ep 48 8-16/5/4713 The Orerry; Hasari - Asylum Stone #5

Return to Magnimar by Quillax's tree spell, consult with Sheila Heidmarch. Claw joins the Pathfinders and gets started on the Heidmarch larder. Word is that half the Lady's Light has collapsed into the sea. Giants raiding Sandpoint took a stone from the Old Light (which Neril confuses with the Lady's Light).
Return to Kaer Maga. Meet Lawless Kaid. Delve into the pits under the Therassic Spire, knock out & rescue the monk Hasari. Sephiria gets library access.

Quillax Account

Journal [30-April]

We were able to get to the library exit with Jarrick's body, meeting up with the rest of the group and we mourned his death. Jarrick had previously instructed me that he did not want to be revived, so we wrapped his body up and worked out that there was no Temple in Kaer Maga where we could have him buried, so we would need to bring him back to Magnimar. Sepheria found a temple which could cure her curse for trade of one of our +1 rings of protection. Once that was done, we stepped through to Magnimar using Transport Via Plants. We brought Jarrick to his Temple and instructed them to bury him as per their customs and handed over his shield. Perhaps fittingly, the painting on the shield would forever remain unfinished. though it would go on to protect another Paladin in the future and his tower/soup kitchen was ceded to the Temple for their continued use.

While we were in Magnimar, we went to the Lodge and spoke with Sheila. She heard our report and inducted Claw into the Pathfinder's Society officially. She also handed over the next Ioun stones. She did mention that we could potentially carry more than one stone each, which is something we were previously warned against. We cannot attune to more than one but theoretically we could each carry up to three stones without being driven insane.

With the other formalities aside, Sheila introduced us to a new Pathfinder who came highly recommended to her and she suggested that he travel with us. Irizati Al-Amestri is a tan half-elf with dark hair, who favoured a duster and a broad-brimmed hat and had been trained in Alchemy. He handed over two scrolls as a goodwill gesture. We agreed that he could travel with us and planned to leave first light on the morrow.

We met up to return back to Kaer Maga, but my Travel Via Plants spell failed, due to Kaer Maga's magical protections that had caused us issues before. We would have to wait until the following day to try again to travel to just outside the city near the Half-Light Path.

As we had time, Sepheria visited her sister, I worked on making potions, and Neril checked in on his students, and Claw explored the city. The following morning when we met again, Claw informed us that he had a vision of a ruined Abbey while holding the shard of Gluttony; his descriptions led to us to believe this was Windsong Abbey due to the Doomsday Door he described. We knew that the Doomsday Door was related to the Cult of Grotis, an end-of-days group. We are fairly certain the next shard should be Envy which will require the Dusky Rose Prism Ioun Stone that we had received from Shiela.

- Side note - Winding Abbey is known to be a meeting place of the 21 most important/powerful religions where they met to discuss important topics, although this has declined in recent years and the Abbey has be left to ruin.

It was suggested to us as we gathered to leave that we later check in with Koriah Azeren at Windsong Abbey. I had met her once, when I had first joined the Pathfinders so many seasons ago, and there was the small accident following the puzzle box.

As we had prepaid for only a week at the Wheel Unbroken in Kaer Maga and we had left Capita there alone, we felt it important to return quickly so save any incidents. Thankfully, we returned to the Inn before our pre-payment ran out and we paid for another week. As we were arranging this, the Owner informed us that a woman, Facelss Kade, had asked after our group. As you may remember from our previous messages, Faceless Kade leads an exiled group of Grey Maidens who live within Kaer Maga's walls. We were told she could be found in Down Market, probably in the main market area.

Sepheria sent a runner to invite Kade to tea that afternoon. Irizati sat at a table a little away from our group and Neril hid himself in invisibility to test if they were able to see him and as a flank in case they decided to be unpleasant. It was just on time for tea when 5 Grey Maidens in incomplete sets of armour entered the Inn. Only one had a full set of armour and we correctly guessed she was Kade. Two more had nearly complete sets and the last two had even less. They asked about a leaflet Sepheria had distributed regarding the invitation of Loyal Grey Maidens to Fort Rannick. During the discussion, they admitted to having killed a HellKnight that was chasing a person who had some tax discrepancies. They were paid to protect him and had done so. This was approximately 3 months previous.

- Side note - Hellknight Rogare had a personal crusade against the Grey Maidens as they considered them cause of the Plague, hence his start of legal proceedings against our group whilst they were in Magnimar and the reason we moved them to the relative safety of Fort Rannick. While the Maidens were indeed involved in the Plague, most Hellknights do not actively hunt the Maidens. They will only actively hunt the ones that are allied with the Church of Ergothoa, but otherwise will leave them alone. The most senior Grey Maiden survivor took a large number of Grey Maidens to Chellus (?) and were adopted by the Queen.

Sepheria informed Faceless Kade that we had business to attend to further before we could speak more with them and they informed us they could be reached in the "Three Tuns" later. Neril followed them out and reported back their conversation to us later, which was mostly that they had to induct most of their recruits, who were not top-level fighters and many of the women were happy to stay in Kaer Maga.

Once Neril returned, we returned to the Thorassic Spire to complete our promise to find all of the missing party. We bumped into Luonim the BloatMage in the library and found that his confidence in his own skills had been extremely shaken.

We made our way back to the Orriary room, which was a fascinating model of the solar system. Wisely, Sepheria opened the door with mage hand and when nothing attempted to kill us, Claw peered around the door before stepping into the room. Once he was inside and proved the room was currently safe, we all followed. Sepheria reckoned the model was quite accurate. There were two large cracks on either side of the room, breaking the perfectly smooth, round walls of the room but it seemed mostly like wear and tear as opposed to damage like that of an earthquake or such, however, the cracks matched each other almost perfectly.

Sepheria investigated the plinth/stand and determined that the lever was the on/off switching the odd wheel set into the plinth with cog-like ridges around it controlled something about the room, possibly the model. She used Mage hand again to flip the lever and we all waited for an attack but instead an illusion was activated around the entire room, the walls, ceiling and floor - with the exception of the cracks which showed nothing - all showed what appeared to be a live feed of the outside world with little miniature people going about their business unaware of being observed. After some discussion, the wheel was turned one tick counter clockwise. The little figures became translucent and began moving backwards. Neril then turned the wheel two clicks clockwise, so it was one click clockwise from it's original position. The people began to move forward and as time passed (and the sky darkened into night in the illusion) they became more and more translucent. Sepheria recommended we put the wheel back to the original position and lock it with a dagger then turn off the illusion. She suggested this was a long-term research project and we had important work to finish.

We moved to the next door, checking it carefully for traps. Neril noticed a large black spot on the ceiling. He hurried back to the plinth and removed the dagger, wanting to move the time back so that the illusion would show now as opposed to a little bit in the future when we turned it off. Before he could do this, the black spot split into two and each headed for a crack in the wall.

Two monstrous dog-like creatures appeared, which we later identified as Hounds of Tindalos). One hound attacked Irizati, who quickly turned invisible and teleported out of the room. The Hound, confused, then headed for Sepheria. The second Hound attacked me. Claw charged at the Hound attacking Sepheria. I took Earth Elemental form and hit the Hound, which Clank also then attacked. The Hound started to 'speak' in it's planar tongue. Irizati returned to visibility and cast banishment on both hounds, managing to banish one back to it's plane. Neril attacked the remaining hound and attempted to stun it but the hound shook it off. Sepheria cast booming blade on it and badly wounded it. The Hound lunged at her and grabbed her throat. Claw took its head but somehow the body still moved!

The banished hound came back through the crack and hit Claw with a rending gaze, injuring him, then went after Irizati. Claw struck a blow on the first hound that seemed to finally kill the headless beast. Clank and I charged after the beast that went after Irizati, who drew an odd weapon he called a gun and shot it three times, killing it.

Sepheria examined the room more closely, while trying to patch up her injured throat and suspected that activating the room was like a homing beacon for the Hounds but the only reason they could enter was because the walls were broken. The hounds couldn't enter our plane except through a jagged edge. We decided that we needed to fix the walls. I sealed one crack using stone shape before Neril suggested trying wall of stone, which worked well in sealing the other. The walls were mis-coloured but smooth once more.

Once we were patched up, we headed to the next door, on which was written Workshop in Thesselon. Inside, the Monk, Hasari, knelt over the dead body of the halfling (her partner). She whistled angrily, unable to speak as her lips were sewn shut. Buzzing came from the hives as Hellwasps started to swarm. Sepheria cast fireball on the wasps, trying not to hit the monk or her dead lover. Hasari bent over and seemed to listen to the dead halfling and then screamed angrily and ran over to attack us. Neril met her in the middle of the room, and attacked her when reason failed. I tried to strike her but she struck back and stunned me. While stunned, I could see a little wasp crawl out of the dead body's mouth then retreat back inside. Clank charged to my defence and struck Hasari twice. Sepheria tried Tasha's hideous laughter but it failed and she moved away to reconsider. Claw hit her then tried to grapple her and was able to grab her. Irizati quickly closed the door and readied himself in case she slipped free and tried to escape out the door. Neril attacked her again and this time was able to stun her. Meanwhile, I shook off my own stun and told the others in carefully formed words of the wasp.

Clank helped Claw and Neril restrain and tie Hasari up, with Neril continually stunning her to keep her from causing us more injury. Sepheria turned her magics to the dead body and effectively cremated it and any wasps hiding inside.

Under the remains of the halfling was a backpack of books, only slightly damaged. We picked up as much of his corpse/dust as we could and took his remains and the insane monk back to the librarians to deal with them and collect our reward. The Librarians told us they were going to send the Monk to a special group to see if they could help her.

Sepheria decided to try to hire Luonim, who agreed to take on a position at Fort Rannick as magical support for the Maidens there as well as Sepheria's research assistant.

I told Sepheria that she was never allowed to spend more than 24 hours in 72 in the Library or else she would change and become like the Librarians, wizen and slightly malformed by the magics contained in the books and the Spire itself. She reluctantly agreed.

We left the Spire to return to the Wheel Unbroken to tend our injuries properly.

[ xp 3140 each / 1000 clank ]

The Shards of Sin

#1 Shard of Pride
Overwhelming Illusion aura. The Shard of Pride is made of coppery horacalcum. Requires attunement.
As long as the Shard of Pride is carried, its owner
1. Can use major image once per day. At spell level 6 if caster is 11th level or higher. User can use INT for spell save DC.
2. Has advantage on saves versus illusion spells.
3. Has a +2 insight bonus on all skill checks.
Curse: The owner suffers delusions of grandeur, and is sickened whenever she must serve another creature as a subordinate of any sort for as long as that arrangement persists. She cannot gain the benefit of the aid another action, nor can she take the aid another action.

#2 Shard of Greed
Aura overwhelming transmutation. The Shard of Greed is made of black adamantine. Requires attunement.
As long as the Shard of Greed is carried, its owner
1. Can use haste as a spell-like ability once per day.
2. Has advantage on saves versus transmutation spells.
3. Gains a +1 bonus on attack rolls.
Curse: The owner becomes greedy, and is sickened whenever she is not wearing at least 500 gp per Hit Die in nonmagical jewelry and fine clothing. Each time the owner sells a belonging or gives one away, she must succeed at a DC 15 WIS save or gain 1 level of Exhaustion.

#3 Shard of Lust
Aura overwhelming enchantment. The Shard of Lust is made of a deep red djezet alloy. Requires attunement.
As long as the Shard of Lust is carried, its owner can
1. Use suggestion as a spell-like ability once per day. Can use CHA for casting stat.
2. Has advantage on saves versus enchantment spells.
3. Has advantage on Initiative checks.
Curse: The owner becomes narcissistic, and is sickened whenever he has not engaged in sexual relations with another creature within the past 12 hours. While the owner wears any sort of armor or magic item that occupies the body slot, he is staggered.

#4 Shard of Gluttony 
Overwhelming Necromantic aura, made of pale inubrix. Requires attunement.
As long as the Shard of Gluttony is carried:
1. User can use vampiric touch as a spell-like ability once per day at spell level = half user level, rounded up, to a max of 9 at 17th level. User can use either STR or DEX, or their spellcasting stat, for the touch attack.
2. User has advantage on saves versus necromancy spells.
3. User increases maximum hit points by 1 point per Hit Die.
The owner always feels hungry & thirsty - with ioun stone this effect is greatly lessened, but they still tend to snack a lot...

Curse: The owner is always hungry and thirsty, and is sickened whenever he has not eaten food in the past hour. The owner must make a DC 20 WIS save to resist consuming any food or beverage (including potions and the like) he carries immediately. If the save is successful, the owner can resist the urge for 1 hour before being forced to make the save again.

#6 Shard of Wrath (Major Artifact)
Aura overwhelming evocation; Weight 1 lb. Requires Attunement.
The Shard of Wrath is made of sparkling silver siccatite that feels hot one day, but cold the
next. As long as the Shard of Wrath is carried, its owner can use fireball (8d6, DC = CHA+Prof) as a spell-like ability once per day, gains advantage on saves versus evocation spells, and gains a +1 bonus on all weapon damage rolls (alternating fire & cold daily).
Curse: The owner becomes addicted to violence, and is sickened whenever she hasn’t brought a living creature to 0 hit points within the last hour. Once the owner attacks a creature, she must make a DC 15 Will save if she wants to cease attacking; otherwise, she does what she can to kill the creature.

ep 47 8/5/4713 The Black Rider

Destroy Rot Grub Swarms, defeat wyverns, steal Sihedron Shard, flee back, defeating Black Rider on the way.

2nd half XP
Evade Caulborn XP 2900
Evade Manananggal & 2 Hungry Fogs XP 2750
Defeat the Dark Rider CR 14 XP 11500
Total: 17150/5= 3430

Take the Sihedron Shard +1200 each

Total: 4630

Journal [16-April]
We landed in the Black Forest. Sepheria quickly shouted for us all to step away from the Menhir as we had been warned about the worms. Her warning came just in time as swarms of evil rot worms wriggled up from around the Menhir.
From a distance, Sepheria cast fireball and the flames washed over about three-quarters of each swarm but also lightly burned me, Claw, and Jarrick. The worms crawled onto Jarrick but his armour offered him protection. They also crawled onto Claw and two burrowed under his unarmored skin. They tried to climb onto me, but I shook them off quickly. I informed the others that Rot Worms are fatal if they get into the heart, so Claw was in danger if they got burrowed too deeply under his skin.
Claw used an arrow to gouge one out from under his skin but couldn't dig out the other. He headed over to Sepheria for help. Jarrick ran around the Menhir and away from the worms while I climbed on top of Clank, who the worms did not seem interested in as he was metal. I quickly cast Flaming Sphere and send it rolling around the menhir, burning the worms. Clank carried me towards Jarrick while Sepheria cast Scorching Ray at Claw's arm, aiming for the remaining worm. She was able to kill it and directed her magic towards a swarm, destroying it.
All the remaining worms started towards Clank, swarming up his legs towards me. Claw helped scrape the worms off Clank, getting most off, and Jarrick also helped with his shield, destroying one of the swarms and getting them all off Clank and away from me. I moved the flaming sphere over the swarms and cast produce flame, destroying another swarm while Clank stamped on the remaining worms around us, destroying the last of them.
After checking ourselves over for any remaining worms, Neril, who had followed our trail through the library's cavern to the Menhir, appeared beside us. He pointed out several wyverns flying around. We all hid under a nearby tree, watching the wyverns catch and eat something before they retreated to a tower that was part of the nearby keep. There was a large dome about 70' up from the ground. After some discussion, we decide to go after the wyverns.
As we approached the keep, the double doors swung open silently as we approached. Inside, we could see alcoves containing suits of armour and stairs going up the far end with doors on the North and South sides of the large room. There were two sets of hoof prints - a large war horse's and a smaller riding horse's - both coming and going. We consider the room carefully, then decide to go around and climb the outside.
As we stepped around the corner, a bunch of wyverns peer over and down at us and roar angrily.
Claw threw his javelin at them but missed then started climbing the tower's wall to get to the nest while Sepheria stepped back and threw a fireball at them.
One of the wyverns tried to dive at Sepheria but missed. Another went after Claw, who was climbing and when he let go from the wall, it snatched him from the air in it's talons.
​I took air elemental form and tried to whirlwind two of the wyverns but it wasn't effective at all. The large blue Alpha Wyvern went after Jarrick. Clank headed towards Sepheria to try to defend her while Neril started running up the wall towards the wyverns, attacking the one carrying Claw, stunning it and driving it into the ground, sending Claw tumbling from its grip.
Jarrick shot two ice arrows at the Alpha while Claw ran over and killed the stunned wyvern. Sepheria moved so she was protected by the castle's walls and pulled out her wand of magic missile and fired it overclocked at the Alpha.
The remaining wyverns attacked me and Claw. I smacked it in response and retreated to the group. The Alpha attacked Claw and Clank moved over to join us, readying an attack in case anything came within range. Meanwhile, Neril climbed the walls again and repeated his previous jump attack on a wyvern. Claw readied his glave while Sepheria threw scorching ray at the wyvern Neril was on top of, killing it, then she turned her attention to the Alpha. The smallest wyvern ran and we ignored it. I attacked the Alpha and when it turned to run, was able to kill it.
While we fetched our weapons and checked our injuries, Sepheria used her arcane recovery. Neril took a few minutes to help me extract wyvern poison from the fallen wyverns. We got 10 doses which we stored in the alchemy kit. [DC 15 CON save, 24 damage, 1/2 on save. 1 dose per hit, such as arrow or sword. Can put multiple doses on sword but could be spent on first enemy]
[ 3400 xp each, 1700 clank]
We climbed up the outside of the tower to check out the wyverns' nest and found some interesting bits, including a magic horse shoe.
From there, we flew or climbed to the top of the highest dome in the Black Keep. Sickly yellow-ish green light emitted from the preternaturally smooth window, through which we could see that the light originated from a high column/pillar that seemed to be part organic and part mechanical. At the top was the Shard, around the base were three desecrated angelic figures with metal sprouting out from their eyes and twisting up the pillar. We identified them as Astral Devas and they appeared to be drained of power, which had likely been filtered through the shard into the column.
Sepheria tried Mage Hand to draw the Shard to her but nothing happened. Claw tried to break the window but he simply bounced off what we determined was a Wall of Force. Sepheria Disintegrated the Wall and snatched up the Shard with her Mage Hand.
After a moment, the Devas screamed and started to disintegrate. The Forest shook like an earthquake suddenly happened. The air quality dropped significantly and the sky darkened. From deep within the Keep, a neigh from a horse screamed out. Cold, necromantic energy washed over us and both Jarrick and Sepheria were afflicted by a Curse of Living Death. Their skin paled and started to turn gangrenous.
With nary a word, we all turned and ran towards the Menhir, which was not far away. As we flew past the Keep's doors, the doors burst open and a headless horseman burst out. We could see a flash of light from the Menhir, as if it was activated although we were unsure if anyone had come in or the Caulborn had simply opened the way out. Our hopes to fly above the horseman to the Menhir were dashed when the horse took to the air.
Jarrick readied his weapon as the horseman approached but instead the Black Rider drew a severed head from his belt and threw it at Jarrick. it exploded with negative energy, doing major damage to the group. Sepheria lost concentration on her Fly Spell which was carrying Claw and he fell to the ground. Claw picked himself up and attacked the Rider, as the horse was still within reach of the ground.
Seeing how much damage the horseman can do with one of his bizarre head-weapons, I darted under the horse and up the side of the Rider, stealing one head away but not able to get both.The horse kicked me and the Rider landed a blow as I scrambled into the dubious safety of the main hall, forgetting that we chose not to go that way in the first place. A door at the end of the hall started to open.
Meanwhile, Neril attacked the horseman and stole away the other head then started to run for the Menhir. Sepheria dismounted from the broom and attacked the horse with the animated objects. The Rider was forced to land and he struck at Claw, as did the Horse. Claw barely managed to stay upright. Jarrick ducked in and Laid Hands on Claw then cast Shield of Faith upon himself. As we decided to regroup by the Menhir, Claw disengaged and ran.
In the main hall, two suits of armour started to leak a living gas, which as an air-elemental, I was immune to the poison. A manananggel (a creature with the head a bat, the disemboweled torso of a woman and the ability to fly launched itself at me and hit me hard enough to force me back into human form. The gas creatures moved towards me and acted like a poison. Unable to retake another animal form, I called on the Cuatal, and used our planar ally to cover my retreat.
Neril made it to the menhir and dodged past the ill prepared Caulborn who had stepped through and were standing near the rock. Sepheria left the animated objects running as she, also made it to the Menhir and passed through with the Shard, darting over the Caulborn on the broom. Jarrick quickly followed them through, leaving me as I told him to protect Sepheria and the Shard as the Horseman had followed her through. His horse was unable to move through the Menhir and was left behind. Sepheria's objects dropped from the air as she departed the plane, so the horse stood placidly by the stone. Jarrick struck the horseman and landed a very powerful blow as Ayomeday's blessing coursed through him in his fight against the evil creature.
Claw also moved and shoved his way through the Caulborn to the Menhir. Clank flew over the Caulborn and went into the Menhir as I commanded him to retreat and return to the library if he could make it. The manananggel grappled me and made it impossible to move and was both stronger and faster than I was, so I desperately cast Polymorph on myself and took on a Giant Ape form. My size prevented the manananggel from keeping me from moving so I headed to the Menhir, which was starting to lose it's glow.
Two of the Caulborn had followed Sepheria back so I was able to shove through and touch the stone, leaving the manananggel behind.
One of the Caulborn cast Charm Person on Sepheria, which her Ring of Spell protection bounced back and the Caulborn was ensnared by the rebounded spell. The other tried to attack her but was unable to land a blow. Neril was told to retreat out of the small room and Sepheria grabbed Claw and teleported them both up to the library where they started to ready to defend themselves against the coming Horseman. Following my orders, Clank continued up to the exit, managing to fly over the Toad Demons, only taking some damage.
Jarrick stood alone against the horseman, holding his ground and refusing to the let the Horseman loose on this plane. He fought most valiantly, striking with his weapon as much as his faith, nearly taking down the evil creature. As I came through the Menhir, Jarrick was bloodied but refused to run, so I engaged the horseman with him. Before I could react, the Horseman landed a fatal blow on Jarrick and struck his head from his shoulders in a terrible blow.
Enraged with sadness, I lashed out at the horseman. Neril, having heard my shouts, returned and between us, we beat the horseman down with Neril landing the final blow in vengeance for our fallen companion. We stripped the horseman of gear and collected Jarrick's head and body and started the journey back to our companions. Although Jarrick had instructed us not to form him a new body and call his soul, there was the possibility that there was a strong enough cleric to revive him into his current form if he was willing, as long as we hurried.
[4630 xp each for 2nd half; 1158 for Clank]
Horseman's gear - +2 Full Plate, +2 hand-ax, Spine Flail.
Things to do:
- Fix Sepheria's Curse
- See if Jarrick wants to return
- Quillax will want to make a bunch of potions (I have the ability for 1/day/25gpI think) + figure out how to make one of those metal rods to use my new planar shift spell.

ep 46 8/5/4713 Beneath the Therassic Spire

8/5/4713 Pathfinders return to the Therassic Spire, enter dungeon, find Luonim the mad Bloatmage (cured), the Spirit Naga (killed).  Dispel a fey fish, bypass river demons, meet Caulborn and travel to the Dark Forest.

Quillax Account

Journal [9-April]
After our long rest, we woke and decided to go to the market to see off our extra magical items to our new Dwarven friend and pick up some more reviving materials, however, he was not open.
We headed over to the nearby jeweler, where we bought diamonds (for Jarrick's spell) and the unguents (for my spell) necessary for the spells. By the time we had completed that shopping, Gadkah had opened and we sold him our magical items.
Due to the amounts of money involved, we had to go to the Bank of Abadah to collect it from his account and open our own so we were not carrying as much. We agreed that if the entire party died, the account would be bequeathed to Sepheria's sister.
While there, the branch of the Bank offered to help us in regards to the Sword. They would take it from us for 9500gp instead of us bringing it back to Wen Histani.
We headed back to the Spire.
We passed the door on the right marked Orrery, which Sepheria explained was a mechanical model of the solar system (with much difficulty considering Sepheria and Jarrick were both interested) and then the door on the left marked Moon Garden. The third door on the left was marked Centrifuge.
After some consideration, I stoned shaped an anchor point outside the door and threaded ropes through it with Clank acting as the anchor. Claw volunteered to go in first and as such was secured to a rope.
We checked the door for traps and found blood on the handle, we considered that this was from the bloatmage, who oozes blood. The door opened to a spherical room. Inside Luonim the Vast (the bloatmage) was standing on a raised dais in the centre of the room, saying he could control the spin of the world. It was quite obvious that he was driven mad, most probably by the psychic librarian blob at the entrance.
Sepheria was secured with a rope also as she stepped into the room to try to talk with Luonim, however, he flipped a switch that activated the room, which sent the entire spherical room spinning in all directions, cutting the ropes and leaving the rest of us outside, able to see only brief glimpses when the room aligned with the door.
Claw was able to grab Luonim and pull the lever again, causing the room to slow and realign with the door as it stopped. We tied Luonim up and gagged him, particularly when he tried to fireball us. Luckily Sepheria was able to block it.
We searched him and found:
- a potion of healing
- a wand of shield, with 11 charges
- a ring of protection +1
- a masterwork dagger
- a pouch of leeches
We brought him to the librarians and after some discussion, we decided to try to Dispel Magic on him, which freed his mind of the spell. He told us the Rogue may be in a bad way. We left him under the care of the librarians and continued back along our path (convincing Sepheria once again to pass the Orrery with difficulty).
We continued through the Centrifuge room into the next room, labelled the Water Chamber. I cast Water Breathing as a ritual on the party and we stepped inside. There was a few feet of water on the floor and an odd fish-like creature (a Grodair) trapped in a large metal cage in the middle of the room, with a metal cap strapped to it's head protruding with wires.
Thick metal doors behind us and ahead of us slammed shut and the room started to fill with water and a sharp electric shock passed through the water. Sepheria quickly mounted the broom to get above the water and cast Banishment on the Grodair. The water stopped increasing so Claw swam over and ripped the metal hat the Grodair was wearing from the wires. He got shocked but the water started to recede and eventually the doors opened.
The fish never returned, so we understood it was a permanent banishment as the Grodair was a fey creature, so it had been freed and sent home.
There was nothing written on the next door, so we entered cautiously.
Inside were two mosaics done in black and greys. On the North wall, there was a valley, which we knew to be the legendary Dark Forest, home to the Dark Rider. On the South wall was depicted Xavorax, the City of Silence, home of vampires and Caulborns. On the far wall was as door with a sedehron and a large onix stone set into the door.
Silasni - the dark naga - was by the door. She was wearing a Mind Shielding ring of jade on her tail. She told us that the Halfling was killed by Hell Wasps in the room past the Orrery, his wife the Monk went mad and was probably still with his body.
Sepheria talks to Silasni and determines that the Naga wants the Shard for herself. We decide that she is not a safe master for the Shard and Claw charges at her. Silasni banishes Sepheria, which enrages the rest of us. Claw hits her twice and she responds with a Flame Strike that hits my, Jarrick, and Claw.
I took Earth Elemental form and struck her. Clank moved in and readied an action to strike if he could reach her.
Jarrick shield bashed her and was able to knock her prone. Claw hit Silasni again and she tried to bite Jarrick but missed. I struck her with my stone fists, aiming down her mouth so she could not bite anyone else, then stepped back to let Clank strike her and he destroyed her (as much as one can kill as Dark Naga since they are effectively immortal and she'll come back eventually). Sepheria returned and collected the ring from the limp tail.
Looking at the paintings, we determine that the Castle in the North wall mosaic must belong to the Dark Rider also known as the Black Huntsman.
We know rumours of this being. He is said to go out on a cold, moonless night with his Shadow Hounds to hunt his prey. The hunt doesn't end until the Rider catches his prey and calls the human's name then kills them. Rumours say that sometimes he adds the soul to his pack of hounds. We also believe that Kazoug may have formed a pact with the Dark Rider.
Jarrick can sense that there is supernatural evil behind the next door and after some discussion, I touch the door in my elemental form. It lights up the onix ball but my stone 'fingers' are too big to draw on it. Claw goes up and tries to draw the symbol of Gluttony on it but the response is to strike out with lightning, hitting all but me.
Jarrick heals up Claw some then steps forward and draws the rune of Greed. The door opens.
We retreat for a short rest in the other room for Clank as he is badly damaged. Once we have rested, we continue into the next room. There is a large river (River of Memory) and we know that something is in the water, watching us. We spy several Toad Demons lurking under the surface.
Jarrick goes forward and strikes one then backs up away from the water. Claw does the same.
After consulting with Sepheria, I cast Wall of Stone as a cap over the water and we simply run over the river, leaving the Toad Demons trapped under the stone for the moment.
We knew that beyond the River of Memory, we were to meet with the Caulborns at the Black Menhir, so when we approach the next room and see a giant brain-like creature and three Caulborn standing next to a large black obelisk, we knew we were in the correct location.
Sepheria speaks with and negotiates with the brain-like creature and it tells us: To recover the Shard, one must destroy the Black Rider, which aligns with their goals. They want the Black Rider gone. Sepheria informs that that we will be keeping the Shard and after further negotiation, they agree.
We ask what they know about the Black Rider and are told:
- Kazoug was afraid of the Black Rider
- The Black Rider approached Kazoug, concerned about the Black Forest's magic.
- Kazoug agreed to use the Shard of Gluttony to shore up the Black Forest's magic in exchange for the Rider guarding the Shard.
- The Black Rider was possibly a servant a Farasma, Goddess of Death
The Caulborn activate the portal and the world changes
[ 7325xp each]