Threnody Stones
The Threnody Stones are a solemn, circular formation of towering necromantic monoliths, half-sunken into the blighted marsh of the Mire of Unmaking. Each stone pulses with death-energy, carved from black shale veined with boneglass and etched in runes older than mortal memory. Positioned along a corrupted leyline convergence, they serve as a resonant choir of undeath—a sacred instrument for mass resurrection and spirit-binding rituals.
Purpose / Function
- Mass Resurrection Rites: When activated, the Threnody Stones draw from the swamp’s necrotic essence to reanimate dozens—or even hundreds—of corpses. These may rise as bound husks (Mireborn), spectral wights, or fully reformed revenants, depending on the rite’s precision and sacrifice.
- Spirit Anchoring: The Stones trap nearby souls, preventing passage to the afterlife. These spirits can be questioned, bound, or reinserted into new vessels, including prepared clones, fungal effigies, or bark-fleshed bodies.
- Ritual Amplification: Thornshroud druids and necromancers use the Stones as power multipliers, channeling rites too vast for one caster to sustain. Entire groves sometimes chant in unison to maintain complex awakenings.
To the Thornshroud Dominion, the Threnody Stones are sacred infrastructure—a place of remembrance, rebirth, and unholy might. Pilgrims sometimes journey here to offer bones or sing dirges, hoping to attune themselves with the death-song of the land. For the Thornshroud’s elite necromancers, these Stones represent the chorus of their dominion—proof that even silence can be shaped into power.
Would you like a ritual layout, chant fragment, or visual reference of the Threnody Stones next?
Architecture
- The Mourning Ring: The stones form a rough circle 80 feet wide, though the swamp distorts its shape depending on the season. Between the stones is an ever-present shallow pool of black, humming mirewater.
- Runed Facets: Each stone stands 10–15 feet tall and is engraved with mourning scripts—lyrical necromantic inscriptions in an extinct elven tongue, believed to weep softly when activated.
- Swaying Fog: A spectral mist coils between the monoliths, often taking faint humanoid forms or echoing long-forgotten laments in the wind. This fog is a sign the ritual field is ripe for use.
History
- The First Threnody: Legends claim the stones were raised after the fall of a forgotten kingdom, whose entire army was buried in the mire. Their collective death-scream became the foundation of the resurrection ritual.
- Echoing Dead: Each activation of the Stones comes with a price—voices of the reawakened continue to haunt the swamp for days, sobbing or singing twisted versions of their burial songs.
- The Stone That Shouldn’t Sing: One monolith is cracked, weeping green ichor. Some say if it joins the chant, a deathless godling buried beneath the mire might awaken.
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