The Eye Of Winthorp
One man's ultimate demise could prove another's treasure...Or curse.
The Eye
The eye itself, is a normal looking human eye (gruesome only by the fact that it is no longer attached to someone). The iris appears steel grey, and the rest is as you would expect, mostly white with some visible blood vessels. Strangely enough, the eye is warm to the touch, as if the blood was still flowing through it. As expected, it is slimey and squishy. At first glance it doesn't really appear to be anything other than an unpleasant remnant, if you disregard the curious warmth.
However, should you choose to carry the eye with you, two things will happen. First, you would get a strange sense of understanding for doors, shackles and locks. With just a glance, you somehow recognize the workings of that particular brand of lock, the way the door is built and where its weaknesses lies. Greatly aiding you in any lockpicking attempts you might make.
The second thing, is that you slowly start losing all your inhibitions. It may start out with an urge to pilfer some coins from an unguarded pocket, pinch a barwench's bottom or simply undo any bindings you see, from belt buckles to knots. Until you can no longer think before you act, you simply follow the first impulse that comes into your head. And this could happen even when you sleep. Many adventurers who found the eye have ended up arrested for indecent exposure, or worse, killed by dragons/beholders/bar thugs. A well known story tells of one who was said to have been hanged for relieving himself on the dance floor at the royal gala, an event that sounds as if it would have been most likely related to the eye.
If you try to get rid of the eye, as most are want to do sooner or later. You will feel a wave of apathy hitting you like an ocean surf. All of a sudden, it will be hard for you to do anything at all, other than obsess over what would happen if you did do something. Everything becomes an unsurmountable task, even taking a single step. How long this apathy will remain with you, depends partly on your own inner reserves, as well as how long the eye has been in your possession. Should you regain possession of the eye, this effect will slowly dissipate to be replaced once again with the complete lacking of inhibitions.
The eye can only be destroyed temporarily, no matter what you do with it, it tends to slowly mend itself. If you were to use fire or acid on it, it will indeed seemingly be destroyed, but there are tales that suggest that this has been tried before, and yet the eye has turned up again since then.
The eye has no apparent will of its own, imparting only emotions, compulsions and partial knowledge. Seemingly, it does not communicate with the current owner or anyone else.
Winthorp A. Viesmuel
The eye is said to have once belonged to a rogue named Winthorp. And any characteristics associated with the eye, all came from him. If the stories are to be believed, there wasn't anything remarkable about the man, aside from his talent in his trade and his outmost gall. Which in the end, would prove his undoing. His brazen overconfidence led him to try to steal from a mindflayer, Myrlgraaf el Ceedofren by name. What transpired in the tower of the mindflayer the night of the attempted robbery is not recorded in any reliable sources, but seeing as only one of Winthorp's EYES made it out from that tower, not to mention the state of the eye, one can only imagine. But one would be wiser not to.
Plot Hooks
- The mindflayer Myrlgraaf has been using the eye for his own alien reasons, but now he seeks to reclaim it. Unfortunately, he also seeks to capture the most recent owner of the eye, to conduct some horrid experiments no doubt. Perhaps the current owner will simply be whisked away one night, or perhaps cloaked shadowy figures will start to stalk the area of the eye's last known location.
- A group of freedom fighters wish to use the eye to besmirch the reputation of a local nobleperson by secretly putting it in his/her possession. Unbeknownst to him/her, the soft pillow he/she just received as a gift, contains a gruesome surprise. The consequenses of which, are easily calculated.
- A group of street urchins are playing marbles in a street corner, one of the marbles seems unusually large and soft. If it remains in their care, no doubt the urchins will find themselves living in a Peter Pan like fantasy soon enough, or perhaps more akin to Lord of the Flies.
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? Responses (7)

I quite like the write-up for this slightly revolting item. At first, I had some issues but the viability of this item concerning the likelihood of it being picked up by normal PCs but after thinking abt it some more, now I'm okay with it on this pt.

PCs will pick up anything they can carry, in my experience. :p

Hmmm... must be some kind of novelty factor at play. Anyway, I was thinking a PC who's a thief would want to pick it up.

It's a twisted item with some interesting side effects. I like it.

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