NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 9650994" data-attributes="member: 508">ADVENTURE 94: UNDEAD MEN'S PARTYPC Roster: Alewyth Putterpye, dwarf priestess of Aerik 19             Thurloe Pulver, human fighter 3/wizard 3/spellsword 10/eldritch knight 3             Wakuren, half-orc cleric of Cal 9/paladin 10             Xandro Silverstrings, human bard 6/rogue 13             Zander Quilson, elf sorcerer 19Game Session Date: 26 April 2025 - - -Stepping through the glowing doorway in the interior of the sphinx colossus, the five dreamwalkers found themselves in a rather barren land – no plant life was visible, just rocks and hardened earth.  There were, however, a few above-ground buildings visible, and Pendlebrook started walking towards one of them, the other five following.As they walked, the lich explained the Forbidden Lands were shielded from scrying and the like, and it was likewise impossible to breach with teleport or plane shift spells, or similar magic.  "We're a reclusive society," he explained.  "We keep to ourselves, and prefer to keep outsiders out, unless they're planning on joining us on a permanent basis."He went on to explain his views on undeath:  "Everyone is born.  Some, alas, are stillborn – they never get to experience life outside the womb at all.  This is sad, but it is a fact of life."The next stage of life is babyhood, when you're completely dependent upon others for your survival."Next is toddlerhood, when you learn to walk and explore your own world."Childhood is next, followed by young adulthood, adulthood, and finally old age.  At each of these stages, some people die and do not get to experience any of the stages that follow.  This also is sad, as is the end of any life, at any stage."Undeath is simply the final stage of existence.  It can be attained before some of the other stages – straight from adulthood, in some cases, for example – but it is the final stage of existence.  Sadly, not everyone is able to make the transition from a stage of life to undeath, either through not understanding it to be a completely natural progression through the stages of existence, or through a lack of knowledge of how to complete the process."  As he was expressing his views, the lich was also sending out a message spell that he was bringing new recruits to the Reception Hall, and for those he had informed to pass along the word.When they arrived - a short trek of no more than ten minute's time - there were already a few undead residents there to greet them: a few curious liches, a vampire or two (for the sun had set shortly after the dreamwalkers had first entered the sphinx colossus, and it was safe for them to move about aboveground), and a dozen or so necropolitans: creatures who had passed the threshold of death but still looked much as they did while living, although the older among them had almost mummified flesh clingingly closely to their bones underneath.  Pendlebrook made the introductions, but as is often the case when one is introduced to a great many people all at once, not many of the names stuck around in the heroes' minds for very long.One notable exception was a beautiful young drow woman with smooth, ebony skin - up to but not passing her neck, for her face was nothing more than a grinning skull, albeit one with full, flowing locks of hair as white as the moonlight.  She gave her name as Skullvira, although no one believed that to have been her given name at birth.  "Go ahead," she cooed at Xandro, "give it a feel," offering up her arm for the young rogue to touch for himself.<Don't do it!> warned Petey telepathically from Zander's shoulder.  <She's a lich - you'll end up paralyzing yourself!>Xandro just smiled an apology as he backed away, but Wakuren stepped forward in his place.  "Very nice," approved the half-orc, placing his bare hand - he'd removed his gauntlet of Cal to do so - on her upper arm, brushing it against her ample bosom as he did so.  "It seems as warm as that of a living being's."  He smiled at her confusion; she was no doubt unaware that the freedom of movement spell he'd cast upon himself while passing through the interior of the sphinx colossus was still in effect, protecting him from the paralyzation Skullvira was no doubt wishing to spring upon one of the newcomers."Would you care for a drink?" asked Pendlebrook, steering Wakuren away from the voluptuous, skull-faced lich.  "While we undead require no such sustenance, we keep several vintages on tap for such occasions as these."  He indicated a necropolitan behind the bar, whose shelves held various bottles of alcoholic beverages, each covered in cobwebs - the place apparently saw infrequent use.  Thurloe politely declined on the behalf of the whole group, not trusting anything the undead sought to serve them.  But then he spotted a female vampire eyeing him from across the room, every bit as good-looking as Skullvira from the neck down but also having a lovely face covered in actual flesh.  She, too, was a drow, not surprising as that was the predominant race in the western half of the Talonian continent.  The spellsword excused himself to go chat up the beautiful bloodsucker.Not wanting to be rude, Alewyth approached a group of necropolitans talking among themselves and introduced herself.  They seemed amused that the priestess was a dwarf, and that she revered Aerik instead of Akari, asking her about the Mark of the Undead God upon her forehead.Before she was able to answer, however, there was a commotion at the front doors.  A necropolitan had just entered, one with a skeletal bat sitting on his shoulder and with a hollow, humanoid mass of skin flopping along at his side like a trained seal.  "What are they doing here?" demanded Gnoxos the Ossophile, pointing an accusing finger at Wakuren and Xandro.All conversations stopped as everyone looked over at the new arrival.  "Is there a problem?" asked Pendlebrook."Yeah, there's a problem, all right!" snarled Gnoxos.  "These are the bastards who slew my original familiar and prevented - well, delayed - my transformation into a necropolitan!"  At his side, the boneless raised its head and stared accusingly at the half-orc with its eye-holes.Anticipating a fight, Alewyth started casting the words to a prayer spell, designating everyone not one of the five adventurers from Armaturia as a potential enemy - or at least those within range of her spell; the Reception Hall was large enough that several of the liches gathered at a table near the front stage and the podium were too far away to be affected.  Thurloe, likewise anticipating trouble, excused himself from the vampiress' company and headed toward the front doors and Gnoxos.  If there was going to be any combat, he wanted to make sure he got a piece of it.Wakuren brought forth the words to a silence spell to the forefront of his mind, ready to cast it at Gnoxos if the necropolitan started casting any spells himself.  He hoped he could trust his friends not to be the ones to start any fights here among the undead they were desperately trying to infiltrate; it would be a poor first impression were they to arrive and immediately slay one of the members of the undead society.  Fortunately, Zander Quilson was of a more defensive mindset: he cast a mislead spell on himself and Petey, stepping invisibly away from the exact copy of the two he left behind in their place, then he slunk quietly over by the bar, while he had his illusory double turn to face Gnoxos with an innocent look of surprise and confusion on his face.Xandro pulled the Dardolian Lute and began playing the initial chords of the song of inspirational courage as Gnoxos looked about to cast an attack spell.  But before Wakuren could silence him with his own spellcraft, Pendlebrook interceded.  "Hold up!" cried out the lich in a commanding voice.  "There will be no fighting in the Reception Hall!"  He then turned to the five newcomers.  "Would you like to reply to the accusations?" he asked."We stumbled upon him after he broke into a mausoleum and was animating the skeletons interred within," Thurloe replied.  "The act was in direct violation of the laws of the local area."Wakuren stepped into the discussion.  "We would have had no problem with him doing so if he had first gotten the permission of the family whose ancestors were buried in the mausoleum," he said.  "And obviously, we have no problems with him wishing to become a necropolitan, a wise alternative to impending decrepitude and eventual death," he added, thinking to build up the case that the five adventurers were simply A-OK with the concept of undeath."That seems like a valid argument," pointed out Pendlebrook, looking over at Gnoxos.  "And your interactions with these five did not prevent you from attaining undeath, after all.""That damned half-orc killed my bat familiar!" accused Gnoxos."And your replacement seems entirely adequate," the lich observed.  "Come, come, this should all be water under the bridge!  Let us let bygones be bygones - what do you say?""We feel no animosity to Gnoxos," Wakuren was quick to interject.  The necropolitan just hmmphed loudly and turned away, mumbling to himself.  Pendlebrook took it as an implicit agreement to the truce, and the reception started back up, with dozens of undead voices discussing the events at hand.  But no sooner had a handful of minutes passed than there was another commotion at the front doors, as a second inhabitant arrived at the Reception Hall with a bone to pick with the heroes."What's all this I hear about living Champions of Akari?" demanded Mother Bones.Wakuren could see her consternation at once, given the clerical robes she wore and the prominent unholy symbol of Akari, God of Death and Undeath, she wore on a chain around her neck.  He approached her, bowing his head down in reverence.  "Akari has, for reasons known only to Him, chosen us as His emissaries," the half-orc explained, hoping to deflect some of the female lich's rage away from himself and his companions.But Mother Bones was having none of it.  "It doesn't make any sense!" she insisted.  "Why would He choose living beings" - she spat out the words as if they were a vile curse - "when He has those who have served Him all of their lives, and for centuries after their journey into undeath?"  It was obvious she was more than a little jealous at having been passed over for such an honor."Perhaps," ventured Wakuren hesitantly, "He values your continued service in your current role, and has chosen to select those who are more expendable to be His champions?"  When that didn't seem to bear any weight with her, he added, "But we are mere servants, to be used in whichever way Akari chooses to use us.  None of us know why He sent us here, but we were more than happy to obey His wishes.""How do we know this isn't all just some sort of scam?" demanded Mother Bones.  "Those Marks of Akari could be nothing more than simple tattoos.""You're free to examine them for yourself," offered Wakuren.But Pendlebrook had another idea.  "Daedrun!" he called out across the room.  "Have you completed your newest project yet - the new guardians?"A necropolitan in wizard robes approached from the back of the room.  "Yes," he offered, one eyebrow raised in wonder where this question was leading.Pendlebrook laid out his plan.  "Well, these five - four of them, in any case - claim to be the Chosen of Akari.  One would imagine Akari would not have chosen poorly when He made His selection; He'd have picked individuals dedicated to His cause and capable of serving His interests.  So, I suggest you summon your guardians - what are there, four, five?  Four, then.  Summon them forth, and set them upon the Chosen.  If they triumph against your guardians, they will have proven their worth.  And if they fail, they will have likewise have proven themselves to have been phonies, unworthy of the status of Chosen of Akari.  What say you?""I don't know..." worried Daedrun aloud.  "I put a lot of effort into creating these...I would hate to see them destroyed so soon after their creation.""Think of it as a proof of concept," suggested Pendlebrook.  "Even if these five prevail and destroy your creations, they may point out areas of improvement for your next, newer models.""I suppose..." replied Daedrun hesitantly."Mother Bones?"The lich nodded her head approvingly.  "It would be a fair test," she agreed - but her glowing eyes aimed at the five dreamwalkers said she very much hoped they'd fall before Daedrun's guardians.Pendlebrook turned to the dreamwalkers.  "Do you accept this challenge?" he asked.Wakuren answered instantly for the group.  "If it is Akari's will, then we will comply without question."  His answer earned him a possible smidgen of approval from Mother Bones, not that she would admit it for anything."Then let's take this outside."  Pendlebrook led the assembled welcoming committee outside, where they fell back behind the five adventurers from Armaturia.  Pendlebrook, Daedrun, and Mother Bones all stood in the front ranks, where they'd get the best view of the contest about to occur.  "At your readiness, Daedrun," the lich offered.Daedrun raised his withered arms out from his sides and called forth a summoning spell.  "Arise, my protectors!  Defend the Forbidden Lands from these five interlopers!"  The ground just ahead started buckling and cracking as unseen entities buried below scrabbled upwards into the night air.The first to fully surface was the petrified skeleton of a parasaurolophus: a plant-eating dinosaur with a long, curving horn arcing back from its head.  It gave a long, low, moaning bellow that reverberated back from the building and washed over the combatants and spectators alike.  Alewyth responded almost immediately to this threat by casting a summoning spell of her own, and the earth burst open between her and the paleoskeleton as a huge earth elemental - an earth titan - rose up from the ground.  It lumbered forward and brought a boulderlike fist crashing down upon the prehistoric skeleton, cracking its petrified bones in several places by the power of its blow.The next guardian to crawl its way up to the surface was a three-horned triceratops, a massive, bony frill sloping back from its skull.  Thurloe took the opportunity to try something he'd been aching to test since entering the Forbidden Lands: he cast a shroud of undeath spell, causing his body to temporarily switch from the semblance of life to that of undeath; healing spells would now harm him but inflict spells would actively heal him, but more importantly, mindless undead would instinctively believe him to be as undead as they were and leave him alone.  He knew trying it out on the liches, vampires, and necropolitans would be a waste of time, but this was a perfect opportunity to try it out on some mindless undead.  With that thought in mind, he boldly raced forward towards the triceratops paleoskeleton, confident in his immunity.A petrified tyrannosaurus skeleton rose up out of the ground next, a creature the heroes' halfling friend Beetle would have called a swordtooth titan.  Across from it rose up a squat paleoskeleton with a large, bony sail rising up from its spine: a dimetrodon, or sailback.  But Wakuren, judging the tyrannosaurus to be the biggest threat of the four guardians, cast a destruction spell at it as it rose and the petrified bones shattered in a cloud of fragments and dust.Xandro wasn't about to go running out into a group of dinosaur skeletons, who he knew had no internal anatomies for his magic rapier Deathwhisper to damage; instead, he started playing the song of inspirational courage on his Dardolian Lute and hung back, staying out of the way so the spellcasters could deal with the threat and wouldn't have to worry about catching him up in their attack spells.  Zander proved this to have been a good idea almost immediately, as he cast a chain lightning spell at the dimetrodon paleoskeleton, arcing secondary blasts of electricity to the other two.  The spell, empowered to greater heights through his ring of mystic lightning, shattered the sailback skeleton and likewise demolished the already-heavily-damaged parasaurolophus, leaving only the three-horn still standing on the battlefield.Alewyth decided to charge at the triceratops, swinging her dwarven warhammer Sjondra into the side of its massive head to good effect, as her earth titan ambled over and struck it from the other side with a massive, stony fist.  It was lucky for Thurloe that she did so, too, for it stabbed out at her rather than him for the simple reason she was now the closest foe; little did the spellsword realize, but these paleoskeletons weren't even undead - their petrified skeletons were being "piloted" by earth elementals in much the same manner as golems.  Alewyth grunted in pain at the stabbing of the dinosaur's pointed horns, but gave no further indication she even noticed the attack.Fortunately, that was the last attack the paleoskeleton would get in, for Thurloe rushed in with his bastard sword Spellslicer and, with the boost of strength from his torc of the titans, managed to deal the petrified beast enough damage that it collapsed into a pile of individual bones.  Then, smirking because he'd made the killing blow, he turned and preened for the benefit of Gnoxos and Mother Bones.  "That enough proof for you?" he challenged.Gnoxos just turned and left without saying a word.  "It would seem you are indeed under the protection of Akari," remarked Mother Bones, her voice betraying the great cost in pride each word dealt her.  "Welcome to the Forbidden Lands."  And with that, she too turned and left."Well, I'm glad we got that out of the way," interjected Pendlebrook.  "You won't win any popularity prizes from those two, but I don't think anyone here doubts your rightful place among us." - - -I was afraid this adventure - mini-adventure, really - wouldn't take up too much time depending on the combat strategies the players employed, so I had the next short adventure prepped and ready to go, and we went straight to it next.  (In hindsight, i probably should have given the four paleoskeletons maximum hit points and/or advanced them up a few Hit Dice to make them more of a challenge - oh well.) - - -T-shirt worn: My "The Walking Dead" T-shirt - I have several of these (different styles), and they'll be the most appropriate for the vast majority of the rest of this campaign.</blockquote>

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