With the heat waves rolling and receding throughout the month, most of Mardrun finds ways to cool off and relax before the busy months of harvest that are coming up quickly. However, some of the world has other plans in the works…
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Clan Ironmound continues to rebuild after the devastation, and with the help from outside forces the process has expedited some. The prideful and usually prickly members of the Clan are starting to warm up to those who have come to help with the reconstruction, often ending the night drinking with the volunteers. While there is still extensive amounts of labor and work ahead, many within Clan Ironmound are starting to feel some hope after many months of desperation.
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In a Grimward outpost along The Shield of Mardrun a horrible accident befell a workman in the process of patching a section of an outpost wall that had been damaged by recent high winds. One of the legs of his scaffold gave way and he fell nearly 15 feet before landing on a jagged piece of his broken platform. The worker was quickly carried to a nearby surgeon, but by the time he arrived the wounds proved to be too great and he passed away. Not willing to accept this outcome the surgeon quickly set to work on the newly deceased body and through what can only be thought of as a miracle of medicine, she was able to bring him back from the otherworld..and bring him back from the otherworld she apparently did. The Ulven shot to his feet with a wild look in his eye, screaming at the top of his lungs. Slowly he came back to reality and told everyone around him what he’d seen. His words have spread far and wide.
“There I was, falling from a scaffold. Next thing I know I’m on my back and my vision is fading out and my lungs are filling with blood. I close my eyes. Then suddenly I feel totally fine. I open my eyes and I’m standing in a forest and off in the distance I see the hulking shadow of The Great Wolf as it stalks its way toward me. Naturally I freeze in place. Then I hear a voice, low and rumbling like a growl barely escaping the throat of the great beast, ‘I do not know you yet you intrude on my forest?’ the beast called to me, ‘Without a name, you are nothing to me. Nothing but a morsel.’ Then the Great Wolf turned and began bounding toward me, his maw open. I tell you the likes of it I have never seen. When he opened his mouth, by Gaia’s grace his mouth so large it could swallow ten warriors without thinking, I saw the stars inside. I saw the very cosmos itself, but at the center of it all, I saw something that scared me more than any of the rest of the experience. I saw nothingness; a void of pure emotionless, nothingness. I screamed…and then I was here.”
The laborer spread his story across the outpost to any who would listen to it and when he ran out of people to tell he packed his things, threw on a cloak and started walking south to continue to spread his word. “When he sees me next he’ll know my name!” he shouted back into the outpost as he left, “Hjalvar the Great Wolf’s Priest!”
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In the City State of Newhope people enjoyed their time relaxing in the late summer days, children playing in the fields and streams, parents enjoying a bit of peace. In the manner of a single night, this peace was turned into chaos as the mass murderer struck again. A family of five were the targets it seems, their bodies all found in the barn, hanging by their legs upside down. The sight of the scene soon spread like wildfire, along with the words carved in each of the victims. “Did you miss me Newhope?”
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Bandit activity in the Riverhead lands reaches an all time high this month. Caravan’s are now refusing to go any further north without significant martial support. While some packs from Clan Nightriver and Whiteoak do offer aid in this, more often than not are met with overwhelming amounts of bandits rushing the caravans. Many are pleading for higher up authority figures to do something about the situation, but many are conflicted on the proper way to handle this situation.