Cleric's Soft Wood Torch of Debility

Cleric's Soft Wood Torch of Debility glows with a pale, feverish light, its shaft carved from a buttery-soft wood that fits the hand like a well-worn glove. The grain shyly circles in concentric rings, as if the wood itself remembers every whisper of the rites for which it was chosen. A lantern-hued flame hovers above a hemp wick, burning with a steady, restrained glow that seems to drink in the room’s shadows rather than push them away. The top is crowned with a small brass cap, etched with a circular sigil that looks almost like a tear in the air, a little reminder that this torch never truly lights on its own but borrows power from the will of those who wield it. When you cradle it, the texture feels almost maternal—soft, warm, and curiously alive—as if the wood breathes in time with your pulse. The lore threads through it in a patient, almost ceremonial way. They say the torch was shaped in a monastery that stood at the edge of a rain-dark coast, where clerics learned to bend fear into focus. The Soft Wood, chosen for its resilience and quiet resilience to wear, was gifted to a healer who walked among fighters with bandaged hands and open wounds. Debility, in the old tongue, was the slow unraveling of a foe’s resolve: a whisper that saps their stamina, a tremor that saps their grip on a weapon, a moment when a roar becomes a rasp. In the right hands, this torch became more than a tool; it was a patient tutor, a calm bell that measured out courage in measured breaths and made the room feel a fraction safe even when danger pressed close. In practice, the Cleric's Torch of Debility threads itself into the battlefield like a quiet mentor. Its aura seems to ripple outward in soft quivers, nudging enemies toward hesitation while guiding allies toward steadier footing. It’s not a blunt hammer of power, but a precise chisel that teaches foes to hesitate, to misjudge a stride, to waste a moment while your party gathers momentum. Healers and support roles prize it for the way it tempers aggression—enough pressure to deter rash charging, enough light to keep the night honest. Those who study the torch’s history also notice its peculiar texture—the way the flame seems to tilt away from violent action, almost inviting restraint as a form of defense. It’s a storyteller’s instrument, a piece of battlefield poetry that reminds comrades to choose the right moment to strike. Prices drift through markets like a quiet rumor, and it’s not uncommon to hear traders debating the torch’s true worth as if reading tea leaves. Saddlebag Exchange, with its mixed caravan sense of punctuality and rumor, often serves as the stage for such conversations. A well-traveled seller might offer a rough estimate in gold, perhaps nine to twelve depending on the wick’s stubbornness and the wear on the carved sigil, while others trade in silks and rare herbs that carry their own tales of distant voyages. The dialogue around it is part inventory, part legend, part confession: you’re not just buying a torch, you’re buying a lineage—someone’s careful balance between light and silence, between fear and the steady hand that follows.