The Traveling Spire

Most Spires are stationary, gargantuan constructs seen all over the land stretching towards the sky as if trying to grasp the stars. Though there are rumours of something which can only be described as the Travelling Spire. Most of it sounds like folk tales which should not be trusted but now and then some of them seem to strangely align and thus they may hold some truth to it. Still it all sounds too much like fantasy or stories from an old, mad man. Given how many arguments we have against it and what we know about this matter it seems unlikely to truly exist.
~ Markus Stormlichter

 

It is now the sixth time this strange construct was spotted in Galania and once again once we reached the place of the sighting we did find nothing but dead tree trunks and this strange hole in the ground. Its size fits perfectly with the other sightings, being a perfectly round hole with a diameter of 23 feet. One man got too close to it while measuring its size and fell into it shortly before we experienced the quake and the hole collapsed. The silence when we arrived at the sighting was unbearable and it still gives me the creeps. Not even a fly or an ant was to be seen in the area. This all lets me conclude that it is the work of the strangers from the Spires but for now we do not have evidence for it.
~ Inspector Auston

 

We experienced something very strange, sir. The tall, masked man who offered his help before the battle came from the mountains with a small army of bug-man. They looked similar to the warriors who live in the Spires but we know the area and there is no Spire in this direction. We did win the battle and as promised left the battlefield immediately carrying away our wounded. Whilst our commander was preparing for the following negotiations with our enemy I assigned three scouts to see what these strangers are up to and where they go. Only one came back with a truly disturbing story. He witnessed them taking the bodies of their fallen but also those of our men and our enemies. Earth was moved to look as if graves were dug but he saw them empty. They dragged the corpses back to the mountains where they walked into a massive mouth emerging from the ground. Once all entered the mouth closed and retreated back into the ground shaking the earth whilst moving. Before reporting back he measured the hole to have a diameter of 23 feet. It collapsed some time after he left the area as we couldn’t find any evidence for it being there. I will resign my post for the words I heard shiver me to my bones and I mourn whilst thinking about which atrocities the dead bodies of our commands are used for. This letter is used to describe to you, sir, the reason for my resignation.
~ August Marteau

 

From what we were able to discover the Spires aren’t buildings but in fact they are massive organisms. Being somehow similar to trees but indeed very different at the same time. It is said that long before our times the Dragons had a war with those who live in the Spires, though it is not common knowledge. These rumors also mention that it was in early times where most of the Spires were still growing and some of the smaller ones were destroyed leaving nothing behind. But we know that this is not the truth as we found on several occasions the leftovers of root systems of something which was very similar to a Spire-tree. Though most of them were long dead some still had fought for survival. Strange creatures seen nowhere else could be encountered at such places but it seems the people of the Spires were not interested in them. This does not exclude the possibility of some of these cut off roots to have survived and somehow allured the glare of the eyes of these strange people. Just one more of their secrets. Would it now be possible that one of these roots is now inhabited by a group of them? Maybe they even managed to use their blasphemous magic to make such a root move on its own. This could explain the strange sightings we had heard about.
~ Versula, Chapter Mage and Elder Librarian

 

I had a strange encounter yesterday and wanted you to know about it, my prince. On our way to Acheron we encountered a group of bandits outnumbering us by far so we had to retreat. Before it came to the battle a stranger came to our camp. I could swear we were one of these strange people from the Spires. He was tall and had this strange demeanor to him. But he was not like others I had encountered. Instead of painted skin and bone he was clad in porcelain and armor looking like a bugs certain. He did say he is the Mask-Maker and he came with a deal as he saw we are in need. The bandits, he said, are no good for us like they are for you. He offered me to join our forces. We would have our path cleared and he would gain something out of it which he made seem an obvious gain but now it seems my mind lacks any detail of what it might be. Today we had our battle and men who looked like clad in the armors of giant bugs fought by our side. We won and left to be on our way as quickly as possible as the everlasting silence of these strangers made us more nervous than the presence of the bandits nearby.
~ Commander Sytrik Skalkonski