Mythora

Death Was the Tutorial

Dark Fantasy LitRPG

You died on Earth. A tired goddess caught you falling and set you down in a world that ran out of heroes thirty years ago — alive, level nothing, owning the clothes you died in. Now a line of grave-light script only you can read tallies everything you survive. Dungeons called Graves tear open in the land and ripen if ignored. Four guilds want your name in their book. The monsters have united under nine banners and started printing their own laws. And at the mouth of the one Grave that never closed, something polite is asking how many bells rang this week. An old spearman at the inn buys your first drink, because somebody has to be the tutorial.

Where things stand

Death Was the Tutorial is played by real people and keeps moving between their sessions. This is the state of it as of the last update — not a fixed setting, and not where it began.

Lastbell spirals further into irreversible collapse as the Mireward's influence and the Cantor's dominion deepen. The Still Man issues desperate, focused psychic warnings while Charter-Master Silas Vane ruthlessly exploits the city's despair, swelling his ranks with desperate citizens. Amidst the chaos, Weftmistress Homura Nine-Stitch leads a desperate retreat through hidden passages, seeking to preserve the Gilded Weft's remnants, as the hobgoblin Banners consolidate their conquest of The First Death. The Mireward's psychic dominion experiences a violent tremor as ichor conduits strain under the assault on The First Death, momentarily destabilizing Corvin. The Bannermoot's chilling efficiency under Kruul Stonehide underscores the grim cost of the hobgoblin's conquest. The Mirewarded Archives suffer a violent psychic backlash, further destabilizing Corvin and the ichor conduits. Kruul Stonehide's Bannermoot dispatches resources with chilling, silent efficiency, cementing its role as a brutal hub of the hobgoblin conquest.

Places

The Bellhouse of Veyadungeon
The great round temple where the Returned wake. A bronze bell the size of a house hangs in the open tower; it rings itself, once, each time Veya pulls a soul through the Second Door. Beneath it, stone waking-slabs radiate outward like petals, each worn smooth by centuries of first breaths. Nkomi priestesses move between the slabs with water, clothes, and the standard speech: you died, you are here, the world needs you. A side wing — the Mireward — is kept locked, and the priestesses do not discuss it.
The Sandroad Marketmarket
The Sandroad Market is now a place of active, desperate recruitment. The Charter's agents, emboldened by the city's terror, push contracts with renewed vigor, promising protection from the unknown horrors stirring beneath.
Emberline Fieldswilderness
The Emberline Fields are now thoroughly overrun by Ghezza's vanguard, their organized advance leaving a clear path of destruction towards Lastbell. The thrumming of war machines and the shouts of hobgoblin skirmishers drown out any other sounds. The char-black shrine gates stand as silent witnesses to the coming storm.
The Bannermootcamp
The warcamp of Ghezza the Nine-Banner in the western hills — no raider's sprawl but a planned town of ramped earthworks, drilled companies, and nine tribal banners around a tenth pole that stands empty. Hobgoblin engineers cut roads; goblin runners carry written orders; penned wargs turn spits. Most unsettling of all is the human quarter: advisors, deserters, and tradesmen who came for pay and stayed — treated well, watched always.
The Hunters' Ledgermarket
The licensed adventurers' guild of Lastbell. A converted courthouse: bounty boards where verdicts once hung, a great iron ledger chained to the central desk recording every certified level of every hunter alive — and a second, black-bound ledger for the dead. Levels here are not vanity; they are law. An Assessor rolls carved knuckle-dice against your deeds before any rank is stamped. The Ledger holds first-claim rights on every new Grave reported within the city's charter.
The Gilded Weft (Banner Stronghold)military fortress
The Gilded Weft's ruin is now complete, its artisans either fled or pressed into service. The district pulses with a new, oppressive energy as the Bone Charter formalizes its control, exploiting the city's terror for profit and power.
The Unclosed Gravedungeon
The Unclosed Grave's garden is now a grotesque, living extension of the Mireward, pulsing with raw energy. The cottage at its mouth seems to shrink under the weight of the growing wrongness, and the echoes from its depths are deafeningly insistent, now actively calling to the new Grave in Lastbell.
The Diggers' Yardmarket
The Diggers' Yard has been fully co-opted by the Mireward. Controlled Union members, their forms grotesque, now serve as agents of corruption, physically expanding the entity's reach and infesting Lastbell's foundations with its foul ichor. The atmosphere is oppressive and sickening.
The Mirewarded Archivescastle
Corvin has transformed the archives into a weaponized hub, using 'Door Arithmetic' to channel and intensify Mireward corruption against the city.
The Charter's Enclavetown
The Charter's Enclave is a grim monument to Lastbell's despair, its operations streamlined to absorb the terrified populace. The hum of the printing presses is constant, churning out contracts for the newly 'protected'.
Bellhouse Sub-Passagecave
The Bellhouse Sub-Passage, already a torrent of Mireward ichor, violently ruptures as a new, nascent Grave tears open within its depths, mirroring the Grave of the Silent Kennel. Its wrongness seeps into the city.
Cavern of Rusted Hymnscave
The Cavern of Rusted Hymns, once echoing with its own deep sounds, now thrums with a new, intelligent psychic presence, becoming a primary nexus for the Mireward's expanding consciousness beneath Lastbell. The air is thick with a wrongness that feels observed.
The Broken Cryptcave
A vast, broken crypt, its floor littered with snapped wood and overturned stone coffins. The air is thick with damp earth and a metallic-sweet scent.
Whispering Aisles (Bellhouse)cave
The Aisles' psychic cacophony is momentarily disrupted by a painful jolt of defiance, then reasserts itself with increased intensity.
The Bellhouse Foundationscave
The Bellhouse Foundations are now a living, writhing mass of Mireward corruption, with a central tendril breaching the surface directly into the Bellhouse proper.
The Sunken Fenforest
The fen's wards are failing, its mists now thicker and permeated with a palpable wrongness. Spectral entities, drawn by the escalating psychic resonance, are increasingly common and hostile. The path to its depths is now fraught with unseen dangers.
The Bellhouse Foundations: Heart of the Disturbancecave
The Heart of the Disturbance has become a central node of the Mireward's physical manifestation. Former Union diggers, now mindless thralls, ceaselessly work to spread the virulent ichor, accelerating the city's corruption under the direction of an unseen, malevolent will.
Subterranean Tunnels of Ur-Themmcave
A newly exposed entrance descends into dark, winding tunnels, marked by arcane symbols and a sense of ancientness. The air is heavy with distorted energy.
The Weaving Heartcastle
The Gilded Weft's 'Weaving Heart' is now actively integrated into the Mireward's network, its magical pathways twisted and reshaped by Halvard's conscious influence. The usual hum of creation is replaced by a low, predatory thrum, and the very air feels heavy with wrongness.
Sunken Wardens' Cryptcave
A waterlogged underground complex beneath the Gilded Weft, rumored to hold relics of ancient guardians who once fought against encroaching darkness. Its chambers are filled with stagnant water and spectral echoes.
The Twisted Archivetemple
The Twisted Archive now hums with a newly awakened, personalized malevolence. The passage Vladar entered pulses with a dark, inviting energy, drawing other 'lost' souls deeper into the Mireward's grasp. Its architectural corruption deepens, hinting at a new, more intimate connection to the Mireward's core.
Grave of Gnawed Crownsdungeon
The Grave of Gnawed Crowns pulses with renewed, vengeful power, its influence expanding rapidly throughout Lastbell. The 'phantom note' has only sharpened the Cantor's resolve, accelerating the city's corruption.
Grave of the Silent Kenneldungeon
The Grave of the Silent Kennel, now fully awakened and resonating with the Cantor's amplified power, thrums with an even greater call to the Tide. Its influence reaches beyond the Emberline, now directly connecting with the newly formed Subterranean Maw within Lastbell.

Figures

  • Weftmistress Homura Nine-StitchMaster of the Gilded Weft
  • Baba UndumeRoot-Witch of the Emberline, Grave Pattern-Reader
  • Old MarnInnkeeper of The First Death, Retired Gravedigger
  • Assessor Imral VashkAssessor of the Hunters' Ledger, Keeper of the Knuckle-Dice
  • The Still ManThe Wake That Laid Its Own Grave
  • Ghezza the Nine-BannerActing De facto leader of a resistance faction within Levyhall
  • Sister LarkPriestess of the Mireward, Warden of the Wrongly Returned
  • Warden-General Aldous KreelWarden-General of Lastbell, Author of the Scorched-Line
  • Matron Ayo SefuHigh Priestess of Veya, Keeper of the Bellhouse
  • Deck MosleyLevel-9 Spearman, Unofficial Greeter of the Newly Returned
  • Yasu Ember-NoseFirst Scout of the Levy
  • Runa SixteenThe Ledger's Top Grave-Scout, Sixteen Times Summoned
  • Registrar Ottia PellIntake Registrar of the Bellhouse, Keeper of the Ration-Writs
  • Qeshira Bint-AlwanMistress of the Sandroad Caravans
  • Guildmaster Petra HalloranMaster of the Hunters' Ledger, Hero of the Overrun
  • Charter-Master Silas VaneMaster of the Bone Charter
  • Foreman Brakka Ur-ThemmMaster of the Gilded Weft
  • Captain Rhoswen VanceGate Captain of The Bellhouse
  • Scribe OndineBellhouse Head Scribe and Keeper of Records
  • LazloWandering Merchant
  • CordeliaMerchant, Purveyor of Grave-Kits
  • CorvinActing Logistics and Supply Master for the Bellhouse
  • KiyoWeaver's Apprentice
  • Kjar StonehandJotenblood Master Smith

These are the figures the world was seeded with, and who are still alive in it. Others have appeared since, and some of these are no longer who they were — the world keeps moving whether or not anyone is watching.