D20 SYSTEM✦ Beginner

The Corrosion of the Verdant Festival

# Intrigue# Wilderness

The annual Spring Plowing Festival is a beacon of hope in the valley, a celebration of new life and communal bounty. This year, the snowmelt waters in the magical irrigation ditches have turned a virulent, sickening green, scorching the fields and poisoning the livestock. The reagents used for snow-melting by the rival upstream town of Frostholme are the suspected cause, but their Mayor claims they are merely fighting a brutal, unending winter to survive. The truth is a web of desperation, sabotage, and a creeping magical blight that neither side fully understands. Veteran players will find no simple heroes here, only choices with heavy consequences.

Chronicle Prelude

The player arrives at the prosperous farming community of Hearthglen, now a scene of panic and despair. The central square is a cacophony of arguing villagers, sickly animals, and the acrid stench of the corrupted irrigation ditches. A hastily erected barricade blocks the road upstream toward Frostholme.

Environmental Traits

The magical acidification is slowly spreading, threatening to turn the entire valley into a toxic wasteland. Players must uncover the truth and decide who bears the responsibility—and the cost—of the cure.

Legendary Archetypes

Rayan

HP:45

STR:16

WIS: 12

CHA:11

Key Factions & Autonomous Nodes (8)

Mayor Aldric
A gaunt man in his late fifties, with deep lines of stress etched around his eyes and mouth. He wears a heavy, fur-lined coat despite the relative warmth of his office. His hands are perpetually stained with blue chemical residue.
Councilor Elara
A sturdy woman in her forties, dressed in practical but fine woolens. Her face is set in a mask of controlled fury, her knuckles white as she grips the arms of her chair.
Alchemist Voren
A wiry, nervous man with spectacles perched on his nose and scorch marks on his leather apron. He constantly fidgets with a set of brass calipers.
Guard Captain Theron
A broad-shouldered man in Hearthglen guard livery, his face weathered and stern. His hand rests on the pommel of his sword, his gaze sweeping the crowd with suspicion.
Acidspitter Beast
A bloated, six-legged creature that was once a badger or large rodent. Its fur has sloughed off in patches, revealing slick, mottled grey skin covered in weeping sores. Its mouth foams with a corrosive green saliva.
Frostholme Reagent Guard
A soldier clad in insulated leather armor and a fur-lined helm, bearing the Frostholme crest. They stand with disciplined posture before the entrance to the reagent works, their breath misting in the unnatural chill that emanates from the building.
Old Maeve
An ancient woman wrapped in layers of patched wool and fox fur, living in a hovel built into the hillside near the nexus cavern. Her eyes are clouded with cataracts, but her voice is sharp and clear.
Corrupted Leyline Elemental
A swirling vortex of sickly green energy and raw, crystallized magic. It has no fixed form, constantly shifting between jagged geometric shapes and writhing tendrils of light. The air around it crackles with unstable power and the smell of ozone and rot.

Chronicle Prelude

Environmental Traits

Legendary Archetypes

✦ Related Cases ✦

The Goblin Plight of Rivervale and the Cryptic Mine

The Lost Workshop: Heart of a Raging Core