620_88566_Ghostwalk3.qxd
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ou’ve got your characters—some living and some dead—and you’re ready to go. But go where? To Manifest, of course! The city of Manifest is the heart of every Ghostwalk campaign. Poised above the entrance to the land of the dead, this is the place where every soul comes when it has shaken off its mortal body. Adventures may lead your characters to the far corners of the campaign world, but in the end they will always come back to Manifest . . . one way or another.
THE HISTORY OF MANIFEST
In the early days, when the mists of creation still rose from the brand-new world, an elf named Thaerana swore never to leave the side of her brother Thaedon. The two fought against the dark forces that plagued the freshly born world, until Thaedon fell to the horrific blows of a demon’s sword. Thaerana took her oath seriously and, with the help of spells of her own devising, traced Thaedon’s spirit to a narrow stretch of the Hikirian peninsula, and to a peculiar grove of trees. Thaerana managed to follow the trail to one tree in particular— one tall and strong, teeming with life force. Her brother was here, there could be no doubt. Thaerana knew she had found the realm of the afterlife. Many years later, the elves—who now dedicated themselves to tending and protecting the slowly spreading grove of “spirit trees”—found a small cave. They sent in a team of explorers who found a winding series of tunnels leading downward, ever downward. Moreover, the tunnels appeared to be haunted. The woods above were home to the ghosts of many elves, so in the tunnels, the explorers expected to see more of the elf spirits, perhaps those whose deaths were so violent or shameful that they shunned the company of their brothers and sisters. The elf explorers were shocked to instead find the ghosts of humans, halflings, gnomes, and dwarves roaming the caverns in great number—with not an elf spirit among them. An even greater surprise lay ahead. Just when the elves were ready to turn back and report on the strangely haunted caves, they heard odd noises coming from deeper in the earth. Bravely, they followed the sounds down to where it seemed the tunnel system stopped at a huge gate of stone and iron. The gate was guarded by dwarves in gleaming armor—living dwarves.
