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HALASTER "This Man This Monster" |
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| HALASTER Halaster's Hold and the Underhalls Tales tell of a wizard who came to the mountains in ages past to make his home in isolation from the societies of men. Some say Halaster Blackcloak came from Netheril others from the east. The wizards name is even a matter of dispute: Halaster is sometimes called Hilather in old text. Research indicates that Hilather is the Mad Wizards given name while the grander Halaster was the name he took for himself as a powerful wizard. Halaster is said to have started the traditions of of holding Magefairs each decade (and the smaller annual Spellmoots) in remote ever changing locations. He is said to have devised many powerful spells, and perfected some processes and items now widely known and used in wizardly circles. Whatever the truth about Halaster's origins, the stories all tell the same story of his later years. He suddenly left off all dealings with men over a 1000 years ago, and came to Waterdeep to make his home, accompanied by eight apprentices. Hal' summoned and bound creatures from other planes to build a traditional wizard's tower, ringed with a stout rampart enclosing an extensive garden, paddock, and warehouses. The Eight, as the apprentices are named in historical texts, worked the fields, dwelling in lesser turrets along the inside of the ring-wall. They continued their magical studies but saw their Dread Master little. Hal's dealings with his summoned servitors changed him. The more he avoided human contact and dealt with otherplanar creatures, the stronger he became. He grew grim, given to long silences, sudden rages, and erratic behavior. He had his creatures dig storage caves, additional laboratories, and long exit tunnels beneath his tower. This work went on for decades. At length, the tunnels broke into the old dwarven delvings called the Underhalls, once home to the long-vanished Melairkyn clan (only a fading memory, even then). The Underhalls were large and grand, built to the scale of large men rather than dwarves. They gaurded two ancient mithril-mines known as "The Seadeeps"which extend far beneath the mountain. The mountain itself was known to dwarves of old as Mount Melairbode, named after the dwarf who first explored it and found the mithril. His decendants became the clan Melairkyn; in the end, the clan members all died or were scattered by duergar and drow from the depths of the Underdark. The Underhalls became the lairs for the duergar and the dark elves, in residance still when Hal' found his way into the deep ways. As soon as the mithril was worked out, the duergar moved on. In the days of the Fallen Kingdom, most of the drow were slaughtered in viscious battles with surface elves. Halaster himself is thought to have eradicated the last organized remnants of the Dark Folk. The Eight wrote often in diaries of their Master's increasingly dangerous expeditions against the drow-the phrase "Halaster's Hunt" still retains its meaning as a "beserk raid or wilful slaughter" in the North today. The Eight also hint at some captured drow being transformed and enslaved into Halaster's service. With the drow gone or magicly twisted into grotesque servant-creatures, Halaster banished his summoned slaves to their home planes and moved entirely into the subterranean ways, abandoning his tower to the elements. His curious apprentices, upon exploring the tower, found only traps awaiting them, baited with powerful magics and enigmatic messages hinting that "true power" awaited them below. Deep in the bowels of UnderMountain, Halaster grew to be a great and terrible old man who dabbled in magics that buy immortality, To continue his work relitively unmolested, he created a double, or clone, of himselfquite late in life, infected it with the wasting disease (leprosy), and let it be found by patrols. Roaming the halls of UM, he amused himself by watching parties of thieves, wanderers, soldiers of fortune, and magical rivals fall afoul of his gathered monsters and the clever death-traps he had devised. He found humor where many found comfortin the mistaken belief that he was dead and they could pillage the wizard's dungeons unopposed. No one in WaterDeep, or UM is positive if Hal' is still alive or dead. Many who venture deep into UM believe he lives on. They say he watches from the walls, walks the lowest levels, and is vastly amused by the pain, suffering, deeds, and deaths of intruders. Sometimes he aids those who are lost by providing a single lit torch, or a dagger clattering down from overhead-often accompanied by a human skull as a grim warning. He indulges the whims of his cruel humor by playing tricks, manipulating explorers like puppets on a stage. |
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