RP Guide - Stormreach

[Ashurr]

Stormreach is a small frontier city nestled on the eastern coast of the Skyfall Peninsula in Xen'Drik. Despite its small population, Stormreach is an important city because of its location, allowing easy docking access to travelers wishing to enter Xen'Drik. The city also acts as a center for trade and commerce for all who visit the lost continent of Xen'Drik. Stormreach is known by some as the "City of Dungeons" because it was built atop an ancient city from the long-lost Xen'Drik civilization of giants.



History

Stormreach was initially used as a hideout for pirates and smugglers who attacked vessels traversing the Thunder Sea to the north. From Stormreach, pirates could easily recoup, as well as trade among other pirates. In 800 YK, as the continent of Xen'Drik became an interest to scholars and the Dragonmarked Houses, the houses petitioned the King of Galifar to cleanse the area of pirates and by 802 YK, the Galifar navy had done its job.

Leadership

Despite ousting a large majority of the pirates and smugglers, a few powerful smugglers, called Coin Lords, took advantage of the reduction in competition and became the first leaders of Stormreach. Their descendents continue to govern over Stormreach to this day. Currently, Stormreach is governed by five hereditary nobles. A Harbor Lord oversees all harbor activities, while four Coin Lords maintain the rest of the city. Together, these five nobles are called the Storm Lords.


Power Groups

Although the Storm Lords hold authority over Stormreach, other nations and the Dragonmarked Houses have consulates and enclaves there. The Five Nations acknowledge Stormreach, but none claim it as their own. Instead, they simply maintain business relationships with the Storm Lords hoping to turn a profit on all that Xen'Drik has to offer.

The Dragonmarked Houses, particularly House Lyrandar, House Kundarak, House Deneith, and House Tharashk have great sway in the city, and the Storm Lords go to great lengths to make sure their presence remains.

[Ashurr]

802 YK The City of Stormreach is Established in Xen’drik:
The Kingdom of Galifar, in cooperation with the dragonmarked houses, funded the upgrade of the trade city of Stormreach on the northern peninsula of Xen’drik in 802 YK. The city of Stormreach had a fascinating history. Forty thousand years before the present time, Stormreach had been a city of giants and served as the capital city of the Cul’sir Empire. That city’s remnants were still visible throughout modern Stormreach, including the great statute of a giant ruler known only as the Emperor that looked out over the harbor, the rings of standing stones that continuously radiated magic, the colossal, cyclopean walls that divided the city’s districts and the floating edifices that defied gravity throughout the city. Over the centuries after the fall of the giant civilizations on Xen’drik, communities of sahuagin and thri-kreen had also made their homes in the city before being wiped away by an unknown force.

The history of Stormreach begins in the Age of Demons. Much about this age eludes modern scholars. The dominion of the demon Overlords stretched across the face of Eberron. There is no question that fiendish Overlords ruled domains in Xen’drik and that the dragons and couatls opposed them and might have drawn the titans, the giants’ mythic ancestors, into the struggle. Explorers have occasionally found traces of the past: the magic blade of a rakshasa warrior or a brass spire in the style of Ashtakala, the citadel of the Lords of Dust in the Demon Wastes. According to the storytellers of Rushemé, it was in this age that a curse was placed upon the land near the northern ocean. Some scholars believe that a terrible secret is hidden deep beneath Stormreach, below the most ancient ruins of the giants. Although some believe this land to be cursed, others have always been drawn to it. The titan Cul’sir made this region the center of his empire during the Age of Giants. Many sages believe that the Emperor, the statue towering over the present city’s harbor, is a representation of Cul’sir himself, set to guard the city against the demons of the past. Researchers are still struggling to reconstruct the events leading up to the devastation of the original giant cultures of Xen’drik. It is clear that elves lived among the Cul’sir giants, most likely as slaves; many tools and structures from this period are designed for use by the smaller elves. What records have been recovered emphasize that the city played a critical role during the quori invasion of Xen’drik and was a focal point for arcane research tied to the giants’ war effort. The historical records are obscure about what the city’s wizards were researching but hint at a tremendous power source beneath the city. Whether it was a creation of the giants or a force they were trying to tap into is unknown.

The defeat of the quori set the stage for the elven uprising against the giants. Relics found in the jungles around Stormreach suggest an elven campaign of guerilla warfare lasting for centuries. This quiet struggle was punctuated by pitched battles. According to Tairnadal tales, the great elf hero Dyrael Morain led an attack on Stormreach in an effort to “destroy the greatest evil in this dark land.” Dyrael and his forces, the largest elf army ever seen at that time, were annihilated, but the Tairnadal still honor his bravery and sacrifice. Many elves of the Valaes Tairn have come to Xen’drik and searched for Dyrael’s bones and his legendary magical blade in the fields south of Stormreach. The Age of Giants came to an end in a wave of epic magic and dragonfire. Compared to much of Xen’drik, the ruins of Stormreach are well-preserved; the colossal watchman of the Emperor is almost untouched. Other sections of the city were partially buried but otherwise left intact. The giant inhabitants were slaughtered, but some sages believe the dragons held back in dealing with Stormreach itself—that for some reason they were afraid to unleash their full power against the city.

The devastation of Xen’drik left a continent in chaos. The archeological record suggests that a number of cultures found footholds in the region around Stormreach. But each of these settlements collapsed, and by the time humans came to the area, all that was left were ghosts and shattered stone. Scholars have confirmed that the following cultures inhabited Stormreach in the past thirty thousand years. The first group to return to Stormreach was the giants, the ancestors of the modern giants of Rushemé who live near the city. The loremasters of Rushemé say that their ancestors were gripped by the Du’rashka Tul , a homicidal madness that forced them to turn on one another and destroyed their nation. Thousands of years later, the sahuagin of the Thunder Sea came to Stormreach. The sea devils constructed an amphibious community in the flooded sewers of the original giant city. Modern sahuagin will not speak of this fallen culture. Some scholars believe this silence is due to shame—that the old sahuagin were corrupted by a dark force below the city. Others assert that the sahuagin civilization was destroyed so long ago that the modern sahuagin simply know nothing about it. The sahuagin were ultimately driven from the city by a group of giants called the Fallen Stone. Evidence suggests they were either storm giants or some sort of amphibious stone giant—perhaps a missing link between the two races. The Fallen Stone was short-lived; following their victory over the sahuagin, they apparently fell prey to a plague that resisted all forms of magical treatment. Within a century, the region was abandoned again. The next civilization that left a clear mark on the region of Stormreach was that of the thri-kreen. In the modern age, the intelligent mantis folk of Xen’drik are few in number and largely avoid human contact. But there was a time when tens of thousands of thri-kreen inhabited the region, carving twisting tunnels into the giants’ foundations and sculpting strange monuments beneath the city. The fate of the thri-kreen remains one of the region’s greatest mysteries. The other cultures fell to battle or plague. As far as researchers have been able to tell, the thri-kreen culture came to an end instantaneously, as if the bulk of the thri-kreen population simply vanished. The thri-kreen refuse to discuss their history with humans, but the answer might be found in Stormreach’s depths. These four cultures left clear marks on Stormreach, while others passed through with barely a trace.

The Library of Korranberg has records of a gnome effort to build an outpost in Stormreach sixteen hundred years ago (around -1600 YK). After mere months, a handful of survivors returned to Zilargo. They blamed their failure on hostile giants, but in recent years the scholar Hegan Del Dorian has advanced the theory that this was a cover story hiding what really happened; he points to the written testimony of a gnome sailor who speaks of a “darkness that gripped both body and soul.” But the history of modern Stormreach itself is much less of a mystery. In the decades before 802 YK, Riedra had already been exploiting Xen’drik’s natural resources for centuries and smugglers from Breland and Zilargo had long probed the mysterious continent’s northern coast. As trade began to flourish in the Thunder Sea after the human settlement of Khorvaire, pirates from Breland, Cyre, Zilargo and even the Lhazaar Principalities began to prey on the Galifaran shipping in the region. The first Khorvarien humans to make landfall in the Stormreach region were pirates. They wanted an outpost to repair and resupply their ships, and the crumbling docks of Stormreach seemed a good foundation for such a hideout. They found a city in ruins, marked by the civilizations that had come before. The pirates clashed with giants, drow, and sahuagin, but they were mysteriously spared the strange horrors that befell previous settlers. A century passed without plague or warfare, and the pirates prospered. They began searching for opportunities on the continent and discovered both valuable relics in the interior and the power of kuryeva, a potent form of gin fermented from the berries of the kuryeva bush endemic to northern Xen’drik. Piracy and smuggling grew ever more profitable in the Thunder Sea and these outlaw captains needed a base to resupply their ships.

Smugglers established hideouts along the northern coast of Xen’drik, but most were quickly destroyed by monsters or the marauding Vulkoori drow clans of the interior. The rogue captains needed a truly secure refuge. Some claim it was Delera Omaren, the pirate-queen of the Thunder Sea, who laid the first stones of modern Stormreach. Others say it was Kolis Sel Shadra, the wily gnome smuggler said to own a fleet of spectral ships. Whoever began the settlement, it soon became a joint venture, with many pirate captains contributing resources to the new town in return for sanctuary within its harbor and access to its businesses. The walls of the ancient Cul’sir giant ruins provided simple fortifications for the settlement and for some reasons, the predators of the jungle seemed to shun the city. The small outpost grew and prospered, as did the piracy it supported on the Thunder Sea. Delera Omaren and the dwarf pirate Korchan Amanatu left bloody wakes in its waters and the newly-emboldened pirates began preying on Zil, Aereni and even House Lyrandar’s shipping. House Tharashk saw the shiploads of dragonshards the pirates were capturing from the Riedrans and wanted to establish their own prospecting operations in the shattered land.

Scholars and artificers seized the relics retrieved from the interior of Xen’drik and wanted more. But between harsh weather, the sahuagin, and the constant threat of piracy, travel was simply too dangerous. And all the while, the other dragonmarked houses also became increasingly interested in both Xen’drik’s natural resources and the hidden magical secrets of the lost giant civilizations that lay within its forbidding interior. The Twelve, acting on behalf of the dragonmarked houses, finally appealed to the throne of Galifar to end the pirates’ depredations and establish an official Galifaran port in Xen’drik. In 800 YK the king took action. Galifar’s greatest military strength lay in its land forces, but the Royal Galifaran Navy was still a force to be reckoned with. After a few sea battles in the Thunder Sea that resulted in deep losses for both sides, a gnome smuggler appeared in Thronehold to petition the court of Galifar. Kolis Sel Shadra was known by his reputation as the smuggler who had never lost a cargo—either to the Galifaran Navy, the Galifaran customs service or other pirates. Sel Shadra came to Thronehold as the representative of the four most powerful pirate captains of the Thunder Sea: the human Delera Omaren, the dwarf Yorrick Amanatu, the human Moluo Lassite and himself. Sel Shadra offered the king of Galifar a truce—if the king would offer these captains an amnesty and recognized political authority over Stormreach, the four would use their influence to disperse the pirates. After extended negotiations, the king agreed in 802 YK to an accord called the Stormreach Compact that would end the war between the pirates and Galifar, and even promised that the Galifaran Crown would join the dragonmarked houses in funding Stormreach’s expansion as Khorvaire’s primary port of call in Xen’drik. But the king insisted on one condition: that he and his successors appoint a fifth lord over the city who had the Crown’s trust. There was much debate, but in time, the four captains—now called the Coin Lords of Stormreach—agreed to grant the privateer Jolan Wylkes the title of Harbor Lord and for the five of them to collectively rule Stormreach together as an oligarchy called the Storm Lords.

Wylkes was a sailor, as opposed to the Galifaran nobles who had first been proposed by the Crown. The king and his descendants held to their vow and the Storm Lords lived up to their end of the bargain as well, bringing an end to the rampant piracy. For nearly two centuries now, Stormreach has grown and prospered. Several dragonmarked houses have established sizable enclaves within the city and the kuryeva of Molou’s Distillery is prized by conosseiurs across southern Khorvaire. There have been times of trouble—the Omaren Revolt in 890 YK when one of the Coin Lords sought to take over the city and the attack by an army of enraged giants in 946 YK—but the city has always persevered. Today, with the Last War over, Stormreach has become a preeminent destination for the more intrepid merchants, explorers and adventurers of the Five Nations, swelling the city’s population to over 11,600 people of every race and creed found on Eberron. Stormreach has also become a major center of intrigue between the dragonmarked houses, the Five Nations, the Inspired of Riedra and many other organizations, all of whom desire a chance to gain access to the many hidden secrets of the ancient past that lie deep within Xen’drik.


The end of the Last War proved to be good for Stormreach, the small city in northern Xen’drik that was Khorvaire’s gateway to the secrets of that mysterious continent. According to a Library of Korranberg census, the city had about nine thousand residents in 996 YK. Estimates suggest that more than two thousand immigrants had joined them by 998 YK, swelling the city’s population to more than 11,600 residents. More arrived every day. With the Last War at an end, there was a groundswell of interest in the city. Refugees who lost their homes in Khorvaire came in search of a fresh start. Academics from the Five Nations’ universities sought answers to Xen’drik’s myriad mysteries. The dragonmarked houses saw untapped potential in the wild lands beyond the city’s walls. And so the population grew and the city expanded. Moreover, transients steadily flowed through—hundreds of merchants, sailors, explorers, and others who remain for a few days before passing on to the next port of call. Following the gaping hole in military service created by the national demobilizations that followed the Treaty of Thronehold, a small company formed to take advantage of the military expertise and discipline now lying fallow. Mackinnon “Mace” Maceck, a dwarf entrepreneur and former Cyran battlefield commander, created a transportation and security firm to contract out his services to the highest bidder. Under his charismatic influence, soldiers, adventurers, and support personnel from every corner of Khorvaire found gainful employment at the end of the war. This firm, the Blackwheel Company, began by taking the jobs that no other organization, including the dragonmarked houses, would touch.

Clandestine smuggling missions into areas deemed too dangerous to risk valuable house or national resources became the company’s calling card. As the company grew in reputation and prowess, the dragonmarked houses elected to commandeer this rising military power. A special meeting of the Committee of Twelve was convened, and the dragonmarked houses pooled their resources to essentially buy out the Blackwheel Company. By retaining their services indefinitely and exclusively, the Twelve created for itself a military force that could be deployed anywhere in the world to pursue the aims of the dragonmarked houses’ magical academy’s council. As the first order of business, the Twelve dispatched the company to the continent of Xen’drik, where Mace, having appointed himself the Field Marshal of the Company, established operations under a new flag—a thirteen-spoked wheel surrounding the motto “United Aim,” symbolizing the shared interests of the Twelve. The group’s current base of operations, a massive airship, provides the company with the mobility and firepower needed to operate in the most inhospitable regions of Xen’drik. This airship, the Glory Road , is rumored to be a House Lyrandar special project funded by the combined resources of the dragonmarked houses, and is a sight to behold. This leviathan of an airship provides a mobile base of operations that keeps the Blackwheel Company’s nerve center from being tied down to any one location. The current focus of the company appears to be furthering the arcane research agenda of the Twelve—securing dragonshard deposits, exploring ancient ruins, and protecting vital artifacts in and around Stormreach.

The Blackwheel Company was one of four adventurer societies—along with the Cabal of Shadows, the Covenant of Light, and the Crimson Codex—that sought to unlock portions of the draconic Prophecy in Xen’drik. These factions are relatively small and operate primarily within the continent of Xen’drik, although they may have interests elsewhere in Eberron. Dedicated to discovering—and manipulating—the pieces of the draconic Prophecy known as the Caldyn Fragments (see below), these organizations often found themselves in direct competition. Their conflicts become bloody as the factions mount rival expeditions, racing into the heart of Xen’drik in pursuit of the Prophecy’s mysteries.

These four divergent power groups—the Blackwheel Company, the Cabal of Shadows, the Covenant of Light, and the Crimson Codex—are motivated by one event: the discovery, collection, and translation of various pieces of the draconic Prophecy into a single document. This work was accomplished by a human Library of Korranberg scholar originally from the Brelish aristocracy named Lord Ohnal Caldyn. Even as a child, Ohnal could talk to a dragonmarked individual, or see a dragonshard, or study the skies, and he would make a prediction that at first seemed to go unfulfilled—only to be confirmed later in a different context. Taking to the life of an adventurer, Ohnal made it his mission to gather knowledge and insight into the draconic Prophecy. He began to understand that his ability to see the shifting patterns of reality tapped into a force that flowed through dragons, going back to the very first great Progenitor dragons whose forms created the world. The notes that Ohnal Caldyn recorded in his red dragonhide-covered tome became known as the Caldyn Fragments .

The most frequent mistake made by students of the Prophecy is to use “draconic Prophecy” and “Caldyn Fragments” interchangeably. They are not the same. The draconic Prophecy is an ever-changing and ephemeral force that, as far as anyone can tell, moves like a shadow behind reality, both reflecting and predicting the ebb and flow of all things living on, above, and beneath Eberron. The Caldyn Fragments are the result of Ohnal Caldyn’s efforts to capture a small part of the Prophecy in a written form that could be easily understood by humans and manipulated to produce desired outcomes. Caldyn founded the organization known as the Crimson Codex (named after the red dragonskin journal in which he recorded his prophetic fragments) to use his insights to promote peace and stability throughout Eberron and possibly support the reunification of Galifar. But as people outside the organization learned about the existence of the Caldyn Fragments , others scrambled to obtain copies of the work that could supposedly predict the future. Now, each of the four groups focused on the Caldyn Fragments tries to shape and manipulate the predictions to its own ends. The secret society founded by Ohnal Caldyn and known as the Crimson Codex has a two-fold purpose—to study and manipulate the draconic Prophecy. The organization’s ultimate goal is to avoid another confrontation on the scale of the Last War, reunite Galifar, and return to a golden age of peace and enlightenment.

The Codex believes that knowledge is by far the most powerful weapon, and that the Prophecy is the ultimate knowledge. To that end, the Crimson Codex has a network of spies and informants within all the major civilized governments of Khorvaire. This network ensures that treaties are upheld and peace remains a priority. Of the four factions pursuing the Caldyn Fragments , the Codex has the strongest connection to the dragons and their kin. Like the great wyrms, the Codex is capable of waiting many years for plans to come to fruition. Although the Codex is a global operation with interests on each of Eberron’s continents, it continues to focus considerable resources in Xen’drik in pursuit of the ultimate prize: the potent knowledge contained in the Caldyn Fragments .

A compassionate and charismatic woman named Lirashana founded the organization known as the Covenant of Light. Although she appears to be a kalashtar, the rumor persists that she is actually a divine spirit—an angel of justice unable to ignore the pain and suffering she saw on Eberron. To the Covenant, the search to unlock the mysteries of the Caldyn Fragments is nothing less than a crusade for the powers of Light. It is said that when Lady Lirashana first endeavored to establish the Covenant, she was visited by overpowering celestial music, a force that she would later call the Song. The Song compelled her to create the Covenant in Xen’drik, and to include in its noble mission the pursuit of the draconic Prophecy. Followers of the Covenant also hear and follow the Song and believe that an era of enlightenment and peace can be brought forth by the collective power of virtue in action. Members are expected to behave in a virtuous manner in all aspects of their lives. Mystics of many different religions have been drawn to the Covenant, and all have their own explanation for the Song. Worshipers of the Sovereign Host claim that it is the voice of Dol Arrah, calling the virtuous to battle. Followers of the Silver Flame attribute it to the Voice of the Flame itself. The kalashtar say that it is an external manifestation of the noble impulses that exist within all mortal minds—the harbinger of il-Yannah , the glorious light of the next age of Dal Quor. Regardless of its source, all Covenant members initially experience the Song directly as music in their minds—a bright and irresistible summons that draws them individually to serve in Xen’drik

Radiant Hold is the primary headquarters for the Covenant of Light and its chief military outpost and it lies several miles beyond the walls of Stormreach. The faction’s greatest leaders and most prized treasures all rest within its grey stone walls, well-shielded against the plots and weapons of those who would extinguish Xen’drik’s best hope for a bright future. From the outside, Radiant Hold is something of an enigma. It appears to be a fortified citadel of classic Thrane architectural design, built entirely within the shell of a massive Xen’drik giant ruin. Eight ancient walls radiate from a central keep of crumbling rock, each one pointing in a cardinal direction. Though the outer husk of giantish construction looks as if it could fall apart at any moment, there is also a timelessness about the ruin suggesting that long after Radiant Hold itself is dust, the aged shale of its outer walls will still be standing. Cast out from their homes, touched by darkness, or consumed by madness and rage, the members of the Cabal of Shadows are a diverse group of troubled souls. Not all of them can be called evil, but none of the Cabal’s goals could be considered virtuous.

The Caldyn Fragments speak of a time of shadow and change when a dark prince will rule. The Cabal believes that the Traveler, or some agent of his, will bring this prince forth in this era and that its members will rule under him. The Cabalists intend to help bring this time of change about and see the Caldyn Fragments as their guide to the Traveler’s will. The Cabal is made up of various cults, sects, and affiliations known as Obscura. Sects within the Cabal of Shadows can be quite different indeed—a sect of unaligned changelings can work together with a cult of evil tieflings, or even form an uneasy alliance with a pack of mad daelkyr half-bloods. But the Calling unites them all in fear and dread and hope for glory. For the most part the Cabal is scattered throughout Xen’drik, but as with any organization on the continent, the Cabal has interests in and around Stormreach. As the name suggests, the Cabal of Shadows prefers to remain concealed in layers of darkness. Of all the societies in the city, the Cabal is the most underground, literally and otherwise.

Cabalists move in the deepest catacombs and ruins beneath Stormreach, the darkest places where even the Bilge Rats, the city’s infamous wererat-lead thieves’ guild, fear to tread. There are four main Obscura in the Cabal, called the Mourners of Yore, the Defiance, the Instruments of Change and the Children of Xoriat. Each sect has its own organizational details, goals and character, but all follow the mystical force known as the Calling and the four largest sects govern the entire Cabal through the Council of the Obscured. The council, it is said, performs certain dark rituals below Stormreach and elsewhere in Xen’drik to channel the true voice of the Calling and direct the actions of the Cabal as a whole. Without these regular rituals, it is likely that the sects would turn to savage infighting, collapsing the Cabal from within. The Calling binds the various sects of the Cabal together and calls the members to Xen’drik. The few courageous scholars who have studied the phenomenon suspect that the Calling is a magical aspect of the Traveler that manifests in the dreams and unconscious minds of mortals. All Cabal members initially experience the Calling as a voice in their minds—an irresistible summons that draws them to Xen’drik.

It is not lost on the members of the Cabal—or the Covenant of Light’s members for that matter—that the forces of the Calling and the Song seem to be suspiciously familiar. More than one member of both factions has been disturbed by the possibility that though both forces are probably opposed, they might actually be manifestations of the same power. As if all this potential conflict were not enough, the area around Stormreach has recently seen an influx of the strange drow who call themselves the Umbragen or the “shadow elves” in the drow dialect of Elven. As noted above, following the disastrous Quori-Giant War in which the ancient giants of Xen’drik won victory over the denizens of Dal Quor only through the use of tainted blood magics that shattered the jungle continent, the elves and drow took advantage of the chaos afflicting the beleagured giant civilizations to rebel against their huge masters. To put down the rebellion of their slaves, the giants prepared to make use of their world-shattering magics once again, but to prevent this potential disaster, the dragons of Argonessen intervened and waged war against the giants. In the resulting clash, a group of drow fled underground into Khyber after the destruction of their city of Qalatesh by a storm of massive dragonshards (including the largest dragonshard in existence called the Heart of Siberys) that rained down from the golden Ring of Siberys.

The underworld of the Dragon Below was filled with its own terrors, but nothing as deadly as the conflict between the god-like giants and dragons. After a long and dangerous journey, these drow refugees settled in a new city-state they established deep below the mountainous region of Xen’drik known as the Ring of Storms, the legendary home of the powerful elven necromancers called the Qabalrin who had once inhabited Qalatesh alongside these drow and other elves. In their struggle for survival, the dark elves uncovered the ancient lore of the Qabalrin and used this knowledge to tap a dark well of magical energy, what some believed to be the arcane powers of the god called the Shadow, which the drow named the Umbra. Over the course of generations, to enhance their own survival in the underworld of the Dragon Below, these drow, now calling themselves the Umbragen or “shadow elves,” performed terrible arcane rituals that bound their body and souls to the Umbra, blending this shadowy force with their own flesh and souls.



For thousands of years the Umbragen held their own in the depths of Khyber, defending the realm they had carved out against all manner of monsters. Then in 997 YK, the balance of power in the region of Khyber beneath Xen’drik changed. A daelkyr known as Belashyrra, the Lord of Eyes, the creator of the race of beholders, awakened and stirred in the primordial dark and an army of beholders, mind flayers and other aberrations arose from the shadows at the fleshshaper’s command. The doom of the Umbragen was at hand. Slowly, the dark elves began losing the battle to the flesh-shaper’s forces and their outlying citadels fell one by one to the aberrations as the daelkyr’s horde closed in on their home. In desperation, the Umbragen dispatched agents to the surface of Xen’drik to search for anything or anyone that could be used as a weapon against the aberrations of Khyber. Some of these agents even now are secretly abroad in Stormreach seeking for something, anything, that could be used to save their imperiled civilization. Finally, deep beneath Stormreach sleeps the fiendish Overlord known as Sakinnirot, the Scar That Abides. This rakshasa rajah has lain dormant for long millennia, but the growth of Stormreach’s population since the end of the Last War and the extensive excavations beneath the city being conducted by House Kundarak’s dwarves have begun to weaken the ancient arcane prison that contains this incredibly powerful being. Should the Scar That Abides awaken once more, all the world’s attention may be focused on Stormreach and Xen’drik.