Dragon Age: Origins — Awakening — Spirits in the Blackmarsh

Caelyra and her companions had entered the Blackmarsh in search of Kristoff, and instead had been lured into a darkspawn trap and were now stuck in the Fade. They needed to find a way out — quickly!

Her memories of the Fade from when she was in the Mage Tower were still strong. Perhaps there was another demon here, in control of this entire area, and once it lay dead they would be free.

As they walked through the Fade they were set upon by shade after shade, the demons were everywhere.

There were also demons dancing around strange altars. They quickly dispatched of the creatures and near instantly felt a slight shift in the Fade, almost visceral. Perhaps these altars were the key to their escape.

Standing around the altar, they looked around... and realised that these altars had been placed in the Fade in near the same locations as where the tears in the veil were out in the physical Blackmarsh.

They needed to find more of them!

They found several more altars and while each time they deactivated one they felt a shift in the Fade, nothing seemed to really happen; nothing let them free from the fade.

Finally they came across something Caelyra thought looked familiar. A pedestal just as the one she had toyed around with the last time she had been stuck in the Fade.

Caelyra activated the pedestal. A great flood of fiery rage demons spewed out of the ground when she touched it and they fought and fought until all the rage demons lay dead. Then, in a moment of truth, Caelyra pressed her hand to the pedestal.

Another shift in the fade was felt, but nothing happened, she wasn't able to travel anywhere, they were still stuck in this one location.

Exploring further through the fade, they managed to get 'round the other side of Blackmarsh village where they hadn't been able to reach in the physical world. There, a young girl lay crying by a grave then spun around in terror as they appeared.

She was scared and ran into the nearby crypt. They quickly ran after her, seeking answers.

After running into the crypt themselves and fighting off hordes of skeletons, they found the girl again and tried to talk to her.

She didn't want to talk; she laughed instead. They had followed her into this trap! She was going to devour them, muahahaha!

Caelyra managed to talk her down, somehow, and the woman thought to herself for a few minutes. Fine, she said, she would let the baroness devour them and she'd just have the remains, then she vanished.

Taking their leave of the crypt, they emerged in the village and it was certainly a lot more busier than it had been in the marsh. The spirits of the people wandered the streets, children and animals and adults alike, and the village was even surrounded by guards.

It was a living breathing village, only in the Fade and every person there was aware of what they were: people trapped and likely long dead.

One of the guards informed Caelyra that a spirit was trying to help them and perhaps they too could help the spirit.

Finding the spirit was easy, he was out the front of the great mansion in the centre of the village, pounding at the gates and riling up the nearby villagers. He demanded the baroness free them and free them now or he would make her free them!

Caelyra walked over to the spirit and introduced herself. Apparently this was a spirit of Justice and he had been watching this village for some time. He had had enough! He was going to deliver justice upon the witch who had done this to the poor village and was going to allow the villagers their freedom, at last.

A noble goal.

Caelyra said that she would help him. Anders was a bit hesitant. The baroness had done this, so surely they could appeal to her to send them back instead of dealing with spirits, but Caelyra thought that this was the right thing to do. Anders acquiesced.

Together they broke through the fence and stormed into the manor grounds. The baroness appeared, flanked by two great demons Caelyra had never seen before, and berated them for daring to trespass upon her property.

The spirit of Justice demanded she release the souls trapped here at once.

Suddenly the talking darkspawn — The First — stood at the baroness' side and gloated. The baroness was going to send him back, once he had taken care of Caelyra and her group.

A great fight ensued. The spirit of Justice appeared at the baroness' side and together they fought whilst Caelyra and her group took care of the demons and darkspawn below.

They focused their efforts on The First and ignored all else until he lay vanquished.

Before Caelyra could deliver the killing blow, the baroness screamed with rage. Fine. She would send them back — she would send them all back and they were going to pay for ruining her haven!

She swirled her power around and 'round The First and drew from him more power, more and more power, until the darkspawn was sucked into a lifeless husk. Then the baroness swept that power outwards and the fade seemed to vanish.

Awakening back in the mud of the Blackmarsh, Caelyra and her group leapt to their feet, grateful to no longer be in the Fade, but then the corpse of Kristoff rose off the ground. The Spirit of Justice was trapped in Kristoff's body and it was very confused. It didn't want to be there, it shouldn't be there, it didn't belong there.

Then he snapped to attention. He could feel the baroness nearby. They needed to destroy her. He performed some magic on Caelyra's weapons that would repair the fade rifts and bid her go, to hurry, they needed to close the tears in the veil and destroy the baroness.

Caelyra leapt into action. Heading the way they first came, one of the fade rifts was just where the egg-sacs were. It was spewing out revenants and demons and they needed to hurry, to close it quickly.

With their enhanced weaponry, they shut the first rift then dealt with the creatures that had poured from it. There had to be more rifts around here.

They destroyed several rifts and the creatures that came out of them, then barged back into the village where the baroness was waiting.

She was quite pleased to be there, in the mortal realm. For she had stopped being mortal so long ago and was now the greatest of all demons. Soon all the mortals in the world would worship her! Dropping to her knees, she released a great roar and transformed into a giant pride demon.

Caelyra had never seen one of those before! She had come across so many demons during her short time as a Grey Warden, but never a beast such as this.

Gathering all of her strength and resolve, she and her companions leapt upon the beast and fought it for what felt like hours, it's skin was as the thickest armour and nearly repelled all of their weapons. But Anders' magic worked well against the beast and it finally lay dead.

The spirit of Justice was relieved. He had vowed to slay the baroness and free the souls of all she had captured and he had done it, at last. But now he didn't know what to do. And he was stuck in this poor Grey Warden's body.

He held his head in his hands. Vague memories of Kristoff were coming to him. The darkspawn had killed him. Could he stay with Caelyra and kill the darkspawn and allow Kristoff his own justice?

Caelyra told him that it was up to him. She could not decide for him. And so the spirit decided to remain within Kristoff and allow the man some justice as they faced the darkspawn.

Now that the Blackmarsh wasn't quite as torn, they could explore a few of the areas they were unable to reach previously. Behind one of these areas was a great dragons head.

Whilst they were roaming the marshlands, Caelyra had found several dragon bones... and now she put them inside the skull, repairing that which had been broken. As the last bone slotted into place, a ghostly scream rose up and the heavy flap of wings swooped overhead.

Caelyra had inadvertently summoned a dragon — a ghost dragon! — and it was angry.

Whipping out their weapons, they fought the creature. It spat out lightning bolts at them and knocked them to the ground as it whooshed across the battlefield, and every time they managed to damage it, it would suddenly split into a dozen wisps which they had to fight one by one before they could reach the dragon's spirit in the centre.

Finally, the ghost beast lay dead... and Caelyra vowed to never put random bones back together ever again.

After all this excitement it was time to head back to Vigil's Keep. Hopefully no more nobles had tried to betray them in their absence.

 

Until next time! ⚔️🐲

 

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_{All screenshots in this post are courtesy of me, @kaelci and are from the game: Dragon Age Origins.}