EdgeOfHeaven/CampaignLoresheet

Edge of Heaven (Destiny 0)

This is the loresheet for the Edge of Heaven campaign. Unless otherwise noted, there is no cost to gain access to the loresheet elements below.

Locations

Blazing Beacon

The old walls have seen better days. The gates were torn down for scrap half a century ago. The old market quarter is a ghost town, home to vermin and rubble, but no trade. The old Magistrate’s Residence, sitting on the shore of Waning Moon Lake, has been boarded up longer than anyone can remember, and anything valuable in there was stolen long ago. The willow district, once the finest on the Path, is closed for business. The stately homes of the Hill Song District are now ramshackle residences, three or four families per. The oases that once made the town an agricultural miracle still support the few hundred souls that live here, but most of the fertile land lies untended.

Of all the things that made Blazing Beacon great, only two are still standing: the great brass brazier on its stonework tower in the center of town, and the Heaven’s Edge Teahouse. The latter is — for now, anyway — the first and last choice in restaurants, teahouses, taverns and brothels. It’s a makeshift town hall, to boot; it’s Duke Ko’s place, and when the Duke thinks there’s something the needs to be discussed, that’s where it gets discussed.

• 0 Bonus: All characters begin with 1 Involvement in Blazing Beacon.
• 1+ Involvement: Perhaps you're here to make a name for yourself, or to see civilization returned, or propriety restored, or what have you. You're in the mix in the soon-to-be-booming town.
  • 1-2 Status: You’ve already made a name for yourself in town; have you done a good deed for the people, are you a friend of Duke Ko’s? If you’re new in town, how have you gotten such notice so quickly?
• 2 Destiny: Duke Ko has, by hook and by crook, kept this town alive through the lean years, and he’s bound and determined to keep his position in the town. Whether a local or a newcomer, your destiny is intertwined with his.
• 2 Fortune: Though still a small town, already a trickle of refugees from the east arrive, and soon the trickle will become a flood. Once per story, declare any newcomer to the town to be someone you know from 'back east'.

Jade Gate

• 3 Fortune: The official story of how, when and why the Owl Legion left the Jade Gate is not the real one; you’ll discover the real story, and, as is usually the case in Shen Zhou, the past isn’t dead; it ain’t even past.
• 2+ Treasure: You’ve visited the old fortress ahead of the returning Legion, and you’ve found something quite valuable — maybe a special weapon, maybe a relic, or combat manuals.
• 1+ Involvement: You’re involved with the return of the Owl Legion, either as an advanced scout, or to aid in procurement of goods and services, or perhaps you’re a veteran yourself.
  • 1-3 Fortune: You have contacts within the Legion, and can usually find out what they’re up to.

The Silk Road

• 1-5 Involvement: You are a player in the reopened Silk Road trading routes.
  • 0 Bonus: You gain a +5 Survival Specialty Bonus: Silk Road
• 1-3 Status: You are known and respected among merchants and officials as a Player in the Silk Road Trade.
• 2 Fortune: Once per story, declare a person or organization to be another player in the Silk Road trade.
• 3+ Treasure: The Silk Road brings exotic goods of all kinds from strange lands — gold, silver, jade, glassware, strange wines, spices, beasts otherwise unknown to Shen Zhou, and more. One of these treasures has found its way into your possession.

Master Jun's Library

When the Silk Road caravans were making regular stops in Blazing Beacon, they brought with them more than just the exotic wares of the west; they also brought their strange ideas and philosophies. While the Confucian and Legalist establishment took great pains to keep these ideas quarantined in the market quarter, there was a heterodox Daoist scholar who took great pains to learn whatever the foreign merchants had to say — whether it was something as trivial as weather reports, or as earth-shattering as a powerful form of kung fu. The rumors of what it contains are grandiose: sutras of a strange western two-faced god; the true Devil-Deflecting Blade Style; barbarian prayers that grant immunity in battle ... and those are the more plausible suggestions.

• 5 Destiny: You will discover one of the secrets of Master Jun’s Library. Maybe you have clues to its location already, or maybe serendipity will put you in its path.
  • -2: You are not alone in your search for the secret, and there is no guarantee that you will be the only one to discover it.
  • 10 Technique: The secret you will find is a long-lost, or perhaps never-known, style of Kung Fu.
  • 5+ Secret: As above, but the secret you discover is an Extraordinary Technique.
• 8 Victory: It is one thing to find the library, it is another to become its master. To become the Librarian is to have strange secrets at your disposal, but also the responsibility for its safeguarding.