Dread Penny

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B
ad Coin. Worse Fortune. The copper-pieces from Nagrothea are not welcome in most reputable establishments outside the Burned Over District(s). But, as with most such things, there are of course exceptions. A few private collectors. Aficionados of the outre or the obscurely wicked. Twisted dilettantes looking to add a bit of vaguely-risque darkness to their social cachet. Abdead militants looking for some sort of touchstone or memento or something--anything-- to help them unlock a connection back to the homeland to which none of them have even been.

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Conservatism is not for the living. In Nagrothea such philosophy is only discussed among the PostMortes. To do otherwise would be to cast pearls before Grunters; a waste of time and sure to produce an annoyed pig-thing. The ancestral Host of Nagrothea do not waste time. Nor pigs.

So-called 'Dread Pennies' were allegedly first minted not as coins, but rather as a way to preserve certain of the increasingly decrepit and failing members of the Established Order, those who were unquietly succumbing to the ruthlessly erosive ravages of time's inexorable passage. Even the mighty ones of Nagrothea cannot completely free themselves of the tyranny of entropy and decay. Already mummified, embalmed, or otherwise preserved, the crumbling venerables were forcibly reduced to a less corruptible state then bound within these tokens of esteem.

To this day one can still hear the faint mutterings and dire imprecations of the spirits lodged within the macabre coinage as they are passed from one illicit vendor to another. It's better to spend these things quickly, before the nightmares and screaming begin.