The Boundary Lands: On the Edge of Civilization (Updated 5/9/11)

hayek

Explorer
This is a homebrew 4e D&D campaign (though I did swipe the general concept of the Empire of Nerath from the 4e DMG). It’s played in old-fashioned real life around a table.

Hope you enjoy it!

...

Letter of Resignation from Malis Kristolm, Former High Priest of the Temple to the Raven Queen in the city of Fellis
Some say I have turned from my faith because my mind has been corrupted by disease, or my heart turned black by desire. Those who do not understand the Queen of Winter may think that her priests are destined for madness, to devote their life to the worship of death. Know that all of these claims are false.

The truth – I curse the gods for they have cursed me. The end of the world is not a sight for the eyes of any mortal, yet I bear the burden of having seen it...

Forged by the gods and born in the depths of shadow, the keystone will unlock the doom of our existence. Unending death will claim every living thing and the land will be shrouded in eternal darkness. Worse than the sight, the sound haunts my dreams – everywhere empty, soulless silence… except for the wailing of the damned.

I know not if this vision is our destiny, or if we have the power to change our fate. I only know that this vision is real, and that we trudge blindly onward, drawing nearer to the end of all things.
The Boundary Lands
Chapter 1 - Lord Dread
Chapter 2 - Ramshead
Chapter 3 - Calipha
Chapter 4 - The Terrible Wrath of the Arinfax Colossus
Chapter 5 - A New Home
Chapter 6 - High Finance… and Pirates!
 
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hayek

Explorer
Background and Prelude

If you’d rather jump right into the story you can skip this post (though character introductions are at the end of it). Long story short: the party is a team of ‘special forces’ for the Emperor of Nerath, formerly ruler of the massive Empire of Nerath, now just ruler of the small city of Verind’s Edge on the edge (thus the name!) of the known world.

(Yes, the name ‘Arinfax Colossus’ is a total rip-off of ‘Ventifact Colossus’ from Sagiro’s story hour, but I can assure you only the name is a rip-off… it is not also a giant turtle).

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Background

The Empire of Nerath

The Empire of Nerath spread over most of the known world for nearly a century, but it began to fall into decay, internal rivalries blossomed into civil war, and eventually the empire fell entirely. As its borders receded, ambitious nobles seized the opportunity to reclaim their past lands and titles, and vicious warlords arose to claim new territory for themselves. The Empire of Nerath was originally founded in the ancient nation of Kasalat, at the northern edge of the civilized world, and its capital remained there, in the city of Korindor. As Nerath’s end became imminent, the current Emperor, Essran, conceded defeat and brokered a deal to preserve himself and the remnants of his empire.

The Emperor took what was left of his army, no more than 3,000 soldiers, and his remaining loyal followers and led them to reclaim the city of Verind’s Edge – an outpost that has been lost for nearly a century to the Goblinoid races of the Torin Plains. The Torin Plains border the nation of Kasalat on the northwest, and throughout all of history, civilization has never spread into the plains. The Torin Plains have always been inhabited solely by a mass of Goblinoid races – orcs, kobolds, goblins, ogres – and other monstrous creatures. The Boundary Lands are the northwest regions of Kasalat that border the Torin Plains. Verind’s Edge is the farthest that civilization has ever ventured into the Torin Plains and for centuries it was the first line of resistance against the Goblinoid races. The nobles and warlords of Kasalat were willing to let the Empire of Nerath live on in a small city on the edge of the world if it would extend the borders of Kasalat and reestablish the nation’s presence further into the unclaimed lands of the Torin Plains. Moreover, Nerath’s enemies thought there was a good chance the Goblinoid races would simply finish off the Empire on their own.

Verind’s Edge

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Essran arrived roughly seven years ago, and he has successfully revived Verind’s Edge and fended off the attacks of the Goblinoid tribes. The keep is now the center of a bustling city (as much as one can be when it sits on the edge of the known world). Essran married a noblewoman, Larindra of Thersi, from the Boundary Lands to help legitimize his standing within the region. He kept the original name of the city unchanged to gain favor with the peoples of the Boundary Lands who have known Verind’s Edge by no other name for centuries (though Essran still names himself as the Emperor of Nerath).

Some of the existing nobles in the Boundary Lands resent the emergence of Verind’s Edge. There are some precious resources native to the Torin Plains, and by occupying a city further out in the Boundary Lands, Verind’s Edge has taken a hefty share of the trade in such goods. Moreover, the city has become somewhat prestigious for successfully reclaiming lands that had been lost for nearly a century. The nearest fiefdom, Uthrin, led by the noble, Sir Uthrin III, is particularly bitter towards Verind’s Edge. Outright war has not broken out, but some skirmishes do occur, and relations are quite strained to say the least.

First Knight Thalus

Some time after reclaiming Verind’s Edge, the Emperor discovered an ancient Goblinoid prophecy, which claimed a great creature known as the Arinfax Colossus was destined to rise up and lead the Goblinoid races to crush the civilized lands. The Emperor sent his most trusted man, First Knight Thalus, to hunt down the Arinfax Colossus and slay it before it could complete this supposed prophecy. Sir Thalus recently returned with good news – after exploring the Torin Plains for some time, he discovered the beast was a great dragon and tracked it to its cave where he slew it. The city of Verind’s Edge now plans to host a grand celebration to honor Sir Thalus and the slaying of the Arinfax Colossus.

Prelude

In the Service of the Emperor

The party has been in the service of the Empire of Nerath in the city of Verind’s Edge for some time. The party has gravitated toward each other and forged a friendship, not only because they get along with each other well in their own peculiar ways, but also because they have recognized the potential in each other to excel far above the average soldier or officer in the Empire of Nerath.

The party put their exceptional talents to the test recently – the nearby fiefdom of Uthrin has been squabbling with Verind’s Edge and has claimed that some of the new villages that have sprung up to the east of Verind’s Edge (between the city and the rest of the Boundary Lands) lie in Uthrin territory, and hence owe taxes to Sir Uthrin. Uthrin’s soldiers threatened some of these villagers with imprisonment if they did not deliver, and when the soldiers came to make good on that threat the party was there to welcome them, along with a few other soldiers from Verind’s Edge. The party members were the only survivors of the fight, successfully fending off the Uthrin soldiers. Some recognition followed this deed, and as a reward for being the sole survivors of the battle, the party was invited to attend a grand dinner with Emperor Essran himself. The dinner was part of the celebration of First Knight Thalus’s slaying of the Arinfax Colossus.

The party finds themselves back in the city of Verind’s Edge enjoying the celebration, taking in the parades, and knocking back a few drinks before their dinner party.

The party consists of:
  • Erik (Human Wizard) - Erik was raised amongst elves by a wealthy elven merchant in the great forest kingdom of Quinalyn. His brother, Luwin (his father’s son by blood), grew jealous of Erik’s developing arcane talents and their father’s admiration of Erik’s success as a wizard. This jealousy eventually drove a wedge between the family and Erik’s father had to send Erik from his home out into the world.
  • The Zaza (Dragonborn Paladin) - Confident enough in her ability as a warrior to add an article to her official name, The Zaza was raised in a simple village of dragonborn in the Boundary Lands. She had a twin brother, Daza, who dreamed of becoming a hunter for the village one day. However, when they were only thirteen and exploring the wilderness around their village together, The Zaza witnessed her brother being kidnapped by a pack of “short people” – dwarves or gnomes she presumes. The Zaza watched in stunned silence, so scared she couldn’t even scream out for her brother as he was taken away. Afterwards, she was ashamed of her cowardice as she witnessed her brother’s kidnapping, and she pledged to become a hunter for the village in her brother’s place. She found her talents far exceeded those of the village’s best hunter, and also discovered her devoted relationship with the nature goddess Melora was blossoming into a strong source of divine power. Realizing she was destined for something more she left her village, partially in the hopes of finding her long lost twin brother some day.
  • Invicto Fizzleflame (Gnome Warlock) - Invicto was abandoned by his parents and raised by humans. He is somewhat bitter towards the world at large, which has contributed to his occasionally evil tendencies, including forging an infernal pact with demons to gain his arcane powers.
  • Fargrim (Dwarven Warlord) - Fargrim has a checkered past consisting of bouts of showing off military brilliance as well as bouts of ticking off numerous superiors and breaking numerous military codes of conduct. He has followed Emperor Essran to the edge of the known world to get one last chance to revive his career.
Later, the party is joined by:
  • Charm (Tiefling Rogue) - A later addition to the party, Charm has worked as an independent freelancer around the Boundary Lands for some time. She is able to handle a variety of tasks for her employers with discretion, but when necessary, she is fierce in a fight, unafraid to leap into the frontlines to go toe to toe with an enemy. Though her line of work is sometimes legally questionable, she is good at heart, truly embodying the idea of ‘honor among thieves’.
  • Aramil (Eladrin Warlord) - This veteran soldier joins the party later on. He has been a devoted servant of the Empire of Nerath ever since it ruled over Quinalyn, thus he has continued his service to the Emperor in Verind’s Edge. He proves to be a very competent leader in battle and out, constantly recruiting young warriors into the party’s service in hopes to slowly build his own personal army. A quintessential ‘high elf’, Aramil believes in pursuing truth and justice, but also believes that sometimes the pursuit of truth and justice applies mostly to himself.
 
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hayek

Explorer
Chapter 1 - Lord Dread (s. 1)

1.1 A Celebration

Fargrim, The Zaza, Erik, and Invicto are in Verind’s Edge, taking in the celebration festivities for the slaying of the Arinfax Colossus, when they catch a street ruffian, a boy of no more than 10 or 12 years, attempting to pick the pocket of Fargrim. Fargrim grabs the boy and suggests some severe punishments, but in the end shows his graciousness by letting the ruffian go freely if he promises to gather up a round of drinks for the party. He gives the boy a few coppers to purchase the drinks and sends him off. Of course, the boy never returns. The party returns to taking in the festivities, including watching the severed head of the great dragon, the Arinfax Colossus, as it is paraded through the streets.

Dinner with the Emperor

The party then attends the grand dinner with Emperor Essran where they are regaled with the full tale from Sir Thalus of his slaying of the great Arinfax Colossus. Fargrim suspects the beast was truly a two-headed dragon and that only one of its heads was removed, leaving the beast alive and well and destined to soon romp through the civilized lands leaving death and destruction in its wake. Sir Thalus embellishes his tale quite thoroughly, describing in great detail all of his magnificent exploits as he battled with the beast, and making little mention of the troop of soldiers who journeyed with him to fight the great dragon.

At the dinner the party also meets a hulking Goliath named Mujeh who is a bard visiting from the Guildhouse of Ellendor from lands far to the south of Kasalat. The Guildhouse of Ellendor is a great guild of bards, whose agents travel all of the known world collecting and sharing information on great leaders and significant events. They convince him to share a few ribald limericks with them, though Mujeh declines to break out his dirtiest material since they are in the presence of the Queen. Queen Larindra, Essran’s wife from a very strategic political marriage, is quite fetching if a bit older. The party senses a somewhat frosty relationship between Larindra and Essran, which they suspect springs from their marriage being one of political expedience. Also attending the dinner, the party meets Court Wizard Davos, an advisor to Emperor Essran.

Eventually Essran introduces the party and thanks them for defending the village against Uthrin’s soldiers. He then asks the party to take on a task for him – he has received word that a group of Uthrin soldiers are in town to partake in the celebration. He expects they are more interested in causing trouble and asks the party to frequent the inns and taverns of the city tonight to keep an eye out for this group and to “take care of them” if they do get out of hand.

A Night on the Town

The party heads to the Goosed Liver later that night, one of the largest most popular taverns in all of Verind’s Edge. There they run into the Goliath bard Mujeh and share a drink with him. He asks them to recount their tale of what happened in their battle with Uthrin's soldiers and they are happy to oblige. He mentions travelling through the fiefdom of Uthrin and having a very unpleasant experience as he was accosted by guards asking for a “toll” – behavior more in line with that of bandits rather than royal soldiers. Mujeh shares his most offensive of limericks with the party and they all enjoy some hardy laughs along with their drinks.

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The Zaza then approaches the bartender to ask if any Uthrin soldiers have been around tonight causing trouble. The barkeep has not heard of any out tonight, but mentions hearing of a group of Uthrin soldiers at the celebration during the day – the soldiers had a dispute with a merchant that ended in them overturning his display table and throwing a drink in his face. The barkeep assures the Zaza that she’ll have no trouble identifying the group, as they were walking around in full uniform. Just then the group in question enters the Goosed Liver led by a surly looking dwarf.

The dwarf leads his friends, including a few well-armed human soldiers and a slender elf armed only with a wand, to the bar to get a round of drinks and they quickly become a loud, raucous crew. The party suggests that Mujeh improvise a song dedicated to their defending of the village against Uthrin’s soldiers, emphasizing the inept, and ugly, qualities of the Uthrin men.

Mujeh takes the stage. He sings and plays a lute that looks incredibly small in the Goliath’s huge muscled arms and hands:
There once was a village in the Boundary Lands
Grew up strong and vibrant under Lord Essran’s hands
But goblins and orcs were a threat quite small
Compared to the brutish ogres who were Sir Uthrin’s thralls
They showed their ugly faces with warts and knobs
Demanding taxes to support their royal snivelling snob
But these hideous monsters did not expect
A band of four heroes from brave Verind’s Edge
They stabbed the beasts in their stinky yellow hides
Smashed the crooked teeth, and blackened their eyes
The last soldier was so certain that he was facing defeat
He soiled himself and ran away with pants ’round his feet
The patrons of the Goosed Liver enjoy the performance quite thoroughly, but the crew of Uthrin’s soldiers is quieted. Eventually the dwarf pipes up that the performance was awful and Fargrim quickly challenges him. The dwarf says that Fargrim is not worthy of suckling on his mother’s teat, and only a few more words are exchanged before a fight breaks out. Despite the elf mage quickly running to the 2nd floor of the tavern and raining thunder and lightning down upon The Zaza, Fargrim, and Erik, the party makes quick work of the Uthrin soldiers with no one coming close to falling in the fight. The last blow is delivered by Invicto as he engulfs the elf mage in the Flames of Phlegethos, leaving his body as only a charred black husk.

A Research Mission

The next day, the party reports to their commander and gets word that Court Wizard Davos would like to see the party to ask them to take on a special mission for him. The party meets with the wizard and finds him bumbling through some arcane experiments including the use of some foul-smelling components. He pauses to sit down with the party and explains that he would like to conduct some research on the Arinfax Colossus. Though the threat has been dispatched, he is interested in collecting some information on the beast, such as its origins, the history of its prophecy, etc… He believes the enigmatic character Lord Dread, a human who supposedly lives in a great keep far out in the Torin Plains and somehow coexists with the Goblinoid tribes, might have more information on the Arinfax Colossus and would like the party to travel to meet with him. He asks the party to obtain whatever information they can from Lord Dread, and in return he will pay the party 2,000 gold pieces (though he will not reimburse the party for whatever they must hand over to Lord Dread to obtain the information). He assures the party he can look elsewhere for help with this mission, and he cannot order them to take it, but the party is interested and accepts. They commission food, supplies, and horses and undertake the journey to the roughly known whereabouts of Lord Dread’s keep, estimated to be a week’s travel on horseback.

About three days into their journey The Zaza spots a group of kobolds tracking the party’s movements. The party decides to lay an ambush for them, and they catch the kobolds by surprise. The fight begins well, but kobold slingers eventually set Erik on fire, bringing him near to collapsing. At the same time a pair of kobold skirmishers flank Fargrim and succeed in bringing him down. Fortunately, fate is on the side of The Zaza as she dishes out blow after blow while receiving little in return. Invicto delivers inordinate amounts of punishment from afar, and Erik hangs on just long enough to roll his Flaming Sphere around the battlefield to finish off a few of the kobolds, and the party wins the day.
 
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hayek

Explorer
Chapter 1 - Lord Dread (s. 2)

1.2 A Dreadful Meeting

The party gathers their spoils from the slain kobolds and proceeds uneventfully to Lord Dread’s keep. A few days later, as the day turns to evening, they break through a treeline onto the rim of a shallow valley where Lord Dread’s keep teeters on the edge of a cliff. A light fog rolls through the valley, obscuring the ground around the keep.

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Welcoming Party

As the party enters the valley, they come across numerous tombstones scattered about the valley floor. The fog begins to thicken until the party has trouble seeing more than a few feet in any direction. The party hears strange whispers and movement around them. The Zaza and Fargrim pick out at least three humanoid shapes moving towards them from opposite directions. The Zaza calls out that they simply wish to pass through to the keep and a voice asks that they “speak the phrase”. The party has no answer to that request and the creatures emerge from the fog to attack – two skeletal warriors, a zombie, and a wraith. The Zaza moves to engage one of the skeletons and the wraith on one side of the battlefield while Fargrim takes on the other skeleton and the zombie. The wraith proves an intimidating foe as its shadowy touch quickly weakens The Zaza while its ghostly form shrugs off most attacks that strike it. With the skeleton striking her as well, The Zaza is quickly bloodied; though, drawing on her own Divine Mettle, she is able to at least remove the effects of the wraith’s weakening touch.

On the other side of the battlefield, Fargrim delivers a devastating blow that crushes one of the skeletal warriors in one fell swoop. Erik and Invicto pour various amounts of arcane fire onto the wraith, enough to attract its attention their way. Erik is severely injured and weakened, but quickly shrugs it off thanks to Fargrim’s always inspiring leadership. Erik moves out of the wraith’s reach as Invicto takes down the zombie with a devastating critical hit from his Eldritch Blast. The Zaza catches her second wind and delivers some strong blows to the remaining skeletal warrior. With two opponents down, the rout is on. The party focuses fire to take down the wraith and then makes short work of the skeleton.

Lord Dread’s Proposition

The party then proceeds to the main doors of Lord Dread’s keep. They find no guards outside of the keep and Fargrim decides to simply knock on the doors with his warhammer. They slowly open and a cadre of undead warriors awaits the party, though they do not appear hostile. They lead the party into the keep where Erik promptly steals a torch from a wall. Fortunately, their undead escort does not seem to care. Fargrim is unimpressed with the rough stone work the keep is comprised of.

Eventually, the party is led to the throne room within the keep, a grand hall with even more undead creatures milling about. Haphazardly throughout the throne room are dark obsidian columns with bodies in various states of decay frozen in them, their faces contorted in pain. The bodies are mostly goblinoids, though the party sees a few humans trapped in the obsidian, including a young boy. A huge black knight in spiked plate armor stands behind Lord Dread’s throne. The throne itself is made entirely of black ebony skulls. Lord Dread wears a skull mask over his face, and black robes are draped over a dark suit of chainmail.

Lord Dread welcomes the party and apologizes for them having to deal with his guardians. He explains that those who do business with him usually know the passphrase to move safely through the valley surrounding his keep. Fargrim is quite impressed with Lord Dread, and the numerous dead goblinoids around his throne room, and proceeds to actually bow before the imposing dark lord. The rest of the party remains standing and eyes Fargrim dubiously. Lord Dread thanks Fargrim for his flattery and asks that they get down to what business the party has arriving at his doorstep.

The party tells Lord Dread that they have been sent by Court Wizard Davos to gather information on the Arinfax Colossus, which was supposedly recently slain. Dread does not recognize the wizard Davos, but assures the party he could gather some information on the Arinfax Colossus from his library, and by speaking with some of his long dead associates. The party inquire as to what he would want in return for this information, and Lord Dread offers the party a proposition:

“A historical artifact was recently stolen from me by a tribe of goblins. The goblins have returned to their dwelling, which is roughly a week’s travel from my lands. I could use assistance in retrieving the relic. The Goblinoid races tolerate my existence, but they would turn aggressive if I, or my agents, roamed from my home here. So, I cannot chase this tribe to its home to retrieve my property. If you could retrieve this artifact for me, I would be happy to provide you with the information you seek.”

The party asks for some time to debate this proposition. The Zaza and Erik are a little unsettled at the thought of working with the enigmatic Lord Dread, though Fargrim insists he would be a unique ally. In the end, Erik concedes that they must obtain the information that Davos sent them for, and the party agrees to take on Lord Dread’s task. However, they believe this artifact might be worth more to Lord Dread than he lets on, so The Zaza steps forth to negotiate the terms of their deal. Thanks to her incredibly adept silver tongue (and aided by the legendary pink die of 20’s) she manages to convince Lord Dread to add 200 gold pieces to their payment terms upon delivery of the item, and furthermore, to provide the party with 200 gold pieces worth of potions and alchemical items to aid them in their journey. Lord Dread sends away one of his undead servants who returns shortly with 2 Potions of Healing, 1 Potion of Clarity, and 1 Gravespawn Potion.

Lord Dread then gives the party more information on what it is they are seeking – a small, black stone statuette of a man lying prone with his chest raised. The figure has the symbol of a crow’s head carved into its chest and back. Erik, a learned student of various religions, recognizes the symbol as that of the Raven Queen, the goddess of death and winter who dwells in the Shadowfell and sends the souls of all creatures to the afterlife upon their passing. Moreover, Erik recalls seeing the actual statuette Lord Dread has described as one of the trappings often found in temples built to the Raven Queen. The statuette is sometimes used in various rituals and celebrations, though he recalls such statues being purely decorative and holding no special magical properties.

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Asking Lord Dread about the significance of such a common piece of religious paraphernalia, Dread informs the party that the piece in question is of unique academic value, as it is a rare, old carving that was used in some Goblinoid temples. This makes the piece particularly interesting to a few select scholars, though Lord Dread assures the party any common merchant they approach with the item would find little value in it. The Zaza’s keen insights tell her that Lord Dread is not lying about the resale value of the piece, but that he is hiding something about the piece’s true value. The Zaza is further suspicious of Dread’s answers when the party asks him about how the piece fell into the goblin tribe’s hands.

Dread instructs the party to head northwest for a couple of days until they reach a river, and to follow that river northwest for several more days until they reach a rocky plain leading up to a mountain range. Though he doesn’t know the exact location of the Bone Hand Goblin tribe, he knows they dwell somewhere in the rocky plains, likely in one of the numerous caves dotting the area. Before parting he tells the party the passphrase to bypass his keep’s guardians in the future, “Caratus Sinor”. Erik recognizes the arcane phrase as roughly translating to “Your master commands peace.”

On the Trail

The party follows Lord Dread’s instructions and arrive in the area of rocky plains several days later. At this point, the party is running low on food and water, having been in the wilds of the Torin Plains for upwards of two weeks now. On top of that, the area of rocky plains they have reached offers little in the way of wild game or creeks or rivers. The party’s skills are challenged as they attempt to survive in the rugged environment while trying to locate some tracks that might indicate where a large tribe of goblins might have travelled through the area. The party expects that if they do not locate the goblin tribe soon, their physical reserves may begin to dwindle.

The Zaza’s keen eyes help her locate some likely trails that might have been left by a large group of humanoids. She puts her head together with Erik – The Zaza draws on her knowledge of the natural world to narrow down which signs of passage would actually have been left by a tribe of goblins, and Erik draws on his natural insights into the movement of the tracks to determine which set are likely the goblins moving directly towards their home. Bowing out of the more cerebral work, Fargrim draws on his natural reserves of dwarven endurance to keep the party moving and to gather water, food, and firewood at the end of the day when The Zaza and Erik are too drained to lift a helping hand. Invicto simply kicks his feet up and enjoys the scenery during this whole process. With virtually no setbacks, the party finds themselves quickly on the trail of the Bone Hand goblin tribe, and the rigors of the environment do not take a toll upon the party.

After following the goblins’ trail for a day or so, the party sees buzzards circling the sky ahead of them, and they shortly come across the remnants of a gruesome battle scene. Roughly twenty goblins are dead, along with a few large hunting cats the goblins travelled with. Amongst the numerous dead goblins, the party finds five gray-skinned humanoids, who apparently were on the other side of the fight. Drawing on his knowledge of arcane studies, Erik recognizes the humanoids as Shadar-Kai, a race that dwells in the Shadowfell, serves the Raven Queen, and worships death along with the dark goddess.

The party supposes the Shadar-Kai are interested in the artifact they are retrieving for Lord Dread, and spend some time theorizing what they would do if the Shadar-Kai came calling on them when they had the artifact in hand on their way to return it to Lord Dread. Despite his earlier admiration for Dread, Fargrim suggests they ingratiate themselves to the Shadar-Kai. Erik and The Zaza are dubious about allying with the Shadar-Kai in any way, though they are dubious about allying with Lord Dread as well. They figure it’s a bad situation either way and they will cross that bridge when, and if, it comes later. In preparation of getting on the good side of any Shadar-Kai they may meet, Fargrim gives the slain Shadar-Kai a proper burial before moving on.
 
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hayek

Explorer
Thanks to the mods!

Oh, and thanks for dropping by Rune, glad you're enjoying it!
 
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hayek

Explorer
Chapter 1 - Lord Dread (s. 3)

1.3 In which the party crawls through a dungeon

Part the First, In which the party terrifies a group of cowardly goblins

The party eventually tracks the goblins back to a cave that appears to be their home. They debate how they should approach the cave, considering a stealthy entrance, but then realize that none of them are remotely capable at being stealthy. Nonetheless, the party circles around to approach the cave from the side and gives it their best shot at being quiet. As the party nears the cave entrance a small goblin head pokes out and looks at them. Its eyes widen in surprise and the goblin runs back into the cave. Erik and Invicto try to leap into the cave mouth to blast the goblin with an arcane spell before it gets away but they aren’t quick enough as the goblin disappears around a corner.

The cave entrance is a wide curving corridor that eventually opens into a larger cavern. The party follows the cave around and find a force of goblins awaiting them in the cavern – eight goblin cutters, four goblin javelin throwers, and two vicious-looking hunting cats. The creatures look poised to attack, but Invicto calls out in his most intimidating voice, “Wait! Put down your weapons and you don’t have to die!”

Some of the goblins do actually hesitate at his warning, but one of the goblin sharpshooters in the back of the force, presumably their leader, shouts out some encouraging words and commands the goblins onward to attack. Then The Zaza cries out that the party only wants the statue, and if they get it battle can be avoided. The mention of the statue seems to spread more hesitation throughout the goblin force and one of them actually calls out to the group’s leader. The leader responds, and the goblin force breaks out into an impromptu argument. They are all speaking goblinoid, so the party doesn’t follow, but, eventually, the goblin’s leader turns to the party and speaks in broken common, “You pay for statue! 10,000 gold!”

The party scoffs and insists they will pay nothing, and that if the goblins wish to die, then so be it. At their disdain for his offer, the goblin leader calls out, “5,000 gold!” Tired of wasting time allowing the goblin leader to think he can negotiate a price, Erik calls on his powers of Prestidigitation to brightly burn an illusory symbol of the Raven Queen into the tunic of the nearest goblin cutter, while coolly stating, “If you do not give us the statue you will anger our dark goddess…” The goblins recoil at this display of magic and all begin chattering excitedly in goblinoid.

The leader calls out, “You take statue, no fight!”. The party relaxes as the goblins have finally been sufficiently cowed. The goblin leader steps forth to speak further with the party, explaining, “Tribe priest, Grog, has statue below. He do ritual with statue. Make one zombie dragon already. Today make two, then three… You kill Grog now, take statue. You NOT tell Grog we make peace with you!” Apparently, the goblin leader feels threatened by Grog's newfound power, and the party makes for a convenient way to remove that threat.

The group of goblins then leads the party through a corridor in the back of the cavern and deeper underground. The party eventually passes through a roughly carved hall with six dragon heads carved into the walls, three each on the left and right sides. At the end of the hall a massive dragon head is carved into the rock, its jaw agape. The corridor continues straight into the mouth of the dragon. The party follows the goblins through the dragon’s maw, and they feel a chill passing through the dragon head as the air becomes noticeably cooler on the other side.

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Soon, the cavern walls are covered in a thin layer of frost as the air gets colder and colder. Eventually the party reaches an intersection where it appears an adjoining corridor was tunneled into the cave complex the party is in. Here the goblins file into the side passage and the leader turns to tell the party, “This way goblin tribe lands. You no go here! Grog that way.” The goblin points down the icy passage before turning to leave. The party continues down into the frozen cave.

Part the Second, In which the party is repeatedly pelted by ice darts

After traveling for some time, the party comes to another well-carved hall. It seems to mirror the hall they came upon earlier with six dragon heads carved into the walls, three on each side, though the stonework is much more impressive here. There is no large dragon’s head carved into the end of the hall, however. The air is significantly colder in this portion of the cave, and Erik draws upon his arcane knowledge to surmise that there is some overlap with the elemental plane of cold here which is making the area so unnaturally icy. The party sees that the smoothly cut floor before the dragon heads is coated with a thick patch of treacherous ice that would make crossing the area quite difficult.

Nonetheless, they figure they can eventually make their way across, and Invicto carefully steps onto the ice. He is immediately pelted by a dart of ice that shoots out of the mouth of the nearest dragon head carving. He quickly decides to waste no more time on the ice and attempts to rush across the hall. His acrobatic feet are up to the task and he avoids falling on the ice, but the dragon head carvings, which he now notices are offset from each other all along the hall, each take a turn pelting him with an ice dart. He manages to make it past the dragon heads, barely clinging to life, but still in one piece.

Erik now steps up to examine the icy trap more closely. He finds a Scorching Burst spell burns away the ice momentarily, though the elemental magic in the area makes it quickly reform. He figures he could burn away the ice long enough for someone to rush across the area and avoid the chance of falling on their face, but finds no way to avoid the dragon heads’ ice darts. He does see some arcane runes engraved on the floor in front of the dragon heads but has no desire to stand in front of one of the heads and get skewered by ice darts repeatedly while he attempts to decipher the runes.

So, the party decides to just take its chances, and with Erik burning away the ice every few steps, they make their way across the hall. They all get a hefty dose of ice darts, but they do all survive the ordeal. They take a short rest to regain their strength and then continue deeper into the cave complex.

Part the Third, In which the party’s curiosity leads them into a cave of bats

Shortly after leaving the trapped hallway behind, the party comes to a fork. One corridor seems to angle downwards while another stays level. The party argues for a time over which passage to take. Specifically citing the goblin leader’s statement of Grog being “below”, The Zaza feels that any passage going downwards is the best choice, while Erik argues that they’ve been going down for a while now, and they don’t necessarily need to go down even further. The Zaza’s keen ears pick up a skittering sound from the downward sloping passage and no sound from the passage that stays level. Eventually the party agrees to take the downward sloping passage.

The passage quickly expands into a large, rough cavern with stalactites and stalagmites throughout. As the party enters the cavern the skittering sound The Zaza heard ceases. The party sees a few rotting goblin corpses in the middle of the room, and Invicto quickly moves to loot them. As he reaches the middle of the room, a dark shape flies down from the cavern ceiling and attacks him. A huge shadowhunter bat, as large as a man, whizzes by, slashing at Invicto with a long, sword-like tail before flying back up into the dark recesses of the ceiling. The rest of the party rushes into the room, and between their several light sources, they are able to pick out four shadowhunter bats hiding amongst the stalactites on the ceiling.

Battle erupts quickly as Invicto and Erik pelt the bats with magical attacks from afar, and The Zaza and Fargrim wait for the bats to descend to strike before retaliating with their own attacks. The bats prove to be elusive foes, but don’t offer much of a threat. Before long, two bats lie dead on the ground, and the remaining two barely cling to life. They think better of tangling with the party and scurry away to the back of the cavern, hiding amongst the shadows on the ceiling. The party claims the loot from the goblin corpses, which includes some valuable gems but sadly no magical items. Searching the cavern, the party finds no other exits other than some winding chutes and chimneys in the ceiling the party presumes the bats made use of.

Part the Fourth, In which the party reaches their final destination and Erik is nearly killed by a dragon numerous times

They return to the forked passage and continue on, taking the corridor they left unexplored earlier. The corridor eventually expands into a gigantic cavern extending off into the darkness beyond the radius of the party’s light sources. The party’s light does illuminate the skeletal head of what was once a great dragon, now long-dead. They also see that the ceiling above is not stone but thick layers of ice. The party hears rhythmic chanting coming from the back of the cavern. They move through the cave to approach the sound and come across some broken eggs with dragon skeletons inside of them, though they notice one egg is missing a skeleton.

Approaching the back of the cave, the party finds a corridor extending deeper into the rock and head inside. They emerge into a smaller cave that is well lit. Inside they see an undead white dragon standing in the middle of the cave. It is mostly skeletal, though there are some patches of rotting flesh still clinging to the beast. To one side of the cave a goblin hexer, presumably Grog, is in the midst of a ritual. Arcane runes are inscribed in the floor around the corpse of another skeletal dragon. The black Raven Queen statue the party is seeking spins in the air above the dragon corpse. Black tendrils of necrotic energy seep down from the statue into the body of the dragon. As the party enters, Grog looks up from the ritual and the necrotic energy dissipates, though the statue continues spinning in the air. Grog and the zombie white dragon both move to engage the party.

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The fight starts out well. Erik summons a Flaming Sphere next to Grog and Fargrim moves to engage him in melee. Before Fargrim arrives, Grog utters a Stinging Hex on the Zaza but fails to affect her. Between Fargrim’s blows and Erik’s Flaming Sphere, Grog is already barely clinging to life. Then the dragon joins the fight and things quickly go south.

The great beast rushes up to the party and lets out a roar of terror which stuns The Zaza and Invicto. Then it breathes out a blast of icy frost that significantly damages The Zaza and immediately drops Erik. Fortunately, Grog is taken down by simply standing next to Erik’s now-stationary Flaming Sphere, and Fargrim moves to engage the dragon. As he does so, he shouts some Inspiring Words to his comrade Erik, who shakes off the cobwebs and comes back to reality. The dragon rakes its claws on Fargrim, but he handles the blow well enough. Erik, now fully conscious, stands up and launches a magic missile at the dragon, missing the beast. He draws on his adventuring reserves to quickly strike again but misses once again.

The Zaza and Invicto, having conquered their fear of the dragon, move to engage. The Zaza approaches the dragon on its right flank, while her three comrades all stand on its left flank. She shouts a Divine Challenge against the beast, daring it to attack her comrades instead of her. The dragon feels its breath weapon replenish and, seeing three nicely packed enemies on one side of it, it dares. The dragon suffers a blast of radiant energy from The Zaza for ignoring her, but is quite satisfied when its icy breath critically strikes Erik and takes him right back down out of the fight again. Fargrim uses the last of his inspiring resources and shouts some encouraging words to Erik to yet again bring him back to the fight. Erik promptly crawls along the floor to get well away from the action.

With Erik a safe distance away, the party starts to make some progress on defeating the dragon. The beast is not out of tricks yet, and it uses its one remaining action point to turn its attention to The Zaza. It breathes a cone of frost at her while tearing at her with both of its claws. Fortunately, The Zaza proves a solid defender as all of the dragon’s attacks are turned away harmlessly. The party leaps to counterattack, pouring on the pain as The Zaza and Fargrim flank the beast to pound at it with their axe and hammer, and Invicto and Erik launch arcane attacks at the beast from afar.

Invicto, having already uttered a curse upon the dragon, truly shines as he delivers two massive blows to the beast. He first launches a Vampiric Embrace that does not critically strike its target but still somehow delivers maximum damage to the dragon. He then sears the dragon with an Eldritch Blast, literally tearing off whatever remaining hunks of flesh that the necrotic beast had left. Thanks to the Gnomish Warlock’s decimating attacks, the tide has finally turned and soon the dragon is defeated as it lets out one last desperate roar before falling to the cave floor.

The party retrieves the obsidian Raven Queen statue and immediately recognizes that it is a powerful magical artifact, not just a historical oddity as Lord Dread described it. They debate for a bit about what to do with this new-found information, considering whether they want to put this powerful magical artifact into Lord Dread’s hands, and whether if they do if they should ask for more money. In the end the party puts those questions aside for future debate as they settle down to take a much needed rest to replenish their strength.
 
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hayek

Explorer
Chapter 2 - Ramshead (s. 4)

2.1 A Mystery

The party makes their way out of the goblin cave complex, with the Raven Queen statue in hand. They debate whether this powerful evil artifact should be handed over to Lord Dread, and consider the possibility that Davos may be more interested in the statue than in information on the Arinfax Colossus. So, they decide to return the statue to Davos and just ask him if he really wants them to hand the statue over to Lord Dread. The party reaches the surface to find their horses have been slaughtered by some wandering beast of the Torin Plains, so they start the long trek home on foot.

A Charmed Meeting

Just a day or two into their travels, the party runs into another civilized humanoid out in the wilds of the Torin Plains. Charm, a tiefling blade-for-hire, has been picking up work here and there around the Boundary Lands for several years. She’s often been hired by nobles in the area, and by the Empire of Nerath, to handle… discrete… tasks that require some specialized expertise. Charm has made a comfortable living working independently, but she’s recently begun to grow tired of the lonely freelancer lifestyle. She’s gotten some steady work in Verind’s Edge and has been hanging around the city for some time now. Consequently, she’s had several run-ins with Fargrim, and the two have developed a gruff love-hate relationship.

Most recently, Charm was hired by the Empire to investigate a rash of missing shipments from the Torin Plains. Merchants often venture far out into the Plains to collect valuable unique resources, or to occasionally trade with some of the goblinoid tribes of the plains. Of course, it is quite common for merchant caravans to never return from the Torin Plains, meeting a grizzly fate from the numerous denizens of the untamed wilderness. However, there has recently been a spike in missing shipments, and the Empire has heard rumor that some of the missing caravans may be due to the attacks of organized humans, likely soldiers from the Fiefdom of Uthrin. Charm was sent out into the plains to investigate some of these missing shipments, and she tracked down the remnants of one such caravan. Examining the battle site, she confirmed, to her eye at least, that the attack looked to be perpetrated by trained soldiers with quality weaponry, not the usual brutish assaults of the ill-equipped creatures of the Torin Plains.

Returning from this expedition, Charm came across the party making camp one night, and decided to head back to Verind’s Edge with some company rather than going it alone. Fargrim claimed the rogue was not to be trusted and shouldn’t be allowed in camp, but Charm lived up to her name with respect to the rest of the party, and everyone else took an immediate liking to the tiefling.

The Statue Causes a Scene

A couple of nights after Charm has joined the group, Erik is taking his turn at watch when he hears some whispering. He looks about, but quickly realizes the voice is in his own head. The words become clear, “You are superior to the others. Take me and we will escape together. I will bring you so much power…” Erik promptly realizes that he is wasting precious time with this gaggle of buffoons he calls friends, and it would be best if he took the statue and went on his separate way. He attempts to quietly rummage through The Zaza’s pack to retrieve the statue, but the dragonborn’s alert ears waken her before Erik can grab the artifact.

As his friends tackle him, the fog lifts from Erik’s mind and he returns to his senses. The party restrains the wizard and proceeds to question him. He insists he was being influenced by the dark statue to take it and run away, that it whispered into his mind. The party has their doubts about his story and decide it might be best to leave Erik tied up for the remainder of the journey home.

As Erik pleads with the party about the dark whispers he heard, Invicto hears similar whispers. Fortunately, the warlock is able to resist the statue’s dark influence, although, Invicto finds the statue’s suggestions pretty agreeable anyways. He decides to keep his confirmation of Erik’s story to himself, just in case he does decide to run off with the evil artifact later. For now, though, Invicto is enjoying his work with the party, and he decides it isn’t the right time to slaughter them all to further his own dark ambitions. As the party continues their journey back to Verind’s Edge, Erik and Invicto continue to periodically hear whispers in their minds, but now that they are aware of the statue’s influence they find it easy, though a little tiresome, to resist its power.

The party spends some time dodging roving bands of orcs and ogres and scuffles with a couple of goblins and kobolds, but after two weeks of travel, they are eventually able to make it back to Verind’s Edge relatively uneventfully.

The party heads straight to Davos’s tower to report back to him. Davos is pleased to see the party has returned. Since they had been gone for nearly a month, the wizard had started to worry they might never come back. He is immediately intrigued by the statue the party has brought back, confirming that it appears to be a powerful artifact infused with necrotic magic. He restates his concern for obtaining information on the Arinfax Colossus, but agrees that the artifact is worth investigating before handing over to Lord Dread.

The party leaves the artifact in Davos’s hands, and now that the statue is safely far away from the party, they release Erik from his bonds. The party takes in some rest and relaxation after many long weeks on the road, starting with some drinks in their favorite inn where they run into Mujeh, the goliath bard from the Guildhouse of Ellendor. Mujeh fills them in on the happenings in the city and shares a drink with the party. Charm continues to spend time with the party, and late one night, after many drinks, she admits she wants to be part of something more and to have a steady place, and group of friends, to call home. The party is happy to offer her that, and she is officially added as the fifth member of the crew.

Davos calls the party back to his tower a couple of days later. He says he has made limited progress in discovering the statue’s true magical nature, but over the last two days he was attacked by three of his own assistants as well as two acolytes from a nearby temple. All the assailants were under the statue’s magical influence, of course, but the statue’s danger made a quick decision necessary. Davos consulted with the head of the temple whose acolytes were affected by the statue to perform some divination regarding the issue. The priest was assured through his divinations that handing the statue over to Lord Dread was dangerous, but not obtaining information about the Arinfax Colossus was also dangerous. Since it was especially dangerous to even keep the statue in the city for further study, and because Lord Dread has kept to himself for decades out in the Torin Plains, Davos decided it would be best to pay Lord Dread’s price and hand the statue over to him.

A Dreadful Meeting, Part 2

The party requisitions some new horses and heads back out into the Torin Plains to the keep of Lord Dread. They make their way through the dense fog surrounding the keep, using the passphrase “Caratus Sinor” to bypass the undead guardians. They enter the keep and find it similarly decorated to their last meeting with Lord Dread – numerous undead servants mill about and twisted screaming faces are frozen in ebony pillars throughout the grand hall.

The party tells Dread they have obtained the statue, but they discovered it was a powerful magical artifact, not a historical oddity. They feel they should be compensated more for obtaining such a valuable item. Lord Dread scoffs at this suggestion, admitting all along there was a very small chance the statue would be magical, and assuring the party that it was simply for that chance that he offered the deal to the party at all. This adds further doubt to Lord Dread’s claim that the party was retrieving an item that was stolen from him, as he did not even know whether the statue was magical or not. Nonetheless, Dread seems very uninterested in renegotiating their deal and he insists the party hand over the statue. The party demands that they get the information about the Arinfax Colossus first. Dread asks to at least see the statue first and the party shows it to him, at which point Lord Dread becomes quite excited… as excited as a dark master of undead minions can be.

Dread hands the party the information he has collected about the Arinfax Colossus. Looking over various scraps of writing and old parchments, a large drawing of the Colossus catches the party’s eye.

ArinfaxColossus_Upload.JPG


“I heard a great knight from your city supposedly slew an ancient dragon that was the Arinfax Colossus. I’m certain the knight was a brave warrior, but I’m afraid he was quite mistaken. The Colossus is no dragon. It is a great creature forged from the elemental chaos of the Abyss by the Titans. Like the Titans, the construct seeks only to destroy the world. The goblinoid races prophesize that the Arinfax Colossus will rise from the earth in the Torin Plains some time in the next few years. It will march through the civilized lands to the east, literally crushing cities beneath its feet. And the goblinoid races will follow in its wake, spreading chaos and death throughout the lands.”

Though it’s no ‘two-headed dragon with one head still remaining’, Fargrim is pleased that his prediction that the Arinfax Colossus had not been dealth with yet was accurate. The party asks Lord Dread if the goblinoid prophecies spoke of how the Colossus could be stopped or destroyed. Unfortunately, Dread assures the party that the goblinoid prophecies are quite optimistic about the Colossus being totally unstoppable. The party also asks Lord Dread if they know how Sir Thalus was misled into thinking the dragon was the Arinfax Colossus. Dread does not know specifically, but he supposes the knight romped through the Torin Plains torturing any goblinoids he came across until one simply invented the idea to placate the knight’s demands. Sir Thalus was then quick to believe that this was his destiny, to slay a great dragon that threatened the safety of all of the civilized lands.

The party also inquires about the additional payment of 200 gold they were to receive upon delivery of the statue. Lord Dread notes that he gave the party 200 gp worth of potions to aid them in retrieving the statue, stating, “If those potions were not used for that purpose, it seems they should be returned to me. However, since I owe you 200 gold, why don’t we simply call it even.” This does not sound like the terms the party had agreed to, but they become acutely aware of the fact that they are surrounded by a host of Lord Dread’s undead minions deep inside his black keep. They decide the 200 gold is not worth arguing over since they have the information they came for and the party agrees to take their leave. Lord Dread assures them it was a pleasure doing business with them and that if they ever need to strike a deal in the future they know where to find him.

Spending Some Time in the City

The party brings the information they have gathered on the Arinfax Colossus to Davos who is very interested in the revelations the party has uncovered. He immediately starts studying the writings the party has brought and waves them out of his room. The party reminds Davos of the 2,000 gold pieces he owes them. Davos scrounges around, mentioning that he doesn’t have too much gold on hand. He offers them a magical suit of stanching cloth armor along with 1,320 gold, and the party accepts. The party departs to get in some rest and relaxation once again. With the help of Mujeh’s developing network of contacts, they spend some of their newly-acquired wealth to obtain additional magical arms and armor.

While strolling through a marketplace within the city one day, Erik runs into an old acquaintance, Gregor – a man in the service of Erik’s adoptive father. Gregor is excited to run into Erik and spends some time catching up with him. Gregor has built up some savings over the years and has recently struck out on his own, coming to Verind’s Edge to try and make a living as a merchant. He is using his contacts within Quinalyn to carry out some trade between the elven lands and Verind’s Edge and is doing well for himself so far.

Gregor tells Erik that his adoptive brother, Luwin, has “bought himself a lordship”. Luwin found a debt-ridden noble ruling over a small farming village and was able to buy up the noble’s lands and place himself in charge of the village. Luwin hasn’t been satisfied with ruling over a small farming village, though, and rumors are that he has started venturing into the depths of the Feywild to collect scarce, valuable resources for trade. Gregor tells Erik that, believe it or not, his adoptive father, Varna, feels bad about the way Erik left, and that Varna wishes to extend an open invitation for Erik to come back and visit him at any time. Erik is a little dubious about his adoptive father’s newfound guilt, but considers it a possibility to pay a visit to Varna at some point in the future.

Davos calls the party back to his tower a few days later to update them on his findings. The wizard has looked through the writings the party brought him and is very concerned about the threat the Arinfax Colossus poses, but he did not find any information about how to stop the creature. Davos has spoken with Emperor Essran about the threat, but the Emperor maintains faith that the threat was handled by Sir Thalus. Despite the evidence Davos has collected, the Emperor is certain the Arinfax Colossus has been dealt with. Davos intends to pursue the matter further on his own and plans to travel east to Korindor, the capital of Kasalat (by way of a Teleportation Circle in Thersi). There he will procure more powerful divination services to attempt to discover a way to stop the Arinfax Colossus.

Two situations have recently arisen that command the wizard’s attention, however. Davos will handle one on his way to Korindor, but he needs the party to investigate the other matter for him. Davos doesn’t care which task the party wants to take on, he is happy to handle the one they do not choose.

The first issue concerns strange reports from the small village of Ramshead. The reports are fairly confusing, but Davos has received word that the village has been attacked by strange bands of assorted creatures – a wolf, deer, a bear, a giant beetle, and giant spiders. Davos has no idea why these creatures would be working together, or even why they would be attacking villagers, but the matter certainly needs investigating.

The second issue is an offer from a minor noble within the Fiefdom of Uthrin to pledge allegiance to Emperor Essran. The noble, Count Meric, has secretly reached out to the Emperor to seek his help in breaking some kind of curse that has been plaguing his family for generations now. The Count offered no specific details on this curse, but assured the Emperor that if he could end the curse on his family Meric would join the Empire of Nerath. The party debates briefly and decides that giant beetles sound more enticing than strange, dark curses, so they head out to the village of Ramshead.

Ramshead

After a couple days of travel to the southeast, the party comes across the village of Ramshead as dusk is falling. The village seems to be mostly deserted, though lights are on in a few houses. As the party enters the village they see that some of the houses appear to have been attacked, with doors battered in and windows shattered. The streets have debris and trash scattered throughout. Despite the general state of disrepair, there seems to be some people still in the village. As the party proceeds down the main street the door of one house is slammed shut and curtains are pulled across the windows.

VillageOfRamshead_Upload.JPG


The party heads to the center of the village where there is a large two-story inn, Ramshead Tavern. Charm uses her stealth to quietly enter the structure while the party waits outside in the village square. She finds the inn currently empty, though there are signs that it has been recently inhabited. Looking in the kitchen she finds the back door left open, through which she can see a small girl sitting in the street, crying. Charm approaches the girl and as she gets closer, she can tell that the girl appears to be in shock. The child barely acknowledges Charm’s approach. Charm attempts to console the girl and ask her what has happened. After some coaxing, the girl says her name is Lucinda and she tells Charm that the villagers took her mom away to the lake south of town. Charm takes the girl into the inn and gets her to rest in one of the beds, then the party heads down to the lake.

As they crest a ridge, the party sees a crowd of villagers angrily shouting. There is a small pier built out onto the 'lake', which is really more of a pond. On the pier, a hulking man with dark eyes holds a woman with her hands tied shouting something to the crowd about the gods’ justice. The woman is crying and pleading to the mob of townspeople. Some townsfolk seem to be shouting to throw the woman into the water, while a small minority cries their opposition to the idea.

When the townsfolk see the party cross the ridge, someone calls out “Strangers!” and the villagers immediately switch their attention to them and become very tense. Many men brandish some crudely improvised weapons, others start stepping away from the party. The party calls out that they were sent by the Emperor. This causes a stir amongst the mob and some seem interested in hearing the party out while others still eye the party suspiciously.

Fargrim calls out to let the woman go, and the hulking man responds that they are only delivering the gods’ justice. As the party moves to approach the pond some villagers call out “Don’t trust them!” and “Run back to the village, we can defend ourselves there!” The hulking man tosses the woman into the water as the crowd disperses and the villagers flee into the surrounding woods. Most of the party heads to the pond to rescue the now drowning woman, while Fargrim attempts to tackle the dark-eyed man who tossed the woman off the pier. He gets close enough to lunge at him as he runs around the edge of the pond, but Fargrim misses and the man beats a swift retreat into the dark woods, leaving Fargrim behind.

The woman thanks the party for saving her and, almost in disbelief, asks the party if they really are from the Emperor. She is ecstatic that help may have finally arrived. The party calms her down and asks her what is going on in the village. The woman assures the party that she has done nothing wrong, and that the villagers singled her out as bringing the attacks upon the village simply because she is an unmarried woman with a child. The hulking man leading the mob, Raver, claimed she was a woman of ‘loose morals’, and the gods were punishing the village for her actions.

Strange Happenings

The woman, Igris, goes on to explain the history of the attacks. They started some time ago quite unexpectedly. Some villagers went missing in the woods surrounding the village, and when their bodies were found they were missing their heads. A few days later an assortment of creatures simply wandered into the village and attacked some of the townsfolk. The creatures removed the heads of their victims and retreated into the woods. The villagers then organized some defenses and were ready for the creatures when they returned. They were able to fight off the creatures, though a few more villagers were killed in the fight. The creatures again removed the heads of their victims as they fled back into the woods.

Then, some of the villagers themselves started turning on each other. One woman’s husband attacked her in their home, beheading her and running off into the woods with her severed head. Now, most of the village is holed up in the inn in the middle of town waiting to fend off the next round of attacks and suspicious of anyone or anything that comes into town. No one seems to know why the attacks are occurring, though most villagers believe the gods themselves have forsaken them and damned them for some reason.

The party suggests heading back to the inn to talk with the townsfolk – Fargrim is especially excited about running into Raver again. Igris is not at all interested in putting herself in danger again and would rather leave town, but she admits she must find her daughter before doing anything else, and Charm assures her Lucinda is in the inn. The party heads back into the village and as they start down the street heading towards the inn an odd pack of creatures emerges from the woods and approaches the village. The party turns to face the monsters while Igris flees to the inn.

Two Deathjump Spiders, a Cave Bear, an Ankheg, and a Bullywug Mud Lord move to engage the party. Fargrim, Charm, and The Zaza form a strong front line that engages most of the creatures while Erik and Invicto stand behind them. However, the Bullywug hangs back behind the creatures’ front line and uses his Fiery Croak to launch attacks on Erik and Invicto from afar. Meanwhile, one of the Deathjump Spiders is able to leap behind the party’s front line and it begins chasing Invicto around the back of the battlefield.

Fargrim and Charm may have a love-hate relationship off the battlefield, but in the heat of the fight they work well together, with Fargrim helping to setup Charm for several effective attacks. Fargrim, however, finds that fate is not on his side as he misses time and time again himself. The Ankheg quickly snatches The Zaza in its mandibles and drags her off to the side of the fight, removing her from the battle as it continues to chew on her. The Zaza is able to hack away at the beast while caught in its mandibles, however, and soon the Ankheg is near death. Fargrim runs to The Zaza’s aid and uses a Brash Assault on the Ankheg to make an opening for her to finally deliver the killing blow.

Charm, somehow left behind as the remaining front line of the party, is taken down by the Cave Bear and one of the Deathjump Spiders as Fargrim and The Zaza rush back to the fight. Meanwhile, the Bullywug unleashes a devastating blast with his Fiery Croak, critically striking both Erik and Invicto in one hit. The two magic-users are now both on the brink of death, and one of the Deathjump Spiders continues to harass Invicto.

Fargrim and The Zaza rejoin the fight just in time. Fargrim shouts an Inspiring Word to Charm to get her back on her feet, and The Zaza engages the spider harassing Invicto while placing herself between the Cave Bear and the rest of the party. Invicto unleashes his vengeance in the form of the Flames of Phlegethos and brings one of the spiders to death’s doorstep. Erik uses his newly acquired Stanching magical armor to quickly stitch his wounds and continues to harass his enemies with his Flaming Sphere. Fargrim misses yet again with a Brash Assault, but his move creates an opening for The Zaza to drop another enemy. The tables seem to have turned and Fargrim finally lands his first hit of the fight on the Cave Bear. Though Charm may be a little worse for wear, and Erik and Invicto look thoroughly singed, the party is able to finish off the strange band of creatures as they stoically, and somewhat surprisingly, fight to the death.
 
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hayek

Explorer
Chapter 2 - Ramshead (s. 5)

2.2 Mmmm... Brains...

The party heads back to the inn where they can hear the villagers have regrouped. They burst inside to find Igris dead. Raver stands over her body with a bloody knife in hand, shouting about how “this was necessary”. The party decides they have their own “necessary” murder to undertake now and immediately moves to chop Raver into numerous small bits, led by an exceptionally angry Fargrim. Unfortunately, the villagers aren’t eager for more bloodshed and a mob intervenes between the party and Raver. Rather than chop down innocent villagers to get to Raver, the party puts off their vengeance for now. An older man gets onto a table and commands silence. The villagers seem to defer to him and the party hears a few cries of “let the Elder speak!”. The Elder calls for order and insists that the village cannot lose its sanity in such trying times. He claims he will stand in as the voice of the town while Mayor York is away.

The Elder gives the floor to the party for them to present themselves as representatives of the Emperor. The party confirms that they were indeed sent by the Emperor, and that they are there to help the village. They also insist that Raver has just committed murder and should be punished accordingly. Raver speaks up to defend his actions, again claiming that everyone in the village knows the woman, Igris, was of ‘loose morals’ and it is her actions that have brought this terror upon the village. Through a combination of diplomacy and a little intimidation, the party cows the villagers into accepting their authority to some degree. The Elder will not allow further bloodshed, but he agrees to hold Raver in prison until the Mayor returns to decide what to do with him. The party grudgingly accepts the Elder’s decision, and some burly young villagers escort Raver out of the inn.

The party seeks out the Elder to speak with him about the attacks on the village. His story is very similar to Igris’s, and he is equally clueless as to what is behind the attacks. He surprisingly confirms that the woman Igris was known in the village for offering certain discrete services of… questionable morality. Of course, he doesn’t believe she should have died for her actions, and he assures the party Raver will face justice once the Mayor returns. Apparently, Mayor York left a couple days ago to personally seek out help from Verind’s Edge since no help had yet arrived.

Late Night Surprise

With no real leads to pursue, the party decides to get some rest for the night in the inn. They are awakened in the middle of the night from screams below, though. They rush downstairs to the first floor. A woman comes running out of a store room that has been converted into a bedroom to accomodate all of the villagers staying in the inn. She is initially somewhat incoherent, screaming in terror, but the party eventually gets out of her that some kind of worm was attacking her husband in the store room. The party enters and finds the woman’s husband in a groggy, dazed state of mind, but no creatures seem to be threatening him. They calm the woman down further and ask her to tell them what happened.

“I woke up and saw some kind of worm crawling into my husband’s ear. He looked awake, but he was totally unaware of what was going on. I managed to knock the worm off of his head onto the table next to him, where I put a mason jar over it.”

As Erik’s curiosity is peaked at the chance to inspect this strange worm creature, Fargrim promptly turns around and smashes the mason jar on the table in the store room. He then kindly offers the squished, flattened worm goo on the end of his warhammer for Erik and the party to inspect.

Surprisingly, the rest of the party doesn’t make much of it, but Fargrim himself actually recognizes the creature from its mutilated remnants. The creature looks like a small worm, but with a massive flayer of numerous tiny, thin tentacles protruding from its mouth. Fargrim’s dwarven heritage brought him into contact with many creatures of the Underdark that dwell in the caves beneath the world. Drawing on his knowledge of Dungeoneering, Fargrim actually recognizes the worm as the brood of a Tentacle Flayer. A distant cousin of a Mind Flayer, Tentacle Flayers are somewhat intelligent worms that have mind-controlling powers. A Tentacle Flayer can birth numerous small Brain Worms to spread out and look for subjects to dominate in the area. Tentacle Flayers are more animalistic than Mind Flayers, having no grand ambitions for power, and not forming societies. The worms dominate innocent subjects to simply put them to work scrounging up food for their masters. Fargrim recalls that the Tentacle Flayer’s food of choice… is brains.

TentacleFlayer.JPG


Brain Bait

The rash of beheadings suddenly makes sense to the party and they are pleased to at least know what they are dealing with. Unfortunately, they are not sure how to track down the Tentacle Flayer responsible for the attacks. They debate some ideas and settle on creating a “brain bait” trap. They requisition some hunters from the village and in the early morning hours head out to hunt down a wild animal to use. The hunters take down a boar and the party removes the animal’s head.

They trek a few hours south of the village and place the head in an open field, with the neck side up so the brainy scents can waft up into the air. The party hides in a nearby treeline and waits. Unfortunately, a full day passes without event and by the next morning the head is starting to turn a little gamy. The party doesn’t give up on their plan yet, and thankfully around mid-afternoon a lone wolf approaches the head, gives it a sniff, and picks it up in its jaws. The wolf lopes away to the south, and the party quickly follows. They debate their concerns that this wolf is not under the control of a Brain Worm, and may just be a hungry wolf. Nonetheless, they stick to the plan, and as the wolf continues to travel for several hours without taking a bite out of the head, they are confident that the wolf is headed to the lair of the Tentacle Flayer.

The wolf eventually leaves the forested area around Ramshead and begins to enter the rocky plains that comprise the Dwarven Ruins south of the Boundary Lands. The party spies a large pile of severed heads. The wolf drops the boar’s head onto the pile, then turns to head back to the north. The party moves to the side and hides amongst some rocks as the wolf passes. They peak out at the pile of heads again, waiting for movement. After some time, they see a Tentacle Flayer burrow up out of the rock itself by the pile of severed heads. Its long tentacles reach out and pick up one of the heads from the pile, bringing it to its mouth. It slurps out the brains, tosses the head aside, and picks up another severed head with its tentacles.

Tentacles of Despair – Reach Out and Touch Someone

The party has seen enough, and they move to engage the beast. It turns at their approach and quickly meets them in battle. As the party begins to move into position to attack the Tentacle Flayer, they realize the creature is not alone. Another Tentacle Flayer burrows out of the ground, along with several large Brain Worms which begin dazing the party with psychic blasts of mental energy. Last, but certainly not least, the party discovers that the two Tentacle Flayers they are facing are actually younger broodlings. The clear mother of the brood burrows out of the ground, dwarfing the other Tentacle Flayers at twice their size.

The party discovers the fully grown, adult Tentacle Flayer does not need a Brain Worm burrowed into someone’s head to control them, as it simply reaches out with its Tentacles of Despair and delivers a psychic attack to The Zaza, dominating her and commanding her to turn and strike Invicto. Fortunately, The Zaza quickly shakes off the dominating effect and begins hacking away at the adult Tentacle Flayer. Erik begins clearing out the small Brain Worms by rolling his Flaming Sphere around the battle field. Despite being caught by surprise at the number of combatants, fate seems to be on the party’s side and they make short work of the Tentacle Flayers and Brain Worms.

The party returns to the village of Ramshead triumphant, assuring the villagers that their problems have been taken care of. Unfortunately, the party learns that while they were hunting down the Tentacle Flayers, Raver escaped from prison and fled the village. Nonetheless, the party tries not to let the news dampen their spirits, as Ramshead has been freed from the terrible threat of the Tentacle Flayers. The village plans a grand celebration, and the party stays the night to partake in drink and revelry with the villagers. Invicto finds a buxom young farm girl who is able to see past his Gnomish features to the true adventuring hero within (thanks to numerous cups of mead, of course).

A Look Into the Future

The next day the party leaves the village of Ramshead to return to Verind’s Edge. Expecting an uneventful journey, they are surprised to spy massive discharges of arcane energy in the distance. They proceed to investigate, though it takes them a couple of hours to reach the source of the displays of magical power.

They find the remnants of a strange, gruesome battle scene. A massive armored carriage is tipped over and ripped open. The carcasses of many small imps and devils lay splayed about the field, winged beasts with foot-long, narrow claws protruding from the ends of their scaly fingers. Most notably, a giant winged devil lies slain in the middle of the battlefield, its face contorted in a scream that displays massive black fangs. Invicto promptly climbs atop the beast and pries out its two long canine teeth, believing them to be a valuable find. The party also finds the bodies of what appear to be three angelic-like creatures surrounding the carriage, regal winged humanoids with glassy eyes and silvery skin. Amidst the carnage are also the bodies of several armored eladrin, most of which appear to have been literally ripped to pieces by the devils. The eladrin appear to have been armed, though some of their weapons and armor have been removed.

The party hears screams from some distance away and decides there may still be survivors from the battle. They head in the direction of the screams and find that someone else has apparently beat them to the remnants of the battle. A band of orcs has collected some loot from the battlefield and is now tormenting what appears to be the sole survivor, a defenseless humanoid woman. The orcs have brought her to a nearby river to “clean her up” and are toying with her and abusing her.

Orcs.JPG


The party quickly moves to give the creatures someone their own size to pick on. An Orc Witch Doctor utters a curse upon Erik and Invicto to strike them blind, though they are eventually able to shake off the effects. Meanwhile, The Zaza and Fargrim engage two Orc Berserkers while two Orc Crescent Hurlers use their chained axes to strike the warriors from afar. The Hurlers use their weapons to pull The Zaza and Fargrim into the river, sweeping their feet out from under them. An annoying tactic, but one The Zaza and Fargrim are eventually able to overcome by pounding their foes into obilivion.

After the battle, the party recovers the loot the orcs had plucked from the battlefield, including several magical items, and tends to the humanoid woman. They now notice that the woman appears similar to the angelic creatures the party saw on the battlefield, with silvery skin and elongated features. They do not see her eyes, however, as she keeps them closed. In fact, she asks the party to retrieve an embroidered cloth for her to wrap around her eyes, to be sure they remain closed. She thanks the party for saving her life and introduces herself as Missyus. She explains that she is an avatar of the god Ioun, god of knowledge, skill, and prophecy. Erik pieces together that, as an avatar of Ioun, she is likely a seer of some sort. She admits that she is a ‘True Seer’, blessed with the power of foresight. In return for saving her life, she offers to provide each party member with a vision of their future.

Missyus explains that anything she lays eyes on provides her with a vision of the future. In broad daylight, she sees so much that she is simply bombarded with visions and her senses are overloaded, thus she must travel with the blindfold. Once the party makes camp at night, she sets up a single candle inside a tent so that she can be wrapped in relative darkness. She asks each party member to enter the tent, one at a time, so that she can open her eyes for a brief moment and gaze upon them to capture a vision of their future. Missyus’s visions are often cryptic, and she does not always understand the context of what she sees as she puts it into words. Nonetheless, she assures the party that her visions will be important to their future, and may even save their lives. She also insists that the visions cannot be shared with others until they come to pass. Revealing the information to others may taint the future and make the vision meaningless.

Each party member enters the tent alone and receives a prophecy of their future…
  • Fargrim - 371-529-144
  • Invicto Fizzleflame - ...
  • Erik - If you pay the Queen’s price, she will tell you of your true parents
  • The Zaza - Drink from the mouth of the Silver Dragon and you will learn of your brother’s fate
  • Charm - The key to your prison will be in the lock
 

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