#RPGaDay2024 Day 1 – Runes

Hello August! Also, hello, friends and readers, welcome to day 1 of #RPGaDay2024.

Here we are again… This yearly tradition seems to bring me out of the shadows and back to the blog, albeit briefly. This year is the 11th year of # RPGaDay and the 10^th year I’ve participated. So, let’s do this!

But before we go on, for the uninitiated, those of you who may not know what ##RPGaDay is, let me summarize. #RPGaDay celebrates everything good and positive about the tabletop role-playing hobby. Prompts are provided, and participants are invited to create content highlighting our hobby’s wonderful aspects. Further details and the prompts list for this year can be found at David F. Chapman’s Autocratik blog.

This year, I’ll mix the main prompts and the alternative prompt challenge list by Skala Wyzwania. You can find more information in David Chapman’s Autocratik blog post for RPG a Day this year. Let’s get going.

The RPG challenge theme for today is Runes. Rolling a 1d10 for the quest. The result is 9, Write an Eavesdroppable Dialogue.

A Little Whisper

The common room at the Obsidian Boar is dark, noisy, and packed. The locals drink at the bar and huddle around the few lamps and the large fireplace as they laugh, drink, and gamble to forget the night outside. With all the windows closed and curtains drawn, they try to ignore the darkness, the howling wind, and the ember ash it carries.

Two men sit in the far back of the room, near the niche where the carved boar that gives the establishment its moniker is placed, speaking in hushed tones. I slip by the locals and place a fresh apple by the wall as my offering to the Night Swine, along with all the other sacrifices the patrons left.

I huddle as close as I can to their table and listen to the conversation between the stranger in the dark robes and the priest, the man I’ve followed for weeks.

“… you know it then. So, you know the symbol?” The priest stammers nervously, pulling on his cloak to hide his white vestments, soiled by all his travels. His interlocutor nods by swinging his hunched form back and forth, the folds of his dark, purplish robe shifting like shadows. The stranger’s voice was even lower than the priest’s, raspy, difficult to hear. “Yes, one of the runes of ruin, one of the symbols of woe.”

The priest swallows a whimper and pulls up his sleeve, showing a dark mark on his forearm. The light is too tenuous; I cannot make out the rune itself, but the skin around the lower forearm is reddened and blistered. “I know that much, sorcerer, but which rune? How do I rid myself of it? The robed sorcerer chuckles, “You do not rid yourself of the mark of one of the lords of the night. You bear the rune of anguish, the tears of Mishafan, for your sins and dark pacts you have been marked.”

The priest nervously pushes back his unkempt sand brown hair and raises his voice, full of equal parts despair and indignation, “I made no pacts with the nocturnal potentates, I have committed no transgression to the high gods or the low, this has been foisted upon me for no reason.” The robed stranger straightens his back, the gaunt frame upon which the robes hang rising a head taller than the priest, a salt and pepper beard visible beneath the cloak’s hood, green glowing eyes flashing for a moment. His voice remains low, but the words carry a force even I feel from my hiding place behind a nearby column. They drum in my ears and burn my eyes, and I strain to listen but look away, suddenly tired and confused.

“I can see the stain upon you; do not lie, for my arts can unravel the knots of fate you carry. I can see the forbidden love, the vow, the drowned child, the anguish you have caused there upon your flesh. If you wish to rid yourself of it, I can tell you the way but do not trifle with me. You will need to travel to a shrine and pay the price of the hermit…”

They suddenly grow quiet, and I chance a look back at their table. Both are staring in my direction, scanning the faces of patrons near me. Have I been found? No time to waste, I slink back into the crown in the room. Hopefully, I can catch up with the priest in the morning.

Well, that’s my Day 1 challenge post. Hopefully, you find something interesting there that inspires your games.

I hope you join #RPGaDay2024. Remember to tag your contribution with the hashtag and share it here, on your social media, and in the #RPGaDay 2024 Facebook Group.

See you tomorrow.