Ink and watercolour plate of a round platform of carved stone and brass with inlaid rings and dials, a spiral of fine sand rising from its centre, with detail sketches and a plan view.

History

The Time Platform

The time-travel platform the stranger rode through Meliora's past: the invention at the heart of both Aureliuses' stories.

  • Before the Invasion
  • The Goblin Invasion

Description

The platform is a device for travelling through time, which carried the stranger from the Sanctum to the places and moments marked on the map. Aurelius attuned it so that its rider cannot die on it: if they take too much harm, or let something happen that would change the future they come from, it erases its last voyage from the streams of time. It can also cancel out events in which its user has already taken part, so that old battles can be fought again.

Its limit is harsh. If two different people from different times travel to the same moment, one of them has to be removed, which, more or less, is what happened to Aurelius.

Historical context

The other Aurelius claimed the platform as his own invention, the very one the stranger arrived on, and said the people of the future ruined his good name out of fear of it. Aurelius came to believe it was the invention the High Council had rejected. Even as he departed after the victory, he could not resist a parting word about it.

"Be careful with the platform!" — Aurelius