Red Harvest by Rob Torno
The fields should be golden with tall rows of ripe grain, but the stalks droop and the tips are a dull red. They are the rust color of dried blood.
The farm houses are abandoned. Everything that could be moved has been taken.
The next field is the same; and the one after it.
What has happened here?
In nearby cities are rumors of curses or punishments from the gods, but none know the source of this blight or what it portends. Diviners, priests and wizards all seek answers but thus far none have revealed any. Fear and worry is spreading.
At least the Red Monks bring comfort, if not answers, to the people.
The Stage is Set
The Red Monks of the Hidden Kingdom entered the lands from the east. The rust blight entered the lands from the west. The weather was good and pests were minimal, but what should have been a record harvest of grain fell to the blight. Prayer would not turn it away, nor would magical charms. The red blight spread quickly and made the fields look like seas of dried blood.
The Red Monks came and offered aid, buying blighted grain for fair prices only to destroy it, and trade what untainted grain they brought with them to feed the hungry. The local nobility searched for a remedy, magical or otherwise, but worried about the growing influence of the cult as well as their people. Agents of the King were dispatched to find the origin of the blight, and now the peasants gather to seek answers, seek hope.
Conflict does not seem far off…
Behind the Curtain
There are several options as to what is really going on here, depending on the needs of the campaign, and various ways for adventurers to get involved. The following is a list of potential adventure hooks that might be used to include the Red Harvest as a means to introduce Brother Ptolemy and his Red Monks into your existing campaign.
- The nobility believe the cult is spreading the blight to increase dependency upon them, they would be happy to hire investigators to prove this. This may be true, after all the monks do not need to eat.
- The cult is secretly harvesting the blighted grain because, when dried and baked, it has mystical properties, spurring visions and flashes of prophecies before a slow death. The recruitment possibilities the blight causes among the farmers and townsfolk is simply an unexpected benefit. The characters may stumble across elements of the cult harvesting the grain before burning the stalks or sacks of blighted grain being transported.
- Brother Ptolemy believes the blight has been spread by those wishing to discredit and has hired the characters to investigate the source. This may be so, perhaps a minor death god has released the blight to strike against the cult which is stealing his due. Perhaps it is a gift to those who oppose the cult, as ingesting the blighted grain makes one immune to the effect of Ptolemy’s ritual.
- An unscrupulous group of merchants wants the Red Monks out of the way so that they can make a huge profit off the misfortune of the common people. So the merchants want Ptolemy’s operation out of the way, be it by defaming the cult or by destroying or stealing the supplies the cult is bringing in or both. The characters could be hired to guard the supply caravans or to raid them.
Note that several of these ideas are not mutually exclusive. For example, the characters could be hired to guard a Red Monk supply caravan, only to find that the monks are shipping out blighted grain.
Additional Notes
The blight is resistant, but not immune, to magical curing so counteracting the blight is not as simple as casting a spell. Something will resist the magic for somehow the blight is magical in nature. Detecting magic on the blighted grain will detect a very faint magic that is difficult to identify. The exact nature of this magic will depend on what options the Games Master chooses.
Sequels
Whatever caused the blight may cause another blight, if the characters stopped it once they will almost certainly be expected to do so again. Or they may find themselves dealing with a totally different problem.
Red Harvest by Nevermet Press is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.nevermetpress.com/contact.
