[OL-FB] The end of the journey

[Keymonus]

Inside the hold of the Meduse, South of El Oleonda, May 624

Spoiler

Ghostly voices

Down below

A suspicious jungle stroll

The mouth of the Emperor

The City of the Dead

Shadows of a distant past

Morituri te salutant

All the parties involved

End of a scoundrel

What a warrior must do

Tristan walked into the cargo hold of the Meduse. He had little time, and a fundamental decision to take.
After days of exhausting marching in the jungle and a few skirmishes with the Daca warriors, Tristan and his men had finally reached the Southern Coast of El Oleonda, where the Meduse was waiting for them. For some reason, the natives seemed to be afraid of the Ocean: the sight of the sea put an end to their chase, allowing the Oleonese to safely board the rescue ship. Now that the danger had ended, the captain would soon have asked where to set sail... and Tristan's answer could have changed the future of El Oleonda.

Konrad, the only survivor of the Carnite expedition, was waiting for him... and basically represented the source of Tristan's problems.
The young Carnite explorer, together with the maps and diaries from his unfortunate adventure, could lead to a fabulous treasure: gold and silver, jade and other gems, sunk with the old Lotii fleet and dozens of its sailors... a treasure worth thousands and thousands of doubloons, enough to make an empire move.
At this point, Tristan could order the captain to sail west, to Neuburg, and return Konrad to his nation. This, however, would have surely renewed the interest of Carno for El Oleonda, inducing them to organize a new expedition to the shipwrecks... in other words, Tristan would have thrown a huge pile of hay on the embers of the war.
On the other hand, he could order him to sail east, to Jiangkai. The military intelligence would have acquired the documents, and Tristan would have likely received a medal. Then, Oleon would have tried its luck with those cursed shipwrecks, angering both Carno and the Lotii. The war would have likely started again, and many more would have died.

There was, however, a third possibility. The mysterious Cypher could open the route to unknown islands, to the discovery of a mint-new part of the World and its wonders... even if the very existence of that object proved that "discovery" was not the right word at all!
Before the unfortunate expedition, Konrad had spent years studying the artifacts of the ancient civilization of El Oleonda, and could represent a valuable help to decode that unusual, ancient map. Moreover, that task would have kept him safely far from both the Carnite and the Oleonese authorities... definitely better than "just shooting that Carnite dude and throwing him in a pond", as one of the scouts had suggested!
Many questions remained, and the answer was probably out there, somewhere in the Southern New Haven Seas. Who had built the Labyrinth? What had caused their end? Did something survive of them, apart from old ruins and a few tribes of barbarized descendants?  
Well, someone might have complained, and he might have received an angry letter from a ministry or two... but the decision was taken. The Meduse would have sailed neither to Neuburg nor to Jiangkai, but southbound, towards the unknown!

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Unfortunately, I will be away from most of my bricks for a while, but I wanted to provide a proper conclusion also for my main character arc in this long storyline! There is not much to say about the MOC itself. The shiphold comes from another storyline (the Tale of the Charon), even if I refurnished it. Chronologically, this part comes before "Aftermath", and is still set in May, immediately after the escape from von Undingen's ambush.

[Khorne]

An adventurous conclusion to the story arc! We will see what Tristan's future brings and what new places he will discover.

The backdrop might be simple, but conveys the feeling of a hold very well. It's fittingly repurposed here. I will come back to check this out once I need to make a backdrop of a ship's hold myself . I like the raised parts of the floor. That's a detail I would've forgotten if I made something similar.

[NOD]

That was a great, entertaining, varied, unexpected and exciting sequel!  The dioramas were always built with lots of detail. I really like the ending, it was the right decision to sail south into the unknown. Tristan and Konrad are likeable characters, it would be nice to read about new adventures someday.