#jor'dnaga

[kelmorvatsatiki]

The fighting was hard and bloody. The monster was one step ahead all the time. Dodging in and out of the darkness and shooting arrows beyond the partys range severely hindered any planned resistance. More jor’dnaga was hurt and the party couldn’t do anything to stop it until Mesin’ha deviced a plan to engage the monster. He and Roxanne, with the aid of magic, managed to sneak out of the entrance hall and started sneaking around the dar’gafl. Katla stayed and drew it’s fire, distracting it from the threat. 

On cue Roxanne released her final burst of magical fire while Mesin’ha went in to hamstring the creature. On the other side the rest of the expedition rushed in to flank it. Even so the fight was even. Swinging its massive sword it badly wounded most of the party. In its death throes it swung wildly and had hit Bosse in the neck if Katla hadn’t stepped in and taken the blow. Katla got a lethal wound that would eventually kill her. The party brought her back to the camp and let her rest. 

Frustrated and unable to help or do anything to help her dying childhood friend Roxanne decided to go away from the party. Boram joined in to protect her. Wandering closer to the common hall, cursing herself, she heard sounds from the far sout-eastern tower. It sounded like sobbing. Thinking it might be a prisoner the two went to investigate. In the top room they found a young jor’dnaga woman, or looked young at least, chained to the wall. She was clearly an undead, having large wounds that didn’t bleed and old caked blood around her mouth. Boram went for his weapon, but the woman pleaded for them to hear her out. 

Her name was, a long time ago, Jetna Skarisdottir. She was imprisoned by the runesmith in Fallan her being the object of his obsession. The smith loved her and vowed to make her his, even though both Jetna and her familiy said firmly no. Driven to madness by unfulfilled love he seeked other options. This led him to the dar’gafl. There he made a deal. The dar’gafl could have karak Fallan, and he would make every slain jor’dnaga there into an undead servant of the dar’gafl if he himself and his love was made immortal. The dar’gafl agreed and gave him the means to turn both himself and his beloved into undead. Only days later he opened the way into the karak, kidnapped Jetna and performed the foul ritual. The jor’dnaga was slaughtered and driven south of Vettefjellene. The smith, called Toshnad Smed, stayed behind, locking Jetna up so she would forever be his and began raising jor’dnaga and other creatures he coud kill near Fallan. 

Both Roxanne and Boram had their doubts, but believed Jetna. They also described what had happened to the party, and Katla. Jetna proposed to help them keep Katla alive if the party helped her safely south to the nearest jor’dnaga civilization. Knowing that this meant making Katla undead Roxanne and Boram agreed. What they didn’t do was explain what Jetna would do to Katla, and when Katla rose unable to feel neither pain nor pleasure they had a row.

This split the party in fragments. Katla decided she would leave as soon as they got down from the mountains to find a cure and Mesin’ha refused to stay with people that held life so cheaply, so he would leave as soon as he could. Roxanne and Boram regretted their desicion for a long time after this fight, breaking bonds between friends. Even so, everyone agreed that they needed to work together to leave at all. 

The party took of once more to search for the way out, finding it on the top floor. The mechanism for the door lay in a room where the walls had caved in, opening it up for exposure of the storm and snow. While they outwaited the storm the gathered every valuable item they could find. Jewelery, art, tablets and old weapons were all gathered and loaded on their pack animals. Then, when the storm stopped, they started the long hike home. 

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Following the trail the expedition found two men defending themselves from a troll assault. One human and one silf. The party couldn’t leave them to certain death and intervened. After a heavy fight the last troll went down. 

The silfs name was Hydar, an alchemist, and was in the mountains to search for ingredients only found this far north. His companions name was Rivera. A bard from the noble families of Alfatri. He accompanied Hydar in the hope that he could base a new epic on his adventures. Unfortunately, neither had accomplished their goal due to the dangers of the mountains. 

After seeing the prowess of the expedition the two men offered their services in exchange for the protection such a large group could offer. The journey then went further north and west to Linneberch. After some days searching the area the expedition uncovered parts of a road leading north. 

Navigating through and between the cliffs and gorges the expedition followed the road. After about a week the passed over a summit and saw a large fjord and a ruined city sprawling around the water and into the mountainsides. Everything was quiet and some light snow was begining to fall, signaling the coming end of fall. The city, unknown to the expedition, was empty. No one had lived there in decades, centuries even. The wildlife and ocean had reclaimed most of it already. 

Searching the city an underground complex was discovered. A huge room sprawled under the city center and had the same layout as Steinens minne, “Memory of the Stone”, the jor’dnaga archives and the place of worship. To stories high and both floors a perfect square. The top floor is placed askew so that from above the room forms a perfect symmetrical eight-point star. The only thing left intact in the old Memory was a dias with a large gem encrusted skull of a frost serpent. Creatures living deep in the everlasting glaciers of Vettefjellene and hunted down to the brink of extinction for their glands. The concoction produced in these glands was, and is, the sole important ingredient in the making of cold forged iron, the only known efficient weapon against creatures of the underworld.

The glands of this particular serpent was already far gone, but the skull was the only thing of value the expedition had found in the city and thus brought it with them. While the jor’dnaga engineers built a contraption large enough to lift the skull out the party searched on. In an other part of the underground complex they found a local map showing that this city was not the fabeled Fallan, but actually just Fallans closest harbour. Karak Fallan lay further west, at the very edge of Vol Iashkin, Istaket (The ice roof). Vol Iashkin was an enormous glacier resting atop the highest peaks in the area and leaning onto Ûngal hiđ moran, Evighetsspydet (The spear of eternity), the highest peak for miles. 

Packing up, the expedition left and followed the route suggested on the local map towards karak Fallan.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Mesin'ha Darakfe'en is the only child of Tanin Darakfe'en. Tanin is, as Katlas father, a noble refugee. During the jor'dnagas great cleanse of the alfatran silfs 70 years ago Tanin appealed to Endorin Garméls father about amnesty. This was granted on two conditions: first, the Darakfe'en family had to live somewhat anonymous and second the Darakfe'en had to send a representative if silf related issues should arise in Vettefjellene jarldømme. This Tanin agreed to. 46 years later Tanins wife dies in child birth. The child, Mesin'ha, grew up in Mekaran with hus father and was taught both the ways of humans and silf. The boy soon proved to be both exeptionally intelligent and agile and mastered both silf lore and fighting style quickly. By the age of 24 he was well-versed in his noble lineage, History and religion, though influenced by his fathers grudge towards the jor'dnaga. Mesin'ha soon found that, since his lessons wasn't hard enough to occupy all of his time, that he had a talent for trickery. Not that Mesin'ha was a malicious boy, on the contrary, but he found that charm and nimble fingers could achieve much that schooling could not. His curiosity to see if was able to perform feats of dexterity and charm often led him into misunderstandings. No one was ever hurt, but Tanin was soon enough informed of his sons attempts to steal somethings and then put it back unnoticed. Tanin reaction to this was surprising. Mesin'ha was scolded, not for stealing, but for beeing caught. This has made Mesin'ha trust his gifts rather than hide them and he understood that his abilities can be used for kind actions as well as bad. He strives to do kind actions towards kind people, and to soften and bend rigid, and in his eyes unfair, rules. Mesin'ha believes in people and the freedom of own choice. He loves being with people and watch and interact with social connections. He is a nobleman, but cares for the common people as well. Thrives with fun, kind and intelligent people with no regards of class, religion, gender or race, even though he is often suspicious of the jor'dnaga. In battle he is the unseen shooter, the hidden knife and a flamboyant duelist. He prefers the silf way of fighting. Weaken the enemy from afar and then hit them where it hurts. Always moving to outflank stronger and slower opponents, nipping at voulnerable spots in their armor and felling creatures twice and thrice as big and heavy.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Katla Jalisis, the daughter of Deka Jalisis, is 19 years old and very bright. Deka spent long hours teaching his daughter the ways of the world. She has become well versed in History, architecture, religion and the culture of the nobility and upper classes. During her lessons she discovered the unfairness of the world and how different people were treated on the basis on things she took for trivial. Therefore she aquired a sharp distaste for racism and fights for equal rights whenever she can. Her grandmother was Varon nobility and she fled from her home country to Alfatra due to a revolt. Deka Jalisis expressed the importance of Katlas heritage and underlined that "if you're ever going to lead, you've got to know how those you lead live". He then brought his daughter away from the noble life, to Mekaran, to start a life as a merchant and work his way up through hard work and not blood. Katla adopted this way of thinking and pursued her ambitions fervently so she could become a leader among equals. She became almost unequaled in every field she practiced and even had a talent for combat, seeing many strategies where others would fail. She soon became a solid swordswoman and uses a style that's a mix of Varon knight duelists and the jor'dnaga phalanax. In the field she's an armored hulk, Untouchable and dangerous, giving orders to work the situation in her favor her only fear being snakes and the undead. At the same time she's a scholar and diplomat and favors reason over fighting if it can be helped.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Trauge is the largest, and only, human city i Vettefjellene jarldømme(earling) . When the party got there it was calm on the outside, but something stirred beneath the surface. Katla and Mesin'ha, both familiar with politics and nobility, knew that humans and jor'dnaga had an agreement. Humans paid monthly taxes to the jor'dnaga who promised to protect the lowlands from threaths from the North. Beeing vetter or otherwise. This deal was over a hundred years old and the source of much frustration, especially in years like this when the cold had destroyed large amounts og crops. Humans no longer believed that the threat was real, since it had been peaceful so long and felt that they starved themselves to pay the jor'dnaga to protect humans against nothing. Jarl Endorin Garmél was known to speak out against the jor'dnaga and often tried to lower the taxes for humans. Jor'dnaga on the other hand took the agreement very seriously and insisted that the taxes was appropriate for the service the executed. As anyone can see: if the jor'dnaga planned the assassination on Endorin there would be turmoil and conflict between the two races. The party chose to search for clues among the criminals in Trauge first. Learning that Hakano Goldah, red hammer, was a jor'dnaga Organization and further implicated in the murder of the Jarl. The party needed to find Tezach. The man that appearently had hired Hakano Goldah.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Karak Norn Graz with its 29 clans is done. Only the fortress itself remains.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

Only 4 miles from karak Norn Graz lies the human city of Trauge. Built as the human's main trade hub with the jor'dnaga in Vettefjellene jarldømme (the earling of Vettefjellene). This is also the seat of the recently deseaced Jarl Endorin Garmél and his family.

[kelmorvatsatiki]

The beginning of karak Norn Graz. The Northern jor'dnaga (dwarven for comparison) fortress on the borders of Vettefjellene (the "correct" translation would be the goblin mountains, but a vette is not a traditional goblin. Ill come back to this later.) All my Games is in Norwegian and i want my own touch to my World. Therefore you can imagine a traditional pathfinder World and Ill describe the differences.