Forgemaster's Pride

Forgemaster's Pride is a powerful weapon created by the Forge Cleric Ronan, empowered by his god Tohmos.

## History

As a final dedication on his Trial of Spirit, the firbolg cleric Ronan travelled to the Celestial Citadel of Tohmos within the peaks of Mount Celestia, becoming a conduit for the Greater Deity to reforge the weapon anew from the fragments of Forgemaster's Might. While the former weapon was depleted of power with the disputed ownership of the flame contained within when first located, Forgemaster's Pride is afforded none of the limitations of its precursor, and is named accordingly.

## Description

Immutable molten iron wreaths the heads of this warhammer in igneous heat, threatening divine immolation for those deserving of deliverance by its might. Mounted upon an smouldering handle, it requires a Strength of 19 or higher to wield effectively.

Contained within *Forgemaster's Pride* is the soul of the Ancient Silver Dragon Xorithromlax, known also as the Glimmer Knight. Created by Ilemer to serve Tohmos, they did so faithfully for over nine hundred years. After such a time, they were given respite by the Master of the Hammer and encouraged into a deep slumber with the promise that they would be awoken when they were needed once more. Feeling great anger upon awaking centuries later to find a world ravaged and absent of life they had fought so zealously to protect, they instead turned their fealty to that of Iotl, the Stoneheart, before being coaxed back to the path of Tohmos through acting as a mentor for the Firbolg Ronan. Now contained within the reforged weapon of the true, they continue to offer the same support and guidance to all worthy of wielding the weapon.

As part of an agreement made with his deity, Ronan pledged his soul to replace Xorithromlax's own when his time of passing came, allowing Ori her final eternal rest. With an audience of Devas, Planetars and thousands of Lantern Archons, an solemn oath was made, ratified by an Oathmaker of the Lantern Lord.

During the journey to the Echoing Athenaeum, Ronan and Fonteyne used *Dimension Door* to close the space between them and the Keeper of Whispers. Repeatedly harried personally and indirectly through his warding bond, he was eventually slain by the Keeper using **Forgemaster's Pride** itself. While the Keeper attempted to trap Ronan's soul, binding his consciousness and memories into a new Soul Sliver, the inevitable magic of the Oath instead overcame the power of the Lesser God, and instead Ronan's soul was bound into the Hammer itself. Recovered by means of a Divine Intervention by Hassk, Forgemaster's Pride was first offered to Aenarion, whom rejected it, and then given to Ragmond to hold within the Temple of Tohmos until another wielder could be found.

Unbeknownst to most, two weeks after the event in mid Onteer-Whiterose, 9WD, Ragmond departed Whittengrove with the warhammer, purpose uncertain.

Through the efforts of Aenarion Quelenneth Velenthir, Aphyllia and Ragmond McDougall, it was later reforged into a humanoid form, allowing the soul of Ronan contained within mobility akin to that of a celestial being. In doing so, Ragmond gave his soul to further ignite the Beacon of Souls in Yaldin's Domain to facilitate the reforging.

In this form, Ronan aided in the Battle of Manifestation's Return at Whittengrove, and was thusly responsible for the final destruction of the fragment of the Darkbringer when the judgement of Tohmos was called down upon the fractal crystalline mass that appeared with Hadar's demise.

## The Ronanites

One hundred years after Ronan's (mortal) demise at the hands of the Keeper of Whispers within the Athenaeum, there was a sudden resurgence of acknowledgement with regard to the firbolg cleric, and what they had subsequently been involved in during the Battle of Manifestation's Return. Founded by the gnomish vintner Sintry, the group that would become to be known as the Ronanites, or sometimes the Disciples of Ronan, were created in an effort to recognise the importance of the adventurer, seeking a formal recognition from the various churches dedicated of the God of Nobility, Tohmos, to acknowledge Ronan as a saint of the faith. Sintry claimed to have been present for the grand last stand against the Cinder Star Hadar and their denizens in the fledgling city of Whittengrove in 9WD, and bore witness to what Ronan had become when his form was unified with that of the Remnant Weapon Forgemaster's Pride. While the event profoundly changed Sintry's life - finding his first steady source of employment immediately after the resulting battle, something that they always attributed to Tohmos, the gnome maintained that when they received visions and blessings from the Master of the Hammer, it was always the forged form of Ronan that residing within them, not Tohmos themselves. Such claims were highly controversial at the time, but for decades Sintry preached of them more discreetly than most, but preached still all the same. It would not be until the Century Celebrations of Whittengrove in 103WD that they would escalate their efforts, planting the seeds for what would be a sect of several thousand less than a decade later, all with the figure of Ronan centremost as a paragon of Tohmos' teachings.

There was, as the Disciples spread, push back from many within the faith of the Principal Sixteen. While Saints, Paragons and other Exemplars of the faith exist within the belief system of the Ahlusian Pantheon, such figures are held in high esteem. They are, however, few in number, the process of canonisation and codification exceedingly particular and precise in its selections, and more pressingly so in the case of Sintry, always historically initiated by an existing member of the high clergy. Sintry, while faithful, had never been involved in any ecclesiastical role, and thus was an invalid initiator of such a process. Complicating matters further were the claims that Sintry had made, many of which could have been plainly interpreted as his solemn belief of considering Ronan to be, or soon to be an equal, or even superior to Tohmos instead of acknowledging their role as a holy servant of the True. Egos Aldaviel, the Devoiciar of Whittengrove engaged in preaching himself over the following months with a particular focus on the hierarchy of the dominions of Celestia, and encouraged his peers to do likewise. The Hierarch of Golgyra, Celenwe Lithtaur, went a step further, declaring it blasphemy and called on the Archons of the Conclave to seek trial and judgement onto the gnome accordingly, suggesting investigation of his psyche to establish the truth of the matter. In Atralran, the Archcleric Rohaida Aveline proposed a more measured approach, considering a balance of probabilities and occurrences in a manner befitting one dedicated not to Tohmos, but Yaldin. What was more likely, she proposed - "that a malign force seeking to destroy or supplant one of the greatest of the Ahlusian Sixteen?" or that a "mortal mind without training into theological nuance has misinterpreted something?".

By now however, the movement had continued to grow, for Sintry offered up no signs of ceasing his proclamations. Blacksmiths, inspired by the tale of ascension from simple forgehand to divine-infused saviour started to produce pins of bronze shaped like hammers stylised to form the letter R in a variety of scripts, although the Fundamentum alphabet used by Common predominated. Such sects were not considered hostile, nor malign in nature, but for many, there still remained concern with regard to the precedent set by loosening the formal process of sainthood, and subsequently official support, or even acknowledgement by the conventional faith of the Principal Sixteen was all but absent. For many however, the appeal of the Disciples of Ronan's beliefs were obvious. Ronan had been, like them, normal, mundane, common. From humble beginnings in a faraway land they had found themselves elevated far beyond the typical scope of the mortal soul, and thus served as a source of aspiration and inspiration far more greatly than entities already of the divine, purposefully-crafted into existence to serve a specific role. Sintry and his greatest supporters continued to drive the wedge between the commonfolk and the clergy, with differing parties debating whether this was a deliberate act or otherwise. Regardless, the divide would find itself unified a decade and a half later, upon the election of a new Archcleric of Atralran in 116WD. Rodaiha Aveline had, thirteen years prior started an inquiry into the life of the would-be saint, a thorough examination of which from birth to death serves as the cornerstone for canonisation, its conclusions delivered through the services of the Aureate Archivist months after her demise. The resulting hard-fought research was presented to the new Archcleric - a charismatic priest that had shocked all in their election to the highest ecclesiastical position in the Kingdom of Atralran at the age of eighteen - who subsequently immediately ordered the transition to the next step of the sainthood process. Over the following four years, further investigations would take place at the command of Archcleric Jacotin Emym, including confirmation of Tohmos' blessing of Ronan's acts through recorded cases of *Divine Intervention* as a result of the cleric's prayers, and in 121WD, the firbolg would be granted sainthood, formally recognising them and venerating them as a figure unequivocally blessed by Tohmos. Sintry would die but a month later, supposedly doing so with such joy, his eulogy performed by the Archcleric, an act that would definitively serve to bring the Ronanites back into the fold of the faith, the movement's members definitively active worshippers of Tohmos, but with a particular lingering reverence for arguably the most prominent servant of their deity in recent centuries.