Shoulders of the Ebon Vanguard Choice Chest sits in the market’s pale glow, a compact iron coracle wrapped in black lacquer and stitched with weathered leather straps. The lid bears a raven's-wing sigil, etched in silver that catches firelight and then dies to a soft, brooding gleam. The texture invites your fingertips—the grain of the wood inside, the cool smoothness of the metal, the way the ancient finish traces your palm with a whisper of centuries-old craft. It feels like a kept secret, a pledge pressed into a sturdy container, as if a vow could be weighed in iron and ink. lore threads wind through its surface: the Ebon Vanguard, a company of veterans who once carved a line of defense across the frontiers, left their mark not only on banners but on the very gear that bears their name. The chest is less a box than a memory, waiting for someone who understands that choosing its contents is choosing a part of that memory to wear. Open it, and the air shifts—the scent of oiled leather and cold steel rising like a memory resurfacing. Inside lie five pauldron designs, each a different mood of war: a plated silhouette with obsidian sheen and bright, ribbed edges; a smooth slab of blackened steel with minimal ornament; a samite-soft leather version reinforced with copper rivets; a runed set that glows faintly when the night is long; and a heavier ceremonial plate whose shoulders curve toward a commanding silhouette. A note tucked beneath the first tier lists the options in a single, careful line: choose a shoulder that tells your story, not just covers your collarbone. It is the kind of choice that makes a player feel the weight of the world on their shoulders—quite literally. In gameplay terms, the chest is a quiet hinge between appearance and purpose. The armor you mount on your shoulders does more than shade your hero from blows; it marks your path. Some pieces emphasize durability, others agility, and the rare few blend both in a way that suits a commander’s stride or a hunter’s furtive step. The Shoulders of the Ebon Vanguard Choice Chest lets you decide which voice your character speaks at the moment of combat—the stern, disciplined echo of a veteran, or the nimble, insurgent hiss of a skirmisher. It’s a small, intimate ritual that can shift how you approach a fight, how NPCs react, even how you tell your own story when you pass a campfire and your silhouette flickers in the dusk. The market aspect threads through the narrative as well, the way rumor and possibility converge on a single stall in the Saddlebag Exchange. Traders murmur that a pristine set can fetch a handsome price, and that the choice chest, when brought to market, carries a premium for its guaranteed selectivity. A coral-gowned merchant once told me how a brisk exchange there—gold traded for scabbards, a pulse of barter—made the night feel charged with potential. The chest’s value isn’t only in its metal and leather but in the chapters it promises to unlock, in the way a single gauntlet—or a single shoulder—can tilt the balance of a party’s look and a player’s courage. So you carry it from stall to campfire, from arena to vendor, and you carry a memory: the Vanguard’s oath is not just scrawled on a banner but worn as a shape on your shoulders. And in that quiet, every choice chest becomes a step in a larger story, your own chapter stitched into the longstanding memory of the Ebon Vanguard.