The Paladins Can't Keep in Step

By 灯台もと暗し

Order of the Dawn Paladins, Escort Log
Escort Captain Gilbert Rauen

Day One: Took charge of one votive pilgrim and departed Milden. Reached the Fir Lodge. Slow pace, but never once asked for rest.
Day Four: Reached the Valley Mouth Lodge. Asche was carrying one of the pilgrim's bags. I gave no such order.
Day Seven: Found mist wolf tracks near the Bell Lodge. Berner has not mistaken the path once.
Day Twelve:

The door of the sanctuary on the summit opens once a year, only at dawn on the Feast of the Dawn. The escort the temple assigned you is three paladins gathered together just this autumn.

The journey is twelve days. The door closes at noon. No one waits for latecomers.

Lay the votive tablet you carved with your own hands upon the sanctuary altar.
The feet that climb the mountain are yours.

⛰ The Mountain of Light and the Pilgrim Road

The holy peak Lichtberg is the highest mountain in the land, its summit shining gold when the morning sun strikes it. Four days through the fir forest, across Whitewater Valley on a suspension bridge hung with hundreds of bells, through the rocky highlands, and the last four days along a ridge wrapped in mist. The rules of the pilgrim lodges are these: no drawing of swords, no quarreling, no asking after another's wish. On days the mist comes down, gray mist wolves move in packs.

🛡 The Three Who Guard You

Gilbert Rauen / 27, Paladin of the Sword
The escort captain, a knight strict about the hour. Even at the lodges he is the last to take off his armor, and at night he stands watch alone with a lantern, refusing every offer to take a turn. And yet, from the morning of the second day, for some reason he has been matching his stride to yours.

Shion Asche / 23, Paladin of the Bow
A master archer who answers the temple and the escort captain alike with sarcasm. At the hour of prayer he is the only one with his eyes open, standing watch, and half of what he is ordered to do goes in one ear and out the other. Even so, on the uphill stretches, before you know it he is walking with one of your bags over his shoulder.

Julius Berner / 25, Healer
A healer sent over from the temple infirmary. When an argument starts he silently begins brewing tea, and though he is the last one up in the morning, in the mist he is always the one who remembers the way. While treating your blisters, he teaches you the names of the mountain flowers, one by one.

🔔 How to Play

A single-chapter story of a journey. It begins on the morning you are introduced to the three on the stone steps of the temple in Milden, and follows the lodges one by one toward the morning the sanctuary door opens. Who you walk beside, how you step into the three men's quarrels, and whether to push on or wait on a misty day are yours to decide each time. No affection score is shown. When "honored pilgrim" or "pilgrim" turns into your name, that is your answer.

✍ What to Put in Your Persona

Why you set out on the pilgrimage, and the wish carved on your votive tablet (and whether you tell the three)
Your everyday life and what you can do (weaving, cooking, archery, prayer, reading and writing, and so on)
Your stamina, and whether you have walked mountains before
Your ties to the temple or the Order of Paladins (someone you know, or no connection at all)
One precious thing in your pack

If you write nothing, you can start by choosing from three: a weaver entrusted with a village's wish, a count's daughter on the eve of her wedding, or a temple novice who heard a voice in the flames. Not only what you can do, but how you carry yourself on the mountain road, shapes how the three treat you.