The Tunnels of the Lux Umbra
From the docks of Underside and Downside, to the settlements of Bilgebottom and all the way to the Halamar Mines, rumours abound about the deepest reaches of the Lux Umbra. It is said that, if one was to push deep enough, the roughly hewn walls are decorated with morbid and unsettling motifs that have nothing to do with the Iscarnethi style.
Some say they are the work of Mithridates Alti's undying servants, others whisper of even more unnatural artificers behind them. And yet, these rumours do not stop foolish fortune seekers to venture into those tunnels. For another rumour persist, spread by old prospectors. They tell of veins of softly glowing blue crystals criss-crossing the walls.
Many an edge alchemist call it Umbralith and will swear that is a kind of realmstone unique to the Lux Umbra, motes of magical energies from all the Realms brought over by the Catarhactes, melded and crystalised by Noctis' pull. Of its great and incredible powers, they can say nothing, as those few that ever returned from the depths of the Lux Umbra did so empty ended and as little more than raving lunatics.
This is the beginning of a subterranean Warcry board I will use to play my games for Animosity III. The walls are, very simply, squares of cardboard glued on square bases and decorated with the skulls from the Arcane Ruins kit and a couple of old Chaos shields. I then glued sand on the edges to protect the foam, sprinkled dried coffe grounds over smears of superglue to break the wall surface and scattered slate chips on the bases.
The mixture of corners, t-junctions and straight walls allows for plenty of configurations, ranging from a single large chamber to a network of tunnels covering half of the board.
To match the colours of the board, over a Grey Seer undercoat I used the following combinations.
Walls & Debris: stippled Celestra Grey, Nuln Oil wash, stippled Karak Stone
Tiles & Bas-reliefs: Incubi Darkness basecoat, Sybarite Green drybrush, Biel-Tan Green wash, Moot Green drybrush and hedge highlight
Veins of crystal: Ceramite White basecoat, Drakenhof Nightshade wash, Lothern Blue drybrush, Temple Guard Blue drybrush
Laelanyel's Shroudmaidens
Light. The purest of lights. No discomfort yet.
Flames in sickly shades of unhearthly colours. Raging, whirling, cackling around another flame. Golden and furious.
The cackling flames close onto the golden one. They smother it.
A laughter, and the pure light gives way to deepest darkness.
In it, the golden flame plummets, dimming until only a charred gold rune is left.
Laelanyel woke up with a start. Only in a dream the light of Hysh would have not given her a pang of unease. Still, even in dreams it brough about revelations.
"Vorya! Slytha! To me!" her imperious whisper stirred the fog drifting through the crumbling palace. In a matter of moments it coalesced into the shapes of two she-aelfs.
"My maidens! Go and summon forth the Arh'khaladh! And send word to the Caengan's Magmahold. The trail of Aef-Grimnir is no longer hidden from me. We set off at once".
The Shroudmaidens nodded and vanished again into the fog. As they faded from sight, so did the sound of daemonic laughters from the Mistweaver's memory.
I said I would add models to the Shadowflames to make them into a campaign-ready Warcry warband, and here they are! Vorya is the Witch Aelf I got as a free model from my Warhammer store in December. Slytha is a Cauldron Guard that was laying in my bits box. Like the Shadowkin Stalkers, I've mounted them on whisps of fog made with wire and Greenstuff and swapped their heads for those from the Blood Bowl Elven Union team, but used faces rather than masks.
On Vorya I've also swapped one dagger with a Razor Flail from the Drukhari Wytches, so that I can use her as a Slaughtershade with Shadow Whip. Slytha, with her long spear, was already perfect to work as a Slaughtershade with Umbral Spears.
I decorated the bases with bits of cardboard and skulls, so that they match the ones used on the rest of the Shadowflames and then painted them in the same black and white palette with purplish metal I used for all the aelfs in the warband.
Aef-Grimnir's Trials: The Cleansing Light
Aef-Grimnir woke up suddenly upon a sigil-etched floor. How he had come there, he could not recall. He remembered the press of orruk bodies around himself, his ur-gold runes throbbing, Kaptain Mogrum's Waaagh! building up, then a flash of purple light. And the nightmares.
It was then that the Gaunt Summoner's visage loomed above him in a blaze of unearthly light.
"Should you wish to regain your freedom, son of Grimnir, best my trials!"
With this the Summoner faded from sight, leaving only his echoing laughter, and a glowing portal leading onto the Silver Tower's labyrinthine depths.
Beyond it, Aef-Grimnir could see a corridor, its floor made of interlocking and churning cogs. At its center, a blue daemon and a masked human taunted him to came forward.
The Runefather cracked a broken-toothed smile. If that was what the Chaos filth wanted, he would be happy to oblige them. He would hack his way out of the Silver Tower, no matter what. Working himself into a ur-gold fuelled frenzy, he charged forward.
He cut the Blue Horror in twain, his return swing turning the Brimstone Horrors that had replaced it in a scattering of smouldering cinders, before being deflected by the cultist's shield.
A screeching imp with an avian head emerged from a pulsing portal, shouting orders at the Acolyte. The man's blade flashed, but Aef-Grimnir locked it into the teeth of his axe, broke it and then decapited the cultist. He made to move and capture the imp, but the creature evaded him, curses streaming out of its beak.
As the imp disappeared into the portal, the shadows around Aef-Grimnir stirred and shifted. An ancient presence moved within them, whispering promises of power. Enthralled, the Rune Father followed the voice into the next chamber where a cackling Blue Horror ambushed him. Quickly recovering his wits, Aef cut the daemon down, only to be engulfed in flames as the Brimstone Horrors that emerged from it spitefully detonated themselves.
Calling onto the power of the runes studding his body, Aef waded through the cloud of pink fire to find the next room was a dank and smelly Tzaangor den. The avian beastman charged forward and found the Rune father's axe waiting for it.
Again the ur-gold runes flashed deflecting the Tzaangor's blows and propelling Aef forward, the beaked head rolling on the floor behind him. Amid the debris littering the den lay a scroll inscribed with words of power and images of a basilisk's tongue. The Rune Father grabbed it and started to look for any other valuables the Tzaangor had hoarded. As he searched, Grotling Scuttlers emerged from a dark opening in the floor.
Working himself into a berzerker fury, Aef whirled around the room, killing the grotlings as fast as they emerged from the darkness.
As more Grotlings came screaming into the den, a shiny mirror appeared, drawing Aef-Grimnir towards the beckoning figure within it. As the Fyreslayer stumbled for the mirror, the Grotlings were upon him, their crude weapons biting deep into his muscled frame.
Aef-Grimnir shacked off the mirror's glamour and felled the greenskinned creepers. While he summoned the power of his runes to hel himself, a vial of shining liquid caught his attention. As soon as he grabbed it, a moon-faced homunculus appeared, asking for it. The Rune Father managed to grab this one and forced it to grant him its services. The creature promised great riches will come to the duardin and disappeared into thin air.
The strangeness of that place was starting to wear heavily upon Aef-Grimnir, so he resolved to plunge deeper into the Silver Tower. Crossing a glimmering gateway, he found himself upon a windswept, narrow ledge leading to another gate from which a completely different, more wholesome light was pouring.
As he made to cross it, the unnatural wind sent him slamming against the wall. Brushing off the minor injury, Aef stepped into the next room. There, a throng of Acolytes and Horrors chanted at the feet of a golden statue in the likenesses of a Lord of Change. Beams of the purest light darted towards the walls from prisms on either sides of it.
Aef-Grimnir could see that was the light of Hysh itself and was sure it would have banished the daemons and burnt the acolytes. Thus, he moved towards the closest prism and tried to rotate it. Alas, the prism didn't move.
The daemons and acolytes rushed around, their chanting turning into syllables of power and multihued fires filling the room. Among them, the moon-faced homunculus reappered, accompanied by the horrid stench of a fish walking on bird legs.
Singed and on the verge of collapsing, Aef-Grimnir braced himself against the wall, his hand reaching for the scroll hanging from his belt. As he read it, a score of dameons and all the acolytes turned to stone.
Still, two daemons came for him and though his runes gave him the strength for a last push, they had the best of him.
Through the eyes' of the statue, the Thief of Wits glared over Aef-Grimnir's demise. With glee, the daemonic enchanter plucked at a tiny strand of fate and kept the Fyreslayer alive, images of his pain travelling through the aether to reach Lady Laelanyel in Ulgu.
This was proving to be quite an entertaing way to pass the time before the Prime Dominon was ripe for war, thought the Gaunt Summoner.
