Editing Kyuad's Lorebook (section)

==ERETHOR EASTERN FRONT REGION==
===Road of Ruin===
:  Given it's grissly name for the hanged dead along the road. From the walls of Weirhold (a district within Baden's Bluff) a broad road leads south, descending to the lower coastal hills and beyond to the seemingly endless prairies of the Westlands. This highway is known as the Road of Ruin. Men speak its name with fear or smoldering rage, while orcs growl it with spiteful mirth as they grind the bones of Erenland beneath their hobnailed boots. <br> The Road of Ruin is a wide highway of compacted earth, broken stone and, in the muddier regions, felled logs, which cuts through the gentle hills and wooded lands south of the Bluff. In the shadow of the orc citadel of Vorstuk it meets the Eren Road to Erenhead in the east and the Road of Salt and Tears from Arwich in the west. The Road of Ruin continues southwest until it reaches the River Orh where it turns south again and, with the emerald smudge of Erethor ever on the horizon, follows the edge of the Westland plains to Eisin. Along this route from Baden’s Bluff to the Orh a straggling chain of ghost towns slip slowly into oblivion. In the Second and Third Ages, these market towns and villages were the thriving heart of the Badens’ dominion; now their eerie desertion is a poignant reminder that the Shadow’s knife has pierced that heart and that it beats no more. It was the orcs that caused the inhabitants of these settlements to flee, for to live in the path of Izrador’s armies is to live in the shadow of death. Those who could left decades ago, while those who didn’t were taken as slaves or food. Now, only the truly desperate haunt the desolate towns: scavengers and those who are too weak, too poor, or too scared to flee to safer locales. <br> The Road of Ruin sees frequent and heavy traffic during the arcs that the Pelluria crossing can be made. Orc forces from the North disembark at Baden’s Bluff before moving in force to join Grial the Fey Killer’s armies in Erethor. Orc-held fortresses like Vorstuk, Orshank, and Gifang are spaced by a day’s forced march to provide secure resting points for the warbands, and are manned by garrisons who enforce the Shadow’s occupation. The orc garrisons mount regular patrols and hunting parties led by goblin sniffers to track down and eliminate insurgent forces that are a constant nuisance upon their flanks. While the orc soldiery are by far the most numerous travelers on the Road of Ruin, there is also a steady stream of wagons and mules carrying food, supplies, and slaves to the fortress garrisons and to the warfronts. These caravans are usually guarded by human or hobgoblin mercenaries; such duty is considered demeaning by the orcs, and besides, their commanders believe that their bloodlust and ferocity is better employed on the killing fields of Erethor.

===Plains of Ash and Blood, dangers and foes=== 
:  Since the end of the Third Age, the Shadow’s foul minions have hacked and burned the forest, cutting a great ragged swathe of destruction that extends 300 miles west from Eisin’s walls and 100 miles to either side of the polluted Felthera river. A vast wasteland of ash and charred wood is all that remains of 30,000 square miles of ancient wildwood. Where springs and brooks once babbled beneath the arching boughs of giant cedars and homewood trees, blood and hissing sap are the only moisture that remains. Charcoal spires break the monotonous gray of the shifting ash lands, where thick smoke from the still-burning forests drifts in roiling clouds across the desolate scene. Sudden maelstroms of choking soot blow before screaming winds that seem to cry the forest’s anguish between the black skeletal hulks of the trees. <br> Though there is no sign of the sun through the smoke that covers the sky, the light begins to fade. Things take on a strange black and white, probably an effect of the moon’s light being filtered through the smoke cover. 

=====Dangers Include=====
*  '''Cinder Storms''':  Wide areas covered by fields of hot cinders that lie on or just below the thin layer of insulating ash.  When stirred by the wind, these cinders can become a glowing storm of stining, burning danger as hot pinpricks sear the skin and the air rapidly heats to kiln-like temperatures.  Anyone within the storm risks permanent blindness without finding adequate cover. They can be miles across and can easily set new blazes if they reach fresh wood.
*  '''Firestorms''': Storms of fire that are more than 30 ft. cubes engulfed by sheets of roaring flame and whirling cinders. The thick black smoke chokes those caught in the blast area, moving at 30 ft. in 6 seconds and burns itself out in under a minute.
*  '''Firefalls''':  Forests are natually full of gullies, short drops, animal dens, and other depressions. After fire has passed these by, sometimes they are left covered by a layer of ash, mud, and charred branches that can make the ground seem safe when it actually houses a fall into fiery pain. These pits act as reserviours of heat, full of smoldering cinders and occassionaly even hot pockets of natural gas or coal seams that can burst back into flame when exposed to air. 
*  '''Firebugs''':  These massive vermin are perverted by the touch of Shadow on the land. The unholy fires affected these bettle-like bugs that normally lie dormant under the soil, whating for an opportunity to feed on new green shoots and fertilize the ash-laden soil with their excrement; but in the Burning Line their is no regrowth to norish them and they become ravenous predators.
*  '''Faergral''' Man, Elf, Orc, Ogre, etc... These horrors of the searing heat and chokeing smoke of the Burning Line are a hideous form of Fell. Combinations of unleashed magics, terrible slaughter and the awakened spirits of fire and the dead have created the Faergral, the Flaming Dead. Damned to restless undeath until their bodies are consumed by fire. Even the Maelgral are more cunning, as the pain of theirimmolation often cracked as their outer shells.  The risen Faergral focus on lonly one thing: to spread its pain and burning destruction as far as it can before consumed. 
*  There have been stories told of other things that live on in undeath within the Ash, but none are detailed enough at this time...

===What lies beyond? - the lands near Baden's Bluff===
[[Image:The-Bluff-Area.gif|thumb|the Baden's Bluff region]]
[[Image:Badans-Bluff-color.gif|thumb|Baden's Bluff proper]]
: The city of Baden’s Bluff crowns a wide peninsula that juts out into the mockingly serene azure waters of the Sea of Pelluria. The bluff is the last in a series of gentle hills that march north from the River Orh, a rich land blessed with fertile soil and good weather. The estates that the Dorn and Erenlander nobility once held here were famed for their splendid orchards, finely bred livestock, and vineyards that were the envy of the kingdom. Now, once grand manors lie in overgrown ruin or are occupied by traitorous usurpers who serve the Shadow and call themselves lords. The fine flocks and herds are gone, the pasturelands and orchards are reclaimed by the wilds, and the scions of the true lords are dead or live in secrecy among the winding back alleys of Baden’s Bluff. Towns that once dotted this pleasant land lie in echoing abandonment or have become slums where the race of men sinks into fearful ignorance, forgetting who they were and why they had once been proud. The rural folk whose ancestors lived free under the benign auspices of House Baden now eke out cruel lives as serfs forced to toil in servitude to traitors and black-hearted legates. They see little return for their back-breaking labors as the legates’ tithe-masters take most of what they grow to feed Izrador’s growing armies. Meanwhile the hateful orcs arrive from the north in never-ending numbers, their howls and the fearful beating of drums often filling the night air as they march along the Road of Ruin to the war fronts of Erethor.
: Where the blue waters of the southern Sea of Pelluria meet the rocky shoreline, a broad peninsula protrudes into a deceptively gentle sea, its length crenulated by gentle hills cloaked with dreaming woods and pleasant pastures that have long provided a bounty as rich as the sea that lies beneath them. At the tip of this promontory a bluff of gray stone rears above the water; clinging to its sides and crowning its summit is the city of Baden’s Bluff. The west side of the bluff faces the open waters of the Sea of Pelluria, its surface pockmarked by ledges and mine shafts and scarred by the working faces of long defunct quarry works. The shallower tunnels and excavations are now used by the most destitute of the Bluff’s residents as squalid tenements. On the northern and eastern flanks, the ground rises less severely and is carved by a maze of canals and alleyways that make up the Tidewood district. The northern part of this district is the claustrophobic shantytown of the Worm Docks, bound by rotting piers and the sea in the north and the broad Aransway canal to the southeast. Home to dour Dornish fishermen and grim-faced laborers, the Worm Docks are rumored to be the last dominion of the Badens in exile. The Stone Docks lie on the other side of the Aransway canal. Here is the true port of Baden’s Bluff, where ships have for centuries found safe harbor behind the dwarf-built sea wall. Occupying the north-easterly flanks of the Bluff, the craftsmen and merchant quarters of Guildall and the Well make up the Bellows District. Clinging precariously to the northern face, the slums known as the Steep provide shelter of sorts to the downtrodden and desperately poor. These are the squalid breeding grounds of disease, misery, and violence—they are Izrador’s benedictions, and are tools used well by his black priests. Beyond Guildall, the plentiful inns of Hearthhome lie in crowded and incongruous proximity to a bewildering number of sinister temples and shrines to the dark god. Along with the administrative quarter of Kingshand and its imposing halls and governmental offices, and the dilapidated residences of Weirhold, Hearthhome forms the district of Leewall. Above it all, the once splendid Baden Court crowns the bluff, and within its walls pretenders, sycophants, and bastards squat in the Badens’ palace, acting out a charade of governance and power. On the delicate balustrades of the graceful Spire, a winged horror squats where elven diplomats and emissaries once gazed at the stars. Corruption and menace hang over Baden’s Bluff like a bilious cloud, and from its gates march a seemingly endless horde of orcs, newly alighted at the Stone Docks and on their way to war against the fey in Erethor.<br> <br> The road that leads to the Burning Line passes through the wooded hills of the peninsula and traverses the borderlands bound on one side by the forests of Erethor and on the other by the Westland plains. To the east and west of the port city, the land rolls away in a series of low hills that follow the coastline, providing a northern edge to vast plains that stretch to the lush Eren River Valley in the east and the shores of the Ardune in the south. The Shadow’s grip is felt in the hill country, where the once multitudinous towns and villages of Erenland lie largely in ruin and the proud men and women of the kingdom eke out pitiful lives of servitude and toil. Only in the sea of tall sword grass can men and the last remaining halflings snatch some freedom from the Shadow’s tyranny, but their existence is a hounded one as orc bands led by traitorous men hunt them through the plains.
: The Baden’s Bluff district stretches south and east from the Green March in an almost 200-mile arc around the city. Officially, Count Halrion, the bastard Baden, rules Baden’s Bluff, the largest human city on the southern coast of the Pelluria. 

====Baden's Bluff Districts====
*  Leewall 
**  Weirhold 
**  Hearthhome 
*  The Crown 
**  The Spire 
**  Baden Court 
**  The Watch
**  Kingshand 
*  The Bellows
**  The Well 
**  Guildall 
**  The Steeps
*  Tidewood
**  Stone Docks
**  Worm Docks
**  The Quarries

====the Trollskarl forest====
: In the Last Battle, the Shadow’s forces teemed with countless orcs, terrifying fire-breathing dragons, foul demons, raging giant-kin, and other monstrous horrors out of the wild places of the world. One of the abominations put to devastating use against the human cities and elven woods were trolls bred in the vile pits north of the Highhorn mountains. These creatures, twisted by malice and hate, were often in the front of the Shadow’s onslaughts and bore the brunt of the defenders’ wrath. It was therefore not surprising when, in the aftermath of the war, a number of trolls fled their orcish masters and hid themselves in the wilds of Erenland. A large group escaped into the woods now known as Trollskarl. Over the last century, the trolls’ numbers have increased and the forest has become infested with them. Quite apart from the trolls, which orcish hunting parties sometimes attempt to capture, there is a palpable menace in the Trollskarl that is said to arise from a great spirit that haunts the dark center of the woods. The trolls are said to serve this entity, going as far as calling it queen. A mysterious series of power nexuses that lay at their center. The nexuses have been masked by this spirit from the attention of the Shadow and luring hundreds of enemy troops inside her woods to their doom.

====Arwich====
: Arwich is a rundown border town built on the ashes of an older settlement that lies at the end of the Road of Salt and Tears. A century ago, Arwich was a thriving merchant city that enjoyed great wealth arising from the salt trade and close contacts with the nearby Green March. The city was sacked at the end of the Third Age, its fine buildings reduced to smoking slag by dragon fire and the salt mines claimed by goblins and orcs. After the Last Battle, Arwich was left deserted for decades. As the arcs turned to years and the war in Erethor continued interminably, hunger threatened to halt or even reverse Jahzir’s progress. The great herds of wild boro and gazelle on the Westland Plains required intensive hunting, and the meat spoiled quickly in the hot springs and summers of Southern Erenland. Nor could the decimated halfling and human populations of Erenland support the orcs, either as a food source or as providers of it. In the face of looming disaster wrought of their own voracious and destructive nature, the orcs were forced to adapt to the role of occupiers rather than conquerors, besiegers rather than raiders. The legates began to restore order in the rural communities, slowly resurrecting the devastated society so that it might support the very forces that destroyed it. Soon, thousands of slaves toiled in the countryside of Erenland, growing and rearing food enough to feed Izrador’s ravenous hordes. To solve the problem of spoilage, the legates reopened the salt mines at Aarl and shipped the dirty white powder by the wagon- and boat-load to Baden’s Bluff and Erenhead. The inhabitants of Arwich earn a meager living by providing food and labor to support the mining operation, although the mines themselves are worked by slaves drawn from across Eredane. 

====The Salt Mines of Aarl====
: Aarl is a wide area of rocky badlands and salt-flats that run from Arwich to the coast some fifteen miles distant. The region’s name is a corruption of the elven word for death, and the brackish pools and barren rock stained by dirty bands of crystallized salt are aptly devoid of life. The salt mines are a legacy of Erenland’s heyday. The entrance to the mine was once housed in an ornate stone dome that is now little more than a broken shell, half-buried beneath rubble and drifts of powdery salt crystals. 

====The Road of Salt and Tears====
: Just as the Road of Ruin is the chief inland highway of the area, the so-called Road of Salt and Tears is the principle road of the western coast. In the lee of the granite cliffs of Vorstuk, the rutted track leaves the Road of Ruin to wind through a sparsely populated country of lightly wooded meadowlands and low coastal hills. It wends through this picturesque landscape like a diseased vein carrying the poison of suffering and the Shadow’s hate. The main traffic consists of merchant trains taking cured meat, salt, and grain to Baden’s Bluff and the garrisons of the Road of Ruin, tempting targets for rebels who wish to inconvenience the Shadow’s war effort. 

====the River El & Elsweir====
: Not many miles from Baden’s Bluff, the Road of Ruin crosses the valley of the river El, spanning the gorge by way of a high viaduct that is a testament to the engineering mastery once possessed by the men of Erenland. A few hundred yards from the old stone bridge, a rutted track descends into the valley and follows the river to the sea. The valley is a wild and beautiful countryside of reedy marshland and sloping meadows broken by woodlands of beech and oak. Dense hedgerows and majestic elms dot the landscape, serving with the crumbling stone crofts as reminders of the region’s agrarian past. The only inhabitants left in this part of the valley are the occasional sullen-faced shepherd or goat herder and his milling, mutely staring charges. Five miles along the valley, the road comes to Elsweir, a dirty slum town built around a stone weir on a bend in the river. Long before a traveler reaches the ramshackle collection of tightly clustered hovels and rough-looking taverns, he is assailed by the stench of the town’s industries: the smell of tanning skins, butchered meat and acrid dyes combine to generate a foul miasma that causes the eyes to water and the nose to rebel. The eastern road to Elsweir is little traveled as most of the town’s produce makes its way to Baden’s Bluff by boat: it is only a short journey downstream to the river-mouth, and from there is less than an hour around the peninsula to the Stone Docks of Tidewood. Officials and legates are rare in Elsweir and the orc patrols almost never journey this far down the valley. 

====the Green March====
: In the Green March, Frag Longtusk commands an army of orcs fighting a more mobile war against a scattering of human and elven villages, attempting to bypass the elven defenses. All told a few thousand humans, orcs, gnomes, and goblins would consider themselves permanent residents of the Sea of Pelluria, but for the most part the water’s populace is donated from the shores that surround it. Of these, the southern shores boast 225,000 Dorns, 100,000 Erenlanders, and no more than 15,000 Sarcosans. Most of these populations are focused on Baden’s Bluff and Erenhead, though there is a thin line of humanity stretching along the southern shore from the Green March in the west all the way to the Kaladruns in the east, making lives wherever the resources are available and the orcs will let them.

=====Fraag Longtusk=====
: The knowledge on this Shadow minion is limited due to the fact that he is a commander of more recent note, not having given time to have collected any intel in your Lorebook or with the Elves.  He IS noted on the Maps given by Aradil and taken from Vrolk, so he must be within 1-4 steps from his Night King commander.  In the area it is extremely likely he is under the command of the King of Erenland - Jahzir Sword of Shadow...  MORE - <font color=red> '''''COMING SOON'''''</font>   

====Dern's Hold====
:  <font color=red> '''''COMING SOON'''''</font>  

====Giant's Face====
:  <font color=red> '''''COMING SOON'''''</font>  

=====Lord Eoatin=====
: The knowledge on this Elven person is limited due to the fact that he is a commander of more recent note (and the guerilla style of troop movements), not having given time to have collected any intel in your Lorebook.  He IS noted on the Maps given by Aradil and taken from Vrolk, so he must be within 1-4 steps from the Witch Queen...
: The Arrows tell you:   <font color=red> '''''COMING SOON'''''</font>    

====Elemic Knot====
:  <font color=red> '''''COMING SOON'''''</font>  


===The Northern March===
====Blood Tower of the Northern March====
:  In the early days of fighting against Izrador, the Blood Tower was known as Rokan’s Hold and was part of the great Fortress Wall of the north. The Hold was a renowned training ground for warriors and it consistently managed to bring in dozens of orc trophies a month. Its walls were adorned with grisly reminders of past battles and the men who served there were amongst the most vicious of all defenders. Even the hint of an orc could send them into murderous frenzies and the dark races eventually learned to avoid the Hold entirely.
:  During the second invasion of Izrador, the men of the Hold were put to the test. They were all that stood to stem the tide of the Shadow while the northerners retreated to shore up defenses elsewhere. For weeks, the men of Rokan’s Hold defended the tower, slaughtering any orc who dared get too near. Though the defenders fell to magic and arrows, they whittled away at the forces attacking them.
:  The arrival of a contingent of Shadow Minions spelled the doom of Rokan’s Hold. The battle for the tower raged for weeks longer, even after the arrival of the minions, until the interior of the tower was drenched in blood and the walls were plastered with gore. Though the Hold fell, its defenders became legends because they gave the northerners needed time to regroup and reorganize. The Blood Tower became a story to inspire warriors from that time forward.
Powerful magic waits in its lower regions. The powerful nexus somehow escapes the notice of Izrador’s legates and even the astiraxes. :  It is told that should heroes be able to infiltrate the Shadow’s defenses and craft magic items in the heart of one of his strongholds, the benefits would be powerful indeed: magic weapons that retain their enhancement bonuses even when within the presence of a black mirror.

:::  '''BLOOD TOWER OF THE NORTHERN MARCH'''
::::  Spell Energy: 40
::::  Feats: Craft Magical Arms and Armor
::::  Affinity: Any weapon enhancement 2
::::  Recovery: 4
::::  Special: May only be used in the creation of weapons; may only be used by those who oppose Izrador and his forces; any magic weapons created here retain their enhancement bonuses and powers even when within the presence of a black mirror.



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[[Midnight: North & South Portal|PORTAL]] &nbsp;|&nbsp; [[Midnight RPG - THE SOUTHIES|THE SOUTHIES]] &nbsp;|&nbsp; [[DURGAZ]] &nbsp;|&nbsp;  [[ERANON]] &nbsp;|&nbsp; [[ZAL'KAZZIR]] &nbsp;|&nbsp; [[Kyuad|KYUAD]] / [[Midnight: the Shadow Killers player Bill|Bill]]