Your character has just arrived in a swampy, dim town. As they look around, their gaze is met with shacks and cabins. It smells of rotted wood and wet moss. They duck and step into a tattered tent, illuminated by a series of candles suspended in the air. At the back of the tent, an old hag raises her head, “What brings you to this dingy town? She begins, then pauses to study your face—”Ah, it’s you. I’ve been expecting you. Sit,” she gestures at a cushion, “Tell me your story.”
((How do you respond?))
Zarûkhân stepped carefully over the uneven, muddy ground, his boots leaving shallow impressions in the damp earth. The air clung to him, thick with rot and smoke, but he ignored it, letting his amber-brown eyes sweep over the shacks with a cool, measured gaze. Ducking into the flickering candlelight of the tent, he kept his posture straight, though there was a hint of weariness in his movements.
He had been born a Highlander, raised in a wind-scoured valley where winters claimed the weak and wolves tested the strong. From an early age, he was taught to endure—the bite of steel, the hunger of lean seasons, the weight of expectation. His people were proud and warlike, and Zarûkhân grew broad of shoulder and hard of hand, a survivor in a land that had no mercy for the unworthy. Among his clan he was respected, but never fully trusted. He fought like them, bled like them, but where they prized bold words and brash deeds, he kept his silence, weighing his thoughts before he spoke. Some whispered that he was cursed, others that he was simply too different. Zarûkhân never denied it.
In time, the pull of the wider world grew stronger than the bonds of kinship, and he left the high valleys behind. He walked into the wide, unforgiving world, seeking truths his people had buried and debts that had never been repaid.
At the hag’s words, he tilted his head slightly, meeting her scrutinizing stare without flinching. He lowered himself onto the cushion with deliberate calm, hands resting lightly on his knees. His voice, low and even, carried the weight of long roads and harsher years. “He had walked far,” he said, “seeking truths that others fear to name. She knew why he had come. It was time the past was acknowledged, and the debts… settled.” His gaze lingered on her, steady and unwavering, as if testing whether she would speak first or let him continue
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