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View Full Version : Build-A-Legend: "The Living Palace"



Admiral Squish
2015-01-02, 10:45 PM
Welcome to Build-A-Legend! It's a simple game, but I do hope you'll enjoy it.
Your task is simply to create the legend behind the name given below. It can be a creature, a place, an event, an idea, or pretty much any other sort of noun you can think of. It can be in any setting you can think of, from high fantasy, to sci-fi, to alternate history, to official settings, or it can even be its own setting, if you're that ambitious. Each week, on Friday, I post a new thread, with a new name for people to build on, and add the last one into the archive. If you'd like, you can suggest names for the future. There's no rules, just have fun and try not to insult other people's creations. Do those count as rules?

The Name: The Living Palace


“The Iron Cathedral” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?378644)
“The Glass Sea” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?378644&p=18306562&viewfull=1#post18306562)
“The Hounds of Kel'ranu” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?380942)
“The Vanishing Heights” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?382217)
“The Order of One” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?383641)
“Rono's Folly” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?384719)
“The Day of Shadow” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?385764)
“The Wandering Crown” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?386947)
“The Silver Legion” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?387896)
“The Menagerie of Tehn-Keltan” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?389014)
“The Crystal Isles” (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?389867)

ImNotTrevor
2015-01-03, 04:37 AM
The ground shakes once. Suddenly, jarringly.

It shakes again, harder. It is accompanied by a dull boom that echoes across the battered landscape.

The earth shudders again. Footsteps. It is footsteps. Massive, ungodly footsteps.

The being appears. A head the size of a large house, wrapped about in ivory white stone. Two stained glass rosary windowd act as unblinking eyes. Brilliant red flags dangle from the bottom of its jaw, held shut by massive iron bands bolted to the creature...construct? It is hard to tell the difference.

The beast bellows, a deep sound that shakes your ribs and makes your stomach tremble. Its head is supported by a thick neck that leads into a body that looks as if a Mesa had sprouted legs and began to walk. The legs are jagged and rough, covered with moss and engraved with strange symbols and glyphs. Its underside is pocked with hundreds of small holes.

Around the lip of its flat-topped body wraps a fence made of the same ivory stone, bearing the same crimson flags as the jaw of the creature. From its back, one can see a palace. As tall and as grand as any one has ever seen.

It walks on.

They call it the Living Palace. Its owner or owners unknown. But it is feared.

Every few months, it will walk over a village. From the holes in its belly will drop soldiers on ropes, who pillage and destroy. They steal food, water, women, whatever they need. Then they leave without a word. And the palace trudges on.

They say it was built by a mad king and his court wizard. Their names are lost to history, but their creation continues to stalk the earth.

Who lives upon its back? Why do they not stop? Where does it go when it is not attacking? Is it alive? Can it be killed? What riches does it hold?

No one knows...for now.

ramakidin
2015-01-03, 12:00 PM
So, you foolish adventurers want to find the entrance to The Devil's Kingdom just to bring back some pretty girl you barely met. Fine, but you have to take me with you. Stop your protests, I won't even be there on the way back. You and your party simply have to take me to the Living Palace and leave me there.

What? You have never heard of the Living Palace. Then let me tell you, It is made entirely out of white marble and plants and filled with all of the best parts of living. Upon entry you return to your prime and have eternity to enjoy all that is offered.The most delicious of food, the most perilous adventures, the best of drink, hoards of treasure, and not to mention the most beautiful women (Or even men if you are into that). It is a paradise in hell and I intend to get there before I die because I know where I would end up otherwise.

Sounds like Heaven right, well that's cause it is. Death got tired of hell and made his own heaven without the morals of angels. I will be your guide until we see the magnificent spires and statues under the Living Palace's dome. But if you don't want to join the eternal party, then don't put a single foot into the dome because once you enter you stay there for all eternity. You can stop your doubting, I heard about it's successful construction from those demons, you guys killed last week. Let me get out my old adventuring gear and we will be on our way.


Some of you might already be aware of this story, it is called a Nice Place to Visit and was aired on the Twilight Zone show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GDzuQa2UTk

If and only if you don't have time to watch it (or the 6 minute edited version in the side bar). In essence, The Living Palace is still hell because you can do whatever you want with no risk and you will be bored for all of eternity.

Admiral Squish
2015-01-06, 08:47 AM
Very nice entries so far! I might well make a submission of my own at some point.

Liodre
2015-01-06, 09:56 AM
16 March, 1248
Status Report, Jaochim Brex, Folklorist
Current location: Town of Leosburg

For what it is worth I will record the ridiculous things I have heard since being assigned this investigation. A 'living palace.' At least that is what virtually everyone has said for the better part of a fortnight. Though it sounds more like heavily fortified and trapped castle. I believe none of these wild jabberings; no one, they say, has gone there in centuries.

The important ramblings; the legends state that long before collective memory, during a siege in the Chaos War, a half-crazed (probably more) demigod champion of some forgotten deity expended every divine favor and mortal energy at her disposal to create a powerful artifact to fend off the Abyssals and maintain her keep. (Sounds good so far, does it not? What could go wrong?)

When the demigod activated this artifact it pulled, not only her, but every soldier, crafts-person, servant, and pet of the keep into it, and cascaded mystical power through and around the castle. The lore says it created a sentient hive-mind-like entity of the keep. The magical, technical, perceptive, and thought capabilities of those inside could create anything within the walls. The stories tell of entire sections of the keep re-configuring itself, sudden traps where none existed before, constructs, and even fluctuations in time and gravity.

I will see about assembling a team to investigate if even the location is true. Subsequent reports to follow.

Gather and protect; Lore is life.

Archivist's notes: No further reports received. Follow up questioning of Leosburg confirmed Folklorist location and destination though no return. Review pending additional investigation of Leosburg lore.
-Archivist Dewit, 24 August, 1248

Taet
2015-01-06, 12:44 PM
Oh get that look off your face before it freezes that way. I heard that in your lands you chain the city shut at night to keep out thieves and armies. Gold does not grow back you know. And inside your city you still live in tiny dirty stinking rooms. We have good warm stone around us. Yes it is warm. Go over there and stick your tongue to it. See? Fine, I will.

:smallyuk:

I did not stick. Now do you believe me? And we all work on growing our own food too. No hunger here. Oh at least you have some idea of how good we have it. The roof that is not green? That one is the medicine roof. Saff-something, I think, ask the wife. I said it before. Life is good here. We all live at court. Maybe we do not spend all day with our lips stuck to someone's hind end. We do real work. So?

:smallannoyed:

Because you are keeping me from doing it. Who you need to talk to? Go over the flying bridge to the Unliving Palace. They keep all the records. You please them, they will set the seal on your face and give you a room before the sun comes up. The palace gates will stay open all night of course. You will not get locked out. Paranoid.

Spojaz
2015-01-06, 01:13 PM
They say it was crafted by elves, before the age of man. It takes thousand-year patience to twist the great skywood trees, weaving the branches when they are yet new and green, twisting the buds and pruning back the leaves. Constructed without hammer, nail or stone, a living lasting testament to the oldest of races. Forest not tamed, but bent, year by year, day by day.
Thousands of lesser oak, their branches hiding sleeping rooms and kitchens, storerooms and vaults of ironwood, trunks tight together. Spiced wines of vintage older than our history, maturing in the hollow of still living trees. Gardens for flowers and food on every wall, even through the great library of their forgotten knowledge. Living walls a hundred feet high protect and frame the central throne, shaped from the last of the sacred elf-bramble. Dappled with sunlight that drips down through the foliage, and accented by glowflies, the rulers of old kept their court here, in the last bastion of their kind in our world.

And you, decided it was a good place to play with fire!

Taet
2015-01-06, 01:49 PM
Spojaz, you have been a DM. Haven't you? :smallbiggrin:

Durkoala
2015-01-06, 03:55 PM
Me? Around these malodorous parts, I'm normally known as Wight. Don't worry, "Wight" is just an old word for person, nothing to do with any shambling nasties. I'm as alive as you are. So, what's somebody so young, innocent and good-looking doing robbing graves? Oh, stop looking so shocked, it's practically legal around here. Well, nearly legal, sort of.

Legal or not, it's a very dangerous line of work. Most newbies get caught by the Watch, and then flogged, branded or stocked. The others run into things like Vampires, revenants, zombies, Crypt-Wights and ghouls. There isn’t usually much left of them, and it usually doesn’t want to be buried, if you get my drift?

If you want to have a life down here, you’ll need to know where the safe districts are, where to find the swag, a good set of tools and friends who know what they’re doing. The corridors of the dead stretch for tangled, thorny miles, winding around buildings that the overworld has forgotten. Most... “Treasure Hunters” don’t take lightly to finding somebody else going after their prize, so some extra muscle is essential. In fact, I’m trying to start my own band of brigands, but you’re the first piece of new meat I’ve come across. How about it? Down here, there’s riches and freedom galore!

There’s also the greatest place to stay ever! There’s an old posh place that sunk down ages ago, and there's some kind of spell on it that keeps the shamblies away. They sometimes rise up and attack the surface, you see, so this was probably put there to keep some posh twit safe. It's been done up since it sank, and now it's full of light because we keep the lanterns burning, furnished with our findings and the library is full of great stuff. It's basically neutral territory: all the groups help keep it alive and fighting in the palace is banned. When you see it shining in the dark, like a great house of life in the lands of the dead, then you will understand why it's called The Living Palace.

If you want to come, it's now or never.