The old gods built the house and left. The new gods grew up in the house. They know which floorboards creak and where the roof leaks. Whether that makes them better landlords or just more dangerous ones remains to be seen. - overheard in a tavern in Asylum, Year 47 of the New Reckoning
Fifty years have passed since the Confrontation, and the world is still working out what that means. The empires are renamed. The gods who keep the world running once carried mortal names half the city remembers. Asylum endures as it always has - chaotic, ungovernable, and alive.
What follows is the present-day record: each arc of After Asylum: Hubris as it unfolds, with the recovered materials and the Loremaster's notes for it. New arcs will be added as the chronicle continues.
Fifty years have passed since the Seal Bearers defeated the Great Devastation at the Confrontation of the Kraken. The old gods are gone, and the new gods, once mortal heroes, now walk among the people of Aevum. On the island city of Asylum, midway between Solorien and Tenebris, the Festival of Revelation has begun: a day for exposed lies, hard truths, public confessions, confrontation, and debts of honesty finally paid. In the Docks, beneath the lanternlight and noise of the infamous Harlot’s Triumph, five figures gathered around an oval table at the invitation of Cirrolius Skye, a scrappy halfling with a mysterious job and even more mysterious client.
There was Coal, an Aasimar laborer from the sugarcane bayous of the Southern Federation. There was Alaric Voss, retired Port Authority official, scholar, wizard, and late-blooming servant of Vitana. There was Arvo Worthington III, a sixteen-year-old bard raised in the shadow of the Harlot’s Triumph, surviving by charm, and lies well enough to become the truth. There was 1RONW-O0D, a Warforged druid following the strange heartbeat of the living world through the streets of Asylum. And there was Jorda LittleDream, changeling storyteller who spent years reading adventures to children before stepping into one of her own.
Cirrolius hired the group to recover a series of research journals, written by one Alistair Greenfast. Their destination was Sailor’s Folly, a treacherous graveyard of wrecks, reef, and broken hulls. After a night of revelry, suspicion, first impressions, and uneasy fellowship, the party took the rowboat Cirrolius had arranged and made their way toward the Folly. The place fought them at every step: rotten planks, hidden pits, open gaps between shattered ships, and a wilderness that seemed almost personally opposed to their passage.
Their first discovery came within the wreck of the Amber Crown, its ruined hull transformed into a makeshift research base and claimed by a massive hive of bees. Rather than burn them out or force a fight, 1RONW-O0D reached toward the living world and, through the bee language of interpretive dance, managed to communicate with Barry, the hive’s guard, and secure permission to enter the hive from Queen Beatrice herself. With Arvo’s encouragement, Jorda’s guidance, and Alaric’s careful search, the party recovered the first of the Greenfast Research Journals, wrapped safely in oilskin beneath a film of wax.
Inside, Greenfast wrote of the Lodestone: a living ship of vine-threaded wood, rustless metal, and impossible origin, once tied to the legendary pirate Jon Sixfingers and later to Liam WindChylde, now worshiped as Vitana. Greenfast believed the ship did not merely drift through history. It had purpose. It was going somewhere. Carrying that revelation with them, the party pushed deeper into the Folly and reached the wreck of the Pale Sister, only to find another crew already aboard: Magpie Delacroix and her companions, sailors under the legendary privateer Thaddeus Strongarm. For a brief moment, tense introductions held peace between the two groups. Then a halfling in an enormous hat burst up from belowdecks, a parrot in a smaller matching hat on his shoulder, and an oilskin-wrapped journal clutched in his hands.
“Found it!” they cried.
When last this tale drew breath, our heroes had explored deep in the jungle of Sailor’s Folly, knee-deep in the ribs of a dead ship called the Pale Sister. They were not the only scavengers among her bones. Across the wreck waited the crew of the privateer Thaddeus Strongarm, fronted by the charming Magpie Delacroix. In the halfling Rodrigo’s hands, his parrot of the same name on his shoulder, lay the prize: one of four research journals penned by the lost scholar Alistair Greenfast.
For one held breath, it seemed words might win the day. Then Arvo Worthington III, golden of tongue and ever certain of his own legend, loosed a lance of sparkling violet light, and Magpie and her dwarven companion Barnacle Pete dropped where they stood into enchanted sleep.
What followed was no contest. Strongarm’s people wanted the journal, yes, but not at the expense of their crew. When the heroes hammered poor Rodrigo into the dirt, his crew leveled their pistols and named their terms: take the journal, leave the halfling, let us go. So they went, but not before Coal, quick to mischief, plucked the hat clean from Magpie’s head. The look they traded sat between fury and perhaps something else—the kind poets like to remember.
Deeper into the green they pressed. Jorda, whose knowledge of the green and growing world had heretofore been primarily in books, marked a reptilian hunter in the underbrush, and the band slipped past untouched to the Gilded Eel. The wreck’s bow heaved skyward, its stern drowned in rainwater and ringed in great blue blossoms. Beautiful, and merciless. The flowers’ sweet, heavy scent took the heroes one by one: Jorda by the hull, Coal mid-carving, Arvo in the mud. Only 1RONW-O0D, who needed no breath, stood untouched, hauling Coal back to waking while old Alaric Voss, ever the keeper of his young charge, shook Arvo from the dream.
They woke into nightmare. A serpent thirty feet long, grown fat on its quiet pact with the flowers, erupted from the flooded hold and sank its fangs into Jorda. Alaric’s warhammer rang against its scaled flank, and Coal’s farmer’s hoe carved a long red ruin down its side. But it was Jorda, the one whose blood had spilled first, who ended it: she took the shape of a great venomous serpent and tore the beast’s jaw clean from its skull.
In the captain’s drowned cabin waited their reward: a wax-sealed tin and a second research journal within. Coal, for reasons of his own, pocketed a fistful of the blue seeds before they left. The shape of the journals’ narrative rose into view at last: the Lodestone is no mere prize, but a ship that hungers for a captain, bound to a purpose the heavens have not yet named.
A short respite, rain murmuring on blue petals, and then the path to the Cormorant’s Rest. Upon it they met two travelers, northern by their tongues, an elf and a human in ranger’s leathers, who gave the names Vance and Jerik and a tale of simple treasure hunting. But a liar must keep faith with his own lies, and these two could not. Coal saw the seams at once. The parties parted in peace, while a hawk of 1RONW-O0D’s calling slipped away to follow.
The Cormorant’s Rest was the most devoured of the wrecks, so wound in vine and canopy it rose from afar like a green hill crowned with masts. Across it nested a clamoring colony of seabirds, a living alarm. Heedless of their shrieking, Coal set his axe to a tree grown up through the hull, and the sound woke a sleeping thing. Up rose a corrupted mechanical guardian, long severed from its master and long since mad, rebuilt from salvaged timber and iron, half ship and half island now. A dark mirror of 1RONW-O0D it was, and like a mirror it answered: one blow, another, and the mechanical druid fell senseless. Alaric, leaning on the wisdom of his years, hauled himself aboard, pried the control amulet from a dead man’s shriveled throat, and reached for the creature’s fury with a word of command. But that word was eaten by rust, and his will alone could not still it.
And there, beneath the rising wrath of the guardian, we hold the line.
The guardian at Cormorant’s Rest fell, and in the broken ruin of its body the party found something stranger than battered metal and old violence: a brass core, worked with intention, waiting inside the wreckage like a heart that had forgotten how to beat. With the guardian defeated, the fourth of Alistair Greenfast’s research journals was finally recovered. The mission, as it had first been given, was complete. All four journals were in hand. All four covers had been brought together. And with that, Greenfast’s scattered obsession pointed toward something larger and stranger.
The journals did not offer a simple answer. They discussed the connection between Liam WindChylde, Vitana, and the Lodestone, that impossible vessel of living wood and stranger purpose. Alaric studied the matter closely, following the evidence as far as reason would carry him. Arvo remained admirably fixed upon the practical heart of the work: the job had been done, and jobs done well ought to be paid. Coal carved a small wooden ship, turning the shape over in his hands while trying, perhaps, to keep divinity at a distance despite the light and burden of his own nature. 1RONW-O0D considered the corruption of the island, the question of living wood, and whether such corruption was only a wound upon a thing or the force that might shape it. Jorda, copying the journals with careful attention, wished the answer could be found in the stars.
As the party returned to their rowboat to leave Sailor’s Folly, they found a bottle waiting where it could not be missed. Inside was a message from Captain Thaddeus Strongarm, whose confidence in his own legend had survived years at sea entirely intact. Thaddeus named Vox Noctis as their employer, warned them against trusting the Voices, and offered another path. In three days’ time, his ship, Thaddeus’ Redemption, would sail in search of the Lodestone.
Back in Asylum, Cirrolius waited with his familiar smile stretched just a little too wide. He led the party through the Docks to a warehouse that smelled of tar and cold seawater. There, a representative of the Voices, an enormous brute of an Orc named Tiny, stood with the calm of a man who did not need to threaten anyone loudly. The offer from Vox Noctis was blunt: the journals would go to auction, and because the party had read them, they could not be allowed to walk freely until the matter was settled. One comfortable week somewhere pleasant. Payment in full. A favor owed by the Voices. Or refusal, and the same week made harder.
After weighing Thaddeus against the Voices, and after letting violence sit briefly on the table, the party chose not to fight. They handed over the journals and accepted the guild’s terms. Aboard the Honest Wage, their prison proved to have good food, soft beds, bored guards, and no visible shore. They passed the week safely enough, meeting the crew and spending time with Corwin Pell, the soft-spoken dwarf who spoke of his family in Zhangrym and of work with Vox Noctis as the sort of thing a person does when the bills must be paid.
In time, the heroes received the newest edition of The Asylum Broadside, carrying news of the strange auction they had made possible, amongst other curiousities. Then the Honest Wage returned them to Asylum with significantly more gold than they had left with, and something rarer still: a favor owed by the Voices.
Flush with coin after their return to Asylum, the heroes scattered from the docks. Yet wherever they went, another hand seemed to be reaching for the same prize. Every conversation was an invitation, every kindness a bid, and every faction wanted their loyalty before the Lodestone could be claimed.
At Oslo's Curiosity Shoppe, Ironwood tried to persuade Vasily to hire part-time help to mind the store while they were away. Vasily showed little interest. Instead, Ironwood agreed to carry a carved wooden box to Vasily's old friend Caelum Spero, extracting in exchange a promise that Vasily would sell three items before they returned. Still haunted by the corrupted shield guardian, and by the fear that its fate might someday become their own, Ironwood sought the Wata Wa Nusu and found Mzizi Ya Miti. They spoke of sentient plants, strange origins, and the uncertain boundary between what is grown and what is made. Mzizi saw nothing unnatural in Ironwood's construction: wood, iron, and vines all come from the natural world, however many hands may stand between their source and their final shape. For deeper answers, Mzizi directed Ironwood toward the Atara Oren, the world tree.
Coal climbed to Highside to confront Lady Vandra Dross, attended as ever by her geriatric butler, Jebidiyah. He demanded to know whether she understood what she had sold them into, and whether she was finished using him. Vandra answered plainly. No, she had not known what the journals contained, and yes, she had taken her cut regardless. She offered no apology for making money, but she did offer a way forward: an introduction to Ambassador Merris Goldweaver of Zhangrym.
Alaric prayed to Vitana and received Maelys instead. The Voice of the Feyveil pressed her people's claim to the Lodestone, then wrapped a rebuke toward Jorda in language soft enough to pass for courtesy and sharp enough to remain a threat. Jorda, meanwhile, placed everything in Cellulinde's hands: the Greenfast Research Journals and the location of the Lodestone itself. In return, the Springseeker identified every interested party at the auction by name and nation. Arvo bought boots.
Ironwood and Coal crossed paths at the Gate of Champions and continued together to Veris' Slip. There they met Arlun Besenyn of the Praesidium, seemingly dictating notes to an invisible third party. The triton claimed that Alistair Greenfast had appeared within the Praesidium with no memory of the previous six months. He offered the heroes access to the scholar and to the Praesidium's vast library if Ironwood would cooperate with his people. Then, business apparently concluded, Arlun stripped to his underclothes and dove into the bay.
Two offers remain unanswered. At the Harlot's Triumph, Captain Mireille Saavedra promises freedom and partnership: an even split, no masters, and no crowns. Through Vandra, the door stands open to Ambassador Goldweaver and the power of Zhangrym. The Lodestone is no longer merely a mystery. It is a prize, and every side wants the heroes to claim it for them.
With the location of the Lodestone finally within reach, the heroes gathered around a table at Veris’ Slip to decide who—if anyone—could be trusted with a ship capable of sailing beyond the boundaries of the known world. Alaric argued that the vessel belonged with the fey, whose claim was ancient and whose connection to the Feywylde might prove essential. Arvo Worthington III preferred the more practical course: back whichever horse offered the fullest purse. Before them lay a sea of competing interests. Elenethil offered magic and diplomacy. Zhangrym commanded gold, ships, and industry. The Feyveil claimed the Lodestone by right. The Praesidium possessed vast stores of knowledge—and Alistair Greenfast himself. Beyond them stood the independent captains, promising freedom without masters, councils, or crowns.
Coal and Ironwood carried their questions to the Two-Sided Coin, where Lady Daphne Wendlebright welcomed them with silks, ceremony, and faultless neutrality. In a private chamber, Ambassador Merris Goldweaver received them with food, wine, music, and an interest that seemed focused as much upon the heroes as upon their discovery. The Lodestone, she explained, could open trade routes across Aevum and perhaps through the planes themselves. If the ship possessed a will of its own, Zhangrym’s experience forging living beings made it uniquely prepared to understand it. She offered passage aboard a mighty Vanquisher-class warship under First Engineer Carver Grey, a dwarf who trusted curiosity—but never the sea. As both payment and goodwill, Merris presented five bags of gold and a magnificent golden music box bearing six songs from her homeland.
Meanwhile, Arvo and Jorda entered the Harlot’s Triumph to meet Captain Mireille Saavedra of the Storm Queen. Mire was all confidence, charm, and the dangerous freedom of an unsheathed blade. Her offer was simple: help her claim the Lodestone, serve as her officers, and receive equal shares. Once the prize was won, the heroes would take command of the Storm Queen itself.
Yet when the company reunited, they chose neither ambassador, archfey, scholar, nor pirate. They would strike out alone.
Through Alaric’s connections, they found employment guarding the Old Reliable, a wandering steamship captained by the gnomish mechanic Verner Klank. Her only other crewman was a scruffy black cat who plainly regarded Verner with contempt. For ten uneventful days the ship steamed toward the Feyveil. Alaric attempted—with steadily diminishing subtlety—to turn Jorda toward Vitana, while Jorda retreated deeper into her books and her divided loyalties.
Then, during the tenth night, unseen hands struck.
By morning, Jorda’s satchel was gone—along with her notes, her journal transcriptions, and the location of the Lodestone. The black cat had vanished as well. No cry had been heard. No intruder had been seen.