Cleric's Iron Rifle of Hobbling

Cleric's Iron Rifle of Hobbling rests on a scarlet cloth, its iron barrel pocked with age and the kind of patina that only centuries of rain and prayers can earn. The stock is ash-dark wood, knurled with grain that broadens and narrows like a heartbeat, and a brass band circles the grip as if binding a stubborn truth. Along the barrel runes—thin, precise, almost surgical—glow faintly when the object whispers of its past. The metal feels cool to the touch, a reminder of winter nights spent in vigil, and the weight settles in the hand with a patient, almost pious certainty. A faded seal on the underside bears the sigil of a clerical order long dispersed by war, a reminder that this rifle was never just a tool but a vow. When I turned the weapon over, I could almost hear the echoes of a procession, marching through rain-slick streets of a monastery city long since turned to rumor. The lore is clear enough for those who listen: this iron rifle was forged in a furnace sanctified by healing prayers, blessed to keep feet, boots, and whole bodies from running into danger when every healer’s breath was counted. The designation “of Hobbling” is not merely flourish; it is a rite’s linguistic truth. A shot that lands binds its target in a slow, deliberate drag—movement softened as if the foot were caught in a treacherous swath of quicksilver. The effect is quiet and inexorable, a controlled hush that buys time for a healer to anchor the line or for a scout to slip back into safer shadow. It is the kind of instrument that makes a battlefield feel like a corridor, narrow and watched. In gameplay terms, the weapon is revered not for raw power but for presence. A single, well-placed shot can tilt a skirmish by stitching distance into the enemy’s retreat. It rewards patience: aim true, and the Hobbling enchantment tethers the opposition just enough to set up a counterstrike, to pull a wounded ally toward a safer flank, or to buttress a fragile line against a sudden assault. Veterans of low-light ruins tell stories of the rifle turning chaos into choreography—how the slowed advance of a dense phalanx buys the room a healer needs to weave a barrier and then release a healing torrent. It’s a relic that insists on tact, not triumph; on restraint, not bravado. Market whispers thread through the temple corridors and stone stairwells, a cadence of trade and recollection. It’s not uncommon to see a Cleric’s Iron Rifle of Hobbling drift between hands as if the weapon itself is a vow passed from one keeper to another. The Saddlebag Exchange—a favored haunt for catalogues and auctions—often flags these rifles as scarce, their price swinging with rumor and demand. I watched a deal settle in copper and silver, then gold, with a collector whispering of provenance while another buyer weighed the risk of restoring such a relic to service. The price, when spoken aloud in that market’s soft murmur, felt less like currency and more like testimony: a measure of trust in the hands that would wield it again. So it sits—an artifact of stained glass light and rain, of clerical care and battlefield mercy. Cleric's Iron Rifle of Hobbling is more than metal and wood; it’s a bridge between the old order and the new battles that test those who still believe healing can be a weapon as precise as any drawn blade.