> [!infobox|wikipedia] > # Red Priests > [![[Red_Priests_small.webp|cover hsmall]]](Red_Priests.webp) > ###### Faction Information > Attribute | Details | > ---|---| > Type | Faction | > Category | Necromantic Cult | > Allegiance | Servants of the Valtorran Empire | > Leader | Identity concealed | > Base | [[Valfyria]] | > ###### Status > Attribute | Details | > ---|---| > Status | Active | The **Red Priests** are an order of necromancer-priests who serve the [[Valtorran Empire|Empire]] in the world of [[Elandis]] — robed figures marked by a serpentine dragon scarred into their flesh, feared even by the soldiers who fight beside them. They appeared seemingly from nowhere in the Empire's recent campaigns, raising the dead to break sieges and vanishing into vapour when their work was done, and little is known of who they truly are or what they ultimately serve. ## Purpose & Goals To the Empire's enemies, the Red Priests are a weapon — a corps of necromancers loosed upon the campaigns the regular army cannot win on its own. They raise the slain into shambling siege-engines, break walls and wards, and "accelerate timelines" their commanders judge too slow. Where they pass, the dead do not stay buried. Beyond that battlefield purpose, their aims are opaque even to those who employ them. The order keeps its own counsel, leaves no trace when it withdraws, and answers to no chain of command the army recognises. Captured Imperial soldiers maintain that the priests serve a master darker than the Empress herself — a claim that has done nothing to settle the unease they inspire in the ranks. Whatever the order is truly working toward, it is not the Empire's war alone. ## Powers & Methods The Red Priests are necromancers above all. At Val Noren they raised the city's own dead — townsfolk in life — and sent them shuffling against the gates to detonate in great fireballs that shattered the defences. Cornered in the royal crypt, one priestess animated a wight and swarms of crawling hands from the surrounding sarcophagi, fought with a scythe, and loosed a psychic *Spirit Wail* upon those who closed with her. They are also slippery quarry: four of the five priests at the [[Stoneheart]] dissolved into vapour and simply vanished, leaving no body to pursue. Each priest bears the order's mark — a serpentine, fire-breathing dragon scarred across the back, the same device on every one of them. When one captured priestess was compelled to speak from beyond death, she named the order's one weakness in a single word: *knowledge*. ## History The Red Priests entered wider knowledge only recently, surfacing during the Imperial campaign against [[Val Noren]], where they served in the host of the [[Dread General Gerard Blackmarsh|Dread General]]. Where the order came from, how long it has existed, and how its members are gathered are all unknown to those outside it — the priests leave no records, no survivors among their own, and no trace of their passing. What little has been pieced together places their base of operations at [[Valfyria]], the great volcano at the heart of the continent, from which they are believed to move and scheme across [[Valtorra]]. ## [[The Bloody Nails|Campaign: The Bloody Nails]] #### [[Session 37 - March of the Dead]] During the Imperial siege of [[Val Noren]], the Red Priests served in [[Dread General Gerard Blackmarsh|Blackmarsh]]'s host. The General was overheard ordering that word be sent to the priests to "accelerate their timeline" — and that night a fog rolled off the river, concealing the priests' undead, who threw themselves at the city's gates and detonated in fireballs that broke the defences. #### [[Session 38 - A Trail of Blood]] A captured guard spoke of the Red Priests near the General, describing them as unsettling and "hungry" — feared even within the army they served. #### [[Session 39 - The Stoneheart]] At the [[Stoneheart]], the party witnessed five Red Priests meeting with Blackmarsh and [[General Korvas]] over the captive [[King Marius Noren]]. Four of the priests dissolved into vapour and vanished, claiming their master had need of them elsewhere; the one who remained dragged the King down into the catacombs and, cornered there, raised a wight and swarms of crawling hands before she was finally cut down. #### [[Session 40 - General Blackmarsh]] Searching the slain priestess's body, the party found dragon scarification across her back — a serpentine, fire-breathing beast — and carefully copied the design. #### [[Session 43 - The Shield of the North]] Interrogated Imperial prisoners revealed that the Red Priests were a recent addition to the army who seemed to serve a master different from — and darker than — the standard Imperial command. #### [[Session 44 - The Elven Archmage]] Casting *Speak with Dead* upon the priestess's severed head, the party learned that the Red Priests operate out of [[Valfyria]] and serve [[Empress Morganna Eventide]], who in turn serves an ancient entity named [[Kharazoth the Crimson Shadow]]. The head melted to sludge the moment his name was spoken. The corpse named the order's weakness as "knowledge." #### [[Session 47 - Confluence of the Seven]] Everything the party had uncovered about the Red Priests — their base at Valfyria and their service to the Empress and to Kharazoth — was laid before [[Illythia Voss]] during the party's briefing.