Travels of Agon
My name is Torgrim Eiriksson, and while I am neither the wisest nor the most powerful man on Agon, few have traveled as widely as I have. Due to a combination of displacement, wanderlust, and a slightly debilitating fondness for Mirdain sunwine (you know, the white stuff), I have seen more villages, wildernesses and dungeons than I would care to count.
But now my days of exploration and wandering are over. While the wonders of Agon are countless, I feel that I've seen my fill of them, and that it's time to grow some roots. As I write these words, I'm lounging like a well fed, pipe smoking cat in front of a fireplace in our recently constructed clan keep, with a feeling that my new life is going to be rich and satisfying. Wandering has it's rewards, but so has the settled life.
In the coming months, I plan to indulge in the occasional bout of chronicle writing. Why? Because it goes well with a glass of wine in front of the aforementioned fireplace, and because I hope that Agon's next generation of travelers can benefit from my insights and observations. At the very least, my readers will learn how to avoid making some rather cataclysmic mistakes or, failing even that, how to survive the desperate escapes that tend to follow.
But first, a couple of lines about the chronicler, and about the tragedy that started me on my travels. Like I said, my name is Torgrim Eiriksson, and I was raised in a village called Graafjord on the south coast of Niflheim. Like all human settlements on that ice-shackled continent, Graafjord was a fragile island of life, clinging to the narrow strip of land that separates the sea from the glaciers of the inland. Despite the conditions, we thrived on a combination of fishing, sealing, whale hunting, and the odd southbound raiding expedition.
Some six years ago, however, our good fortune ran out. Arriving from god knows where, Illgarm the Ice Demon came to the heartlands of Niflheim. He immediately decreed that an ice citadel be built, and while its spires were still rising, he began creating an army out of the monster tribes that roam the Niflheim inland. Those who would not join, he slaughtered with great efficiency, feeding their remains to his growing army.
Since the sun set on the Ice Anvil kingdom, the northmen of Niflheim have lived in small, independent-minded jarldoms that were ill-suited to the task of halting Illgarm's rise. Eventually, many communities chose to join with the demon, their ships and soldiers swelling his ranks, while others who resisted were swept into the Isgard Sea.
I will not dwell on the last days of Graafjord, but my home village is no more, and I was among the scattered refugees who made our way to safe harbours on the mainland. When better times come (as I believe they inevitably do), I would like to make one final journey - to Niflheim, and the ruins of a village that once sparkled above its ice-bound shore.
But enough of that. And those are definitely not tear stains on the page you're reading, they're tiny drops of spilled sunwine. My familiar wanted a piece of the action on this chicken leg I'm gnawing on, you see. Torgrim Eiriksson is as hard as they come, and don't you forget it.
Episode 1: Sadayel
You don't know anything about mud before you've tried running for your life through the swamps of Morak. The festering depths of the orkish kingdom are home to so many aspects of the stuff that you'll emerge - if at all - with a deeper understanding of mud's true and manifold nature.
Episode 2: Minotaurs
"So what do you think," my old friend said, while an impish grin played havoc with the scars on his ugly face. The grin had been threatening to erupt for quite some time: Ewan "Slick" McLurk had his man the moment I walked in the door, and he knew it.
Episode 3: Rubaiyat
Normally, I would have singled them out as trouble the moment I walked into the bar. On the occasion, however, I was tired after a long sea journey, followed by a protracted haggling session with the local merchants, and I didn't pay much attention until one of them ambled over and sat down at my table. As he leaned in close, I noticed an evil glint in his eye, as well as a body odor so pungent that a Swamp Hag would go pale with envy.
Episode 4: Cult of the Moon-Beast
"This is a long shot, northman. A bindstone in the middle of a Cult village, and we're supposed to just swan in there, kill everyone, and take it over? It all sounds vaguely suicidal. And that's supposing we're not killed by gnolls first, which I personally..."
Episode 5: Svartdverger
I was walking east through Idawoll when fog descended from the snow-clad peaks, covering the land like a soft blanket. In this part of Dvergheim, the fog was a frequent visitor, and the locals talked about it as if it were some kind of malevolent and unpredictable entity. "If Old Whiting joins you," a slightly pompous dwarf once told me, "you'd better lie low until he tires of your company."
Episode 6: Chaldean Tomb
"Remember when I asked you to be as quiet as possible?"
"Yes I do, and I'm trying my best. It's just -"
"Trying? I can't see how you're trying, unless you somehow got moving quietly mixed up with stumbling about like a drunken, horn-honking clown in a drum factory."
