The Hills Are All Hainted
The Forests Go Hawing
The Mountains Grow Hungry
The Gathering Mysts Hum
Welcome to the next installment of Tales of Primordia!
This campaign takes place in our sandbox world of Primordia, which we have explored in the past, but we begin in a precise location and specific time that are not yet revealed. We only know the lay of the land where we first arrive!
We commence our story in an isolated little village called Firefly Hollow (our, more commonly Firefly Holler). The village lies in a remote valley in the Splinters, an isolated segment of a very, very old mountain range. And how do the folk of Firefly Holler know these mountains are so very old?
They know because the Old Ways tell them so. Because it is whispered to them by the wind in the trees and painted for them in the the depths of the night sky.
Tales of Primordia - Gathering Mysts is a tale of folk beliefs and spooky forests, of haints and hags and things that go bump in the night. It is a tale of remote settlements far from any civilized world, where honest folk do not wander too far into the hills, nor whistle into the woods, nor fail to heed the wisdom of the Old Ways.
There are many familiar, yet strange, elements in the lands around Firefly Holler. The elves, or Sheehee as the locals call them, are rare, capricious creatures who dance under the moonlight and largely avoid the world of men. Dwarves are cunning craftsmen who live in their natural, remote caves and grottoes and know many secrets. The Splinters and the nearby Shambles are hainted by many spirits of the land who can bless or curse travelers at a whim, trolls, witches and even guardian spirits who protect the innocent and unwary.
This campaign is inspired by a number of sources, some more loosely than others. These sources include:
* Hillbilly. A series of comics by Eric Powell set in an imaginary Appalachian / medieval world
* Old Gods of Appalachia. A horror-anthology podcast by Steve Shell and Cam Collins
* Red Shadows and other tales of Solomon Kane, written by R.E. Howard and found primarily in the depression era anthology magazine Weird Tales
* Tales of Cu Chulainn: Irish Heroic Myths, a collection of Celtic legends collected by Penguin Books. (most common pronunciation: koo-KULL-en)
* Everything That Rises Must Converge, and other works and short stories by Flannery O'Connor, along with themes and tropes found in the works of other southern gothic writers that utilize strange events, eccentric characters and local color to create a sometimes moody and unsettling depictions of life. Things can appear normal on the surface, but reveal themselves to be strange, disturbing and sometimes horrific.
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