Difference between revisions of "Raiz Kai"

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Raiz Kai, The Earthbound, 3rd level male neutral half-elf earth singer

son Rhyma Shadowstride, of the clan of the Crimson Shadow, of the tribe of the Iron Runners

Strength: 18

Dexterity: 17

Constitution: 16

Intelligence: 19

Wisdom: 16

Charisma: 14

Born: Free Year -4, 21st Year of the 190th King's Age, The Year of Enemy's Agitation, 4th of Assalia (month), age: 23

Height: 6 ft., 2 in.

Weight: 145 lbs.

Campaign: Dark Sun - Sun and Stars Campaign

Summary

Family

Mother: Rhymana Shadowstride

Raiz Kai was born the son of Rhymana, a fleet-footed elf who possessed the power to move shortly ahead of her tribe with but a thought, and for this power was named Shadowstride in her youth. A fecund woman, Rhymana has had a great many children, and in the elven custom, almost all the children were born to different fathers. One such father was a human wizard named Manos, who was briefly Rhymana's slave. When buying the handsome man for her amusement in the city of Nibenay, he pleaded that she buy the scrolls he was captured with. Being at that time quite wealthy, she accepted. During their few months together she became pregnant with Raiz Kai. One night, Manos was templars of Nibenay and she never saw him again.

Rhymana kept Manos' scrolls however, but only years later did she take serious interest in them. Soon she realized the scrolls contained numerous spells, and in time her genius learned to cast the most basic spells on her own.

The granddaughter of a deceased clan chief of the Crimson Shadows, Rhymana has slowly built herself to become the de facto clan chief, eclipsing chief Enmaker. In recent years, her wit and skill in building alliances, as well as her growing magical talent and large number of children, has allowed her a senior position in the tribe at large. Upon the death of Chief Kai'Zamon, she consolidated her position as one of the most powerful leaders of the tribe, leading two clans on her own merit, the Black Iron clan and her own Crimson Shadows.

Rhymana can be a cold mother, perhaps because of the large number of her children. She makes no apologies for having left Raiz Kai to die from exposure, yet often is affectionate when it is most efficacious for her. She is known for her incredible brilliance, even for an elf, and is able to string together a vast network of contacts both in and out of the tribe to support her in her position. Rhymana may be more ambitious than anyone yet knows.

Background

Birth and Exposure at the Silent Kings

Raiz Kai was born to the Iron Runners tribe in the Year of Enemy's Agitation of the 190th King's Age, born in the wilderness near the Silent Kings, a formation of strange uninhabited hills on the other side of a vast and deadly unnamed salt plain at the southern edge of the Tablelands and the known world. The hills were blessed with three precious springs, and the Iron Runners, nearly dead from lack of waters, drank from the scant drips that came forth. Raiz's mother, Rhymana Shadowstride, was so dehydrated and weakened from the salt plain crossing that she nearly died giving birth, and her own half-elf child was born weak and gray, desiccated by the starvation of its mother and defiler magic of the Iron Runners wizard, Karmathon, whose magic had helped the tribe cross the desert, but at a great cost. Inspecting the child and beholding a maligning birthmark (insert description), the callous Karmathon, already having despoiled much of the precious verdant ravines of the hills to fuel his vile magic, declared that the infant would not live, and that by his consultation with the stars, the child would bring doom to the tribe if it lived. Rhymana took the infant to the most desolate ravine, and exposed it, as is the fate of many half-elven children. However, when the she-elf left, an elderly human man appeared, a cleric of great power, and saved the child from the elements.

Pushed to their limits after the defeat of elven tribal coalition army under Nigondal of the Fire Stalker Tribe by the gith army of Ekbor of the Canyon of Ohn, the defeated Iron Runner elves were forced to cross the massive and nameless salt flats northeast of Celik, lest they be pursued by the gith. Severely depleted of water and many elves already wounded and otherwise near death, the Iron Runners, in desperation, turned to their wizard, the defiler Karmathon, who offered to cast a powerful spell over each clan that would give them strength enough to cross the endless salt, but might prove fatal to the weakest among them. Not all the clan chiefs agreed, having only just witnessed the failure of Nigondal the Fire Stalker's defiler, Piloth, in the battle with the gith. However, the chief of the Iron Runners, the cruel Kai'Zamon, insisted there was no other way. Karmathon's magic was cast on each clan in succession, and although it gave strength to their legs and stamina to their weakened hearts, the enchantment spoiled their food and water, and drained the spirits of the weakest amongst them, and more Iron Runners died on the salt flats than in the battle with the gith.

The Crimson Shadows Steal Back Raiz Kai

Years later, the Crimson Shadow clan returned to the Silent Kings, bringing a shipment of precious Tyrian iron to be smuggled into the great coastal city of Balic. While resting at the springs, an elder son of Rhyma named Rimmon, an adolescent youth, discovered a young half-elf boy tending a small herd of kank. To his surprise, Rimmon recognized the (insert birthmark description), and remembered the mark upon the infant son of his mother who had been exposed in years before. Scouting further, Rimmon found a hidden tent and camp, ensconced in a narrow and remote ravine in the hills. Rimmon told the clan chief, Enmaker. In counsel, Enmaker decided that the boy was the property of the tribe, and selected a party of warriors to take the boy back. At night, the band of elven warriors descended silently upon the encampment, and stole the boy with hardly a noise. Although sure to keep him quiet, they could do nothing when the terrified boy teleported from their grasp and returned to the small tent. His excited voice then awoke his mentor. The old man appeared, staff in hand, to defend the boy. The elves mocked and threatened the old man, and paid his threats no heed. When they approached to seize the boy again, the old shepherd raised a hand and spoke some words, and the greatest of the warriors, Nathom, turned to stone. Outraged, the elves rushed to slay the man with their bone and obsidian swords, but not one of their blades could harm the old hermit, who fought back with his gnarled staff, crushing bones and smashing out teeth. At last, the warrior Nithol seized the half-elf boy, and began leading the retreat out of the ravine, just as the hermit smashed in the brains of the elf warrior Withon Flint-Eyes, killing a second one. The elves then fled, but old hermit took a stone and threw it at the elves, crushing Nithol to death and smashing another's arm. Rimmon, the youngest of the party, took hold of the half-elf boy and they fled.

The Silent Kings, so called by the elves for the eerie silence of their craggy escarpments, was the home to Raiz Kai for the first years of his life. Far from cities and villages or from any hint of civilization, Raiz Kai was reared under the tutelage of the nameless man he simply called father. Taught to respect the delicate balance of nature and despise defiling, Raiz Kai was endured a lonely existence hidden in the isolated ravines of the hills, raising domesticated kanks for their honey, and living off the fruits and vegetables of his "father's" small gardens. Told the truth about his origins, the boy was raised to revere the spirits of the earth, that brought life and perfect stability to the world. His simple existence was however not to last, for in his 11th year, the elves that had once abandoned him to die came back to reclaim him.

With three of their warriors dead, Rimmon and those remaining in the party returned to the camp of the Crimson Shadows, awakening their fellows clan members. Told of what happened, Enmaker called up all the other warriors of the clan and readied his own sword to personally slay the hermit in vengeance, but the clan became terrified when a tremor struck their camp, and from the hill a mass of rocks and boulders came alive to attack them, with the once harmless hermit not far behind. Fearing a massacre if they continued to attack the powerful old man, elf women and men pleaded for Enmaker to not risk further lives and flee the hills immediately. Enmaker relented, but before they escaped, the vengeful cleric brought about an earthquake, which swallowed in the great cracks in the earth it caused six more members of the clan, a young warrior, two women and three children.

Raiz Kai the Daeg

With nine dead, Raiz Kai was loathed by the Crimson Shadows, and treated very harshly. Eventually, he was brought to Kai'Zamon, the chief of the Iron Runners, who judged him a daeg, an untrusted outsider who was little better than a slave. Given the elf name of Raiz Kai, based partially on the name of his human father, the wandering adventurer-wizard preserver Kaimon, he was called Raiz Kai "Nine-Lives", mockingly named as such because of the lives he was worth in order to take back.

Raiz Kai might have been killed by the near-kin of the elves that had taken him from his hermit father, the young boy was protected by his mother Rhymana and her long-brother (paternal brother) Zalhereon. Although not especially loving, Rhymana refused to let her erstwhile son be murdered in vengeance. She taught her son to be strong, and to help her gather power, in order to become a great member of the clan and of the tribe as a whole. Raiz Kai's greatest enemy at this time was the tribal defiler, Karmathon, who despised the half-elf as an abomination who had had been fated to die, but had cheated nature of the fate intended for him. Not a full elf, Karmathon nearly succeeded in having Raiz Kai expelled from the tribe altogether, but his attempt was blocked by Rhymana, a budding wizardess in her own right, but a preserver and not a defiler.

It being well known that he had been raised in his early years by a very powerful and mysterious cleric of earth and stone at the edge of the known world, Raiz Kai was of interest to the tribal earth singer, Lanrik Iron-Singer. Lanrik revered iron, obsidian, flint rock, silver and gold, and wood--the practical goods of the earth. An iron-maker in his own right, Lanrik's worship of the fruits of the earth viewed defiler magic as a useful compliment to the tribe's power. Despite the start contradiction to Raiz Kai's father's teachings, Lanrik nonetheless still received the spells from the spirits of the earth. Lanrik asked many questions about Raiz Kai's father, seeking details as if meaning to strike at the old man in the future.

The Defeat Before the Balicans, the Death of Lanrik Iron-Singer, and the Raiz Kai's Return to the Silent Kings

The Iron Runners, so named for their iron shipment runs from distant Tyr to the cities of the east, grew wealthy under the leadership of their chief Kai'Zamon. The chief used the wealth to arm some of their warriors with iron arrow heads and even a few with iron swords, and it was clear he meant to become a great chief, like Nigondal the Fire Stalker, who had led a coalition of thousands of elves, and for a time had lived like a king. Seeking the silver of the city of Balic, famed for its silver mine, one of the last in the known world, Kai'Zamon made a pact with the exiled Balican general Zanthiros, and helped Zanthiros raid Balican merchant caravans crossing into the west. Many merchant houses paid Zanthiros, and thus Kai'Zamon, Balican silver so as not to be raided. Kai'Zamon became very rich, and began to groom the alliance of other elf tribes to serve him as dependents, as Nigondal had done in years past.

Eventually, the Balican state grew weary of Zanthiros and his elven allies, and the Balicans sent an army to deal with the raiders. Surprised and overwhelmed by an amphibious landing, an infantry approach along the Balican peninsula, and the simultaneous secret attack of a bought-off gith army, the Iron Runners and their coalition of elf tribes broke upon a wall of Balican spears and the savagery of the gith charges. The Basalt Runners were all but destroyed, and the Sirocco Runners, Sunset Stalkers, and Sun Runners suffered heavy losses. The Iron Runners did not escape these losses, and amongst the dead was the Iron Runners' only cleric, Lanrik Iron-Singer.

With his elf alliance broken and his erstwhile human ally Zanthiros having escaped with his forces into the deep desert, Kai'Zamon and his clan chiefs and advisors held counsel in the foothills of the White Mountain. Wishing to gather their power once again, and this time lead Zanthiros and any other allies, Kai'Zamon announced his intention to sack Balic and teach its citizens the cost of making an enemy of the Iron Runners. Amongst their plans to accomplish this was to have trained a new tribal iron-singer, but the Iron Runner elves did not know of any earth clerics left who were powerful enough to initiate a new cleric. To the defiler Karmathon's strong protest, Zalhereon, a veteran and respected warrior and ranger of the tribe, suggested that Raiz Kai be taken back to the Silent Kings, where they would beg the daeg's old mentor for the power to make another earth cleric. Kai'Zamon agreed, and Zalhereon declared he would take the boy back there himself.

Receiving the blessing of Rhymana, who was ever desirous to accrue power through her children, Raiz Kai was taken back across the deep desert to half-elf's first home, escorted by his uncle Zalhereon and his immediate followers. Zalhereon, an experienced ranger with true reverence for the land and its preservation, taught Raiz Kai much during this journey.

Raiz Kai and the Initiation

The unnamed hermit of Silent Kings was not pleased by the return of the elves, and did not appear pleased by the return of his erstwhile "son". The old man despised the Iron Runners for freely admitting a defiler within their tribe, who had in years before, when Raiz Kai was born, defiled and forever made infertile one of the three springs of his sacred hills. Zalhereon pleaded forgiveness, asked even to receive the old hermit's teachings in return for service to the Earth in recompense. The old man suggested two tasks, one being to kill the Iron Runner defiler, Karmathan. Zalhereon refused to kill a member of his own tribe, but suggested he might kill any other defiler. The cleric named an evil hermit defiler yet even further south, in the deep wastelands, an enemy to life and the earth. Leaving Raiz Kai behind, he took his three followers and vowed to return with the named defiler's heart. In the absence, Raiz Kai and his father had uncomfortable encounters, and the old man attempted to deprogram or at least question the half-elf about the elven ways that had sunk into his heart since their years apart. The old man pressed to see if Raiz Kai still had in his heart the respect for the earth that he had been taught as a boy, or if he was forever corrupted by the amoral ways of the Iron Runner elves.

At last Zalhereon returned, but alone, for his three companions had died in killing the defiler. Grim and despondent, Raiz Kai's uncle at first did not agree to the second task, but turned around and asked for it. Zalhereon was asked to kill Karmathan again, and again refused. Instead, the old man said he would go with him himself on a quest of an unknown nature. For a month Raiz Kai was left alone in the home of his birth, but the two eventually returned, with his uncle deeply changed.

The old cleric then said he would agree to take on the boy as a pupil, but it was not assured Raiz would survive Initiation. Zalhereon left, promising that if the boy was granted the power, he and his nephew would use their powers to turn the Iron Runners from defiling and to preserving, and that they would kill defilers wherever they found them. After both promising this pact, the hermit agreed to teach Raiz Kai and prepare him for the rites of initiation. Zalhereon left his nephew, returning to the tribe, and Raiz Kai's tutelage resumed in earnest.

For a year Raiz Kai studied under the nameless man who had saved his life as a child. The cleric tested him and his resolve to protect what was left of Athas from the abomination of the defilers. At last, whether through Raiz Kai's deceit or his honesty, or some mix of the two, the ancient hermit, after a year and more, at last agreed to conduct the Initiation. When the ritual began, at sundown, the old cleric began chanting, and covered the young half-elf in mud gathered from four different riverbeds, inscribing the mud with strange symbols before a fire burning with deep roots dug from dead trees. Raiz Kai prayed all night, calling for the earth spirits which he had had never heard, reciting spells and petitions which had never been answered. At dawn, Raiz Kai was taken deep within one of the gorges of the Silent Kings, one that was rich with fertile earth and plant growth around a secret spring. In the midst of this, the half-elf beheld a terrifying open pit, no doubt dug by the ancient hermit, and he was bid to climb in. Then the old man began to bury Raiz Kai alive, being told that if the spirits of earth accepted him, he would emerge at sundown alive, and if not, then he would die. The rocks and earth caved in, and Raiz Kai was left entombed. Terrified, Raiz Kai was magically sustained by his master's spell, and his soul was investigated as he petitioned for the earth spirits to receive him as a servant. All the day, Raiz Kai was tested, but only at the end, when at last his body seemed about to be crushed by the rocks and suffocated by the earth, did he finally hear the voices of the earth elementals. Granted their powers in his own right, Raiz Kai burst through the fertile earth in which he had been buried, emerging as a genuine cleric of earth.

Buried in a pit of fecund earth from dawn to twilight, Raiz Kai all but died, and was reborn a cleric of earth. Earthbound and utterly inhumed, Raiz Kai only heard the voices of the elementals just as the last breath of life left him, and when his last flicker of life was about to extinguish forever. Rising from the earth, Raiz Kai now walks upon it, but now visited always by the voiceless mutters of the spirits to which he is now bound, a living conduit of their power on Athas.

Raiz Kai Returns to the Iron Runners

His initiation complete, Raiz Kai was bidden by his former master to go forth and defend the earth wherever he might, and to bring death to the defilers wherever he found them. They parted, with the old man's grave warning never to betray the spirits and the cause to which he had sworn his life. The old man awarded the boy several magical fruits and other small gifts, including a small skein of wine made from the berries of the gorges of his birth, enchanted to cure any disease and remove any poison.

Raiz Kai returned to the Balican peninsula, east of the Tharian Hills, where he last new the Iron Runners dwelt. On his journey he had several adventures, but the grave voices of the elementals, at times maddening, at times comforting, and at times utterly esoteric, whispered to him obscure wisdoms and arcane truths, but now when he called, the spirits answered, and the spells his master taught him now finally granted him the power he needed to survive and be strong.

When Raiz Kai returned, he learned from allied elf tribes that once again the Iron Runners were gathering strength. The city-state of Balic was in the midst of internal dissention, and was about to be invaded by a foreign army of ex-slaves from the west. Kai'Zamon, he was told, was saying that the time was ripe to sack Balic, and take its riches so that the Iron Runners could live like oasis kings, and be respected and feared as the Fire Stalkers once were in the deep south.

At last Raiz Kai found his tribe in the desert, and was hailed by his mother, who had grown quite powerful in his absence both magically and politically, as the new Iron-Singer of the Iron Runners. Although at first not welcomed by the Iron Runners upon his return, detested for his past and being a half-elf, it was judged by Kai'Zamon that the new iron-singer could not also be a "daeg", and thus this status was lifted from him by the chief. Quickly after this, Raiz Kai's new powers to magically heal and provide other miracles more than proved his worth, and although his enemies amongst the tribe remained, many others who had no personal cause to hate him began to accept him as a genuine member of the tribe.

The Death of Kai'Zamon

On the 20th of Hexameron, the Year of Guthay's Contemplation, Balic fell to Xal'gren, general of an army of freed slaves. General Zanthiros, the long-time rogue and outcast general of Balic, saw his chance to capitalize on the instability in the city, and called together his allies, including the elves of the Iron Runners and those tribes still loyal to their coalition.

In this environment, Raiz Kai healed the wounds of a clan chief's daughter, and was at last hailed as a true tribesman of the Iron Runners, even though he was still despised by many, and still called Raiz Nine-Lives. Nonetheless, Kai'Zamon himself now accepted him as a member of the tribe, and allowed him a place at the chieftain's side at council as the young iron-singer of the Iron Runners.

The approaching war troubled Raiz Kai's mother Rhymana, and although officially supportive of chief Kai'Zamon, she subtlety suggested to tribal leaders that warring with the Balicans was folly, even though they no longer had a sorcerer-king. Privately, she told her son and close allies that Kai'Zamon would only likely bring devastation and the deaths of hundreds of tribesmen should they go to war, or if by some off-chance Kai'Zamon and Zanthiros' alliance should somehow prevail and actually sack Balic, it would only consolidate Kai'Zamon's power and cement the influence of the defiler Karmathan over the tribe. Without Raiz Kai's knowledge, she therefore planned to poison the mighty chieftain when the tribes rallied before the power-hungry Kai'Zamon's tent, and with the help of her clan and other followers, aimed to take his place.

When the day came, Rhymana brought her clan and allies early to the gathering of the tribes, and commanded her son Rimmon, who had kidnapped Raiz Kai years before, to supply a magical poison she had been secretly brewing to the great chief's wine. A clever rogue, Rimmon planted the poison well in the chief's skein, but as the tribal gathering began, the powerful magic of the defiler Karmathan detected the poison. Already enemies with Rhymana for her practice of preserver magic in opposition and competition with his own sorcery, Karmathan immediately suspected Raiz Kai's mother, immediately increased the chief's guard, and seizing the poisoned wine skein, left to bring the other clans and tribes so that Rhymana's followers would be overwhelmed and give her up to the chief's outrage. Sensing the distress of his mother, calculating that she had meant to poison Kai'Zamon, and seeing that she and her close allies had been outmaneuvered and would soon be revealed as aparty to a plan to assassinate the tribal chieftain, Raiz Kai chose to act.

Knowing of the magical poison, Raiz Kai teleported to his mother's study tent and seized the remainder of the bubbling potion from the blue-flamed coals on which it brewed. Placing an enchantment on himself, Raiz Kai teleported back to the chief's tent with the vial of poison secreted in his robes. As the day progressed, the tribes gathered, and Raiz Kai watched as the ambitious defiler Karmathan scurried from chief to chief, secretly informing the tribal and clan leaders that Rhymana of the Crimson Shadows had attempted a plot on the great chief's life, and that at the signal, once Kai'Zamon was informed and the Crimson Shadows were fully surrounded and unable to escape, Rhymana and her chief followers would be seized and put to death.

Trusted by Kai'Zamon as a poison-taster in his own right, with his spells providing him the power to detect poisons, Raiz Kai drew near to his chieftain and patron who had supported him and named him Iron-Singer. Seeing Karmathan approach the great chief as well, waiting for the perfect moment to expose his mother, Raiz Kai made the first move. Publically hailing and addressing the chief before the tribes, Raiz Kai thanked Kai'Zamon for allowing him, a half-elf, to not only survive but prosper as an Iron Runner, for it was by the great chief's leave that he had been allowed to become the tribe's new iron-singer. Pouring a wooden goblet from his skein of prized magical healing wine, Raiz Kai announced that the juice would bring the chief renewed youth, and that this was a gift of good will from his mentor, the Hermit of the Silent Kings, who hoped the chief would lead the elves to help protect the earth in their conquests rather than defile it. Accepting the prized drink which was coveted by the elves, Raiz Kai drank first to alleviate any lingering suspicions from the chief. The chief drank, and Kai'Zamon even made a comment criticizing Karmathan and his defiling arts, suggesting that the elves gained little by despoiling desert grazing lands their flocks could never use in the future. However, within two minutes, Kai'Zamon began to feel ill. Moments later he fell to the ground, grasping his breast, flailed uncontrollably, and died, his veins turning black. Raiz Kai feigned to help him, even casting pointless healing magic as if to save the great chief.

Karmathan, eager to be rid of his chief rival Rhymana, immediately called the sorceress out, saying that she had framed her own son, one of Kai'Zamon's patrons and loyal tribesmen, in a bid to win power for herself. Raiz Kai however stood on a prominent rock, and declared that his mother knew nothing of the assassination, and that he had poisoned the great chief on his own volition, for whereas Kai'Zamon may have supported him, he was still a friend of defilers, and would have brought disaster to the tribes by making war with the Balicans just as Nigondal of the Fire Stalkers had done 23 years before. He declared he had to kill Kai'Zamon, and before the stunned crowd, dumped out the poisoned juice from one skein, which smoked on the rock upon which he stood, and then drank from another skein, which healed the poisons which were more slowly leaking past his protective spell. Karmathan then cast a red lightning bolt, but the spell was blocked by a blue sphere of protection from Rhymana. Karmathan called for Raiz Kai to be killed, and so the cleric teleported as far away as he could.

Raiz Kai and Rhymana

It was two days later when the Crimson Shadow skyminder sought out Raiz Kai telepathically for where he was, and another three before his mother appeared, running and psionically dimension dooring as she crossed the wastes to find her son's hiding place. Raiz Kai had sacrificed all his credit with the tribe for his mother's benefit, and made himself anathema. She said that whatever doubts she had regarding her son were gone, and that she would never forget his sacrifice for her sake and the sake of his siblings. She said that in the aftermath of Kai'Zamon's death, the Iron Runners tribe had fragmented. Rhymana had accused Karmathan of creating an elaborate ruse to assassinate his own chief, using his magic to control her son, while Karmathan persisted with the argument that Rhymana's son was lying and that he had in truth poisoned the chief at her suggestion. A third party, Na'Zamon, the son of the chief, had declared that he was now the rightful chieftain, and would not follow either Karmathan nor Rhymana. The tribe's seven great clans had split along party lines, with Rhymana taking the Black Iron clan with her Crimson Shadows, with Karmathan taking the Black Arrows, the Basalt Runners, the Sky Reavers and the Gold Moon Stalkers, and with Na'Zamon leading the large Iron Arrow clan.

Rhymana said that although the tribe had splintered, and the tribal coalition with it, at least the Iron Runners would not all be killed in a pointless war with Balic. In time, she promised she would see an end to Karmathan, and reunite the tribe under her leadership. Once she was named chief, she promised that she would restore Raiz Kai to prominence within the tribe. But to do these things, she said, she needed time and power. She said that Raiz Kai might help her with the latter.

When Raiz Kai was gone for his Initiation, new Iron Runner raids had sacked a caravan belonging to the Balican merchant dynasty of House Wavir, and killed the preserver wizard that helped defend it. In one of the massive caravan wagon's rooms, the elves found the wizard's books, and Rhymana found in one such very old book a description of a temple of the ancients on an islet off the island of Idethys in the Silt Sea. The wizard had been doing considerable research on the temple, with many notes. A Balican history recorded that a Balican admiral once landed on the islet, curious about its ancient ruins, but upon landing and passing the entry seal to the ancient temple they were confronted by undead, and after fighting passed these, were challenged by a powerful spirit whose earth-based magic defeated even the admiral's powerful templar spells. The admiral commanded his fleet sorcerers, both preservers and defilers, to use their wizardry to the destroy the spirit, but the spirit held a strange ginger-colored stone that prevented them from drawing energy from plants to use their spells. They were forced back, and an earthquake in the silt swallowed much of the admiral's fleet. He never returned. According to the House Wavir wizard, the mysterious icon the spirit held is still at the temple. Rhymana believes it is worth a try to see if the Wavir wizard's research is accurate, for the surviving passages indicate that its possessor can prevent wizards from drawing magic to fuel their spells. She also thinks that Raiz Kai might have more luck with the spirit, if it still exists, because he is neither a templar nor a wizard, but a cleric of earth. Perhaps Raiz Kai could convince the spirit to give him the icon, or if need be, take it from the ghost by force. With the icon, they could use it to defeat Karmathan and reunite the tribe. Either way, even if it is an empty lead, Raiz Kai will spend time away from the tribe, giving his mother time to prepare the way for his return.

Adventures

Equipment, Magical Items, Ownership

Psionic Summary

Teleport

Constitution Score: MAC 9 (see below)

Initial Cost: 10+

Maintenance Cost: na

Range: infinite

Preparation Time: 0

Area of Effect: personal

Prerequisites: none

The user can bring his clothes, small items, and equipment (up to one-fifth of his body mass). Doubling the amount of PSPs spent to activate the power lets the user carry up to three times his body mass, or to take along up to two others he has a firm grasp on.

Distance PSP cost MAC

10 yds. 10/5 9

100 yds. 20/10 8

1,000 yds. 30/15 7

10 miles 40/20 6

100 miles 50/25 5

1,000 miles 60/30 4

10,000 miles 70/35 3

Interplanetary 100/50 2

Power Score: The PSP cost is reduced by 20 percent, rounded up.

1: no effect