Mhallon, the Iron Fortress
Ah, the Iron Fortress—a name that sounds sturdy and imposing, and sure enough it rising up like a sentinel from the chaotic mess of Wormblood. It’s making a statement, and that statement is “Hey, berk, you ain’t welcome here.” Trust me, it’s not just a gatehouse—it’s a whole fortress, complete with towering walls and defences that’d make even a marilith swallow hard.
The fortress is the primary church of the Plaguebearers—a cult that’s got a taste for destruction and a fondness for chaos. You’re diving into some grim and gloomy territory, but I’m here to spill the chant. Let me lighten the mood with a joke. What do you get if you cross a Doomguard’s apocalyptic thinking with a Dustman’s zest for life and throw in a soupçon of eldritch horror? Give up? Well the joke’s on you because unfortunately the punchline is the Plaguebearers. They’re a group of dangerous bloods who’ve wholeheartedly embraced the idea to hasted the end of all things. They’re like a pack of yeth hounds howling for the apocalypse, and they’ve set up camp in the Iron Fortress like scavengers waiting for a feast.
The Plaguebearers have got a philosophy that’s as infectious as a zombie plague. They believe that by spreading disease, they’re speeding up the countdown to oblivion. To them, the Abyss isn’t just a chaotic mess—it’s a canvas for their nefarious art. And that art is a tapestry woven with threads of pain, suffering, and despair. They’re led by a truly damaged cutter called Verolax the Decayed, who formed the cult of personality around herself after getting lost from the prime.
The Iron Fortress of Mhallon is a breeding ground for their malevolent schemes. It’s filled with laboratories of disease and chambers of torment. They see themselves as agents of chaos, brewing up and unleashing pandemics and plagues with a manic zeal for their dark master.
These Plaguebearers aren’t just spewing diseases for the fun of it. To them, it’s a means to an end—a way to hasten the destruction of reality itself. They’re like nihilistic puppeteers, manipulating the strings of fate with a gleeful madness. Whether the Wormblood disease is their doing, or the reason they came to the layer in the first place, isn’t clear—but they’re certainly making the most of it.
Even worse, if you can imagine that, the Plaguebearers are cultists of the Great Old One Kyuss, the Worm that Walks. They call it the Parasite Divine. While Kyuss itself is imprisoned, they doesn’t stop these nihilistic berks worshipping him and receiving spells. Some factions of the cult are focussed on trying to free their horrible master, while others cross diseased vermin they have gathered from Wormblood and other dark places. The most dangerous part of the cult though are the truly crazed sods who deliberately get themselves infected with a contagion, then seek out a portal to a highly populated place and jump through.
So, if you ever cross paths with the Plaguebearers, keep your distance and your plague mask on—you’re dealing with a faction that’s more interested in ending the world than in jink or power. They’re like a storm on the horizon, and they won’t rest until they’ve spread their plague of chaos far and wide. Choose your battles carefully, cutter, ’cause the Plaguebearers might just be the embodiment of one of the Abyss’s darkest nightmares.
Source: Jon Winter-Holt
