Ebonblade

## Ranks and Titles

* Mayor of the Commune
* Marsh Lord of Ebon's Blade
* Elder
* Veteran

## Affiliation

* Commune
* Marsh Lords

**Ebonblade**, most often shortened to **Ebon**, was a wealthy businessman and mayor of the Commune.

His association with cutthroat mercenaries and the dark underbelly of Dragonhollow got the better of him when his own contact robbed him of his wealth, resulting in him leaving forever.

# History

### Early Activities

   Ebonblade arrived in Lakeview Village via airship on 1E:6.

He rapidly established a factory farm in the south-central Lakelands, prioritizing a cattle breeding program to quickly produce massive quantities of beef.

On 1E:8, he was one of the first handful of victims murdered by deadly warrior Champ as he launched his one-man war on all of Dragonhollow. Two days later, Champ slaughtered him again outside his farm, gaining needed supplies in the form of ten stacks of steak. To stop the killings, Ebon reached a financial agreement with Champ, briefly becoming a vassal of the warlord.

In the wake of the war, Ebon developed mercenary contacts within the seedy underbelly of the Lakelands, most notably Ozven, and began paying them for protection and secret assassinations.

### The Commune

As a reaction to the horrors he witnessed during Champ's Crusade, Ebonblade founded a utopian community known as the Commune.

The town was open to all residents and protected from the outside world by a barrier wall. Inside the Commune, the very notion of private property was abolished and everyone shared materials and structures were accessible to all. Residents of the Commune were expected to work together as one to achieve their common interests. Decision making was done by consensus achieved through public votes. Violence and incivility were grounds for expulsion.

Ebon's own home was near the town center, a three-story oaken townhouse, the largest in the community.

After property disputes and a series of thefts led the unrest and paranoia, Ebon made the controversial decision to open a police station and appoint Moosin as Sheriff of the Commune. The decision was fairly unpopular, with Faeblade pointing out that the community was supposed to be a safe haven against both crime and authority. To make matters worse, residents felt that Moosin did more harm than good and that he often overstepped his bounds.

### Robbery and Revenge

On 1E:45, someone carried out a massive heist that drained the community of its valuables. Order decayed rapidly as everyone blamed each other and Ebonblade lost control of the situation leading to bloodshed. After a brief investigation and search of the premises by Moosin resulted in no promising leads, Ebon dismissed Moosin as sheriff and turned to his sellsword contacts in the dark corners of Lakeview Village.

He offered a 64 diamond reward on the Bounty Board for any information that led to those responsible. Ebon provided those who pursued the job with a list of Commune residents with access to chests and a separate list of the most likely suspects. A number of bounty hunters answered the call including Tycar and Pancake, but it was Tox who eventually exposed the culprit as L3gitSkullz in exchange for a double chest full of dirt for use in the construction of Black Rose.

Armed with evidence and coordinates, Ebon attempted to confront the thief L3gitSkullz and lure him out of hiding, but the man suspected trouble and declined. Instead, he hired his contract killer Ozven to carry out a surprise assassination, which was successful several times over.

### Commune Collapse

Ebonblade then announced to the Commune who was behind the theft, but it was too late. Their trust shaken and their hard work for naught, most of the members moved elsewhere or abandoned Dragonhollow altogether.

Ebon abandoned the Commune completely once his residents left and it fell into ruin, being slowly picked apart by scavengers.

The experience changed him, leading him to become lackadaisical and led purely by serendipity, his only joys coming from whatever whim crossed his mind in the moment.

### Business Interests

Ebonblade came to dominate the food industry of the First Era, flooding the markets with exceptionally cheap beef in huge quantities. To further his monopoly, he made use of Ozven and other paid killers to strong-arm, blackmail, and undermine his competition.

His interests became diversified as he created many monster farms, accruing mass supplies of bones, arrows, spider eyes, slimeballs, armor, and weapons which he then sold to the highest bidder. He quickly became one of the richest merchants in the Lakelands, securing a number of high-profile contracts that included stocking the pantries of Pink Petal and Black Rose.

Ebon was also charitable, offering newcomers entire stacks of beef for free and sponsoring new builds across the region.

His farms were so extraordinarily productive that Eris carried out a worldwide purge of livestock over environmental concerns, eliciting stern objections from Ebon that fell upon deaf ears. Furthermore, in response to what she considered excessive animal rearing, Eris instituted a new edict that made it a crime to raise too much livestock.

Despite the setback, Ebon had already made a sizable fortune. As a symbol of his fabulous wealth, in Lakeview Village he erected Ebonrise, an ostentatious five-story office tower built from stone brick and spruce wood accented with blocks of diamond, emerald, gold, iron, lapis, and redstone.

His head was was of many caught in cobwebs inside the Pumpking.

### Chronos

When the time distortions of the World Warp began affecting Dragonhollow on 1E:54, Eris evacuated all residents to the planet Chronos.

Ebonblade thrived in the new environment, quickly enchanting a set of armor and weapons with which he hunted new arrivals who had been forbidden by their goddess from bringing any possessions with them from Dragonhollow. This made them easy targets for a number of local bandits including Ebon.

He soon grew bored with casual murder and decided to explore the truth behind Acey's claim that people on Chronos were entitled to do whatever they wanted. He gathered several buckets of lava, built a series of pillars high in the air, and formed an impenetrable wall of fire and flame that no one leaving the airship could advance through. Dozens died and travel to Chronos was interdicted for hours while he cackled maniacally at their misfortune.

After the World Warp was ended by Eris and refugees were returned to Dragonhollow, a number of concerned citizens called for the arrest and execution of Ebon for his crimes in the Ebon Referendum. Though the vote passed, Eris felt that a death sentence was disproportionately extreme for his offense. Instead she imprisoned him in Lakeview Village and allowed residents to slap him around and throw snowballs at him.

When the DDoS Protection Pack was made available as a reward for the community's patience in dealing with the World Warp, the DDoS Edge became Ebon's favorite weapon and he carried it everywhere he went for the remainder of the First Era.

On the night of the First Bloodmoon that led to the destruction of Lakeview Village, Ebon held a lavish party for his friends at Ebonrise. A guest, the future Loremaster Alarrick, would later write a book recounting the horror that unfolded before his eyes.

### Swamplands

Ebonblade rebuilt his lost trade empire in the Swamplands during the Second Era, profiting from the many relationships he'd already established. In addition to his existing contracts with Ozven and Tycar, he began working with other mercenaries such as Wasdoog and Wiz.

He quickly became one of the region's wealthiest citizens.

In the region's capital of Swampwater he constructed Ebon's Blade, one of the five Marsh Towers and the tallest manmade structure in the city. The ostentatious high-rise was a symbol of Ebon's riches, built from excess coal, redstone, and lapis and embellished with gold and diamond.

### Ebon's Fall

Searching for ways to continue expanding his power base, Ebon floated the idea of creating a shadow faction with the manpower and supplies to control the Swamplands from border-to-border, but whose members would operate as solitary bandits so that the public would think they were completely independent rather than part of a cartel.

His new ally Wiz expressed interest in the plan and promised the involvement of his friends KlutzMacher and Samuel Bobby. Ebon rewarded him by inviting Wiz to live inside Ebon's Blade tower and granting him access to the supplies within.

However, Ebon had been deceived—Wiz's offer was cover for his burglary of Ebon's Blade. The bandit stole the all of Ebon's valuables—then took the tower itself, disassembling its valuable walls. When Ebon tried to stop him, Wiz slaughtered him and looted his corpse as well.

Outraged, Ebon petitioned Eris and demanded that she intervene, confiscate his goods from Wiz, and return them in full to their rightful owner so he could rebuild Ebon's Blade. When the goddess of discord laughed in his face and scolded him for being so gullible, he furiously announced that he was done with Dragonhollow and marched off to the airship.

Sensei and other friends and supporters launched the SPREAD THE WORD campaign calling for the immediate execution of Wiz for his deception. Acey eventually addressed their concerns by putting it to a community vote. The effort failed when two of the petitioners forgot to vote and Acey herself issued a tie-breaking effort when the when the Archpriestess Azureila made an impassioned argument that the bandit's actions had been entirely legal and legitimate.

Ebon never returned to Dragonhollow.

His departure was the subject of *Broken Blade*.