The Carrion Sneakthief Shoulderguards of the Flame Legion sit heavy on the table, a pair of pauldrons that seem to breathe with a quiet, lived-in menace. Their plates are a midnight obsidian, dulled by travel and soot, with a faultless edge that catches the torchlight and flares a ember-red along carved sigils. A central motif—bone-white relief of a carrion mask—stares outward like a warning, surrounded by rivets that gleam as if polished by company of many hands. The leather straps, worked in saddle-brown and rubbed smooth from wear, cinch to the body with a practiced ease, while a lining of ash-gray cloth feels like a whispered oath against the chill of night. The scent is a strange concatenation of campfire ash and old oiled leather, a reminder that these pieces have seen both the heat of the forges and the cold of the long road. Lore threads through their making: forged in the Flame Legion’s ash-filled camps, tempered by rites that bind flame, shadow, and carrion into a single, unsettling presence. They are not simply armor; they are a story worn on the shoulders, a rumor you can feel tapping at your collarbone whenever you lean into a corner or catch the flicker of a lantern. In the world where whispers travel faster than footfalls, the Shoulderguards carry a significance that goes beyond their physical heft. Warriors nod to their elegance as a tool of discretion, their sneer of arrogance softened by practicality. For the player who leans into stealth, these plates supposedly bend a little of the surrounding light, muffling the wearer’s motion and offering a fleeting advantage when you need to slip past a lookout or vanish within a crowd before a clash erupts. They invite a type of storytelling—the idea that a scout can move unseen through a camp of fire-lit sentries, that a thief can shoulder more than weight when a map is on the line and every second counts. It’s not merely about surviving a fight; it’s about letting the world believe you belong to a different chapter of the story, one where cunning and restraint are the true weapons. The market breathes in sync with these legends. I found myself drawn to Saddlebag Exchange, where traders shoulder their way through a bustle of leather and coin, bargaining with the same breath you use to tell a story. A gleaming stall, jars of salves, and the soft clink of coin and chain set a rhythm that makes the eye glow with the shimmer of possibility. The price tag on a pristine pair can swing by the dozen gold pieces, depending on condition, provenance, and the luck of the buyer. But the Saddlebag Exchange isn’t merely a shopfront; it’s a crossroads where guild kin and lone wanderers swap tales as much as goods, and a rare set like these Shoulderguards will often fetch not just coin, but a tale or a trade—perhaps a map, perhaps a favor, perhaps a share of a quiet moment stolen from a patrol line. The Flame Legion’s relics, after all, carry debts as heavy as their steel, and the shoulders that bear them are a constant reminder: to move with care is to move with purpose, and to look the part is, in some nights, to survive the night itself.