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Thursday, February 16, 2017

Behind the Blue by Ethan "Jean-Baptiste" Goldman

[Editor's Note: this series is aimed at providing backstory on different in-house and magical items found within the Realms. Got a nifty one that you want to share? Let us know!]


The Boon of Hashinabe Ur

Years ago, where elves took a knee to their Neden masters, the weight of servitude enraged the slaves in the same way the living dead chock at the leash today. However unlike the zombie burdened by rotting bodies and fading minds, the drow were as cunning as they were cruel, they knew the power of gems and stolen a tree from neden’s fabled apple orchard, using necromancy to drain the tree until its bark was reduced to pure jet. Chipping away at this stone they wrought its pieces in pyrite, and hid the resulting jewelry and its many sister pieces as they slaved away. For as the drow gods failed them they must make one new.

The ritual of fell gods was simple, if painful, for each drow that died cruelly under Neden’s yoke, for each drop of blood spilled onto the profane instruments that each drow hid, the boons grew in power, and from the budding sentience of each artifact the makings of a hive god stirred, a being of enough power to destroy the kingdom that had enslaved them, to shatter their idols and tarnish their treasure till they were reduced to mere legacy.

Then Durin’s Plate was stolen and the Realms finished the Drow’s job before the elves could even start, and with Neden’s death the drows vanished, their planes forgotten and the jewelry rusted and its magic waned. The god withered before being born.

Till the zombies revolted, and undead blood was spilled onto jet. 

As each scalp is destroyed Hashinabe grows more aware of the world, ever closer to existence, and as it does it blesses those that hold the jewelry that gives it form and power, these unhallowed tokens of the hive gods might and blessing. And from these Boons of Hashinabe Ur the false god may see its purpose filled once more.

Till then, it offers its pseudo divine aid to all who ask it, all it needs is scalps to weave its workings with.