Like much of the original Volo's Guide content, the material herein can be used in non-Realms games, as well as Realms games set in the pre-Spellplague Realms.
Please let me know in this thread if any of this material was useful to you or if you have any questions or ideas for future content.
Thank you in advance for reading and enjoy!
Spellcatch Ruin
Dancing Rocks
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Wizard’s Run is the current name for a small, rebuilt keep with extensive underground cellars and a single tower rising up from its center that stands twice as high as the keep’s walls. The knowledge of who built the keep, as well as its true name if ever it had one, has been lost to the passage of time.
The keep is set partially into a hillside and faces south, where it overlooks the village of Nesmyth some distance away. From the top of the tower one can see past the hill and partake of a splendid view of Cormyr’s rolling countryside to the north.
The keep and surrounding lands takes its current name from the last days of a rarely seen wizard, known locally as Gardragath, who some time ago claimed the dilapidated, tumbledown keep for himself and soon after rebuilt and fortified its walls, adding a tower in its center.
It was rumored that Gardragath had discovered a formula for creating Helmed Horrors and that his keep was filled with all manner of objects that the wizard could inhabit with his will and cause to move about, inlcuding animated, horseless wagons that would come into Nesmyth, through which Gardragath could speak and listen.
On the night that Wizard’s Run was to earn its name, a pair of war wizards who’d been assigned to keep watch on Gardragath’s doings spied a great green fire erupting from within the keep that surrounded the tower, followed by the opening of the keep's large, iron-shod wooden doors and the swift flight of a barefoot, bald, wild-bearded man who came running out of them.
Not a moment later several suits of battle plate armor gave chase, wielding longswords and batlle axes, the eye slits in their helms glowing a vivid green.
The war wizards watched from a distance as the bald man, about to be overtaken, turned and shouted a word of magic that shattered the armor of his pursuers, the sound echoing through the night like a thunderclap.
The War Wizards could see no remains of the dead; clearly the ruined suits of battle plate were empty and animated by magic. A moment later a towering gout of green flame shot up from the keep and the shards of plate armor rose up in a whirling maelstrom to rend and tear at the wizard.
Gardragath, or a man very similar to him, was slain that night, his body left in a bloody heap ere the wet, whirling remnants of battle plate spun away and returned to the keep, its iron-shod doors closing after them as the fire in the keep died away.
The war wizards set watch on the keep but did not enter. Later, three attempts by war wizards and Purple Dragons to enter the keep met with swift death and dismemberment as animated swords, the doors to the keep and anything not made to be fixed and immovable worked to slay all who dared try and enter it.
The keep with its lone tower was isolated and travelers were warned to stay a safe distance from it lest “some animated thing rise up from Wizard’s Run to slay you before you can outrun it.”
Few incidents occurred near the keep and it was left unoccupied, much as it was long before Gardragath came.
Two decades later the Company of the Singing Harp covertly entered Wizard’s Run. It is not known what danger they encountered and overcame within. Only the leader of the band (Aurbrand "Firebrand" Ambrival) survived, his efforts to put down the remnants of Gardragath’s magic winning him the reward of a noble title and the grant of land surrounding the keep.
Residents of Nesmyth and nearby lands whisper the keep remains haunted and the fell magic that slew Gardragath has formed itself into a curse slowly killing off the Ambrival noble family. Farmers and travelers claim to have seen pieces of armor and a lone dagger or sword wreathed in green light flying low to the ground at night, and in one case a full suit of armor with green glowing eyes roaming about in the fields near the keep under the light of the moon.
Situated just south of the Way of the Manticore as one travels west from Wheloon to Hilp, Spellcatch Ruin is a recent discovery that has slain a score or more of curious wizards and their companions. The location is not properly a ruin, as the thus far revealed portions are in pristine, if piecemeal, condition.
Spellcatch Ruin first appeared during a confrontation between a small caravan of merchant wagons and a group of horse-riding brigands operating out of Hermit’s Wood. A hiremage working for the master of the caravan unleashed a barrage of magic missiles at the brigands as they emerged from the cover of trees to the south of the road, but his missiles seemed to splash into some sort of invisible barrier that consumed them, causing vertical ripples to appear in the air that revealed shield sized portions of stone wall in their wake.
The suddenly-there floating stone felled mounts and riders alike, as the attackers could not dodge out of the way while charging at a full gallop. The seemingly hovering sections of stone wall were undisturbed by the rider’s impact.
The brigands retreated, but the caravan remained while the hiremage (on orders from the caravan master) continued his spellcastings. A short time later the hiremage came to see that magic missiles no longer worked; the missiles flew past what appeared to be the edge of one newly revealed wall and struck the injured brigands who’d been "volunteered" to stand behind the wall so the mage could target them (hoping, as before, that the missiles would hit the wall and make more of it appear).
Working in the other direction, the hiremage found the wall was starting to absorb his minor spells without revealing more of the structure. He attempted greater castings, discovering that well placed fireballs revealed significant portions of stone wall. His last fireball seemed to be absorbed into the wall, so the hiremage turned to his spellbooks to decide what spell to cast next. Unlooked for and unseen, the castle wall rippled and spat the seed of the mage’s fireball back at him, cooking and killing the hiremage, the caravan master and burning several wagons besides.
The lesser merchants and mercenaries sifted through the contents of the fire-blasted wagons, electing to leave behind the remains of their fallen comrades as a warning to others. The merchant caravan traveled as far as Hilp before breaking apart, each man and woman taking with themselves the tale of what slew their companions. Tongues waggle after a long journey, especially when lubricated by strong drink and the heady rush of surviving a near death experience. It was not long before word spread of “a heretofore unknown ruin near the Hermit’s Wood that catches spells right out of the air and hurls magic at unwarry travelers who get too close.”
Some sages theorize the wide, tall wall is part of a castle that was shifted into a pocket dimension. Some say it is part of a structure properly belonging in the feywild that is somehow slipping through. Still others claim the wall may have been the recipient of a powerful cloaking illusion that became all too permanent.
Other sages believe the structure, whatever its true form, was warded against specific spells and only by casting those spells in the area of the ruin can one reveal the remainder of the structure. Some think Spellcatch was once the fortress of some long-ago foe of Cormyr, spell-shifted away by war wizards.
Most sages agree that the last century and a half of magical calamity, as well as the passing of time, has weakened whatever magic keeps Spellcatch hidden away, making it possible to “pull” the structure back into reality with the application of magic.
Many wizards have since tried different spells and spell combinations to reveal more of the extent of the wall. The wall seems to absorb all 1st level spells without effect and is known to reflect most 2nd and 3rd level spells back at their casters. Spell reflections for higher level spells are intermittent and unpredictable, and sometimes seem to be almost targeted in nature. One wizard was slain by her own ice storm a full six hours after casting it, even though she was standing three hundred paces distant from the place where she cast the spell.
Certain high level spells briefly reveal more of the ruin. Interior buildings made of stone with arching bridges have been sighted. Some claim to have seen unmoving people standing on those bridges, as if they were frozen in time.
The revealed portions of wall glow in iridescent blue-white on the night of the first full moon of each month, otherwise they shed no light and can be easily blundered into if one moves off the road to try and reach the woods beyond Spellcatch. Some claim that by the light of the moon a pair of large, ghostly stone towers can be seen hovering in the air beyond the revealed portions of wall. Others say the moonlight reveals the full extent of the ruin; something massive, wide and roughly square in shape. Still more rumors claim arcane magical writings appear on the interior of the walls that reveal magical secrets, but only to those who have not yet cast spells at the wall.
War Wizards do not experiment on the ruin, but do not prevent others from doing so. They, along with the Purple Dragons, are under orders to patrol near the area, keep tabs on wizards and anyone else who makes any progress in revealing more of the structure and to maintain order between rival groups working to reveal more of the ruin.
Various independent wizards have successfully “turned the corner” that was first revealed by the now dead hiremage and have extended it into Hermit's Wood. Others have managed to expose the first interior structure: a single level of a stone tower, with an intact floor and roof of stone, featuring one lone window made of wrought iron and colored glass that faces south, all hovering in midair over the trees south of the wall, though none have as yet dared to try reaching the window or breaking through to see what lay beyond.
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