The Ia'shal Barrow, long abandoned by the people of Helba, has been shrouded in darkness for many years now. The hallowed barrow was once used to sanctify the Golbans who died young or were unable to make the perilous journey up the cloud-wreathed mountain, though it is now little more than a charnel pit of decay and rot. When war came to the people of Helba, the bloodshed drew an ancient enemy that long ago preyed upon them in their ancestral homes and reawakened an unending nightmare.

Hunters in the dark, the Shil'tok stole into the village of Helba in silence, taking those that they could find and leaving little more than a trail of blood that led back to the sealed barrow. Guards, hunters, and miners all vanished in the depths of night with only blood left spattered to mark their passing.

After many months of deliberation and scouting for the Shil'tok raiders, Kelliara, the Chair of the Secretariat of Spinesreach, lead a contingent of Spirean warriors into the unsealed barrows. The warriors struck down the monstrous spiders that they happened upon and did battle with the fearsome Shil'tok warriors that awaited them in the darkness. It remains to be seen what will come of Ia'shal, but something yet lingers in the forgotten depths...

Penned by my hand on the 7th of Midsummer, in the year 453 MA.