Hello Monsters,

We're in our final week and still making great progress as we head toward the finish line! Tomorrow, I'll have a big update that reviews all of the Pledge Tiers and Add On options, so keep an eye out for that. On Tuesday, we'll have the final two manuscript sections from the Monster Kingdomes draft version; backers of this project will be able to read the entire book in it's current form, before any pledges are processed or payments collected. No monsters on this end - the Onyx Path team wants you to know exactly what you're supporting and make sure you're on board with the project!

On Wednesday, we're gonna take a look at the Stretch Goals we've unlocked. Just a reminder about our current target...

Dearest reader, I have a tale I doubt you will believe, but I shall regale you with it all the same. I have sworn that every recent entry in this journal is truth, and I abide by that vow. In the last season, I dined with an emperor and entered a realm I could hardly believe existed, the light within was so bright. It seemed to scour the sin from my scales.

Be at ease, good reader: I have accumulated plenty more since then.

In my flight from Pandemion, I made good company with a renegade dreadnaut by the name of Atticis. How he was free from his master’s whip, I do not know, but on promise of paying him well and bringing him to the safety of Draoidahaek (it seems Pandemion is not to his tastes), he agreed to lead me across the Nithera Empire once more and to a sanctuary. He described this place of safety as Carnaton, which I confess is not a town I knew of before he named it. In need of an ally and a strong spear (Atticis’s sceptre was a great shaft of black wood with a sharpened obsidian tip that he named the Purity, rather arrogantly) I agreed to his offer.

It's a fine thing that Atticis was with me as without him I would not have known to give the Nitheran town known as Rebel’s Moan a wide berth (tis a prison camp worse than Mudriven, I am told). We remained low, dressed as peasants, and availed ourselves of the tender mercies of villagers, farmers, and Alfaith priests we encountered on our journey. Atticis was surprisingly verbose for a gauntlet, and taught me much of the empire’s dreadnauts, how depending on one’s armor a dreadnaut can become utterly enthralled to an emperor’s will (I knew they were slavishly devoted, but had no idea there was a magical component), and of the positions and outposts along the great walls dotting this land.

We reached the water in good time, despite having to cut our way through a squad similar to the one I forged long before and fight off a pack of harpies coated in the skins of their enemies. It was Atticis’s intent that we find a means to cross and reach a “friendly” town named Glimmerton, before taking a longboat south, past the giant’s toll gate at Lotide (which would have taken some good bluff work), and ultimately turn due east-south-east for Draoidahaek.

Dear reader, my pursuit has always been the writing of this journal. To return before visiting the remaining kingdoms was never a part of my agenda. Yet I told Atticis that I would follow his plan, because I needed his aid. Archlich Khufu: I never once entertained the idea of returning to my kingdom without a complete accounting. I swear it.

We were out of good fortune. The crossings to the Nithera isle and Glimmerton were all adrift. Apparently a recent clash between the Scorpion Legion and dreadnauts resulted in six bridges’ destruction, implying great success on Pandemion’s part or that the empire has no desire for the north’s chaotic forces to access their central island. Therefore, we constructed a raft from driftwood and tried paddling to Glimmerton ourselves. This was an extreme error, for the empire suspects all who use their waterways without the appropriate clay tablets. Unidentified folk such as ourselves would be picked up by the first passing patrol. 

It so happens, dear reader, that a dreadnaut patrol did not intercept us. Our raft — a pathetic construction, all told — was caught in the backtide washing us northwest, past Glimmerton, away from Draoidahaek, and into the swell of the royal skiff sailing out of Canalcrown. We were fortunate to not end up beneath the water, but for reasons that remain elusive, we were plucked from the depths and brought aboard.

This is where I met my first emperor, dearest reader. Emperor Fier the White intended to have us tortured and executed for his own amusement. Certainly, when Fier discovered Atticis was a traitor he had him pulled apart at the joints with everyone aboard the skiff to act as witness to his screams, cries, pleas, and final breaths. I was sure that my fate would follow a similar path, but instead Fier invited me to dine with him.

Fier is known for his cool, detached demeanor. He is also recognized for his dragonkin heritage, which he displays proudly. Mayhap I was spared because he felt we shared a common background? No, that thought was put from my mind when he made me eat from a bowl on the ground as he fed on a banquet of luxurious food and drink from around Gewinn. I never lied, good reader. I said I dined with him, but never stated it was at the table.

Emperor Fier was intrigued enough by my presence as to want to read my journal, which his dreadnaut guards located in its hiding place. I felt that terror again, my reader, that this journal and all of my accumulated data for Draoidahaek would be destroyed for no reason other than some imperial’s amusement. But Fier was interested and questioned me repeatedly. This wasn’t an interrogation such as the one in Mudriven; it was closer to a conversation. He took great delight in my remarks regarding other kingdoms’ weaknesses and flaws. He even described Mudriven as a shame on the empire. And then he gifted me my own journal and commanded me, on behalf of the Nithera Empire, to complete my work and ensure it was published far and wide.

To describe myself as stunned would be an understatement beyond reckoning. I thanked him profusely, groveled like a fool, and was soon thrown from his skiff onto the southern bank of the Lasting Canal. I did not know this place as I did others, and so I spent many days wandering alone before discovering the largest amassed army I have ever witnessed. Legion upon legion, banners fluttering in the wind, monsters and men, weapons, armor, and siege engines by the thousand. I tried to identify who they were attacking, but I came to understand they were there preparing for a massive assault that hadn’t yet begun. The target: the Kingdom of Shards.

Now, reader, you must understand that while I have no sympathy for those servants of light and delusion, for this journal to find completion I was compelled to enter the Kingdom of Shards before its destruction. I was certain the empire’s forces would demolish the huge wall of entangled limbs (some claim it’s constructed from the fossilized remains of angels known as ananephilim) and march into the kingdom, annihilating all in their path. To do so would require mass military coordination and maneuver, however, and a solitary traveler can more easily breach such a wall without notice.

With no time to lose, I clambered over the hillside, nearly losing my footing as I sped across the landscape toward the Empyrean Wall. I cared not that imperial forces would see me — a dragonkin in filthy magus robes laden down with satchels filled with books and using a curved longblade (my sceptre) as a walking stick — as I knew deep in my soul that the Empyrean Wall would part for me.

Part it did. I have wondered if it sensed Zeldera on me still and identified me as one of the forlorn. Whatever the truth, I approached that enormous barricade of bodies and an aperture made itself known, a knot of necks and torsos stretching and splitting so I could climb through. I was hit by such blinding, devastating light as I entered that it felt as if my scales were being burned from my body, but soon I grew used to the radiance.

This Kingdom of Shards, my reader, my archlich, is a thing of miracle. I am not suggesting it is great and glorious! No, not at all. I am stating that its presence should not be, yet here it is. A vast garden of giant statues, each of them a heavenly body. A twisted woodland of ripe berries and pleasing shade. Fields of rich crops and healthy livestock. A people who seem sad, resigned to doom, but determined to fight on until they can fight no longer. How can this exist if not by a miracle?

The secrets of the Kingdom of Shards I am determined to retain in my mind alone. Penning them as I have these other entries seems to disrespect the miracle. Dear reader, do not assume I am won over by the truth and beauty of this place. It hurts me to be here. The light is too bright, the joys and loves too saccharine sweet. The misery pervading Shards was my anchor, but I knew as I explored the realm (oddly, I was rarely challenged despite my not being from there — mayhap the wall allowing my entry was test enough for the people) that my time would need to be short as the Nithera Empire were due to launch their campaign of obliteration.

Dear reader, my most persistent confusion is this, even as I sail south to Frontereton and the Kingdom of Branduur: as I departed, the invasion had not yet begun. And from what the forlorn told me, the Nitheran army had been held in position for four seasons, quickly draining the surrounding towns and villages of Nithera of all resources in order to feed this huge conglomerated force. The forlorn were convinced that the attack would never come, that there was something preventing it on the Nitheran side. What that might be, I cannot say. Perhaps one of the emperors has not given the decree, but if that is so, one must wonder at their motives.