The Unburied
The story so far: a grave, a fire, and a Forge that will not take you.
You do not remember dying.
The earth was cold. Then it wasn't.
Somewhere to the north, a fire is burning.
The grave
You wake in a shallow grave at the edge of the woods. Someone buried you, and you do not remember dying. A plank cross stands at its head with no name on it, only a warning scratched deep into the wood: rest, do not rise.
You rise anyway. The road leads north, toward smoke and voices and a fire that does not go out.
The Deep Forge
Something old and vast burns beneath the land. The people here call it the Deep Forge. It takes the souls of this land's dead and draws them down, and the things crawling up out of the earth are what it has been making. The fire glowing out of the dungeon pits is its breath.
The Forge takes every soul in this land. Yours, it spat back out.
Forgewalkers
The survivors have a name for those who come back: Forgewalkers, souls the Forge refused and spat back into a body. You are one of them. You were not the first: the old Forgewalkers left their paths across the land in blood and stone, and those paths wake when one of you comes near.
The camp has seen your kind before and does not fully trust you. One walks out of the trees, fights, dies, and comes back. Useful. Unnatural.
The camp
North of your grave, the land's last survivors hold out behind a stake palisade around a great bonfire. It is not a town, only a refuge. Reach it, and its fire binds your soul: from then on, when you fall, you wake beside it.
The camp's fire knows your name now. It will call you home.
How the world explains the rules
| In the game | In the story |
|---|---|
| Spells socketed into your gear | Forgewalkers can bind power into forged steel. Steel remembers what is bound into it. |
| Waking at the bonfire after death | Your soul is bound to the camp's fire. Before you find it, you wake at your grave. |
| Worn gear soul-bound after death | What you held tight when you died is dragged along with your soul. The rest stays with your corpse. |
| Waypoints | The old Forgewalkers' blood-paths, waking for you |
| Town portal | A thread back to the fire that anchors you, which you can call to you |
For the rules themselves, see Spells and Sockets and Death and Soul-Bound Gear.