Ajax, the Invincible Overlord, the Iron Saint, has won another victory. The Chain of Acheron is decimated and on the run.

Who are the Chain?

A mercenary company of career soldiers. Legends claim they are one of the Seven Legions of Hell. They are an army for hire.

• A powerful figure loses a war and their army, but still has money; hire the Chain.
• A small country with resources fears predation by a larger country; hire the Chain.
• A leader fights a distant war, leaving their home undefended; hire the Chain.
• The government tries to shut a powerful guild down. The guild hires the Chain.
• A military leader rebels, taking the army with them. The nation hires the Chain.

They have been all over Orden, operated in every region and in the past claim to have worked across the Timescape. At times they have numbered in the tens of thousands, and at others a mere handful have remained following a defeat.

Who Joins the Chain?

People with no options who need to escape their past. The life of a professional soldier is unglamorous with little reward. Some few save their meager pay and escape to retire somewhere, but many is the story of the retired soldier who returns to the fold after finding there’s nothing for them outside the camaraderie of the Chain. The Chain are famous for being an organisation people join to disappear, to be forgotten. If you had any other options, you’d take them rather than join the Chain. Criminals escaping their past, lovers caught sleeping with the spouse of a powerful noble, innocent people framed for crimes they didn’t commit, heretics, political dissidents. One thing that unites the soldiers of the Chain; they can’t go home again.

So How Does It End?

For the soldiers of the Chain, redemption is found in the Chronicle. The tomes of history kept by the Chain’s Chroniclers down through the centuries. They win battles, they lose them, but their deeds are recorded in the Chronicle and this is immortality. If a soldier features prominently in the tale of a great battle, they feel they can die happy. The reverse is also true. The officers of the Chain brook little disobedience, but the greatest punishment is to be spoken badly of in the Chronicle. The Chronicle echoes through eternity. In dire times, the Chronicler finds inspiration in the stories of their predecessor, often reading from the Chronicle aloud to inspire the troops. The Chronicle is also a powerful tome of lore and perhaps wisdom.

What Just Happened?

The Chain’s most recent employees were Duke Kenway of Dalrath, Nicodemus Baron of Rend and Lady Sariel of the Orchid Court. Their contract was to kill Saint Ajax’s Archwizard, Mortum. Intel brought them to the independent city: Blackbottom. But it was a set-up, Mortum was never there. The details are unclear, but the Chain seem to have been caught in the middle of Ajax and Lady Sariel’s feud. The elf took her chance against Ajax, and it wasn’t enough. She is probably dead. The Chain got caught in the crossfire and paid a heavy price. Ajax’s pet demon, Relg, ate the Commander and his Hawklords bombed Blackbottom. Some of the Chain were seen fleeing to the docks, others took cover under ground, but many more were seen dead in the streets.

You are one of a group of six who beat the odds and made it out of the city, one of your group was the Chain’s Chronicler. You don’t know how many, if any, other members of the Chain got out. It wasn’t easy, and a detachment of Ajax’s Hawklords hounded you. Faced with an inevitable death on the open moors, or a likely death in a wode, your group chose the wode. Having reached its border, the Chronicler at last succumbed to her wounds.

“I’m done…that rider was an incredible shot.” The Chronicler spat out some blood and clutched at the puncture wound in her chest made by a Hawklord arrow. “I can’t follow you in. The Hawks have seen where we entered, and the Wardogs will be coming soon.”

Her clenched fist went to her waist where a belt of chains cinched her tabard. One of the chains looped through a ring attached to a huge tome. Its cover was made of wood and metal and it bulged with thousands of yellowed pages. Having unhooked it she hefted the Chronicle from her lap towards the group.

“Take it. The Chronicle is the Chain and it must survive. Get away, keep your heads down and then look for other survivors. If you are all there is…” The Chronicler paused and winced, whether through pain or perhaps the thought that the future of the Chain lay with these five, was unclear. “If you are all there is, then good luck to you. The contract remains unfulfilled. The choices will be yours to make. For now, just survive.”

With the Chronicler dead, the five members of the Chain venture further into the wode. The Hawklords can no longer harry you, and the Wardogs will never follow you here. The immediate danger has passed. Now you need to survive the wode.

Making Your Character

What’s Your Character’s Nickname?

No one in the Chain uses their real name. Everyone gets a nickname, sometimes descriptive, sometimes a reference to something they did or said when they joined. Nicknames in the Chain aren’t dramatic; they’re common. These aren’t heroes; they’re soldiers. Candle, Slick, Red, Fish, Long John, etc… What’s your character’s nickname?

Why Can’t You Go Home?

People join the Chain to escape their past. They did something, or know something, or are accused of something that makes them a pariah in their homeland. What happened to you, to make you sign up with a mercenary company?

How Did You Become an Officer?

Rank and file soldiers become officers by distinguishing themselves in battle. Often by risking their life to save other soldiers. In which battle or mission did your character attract the attention of the Officer Corps and what did you do?