Dire Ceremonial Warhorn of Vision

The Dire Ceremonial Warhorn of Vision sits on the desk like a captured breath from a long night, its mouthpiece wrapped in weathered sinew and its surface polished to a midnight gloss that catches the lamplight and holds it, alighting the carved runes along its length. The horn itself is a curve of dark wood, almost black with age, veined with a lacquer that glints copper in the glow. Along the spine, sigils coil in a careful dance—stars tethered to a serpent, a circle broken by a single, gleaming eye—as if the instrument itself keeps watch over a forgotten prophecy. A thin lattice of brass pins holds a suspended lens, a small, pale key that seems to pulse with the room’s rhythm, while a leather strap, worn soft by hands that have used it to summon dawns, hangs at its base like a reminder of journeys begun and vows kept. When you lift it, the horn feels heavy with memory, the scent of old rain and resin rising from its hollow throat, and you can almost hear a chorus in the hollow that follows the breath you’re about to release. Lore says this horn was born in the shadowed halls of a seer’s enclave, a place where the world’s whisperings were weighed and watched. It was trained to listen when others spoke only in noise, to translate tremors in the air into a visible thread that could guide a caravan through a shifting valley or a city through a siege. The Dire Ceremonial Warhorn of Vision does not just announce your presence; it invites you to share a moment of sight with those who stand beside you. In times of crisis, its blasts are said to unfurl a veil of possible futures, a brief map that lets a group choose a path that avoids danger or presses a moment of opportunity into the present. Soldiers claim it Amenable to the wind, a priestess swears it once brought a mother’s heart back to a courtyard, and a workshop of smiths murmurs that the horn’s tone carries the ache and hope of a dozen legends. In practice, the horn becomes part of a larger story you tell your party as you push through ruined gateways and crowded markets. A single, measured blast can sharpen a party’s focus, drawing attention to hidden wards, traps, or the glint of a concealed edge in a wall. Its follow-up notes coax allies to press their defense a pace, or quicken their steps toward a safe corridor that had seemed to vanish. It isn’t a weapon in the ordinary sense, but a storyteller’s instrument turned to battlefield use: a way to align courage with circumstance, to translate fear into a shared plan, to remind a group that what you see together still matters. Pricing, of course, is a whisper in the wind. Saddlebag Exchange—the kind of place where rumors are traded as frequently as merchandise—often has it stashed behind a glass counter, its price drifting with rumor and need. It can move from a few gold pieces on a quiet day to well beyond that when a festival breathes life into the city, when dreamers sigh for visions and traders hedge their bets on what futures might reveal. The horn’s value is never only measured in coin; it is valued in the courage to listen, the willingness to share a guiding light, and the quiet promise that vision, once summoned, can alter the course of a night in a world that never sleeps.