16th of Davor, 1329 Avard

Droog Grimfire was close to four-and-a-half feet tall, bald, and typically dwarven in many aspects. He was different in several aspects, as well. He was built a bit lighter than most dwarves, though none-the-less solidly, and his beard was cut straight across his chest, in a manner indicative of austerity. His rust-red and brownish-red leathers covered banded mail, instead of the more common breast-plates among dwarves – and he had silver all about him, from silver-plating on his dwarven battle-axe, to silver rings about his fingers, silver runes melted onto his leathers, and more. Droog's piercing black eyes were full of intelligence, and something more, as he stood comfortably with his hands behind his back.

Droog was listening politely to Father Korin, a somewhat short human of middle years, but strong of frame and mind. Father Korin was a devout follower of the dwarven god Galgiran, and a rarity among humans. The man and the dwarve were in the main aisle of the temple to Galgiran in the city, surrounded by pews and seating for several hundred.

Father Korin's mild baritone was kindly, but belied steel beneath it. “I don't have a problem working with you after worship services, but time has been rather tight, of late. Perhaps you could use the forge, and I could loan you one of my accolytes?”

The dwarf's intense eyes glanced down, considering, and then he stuck a paw out to shake Father Korin's hand. “If that's all I can get,” he answered without a trace of accent in the common tongue.

There was a commotion outside, and then the doors to the temple burst open. A creature nearly six feet tall at the withers barged in, with the head of a hippopotamis and the body of a tyrannosaur, but with a thick vertical tail full of fat used for swimming. The ugly creature bellowed once with a 'gronk'-like sound, and it's driver reigned it in. The dwarven driver looked tired and even a bit pale, as he tossed a sealed scroll to Father Korin.

The hippotaun's tail swept to one side, knocking over several pews, and the driver suddenly seemed to realize that he had ridden his mount into the temple.

Father Korin ignored the driver and his mount, and broke the seal on the scroll. Droog idly noticed that the seal had been that of the Baron-and-the-Bishop Dwarfendale, one of the most powerful dwarves in Rakore, and feudal lord of the city, and most of the lands around it, as well as its spiritual leader.

Father Korin's face became white as he read the scroll, and then he handed it to Droog, yelling at his accolytes further into the temple, “Ring the bell! Ring the bell!” He pointed at them, continuing to yell, “Ring the bell! RING THE BELL!”

Droog read the scroll, and then said in the dwarven tongue, “Oh, shit.”

The driver of the hippotaun added to the chaos, by turning his mount around, and its tail swept over several rows of pews, knocking them down. It's huge, webbed, splayed-toed feet trod the aisle's carpet into a rumpled mess, and the driver quickly retreated, his task complete.

A moment later, the bells of the temple began to peal in a pattern that everyone in the nation of Rakore recognized: Trouble.

* * *

Barome Revelstoke was about average in build and height for a desert elf, being a few inches over seven feet, and weighing in at about 300 pounds. He even camouflated himself much like the rest of his kin, wearing desert and dun-colored leathers, and tattooing himself in a seemingly random pattern of lines. Several of the lines had cross-hatched marks on them, making them look like barbed wire or stitches of some sort.

Barome had darker hair than most desert elves, keeping it hacked off at the shoulders and back in a pony-tail. His brown eyes were darker than most desert elves, as well, but they were very keen, and missed little.

The desert elf was talking with Ye Sival, a lithe woman from the Toomaran plains, with a skin tone with a slight reddish tint to it, and thick, lusterous black hair down to her derriere. Her dark eyes were flirtatious, but not overly so, and Barome was playing it safe while talking business with her.

Ye said in a light voice, “Now that I have the measurements, I can make a decent saddle for your camel – but my quality does not come cheaply.”

The desert elf grinned, and was about to make a witty retort, when loud bells began to sound within the city just to the north of them. The tannery, by necessity, was just outside of the city. A half-second later, as Barome turned to peer towards the city, more bells began to sound.

Ye Sival muttered a curse in her native Toomaran, and then yelled at her workers and apprentices, “Move! To the city square! Move!”

Barome asked, “What is it?”

“Something important. Quickly!” She raced through her open-air workshop, ensuring everyone was out, and then ran off towards the city.

Barome whistled for his camel, and then trotted off at a leisurely pace, easily keeping stride with the sprinting human. The camel caught up with him, and followed behind him obediantly.

* * *

The city of Rilan was built next to a large river, which wound its way around an enormous, jagged bit of mountain. The mountain held a snow-cap even in the mid-summer morning, and was considered a place of worship for many. The city supported the temple and fortress of the Baron-and-the-Bishop, located perhaps half-way up the mountain. On the far side of the mountain, closer to the tree line, lay the mages' academy. The city was built to withstand a seige, and protect the one road up the steep mountain, which went to the fortress of the Baron-and-the-Bishop, and then on up to the academy.

Rilan's town square was faced on one side by the Vedis – the local city hall, home of the city's own baron, and the constabulatory, jails, law libraries, and more. Half of the square, right in front of the Vedis, was cobble-stoned, but the other half was a small park with well-maintained greens, which sat before an inn nearly as large as the Vedis. Other shops and businesses lined the crowding square, and more people were standing in the streets leading to the square.

The Baron Complan, feudal lord of the city, and servant to the Baron-and-the-Bishop, raised his arms for silence. Father Korin, at his elbow, called a prayer to Galgiran, and it was granted – the baron's voice echoed all through the square, such that the nearly 3,000 people there could hear him.

“People of Rilan! People of Rakore! Our nation has been invaded by the ograns!”

A roar went up from the crowd, and they began to take on a grim air, but not panicked, nor fearful.

“Loreguard holds! The Stonehelms hold! The Rakanus Wall has fallen! Roc-hawkes have been spotted to the south! We must be prepared, for invasion by land, and attack from the air! Arms and armor from the Vedis, will be opened to all! The militia is hereby called to duty! Knights of Rakore, to ARMS!” and he drew his sword, holding it high.

The crowd let out a roar, and then began to both disperse and increase, as people headed wherever they seemed to need to go.

Droog stood near Father Korin, ready to support and aid the cleric. Father Korin stood near the baron, as he directed various questions to the experts, or asked issued orders to his assistants. Also nearby was the reeve of the shire, Sir Bridar – a desert elf in charcoal gray leathers, with amber-colored eyes that made anyone looking into them feel a chill in their spine.

Barome managed to skirt the great crowds, and approach the shire reeve, asking in the desert elven dialect, “What can I do to help?”

Sir Bridaraarayus turned to the newcomer after directing his assistant to open the armory. “For now, just be close.” The reeve peered at the other desert elf, and managed to place him, his memory filling him in.

Barome Revelstoke had a passionate hatred of the orcs, because they had killed his parents some eleven or twelve decades prior. The desert elf patrolled the Galanus River from its headwaters near Loreguard, to its mouth, including the middle where it wound around Mount Rilan and the city. The warrior did it in the hopes of finding orcs, and decimating them, wherever they turned up, but also had a strong affinity for the new nation of Rakore, which welcomed all races, save the ograns.

The baron turned to both Sir Bridar and Father Korin, “Begin evacuating what you can to Lok Giran and Lok Magius, including the children.”

Father Korin snapped his fingers. “Ah! I have something that can't go that way…” He whirled on Droog. “Come with me. I have something I want you to take for me up to Lok Giran.” The cleric paused, and turned back to Sir Bridar. “I'll need a suitable guard, too. Two hippotauns should do it.”

The desert elf with the amber eyes nodded, and then turned to Barome. “Go with them. Maybe the ograns will find You.”

Droog and Barome both moved to follow Father Korin back towards the temple of Galgiran.

The crowds were armed to the teeth, and virtually every family in Rilan had at least one set of armor and weapons. The huge inn, named the Blue Tyven, was run by dark elves – short, slight, and ebon-black of skin – and virtually all of them were out and about, helping organize the crowd and readying for refugees from outlying lands.

Father Korin spoke hastily to Droog in the dwarven tongue, and then disappear inside of the temple. Droog had his draft-mule and two-wheeled carriage in front of the temple rather quickly, and then the dwarf and the desert elf had a chance to size one another up.

The desert elf was armed to the teeth, and his camel had spares of his many weapons, from composite longbows to longspears to scimitars to daggers, and quiver upon quiver of arrows.

Though the desert elf sneered at the carriage, he admitted that it was sturdily built, with a convenient lock-box behind the seats, and plenty of storage under the seats. The dwarf, though, was fearsome – armed with a battle-axe, a war-hammer, and even a sling. What caught the desert elf's attention, though, was the dwarf's eyes – there was something in those black orbs that was penetrating.

Father Korin burst out of the temple, with four accolytes trailing along behind him. The four accolytes together could barely hold up a cloth-wrapped bundle no more than a foot across, and perhaps circular. They managed to maneuver it onto the carriage's bench seat, and, casting fearful glances at it, moved away.

Droog asked, “You got a box to put it in? Something to hide it?”

The cleric barked orders at his accolytes, who quickly returned with a plate cupboard. They tossed the plates out onto the cobble-stoned road, where they shattered into a thousand pieces of sharp porceline. The object in the cloth-wrapped bundle just fit inside, and then the item was put back onto the bench seat – though in a box.

Barome asked, “What is it?”

Father Korin responded, “It is a relic – a holy relic. Please ensure that it gets safely to Lok Giran.” The cleric turned back to Droog, and said in the dwarven tongue, “Hurry, my friend. Get this up into Lok Giran. The Baron-and-the-Bishop will know what to do with it.”

Droog nodded, knowing full well what the artifact was: it was the dwarven skull of one of the first prophets of Galgiran in all of Gaeleth, encased in and filled with a sheet of lead, and another of mithril. Maekar's Skull was a powerful item, capeable of granting incredible boons to a priest of Galgiran. But, since the War of the Undead, it had been a double-edged sword, also capeable of inflicting horrible curses upon whomever tried to use it.

The dwarf chose to say nothing of it to the desert elf, and merely climbed into the carriage, beside the plate cupboard. He flicked the reins on his draft-mule, and turned the carriage around, heading towards the road up to Lok Giran – dwarven for the Fortress of the Soul.

The desert elf fell in behind the carriage, and as they neared the northern edge of the town, two hippotauns, each crammed with dwarven infantry on their backs, awaited them.

One of the dwarves lifted his hand in salute, and called something in dwarven, to which Droog responded with an affirmative. One of the hippotauns took up a lead position, and the other fell in behind the carriage, as Droog flicked the reins.

Barome tethered his camel's reins to the carriage, and then speed-walked beside the carriage for a moment. “I'm going to scout ahead…”

Droog merely nodded, and the desert elf loped up ahead of the other hippotaun, before disappearing around a turn in the bend of the tightly packed, switch-backed road.

Occasionally, Barome would check back in with the convoy, but found Droog flipping through some large book, and not even paying attention to the landscape around him. The desert elf kept one eye to the sky, half hoping to spy a roc-hawke, but never quite catching one with his sharp vision.

* * *

About mid-afternoon, they made it to Lok Giran, after pushing the draft-mule hard. Two massive towards stood guard over the courtyard into the fortress, and a large set of double-doors, wide enough for four hippotauns abreast, was wide open. Traffic moved in an out of the doors, apparently moving further up the mountain, and receiving things from up on the mountain.

Dozens of hippotauns milled about the courtyard, and dwarves in thick armor were everywhere.

A tough-looking dwarven woman with straight-razors woven into her braids motioned them over to her. The leader of the dwarven escort said something in dwarven to her, and she responded, before moving towards the carriage.

Droog said in the dwarven tongue, “I've something for the Baron and the Bishop.”

The female dwarf, whom Droog knew as Loren Razorbraid, a bastard dwarf like him, and one of the Baron and the Bishop's reeves for Lok Giran.

Loren asked bluntly, “What is it, Droog?”

Droog leaned forward and said, “I've Maekar's Skull.”

Loren's eyes went wide, and she pointed towards the huge door. “Through there – find one of the brothers Rubynose!”

When Droog snapped the reins on his draft-mule, Barome followed the carriage, holding the reins to his camel, and wondering at what all was going on.

The dwarf Barome had been assigned to followed the carriage through the great doors, and down a well lit corridor. The expensive torches of the dwarves, the ones that burned with a steady light, no fuel, and no fire, lined the walls, giving off the light of a forge from each with no heat.

Right off the corridor was an immense stable, carved from the very mountain itself, in which many hippotauns were held. Barome pointed into the stables, and told his camel, “Stay” in the desert elven dialect. The camel obediantly walked into the stables, and looked around, before looking back at Barome as if to ask, “In Here?!”

Barome gave the camel a stern gesture, and continued on behind the carriage. The dwarf seemed to know where he was going, and stopped the draft-mule near a crowd. A number of dwarves seemed to be taking direction from a red-nosed dwarf in the vestments of a priest of Galgiran.

The red-nosed dwarf turned towards them, and asked something of the bald dwarf, still sitting in his carriage. The bald dwarf and the red-nosed dwarf talked in their harsh, gutteral tongue for a moment, and then the red-nosed dwarf signalled several odd-looking dwarves over towards the carriage.

Barome half-expected trouble from the odd-looking dwarves, and prepared for it. They had no weapons, but their armor was ridged in an odd way, and glinted in the golden-light from the dwarven torches. Their hair was tucked into their armor – odd enough itself in a dwarf – and their gauntlets, elbows, and knees had ridges of metal that looked razor sharp. Their eyes, though, was the scariest thing about them; the whites showed all around their eyes, and their gem-colored eyes missed nothing.

Droog said, “Elf, can you carry this?” and he motioned towards the cupboard box.

Barome stepped forward, keeping an eye on the odd-looking dwarves, and heft the box. It was staggeringly heavy for its size, but the desert elf managed to get it up onto one shoulder without too much trouble.

The red-nosed dwarf uttered more harsh words in his dwarven tongue, and motioned down another hallway. Barome's dwarf led him off in that direction on foot, leaving the carriage behind. The strange dwarves stood out of the way and watched them pass, and they gave Barome a sick feeling his his gut.

Droog took them down several corridors, noting that Lok Giran was in full battle array. The passages had not been crafted in the traditional fashion, with picks and bits and chisels, but with prayers to Galgiran. The priests of Galgiran within Lok Giran kept with the old traditions, though. The walls were all seven feet in height; the corridors seven in width. Along each wall at eye-height for a dwarf ran a story in stone along the right side, telling one tale or another. The story in stone on the left side ran backwards.

Droog Grimfire knew the corridors well enough, having stayed at Lok Giran several times over the years. The directions Gawan Rubynose had given him, though, took him to a part of the keep that was new to him. When he rounded a corner, he saw why.

Two of the fearsome Khol Ongs't stood on either side of a sealed door. The Khol Ongs't – dwarven for the Blades of God – were given the righteous anger of Galgiran in a ceremony that took seven days, without food, water, light, or contact with another living being. The Khol Ongs't were fearsome in combat, forswearing all weapons save the armor they wore and their own bodies.

Some dwarves believed that the Khol Ongs't actually died during their ceremony, and were reborn as the strange Shadow Guardians that had been seen since the War of the Undead. Droog thought it was nonsense, since the Khol Ongs't had existed long before the Shadow Guardians, and did not even appear like the Shadow Guardians.

Droog said, “I am Droog Grimfire, Vicar of Galgiran. I have brought Maekar's Skull here, to be placed within the vaults of Lok Giran.”

One of the Khol Ongs't nodded curtly, and turned to the sealed door. He held his hand to the door, and the edges of it glowed for a moment, and then recessed, before sliding back into the wall. Inside, was darkness.

Droog motioned for Barome, and the desert elf took a step forward, to be met by the upheld arms of one of the strange, crazy-looking dwarves with the silent, wide-eyed stares. The Khol Ongs't turned about, Maekar's Skull in his arms, and trudged into the darkness, where he disappeared.

Barome, curious, pulled forth from over his shoulder pack a sunrod. The tip of the rod had been enchanted by a priest of Arpelos, the Sun God, for a donation to the church. Barome walked forward, but was instantly met with a wall of metal, as the three dwarves stood before him.

The desert elf acted more on instinct than rationality, as he leapt over the dwarves, expecting them to rush forward onto him, such was the hostility they radiated.

Barome landed in a roll, sunrod held high, and just made it into the darkness as he was beset from behind by three dwarven bodies clad in razor-edged steel.

Droog groaned in exasperation, and noted that the Khol Ongs't were being relatively gentle with the desert elf, seeking only to restrain him – but the very act of using any of their armor against an opponent, was dangerous to their opponent. The vicar finally managed to get all of the Khol Ongs't off of the desert elf, and pull him from out of the darkness within the doorway.

The desert elf was badly cut up, and bleeding all over the floor, but looked to have plenty of kick left in him. Droog pulled his holy symbol from around his neck, and held it in his hand. His other hand, he placed on the desert elf, as he invoked Adrian's Prayer. A moment later, Galgiran granted him his prayer, as a wave of heat and a blast of power radiated from the amulet in his hand, using his body as a conduit, and travelling into the desert elf's body. Red-orange-golden light spilled from the wounds, and then the black, dried blood fell off of the freshly-healed wounds, revealing only aged scars.

The leader of the Khol Ongs't barked a reprimand at Droog, but the vicar ignored it, and drug the desert elf up to his feet.

Barome explained, “I was just curious!”

Droog grunted, and motioned for the desert elf to follow him.

Barome took one last look at the darkness, as the fourth guard returned, stepping out of nothingness.

Droog said nothing, and the Barome just followed, not really understanding what had happened. The desert elf figured it best to stay close to 'his' dwarf, until they were outside. Barome had never been inside of Lok Giran; had never been in any dwarven citadel, before. He had travelled up and down the Galanus River for several years, and never set foot on Mount Rilan, for which the city was named, and which housed Lok Giran, and the mages' academy of Lok Magius.

As they passed the dwarf with the red nose, Droog merely exchanged nods, and motioned for Barome to continue following him. Droog stepped back into his carriage, turned the conveyance around in the tight quarters with some well-placed touches of the reins, and let his mule lead on.

When they passed the stables, Barome whistled the 'come' command for his camel, and it obediantly rose up from the side of one stall, and quickly came to his side. The camel apparently did not like being near the hippotauns, though it tolerated them to an extent.

Outside in mid-afternoon sun, Droog put on the hand brake, and turned in his seat to the desert elf. “I'm going on up the mountain, not down. I'm going to Lok Magius – the mages' academy. If you come with me, it's six marks further on, at a good clip. If you want to go back to Rilan, it'll likely take you just as long to make it there.”

Barome stopped and thought about it for a moment. On the one hand, he was likely to find more orcs, faster, looking for them than staying with the dwarf. On the other hand, Lok Magius was liable to be under attack before almost anywhere else in Rakore, since it was the home of all the mages – almost all the mages in the world.

The desert elf said, “I'm coming with you.”

Droog nodded to himself, and then released the hand brake. He drove his mule through the massive towers of the courtyard, and back onto the road to Lok Magius. There was more traffic on the roads, and Droog edged his carriage off to one side to better fit in with the flow of traffic. He pulled his book out, and had it opened up on the seat beside him – occasionally glancing at one passage in particular, his warhammer used as a placer against the harsh mountain winds.

Barome, for his part, continued to range ahead and sometimes to the side of the road, hoping that the inattentive dwarf would lure roc-hawkes to him.

When the sun set, they were on the south side of the mountain. The darkness was doubled, for even twilight was obscured from them as they headed into the shadowed side of the mountain giant. The stars were out in abundance, and very clear.

Barome watched those stars, to see if any were obscured by the great hawkes. To his disappointment, they made it all the way to Lok Magius on the well-travelled and well-patrolled road, without incident.

Lok Magius was built upon a pinnacle of rock, with three successive walls, leading to a middle tower of considerable height. The walls themselves were thick, and each was nearly impenatrable. Towers at the corners of the hexagonal structure showed ballistae and archers watching the skies, and watching the mountain for trespassers.

Before the drawbridge to Lok Magius' main gate, lay a number of towers, each made of a different kind of stone, though most were of granite. One was all of black basalt with white morar. Another was made of some rose-colored granite. Some were squared at the base, and others round. The dozen or so towers stood as mute guardians to the main gate of Lok Magius.

Droog explained, “These towers used to be the mages' academy, before yonder fortress was built. The guards use these, now. And the storemen.”

A tall stone fence used a short, squat tower at its corner as an anchor, and inside of the fence were a half-dozen hippotauns. Outside, dwarven infantry sharpened weapons, tended to armor, or otherwise prepared for war.

Barome held back. “I'll wait out here, for you…” The close confines of the keep were making the outdoorsman feel claustrophobic, and he wondered how humans could live in such places.

Droog shrugged. “I'll be in the library, if you need me. See you tomorrow morning.”

Barome waved off-handedly, and led his camel towards the short, squat tower, calling a greeting to the dwarven infantry. They waved him in, and let him sit with them for awhile.

At the gate house, the guards waved the familiar Droog inside.

The dwarf put his carriage in the stables, and affable stable-master helped him take care of his draft-mule despite the late hour. The mule seemed eager to rest after the hard climb up the mountain, but almost balked with all the confusion going on in the stables.

Familiars – the beasts that were consorts of magic to the mages – were hard at work in the stables. A spider with a body as large as a man's head, and legs that gave it a spread of nearly six feet, was hard at work building suits of silken armor. A monkey leapt onto a stall, startling a mundane horse, and then leapt up into the rafters. It had held, grasped in its tail, a small hand crossbow.

Droog gazed about at the chaos of the stables, before turning his attention to his lock-box. He pulled out of it the large book Barome often saw him reading, secured the box, checked on the mule, and then headed towards the library.

The library of Lok Magius was always under tight guard, and no one could be admitted to the library without the express permission of one of the librarians. The librarians restricted access to the library to those with a penchant for the arcane, and anyone wishing to view the books had to answer basic questions about magic, as a way of encouraging the students of the academy to study. Failure to answer would result in barment from the library for a day.

Droog had been barred from the library many times, over the prior ten years, but had come to a basic understanding of arcane magic – even if he had yet to master the simplest of spells.

The librarian on duty was a younger man, whose name escaped Droog. The boy asked in an almost bored tone, “What nimbus does abjuration magic give, to one who uses spells of magical detection?”

The bald dwarf thought for a moment, piercing the young man with his coal-black eyes, before answering, “Blue.”

The boy made an obscure, arcane gesture, and the doors to the library opened. “Enter.”

The heads of two statues to either side of the outside door turned to follow Droog's progress through the doorway.

Inside, Droog went to a set of shelves he knew by heart – the location of translations, from draconic to the elven script, and from draconic into the common script. As far as Droog could tell, nowhere in all the world was a translations of the draconic script, into the dwarven script.

Working diligently and long into the night, he poured over the two translations, and compared it to one paragraph in particular from the book he'd brought with him.

The big book was bound in iron sheaves, and had a lock of its own built into the cover. The key was kept about Droog's neck on a separate chain from his holy symbol, and was always catching in the dwarf's chest hair, much to his discomforture. The book had been written by a mage named Rahob, who used the draconic script to record his thoughts, notes, logs, and spells.

Or so Droog assumed. He had met the ghost of Rahob, guarding the book with a jealous passion, and with the help of his then master, had sent the ghost of Rahob on into the afterworld. With a battle raging on, they had moved on to other issues, and the book had been forgotten.

Droog fought by the side of his master for several years, through the War of the Undead, until he began to see a pattern in his master's ways. Droog and his master both were clerics of Galgiran, using their faith in their god to send the undead fleeing back into the darkness, or to destroy their very souls upon the fires of Galgiran's will. Droog Grimfire saw something else in his master, though. Something that chilled him – a corruption of Galgiran's will, and Galgiran's spirit.

The bald dwarf was determined to bring his former master back into the fold of the church, without harming him or the church. The Grimfire felt that since his master had been corrupted by the magics of the War of the Undead, then perhaps within those magics lay his salvation. Droog had returned to the site of Rahob's ghost, and retrieved the locked and bound spellbook. And he had spent the last decade trying to unravel its secrets. He knew that he was close, and he knew that the war might not give him another chance to find out.

So ends the 17th of Davor, 1329.

This is the first recap, done after the second session. The knuckle-heads forgot to leave me their character sheets, or maybe I didn't emphasize it enough, but they're learning. I apparently am a rather unique DM, and take some adjusting to. We'll see if it's worth all the trouble, some years down the road.

Like many of my players before me, James has only known hack-n-slash Dungeons and Dragons. I hope I don't beat him up too badly with the role-play, and I try to ensure that every session involves a life-or-death situation – just for the sake of the drama. (chuckle) So far, he seems to like being able to take the time to learn how to build a character from scratch, instead of being handed a sheet and having to play someone else. I look forward to seeing him grow into his character, even if I have to roll up a newspaper every now and again and whop him for metagaming.

Erin metagames worse, but he does it without thinking, catches himself, and tries to undo. (whop!) Erin's a more veteran player, but I'm noticing that his experience actually paints him into a conventional box of sorts. Once he learns to recognize the box his former games have put him in, I think he'll blossom along just fine.

750. (total character XP to date is 3,750; characters started out at 3rd-level)