Barbarian Short Story: Wayfarer

Posted 11 April 2012 by Nizaris

The next short story has been released to accompany the DiabloWikiBarbarian reveal on Darkness Falls, Heroes Rise promotional page. The previous story for the Demon Hunter was actually fairly well written, and fairly demonic. I was critical at first, but the story eventually brought me in. I have not yet read this short story, but I do hope that it lives up to Hatred and Discipline.

One of the things I really liked about the previous story was that it is the full background of events that happen directly before the falling star hits DiabloWikiTristram Cathedral. I can only assume that this story will be placed during the same time as the Demon Hunter, but elsewhere in Sanctuary.

A small excerpt:

His dead sister came at sundown. Always at sundown.

Barbarian ImageAs the sky bruised and the shadows grew long into night, he stood to watch the sun disappear behind the mountains. This was when the whispered sound of the evening breeze would crumble into the slow, shuffling rasp of feet. Her feet… cold and white, frayed tendon and cracked bone worn bare over countless miles of frost-rimmed rock. It did not matter how far Kehr had traveled that day, how many rivers he had forded or cliffs he had scaled. She came at sundown.

The large man busied himself with the fire as the shuffling drew closer. Tinder had grown more plentiful as he had descended into the Sharval Wilds, and Kehr tried to find some comfort in the thought of warm food after weeks of dried venison. It was a futile attempt at cheer, as he knew it would be. The limping footsteps always brought a seeping chill, a liquid sense of ice and horror that rippled and lapped against his skin. They came to a stop in the darkness just beyond the firelight.

Tagged As: | Categories: Barbarian, Diablo 3, Diablo III Classes, Lore and Story
«
»
7 Opinions have been expressed on “Barbarian Short Story: Wayfarer”

  • Kinda dissapointing that this barb isn’t our ol’ D2 barb. Looking past that however, I find the story engaging and well written

  • So much more interesting than that gameplay video minus the new monsters

  • I enjoyed this one just as I did the Demon Hunter one, looking forward to reading the rest of the classes.

  • Do you think this is our barbarian or one we will meet on the Iron Road?, I am betting that the sword he threw away will be a unique ingame weapon :)

    • I’m also interested to see how well Blizz weaves the existing lore into the in-game story.  Somehow I don’t want to get my hopes up.  Despite the wonderful medium that video games provide for story-telling most games feel like pornos, the story is just an excuse for the action.  If these short stories are in any way integrated into the game it’d be a great start in the direction of immersive digital narrative.

    • It’s our barbarian, the story explains why he is half-naked and carrying just a woodcutter’s axe when we start just outside New Tristram. I believe the Demon Hunter’s story also explains why she doesn’t have plate armour on. :)
       

      And yep, except it’s an axe: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/item/axe-2h/#type=legendary  :P (couldn’t link directly to the item without a 404 error for some reason)