Torch of the Burning Sky

The Torch of the Burning Sky is an artifact with teleportation powers, and so it is tied to the Astral Plane, as well as the Elemental Plane of Fire.
Normally the Torch just looks like a somewhat jagged and fire-cracked femur, 40 inches long, wrapped in eerily smooth white skin around one end, marking the handle. The item appears primitive, and Coaltongue often adorned it with tiny ceramic beads on leather cords. When the heroes acquire it, the Torch possesses no magical powers, though it detects as possessing overwhelming conjuration, evocation, and necromantic magic.

Mechanics & Inner Workings

The Torch functions as a +5 ghost touch vicious morningstar.
Any creature who tries to pick up the Torch must roll 1d20, and adds his base attack bonus and his Charisma modifier. If he beats DC 30, the Torch accepts him as a wielder. Otherwise it inflicts a negative level on him. One day later, the creature must make a Fortitude save (DC 34) to avoid permanent level loss.
Additionally, if another creature succeeds in getting the Torch to accept it, the Torch attempts to consume the soul of its former wielder. The former wielder feels flames bathing him, wracking him with pain. Each round he gains a negative level, and must succeed a Fortitude save (DC 20) to take any actions because of the overwhelming agony. Once the Torch has inflicted ten negative levels it stops, but one day later the creature must make a Fortitude save (DC 34) for each negative level to avoid permanent level loss.

Lesser Powers

• As a free action, the wielder can cause flame to emerge from the head of the Torch, which lasts until dismissed. This flame can be as dim as a normal torch, or bright enough to illuminate a mile in every direction (and to be seen out to the horizon). The wielder can instead have the Torch conjure a singleheaded axe of flame as a free action, which glows as brightly as a normal torch. While so activated, the Torch functions as a +5 flaming burst ghost touch keen vicious battleaxe.
• The wielder and anyone who travels with him takes no fire damage from teleportation.

Greater Powers

To activate the Torch’s greater powers, the wielder first must use the Torch to slay a living creature with a minimum number of Hit Dice (the exact number depends on the power). Whenever he does, the Torch draws in the creature’s soul, and the wielder becomes aware of what powers are now available. If he does not activate any of the Torch’s powers within a minute, the Torch releases the souls it has captured, and it cannot use a greater power until the wielder slays someone else.
All of these abilities have a caster level of 25.

• Minimum HD 5. Teleport the wielder up to 150 feet as a swift action.
• Minimum HD 10. Cast greater teleport as a full-round action (Will DC 29 negates). This effect can only be used within sight of the sky. This ability can only be used three times per day.
• Minimum HD 15. Cast widened enlarged empowered flame strike as a standard action (Reflex DC 27 for half damage). This ability can only be used once per day.

Additionally, the wielder may attempt to call upon the greatest magic of the Torch, teleporting an entire army at once. To activate this ability the wielder first must use the Torch to slay a living, intelligent creature with at least 5 Hit Dice. Whenever he does, the Torch draws in the creature’s soul. If he does not activate this power of the Torch within a minute, the Torch releases the souls it has captured, and it cannot use its mass teleporation until the wielder slays someone else.

• 3/day – The sky crackles with flame, and a vast pillar of fire descends, picking up the wielder and any number of creatures the wielder can see within 1 mile. Creatures can make a Will save (DC 40) to resist going. All creatures picked up by the pillar of fire instantaneously teleport to any outdoor location where it is daytime.

Destroying the Torch

Like any artifact, the Torch is not easy to destroy. It is thematically connected to the myth of the The Aquiline Heart, representing the dragon which devours souls in order to gain power. Thus, it can be destroyed by using it to consume the source of its own soul, Trilla, the dragon known as the Mother of Dreams or by bathing it in the blood of the The Aquiline Heart, which satisfies its one unfulfilled conquest.

Manufacturing process

The Torch was created in approximately CY941 by chance. It is a bone devil’s thigh bone that was used as a club to slay a trumpet archon in the presence of a very young Trilla, the psionic gold dragon now known as the Mother of Dreams. The Torch combined the teleportation powers of the devil, the divine energy of the archon, and the ability of Trilla to create souls from her dreams, and thus the Torch could devour those souls for a limitless supply of power.

Significance

When Emperor Drakus Coaltongue was killed, one of the assassins intentionally damaged the Torch, which likewise caused damage to the local fabric of the planes. The nearby Astral Plane is being suffused with energy from the plane of fire, which has two effects.
First, things are getting colder. The campaign starts in January, and there is no spring in sight for Acheron and the lands bordering it. Druids can sense that something is amiss, and the sky is filled with flocks of confused birds trying to flee this unnatural winter. By the later adventures in the campaign saga, temperatures across the region are perpetually below freezing, with some regions even more dangerously cold. By the campaign’s finale, the PCs will have a chance to end the winter, and for a few months spring renews the land, until the natural turn of seasons again takes it course.
Second, teleportation and other forms of astral travel are hot and dangerous. This effect, which will come to be known as The Burning Sky, has a limited effect on travel between planes. Whenever a creature undergoes planar travel to or from the lands involved in this campaign, that creature takes 1d6 points of fire damage. Creatures arrive in a small burst of flame, enough to easily alert onlookers. This affects all summoning, calling, and teleportation spells, except for those that use the ethereal plane or plane of shadow.
The Burning Sky has a greater effect on travel across the plane. For every hundred feet (or fraction thereof ) you teleport at a time, you take 1d6 points of fire damage, to a maximum of 40d6. Average damage is 140, just slightly more than protection from energy can help against.
There are various methods for bypassing this danger, typically involving either transforming into a creature immune to fire, or using a spell to grant fire resistance. Desperate characters might all climb into a bag of holding and let the wizard hope his protection from energy spell holds out.

Item type

Unique Artifact

Owning Organization

Imperial Seat of Acheron

Weight

4 lb

Dimensions

40" x 1.5"