[October 07, 2025]

Excerpted from the Diary of Vadania “Necro” Amakiir

Stunned, myself and my friends barely even noticed the perfectly crafted crostini laid before us. Bricru stared straight ahead, their fae-like features dull, their face slack, their eyes unfocused. Shawn tried his best to get their attention but to no avail. I noticed a slight odor in the air, a smell a bit like rot. It wafted in and out of my senses but I couldn’t pinpoint its origin, nor did I recognize it as anything in particular.

Although it was no longer glowing, and it was cool to the touch, the skin underneath my armor was raw and tender where the wooden coin of Bane had burned hot against my chest. Not for the first time, I realized the complicated consequences of asking for his help. This coin seemed to do nothing but cause me pain during battle and seemed to be of no discernible use the rest of the time. There was no fireplace within our section, but several candles glowed atop the table. I held the coin out over the flame, but it would not light.

Shawn, still trying to get a reaction from Bricru, took the coin from me and put it in their mouth. Neither the coin, nor Bricru reacted in the least.

I asked Meep if I could borrow his axe, but he refused. He did agree, however, to take a swing at the coin himself. He placed it on the ground, swung the axe high over his head and brought it down on the coin with all his might. Without inflicting even a small nick in the wood, the axe bounced off the coin, reverberating violently through the halfling’s hands. Frustrated, I picked up the coin, marched out to the common area and launched the coin out the window as far as I could. I returned to the table to find the rest of the group finally tucking into the salmon crostini.

The next course was an aromatic leek and potato soup. Spice-encrusted, pan-seared cubes of venison cooked to a perfect medium-rare floated in the glistening broth. Fresh sprigs of rosemary completed the dish. We all grew silent as we sipped and slurped the mouthwatering soup. A muffled chattering came from the sack at Shawn’s side. The halfling pulled the head of Ibram free of the burlap and dipped his mouth into his bowl. We all agreed the soup was a culinary triumph.

Our attention was drawn to Bricru. They still had not moved, but they had drawn the attention of two or three flies who buzzed around their face. Landing here and there, meandering around their limp features. Refocusing on the fae, Imp was now able to sense a deep and malevolent evil. “I think we gotta get outta here.” He quickly declared, but then hedged, “How many courses are left?”

Drakon reflexively slapped at his neck, swatting at some sort of insect. We noted that the din from the hall outside of our privacy curtain was steadily getting louder. We pulled back the curtain and saw that the staff was hurriedly flitting about, and patrons were hastily exiting and leaving their meals half-eaten. Grabbing Bricru by the hand, and ferreting away several bits of food, Imp led us all out of the Wine Hall in a hurry. Several of us swatted at troublesome insects on the way.

The afternoon sun was diffused through a hazy sky. It gave everything around us an eerie orange glow. The flies were present outside as well, and many more in number. The rotten smell that I had caught a whiff of in the restaurant was also much stronger outside, but I still could not detect its origin.

Bricru allowed us to lead them along, but in the brighter light of day, they looked even worse than they had inside. Their pallor was a dull grey, and black lines edged their face. As we pulled them along, their gate grew stiff as their joints and limbs hardened. Imp thought it was best that we kill them before something sinister happened. Shawn wanted to try bringing them back to the woods first, but when he took out his magical coin and flipped it into the air, it landed before him with a dull thud and accomplished nothing. Before he could even bend to pick it up, Imp swung his sickle and slashed Bricru across the midsection. Upon impact, the fae exploded into a cloud of ash and disappeared.

We noted five nobles approaching from further down the road. They did not look well, their skin was grey and they were surrounded by a small cloud of flies. Imp wasted no time in charging at one of them with his sickles whirling. A few quick swipes later and the noble fell to the ground in three distinct pieces. No blood could be seen, only a viscous black fluid that oozed from the wounds and coated the blades of the sickles.

Running up behind Imp, Drakon’s sword slashed straight through the neck of another noble, their head rolled away as the body collapsed in a heap. Claera performed dissonant whispers on the third noble before blasting him with a fire ball. Now aflame, the noble continued moving forward, slowly making his way toward the halfling barbarian. Meep swung his axe at the noble, first slicing off his arm and then his head. His attacker cut down, his axe began to glow a ruby red and he felt a rage stirring within him until he burst forward in a berserk frenzy, swinging wildly at anyone who got close.

We were able to dispatch with the final two nobles with ease, but we had a new problem; the no-name halfling was in a cursed fog of confusion and was now hell-bent on coming at us. Pulling on my newly acquired magical powers, I commanded him to halt, and by the grace of good fortune, it worked. Meep lowered his axe and gradually came back to himself. Seeing that he was once again recognizing us as friends, we all expelled a long breath of relief.

A skirmish drew our attention some 200 feet away; several Golden Empire guards were involved in some sort of altercation. Imp turned and hurried that way, sickles at the ready. We all followed, but drew to an abrupt stop as we passed the large front stairs of the library. An extremely familiar cat was stretching across the steps. She meowed and slinked inside through the slightly ajar doors. The guards forgotten, we followed Daisy inside.

Entering the library, the first thing we noticed was the complete lack of flies. It was a welcome respite from their relentless biting. The next was that the smell of rot, which had filled our senses outside, was absent in this space. The library itself was beautiful; filled with rich wooden tables, hand carved embellishments, sturdy bookshelves filled to the brim with volumes, and warm leather chairs. Heavy red velvet curtains were pulled across all of the windows thrusting the space into murky darkness.

Amid the maze of shelves, the dull, flickering glow of candlelight drew us forward. On the far side of a row of shelves, hunched over an enormous tome, her pink hair almost glowing in the semidarkness, sat the elusive Madam Primm.

“Hi Primmy!” Shouted Shawn.

Madam Primm shushed him and went back to reading. But she was soon unable to ignore our persistent questions. She took no credit for whatever was going on outside, and she would not explain her interest in the book before her. Imp tried to sneak a peek at its pages but the book itself resisted being read by anyone but Madam Primm, the pages transforming into a kaleidoscope of illegible shapes and colors.

Annoyed, Madam Primm emphatically closed the book and looked sternly at all of us. Relenting against our onslaught of questions, she finally admitted, “I think Talona is making her move.” If the goddess of poison, disease, and decay were involved, everything we’d seen in the last hour made much more sense. But why? And why now? We turned to head out of the library, just as the front doors swung open. Galathor, Fargrim, and six soldiers of the Empire rushed in and slammed the doors shut behind them. They were pale, sweaty, and fatigued; their armor was smeared with the black viscous fluid of the undead. They had come in for cover, and had yet to even notice us.

Worried that my ill-considered pledge to Bane might put us all in danger if it was discovered, Imp cast sanctuary over me and sidled a bit closer, placing himself before me in Galathor’s line of sight. Shawn drew their attention with an exuberant “Hi!”, and Galathor whipped around in surprise.

“Of course I would find you here.” He sighed. “I’ve been forsaken. Tyr’s light has fallen dim. We are under attack.” Galathor was despondent. But when he told us that he believed that Minesha Graves was behind this, he cursed her name passionately. Imp rolled his eyes and told Galathor that it was unlikely that Minesha was behind this and that Galathor ought to give up and just succumb to his obvious carnal lust for Minesha.

Galathor’s guards began slapping at their armor, as though they were being bitten, but there were no flies visible. Galathor grew upset again. “There is a pox running rampant through the city.”, he cried, then suggested that we needed to scour the library for clues. Some of us turned to ask Madam Primm her opinion, but both she and the book were gone. Galathor sent his soldiers deeper into the library and insisted that we follow him into the stacks, but told Fargrim to remain at the door. As the rest of us shuffled after our former leader, Meep stayed behind and kept a keen eye on Fargrim.

As we wended our way through the book collection and away from the dim light of Madam Primm’s candle, the air became thick with moisture. A dense mist crept in around us. The shelves to our sides twisted and transformed and before we knew it, we were in a wood; Galathor was no longer ahead of us and we’d left Meep behind in the library. We were surrounded by gnarled leafless trees and the musty stench of wet earth; the canopy above us was a fresco of twisted branches. Apprehension and claustrophobia took hold.

Anxious to return to the library, Imp asked Shawn to retrieve his coin and transport us there, but when he reached into his pocket, it was to reveal the coin given me by Bane. It burst into flames in Shawn’s hands and he dropped it in surprise. Hitting the ground it extinguished and began to smoke. I reached down and picked it up but it was already cool to the touch. Shawn searched his pockets again and came up with his own coin, but when he pulled it out, it turned to dust and scattered to the wind.

All of this must have shaken Imp to his core, because he, who had been the most vicious critic of my unfortunate allegiance, actually suggested that I call upon Bane. I pulled out my prayer beads to do just that when a tall, slim fae approached from among the trees. Its face was slack, grey and emotionless. “This realm no longer belongs to Bane. His powers have no sway here. He cannot save you, mortals.” We asked them who did control the realm. They did not explicitly say, but they warned that “she was everywhere and nowhere. She is where she needs to be and you are where you need to be.” With this, they disappeared back into the misty woods.

A path was evident ahead of us and Shawn started down it almost immediately. The rest of us saw no other choice but to follow. After a bit, we passed some discarded carnival gear; faded, ripped and ravaged by time and weather. Metal was rusted, cloth was faded and moldy, the air around us smelled of rot and decay. It was all disturbingly familiar, as though we’d been in this woods before; but this version of it was twisted by time and devastated by disease. It seemed that Bricru’s ramblings were right, something was off. The balance between realms had been disturbed, and our reality was somehow corrupted and deranged.

Beyond the dilapidated carnival, in the distance, we could see a purplish glow rising up from somewhere ahead and reflecting off the knotted canopy. Like moths to a flame, we hurried that way. Imp paused at one point, claiming to have seen a being off to one side of the path. He borrowed Claera’s boomerang and threw it at the figure but the boomerang clanged of a tree and dropped, lost in the tangle of the wood. With a sheepish grin on his face, he apologized to Claera and we forged ahead.

Shawn crawled up on Imp’s shoulders when he took the lead, craning his neck to see through the mist. The purplish glow took on an almost maroon hue as we got closer and soon we found ourselves entering a large clearing, and at the apparent source of the light. The coin stashed in my armor caught my attention as we neared the clearing, it began to glow a deep, dark red, increasing in intensity with each step.

At the center of the clearing stood a ring of candles emitting that foreboding purple light. At their center, stood a burly figure, clad in ostentacious golden armor. He was propped upright as if shackled by magic, his arms outstretched above him and his head hanging limply in exhaustion and defeat. A closer look at his face revealed an eye patch and a scarred visage. Suddenly Drakon gasped behind us and whispered a shocked, “Tyr!”.

Across the way, a red light bobbed its way into the clearing. It was the no-name halfling. His axe glowed the same deep red as my coin. However he had managed to join us in this cursed wood, I was glad to see him.

“Woah. This is fucked up.” uttered the severed head of Ibram, clutched tightly in Shawn’s hands.

“Should we blow out the candles?”, I asked.

“He’s my God, I’ll do it”, offered Drakon. He stepped forward and blew out a candle. All remaining candles snuffed themselves out at the same time. When our eyes adjusted to the ambient light, Tyr was gone and in his place stood Fargrim. Garbed in jet black armor, the dwarf was surrounded with the lazy smoke curls of a powerful incense. On the outer rim of the clearing, the slain corpses of numerous goblins were impaled on large iron spikes. Imp’s expression hardened considerably when he recognized some of the goblins as his own former guards.

“It was the only way.” Fargrim’s deep voice boomed.

“What did you do?” Imp growled.

“It was the only way.” The dwarf repeated. “She was the only way.”

With that, Fargrim raised his battle axe, black ooze dripping from the blade, and charged the group. At the same time two giant flies swarmed into the clearing and landed behind the dwarf. After that it was mayhem.

Fargrim took attacks from every side. Imp’s sickles glowed with divine radiance as he slashed at the dwarf. Drakon’s powerful sword swiped at him. Raging, the halfling barbarian swung his axe at the dark soldier before being spun around by a new combatant. A strange creature had emerged from the mist, tall and gaunt, its skin covered in poxes and boils and stretched tautly over its skeleton. It swung at Meep with its exposed claws.

Shawn used a spell to blind the giant flies, and then cast mirror image on himself and suddenly four distinct Shawns bounced around the clearing, drawing attacks, and inflicting damage with magic missiles. Blinded, the flies spit haphazardly, their poisonous saliva burning whatever it hit. Claera cast a phantasmal killer spell on Fargrim, who momentarily cowered in fear before recovering and swinging violently at Imp.

Another of the gaunt, clawed creatures emerged from the woods, coming up behind me, it caught me unaware, and slashed viciously. Its claws ripped into my flesh and sent me writhing to the ground in pain. I looked up at the fight around me. It was chaos. For every inch we gained in battle, it seemed we lost another. Fargrim was taking blow after blow but never dropping. The flies and the clawed creatures were wreaking violent havoc. I wondered how we could possibly outlast these dark enemies here in their realm. Then I felt a familiar heat pulsing under my armor. Reaching beneath my chest plate for the coin, it was hot to the touch, glowing a deep, blood red and as my fingers closed around it, it burst into flames. My hand impervious to the fire, I scrambled to my feet, wound my arm back and hurled the coin at the demented dwarf.

The flaming coin hit him in the chest, lodged in his armor plate and the fire quickly spread across his torso. He dropped his axe and swatted at the fire. “She was my escape!” He choked out as the fire consumed him, melting his form down into the earth.

We watched as the fire extinguished itself, and left no trace of Fargrim. Only the coin remained, spinning to a stop in the dirt. Looking around, the flies and the clawed creatures were nowhere to be seen, and the mist was vanishing. I almost flinched as Daisy popped out of the woods, and bolted through the clearing, an eye patch dangling from her mouth, then disappeared into the trees. The forest was green once again, the smell of rot and decay lifting with the mist, as sunlight returned to the sky.

With Shawn’s coin no longer an option, we sheathed our weapons and headed back the way we had come. Soon another mist thickened around us and enveloped us before fading away. Transported once again, we found ourselves in the Great Hall of the former headquarters of the Adventurer’s Guild. The room was filled with squabbling nobles, Minesha Graves prominent among them, and Galathor noticeably absent.

Seeing us enter the room, Minesha hushed the crowd and asked us where we’d been. After explaining what had happened, Minesha thanked us on behalf of the noble class, grateful to us for restoring the balance to the realm. Worried that something like this could easily happen again, one of the nobles suggested that the Guild needed to be reestablished to police unsanctioned magic and to protect the innocent. Seeing an opportunity, we inquired after a magic license for Shawn. The nobles declared that although wild magic would never be legal, that Shawn had indeed earned the right to practice authorized magic.

More squabbling ensued, but soon the nobles were in agreement that reestablishing the guild was necessary. Minesha looked thoughtfully around the room, before declaring that she believed the individuals best suited to lead the reformed guild and to help usher in a new age for Athkatla and Amn was the dirty, weary, and bloodied company standing before her.

To say we were surprised by this suggestion would be an understatement. Shawn, had only one question. “Can we change the name?”