Promissa

X Worldbuilders:

GM James R

"Out of all the Re-Animators I know, you have always been the strongest" - Fermi's last words to his ward

Promissa was a necromancer serving under the lost god Vecna in the early BR era. She called herself a "Chaser of Secrets".

About

Promissa was stranded on the island of Kiston...purposefully. She and her faction of Vecna followers were on a mission to divine the secrets of the realm for their God of Secrets. Knowing the center of the realm was an unmapped death trap, their team, led by the necromancer Fermi, drove their ships directly into the maelstrom, banishing themselves into the locked continent.

Promissa considered herself a "Newling" of the clan, and expendable, which is why she volunteered on the mission to head into Kiston in the first place. She begged to be given up to the Draco-Orc sacrificial ritual in place of her mentor Fermi, but the others, a group known as The Venship, voted that Promissa should stay alive, as she was full of "promise", and Fermi would be sacrificed.

Promissa, or an associate of hers, gave the name "Vern" to creatures later known as Wyverns.

After encountering The Venship on Kiston, Promissa struck a deal with the group. Because she was a necromancer, and because the group had already suffered casualties, Promissa promised to help lead and guide the team on a mission that would lead them off the island, but needed to resurrect two of the dead, Alexias and Edgar, in order to properly protect the group and to have more helping hands on the team. While this lead to the gruesome resurrections of a skeleton Alexi and a zombie-like Edgar, the team ultimately decided it was for the best, and the 4 living + 2 dead were able to work together and get to Promissa's abandoned campsite further inland.

Promissa's resurrection of the two members of the Venships was not without note: After a few party tricks like making the corpses say "Thank You" and "I am Ready to Help You!" with uncanny enthusiasm, the venship demanded that Promissa ease off, and let the zombies do their own thing for the most part. A set of boundaries were established:

• Rule 1 - Can't kill them for no good reasons.
• Rule 2 - Can't do anything that purposefully destroys their bodies
• Rule 3 - Alexi and Edgar MUST be brought back whenever possible.
• Rule 4 - No using them as a shield or as a guinea pig
• Rule 5 - No using our friends to Initiate a Battle
• Rule 6 - No using our friends against us
• Rule 7 - No leaving our friends behind unless they agree to it

Promissa's first job with the new team was to teach Edgar La Croix, how to decipher the ancient texts of Vecna. While doing that, she helped the group reverse-kidnap Presidith from a group of Draco-Orcs who had stolen him away in order to turn him over to Jatil Jivelg

Promissa's last act in life was to cast a "Protection Curse" over the Kalachakra, drawing from the same life & death energies that Vecna empowers her with. Just after casting the spell, she was taken down by the infantile World Breaker. It is said that it was Promissa's death that doubled down on the necromatic power of the curse, preventing anyone in the realm from every touching or damaging the wheel, with the exception of those present to imbue the curse in the first place.

With no children of her own, the only people who would ever be able to move the wheel again were the children of the Venship...known 2000 years later as The Fated Five.

Behind the Screen

• Promissa's name is latin for "Promises", a reference to her being "The Promised One" in Vecnan prophecies, leading the way to solving the riddle of Kiston, as well as her promise to Fermi to make good on his life's work.
• Promissa was described as having light brown skin and dark messy hair, with black/purple robes.
• Promissa's spells included:
  • HARM (14d6)
  • Contagion
  • Stone Shape (Ocassionally functioned as Mud Shape since much of the island was muddy dirt)
  • Dispel Magic
  • Animate Dead (which would be spent every day to animate the two PCs
  • Silence
  • Command