The Echo Below

The Echo Below

Track a conspiracy across fog-choked docks, echo-haunted roads, and mines where grief itself has teeth before the Core hums its final, fatal chord.

By: Joe McMahon
System: Daggerheart
Complexity: ⏺
Setting: Scorval Blight

The Pitch

A stolen Resonance Core has vanished into the fog-choked wilds of Scorval Blight, and its unstable energies have begun to rattle the coastline like a held breath ready to break. Whispers from Uled’s harbor factions point in every direction, but all of them agree on one thing: something beneath the land is waking. Echo-storms twist memory, griefglass bleeds old tragedies into new ones, and even the roads seem to hum with warnings no one wants to hear. As rival powers scramble to seize control of the Core, the heroes must navigate lies, sabotage, and echo-haunted ruins to uncover the truth. Each step north drags them closer to Baled, a town crushed by its own history, and to a mine where grief itself has grown teeth. If the Core reaches its final chord, the entire coast may be rewritten in violet light.

Tone & Feel

Eerie, investigative, atmospheric, tense, gritty, foreboding, conspiracy-laden

Themes

• Conspiracy Beneath the Surface
• Grief as Power and Weapon
• Choices Under Pressure
• Community vs. Corruption

Touchstones

Dark Souls, The Mist, True Detective, The Witcher, Annihilation, Wicker Man

Overview

If your group decides to play this campaign, give your players the following information before character creation.

Velthuryn is a fractured world where the land itself seems to remember grief. Its skies are governed by Solivar, the copper-gold sun, and two moons whose crossings spark resonance storms that twist memory, voice, and oath. Across its continents, kingdoms rise and fall in the shadow of the Aethergrave, a continent-spanning wound where reality itself failed. Here, time falters, emotions manifest as storms, and griefglass grows from shattered cliffs, whispering with the voices of the dead.

Along the northern coasts lies Scorval Blight, a state where the Aethergrave gnaws openly at land and sea. Resonance storms roll down from the Verge like tempests of sorrow, shattering stone into glittering griefglass and seeding paranoia wherever shards are carried. To local cults, this devastation is scripture, each thunderclap a hymn and each cliff-fall a verse. For the people who must live in its shadow, however, the corruption is not divine but deadly, a constant pressure threatening to swallow entire towns.

It is here, in the vicinity of Uled and Baled, that the tragedy of recent years unfolds. Uled, a fog-choked harbor town, survives on smuggling, wardenship, and uneasy alliances, while Baled was once a proud mining settlement feeding griefglass and ore into the Concord’s coffers. Now, both are scarred. Whispers spread of children vanishing in the night, their boots left neatly by the hearth or chapel fire. Some claim they ran off toward the mines, drawn by voices only they could hear. Others insist they were taken by the skittering, grief-touched creatures now seen prowling the streets and markets. Shipments vanish in the night, reliquary bells falter into silence, and fissures yawn open where miners once worked. Rumors ripple through taverns and temples alike: some say smugglers are bleeding the towns dry, others whisper that the mine itself is waking, calling the cargo back into the earth.

The people of Scorval live with a shared wound: the sense that the land judges them, that every broken oath echoes into storm and stone. In this atmosphere of grief and suspicion, the missing Concord crates, marked SG-Δ, bound for Baled, are more than stolen cargo. They are a spark on the edge of catastrophe, proof that sabotage and resonance are converging. When the adventurers arrive in Uled, they find themselves thrust into the heart of this conspiracy, accused of complicity even as they struggle to prove otherwise. From there, the path winds only deeper into the Echo Below. At the campaign’s climax, the saboteur stands revealed, one of several possible suspects, and the mine itself becomes the stage for a choice: destroy the Core, harness it, or let it reshape the world.

Communities

All Daggerheart communities are available for this campaign

Ancestries

All Daggerheart ancestries are available for this campaign

Classes

All Daggerheart classes are available for this campaign

Player Principles

Share discoveries

Investigations succeed when everyone compares notes.

Embrace vulnerability

Echo-storms and griefglass visions reward those who open themselves to risk.

Rotate the spotlight

Every faction, clue, and danger matters more when all voices are heard.

GM Principles

Keep clocks visible

Villain progress and Heat should always be in play. Then show Detonation when party discovers the mine connection.

Escalate noise and chaos

Every loud move ripples into consequences.

Show faction responses

Every success or failure changes attitudes in Uled, Baled, and beyond.

Lean into eerie sensory detail

Whispers, doubled echoes, violet light - make resonance and griefglass feel alive.

Distinctions

Griefglass

A mineral infused with grief and resonance. Shards whisper memories, dust corrupts lungs, veins glow violet in the mines. Both clue and hazard.

Echo-Storms

Weather and soundscapes warped by resonance, rewarding risk but sowing Fear.

Factions in Shadow

Every group points blame elsewhere, planting false leads as suspicion mounts.

The Inciting Incident

In Uled’s fog-choked harbor, crates bearing government seals, shipments bound for Baled vanish overnight. Mooring ropes hang cut clean, violet dust clings to the cobbles, and dockhands whisper that the cargo was either stolen… or called back by the mine itself.

When the adventurers arrive, the timing proves too convenient. A dockhand swears he saw strangers near the cargo road at dawn, and the rumor spreads faster than gulls over the tide. The Hollowbound Wardens, already stretched thin, seize on the newcomers as easy scapegoats. Lanterns are raised, chains rattle across the pier, and an officer steps forward with accusations sharp enough to cut the mist.

The crowd murmurs with suspicion: some believe the heroes might be smugglers in disguise, others that they’ve been sent by a rival faction to cover tracks. The local smuggler captain and the Cradlekeepers’ priests offer only half-truths and evasions. From the first moment in Uled, the adventurers are forced to defend their names or dive headlong into the mystery to prove the blame lies elsewhere.

Session Zero Questions

While creating the Daggerheart characters for this adventure during a session zero, use the following questions to help tie them to the area, the campaign, or the tragedy.

• Who in Uled trusts you, and who suspects you?
• What grief ties you to the area’s tragedy?
• What dream or memory do you fear the griefglass will steal from you?
• When the Wardens conscripted you for this task, what debt or promise forced your hand?
• What debt, secret, or favor binds you to one of Uled’s factions: Wardens, Reliquary, Smugglers, or Cradlekeepers?
• When the reliquary bells fell quiet, what omen or echo did you hear that no one else admits to, and why have you kept it secret?

Campaign Frame