Scattered tribes of nomadic Orcs are migrating from the western wastelands. The Longhunt Clan is a small but brutal nomadic tribe containing Many Arrows’s exiles, half-orcs, Grey Orcs, and even an occasional goblin or bugbear. Some say they originally left The Plain of Standing Stones searching for plunder and became an ever-wandering tribe of Worg riders often raiding other Orcs with hit and run tactics. In the far east of Luraur, between the Arn Forrest and the Frozen sea, Uthgardt barbarians, factions of the Black Lion Tribe have turned to raising Rothe as livestock. They drive their herd west along the Old Fork trail to market in Silverymoon. About 10 years ago, these tribes warred with other more traditional tribes in what they refer to as "The lesser Clan war". Various offshoots of Black Lion and Red Tiger fought a frontier war for the better part of three years. As the adventure begins, the party is working as guards and Rothe Wranglers for Arugg and Marrona Andarson on their homestead east of the Arn Forest.
We were invited in to celebrate the arrival of Thane, Arugg's older brother. It's not obvious, but Marlyn noticed a warmth between Marrona and Thane, and Arugg's younger daughter, Abby, seemed to look a bit more like Thane than Arugg. Lucia, the older daughter, was 18 and betrothed to Jarl, another local homesteader.
Roccar, the local Reaver, entered to tell us that orcs had attacked. Jarl had found his herd stolen. Arugg offered us a 300g bonus to find the herd and get them back to Jarl. We all accepted and quickly mounted up.
Roccar led the party. It tool about two hours to get to Jarl's homestead, where we picked up Jarl and picked up the trail of the orcs. We followed the tracks through the night and nearly through the next day. We mounted a rise and found the rothe herd. It had been slaughtered and left. The tell tale javelins and arrows of the Longhunt clan told a familiar story. Something like 40-50 orcs had been here, and had left some hours before. They'd taken a different route back towards Jarl's homestead.
Our horses were badly winded, so we were forced to camp before heading back. We knew we couldn't take that large a band of orcs, so there was no point killing the horses to get back.
On our return, we found both Jarl's and Arugg's homesteads were burned to the ground. Not long after we arrived, the older retainers came down from the hills.
Tordek found there were small steps leading towards the family graveyard, followed by orc tracks. We found a rough hewn marker for Kaylar, mother of Arugg and Thane, killed at age 41 by the Longhunt orcs. Next to the marker was Abby's favorite doll. It seemed to be dropped, not placed, and was slightly trampled.
At Roccar's request, and because the orcs had come through several hours before, we dug shallow graves for the dead. Arugg was among the dead; we found no trace of Abby, Lucia, or Marrona.
We got back on the road as quickly as we could, with Roccar's squad of Reavers. Some ways down the road, we found a dead orc, half-buried under some rocks. He had succumbed to his wounds. Thane stabbed it in the eye. He believed it deprived dead orcs of honor in Gruumsh's sight, keeping them out of their afterlife.
We continued to follow the tracks. Roccar and Thane were split between revenge and rescue. Before much longer, we noticed Longhunt orcs and their worgs above the road in the hills. We stayed calm until we were in galloping distance of an upcoming ford. As soon as we broke into a gallop, they charged down at us.
We crossed the ford quickly and were able to take cover behind a rock formation. It was enough to slow them down. Thanks to Roccar's Reavers, Thane's bow, and our own work, the orcs broke their attack after losing quite a few of their number.
Roccar thought we had been too focused on the fight over saving the girls, and left with his Reavers. Thane led us on to track the orcs. There was no sign of the girls, but from what we could tell the original group of 30-50 had been joined by more orcs.
We continued following the trail. On the second night, during the first watch, we were attacked by a group of human bandits. We dispatched them easily.
In the third watch, Tordek heard screams from the direction we'd been traveling. Tordek woke everyone up, and Thane went to investigate. He came back without his worg pelt cloak, and told us we would continue on. He wouldn't tell us what he'd done with the worg pelt.
As the night fell, we closed on the main Longhunt camp. Jarl moved forward stealthily to investigate. The camp was very large, and at least Lucia was still alive. Thane said it wasn't Lucia, it was an orc; he'd buried Lucia in his worg pelt cloak.
Jarl sang a death chant and charged into the camp. He killed 2-3 orcs before going down.
We hid from the orcs until they settled back down. We ended up returning to a crossroads after seeing no sign of the girls again for a tenday. We didn't need to buy anything, but one of the peddlers told Thane that a half-orc had traded with him a few days before. The peddler told us that the orcs still had captives. We had a new lead.
And the peddlers looked like they were wearing leather armor under their clothes and carrying weapons. We prepared for an ambush when we camped. We weren't disappointed, dispatched them quickly. The seven of them were carrying heavy crossbows and shortswords, which we took to sell later.
4th Level
We continued hunting for another two tendays.
Marlyn & Tordek examined the ruby. It was actually a ruby, but it didn't quite seem like it was from this plane. It was a little too light, and it was tickling something in the back of his mind, but couldn't quite place it.
We located a rothe herd that we suspected belonged to the orcs. Thane seemed to be bent on revenge; he drew his bow and started shooting them down. He told us we had to join in so we could kill the herd. He intended to make the orcs starve over the winter.
The rest of us thought we were pretty far beyond our mandate, and asked Thane to stop. He finally agreed when he noticed we weren't also firing. He reluctantly agreed, saying there was an inn a few days away. We could spend some time in civilization, with ale and merchants.
Once we arrived, Jayden tried to see what the locals knew. Her approach was not particularly subtle though, and didn't net any information despite several appearance changes. Marlyn opted to buy one of the folks and ale instead. The farmer didn't seem to know anything, but pointed him towards the two rangers at the bar.
Old Poe, who'd helped the group initially, entered not long after we'd settled at a table. He immediately called out to Thane, clearly happy to see him. Something about the ranger's walk reminded Marlyn of Jayden; possibly another changeling.
He told us there was an orc camp nearby. Scar, an orc leader, was procuring a large number of weapons, enough to provision an army. It struck us that the bandits we'd relieved of their crossbows and swords were probably on their way to sell to the orcs. If we approached as merchants, with more weapons to sell, we could probably get a meeting.
There was a trading area near the inn, where we found a merchant selling poor quality weapons from a cart. We figured it was worth about 200g all together, but he was trying to sell for 600g. With Sajuuk's persuasion, we got the lot and the cart for 250g. Jayden was willing to front the money. We had no luck bartering with the heavy crossbows we had.
That night, Jayden decided he'd get his gold back. Sajuuk went with him. They snuck into the merchant's tent, incapacitated him, and took the gold plus another 100g.
When he returned to camp with the rest of us, he recommended we move our camp. Some of the others in the area seemed to be talking. We grumbled a bit, but broke camp and left the area before dawn.
Around three days later, at the crest of a trail into the foothills, we noticed a group a ways off that seemed to be tracking us. They were fairly far away and didn't seem to be coming directly at us. At a rough guess, it seemed like about 8 of them. Thane reluctantly cast Pass Without Trace to help us lose them.
Eventually we linked up with other travelers looking to sell to the orcs. We got enough information to be comfortable that we'd be let in. The tent where the purchasing was taking place was deep in the camp, though not dead center. It was on a mound though, and no other tents were particualry nearby.
Scar received us, and seemed to recognize Thane. He gave a speech about taking many faces in response to the death of his sons. He then commanded one of his wives to stand from the group of figures nearby in the shadows. It was Abby, wearing a gruesome cloak made of stitched together human faces. Among them were Abby's family. Thane hid his reaction well; he said that they'd come for business, not insults, and left. Scar let us leave.
We returned to camp. During the second watch, we heard the voice of Abby in the woods. Abby was telling us she'd made her choice at this point, and told us to go. Thane drew his bow as though he was going to shoot her. Her voice seemed to be coming from behind a tree.
We tried to talk Thane down, but in moments 20 arrows flew out of the night. Ten hit him. We fled as quickly as possible.
Over the next few tendays, we got Thane back into fighting shape while putting some distance between the orc camp and us. We came upon a large human encampment. We recognized a banner from the reavers, and sure enough Roccar was there.
Roccar told us they'd found Old Poe. He'd lived, but wouldn't tell where the orcs had gone. Apparently he'd been badly wounded. At Roccar's invitation, we entered his tent where Old Poe was resting. The orcs had brutalized him; his hands had been removed, and his face flayed.
He told us the orcs had gone to the Thirteen Fangs. Thane recognized that was a nearby region with some redstone pyramids. We worked with Roccar to develop a plan where we would sneak into the camp in advance of the human army, and attempt a decapitation strike. There'd still be fighting, but without Scar, the humans might have a better chance.
We were aided by an incoming sandstorm. We got into Scar's tent, without any seeming detection. It was empty though, except for Abby. Her pregnancy had advanced during our wandering, and she showed signs of abuse.
Scar walked in with a group of guards. Abby slipped out past us; Sajuuk followed. Scar and his group attacked the rest of us.
Sajuuk knocked Abby out and returned to us. We dispatched them all quickly. Thane took Scar's face (very efficiently) and charged after Abby.
Tordek cut Scar's belt, taking his pouches, beheaded him, and kicked the head out of the tent. The whole party charged after Thane.
Jayden ran ahead and intercepted Abby. He was able to pick her up and keep her moving so that Thane wouldn't catch up, but we'd keep track of her.
Thane went down hard, but we didn't kill him. We restrained him and explained the situation to Roccar.
Roccar gave us a 1000g reward for our persistence, and returning Abby. He told us he would put Thane up on trial and ask that we act as witnesses. We agreed.
We broke camp and began our travel back towards the homesteads. As we passed one of the pyramids however, the ground opened and we slid down a sinkhole.
The tunnel where we found ourselves was crafted, similar in construction to the pyramids. The tunnel appeared older though. Everything was suffused in a dim blue light, which seemed to be from a bioluminescent fungus.
After following the tunnel for a bit, we came to a T in the intersection. Two red-cloaked mages sat in the hall beyond, staring farther down that branch of the tunnel. They appeared to be looking at another figure, perhaps a paladin, dimly outlined.
The mages were heavily cloaked. Once they noticed our presence, they asked us to join them. We didn't detect any deception about them, so we did.
The shorter one, sitting on a rock, introduced himself as Lord Bartle. He told us he'd been studying the 13 red pyramids for some time, and that there might be a treasure buried here. He held up a ruby that he thought would unlock the treasure vault. It seemed similar to the ruby we had. His companion followed him, but seemed to have been struck by a Feeblemind spell when casting while holding the ruby.
Lord Bartle offered us 1000g, a set of Goggles of the Night, and a 40% loot share if we aided them. The paladin we saw had taken a sword from a stone and become hostile. We stepped forward and tried to speak with him, but he drew his sword and attacked.
He hit hard, grievously wounding Tordek several times. He did not have a great deal of health though, and so went down quickly. Marlyn was able to stabilize him.
As soon as Bob fell, the sword fell to the ground and melded into the ground about half-way. We bound Bob and tried to wake him up; as soon as he did though he began struggling and trying to get to sword again. We knocked him back out.
We proceeded down the corridor, and worked through a series of rooms and traps. One of the rooms had uncountable diamonds, with skeletons and weapons among them. When Shaylee had her pseudodragon pick one up and bring it to her, we were all (except for the wizards) compelled to attack her. We succeeded in breaking the compulsion before hurting her, but did not attempt to pick up any other diamonds. Sajuuk used Mage Hand to extract a Shortbow +1 and a broken warhammer from the bones. Jayden took the shortbow and Marlyn took the warhammer.
Lord Bartle told us the room was not the treasure, it was simply a trap. We deduced that the diamonds weren't enchanted, but at some point we'd entered a pocket dimension or some such. The diamonds were generated by violence and their nature was that anyone holding them appeared hostile.
We continued on through more rooms until we ran into a drow who seemed to be insane. He attacked us as soon as we approached. We defeated the party and continued on.
We found some sort of altar room. Lord Bartle revealed himself as Wartle, a Slaadi chaos demigod. He told us he was leaving, and we could sacrifice the feeble-minded companion to get "something pretty great." This wasn't an appealing option to us. Wartle also left behind a Tentacle Rod, which Marlyn took.
We found additional hidden doors. Going through the least obvious one, we found a statute. Triggering a lever on the statue opened another door, letting five mummies into the room with us. Thanks to a fortunate Turn Undead, we were able to take them one a time.
When the last one fell, a portal opened to Sundabar. We grabbed some diamonds from the statue, a circlet and a bracelet from the mummies, and jumped through. It was Bartle's abandoned house.
We rested and refreshed ourselves. We found Roccar entering the city when we exited.
Fifth Level
Roccar told us Thane's trial was to take place in Silverymoon soon. We were summoned to testify.
We had time to make a few purchases, upgrading some of our arms & armor. We continued to occupy Bartle's house; no one challenged us on it. The neighbors didn't seem to mind.
Three weeks passed before we received a note under our door. We were asked to meet Roccar in a local tavern; he needed our assistance. There was no signature.
We went at the appointed time. We were taken into a back room by a blue-skinned gnome that we didn't know. Roccar was there, along with Ser Mary Glendale, a famous human paladin; her attendant, Sal; a rogue-like human male, and a gnome. We found out the gnome was affiliated with the Black Network, as, we found out, was Jayden.
War blade of Sundibar, Grand Inquisitrix, High Protector of the Silvery Marches, Orcbane.
Rowan the Watch Blade of Sundabar; rogue-like human; spymaster for Ser Mary Roccar Attendant, Sal Fumbles McNilbog, the gnome
There's been some bizarre magical issues driving the orc bands of the Silver Marches out of their accustomed territory. Our encounter with the Longhunt clan was related; that Chief was attempting to use the disorder as a way of consolidating the clans.
The clan migration was causing many problems in the surrounding areas.
There was a goblin, Weasel, who they thought was smuggling magical weapons to the orc armies.
She suspected this was going to continue to cause escalating conflict, including destabilizing the Many Arrows clan north of the Spine of the World. Tensions were rising throughout the North. Ser Mary was trying to gather a peace council that could reduce tensions. They had also been in contact with Trellani, a powerful mage of Silverymoon who had been empowered to sign a pact on behalf of the north.
Our assistance was sought because we'd made a name for ourselves ending the threat of the Longhunt. Since we were otherwise unaffiliated, they might listen to us.
If the council is successful, the plan is to organize the orcs together and escort them back to their homelands through the Underdark. Fumbles was working with several smuggling networks to make that happen safely.
No one knew what the magical aura was, precisely. It was perhaps related to the threats that made Wartle flee the dimension.
We finally agreed, with payment of 500g payment after negotiations completed. It shouldn't take more than two weeks, so we felt the compensation was appropriate. We did have to purchase our own horses however, and we would have to enter the council unarmed.
Jayden was going to try and smuggle in his shortsword with sleight-of-hand. Tordek bonded his battleaxe and Marlyn's warhammer so that he could summon them if necessary. We arranged for horses and re-provisioning.
Travel was expected to take 4-5 days. The first day passed uneventfully, though we saw some tracks corresponding to an odd owlbear.
The second night, we were all awakened by a shriek. We found ourselves in a room with runes on one wall. There were six beds, one for each of us, plus a bed with skeletal remains on it. We were all in normal clothes, with no weapons. Tordek could not summon his axe. Shaylee did not have her pseudodragon, and couldn't contact it.
We touched the runes, and found that a certain order opened the wall into a room full of weapons. We each made selections, and the room changed to a series of 20 doors with a pedestal in the center. The pedestal had another rune.
Touching the rune opened one of the doors at random. We killed two centaurs first. The next door was two imps. We defeated them as well. After the first few successes, we were compelled to open the next door as soon as a challenge was completed. Jayden was the first to die - and he woke up in a cave.
While we continued to fight the challenges, Jayden found us in separate chambers in a cave network. Each of us had a stalagmite with a blue glow next to us. As he continued through the area, Jayden found an Illithid. When he attacked the Illithid, we all woke up.
We woke up in individual caves, with a blue light disappearing as we noticed it. We had no equipment. Tordex attempted to summon his axe - and it worked. When he picked out of his cave, he saw the Mind Flayer. In true dwarven fashion, hearing Jayden's cries, he attacked. He kept the Mind Flayer occupied long enough for the party to get orgazanized, but the Mind Flayer did get his brain in the process. Jayden, thinking quickly, intercepted the Mind Flayer's extraction, and ran away with Tordek's brain. It was messy, but they were able to kill the Mind Flayer, get the brain back into Tordek's skull, and cast Revivify within a minute. Tordek was glad to be back, though his Intellect was reduced by 4.
The Mind Flayer held a key, and little else. Exploring the cave system, we found a large chamber in the center with our equipment, an altar, and some miscellaenous trinkets. Among the trinkets were five Bracelets of Friendship. They each had unique abilities, and bonded to the wearer. The altar had several Illithid larvae; we killed them. The key opened the main door.
We rejoined our group, and found it had been two days. They were happy to see us, and continue the journey. Before long, we entered the negotiation grounds within the orc army. We turned in our weapons before entering the orc camp.
The orcs introduced their leaders. Their general, Gorcrom; Azdaboo, the new chieftain; and his mate, Sheng. There was also a goblin shaman.
The negotiations went well for most of the day, though not everything went our way. Towards the end, the orcs demanded Scar's son as part of the deal. We were able to hold off their demand for the day.
That night, we noticed the camp was loosely ringed by orc guards. At dawn, we heard a warhorn, and the guards charged the camp. They stopped short of attacking however, holding us all in a ring. Sheng entered the camp with Roccar's axe. She accused us of killing the chieftain.
Sajuuk remembered that Orcish law allowed a trial by combat. We challenged them, and they accepted, though we were not allowed our weapons. That proved less of a concern; Tordek took a greataxe from one of the assailants, while Jayden took a dagger from another. With the magic available to the rest of the group, we made short work of our challengers.
Our victory was accepted, begrudgingly. Sheng returned Roccar's axe, agreed to sign the treaty, and went to do so with Rowan.
We remained under guard in the camp, and did what we could to investigate. Marlyn used Detect Poison to determine that the bottle Ser Mary had given Azdaboo as a gesture of good faith had been poisoned. With her assistance, we found out that her assistant, Sal, had poisoned the bottle at the request of Rowan and Gorcrom. Also, she'd swapped the bag of holding with everyone's weapons and buried a fake.
Ser Mary stripped Sal of her rank immediately and restrained her. Sal would face Ser Mary's justice, after we went to find out what was happening with treaty signing. With the new information, the orcs didn't stop us.
We were intercepted by a contingent of Gorcrom's forces on our way, and fought our way through. We found 50g, potion of greater invisibility, 5 gems at 100g each, and a piece of parchment with an address in Neverwinter, noted with "good price" in Orcish.
We went after Ser Mary. Rowan was overlooking the clearing, in the trees, appearing to be about to shoot Sheng. Trellani heard our warning, and knocked Rowan out of the tree.
Rowan told us that he'd been unable to accept the orcs banding together and getting stronger. He'd planned on killing Trellani to resart the conflict.
Ser Mary paid our 500g, and also gave us Rowan's Cloak of Elvenkind.
Due to Rowan's treachery, they allowed Scar's son to return to the orcs, and the peace was retained.
6th Level
We returned to Sundabar without incident. A local healer cast Greater Restoration for the slightly discounted price of 1000g. Everyone kindly chipped in, and Tordek was back to his old, pre-Illithid self. Mostly.
After about 3 weeks, Roccar sent us a note, requesting a meeting outside town. Fumbles was there, and told us he had a job for us. We were going to infiltrate the lonely tower - a white tower to the West. The owner, SSessibil, was a noted spellcaster and Yuan'ti fiend. It appeared that the Non-partisan Anti-gnome Geometalliscopic Procurer's Union (or NAGPU) had taken up residence. Fumbles wanted us to find out what they were doing. The safehold likely had quite a bit of their valuables. The leader of NAGPU was a kobold, Leklek, controlled the Silvery Marches and the Spine of the World.
As part of the deal we orchestrated, there were some protections for NAGPU, so this had to be... covert.
Leklek recently passed. It was believed that Bekbek, his second, was now in charge. We had a map of the tower, but wizard's towers tended to shift depending on the controller. It was expected there was a lot of loot inside, but we had to avoid any keepsakes. No wizard staves for example. Fumbles would have first pick of the loot. In addition, Fumbles offered a payment of 1000g and second pick of the safehold. There should only be a few goblins and kobolds inside, and orcish patrols outside. If we could keep Fumbles safe for six hours, we'd be in.
Once we agreed on the fee of 1000g, and being paid half up front, Fumbles gave us three Potions of Healing(Supreme), three Potions of Heroism to divide amongst ourselves, and two sets of manacles each. He also had several conveniently dead Orcs from the South Tooth clan, which matched the hirelings.
With Shaylee's assistance, we would dress up as a replacement squad of Orcs. Jayden would impersonate a kobold as a new second from NAGPU for Bekbek.
We set out from the camp shortly after. The tower was supposed to be about two days travel away. On the road, we passed a silent band of Reavers, who had a cart with a block of stone. On top of the stone was a protusion and a blackened set of chain mail. We didn't trouble them. As we set up camp for the evening, a traveling cart passed us on its way to Sundabar. They were local merchants selling cheesy buns. We purchased a few and talked with them. They told us they'd sold more than they'd expectd in their travel. The most interesting thing they'd seen was a floating tower towards the coast. We allowed them to camp with us for the evening, and they cooked a generous breakfast for us in return the next morning.
We contined on the next day, largely backtracking along the cart tracks. We found very large humanoid tracks crossing the cart tracks. While investigating, we were ambushed by four cyclops. It was a difficult fight, and it looked grim, but a voice shouted out of the woods. In orcish, it said that the cyclops were attacking the wrong group. The cyclops immediately disengaged and ran towards Sundabar. We couldn't move fast enough to catch them, but Shaylee sent her pseudodragon to give the cart a warning. Cyclops had poor eyesight, and if they got off the road it was probably enough. We also heard at least another cyclops in the woods, crashing off towards the same area.
We moved a bit and took a short rest before continuing. We traveled on afterwards and planned our travel to arrive very early in the morning; around 3 AM.
The tower was tall and slender, and not floating. The land around the tower was a jumble of volcanic rock, notably discontinuous from the surrounding area. We could see a patrol of 30 orcs that circled the area around once per hour. There were likely another 70 or so orcs in the area. Fumbles told us that the orcs were likely hired originally by SSessibil, but NAGPU recently took over their contract.
The two guards at the door had a largely unobstructed view from the tower to the edge of the woods, about 500 feet. Once the main patrol was about a third of its route past us, we approached. They gave us no trouble, which made it a little easier to cast Hold Person on them and kill them quickly and quietly. Then we propped them up at the door and checked their pockets. We took 40 gold, the key to the entrance, and a reddish Sending Stone, which we believed would let us communicate with the control.
Fumbles took the key and opened the door. We entered and began looking around. The first door we checked was a library. The whole room was dedicated to the study of nature. Another room was dedicated to politics, and the next to fiction. In the room after, we found a orc, passed out. We debated what to do with it, but Marlyn and Jayden killed him while we discussed the ethics. He was on a chest; inside were two healing potions, and a few more unidentified bottles. Shaylee took one potion, and Marlyn took the other. The unidentified bottles were orcish liquor. No one else was on the first floor, though there was plenty of additional, interesting reading material.
The second floor held a ring of alchemy labs, currently unattended. It appeared devoted wholly to crafting iron rings suitable for becoming Rings of Antimagic Field. It was odd, but no tools or samples were left behind, other than some ore.
The third floor was devoted to SSessibil's keepsakes. There were a variety of magical and non-magical items, all of which we left alone. There was also a set of paintings that shifted to depictions of the viewer's memories.
The fourth floor had four orcs waiting at the stairs, who asked us for the password. We attacked, and dispatched them quickly. The rest of the floor (except for a bit of gold on the orcs) was already largely cleaned out. There were potions of invisibility, Fire Resistance, Acid Resistance, and Frost Giant Strength. Jayden also found a Potion of Flying and a Potion of Featherfall which seemed old. Their efficacy was in doubt.
The fifth floor had Bekbek, and 7 minions. We killed the orc guards and checked the floor. Bekbek was remarkably cooperative, especially once we had him in chains. Searching the floor (and subduing a few more goblins), we found a warded room with a grinding mechanism, bags holding powder, made of chain mail and silk, and two Staffs of the Magi. Fumbles immediately swept those up and put them in a Bag of Holding. Putting this together with the rings and several chalky bags, it appeared that Bekbek was creating bombs. The room was warded to keep the staves from exploding while they were being ground up. Each bag was sealed with a Ring of Antimagic Field. It appeared they were grinding staves and wands to dust in the warded room, filling the bags, and sealing them with the rings to keep them from exploding once they were out of the room.
Someone was building very powerful, very expensive magical bombs that could pass undetected through nearly any ward.
We manacled the goblins together and took Bekbek with us to the sixth floor. We found a potion of healing, a spell scroll for Unseen Servant, Augury, and Detect Evil. We picked up additional pieces of various loot throughout the tower. At the last room, Bekbek enraged and attacked us. It was difficult, but we subdued him. He reverted to a Death Slaad when he became unconscious. Shaylee executed the unconscious Bekbek with a coup de grace rather than risk its new form.
We ascended to the 7th floor. This contained the room Fumbles was looking for, and he set to work. The clock was ticking. There were a number of prisoners, with dire warnings not to let them out. Marlyn and Shaylee thought about freeing one that looked like a little girl - but through its tomb of ice, we could tell there was something particularly inhuman about it.
After some time amusing ourselves, we heard over the sending stones that someone was seeing smoke from the sixth floor. We said it was under control, and went to check it out. An everlasting candle was next to curtains in the room, and had lit them in fire. We smothered the flames.
Over the sending stones, in common, someone started taunting us. We weren't sure who it was, but one of the magic bombs was tossed into the room we were in. It exploded, and was very painful, but we all survived. The orcs began pushing in with siege engines. We repelled their battering ram with a Fireball. Their siege tower fell to Firebolts from Tordek. We then had to run downstairs and handle a group of orcs raised as skeletons. Someone was definitely inside the tower with us, and probably invisible.
We took a short rest until the orcs began rolling a catapult forward. Instead of stones, they launched a volunteer at us. It missed the tower; it didn't sound like a good landing. They continued in this vein, dialing in to the 7th floor balcony.
Before they landed someone successfully, Fumbles got into the vault. Every door in the tower opened, including the front door. The vault contained 5 Nothics, with 5 Staves of the Magi in a pentacle inside them, all surrounding a battered beholder. The beholder's skin and tentacles were badly singed and burned; the tentacles clearly didn't work. Its central eye was covered with a silver plate, which seemed to be held in place magically.
The beholders voice reached us telepathically, and told us to ask our questions. Fumbles asked about Dormoor, which Wartle had mentioned. The beholder told us that Dormoor's plan was to bring universal love to the world. The Staves of the Magi would help defeat the plan. The beholder told us that the Nothics were restraining him, and it would attempt to escape as quickly as possible if we freed it.
We each grabbed a staff. The silver plate fell from the beholder's eye, but true to its word it immediately flew up into the rafters. We killed the Nothics in short order, though we heard the orcs piling in below.
We dispatched the Nothics. The beholder drifted down and cast a large antimagic field, freeing all the prisoners before running away. Roccar's voice came in over the sending stones as the beholder moved away, offering us a ride. He met us on the balcony in an airship, of all things.
7th Level
Roccar took us back to Sundabar in his airship. We saw smoke rising from a portion of the city, which included the house we'd commandeered. The city watch, the Stoneshields, had been attempting to push some criminal elements out of the area, and there had been riots and fires. Some said the Stoneshields had started the fires themselves. The city was closed to normal travel.
Despite the unrest, commerce was still happening. We sold the Staff of the Adder and the Staff of Withering, along with our gems. We also traded in various minor items. Marlyn and Tordek took the opportunity to upgrade their armor to plate from splint. Jayden was kind enough to loan Tordek 300 gold at no interest to complete his purchase.
We chose to stay in the Firestar Chariot, which was close to our house. It would serve while we rebuilt. It had seen better days, and the few patrons there seemed to be travelers that were stuck until the Stoneshields opened the gates again.
There was a drunk at the bar that complained about a poet's society nearby. He said that it was a cult. We asked the innkeeper, who told us he'd heard some local residents were hiring out space and the poet's society might be an illegal inn. He was considering a complaint with the Guild of Innkeepers.
We decided to investigate. The building was boarded up, and Tordek noticed the poetry coming from inside seemed to be repeating roughly every 5 hours. Sajuuk sent his weasel in to investigate. The sound was coming from the front room, but it was empty. We went around the back to see if we could discreetly enter from the back. Jayden stopped us in the alley however, pointing out a message in Thieves' Cant. It said, 'I see you,' with an arrow pointing up. We didn't find anything on the roof.
There was a pool of blood farther down the alley. It was a couple of days old, and large enough that someone had likely died. There were no signs of a major struggle. Jayden found a bit of Traveler's Dust in a puch near it; it was a deadly and addicitive drug. Each of the three grains were one dose that was placed in the eye and allowed to dissolve. The users were said to be walking the crimson road. If it were found on us by the guard, it would be cause for immediate arrest.
Shaylee covered the eye glyph in the Thieves Cant, and we examined the side door. Sajuuk picked the lock effortlessly. The room behind it contained what appeared to be an alchemy lab, perhaps involved in the production of Travelers Dust. There was a spyglass on the workbench, and components for True Seeing. There was a note that indicated the spyglass might show the user's fate, but when Marlyn tried it he took some Psychic damage. Sajuuk took the components and the spyglass.
We continuing the investigation, we found another room farther in with a false floor. The floor had stairs beneath it, leading to an apparently abandoned cellar. There were several crates there. One had non-magical monocles in it, packed with straw. Another had four monocles that seemed to have an enhanced version of True Seeing on them, which ran down with use. Each had about four hours of use on it. Jayden, Sajuuk, Marlyn, and Jayden each took one. Behind the crates was a bag of rings. Three of the rings were magical. They were Rings of Mind Shielding. Tordek, Sajuuk, and Shaylee each took one. They were unoccupied.
We heard the sounds of pounding boots above. Peeking out, we could see a column of Stoneshields entering the area. The force was about 200 strong. They were leaving destruction in their wake. Roccar appeared to be at the head of the column. When asked telepathically by Shaylee's familiar, he said they were burning out traitors.
We went back into the cellar and investigated further. We found a small chest with 500g and an empty alchemy flask. There was also a brick wall, that looked like it might lead to the inn. Breaking the wall revealed stairs up into the inn's cellar. Just inside was a dead body - apparently the source of the blood pool in the alley judging by its condition and approximate time of death. Rickety stairs, with some broken steps, led up to door underneath the inn. Jayden took on the persona of the dead man before we proceeded further.
Getting up into the inn, we pushed aside some barrels and crates to get into the inn's storeroom. There were some barrels labeled Luskan, and some small amount of blood evidence scattered around. We moved through into the back of the inn. Once the innkeeper saw us, he asked why we were there, but he immediately changed tack and told us we couldn't hide here, we had to leave. The patron who'd been drunk at the bar looked wide-eyed as soon as he saw Jayden, and fled out the front door. We gave chase.
Sajuuk looked out onto the street, and put on his monocle. The army was only a block away. The person who we'd thought was Roccar was actaully a Slaad. Slaadi were sprinkled throughout the troops as well. Sajuuk saw some Abyssal on the side of the building as well, which was new.
We tried to head back out through the alley again, but troops were all throughout the spaces and started shooting at us. The Stoneshields were using crossbows and spears to kill everyone they could see. We evaded them and got onto the roof of the inn. They announced they'd found the arsonists and began to disperse as soon as they reached the end of the block.
An imp appeared on the roof, muttering something about Ritska (the vendor of cheesy breads) and threw a note at us. The note read "Helmeet." We knew that meant the Hall of Valor, Helm's Temple, near where we'd landed in the airship.
When we arrived, we met up with Fumbles. Fumbles was wearing a monocle, and had a small group with him. He'd been working with a resistance force in the city to push back against the Slaadi. He told us that Denorian was still opposing us; he'd been the master of the tower, and was trying to get back some of the Staves of the Magi. However, the Slaadi were part of Doramor's plan to invade the plane and take over. The Slaadi were being controlled by their gems. There was also a chaos field over the city that was playing havoc with travel spells.
Fumbles led us down into the tunnels beneath the temple. He told us there was a portal that would get us out of the area - and he gave a note to Sajuuk with the activation phrase just in case. This was wise; after we'd been travelling for about 10 minutes through the tunnels, we were ambushed by four Death Slaadi at a tunnel junction. They focused on Fumbles.
It was difficult, but we won. They did not have controlling gems, so they had been controlled by something else. Fumbles pointed the way, and we ran on.
As we neared the end of the tunnels, we heard voices up ahead. Naz, Shaylee's pseudodragon, flew up ahead and investigated. Fumbles (not our Fumbles) was talking to Roccar. He was in the middle of telling Roccar that, since Roccar had the activation phrase, they should go. Naz could tell that the Fumbles near Roccar was a Death Slaad. He had three guards with them, which were Red Slaadi. We approached, and when Shaylee tried to give Roccar a monocle, the slaadi attacked. We defeated them, though we were wounded in the process. Tordek and Marlyn also had Slaadi tadpoles implanted.
We took the portal, and found ourselves in Luskan. We had time to rest and refresh ourselves.
8th Level
After we'd spent some time recovering, Roccar told us that Sal had escaped from his care. He asked us to investigate the seedy areas and see if we could find her. He recommended starting at One Eyed Jack's inn.
The inn was seedy as advertised. On entering the inn, we saw a rotund half-elf with body guards leaving through the back, absent-mindedly tucking away a large jewel. Jayden heard a rumor that some of Treilani's jewels had gone missing. He heard nothing about Sal.
We followed the half-elf and interrogated him. They were understandably reluctant to talk. After a brief altercation, the half-elf tossed the bag of jewels and ran. We intercepted him, and he told us he'd bought the jewels from someone named Big Al down by Big Al, for about 4,000 gold. We decided we'd need to inform Roccar, so we returned to our inn so that Marlyn could learn Sending.
In the morning, 10 children with weapons entered our room unannounced. A telepathic voice told us, "Awaken, and follow the Schoolchildren." The Schoolchildren were a local gang - they weren't innocents. We followed them to a local butcher shop. It was a bit on the nose, but we weren't immediately concerned.
A shrouded figure in a large hood entered the room, followed by a middle-aged tiefling. The tiefling took a seat on a chair that materialized on her command. One of children told us Headmistress wanted to know if we'd stole anything. The Headmistress identified herself as Ritska. The hooded figure was a Mind Flayer - H - but seemed to be restrained so far. We told her we hadn't stolen anything of hers, as far as we knew; she accepted the Mind Flayer's agreement.
It turned out she'd lost a very valuable box that included the staves of the Magi. We were offered 5,000g to recover them; we argued them up to 1500g. We bargained into a possibility of a rare magical item instead. We got agreement and were allowed to go on our way.
Roccar took us back to the safe house where the box had been stolen from. One of the children were always on watch, in shifts. All the external entrances were sealed with bricks; there was a false door with a strong contact poison. The real entrance was through a tunnel in the basement of a burnt out building on the next lot. Its entrance was locked and alarmed with arcane magics. Inside was a disguised trap door which led to the storage room. The ashes strewn about the trap door were undisturbed; the poison and arcane locks were undisturbed.
H took us though the tunnel into the storage room. The room held an adamantium cage suspended from the roof. The top plate had a Teleportation Circle on it, flanked by anti-magic fields. The floor below was covered in spikes. Basically, if an unauthorized person entered the cage, the cage would drop onto the spikes. Ritska was the only authorized person; she was sure that the staves and box of valuables were in there when she deposited them.
We asked the children who were on guard the evening the items disappeared. They told us shifts were normally 4 hours, but Sam, one of the guards, covered a shift from 10 PM - Midnight. When pressed, no one could remember much about Sam, except that he'd been pale, and nice.
Sal's father had been dead for years, and named Sam. It was a bit of a leap, but we believed we might be dealing with a vampire. Gaseous Form seemed like the perfect candidate for getting into and out of the cage. Looking around, we determined that there were fresh wagon tracks leading to the docks. Dockworkers told us the wagon's contents had been loaded onto a longboat and rowed out to the Raven's Claw, a black ship that departed around 12:30 AM that same night. It had last been seen sailing due East, into the Trackless Sea.
We attempted to access the warehouse where we believed the wagon had been stored. It was guarded; we were ambushed by several vampires. We captured one. It seemed they'd all been newly turned, being normal dockworkers before. He didn't have much other information. Evil undead being evil undead, we dispatched the new vampire.
As the dust settled, a tiefling child told us the ship was ready. It was a small ship, but fast. Ritska would send along a heavier warship to back us up.
It took us a few days to catch up to the Raven's Claw. We tried to maintain some distance unitl the warship caught up, but we were attacked by vampires in the night. We drove them off, barely.
The rest of the night passed in rest, and we finally finished our rest around Noon. We were in a position to engage the other ship during daylight.
The ships closed distance quickly. We had to dodge a few ballista bolts, but were able to take the deck of the other ship. After disabling the ballista, we hacked a hole through the boards covering the hold and flooded it with Sickening Radiance.
We had to go in after them, and got all of the vampires trapped between incoming daylight and the radiance. It was hard fought, but we killed several of them while Jayden found the staves. As he was getting back topside, our warship, the Dumb Luck, arrived. We cleared the Raven's Claw and worked with the Dumb Luck to light it on fire and burned it to the water line.
Ritska paid our 1500 gold, gave us our choice of +1 weapons, and any Ioun Stone. Jayden, Sajuuk and Shaylee sold their +1 weapons for an additional 600 gold. Marlyn took a slightly lesser versio of a Wand of the War Mage; Tordek took a Handaxe of Warning. All of us took Ioun Stones of Mastery.
9th Level
We returned the gems to Treilani for a reward of 2000g. Months later, we found ourselves on an airship in Sundabar, at the Shieldsar tower. We were to meet with Roccar, who was now the de facto Watch Blade of the Silver Marches. As we prepared to disembark, an explosion rocked the tower. We heard metallic voices calling for Denorian, and saw five metallic constructs attacking Roccar's guards and attempting to join forces with five more constructs acting in the same way.
Sajuuk could tell that the constructs were autonomous, with a small control gem in them. As constructs they were immune to poison and a host of other effects. We fought valiantly before falling back within the circuit of both Shaylee and Marlyn's Spirit Guardians. Once they were clustered, three of them exploded in Fireballs. It took most of us down. Shaylee and Jayden saw other automatons fly off with Ser Mary and Roccar prisoner. The others withdrew at the same time.
A sergeant rushed up to us and told us we needed to board the airship and give chase as quickly as possible. He had healers with them who fully healed us all.
We boarded the airship and gave chase. The ship was equipped with two ballistae, which came in handy when several of the constructs turned back to stop our pursuit. We defeated them without too much damage to the ship.
Over the next hour, we rested until a floating tower came into view. We landed in its only suitable landing area. Double doors stood open to the interior of the tower. Jayden went through and scouted about.
He encountered one trap while entering a chamber. Behind the door was a throne room, with a large painting of Treilani holding the box of gems we'd returned. One older man in travelers clothes sat on the throne, reading a book. Ser Mary and Roccar lay nearby, held in clear spheres and apparently unconscious. The man on the throne must have known Jayden entered the room, but did not respond. He returned to us.
We went and tried to speak with the man, who we believed to be Denorian. He was reading The Book of Vile Darkness. We tried to convince him to give us Ser Mary and Roccar; he called in Iron Golems instead. He also released Roccar and Ser Mary, who slumped to the floor, unresponsive.
We fought them a bit, but as we retreated, Denarion commanded us to leave again, as his form split to reveal another construct. It was some sort of Simulacrum, and not remotely human. It was also about to explode.
We ran for our lives, and, with a Fly spell, took Roccar and Ser Mary with us. They woke up soon after we boarded the airship, and urged us to return to the Master's Hall.
Ser Mary reacted with a start as she came around. She held out her hand; in it was the glowing, purple gem that Denarion's simulacrum had been working on. Roccar swore as he grabbed the gem, and revealed himself to be a death Slaad. He said that "It doesn't matter, they've forced the portal open by now." Then he slashed one of the supports, causing the airship to list heavily.
We tried to fight without getting hit by more gems, as more poured out of him as he was injured. Everyone except Jayden avoided the gems until we shoved the Slaad off the side of the ship. The gems, like the diamonds we'd encountered before, made the person they touched attack the person who caused the gems to spawn. Jayden wasn't able to kill anyone before he came back to his senses.
Sajuuk cast Featherfall and we all floated down away from the ship. Tower crew were able to reel in the ship from there, clear the remaining gems safely, and start repairing the severed struts.
We all went down to the portal room, where we found Roccar, Jayden, and Marlyn... That Roccar said told us it was over when he couldn't convince us that the people in our midst were actually Slaad.
Then Tordek turned into a particularly large Slaad.
The fight was long, and near the end it was only Ser Mary and Marlyn. However, they prevailed before the last Slaadi could re-activate the portal.
Sundabar kindly took care of raising the others, and we all rested. The real Tordek returned from another mission a few weeks later, none the worse for wear.
10th Level
While in town, Tordek traded out his Battleaxe of Wounding for a Battleaxe of Force. We all made some minor upgrades. Those of us that could also expanded our spellbooks.
We'd been patrolling Luskan periodically, and in our third week we were ambushed by two Death Slaadi. Roccar joined the fight part way through. One of them dropped the bomb as it neared death, dealing a great deal of damage to all of us. It was one of the bombs made from the ground up Staves of the Magi.
Roccar took us underground to a safe house. Past various supplies and the portal, he led us to a room where we could rest. We shared the room with a mound of stone with a protrusion, which in turn was covered in chain mail. Roccar told us it was a Holy Avenger, which he was studying for now. No one was to touch it.
We rested for an hour or so, tending our wounds from the explosion and recovering our familiars. Then we heard another explosion. We saved the people we could; one witness told us that someone, impersonating Ser Mary apparently, had dropped the bomb. We knew it was a Slaad of course.
It wasn't long before we heard two more explosions. Roccar went to investigate one and we went to the other. After trying to calm the crowd, many of whom now felt Ser Mary was an enemy, we were summoned by one of Ritska's children. Brie took us to the same place where she'd previously hid the Staves of the Magi. She told us that Denarion had just shown up and taken her staves, and then left. Denarion had changed since she'd last seen him, and now believed he was destined to stop the elder evil.
Ritska believed there was a prophecy, and that Ser Mary had to stay alive to be part of the fight with the elder evil, so it was imperative that we keep her out of this battle to preserve her. She passed us each a glowing sapphire, which we could touch to our weapons or armor to gain a temporary bonus.
Ritska's illithid came up and told us that Denarion was studying the source of the Elder Elemental Eye. This didn't make sense to us, but Ritska didn't seem to be surprised. The illithid also told us that Ser Mary had arrived.
We left Ritska's buildng and returned to the portal. In the passage to the portal, we found Ser Mary, but she reached for a bag when we saw her. It was a Slaad. We grabbed the bag, but it grabbed it back, and detonated it. We were badly wounded but healed up and continued.
Ser Mary was at the actual portal, and she passed our tests. We told her about Ritska's plan. Ser Mary didn't disagree with us, but she did feel we needed to find Roccar.
We hadn't been in the street long before we were confronted by another copy of Ser Mary. This one didn't pass our tests. We were able to keep it at bay until it decided to drop its bomb. Ser Mary agreed we should get off of the street.
We found a safe house and rested. Bombs continued to go off throughout the night; we did not know what else we could do though. Shaylee's Fae Dragon searched throughout the night, and found a letter from Doramor. He told us that he had forged a hivemind allowing control of the Slaadi in the city. He offered a trade; Ser Mary for the hivemind. Destroying the hivemind would kill most of the Slaadi and the rest would likely leave the plane. He told us to meet him at the piers the following evening.
During the night, Sal also came to Shaylee. He told her that he would give us two Staves of the Magi if we gave her the hivemind. She intended to continue inciting war with the orcs. She gave us a ship name, to meet her at midnight following the exchange with Doramoor.
Ser Mary severed her ring finger with her signet, and suggested we present it as proof of her death to Doramoor. She also told us that she'd let Doramoor down. When he'd been a child, she told him that anyone could be a Paladin. Later on, when his parents were missing, she did not pursue it in the face of other enemies. She did not know, but her choice had doomed them. She also didn't know how Doramor had found out about it.
Obviously we couldn't take the easy way out. It looked like we had two difficult fights coming up.
At the appointed time, we went down the docks. Doramor was waiting as planned, flanked by two huge cyclops. A rotating ball of ruby light was next to him; the hivemind.
We spun our tale of Ser Mary dying in one of the Slaad attacks. Doramor did not take it well; he immediately became very angry and attacked us. We prevailed by killing Doramor, smashing the hivemind, and killing the cyclops. The Slaadi immediately left the plane as we suspected they would.
Doramor had 2000g, which we split evenly, a piece of a crystal Staff of the Magi, and a Cloak of Protection +2.
11th Level
Our next steps were to take the ship, and head into the Trackless Sea, after Denorian.
The ship was thrown wildly off course by an unexpected storm, and we found ourselves next to an empty longboat, drenched in blood, and drifting in fog. We found a map, and a note, written in blood, telling us to find the isle of the magi and free their souls.
We were at a loss.
But before long, we exited into the fog and into bright sunlight. Four rocky outcroppings protruded ahead of us - they were the fingers of a statue. Sajuuk used an Arcane Eye to examine it. It was a huge statue underground, apparently of Denorian. It appeared to be over 300 years old - which did not line up with our timeline. The stone seemed to be crumbling.
Before we could think too much more on it, another strange wind came up and disoriented us afresh. We found ourselves just offshore of a new island; this one had a central shaft rising out of sight, and a great stairway leading up from the beach. We anchored, took our dinghy to shore.
We were greeted by strange natives - monodrones. They told use there was a maze to test us, to the North. If we entered and completed the puzzle, we would receive another piece of the staff.
We journeyed to the spire, and found the entrance at the base. It was a newer cave, but of the same craftsmanship. We entered a room with several rooms; once we all entered one of the rooms, we were transported into the maze.
We fought several monsters within, but finally triumphed and claimed the additional part of the staff.
We rested on the beach for a night before continuing.
12th Level
Marlyn used a Divination to determine where we should go to find the next piece of the crystal staff. We were given a Northeastern bearing, and set sale. A storm closed in after a few hours. The seas were high, but we managed to get to another island, with a settlement of some sort at its beach.
No one came out to meet us from the buildings. The settlement didn't seem abandoned, but some series of events had badly damaged them. It looked like it had been raided giants, probably four.
We followed the giant tracks into the island interior. Before long we were ambushed by three hill giants. We dispatched them and continued, looking for the fourth. After following its tracks across a bridge, a T. Rex attacked us. Though it was definitely tough, and oddly augmented by some magic on the island, we dispatched it.
After a short rest we located the fourth hill giant's tracks and followed it to a camp. It looked like they'd brought up many of the humanoid effects from the huts at the beach. The fourth hill giant was there, dead, and roughly half consumed. It looked to be the work of a dragon.
It didn't take long to find the beast, once we took to the sky with Fly spells. It had landed near a clearing where it had found another meal. It noticed us nearly as soon as we landed nearby. It was a wily opponent, and we hurt it badly before it decided to leave the area. We suspected it had consumed the next shard of the crystal staff however, so we pursued it to its lair.
The lair had several wyrmlings and a juvenile dragon along with the adult we'd already seen. We triumphed, found the shard in the dragon's belly, and divvied up its hoard.
On our way back to the beach, we discovered an odd aura on the bridge we'd crossed before encountering the T. rex. Crossing the bridge moved us some time into the future. Back at the beach, our ship was a beaten wreck. Around twenty years had passed by our estimate.
We rested, and set to repair the ship. With some local materials and liberal application of the Mending cantrip, we got it seaworthy again after a few days. Near the end, we heard music or chimes that seemed to get more intense the longer we stayed in one place. This was the same music we'd heard each time we were about to reach another island.
We set sail again, following another Divination. The next stop was another island with a giant, runed obelisk in the center. We were ambushed once we reached the beach. Strange, mutated kobolds attacked us from nowhere. Oddly, they divided once if they were hit but not killed. We managed to dispatch them before they overwhelmed us.
South of our landing place, we found a pile of stone. It looks like it was the crashed remains of Denorian's tower. We found a few things in the rubble - a book about Sigil and the Far Realms; a broken vial labeled "Concentra"; a broken Ring of Fire Resistance; Gauntlets of Ogre Power. Sajuuk mended the Ring of Fire Resistance and took the book. Marlyn took the Gauntlets of Ogre Power.
Farther down the beach, Shaylee and Jayden noticed a cave, and a bit of movement. We all continued down the beach to the cave. Jayden went in to explore when we couldn't identify the tracks outside. He found a sleeping giant tarantula, with a silver-haired boy sleeping on its back.
Jayden hid and called out to them from the shadows. They had a brief discussion; the boy identified himself as Nori, and the spider as Legs. Nori was hiding from Denorian, and so would not come outside. However he invited us in. He also told us that Denorian's stronghold was at the center of the island.
As soon as we were assembled, he recognized us, and said he had to find our moment, then disappeared.
Exiting the cave, we began moving towards the center of the island. Before long we were enveloped in a mist that was so thick it separated us. With a bit if work with the Sending Stones and some light spells, we reunited and continued on until we encountered a tree. The tree had chains in it, with corpses. We were all mad for a short time as we realized the bodies were copies of us. All a little different, but at least 15 different versions.
An hour or so later, we reached the stronghold. We saw mindless servants working about the grounds - more copies of us. They were deadeyed - and on closer inspection, they all had wounds on the back of their heads. It looked like illithids had done something to them. We entered the stronghold unopposed.
Inside, there was a pit about 100 feet across. Eighty different versions of ourselves were in various states of torture, by equal numbers of kopru and illithid.
A robed figure appeared and demanded to know where the boy was. When we asserted we didn't know, 17 or more Manananggals flew out and attacked. We worked together to keep inside Spirit Guardians from Shaylee or Marlyn as much as we could. After we'd killed several, the shadow grew bored, and summoned more. At that moment, a slightly older Nori appeared through a portal behind us, with different versions of ourselves, and evacuated us. We were back at the beach, with our craft. Sajuuk's counterpart handed him another piece of the staff.
We pushed off into the water, and immediately we felt the shimmer telling us we were on our way to our next destination.
13th Level
A new island appeared out of the mists after some time. Its central feature was a giant mountain of black stone, studded with settlements or cities on its flanks. A mound of carrion dominated the beach, and we could see baby T. rexes feasting on it. Tordek stumbled over a vial in the sand, intact, labeled "Concentra." Sajuuk identified it as a Potion of Concentration that would let the imbiber keep two spells using concentration active at the same time, at the cost of psychic damage.
Five T. rexes charged out of the jungle. Shaylee and Marlyn were badly mauled, but we killed four of the T. rexes and drove off the last. We decided to march into the jungle towards the mountain and its settlements.
After our Fly spells wore off, we marched along the jungle floor for an hour. We were accosted by many stinging, flying, crawling biting insects along the way, gaining several diseases. At the end of the hour we decided to continue flying instead.
Once we exited the jungle, time changed. We were confronted with a barren wasteland, with poisoned air. We were greeted by suited illithid which were friendly. They tried to communicate with us, but we couldn't get much out of them. We found they had the corpse of Denorian, whose head had a suspicious hole in the back and a rune carved on the front. We took two scraps of paper from the corpse's throat while examining it. When we disturbed the corpse, the illithid began arguing between themselves and some started casting. We were encased in a shimmering sphere. We moved again.
Now, we were in a much younger version of the island. We entered the mountain unopposed. We followed a trail inside, until we found a deep cave that seemed dedicated to some sort of eldritch toad. Indeed, there was some sort of horror inside that we defeated.
There was some sort of magical pool to the side, which had some sort of curse on it. Anyone submerged in the water started to grow gills, and we assumed more transformations would follow. Shaylee braved the waters to get the last piece of the crystal staff, and see if there was any addtional loot worth the risk.
Shaylee scooped up 9900 gold as quickly as possible, along with a magical talisman and a giant flail. As we left the chamber, we heard the chimes again, more loudly than before.
14th Level
Once on the boat, we took some time to read the notes we'd taken from Denorion's throat. They were written by Denorion. One told of his struggles to find the good versions of himself and extinguish the evil versions. After finding a book in his belongings, he suspected he wasn't alone. Reading the book seemed to drive him to evil. The other note warned that Shothotugg, the Eater of Worlds was on its way to our world. The first magi, whose names were lost but who'd crafted the crystal staff, built a magical defense. An 800 foot statue stood on an island, with a circle in its upturned palm. The circle contained a star chart that predicted Shothotugg's arrival. Inserting the crystal staff (or the Exemplar) into a hole in the center of the circle, along with staves of the Magi in the other holes, would repel Shothotugg and cast it out of our reality.
The boat moved and the scene shifted. In the sky was a dark mass of water and tentacles, big as a mountain. Shothotugg had arrived. The beach was patrolled by shambling versions of ourselves, with tentacles. Aboleths floated among them, and fire-breathing, winged T. rexes patrolled the sky. (They were emphatically not dragons.)
The T. rexes attacked first. We managed to clear the beach, though it took most of our spell slots. During the fight, versions of Nori appeared with other versions of ourselves in other areas, so we weren't overwhelmed.
Nori then created a pocket where we could take a short rest. When we exited, we were at the top of the statue, confronting a angry, flying Denorion, quite obviously the evil version. He carried a bag with the missing Staves of the Magi.
Marlyn dispelled the Fly spell, and Tordek (or perhaps Gronk) was able to grapple Denorion and keep him from casting another Fly. That helped, but Denorion still had quite a few tricks up his sleeve, along with resistance to most of the damage types we had available. He was at least part mind flayer, as he attempted to relieve Tordek of his brain at least once. Gronk didn't let that happen. It was enough, eventually, and Denorion fell dead.
The evil essence seemed to drain away, and Denorion rose again as the good version of himself. He took the fragments of the crystal staff and magically reassembled them. He then had us each take a staff, and together we inserted them into the correct places in the statue's palm. We held on while Denorion invoked the great enchantment of the statue, until Shothotugg was banished from this world. For now.
End of campaign