The Pheronian seas experience their fair share of piracy. The westerly trade winds bring merchandise and danger in equal quantities. Some pirates operate entirely outside kingdom and city-state law, while others seize and burn ships with full license and charter from their home nation. The only shared truth known to all sailors is open water's profitability.
Captain Aedric Storm's fledgling enterprise of cutthroats and salt dogs cannot claim the infamy of such dread figures as Lord Admiral Blauvelt or Captain Claes the Dancer, but give him time. Maybe you want to be a pirate too; maybe you fancy ocean air or find regular vitamin C intake overrated. Whatever your reasons, vicarious life through Captain Storm will not be a disappointment.
Clergymen and women of Pheronian temples are commonplace. You see them on every street corner and collecting alms in every village. Whether devoted to Thalandar, the Eternal Lady, or one of the numerous lesser deities, priests, nuns, novitiates, Templiers, and all the rest help guide the peaceful (and not so peaceful) toward Palonia, the Great City beyond mortal death.
Strikeleader Jessica Tallianos, however, is unlike most clergy members. Her religious order, the Silverswords, fight continually to protect the realm. But what threatens Pheronia's political and economic stability? The expansionist Yoshen Empire, for one, whose sorcerers follow the teachings of Ta'al, called the Jackal Demon. Then there is the false god Zyrit and His vile cult of blood-bound devotees. Finally, along the edges of civilization where man has yet to tame wilderness' precincts, savagery lurks, distant beasts bray, great wings flap, and undeath's stench cloys.
Jessica, called the Drake Talon, uses the Eternal Lady's boons to quell the Silversword order's enemies. This potent magic, however, places the priestess at odds with her temple's orthodox leadership. She is hated by the very people she protects, a cost which levies a profound toll. Maybe you worship heavenly powers; maybe you long to travel the land as an armored knight, expelling evil in all its forms. Whatever your reasons, vicarious life through Strikeleader Tallianos will prove taxing, bittersweet, and terribly rewarding.
Magic exists, yes. Years of scholarship can teach the mind to manipulate stone, call forth flame from thin air, or mend wounded flesh. But why take the risk?
Sorcerers and witches, unable to control their dark arts, inflict horror across Pheronia. Stillborn infants, men's spines twisted like bitter gourds, spontaneous organ failure, plague outbreak--many maladies suffered by common and noblefolk alike arise from a foolish hand thinking it can command magic. Ancient men believed themselves superior to magic and nature and even the gods. Their arrogance brought down a deluge of fiery wroth.
Maybe you found a Yoshen treatise on abjuration or witnessed a Zevotari sacrificial blood-rite; maybe you seek control over the elements or wish never again to allow typhoid to steal a child's life. Whatever your reasons, stay away. Magic, in all its forms, ends only in torturous pain.