Tag: srlm
The Legend of the Questone Gateway
Posted on November 20, 2024 in Steel-Realms
A pair of adventurers – Rogahn the Fearless, a warrior, and the magus Zelligar the Unknown – discovered a path leading to the Dark Lands. They kept its secret, whether it was a physical tunnel or some sort of mystical portal, and made forays over years. They built a fortress into the hillside nearby as a permanent base, and a tower where they could see the cave complex in which was the pathway. They explored for decades successfully, but one day the Orrish followed them home.
The Legend of the Questone Gateway is a Steel Realms Timeline Event; recorded knowledge.Chronicle of The Legend of the Questone Gateway
Information Sources: Mundane Reference | Associated Phenomenology Only | Specific Lore
Knowledge is broken down by ease of discovery/availability; Any attempt to know more than what's Pervasive will require a reference, source, knowledge, check, or access to someone who can get or provide either of these.
Pervasive Knowledge / Very Easy Difficulty
A pair of adventurers – Rogahn the Fearless, a warrior, and the magus Zelligar the Unknown – discovered a path leading to the Dark Lands. They kept its secret, whether it was a physical tunnel or some sort of mystical portal, and made forays over years. Zelligars last name was Questone – hence the name “Questone Gateway”. They built a fortress into the hillside nearby as a permanent base, and a tower where they could see the cave complex in which was the pathway. They explored for decades successfully, but one day the Orrish followed them home.
In CY 8857, A pair of adventurers – Rogahn the Fearless, a warrior, and the magus Zelligar the Unknown – discovered a path leading to the Dark Lands. The pair somehow found a path or method of accessing the Dark Lands from deep in the Heartlands – in the Grand Duchy of Dunstrand. They kept its secret, whether it was a physical tunnel or some sort of mystical portal, and made forays over years. They built a fortress into the hillside nearby as a permanent base, and a tower where they could see the cave complex in which was the pathway. They repeatedly came back with fabulous riches from ancient ruins of The Fallen East. Although they were gone for months at a time, they never seemed to have been equipped to travel that distance, leading to many rumors and much speculation. They had their own select group of followers – one time mercenaries that had become permanent soldiers in their ranks, and shared in their wealth (also keeping their secrets). They explored for decades successfully, but one day the Orrish somehow followed them home, beginning a time of strife and violence for those nearby. During this time, they seemingly remained uncaring, defending only their own base of operations.
Common Knowledge / Easy Difficulty
Over time, the name has been corrupted/morphed into “Quasqueton“.
The Orrish either tunneled into their passage into the Dark Lands or found a way to use some portal and they began to raid locally from the cave complex. It became a game of tit-for-tat; They would raid, and then the Orrish would raid back. For decades this went on, and the pair grew older and took more and more with them for protection. Each time they sealed the cave complex, the Orrish would dig it out. Their reputation began its decline, and the locals blamed them for the ill fortune of the raids. The pair drifted apart. One time, the magus went to the Dark Lands on their own with mercenaries and his apprentices. The Orrish must have somehow known, they attacked their fortress and killed the warrior while the magus was raiding their own homeland. The magus never returned, while the warrior fended off the Orrish as best as he could and closed the passage. By now, the main entrance had collapsed, though many exits had repeatedly been dug out of the hillside. It seems they shared the same fate, though not together – the magus was never heard from again. Their fortress was attacked and overrun by the Orrish, everyone was killed to the last.
Uncommon Knowledge / Average Difficulty
Thus began a period of time of raids by the Orrish and tunnels collapsing by the locals. Every excursion deep into the complex resulted in dead ends – the connection to the Dark Lands was never found. For nearly 300 years, the Orrish have tunneled new breaches out of their main complex. They have fought light dwellers to standstill and even collapsed the tunnels and caves themselves in order to protect the true source of their escape back into the Dark Lands only to resurface years later in nearly the same area. Dwarves have been enjoined to seek the source and were violently repulsed. Then the Long Summer of Elancil came and for 40 years all was quiet. Then, over the last 30 years, the quiet has ever so slowly been rolled back. Mostly just small raids, striking far and wide to spread terror, but in small numbers. Now the time of peace is over. An ever increasing amount of goblins raided, and Neplanthe Keep was built to hunt and kill the raiders. Then in 9168 the Orks began to show up. Then strange things began to happen in the hills and riverlands nearby. Larger and larger raids began to happen.
Runel Rats
Posted on November 20, 2024
The Runel Rats in the North Merchant Cities is less an official sect and more of a tradition. It is not a formal institution, nor does it have any universally recognized authority or hierarchy. About 20% of the independent magi in the region participate in, usually the ones with association of the criminal elements. The river rat is the symbol of cunning and capability, and they are the giants among their own kind. This symbolism is what its members present. Without a formal institution or organization to back them up, the tradition serves to augment their powers to make them competitive, but keep them free of high visibility political entanglements.
Control: Many die seeking it out. The mighty Beyne River has remnants of the Sea King experiments dwelling in it – giant water rats in this case. These beasts are favored by the rat spirit of Irrigi as top level predators in their environments. They are survivors and have a reputation with their presence along the river – especially partnering with smugglers that move goods along its length. They are known to be able to lead rats to sever ropes, move packages, spoil goods, and other ‘tricks’ that infuriate inhabitants.
Joining: The area around Karolak has the most ‘followers’ of this tradition. Priests of the rat god seek out their initial training by adopting a colony and learning to use them to survive – often killing existing followers and usurping their colony. The prospective follower of Irrigi enters into a river nest or into the sewers of one of the cities on the river that they are assured to be found in. With an open wound, they find a giant rat, capture it, and mix their blood into their own open wounds. The disease and infection kills many, but those who survive the ritual can call themselves Runnel Rats (of Irrigi). The wound will scar to roughly shape like a rat, known simply as the ‘rat mark’. Irrigi is not known as a truly attentive principal, and looks to the survival of the strongest as a guiding principle. Those who survive are often seen as having a multitude of rats as pets and watchers.
It is said that most of the leaders of the Mud Vipers in Richfield are Runel Rats.
La Celle-Saint-Cloud (entering Falcon Reach)
Posted on November 5, 2024 in Steel-Realms
The town of La Celle-Saint-Cloud stands as the primary entrance to the territory of Falcon Reach. A spur road that goes around the branch of the Falcon River that separates Falcon Reach runs through the city. There is always light traffic on it.
An obelisk standing stone is a trail marker that marks a spur that clearly leads to a city in the distance. A city that sits on a slight rise. Further north at rise becomes a slope that rises a good kilometer or more through hilly terrain to a plateau far in the distance. There are multiple settlements with their trail markers of white limestone clean and gleaming in the late morning sun. The vast majority of the trade coming in and out seems to favor the river here and take a spur to the main road to the east. There is a way station marking the place as Gold Robe Crossing in multiple written languages.