The Riftbreaker Tree

Aliases/titles

1. World Tree

2. Heavens Bane

3. Demons Haunt

4. Traveler Tree

5. Riftbreaker Tree

Known weaknesses:

None

Known abilities:

1. Rifter: The Riftbreaker Tree always appears such that it’s domain is, at most, a kilometer away from the Rift entrance, and all signs point to the tree being the cause of these Rifts.

2. Retardant: The Riftbreaker Tree appears to be immune to all forms of elemental damage, and at the least long-range magic.

3. Summoner: The Riftbreaker Tree spawns waves of enemies within zones, getting stronger and stronger the closer to the tree you get.

4. Crushing Wisdom: The Riftbreaker Tree has an Aura that makes one feel an oppressive weight, as though something even more than a god was giving them more attention, in accordance to how close the group is to the Tree

History:

The Tree was first discovered in the First Rift. When the group of five explorers entered its zone, it seemed upset that they did not wait for it to summon its defenders, and communication was lost as the Rift closed. There were no signs of them in the following Rifts for twelve years.

After twelve years, there was a panic when a Rift not showing the Tree appeared, as the Tree seems to be the only thing preventing its summoned monsters from rushing out to kill innocents.

The Rift appeared in a graveyard, and it seemed to lead to another not unlike the one it appeared in, see “The Graveyard.”

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No being of any kind has made it further than zone thirty-one.

The group of two hundred soldiers, made of twenty-five archers, 100 foot soldiers, and 25 specialized scouts and assassins as well as 50 spellcasters, all of mixed origin, were faced with at least four, possibly more, Ancient Dragons.

The Dragons slaughtered all but one of the soldiers, and then forcefully ejected the remaining Rogue from the Rift.

On Zones, they are set up and marked by the Tree. Every 5 Zones will have a small space to set up camp where no monsters can enter. Zones can vary in size depending entirely upon Rift and time.

The Graveyard

Inside the Rift, the only thing that the janitor, who was the only one permitted in, found was a well-maintained graveyard, with the same number of graves as the Rifts had killed.

Each individual grave has a gravestone that matched the deceased’s religion and beliefs, the deceased person’s name engraved in strange text that any being seems to be legible even to the illiterate or blind.

There is a chest at the base of each headstone, only opening to those the deceased held dear, filled with the deceased’s possessions, gear, religious items, the deceased’s will and testimony, as well as an autobiography.

The autobiography is always legible, again to any person or being regardless of ability or disability.

The autobiography details the persons life down to the smallest detail, taking months to read despite seeming small (the book never contains sexually explicit scenes, and is always the size of a small journal regardless of actual contents).

These items are always returned to the chest if someone ‘unworthy’ steals them, but the items can be freely given, not purchased, with the explicit consent of the person held dear.

The chest always contains just enough money to help the deceased persons family survive, if barely, with no savings.

Notes on function:

The Graveyard holds the dead in extremely high respect, banning those who disrespect the dead from Rifts forever, unless explicit permission from the dead’s family is given.

No entities or beings can enter the Graveyard in any way if they bear ill will to those currently there, dead, or alive.

No resurrection, communication or summoning spells work while in the Graveyard.

No grave bears the name of one who did not die in the Rifts, except those the Tree seems to believe died an unworthy death.

There has only been one noted occasion of the Tree sending monsters outside of the Rift.

A man was burning down an orphanage in misguided rage and was promptly attacked by an Ancient Wyrm.

Once the ‘threat’ was removed, around 30 Draconic Beastkin, a Rift exclusive race, ran into the building.

When the Beastkin returned, they were bringing the bodies of the dead children and staff, who they proceeded to resurrect and care for until the children were healthy once again.