Meyer - Bradley, Leigh Ann, Leah Aethelwulf, and Oscar (uncle and
fellow employee of Bradley). Bradley Meyer died intestate, but had
instructed his attorney to deliver a puzzle to his daughter, Leah
Aethelwulf. Mr. Meyer's accounts were empty and he had no substantial
assets at the time of death; nevertheless, the attorney claimed that
solution of the puzzle would allow him to release funds to the daughter for
her support, on the condition that the entire matter be kept strictly
private. Leigh Ann, the pennyless widow, sent SOAK a request for help in
solving the puzzle.
Meyer Puzzle - Encountered as a mission for the Meyer family by
SOAK. The puzzle was a rhyming quatrain encrypted with a straightforward
substitution cipher. On decrypting, it read:
In three days of consideration, interviewing both Mrs. and Leah Meyer, and
exploring prominent features of Distown, the SOAK team was unable to find a
reasonable interpretation of these lines. Mr. Meyer's seachest proved to
have a false bottom, which had been frequently used but was currently
empty. Mrs. Meyer had been unaware of it. Oscar Meyer had had the trunk
in his possession before bringing it to Dis-town. He may be aware of what
contents there may have been.
- Wavy clock of brass: Inver Brass, a circular lake on Pavimentum with
resort towns and 3M mines nearby. Assume that it is to be read as a clock
since it is wavy and (inver) brass. If Inver Brass is a clock, some kind
of lake revolutions could easily be our thousand days. It should be noted
that one day is*twice* 'round the clock, since rotary clocks show twelve
rather than twenty-four hours.
- Mummies melting ere they delve: the slang term for 3M employees Find
a 3M operation where employees are in some way melting. Directly across
from the 3M operation would then be 12 o'clock according to the riddle.
There is a 3M refinery on southern shore of Inver Brass. Alternately,
there is polluted river draining presumed 3M mines at the north end of
Inver Brass. Would put "strikes at twelve" closer to the area of the
Meyer's second honeymoon.
- Leaders known to you at birth: The resort towns of Inver Brass are
used as locations for Summit Meetings among Pavimentum city-state leaders.
Alternately, Bradley Meyer - father of Leah A. General Aethelwulf -
namesake of Leah A.
- Thousandth day on earth: *Echyebrech/balrogs who have been in EOW
roughly 1400 days. *A child/children who are roughly 3 years old now and
who are in some way leaders or heirs to a throne in Pavimentum. (Or, this
could conceivably refer to the "Sword Twins", perhaps) *Perhaps day is not
being used literally. It could potentially refer to 1000 years, or 1000
days counted by some system of things revolving around/rotating in the
lake. *Gen. Aethelwulf was born on September 1, as was Bradley Meyer! The
date that falls 1,000 days later is June 11. *Gen. Aethelwulf died Nov.
11, 10010. The date that falls 1,000 days later is Aug. 21, 10013, almost
exactly one year after Leah Aethelwulf was conceived.
- Is there Aethelwulf lore connecting him with Pavimentum/Inver Brass?
- Did Bradley Meyer have books about Aethelwulf/Order of the
Rhododendran/ Inver Brass, etc? He was a military history buff after all.
- Were there significant events in the lives of Aethelwulf or Bradley
Meyer that occured on June 11, their "thousandth day on earth?" If so,
where were they so Leah A. can follow her "leaders?"
- Failing that, where was Aethelwulf living when he was 1,000 days old?
And what about Bradley Meyer? (June 11, 9968 and June 11, 9993,
respectively.)
- Is that polluted river running into the Inver Brass formed from any
sort of glacial runoff or snow runoff from the mountains? (mummies
melting....)
- SOAK got a job offer from Club Azure to investingate the source of the
river pollution, so we have an excuse to go back to Inver Brass.
- The "h" characters in the puzzle seem to have been added specifically
to make each line come out to the same length. Each line is 45 characters.
If you include the lines on which we wrote the solution, this yields a
total of 360 characters. Same as degrees in a circle and days in an EOW
year. Significant?
- Assume that the "Wavy clock" also has a date hand which marks off the
360 days of the year on the 360 degrees of the circle. Perhaps 1000 dyas
on earth = 1000 degrees around the circle. i.e. lines one and two tell us
where 12 o'clock is. Line four tells us to go 1000 degrees from there
(just north of Port Warden if we go clockwise) and line 3 tells us to look
for some Aethulwulf reference when we get there. OR, perhaps we go to the
degree marking which would be June 11th and look for Aethlwulf there. June
11 would be 161 degrees from 12 o'clock. That would put us between Club
Azure and the 3m refinery. Closer to the latter. (All of these estimates,
assume that 12 o'clock is directly across from the 3m refinery.)
- What will we find when we get there? Just Bradley Meyer's retirement
money in a buried chest? A Beigebeard hoard? A clue to a BB hoard? The
King? The monkies that just fell out of Ben's butt?
Considering this Bradley's motives a little: It is known from family
accounts that Mr. Meyer believed strongly that only the intelligent deserve
anything. He apparently considered himself as intelligent enough to
qualify. It is also fairly plausible that he had little regard for his
wife's intellect. Now, his relation to his daughter is a question. Even
without considering SOAK's failed attempt to explain cryptography to the
girl, her intellectual prowess was estimated to be 'average' at best. How
on earth could her father have expected her to unscramble his cypher, much
less puzzle her way through to the lake? If her father had spent any
amount of time teaching her about such puzzles than either (a) she would
not have been so mystified by our success, or (b) he would have realised he
wasn't getting anywhere (as we did). It seems like Mr. Meyer could
scarcely have expected his daughter actually to win the prize. The obvious
question follows: is the prize *really* there to be won? Could the whole
puzzle thing be no more than a red herring designed to convince his family
that he left them nothing only because they *deserved* nothing? If the
fortune actually exists to be found, then one might wonder, (a) For whose
benefit did he plant this fortune, if not his daughter's? (b) Or, is it
actually something like a Beigebeard hoarde he's stumbled on? In which
case, (1) How'd he find it and why couldn't he get it himself? (2) Why
would he think Leah would be able to extract it with *no* outside help?
(c) Is there competition with anybody else to find this fortune? A child
from another marriage unbeknownst to the Distown Meyers? Any contacts or
partners of his who also have similar clues to unscramble?
"The attorney claimed that solution of the puzzle would allow him to
release funds to the daughter for her support..." Why are we running all
over Pavimentum and carrying widows around resort towns looking for buried
treasure, when all we have to do is tell Ms. Meyer to go to the attorney,
give him the decrypted poem and tell him that the wavy clock of brass is
Inver Brass, the mummies melting are the 3M workers at the mines and
refinery there, the leaders known at birth are Bradley Meyer and General
Aethelwulf and do it all on the thousandth day after their shared birthdate
- and he'll just give her the money?
Mica - mineral found all over especially near volcanic quarries.
Component for lightning bolt.
Micklegarth - city on Pavimentum where it is illegal to possess magic without a licence.
Mickelgarth Commerce - Lilongwe Dukas, Vice President for Salvage and
Repair, hired SOAK to investigate a sunken ship and a possible basilisk on
Gateway Island in summer 10043.
Micklegarth Mining and Manufacturing - 3M.
Middle Earth
Ben ponders: "I feel confident at this point that Rob has incorporated Middle Earth into his mythos rather literally. Many of the things we have encountered match Tolkien too closely for Rob's style of borrowing references. (Rings, Belryg, Ringwraiths, "The King of Rohan", the watching birds, etc...) So, let's assume for a minute that ME is a "real" place to which the characters could travel. Now, have we been there yet? How would we know? I can't think of any geographical features in the worlds we've seen that match ME. Also, ME is Tolkien's mythological history of Earth. Real Earth. If I understand correctly, the end of "Return of the King" brought ME into the fourth age (or fifth, whatever), the age of man, and thus, somehow into the real world of Earth. At what point in time would we be intersecting Earth/Middle-Earth? How would we be able to tell? Evidence that we might be able to use would be:
-The existence of the One Ring. I only recall one of "the rings" that we have seen overwhelming characters into desiring its posession. That was... in the dragon's lair. We took it, and lost it very soon after that in a magic shop... But even this seems not to match the "One Ring" very accurately. Has the One been destroyed yet by [Frodo]?
-Evidence of Tolkien-style Elves. Tall and strong, graceful, immortal, intelligent and wise beyond human capacity. After the War of the Ring they all left ME to a place across the sea and stopped aiding in the affairs of men. Can anyone remember encountering a people who match this description?
-Evidence of "Modern" Earthly technology or people. There was this thing a long time ago involving robots or something in an underground thingy, but that was some bizarre concoction of Rob's which we entered via my world. Does anyone remember this? Have we seen other evidence of old technology? Mithril, for example, is always found in pieces of smooth curves, as if they were the fragments of a very large well-manufactured sphere or egg-shaped thing.
Midgard, Agent (Gooch) - A pacifist healer. Joined El Ouhd in November
10043. See also Juliette Naturas. Missions: Taniger Rescue.
Militia, Michigan Mitch "the pothead" (Joe) - a fairly
useless-seeming fellow whose principal motivation in life seemed to be that
old wacky tobacky. Joined the Verteux Loonies in October 10039. Killed
while attempting to climb treacherous cliff in the Sprines while looking
for Orson's gold in December 10039.
Milius (NPC) - Vornish elf. In the desert west of the Niello Monastery, the Sword Group found a decimated camp where Milius and three other elves were hiding. They had been set upon by skeletal warriors that had killed many of their friends. Joined the Sword Group and gave the speech to the Alliance Council in October 3207.
Millstone, Miles () - Member of OMNICo. Went back into the
Beigebeard horde on Ilum Gamma to get the other treasure chest, and didn't
return - presumably killed by the poison gas. Missions: Ilum Gamma.
Mind Flayers - officially known as Uxors. Dangerous psionic
humanoids. It may be that their psionic powers increase with the square of
their number or some such thing, because the one by himself was fairly easy
for two average types from the Pike Group to defeat whereas a small group
of them was difficult for the whole party to defeat.
One was encountered by the O.R. in the Yarisuto tunnel. It attached
itself to Dextro's face and could not be completely removed, causing severe
disfigurement.
Mines, Ship - The Order of the Ring ran into some ship mines near
the Vyrican Black Tower. As they were escaping their sinking ship in a
life boat, someone cast "detect magic" so he could see when the mines
approached and then someone else (a Nick character? Brian?) jumped
overboard to push them away - which worked!
Minetown is a small mining community founded on the eastern side of
the Sprines in 10022 as a joint venture by Anthraco, the Kendronic League
and the government of Allotrope. Mineral deposits were not sufficient to
warrant a solely governmental expedition, but the strategic value of the
location and the work begun on a second Sprinal Pass [where? see SOAK's
Bridge Mission.] justified the government subsidy of the mining industry.
In [37-02] Minetown was captured by an overland assault by deep gnomes and
has remained in their hands ever since despite two serious assaults by the
Allotrope Navy.
In 10038, the area was plagued by somnambulism and trances which were
believed to be associated with a mysterious cave complex discovered by the
NETCo Spell Component Hunters.
Known Residents, Past or Present: Gathrin Glanmer, G. Gjurin Guanova.
Minetown Cave Complex - Found by the NETCO Spell Component Hunters
in February 10038 (?) and described as a small cave complex with a deep,
round lake that harbored animate bodies of some sort. Reached by following
Golan's Ridge westward from Minetown for two days, then turning into
Gerrin's Pass until finding a small cave set in the south or southeast side
of the ravine wall (primarily limestone). According to Gathrin Glanmer in
March 10038, there was a narrow path which went straight in (natural) and
then turned left and then right with some blood stains on the walls. After
the two bends, the corridor exited onto a small platform which was the
terminus of a rope bridge which stretched about forty feet out across a
hemispherical room to a pillar of stone which stood in the center. In the
pillar was a niche into which the bridge led; from this niche there was a
series of rungs (very far apart) which led down to a small "beach" at the
bottom. The cavern (obviously artificial) was filled with water to a level
approximately 35 feet below the initial platform. The room was very quiet,
and Gathrin remembered that it had "felt funny" to be in. At the bottom of
the pillar it was possible to walk around in a counter-clockwise direction;
the water stretched out in all ways. There was a small wooden boat but
without oars; apparently there had been oars previously. See the Abraxian
Shrine.
Minotaurs - creatures found on Persand. Killed Charles Cromwell.
Mithril - a valuable metal. Pieces of mithril only the size of the
terebinthium crystals found by the Mock Turtle group in animated skeletons
on Vorn would be worth nearly 1 million silver. It should probably be kept
in lead to shield its magical properties.
Always found in pieces of smooth curves, as if they were the fragments of a very large well-manufactured sphere or egg-shaped thing, or a shattered solidified bubble/sphere.
Corrections? Additions? lkies@jumpgate.net
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