Track 10: Far from Home

Track 10: Far from Home sits in the palm of a weather-stained navigator's hand, a slim disc of brass etched with wind-silver runes that catch the light like fish scales. The edge is beveled, catching every fingertip as if it were a shell pressed from a tide pool. When you tilt it, the surface ripples with a tiny map of a coastline you think you recognize, though the ink has bled into the metal with salt-stung years. A faded string runs through a worn notch, and the tag carries a scent of old parchment and rain, of long journeys and the kind of fatigue that makes a person listen more closely to the sound of their own breathing. It is small enough to hide in a coat pocket, large enough to feel like a coastline in your hand, a compass for memory rather than a tool for navigation. Ladled into its lore is the notion that this Track is not simply a collectible but a memory capsule—one of the many tracks that travelers press into their belts as if to lock an echo into the body. Track 10: Far from Home, you learn, was minted during the summer of a disputed border, when caravans of exiles drifted along the Shiverpeaks' foothills and whispered about promises kept and promises broken. The lore speaks of a captain who swore she would circle the world once more and who never did, because the turning of the world changed the way a heartbeat marks time. When the track is played—if you are a musician, a mapmaker, or a guardian of memories—the note threads itself through the air in a pale mist, tugging at the seam between what you carry and what you owe to the road you chose to walk. In practical terms, Track 10 is a collectible that unlocks a small vanity effect and offers a modest boost to those who collect five or ten similar items, letting you choreograph a procession of keepsakes as you move. But the effect feels less like a stat and more like a narrative nudge, a prompt to tell a story aloud around a campfire, to spin the yarn of how far one journey travels when the traveler makes peace with the fact that home sits wherever your feet decide to pause. It sits comfortably in a caravaner's pack, yet it begs to be laid on a table in a tavern so the price of memory can be weighed against the price of bread. And here market life threads the tale: Saddlebag Exchange, a place travelers drift toward when moonlight glints and gold feels light, has become the chorus behind every whispered purchase. Listings drift in and out, often priced by how much memory the buyer wants and how much the seller fears losing it. Some days the track zips along at a premium; other days a patient buyer can name their price, trading stories as readily as coins, until the world outside feels like home tonight.