# Hilden Tales



## Fieari (Jun 23, 2004)

This is from a player's point of view.  My group passes the DM hat around the circle, and while I have had my turn DMing in this setting, it was a different set of characters and the story isn't really connected.  We've only had two sessions with the current DM, but I'm enjoying it a lot and felt the need to tell you all about it.

Hilden was one of our groups attempts to collectively design a world setting.  Hilden itself is the only known bastian of human civilization.  There may be others, far far away, but they are unknown.  The kingdom rests in a plains area from the Glass Sea in the south to the White Mountains in the north.  To the east are ravaging Orcs, and to the west are shadow tainted fields that spawn monsters.  The borders to either side are well kept.  The mountains have low population, and are well mined, with a few dwarven contacts.  Elves are known of but never seen.  Half-elves are seen but despised.  And there might be a total of a hundred Wizards in known existance.  They tend to be very rich artificers, selling fine quality and enchanted goods to other nobles.  They also tend to stay away from everyone else except to occasionally send an apprentice to sell goods and buy fineries.

Our group right now consists of only two PCs.

My character is a young human lad, sixteen years old and running away from his parents, whom he considers to be bat**** insane.  The stereotypical rebellious young youth, except that in this case, he may have a point.  His parents are both evil wizards with a penchant for digging holes in the ground and filling them with monsters and then encouraging  entrepenuering young heroes to come and get killed in them. (By means of kidnapping maidens, plaguing the countryside with undead, being the cause of some mysterious sickeness... you know, plot hook things)

So my character, named *Soles Blackheart* by his messed up parents, has decided to rebell against his parent's ways and unlike his siblings, not follow in the family trade to become a Wizard.  In fact, he rather dispises magic.  He wanted to be a swordsman, maybe see the world.  Pity magic caught up with him instead... turns out that having 5 or more generations of wizards in the family tree means that magic comes out whether you want it or not.  He's a sorcerer, although he has managed to direct his energy mostly in the direction of getting rid of other magic-- Abjurations.

I'm using the variant "Lineage Sorcerer" as seen in the House Rules section of this very forum... Level 5, Magical Family Lineage, Abjuration Specialty, Necromancy Weakness, Psuedodragon Familiar, and "Protection From Alignment" as my spell-like ability 3/day.  (Lineage Sorcerers get a lvl 1 spell like ability at level 5).

So he's off to get away from his nutso parents, and heads south away from the mountains which was the location of his folk's most recent endevour.  About halfway to the sea, in a town named Wywood (situated next to the forest named Wywood) the gates to the walled town are closed overnight, and they won't let him proceed.  While waiting around town, he encounters a Ranger who's being hassled by some priests.

The Ranger's name is Cyrus, and is unfortunatly the only other PC in the group.  It seems that, that very morning, he woke up with this funny taste in his mouth.  The priests are hounding him about this for some reason, going out of their way to accost him as he was walking along a forest path.  They want to take him to see "the Seer" about this thing.  They have a large number of armed guards in order to enforce their desire.  Cyrus isn't happy about this.

Soles, upon realizing the situation, is trying to make himself be as unlike his parents as he reasonably can possibly be.  That means being a hero.  That means stepping into buisness like this, whether it's his "buisness" or not.  It's stupid, but well meant.

All it means though, is that both Soles and Cyrus are taken into the woods to an encampment, where this mysterious seer dwells.  Once in the encampment, the armed guard fades, not that it means much since the encampment is set at a river fork, the river is full of toothy angry fish, and the land route out is still guarded.

So we go to see the seer.

Who promptly offers us magically drugged wine, not recognizing that Soles is a sorcerer able to see such things.  On his advisment, Cyrus also declines the liquid refreshment.  Guards show up and offer to run us through if we don't drink.  We draw our own weapons and dare them to try it (we hadn't been disarmed).  The seer waves them down, and says that she's decided against "helping him <Cyrus> on his way" and that we might be able to perform a service instead.

It turns out, that dear ole' Cyrus has been the target of a spell that has turned him into what the seer calls "Half Undead".  And he hasn't been the only one.  About five others have also been found in this "wretched state" and they've seen it their duty to, since the spell basically killed them already, send them peacibly on to their eternal rest.

Cyrus was... understandably not happy about this, and through vigorous gesturing with his longsword, made it perfectly clear that "sending him peacibly" would NOT be an option.  Soles stands by him firmly in this stance, again, trying to emulate a hero.

Well, the trick is, we'll be allowed to leave the encampment unhindered on the condition that we hunt out those responcible for Cyrus and the other poor unfortunate souls being in this state, which we still hadn't been fully convinced was even real... I mean, he wasn't decomposing, his skin hadn't gone pale, he wasn't lurching about moaning about brains... he looked perfectly fine.

So we were given their only lead, which they hadn't followed up on because they were too busy trying to find and "send on" others who'd been so afflicted, and sent on our way.  With a Geas laid on our heads to boot, to make sure we didn't just wander off instead.

<going to take a break from writting here, will continue tommorow>


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