Anthology 2: I Was There, 400 Years Ago

Session Log

The year is 2611. A few weeks ago, the demonic army known as the Ironclad razed the fortified city of Kelstor to the ground. The army mysteriously appeared in the southwest of the continent, and has been travelling northwards, destroying everything in its path. All major civilizations on Radro have banded together in an attempt to stop the Ironclad, but nothing so far has worked. The Ironclad’s leader, the being known as Varia, has made short work of even the powerful angelic forces sent by the Celestial Queens. In a final attempt to stop the demonic horde, the best of the remaining combatants have been assembled in the highlands. Divided into small squads, their task is to isolate and defeat the commanders of the Ironclad army, with the ultimate goal of killing Varia herself.

The day before the assault, the goliath pirate Oran Shipcleaver seeks out his fellow soldiers of the Silver Division for conversation. He first meets Flore Vaugrenard, a noble human inventor who makes the group a delicious soup to replace the terrible army rations. Next he meets Abdul bin Faruq, the human necromancer who busies himself with the gruesome task of converting battlefield corpses into undead soldiers. Lastly, he meets the dwarven monk Aegrim Whitebeard, who spends his time in quiet contemplation while fishing in a nearby pond.

While the group has dinner around the campfire, they converse with three other soldiers. The dwarven inventor Barath Greyhammer is eager to learn Flore’s recipes, as he hopes to open a tavern when the war is over. Vulruth Kellahvraan, a gold dragonborn alchemist, discusses his experiences with creating experimental oozes. Nephal Waterside, an innocuous rural man with a spear, is initially taciturn, but soon discusses the thrills of battle with the likeminded Oran.

In the evening, a bell is rung to gather the troops. Commander Myhradel Yovunbiisos, a bronze dragonborn, tells the troops about their plans for tomorrow. He isn’t very convincing, as he was abruptly promoted when the previous commander died. The Silver III Division, consisting of Abdul, Aegrim, Flore, and Oran, are tasked with hunting down a commander named Tsep, a devil known for keeping monstrous pets. Several others from the Silver Division, including Barath, Nephal, and Vulruth, will go after Varia, the leader of the Ironclad.

The next morning, the troops start gathering. Oran calls attention to himself and gives a motivating speech about how they shouldn’t be disheartened by the failures of those who came before, because fate may always swing differently than you expect. The troops are slightly more emboldened as they split into squads and spread out across the battlefield. As the group reaches their position, they see Tsep approaching as expected, along with two huge howler demons.

The howler demons release deafening screams as they approach, initially disorienting the group. Oran and Aegrim resist the effect and charge in. While they hold off the monsters, Abdul reasserts control over his undead soldiers and rains down a barrage of arrows and necrotic blasts upon the demons. When one of the beasts is staggered by the hail of arrows, Oran uses the opportunity to decapitate it with his poleaxe. The other beast and its master attack with fangs and psychic whips, but Flore uses a magnetic enchantment on her armour to pull Tsep into the open. Aegrim, Oran, and Flore then gang up on the devil, and after a brief brawl, Flore kills it with a powerful uppercut that utterly crushes his head. Shortly after, Abdul’s undead spirit annihilates the remaining howler with a beam of necrotic energy.

With their own task completed, the group follows the sound of distressed soldiers nearby. They find a large group of small demonic beasts overwhelming a lone knight, with two dead mutilated knights nearby. The others charge in to draw the attention of the demons, while Abdul and his undead rain down a carnage of arrows, necrotic blasts, and lightning on the beasts, rapidly thinning out the horde. One of the demons drags off the wounded knight, so Flore uses a web spell to entangle it. Aegrim dashes after them, stuns the demon with a chop to the neck, then heals the knight with his chi powers.

When the remaining demons are cleared, the knight thanks them for the rescue, and explains that his squad only expected half as many demons as they ended up facing. Aegrim climbs to high ground and scans the battlefield. The other battles seem to be going favourably, except that one armoured humanoid in the distance is wreaking havoc on the troops. The group is worn out from two battles, so they retreat to recover their strength. As they rest, some of the other battles die down. Commander Myhradel then teleports to them, injured from battle, and informs them that the fighting has congregated around the seemingly-invincible Varia. The group joins him in seeking out the final battle.

Varia, an armoured humanoid with a lance, is surrounded in a wide circle by a shield wall of cautious soldiers. Around her are many corpses, as well as Barath, Nephal, and Vulruth, who are alive but heavily injured. Varia calls for more challengers, and Oran promptly steps forth to taunt her. The others hurry after him to back him up, while Flore moves in to shield the injured Barath. Varia takes this as a challenge and charges, bashing Flore aside before impaling the dwarf, whose body disintegrates into nothing.

Abdul’s undead shoot at Varia, but their arrows bounce harmlessly off her skin. Oran starts hacking away at Varia with his magic poleaxe, while Aegrim pummels her with chi-infused fists, and Flore surrounds herself in freezing blue flames that lash out at the demon. As their attacks start making a dent in her defences, Varia slams her lance on the ground, creating a thunderous explosion that batters the group and demolishes Abdul’s skeleton soldiers. She then transforms into a huge demonic beast made of jagged metal and fire.

Aegrim, Flore, and Oran surround the demon and continue their assault, while Abdul barrages it with astral blasts. Varia deals devastating strikes with her claws and fangs in return, and despite Aegrim’s chi healing, she eventually smashes both Flore and Oran into the dirt. Abdul then transfers his own life force to the two of them, bringing himself near death to get them back to consciousness. On her last legs, Flore distracts Varia just long enough for Oran to smash his axe into the demon’s thigh and tear open her side with the follow-through.

The burning metal form bursts apart, revealing her humanoid form. Staggered and panting, she mutters “well, that was fun,” before Oran promptly cleaves her right down the middle. As the bifurcated body falls to the ground, the spirit of the demon lord Var rises from it, releases a vicious laugh, then leaps into Oran’s body. Flore quickly uses her magic to reinforce Oran’s willpower, and with her help he resists the possession, forcing the spirit back out. An unfamiliar magical force then emerges from the sky, snatches the spirit of Var, and drags it away into the distance.

Epilogue

After the brutal execution and odd event that followed, a scowling silence fell over the crowd first. Confusion and hesitancy had taken a hold of the troops who had spent life and limb on this months-long campaign, and the sheer disbelief that their plight might be at an end was palpable.

As the combatants caught their breath for a moment longer, the first cheer of victory erupted from the man known as Nephal, who had stood at the edge of the fighting ring. Within seconds, a wave of relief swept over the remaining survivors, and cries and roaring acclamations burst forth from the barely four dozen that had held the edge of the ring. In a parade of triumph, the warriors Abdul, Aegrim, Flore and Oran were carried back to the encampment. With the remainder of the warriors falling apart swiftly to tend to their wounds, loot the remainders of the battlefield, pay their respects to the fallen, a solid core spent their remaining magic and expertise to prepare a grand feast.

That night, there would be no more bloodshed. No more pained sweat, no more tears of sorrow, no more worries for what the next day might hold. Only joy, friendship, laurels, casks of ale and fine wines, the last supplies that the United Legion of Radro could cough up. They had succeeded, at last.

Varia was no more.

And deep into the night would the companions celebrate. They’d cry of friendship and shout of brotherhood, they’d dance ‘til their legs gave way to the ground that seemed so much less hard than it had the nights before. When the sun did rise once more, they would still be feasting, and when it set again, they would still be drinking.

The days that followed would be of no less historical significance, as a drunken man profoundly declared that these frozen, no-good highlands, which until this day were known as the Horned Highlands, would be renamed to remind the continent of what had happened these fateful days. And thus, the moniker Varian Highlands was to be struck down in every kingdom, tribe, and empire’s records.

The day after, high command ushered a statement that would change history once more.

For this was the first time in all of Radro’s history, one that spanned back over two and a half millennia since the elves and dragonborn had set foot on its shores, that all races of the continent stood side by side. For the first time in history, petty squabbles had been put aside, debts and feuds no longer mattered, all were brothers and sisters. And together, hand in hand, they could face anything. And though the slaying of Varia, credit where it is due, befell unto the hands of the now nigh-legendary quadrumvirate of heroes, it was the whelp Myhradel, standing in the footsteps of his late mother, who reorganized the entirety of the Legion, single-handedly formed the strategy that lead to her defeat, and managed to steer it all.

The High Command of the United Legion of Radro would be more than just a war council. It was decided, there and then on those blood-soaked grounds, that they would expand and become the United Council of Radro. All houses of elves, all tribes of dwarves, all sects of beastfolk, all bands of tieflings, all bloodlines of humans, all clans of dragonborn, they would bond together under one united empire. At the helm of this behemoth of an organisation was placed young Myhradel Yovunbiisos, for though he lacked the charisma to inspire troops, he bore the insight to manage an empire.

Under the hand of Yovunbiisos, and with the shared counselling of all races and representatives, Radro would thrive. The days that followed were hectic and chaotic, as soldiers were paid their wages and all would pack to head back home. Each leaving a legacy, no doubt.

Abdul, though ever the demon hunter, would find his faith in the world and its safety restored under the shielding hands of a united Radro. A wise scholar, with years of experience and to-further-or-lesser-extent forbidden knowledge, he would work with the equally scholarly Myhradel on a way to inform generations to come of all things the world would have to offer. Agreeing on a network of academies and libraries to be built in the greatest cities of the continent, the first would be built in the harbour city of Glyckheart under Abdul’s personal overseeing. This building carved from blood-red stone would be crowned the Crimson Archive. Though Abdul would go on to assist and oversee the construction of several more of such places, he would always return to this desert city, working diligently to stockpile more and more scrolls and texts. Believing the world to be in good hands after decades more of diligent archival work, the great necromancer once known as Abdul bin Faruq, now known to most young scholars simply as “the old librarian”, would pass peacefully into the afterworld.

The dwarf Aegrim would use his more than generous pay to traverse to the mystical mountains of the Frosthearth, from where he had heard such grand tales of spiritual powers. Finding what he’d had hoped, and despite being of hill dwarven origin in a mountain dwarf ruled domain, he was welcomed with open arms in their shrines and houses. Perfecting the ways of harnessing one’s own internal energy reserves over the course of decades, learning of all schools and paths the mountains had to offer. Eventually, Aegrim settled amongst the southern-most peaks of this beautiful range, founding his very own clan from where he would train disciples and monks in the arts of mercy that had kept him safe all those decades before. The clan of Whitebeards and Strongbeards would grow to flourish over time, always hidden but producing diligent sages and capable warriors all the same. Aegrim would smile upon his legacy, until his own, peaceful death many centuries later.

Flore returned home to the town of Spigath and her ancestral lands of House Vaugrenard. With tales of her victory preceding her, she would find herself with a veritable town’s full of younglings who would beg her for a position of squire before nightfall. Training and raising many of them, she naturally become the town’s knight-commander, with a by-now well-equipped town guard at her back that she had trained herself. Known as a paragon of protection and safety in and around the town and its many surrounding estates, she was a loved and respected knight until her last breath. Ever the wall and shield for the unfortunate, Flore found her end when a demonic and mad worshipper of Varia tracked her down during a training exercise with her squires. Stepping in to take the blows for them, but no longer the physically young and sturdy knight she once was, she succumbed to her wounds shortly after besting her foe. A martyr and a hero, Spigath would never forget her.

Oran Shipcleaver, the one that had struck the final, decisive blow against Varia, celebrated by other rowdy adventurers and always one to keep his word, would return to the City of the Glacial Stream to fulfil his promise to dethrone his last captain. Taking the title for himself, he set to work to transform his crew into a lawless but deeply capable and, in no small part due to Oran’s relation, deeply infamous mercenary fleet known as the Hatchetmen. Laying his lot with the southern waters that crested the continent from the elven isles to the Ornokarthian rivers as guards and patrols, and other times in the Bay of the Spike making a name for themselves as monster hunters and poachers of the horrors that dwelled there, the Hatchetmen would always serve partly the good and partly the money. For two decades, Shipcleaver would stride on tides, before returning to his clan, satisfied with the life he had spent at sea. Spending the rest of his capable physical years training aspiring goliath warriors in his personal style of polearm mastery, Oran would leave behind a son and a daughter. His descendants would carry on his spirit, being endowed with legend-worthy martial skills and infamous ferocity as a captain respectively. At peace with both his legacy and a life of such excitement few would ever be able to match it, he allowed his old wounds to catch up to him in a tranquil death.