This year the Fairelands Quest sends you through the Fairelands to save the only thing keeping the Unweaver in check: The Bard Queen herself!
Category Archives: Hunt
The Fairelands Quest: The Bard Queen’s Song
Every year the Fairelands arrive with a mystery to solve, a quest to challenge brave adventurers, and this year is no different! Last year might have lead you to face a dragon, but this year we (and Farion) have a much bigger problem in our hands.
FARION SUNBREEZE IS A PIXIE WITH A PROBLEM.
His boss has gone missing and he (and The Lads) have come to the conclusion that, while she’s been known to do this sort of thing before, something’s not right about this one. Were Farion a noodle seller from Kakushi Pasu this wouldn’t be a problem, but Farion (and The Lads) work for the Bard Queen – and an absent Bard Queen is bad news for the Fairelands.
So Farion (and, yes, The Lads) have come up with a plan: for Farion (and this is where The Lads backed off a bit) to follow the Bard Queen’s trail, see what she’s been up to and help out if she needs it. If she’s catching some her-time with a fruity beverage in Dawn’s Promise then all’s well, but if the Unweaver has something to do with it…
Well, let’s face it: Farion’s a pixie. Great of heart, but not so much with the sword-arm – even if he did grow up on the wrong side of town. He’s going to need some help. Someone brave, strong, true… and preferably unaware of Farion’s slightly questionable reputation before the Bard Queen hired him.
What Farion needs is a hero.
The Bard Queen’s Song takes you to Morbus, where the Unweaver’s twisted power has turned beauty into chaos and nature against itself. Search among the thorns, avoid the twisted denizens and then on into the Alchemist’s tower to –
What, you were expecting spoilers? For shame! These are the Fairelands, hero; enlightenment only comes to those willing to seek it.
Are you ready for the Fantasy Faire Quest?
This year the Fantasy Faire Hunt has become a Quest. Still with a fantastic cascade of prizes at the end (and some great prizes you collect as rewards as you go through the stages of the Quest), this year we’re continuing to develop the tradition of a strong and exciting story that carries you through the whole event.
And here is a taste of that story …
Read more about the story that lies behind Malfience on the main Quest page here.
And prepare to meet the Bard Queen in Fairelands Junction to be given your mission when the Faire begins on Thursday 21st April!
Champion of the Faireland: Muromi. the Water Sprite
This year’s Fairelands Hunt – the Lost Land – sends you on a search for the Ten Champions chosen by the Bard Queen to mentor, protect and instruct her daughter, the Princess Flora. Each day the Faire is running, we will be introducing you to a different Champion. They all have stories to tell … and some of these may give you clues to help you find them!
Muromi, the Water Sprite
Muromi was the child of a fisherman and a mermaid.
The fisherman drew the mermaid up in his nets one day from the deeps. Terrified, the mermaid begged him to let her go but the fisherman, who had no children of his own to help him pull the nets, asked not for gold nor for jewels, but for a child. The mermaid agreed to his wish and many months later, when the winter wind whistled around his poor shack, there was a sharp knock at the door. When he hastened outside, he found a baby, seemingly human, wrapped in a robe of watered silk scattered with rich pearls, lying in a great pearlescent shell for a cradle.
The fisherman, who was a sensible man, sold the pearls and bought a great house by the shore from where he could watch the fleet of fishing boats he now owned. There was no need for Muromi to pull up nets, but all the fisherman’s bribes and loving scolds or threats could not keep the child from the water.
As soon as she could toddle to the water’s edge, she did. And beyond for, to the fisherman’s alarm, his little daughter toddled straight into the water–and under the water, too. By the time the fisherman had raced to the water’s edge, Muromi was swimming around in little circles, singing a strange song that sounded like the sighing of waves on a summer’s night.
From those early days, the fisherman was forced to accept that his beautiful daughter had two natures–the earth dwelling and the sea dwelling. If kept too long from the water, she pined and drooped like a sea plant taken out of its environment. But she would never stay overlong in the water either, save for once a year when she would–as she told her father–take her place beside her mother in the Great Swim that took her deep beneath the ocean waves to the Palace of Pearl.
When the Bard Queen needed a teacher who knew the waves for her daughter, the Princess Flora, who else could be chosen but Muromi?
Champion of the Faireland: Gassire, the Musician
This year’s Fairelands Hunt – the Lost Land – sends you on a search for the Ten Champions chosen by the Bard Queen to mentor, protect and instruct her daughter, the Princess Flora. Each day the Faire is running, we will be introducing you to a different Champion. They all have stories to tell … and some of these may give you clues to help you find them!
Gassire, the Musician
Gassire was a warrior King, a brave and noble leader of his people, child of another such warrior and a fierce desert djinn. He had fought a long and bitter war against an ancient enemy of his people. After many years of conflict, they faced one final battle that would decide everything.
As Gassire lay sleeping in his tent the night before the battle, he was awoken by the sound of music. It was not the reed pipes and drums that were usual in his land, but a strange music, resonant and powerful. The tune was one he had never heard before and yet the sound of it moved him nearly to tears. He rose and wrapped a silken robe around his body before stepping out into the desert to hear the music more clearly and discover the player.
But there was no sign of the musician and, indeed, the music was fainter. Puzzled, he returned to his tent, and heard the mysterious music clearly once more. There was no sign of a musician, but all at once, Gassire was convinced that he would be victorious the following day. And as soon as he felt this conviction, the music faded away and he was left with the faint sounds of the sleeping army around him, and the night wind of the desert.
The hope he had been given proved true; the following day he won a crushing victory, which defeated his greatest enemy. Gassire returned with his army to his capital in triumph.
But he did not forget the music. From that day forward, he encouraged foreign musicians to come to his court with their native instruments and play for him. And always he searched for that strange sound he had heard in the battle tent.
At last, after many years, a talented musician came to play for the King, bringing what appeared to be a strange instrument–a lute. As soon as he heard the first notes, Gassire knew that his search for the instrument was over.
But the musician had never heard the strange music that Gassire described, that had played so mysteriously the night before the battle. Gassire decided that he would renounce his throne and devote his life to music… and discover once again that mysterious song of hope.
And his quest continued, even after the Bard Queen summoned Gassire to teach her daughter, the Princess Flora, the ways of music.
Champion of the Faireland: Sun Wukong, the Rogue
This year’s Fairelands Hunt – the Lost Land – sends you on a search for the Ten Champions chosen by the Bard Queen to mentor, protect and instruct her daughter, the Princess Flora. Each day the Faire is running, we will be introducing you to a different Champion. They all have stories to tell … and some of these may give you clues to help you find them!
Sun Wukong, the Rogue
Sun Wukong was a powerful and proud Prince, the son of a great Queen and her demon lover. As a young man he was seen as an idle wastrel; he loved to drink and gamble with his friends–and there were many tales of beautiful women, too.
One night as he sat at dice in a tavern with his chosen associates, a mysterious stranger entered. He chose to drink alone and quietly, but the haughty Prince disliked to see anyone failing to acknowledge his presence and his importance. He therefore sent one of his companions to issue a challenge to the stranger to play dice with the Prince.
The stranger looked long and hard at the prince, and then nodded. He took his place opposite the Prince, and the game commenced.
Very soon, Sun Wukong realised that he faced the most skilful dice player he had ever met. Where skill was needed, his opponent possessed it in ample measure, and the luck of the game seemed always on his side, too. The Prince lost, and lost heavily, and although mere financial transactions troubled him not at all, a far more important commodity to the spoiled Prince–his pride–was hurt.
But as he played, he saw a way in which he could win–a cunning cheat through a spell taught him by his father, cast upon the dice. No-one, he thought, would realise what he had done and even at this stage, he would win the game. He stretched out his hand…
…and the stranger caught that hand and Sun Wukong’s hand opened… the spell lay like purple smoke in his hand, then gently drifted up and dissipated. But not before it had been seen by everyone in the tavern.
Then the opponent rose to his feet, and everyone recognised him as one of the gods of the land. He pronounced a curse on Sun Wukong. Until he had recovered Seven Sutras (sacred books) from a land far, far in the West, he would be forced to remain in the form of a monkey. If, said the god, he lived a virtuous life, then in times of peril he would be able to transform into other forms–but he would never lose the monkey’s tail.
Many are the stories told of Sun Wukong’s journeys in quest of the Seven Sutras. Did he live a virtuous life on his journeys? Well, it seems that he was not able to transform himself as often as he might wish, so judge for yourselves! And the tales are full of daring tricks and deceptions practiced, and very narrow escapes. But eventually he returned to his homeland with the Sutras and once again took up his role as a Prince, in human form.
So he was when the Bard Queen summoned him to become a Champion for the Princess Flora. It was declared this was for his peerless skills as a traveller. Some thought that the Bard Queen also believed that a little touch of the rogue remained, and was not averse to her daughter learning such skills too!
Fantasy Faire SL Archives 