Hannah and the Ice Caves

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Hannah discovers the Heart of the Mountain in the eponymous Ice Caves.

This article is about the plot Hannah and the Ice Caves. If you are looking for the game, see Hannah and the Ice Caves (game).

Hannah and the Ice Caves was a plot that began on 21 October 2004, and concluded on 22 December. It introduced the Bori, Neopets from a civilisation which had been kept in an enchanted sleep under the ice of Terror Mountain, who were awoken when the Thieves Guild tried to steal their magical gemstone.

It starred Hannah, the hero of the game Hannah and the Pirate Caves, and introduced Kanrik and the Thieves Guild. Kanrik would return in the War for the Obelisk, while the Thieves Guild was also featured in The Faeries' Ruin.

As in Champions of Meridell and later Curse of Maraqua, users were able to choose a side, assisting either the Thieves Guild or Hannah in battle.

Synopsis

In order to steal the Heart of the Mountain, the leader of the Thieves Guild Galem sent Kanrik to recover the Bringer of Night, an ancient monster sealed in a tomb in the Lost Desert. Kanrik recruited Hannah to help him, but lied about what his true goal was. When she discovered Kanrik had betrayed her, Hannah followed him to Terror Mountain, where she discovered that the Bori civilisation was being kept alive in a magical sleep by the very gemstone the Thieves Guild sought.

After a confrontation, the Bringer and the Thieves Guild forged an uneasy truce to capture the Heart of the Mountain together. Kanrik defected from the Guild, and helped Hannah and the restored Bori defeat the Bringer's icy skeleton army and his former allies. The Bringer of Night himself was frozen solid by the magic of the Heart.

Story

Hannah and Kanrik discover the tomb.

Somewhere in Neopia, the Thieves Guild were counting their ill-gotten gains when they discovered an ancient manuscript mentioning a large gemstone hidden in Terror Mountain. It was called the Heart of the Mountain, purported to possess the powers of eternal life. The writings also told of a "key to the heart deep within a tomb" with strange markings on it. Intrigued, the leader of the guild, Galem, ordered his best thieves to find the tomb and bring him back what was inside. They would recognise the tomb by its strange markings, an eye staring out of a sun.

Meanwhile, famed adventurer Hannah was in a tavern boasting of her success in the pirate caves. One of Galem's thieves, a cloaked Gelert named Kanrik, approached her; his sister was dying of a plague that had infected his village. Having heard of her great deeds, he wanted to employ Hannah to help him raid a tomb said to contain the cure. He showed her a piece of parchment covered in symbols. Hannah had seen the symbols before in the Lost Desert, and agreed to lend him her services in return for a generous payment of gems.

When they arrived at the Lost Desert, Kanrik told a story of how his village got infected: at first it was just one or two people — then it began to spread. His sister used to love to sing and dance like Hannah, but since becoming infected barely had the energy to whisper. Unbeknownst to Hannah, two more of Kanrik's friends from the Guild were following close behind.

They found their way to an ancient tomb. Carved into the walls were inscriptions that read, "A demi-god of awesome power lays within." Hannah effortlessly evaded every booby trap in the tomb until she reached the doorway to the inner chamber, where she accidentally triggered a secret button on the floor. The door opened, but Hannah's arm was branded with the sun symbol, the Mark of Ta-Kutep. In pain, she slipped off a ledge, and Kanrik revealed his true colours: he allowed her to fall, and his two accomplices, alerted by her screams, arrived.

Inside the inner chamber, all Kanrik and the thieves found was a sarcophagus. They decided this was the "key to the heart" the manuscript spoke of, and carried it away to Terror Mountain. They were gone by the time Hannah had climbed back up from her fall. She couldn't read the hieroglyphs inside the chamber, but found a brilliant red gem on a necklace hidden inside the walls. She returned to the village and met the Lost Desert Medicine doctor, who explained that the marking on her arm was a curse that cannot be healed through normal means. Hannah insisted it was "just a burn" and decided to go after Kanrik to Terror Mountain.

The Bringer of Night's enemies flee before his undead army.

At Terror Mountain, Valin the Quick was on a special mission for Galem. He feigned exhaustion at Taelia's door. She carried him inside to help him warm up, but to her surprise, he jumped up and began wreaking havoc in her home. He found Taelia's Wand of Ice and froze her solid. Assured that the Snow Faerie was indeed immobilised, Valin escaped through a window.

Hannah was not fairing much better in the snow. The effects of the cursed mark began to take their toll, and she collapsed on the mountainside. The necklace she found in the tomb began to glow, keeping her warm. A strange creature named Armin came by to rescue her. He told her the tale of the Bori, hundreds of whom once lived within the mountain. However, a terrible, treasure-greedy beast appeared and killed many of them. Their leader, the Keeper of Time, cast a spell of protection on his people, trapping them in ice. A magical gem called the Heart of the Mountain kept them safe. The monster too sought the gem, but for a different purpose. Armin was unsure what has happened to his people since. He explained that he woke up a few days before, alone, with that story running through his head. They went looking for firewood, although had to contend with the local Snowbeasts.

Kanrik joined the rest of the Thieves Guild with the sarcophagus. Masila explained to him that it contained a great monster who could fight for them - with its help, Masila and Kanrik would finally be able to overthrow Galem and seize control of the Thieves Guild themselves. Kanrik wasn't convinced at first - Galem had already defeated a previous attempt at a coup. However, Masila's sly words began to tempt him, and by the time he awoke from his sleep, he was determined to open the sarcophagus.

When the sun came up, Galem and the Bringer negotiated a truce.

From it emerged the Bringer of Night, a massive Moehog that refused to heed anyone. It could sense the presence of the Heart of the Mountain again. It attacked the thieves, aided by its soldiers made of ice. They fought all night, but there appeared to be no end in sight. However, as dawn broke, the light of the sun melted the soldiers. Galem seized his chance to broker a deal with the Bringer, offering to help him find a way into the mountain.

Masila double-crossed Kanrik and sided with Galem. Galem threatened to kill Kanrik for his betrayal, but Masila interceded and offered an alternative: banishment. She drugged Kanrik with a potion and hours later, he found himself alone in a frozen tundra. He headed to a light in the distance, which turned out to be Armin and Hannah's campfire. When they realised who it was, they attacked him, and during the ensuing scuffle, opened up a tunnel passage further into the mountain that had been hidden by the ice. Hannah was too weak to keep fighting, and Kanrik apologised to her - he hadn't known the tomb would curse her, and his friends had turned their back on him after he had released the demon. Realising that he meant the Bringer of Night, Armin rushed down the tunnel they had found. They had to alert the rest of the Bori!

Armin, Kanrik, and Hannah reached the Bori's cavern at the same time as the Bringer and the thieves guild's digging crew. Around the glowing Heart of the Mountain stood the entire Bori race, frozen in ice. The Bringer summoned his icy skeleton army again, and the thieves and the Bringer fought over the Heart.

While the battle raged, Hannah found the only other Bori who wasn't frozen solid. The Keeper of Time recognised Hannah's pendant for what it was - the Keystone. The Thieves Guild had thought the Bringer was the "key to the heart", but the writing had really meant the necklace. He urged Hannah to unite the Keystone with the Heart. Her companions rallied around her as they made their way across the battlefield.

Galem and Kanrik settle old scores.

Kanrik and Galem found each other in battle and began a deadly duel in which Galem fell. Hannah reached the Heart, and just as the Bringer was about to slay her, she united the Keystone. A red mist filled the chamber and the frozen Bori were revived, the enchantment ended. The Bori joined the fray and helped drive out the thieves. Seeing the signs of trouble, Masila slipped away. The Bringer took a swing at Hannah, but struck the Heart of the Mountain. Its magic froze him solid, and Armin defeated the Bori's ancient enemy with a well placed pebble that shattered him to pieces. Without their master, the ice army melted away.

Hannah collapsed from the power of the curse. Her friends rushed her to Taelia, the only one with the power to help her. The Keeper of Time freed Taelia from ice, and in turn, Taelia cured Hannah of the curse. The mark, however, would remain forever.

With Galem gone, Kanrik assumed leadership of the Thieves' Guild, while the Bori were re-initiated into Neopia. Hannah, meanwhile, returned to telling stories of her adventures in Krawk Island taverns - while a vengeful Masila watched from the shadows.

Participation

Players participated in this plot by battling special 1-player challengers in the Battledome. Before the war began, players could choose whether to side with Hannah and the Bori or with Galem and the Thieves Guild - different enemies were available to fight depending on whose side they joined. 349,802 players joined to the battle, with more favouring Hannah's side than Galem's (217,962 versus 131,840).

Every time the user defeated one of the opponents, they earned points for themselves and their side of the war. In the end, Hannah's forces earned 8,975,535 in total versus the Thieves Guild's 6,880,151.

There were two battles in the war. The first began on 24 November, with the Thieves Guild under attack from the Bringer and Hannah and Armin battling Snowbeasts. More challengers joined them on 30 November, 2 December, and 3 December. The second battle broke out on 9 December, with the Thieves Guild supporters fighting the Bringer's army and the Bori, and Hannah's supporters fighting the Thieves Guild. Further waves enter the battle on 10 December, 14 December, 16 December, and 17 December. Three of the Thieves' Guild's opponents from the first battle returned for the second battle.

Initially, challengers did not get harder after each win as intended. Although The Neopets Team fixed this, some people had already accumulated very large scores from beating lots of the easy challengers. To resolve this, on 29 November, they reset everyone who had earned over 300 points back to 300.

Hannah's forces opponents Name Picture Points per win Difficulty First battle Flea Ridden Snow Beast 1 5 Snow Beast 3 25 Angry Snow Beast 5 75 Gigantic Angry Snow Beast 10 150 Second battle Petty Thief 2 8 Bandit 4 28 Pillager 8 80 Thief Brute 15 180 Thief Overseer 25 225

Thieves Guild's opponents Name Picture Points per win Difficulty First battle Skeletal Minion 1 5 Skeletal Soldier 3 25 Skeletal Knight 5 75 The Bringer 10,000 100000 Second battle Skeletal Minion 2 5 Skeletal Soldier 4 25 Skeletal Knight 8 75 Skeletal Commander 10 150 Magic Caster Skeleton Warrior 15 180 Skeleton Warlord 25 225 Bori Miner 3 15 Bori Guard 6 80 Kanrik ? 50,000

Prizes

They players earned trophies on their user look-ups depending on how many points they had earned in the Battledome. Different trophies were awarded depending on which side the player had joined.

Hannah's forces
Explorer 1 - 4 Wanderer 5 - 9 Venturer 10 - 19	Pathfinder 20 - 49 Expeditionist 50 - 99	Wayfarer 100 - 199 Voyager 200 - 499	Adventurer 500 - 999 Opportunist 1000 - 1999	Navigator 2000 - 4999 Pioneer 5000 - 9999	Daredevil 10000 - 19999 Master Explorer 20000 - 49999	Master Explorer 50000+

Thieves Guild
Pickpocket 1 - 4 Apprentice Thief 5 - 9 Swindler 10 - 19	Pilferer 20 - 49 Scoundrel 50 - 99	Bandit 100 - 199 Plunderer 200 - 499	Footpad 500 - 999 Blackguard 1000 - 1999	Rogue 2000 - 4999 Infiltrator 5000 - 9999	Brigand 10000 - 19999 Master Thief 20000 - 49999	Master Thief 50000+

Based on their scores, players were awarded prizes automatically on 27 January 2005. Participants received one of the following:

Commander Blade Frozen Battle Axe Frozen Commander Shield

The Bringer Plushie The Golden Bringer Plushie

Thieves Dirk Wind Up Icy Skeleton

Behind the scenes

Alternative ending

Dr. Sloth exacts his revenge.

This plot followed the 2004 cancellation of the Return of Dr. Sloth plot. This was referenced in an alternative ending to part 16, where Dr. Sloth and Sophix II transfigured Hannah in revenge.

This ending was replaced with the real ending by 23 December.

Cameos

Several future plots would revisit characters from Hannah and the Ice Caves.

• Kanrik and Hannah made a cameo appearance in the next plot, Curse of Maraqua, as the bride and groom that Garin robs. An editorial in 2013 implied that they were a couple.
• Hanso, star of The Faeries' Ruin, was a member of the Thieves Guild, and recognises a location as a former Guild safehouse. He is shown in a flashback to have robbed from Kanrik.
• Kanrik and the Thieves Guild received a starring role in the War for the Obelisk.

Other

TCG expansion logo.

• The Hannah and the Ice Caves expansion to the Neopets TCG was released in conjunction with this plot.
• A game under the same name was released along with the plot.
• Galem was never released as a Battledome challenger in this plot, even though Battledome images of him were made.
• A puzzle, The Guildmasters' Dinner Logic Puzzle, was released in conjunction with this plot, but was cancelled before it could be completed due to "unforeseen [circumstances] both work and non-work related that prevented [TNT] from completing it".
• Following feedback from this plot, The Neopets Team made an effort to improve character development in the following plot, Curse of Maraqua, and to make the prizes fairer and improve how they were given out.

External links

• Plot Info: Hannah and the Ice Caves (comic), Hannah and the Ice Caves Recruitment
• Neopets TCG: Ancient Tomb, Bori Miner, Bringer of Night, Galem Darkhand, Hannah the Cursed, Heart of the Mountain, Keeper of Time, Taelia the Snow Faerie, Bori Guard, Kanrik, Masila, Thieves Guild, Armin the Small, Brooch of Warmth, Icy Skeleton Hordes, Lower Ice Caves, Valin the Quick, Mark of Ta-Kutep
• Neopedia: Armin, Hannah, Kanrik
• Caption Competition: #489, #505
• Editorial: #158, #160, #164, #172, #175, #179, #180, #182, #189, #200, #237, #327, #344, #345, #447, #577, #639, #651, #654