Tenmenfend stands as a ruin of its former self, a double-walled city built around the deep chasm which contains the Darklantern - a pyramid of runed black stone immersed in a shadowy pall.
The neighboring city which has been Tenmenfend's lifeblood collapsed a century years ago, and along with it the commerce that allowed it to prosper. What once were fertile lands in the great-grandsire's time have gradually become cursed with a blight known as Egg Mold, for the foul rotten egg odor it gives off. The people have long forgotten the Green King and his impetus to wipe the Darklantern from existence. All that stay are those too stubborn or fearful to move.
Five hundred people remain. Of them, there are five clans of import: the Watchs, the Sutlers, the Knights, the Diggers, and the Makers. Each can trace their lineage to folk of import in the Green King's glorious army, if they still bothered. What began as roles in the siege has largely intermingled overtime to the point where they are now indistinguishable from one another. Now they’re just meaningless names. Although… An elder or two among them can pass down stories from their grandparents about when that wasn’t the case.
And in all that there is exactly one dying old man, recalcitrantly upholding tradition, who is unknowingly holding back the Darklantern's tide…
THE PLACES OF TENMENFEND
Tenmenfend lies between a double-walled envelopment of the Darklantern. The interior wall facing the toxic chasm and the Darklantern is called The Short Wall by the locals. The exterior wall that once anticipated reinforcements is called The Long Wall, stretching many miles in a perimeter around the city. Both are mighty and high where they've been maintained, reaching 50ft above an incline soggy ditch, with towers and gates long ago converted into now-abandoned homes.
Between the Darklantern and the Short Wall lies the Toxic Chasm, with sheer cliff faces plummeting some 200ft down into mist and poisonous gas. It is traversable by great risk. Some parts of the Short Wall have collapsed down into the chasm as the poison erodes the earth beneath it.
Across the Toxic Chasm lies The Causeway - also called The Bridge of No Return - formed of runed black stone. Like the Darklantern is bears no markings of age, and any structural damage it sustains is repaired in a matter of minutes by the Darklantern's self-replicating structural defense systems, like living tissue healing itself. Overlooking the Causeway is the Tower Inn on one side, and The Evil Eye on the other. The Eye lies just above the Darklantern's gate, seemingly an inert lidless eye carved into the threshold's stone. It fires a disintegration beam at anything crossing the bridge, reducing anything to gas and dust in an instant, save potentially those protected by the archaic defenses once espoused by the Green King.
Tower Inn
Made from an ancient siege tower that was to roll down the Darklantern's Causeway. Facing the bridge of no-return are the remains of a giant basilisk head mouth agape - once housing a giant battering ram. The ram itself, a rectangular prism 20ft long, enchanted with such ancient spells of destruction that it could bring down any gate or wall, now serves as a dining table. If one were to make anything vaguely structurally-dependent upon the table it would immediately collapse. Nobody knows what it is anymore.
Managed by Dorothy Watch and her cousins Dana Watch and Damsel Watch. They make a wonderful mushroom stew that is very slightly hallucinogenic. It tends to kick in when one tries to sleep, giving them potent and strange dreams.
The Watch cousins often dream of infatuation with a beautiful young man, with blonde hair like the sun and bright hazel eyes piercing like diamonds. (It is the Shadow King infecting their dreams in his cryogenic sleep. Even hibernating the King prepares the way for his return.)
GOINGS ON IN TOWER INN (d6):
- Dana is trying to build a gingerbread house on the ancient battering ram. It keeps crumbling to pieces. She's very frustrated, and thinks the cookie recipe isn't quite right. Or maybe the sugar-glue.
- Damsel is complaining to Dorothy about wanting to leave. Business isn't what it used to be, and lots of people have moved away already. Misfortune seems to rule this land now. "No use staying in a sinking ship."
- Three farmers retiring after a long day with some ale and stew. Speaking about the mold growing over their crops - it's bad this year. Horrible violet stuff: chokes out plants and withers everything it touches, gets in the food and spoils it. One of the farmers swore he saw a clump of it moving... The other two don't want to believe him.
- Mayor Bill Sutler is here, gambling with some mercenaries at liar's dice and losing badly. The mercs are doppelgangers and are reading his thoughts. He's about to put up his family house, against everything he's lost, and lose. Secretly he's almost hoping for this outcome. He wants to take his family and leave town.
- Doppelganger meeting. A dozen folk all eerily turn their heads at the same time when somebody enters the inn, then simultaneously go back to pretending to talk to one another. They're having a secret telepathic meeting, and you just interrupted by arriving.
- An old man falls down. Hanlon Digger, sulfur miner. It's the bad kind of fall when you're old and frail. He can't walk anymore. Someone will say: "The vapors finally caught up to him. Happens to everyone who lives by the chasm."
Church of the Bivouac
A pavilion tent which has stood for a thousand years, as the Pavilion Priest Expeditious will attest. He is a balding but subtly fit man, capable of feats and strength and knows every rope knot in existence. Glorious back in its heyday, the tent itself is a Ship of Theseus of tents. Big like a big top tent. Mighty ropes adorned with faded green ribbons. Patterns of a basilisk’s curved horns and their searing eyes adorn the cloth. Horned warriors in green livery fight trench soldiers and bone giants commanded by frail old men wearing fractal-pattern masks.
Expeditious offers ritual: libations of wine soaked into long triangular banners, flown on the wind in offering to the heavenly gods and Flax - a local god of cloth and strength. Flax is said to be a saint who apotheosis’d in the days of old. He was a harbinger for the Green King, who designated the very foundations of this church for his masters great Pavilion Tent (of which we now stand!).
Flax is depicted on icons of cloth and on flags as a rather pointy green-haired knight. He grants blessings for: finding the proper ground, foraging, riding, and feasting. Such blessings can be used to automatically succeed dice checks made in those topics, to maximum result.
Curiosity Shop
Built into the catacombs that were once siege trenches. Minded by a changeling named Miss Curiosity - the child of a doppelganger spy from the Darklantern and a wandering woman. She is a marvel of feathers and expensive (looking) stones. A generalist in all things magical and a purveyor of information. She knows many things (for a price!).
Wrapped up in mystic-seeming auguries and divinations, she’ll offer her ancestral knowledge of the Darklantern for barters, deals, and binding promises. She knows the ways in. She knows that the poisoning of the land is due to the Darklantern. She’s hedging her bets… The Heroes prevail, she’ll buy up the pickings. Darklantern unleashed, she’s loyal to the new regime.
CURIOSITIES FOR SALE:
- A silver (tundsted) amulet. Can be used to cross the Causeway without provoking The Evil Eye. Quite expensive. 1000g. (The one on display is a fake, made of only silver! Worth 50sp) She'll only bring this up if an interest in the Darklantern is given.
- Preserved biological abomination from the Chasm. Undecipherable mass of flesh submerged in alcohols. Dredged up by a youth twenty years ago. Would fit well in any freak show or wizard's lab. Also makes a good conversation starter! 20gp
- One cigarette. Called a ‘smokestick’. Brings vitality and focus! Acquired from a western trader. 10gp
- Ancient Fire. Kept in a jar. Alchemist’s fire, but five times as potent. Strong enough to burn through even the Darklantern's exterior (although Miss Curiosity doesn't know that for sure). 70gp
- Saint Flax’s Sock. A woolen sock worn by the Harbinger himself! Kept in a precious metal box. Wearing it increases ride speed by 10ft and causes Horses to always like you. Won it in a game of cards from Expeditious. She'll play again for similar stakes. 500g
- Eyeware. A bin of veils, cheap hats, and hoods. Anything bearing the Eye of the Darklantern may protect one from its denizens… perhaps. 1-10gp based on item. There's a loose and torn Mold Priest veil with one black circle on it - denoting the lowest priestly rank. Repairing and wearing it grants immunity to the Darklantern's point defense.
Megaham’s Hovel
Old Man Megaham runs the traditional parade still, all by himself, around the entire perimeter of the city. Fifteen miles, once per week. If he dies as ordained in three weeks, the parades stop, and the automated defenses of the Defenders will recognize that all external resistance has finally subsided, provided nobody else takes up the apparently futile cause. It will begin to wake them up… soldiers from the Wars of Old, one by one from their long slumber.
Megaham is an impoverished lonely grump. Immensely traditional, and given he has no real authority, immensely unlikable. If someone is actually kind or curious enough to join him on the parade, he’ll spend the whole time complaining about it.
A parade consists of a lot of walking, some praying, a bit of banging, and a moderate amount of shouting.
THINGS MEGAHAM WILL COMPLAIN ABOUT
(d6, or whatever's appropriate):
- "Whatever happened to walking right? Children nowadays don't know their feet from their asses!"
- "You call that a prayer?? No wonder the gods hate us!"
- "Adventurers these days are nothing but god-cursed heretics and cooked sausages! In my youth we used to have pride in what we did! They acted like it, too. Not like you lot!"
- "Why do you travel with these demented gremlins?" (Saying to one party member, pointing to others.)
- "The fact that you haven't offered to carry me -your elder!- betrays your ignobility. This is why we have no heroes anymore. Because of lots like you!"
- "Don't you lot ever shut up? Folk used to say less and do more! Nowadays they need a committee to take a shit!"
Knight Manor
Albatross Knight is the big man around here. Rouster of the town militia (about 30 people at this point, mostly relatives). ‘Greeter’ of suspicious travelers. Guaranteer of the law. The Knights are relatively numerous, and live in a big house of faded glory on the highest hill. He wears the green tabard bearing the basilisk. He carries an heirloom sword.
The family's wealth has been generationally sold off in order to maintain its position. At this point, the only thing of worth that have are big stone walls, fancy silverware, and Albatross's sword Stonefang.
Stonefang - a relic side sword wielded by the first of the Green King's knights. It is more important to Albatross than some of his children and it never leaves his side. Biological minions of the Shadow King must Save or turn to dust when struck by it, and other bitten by its blade must Save or receive accelerated Tetanus. It will not dull or break save by a Disintegrate spell or higher. It also reveals the presence of the Shadow King's minions when drawn - making Doppelgangers take their true form - something Albatross would quickly learn if ever he deigned to unsheathe it.
His biggest concerns:
- Crops are doing poorly. The blight is spreading. He’ll offer his daughter and his son in marriage to anybody(s) who can fix the problem. (They’re twins!) It would be really weird to marry them both (but he’s not against it if results are produced).
- The fortifications need repairs (they’ve needed repairs for literally about ten generations). Know any excellent masons? He’ll settle for a half-decent carpenter.
- Twenty square miles of toxic north of the Darklantern lies the Cannon Swamp. Ancient trenches and tunnels flooded with the foul waters of the chasm. The remnants of an ancient cannon shaped like a basilisk’s head stick oblong out. Vines of creepers grow over it. Sickly goblins live in the swamp, subsisting on big horse flies and stomach-churning molds. They are "sickly and barely a threat to anybody", but Albatross is concerned that they're stealing food and multiplying. (Which they are, although it's the doppelgangers stealing food. All part of destabilizing their defenses.)
Digg's Place
There's no sign or markings to indicate that this is Digg's Place. It's nothing more than an abandoned home wedged between two other even more abandoned homes that Digg bought for the cost of a (mostly) safe-to-eat ham sandwich. But you'll know it from the smell. It smells like savory cooked meat, and sulfur - like the Egg Mold plaguing the land. Digg takes rotting food and carves the edible bits out of it with a dull knife. He spends half of his time scavenging for carcasses and moldy grains to make meat skewers and fouled ale out of. It all tastes actually quite decent... but you'll have chicken shits for a week.
Digg not infrequently gets accused of purposely spreading the Egg Mold, which is why he lives in the abandoned outskirts of town. The townsfolk cuss and kick at him for trying to sell tainted meat and ale, which in yester years would have put him in the stockades, but nowadays people don't even bother, as they're wise to his act.
See him on the streets, and he'll be a smiling ragged man: missing a few teeth, hands full meat skewers wedged between the fingers, all excitement and hustle like he's liquifying his assets before the recession.
Which, to be fair, is exactly what he's doing. He wants to leave, but can't seem to save enough supplies to go. Still, he is too proud to beg. In his mold-dusted bed he tosses and turns in his sleep, prophesizing doom for the town. His screaming rarely reaches others' ears. He's so frail that even a solid kick could send him into seizure, and scream a doom:
DIGG'S DOOMS (d6):
- "SHADOWS! SHADOWS BEHIND THE EYES! SHADOWS BEHIND THE SKINS! THEY'RE EVERYWHERE, EVERYWHERE!!"
- "TEN TRILLION HUNGRY LITTLE STALKS!! THEY WILL DEVOUR THE LAND AND THE PEOPLE AND THE LIVESTOCK ALL!"
- "IIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAHHHH!... THE BEAUTIFUL FACE MASKS FORMLESS VOID! IT WILL DEVOUR THE WORLD! IIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!"
- "THE GREEN KING CANNOT SAVE US! HE IS FOREVER GONE, AND HIS SUCCESSORS DO NOT KNOW THEIR WORTH!"
- "THE POISON WILL SPREAD ACROSS THE LAND - A HARBINGER FOR THE ARMIES OF DARKNESS WHICH WILL BRING THE WORLD INTO SHADOW!"
- "THE SWORD! THE SWORD! THE SWORD IS SALVATION, BUT IT IS NOT MEANT FOR THEY IT HANGS ABOVE!"
The Bakers Maker
It smells like warm bread and mushroom stew, heavy with spicy mustard seasoning. The childless bakers, Charles and Matilda Maker, make good bread and stew, but their real passion is botany. They're tight-lipped about where they get the fresh herbs, but they give out cuttings often enough that nobody presses the issue.
In the ruins of neighbors homes, they have a secret garden inherited from Matilda's side of the family, mother to daughter, since the time of the Green King. In a hidden atrium between four houses, behind a secret door unlocked by a hidden candlestick lever, are her greatest treasures: spinach, parsley, chives, basil, oregano, dill, rosemary, basil, a pear tree, and even tropical limes - green fruits and herbs that have no business growing in such little light. The secret of it all lies in the center, at the ancient statue of a kneeling maiden, holding a vine-covered grail of aged copper: The Grail of the Green King.
Touched by the Green King's lips when he still walked the land, water kept in the Grail, when spilled upon the earth, provides ample fertility to green-colored crops. Even tropical fruits like limes. More than that, it has the power to dispel the devastation of the Egg Mold, and can wither the fungal forces mastered by the mold priests within the Darklantern without fail.
...But Matilda doesn't know that. Charles does, but that's because a doppelganger replaced him a about a month ago. The real Charles was thrown into the Toxic Chasm by his replacement - his shattered body is dissolving on a rock somewhere down in the mist, embalmed by the foul gasses. Mattie thinks they may both be losing theirs mind. She loves Charles very much, and to learn of his grisly demise or malicious replacement would devastate her beyond sanity.
TOPICS OF CONVERSATION FOR A WOMAN WHO'S LOSING HER MIND... (d6):
- "Charles always loved extra dill in his mushroom soup. Always! And now he can't seem to stand it at all!"
- "He's always following me when I leave the house. He thinks I can't see him, but I know my husband's footsteps anywhere. I thought he was just looking out for me, but I'm not so sure anymore."
- "People have asked me whether Charles was acting strange. I told them I didn't know what they were talking about. They said that he acted like he didn't even know them."
- "Is it me? I feel like I've been forgetting things more and more often. Why, just last week I forgot that I had some loaves in the ovens, and burnt a whole batch! Charles was furious, and he raised a hand against me - he's never done that before."
- "Things aren't all bad! Charles stopped snoring recently. He'd done it for so many years I'd gotten used to it, but to have a quiet night like that was quite nice."
- "I think we may have a child on the way! At last, after all these years! I'd almost given up on hope."
WAYS TO GET INSIDE THE DARKLANTERN
AMULET
A plain metal amulet depicting a closed eye. In True Darkness (such as a Darkness spell), the eye will be open and visible, revealing its true nature. The Shadow King can see through these when open, and will sometimes open on their own when nobody is looking.
The Defenders have always been watching. Every so often they’d send out a spy to recon the besiegers' defenses. These spies were given tungsten amulets to identify them to the automated defense systems, which won’t shoot at anybody who is displaying one of these amulets. A few of them never returned, and the amulets are still out there. One or two of them even remain in Darklantern, passed down as secret family heirlooms to spies who settled outside the walls.
BATTERING RAM
The Ram in the Tower Inn, if it can even so much as touch the front gate of the Darklantern will rip it apart like paper mache. The Ram is indestructible, but the people carrying it are not immune to the Darklantern's laser defense systems.
HOUSE
One of the Houses is ‘cursed’ according to the locals. Used to be owned by a Sutler family, but all of them went missing. The braver of the townsfolk investigated and found a big dark hole in the basement wall. They sealed up the hole and the house, and nobody has gone in it since. It offers a way into the pyramid, albeit through a horrible siege line tunnel filled with toxic gas.
CHASM
The chasm between the pyramid and Darklantern is deep and long, but one could potentially climb down into that dark pit. The bottom is filled with toxic waste, and horrible things dwell down there, but a disposal sewer entrance can be found in the mist. It’s an awful climb down and an awful climb up. The mist emanating from the Darklantern erodes the walls of the chasm, making unsure footing and rockslides likely.
NAME DROP / WHITE FLAG
If one goes out onto the causeway and declares that they are an emissary of The Green King seeking to present terms for the castle’s surrender, then the automated defenses will let you in. They’ll wake up somebody capable of making a decision (The Assessor being most likely) to meet you and discuss the terms in the Darklantern's Muster Yard, just inside the gate . Something similar will happen if you take a white flag onto the causeway. It would take a brave fool to try this approach.
WALL BREACH
It's incredibly dangerous, but one could attempt to burn a hole into the Darklantern's exterior. It would take a world-shattering force, and it'll heal up in a matter of minutes, but you may be able to slip in unnoticed before it crushes everyone in the derma. Madame Curiosity's fire oil may do the trick, as might a Disintegrate spell or Passwall.
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