Corrupted Forest seed ·
deep Great Wood,
east of the Stream,
deep into the Wood
Truth
Hec’tumel
+ thrall
Rowan
drove the Forest Folk off; living trees are the last seal. Logging weakens it — that is why
the village is forbidden to fell living wood from the Great Wood (the old compact with the Folk).
After they seal it: they learn the lattice is carried by specific trees marked with Folk runes.
Those marked trees must stand; the rest can be harvested without opening the wound.
That unlocks
Great Wood Timber.
“The Stream runs black where it touches the trees, and the Great Wood beyond that is wronger every week.
Deeper in, the fog is born — that’s where you have to go, if you mean to stop it.”
Village → Stream → deep Wood → grove.
Run 2 short stops so the march lands. One fight or hard choice each.
1. The Stream
“Where the Stream skirts the Great Wood, a black film rides the current, oily and still.
The water is colder than the season, and the cold clings when you pull your hand free.”
Cross carefully: Defy Danger +DEX or +CON. Miss = soaked gear, mark cold, or lose a provision.
Skip / rush: no roll now — but the Outer Ring fog has advantage on the first exchange (they reek of the Wood wrong).
2. Waystone
“A
waystone
stands half-choked in moss, and the paths fork hard around it.
One way holds a gold gleam on the far horizon — the
Golden Oak,
Fae and not your goal — and the other sinks deeper into ordinary dark.”
Read the stone / follow Folk glyphs: Know Things or forest eyes. 10+ = true line to the grove. 7–9 = true line, lose half a day. 6− = wrong fork; fog ambush (2 shadow-people, stats as the Outer Ring) before they correct.
Chase the Oak instead: waste a day, Fae notice (soft move later), doom ticks if this is a return trip.
Ignore the stone, bull through: no fight — but they arrive at the Outer Ring exhausted (disadvantage first roll) and the fog is thicker (one free hard move before combat).
Outer Ring
Fight
“You reach the edge of a ring of ancient elders — half still green, half weeping tar-black sap.
Folk glyphs for HOLD and BIND are gouged half-away on the trunks, and cold fog pools at your ankles.”
HP 6; Armor 1 (0 vs bronze) Damage drain Special qualities melt at 0 HP; one free arrow-swallow for the whole fight Instinct to drain the living
They rise when anyone crosses the outer elders. Teach: arrows fail once; bronze/close matters.
Fight them: clear path. After: Know Things — binding site; wound is center under stone.
Run past without fighting: each PC Defy Danger +CON or +WIS through the fog.
Miss =
drain and separated for a beat.
Even on success: the Rowan’s Dark Rowan gets a free opening hit (they did not thin the fog).
“The fog thins enough to show a path between two dead elders.
Crude glyphs on the bark point inward — deeper into the ring.”
Line-Holders
Block / talkFight if pressed
“Four figures block the path — bark-skin and bone spears, eyes empty as winter ponds.
They do not charge. They stand the line and wait, as if the wood itself had posted a guard.”
HP 10; Armor 1 Damage spear Special qualities won’t flee; cruelty → one returns in the Crack / seal against the ritual Instinct to hold the line
Speak, show a Forest Folk shade or other proof of good intent, drop axes, offer respect for living wood —
or draw steel / shove past and it becomes a fight.
Talk / prove intent: they part or escort. Clue: “Stone. Under. Thrall guards the mouth. Bronze bites.”
(thrall)
Fight: only if the PCs attack, refuse, or force the path. Same clue if any still stand after.
Sneak: Defy +DEX. Miss = they call out and bar the way (still not auto-attack — then talk or fight).
Dialog (pick 1–2)
“Axe-people. The living wood is not yours.”
“We held the ring when the Pale one came. We hold it still. Turn back — or name why you walk our path.”
“Show us you are not the thrall’s meal. No iron at the heart-stone. Bronze… bronze bites the dark.”
“The stone. Under. The shadow-eater waits. We stayed. The rest… went. Or became fog.”
(If they fight and win without cruelty)
“Go. Finish what we could not. Leave the marked trees standing.”
“The path opens into a darker glade.
What little daylight you had dies under the canopy, and the air tastes like cold iron.”
Rowan’s Dark
Skirmish
“The path dips, and the fog climbs to your waist — thick enough to drink.
Something moves in it that is shaped like a man and not filled in, watching from the dark between the boles.”
Rowan — thrall of Hec’tumel
· lives in the
Maw
when not here · jumps them, hurts them, flees to the crack unless pinned or bought
HP 16; Armor 1 (0 vs bronze/orichalcum) Damage cold Special qualities vanish into shadow; swallow arrow/flame; call fog; can’t vanish while bronze is in him Instinct to feed the Maw
Same HP tracker in the Crack / seal.
Torch flickers hard (almost dies) — shadows leap. First arrow into the dark is eaten (free).
He hits one PC (damage), then speaks.
2–3 exchanges, or until bronze lands / spike shown / whiskey paid.
Unless pinned or paid: flees to the Crack / seal at ~half HP (or after wounding two). Track HP.
Bronze / spike shown: he can’t vanish into shadow this exchange; then flees if still up.
Whiskey: skirmish ends. Clean walk. He is full HP at the Crack / seal (fed).
Iron only: he flees after one more free hard move. HP reduced if they scored.
Drop him to 0 here: body unravels to fog; reforms at the crack with HP 8.
Dialog (pick 1–2)
“You’re hunting coughs. I live at the lung.”
“Whiskey buys a walk. Bronze buys pain. Soft iron buys you nothing.”
“The Folk stayed to die pretty. I stayed to feed. Which are you?”
“Your arrows taste like fear. Bring more. Or better — bring despair. He likes both.”
(If they show the spike)
“Ah. A nail. My master will notice if you drive that home. Will you?”
“Ahead the trees stand in a giant ring, and at its center a carved boulder.
Under the stone the black fog is thicker — born, not wandering.”
Speaking-Stone
Read the wound
“The elders nearest the center are dead, bark split, sap black as pitch.
A glyph-carved boulder sits in the middle; at its foot a hairline crack bleeds fog in slow pulses, and beside it the stump of a felled elder — a nail pulled from the seal.”
Know Things / Discern / lore
10+: name is Hec’tumel if they push; crack is the seed; need recut glyphs + bronze spike + hold fog + stop the thrall.
7–9: spike + lattice plan, or the name — not both clean.
6−: fog surge — fight 2 shadow-people (the Outer Ring stats), then retry.
Optional: start glyph work here (same roll as the Crack / seal step 2). Miss = 2–3 shadows mid-carve.
“The hairline crack at the boulder’s foot is the wound.
Everything you’ve come to do is right here — the marks, the thrall, and the fog that won’t stop.”
Crack: boss + seal
BossSeal
“The crack under the stone yawns wider when you kneel to it — a mouth of cold and black breath.
The fog here does not wander; it pushes, and something in the dark between the elders is waiting for you to try.”
Rowan (thrall)
present (carry HP from the Rowan’s Dark). Cruel the Line-Holders → +1 hostile revenant. Kind the Line-Holders → 1 ally revenant (HP 10,
)
Defends the spike-bearer.
HP 16; Armor 1 (0 vs bronze/orichalcum) Damage cold Special qualities vanish into shadow; swallow arrow/flame; call fog; can’t vanish while bronze is in him; priority = spike-bearer Instinct to feed the Maw
HP 12; Armor 1 (0 vs bronze) Damage Instinct to undo the seal
Fog
Each seal step below, if nobody is holding the fog (bendis root smoke, spirit blessing, or a PC rolling +CON / Defend to hold it back):
Disadvantage on that seal roll, and
Free hard move before the roll: snuff light, drag someone, spawn 1 shadow-person, or deal
drain to the worker.
bendis root (Value 2, burn at the base) or a spirit/Fae blessing:
skip the free hard move for the next two seal steps.
Ignore the fog entirely (no hold, no smoke, no Defend):
after any successful seal step, crack spits a crack-spawn (tracker above).
Kill it or the work undoes.
How to run the scene
Players say what they do — fight Rowan, Aid, recut glyphs, drive the spike, hold fog, burn bendis root.
Roll when a move triggers. On a 6− (or when they leave an opening), hit them with Rowan or the fog
(hard move from his list: vanish into shadow, swallow arrow, drag the spike-bearer, call fog).
Spike seats only if Rowan is at 0 HP, bronze-pinned, or bargained out (whiskey + abandon full seal).
Seal steps (in order)
Name (if not already):
speak Hec’tumel true (from the Speaking-Stone lore, a spirit, or the Hec’tumel Codex if someone has it). Without it → best result is partial seal.
Re-carve glyphs — one PC, +INT or +WIS (forest eyes or Folk shade: advantage). Others may Aid.
6−: wrong mark —
ignore armor or a debility; lattice not fixed (retry or partial only).
Drive the spike — one PC (+STR). Spike in hand, at the crack.
10+: seats. Fog screams inward.
7–9: seats, pick 1 —
from the crack · bronze spike spent/cracked (ori does not) · ally dragged (Defy +STR/+DEX) · trigger Hec’tumel’s offer now if not yet.
6−: spit out. Hard move. No seal this beat.
Hold until it takes (if anything still thrashing) — +CON or Defend the spike.
10+: locks.
7–9: locks; mark a debility or lose gear to the dark.
6−: crack-spawn (above). Kill it or spike works loose.
Rowan at the crack (dialog)
“You brought the nail to the mouth. Brave. Or stupid. Both feed him.”
“Touch the crack with soft metal and I’ll only laugh. Touch it with bronze and I’ll try to stop you.”
(If they almost seat the spike)
“Leave it open and I’ll let the village keep its whiskey and its children for one more season. Drive it, and I come for the one who swings the hammer.”
Hec’tumel’s offer use this
To whoever can hear the Pale Serpent (Codex-bearer, spirit-touched, or the desperate), once, mid-fight:
“Name me. Serve. I’ll seat the spike for a little thing.”
Accept: spike seats without +STR. Mark a consequence, debt, or mark of the Pale Serpent (Codex consequences if applicable). Full seal still needs lattice + name fiction.
Refuse: fight continues. No free seat.
If the seal holds
The forest is sealed. They learn (glyphs, a Folk shade, or a still-standing rune-tree) that only
trees marked with Folk runes still carry the lattice — leave those; harvest the rest.
Great Wood Timber
is safely available.
Path-stone in the wet earth:
Nerth Serpent’s Vigor
(discovery now; midsummer unlock).
4 Shadow-people
