Character Introductions & Setup
- The group finalizes character names and backstories:
- Krish Two Fates – coin‑flipping, ceremonial‑garbed warrior from Dhruv.
- Quinlan Ashwick – edgy, agile character connected to the Savawell Thicket.
- Vien – charismatic, social, and upbeat upperclassman from Lux Arcanium.
- Sabra Shield Dancer – flashy, spear-wielding dancer from Samitra.
Arrival at Lux Arcanum
The world had grown uncertain in the twenty years since the Breaking, when the sun had stopped moving and the slow creep of wrongness had begun to spread across the land. Each of the great states, sensing that the time for waiting had passed, sent their most promising young adults to convene at the gleaming city of Lux Arcanum. As the party made their way through the city’s grand streets, they passed beneath banners and floating lanterns, beside fountains twisted into impossible shapes by unseen magic, and beneath the shadows of airships drifting overhead. At the heart of it all stood the college itself, where Arch Magister Valessa waited in the courtyard to welcome the gathered groups with a voice amplified by enchantment, declaring that knowledge would light their path through the world’s growing darkness.
Among those who answered the call were four individuals from very different corners of the world. Krish Two-Fates had come from Dhruv, a man so accustomed to leaving things to chance that he was known to flip a coin before making any decision of consequence. Quinlan Ashwick had traveled from the Savawell Thicket, sharp-eyed and quick on his feet. Vien Ashwick had already been in Lux Arcanum, while Sabra Shield Dancer had made the journey from Samitra. As Valessa divided the arrivals into their groups, these four found themselves standing side by side, next to a rival group led by a charismatic woman bearing a great shield. Vien recognized a familiar face among the others — Mira Ashwin, a fellow student from several shared classes — and slipped away briefly to exchange words, while Krish caught the eye of Kael, a brooding figure from Dhruv who immediately looked away and retreated into himself.
The Calibration Trial
Before any true mission could be assigned, Ser Corin, a teacher at the college, led the four into a specialized training chamber to assess their capabilities. Inside a glowing magic circle stood three white-colored constructs, each connected by cables to a central pylon fixed to the floor. Ser Corin explained that the constructs would only activate once the first blow was struck, and that the whole affair was perfectly safe. What followed was a lively demonstration of the party’s varied talents — Quinlan landing swift strikes, Vien channeling fire, and Sabra pressing the attack — though not without a few embarrassing misses along the way.
Midway through the trial, something went wrong. A red pulse tore through the building without warning, and the statues standing in the atrium outside the circle cracked and split as it passed through them. The constructs, too, were changed — their white glow shifting to yellow and then to a deep, ominous red as steam began hissing from their joints. They moved with a new aggression, rotating toward the party with a menace that had not been there before. Ser Corin, visible through the barrier, began banging against the magic circle, unable to get inside.
The party pressed on despite the escalating danger. Vien unleashed a torrent of fire that reduced two of the constructs to molten slag where they stood. The third remained, still active and still threatening, but Quinlan had spotted the real solution — the pylon at the center of the circle, the source of power for all three constructs. He worked at the cables connecting it to the last standing construct, and with one final effort, wrenched them free. A spark leapt up like a vacuum cord yanked from the wall, and the pylon detonated, taking the last construct with it. The barrier fell, and Ser Corin rushed in with a handful of potions to restore what the party had spent.
The Arch Magister’s Briefing
There was little time to celebrate. Arch Magister Valessa burst into the room, breathless, announcing that this was the fourth fluctuation that month. She ushered the party into the main assembly hall, where she addressed all the gathered groups with barely concealed urgency, explaining that the pulses appeared to be originating from the Savawell Thicket and that things were only getting worse. She had barely finished speaking when the warning lights at every doorway in the hall blinked red, and another pulse ripped through the building. Outside, lanterns exploded in cascading bursts of light, and the screams of younger students filled the air.
Chaos in the Courtyard
The party rushed into the courtyard to find pandemonium. A tentacle panther — a creature that had no business being within the college gates — was popping in and out of existence, terrorizing the students who scrambled and wept in every direction. Krish and Vien threw themselves at a stuck door leading to the cafeteria, straining to muscle it open and give the students somewhere to flee, while Quinlan attempted to draw the beast’s attention with a flash of light from his staff. Sabra took a more direct approach, jabbing at the creature repeatedly until it decided this particular meal was far more trouble than it was worth. With a final flicker, the tentacle panther appeared atop the wall and then vanished entirely into the night. Krish, drawing on a warm and steady magic, moved among the remaining students and calmed them enough to guide them safely through the now-open cafeteria door.
Investigation of Professor Alera’s Office
In the quiet that followed, Valessa pulled the four aside with a hushed urgency. A professor had gone missing, she explained, and she needed a fresh set of eyes in the woman’s office. The room they entered was a mess of scattered papers and broken glass, the lanterns long since blown out by the pulse. On the wall hung a chalkboard covered in dense, cryptic scribbles, and on the desk lay open research notes. Krish studied the board and picked out the word Samitra among the chaos, while Vien, approaching the tangle of lines with an entropic eye, identified something more significant — a star-shaped pattern connecting five locations: Samitra, Dhruv, Galatra, Volund Etherium, and the Radiant Seat. Dozens of other cities had been crossed out around the star’s edges, as though systematically eliminated.
It was Quinlan who found the paper on the desk that made everything click into place. Written by Professor Alera Vorin of Lux Arcanum, the document was titled “The Harmonic Fracture: A Study of the Savawell Thicket.” In it, Alera argued that the Thicket was not simply corrupted — it was reacting to a failure in something she called the planetary engine stabilizer ring. To enter safely, a five-fold harmonic lattice had to be restored, composed of five frequencies: rhythm, heat, wind, memory, and light, each one unlocking the next in sequence. Most critically, she had written that she was positive the rhythm frequency could be found among the ancient star charts of Galatea, in its capital city of Constellatica.
Naming the Party and Forging Bonds
The party brought their findings to Valessa, who read the notes with wide eyes and confirmed that this would indeed be their assignment. In the morning, she would arrange travel for them. Before they retired for the night, she asked them one final question — what did they call themselves? After a moment’s consideration, they settled on the Astral Covenant, a name that felt strangely fitting given the star diagram on the chalkboard, the star charts waiting for them in Constellatica, and the coin Krish had been known to flip beneath a sky full of stars. Valessa nodded, and with that, the Astral Covenant had a name, a mission, and a first destination.
As the night wound down, the four took stock of one another in the way that strangers do when they realize they are no longer quite strangers. Vien found himself quietly admiring the speed with which Quinlan moved, while the others navigated the more complicated terrain of loyalty and mistrust that comes with being thrown together by circumstance rather than choice. They were a new party, still finding their footing, their bonds only just beginning to form. But the world was cracking at its seams, a missing professor’s notes had pointed the way, and come morning, the Astral Covenant would be on their way to Constellatica to find the first harmonic frequency before whatever was breaking the world could break it entirely.