Quote Originally Posted by dragonearth View Post
I have a character that I really don't know what to do with as I have never made a person like him before. This is for a horror campaign
Race: Warforged
Class: Fighter
Background: Soldier
Level 3
He is a dexterity based ranged Battle Master.
Age is 84 ( not in Eberon)
OK - so you have him at 84 years old (and good thing you put not in Eberon, because I know zilch about that campaign setting)... Now the story essentially ends with his birth - but it's easily believable that his "objectives" (mentioned in the story) have had him wandering around, attempting to complete it for the last 84 years!
I enjoyed writing this - because it was different. You mentioned the horror campaign, so I thought of Ravenloft type setting and worked from that mindset.
I've never really written any horror stuff myself... a few short story challenges here and there... and I don't feel like this was so much a horror story - but the birth of your character... and why and how he came to be - but with an emphasis that it's a dark world he lives in...
As always, feedback is appreciated! Whether good or bad, what I got right, what I got wrong, same old song and dance as the others. :)
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“There is no reason to fear the dark, until the darkness blinks at you.”
- Tarik Moonstrider

The War of the Misthunters is legendary and tragic.

There had been a family that had taken up residence near Uren’tor, the main city on this side of the continent. Things seemed normal at first – but then people began to vanish. Concern grew and adventurers were hired to find out what had been going on. Some of those adventurers were found, years later, wandering aimlessly, their very mind stripped from them. The others were assumed to have been dead.

The family that moved near Uren’tor were called the Van’shin family. Perhaps that should have been the first clue, since the name – in ancient tongues literally meant ‘born from darkness.’ When a lynch party had formed and marched towards the Van’shin manor, they were greeted by undead – some of which were still recognizable as adventurers who had been employed to investigate what had been going on.

The few that had managed to escape the horrors of the undead returned to Uren’tor with the news. The Council immediately convened about what was to be done. But before the Council could decide, pounding came from the Chamber Doors. Allar was the one who answered it – and was surprised to see several of the people who had gone missing weeks ago standing at the door, wounded and bleeding. “By the gods!” he exclaimed. “Come in! Come in! Before they come!”

And those fatal words of granting the vampire spawns permission to enter – eight creatures now turned by the Van’shin family burst into the Council chambers and tore apart each and every person inside, leaving nothing but blood and body parts, before moving throughout the town to continue the same ruse and gain entrance to the residence of unsuspecting villagers of Uren’tor.

The City Guard managed to slay several of the vampire spawns, driving the others back to the manor. Assaults on Van’shin’s Manor typically left more undead to be used against the town of Uren’tor in the form of zombies, ghouls, or ghasts.

Tarik Moonstrider was a wizard who had dabbled into Necromancy in secrecy – but it was not to create undead, but to expand his own human life. As such he had made pacts with demons, devils, angels and gods. He knew why the Van’shin were here… they had actively been hunting him for over a hundred years. His knowledge of the afterlife and how to cheat it had caught the interest of the Van’shin who were vampires that sought to seek in daylight.

This was not because they had missed the feeling of the sun on their pale skin. This was because this would allow them to hunt for human food during the daylight and be stripped of the weakness wrought to vampires by their nature.

Tarik might have considered helping the Van’shin in the beginning, many, many, many years ago. The problem was the Van’shin had, unknowingly – before they were even aware of who Tarik was – killed and turned Tarik’s daughter into a vampire spawn.

Tarik had captured his daughter – and using the knowledge had gained – had managed to find a way to reverse the Vampirism. When the chord was severed between Tarik’s daughter and Nev Van’shin – the eldest of the Van’shin knew something was different. He had not sensed her death, as he had the others. He could still see through her eyes and hear all she heard, but he could no longer control her. As the weeks progressed she began to have bursts of violence and anger that had been completely irrational. Her need for raw meat increased as the weeks went on. Within a year, she was completely feral incapable of thought and Tarik knew what had to be done.

And now the Van’shin had caught up with him here in Uren’tor.

Tarik had expected this day to come and down in the tower he had worked vigorously on something he had spent years researching.

And now it was ready.

He could hear the Van’shin howling outside of his tower. That meant almost everyone – if not everyone – in Uren’tor was dead. The Van’shin rarely made their own presence known, relying instead on their charmed minions or the undead which they’d created.

From the basement, Tarik shouted, “Damn you Van’shin! Damn all of your souls to the planes of Hades! May they be ripped and torn and sent to every corner of Hell. If you think you can take me – then let’s end this tonight! I grow tired of running! This old bones will fight here and now – and one way or the other – this ends for me! So come in! Come in and find me in the basement!”

Tarik heard the door explode upstairs – and it sounded like a million bats screaming with excitement as they came into the tower. Nev Van’shin himself walked down the stairs, his cloak pulled tightly around him. He was extremely attractive, forever potentially looking as if he were a young twenty five year old human, when in truth he’d live nearly five hundred years.

“I don’t want to kill you, Tarik,” he said. “I won’t even turn you. Just tell us what you know about reversing this undeath.”

Tarik smiled. “There is no reason to fear the dark, until the darkness blinks at you.”

That was the moment of my birth.

I am not human.

I am the only weapon that can fight the Van’shin.

I am Warforged. Created to fight.

The command Tarik uttered - “There is no reason to fear the dark, until the darkness blinks at you”- activated me and set into motion the two primary objectives.

First – Kill Tarik.
I turned and grabbed the very man who forged me and snapped his neck.

Nev Van’shin howled in fury. “No!”

Objective two kicked in – Destroy the Van’shin.
Objective three – Destroy all undead.

Immediately I lunged for Nev Van’shin who immediately realized the danger he was in and shouted, “Retreat! Everyone out!”

I had managed to grab his cloak, but he ripped it off from his neck and turned to mist and fled. I had knowledge that Tarik had plugged into me – I knew where the Van’shin Manor was and immediately marched there. The undead perished at my hands as I reached the front door and smashed it in. I searched the entire manor but the Van’shin had fled.

Objective two – Destroy the Van’shin.

I will walk this world until the generations of the Van’shin have all been destroyed.

In between – Objective Three would be active – any and all undead must be destroyed.