[Sendaz]

Edit:  Changed the title as this will be actually have a number of Myths, Urban Legends and similar....

*from a very old Ork Matriarch I met in my travel and had the honor of breaking bread with her and her clan. The following has been translated as best we can while still keeping with the spirit of the original verse, especially reverting the various derogatory terms for the Elves as their rant can get quite colourful. We apologize and are solely responsible if we make a hash oh her tale.*

It is said long, long ago the People lived longer than they do now. That in the Dawn of time the span of our days rivalled that of the Round Ears.

The Elves and Dwarves walked the land as well back then, but back then their share of days was as one. And therein lies our Secret and their Shame.

The People were free souls, always moving with the seasons like the herds we lived upon.

The Elves though preferred to lay false claims to the land and those who strode upon it. How can you own Land? From whom would you receive it from?

Still the Elves were persistent and from time to time the People bore the Yoke laid on them by the Elves and other races, but we endured.

But the Elves did not merely seek dominance over the races of Man, but grew to contend with the Dragons themselves.

Now Dragons are mighty indeed and not to be taken lightly. The People respected the Dragons and endured them as one must endure the storm that passes overhead, for they were like the forces of nature itself, so why complain about it?

The Elves though sought means to gain the upper hand, but their efforts were thwarted by Time.

For a Dragon only grows stronger as Time goes by, it's growing never stopping.

The Elves back then lived the same breadth of time as the dwarves, a century or more, but even then the decline of one's mind in their elder years meant a certain limit to their plans and goals.

So a plan was hatched. They would change themselves down to their essence, drawing upon the life of another to extend their own. But who?

They looked across the Land and their gaze fell upon the People. With our gusto for life and scattered magic, we were perfect for their plan.

The People were of 16 clans, each roaming far and wide. The Elves lured the 16 Leaders to their Kingdom with promises that would never be kept.

Once within their power these 16 were sacrificed to the Great Spell the Elves had crafted, and through them the spell reached to all of the People.

It took from each of us a Portion of our days, bestowing it upon the Elves and extending their days threefold while cutting ours the same.

Some of those there had also worked their own patterns into this  Great Spell and they found the grip of time loosened even further for them as they ceased to age.

Thus were the first Immortal Elves born.

Those of their bloodline would also sometimes show this trait, so that from time to time a new Immortal would arise from the elven loins.

With their longer lives, thus did the Elves continue in their struggle against the Dragons, their Immortal leaders able to play the long game at last.

Even to this day the People pay for the long lives of the Elves. But it need not always be so....

Some say the hearts of the 16 clan chieftains still burn, tied to one another by the magics that bound them, and through them all the People, to the Great Spell

Should these ever be found and brought together, maybe the magic can be broken and our days returned to all the People.

But who can say, it is only a legend afterall.......

[Sendaz]

Rumours persist of the La Grande Risqué, a casino/ menagerie of sorts that moves from time to time, always to places where the veil between worlds is thinnest.
Here Spirits of all shapes, obscure or legendary Awakened and Infected meet to indulge a wide range of vices, both of the earthly and astral realm.
But the coin spent here is nothing as simple as gold or nuyen.
Karma, Blood, Essence and Services are all wagered alike across the velvet topped tables here.
Those willing to wager a bit of their soul can win themselves Services to be rendered at a later time, not unlike those offered by a bound spirit, usually through a token bestowed by the entity owing.
Nor does one have to be Awakened themselves, one tale speaks of one particular Sammie who won 3 services of a powerful Fire Lord, what most in the wiz biz would call a Great Form Spirit, in rather intense Poker game earning himself a ring carved of an unknown blood red stone that is always warm to the touch.
Twice the Sammie did call on the Fire Lord, raining fire and death on those who beheld it, before the Sammie himself disappeared on a particularly nasty run.
How or even if the last task was ever used remains unknown....Though if you should find such a ring, I know certain parties who would be most interested....
********************************************


Now I can neither confirm nor deny the truth of the tale as while I have searched for this elusive casino, I have never gained access to it myself.

Just be careful as the door swings both ways in this, an overcocky runner could end up a few pints dry or even sporting a new essence hole if unlucky, or worse bound in service to another.

I recall a tale of one such gambler who ended up paying a rather large debt by letting the spirit usurp his body from one new moon until the next. He returned to his body to find it while intact definitely a bit worse for wear and sporting quite a few new addictions along with a shiny new Criminal SIN to go with the very curvy and enthusiastic if very young new wife and a briefcase full of certified credsticks. Or so he claims when asked how this all happened.

Now this raises many questions as normally one can not reside outside their body for so long without some sort of assistance or perhaps he was merely asleep while his body was otherwise occupied.

Still there is a lesson there for any who may wish to try their luck.

[Sendaz]

The truly posh can also turn their eyes to China, where certain parties claim scientists have discovered an Emerged breed of waterfowl that has consistently shown Resonance abilities in each successive generation. 

While still unable to clone these, natural breeding still yields 3-8 young and with the more controlled lab conditions the survival rate is fairly high.

During their formative time, the company provide an electronic environment for the hatchlings to orientate with and learn to navigate, using their resonance abilities to hack their way through obstacles to obtain food and shelter.

During this time they are also subjected to a series of operations. (Animal activists may not wish to read the following)

First they are sterilized so as to ensure that only the Company will be able to provide viable replacements/future stock.

Then a specially redesigned CAST, referred to as T-CAST, is introduced into the biosystem and training adjusted integrate the usage of the new system.  Designating a virtual target as food or other desired item, the avian will then proceed toward it, utilizing it's developed skills to obtain the objective.  Buyers are brought in at this stage for training to work with the animal as well as how to operate the T-CAST system. This normally involves a period over 1-2 months.  While the insertion of the T-CAST does inhibit some of their talent, the unique experience of dancing the matrix via the translated senses of an emerged animal is not to be missed.

By month 7 the emerged avian is fully mature and ready to be deployed.

So for a cool couple of mill, you too can get your very own Peking CyberDuck and try your hand at Quacking on the Fly.

[Angelone]

Very interesting and kinda creepy.

[Sendaz]

Saito Tipilhuan, or Sons of Saito though they got the nickname of Az-Yaks.
Basically they supposedly started out as a bunch of Azzie corp-brats during the CFS occupation. Now officially Aztechnology was barred from operating there at the time, but the corp did a workaround in LA, Sacramento and the rest of the region with a minor name change and general bribing local officials to turn a blind eye.
Anyway, these corp punks in a bit of a Stockholm syndrome turned to hero worship of the Japanese in general because they had basically tossed back the Azzies and Elves forces to take Cali for it's own, becoming muy macho in their mind, so they wanted to emulate them and thus take on their attributes.
Somehow the messages got crossed and they picked up a lot of flowery reading material about the yakuza which they integrated with their own Aztlan mythos and created an unholy blend of pseudo-samurai bullshito, Aztlanic brainwashing and fitting both group's belief in a super race genetics to form the baseline of the own mini-mafia.
Thus you had Azzie corp-cubs strutting about with Azzie and Japanese tats, topknots, synthetic obsidian edged weapons as well as a fierce warrior instinct with little fear of death as they are hung up on dual diet of legends impressing on them to die a flowery death in glorious combat.
All of which was compounded when the Japanese officially withdrew from the CFS in 2061, but Saito gave the Land of the Rising Sun two fingers and stayed.
Now the gang had a figurehead to romanticize about, going on about how he had the warrior spirit to fight on -blah blah blah and they took on their title of being the Sons of Saito.
Which is quite amusing as Saito would have gutted them like fish back then for associating his name and the yakuza in the same breath.
Anyway, roll forward a few years and they are surprisingly still around and even expanded into other regions where Aztechnology has a foothold as they recruit from the dissatisfied corp young within Azzie turf, including Seattle.
Then came the big Kick Out, when Saito and his forces were ousted from their little California Protectorate.
Now no one has seen Saito since and everyone is looking for him and his lot of war criminals.
Shortly thereafter various branches of the Sons of Saito (or Az-Yaks as many of the other gangs have taken to calling them, though rarely to their face) up and down the coast , including Seattle, have been recently seen sporting some shiny mil-spec toys, and a harder attitude.
Rumours circulated that there was a new head, but there is not much said about him, beyond the title Tota, or Our Father who supposedly wields a synthetic obsidian katana(how that is supposed to work I am not sure-but it's probably more ceremonial than functional- we hope), who they feverishly follow and in some cases have literally died while being held for questioning without giving this mysterious head up.
In one spectacular case, the Az-Yak, who was supposed to be a mundane according to one investigator, triggered one of his tats to create a black mirrored magical blade that he promptly used to commit seppuku in the holding cell.
Now we are not saying Saito himself is manning that particular helm, but it would not be impossible for him or at least one of his subordinates to maybe picked up the reins on this lot since they literally worship him and his crew.

[Dangermaus]

Good stuff Sendaz! Keep it coming please.

[Sendaz]

Not so much a theft, but a train was 'stolen' in a fashion back in 2031.
It was the EuroWars and Russia was kicking arse across Germany, Austria, Hungary and the Czech Republic. This would change in the following years as the EDF and Met2000 organised and the infamous Nightwraith incident occurred, but for now the Ruskies were on top.

A Russian support train loaded with fresh troops, vehicles, parts and other gear was steaming through Slovakia on its way to Bratislava from which it would resupply their forces in Hungary and Austria

It would never arrive at its destination.

Satellite images taken at the time showed the train entering the Harmanec Tunnel, which is about 4,698 m long. The train cars themselves tallied up to right around 3,000m so it was expected there would be a window of time when the train was not visible from above.

However, when the train failed to turn up, alerts were sent out and it's path backtracked as no transponder signals from the various car were detected. Upon discovering the train had never exited the Harmanec, troops were diverted there as fears that maybe a tunnel collapse/sabotage had occurred.

What they found was much more disturbing.

While the tunnel itself was intact, just over a 1,000m into the tunnel a 100m section of the rails was missing, with only freshly churned soil filling the gap. Theories of a pit trap were at first dismissed as even a moderate sized hole could not have accomadated the entire train and would have left stalled cars on their own tracks, albeit in disarray.
The walls of the tunnel were searched for possible hidden side passages that a stolen train could have been diverted along, but to no avail.

In the meantime digging commenced in the churned earth area to look for clues while magical support was called in to try assensing the situation. When the Soviet волшебник (mage)turned up and viewed the site, they went pale. The soil did indeed show recent magical activity and a strong one at that. Earth elementals were summoned to help speed up the digging, following the churched earth and magical traces down.

They found the end car about 500m down.

Someone or something had basically made a hole just over 3km deep and let the train drop down it, it's own inertia pulling in the rest of the cars behind it. And then filled it in with everyone onboard still inside, not that many would have survived the drop in the first place.

No one ever claimed responsibility and the Russians had already decided to focus mostly on the German end of the push going forward anyway, so this was quietly filed away and forgotten while diverting many of the troops in the region to other fronts, leaving only token forces to hold the already claimed areas.

A mystery remaining to this day.

[Sendaz]

THE PHONEBOOK
In the Before times, we are talking Early 'Bull' Era, possibly even Pre-'Bull' Era- details are hazy on this point, ancient chummers had to ring each other up with primitive comms systems, some even non-portable and mounted on the wall of your pad.
So they had these things called phonebooks.  Real actual pages made from dead trees bound together and loaded with all the various commcodes for people and businesses in the area. And that was really the only way to find and contact people back then.
Anyway, tech moved on, comms became portable and one could just search the Matrix for commcodes, so these phonebooks sort of fell by the wayside.
Except for one.  Rumours persist there is a Phonebook that still holds ALL the commcodes, past and present, both public and private.
Yes, even Nadja Daviar's personal hotline, you pervy stalker.  Now, focus....
The technomancers claim it is some kind of Deep Resonance artefact given form, Mages argue about whether it  even exists and if so whether it is connected to the Metaplane holding the Akashic Library.
While probably just another urban legend, enough folks of interest seem keen to lay their mitts on it that there may be some truth to the story.....