A mercy mission carrying desperately needed supplies through forty miles of deadly winter wilderness reveals a sealed letter with an impossible order: the king has chosen who lives and who dies, and now so must you.
Welcome to “The King’s Mercy” 5E adventure! Within these pages, you’ll discover everything necessary to embark on this thrilling quest, complete with detailed descriptions of locations, encounters, NPCs and stat blocks, maps, and handouts.
This adventure also features a versatile and scalable system, allowing Game Masters to easily adjust the difficulty and complexity of encounters to suit their players’ preferences and skill levels. Whether you have a party of advanced players or beginners, you can tailor the challenges to ensure an exciting and engaging experience for everyone involved. The scalable system guides modifying creature statistics, making it simple to customize the adventure to fit your party’s level.
In “The King’s Mercy,” a party of 3-5 characters (levels 4-5) is recruited by Lord Castellan Roderic Blackmoor to transport food, medicine, and firewood across forty miles of frozen wilderness to Northhaven — a border village of 200 civilians and a 40-soldier royal garrison both facing starvation after an early winter sealed the mountain passes before the final supply caravans could arrive. The reward is 400 gp and the lives of 240 people. The characters are also given a sealed letter bearing King Thane’s personal wax seal — magically trapped with an alarm spell (DC 18 Arcana to detect, DC 20 Sleight of Hand to bypass) — to be delivered unopened into the hands of garrison commander Captain Brenna Ironhelm. What begins as a heroic mercy mission becomes a test of values when the letter’s contents are revealed: the king has run the arithmetic of survival, and he has chosen the garrison. The adventure is divided into three parts and is designed for a single 3-4 hour session.
Part 1: The Hook
Lord Castellan Blackmoor briefs the party in Kingsford’s war room, genuinely believing this is a straightforward mercy mission (DC 15 Insight confirms he has no idea what the letter contains). He is immovable on the reward amount and sealed-orders policy. Each character receives snowshoes, winter clothing, 10 days of personal rations, tinderbox, firewood, rope, and a waterskin; the enchanted supply sled carries 2,400 pounds of preserved food, medicinal herbs, 100 pounds of firewood, blankets, and the sealed letter. Before departing, the party faces its first meaningful choice: how many personal rations to take from the sled — every pound removed means less for the starving village. Optional scout Gunther Frostwalker, a weathered 20-year veteran of the northern routes, can be hired for 50 gp (deducted from the reward); he grants advantage on Survival and navigation checks, warns about one hazard in advance, and will fight in one combat encounter of the party’s choice — but flatly refuses to face the wyvern.
Part 2: The Frozen Journey
The forty-mile trek takes 3-5 days governed by interlocking survival mechanics. Cold exposure requires DC 10 Constitution saves once per day in proper gear (DC 12 during blizzards or camping without fire); failure adds exhaustion, a natural 1 inflicts frostbite imposing disadvantage on all Dexterity checks until the character spends 8 hours warm. Travel speed is halved by snowshoes in normal conditions (10-12 miles per day), further reduced by blizzards and the supply sled. Navigation requires a daily DC 13 Survival check; failure costs 2 hours. Exhaustion recovery requires a proper long rest with fire, full rations, and a DC 13 Survival check — no fire or half rations means exhaustion cannot be removed. The GM selects 2-3 major events for the journey. Event 1: The Blizzard is a skill challenge requiring 3 successes before 3 failures (Survival, Athletics, Perception, Constitution) — failure scatters the party, costs 8 hours, and loses 1d4 days of rations. Event 2: Desperate Bandits (required) confronts the party with Sergeant Kara Thornfeld — a former soldier who stayed behind with 6 ragged fighters and 4 emaciated children after her village of Millbrook already starved, now blocking the trail to rob the sled. Combat, negotiation (DC 14 Persuasion with 20+ rations shared earns wyvern intelligence; 30+ earns avalanche bypass), or creative approaches each carry weight; recruiting Kara’s group to Northhaven is possible but complicates the final choice. Event 3: Avalanche Zone offers a safe 8-hour detour or a risky direct crossing (group DC 14 Stealth, with the sled at disadvantage). Event 4: Frozen River Crossing requires individual DC 12 Acrobatics checks; falling through triggers frigid water saves (escalating DC 10+ Constitution per turn or exhaustion); losing the sled means mission failure. Event 5: Frost Giant Territory is a deliberate avoidance encounter — the CR 8 giant is unkillable at this level, and the correct answers are stealth (group DC 16), a 12-hour detour, distraction magic, or DC 18 Persuasion with tribute. At Wyvern’s Pass, the only route into Northhaven’s valley is blocked by an injured wyvern whose broken wing has left it stranded, starving, and pain-maddened for two weeks. Four solutions exist: combat (90 HP, starts at high ground, poison stinger DC 15 or 7d6 damage), feeding (4+ rations to calm it, 6+ rations earns lasting friendship and future alliance), healing (lesser restoration plus DC 15 Medicine check sets the broken wing, earns an uncommon magic item from its hoard as thanks), or stealth (group DC 16 Stealth, sled at disadvantage). Wyvern’s Pass also holds a +1 javelin lodged in its scales and a cave 30 feet up containing 3d20 gp, gems, and a potion of greater healing.
Part 3: The Village Crisis
Northhaven is a corpse of a village — silent homes, hollow-eyed children watching from windows, no smoke from most chimneys. The fortress flies the king’s banner. Captain Brenna Ironhelm strides out to meet the party, professional but visibly crushed by the burden of watching civilians starve while her soldiers hold. She escorts them inside, provides what hospitality she can, and when the sealed letter is placed in her hands, reads it twice in silence before setting it down with shaking hands. The king’s order is stark: the supplies are for the garrison only; the two hundred civilians are a strategic sacrifice. Captain Ironhelm, not bound by her military oath in the same way she would be if acting alone, looks to the party for guidance. Four resolution paths follow. Follow the king’s orders: the garrison survives at full strength, approximately 150 villagers die before spring, the party receives 400 gp and royal commendation, but survivors remember who chose the soldiers. Defy the king’s orders: the village is saved, the garrison is weakened, the party receives no reward and faces potential treason charges in Kingsford (DC 16 Persuasion to argue moral justification at trial), but Northhaven owes them an unpayable debt. Compromise: split the supplies, keep everyone alive on starvation rations, receive 200 gp and the king’s grudging acknowledgment, earn respect from both garrison and village. Creative solutions: large-scale hunting expeditions, a second supply run, magical food creation, sending for aid, or organized evacuation of the weakest villagers south — any approach requiring genuine sacrifice earns proportional outcomes. Every major NPC reacts individually: Elder Hilda Frostborn speaks for eighty years of loyal service to the crown; Brother Grimwald quotes divine mercy and offers to testify at any trial; Sergeant Harkon of the garrison admits he cannot celebrate surviving while children starve outside the walls. The adventure explicitly has no perfect answer.
Release Date: 2025
Format: Digital (PDF)
Items Included
- The King’s Mercy 5E (PDF)
- A B&W Printer-Friendly Version (PDF)
- Maps
- Illustrations (Generated with Midjourney)
- Monster Stat Blocks
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