The Frontier After the Break
"History here did not unfold cleanly. The land remembers violence."
The Wicked West: Frontier of Shadows is set in a world that resembles the late 19th-century frontier, but history here did not unfold cleanly. Expansion pressed westward with rail, industry, and faith, and in doing so tore something open.
The exact moment is debated—some call it The Break, others The Shudder, others refuse to name it at all—but its effects are undeniable. The land remembers violence. The dead do not always remain still. Entire regions warped under unseen pressure, and what was once folklore began answering back.
Layers Under Strain
This world is defined by layers of reality under strain. The mortal frontier still functions—people trade, pray, kill, love, and build—but it does so atop The Veil, a thinning boundary where supernatural forces leak through.
Some individuals, like Sara Eldritch or Clara McGee, have learned to navigate this pressure and survived long enough to become names whispered rather than spoken aloud. Secret societies maneuver behind public life, convinced they alone understand what the world is becoming.
Regions fracture into zones of influence where reality behaves differently, and monsters are not aberrations but symptoms. The Wicked West is not a world waiting to be saved; it is one already wounded.
- Survival creates legends.
- Power leaves scars.
- Every step forward risks drawing attention.
"Something has been watching far longer than humanity has been counting years."