Feast of the Forgotten Hero

The world is old beyond the memory of all but the longest lived, and heroes who were once renowned for their selfless sacrifices and mighty deeds are long forgotten. The genius minstrel Wol Dreyfoot claimed to have been inspired by the many partial tales and snippets of longer stories held in the bardic college’s vaults as he composed his magnum opus, “Song of the Forgotten Hero”, nearly a century ago.

With hundreds of verses, the song tells the tale of Nymia over five acts and typically has an interlude after the third. The epic’s protagonist was a knight already known for her skills in battle and commitment to justice when her love was abducted. The song covers the many trials and adventures she faced trying to rescue him, and the powerful verses that describe her journey are filled with passion, fear, hope, victory, and loss. So long is the song that a full performance can last for several hours.

Using his fame and his position within the bard’s college, Wol ensured his epic was part of the final exam for admittance, and now generations of bards have trained to perfect it. For many of them, it has become customary to perform it a week after Longnight, during what used to be called the Feast of Memory. This much older celebration, dedicated to a now-obscure god of knowledge, has waned in popularity along with that particular faith, but many of its rituals have been rolled into the Feast of the Forgotten Hero.

During the first act, which describes the depths of the hero’s love, small honeyed grain cakes are passed among the crowd and shared between spouses and lovers. The second act is split between alternate verses where the hero is helped by the wise and good-hearted or impeded by fools or the wicked. This act is often extended to incorporate patrons, local figures—and of course visiting adventurers) exposing them to praise or ridicule, depending on the opinion of the performer.

At the close of the third act, the hero is at the gates of the underworld, having discovered that the goddess of that realm has seized her love in jealousy. She sits at the table of the satyr Caretus, eating old mutt on and vegetable stew accompanied by coarse bread. As the satyr complains of the poor fare, she replies with compliments and thanks for a last meal in the land of the living. As the bard pauses to refresh themselves during the interlude, it is traditional for the same stew and bread to be served to the listeners.

The fourth act is the most technically difficult to perform, as it requires the singer to shift styles several times, and the best bards also learn to sing in different voices. It sees the protagonist traverse the underworld, meeting countless heroes who have been forgotten and hearing fragments of their tales.

The final act is a rising crescendo of triumph as the hero returns to life with her love, but the end is tinged with sorrow: to escape the land of the dead, the hero had to give up all fame and renown, and is from that moment forth forever remembered as Nymia, an ancient word meaning ‘nameless.’

Game Mechanics

Those who attend a performance may be affected in the following ways:

• Romantic partners that share a cake gain a limited empathic sense. For the following month, while their partner is within 100 feet, a creature can spend a bonus action to understand the emotional state of their partner. At the Narrator’s discretion, strong emotions felt by one partner may be transmitted to the other during this time. Those who renounce their feelings in front of their partner three times can willfully dispel this effect, but doing so is thought to bring terrible luck for the next year and a day.
• Individuals mentioned in the second act as wise and good-hearted gain advantage on Persuasion checks for the next two days. Those described as fools or the wicked suffer disadvantage on Deception checks for the same period.
• Consuming the stew and bread during the performance grants a creature advantage on their next death saving throw made before the first day of summer.