Life ate me. I could not go on writing as I had hoped. But it is NaNoWriMo again. So Project empress continues.
As a reminder for what has happened so far follows a short synopsis of the story so far:
It’s the year 20xx.
In the first third of the 21st century: the great global industrial civilisation failed.
As it fell it dragged the entire world down with it, leaving it fractured in thousands of tiny pieces. Everyone blamed each other. The shadow of tyranny grew and devoured once great nations. But in a shattered world that still remembered a once golden age, the tyrants were soon eaten by the wolves they themselves raised.
Out of the ashes, built on ruins, half remembered cultures and jealously guarded remnants of the old technology, a great number of new small nations, city states and petty kingdoms rose.
Europe once on the cusp of unity and greatness had returned to its savage ways it had existed for so long, but it was here in these lands, that the historical martial arts underground rose. People used old manuscripts and treaties describing martial arts that had lain dormant for centuries, to bring them back. They were people bound by a common appreciation of the ancient martial arts, who during these times of chaos rose to the challenge, bringing a certain semblance of order into the chaos of a burning world.
Let me take you into a world, where warlords vie for supremacy over the old Europe, where high scientists fight to bring back the wonders of the world that was, where some people dream of becoming kings in a world ripe for the taking, while others still dream to bring back the great unity of the past.
Cara Gibson Müller our protagonist dreams of becoming a sword master of the fabled historical martial arts styles. At the beginning of our story she is a hopeless student of the famous sword master Manfred Brumotti von Burg. Over 4 years of training but almost no progress.
Cara’s fate changes when she gets attacked by 3 ruffian. She does try to defend herself. She fails, but is saved by the wandering journeyman swordswoman Natalie Laukkanen Lapointe.
The latter had sworn to never take a pupil. Too much of a hassle really. But there will be a grand tourney soon, where a secret fencing manuscript will go to the winner. The catch, only a team of master and apprentice can take part. Natalie sees something in Cara so she decides to adopt her.
Natalie gives Cara a crash course in her Style to see if Cara has what it takes. She has.
Natalie then goes to prepare some business entrusting Cara to Walter for the next training session.
Walter Balogh Rayne is the owner of Bacchus’ Barrel the wine bar Natalie likes to hang out with her sword master friend and rival Robert Cavendish Gutierrez.
Walter is an old war veteran who can vaguely remember the old days of the fabled European Union. The utopia Natalie wishes she could bring back. Walter who saw how the “utopia” fell and what followed, has a more down to earth perspective.
He teaches Cara more about the fundamentals of fighting introducing her to the concept of animus. The force true sword masters can invoke to overcome their limits.
And he gives Cara a refurbished computer book that she is to use to write down what she learns.
The next day Cara and Natalie go to see the lord bishop of Monasteria to secure the funding for their Cara’s training and their voyage to Vienna where the tournament is going to take place. The bishop duels with Natalie to see if she has the necessary skills. She has. So he offers her a deal with the opposite of the devil. They get the money and the bishop get’s the manuscript for the holy library of Monasteria, for the glory of good and the enlightenment of the people.
With this deal done, Cara is officially the student of now Master Laukkanen Lapointe.
As her former master Manfred hears about this he suddenly decides that Cara is a snake and a traitor running away from him to snatch the fabled manuscript for her self and get all the glory for recovering it for the bishop.
Manfred decides that he will too take part in the tournament, by sending his right hand man and top student and now freshly declared master Eskil Feltis Gavenda and his new pupil and an as of yet unnamed young man, who happened to be one of the ruffians Natalie bet to a pulp earlier.
Cara doesn't know anything about this. She is busy training and packing her things.
The last night in Monasteria, while waiting for Natalie at Walter’s bar, a bunch of students from Manfred’s appear declaring that Cara is now a Proditor Perfidissimus, a high traitor and demand from Walter that he gives her over to them. Walter hands them their arses instead as he is not only an army veteran but also a grand master of the historical martial arts.
Cara flees with Natalie to the port, where they have bought passage on the MHS Ruhig Blut a free trader ship of the co-captains Erika and Wolfram Hartmann Serafini. They hope the ship will get them through the lawless lands of the Purgatory Gap from Monasteria to independent trade fortress Datlem and from there into the The Confederated Cities of Rhineland North, where they plan to get out to go to the legendary forge city of Solingen.
Here in Soling Cara is supposed to get further training and more importantly new weapons from the forge masters of the city.
The HMS Ruhig Blut is one of the fastest freighters in the entire region using forgotten technology to reach incredible speeds, to push past and if must be right through the pirate gangs of the Purgatory Gap.
Ship, crew and passengers are all prepared for combat.
Everything seems to be going fine, but of course some pirates do mange to board the Ruhig Blut. A fierce battle ensues where Cara shows of her new skills that she has aquired over the last few days. She does pretty well, until the point where a pirate sneaks up behind her and all goes black.
She wakes up in the cargo hold of a pirate vessel inside a cage with no chance for escape. She has been caught by black sword pirates, who do not kill their prey as they prefer to sell them of as slaves.
Cara’s days of adventure seem to be numbered.
However there is a stowaway with her in the cargo hold, the Solingen forge-walker Elisa Klein Cunningham, a special agent of the cit of forges, who had planned to use the pirate ship as transport but now sees her hand forced.
Cara and Elisa have a slight dispute about what to do with the pirates, Elisa says kill, Cara insists of leaving them alive. While Elisa strongly opposes to leave slavers alive she grudgingly accepts Cara’s conditions, if only to get her to shut up and moving.
Meanwhile in Datlem an distraught and angry Natalie goes to see the protonotary apostolic regionaria Alperta the leader of the local independent church and de facto leader of the city fortress of Datlem to get her to help with saving Cara.
The regionaria has better things to do, especially for civilians caught by pirates outside of her sphere of influence until Natalie mentions the tournament and the manuscript the winner gets. regionaria Alperta agrees to help if, when they return they give the manuscript to her to make a copy of the manuscript for the Datlem library. Cara agrees.
Meanwhile Cara and Elisa sneak their way over the small artificial ship island of the pirates, when freedom is almost with in reach at the edge of the island, they get ambushed. However Elisa is a formidable fighter using various different historical styles and weapons to dispatch her enemies. While Cara pushes herself through injuries and pain, fighting to survive. Freedom so very near.
When they think that they have finally gotten rid of all the pirates in their way, they are stopped by the pirate commander Aurei von Brecksbach, who descends with unnecessary drama from the upper deck to confront our two heroes.
Which is the point where our story resumes this year.
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