The Tournament

thebrazenwolfe

The inspiration for this week’s Adventure comes from my youth and where I grew up.

I grew up on a farm where the lights from the cities couldn’t reach. The inspiration comes from two places on the farm. The flats had a creek cutting through it which was surrounded by a dense mass of elm trees. During the daytime it was a place of wonder and adventure, at night the light from the moon and the stars could barely cut through the dense canopy and the only sounds was the creek trickling or of things in the darkness.

The second was up the hill towards the house. A forest of nearly 3000 trees.
At night great patches of moonlight created a patchwork of greys amongst the trees. In the spring and summer the thistles would grow so large that they turned living walls of green, which also created little nooks for things to hide in and stalk prey…

So this week’s plots will revolve around a lord, his wizard and a hunt amongst the trees disguised as a tournament to choose the lord’s next guard.

Picture by Brian Ralphs, found here

The knight, Sir Percival Winterbourne, is a tall and impressive figure who had one of the largest allocations of land in this kingdom. His royal guard are revered across the land and a great many songs are sung about them in the taverns of the surrounding towns and cities. Each year Sir Percival sets up a contest of champions to select one amongst the candidates who would be deemed worthy to become one of his Guard. This year it’s different from the normal jousting and martial arts, it’s a hunt for a great beast in the woods and the party that brings back the beast, alive or dead, are the ones who would claim the prize.

A beast scorned

04MoSt1 / 04MoLe1 / 04MoEs1 / 04MoFe1

The king spared no expense this year, he has brought in an exotic beast from a far away land and has let it loose in the nearby Wyrdwood forest.

Or so that’s what he wants everyone to know, to be truthful the beast was meant to be the final test for an individual in the area. A final test of bravery and skill that would bring fame and glory, and not to mention riches to his people from the crowds that attend his yearly tournaments, however something went wrong and the beast escaped its captivity and the knight believes that it is somewhere in the forest.

The Party has three options here for this quest this week.

  1. They are participating as a group to earn favour of the Knight (04MoSt1).
  2. They have been hired to help a young aspiring squire achieve knighthood, he is passionate, savvy but needs a team to participate (04MoEs1).
  3. The knight hires the party to find the beast and report back on its location, or if possible capture it alive so he can still have his tournament (4MoLe1).
  4. The party arrives a day after the competition has begun. The Knight has one of his courtiers trail the party (poorly) before appearing before the group and asks them for discrete assistance. None of the participants have returned and Lord Percival believes them in danger. He requests the party to bring back the survivors or the bodies of those lost so that they can have a proper burial. (04MoFe1)

Thanks for joining me for the beginning of another week, this time I am following the traditional zine format where you have a single adventure focused on in the book which just gets expanded from there. So this week we are exploring the family farm I grew up on, well sort of, and in particular the feelings, emotions and sensations I had on that green hill at night.

Without taking up too much time I just wanted to reflect that this is the fourth week I have been writing and I wanted to personally thank those who read and interact with these musings from my mind. A big shout out to the people who are following me as I can’t tell you how humble I feel that people want to subscribe to read what I type here – thank you.

As always don’t forget to trigger that spark of imagination that drives adventure and don’t forget to roll with advantage,
The Brazen Wolfe