This Breathing World

	One large island is all that appears to remain after the word of destruction. Maybe continent is a better word than island, because it is easily a thousand miles long and two thousand across. Note: In this description, you will often see things like "an air of 5 is needed to ..." modify this freely by a step for heroes' virtue and flaws, for anything the heroes do that is useful or foolish and by a card draw if it seems a good idea to use one at that point.

Virtue: The Peasant	(simple strength) The world at creation is full of vitality and energy. Any creative act is easy, life is resilient. Something hurt heals rapidly, Something healthy grows stronger. Everything is endowed with outward strength and virility.
Fault: The Cockatrice	(corruption) The Prince has left his mark on the world. Much of it that was created and partially destroyed bears an inner corruption. Sometime this will lie dormant for many aeons in a race, sometimes it will show itself immediately, but in everyhting there is the potential to become rotten.
Fate: The Phoenix	(rebirth / destruction) The world has not had an easy start and struggles with its own nature. If its simple strength can become more than mere fortitude and develop into inner strength, it could see a dramatic rebirth. If not and corruption overtakes it, then obliteration may be the only option for a reluctant creator.
Usurper: The Prince of Unlife	Bitter with the loss of his original creations, hating the new gods and despising their authority, the appearance of the Usurper heralds a loss of vitality, a sapping of strength and a tendancy to self-destructive conformity.

Background	Fafnir, a dragon orders of magnitude greater than the rest, has had a brood hatch a few centuries ago. The young dragons grew to be powerful enough for her urge to destroy to overcome her mothering instinct twenty years ago. However, one of the brood fled to the forest and hid listening to the song of a band of wood sprites. Fafnir also heard the song and was persuaded to forget her young for long enough for it to escape. Fafnir feels mixed guilt and relief over the young's disappearance and tries to deal with the conflict by forgetting about it completely. The young dragon has become a pawn in the fight between the wood sprites and the fey, both of whom believe the other to be evil faeries created to usurp their place. This quarrel has in fact been fomented by real evil faeries (Moredhel) who were indeed created to usurp the other faerie's place. Into this mix come the heroes, who should attempt to: reconcile the two faerie groups help the young dragon drive away or expose the Moredhel, and maybe even help Fafnir.

The Cave Being in each cave 'element' increases that score; if a hero is in no other element, the stone surroundings add one to earth.	The heroes arrive on the Breathing world at the top of a tall, central mountain in a magnificent cave with walls showing natural veins of mithril, gold, and tin. Gaps in the cave walls let in the air, which swirls around in a continuously refreshing and focusing wind. A stalactite drips water into a central pool, bathing in which restores calm and aids understanding. At irregular, but pleasing intervals around the walls, small fires burn on gases venting through the rock, warming and energizing those close to them. Looking out a large forest can be seen to the west. Heroes with water of 5 or more see it as somewhat foreboding. There is a scorched area just to the northwest and plains to the east and directly north. To the south lies a more gently wooded land with signs of random cultivation in small areas. A small group can be seen travelling out of this area, towards the mountain. Unless met halfway, thy will arrive at the cave in three days and call out a summons.
Undead Fey: Air: 3, Fire: 5 Water: 1, Earth: 3 Their unlife aura lowers all a hero's elements by an amount depending on their earth element: - earth is 1,2: -2 to all - earth is 3,4: -1 to all - earth is 5+: no reduction	The group consists of three fey, all seven feet tall, thin and ethereal. They have come to worship the Prince and ask a boon in return. If allowed to worship, two of them will start chanting a long lay (air of 4 to get the gist: "We are created. We owe you everything. We give back your greatest gift to us". Air 6 or better to realize the gift they are talking about is life. A water score of 4 will sense tension in the chant, 5 or better will sense sadness in the non-chanter, 6 or better will sense impending disaster. If unstopped, the two who are not chanting will cut their throats at the end of the song and invite in the spirit of unlife. The Prince will happily take this opportunity to control their bodies and will burn them out in a few minutes taunting the heroes with their impending destruction and then attacking with the now undead fey. The remaining fey, Smoothtongue, is the one who has been chosen to bring back the message and is sad because the two dancers are his only children (Skydancer and Deerheart). Smoothtongue will be bewildered and ask why the worship displeased them, and will plead with the heroes to grant him a boon in return for his son's lives, asking the to accept his children even if they didn't kill themselves. The boon he requests is this: "We live in the valleys and fields and grow food and fruit on the hillside and by the streams. Bees fill our hives with honey, grapes give us wine and we eat meat from rabbits and antelopes. Yet we do not go into the forest lightly, for it is there that live the moredhel, the dark faerie, created to destroy us and take our place in the sunlight. For many ages we have warred with them, although at first they seemed friendly, but then betrayed us by treachery. We keep them from our green and pleasant land and until recently they have been confined to the dark trees, venturing out only in the new moon to put charms of malice on us, but fearing to meet us in the day or by bright night." "But in the last few decades, they have made an alliance with the great dragon Fafnir, who is destined to cleanse the world in fire, but as yet still waits until the stars are right. Now, in the moonlit nights Fafnir slithers out of the forest and burns our villages, crops and families. We implore you to free us from this evil dragon, and, if it is in your will, destroy the Moredhel!" He will give any information that he can. He, like all the fey, knows where Fafnir lives; though none has ever visited there and returned. They think she's male. Tracks of destruction can be seen in the fey lands, and 4 air or better will allow tracking into the forest, with 5 needed to see the rough direction in the forest (west north westish) and good luck and a 6 is needed to track it to the Wood Sprite village. At this point the heros have a wide variety of options available. Exploration is the order of the day.
Fey Farmlands	The fey are tall, thin, somewhat etheral, but with a gentle and graceful civilization. They tend to fair skin and red or black hair with green eyes and do not seem to become tanned from working in the sun. They live on scattered homesteads small cultivated areas around them. It doesn't look like they do much work; the land seems to naturally support them -- crops grow ripe and fruitful, weeds do not appear, bees swarm into hives they construct and in turn they do not waste what they do not need and preserve their charges. Some eat meat, but many are vegetarians. They will be polite to the heroes and stress their peacefulness and their civilized nature as compared to the evil ones in the forest. If asked, they will say that they once dwelt in peace with the forest folk, until, at a festival where their children went searching for flowers in the forest, the young ones were savagely slaughtered by the forest folk, who shortly afterwards threw some of their bodies into houses and ponds of their farmlands. Since then they have been seeking for revenge. They reluctantly agreed with the Prince to supply him with the best of their children as tribute, in exchange for which he would help them resist the forest folk.
Wood Sprite Village Undead Sprits: Air: 1, Fire: 3 Water:1, Earth: 4 Unlife aura lowers all a hero's elements as above: - earth is 1,2: -2 to all - earth is 3,4: -1 to all - earth is 5+: no reduction	The wood sprites are small and dark, hairy with a coarse brown hair over their bodies and capable of flying using transparent, but surprising strong wings. They are hunter-gatherers who will never harm trees, but will happily kill and eat all forms of animal life. The sprites will welcome any visitors, asking how they are and supplying food and drink to them in a friendly manner. They will dance and play for them, and may begin gentle singing (making earth 3 or below heroes somewhat sleepy: -1 on fire, air). If asked about Fafnir they will seem somewhat nervous (to heroes with 5 water) and will tell the heroes all they know about her, which is not much. An air of 5 will allow a hero to notice one of them about to say something about Fafnir's children and then get slapped on the back, hard. If pressed hard (air score of 5 with luck should do it), the one noticed would confess that Fafnir kills all her young. A water score of five will reveal that there's more to this story, but the spirits aren't telling. If the heroes get angry the singing will become very loud, making all heroes with earth 4 or less fall asleep (use a fortune card per hero to modify result). It's hard to stop the singing as the singers will start flying around and hiding. Good air scores are needed to notice the hiders and good fire scores (6, or 3 plus flight) are needed to catch the fliers. If an opportunity arises, a couple of Moredhel will come in shapechanged to evil-looking fey (good air to notice the exaggerated cruel features - more of a caricature of fey than a realistic looking fey) and attack by summoning undead spirits and running off into the forest, shapechanging into small forest animals to hide. The sprites will help if the heroes get in real trouble, and afterwards they will start complaining about the Moredhel coming into their forest and trying to destroy them and take over their forest. Their complaints don't seem very worried, though. They say they can cope with their evil brethren who cannot live with nature but pervert it into servitude for them, and who kill trees and live in their bones. Their story about the treachery of the Fey, whom they call the Morodhel, is essentially the same as the Fey's. It should be clear to the heroes at this point that someone has deliberately engineered this feud. Careful observation of the village will allow heroes to find Ferhyet's cave, which is a few miles from the village. The sprites have hidden Ferhyet in it, as he is mortally afraid of his mother and thesprites have assured him that they will take care of him and hide him with their songs, if he will kill evil Morodhel for them. One of the sprites will go to it every week to check on the young dragon. Ferhyet is young and enthusiastic, especially about killing Moredhel! Finding the moredhel will be much harder. Speaking to animals will tell of strange squirrels that are not squirrels, and birds that cause flocks to flee. Some places in the forest to the west will show traces of passage, and a sacrificial cage where faeries have been burnt alive can be found buried under disturbed ground, but actually finding a Morodhel dwelling -- and there are loits of them -- should be very hard and need clever planning by the heroes.
Visiting Fafnir	Fafnir is an incredible sight. Over four hundred feet of rocky, shining scales, she lies in the soft flow of a lava pool that oozes from below her stomach, warming and soothing her. Even getting close to her is hard for heroes whose fire and earth are both below 5. Any hero with water score of 4 or above realizes that Fafnir is a unique, godlike creation — more powerful than all the heroes together and restrained only by the law put into her creation. She respects the heroes, and as long as that respect holds, she will not harm them. In her cave are numerous beautiful works of art, rock carvings, pottery, statuary, and some spears and swords. They are clearly valued, and if they heroes give her something valuable and beautiful, she will compare it with the others, and place it in one of their places, before lovingly destroying the rejected work. She will purr with contentment. She will be very reluctant to discuss her brood, changing conversation if pleased, snorting fire challengingly if not (fire of 4 to get out of the way, earth of 5 to avoid being wounded if hit). She will laugh at the thought of damaging the fey. Damage? She would not damage them. She would destroy them. Heh. But are they worth it? No. The last time she was out was twenty years ago, and that was not a fun destruction. She will not say more, but her eyes slide to a large, cracked open egg cased in gold and set within a nest of melted mithril weaponry. In it is a fine ash. Fafnir’s twenty-year-old tracks are plainly visible, burned into the ground and crushed through the rock. They can be followed to the forest; a tracking skill of 5 shows Fafnir was following something.
Resolution	If the heroes do not force a resolution, Ferhyet will be seen destroying a fey village and can be tracked to her resting-place. She will be too excited by the joy of destruction to listen reasonably and will probably attack any non-sprites. The Moredhel will journey to below the heroes' mountain and call a group of undead spirits to attack the heroes in the cave. The cave will prove very efficacious in assisting the heroes, but the prince of unlife will get a chance to speak to them. Persuading the two faerie races to see each other as friends will be very hard. They will not meet except by trickery, will not talk unless persuaded and some ruse will probably be needed. Fafnir is very dangerous to treat with and her conflicted nature means it's easy to annoy her.

The Fey - Air 3 - Fire 2 - Water 1 - Earth 1	Powers: Speak to Animals, Seduction (works on earth 3 or below, 4 if a group works together) Fey are forceful, animated and clever. They tend to be loners and make group decisions by listening to important fey and being persuaded. They try to persuade, or seduce if their persuasion is unsuccessful. Failing that, they are very willing to impose their will with physical force. They do not understand non-fey very well, and non-faerie they do not understand at all.
Wood Spirits - Air 2 - Fire 2 - Water 1 - Earth 2	Powers: Flight, Songs of sleeping and forgetting (works on earth 3 or below, 4 for group singing) Wood sprites live in the forest and have a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. They are clan-based, with the matriarch of the clan the head of the clan. Wood sprites avoid confrontation whenever possible and prefer to flee from enemies and charm them into sleep or make them forget why they came.
Morodhel - Air 3 - Fire 2 - Water 4 - Earth 3	Powers: Shapechange, resist charm, seduction Magic: Water Magic (4) Dark Faerie are very, very few: maybe ten to twenty of them exist, hidden in small family groups in the edges of the forest off to the east. They have a strict hierarchy decided by magical contest and are loyal to the Prince of unlife, their master. If killed, they will become unlife creatures under his command, in which case their Earth becomes 5 and fire 4 and they will be unnaturally tough. Moredhel hate their weak and plentiful cousins with a passion, and have engendered the current tension between them using their shapechange ability and superior understanding. No one knows of their existence.
Fafnir - Air 5 - Fire 8 - Water 3 - Earth 7	Powers: Immunity to fire or charming, speech, impenetrable scales except mouth, Breath fire Fafnir was created as the most powerful expression of destruction. Her breath will wound all earth 5-7 and kill earth 4 or less heroes. She exudes an air of absolute, massive control. She has never met anything that she could not squash at will. She is rightly self-confident. Although she loves destruction, she has been breaking away from his creator’s intent — that she destroy all weaker forms of life. She sees herself as so far above them that she ignores them. There is no joy in destroying them. She will be more wary of the heroes, but ennui will cause her to give up chasing them rapidly. Her joy now is the destruction of small objects of beauty, which she collects for that purpose. She occasionally bears a small clutch of eggs, but when the young become larger, she destroys them, as she must. This causes her much pain, but it does help her break free of her programming.
Ferhyet - Air 2 - Fire 4 - Water 2 - Earth 4	Powers: Immunity to fire, Breath fire Ferhyet is a young dragon of Fafnir’s. Fafnir killed all her siblings and she would have died except that singing of a small group of wood sprites caused Fafnir to forget her temporarily. She knows the wood sprites saved her and wishes to repay her debt to them. In deference to her natural urges, she wishes to destroy for them. She also loves collecting beautiful things, but doesn’t destroy them very often.