Adventure of Lucas Broadleaf 1

Broken arches loom over a sanctuary roof split by lightning and time. Rain drips through a ragged hole onto a cracked altar, where pale fire flickers without a candle.

Lucas Broadleaf steps into the nave, boots splashing through shattered stone and old incense ash. The air tastes of ozone and incense, and something deeper, like a storm holding its breath.

At the altar stands The Dragon in Human Form, still as a statue, one hand pressed to a rune-blackened reliquary. Golden light leaks between their fingers in slow pulses.

The reliquary shudders. A low chime answers from within the stone, and the sanctuary walls tremble as if something vast turns in its sleep.

The ancient energy radiating from the reliquary is far too volatile for a mortal vessel to contain. Lucas Broadleaf realizes with chilling certainty that his own strength would be utterly consumed by the surge if the seal were to break.

Lucas Broadleaf plants his sword point-first into a crack beside the rune-blackened reliquary and lends the Dragon his steadying force. The seal flares white, spiderwebs of light racing across the stone as the old binding gives way with a low, shuddering groan.

Lucas holds fast. The pressure in the chamber rushes outward instead of inward, and the reliquary’s black runes peel apart like burnt leaves.

A hidden latch clicks inside the stone. The seal breaks with a sharp report, and a thin stream of pale light leaks from the cracked reliquary without bursting loose.

The Dragon draws back just enough to reveal a shallow hollow inside the opened shrine, where a small, sunken ring of silver rests among ash and dust.

Take the silver ring