My name is Gelfling, and I have been carried away to a strange world that I don't understand. So please!, even if you should be an enemy of the clerics of Rokoon, for the sake of any love you are able to feel, please give this message to Kopeister. He has been my mentor, and this letter is perhaps the last message that I can send to the world of Xyllomer.

Respectfully

Gelfling

Something horrible has happened to me. An unknown force has grabbed me, carried me away, and it seems there is no way to return. I'm feeling so lost, so lonely - how I wish I could meet you again! But let me start at the beginning, as far as I can recall those strange happenings from my memory.

I had returned from a long journey. The ship I had been travelling with approached Padorn on a songsday evening. Surprisingly, the streets were quite empty. After looking at the clock on the dome, I decided that I should still be able to reach the monastery in time, even if I walked there. Oh, if I had only asked Morion for a portal! But I walked through the fields, taking the shortcut, off the road. And there I met my fate.

I had nearly reached the mountains when suddenly a horrible ghoul stepped out of a fog bank and attacked me. Panic overwhelmed me, and my feet carried me away. But the undead followed me. Stumbling through the fog, I finally fell down and broke my arm. My holy symbol dropped into a crack in the ground - out of my reach - and then the undead was upon me. His poison paralysed me in an instant. All my body felt numb and frozen, and I felt that my soul would soon be torn away from it. Now the ghoul was kneeling upon my chest, pressing me down into the wet ground. Mud began to fill my nose and mouth, and my eyes were burning from the poison that dripped down from the fangs of the undead. Then, there was darkness.

My soul touched eternity several times before, and you know this hasn't been the first undead that killed me. But this time it was different. Fear took a grip of my soul, a horrible, mighty fear like I have never felt it in all of my life. There were voices whispering to me, haunting me, telling me: "You are unwanted here!" and: "Leave! Leave, you fool!" Darkness and fear took a grip of my soul. Then it was all silent. Nothing to hear, nothing to see - and even nothing to feel. Not even panic. Just - emptyness.

It seemed to me that I was drifting away. Strange, very strange... what was going to happen to me? Then, black turned into grey, and I my mind was filled with depression. Tears dripped out of nothingness, as if I had eyes to weep, and my tears filled the nothingness that surrounded my soul. Finally, my soul was hovering upon the waves of an ocean of tears, and it's waves washed me towards a small island.

My fear calmed down a bit. The atmosphere in this place was strange, yet quite soothing. "Rokoon!" my soul whispered his name... "Rokoon?" - But there was no answer, not even the feeling that he might have heard me. Then I felt the presence of many powerful beings. "Rokoon?" asked a deep, calm voice. "We don't know your Rokoon, little soul. But do not fear us. We are here to help you. What race will you choose for your body, little soul?" - "But I'm a gnome", said I. The situation made me feel confused. "Good," said the unknown voice, and it sounded as if the speaker was chuckling politely at me, "so it shall be. You are a gnome. Now what gender will you choose for your body, little soul?", he continued to ask. "But I am a boy", said I. "So it shall be," said the voice, you are a boy. Thus he continued asking questions about me. After this strange procedure, I was led to a shimmering blue portal, and as I went through it, a new body was granted to me and my feet touched the ground again. But the place around me was a world I had never seen before.

The first people I met were humans, and quite unfriendly ones, too. I was unwanted, whereever I appeared. I finally fled from their village, as they threatened to kill me. Cold and wet from the rain, and also very hungry, I reached another town, where I found a large building all built from finest marble. Inside, I found that it was a beautiful temple.

The monks inside the temple where quite friendly to me, but none of them had ever heard of Rokoon, nor of any other god that was known to me. When I told them that I was a cleric of Rokoon, they seemed to be rather amused. "How can you be a cleric of a single god? You, a puny mortal, want to decide which god is worthy enough to be worshiped? And besides, you are no cleric here. In this world, you're simply nothing!"

Ashamedly I looked down, and tears filled my eyes. A female hobbit, who presented herself as Dorfinya, took my hand and tried to comfort me. "You must feel lonely," whispered she, "come with me. Maybe I can find a way to help you." Together we walked out into the fields. "What is the name of your former home?" asked Dorfinya. "Xyllomer." said I. Dorfinya stared at me, amazed about my answer. "Xyllomer? There is really life upon Xyllomer? Look there!", she said, and pointed at a little blue star that faintly twinkled near the horizon. "Do you see this little star, over there? You can only see it in the last hours of the night, when the morning is just about to brighten the sky. There, poor little gnome, that is your home planet Xyllomer."

You cannot imagine how desperate I was when I heard her words. "Now I am lost forever!", I cried, "Rokoon has left me!" Dorfinya hugged me softly and tried to soothe me, but I sat down, weeping miserably. "Your god has not left you, but you have left him.", said Dorfinya. "Your fear has drawn you away from his world, and he cannot help you in our world." Again, she took me into her arms and gently rubbed my shoulders. I had to admit that she was right. Fear had drawn me away from my home, and when there is not enough faith inside a follower, how shall his god help him?

Dorfinya suggested that I should write a letter to you, put it into a bottle, and pray to D'wr, the god of sea and sailing, to carry it away to Xyllomer. I do so, and I hope that you will get this scroll somehow. Please forgive me for being such a frightened little fool, but I was unable to withstand the powers of the Baroness and her horrible minions. If I had been a more faithful follower, she wouldn't have succeeded in fightening me away from the world, and away from Rokoon.

I am now in a foreign world, with foreign gods, and I am all alone. Nobody helped me here, except for the friendly monks. So I hope you will understand that I have joined them, at least for the time that I have to stay here. Oh well, yes, it might last forever... And I miss you, I can't tell you how much!

The monks here are much different from any priests I have ever met, somehow I would even call them neither good nor dark. They worship all known gods in this world (there are eleven of them), anxiously trying not to let any of them grow jealous about the others. Einioe, the goddess of life and healing, reminded me a bit of Rokoon, but I also have to worship the god of war and blood. At least he doesn't ask for living sacrifices, and his name is not Huitzilopochtli, but praying to him still makes me shiver.

I had to shave off my beautiful, long brown hair when I joined the brotherhood of monks, and we live a contemplative, silent life in chastity and poverty, only relying on the grace of the eleven deities. None of us is allowed to become a member of any other guild in this world. I think Winddancer would not be happy as a member of such a brotherhood.

The gods also grant certain miracles to us - that is, not to me, yet. I still have to learn how to pray to them, and the holy language here is much different from the ancient language we have been using in our Rokoonian sermons.

I have to end this letter, otherwise the scroll won't fit into the bottle. Please don't think wrongly of me. I miss you so much, oh, how I wish we could meet again... but the gods will not carry me back home, in spite of all the tears I'm crying. Please let your thoughts be with me.

Most respectfully

Gelfling

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