Chapter 1: The First Light
Plot points/Scenes
Chapter 1 takes place in the year 1095 Y.E. with a group of adventurers who arrive in the small lighthouse town of Tiriene. It is a Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition game that began at 1st level and tracked its main heroes (heretofore known as "the party") through level 4 as they completed the first major plot arc in their long journey to becoming heroes.
Themes
This arc is a low-level beginning to an epic saga that tracks a group of heroes from their humble beginnings to their most epic of accomplishments. Its themes focused tightly on more somber, local topics, such as the duty of institutions to defend the people they represent and the duty of the people to destroy repressive institutions. With a dash of cosmic horror thrown in for flavor--and to tease later plot developments--this beginning is a good sampling of all the different stories that can be found on Ec'algor.
Structure
Exposition
Episode 1 - Torchbearers
The story begins with a letter, a call for assistance from the isolated coastal village of Tiriene, the First Light in the southwestern Commonwealth in the year 1095 Y.E. Ashley Moztel, the captain of the local guard, a military outfit called the Tiriene Dutymen, distributes her message through the integrated guild system to every corner of Terisirae, promising a modest reward for completing the investigation of a murder. Briggs Craftsworthy, the patriarch of Tiriene's Craftsworthy Farm, died under mysterious circumstances--worse yet, his body was located bloated with tadpoles and eggs. The waters far out of the coast stirred with dense, impenetrable fog, a grim omen of Tiriene's past when a similar fog and similar series of killings almost destroyed the settlement and all those that lived there. To protect the town, the lighthouse of Tiriene was constructed, and fitted with a magical light-focusing beacon that warded off the fog. Captain Moztel, or Ash to her friends, offered 75 gold pieces per day to any adventurer willing to travel to her town, look into Brigg's death, find the culprit or culprits, and potentially prevent another string of murders. 17 adventurers answered the call, some venturing great distances to participate in the investigation. Brigg's daughter, Dana, says that she witnessed mist creeping in from over the coast and into the nearby woods and that her father disappeared into it two days before his body was found washed up on the beach. Several other townsfolk believed to be connected to Briggs were questioned, but the first-day ended with few leads and less information. That night, several more civilians vanished without a trace, as well as a handful of the adventurers who recently arrived in town. In the morning, several tracks are found in the dirt and mud that lead out to the sea, along with a few shimmering scales that twinkle in the morning light. Captain Moztel then expanded the scope of the investigation to include all the new disappearances and many of the adventurers looked to each other to find strength in numbers. The strongest group among them was The Party, Kellus Canatto, 19 Type B , Gentle, Karina Dantz, Felix von Eisenbrecht, and Etzel Istohu. On the second day, the party traveled to the nearby woods and discovered not only the bodies of some of the adventurers that went missing but also large wildlife like deer and wild pigs that were also stuffed with eggs nearby a river. They spent much of the day in the area, with Gentle following tracks and indicators of a fight that led further upstream, where they discovered another body, strange and scaled like an overgrown fish with legs and huge bulbous eyes. The adventurers that it killed put up a fight, and Gentle concluded that it died from its injuries while trying to escape, and noted that the stream eventually connects back to the sea. The sun was beginning to set, so they used the light of Tiriene's Lighthouse to guide the way back. By the time they returned, the moon had risen high into the sky and a pyre had been built in the village center. The people of Tiriene abducted Dana, tying her to a post and threatening to burn her for witchcraft. She had been seen consoling family members of those who had disappeared, giving them potions to "help their healing", using herbs and plants from around her farm and a natural apothecary talent. The party rescued her from the post, angering much of the town. While Kellus and Karina attempted to talk the angry mob down, Etzel goaded the angriest villagers into attacking him, then retaliated with deadly magic. Captain Moztel, fearing her town would fall apart before any threat from the mist could even emerge, instructed the Dutymen to arrest the party and hold them overnight while the rest escorted Dana back to Craftsworthy Farm and protect her throughout the night from the mob. Felix and 19 managed to vacate the area before getting arrested with the rest of the party.Episode 2 - Knee Deep
On the third day, most of the party awoke within the holding cells of the Tiriene Dutymen, and the town was threatening to pull itself apart. Another fifteen disappearances were confirmed from the previous night, both adventurers and civilians, neighbors turned on each other with wicked accusations. The mist at the edge of Tiriene had crept onto the shore, idling just outside of coastal houses, impenetrably thick and ominously cold. The only building immune to its effects was the Lighthouse at the edge of the settlement, its beam banishing the fog from its view. The party pleaded their case to be released, but Captain Moztel refused, stating they would further agitate the already delicate situation. Still free, Felix and 19 spent much of their day at the edge of the fog, attempting to identify it through arcane and natural means. They combined the information they were able to gather independently, determining the fog to be a magical amalgam of Enchantment and Transmutation. Creatures near it heard whispers and distant laughs, and if they came into contact with it, the fog would attempt to charm them, luring them deeper within. Within the fog were paralytic and anesthetic gasses that were so diluted, a person wouldn’t even notice they were slowly losing their strength and becoming lightheaded. Eventually, the target is immobilized, leaving them vulnerable to be taken by the true culprit of the disappearances. Given the coastal location of Tiriene, the eggs found within Briggs Craftsworthy, the tracks the party had followed the previous day, the fish corpse they had located, the scales, and the luring tactics, 19 concluded that the town of Tiriene was being targeted by a group of carnivorous intelligent sea creatures known as Kuo-Toa. The creatures occasionally take terrestrial mammals and implant them with eggs, avoiding killing them so the creature’s natural warmth incubates the young until they hatch, feed, and return to the sea. 19 noted that something still felt wrong, that the creatures rarely target more than one mammal at a time, and that the abductions are an order of scale more coordinated than Kuo-Toa are known for. They rush back to the Dutymen with a dire conclusion, something is organizing the Kuo-Toa to take and kill these people. When 19 and Felix arrived, they immediately relayed the information to Captain Moztel. She dispatched her lieutenant to Craftsworthy Farm to recall the guards sent there to defend Dana and commanded the rest to arm themselves and prepare to hold the coast. Felix added that, if she wants to protect the coast, having every hand available will only increase their chances of success. Just as they are being released from their cells, the party saw the Lighthouse begin to flicker as a wall of mist climbed all around it. Between them and the beacon were a small army of reptilian creatures from undersea caves called Troglodytes and the reanimated corpses of the abducted civilians and adventurers of Tiriene. Together, the party and the Dutymen battled through the horde, slowly making their way to the Lighthouse, where five Kuo-Toa were attempting to dismantle the magical beacon. When they were spotted, one of them blew into a conch shell it carried on its belt, and the last battle of the night began. Just as the party seemed to gain the upper hand over the strange creatures, an entity entered the lighthouse. Like a great and terrible crustacean, the creature had a shell so thick it could not be broken, and a touch of horrid cold. Disregarding the party, its goal was to destroy the light, and it would have succeeded if Kellus, and Karina had not worked together to redirect the light directly onto the creature’s form while Gentle bound it in place with burning chains of brightest gold, a magical talent he developed while on the hunt. It squealed in pain, its defenses melting away under the magical protections of Tiriene’s lighthouse like a hot knife through butter. It would have surely perished if it had not fled from the coast, and returned to the waters, a shadow moving under the sea. The rest of the sea forces fell shortly after, fleeing to safety as well or being cut down by the party as they tried to escape. The night was won but at immense cost. All of the Dutymen, except for Captain Moztel, had died and been made members of the undead horde along with any civilian who was too slow to escape.Rising Action
Episode 3 - Croatoan
In the aftermath of Tiriene’s near destruction, the party and Captain Moztel holed up in the shambles of the Dutymen building to rest for the night and heal their wounds. In the morning, they found a wasteland, bodies strewn about the streets and empty buildings dotting the coast. Ashley, now on much friendlier terms with the party because of their heroism, asks them to accompany her to Craftsworthy Farm. Once there, they found a grim scene, with body parts left flung around the grounds and blood splattered against the house at the center of the farm. When the party investigated, they found Dana still alive at the center of a circle of blood, viscera, and opalescent eggs blinking in intervals that seemed almost like they were communicating with her. Dana, with nowhere to go, surrounded by the corpses of the men dispatched to protect her, revealed she murdered her father. Dana spoke of the fog, how she ventured deep within it to commune with a presence, a being that entered her mind and spoke to her of the Commonwealth's impending doom. The being's patience was unending, and it was determined to end the West--sooner or later. She said it promised her a barony in the new West, and powers to control the hordes of undead creatures in exchange for her service. She spoke of it as though it were a beautiful, benevolent force, and said that its name was "Ralmorasca", and that even if she was killed it would not stop his plans. Ashley took her weapon in hand and, as the last surviving of the Tiriene Dutymen, found Dana Craftsworthy guilty of treason, murder, bloodmagic, and witchcraft, and sentenced her to death. With a single blade stroke, The Week of the Swelling Sea had been brought to a close. With a threat looming on the horizon and Tiriene's defenses fully depleted, Ash asked if the party would accompany her to Colum. The Assembly allowed the Commonwealth's most valuable defense against Ralmorasca to decay and crumble over hundreds of years, and commissioning its reconstruction would potentially take years with no guarantee of succeeding. Instead, she sought a personal audience with Queen Cassandra to assure the lighthouse town would be well protected and prepared to stop another incursion. Rattled by the chaos of Tiriene, the party agreed and set out together to go northeast to the capital. During their travel, they discovered a litany of other strange magical events in the region around roughly the same time. Small hamlets and villages for hundreds of miles had been impacted, and many hundreds of deaths had been tallied. The worst was outside the small town of Carlyle, a checkpoint between Tiriene and the much larger city of Bearingpool. Carlyle is also near a patch of wood called Paliade Forest, and the nearby Fort Yarten, which controlled guard rotations for the entire area. Carlyle's water sources were all mysteriously frozen at the same time, and patrolled by creatures of frost that prevented ice harvesting. With no resources and no ability to fight the monsters, the people of Carlyle were forced to go to the fort. Yarten's military personnel were also struggling because of similar instances in the Paliade Forest--many of their men were wounded and their food supplies were near depleted with several weeks still before their next resupply. The commander of the fort, Commander Howard, did the unthinkable, sending the civilians of Carlyle into the woods to forage for supplies with a detachment of soldiers just behind them. The soldiers murdered them, then blamed their deaths on the creatures of the woods, repeating for over a week until the party caught them in the act. Ashley, full of rage and a sudden feeling of betrayal, killed Commander Howard, starting a fight between the party and the rest of the fort, outnumbered 5 to 1. Because of their empty stomachs and poorly maintained weapons, the soldiers could barely put up a fight and failed to stop them from fleeing Fort Yarten, not before informing the surviving citizens of Carlyle what happened to their neighbors. As the party headed north to Bearingpool, fires rose high on the horizon behind them. News spread quickly of their actions in Yarten, and the party was nervous about arriving in a larger city with a guard corps that may be searching for them as wanted fugitives. Ashley said there were many old leads for someone within Bearingpool that might be able to help them, a wanted man who spent much longer evading the law, including her.Episode 4 - Manticore, LLC
The party settled into Beaingpool well, careful to keep a low profile and avoid identifying themselves in any place where an overzealous guard might hear them. They also spoke with many workers, shopkeeps, and traders in the area, learning about the town's history, its biggest attractions, and its power structure. They learned of an establishment known as the Manticore, a magnificent inn for only the wealthiest clientele, owned by Veronica Voss, a member of the highly influential Voss family. It was said that her adoptive older brother was a member of the Assembly, the merchants, and moguls who ruled the entire Commonwealth as though it were their private business. The Manticore was also a symbol of The Assembly's grip on the city, all economic activity happened nearby it, even the trade sector wrapped around the building like a hood. Veronica was seen as a sort of twisted public official in Bearingpool, authorized explicitly by the Assembly to extort and extract as she deemed fit. She even had oversight when it came to small-scale policies that affected trade, pay, and hours for laborers all throughout Bearingpool. The opposite to the invested corporate interests of the town was Port Ingenuity, a one-of-a-kind place dreamed up by the 7 Staves guild. It functioned as any normal port would, but instead of being located by the sea, it docked vessels meant to sail the air. Airships large enough to transport multiple dozen people and heavy cargo were still being perfected, but Port Ingenuity housed smaller vessels that could transport a handful of people and lighter loads. Built as a proof of concept for when the larger ships were more common, the port was a hub of technological minds and attracted inventors from far and wide to conduct experiments of a technical and magical kind. Kellus, an experienced thief, sought to use the city's underground network to send a coded message to Ashley but received no word back in the 48-hour window he mentioned in the note. The party was left with a choice, to wait for their friend, or to push forward and complete her mission with great urgency. The vote split right down the center, and they decided to spend another night before voting again.Climax
Episode 5 - Laissez-faire
As the clock struck 1400 hours, the party was preparing to convene another vote, one that was beginning to sway toward them leaving Bearingpool and contacting Ashley further down the line. When they were prepared to decide, Ashley appeared in their inn room with a stranger at her heel. The man, clad in a paladin's gear with a large, bloody prayer cloth spread across his face, was an absolute mountain that towered even over the mechanical might of 19. He introduced himself as Veren, unassuming and unremarkable. But Felix had recognized the stains underneath the blood on his prayer cloth. He saw the Dead Scales, the symbol of Kelemvor, god of death and passage, and suddenly everything clicked into place. Veren was no adventurer Ashely had recruited, he was a hardened criminal who had butchered hundreds and had been evading justice for decades. They argued for hours, with Ashley pleading that his skills and history were necessary to defeat the Assembly. Suddenly there was confusion, defeating the Assembly was not the goal that they had agreed to accompany her for. Kellus and Gentle had noticed she emerged from Fort Yarten a changed woman, but this was treason she spoke of, the very same treason she tried and kill Dana Craftsworthy over, they reasoned. It was then that Veren entered the conversation, speaking long and passionately on the greatest treachery of all, that of the Assembly. He wove tales of how the organization that ran the Commonwealth routinely failed it on every occasion, allowing disrepair and ruin to reign supreme while they extracted wealth from the working people. He argued it was because of their lack of care that Tiriene crumbled and had to pay adventurers to solve its problems, and that Fort Yarten was far from the first or the worst example of soldiers killing civilians because of financial issues. He said he was not hiding within the Commonwealth, but planning his grandest scheme of all and Bearingpool was just the beginning. The party seemed split again, with the decision coming down to Karina, who asked Veren if he would allow her to probe through his memory and see things from his perspective. He submitted to it, allowing her to see his point of view of all the worst criminal offenses his name had become associated with. Each memory was an atrocity, bought and paid for by the Assembly. They funded soldiers and private adventurer guilds all over the West to punish and harshly prosecute any who protested working conditions or market practices. Many were arrested on spurious and superficial charges, or outright killed for questioning the Assembly. If sentiments began to sour within a population, undercover operatives were sent to sow disinformation, turning factions against one another before they could congregate under a common cause. Political movements on either side of the spectrum were crushed, rebels subverted, organizations infiltrated and destroyed from within, all was in question and every action was a conspiracy, all conducted by the watchful eyes at the very top, ensuring that the status quo never changed, and never benefitted anybody but themselves. Karina exited his mind almost as radicalized as he was, ready to take war to the Assembly, but Veren and Ashley aimed instead at the Manticore. If they could destroy it and bring justice to those that run it, it could show that any settlement could be liberated from the Assembly's clutches, an action that could spark the entire Commonwealth into independent insurgencies. Some of the party, especially Kellus and Felix, were hesitant to ally themselves with an extremist like Veren. Felix had previously lived the life of an isolated hermit and would be quick to return to it, but he had a burgeoning respect and friendship that had been developing with the silver-tongued Kellus, whom he admired for being both diplomatic and deadly. Kellus opted to stay because of an affection that burned quietly for the beautiful Karina. Seeing her being inculcated by Veren’s charismatic radicalism was all the reason he needed to stay, and for Felix, seeing a friend take up arms was all the convincing he needed to do the same. The party came together seamlessly after that, their first objective was to spread the guard patrol thin enough that their target could be attacked head-on. Veren assured them that even though Bearingpool looked peaceful at first glance, it was a powder keg of unhappy and overexploited workers anxious to cast off their shackles. Half the party went to the Manticore, gathering a mob of the discontent, while the other half went to Port Ingenuity. When at the port, they targeted and destroyed the long ropes that anchored floating vehicles to the ground, allowing them to float dangerously over the rest of the city. Once the city guard's attention was focused on the ships sailing the air, they returned to their target, where the rest of the party made good on gathering the masses. Nightfall came quickly to Bearingpool, but all was lit with torchlight and rage when the party marched on the Manticore demanding justice for the town of Bearingpool.Episode 6 - Vain Regent
While a mob formed outside, those within the Manticore steeled their defenses, blocking exits and windows with heavy furniture and turning the first floor into a rampart complete with makeshift arrowslits. Of the party, Veren, Ashley, and Karina took first position, standing at the foot of the Manticore’s entrance demanding justice for the people of the town of Bearingpool—it would either come through the surrender of all those inside the building, or they would be dragged out and forced to answer for their crimes. Veronica barricaded herself in the Assembly Suite, a room that comprised the entirety of the top floor, and armed her staff with magical equipment and sharpened serving plates. As the party battled up the steps, the town guard began colliding with the mob outside, and all erupted into combat. Nearly an hour passed when the exhausted party burst through the doors of the Manticore’s highest level, finding Veronica unrepentant and unwilling to be taken alive. When it appeared she would be captured, she made an attempt to end her own life but was stopped quickly by Ashley and Gentle. She was walked back to the street, bound and gagged, made an example of for the town guard to see. Veren declared as loud as his voice could bear that the Assembly had been made to bleed and could be defeated. His presence was so powerful and so commanding that the clamor of battle at the edge of Bearingpool’s market district ceased so that they may hold a trial assessing the guilt of Veronica Voss, tried as a proxy for her masters within the Assembly. The trial began with laborers from around the city, then it transitioned to traders and merchants within the wealthier circles of town, then concluded with remarks from Veronica’s own employees. All made clear notice of her repressive and exploitative ways, and how her de facto rule over Bearingpool was tolerated by an equally pernicious force that cared only about the amount of money she could concentrate. Even the guards that protected her came to understand they had been made tools of a system that sought to exploit endlessly, not to protect or make safer their home. At 2100 hours, Veronica Voss was sentenced to death. As one of the leaders of the charge, Veren was nominated to deal the killing blow, but, before he could do so, Etzel intervened with an idea of his own. He undid Veronica's bindings and gave her over to the crowd. By 2110, she had been killed. The Taking of Bearingpool was nearing its close.Falling Action
Episode 7 - Martyrdom
Veren’s words had stirred the crowds of Bearingpool deeply, even affecting the hearts of the party, but all the fighting and death of that night, especially the gruesome public execution of Veronica Voss, was a traumatizing sight that hardened the hearts of some, and made others’ bleed profusely. While Ashley attempted to redirect the people outside the Manticore, Veren ascended back to its highest floor to retrieve the riches Veronica Voss had attempted to stash away. Within the party, 19, Felix, Gentle, and Kellus still harbored distrust toward Veren and perhaps thought that his extremist tendencies would lead to the rest of Bearingpool being destroyed, and then possibly more of the Commonwealth afterward. They came together and made a secret pact--while Kellus distracted both Etzel and Karina, the most devoted to Veren's cause among them, 19, Felix, and Gentle would rise after Veren and put an end to his campaign. The plan would have gone off without a hitch, but Veren defenestrated himself when the tide turned against him, falling eighty feet to street level, where the party quickly pursued and killed him--but not before being spotted by remnants of the mob he gathered. They all attempted to escape but were cornered, caught, and bound. Even Kellus, Etzel, and Karina were implicated as being involved in the death of Bearingpool's favorite rebel. The mob roared for blood, calling to kill the party in the same way they had done to Veronica, but a single voice broke through the crowd, that of Ashley Moztel. She brought the party to their feet, demanding they stand and answer for what they had done. Among them, it was Kellus who spoke, weaving an intricate tale that warned of a fine line between righteous rebellion and wanton slaughter, a line he worried his friend was soon to cross. The people of Bearingpool called for them to be executed as enemies of the state, a new state that would break away from the Commonwealth and govern itself under the command of Veren's second in command, Ashley Moztel. But she silenced the calls for death, untying the party with a mournful glower pressed firmly across her face. She instructed them to leave the town and to interfere no further in its affairs, proclaiming that they had once saved her life and that the score had now been settled. Ashley then gave a letter to Gentle, asking him to deliver it to the Queen on her behalf. She felt she could not justify traveling further if her goal was to help the people of the Commonwealth--to do that best, she would have to stay in Bearingpool and help it rebuild and reorganize. The party did as commanded, though Karina seemed especially wounded by the loss. For her, it was not just the death of someone whom she admired and had felt a special kinship with, someone who she had practically lived as, if only for brief moments inside his memories, but the loss of a man who represented the kind of irrepressible freedom she sought to recreate for herself. There was also a pang of betrayal that she felt deep in her heart knowing that the man she respected so much was slain by her friends and that she was lied to by the person for whom she nurtured a silent affection that grew slightly every day. The party, all of them together, carried feelings of deep paradoxes and strange contradictions within them as they moved further north, toward the great city of Huvora. With their eyes still set on the far-off Colum, they agreed to rest, resupply, and reassure themselves of their cause before making their next move. The party's story will continue in Chapter 2: Red Eye Rebellion!
Parent Plot
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