Refugees of the Storm, cast out of the Underworld and in no hurry to return, the Walking Dead have gone from myth to reality. They are not the legendary Risen, whose existence the Hierarchy denied. Nor are they the near-mindless, rotting monstrosities that emerge en masse from the darkness like hungry locusts - what some have called Shamblers. These are the Rots: Wraiths who were flung across the Shroud at its moment of near-weakness - and in occasional squalls ever since - and into waiting bodies, there to reside until they body that contains them is destroyed. Strangers to both worlds, Rots must tread a careful path. Too much activity puts them at risk of falling apart, but too much time spent at rest brings out the monster within. They stagger through their days and nights, trying to go about their business while keeping their borrowed bodies from rotting into sludge. To return is to fall, and to fall is to return. They cannot see where they came from, nor return safely to it. However, in the Skinlands they are safe from the ravages of the Storm. No longer suffering the mixed blessing of incorporeality, they can look after their Fetters and Passions directly. But then, the battle between Psyche and Shadow remains much as it ever did, only now the Shadow has equal access to the Psyche's most favored things. How long can the Wraith hold out, with a decaying frame to look after, hunters tracking her every move and her own, worst enemy actively trying to send her back into the Hell she escaped from? For the Rots, this sojourn in the world of the living is dead time, and time is not on their side...       |