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[Ivar, Son of Skargrim]

Hag-sister Selsi,

I offered my spear to the Balladeer matron Aubrey, and I will honor that by slaying rotten beasts and protecting the wretched. But I do not plan to linger merely to galavant around on 'errantry.' I was promised your coven would have a cure to tear this hag-curse from my flesh, and you are an elusive woman!

Next you stir speak my name to the stone head, we must discuss on this curse. It has been delayed long enough.

Ivar, Son of Skargrim

[Ivar son of Skargrim]

Matron Aubrey,

I came to your hall of Balladeers with a straight offer, my spear and loyalty added to the Rose's cause in exchange for the sister-coven's help tearing this hag's curse out of me.

What I got  was a lesson in theatre.

That squire, Onion, sat to question my morals like I was some caged wolf and not a warrior. Spoke of honor, protecting the weak, and all heroisms a bard would like to hear before a killing. Then, without a blink, she bent her ear to a Condottiero who interjected. Suggesting I should kill a woman in revenge for her dead recluta.

Don't mistake me, killing to join a warrior's band is no strange rite. Blood earns trust, but don't piss on a man's boots and call it rain. If the Balladeers want to preach honor, they'd best live by it.. and not twist their words the moment they want a killing done.

So I'll speak plain. If I spill blood for your cause, will you even keep your word? Your squire suggests you bend you morals easily enough.

I'm not here for empty or honeyed words. Give me your oath or don't waste my time.

—Ivar son of Skargrim

The Hag's curse manifests itself after a long time of festering within me.

It was foolish of me to think the curse stilled, lay dormant after all this time. I mistook silence for mercy, and now I paid the price again. This tail writhes at my back like a parasite with a mind of it's own, I should've known better.

But Luck was never mine to begin with.

The question now is not if the curse will worsen, but how to cut it out before it consumes what little of me remains. I'm considering my options...

The Sister-crones of the Vine may know how to cleanse me. They are mystics even if their aims are strange and foul. I do not trust them, yet their skill is known.

The blue-robed warlocks of the Mount? No. They would strip me bare in body and soul, chart every twist of the curse with cold precision, then carve me open to see how deep it runs. I have seen how they treat prisoners.

The Wrothyr, those who serve the Curse-Monger... There may lie true knowledge of the curse. But walking their path may twist me more than heal, if that is even what they offer. I wonder what price they'd demand eventually, perhaps even pit me againt my brother.


I approached the Balladeers, half in jest.. Considering what the Pony-Knight offered at Ramieton. The halfling I met prattled as they all do, painting a fine picture for themselves but asking the same of me as anyone else. They want me to kill for them. That she calls it 'heroics' is a thinly veiled facade, in the end it's blood and death for their purpose the same of the ones they call savages.

Little chance I can find the one they're looking for, but what's another pound of flesh? I owe them nothing, but we'll see if I can take advantage of this hunt..

Maybe a 'masterwork' version of uniform would be good.

Not all janissary are sergeant material so there's some PCs that will be wearing their soldier uniform forever.

To serve as Ephia's Honor Guard.

Skjelar's suggestion was amusing, enough to entice my brother. The dullards who call themselves leaders of Ephia's Well, however, offer little but empty prattle and demands of recompense and justice while their hired pirates sink the ships of my kin.

My people. The same mouths that once spat curses at my name now speak of kinship and send outstretched hands across the sea. I wonder if it is merely Skjelar's drunken fancy, or does our tale drift back home?

He claims the Jarl himself waits for us 'when the time is right'. I thought it just another drunken fantasy, but perhaps Knud's brash, glory-hungry ways have paid off? Might we stand in Frostport as something more than an unwanted wretch, someone respected..

I have found one wise in the ways of Fierce Kula. A shaman from a frozen land beyond the Great Ring. My brother and I allowed her the prize of her 'hunt' in return for the man's trinkets, and her oath to aid me in breaking the hag's curse. I trust she believes her own words, gods willing, that will be enough.


The sting of recent failures fade from my mind. Not long ago, I thought it inevitable that Knud and I would die and rot in this foreign land. But perhaps, the Raider smiles on my brother, thick-headed though he is. Perhaps there awaits victory for us in this land.

10/10 would brook again.

The Tower of the Blue-Robed Warlocks, dreaded by all who speak of it, so spread the rumors. Their spellcraft is no idle tale. I saw with my own eyes the horror they command. A void, dark and hungry, that tore through flesh and bone like nothing. Their victim was no weakling either, a spirit-calling shaman of considerable power, reduced to scraps in moments.

Among their number one 'Ketter' humiliated me but mere days ago. Stripped bare of power and dignity before weaklings, left to flail and be trampled. I am no stranger to ridicule, I was born in it, shaped by the mocking and jeers. Still.. It stung deeply to be powerless.


It matters not.

She laid a poor ambush today, her arrogance outweighing her sense. We sprang her trap like seasoned hunters, and she and her allies were swiftly put to the spear. I thought it fitting retribution that she'd learn what it is to be brought low.

But now I hear she wishes to meet with me. To speak. To share a hearth. For what purpose? Some twisted game, no doubt. All witches speak with honeyed tongues, but their words are always laced with poison.

If she truly seeks mead and words, let her find me below, beneath the crumbling roof of the Hanged Heron, should her warlock allegiance permit her to tread into the home of the free and wretched. Knud mocks this notion, tells me to 'court' this witch, but I care little for his jest.

She will pass into memory like the rest. Just another defeated foe, I shall be glad not to see her likeness again.

I left the North to escape the ridicule, the glares, the shouts and the curses aimed at my wretched visage. The crags and frozen fjords are behind me, in hopes of something or anything better than the wretched life I had known. It was Knud who lit my path. My brother, my blood, the only one who never turned his back on me then. We sailed south, into the blistering heat of the desert, I followed him, trusted him. For who else would I trust?

And yet, even here... even now... I am still a wretch.

I have gained some measure of power, this is true, through my curse sorceries obey me in ways it does not obey others. But it is a cruel gift. It burns in my veins, clogs my throat with bile.. It changes nothing, I remain hunched and foul. My reflection still mocks me. We live in a cracked dust-choked ruin with others, exiles like us, broken things, forgotten names.

It is no kingdom, no glory as my brother seeks.

This day I fell in battle, wrestled to the ground by the foul-hexes of the blue robed warlocks. I thought it would be the end, paraded as a corpse through Ephia's Well. But Knud, he captured half a dozen Ephians and forced their hand. It spared me the ax. I told the janissary, the onlooker, half in jest, half in truth. That I would die for my kin, and that owuld be a life worth living. I meant it, I thought. But in these quiet moments that follow, I wonder, would that death have meant anything?

Would it change a single thing about who or what I am? The gods do not favor me like they do my brother, only the hag's curse lingers.

There must be more. There has to be.

As per title, when cast by a pure wizard/sorcerer (with GSF:Transmutation?) give the character an extra attack per round similar to divine power.

I've been playing a sorcerer focused on melee for a bit, and I've noticed that beyond shapes like Manticore that come with special abilities. I haven't found many situations where I'd want to use a melee shape like Minotaur and Hook Horror, while the extra tankiness is nice. Not being able to use items/spells or have equipment stats, aspects ect, generally doesn't feel worth it, when my damage is similar (often times better) when I'm not polymorphed.

I realize a flat buff to polymorph shapes is probably a bad idea, because it can be accessed by non-casters ect. Hence the suggestion for a buff to pure sorc/wiz only.

[Offerings of coin and treasure for services rendered or coveted relics, such words are shouted over the bellows or scrawled with an uneven hand, etched into the darker corners and outskirts surrounding Ephia's Well.]

Offerings of coin and treasure for services rendered or coveted relics, such words are shouted over the bellows or scrawled with an uneven hand, etched into the darker corners and outskirts surrounding Ephia's Well.

Just no experience like this anywhere else, even within the wider NwN community.

Peak EfU.

I have found a potential long-term assistant for my corpse-picking, sturdy enough, eager and not prone to too many questions. The price? Two orcish corpses, still fresh from the Scald, their flesh blackened from the heat but intact enough for use.

A fair exchange.

The man is simple, though not entirely without sense. His mind seemed a bit dull, perhaps by nature, perhaps by faith. He prattled about duty, or some higher calling whose name I do not presently recall, nor care to. His personal beliefs do not interest me, only that he was wise enough to recognize profit when he saw it.

A tolerable companion for now.

[Tammuz, IY 7789]

Tammuz, IY 7789 A time where lovers shed their tears

The First Dead is said not to have risen by its own will, but by the will of another.

Bleached skeletons, long abandoned, lay nestled in the ribs of ancient dunes—half-swallowed by time, yet still restless beneath the sands. Their bones had been picked clean by those who came before me, their wealth long stolen. All but one piece.

I pried open its crypt with a chisel, a husk lay curled within, its mouth frozen in an indignant scream. When I took the ring from its brittle hand, the air itself shifted. Cold. Bitter. Resentful.

My chest clenched. My breath stilled. Then it moved.

Bones scraped against the stone, fingers clawing at the earth, not alive, but not mindless either.

What causes the dead to rise? A curse? The act of taking? Or does the presence of the living alone disturb the dead?

I ponder these questions...


Necromancy is spoken of as a force bent by will, a power shaped by command and incantation. But what of those that rise without it? Those whose hatred and hunger alone defy their passage through the reeds? Some tutors claim negative energy is a force as natural as the wind, binding the dead in unseen chains. But is it power that compels them... or the soul's refusal to yield?

I have seen corpses rise in anger, in longing, in defiance of time. I have seen the dust in their hollow eyes and felt their gaze upon me long after their bodies crumbled to nothing.

I will seek more, more graves, more corpses. Perhaps the Ashways will yield some answers. Beneath the bloodstained stone of those ancient vaults.

But first I must find another unburdened by conventional morality to aid my passage below...

This worn journal is a collection of writings, sketches, notes and dark musings, its ash-marked pages haphazardly organized and showing the wear of a wanderer's life. Some sheets are stained by sand and sweat, others singed by ash, edges curling from exposure to the desert's harsh elements. Dates are scattered throughout, though many entries are undated.