Warding Weapon (Patreon)

Weapon (any melee weapon), rare

You gain a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this magic weapon, which is inlaid with Celestial runes of ivory.

While holding the weapon, you can use an action to speak its command word and slam it onto the ground at a point within 5 feet of you. When you do, a holy warding beacon erupts from the ground, centered on that point. The beacon is a 10-foot-radius, 40-foot-tall cylinder. The beacon lasts for 1 minute and sheds bright light from its edge in a 20-foot radius, and dim light for an additional 20 feet. The light is sunlight. For the duration, any creature within the cylinder is considered to have half cover against ranged attacks. Friendly creatures within the area when it appears gain 15 temporary hit points, which last for 1 minute. Once this property of the weapon has been used, it can't be used again until the next dawn.

It wasn't unusual for those new to noble circles to wonder at Lady Milton's hammer, an unwieldy weapon for the slight cleric.

To those who asked, she wove tales of a time served as itinerant protector, sworn by sunlit oaths to preserve and protect. It had long been her place to bear the light of the divine, a weight borne to earth in defense of those whose need was greatest.

In truth, she had slain the man that once held the hammer. It was a time she lamented, spent hungry and reckless among outlaws. The man had been a priest, and he used the hammer to protect the people that traveled with him.

She couldn't understand the selflessness of the man, at least at first. In relieving him of his possessions, she found his journal: a well-worn book of scripture and anecdotes. She learned who he was and why he worshipped. She learned, ultimately, why he could die in defense, and in love, of those around him. She became, in his passing, a member of his clergy.

The priest's name was Jonathon Milton, and she held his hammer in honor of who he led her to become.