Elemental Armour from the North

Elemental Armour from the North

Taken, gore-covered, from the body of an alpha monster in Affkat, in the duchy of Unger by the adventurer Melvin Hossenfeffer.

For days Melvin had tracked, hunted, fought and slain monsters in Affkat, ever growing closer to their leader. Finally, late one afternoon, he stumbled across a camp where they rested, bickered and fought over the flesh of snatched villagers, cracking human bones for the marrow within. It is hard to say who was more surprised, but it is easy to say who recovered first. Melvin attacked, sword and axe whirling around him, slashing, thrusting. Jaws snapped and claws trapped, but on he fought, crushing one, cleaving another, until the sweat stung his eyes and the blood loosened his grip. And still he fought on, a man berserk, hewing and hacking, cutting and chopping. The monsters fell, but for each that lay slain, he took a cut or a gouge or a bit, and slowly his strength was ebbing away.

Then came their leader, a towering thing, half man, half beast, armoured where the others had been naked, wielding a great and terrible club. It might simply have been the light, but Melvin thought there was something unholy about the way it looked, some nimbus of darkness that wreathed its form. Fear gripped him, but the fear banished his exhaustion and he bellowed and charged to attack, raining blow after blow on the feral thing.

For an hour and more they fought as day turned to night, beast-thing against man, club and fang against axe and sword, terrible blows given and terrible wounds received, good matched against evil, strength against strength. Blows to its armoured body had no impact, and Melvin was forced to concentrate on harder targets, moving targets, legs, arms, the great, fanged head.

And yet, finally, simply, the man won. Perhaps it was greater determination, perhaps luck, perhaps justice. Regardless, there was no clever trick or cunning stratagem that turned the fight, simply his dogged refusal to lose. One last blow given that proved too much for the monster, and it sagged slowly to the ground and lay, moaning.

Melvin took its head from it body with his axe, and hurled it far into the dark. He turned his attention to the armour that it wore. There was something special here, he could tell, no mere simple coat of chain or bezainted mail this, but a suit of finest scale. Four metals had been used in its manufacture, each with a different hue and a different feel. Rubbing the blood and gore from it with handfuls of grass, he lifted it clear and, compelled by some irresistible urge, he donned the coat himself.

He sheathed his sword and leaning on his axe as if it were a walking cane, he stumbled away, exhausted, into the night.

Eventually, the armour found its way into the hands of Bram, of the Family Aoidh, marshal of the Mesh Sea Devils, who wore it in countless battles against the Daimons who were invading the land. But when he was captured, before he was able to escape their dungeons, the Daimon lords took the armor from him; it has not been seen since.