<< Previous Chapter
>> Next Chapter
^^ Index
The prophet pointed us in the direction of Thintunneled, a largish town nestled in the False Hills to the north.
By the time we arrived there, our group now consisted of Nevskiah Sheenmanor, a lady carouser who helped us as our sherper; Drakolus the Tigerman swordsman; Anticheese Stokesparkle, the lady crossbowman with just a single eye; Mondark Kingtorches our stalwart hammerdwarf, and of course myself.
We arrived in the town's inn to find the subject of our investigations serving drinks.
Her name was Melica Blackpool, and yes, it is her that would later stand next to me as my wife.
At this time, however, she merely dropped a glass as she recognised me, though we of course had never met before.
"You knew him at sight?" Captain Ironblood asked, turning the question to Melica, who had sat in silence thus far.
She smiled softly. "Yes, it is perhaps my turn to explain."
Captain Ironblood nodded. "Please do."
Melica's Story
Although I went by the name of Blackpool, I was born an orphan without a surname. Blackpool is the city I come from, far to the north in the frozen wastes.
I was one of my tribe's warrior priestesses. Unlike the others of the tribe, we do not adorn ourselves with tattoos, other other physically disfiguring marks.
We instead draw our strengths from our God, Armok.
"You're a priestess of Armok?!" Captain Ironblood asked sharply.
"It is part of who I am. We are of one of the less barbaric groups, however, so you need not fear me."
"We already had a priestess here. She didn't last very long. Went crazy." noted Captain Ironblood.
Kodor started in surprise. "You've had a priestess here already?"
"Yes. She said she was looking for the Cult. But she never turned up much. She probably spent too much time gazing unnervingly at me! Very unnerving indeed!"
"In any case," continued Melica, "I was there awaiting Kodor to pass through the area. I never dreamed he would come looking for me."
Kodor realised who I was as soon as I dropped the glass from shock.
Then he began with all kinds of question about his heritage. Burning in his mind were all these mentions of the Progeny. Who they were and what he had to do with them.
I gave him all the answers I could.
Kodor's tale resumes...
She told me that in ancient times, Armok did furious battle with the forces of the Soulsmith. Both Armok and the Soulsmith are Greater Gods, and the heavens raged in the conflict, casting many worlds into the void.
Our world was one of the lucky ones, but the battle did not go unwaged here.
The Avatars who reside in their dark citadel, and those who reign over the Avari are the remnants of Armok's forces, still hunting the twisted warriors of the Soulsmith, the Chaos Lords.
The Chaos Lords are the dark spawn of the Soulsmith, created as his answer to the Avatars in his most dire hour.
The Soulsmith and Armok fought for the Mantle of Life, which is the Godly domain which holds sway over everything living. Both laid claim to it, though Armok eventually bested the Soulsmith, casting him into the Chaotic void as mere husk of his former power. Even for Armok, it is not an easy thing to kill a God, and killing a Greater God completely requires everything relating to them be destroyed.
"The Avatars war with the Chaos Lords on many worlds." interjects Melica at this point. "The Avatars seek to cleanse all trace of the Soulsmith's works from creation, no matter the cost. The Chaos Lords merely need to survive, and create their cults to subvert the Avatars."
Kodor nodded. "Each group is, unfortunately, very persistent about it. Hence the next tragedy."
Melica wished to join us, and as she was a capable warrior I allowed it.
We heard tell of the town of Soundedpaints being reduced to ruin by a marauding Chaos Lord. Melica told us that that nearly never happened, and that we should go investigate and do what we can to fix things.
That obviously involved killing the beast.
As we searched for it, we also took on a mission to slay a behemoth. A monster that, quite unexpectedly slew both Mondark and Nevskiah before I could slash open its throat.
Eventually, we tracked the Chaos Lord to its lair in Voicedempires, a largely abandoned Lizardman outpost in the Murk of Cages.