Angram Freth'aran the Legend of the Battlefield

Skill List

Role

Chapter 7

Been a long while since I've been back in Seantryn proper, feels like.

Well. Not that long, but mostly its just passin through, you get me? Not
really stoppin to take it in.

But that Iskrith laddy from the chasm has tasked me to cause a magical
destructive disaster, and lets be honest here: where else would I go? We've
got unfinished business here, and he might be thinkin this would be tough
me not being a mage, but Angram Freth'aran's got his ways.

The Dragon's Head is the same as ever. Busy, full o' patrons. That'll do.
When they get to running this'll just be that much sweeter, ya know? Well,
not for them, but it'll just make this finer.

I could've put it all to the torch, and to be honest: I reckon that's what
Iskrith's expectin after our chat. Its tempting, because I do love a bit of
the arson to get me going in the mornings.

But I've got a different fire in mind tonight, see.

Noone noticed at first. Just sittin casual in the corner, ya know?

Me and me suffering pal here.

Then the first patron began to bleed out of his eyes, and people started
panicking. Too late though. The scourge is a hell of a thing, and I'd got
this one express delivery. Mages are so often so easily turned to your
purpose for such supposedly smart ladds and lasses.

I let 'em go, of course. They'd be spreading this particular fire all
through Seantryn now that the kindling be lit, and that's just fine.

Iskrith be wantin a disaster?

Angram Freth'aran drained the last of his beer. As shite as it always had
been here.

Seantryn Modan be on fire tonight, and the flames be in the blood.

Time to dispose of this mercenary. Can't be havin him whine to the guild
about breach of contract now, can I?

Role

Chapter 6

A megalomaniacal young duergar grows up in Seantryn Modan as an orphan,
delighting in the process of seeing established systems fall into ruin. He
derives a great joy in seeing what emerges from the collapse of such
systems, large and small, and believes himself to be superior to those who
blindly go along the predetermined paths laid out for them.

He eventually oversteps, causing problems for a criminal gang who realises
he is behind it. They seek to disappear him by shanking him and throwing
him into the well behind the Dragon's Head, but someone left the portal
there open and he falls in during the struggle. He spends a week in the
land beyond the well, scrabbling to survive before finally having to risk
the portal back again when a particularly malicious denizen of that land
pursues him (shadow monsters gotta eat too).

His time in the Shadow Plane inspired him, making him realise that his
ambitions so far have been so small. So lacking vision! A whole plane that
has seemingly come crashing down into a ruin, a crucible which forged him
in a scant week into something far greater than what arrived. What would it
be like to witness such a fall firsthand? To have been there at the moment
when everything comes undone? To... instigate it? To see what rises from
the ashes? This is his most fervent wish.

This is the ends to which Angram will constantly strive, a total
destruction of the established order, and he will align himself with the
Scions of the Eternal Night to achieve it.

In practice: Angram will constantly try to keep the world in a state of
conflict, both physical and socially. He will support powerful mages of an
immoral leaning (primarily Scions but he might be willing to grease the
wheels for other chaotic evil magi), simply because he believes magic is so
dangerous and destructive that it can only help end existence as we know it
faster. Basically a villager's view, but he thinks its a good thing not a
bad thing. He is fundamentally opposed to order, though might approach
undermining it in subtle ways as well as overt ones as the fancy takes him
- will try to be unpredictable here. I'd like Tribs in particular to never
be quite sure if he'll be hostile on a given day or not.

Sphere: settled on destruction. Couldn't decide between that and chaos but
it says destruction is influenced by chaos so I think that makes sense
overall as a kind of tool/result relationship.

Lastname: he was told in the orphanage his parents were from the Freth'aran
clan. Whether this is actually true or not Angram doesn't much care, it
sure makes him feel important so he claims the name.

Religion: will seek to follow Ocaiye.

Role

Chapter 5

At the time, I was proper confused. I didn't realise the ancient magic I'd
stumbled across. Sure as anything those lads didn't know, or they'd not
have been using it to chuck their evidence down. More to the point, I
didn't realise how gods damned lucky I was. Ain't rightly sure what would
have happened if that portal had been closed, but I reckon it would not
have been pretty.

But it weren't closed.

I ain't going to talk about the week I spent there. It ain't for putting to
paper. There are some secrets that are mine to keep, ya know?

But that was my crucible. That land of constant danger. That world of
silence where destruction could be around every corner. Washed out and grey,
it felt more alive than all my years in the homeland.

All the worlds a tower, pals. All the worlds a stage. But this?

This is a land where its mostly all come crashing down. A world where there
is only the struggle for another day, and that question that hangs over it
all: when will the last few pieces land?

But honestly?

Coming home was good. I had to risk the portal again eventually. I
toughened up a bit, but there is tough then there are some of the real
nasties that can end up on your heels there. The thing is?

I'm glad to be home. That place was incredible. It'd be fair to say it made
me who I am. Certainly changed my look, and maybe that's for the best.

But that's a play already written, pals. Its a clock already winding down.
It lacks a personal touch, if you get me?

I've got this whole world at my fingertips, a tower still swaying in the
wind. Ready for the toppling and ready for the watching. I figure its how
an artist feels, having seen a masterpiece and now wanting to make his own.

So lets get to poking and prodding, and setting fires. We've got a whole
pyre here ready for the lighting, and what higher calling than to be the
match which puts flame to tinder?

Lets make some magic happen.

Get me?

Role

Chapter 4

I do love the moments of inflection, pals. Those moments when it all stands
on a knife edge and can all come crashing down. I can think back over my
youth and come up with loads of them.

But the one that really changed... well, everything.

That one was a bit different. Not honestly sure I'm the same lad as I was
before it, to be honest. Not sure I'm still all me. Hard to know. Am I less?
Or am I more. I suppose it could be both.

Judge for yourselves.

See, I got a little bit too big for my new steel capped boots. A little bit
too confident. There's a fact of the world too: poke and prod and
eventually the world pokes back, and let me tell you I'd done a fair bit of
poking and prodding lately.

Turns out I'd not been as subtle as I thought, and one of my plans had come
a calling. Not sure which to this day, to be honest. I had been getting a
bit carried away with the old arson lately, so... eh. Who even knows what
it was.

I was packing up in the Dragon's Head one night after a good long day.
Whispering in ears. Patting backs. You know how it goes. Looking for the
next opportunity as you do.

Bar was mostly empty when the three of them came. Dragged me out bac,
without a word. I'm pretty good at reading the room, ya know? Noone drags
you out the back of the Dragon's Head for a chat. The innkeeper don't ask
questions, and noone tells him lies. Its a good system.

Unless you're the one being dragged, anyway.

I don't reckon I really grasped how proper screwed I was until they took me
down into the catacombs. I've never been down there. Never really saw the
need. But when I saw that great big well and one of the ones not holding me
pulls out a knife as casual as you please I got the message.

Disposal job. No body, no crime.

So I did what any duergar worth his salt would do in my place I reckon.

I kicked the one holding me in the nads. Steel capped boots, remember?
Nicked them off some vender. Hope he's doing well, and I mean that from the
bottom of my gods damned black heart.

So. About that inflection point.

I reckon on any other day, he just lets go of me and I leg for it when he
makes that noise that every man instinctively can sympathise with even when
they're the reason for it. Maybe I make it out, I'm a quick bastard when I
want to be. Maybe they catch up and that's that.

That weren't what happened though.

This lump fell against me instead.

And I went a tumbling down into the well.

Role

Chapter 3

I started small. Cut me some slack, pals. My ambitions weren't always as
big as they are now. Some folks say causing chaos is easy, but they ain't
got a clue. Causing chaos is an artform. You've got to stoke the fire under
that cauldron. Keep it bubbling away. Don't let it boil over until just the
right time.

The boiling over is honestly the easy part. The constant state of
uncertainty? Its a process. That's hard. You can't just wake up one day and
be all 'eh, not today'. Give them an inch, and order takes a gods damn mile.
These systems they've built always try to stabilise. You've got to keep
nudging.

So I started by causing trouble among the street gangs. Some of the older
orphans were involved in the 'trade' so to speak, and one in particular had
my eye. Liked to take my shite, ya know? Go through my things. Shake me
down for anything I'd scrounged. Don't be judging me, now. He was a
minotaur, had a good four feet on me if he had one, and while I like a
scrap, back then I had more of the gift of gab than the gift of stab.

It were surprisingly easy, though. I cleaned pots for coppers in the
Dragon's Head, and there ain't no better place to get a rumour started. Got
to chatting with someone I knew and offhand mentioned I'd seen my dear
minotaur pal chatting to the city watch.

Terrible thing. He ended up getting a right beating and getting left in a
warehouse to cool his hooves a bit.

It burned down with him inside.

Bad luck, eh?

Role

Chapter 2

I'm told my parents were palace guards. From the Freth'aran clan too. Not
bad, eh? Not really sure who they are, but sounds important, so I'll take
it.

I've no reason to doubt it. Seantryn Modan isn't exactly built on charity,
but it is built on being practical. If your guards get their skulls cracked,
getting their kids enrolled in a state orphanage is just good business.
Get that assembly line churning, eh? Get them feeling greatful. Get them
feeling... patriotic.

Well. Mixed results. A nice thought though.

Tell you the truth, my childhood was alright. There were no beatings I
didn't have coming, and while it wasn't three square meals a day it was at
least two vaguely triangular ones. Some people might be feeling a spot
dismayed to hear that, though that just means you've probably got it good.
That's a damn shame, because a lesson I learned right quick: its the
hardships which make us. Its that struggle. That fight.

Seantryn ain't a nice place. It chews weaklings up, specially kids. Maybe
they vanish onto boats and ain't seen again. Maybe one vanishes one day
then you stumble over a corpse in an alley a few weeks later. Grim, for
sure, but what you going to do?

Get tougher, that's what. Learn what the world is really about. Its a
duergar eats duergar world out there pals, and you can either be slaked or
sliced. Pick one.

But enough about that. You're not here for Seantryn Modan. You're here for
me, and ain't that just the best of choices?

You see. Toughening up is a nice benefit of growing up in a bubbling
cauldron with all the nastiness floating on top. Sure is. But there's
something way better about it.

Even a novice can give that mess a bit of a stur. Catch my drift?

Let me tell you about it.

Role

Chapter 1

What is the point?

There is a game that I learned in the orphanage.

It was a foolish game, tell you the truth. Or at least, the way we played
it was.

Simple enough in application though. We would stack wooden blocks in a
tower. Sometimes tall, sometimes not. Then, we would sit about the tower in
a circle and each remove a block from the middle or base of the tower
before trying to balance it back on top.

I learned a lot about my fellow orphans playing that game. Some would take
blocks as high as the rules would permit, a safer choice for those with a
steady hand, and on the face of things an optimal strategy. Some would
always take blocks as low as possible. Each success of a block coming loose
and the tower standing being met with cheers. Some methodical, some random,
some simply indifferent.

Some attempted to cheat. To stack the tower in such a way as to ensure
certain places were safer to pull from than others.

The tower always fell though. Someone always lost in the end, and it was
almost always me.

"Oi. Who is this nutter?"

I just can't help myself, ya know?

You see, there is a truth to this game that noone really understands. Its a
game made to lose. Blocks from the top, blocks from the bottom. Chipping
away at that tower one brick at a time. A gradual undermining.

You can clap your hands and cheer as it sways and holds. You can gasp in
awe as a block from the foundation slides free and it stands tall, defiant
and spitting in the face of reason. You can point to the tower, and cry:
'look. Is it not wonderful?'

But really?

"Will someone get him to pipe down?"

The only way to win?

The only one to have real agency in the game of slow decline?

Is to be the one who gets to say when the tower falls. The other players at
the table will laugh and smile. They'll see the scattered blocks, so much
rubble. They'll walk away, hearts all full of childish pride.

But they're all just blocks in the crumbling tower.

And I'm the architect of their fall.

I get to say when they start their tumble. I get to say how it all unravels,
and most important of all: I can't be sure quite where it'll all come down.

"A'right son. Time for you to leave."

That's the point, friends. That's the only point. The question in life
isn't who you are, or what you are, or what you do.

Its are you a block in the tower?

Or are you the one who kicks it over?

Its really that simple.

Shall we begin?

Na, not yet.

Lets build the tower first.
- Angram Freth'aran monologuing to a somewhat confused gathering in a
Galadon bar just trying to enjoy some Yuletide cheer, shortly before it
mysteriously caught fire.

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