MelWong/TsunamiBlade
Crashing Wave of Morning, the Tsunami Blade
By MelWong
The Tsunami Blade</i>
Artifact 4
Orichalcum/Black Jade/Adamant wavecleaver daiklave.
Melee Statistics
Speed +4, Accuracy +5, Damage +6L, Defense +5
(Statistics are with MM bonus)
Requires: Strength 2 Commitment: 5 (Orichalcum)
The daiklave known as the Crashing Wave of Morning, or the Tsunami Blade, was lost in the Uttermost West at the Ursupation when its owner was slain at sea. It slumbered at the bottom of the sea through the passing of the Great Contagion, up until Stormsea Silence, inheriting the Exaltation of its past owner, called instinctively for it as she fought alone to save her only child from sacrifice to the Fair Folk. It then winged through the air to her hand speedily enough that its accumulated years' worth of coral and barnacles burned off on the sea air, and it burned its mark of ownership into her palm as she lifted it to catch the morning sun.
The Crashing Wave of Morning is a very unusual daiklave, inasmuch as its size is an uneasy compromise between the four-foot cleaverlike blade of a reaver daiklave and the more curved, shorter blade of a wavecleaver. The length and weight of the daiklave is balanced off by an outsize hilt with a ring pommel measuring to a foot long. The thick wedgelike blade has a second rayskin-wrapped handle set in a cutout a foot away from the curved drop point so it can be swung like a scythe, with both hands in a sweeping movement. It possessess no crossguard or hand-guard.
The cutting edge itself is an unusual silver-blue adamant, over two inches wide, flecked with tiny flecks of gold. The rest of the blade is a ruddy, blood-tinged orichalcum folded and hammered over the hard core of adamant, and where orichalcum meets adamant is a finger-thick line of black jade, the inner sleeve for the orichalcum wrapping. The adamant cutting edge bears a visible temper line that recalls the crash of the surf and the waves of the ocean, and legend has it that the sword was treated with heated clay harvested from an underwater volcano, heated in the molten blood of the earth, and quenched in the water of the Uttermost West itself, to grant it the power of the ever-encroaching Sea.
The daiklave is oddly paired with a thick wristlet that could more properly be called a shackle. While fine in workmanship and crafted of orichalcum, black jade and adamant in ornate inlay, it bears a ring on it like that on a slave's shackle, ostensibly for the attachment of a chain. On spending the five motes to attune with the daiklave the wristlet snaps onto the wrist of the wielder's sword hand. Close examination shows that it seems to have no hinge or clasp, and might as well have been forged seamlessly onto the Exalt's wrist. Only decommitment or death by its wielder will allow the shackle to fall off - it cannot be removed otherwise.
The Crashing Wave of Morning has two sockets for hearthstones, one set just below the handle of the daiklave, and the other in the wristlet that fastens onto its owner's wrist permanently.
The Tsunami Blade has several virtues, chief among them its ability to return to its owner's hand on command.
If the daiklave has fallen out of its owner's grasp but is still within sight, they may spend one mote to recall it to their hand. A glowing golden chain of pure Essence will recall the daiklave to the sword hand of its owner.
If the blade has fallen out of sight or is far away (up to a limit of 10xthe character's Essence yards), they may command it to wing through the air and flash back into their grasp, at the cost of 3 motes. The daiklave will then seemingly soar through the air and appear in hand in an eyeblink.
Thirdly, the Tsunami Blade may be commanded to rest Elsewhere at its leisure until its owner should have need to call upon it again. It costs 1 mote to summon or banish it, and its appearance or disappearance is instantaneous.
These abilities may only be used if the daiklave remains attuned to the owner. However, deattunement is very unlikely as the shackle was designed to keep attunement current even while the blade is stowed Elsewhere, as it was forged with samples of blood taken from an Exalted mother and child, and like a wayward child the daiklave will heed the call of the shackle no matter where it is.
The Crashing Wave of Morning is also compatible with the Thrown ability, and all Thrown Charms.
Its final ability, and the one it was named for, is its ability to evoke the power of the crashing waves. When in combat, the Exalt wielding the Tsunami Blade may spend five motes to bypass all armor its target wears as the massive blade roars like an incoming wave. All damage dealt by the blade in that turn is converted to Bashing, and for each level of damage inflicted after soak, the target is thrown back a yard.
