Iconic Encounter: The Weight of Responsibility

How far would you go to save the ones you love?

For Usharak, this wasn’t even a fleeting thought. For him, the question is, how far can I go to save the ones I love? The answer seems to keep expanding as Usharak travels and grows stronger, but today the current answer was the depths of the Sarkoris Scar. What had once been the Worldwound, a fracture in reality that allowed the demonic denizens of the Outer Rifts into Golarion, still teemed with fiends and cultists alike, even as native Sarkorians worked to reclaim their blasted land. Among the ruins, Usharak had learned, was an ancient library dedicated to the demon lord Abraxas, perhaps predating even the Worldwound’s opening. Within, he hoped to find some power or pact that could undo his great shame. Evil as it might be, if it were a means to an end, it is one he would take.

As he traversed ever deeper, he remembered his childhood hunts and wondered if he was truly the hunter here or the hunted. His ever-present weight of guilt tightened around him at the thought. He had managed to avoid many direct confrontations by careful and slow navigation. Not many demons act with patience, and the necromancer used this to his advantage as he moved. He sent several demonic parties on fruitless charges while he crept past. But Usharak’s luck wouldn’t continue for long.

A sound like a crashing wave of the ocean interrupted his journey, but instead of a methodic rise and fall, the noise only increased in volume. Usharak saw the cloud, but it was too late. It approached at a breathtaking speed. The sound wasn’t an ocean but the sound of hundreds of flapping wings. A swarm of vescavors was upon him. Hundreds of tiny green creatures, each little more than wings and a mouth, flew round the necromancer, singing a maddening song. Usharak didn’t have time to cover his ears. The endless yammer of their song rang in his head as they surrounded him. It was far worse than any headache. He felt his mind betray him, and he fell into confusion. He saw flashes of his village from long ago. A happy collection of iruxis doing their best to survive in a tough world. He saw them dead, all around him. They called to him.

“Why didn’t you save us?”

“You were our protector!”

“Why did you run?”

The words ate away at his soul because he knew they were all true. He was a coward and a failure. He lashed out at the caustic words as if he could fight the truth away. What a fruitless effort. The pain of the vescavors’ bites all over his skin was the constant reminder that the weight on his back was his burden, and the ever-present chorus of gibbers in his head was the proof of his inevitable failure in his impossible task.

No.

This weight on my back is not a burden. It was his family, his loved ones, and his purpose. He would not be burdened by his responsibility. He had failed them once; he would not fail them again.

Usharak awoke from the confusion of the swarm’s song, covered in bite marks. With his wits returned, the necromancer called upon his friends. He had always leaned heaviest on Arakuru and Telek. They never let the village down, and they never let Usharak down. As the skeletons manifested, Arakuru wasted no time lunging towards the swarm, spear in hand. Although he was able to skewer a few of the fiendish bugs into a kabob, it did little to dissuade the massive hoard. Telek was always a more patient and calculated hunter. She waited by the necromancer’s side, knowing the bone keeper of the village would need her when the time came.

It came quicker than Usharak wished, as the swarm lost interest in biting bones and charged the necromancer. Usharak looked away and plunged his claw into Telek’s chest. He hated seeing his friends destroyed, even if they were merely simulacra formed from the necrotic power held safely in the bones on his back. Telek’s skeletal body exploded in a blast of ossified shrapnel into the swarm.

The swarm dissipated in an eerie silence. For but a moment, Usharak thought this might be the worst of it, but then the cry came. A monstrously large vescavor demon rapidly approached. Its five pairs of wings and unnaturally long arms were the most obvious giveaway that this was a vescavor queen. The necromancer didn’t linger to fight, instead choosing to run. Despite being the size of a small elephant, the insect flew with blistering speed.

The necromancer had to think quickly. The vescavors had clearly eaten this region of the former Worldwound down to the literal bone. The floor felt calcified, and there were strange twisting pillars made of the same stuff all around. Running past a pillar, the necromancer diverted slightly to risk a glancing touch. All it took was merely grazing the pillar to confirm they were in fact made of bone. While a grisly truth, this gave the necromancer an edge. These bones were not his to command, but he could guess how brittle the pillars were and where they were weakest.

With moments left until the queen caught up, Usharak picked his spot and cornered himself to the queen’s advantage. Maybe, just maybe, she would let her guard down. This plan was risky, but the necromancer had no time to think of a better plan. Then Usharak tripped.

The queen had caught up and slowed slightly as she approached. Clear hunger in her… well, she didn’t have eyes, but she was clearly salivating what looked like toxic goo. Usharak sat up, without enough strength left to pull himself to his feet. His trek had exhausted him, and he looked as if he'd accepted his fate. Or so it seemed. Just as the queen was prepping to launch forward and devour the necromancer who killed her children, Usharak shouted, “Now!” Arakuru, who had been carefully placed, lunged forward, his body fused with his already terrifying bone spear. The enlarged spear struck not the queen but the pillar behind Usharak. With a quick roll, the necromancer just managed to dodge the pillar. The queen wasn’t as prepared and the falling pillar of bone and squashed insectile queen.

Usharak took a moment to rest from this terrifying endeavor. Eventually, the iruxi stood up, wiped the bone dust off his scales, and continued on his way. He knew he was getting closer to an even greater challenge. As he approached the entrance to the ruined library, he steeled himself to bargain for the lives of his village. What was the cost of one soul in the face of so many already lost?

About the Author

Joshua Birdsong (he/him) is designer for the Rules and Lore team at Paizo. He was the lead designer for the upcoming Pathfinder Impossible Magic book. He started his journey with Pathfinder writing homebrew on the internet and is excited and humbled to work with so many wonderful and amazing authors, editors, and all the other incredible people who help make these books and blogs possible! Don’t forget to be awesome!

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