What You Missed: Rhiassa Presents: Echoes of Ragnarok: Svartalvheim
Written by Master Sir Therian of the Felwood and of Chimeron
This is a personal chronicle of the events that transpired on the 21st of this 11th month, in the year known as 1015.
I hate traveling to other realms. I am a priest of Gaia. That means my connection to her is usually best served while within her sight. If and when being given the choice, I tend not to go to other Realms, since my job is usually on this world, in this time. But from what I am told, these people, these Jomsvikings, came to us. And so, we will help them. You may ask how it is that I am considered a priest, since I have no spells, I serve no temple and I sermon no followers. It is true that I am a fighter presently. My name, “Therian” means Hunter. Many think the function of Gaia is only in creation, that she is always about healing and life. That would make you mistaken of many things. Gaia is the cycle. For a world to live and create, that upon and within it must also die. And so my gift is death, so that the cycle may continue. I bring this up because my experience and perspective will be my own. There are others that may know nuances that I have missed. I suggest you seek them out, for it is clear this is but one chapter at the beginning of a story. And as it has been requested of me, I will tell my tale so as to honor the past, and remind the future. I swear the tale is as true as I can make it, to my recollection.
We came at the behest of a man named Ulric. A portal that was called the Vanfrost was opened to a part of his realm: Svartalvheim. It was explained to me that this was an “earth” realm and that our task on this day was to gain the alliance of the dwarves. It was their task to make weapons for the gods, and so having them as allies to bring about the end and rebirth of their cycle, Ragnarok, was necessary. But their fate was unknown since the attack of the “Black Death” which we called Bedlam. And so, it was not clear what we would face on our journey.
The Vanfrost placed us within a mine shaft into the realm of the dwarves. And to our surprise, our magic items and high spells were not functional. It seems that within this realm, to gain access to these things, we would have to mine for various types of stone. We found pick axes and a mining cart, and we learned how to navigate the maze of tracks with our cart. You see these stones we needed? They tended to cause you to explode if you held them too long. And it became clear that we would need these stones for more than just spell reacquisition. And so we made it a task as we went along to find these stones and bring them to the cart, preferably before we exploded.
It was also not long before we came upon the fate of the dwarves: they had been turned into undead slaves of another race: the black elves. So as we ventured deeper into the mines, the encounters and fighting intensified. Now and again, we would find a table of sorts, where various colored stones would need to assemble to gain us access to these items meant for gods to wield. Any items forged, we brought those along with us as well. I spent much of my time fighting to keep the undead and the elves at bay, so I am sure there is far more nuance to how these items were forged, and what else may have been uncovered in this place. But for myself, it seems we spent a good time continuing into the heart of the mines, crafting what items we could, regaining what spells we could.
There came a point where we had to rest. Which was good, because the track for the cart became much harder to travel. At one point, we had to cross an area with fire imps throwing balls of fire at themselves and us. There was a sea of lava and there were avalanches of boulders and rocks. At another point, we had to build the track as we went, however there were two fire giants that would burn the track if we took too long. These were difficult challenges and it took most of us being active in various tasks to be able to cross them. There was also a level with odd automatons that had to be moved by throwing colored rocks at them, since we could not get near them. Depending on the color of the rocks would depend on where these automatons moved. This was also somewhat challenging, but we moved through deftly.
It should also be noted that other gems were found when mining the stones. There was a magical moving shop that allowed us to buy various items that were useful on our trip. I was only partially involved with helping to collect gems for the use in this magical shop.
On our group’s part, one of the more inspired pieces of magic were able to conjure was a Mystic Forge that stayed active on the moving cart. I can say this piece of creativity kept us moving and alive. Also, the constant work of the healers and casters to keep us moving was well orchestrated, and our group moved and functioned well as we continued on our journey.
Eventually we met the leader of this dwarves, who was clearly fighting a loosing battle. Another dwarf had seemed to have enlisted the black elves and was working to crush the existing regime. However this other dwarf, a “Champion”, was so powerful that they had not been able to even scratch his armor. So a plan was revealed: we would have to forge a weapon for the god Thor, and only the worthy would be able to wield it. We would have to use the other god weapons we have made to challenge the other dwarf’s champions to honorable combat. Only one they were all defeated would the one worthy to wield Thor’s weapon be able to challenge this creature and defeat it.
We were brought inside the gates of the dwarven fortress. While Thor’s weapon was forged, and the others who were worthy to wield the god weapons fought their honorable combats, the group kept the undead and elves from over- running the fortress. The battle was long, but our victory was eventual, and in the defeat of this foe gained us the alliance we would need to bring about Ragnarok in that Realm.
In the end, I killed 135 creatures. Approximately 30 of these were black elves, 104 of these were undead dwarves, and 1 human who was unfortunate enough to surprise me. I was raised 15 times, mainly by various Seeds of Life and from 3 different Healers. My armor was repaired 87 times, my bow repaired 10 times. My shield and short sword did not need repairing, and my pike was destroyed never to return to this world. My personal thanks to the healers and casters that kept me well armored and brought me back to kill again.
This is the end of my tale. It is my hope that it will be useful in the years to come, as we bring death to this other realm.
Silence is the Enemy,
Master Sir Therian of the Felwood and of Chimeron
Knight of the Realms
Knight of the Eternal Flame
Champion of Chimeron
Master of Coin of Chimeron
Blademaster