Into the Shadowlands is a private Discord play-by-post of Curse of Strahd, taking place in the Vietnamese-Chinese universe of Tianxia. The game begins as the party is magically transported from different times to the outskirts of Lillefort, a mysterious mist-wreathed town with an ominous castle looming down from the mountains. Their initial goal is to find their way home, but what mysteries await them in the Shadowlands?
The adventure is being adapted into a novel as part of the 2022 NaNoWriMo.
The adventuring party:
- Jian Zhu, half-elf cleric of the Bamboo Knight
- Anya Abirin, half-elf Circle of Dreams druid
- Armani Angaar, fire genasi bard and Draconic Origin sorcerer
- Kōnane Ching, halfling cleric of the Moonweaver, Twilight domain
- Elilahne Silverbranch, half-elf Samurai fighter
- (former) Rhin Liu, dhampir Path of the Beast barbarian
Into the Shadowlands contains these tropes:
- Alliterative Name: Anya Abirin and Armani Angaar.
- Berserk Button: Anya gets royally pissed off at an unprecedented scale thanks to The Reveal that the hags were abducting children. Rhin also rages and shows her claws (literally, being a Path of the Beast Barbarian), because she's a trained Hunter of Monsters and the hags are clear targets.
- Big Sister Instinct: Mai Hoa is very protective of her little brother Dang Khoa. In fact, sending him to Appleton to keep him safe was the reason she met the party in the first place.
- Cain and Abel: Camille is the Cain and Alois is the Abel of the de Varennes royal family. While Alois was generous, good-hearted, and open-minded up until his murder, Camille started off as the dutiful oldest child who followed the family trade of conquering, whose relationship with their younger brother was cordial at worst and distant-but-loving at best. However, Camille slowly became twisted by the "advice" of his advisors and the entity calling itself Death. On the other side, Xuan Huong (known to the court as Daphne) was educating Alois and getting him to change his mind, take his family, and leave Xinghua. Alois came around to her opinion in a Heel Realization just in time for Camille to get it into his head that Alois and Daphne are plotting to remove him and install themselves as the new power couple rulers. Prompted by "Death", Camille murdered Alois to seal a dark pact and became the first vampire.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Sovereign Camille de Varennes, with her raven hair, white skin, and Red Eyes, Take Warning.
- Egopolis: Lillefort and its castle are named after Camille's mother, Lady Liliane de Varennes (née de Montfort).
- Family Theme Naming: Skipped an incarnation, but Xuan Huong (Tatyana) and Dang Khoa (Ismark) were named after famous Vietnamese poets. Hồ Xuân Hương was a trailblazing feminist who wrote metaphorical, provocative verses. Trần Đăng Khoa was considered a child prodigy in poetry, publishing his first work in a newspaper at 8 and his first poetry collection at 10. Additionally, Mai Hoa and Dang Khoa's names rhyme.
- Foil:
- The were-ravens are part of the Ordo Solaris, an evil-fighting order that descended from the ravens that fell to earth after being shot by the Sun. They are determined to make amends for their ancestors' evil deed, following the lead of the Archer (who is technically their ancestor as well). The werewolves were once part of the Ordo Lunaris. This similar order follows the banner of the Moonweaver, but ended up aligning with de Varennes and contributed to the wiping out of their order, which included murdering any werewolf who stayed loyal to the Order.
- Among the party itself, there's the always-prepared, prim and proper, constantly vigilant Elilhane versus the indefinitely cruder, trusting, reckless Armani. Rhin, the dhampir warrior who cuts to the quick, also stands in contrast against Konane, the politer cleric of the Moonweaver (who loathes undead).
- Father Solberg and Madame Astra as the final devotees of their deity in Lillefort. Solberg started as the village's kindly priest who aided a rebellion and was swiftly punished by Camille for his part. He spends the days trapped in his church, praying incessantly that his Lord will heal his daughter Sasha, with no sign that the Archer might hear him and grant him this boon. Madame Astra is intimately aware that there are still deities in this cursed land, because she's channeling one. She is adopting Luci, a promising child to replace her as the high priestess of the Lady of the Stars. She aids the party in their quest to return home (and overthrow the Sovereign), but at the same time still gives Camille unbiased readings when he approaches her because he is her half-sibling (and because he threatened her Found Family if she doesn't cooperate).
- Horrible Judge of Character: Armani, full stop. She gets poisoned for a full day because she ate the hags' pastries. A few hours after the poison wears off, she's taking candy from Headmistress Ward's plate, reasoning that there's no way she'd be poisoned by strangers twice in a row. Her party members react with annoyance at this. Luckily, while Ward is in the pay of de Varennes, she has no intention to directly harm anyone.
- Hunter of Monsters: The Liu family is renowned for being the peacekeepers of the Shadowlands, guarding the rest of Yue'nan against monsters and other threats. Rhin is thrown into conflict as she's a dhampir (albeit of the jiangshi kind rather than European vampires like Camille and their cohort). She also weaponizes her rage at the existence of monsters that harm innocent people in battle as a Barbarian, first demonstrated in her attack on Lea.
- Iconic Item:
- Anya has a Band of the Dryad, a wooden ring that looks like intertwining ivy vines, with a perfect small rose blooming as a jewel. It recharges once daily, and she can use it to heal someone she can touch. Once the charge is expended, the rose wilts away and reblooms at dawn.
- Kōnane wields the Blade of Heaven's Will that she saved from the ruined temple of the Ordo Lunaris. It deals additional damage to the undead. She also has a leiomano - a wooden sword edged in shark teeth, which is the weapon she reaches for first in combat.
- It's All My Fault: Both Father Solberg and Mai Hoa blame themselves for the "death" (turning) of Alexandra. Mai Hoa feels guilty for indulging a young Sasha's heroic dreams. Father Solberg regrets sheltering the wizard and her rebellion that got so many people killed and being unable to stop Sasha from joining them.
- Kill and Replace: A circuitous version of this trope. Camille killed Alois as part of the deal they made with Death, but they still love their little brother (twisted as this emotion may be), so his guise as Stefan von Achterberg is identical to Alois in both looks and temperament. Camille is essentially attempting to roleplay Alois but evil, while benefiting from being able to present as male(-coded).
- Meaningful Name:
- Mai Hoa (Ireena). The mai flower is a symbol of spring in the South of Yue'nan. Her adoptive mother named her that because she seems like a bit of sunshine in miserable, dreary Lillefort. It's later revealed that her initial incarnation (Tatyana) was named Xuan Huong ("fragrance of spring"), but adopted the name Daphne ("laurel") for high society members unwilling to pronounce her given name. In Greek mythology, Daphne fled Apollo's unwanted advances and was turned into a laurel tree by Gaia when she cried out for help. Apollo then adopted the laurel as his sacred plant, just as Camille continues to cling to the idealized memory of Daphne. Another incarnation, Sister Hanae of the Archer's Church, is flower-themed: her name is formed from kanji that means "flower" and "picture", and the party only knows her posthumously by her portrait.
- Dang Khoa, whose name means "graduate", wants to be a wizard of great renown when he grows up.
- Kōnane Ching, cleric of the Moonweaver, has a first name that means "moonlight".
- Camille de Varennes was named after composer Camille Saint-Saëns, French revolutionary Camille Desmoulins, and Alexandre Varenne, a former Governor-General of French Indochina that Hồ Chí Minh immortalized and ridiculed in a short story. The name was chosen because of its gender-neutral status and any resemblance to Carmilla was accidental.
- All the party members who speak Celestial immediately recognize Madame Astra's name as meaning "star", marking her as the last follower of the Lady of the Stars. "Luci" is a shortened/gender-neutral version of "Lucia", meaning "light", as they are destined to be Astra's successor.
- Lady Renée de Winter is a twofer: her first name means "reborn/born again", which is what Daphne hopes to make of her. "of Winter" is fitting for someone essentially living in suspended animation, and might come back as undead.
- Meaningful Rename: De Varennes took over Xinghua, desecrated the shrines to the Mistresses, built a European-style castle that looks like Schloss Neuschwanstein on the mountains, and finally forcibly renamed the town Lillefort - erasing local culture and imposing his own on the town. "Xinghua" as a name is only spoken in secret by people trying to remember that they once were part of Yue'nan.
- Named After Somebody Famous:
- Elisabeth von Hohenembs; her entire backstory contains a string of this. Her canon counterpart is Rudolph van Richten, who traveled under the guise of Rictavio the bard. Empress Elisabeth of Austria traveled incognito as the Countess of Hohenembs, one of her many titles. Her only son was named Rudolf (alternatively spelled Rudolph). Von Hohenembs' adoptive daughter is named Valerie, after Sisi's favorite daughter Marie Valerie. "Titania", von Hohenembs' bardic alias, is based on Sisi's identification with the Queen of Fairies by that name.
- Named Weapons:
- Kōname wields Heaven's Will, rescued from an Ordo Lunaris temple. The sword's name itself is a translation of a legendary named sword in Vietnamese history, Thuận Thiên ("(Following) Heaven's Will").
- Alois de Varennes' Sunbow (the canon counterpart to the Sunsword) is a MacGuffin that the party must acquire.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished:
- The Sun was forced to shoot down his brothers, who had transformed into suns and were slowly killing all life on Earth. The Moon tried to fight the false Suns, but was severely wounded in a nine-on-one battle, and ran into the caves to recuperate, only to get dragged to trial right after she had recovered. For their attempts to protect the mortals in their care, they get sentenced to the fate of Star-Crossed Lovers, and Kicked Upstairs for additional new duties. The Sun became the Archer, whose light would smite away evil. The Moon became the Weaver, who decides the fate of all in the Mortal Realm.
- Lillefort runs on the punishment of good deeds. Chief Gia Han tried to defend her people against the Sovereign's rule and saved some tax money to fix the crumbling infrastructure. She was effectively murdered for it, with the Sovereign weaponizing her heart condition to terrorize her to death. Mai Hoa encouraged a child Sasha Solberg's innocent heroic dreams, indirectly causing Sasha's transformation into a vampire spawn. Father Solberg sheltered a wizard and her rebellion before the rebellion got quashed horrifically and his daughter got turned as punishment.
- Non-Human Non-Binary: Camille de Varennes was already nonbinary before their transformation into a vampire. Having access to disguise magic just gives them further gender euphoria because they can look however and use whatever pronouns they please. They are not the only nonbinary character, as various NPCs of all ages are also nonbinary, with Luci (they/them) being the first one encountered by the party.
- Only One Name: Some characters have no last name, being commoners (or those masquerading as commoners, like the hags). Mai Hoa has a surname but she doesn't use it in practice. To distinguish her from all the other Hoas in the village, she's "Mai Hoa, daughter of the Chief".
- Only Sane Man: It's been snarkily pointed out in the out-of-character chats that this party is what happens when people who think they're the Only Sane Man get together. Paranoid warriors Elilhane and Rhin are prime examples, but the reckless and assertive Armani also thinks of herself this way, being annoyed at her party members' wariness. Jian views himself as a peacekeeping authority, similar to his deity the Bamboo Knight.
- Parental Abandonment: The hags have been keeping the people of Lillefort addicted to their dream pastries as escapes from their dreary, oppressive life. Once they run out of money, they will eventually sell their children to the hags. This does not cast any aspersions on the parents' true morality and nature without the thrall of the pastries - Mai Hoa comments that Luci's parents would have been worried sick had they known their child was gone, not knowing that they were the ones that sold Luci to the hags.
- Princely Young Man: By all accounts, Alois de Varennes was exactly as handsome, gentle, and chivalrous as Stefan von Achterberg presents himself as. Madame Astra's reading explicitly refers to him as "a sleeping prince". While he's not legally a prince in the rest of Yue'nan, he served as the equivalent of a Crown Prince up until his death.
- Punny Name: The Bargewright Inn (no relation to the establishment in the Forgotten Realms), with a lampshade hung upon it by Lady de Winter.
- Shout-Out:
- The inhabitants of the house on the hill are named after three musical theatre actresses: Lea (Salonga), Emma (Thompson), and Imelda (Staunton), who have all played Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street - a character referred to as a witch, who makes pies from the flesh of Todd's murder victims.
- Anya Abirin is named after the protagonist of Anastasia and the film Labyrinth.
- Lady Daphne de Winter, neé Danvers, is an extended Rebecca joke. She's named after Rebecca de Winter, her devotee Mrs. Danvers, and the unnamed protagonist and narrator of the novel, who was named Daphne in early drafts after her author Daphne du Maurier. The Creepy Housekeeper Danvers is convinced that her beloved mistress Rebecca still haunts her home, Lady Daphne keeps the dead body of her wife from decomposing with dark magic. The Lady also learned that she shared a name with the Sovereign's "lost love", and it's only one of the many reasons that she's a Camille fangirl.
- In addition to Meaningful Name, Lady Renée de Winter has a daughter named Isabelle, who's in love with the young, "sullen, impudent" Edmund Favell. In Twilight, Renée Dwyer's daughter (Isa)Bella Swan is in love with the emo Edward Cullen. Isabelle's name beginning with an "I", and her short, blond hair, is a shoutout to the nameless protagonist of Rebecca, referred to by the fans of the musical as "Ich" ("I" in German).
- Maxim and Frank, the proprietors of the Bargewright Inn, are named after Maxim de Winter and Frank Crowley from Rebecca as well, and specifically face-cast as Jan Ammann and James Park. James Park's version of Frank is specifically played as being in love with Maxim. Mayor Favell got his name from the conniving Jack Favell.
- Star-Crossed Lovers:
- The Sun-Archer and the Moonweaver are forced to eternally traverse the sky, having only a precious few hours a day to meet when the moon has risen and the sun has not yet set.
- Camille is convinced that he and "Xuan Huong" are star-crossed lovers. Too bad she has never agreed with him on that point and never will.
- Solar and Lunar: The two deities that have some form of presence in Lillefort are the Archer (sun god) and Moonweaver (moon goddess).
- Tarot Motifs: The party each receives a card as a boon from the Moonweaver, and later gets a card reading from Madame Astra.
- The Von Trope Family:
- Stefan von Achterberg is a handsome, young (for a half-elf), helpful ally to the party who throws his personal support and his noble house (which is just him)'s aid behind the party. That's just a guise for Camille de Varennes, who is the dark version played straight: an autocratic, villainous, sadistic, powerful hundreds-of-years-old vampire skilled at intrigue. Additionally, Stefan is set up to be a red herring as the Lillefort counterpart to the canon Rudolph van Richten.
- The real counterpart to Van Richten is actually Elisabeth von Hohenembs, alias Titania.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: Rhin disappears after the party exits St. Pavel's Orphanage because the player had to go on hiatus for personal reasons, and eventually left the game altogether.
- Vocal Dissonance: While presenting as a young woman who borders on girlish, Camille has a low, purring Alto Villainess voice.
- Would Hurt a Child: The party attempts to fight off a coven of three hags that had been buying and eating children.
