RMB DND Chronological Events!

Key: Dungeon Master, Rolen Amastacia, Ekeroth

Once upon a time, in a grand grand old land there sat a world most divided. In the north the nascent beginnings of a great empire were forming. The smaller independent duchies of the north face extinction, many culturally different peoples being absorbed into one blanket culture.

The center of the land was disunited. A long dormant volcano sat in the middle, surrounded by desert oasis. The only things that thrived were bandits towns and outlaws condemned to death. Assured in that the harsh landscape would keep them safe from any law enforcement that would dare track them down.

In the east a proud warrior people lived scattered, inhabiting the valleys between great mountains. Their runic script and customs alien to the other people of the world who they viewed as weak.

Down south lay a vast series of human fiefdoms and elven princedoms. Peaceful and well versed in cultural matters, they sought no conflict and kept outside contact to a minimum.

Along the western part of the land was dense jungle and forest, undisturbed by any mortal attempts to civilize the landscape. Many who entered would never return, giving rumor to strange monstrous creatures that inhabit the area. An ancient magical barrier of unknown origin seems to keep the boundaries of the jungle in check.

You shall start off in the land belonging to the Duchy of Allswell, in the eastern most part of the northern lands. It lies along the coast and features a semi-arid climate. The duchy remains independent and you have been brought to the local village of Peoplesville in search of a cure for your friend, Welya a half-elf afflicted by a disease of unknown origin. An old mystic who potentially knows of a cure is said to inhabit the lands.

On the outskirts of the western dense forest sat a woodelf six hundred years old. To anyone willing he would tell a story of the village he lived in and his youngest son whom he was parted from.

"Ahh... Young Rolen. I'll admit that for the fifty years he was in my care I would have never imagined he'd turn into a decent man. He drank a bottle of woodale at the age of 10, he spent most of his childhood wandering the dense woods near this village, and in his early childhood when most boys would hunt game and most girls would collect herbs he'd just bring back pictures and maps he drew of lands he charted. For our poor village he done us no good; At least, that's what those living then thought of him."

The old woodelf raised his chin up as he continued telling the story

"All till our lord from the depths of the forest summoned all young man to join a hunt; The great Caledonian hunt. The beast our lord wished to slay was so large and mighty it required sixty ballistas! Fifteen catapults! And from our humble village a hundred man alongside our winter supply of food. We retreated to the roots of the life giver tree, all of us praying to the gods. All of us except my Rolen. I don't know if it was his bravado or foolishness, probably both, but the lord found his palace's window was shot by an arrow with three pieces of paper rolled around it; A drawing, a map and a message. The drawing was of a gray snake with wings coiling around a rock, the map was of a week long route and the message was clearly written 'see her for yourself.'"

Leaning out his chair the old woodelf says.

"What I'm about to tell our village only heard from Rolen, but he has a honest heart so we know this to be true. The route lead to a cliff with a scenic overlook of the seven mountains, the gray snake was the mighty beast our lord heard from legends resting its entire body on mount Olxon and the message had our lord doubting the hunt. All in all despite mockery from the nobles and generals the hunt was called off. However the lord's man visited me the next night, stating a decree that from now Rolen Amastacia is to forever leave Yizrad Mynach and the lord's realm. My son left his hometown, all for a frail pride."

A enigmatic smile crosses the woodelfs face.

"Don't worry too much about my son, his pride was no different from his lords. I receive letters from him every month. He went southeast to some human duchy or another, telling me how he enjoys the company of humans and the way those fleeting lives hold their ambitions dear and the adventures he goes on with the humans."

The summons came to Ekeroth from one of the Order's clerics, swathed in flowing white robes into which gold thread was sown, a mural of cloth depicting a fire-breathing dragon. The man was of rather high rank.

“Searcher, Master Horgh calls for you.”

“Can it not wait, brother? I'm afraid you've caught me at a rather unfortunate time.” Ekeroth had just slipped into an obscenely large piece of horse…feculence.

The cleric eyed the stain decorating Ekeroth's clothes, sniffed the air, then regretted it quite a bit. “Wash yourself of this…mess, then report to the Master’s chambers.”

Ekeroth saluted to the cleric and began on his way, hoping against hope none of the inductees would see him in this state. The possible nicknames flowed through his mind as he walked.

Amundin was a rather large fortress, on the northernmost part of The Hundred Kingdoms, with vaulted walls hewn of black rock surrounding the keep in the center. The yards about were filled with training areas and barracks, wells and entrances to storerooms sunken into the earth. Being the last bastion of civilization on a long road reaching far south, some would say it was the gate to The Central Wastes. The Wastes being generally unpleasant, most people stopped going north at Amundin.

And so, the traders brought horses, and the horses brought waste.

Ekeroth brushed the thought aside as he squared his shoulders in an attempt to salvage some sort of dignity when he stopped to find a new shirt and pair of trousers from Quartermaster Swäno. The Quartermaster looked the Searcher up and down and decided to simply burn the clothes rather than attempt to wash the stain out.

With fresh clothes Ekeroth entered into the central keep, passing through one of the great oaken doors beside the currently raised drawbridge. Inside the keep was dim, lit sparingly by old candles. He found Master Horgh in his chambers, tracing fingers along one of the holy books used to educate initiates.

As the Master of a (mostly) non-militaristic Order, Horgh looked the part of a crusader. His white hair was cut short, almost shaved, and his wind-scarred face was almost always set into a grimace. Strangely his voice was quite calm, betraying the unpleasant looking veteran it spewed from.

“I heard you had had quite the accident when Brother Kurst found you,” he said without leaving the book, “I hope you've changed your clothes. I'll not have refuse tracking the halls of Amundin.”

Ekeroth bit back the wish to curse loudly, and bowed. “Of course.”

Horgh closed the book, finally eyeing the Searcher. “Do you know which book this is?”

Ekeroth eyed the cover for a moment. “It looks like 'Eidolon’s Canticle', Master.”

A nod, “Correct. A history of our Order, reaching back thousands of years. Eidolon gathered the information necessary from hundreds of previous chronicles and stories, searching for every scrap of truth amongst mountains of legend. He died before reaching the previous two centuries I'm afraid.”

He frowned a moment.

“The issue is, Ekeroth, there are gaps in this canticle lasting decades, sometimes centuries. Eidolon’s own words for the state of the records are quite vulgar for a historic text,” the last said while flipping the tome open again to point at a line on the second page.

Ekeroth decided to remember it for the next time one of the inductees decided to think too highly of themselves.

“With the Canticle being in a state like this, we have no set record of our past, nor our purpose, not even the purpose for the construction of Amundin. I've decided you will be the one to find the missing fragments.”

Ekeroth nodded. With him far away, it’d give enough time for the memory of the horse incident to pass.

“Where shall I search, Master?”

Horgh briefly consulted a small note.

“The Duchy of Allswell. Eidolon mentions the place throughout his work.”

Ekeroth frowned. Maybe too far.

"I've always been fascinated by human towns. Their perseverance in poor conditions is markedly different from high elves."

Welya, the half-elf aspiring sun priestess, strolled past the lone guard stationed at the north loose stone path entrance of the town of Peoplesville. She uttered a small blessing to the guard as she passed. Besides words, nothing audible or visible happened. Mouth twisting into a frown she gave her pendant of the Sun an annoyed look.

For a moment she gazed into the cloudless sky with her big green eyes, squinting at the Sun before turning away with a pained look. Pulling up the hood on her impeccably clean white robe, she beckoned to the two travelers she had recently encountered. The smile on her face bright and (barely visible) hair golden, she stood at 172cm.

Behind her was the town of Peoplesville, which while lacking any real fortifications, was a good sized human settlement. Known for being the birthplace of a hero of the Amundin Order in times past, currently it was the biggest settlement of the Duchy of Allswell, a lucrative trading duchy immediately bordered by the ever annexing Autocracy. Rumors abound that agents of the Autocracy are already at work in town to ferment the process of subjugation, many are concerned about the supposed arrival of an Autocracy Magistrix. The closest buildings in view seemed to be made of mud, further down some stone of poor quality could be spotted as a building material. The closest identifiable building is labeled Undertaker and is made of poor stone.