Chapter X: The Empire
to restoring control amongst their own kind, in particular the threat posed by the sheer number of slaves they had captured, such had been their success. As a parting gesture, the Lords of Decay dispatched an assassin to Middenheim to kill Mandred, now elected Emperor. The attack was successful, and the deeds of the Skaven were hidden by carefully engineered evidence pointing to mutants dwelling within the sewers of the city. Ever since their great attack, the Skaven have gathered their strength, often using greedy human allies to provide them with information or to do their bidding. In 2320, Skaven infiltrators, aided by superstitious sailors and corrupt dockworkers, entered the port of Marienburg and destroyed many ships with firepots. In 2387, the Skaven undermined the walls of Castle Siegfried in Sylvania. When their ally, Prince Karsten of Waldenhof, refused to pay them what they had demanded, the Skaven attacked Waldenhof and bore away every child in the town. Most recently, the Skaven have been active in Nuln, under the leadership of Grey Seer Thanquol. Countess Emmanuelle’s Chief Magistrate, Fritz von Halstadt, was discovered operating a smuggling ring in the sewers of the city, and Thanquol’s plans to craft a civil war within Nuln was only thwarted when the plot was exposed by a pair of itinerant adventurers who had come to the city on other business. Like the Chaos from which they were originally born, the Skaven pose a subtle yet deadly menace. Cunning and patient, yet terrifyingly ferocious when necessary, they gnaw at the roots of the Empire, breeding corruption in men’s hearts. Unnumbered and unseen, they are the hidden peril concealed in every alley and behind every sewer grate. T he r esTless d ead Men fear death above all things. Most often they are content at raising sons and daughters, and kings and emperors erect monuments so that generations to come will remember them, while men of lesser means may record their lives in journals or create works of art and craftsmanship. This way something of them remains even after their deaths. But some individuals resort to darker, more desperate measures. They turn to the Dark Art of Necromancy. Necromancy is the magic of the world of dead. A Necromancer is able to communicate with the dead and summon spirits. His magic enables him to extend his life for centuries and to raise corpses to create legions of Zombies to fight for him. Ever since the gates collapsed and raw Chaos spilled across the world, the dead have not rested easily in their graves. For countless generations, men of evil temperament have sought to enslave the dead to their will, and Sigmar himself faced the greatest of all Necromancers—the dread lord of the Undead, Nagash. Those who practice this most dire of forbidden arts face many terrible dangers. Some try to extend their lives for decades or even centuries beyond their natural span. Sometimes they succeed, and these individuals retain their physical body and what is left of their sanity. But usually the result is far more horrible than death itself. Continual use of dark magic drains the soul and withers the body. As the time passes Necromancers become more and more cadaverous in appearance. Mystery shrouds the study of Necromancy. To learn the Dark Art, an aspirant must either seek a Necromancer and become an apprentice or acquire one of the Forbidden Tomes such as the Liber Mortis or one of the Nine Books of Nagash. Another such volume is the Book of the Dead, written by the mad Arabyan prince Abdul ben Raschid. He travelled to the Land of the Dead in far south, and driven mad by his experiences, he wrote his blasphemous masterpiece. He did not live to see the widespread public revulsion of his work, or the great
pyre where the Caliph of Ka-Sabar burned all the copies he could find. Unfortunately, the Caliph did not find them all. Forbidden books have their own perils. The lore of Necromancy is in these books, written with ink distilled from human blood and bound with the skins of mortals. Only the most strong-willed can read these books and retain any sense of sanity. These forbidden tomes tell of the horrible secrets of the beyond, of the dark insane dreams that the dead dream in their eternal rest. Many spells of waking the dead, summoning death magic and controlling the lesser Undead are recorded in these books. They also tell of rites that attract dark magic, they mention the days when the evil magic is at its strongest, and the places that attract the winds of Necromantic magic. Necromancers are universally abhorred and hunted. The men of the Empire respect the dead, and the Priests of Morr as well as the Witch Hunters tirelessly persecute those who would defile the rest of the departed. Many an aspiring Necromancer has perished in the cleansing flames of the Witch Hunters. However, it is not just the Necromancer who threatens the Empire, for the shadow of the Vampire lies long across the land. T he m arCh of The V ampIre C ounTs On the Eastern border of Stirland, under the cold shadow of the World’s Edge Mountains, lies Sylvania, the most ill-regarded place in the whole Empire—some would say all of the Old World. It is a rugged, infertile land covered with barren hills, blasted wastes and fog-swathed forests. It is shunned by all who have no dire reason to go there. Only a lunatic would venture forth into Sylvania after dark and not even the bravest Questing Knight of Bretonnia, nor the most fatigued ask for shelter within the brooding castles that tower over the land. By night, the half-decaying villages are secured against the darkness, their ill-bred inhabitants lock and bar their doors, and hang
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