Adventures of Malric 02

Arrival at Port Arlith

3/24/872

As the Sundancer crested the final swell of current beneath a golden Ashkeeper sunset, Malric Kindhell stood at the rail, staring in awe as Port Arlith emerged from the mist. Cradled in the southern curve of a dormant volcano, the obsidian isle shimmered with strands of bioluminescence, its jungle-draped cliffs glowing in strange hues of green, purple, and blue. The sight was both beautiful and haunting—like a dream half-remembered. As the ship passed into the harbor, guided by pylons pulsing with Luxon energy, Malric felt the cleansing magic wash over him. It was more than ritual. It was a test. A judgment. Something unseen was watching them from beyond the veil.

Their arrival was formally greeted by Ambassador Vezdrana Tyrr, a drow noble of the Kryn Dynasty who ascended the gangplank with quiet authority, flanked by silent Echo Knights. Her words were courteous, but firm. The Sundancer and its crew would be inspected before being allowed passage further into Dynasty territory. Yet she granted them shore leave while the ship remained at Umbra Quay. Malric chose to disembark, accompanied by the half-orc warrior Dazhra. The two of them boarded the waiting skiff with a group of sailors and crossed the still waters toward the mainland, skimming past jungle and glowing cliffs as the sailors whispered tales of Echo Knights and their ghostly companions.

The Rogue Echo

Port Arlith was like nowhere Malric had ever seen. Obsidian streets gleamed beneath the glow of living lantern-trees, and the air crackled faintly with arcane charge. The people - mostly drow - moved with elegant purpose. Echo Knights in polished grey armor patrolled silently, their crystal-faced helms inscrutable. As Malric and Dazhra made their way toward the Lowweb Market, an explosion shattered the tranquil night. Smoke and screams filled the road ahead. The pair rushed toward the chaos, finding wounded citizens and a single Echo Knight collapsed against a shattered wall—his helm cracked, his eyes wide with terror. The knight, Lieutenant Sazrin, spoke of an echo that had been forcibly severed, something that should have been impossible.

Sazrin entrusted Malric with a flickering glyph, a magical device capable of tracking the rogue echo’s location. There was no time to wait for reinforcements. Malric and Dazhra tracked the glyph’s pulse through the side streets and into the edge of the jungle, where reality itself began to distort. They entered a warped pocket of concentrated Luxon energy, where the trees bent at unnatural angles, and the stars had vanished. In this warped place, they found the echo—but it was changed. No longer a pure memory of a Dynasty warrior, the echo had been corrupted, now bearing the symbols of the Betrayer Gods. It spoke in a voice filled with sorrow and malice: “Why do you remember me wrong?”

What followed was a desperate battle. The echo split, half recognizable, half shadow. It struck at them with divine fury, trying to possess Malric and make its form permanent. But the two companions stood their ground. Dazhra's axe cleaved through the shifting illusions, and Malric’s divine light pushed back the invading force. At last, the echo shattered, the darkness within it scattering like ash in the wind. The glyph ceased its flickering, and the unnatural stillness faded. They emerged from the grove changed, the jungle’s mist parting as reality righted itself once more. The words spoken by the echo - “Why do you remember me wrong?” - still lingered in Malric’s mind like a splinter.

Back at the Echo Knight barracks, Sazrin, now bandaged and exhausted, received the glyph with solemn reverence. Malric and Dazhra told him everything. As Sazrin listened, he grew increasingly disturbed. That phrase, he admitted, had been whispered in trance states before, but dismissed as spiritual noise. Now he understood the truth: something ancient was twisting the memories that echo from the Luxon. It wasn't just a broken echo—they had witnessed possession. Recognition followed. For their bravery, Sazrin awarded Malric the Shard of Echoing Light, a relic to ward off darkness, and gifted Dazhra an Echo Axe forged for knights of the Dynasty. Together, they were honored as Trusted of the Echo, given official favor within Dynasty lands, and personally thanked by Port Arlith's guard captain, Myrrakel T’zynn.

As the night settled once more over Port Arlith, Malric and Dazhra stepped out onto the obsidian road, the echoes of their strange journey still pressing at their backs. Dazhra, ever the pragmatist, admired his new weapon but cast a wary glance over his shoulder. “That wasn’t just some wayward ghost,” he muttered. “Something’s waking up. I’m glad we won’t be here to see it.” Malric said nothing, but the words of the corrupted echo haunted him still. If echoes are memories reborn… then who was it that remembered so wrongly? And what happens when those memories begin to fight back?