The Aquiline Heart
An ancient artifact from the primordial times, the Aquiline Heart is the heart of the elemental Stormchaser Eagle. Those who drink blood directly from the Heart achieves immortality.
No one knows quite what the Aquiline Heart is, whether it is an actual beating heart, or a crystal, or something less tangible. What is known is that the heart is bonded to the life force of a vast region of the world, so destroying it will result in the slow annihilation of several nations and millions of people as the elemental energies of the world are thrown into chaos.
Mechanics & Inner Workings
Blessing of the Aquiline Heart
This creature is immortal. He does not suffer ability score penalties from aging, nor can he die of old age, but he does gain the normal ability score bonuses. He has regeneration 30, and heals ability damage at a rate of 1 point per ability score per round. He is immune to disease, energy drain, and poison. Almost no form of attack deals lethal damage to him. He regenerates even if he fails a saving throw against a disintegrate spell or a death effect. If he fails his save against a spell or effect that would kill him instantly (such as those mentioned above), the spell or effect reduces him to –10 hp; unconscious, but still alive and able to regenerate. He is immune to effects that produce incurable or bleeding wounds, such as mummy rot, a sword with the wounding special ability, or a clay golem’s cursed wound ability. If he loses a limb or body part, the lost portion regrows in 1d6 minutes (the detached piece dies and decays normally). He can reattach the severed member instantly by holding it to his stump. Only the bite or breath weapon of a true dragon deals lethal damage to a creature made immortal in this way. He also cannot regenerate Constitution damage from having blood drunk. If he is completely exsanguinated (reduced to 0 Constitution by the blood drain of a vampire, for example), he loses this ability and is slain. If he has nonlethal damage equal to his hp +10, he is unconscious and helpless. While he is helpless, a character may perform a coup de grace to impale him in the heart. As long as his heart is so pierced, he cannot regenerate.Significance
In primordial times, an ancient spirit of elemental fire known as the Flamebringer Dragon battled the spirit of air, the Stormchaser Eagle. The dragon tore out the eagle’s heart and drank her blood, gaining immense power and ensuring the strength of his draconic progeny. But the spirits of sea and stone sensed the dragon’s growing might, and the dragon knew that if he consumed the heart and slew the eagle fully, the other two spirits would unite to destroy him. So the dragon hid the stillbeating heart in a place to which he could never return, preferring to live rather than risk death by seeking more power.
Buried beyond the sight of any creature, the heart’s blood pulsed into the roots of the world, nourishing it and fostering life above and below the surface. Ages marked the world, and as civilization rose, rumors of this font of life spread throughout the lands that would become Imperial Seat of Acheron and its neighbors. Spellcasters could sense its power, and the power-hungry and the desperate sought it out, but only the scantest clues hinted at its location, or at the dangers that awaited those who found it. The Aquiline Heart passed into legend, becoming a symbol of the unattainable.
Then two people found it. Where many had tried before, a young sorceror named Leska and his lover, the fey Etinifi, discovered the path to the heart in a desert of white stones called the Opaline Wastes. A lifeless land, where time flows like an erratic wind, the wastes long attracted seekers, but ancient shamans and warriors had devoted themselves to hiding the heart. The shamans erected colossal arcane totems to conceal the heart’s resting place, and to ensure that only those who truly needed the heart to avoid death could find it, while their warriors slew unworthy trespassers.
Leska and Etinifi, however, had been sentenced to death by the aging Acheron Emperor Drakus Coaltongue who had offered them reprieve if they found him the secret of immortality. Of course others had found the trail to the heart too, but only Leska had the strength to defeat the dangers on the path and claim the prize. He drank the heart’s blood, achieved immortality, and in a fit of patriotism he would later regret, brought back a vial of the heart’s blood for Coaltongue. But he could never again find the tunnels that led to the heart, because he no longer had the need.
Item type
Unique Artifact
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