Even when the story begins, heroes in the world of Dungeons and Dragons are just that - heroes. What forces shaped them? What destiny guides them? Meet the players, and find out.
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Player: Dan
As a child, Volk lived with his tribe in low mountains and hills near the coast. One day when he was still very young, a neighboring tribe attacked and destroyed his village. Those who survived and did not flee were taken prisoner and forced to march to the ocean, where their captors sold them to slavers.
Volk, just a boy, became an oarslave on a merchant ship that ran from port to port along the coast. The work was hard, and he grew strong and tough from his hours on the oars. He also grew large - as Goliaths generally do. By his late teens his physical presence intimidated the captain to the point that Volk was chained at all times, whether at the oars or in his cell at night. He was called "Troll" by the crew and his fellow slaves, thanks to his enormous size. Eventually the captain - a sour, nervous rake of a man - decided his strongest oarslave was simply not worth the risk to his crew and cargo, and put Volk up for auction.
He was bought by a half-orc named Grubak who owned an arena in the southern islands. Grubak dubbed him "Volk The Hammer" for his brutal effectiveness with maul and mace. Volk's Goliath heritage made him a spirited combatant and crowd favorite, and he learned to use his size to his greatest possible advantage. He became the star attraction of the previously unremarkable arena, especially after a dramatic fight between several gladiators and an immature Spitting Drake cost Volk his eye - but every other combatant his life. As Volk's fame grew, Grubak began receiving - and accepting - offers to bring him and the other fighters to larger events throughout the south.
During a voyage to one such competition, a summer storm surprised the ship carrying Volk and the other gladiators. The ship was destroyed by the monstrous waves, and Volk rode a piece of the shattered mast through the night, finally washing up on the shore of a deserted jungle island. Free after years of slavery, he thanked the God of Storms, Kord, and promised to honor him in all his pursuits. At first he struggled to survive on the island, but he came to understand and appreciate the natural rhythms of the earth, the jungle, and its inhabitants.
In time, those rhythms awakened the primal powers within him, and he took up the mantle of the Warden. He traveled the length and breadth of his small island, learning from it and its creatures the ways of the Primal Spirits. He revered the fierce tenacity of the boar as he hunted it for sustenance. He admired the cunning grace of the panther even as it stalked him in turn. He loved their freedom. He was independent and wild; never again would he be a slave to the will of another.
Years passed. Then one day the north wind whispered to him as he walked the beach, a long spear casually across his shoulders. This island is safe, it said.
The volcanic earth, the mountain that had risen from the seabed to form this island, rumbled beneath his feet. It is free.
The ocean waves pulled at his feet and he looked out over the ocean, to the northern horizon. Help those who are not.
The next day he began to construct a sturdy - if simple - raft. There was work to be done... beyond the horizon, on the continent he hadn't seen in so many years.
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