#divinity: storm

Wilderness: Odyssey to the Thundering Isles

The hammer blows let out echoes of thunder across the stormy sea throwing off lighting-sparks with each impact, as nebulas and unknown stars swirl in the darkened clouds: The gods are at work at their forge tonight, and the firmament trembles with the violence of their creation. 

Setup:  Every Sailor who plies the sea of dreams knows to best avoid the Thundering Isles, as even in the calmest of weather those bleak and blasted cliffs are an ill place to try to land a ship, and the waters surrounding them are churned by frequent, raging storms. 

Still, these isles are a holy place, utilized by the gods of storm and creation as forge, anvil, vault, and testing ground for the artifacts they’ve wrought. Ancient temples are carved into the stone so as to better survive the violence of the island’s storms and other more deific calamities. These structures are usually deserted, but sometimes host castaways, hermits, or knowledge seekers come at great pains to study the workings of the divine. The isles are also populated by a stern clan of giants, who serve as attendants and wardens for the god’s creations, and who give very little trust to trespassers no matter how they might come to the island. 

Great secrets lay within the heart of the thundering isles, but to uncover them one must brave the very worst of wind and wave, and risk angering the gods who are ever protective of their creations. 

Adventure Hooks: 

While most storms push outwards from the isles, the party’s vessel is caught within one that smashes their hull on the many reefs surrounding the divine archipelago and forces them to flee to shore. Searching for a place to weather out the seemingly infinite rain, the party encounters a cathedral that may serve as a suitable basecamp, if only it weren’t occupied by a nest of monsters crawled up from the tide. 

She-who-beholds-the-thrashing-of-serpents is a giant with a problem: as the youngest daughter of a family of immortals, she wants nothing more than to escape the incessant demands and expectations of her clan, and find somewhere to snooze that doesn’t resound with the pounding of reality shaking hammers. To this end, “Thrash” has taken a quick jaunt over to the mainland, to find a nice valley to nap in, a valley that just so happened to be experiencing drought, which was blissfully relived by the cloud break caused by her arrival.  In her quest to shirk her chores, the rebellious teen giant may have inadvertently stared a cult, one that grows increasingly bold as they steer their “Rainbearer” figurehead towards more aggressive miracles. 

Beautiful replications of living creatures, anvilwrought constructs are a common sight on the thundering isles, produced by the gods themselves or by the giants imitating their forms. Occasionally one of these creatures is caught up by the storms and carried to the mainland, where it might crash land in the countryside, or rampage about, energized by the lighting. Mortal artificers will pay high prices for the chance to examine the handiworks of the gods but they may have to compete with wind spirits ( or even late-arriving giants) sent out to retrieve these damaged works of art.