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The Good Death (Day 1 of Magic Item March, a 31-day series of homebrewed magic items)

(image source: Italofile - Femmina Accabadora: The Legend of Sardinia’s Lady of the Good Death; image description: a mallet made out of dark wood lies next to a yoke made of lighter wood on a white cloth, which lies on top of a red and white lacy fabric)

weapon (light hammer), uncommon (requires attunement)

On a critical hit made with this weapon, the wielder rolls 5d8 after calculating critical damage normally. If the total rolled is equal to or higher than the target’s current hit points after the attack’s damage is dealt, it falls asleep. Once per long rest, the wielder can declare a successful attack with this weapon a critical hit.

Background

This magic mallet was hewn from a single dense piece of olive wood but is surprisingly light in the hands of its wielder. Legend says these weapons are wielded by the agabbadora, spirits who visit those languishing in between life and death. These spirits have the appearance of humanoids in light periwinkle robes with heavy gray veils covering their face and appear in the vicinity of households containing an elderly or sick person in great pain. Thrice does the aggabadora appear to the infirm, standing next to their head for three nights in a row and seeming to simply gaze into their eyes until the sun rises. On the third night, if the person wishes to leave the mortal coil, the agabbadora lightly strikes them with the mallet and they pass on peacefully. What motivates the agabbadora’s choice in patients is unknown, as they do not appear to every person desirous of mercy.

Story Hooks

The unheard of has happened - an agabbadora has gone rogue...or at least that’s what the locals are saying. Until recently, the spirits have been regarded, if not kindly, at least with some amount of respect for the dark mercy they provide. But in the last several weeks a figure in a periwinkle robe has been found over the dead bodies of fully healthy individuals, disappearing from their bedrooms as quickly as they are discovered. The death is unmistakably that provided by an agabbadora, or at least of the wooden mallet that they wield. If the culprit is really one of those death spirits, what could have caused them to act this way? And if it isn’t, who is the figure and how did they acquire an agabbadora’s mallet?

The olive mallet seemed harmless enough when you found it in the bandit’s trove. The wizard in your party identified its magic properties and handed it back to you, pronouncing it a fairly standard magic weapon. But it seems too much of a coincidence that you awoke later that night to find a periwinkle-robed figure standing next to your bed. In the blink of an eye, it was gone and you went back to sleep, but it returned the next night. Will it return tonight, and if so, what does it want?