Berserker's Scallywag Pauldrons of the Traveler

Berserker's Scallywag Pauldrons of the Traveler sit heavy on the shoulders, a tide-worn crest of brass and weathered hide. The plates gleam with a stubborn, gold-tinted luster, etched with a scuttling scarab motif and a tangle of rope patterns that curl like sea-spray in a storm. Leather straps, dark as well-weathered timber, cross the chest and back, buckled with rivets that catch the light and refuse to give up their secrets. Along the edge, barnacles clack with each step, tiny hull-metal teeth that remind you you’ve walked the deck of a ship long since drifted ashore. The Traveler’s sigil—a compass clenched in a knotted fist—gleams in blackened enamel on the outer plate, a reminder that wanderers are never truly home. The lore is a seam stitched tight into the seams of the armor. It’s said these pauldrons were forged aboard a roving frigate known as the Widdershins, where a berserker captain who craved speed bridled the fury of storms with the caution of caravans. They were gifted to a traveler who earned the ship’s trust by rescuing a convoy from pirates, then tempered by long years on road and river, paying the Toll of Tides with every mile. The piece carries salt, grit, and a stubborn peppering of luck. When the wind pulls at your cloak and the road climbs through heat or snow, the pauldrons seem to breathe, as if the sea itself were listening for your next move. In combat, the Berserker's Scallywag Pauldrons of the Traveler feel like a partner in mischief. They lean into the Berserker ethos with a conviction that your strikes should be swift, decisive, and loud enough to turn heads. Worn with leather gauntlets and a crest of confident grit, they push critical hits, gritty endurance, and forward momentum. You’ll find them most at home on skirmishers who navigate crowded streets, coin pouches jangling, or on raiders who press forward through storms as if the world itself is a tidepool to be conquered. They don’t smooth over danger; they invite it, then turn it into a rhythm you can ride. Prices, of course, mirror the soul of the seas. A trader’s ledger in Saddlebag Exchange will tell you stories as readily as a map will tell you routes: a fierce demand for a look that can make the crowd part, a scarcity born of ships wrecked and captains claimed by the next gulf. I watched a buyer trade pause with relief, as if the price had finally found a harbor. The pauldrons leap from myth to metal with every exchange, and the traveler who wears them becomes, for a moment, a skeleton key to every door along the coast, a reminder that journeys are never merely miles, but the map of who you are after all the miles.