The Death Key

Death was not a tool of wicked souls nor a thing to be feared by the Keepers. To them it was a passageway to even greater enlightenment and place where the echoes of their knowledge could still be heard by living kin

— Excerpt from Tales of the World Birth

While the notion of a key that has dominion over death seems a dreadful thought to the people of modern Tairos such wasn't the case among the Keepers and their servants. To them, the mortal body was a vessel to experience living world and death was the shore upon which that vessel would beach and a new journey was to begin. The minds of the Keepers were such that even in life they could plumb the depths of the other side so for many the end was met with little concern for they'd already touched it.

That peaceful, almost banal view of death, changed when the Golden God passed judgement upon the Keepers. Such was might that he drag the souls of recently departed back before they could reach the other side and render them naught but cinders within the furnace of his being. Many of the Keepers were ripped from their journey as they died, called back by the priests of this vengeful god and offered up as tithes to their master. Others were hunted down by the deity himself who could swim between the realms of the divine, the living, and the dead with ease. Many of the Keepers who had departed ages earlier answered the call of their still-living kin for aid. While this helped stem the advance of the Golden God and erect the ward that protected their last temple-city it also put them within reach of the jaws of their enemy. They too were plucked from beyond the veil and made to suffer the same fate as others before them. Imprisonment, torture, and eventual erasure within the Golden God's Throne-Realm.

It is with this new and dreadful view of death that the key maker chose the appearance of this creation.

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Game Statistics

While holding the Death Key in a free hand or wearing it as an amulet you have Resistance to Necrotic Damage.
Necromancy spells cast by the wielder of the Death Key do not require Manacite or any other form of fuel to cast.
The staff has 10 charges. While holding it, you can use an action to expend 1 or more of its charges to cast one of the following spells from it, using your spell save DC+2: Spare the Dying (1 charge), Gentle Repose (1 charge), Life Transference (2 charges), Feign Death (2 charges), Speak with Dead (3 charges), Enervation (4 charges), Astral Projection (10 charges)
The Death Key regains 1D6 charges per day at dawn.
The Death Key cannot be damaged by any known means of normal or magical damage.

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Manufacturing process

The Death Key was created by one of the last of the Keepers. This individual was an expert in the veil between the living and the dead and this key contains embers of that expertise within it. Its creation required both their mortal life and eternal soul in order to forge.

Significance

The key would eventually end up in the possession of Captain Salavar thanks to his Compass. While a dire fate eventually befell him this key would fall into the hands of his first mate, Klaus Ottiger. He, and those loyal to him became obsessed with cheating death and hoarding their wealth. They walled themselves up in a cove near Crispin Bay and used the key to sustain themselves through the decades. Hoping to escape the many bounties and enemies they'd made. Instead, they turned into undead horrors under the sway of Ottiger who himself had become a powerful wight. The key was then taken by the crew of the The Paradise Lost after they defeated the captain and his slavish servants.

Item type

Magical

Current Location

Tairuk Island Chain

Current Holder

Kazim Musharif

Subtype / Model

Eternity Keys

Owning Organization

Crew of the Paradise Lost

Rarity

This is a unique item. There is only one in existence

Raw materials & Components

The key is made of Dolomite or possibly Limestone. The gemstone within the eye of the skull symbol is Amethyst.