Whispers of the Fallen

From: Empathosarium

A cluster of small obsidian orbs that pulse with a cold, hollow beat. When held together, they release a dissonant chorus of fear, pain, and the fading flickers of life extinguished on a battlefield. Woven amidst the cries are snatches of whispered strategies and a lone voice defying the darkness.

Expanded Lore — Here are a few possible origins and implications for these macabre orbs:

• Battlefield Echoes: Perhaps the orbs are truly the remnants of a brutal battle. The Shapers might have been scavengers of emotional energy, drawn to the slaughter like carrion crows. This implies the battlefield was deeply significant historically or possessed latent magical resonance.
• Ritualistic Sacrifice:  A darker possibility is that the orbs were created during a ritual. Sacrifices weren’t killed swiftly, but made to suffer to fuel the creation of these artifacts.  This hints at a ruthless and deeply unethical side of the Shapers.
• Fragments of a Sentience:  Could the dissonant chorus be the remnants of a shattered consciousness? Perhaps an entity, demonic or otherwise, was dispersed during a cataclysmic battle, its shards of fear and defiance trapped within the orbs.

Use & Implications — Beyond the disturbing origins, the Whispers of the Fallen have applications for Tier One characters:

• Survival Training: Experiencing raw, unfiltered fear forces a character to confront their own reactions, training them in mental fortitude for dangerous situations.
• Tactical Insight: The whispers of strategy, though fragmented, give glimpses into battlefield thinking. This could provide an edge for aspiring warriors or tacticians.
• Commune with the Dead (Risk): Could a sensitive character establish a tenuous connection with the spirits trapped within, gleaning secrets from beyond the veil? This carries enormous risk of psychic backlash or even possession.

Specific Tier One Stats, Skills, Requirements & Tags

• Stats
  • +1 Willpower (temporary while holding the orbs, reflecting mental resilience)
  • -1 Charisma (temporary, due to the unsettling aura)
• Skills
  • Advantage on Perception checks trying to pinpoint threats through the discord.
  • Ability to unlock a basic “Detect Hostile Presence” cantrip (usable a limited number of times a day, flavored as sensing lingering fragments of rage and fear)
• Requirements
  • Strong mental fortitude: Characters easily overwhelmed by negativity will suffer more than they gain.
  • Some basic training in battlefield tactics, or relevant knowledge skills (History, Arcana) for deciphering strategic whispers.
• Tags: Fear, Death, Battlefield, Strategy, Willpower, Potential Corruption

Where & How Items Like This Might Be Bought and Sold:

• Black Market Relics:  The orbs’ unsettling nature and potential danger mean they’d mainly circulate in illegal markets catering to collectors of the macabre, ruthless warlords, or scholars desperate enough to risk their sanity. Price would be wildly unpredictable, driven more by the desperation of the buyer than any set value.
• Battlefield Salvage: In a world where battlefields are scavenged, a set of the orbs might turn up in the hands of a traumatized soldier or a greedy looter. The price would still be significant, but driven more by ignorance and chance than the black market network.
• Inheritance of the Shapers: If the Shapers still function in some form, they might tightly control the orbs. Access could be a ‘reward’ for completing a dark task, or the orbs could be stolen, inciting a hunt for the thief.

Environments for Best Use:

• Desolate Battlefields: Using the orbs near where they were likely created provides the strongest resonance, but also the greatest risk of stirring up psychic echoes or attracting unwanted attention.
• Training Grounds: Military academies or hardened mercenary groups might use the orbs in controlled doses for brutal but effective fear-resistance training.
• Haunted Locations: Sites of great tragedy might amplify the voices, but with unpredictable effects on the user and any lingering spirits. This is for the truly strong-willed or the recklessly curious.

Roleplaying & Tactics:

• Internal Conflict: The orbs force confrontation with raw fear and death, sparking inner conflict for empathetic characters. Do they shut it out, risk corruption, or use the experience to fuel their determination to protect others?
• Battlefield Advantage: A commander who endures the orbs can gain insight into an enemy’s tactics through the whispers, or even demoralize foes with the projected chorus of terror. This is a high-risk, potentially morally dubious tactic.
• Seeking the Dead:  The orbs offer a dangerous way to connect with the dead. Roleplay could involve seeking wisdom from a fallen hero, wrestling with the ethics of such communication, or resisting the pull of vengeful spirits trapped within the orbs.

Sensory and extra-sensory experiences triggered by the Whispers of the Fallen:

• SIGHT
  • What is Perceived: Faint, flickering images within the orbs: flashes of battle, figures locked in combat, the final moments of a dying warrior.
  • Description: The images are fragmented, ghostly, and shift with focus. They evoke the chaos of war more than offer concrete details.
  • Positives: May provide glimpses of weaponry, tactics, or terrain relevant to the orbs’ origin.
  • Negatives: The disturbing imagery can be overwhelming, especially for the empathetic, and trigger flashbacks or trauma.
• SOUND
  • What is Perceived: A cacophony of screams, battle cries, choking gasps, fading heartbeats, and whispered words carried on the edge of death.
  • Description: The sounds overlap, creating a discordant chorus of raw human suffering. Certain voices may stand out with enough focus, offering strategic snippets or final pleas.
  • Positives: Teaches the true sound of a battlefield, hardening the user against fear caused by noise and chaos.
  • Negatives: The sounds can cause psychic feedback, disorientation, and may trigger auditory hallucinations for the sensitive.
• TOUCH
  • What is Perceived: The orbs are surprisingly smooth, and icy to the touch. They thrum with a faint vibration that feels both disquieting and strangely resonant.
  • Description: The coldness seeps into fingers, the pulse mimicking a dying heartbeat.
  • Positives: The physical sensations heighten emotional impact, forcing the user to confront their own mortality.
  • Negatives: The coldness may become painful. Prolonged contact could numb fingers or trigger panic in those who fear death.
• EXTRA-SENSORY: Emotional Resonance
  • What is Perceived: Intense washes of fear, despair, and fading defiance. Individual emotions may spike with focus on a specific orb, hinting at the spirit’s last moments.
  • Description: The emotions wash over the user like a psychic shockwave, triggering their own fight-or-flight response.
  • Positives: Unparalleled training in mental fortitude, grants visceral understanding of fear’s effects for both exploitation or resistance.
  • Negatives: Can overwhelm a user’s empathy, numbing them to suffering or twisting them into mirroring the cruelty they sense.
• EXTRA-SENSORY: Echoes of the Dead
  • What is Perceived: Fleeting whispers of the fallen, sometimes strategic calls, sometimes pleas for mercy. Lingering fragments of strong emotions might leave imprints.
  • Description: The words are fragmented, fading, and may be in unfamiliar languages. It feels more like catching the edge of a dying thought than true communication.
  • Positives: Offers unparalleled historical insight, potential clues about the battle. A deeply empathetic user may gain solace by aiding lost souls.
  • Negatives: Risk of obsession with the dead, or worse, attracting hostile spirits who cling to the orbs and seek influence over the living.

Recipe for Recreating: Whispers from the Abyss: Ritual of the Fallen

• Materials Needed:
  • Obsidian Orbs: Flawless black obsidian, the number corresponding to the desired intensity of the finished artifact (more orbs = greater suffering).
  • Battlefield Remnants:  Items soaked in terror and pain: weapons stained with blood, scraps of armor from the slain, soil from a mass grave.
  • Sacrificial Offering:  The ritual hinges on a life extinguished at its peak of fear. This could range from an animal to a sentient being, the more powerful the sacrifice, the more potent (and dangerous) the resulting orbs.
• Tools Required:
  • Ritual Implements: Sacrificial altar or stone circle, tools for the sacrifice itself, athame for inscribing runes on the obsidian.
  • Enchantment Focus: An artifact symbolizing death or domination (a necromancer’s staff, a general’s bloodstained banner, etc.).
• Skill Requirements:
  • Mastery of Necromancy/Dark Enchantments: Understanding how to manipulate death energy and trap echoes of souls is essential.
  • Knowledge of History or Warfare:  Helps attune the ritual to a specific battlefield for greater resonance.
  • Cruelty and Lack of Empathy: Performing the ritual necessitates a callous disregard for life and potential consequences.
• Crafting Steps:
  • Consecration: The ritual site must be chosen carefully (ideally the actual battlefield the orbs are attuned to, or a place of great suffering).  Spells of desecration and summoning are performed.
  • The Sacrifice:  The offering is slain in a manner designed to maximize terror and pain. The Shaper must channel this raw psychic energy into the obsidian orbs.
  • Inscription: Runes symbolizing death, despair, and domination are carved into each orb. The enchantment focus is used to amplify the binding spell.
  • Containment: If any shred of the Shaper’s conscience remains, they will create a warding case for the orbs, using materials antithetical to death magic (silver, blessed wood, etc.) to limit their influence.

Note:  The fallout from such a ritual is severe. Beyond the moral cost, it likely attracts negative entities from the spirit realm, and the Shaper themselves risks corruption by the very forces they wield.

The Lament of Crows

When brother turned on brother, and fields ran crimson not with harvest but heartsblood, there walked a Shaper of twisted soul. They saw not men, not valor, but the echoes fear paints upon the air as life gutters out. That Shaper, name lost to ages, knelt not with healers but with crows, their ravenous eyes alight.

From blackest stone he wrought orbs as cold as a dead man’s stare. Upon the pyre-smoke and the chilling cries, his foul ritual took shape. Blade took life, not once, but tenfold, a hundredfold, each scream a thread woven into the obsidian song.

When the crows scattered, and only ashes remained, the orbs pulsed with a stolen heartbeat. Kings sought this weapon, for who can falter when they hear the foeman’s terror laid bare? Yet, with each whisper heard, their own hearts grew hard as the orbs they bore.

The Shaper of Crows, some say, fell to his own dark arts, his spirit splintered among the stolen echoes. Others claim he walks still, drawn to battlefields yet born, where his legacy breeds anew.

Moral of the Story:  True strength lies in the shield you raise for others, not the blade that draws their fear.  Let those who seek victory through cruelty hear the lament of the crows and remember – even the victors are devoured by death in the end.

Suggested conversions to other systems:

Call of Cthulhu

Name: Whispers of the Fallen

• Description: Cluster of unsettling obsidian orbs, pulsing with a faint, cold light. Each holds fragments of death and suffering from a forgotten battlefield.
• Sanity Cost: Holding and focusing on the orbs inflicts 1/1D4 Sanity loss as the user experiences echoes of violence and fear.
• Knowledge Gain: A successful Cthulhu Mythos or History roll reveals details about the orbs’ origin (battle tactics, the era, potential lingering entities). Occult rolls can decipher whispers of the dead with varying degrees of disturbing insight.
• Downside: The Whispers’ influence is insidious. Prolonged use reduces a character’s maximum Sanity by 1D4, reflecting permanent scarring.

Blades in the Dark

Name: Echoes of the Slaughter

• Tier: Unique, likely Tier II given the potential for corruption
• Type: Occult Artifact
• Claim: Acquiring the orbs could be a score for a crew dabbling in the supernatural: grave robbing, relic hunting, or thwarting a cult obsessed with them.
• Effect: Provides a bonus (+1D) on Resolve actions when intimidating foes or assessing battlefield situations. Whispers can offer tactical clues if deciphered correctly.
• Corruption: The echoes tempt the user towards cruelty and a disregard for suffering. This could manifest as the Trauma condition “Cold” or “Haunted.”

Dungeons & Dragons (5th Edition)

Name: Whispers of the Fallen

• Rarity: Very Rare or Artifact
• Type: Wondrous Item (requires attunement, strong-willed character suggested)
• Stats: +2 on Intimidation checks, +1 temporary Willpower save after using the orbs
• Insight: Allows a character to cast a modified “Speak with Dead” spell focused on those trapped within the orbs (limited uses per day).
• Flaw: Vulnerability to psychic damage. After each use, the user must make a Wisdom Save (DC escalating with time) or suffer 1d6 psychic damage and gain a short-term Madness effect (DMG’s table)

Knave

Name: Orbs of the Lost Legion

• Material: Obsidian
• Traits: Unique, Cursed, Fragile
• Use: Provides a +2 bonus to resist fear effects or demoralization. Allows limited communication with the dead (unclear and disturbing).
• Corruption: Using the orbs grants a temporary point of Stress. Accumulated Stress could manifest as physical debilitation, attracting vengeful spirits, or losing empathy entirely.

Fate

Name: The Chorus of the Fallen

• Aspect: Echoes of a Lost Battle
• Invoke: Gain a bonus when intimidating opponents, resisting fear, or deciphering tactics whispered within the orbs. This could be a +2 bonus or creating a temporary “Battlefield Insight” Aspect.
• Compel: The orbs’ whispers are insidious. Compels could involve the character becoming cold-hearted, obsessed with seeking out battlefields, or suffering flashbacks that disrupt actions in tense situations.

Numenera & Cypher System

Name: Obsidian Echoes of the Fallen

• Type: Artifact
• Level: 6+ (higher if the battlefield itself is a major plot point)
• Effect: Reduces difficulty of combat-related Intimidation tasks by two steps. Grants ability to use Intellect to discern strategic insights from whispers within the orbs.
• Depletion: 1 in 1d10 chance per use – upon depletion, the user becomes haunted by a vengeful spirit from the orbs, inflicting Intrusions or psychic damage.

Pathfinder (2nd Edition)

Name: Whispers of the Lost Legion

• Rarity: Unique
• Category: Wondrous Item
• Level: 10+
• Traits: Magical, Necromancy, Cursed
• Activation: Interact (concentrate)
• Effect: Grants a +2 circumstance bonus to Intimidation, Warfare Lore, and Will saves against fear effects. Allows the casting of a limited “Speak with Dead” spell tied to the orbs.
• Curse: Upon each use, there’s a cumulative chance the character gains a negative Condition representing mental strain (“Stupefied”, “Enfeebled” ) or an alignment shift towards Evil.

Savage Worlds

Name: The Dead’s Lament

• Arcane Background: (Optional): Linked to a new Harrowed-style Edge
• Powers:
  • Fear (Novice): The user can project the orbs’ chilling aura, potentially causing foes to become Shaken.
  • Detect Spirits (Seasoned): The orbs amplify the character’s sensitivity to the supernatural, allowing them to perceive lingering echoes of those who died.
• Hindrance: The orbs breed a grim fascination and desensitization to violence, represented by a Major Hindrance (Bloodthirsty, Callous, etc.).

Shadowrun

Name: Echoes of the Fallen

• Type: Ritual Focus, Awakened
• Rarity: Highly Unique, Forbidden
• Effect: +2 dice pool to Intimidation, Leadership tests against those vulnerable to fear, and Perception checks to spot ambushes or tactical weaknesses. Allows limited astral perception of lingering ‘death echoes’ on a battlefield.
• Drawback: The orbs are tainted by suffering. Using them increases the risk of attracting hostile spirits, or suffering Drain if the user lacks strong mental defenses. Prolonged use could leave a character haunted or hardened to the point of cruelty.

Starfinder

Name: Death Resonance Orbs

• Type: Hybrid Item (Technological and Mystical)
• Level: 10+
• Effect: Grants +2 to Intimidate checks, Culture checks to analyze military history related to the orbs, and Sense Motive checks to unravel whispers of strategy. Can be used as a focus for a Mystic’s Connection spells to interact with fragmented spirits present in the orbs.
• Origin: The orbs could be alien artifacts designed to record death for unknown purposes, or relics of a precursor race of psychic warriors wiped out in a brutal conflict.

Traveller (Mongoose Edition)

Name: The Lament Orbs

• Tech Level: TL15+ if the orbs are salvaged from an advanced race, otherwise, a relic of unknown origin.
• Effect: +2 DM to Intimidation-type skill checks, and a bonus to Battle Dress or Tactics skills when analyzing a battlefield where the whispers are strong.
• Risk: The disturbing nature of the orbs makes them attractive to twisted individuals or nihilist cults. Using the orbs may lead to Social Stigma or psychological conditions reflecting emotional trauma.

Warhammer (Fantasy or 40K)

Name: The Black Orbs of Despair (Fantasy) / Fallen Echoes (40K)

• Lore: Corrupted by the Ruinous Powers (Fantasy), or disturbing relics of a xenos race known for psychic cruelty (40K).
• Effect: Grant a bonus to Fear-causing attacks and skill checks based on Intimidation. Offer unsettling visions that could provide cryptic clues about the orbs’ origin or the echoes of past battles.
• Corruption: Each use increases Corruption points. Characters may develop disturbing mutations, become dangerously desensitized to violence, or attract the attention of entities drawn to suffering (daemons, Enslavers, etc.).