Anyway, I have attached my sketch of the
hieroglyphs I can make out from the Raven’s descriptions, perhaps my esteemed
colleagues in the Amethyst Order can make better sense of them and let me know
who I am dealing with here.
-Gavius Klugge
Faction
|
Normal Territories
|
Special Territories
|
Total Territories
|
Razed Territories
|
Victory Points
|
Banners
|
Alliances
|
Bretonnians
|
5
|
0
|
5
|
0
|
5
|
2
|
Empire
|
Empire
|
4
|
1
|
5
|
0
|
9
|
2
|
Bretonnia
|
Orcs and Goblins
|
6
|
1
|
7
|
0
|
11
|
3
|
|
Tomb Kings
|
4
|
0
|
4
|
0
|
4
|
2
|
|
Warriors of Chaos
|
4
|
0
|
4
|
0
|
4
|
2
|
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