The start of an adventure

The beginning

The Present

Early morining, in the middle of the market square, stands the statue of the heroes you and the rest of your village adore.
Your adoration is more, almost worship.
They were the heroes of old, those who stood before the Goddess of Creation and chose to better the lives of all people, of which you and your fellow villagers now enjoyed the results. With one last look of admiration to the statue, you turned around and grabbed your backpack. It was time to go.

This was your yearly camping trip with your dad after all, somewhere there was a big fish waiting to be caught, just by the two of you togheter. You hadn't succeeded yet, but this year would be it, you could feel it in your bones, something big was about to happen. With a big smile you waved to your dad, waiting a bit further on, for you to come along.

You took your first step, but the next was like walking through a blurry mist and before you knew it, ...

The tower

Your next step landed on the stone floor of a small round stone chamber. Nowhere any open space of the market square, nor your dad to be seen anymore. Instead a group of strangers stands in front of you, with a look of just as much surpise on their face as you were feeling yourself.

Underneath your feet, the afterglow of a summoning circle started to dim. Getting a better sense of all around you, sound, smell and color start to flood your senses. Except for the strangers in front of you, obviously from very different walks of life and places, each, your surroundings seemed to stay in a kind of blur.

A kind of haze lies in the air, by the smell of it, some kind of alchemical smoke has been filling this medium sized circular room for some time now. And the small slits in the wall, that serve as windows have not been able to ventilate this place well enough. It even seems to have a pinkish, no orange sheen, what makes everything around seem strange, even if only due to the color that does not seem right. The smell confirms the nature of the smoke to be of an alchemical nature, for you have never smelled something like this before. Charred, yet sweet. Crisp, yet parchingly dry, making you swallow consciously. Hard.

You look around, in search of the origin of this strange mist and finally notice someone, not as bewildered as you. Oblivious even, for he stands with his back turned to the lot of you. Busy in front of a large wooden table, filled with strange vials, tubes, pots, cups and other utensils, worthy of some mad wizards laboratory. He is very busy pooring things together, starting to bubble or pouring smoke over the edge of a bowl, ingredients he lists seemingly just appearing in front of him or next to his outstretched hand.

You cough politely, so as to get his attention without trying to spook him to much. It wouldn't do to make him jump and him accidentily throw stuff toghether that can blow all of you up in an instant, now does it. So, after a breath or two, when he does not respond, you cough again, louder this time.

Absentmindedly he turns around 'Yes,yes, what is it?', and almost jumps out of his skin, surprise and fear mingling on his face in equal portions. 'Who are you, how did you get in here? That's not even possible, shouldn't ... now would it?' .... He trails of in stray thoughts, trying to make as much sense of this situation as you and those strangers are doing. Not all of them are as patient about it as you, so you jump in between them and this rooms occupant and try to explain the situation as best as possible.

'But there's no way for you to get in here, there is no door, only these windows, I need to be undisturbed for what I am to do.'

Now that he mentions it, you look around the room one more time, more closely now. Every inch of the wall is lined with tables and shelves. In a small empty space on the floor, rests your backpack, which apparently had even disappeared from your shoulders as well.

'There's only one other way you guys would have been able to enter my room, that would be the summoning circle I used. Well, tried to use, I failed, the heroes of old did not show up after being summoned.'

Everyone looked puzzled at the others. You were stunned, did he just say he tried to summon the heroes of old? For real? That would be like a wish come true if you were ever able to meet them in person. So you pressed this strange robed figure for more information.

'Young man, I am the great mage Xanadoo, do not underestimate what I can do. I needed to summon the heroes of old. Those that stood at the edge of Creation and shaped it to their will. I ... needed their advise. To my calculations, we stand at a pivoltal point in history once again. There is no threat great enough that is active at this point in time to warrant such conclusions, I know, yet my calcultations show me, now is when the heroes are needed again. Yet other signs and portents say exactly the opposite. It is all very confusing, so I wanted to summon the original heroes and ask for their advise on the matter, since they have ample experience with such things. Yet I failed the ritual, no one appeared, at all. That was days ago and now all of you just appear here out of thin air. I fear my summoning has gone wrong somewhere and accidentally summoned you. I appologise deeply. Let me show you the way out of my tower, then you can be on your way home once again.'

With the wave of a hand tables and chests moved aside to show a doorsized empty space in the wall. Slowly it slid open on unseen hinges and a stairs down was the only thing visible behind it.

'Now leave me be, I have to run my calculations one more time, so my other experiments will not suffer to greatly from this failure'.

With that the wizard turned his back to you and the other strangers, already ablivious to your presence, frantically mixing potions and unfurling ancient looking scrolls.

After the last one of you left the room, the stone door slowly closed again and its presence disappeared, turning into a solid wall again. With hardly any other options or way to exit left, you all descended the stairs down to the bottom. After what seemed to be an endless way down, a solid wooden door greeted you. The handle wasn't to hard to use and the door opened effortlessly unto a market square in full operation.

Carts were being pulled, timber and beams were being carried around. People were busy running on and off. A lot of shouting was going on around you. The sun stands high in the sky, slightly past noon, almost blinding you when you step out of the darkness of the tower. You hear someone shouting, hands push you way from where you stand. You bump into a heavy beam of scaffolding that seems to be placed around the wizards tower for some reason.

'Are you out of your mind lad, this scaffolding is being torn down, it needs to be gone by this evening. That does not mean you can already enter the clocktower however!'

You look up to see the huge face of a clock, only a few stories above your head. How strange, were you not just in a wizards tower that seemed to be far higher than this clock tower?