The Story Thus Far:
The Progeny of the Damned Saga
(The Reader's Digest Version)
Contents
The Goblin Invasion Saga
Page 1
Page 2
The Zinsaber Saga
Page 1
Page 2
Page 3
Stories from the Great Schism
Page 1
The Progeny of the Damned Saga
Page 1
It is now 2000 years since the great Mythala arose to godhood. 200 years since the fall of the goblinoid and orcish regime. Life has returned to some degree of normality within the Kingdom of Fastague. Now, somehow, 80% of all adventures start in a tavern, and this one is no exception. Several adventurers of questionable pasts sat quietly to drink their ale and disappear in the crowd. Silas Marner, the barkeep of the Bobbing Eye Tavern in Selvan, cleaned his glasses and kept the locals' mugs full.
This quiet little scene was short-lived, however. Suddenly, a mage named Efrontis walked into the center of town with a pair of bodyguards, and they began to kill some of the townspeople and loot their money. Bragging that they were the bandits who had been plaguing the countryside of late, they disappeared in a puff of smoke. Silas herded everyone into the tavern for a meeting, then, in absence of the town magistrate, locked the doors and refused to let local or traveler leave until he had a few good volunteers to go after the bandits.
The first two volunteers were an elven woman named Yana Starfire, who was masked from head to toe in bardic uniform, and a half-breed elf by the name of Phalan, a druid, followed by a dwarven fighter, Nagatu. Others came more reluctantly: an elven ranger named Kaersalon, a drow woman by the name of Raven, a kender named Minya, and Corinne, an elven fire mage, all agreed to help rid Selvan of the bandits to get out of the tavern. So the party ventured out into Vrolok Forest, found Efrontis' lair, killed the mage and some of his bandits, and, after taking everything of value, returned to a grateful town, just ahead of a naked man bound to a horse whom Silas claimed was the town's magistrate.
After their initial job, the group agreed to set out together to Lindaton to look for more work. They left with the blessings of Silas and the town of Selvan, and were told about a powerful mage in Lindaton by the name of Zannar, who would doubtless have need of adventurers not caught up in the city's politics.
Upon reaching Lindaton, Phalan left to tend to his grove, and the other characters met with Zannar at Permon's Mage Tower and Academy of Magic. There, Zannar gave them their first mission: farmers were being attacked by an unknown group outside of the city, possibly drow. They were to investigate.
A few miles south of the city, Corinne fell into a cleverly-disguised cavern entrance, into which the party followed, only to be surrounded by drow on all sides. Taken prisoner, the party was led to the drow leader, a priestess of the Dark God Felan Diosene who constantly battled her god for possession of her own body. The priestess told the party about a contingent of orcs attacking travelers going to Fort Inundi, possibly under the direction of the powerful merchant families of Lindaton. These orcs lived in the same cave system, and often attacked the drow in the caves as well, and they would doubtless have any items stolen from the corpses of their victims. Though a few of the adventurers doubted the priestess' story, for the sake of Raven they agreed to find the orcs and dispose of them. After the drow released them to the area of caves where they thought the orcs were hiding, the party found the orcs and attacked. The battle was grueling, and Kaersalon lost her life in the battle, but Yana, Corinne, Raven, Nagatu, and Minya were victorious.
They brought Kaersalon's body to the priestess, who resuscitated her, then was possessed herself by Felan Diosene. The Dark God gave the group a dark message about a prophecy soon to come to pass, but did nothing more than toy with them when they queried him on his meaning. With that, the party crawled to the surface and returned to Lindaton, reporting to Zannar the completion of their task.
With a better understanding of their skills, Zannar then commissioned them to find corruption within the Council of Seven, a council comprising of the seven most powerful merchant houses in Lindaton: the Rastam, Mer'veñol, Xnaviel, Brokneshar, Helnail, Von'vrolok'vor, and Maliden families currently held the seven seats, and had for several years. The adventurers were to get in close with one of the council, learn what they could, and report back if it became apparent that the council members were acting against the best interests of the city. He also agreed to provide Yana teaching in void magic, and Corinne teaching in fire magic.
Nagatu left the service of the party shortly after meeting Zannar, mumbling something about magicians. The rest of the group entered into the employ of Atrus Helnail's son, Metrus, who was under the employ of his father in merchant affairs, under the pretense that they would guard his mines for a week. After that week, Atrus Helnail, one of the chairholders, was murdered, and Metrus hired the party to find the killer, who he surmised was one of the other council members. Zannar, too, wanted to find the man's killer, for he felt that the corruption of the council would be uncovered in the investigation. What the party did uncover, however, was several assassination attempts on Metrus' life by strange creatures who were not easily killed, who were more clay than humanoid. Then, the party witnessed the destruction of the local thieves' guild, a gruesome and macabre scene of decapitated bodies in the guild hall. Also, Corinne, Kaersalon, and Raven had their hands full trying to keep Yana away from Metrus, for she was falling for his [ahem] charms and grace.
As the group maneuvered through Lindaton's politics, it was discovered that Metrus had killed his own father in order to implicate his rival, the elf Einsaniar Mer'veñol, and thus gain revenge for a previous deed of Mer'veñol's against Merchant House Helnail. Shortly thereafter, Metrus also unveiled his enemies to the adventurers: the terrorist organization Canis Major, once created to destroy magic during the Mage Wars, now an organization of unknown purposes. He was connected to another terrorist organization called Canis Minor, a group dedicated to using any means necessary to destroy Canis Major. He claimed that the beings sent after him were called changelings, and were capable of endless intrigues and destruction in the kingdom. Not totally convinced, they followed Metrus to his organization's hideout, where they were beset shortly thereafter by beings who had the reflexes to mold themselves around a swiping blade so that nothing could harm them! The party fled into the sewer system as some of the mages among the attackers began to cast an obscure ritual, which then caused every head of every living person in the room to fall off its body as if decapitated. Two of the adventurers, Yana and Kaersalon, were caught by this ritual's effect, and their heads began growing and molding themselves into a copy of their original forms as if they were beings like the ones that had attacked them. Meanwhile, the other party members guarding Yana and Kaersalon witnessed the changelings harvesting the heads of the fallen, gathering them into writhing cloth bags before leaving the scene. The party gathered their own and fled deeper into the sewers, washing at a small natural spring in the area apart from the sewer water. This seemed to bring solidity to Yana and Kaersalon, so they climbed out of the sewers to report to Zannar the news: changelings were using Canis Major to seed corruption in Lindaton, and Metrus Helnail had been killed in the battle.
Shortly, they began to notice a change in Zannar, as well. When Yana found Zannar's body in a closet, his heart ripped from his rib cage, she and the others realized that her teacher in void magic had been replaced by these changeling creatures. The party quickly fled Lindaton after the false Zannar unveiled himself, but not before learning that Metrus had been resurrected by a local cleric in Canis Minor's ranks and was safe. The adventurers ended their flight in Selvan, where they rested for a few days.
Silas, upon the party's arrival, received news of Zannar's demise, and chose to send another adventuring party to retrieve Zannar's body and attempt a resurrection. The body was found and returned a few days later, and the resurrection was attempted in the apple farmer's barn, but to no avail. Zannar's life left him, and he was no more. Yana, distraught that her teacher had perished, visited the Shrine of Shalstor in the town, where she found Zannar's spirit waiting for her, waiting to say goodbye. Their final farewells were brief, but touching, and then Yana rejoined the others.
While Yana was away, however, Corinne was attempting to get a bead on her situation using her fire magic and an inner gift of precognition she'd had since birth. She fell into a trance, which began to whip her wildly through a map of Fastague, showing her various hotspots in the kingdom and beyond. Around her a foul wind arose, as if a bubble had surrounded her, and none of her companions dared come closer while she meditated.
Yana soon returned, and, seeing Corinne being drained of her energy by the trance and wind, flung herself into the fray! Being a void mage, she was able to share in some of the vision, before both of them were thrown violently from the trance by the wind that surrounded them. Both now had an idea of where various problems would soon happen in Fastague, but had no idea what the problems would be nor how to deal with them. They left Selvan with more questions than answers, and headed north to Fahrnach.
In Fahrnach, the party learned of the Prophetess of Dath who might have a clue as to their situation. She resided within the Ruins of Dath deep in the Yuvegar Forest, at the center of the Great Star Lake. The adventurers decided to head for the ruins, but on the way, inside the forest, they found a small shrine dedicated to Anala, tended by a simple cleric. She warned them of dangers in the forest, and bade them seek the Will o' the Wisps when they reached the lake.
They reached the misty lake, and found neither legend nor miracle to take them across. Having been warned never to swim in or venture without a guide into the waters surrounded by the mists, they waited. Yana began to play a soft tune, and Corinne began to eat lunch. Then the wisps appeared, drawn by the scent of Corinne's fruit. The party agreed to give the Will o' the Wisps some fruit in exchange for safe passage to the central island, so the wisps brought an empty boat and led them across to the Ruins of Dath. Once there, the party spoke with the Prophetess, who revealed, cryptically, some of the meaning behind Corinne and Yana's vision. She spoke of them being "Progeny of the Damned", and spoke of a prophecy that linked them to the fate of Fastague. For now, however, their first mission was to investigate the ruins of Hae, birthplace of Gaarik DaRuth, and look for a man born of humans but not human who would lead them on the path of the prophecy previously mentioned.
At the ruins, the party found a cave leading deep within the earth. Following it, they soon came to a young man named Kalzen Bladesinger, a half-changeling, half-dryad who claimed to be of human parents. He told the party that he was responding to a dream his goddess, Marchan, goddess of music, had given him, and thus was wandering the caves he knew as a youth.
More to Come!
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