Our story so far...

## Chapter 1:

### A joyous morning of humble beginnings

Our story begins on a joyous fall morning in the festival grounds of the Eastden neighborhood of Ashden in the 1207th year since the thaw of the Frostbit Coast. It was the first day of the annual fall harvest festival and the citizens of the Ash Isles not only had the festival to look forward to, but to a rare visit from King Iordanos XV to bless a newly built temple dedicated to the elven goddess of Wisdom and Trade, Diera.

Gathered amongst the merchants, locals, and performers were a few faces that would soon become familiar to our story. One, a well dressed half elf named Merkorios, rested his elbow on a balcony railing overlooking the festival grounds and the newly built temple standing across the street. His gaze dotted around the busy square, taking note of any potential threats that could befall his royal father. A row of children are led through the festival grounds by Sansarya Purebreath, an elven princess disguising herself as a mere school teacher. Despite traveling far from home, to distance herself from her past, she still strides through the busy crowd with an aura of royalty. The local druid Synkronos Gaia, a stout half tree / half goliath, was gently making his way through the crowd trying to find the epicenter of the mysterious tremors he had been sensing. Farmers beamed at him as he passed by their stalls, knowing that his careful tending of the Isle had helped lend them the bounty they brought to market that day. Those with a careful eye might have caught sight of Alexander Silverwald, a human dressed in worn down clothes marking his life tough life on the streets of Ashden. His eyes still bore the the cunning curiosity of his academic youth, an ember his street urchin life had not extinguished. Lastly, we have Maegor Arkos, a soldier in training worn down by the horrors of war but still held together by a sense of duty. He scanned the crowd for an opportunity to beseech the king, or anyone else of importance, to deliver the Marquis of West Gholon's message.

A horn echoed in the distance, somewhere further down the roped off road leading from the royal residence to the temple, noting the beginning of the King's March. After a few minutes, the procession to came into view, giving the crowd enough time to find places along the route to get a better view of their monarch. The honor guard entered the square, followed by King Iordanos XV, his wife and Lady of Ashden - Queen Alonash, and Innate Kirhya - the leader of the Dieraian faith. As the full procession came into view, a rumble shook the square. The honor guard paused and draws their weapons forming a defensive position around the king. A second rumble followed, leaving the once bumbling and boisterous square completely silent. The silence was broken by King Iordanos shouting for his Queen to get to safety. As she followed his warning, a significantly louder third rumble broke the silence further. With it, the ground below the king and his guards shattered, sending them into the depths below.

### Can our heroes rise to the occasion

While most of the crowd stands stunned, a royal bastard, a princess in disguise, a street urchin, a local druid, and a worn down initiate spring into action. Reaching the pit, one of them finds a rope and secures it to a nearby post, allowing them to descend into the dark unknown.

A melee ensues but Synkronos' quick thinking turns a skunk thrown at the party into an unlikely ally. Defeating the kobolds, the party scans the room and decides to follow the newly placed cart tracks further into the temple, hoping to find signs of the king and his entourage further inside.

Following the tracks, and dispatching a few enemies along the way, the party found themselves in a circular room baring frescos of a saint's life along the walls and a statue depicting the saint holding up a staff with a glass orb inside of a functional fountain.

South of this chamber, the party found a heavy stone door covered with the residue of numerous explosions. An elven inscription on the door read "Surround yourself with the enlightenment of Saint Aelfthryth and discover the secrets of her journey". After some trial and error, the party discovered that passing light through the orb illuminated numbers on each of the walls. This information allowed them to solve the puzzle to open the secret chamber. Due to their reliance on dark vision, the kobolds were unable to solve this puzzle themselves, instead resorting to brute force via gunpowder.

Opening the secret door, the party discovered a round chamber containing a sarcophagus wrapped with vines. The room also contained a floating deep purple orb, which emanated bird songs and flooded the room with a soft orange light. Hearing the sound of bird songs emanating from the orb, Sansarya and Synkronos approached it. As they did, the party was pulled into a dark endless foreign landscape slightly illuminated by a purple sunset like horizon encircling the entire plane. A lava lamp like bubble emerged from the surface and takes the form of an eight eyed crow. The interior of the bird's wings is made up of spider webs, which appear to be holding back an endless abyss. The crow approached the party and folded the top of its beak back as if casting off a hood, revealing a woman clad in robes made both from only silk and only from foliage at any given moment. Turning to the party, the goddess Deira spoke, "Behold the Eye of Drest, that protected my kin. May it now protect you, for I fear that those who wish to swallow the earth are once again awake. Deal with them my children and you shall be rewarded." Left of kilter and aghast by the divine being before them, the party found themselves drifting back towards the tomb they were formerly in before any could mutter a thought or a question.

Finding themselves on the floor of the chamber, the party regathered their senses and began looking for the king and his entourage once more. Once again following the mining tracks the kobolds installed, the party found a room that once served as the temple's eating chambers but now functioned as the kobold's gunpowder storage chamber. Using his keen senses, Alexander detected a muffled voice coming from the other side of the western wall. Opening the trap door, the party found the wounded king and his remaining guards bound in the pantry.

A medium sized bearded demon squatted on the table above her, chewing on her arm. Ignoring the party, he continued to probe the corpse for answers. Enraged by the demon's actions, the party attacked. With the demon weakened, Alexander went for a killing blow. His short sword hit the mark but instead of falling, the demon vanished in a poof of smoke, departing with a blood curdling laugh.

### The party stands before the privy council

Upon exiting the subterranean temple, the party was immediately escorted by guards before the privy council led by Merkorios' step mother, Queen Alonosh (due to the king's injuries). In attendance were Admiral Bloes, General Gorok, Ambassador Hadid Al Zi, Lord Braden Birch, and Tome-Master Gregory. While the general was asleep and the ambassador was largely uninterested in the proceedings, Birch talked the Queen's ear off about potential measures and Admiral Bloes paced the floor back and forth. Although the queen commanded the party to relay what they discovered, the party chose to keep their cards close to their chest, only revealing a part of their encounter.

Although the young prince wanted to set off in haste, Lord Birch counseled the group to spend the night at his estate while he gathered the necessary provisions for their travel.

## Chapter 2:

### The road to the Red Charger Lodge

Upon waking at the Birch Row Manor, the Lord's staff chaperoned the party to the dining chambers for breakfast. At breakfast, Lord Birch revealed to Sansarya that he had traveled with a countrymen of hers, Elmair Sateen, and in doing so also passed on his former companion's silver short sword over to her. He thanked Synkronos for his help with local agrarian matters, told Alexander that he was familiar with his father's work, and acknowledged Maegor's on his chivalry.

An hour and a half into the extraordinary breakfast, the footman entered the hall. He approaches the table and announced to Lord Birch that the carriage has arrived and all arrangements had been made. The footman turned and began to walk out. As he reaches the door, the party heard him release a loud “oof” as he staggered straight into the broad chest of what looks to be a grizzled veteran. The man entering announced “Jottenheim Sol, at your service”.

Lord Birch clasped his hands “Good, our orc slayer is here. You five have been capable thus far, but it never hurts to have an extra man on the job. Jottenheim was instrumental in my past campaigns against orc invasions. You should be able to make it to the Red Chargers Lodge by sundown. Angharad is particular about her patrons and most of her rooms are under reservations for use by one noble family or another. I have sent word to her to have my suite ready and available for Merkorios and company. The Inn will be on the other side of the Valiant Bridge, about six hours out from the crossing.”

The party was escorted outside, where they found an exquisite burgundy carriage fit for royalty led by two white horses. After saying their goodbyes, they set off east towards the Valiant Bridge. Along the way, the party passed a number of mysterious monks, shrouded in simple black robes chanting in dwarven, making their way to Ashden.

Reaching the edges of the River Poyle, the party was awestruck by the stone bridge erected to celebrate the victory won their against the giants by Ash and his elven allies. Statues on the left side of the bridge depicted commanders leading Ash's outriders and the marble statues on the left depicted key commanders leading Rho's forces. A guard booth was set up on the bridge after the prior day's mishaps. However, the soldiers recognized the wagon baring the royal seal and motioned for the party to cut ahead of the traffic bottlenecked in front of them. After an hour of travel on the Northern March, the party encountered an overturned wagon blocking the road accompanied by a group of Kordian monks. Keenly noticing that the wagon's horses were absent and that the pacifist monks had hidden weapons, the party was quick to deduce that this was an ambush. The bandit's leader, a hairy man with baggy eyes, transformed before the party's eyes into a were-raccoon. He, and his band of bandits, were no match for the party, who quickly dispatched the entire ambush. Searching the bodies, they discovered a note from a mysterious "Z", detailing a conspiracy.

My contacts in Ashden have notified me that the party in possession of the relic will be traveling down the Northern March today. Although our original agreement stands, I must modify the terms. It seems that the pesky Birch has added one of his cohorts to their retinue and I would like our deal to encompass him as well. I believe that an extra 100gb is more than fair compensation for this adjustment. As I stated before, it is of the utmost importance that you capture the Purebreath prodigy and Iordanos’ bastard and secure the orb our master requires. Once you have the orb and the prisoners, bring all three to me at the Red Chargers Lodge at the ambassador’s suite.
Z
PS. I don’t know why I keep having to tell you this, but destroy the note after reading. This job can not be traced back to me and my associates.

The party also found a map of the surrounding area and some gold.

### The lodge

Despite the thick forest foliage around them, the party noticed a red glow on the horizon. As the tree line opened up, those driving the carriage began to make out parts of the Red Chargers Lodge above on the hilltop.

The building was not exactly the sort of inn they were expecting - it resembled more of an ancient temple rather than a hunters lodge. The main central portion of the building was cylindrical. A large brass dome rested on top of it - roughly 300 feet across and maybe six stories at its highest point. Eight smaller brass domes rested atop tower like sections, evenly spread around the central cylinder. The walls of the lodge were paved with red clay. A wooden palisade surrounded the building with two guard towers at the front gate and four more spread evenly across the walls. Each guard tower was manned by a single guard who had the head of a hippo atop a humanoid body. Each guard was dressed in a similar fashion: a short baby blue cloth coat with golden pads with drapes hanging off their shoulders, a puffy white shirt underneath, a blood red sash across their side, and white pants. Each guard carried an odd wooden and metal club contraption, carried at their side, with what looks to be an opening sticking up and away from them. Red banners, depicting Angharad’s family crest - a hand of three playing cards, each with a spade at the center, hung from the walls of the lodge.

As the party approached the gate, a guard on the ground - who to their surprise did not have a hippo head - approached. The man was a dwarf in his early adult years. His long red hair and beard were woven into thick braids. He wore a bulky fur coat that almost hid the fine chest plate underneath. Leaning on his right hand on the top of an axe, with the stone handle digging into the ground, the man said: “I am Logan Hillflower, fourth son of Angharad Hillflower. How may I and the Red Chargers Lodge…. No, no, that's not quite it… Sorry, How may the Red Chargers Lodge and I be of service to you.”

The party informed Logan of their reservations and he led them through the gate and down the path to the front of the lodge to the two two 10 ft. tall hard maple doors. The dwarf tapped his axe on a tile three times and the party heard the creaking of chains as the doors opened outwards.

The doors opened into a very large cylindrical room at the center of the lodge. The ceiling, which at the peak of the dome was roughly 60 feet high, was adorned with old battered war banners - some which they recognized and some which look completely foreign - hanging at various heights. Four wrought iron staircases - two leading to a set of rafters that housed the second floor’s side rooms and two leading to a set of rafters for the third floor’s side rooms - sat equidistantly from each other on the outer edge of the room. The outer ring also contained a collection of booths and fireplaces. The mantle of each fireplace was adorned with a military portrait. Flanking the fireplaces or resting above doorways in a somewhat militaristic organized fashion were pristine yet aged and worn swords and pikes. The center of the room housed a large circular bar with a column shelf at its center, coupled with several contraptions that lower and raise trays to and from the basement kitchen.

At the center of the arc of the bar facing the doorway was an older dwarven woman wearing a blue shirt with puffy white sleeves which had ties at the elbows. Her mostly white hair, which still showed some traces of a hue similar to her son’s red hair, hung to her side. Her handless left arm, wrapped in a clean white bandage, rested on the mahogany bar as she shuffled a deck of cards single handedly, all the while studying the party up and down with the utmost interest. The party took up seats at the bar, introducing themselves and noting their benefactor to the older dwarven woman. They discovered that, Angharad, was the owner of the establishment after her foremother won the fortress in a card game with Gol and Ash after the war. She was also an old flame of Braden Birch. After grabbing their drinks, the party further surveyed the establishment.

Despite its imposingly large demeanor, the common area only had a few hot spots of activity. A giff - one of the hippo looking guards outside - sat on a stool while playing an odd folding contraption with buttons while drunkenly bellowing out an old war tune. His comrades, also in uniform, were playing cards at a nearby table. Most of the other guests were random nobles from an assortment of notable houses from Ol Gholon to Colharbor.

#### The Yuan-Ti in the back

The party did catch a familiar face in the far back corner of the bar. In one of the booths, they made out the face of the Nimth Yuan-Ti ambassador from the prior night's council meeting - Hadid Al Zi. He however was too preoccupied in a conversation with a large individual, sitting with his back to you. Maegor instantly recognized the Beaconian cape adorning the man’s back. As Maegor made his way towards the table to greet his fellow comrade, Sansarya, Synkronos, and Merkorios realized that the mysterious "Z" was likely the ambassador from Nimth.

Maegor approached the large man adorned in silver Beacon chainmail coupled with the signature Royal blue cape bearing the lighthouse sigil of the knightly order embroidered on gold. Picking up on the sound of armor approaching him, the gruff man instantly made eye contact with the paladin and his mouth formed into a cruel scowl. He set his cigar down on the table and presses his right hand into the edge of the booth to push himself up and barked: “Puppy!”

Maegor instantly recognize the man as his former sadistic drill master, Cladius Briggs.

The ambassador replied: “As always, your methods are too sloppy. You take too much pride in cruelty and forget the importance of our master’s work." Looking towards the young paladin, he continued: "Now!, shoe away vermin. We have no business with you pleebs.” The ambassador whisked his hand and motioned for his associate to sit back down. The drill master remained standing, rolling his hand along the grip of his flail, baiting the his former pupil into action. “Well puppy… cat got your tongue again? I see that you already found a replacement to hang onto now that the Renora girl is gone. Tsk tsk, that was a shame. I had such high hopes for that one, but alas, she had to go and try to warn the colonel.”

By now, Jottenheim and Alexander had noticed the commotion and joined to reinforce their friend. Although Briggs initially held his ground, the ambassador beckoned him to let cooler heads prevail and the party let them pass as they left their booth for their room. After a round of drinks, most of the group chose to do the same, leaving for the second floor accommodations in Lord Birch's name.

#### A restless night

Deep in slumber, Maegor found himself once again wandering the familiar hallways belonging to his former home, Beacon. He found himself surrounded by classmates who drifted by him like a schools of fish. He reached out to towards them, aching to return to that happy past. Yet, as he drew closer, he suddenly found himself completely alone in the spartan hallway. Frantically, he turned a corner, and with a deep sigh of relief he saw his peers again. That respite was brief however. A moment later, Maegor heard that agonizing noise. As before, it started with a soft distant chipping sound that gradually built to pincers sheering stone. He followed the noise deep into the library. As he drew near the wall, he froze as the bricks began to crumble, revealing a large mantis like crustacean.

### The journey to Ríc Hathaoir

The party was awoken the next morning by a booming thunderstorm. They met in the hall for breakfast, at which point Sansarya relayed the the events from the prior night. After some discussion of possible trying to chase down the ambassador and his bodyguard, the party decided to leave with haste. Setting off, they ran into some trouble navigating the road, but quickly got the hang of it after digging a wheel out of the mud.

About a mile out from Ríc Hathaoir, the trees opened up to a field of tents. A few at first, then more, and more. The scale of the tent city, at first, made it look like a military encampment. Did Nimth send reinforcements? Windskeep? The sight of a larger orange striped one suggested maybe foreigners from Coimeád Chósta. A red striped tent, followed by a blue one, then another orange, emerge soon after. Mercenary companies from the east weren't even this disorganized.

As the carriage approached the first set of tents, a clearer view of the multitude of motley tents stretching all the way back to a hamlet, almost small enough to be swallowed by the sea of colors, engulfed the party's view. Patches of structure began to emerge in this chaotic favela. Fancier fur covered yurts crowded into pockets close to the hamlet. Tents bearing merchant colors lined the road leading into Ric Halthaor. The ones closest to the edge of town were in the worst shape. Some were makeshift sheets and broom handles constructions. Others were quickly sewn together tarps made up of a myriad of spare fabrics.

Despite conditions, this district was buzzing with life. A battalion of Gholontian Guards, identified by their polished chain shirts, blue and white checkered kite shields, and well made longswords fastened at the hip, patrolled the edges of the settlement, ensuring that the inhabitants were safe from potential outside threats. A gang of kids had organized themselves into a game of orcs and soldiers. One of the more charismatic and boisterous ones proclaimed himself to be Commander Downta, the savior of Ol Gholon. He and his cohort valiantly "galloped" into a fray of orcs. However, a lucky blow from a bigger kid left the "Commander" playing dead. The party heard one of his "knights" call out “Oh no, Lord Downta has fallen” as two other knights carried the "injured commander" away. The rest of the cohort valiantly held the orcs at bay as their leader was rescued.

As the party traveled deeper into the tent city and closer to the town along whose edge it was stationed, they saw more affluent and colorful tents belonging to merchant shops lining the road. Most sold horses out of makeshift stables, furs, wool, or articles of clothing. Unlike the poorer district the party had just passed through, this area was predominantly guarded by private security.

Two shops caught the parties eye. The first was a large cream tent decorated with swirled pink and orange stripes. The sign on it read: Ziqasain The Bountiful's Shop of Extra-Worldly Wonders!. Sansarya, Jottenheim, and Synkronos decided to investigate this shop. Inside, they found a Djinn with a jovial demeaner selling a number of magical items. Jottenheim procured a horn of alarm while Synkronos was drawn to a candle that was immune to the effects of water.

Meanwhile, Maegor and Alexander investigated a large complex of tents forming a beer garden. There they met the proprietor, Cedrik Umpos, who sold the pair two pints of cider each. Merkorios meanwhile set off on his own to procure warmer clothes for the trip north. Regrouping after their shopping spree, the party relayed what they had learned to each other as they continued onwards to Ric Hathaoir.

On the way to the city, they passed a number of fur yurts belonging to the wealthier inhabitants of Ol Gholon. Inhabitants here were preoccupied with preparing for battle, with most of them likely serving in a retired reserve role. Children residing in this district were preoccupied with military drills, while those too old to serve in a combat role were working on producing tents for the poorer residents along with other home front functions.

#### Ric Hathaoir

Arriving at Ric Hathaoir proper, the party was thrown back at how small the hamlet was compared to the tent city, with the actual town center only having two or so dozen buildings. A crowd was gathered at the village square, around a large fountain. The inner part of the fountain depicted a halfling knight standing over a swooning beauty while the outer circle depicted menacing bandits. Somewhat amused by the ostentatiousness, Merkerios relayed the tale of how Sir Bandobras Bandawax was given the title to the dilapidated Ric Hathaoir after he, as the sole surviving member of his party, rescued a princess.

In front of the fountain was a middle aged halfling dressed in fine silk, standing on a barrel. Initially out of earshot to catch what he was saying, the party saw the man whip himself into a passionate frenzy. His face occasionally shifted from a pink shade to a deep purple, at which point his arms seemed to wave in a much more animated fashion.

As they approached, the party began to pick up on his tantrum directed at what looked to be members of the tent city:

“Yes, Yes, I understand that you have YOUR concerns. However, I am the governor of Ric Hathaoir and therefore MY responsibility is to my subjects ONLY. We Bandawax’s have worked tirelessly to restore this land to a state that honors our beloved king. And as a FAVORED subject of our grand King King Iordanos XV, I must beseech you to leave MY lands at once and not besmirch them with your rabble. If you do not, I will contact the crown at ONCE and demand for your removal. It is bad enough that you brought that smut cider into my village but now I must also deal with thieves. No, this ends tonight!”

As the halfling finished, a servant awkwardly approached him to help him off the barrel. The halfling, still red in his face, shoved him off… pondered the height of the barrel, only to motions the servant back to help him down. The crowd began to disperse while discussing the event that had just transpired. Making his way quickly through the crowd, Merkorios caught up to the pompous ass and dressed him down in public on matters of the crown. The sniveling halfling quickly bent the knee to the royal emissary and offered his estate. The party grabbed a few drinks at the near by Bandawax Brewery, finding the mead there to be significantly worse than the drinks Maegor and Alexander enjoyed at the beer hall in the tent city. Before settling in, the party grabbed a seat to catch the opening night of “The Bastard and the Ambassador, A Most Royal Fiasco and a Comedy of Errors” at a traveling theater that was set up within the town square only to realize that the events were a political parody of their encounter at the Red Chargers Lodge. Before the play reached its conclusion, a couple of goblin bandits stole a baby from an attendant and a sandbag from the stage, causing the screen to collapse onto the actors.

The party retreated to the luxurious accommodations in the guest wing of the Bandawax estate. While everyone was deep in slumber, Synkronos went to the window to get a temporary respite from the urban environment he was unaccustomed to. His day dream was however interrupted by a mysterious knock at the window.

"Dear old friend Synkronos, I beseech you to come to my grove at Walnut Hill on the morrow. An urgent matter concerns our order and I know not many more capable than you for handling it."
Signed,
The Squirrel King
Synkronos placed the Eye of Drest next to Sansarya and climbed out of the window. He transformed into a horse, leaving quietly as not to wake his companions.

The next morning, the party discovered that Synkronos was missing. Sansarya found the orb and knew that the druid had urgent matters to attend to, for that would be the only reason for him to leave the orb in her care and take off without notice. Before the party had a chance to process Sansarya's absence, they heard a knock at the door. Upon opening the guest entrance, they found a dwarven smith from the east, named Sylfir Rumnaheim, requesting an audience with the party. He offered his services as a fighter to the party in exchange for passage north.

The party gathered additional supplies, with Merkorios retrieving the clothes he ordered, Sansarya and Alexander searching for potions, and the rest of the party procuring a tent to use for lodging in exchange for a generous donation to the poor of Ol Gholon.

### The road north

On the way north, the party discovered a battlefield being pillaged by goblins. Examining the field, Alexander observed that the battle encompassed a regiment from Ol Gholon facing off against an orc raiding party. A mysterious shield lying amongst the dead also caught his attention. The party moved to engage with the goblins, a mantis like crustacean, one which Maegor immediately recognized as a creature that the orcs used to dig into Beacon, emerged and engaged both the party and the goblins. Before succumbing to the crustacean, the last goblin fired off a flair. The party tried to gather up as much loot as possible, including a chest containing one thousand gold pieces and the mysterious shield. However, as they began to prepare to set off again, they heard the trees around them shake accompanied by the sound of massive thundering footprints. In the nick of time, the party managed to hide the wagon while Merkorios distracted the Ogre Chain Brute with dazzling lights leading it away from their location. Considering the coast to be clear, they set off once again on the road north.

#### Samuel Sycamore, the squirrel king of Walnut Hill

Synkronos made quick pace in his horse form while also drawing little attention to himself. After a few hours, he reach the dense walnut forest to the north east of Ric Hathaoir. Looking around, he sense that all life in this forest gravitated towards a central point. Squirrels raced to and from a central hub, moving collected nuts in and coming back empty handed. The trees themselves bent inwards towards it as well. Looking up at the sky, or the lack of one due to the thick canopy, he noticed that an intricate basket like weave had been woven into the top of the trees. It stretched endlessly throughout the forest. He saw a squirrel here and there repairing it.

Approaching the center, life appeared to get busier and busier. Moving inwards, Synkronos began to notice more and more squirrels. Some red, some grey, some albino. They raced alongside him eagerly, as if to lead the way. After walking another thirty or so feet, he stood before a mound of walnut maybe 10 feet high. A portly dwarf with red untamed hair, dressed in a soft grey bathrobe, sat atop the mound as a lord would sit on a throne. He gave you a jovial smile and slapped his plump belly, scattering a few walnuts down the mound. A few squirrels quickly attend to them, mildly annoyed with his carelessness.

The dwarf bellowed: "Synkronos, my good dear friend, I'm so glad that you made it to my humble abode." He gave off a loud warm chuckle after speaking, yet after a brief moment his expression turned stern and concerning.

Synkronos agreed to help the squirrel king, promising to set off north west to Unova as soon as possible. In return, the old dwarven druid offered Synkronos the service of a loyal albino squirrel named Cracker. He then transformed into a tiger and set off to catch up to the rest of his party.

#### A shadow from the past

As evening set, the party found themselves suddenly enveloped in absolute darkness. At first, the party attempted to light a torch and utilize Maegor's light generating ability, however, the torch failed to produce light and Maegor's magic was snuffed out. Unable to safely steer the carriage, Jottenheim reined the horses to a stop. Stumbling out of their carriage, the party found themselves surrounded by snarling wolf-like creatures with furless and skinless faces. Furthermore, their luck began to run out further as yellow and brown feathered arrows rained down on their exposed position. Between the worgs and the colors of the arrows, Sansarya recognized that they were under attack by none other than Narcipious, a dreaded noble elf from her Marinnian homeland.

The party fended off the worgs while avoiding the occasional barrage of arrows. One of the worgs did manage to sink his teeth into Sansarya, knocking her unconscious. Jottenheim, remembering that his companion had eagerly sought out potions in Ric Hathaor, rummaged through her bag to find one and poured its contents down her throat, springing the spellcaster back to life. Once again in the land of the living, Sansarya trudged into the forest to track down the enemies from her past, believing it to be her responsibility to deal with it. She let loose a dragon's breath spell, carving a scorched earth trail that left no room for enemies to hide.

Eventually, she discovered a frail elven figure, wearing a white ivory mask carved to resemble tree bark, standing atop what appeared to be the ruins of a former druidic mound. Through the mask, she could only make out dull, almost dead-like, yellow eyes peering through it. Draped in a silver cloak that looked both metallic and resembles foliage - clearly a work of elven craftsmanship, his right hand rested upon a mahogany quarter staff stabbed into the earth next to him while his right held a small crossbow. An amulet, containing a glowing eye, hung from his frail neck. Trees flanked the mound on all sides. Among the trees, Sansarya made out the familiar growls and snorts of additional worgs. As she approached, the elf chanted “Lady of Reclamation, lend me your strength”. With those words, he slammed his hand upon the staff, digging it a bit further into the soft dirt mound. The trees around Sansarya began to move.

The party did not heed the princess's warning and followed closely behind her. As the worgs moved in to attack Sansarya and the rest of the party, Merkorios - with some quick thinking - conjured an illusionary ball and threw it away from the party, drawing the beasts away from the encounter. Meanwhile the trees lashed out at the party, striking them in the back and leaving large gashes. As they did, the orb - the Eye of Drest - began to hum in Sansarya's pocket. She pulled the orb out, reached for the magic inside, and released a burst of energy that revealed the trees to be an illusion disguising a drab, featureless, hairless humanoid shadowfell revenant, with long sharp nails, under elf's control. With the orb's and a now returned Synkronos' help, the party was able to defeat the revenant. In the thick of combat, Alexander managed to fire an arrow that splintered the mask worn by the elven illusionist, piercing his skull. The now mask-less elf was revealed to be none other than Lord Collingsley, the head of an exiled family from Marinnia. He directed his last words at Sansarya.

“We must submit to him, our lord of madness in dreams. His waters will swallow us whole or they will baptize us with rebirth. Bring him the orb and maybe he will still spare us despite your childish transgressions!”

The party looted the elf's body for his amulet and his cape and set back down the hill to the road where they abandoned their wagon. They were surprised to find the wagon's exquisite cushioning torn apart, their chest of a thousand gold pieces emptied on the ground, and their horses turned to worg food. As they attempted to refill the chest with the coins, the noticed that the coins now wreaked of a foul odor. Synkronos, volunteering his services, turned into a horse in order to help get the wagon to safety.

#### The doomed farm

Looking for shelter to rest and recover from their day of combat, the party found a farm not too far from where they encountered Lord Colingsley. The farm looked to be abandoned aside several starving horses and oxen locked in the stables. Alexander hopped out of the carriage and began investigating the surroundings. He found a trail of blood leading into the farmhouse and beckoned Maegor to follow him. The two entered the farmhouse and found that the blood trail lead down to the seller. There, they found the body of a farmer, killed by a pitchfork and then dragged down below. They also found two note on his table which read:

I am saddened to learn of the troubles you wrote of in your last letter. Life on papa’s turnip farm was always tough when we were growing up. The string of recent thefts can’t make it any easier. The admiral has always been fair though and I have heard that his adopted son takes much after him. Maybe Lord Downta will ease up on taxes after hearing your plea.
We have had no such luck with the abbot here in Tula. Fredrick pleaded with him for leniency when the blight struck our farm’s crops but Abbott Ashbury would not budge. He spoke of fairness and sighted verses from the Songs of Kord to illustrate the importance of self sufficiency, told us this would only strengthen us. We know well enough that his platitudes come from his sniveling fear of the Iron Count.
Fredrick took things upon himself. I love the man but his boorish resolve gets the best of him far too often. You remember the tales Nan used to tell us - of the crone Annis? Well, the boar apparently never forgot them either. He took it upon himself to go see her in the woods. She somehow knew of Timmy’s sickness - Fredrick swore he didn’t tell her. Well, she said if we brought Timmy to her, she could cure the blight.
We fought the whole night. Fredrick finally said enough was enough and that I was not going to change his mind. We had two other mouths to feed and no way to help the boy. He said he saw other children there with the crone. They apparently looked healthy - I still don’t know if he lied to make me feel less uneasy about all of this - and that the hag had a better chance of making him well. He left with the boy in the morning and came back with a bag of dust in the evening. I spent the night mocking him. How could a man trade his son for a bag of dust.
He rose at dawn and sprinkled it the next day over the rotted cabbage patch. I could not believe my eyes! The crop healed itself before our eyes.
I know Nan warned us of her, but maybe she was wrong. Maybe the old woman in the woods can solve your problems too. Remember what she said about the bone charms. Look for them in the trees and they will lead the way. That is how Fredrick found her.
Your sister,
Catherine

And in the fields place thee
Looters they will see
From their glare, they will flee

The mention of scarecrows perked their attention, as the farm had a number of them stationed outside in the fields. The two quickly rushed out to warn the others, however they were to late. Three of the scarecrows in the fields began to attack and a number of blights emerged from the surrounding shrubbery to join in. Maegor proved to be a menace to both animated and non-animated scarecrows (to be honest, it was mostly the later) while the rest of the party used magic and torches to light their enemies on fire. Having cleared the farm of any threats, the party decided to rest inside the murder scene farmhouse. The next morning, Synkronos had a conversation with the malnutrious horses, gaining their trust and service for the remaining trip to Ol Gholon.

## Chapter 3

### Ol Gholon

At about three miles out, the 450 ft tall stone spire known as Ghol's Throne began emerging on the horizon. Merkorios excitedly pointed out that this was where they were going, that the original settlers who found the ruins first settled upon the perch and as the city grew, moved down to the area now known as the City Core, and that the city core had some of the best clothing shops in all of Ior. As the walls came into view, he told them of how scholars from Ior and even Rho were baffled by their seamless construction - how the entire wall and all of its guard towers appeared to formed or grown, for there were no carver markings, from a single stone feature. The bard however went silent as he and the rest of the party noticed the battle mounds of corpses coming into view. Alexander- keenly observing his surroundings - noticed a slight shuffle in a mound or two. As he began to relay the information to the rest of the party, he noticed a few of their eyes drawn away from the mounds and the road but instead towards multiple flares rising from Ghol's Throne. When the flares reached their apex, they burst into an explosion of falling lights. Drawn to that point in the sky, the party began to see the clouds immediately there begin to shift and form into letters. They read:

Now far more alert to the mounds around them, which now began to shift as orcs dug themselves out from the hiding spots, the group urged the weary horses they found at the farm to full haste towards the gates of Ol Gholon. Passing through the gates, they breathed a short sigh of relief, followed by an immediate panic as the portcullis shut behind them. Their carriage going at full speed, brought them out of the gate house and into the city before any of them could react. They were greeted by war drums accompanied by a soft chant building to a loud crescendo, accompanied by stomps, of "Utred, Utred, Utred!".

Sylfir looked towards those in the wagon with him and said, "Fuck!". And it was "Fuck" indeed as orcs began leaping of the rooftops onto the top of the carriage. Sansarya acted quickly, pulling herself out of the carriage and flying into the air with her tempestuous magic, hurling a chaos bolt at an orc before he could shore up his footing. Seeing his brethren topple off the carriage, one of the orcs dug his spear into the top of the wagon for grip. Another engaged Jottenheim in a wrestling match for the reins. Alexander, sitting next to Jottenheim, lashed out at the orc with his dagger doing his best not to stab their driver. Meanwhile, Maegor and Sylfir used the spear driven into the carriage to triangulate the position of the orc on top to best direct their blind attacks at him, forcing him off the carriage. Jottenheim managed to free himself of the orc attacking him just in time to see a barricade made of furniture and debris blocking their path. Alexander spotted the weak point in the makeshift wall ahead and called for Jottenheim to aim the carriage at that spot while Synkronos and Sansarya fired a barrage of flame blasts at it. The carriage punched through what was left of the wreckage, still somehow holding it together.

As the horses rounded the corner, the bridge from the City Core to Ghol's Throne came into view along with the two or so dozen Gholian soldiers holding the line against orcs trying to push their way through. A number of Gholian archers, perched along the hillside road leading up to Old Town, were positioned to provide cover fire. A single commander, dressed in shining silver chainmail, oversaw the entire defensive effort. She waved to the party to get their attention and then shouted, “We can't hold them much longer, hurry your asses over here”.

Drawing closer to the gate house, the party noticed why she was so concerned, for a mass or charging orcs from a road that forked left came into view. Unlike the prior orcs, and those attacking the gatehouse, this band was covered in massive boils that caused some, but not all, of their appendages to inflame to twice their normal size. The first few were picked off by the wooden steaks fired from scorpions perched on the walls of Ghol's Throne, causing the boils to explode into a putrid green mist. One however broke through and charged at the wagon. Not wanting to see what the effects of the mist were, the party resorted to every ranged exploit in their pocket to pick the charging orc off before he could reach their wagon. The orc burst like his other brethren, but the party by now was able to reach the bridge, where the Gholian soldiers managed to force the orcs back long enough to form a point of entry. With the carriage safely in the gate house, the guards closed off the gates. The commander took off her blue plumed Lykovo styled helm, revealing a dark haired blue eyed woman who Merkorios instantly recognized. She introduced herself as “Lady Isabella Bride, commander of the Last Battalion of Ol Gholon". Having jumped onto her horse, she requested that she ride along as an escort.

#### Ghol's Throne

Reaching the flat top of the spire, the party was met with cheers from a crowd of guards and other Gholian citizens who had gathered to celebrate their heroic race through the city. Sansarya and Merkorios instantly recognized one of the members in the crowd - an elven wizard dressed in silver and green - as Elmair Sateen, the Head Abjurer of Ol Gholon. He instantly recognized Sansarya as the party emerged from the carriage and took to one knee, expending a deep bow as befit Marrinnian custom. “Your excellence, I was not expecting you here. I am glad that you and your party headed my message though!” The soldiers gathered around stood in an awkward silence for a moment and then extend the same courtesy of bowing, with much uncertainty of whether it was required or not. Sansarya, noticing the awkwardness in the air, motioned for them to rise so that she could engage with Elmair one on one. Catching up, she learned that her compatriot had taken up the position of Head Mage in Gholon after settling down in the city to study the strange properties the ancient ruins, noting that his studio is always open if she was interested in learning more about his work.

Merkorios, in the meantime, pulled Lady Bride aside to inquire where he could find Commander Downta. The commander informed him that the Marquis was at the Duke's Perch. Downtas father's estate had recently been converted from a ducal residency into a sick ward managed by the Soul Forger Order and the Marquis was there as a patient. After Merkorios raced off, the commander turned to the rest of the party, “Gents, you have made a hero’s entrance. Come, you must join us for our Hour of Power.”

She escorted them to her villa and into a large drinking hall occupied by a number of men and women from her regiment. The Lady took the seat of honor and the party found a table next to a muscular dwarf who introduced himself as Flint Softbottom. The party made themselves comfortable and took the opportunity to get acquainted with the local smith as other soldiers filtered into the room and servers passed out steins of beer. The drinking began shortly thereafter. To everyone's surprise, a number of local and visiting (Sylfir and Jottenheim) favorites fell within the earlier rounds. The contest went significantly longer than anyone expected with Alexander, Flint, and a surprising dark horse contender, Sansarya refusing to quit. With only the three of them standing, the contestants cheersed their glasses, downed the excellent dwarven brown in unison, and collapsed onto the table and into a deep slumber, only to wake up the next morning with a large pile of gold sitting between the three of them and a massive headache to contend with. In the meantime, Merkorios tracked down Downta's room and had a heartfelt reunion. Downta pleaded the King's soon to look after the people of Gholon, and Merkorios promised his love that he would as if they were his own charge. He begged for his love to stay strong and promised him that he would find a way to cure him and everyone else. As Downta grew weak, exhausting his energy for the day, the Mistress of the Order requested that he be given time to rest. Merkorios cast cure wounds on his friend and saw the spell give Downta some temporary relief. With that, he left the makeshift hospital to rejoin the rest of the party at the rooms Lady Bride set aside for them (though whether the rest of the party made it back to said rooms remained a mystery).

#### Rumors and Planning

Having woken up in the later part of the morning, the group set off in different directions. Maegor and Jottenheim set off in search of Lady Bride's office to get a better sense of the lay of the land. With a bit of trouble, the two found the city guard garrison and were able to locate the commander's office inside after checking in with the guards. They found the office neatly arranged, papers stacked in even piles and a hanging shelf to the side contains seven Northern Brand Whiskey bottles. Although empty of their original content, the bottles instead each contained a note. A date had been written on each bottle, with the bottles then having been arranged in chronological order on the shelf. The earliest date was 10 days ago and the latest was from this past morning. Isabella greeted the two and asked for them to sit in the chairs facing her desk.

* The leader of the orc band, Utred, had fortified himself and the bulk of his forces in Ghol’s Garden. The position has been too difficult to take. His forces roughly number two to three dozen.
* From “interviews”, Lady Bride's forces learned that Chief Utred is petty King to an orc named Penda the Wise. Penda is believed to be stationed at Beacon with the majority of the orc army. They are unsure of why he is holding this force back at this time. An eastern raiding force is being led by another petty king, Boru the Bald.
* She suspects that Utred was able to infiltrate the city quickly using the bug-like creatures the orcs employ to dig under the walls of the garden.
* They spotted bat riders traveling south to the garden and then back north. She suspects that this is how Utred’s forces communicate with the main army.
* Utred has moved a detachment of his army into the City Core. They have taken up manning the walls. However, the detachment seems to be centered at the Soul Forgers Hospice. She does not know why they are so focused on the hospice. Troops are also used to patrol the city.
* The enemy is aware of her evacuation measures and had deployed a large detachment to intercept her cavalry heading back from Ríc Hathaoir.
* She has seen pox marked orcs heading to the soul forger hospice. This happens daily. She has kept track of the number of transfers each day. They are increasing at a steady pace.

Having gotten a better understanding of the situation, the two went over to the Pewter Estate to meet up Sylfir, who was then using Flint's makeshift forge to upgrade his warhammer. Seeing the additional spikes on the warhammer, Jottenheim was inspired to make modifications of his own and inquired if Sylfir could add spikes to his armor. Flint had the servants bring out beer while the fellow smith worked and the four of them enjoyed a few pints under the heat of the forge.

Meanwhile, Sansarya and Synkronos headed off the the Petrov-Pewter Academy. They found the academy on a man made island located in the Old Town Aquifer in the eastern part of the perch. The building was a stout 3 story yellow lime stone structure with two rectangular wings sitting attached to a narrow central structure with gable end roof. The wings had neogothic pavilion roofs with arched windows. The first floor windows mirrored the design of these windows but ran the full length of the floor. Vines covered the building. A large red double door marked the entrance to the academy and was flanked by statues of sphinxes on either side.

Upon entering, They found a grey haired female gnome in pink and blue robes, named Alymis Alamea, sitting at a round wooden reception desk. Two staircases flanked her, ascending from either side of her desk, leading up to a central point behind her. Sansarya asked where she could find Elmair, and the gnome quietly points to a door behind the left staircase. Synkronos meanwhile inquired about magic item identification. Alymis was more than happy to fulfill the request (for 50 gold per item - a stipend used to support the academy) and pulled out a giant tuning fork. She touched each item with the fork, listened to the vibrations, and then relayed the properties of each to the druid and sorceress.

Afterwards, the two headed to Elmair's office on the first floor of the northern wing. The office was arranged eclectically, with bookshelves randomly spaced around the walls and work stations arranged throughout the large space. Some tables had scrolls scattered across the surface, others had chemical apparatuses burning away liquids or dripping one solution into another. A few tables had what appears to be makeshift inventions in various stages of design. Elmair greeted the pair, and after a brief chat, Sansarya mentioned that she was here to take him up on his offer of lessons. The mage motioned to a large standing mirror in the corner of the room, requesting his guests to step through it. Sansarya obliged and Synkronos followed.

They found themselves atop a large flat white and red polka dotted mushroom top, standing about 240 feet off the ground over a lake surrounded by blue and purple mountains. Walking on the 100 foot diameter space, the pair found that the surface had a soft spring bounce to it. Sansarya asked why Elmair brought them there and the mage told them it was a test space he created in a pocket plane in the Feywild. He demonstrated the mushrooms absorption properties by having Synkronos fire a firebolt into it, which appeared to have been absorbed when it made contact. Elmair took a stance and asked Sansarya to fire spells at him. The first attack was stopped with Mage Armor, the next was blocked with a magically created shield, and the last one Elmair merely counter spelled. He gave Sansarya a copy, in the form of a scroll, of the first two and in an familiar and protective way nudged her to study it if she was going to put herself into danger further. Exiting the portal, Sansarya asked what else Elmair was working on.

Having wrapped up her lessons, Sansarya and Synkronos left for the Bride Estate to meet up with the rest of the party.

### Research

Having gathered back at the Bride Estate, the party discussed their next course of action. Finding a cure for the disease seemed like the top priority, but how would they know what they were up against. Realizing that the small personal libraries held by the various lords would likely not come close to what they needed, they decided that a trip to the city's major library, the Dryad's Grove - a temple of knowledge dedicated to the goddess Deira - was the place to go. However, the library was on the east side of the road they took into town, a road that was swarming a day ago with orcs. The trip was too important to avoid, so the party decided to use the cover of darkness to try to avoid confrontation with the orcs (who TOTALLY don't have darkvision or something). Having decided their course of action, they took the rest of the day to rest and recuperate from their respective hangovers, requesting that the staff wake them at two hours after midnight.

#### To the docks

Having descended down the Perch, the party made their way out onto the street after the guards granted them passage through the gate house. The quietly made their way down the bath house district streets. They were so focused on being sneaky that they completely forgot to focus on being perceptive, resulting in the party walking right into a patrol consisting of two orcs riding giant hyenas. Utilizing some mild vandalism (just breaking a window or two to get behind the patrol), they managed to pincer their enemy and eventually defeat them. Resuming the stealth approach, this time with more focus on being perceptive, the party found their way to the east docks used for travel to and from the grove. Noticing a campfire light bounce of a building, Alexander offered to sneak ahead to scout things out. He made his way down an alley to try to get a view of what was happening at the courtyard near the docks. As he approached he heard voices in a foreign language arguing. Trying to focus on what was being said, he edged closer. Keeping his eyes ahead of him, he missed a littered bottle on the ground. Crunch! That was all it took. The voices grew quiet for a second. Then the silence was broken by one of the more authoritative ones barking orders. Alexander looked around the corner and saw the orcs advancing on him. Panicking, he motioned for the rest of the party for backup. Synkronos, Sansarya, Maegor, and Merkorios followed him while Sylfir and Jottenheim went down the main road to the docks to try to cut the enemy off. As Sylfir and Jottenheim rounded the corner, they saw a number of orcs wearing soul forger uniforms readying a boat. The group looked unarmed, so the two kept their focus those engaging with the rest of the group. As they made their way around the corner, they saw a large orc barbarian carrying a vicious dwarven steel maul unleash a blood curling yell as his comrades moved in on Alexander. Synkronos, realizing the danger, knew it was now or never to test out a new spell he had been working on. The druid opened both palms and focused on the areas life force. As he did, a field of sharp vined plants began to sprout all around the orc camp. Refusing to besmirch their honor over a bunch of thorns, the orc grunts charged at the party hoping to prove their mettle before their commander. Their decision quickly proved disastrous as the vines lapped at their ankles and the thorns pierced into their flesh, stopping them in their tracks. They hurled curses and javelins at their foe. Maegor returned fire (javelins, not curses obviously).

Sylfir and Jottenheim continued their run to get into position, however an orc dressed in black materialized before them and lunged his rapier at Jottenheim's rib cage. The strike was true, but the orc did not account for Sylfir's quick reflexes. The dwarf shoved his shield in between the two just in the nick of time. Seeing two of his enemies go down, the orc barbarian felt that things were safe in his comrades hands. As he marched through the magical vines, his blood hissed as it closed some of the wounds the thorns made. He rushed over to his comrade in black and tried to bring his maul down on his foes but his aim was poor.

Synkronos healed Sansarya, who returned fire with a chaos bolt of her own. The groups continued fighting, until the party finally managed to scrape together a victory - in large part due to Synkronos's quick thinking. After taking a collective breath of relief, the party noticed that the orcs in soul forger robes had begun untying the boat from the docks. The group rushed to stop them and managed to capture the boat and the captives. Not wanting to row the boat themselves and not trusting their captives to do the job they were initially eager to do for themselves, Sansarya and Synkronos decided to use their control water cantrips to propel the boat across the aquifer. The party spend the half an hour long trip to the island discussing how to handle their hostage situation and whether it called for the murder of defenseless orcs. Ultimately, Sansarya was outvoted, with the party deciding to tie up their hostages on the boat once they reached the island.

#### Dryad's Groove

The island came into view and Merkorios was immediately surprised to find that it had changed shape from when he last visited the library. Normally, the trees on the island formed neat rows, giving each other enough space for nutrients. Now, the island looked like a fortress with the sequoia trees from the outer two rings instead standing in a single outer ring, forming an impenetrable palisade. The staircase leading up from the docks now lead to a dead end and a secondary, cave like, entrance formed near a lower layer from an opening created by the roots of the trees. A second longboat, empty of occupants, was tied to the docks.

Entering the cave, the party noticed that the walls and ceiling were held together by tree roots. The narrow passage allowed them to march two at a time. About thirty feet into the tunnel, the torchlight illuminated a larger chamber ten feet ahead. The party also found an orc corpse. Alexander examined the body and discovered that the orc had blackened fingers and toes and likely died of frostbite and hyperthermia.

Proceeding cautiously into the large chamber ahead, the party found themselves standing before a large lion shaped creature with a woman’s face, one that was surprisingly similar in resemblance to the goddess they met in the underground temple in Ashden, perched atop an earthen platform. The room's half like dome ceiling, like the hallway leading to it, was held up by trees roots woven together to hold back the earth above. A number of orc corpses were scattered around the room. Some appear to have been mauled while others bore strange wounds that range from deep cuts, burns, or frostbite. The Sphinx took a minute to take their presence in. Bringing her paw to her chin while resting her elbow on the knotted platform, she spoke in a a somewhat intrigued tone “Yes?”

Merkorios approached the sphinx to tell her of their mission to save Ol Gholon and she replied, “To enter into the library, you must answer my riddles three.” The bard agreed to the challenge and the sphinx proceeded.

The first riddle was "In spring I am gay in handsome array; in summer more clothing I wear; when colder it grows, I fling off my clothes; and in winter quite naked appear."

Without skipping a beat, Synkronos answered "A tree".

The second riddle was "What can run, but never walks; has a mouth, but never talks; has a head, but never weeps; has a bed, but never sleeps?"

Again, Synkronos answered "A river"

The final riddle was "This thing all things devour: birds, beasts, trees, flowers; gnaws iron, bites steel; grinds hard stones to meal; slays kings, ruins towns; and beats high mountains down."

The druid believed the answer was "Time" but was not as sure about the answer as the past two. He consulted with the rest of the party, who had full confidence in the answer.

Having answered all three riddles, the sphinx smiled and tapped her paw on the platform and spoke in a language completely foreign to them. As she did, the earthen wall behind her vanishes and the party saw a tunnel with a staircase leading up. Before leaving, Synkronos inquired why the sphinx looked so much like his goddess and the woman told him that her name was Alexandria and that she was a daughter of the Goddess of Song Birds and Spiders who has pledged herself to guarding one of the goddesses holiest sites.

Taking the staircase up, the party emerged to find themselves in a two mile long enclosure. At the center, sat an abnormally large Banyan tree with a trunk as thick as a tower and a canopy covering most of the enclosure. A number of large ring structures were built into it, roughly 10 feet apart in height, holding an innumerable amount of books. Elm trees grew around it, with spiraling ladders leading up their trunks. Each extended a number of branches towards the great Banyan tree, with walkways built into the branch grouping. Kith, dressed in silver robes with monk trim haircuts, made their way up the staircases and across the pathways, which occasionally shift from one ring layer to another. A few Redwood trees sat outside the circle of elms, with trunks also covered with concentric rings holding additional bookshelves. The entire area was lit up with large five foot diameter floating blue spheres.

To the north, they saw a grove of pine trees accompanied by a collection of monks working on harvesting trees and converting them into planks and pulp in an open air woodworking workshop. An area to the east seemed set up as a workstation. The party saw a number of monks working on writing and transcribing books, others focused on making ink from a variety of plants, and others turned pulp into paper. In the western quadrant, the one the party found themselves in, was covered with even rows of fruit and nut bearing trees: apples, plums, figs, lemons, pecans, walnuts, and avocados. The southern quarter had a number of redwoods with covered concentric circles along with areas roped off for gardens and a few green houses. The bustling atmosphere suggests that the grove had not been touched or is by the struggle happening outside its enclave.

A librarian quickly approached the group to notify them that the library was in fact closed for the night. She offered them lodgings for the night and when the party agreed, she escorted them to the southern portion of the grove and assigned them a ring in one of the redwood trees.

The next day, the group was greeted with a vegetarian breakfast made up of items grown on fruit trees, the greenhouses, or the small gardens. After the meal, the group left their tree house lodgings to search for a librarian. Upon finding one, Merkorios and Sansarya requested everything the library had on the symptoms exhibited from the plague, information on orcs and the north, and anything that mentioned the Eye of Drest. The librarian returned 20 or so minutes later with an entourage carrying books, a work desk, and chairs. The party tediously poured over the information.

Sansarya, wanting to learn more about the Aboleths, inquired whether the library had any books on the topic. The librarian returned after some time, carrying a large leather bound tomb titled the Song of Kalanthye. The book was a composition of epic elven poems detailing the mythic rise of Kalanthye, her sister Deira, and her brother Ohotian. The three siblings sought power to throw off the yolk of the Aboleths. Kalanthye traveled to the plane of elemental chaos. Drawing power from the plane, she was able to ascend to godhood - giving her the strength to fend off the ancient aberrations that held sway of the world then. A line in the poem mentioning Ohotian taking an eye from the great Aboleth, Drest, caught her eye.

Before the party had a chance to leave the library, they were stopped by a librarian inquiring if Alexander was the son of the scholar Silverwald. Upon confirming his parentage, Alexander was handed a library bill totaling a thousand gold pieces for unreturned books. Upon inquiry, the librarian produced a list of items checked out by his father. The list included:

The Annals of Alkowin V1 (checked out Nov 5th 498)

The Annals of Alkowin V5 (checked out Nov 5th 498)

The Runeology Codex by Ester Longfellow (checked out Nov 6th 498)

Emmanuel's Study on Deep Speech (checked out Nov 6th 498)

Dunefellow’s Guide to Encryption (checked out Nov 6th 498)

The Reclamation Queen volumes 1-3 by Esta Pembroke (checked out Nov 8th 498)

Secret Societies in the Frostbit Coast (checked out Nov 9th 498)

The Life and Paranoia of Esta Pembroke (checked out Nov 9th 498)

A Brewers Guide to the North by Elk Effelwaffle (checked out Nov 10th 498, returned Nov 12th 498)

## Chapter 4

With their research concluded, the party decided that it would be prudent to relay their findings to the Head Stitcher before setting off for the Abbey at Tula. Before setting off, Merkorios told the rest of the party he was staying behind to take care of a mysterious errand and would meet the party at the abbey. Leaving him behind, the party returned to the docks to find only one of the boats still there and no orc prisoners. Sansarya and Synkronos once again used their control water to propel the boat forward. They traveled by the docks on the other side, where they saw a large orc ambush waiting for them. Instead of fighting their way through it, they navigated their boat towards the gatehouse leading to Ghol's Throne.

Leaving the boat tied to the bridge, the party ascended the pillar and made their way to the Duke's Perch. There they found Irene Pavlov, an older red haired dwarven woman in white robes with gold trim. They relayed their findings to her. Irene, knowing the urgency of the situation, summoned a servant to take the party to the ducal stables. Alexander selected a black horse and named him Furious D. Jottenheim found a Clydesdale horse that was big enough to carry him and named him Jeff. Synkronos also claimed a Clydesdale, which he named Chomp. Maegor found a red horse that spoke to him, naming him Ed. Sansarya claimed that a white horse she found, and named Marybeth, was actually a unicorn. Finally, Sylfir settled on a brown horse which he named Fred.

They set off immediately and raced at full speed through the City Core, avoiding orc ambushes. Upon leaving the city, they took the road south to put some distance from the orc army before turning north west. Cutting through the open plains, the party's plan to avoid enemies fell apart when they were spotted by an orc a riding giant bat, accompanied by 3 more giant bats. The party pushed their horses to a gallop and broke off into two separate groups. A single bat broke off to tail half the party, with the rest following the other half. Unable to shake their tale, Jottenheim jumped off Jeff, and took up a defensive position behind him. A skirmish broke out, resulting in the party capturing the orc messenger.

The orcs formed an alliance with Nim't. The eastern duchy would outfit them with weapons and armor forged by some of the best craftsmen in Ior. The orcs would invade from the north, distracting the Empire and pulling the forces of the Duchy of Ghol. Nim't would then open a second front, advancing on the Duchy of Ghol and the Ashford Isle. In return for their help, the orc diaspora would be gifted their homeland.

### Intercepting the shipment

After murdering their captive, the party pulled out a map to determine how long it would take them to reach the shipment. They decided that if they travelled north and stopped at the abbey they would not be able to intercept the shipment before the orcs got to it. Furthermore, their chances of encountering hostile orcs along the route was fairly high. The party instead opted to take a path directly east that led to the Bargoliar Pass, leaving the herb gathering to Merkorios (who they assumed would figure all of this out on his own).

Galloping across the open terrain, the party was able to reach the edge of the Bargoliar Pass before sunset. A few miles from the mountains, they passed an empty farming hamlet with damaged houses showing signs of odd charring. Deciding that this was unimportant, they proceeded without stopping.

#### The road to Bargoliar Pass Abbey

Approaching the mountains, they saw a sign depicting a hanging anvil pointing north up the mountain trail, that read “Bargoliar Pass Abbey, may Kord bless your diligent steps”. The pass began at a joining point between the two mountains, with a stone archway built across the two. Its frieze depicted scenes of dwarves building a large pagoda-like temple accompanied by a surrounding village atop the mountain. The path up was carved into series of short steps from the mountain slope.

Passing through the arch, they saw a series of smaller half pagodas, one ahead and two above. The first one was about a mile away, at a point where the two mountains begin to separate enough to open a view of the coast at a bend. The road then wrapped up above and headed up along the cliffside.

Unlike the arch earlier, the first pagoda was carved out of the mountain itself. A domed stone roof sat atop a number of slender stone columns. A stout two foot wall provided a barrier along the edges of the cliff. The side facing away from the road up showed some wear in the form of cracks and chips. The pagoda also included a bench, which was carved into the mountain façade. Most of the white polished stone was covered in crude graffiti, sprawled hectically across the interior and exterior.

Upon reaching the first pagoda, the party could make out a second one, which was significantly bigger, about a mile away. Sansarya made out a a flicker of light coming from it. The party took a minute to investigate the graphite. It depicted a creature being led up the mountain by two bigger creatures. The following drawing showed the same short creature encountering a large bird man like creature. The smaller creature gained a jester hat and the large bird man was on his back. The smaller creature then returned to his village with a large gem as a hero. The party didn't know what to make of this, so they continued onwards. When they got closed to the second pagoda, two boulders rolled towards them. Quick on his feet, Synkronos used his shape earth cantrip to transform them into barricades before they could wreak havoc on their horses. The boulders were followed by chants of "Nilbog" and a swarm of goblins, two hobgoblins, a bugbear, and a strange goblin wearing a jester hat. Sylfir and Jottenheim attempted to engage the jester hat goblin. However, a strange force compelled them to worship the creature whenever they made contact. Alexander then attempted to fire an arrow at the goblin, however the arrow disappeared before it made contact. Eventually, Sylfir and Jottenheim broke the goblins hold on them and managed to slay the create. The creatures hat and jester rod turned to smoke, which was absorbed by one of the other goblins. To their horror, this one suddenly sprouted that same hat and jester rod. He cast Tasha’s Hideous Laughter on the dwarf, leaving Sylfir rocking on the ground in uncontrollable laughter.

Sansarya was not amused. Without pondering the consequences, she cast thunderwave which forced both friends and foe back. The blast threw Alexander off the edge of the pass. However, he was luckily able to grab a hold of the ledge, preventing him from plummeting to his death. The party dispatched the Nilbog and his companions. They found that the brigands had amassed a treasure hoard which included a halberd that Maegor grabbed, an intro to spellcasting book that Alexander claimed, gold coins, a few potions, and a diamond dangling from the ceiling.

#### The mountain top

The party continued up the mountain, reaching the peak by nightfall. At the top, they found a ruined settlement, reduced to sections of walls, outlines of foundations, and large black pools. As they rode through the the abandoned abbey, they heard a dip in the water followed by a brief silence. As they looked around for the source of a potential ambush, a large black dragon dragged himself out of the pool to their right. Crushing the stone with his massive talons, he hoisted himself on a raised foundation resting above the party and let out a blood curdling roar. Synkronos attempted to reason with the creature, however the dragon Rædwald was only interested in satisfying his hunger and saw no reason to break bread with lifeforms he saw beneath him. Puffing his chest and bending his neck back, he let out a vicious stream of acid breath targeting Sylfir and Jottenheim, knocking both of them out. Their horses bucked, throwing both riders off, as they miraculously dodged the attack their riders could not. Synkronos transformed into a tiger, after sending Cracker to heal his allies. He heroically charged the dragon and with a mighty pounce, managed to knock it prone. Maegor and Alexander joined the fray, lunging at the creature. Their attacks struck true, but could not slay the beast.

Then... a mysterious elf emerged from the shadows. Sansarya was the first to spot him, muttering "Jesus fucking christ, not Kisworth. Anyone but Kilsworth". But to her dismay, it was indeed Kilsworth. The renowned elven hunter notched his bow, and struck the might dragon in his anus. The fearsome beast let out a last roar, and sunk to a final slumber. As the party gathered their breath, none except Sansarya managed to notice that this stranger was somehow new. Kilsworth simply gave off an aura of friendliness that eased everyone into a lull. To the rest of the party, it felt like he had always been there. Kilsworth himself was however overjoyed to see his princess. His uncle had called him up from Marinnia, knowing the danger Sansarya would potentially be in. The elf traveled for days, tracking the party. Having slayed the dragon, he could now reassure his uncle that the princess was safe and that his quest was complete. While Sansarya and Synkronos collected blood from the dragon, Kilsworth picked up a stone from the temple. He took a bite from a strange berry, and then suddenly vanished.

### Meanwhile, Merkorios...

Merkorios found himself alone for the first time in a long time. It had been a while since he last visited the academy and with the orc hordes occupying chunks of the city, he wasn't sure when he would get another opportunity. The timing wasn't perfect, but when had it ever been.

He retraced the steps Saltat taught him when he first visited Ol’ Gholon, repeating the elven rhythm as he did. First, heading east, he found the fountain bearing the elven maid reading in a tree, with water trickling down each leaf above her and down the spine of her book. He traced the waterfall up, until it passed by a sparrow. Remembering what his mother had taught him, he looked not where its beak was pointing but where the beak's shadow pointed. Gathering his bearings, Merkorios lined his feet up with the base of the waterfall. Putting each foot in front of the other, he counted his steps to 100. Surprisingly, the 100 paces still put him within arms reach of the only leafless tree in the whole forest, one that you swear, as you have many times before, was not there on your way to the fountain. Touching the tree, he murmured in elven “Queen of the city of old, priestess of the Mother of Spiders and Songbirds, your humble servant begs passage into your realm.” As he did, his hand began to draw into the tree, pulling him in.

Stepping through, he found himself in a dark forest covered in webs. A soft song pulsates through the air as strings of the web vibrate. A Satyr, sitting on a stump nearby, was chanting a song in old elven to the rhythm of the web. As Merkorios stepped out, the old faun greeted him. “Merkorios of Ior, what brings you back home?” The Prince told the old faun that he was here to consult with Araknid, the Queen of Spiders. That he had knowledge of the world above that his headmistress was likely to find valuable. The faun whistled a final cord, hopped off the stump, and motioned the Prince to follow.

#### An audience with Araknid

The pair traveled deep into the forest below. As they did, the webs grew denser and denser until they culminated into a throne chamber made up of webbed walls. At the center of the webbed pavilion, upon a white wood throne, sat a majestic drow queen garbed in robes of the finest silk.

Merkorios kneeled before his mistress and once she motioned for him to stand and tell her of the world above. The prince told her of the orc attacks, of the strange plague that had befallen Ol' Gholon, and of the information they discovered at the library.

Merkorios nodded. "Then you must head off to the Abbey immediately. I, in the meantime, will keep my ear to the ceiling."

When she finished speaking, she twisted her hands in an orchestral conduction. Each flourish was accompanied by a band of spiders moving in harmony, forming a circular web behind Merkorios. Having seen this before, the Prince stood in place. When her hands stopped moving he turned around to find a portal, encapsulated in the newly spun web, emanating an image of an abbey behind him. He stepped through the portal and found himself no longer in the Underdark but at the edge of a forest bordering on the outskirts of the Abbey's farm lands.

#### The Abbey at Tula

Small thatched roof houses are huddled together, surrounded by farms. At the center of the village, on top of a hill, sits the abbey, with white stone buildings capped with domed blue roofs behind the monasteries tall white stone walls. A plethora of farmers were harvesting crops. Merkorios carefully maid his way to the small town surrounding the Abbey. As he did, he began to notice that the farm workers he saw from a distance appeared significantly disheveled, missing limbs or flesh. As he approached one such farmer, the pungent smell of death hit his nose. The man smelled as if he had been dead for several days now and yet he did not seem to notice. The Prince tried to question him, but the zombie paid him no mind and so the Prince continued onwards into town.

The town had much of the same scene, maybe a bit more quiet than normal. There were no children playing in the streets and an unusual number of establishments were closed. He did find a one armed blacksmith repairing farming equipment. Merkorios eloquently inquired whether the man knew where to find healing herbs. The walking corpse returned his request with a grunt and a point towards a building with a sign reading "Agatha Apothecary".

The Prince was surprised to find the shop locked down. A meek response of "Who is it?", in a sad creaking voice responded to his knock. Merkorios announced himself, but was met with complete silence. Listening closer, he heard mutterings and sporadic shuffling that one would associate with someone in a state of panic. He proceeded to knock again but was met with a hasty panicked "One minute my lord. One minute".

Finding a way to force the door open, Merkorios forced his way into the shop. There he found a skeleton of a woman sitting at what looked to be a make shift make up station. She was wearing a wig made of straw that covered her naked skull and was in the process of applying blush and lipstick. Jumping at the sight of the Price, she startled "Oooh... Oh no... I can't be seen like this... My lord, my deepest apologies. I do not yet have my face. I am not presentable for a royal visit."

Empathizing with the poor soul, Merkorios did his best to calm Agatha down. With her nerves set, the old woman beckoned the Prince to sit in the only other chair in the room. The two talked. The Prince told her of his quest to get supplies, asked her whether she had seen any of his compatriots, and inquired about what had transpired at Tula.

She awoke, in her present state, a few days later. Having always been fond of children, her focus was on their wellbeing. Surveying the town, she found her neighbors in similar states to hers, though most seemed to have less of them in them than she did. Her initial search for the children proved fruitless. Her fellow residents were as clueless as she was. While searching, she did however discover that a perimeter of odd black rocks, painted with blood, surrounding the town. Despite her best efforts to cross this threshold, to search for the children in the surrounding woods, a dark voice willed her away from such an effort.

With her early efforts failing, she began to monitor the monks more. The monks were unaffected by whatever put her and her neighbors in their current state. In all actuality, they were likely much better off than before. Their workers no longer required nourishment, so more barley was brought to the Abbey than ever before. Shipments out east to the Iron Count were also halted. Instead, crops were now mysteriously sent south.

The monks also no longer wore their Kordian garb, instead dying their robes black. A few days after her awakening, the monks formed a large bonfire in the square - destroying any literature, garments, or holy symbols belonging to their order. Eavesdropping on what looked like a strange festival to some new deity, Agatha picked up her first clues on the whereabouts of the children of Tula.

Whispers among the monks helped her piece together a narrative. Having lost the workforce needed to keep them and their liege fed and fat - and now stuck with hungry and terrified children - the monks decided to make some sort of dark pact. They took the children south, deep into the woods and returned childrenless later that evening, instead with wheelbarrows carrying rune covered rocks that they placed around the town. This somehow allowed them to reanimate their lost workforce. Unable to make her way past the runes, Agatha begged the Prince to take up her cause.

She told Merkorios that she had not seen his comrades or any other travelers since she her reanimation. As for his request for herbs, she was able to provide him with a crate full of White Echinacea, noting that more could be found within the Abbey walls. The Prince promised to help her find the children and then set off to either find his comrades or the long road back to Ol' Gholon.

The walk through the farm fields - while carrying a crate full of herbs - left Merkorios void of any optimism. The rest of the party was no where to be found and he only had his legs as a means of transportation. No horses or beasts of burden were to be found at the Abbey, likely due to plundering orcs. With his mood completely soured, he continued to trudge on.

His deep state of sulking was thrown completely off by a cheerful singsong voice coming from a figure he completely failed to notice "Need a lift?". With a pipe in his hands, sitting on a tree root, was the recognizable form of Elmair Sateen. The mage motioned for the Prince to approach and take a seat and once the Prince was seated, Elmair passed him his pipe. Taking a deep drag from the pipe, Merkorios felt his lungs fill with the potent smoke of a Sateen Kush - a rare strand often discussed but very rarely acquired in Ior. The puff put him flat on his ass, leaving him relaxed and completely absent minded of the passage of time. Several hours had to have passed, or maybe only a few minutes, before Merkorios remembered the offer of a lift. A reminder to the wizard of what he had said was met with a "Patience!" and a freshly loaded pipe.

Night began to set and the Prince was caught tracking the cosmos in the night sky. That however was suddenly interrupted by a loud pop and blast of smoke. Shorty, in its place, stood a second elf - dressed in survival garb of similar color to Elmair's. "Nephew, about time! Did you find them like I asked?" The new elf tossed his uncle the brick he had picked up from the remains of the Bargoliar Pass Abbey. Elmair handed the brick to Merkorios, along with a berry. He told the Prince to focus on the brick as he ate the berry. As the Prince began to follow the wizard's orders, the wizard and his nephew were no where to be seen. Instead, he found himself near the corpse of a large dragon and a number of his party members in deep slumber.

He found Sansarya keeping watch. She tried her best to catch the Prince up on current affairs, however Merkorios was still deep in the smoke or maybe a bit thrown off by the teleportation spell. He asked the Princess for water, who willingly obliged - completely forgetting that she had emptied her water-skin of water, which she then refilled with dragon's blood. It took Merkorios a few seconds to notice the difference in consistency. However those seconds were more then enough for the blood to take hold. He tried to hold it down, but smoking with Elmair had undermined his constitution. His stomach curled into a ball, burning with the heat of a forge. Seeking relief, Merkorios lifted his head up to belch. As he did, a fire ball erupted from his mouth, launching high above the plateau. When it reached its apex, it burst into a massive flaming sphere, lighting up the entire camp accompanied by a loud bang that startled most of his party members.

### The Shipwreck

The party woke up the next morning in a groggy state induced either the stench from the sulfurous pools the dragon inhabited or from being startled awake in the middle of the night by the explosion. After a short breakfast, they immediately mounted up, with Merkorios taking Synkronos's horse, and with the druid transforming into a horse himself. They made the decent down the opposite slope of the mountain.

When they reached the bottom fourth, they spotted the wrecked hull of a trading vessel overturned on the beach below. A makeshift fence was set up around the wreckage, creating a perimeter. The ship's mast was planted in the middle of the fort, functioning as a watch tower. Worse yet, one of the ship's cannons was set on a mound and aimed directly in their direction. Jottenheim cursed "Shit, I thought the fort was further out." Sylfir muttered "How are they already here."

#### The smugglers' fort

Before the discussion could go any further, a boom from the cannon followed by the wiz of a cannonball over their heads broke their concentration. Panic broke out, which led to Jottenheim and Sylfir charged their horses to gain cover from the cannon behind the wrecked haul. As they did, they both gulped down some of the dragon blood they collected the day before.

A band of sailors, led by a bosun carrying a hook on a chain, moved towards the opening between the crashed hull and the makeshift fence. A mage stationed in the crows nest obscured their position with fog.

While the rest of the party dismounted and followed their two brawlers, Jottenheim and Sylfir began to feel the effects of the blood. Sylfir felt a burning energy churn inside of him. He turned towards the hull and let loose a blast of dragon's fire. Jottenheim meanwhile felt a charge course through him. He directed the energy upwards at the mage in the crows nest, hurling a bolt of lightning. He missed his mark but the bolt managed to strike the mast, cracking it in two. The crows nest crashed onto the ground, severely inuring the mage and breaking his concentration on the fog spell covering his allies. The fire cast on the hull began to weaken the wood, which allowed Sylfir to carve his way through the hull and onto the other side. There he was met by the crew's captain who unsheathed his cutlass, challenging the smith. Meanwhile, with their fog cover gone, Sansarya, Alexander, Synkronos, and Merkorios managed to make quick work of the bosun and his crew. Seeing the fight lost and being significantly outnumbered, the captain surrendered to the party.

#### The downfall of Hadid Al Zi and Cladius Briggs

The party questioned the captain and learned that the rest of his crew was resting in the cave along with the two individuals who hired them, Hadid Al Zi and Cladius Briggs. Alexander, having had some time to practice the spells in the spell book he found in the Nilbog treasure trove, cast disguise self to transform himself into the captain. Coopting Maegor and Jottenheim into his plan, he used a false knot to bound their hands behind their back and led them into the cave as "prisoners". Meanwhile, the rest of the party moved the cannon closer, hoping to use it to bury the gear brought here for the orcs in the cave.

In the cave, Alexander, Maegor, and Jottenheim found the two conspirators they first ran into at the Red Charger Lodge, along with two members of the crew - a wizard and the first mate. Alexander's disguise proved to be convincing, and Briggs asked that he hand over the prisoners to the first mate while the three of them deal with the threat outside. Having put Briggs and Hadid between them and their allies, Alexander ditched the disguise and sprung the trap. Breaking the knots, the paladin and the solider were held back by the first mate, who proved to be shiftier than either of them had expected. Alexander engaged Cladius Briggs while Synkronos, in the form of a tiger, charged the Yuan-Ti and 2 put himself in between his two allies and his two enemies.

Hadid cast fear on Synkronos, who in tiger form began to imagine himself surrounded by poachers. The druid was forced to disengage and flee outside the cave where he was able to transform into his goliath tree form, breaking the spell. Briggs drew a strange hollowed out flail from his belt that he began to spin up for an attack. When the flail head reached full speed, it began to glow red hot like metal in a forge. He whipped it at Alexander leaving a painful hissing burn mark on the rogue's shoulder.

Sansarya, meanwhile, obliterated the spell casting ship mate with a chaos bolt. Seeing their numbers dwindle, Hadid threw his snake headed staff on the ground towards Sansarya. Upon impact, the staff transformed into a cobra. Hadid then lunged at Sylfir, in an attempt to constrict the smith, he however missed his mark and instead flopped on the ground. Taking advantage of his enemy being prone, Sylfir drove the killing blow upon Hadid Al Zi. Working together, Maegor and Jottenheim, were able to overcome the fencers shiftiness. With the first mate dispatched, they ganged up on Briggs. After trading a few blows, Maegor managed to knock his former drill instructor unconscious.

With their enemies dispatched, the party collected the magic staff and the flaming flail and moved outside the cave. They aimed the cannon at the entrance and lit the fuse. The cannon kicked back and its munition crashed loudly into the cave entrance, crumbling the ceiling onto the bodies of Hadid Al Zi and Caldius Briggs.

## Chapter 5

### Ol Gholon, revisited

Arriving at Ol Gholon, the party was surprised to find the heavy gate doors restored and shut. As they approached, the sound of horns emerged from the walls followed by the gate doors creaking open. Given their prior experience entering the city, the party was weary of the situation. However, when the gate was halfway open, they could make out several Gholonian guards standing at attention which immediately alleviated their worries.

Entering the city proper, they noticed a small number of civilians restoring parts of the city damaged by the orc attack. Some were scrubbing graffiti left on the sides of buildings, while others were mending windows or removing debris. As they rode forward, they noticed that the walls of Ghol’s Throne were draped with black banners.

Entering Old Town on horseback, they were met with a slightly larger crowd than before, accompanied by horn fanfare. During their first arrival, they were met mostly by guards and soldiers. This time, there were civilians greeting their arrival from balconies and sidewalks.

The reception stunned them long enough to be caught off guard by the sudden appearance of a woman blocking their procession with a low bow. She waited for a minute before raising up, flicking her bright weaved amber hair back behind her and over her blue leather military coat and long pointy ears. Now fully standing upright, they noticed that the fearless greeter, beaming from ear to ear, was about 3ft tall. Standing at attention and now noticing that she had the party's attention, she announced herself in a singsong voice:

“Hiya, MerryWeather Sprocket reporting! Lady Izza sent me. Imma to fetch ya at first notice. Now that the young Wardin is up and at it, the council is due to meet tis evenin’. She tol me to make sure yall were nice and decent for it.”

She took a second to look over the party with a laser eyed focus: “It will take some work but will get yall fixed. Come, follow.”

To the party's surprise, MerryWeather led them towards Ghol’s Perch and not the Bride Estate. Upon reaching the gatehouse, MerryWeather called over a pair of stable hands and motioned for the party members to dismount and to pass their reins over to the attendants.

“Come, come, the ambassador pavilion has been restored. Lady Izza had me ready rooms for you there to get ready for court! A scribe will come find you when it is time. Ring the bell in your room if you need anything brought to your room.”

Each member of the party was given a room fit for a noble or an ambassador within the pavilion. MerryWeather's husband, the court tailor Edward Sprocket, assisted several members of the party with the procurement of outfits using a magical tape measure. Merkorios, for whom the city was a second residence, had the staff fetch the trunks of clothes he left there. Sansarya inquired whether the services of a barber were available. Bethany, her attendant, fetched the royal barber, a dwarf named Nathan who also helped groom Sylfir. Having had time to rinse off, acquire clothes, and get groomed the group casually made their way to the foyer attendants knocked on their doors to fetch them for the meeting.

#### The council meeting

The foyer was a large elegant sitting room furnished in beige and brown hues. The room contained several couches and chairs. Various animal heads lined the walls and a stuffed yeti was mounted in the corner. A gray wooden bar table contained a bucket with ice and a silver and glass water dispenser. They noticed a number of other figures already in the room: a wooden and metal construct curiously examining a vase, an imposing goliath knight wearing a blue cloak and silver half plate, and a familiar smith - Flint Softbottom, who upon seeing Sansarya stand for a glass of water, went and poured on for his former drinking buddy and himself.

A scribe opened the door on the opposite end from where they entered, giving the party a view of a large chamber with a stained glass dome ceiling depicting hunting scenes through green and brown glass pieces. A large chandelier like orb decorated with a multitude of planetary rings hang from the center of the dome and adds a soft yellow light to the room.

The center of the room had a circle of thin wooden columns shaped like trees that supported the heavy glass ceiling. The floor in the middle was sunk in and was dominated by a large round wooden table surrounded by 16 chairs. A map of Powys was laid out on the table. The room contains a number of doors and several small side alcoves for staff. The scribe took up a position in one such nook and unrolled a scroll and began to announce members of the council:

* Alexander Silverwald, son of the great Maxwell Silverwald
* Maegor Arkos, Beaconite Apprentice
* Twig, smith of the Soul Forgers
	+ A living construct made of wood and steel entered the room. He looked cheerfully around the room, waved and said “Hi guys, I am Twig.”
* Flint Softbottom, Master of the Forge
	+ The dwarven smith that the party had met a few times before entered the room. Although he was wearing an outfit that looked finer than the ones he wore the past two times you had met him, it was still covered with soot.
* Sylfir Rumnaheim, fighting smith of Windskeep
* Synkronos Gaia, Keeper of the Moon Isle Grove
* Saint Ann Braken, Knight banneret of Beacon
	+ A middle aged goliath entered the room wearing silver half plate armor accompanied by the blue cloak that marked her order. A larger than usual greatsword sat on her back. Before sitting, she took the sword and sheath off and placed it next to her seat gently. She looked sternly at the scribe and quietly said: “For the record, please adjust the Beaconites title. There are so few of us left that it's silly to call someone that has lasted this long an apprentice.” She unfastened her cloak, walked over to Maegor and handed it to him before returning to her chair without saying anything else.
* Jottenheim Sol, Axe of the Harper Brigade and representative of the honorable Lord Birch
* Lord Elmair Sateen, Head Abjurer
	+ Elmair Sateen entered the room dressed in a formal deep green robe carrying a wooden staff with a large knot at the top.
* The revered Lady Irene Pavlov, Mistress Stitcher
	+ A red haired dwarven woman dressed in an elegant white robe, embroidered with gold entered the room.
* Viscount Plato Pewter, Counter of Coin
	+ An older halfling, sporting a van dyke mustache and curly black hair entered the room carrying a book nearly half his size. He was dressed in a fine black suit.
* Count Pytor Pavlov, Grand Marshal of Ghol’s Legions
	+ A dwarf the size of a large cask of ale entered the room. His bright red hair was trimmed into a braided mohawk. A large blue and crimson cloak covered his right arm. He flicked it back when he reached for his chair, revealing a large metallic arm. After sitting, he made a point of slamming the metallic arm on the table giving everyone a clear indication of its immense weight.
* Count Graysin Rootlander, Master of Pages
	+ As the doors opened, the party saw a tree like throne march its way into the room using its 4 large stump-like legs. Upon it sat an elder thin goliath with long white strand-like hair who was dressed in a simple beige robe. He parked his chair next to an empty spot at the table. Once settled, he looked to the scribe and said “Please strike the title of Count from the record. It is no longer necessary
* Contessa Isabella Bride, Captain of the Guard
	+ The Countessa entered the room with a brisk pace, pulled a chair back and sat immediately. She was dressed in the navy blue guard uniform of Ol Gholon's Last Regiment.
* Commander Bloes, Warden of Ghol
	+ Merkorios was surprised to hear the title of warden used and from it had expected to see the admiral. Instead of his father, Downta entered the room solemnly, dressed in all black except for the royal blue sash reserved for the Duke of the northern kingdom.
* Merkorios Iordanos, The Royal Prince of Ior
* Sansarya Purebreath, Grand Princess of Marinnia

#### Matters of grave importance

After the scribe finished, Downta took his seat. Two guards took position behind him, stomping their halberds to attention. A scribe brought a scroll to the Duke. "We are dealing with an unprecedent number of threats to our kingdom, ladies and gentlemen. I have requested each of you to join me in attending this council so that we may decide how to best guard our Kingdom from these threats and I am blessed to be able to call on each of your wisdoms."

The soldier's revelation left the council startled and silent, until Duke Downta finally cut in to inquire who the "they" were. The council and the party learned, from the injured soldier, that Lord Merrick accompanied by Count Stormcrow were leading a united army from Nim't, accompanied by mercenary forces including war elephants.

As the council meeting wrapped up, Sylfir and Jottenheim sought the services of Flint in identifying magic items they had in their possession. The smith directed them to Graysin Rootlander, the Overseer of the Dryad's Grove.

Rootlander next examined the maul in Sylfir's possession, letting the smith know that he was in possession of a weapon forged by a student of Kord who created the maul for breaching fortifications in the fight against the giants.

The party chose to set out the next day. Upon their departure, Duke Downta gifted Merkorios his prized horse, Placeholder. As they set out, Sansarya noticed that Kilsworth was once again with them, now riding a horse named Astaroth. A fact, largely to her annoyance, which appeared to have gone unnoticed by the rest of the party.

### Journey to Unova

#### Abbey investigation

The party stopped at Tula before setting off for Unnova. Merkorios took the group to Agatha's Apothecary to clue them in on what he had been told. The undead woman was again cautious to open the door to visitors before getting ready. Once she did, seeing the number of guests and the embarrassingly low number of chairs in her possession, she requested Maegor's noble help in moving crates for the party members to sit on. After repeating the information she told Merkorios to the rest of the group, the party decided to investigate the strange rocks outside.

Sansarya attempted to ascertain the meaning and power behind the ruins. She was able to deduce that the runes were powered by an blood magic, that school of magic was too ancient for her to know much more about their nature. Synkronos then tried to use mold earth to distort the runes. His cantrip was however not powerful enough to overcome the magic in the runes.

Seeing his allies' attempts fail flat, before anyone could speak up, Jottenheim grabbed a near by zombie farmer and carried him past the magic circle. As soon as they crossed the threshold, the zombie corpse was deaminated. Not sure what more they could do, Merkorios went back to Agatha and told her that the spell could be broken if she crossed the threshold. Wanting to find the afterlife and leave her current existence as a walking corpse, the healer agreed to do so if Merkorios come with her to give her the strength to pass through the circle. After passing through, the Prince and the party dug a grave for Agatha outside of town. In the meantime, Kilsworth scouted the area south of town, discovering a number of strange bone charms hanging from the trees.

Wanting to resolve the Unova matter as quickly as possible and not wanting to get caught by an orc ambush, the party decided that the pathway south and the road to Unova were not ideal. Instead, they choose to cut through the woods that sat between the Abbey and Unova.

#### The Hart North Woods

Kilsworth, feeling right at home, volunteered his scouting services. Taking to the tree line with absolute grace and fineness, the tracker was making his way through the tree line. As he did, he noticed a rag moving through the tree line off in the distance. He moved in to investigate and was surprised to find a make shift watch tower, full of goblins, riding on the back of an ogre. As he turned to retreat and notify the party, he underestimated the give in a tree branch. The sound of the branch vibrating from his jump alerted a goblin who howled at the ogre to give chase. Nearing the party, Kilsworth leapt from a tree branch onto the ground and knocked a barbed arrow into his bow. As he readied his shot, the ogre's approaching pace made him hesitate. In that hesitation, his grip on the arrow slipped and he released it straight into his foot, pinning him on the spot. Sansarya, seeing her countryman in danger, ran head of the party and cast suggestion on the ogre while yelling "Stop!" at the top of her lungs. Hearing the sorcerer's command, the ogre clumsily stopped on a dime. With its own immense weight, coupled by the awkward backpack house, the sudden deceleration forced the ogre to faceplant immediately in front of Kilsworth. Goblins that were thrown from the ogre's backpack were no match for the party, who were also able to make quick work of the now prone ogre.

#### In the spider nest

As the party continued traveling east, Sylfir and Sansarya began to notice silver strands running between the trees and the ground. As they marched onward, the strands grew more and more common, until it became evident that they were standing in a massive spider web. As this realization dawned on them, they began to make out the sound of numerous clicking pincers all around them. They had just enough time to circle up into a defensive formation before spiders began to emerge from the treetops and nests within the undergrowth.

Sansarya and Synkronos lit up the forest with fire magic with Sylfir and Jottenheim contributing to the bonfire festivities by throwing a torch here and there. Managing to subdue the first wave, they were surprised to see more and more spiders pour into their location despite the fire, which now began to spread throughout the forest.

Caught with the fire to his side, Kilsworth found himself unable to dodge out of the way of one of the spiders. The spider managed to sink his pincers into the bounty hunter's leg, injecting it with its poisonous venom. As the venom coursed through Kilsworth, he suddenly found himself unable to move. With the fire now fully out of control, and threatening to consume one of his allies and nature itself, Synkronos called upon his trusty Create Water spell to douse the forest with rain. Sylfir, having defeated the nearest spiders to him, hopped back on his horse and scooped up the paralyzed Kilsworth.

With the fire dying out from the rainstorm and the swarm of spiders significantly reduced, the party began to make out a deeper more menacing clicking noise coming from their left and right flank. As the noise closed in on them, they began seeing the trees shift and shuffle eventually revealing two giant spiders the side of a carriages, one to either side of them. Alexander scooped up Jottenheim and the two rode for the spider to their left. Maegor, who in the chaos assumed that the party was routing east, turned and charged at the spider on the right.

Before Synkronos, Sansarya, and Merkorios could pick a direction, the fabric of reality in front of them began to tear. The rip in space was nudged open by a series of blue fluffy spider legs. The blue and white spider pushed itself out of the rift, feeling pleased that its tactic had split up its prey. Merkorios invoked Deira's name, demanding that the world rending spider let them pass. When that proved fruitless, the three spellcasters let loose a barrage of magic at the spider. Severally injured before it had a chance to taste its prey, the spider disappeared the same way it came - tearing another hole in reality and crawling through it, maybe to return another day when the party least expected it. The moral of the two giant spiders, seeing their queen flee, dampened. Despite their best attempts to trap Jottenheim in a web, the barbarian's rage proved too much for their webs as Jottenheim simply flexed to snap the binding holding him in place.

#### The haunted hunters' cabin

With combat wrapped up, Sylfir returned with Kilsworth, knowing that his ally would not be in any danger. The party regrouped and then headed further into the forest. After a short walk, they reached a crossroad. The path south took them away from the direction they needed to go. The cliff to the north was unsuitable for the horses and the party did not wish to backtrack through the spider nest to make their way down to the creek below. A pathway did lead east, however it looked like it dead ended on top of a hill housing what Sansarya identified to be an old Elven hunting lodge. From the bottom of the hill, they could make out the ruins of a deck, behind which stood the stone structure. Through the windows, Sansarya thought she saw light dancing every now and then. She volunteered to scout out the location and Jottenheim to help. When the two reached the top of the hill, the noticed that the cabin was in significant disarray and had long been abandoned - likely due to the damage incurred by a giant footprint smashing a side of a wall. They knocked on the old wooden door, but received no answer. Testing the door, they realized it wasn't locked and after pushing it open, they stepped into the main chamber.

At the far end of the room, grew a tree that was amalgamated into the wall. To their left stood seven statues. The wooden roof was held up by stone columns, which divided the chamber lengthwise into thirds. The pair scanned the room but stopped when Jottenheim caught sight of a blur of light behind him. After darting around once or twice, he finally caught it - only for the wispy ball to release a stinging burst of electric shock. As it did, two more will-o-wisps emerged from the columns, one near Sansarya and a second one next to Jottenheim. Sansarya channeled a ray of frost at one of them, but the ball of light bounced away from the blast. The noise alerted Alexander, who directed the rest of the party to rush to his comrade's aid. Before they could get there however, the three will-o-wisps managed to catch the barbarian and sorceress off guard with their agility, delivering fatal shocks that left them worse for ware.

Thinking on his feet, Merkorios cast detect thought. Projecting his thoughts into the orbs and pushing through the barrier between this world and the shadowfell, he managed to reach the spirits souls. The voices were those of tormented elves, ones who died tragically when giants stormed their bunker. Their last desire to hold the line kept their souls tethered to the cabin. Merkorios told them that the age of giants had passed and that the threat was gone. With those words, the wisps faded away.

Before the party could catch their breath, the tree in the back of the room produced a face and began to recite a poem:

Eight different queries we hunted to claim

Seven stand as a testament to our fame

But their letters also hide a secret name

Speak it for the prize to our last game

Realizing that there were indeed seven statues in the room, Merkorios and Sansarya began to examine the figures to their left. The statues, in order from left to right, depicted: a trio of gnolls fighting over a spear, a gruesome werewolf next to a tree, five kobolds around a bonfire, A grinning beholder, two gelatinous cubes patrolling a dungeon corridor, three dragons in flight, two trolls sitting under a tree.

While the pair stumbled over the riddle, Synkronos quickly figured out that the number of objects corresponded to a letter in each of the creatures' names. Putting that together, he deduced that the answer was 'owlbear'. When he said the answer to the rest of the party, the tree's mouth opened up into a doorway. Alexander, looking below, saw a metal staircase leading down into a bunker. He and Jottenheim led the way down and upon reaching the bottom of the spiraling staircase, saw the torches in the bunker automatically light up one by own. Before them stood a room full of arrows, javelins, and swords. At its center, hung up on a cross bar, rested a suit of hide armor made out of white fur and feathers.

Instantly intrigued by the armor, Jottenheim rushed towards it. As he drew close, an initially beautiful but instantly hideous visage emerged from the armor clawing at Jottenheim with its ghostly nails. Assuming that the armor was attacking him, the barbarian charge tacked the stand upon which it rested, going through the banshee in the process. The ghastly elven ghost let out a bone chilling wail. The sound was too much for Alexander and Merkorios who were instantly knocked out and left on deaths door. While Synkronos and Cracker worked together to revive their downed comrades, Sansarya fired a barrage at the banshee. Sylfir moved in to lend a hand, but was suddenly attacked by his own shadow. The creatures slam left him feeling his strength leave his body. Maegor, seeing how dire the situation was, channeled the light of Beacon into his sword. He drove the weapon, now crackling with holy energy, into the ghost. Unlike prior efforts to strike her, which tore through the the ghost leaving only a minor impact, the swords drove through the banshee as if she had a form corporeal - one which the sword cut through like butter. She floated before Maegor for a second, reaching towards him with one of her grizzly hands, before fading away like ash. Sylfir moved to strike the shadow that slammed him, but it too began to fade away now that the ghost holding it in place had been vanquished. Feeling significantly worse for wear, the group decided that the bunker was likely now the safest place for them to get some rest. As they rolled out their bedrolls, Synkronos collected healing herbs from the shelves, Sansarya grabbed a few silver arrows, and Maegor located a few silvered javelins.

#### A shrine to the hunt

The party emerged from the bunker the next morning well rested. Itching to try out a new spell that she had been working on, Sansarya asked her comrades to make room. Chanting a few words in Elven, and drawing sigils in the air with a feather plucked from the suit of owlbear armor, Sansarya sprouted a magnificent set of wings. Launching herself up into the air, past the tree line, she began to scan the forest they were in for a pathway out. The path southward, that the party yesterday assumed would take them away from Unova, actually curved back east after a while. Landing safely on the ground, she drew a crude map for them to follow.

Following the map, the party headed south and then east. On their way, they came across a detour that lead them to a strange alter in the middle of a grove. Synkronos trail blazed ahead, searching for any possible traps. After giving the okay, Sansarya and Kilsworth joined him in the middle of the thick grove of trees. The alter depicted a number of predatory beasts - lions, wolves, and tigers - each carrying a part of their prey as an offering to a strange figure that dwarfed over them in size. The humanoid figure had curled horns of a ram where a normal kith would have ears. His owned maw contained saber-toothed fangs and sharp tiger like teeth. His hands, outstretched to accept the offering, were a mix between the paws of a human and those of a bear - complete with sharp talons. Sansarya and Kilsworth sensed an elven religious motif within the sculpture but could not pinpoint the religious significance of the statue. Unsure of what to make of the situation, Synkronos chose to play it safe - leaving one of his rations of nuts and dried fruit as an offering.

### The Realm of the Eternal Hunt

The party continued on their way until the path started to curve north. Sansarya and Jottenheim led the way on horseback, taking little note of the fact that the foliage ahead did not match up to their current season. Jottenheim suddenly stopped, realizing that they no longer heard the sound of their companions horses behind them. Taking in the landscape around them in fully for the first time, the pair realized that they were no longer in the same forest they were in before. The trees around them were budding as if it was spring, despite it being fall only a minute ago. Some of the trees around them were completely foreign to the two of them and the continent they were on. Flowers along the trail bloomed in colors so vibrant that they would have made even the most traveled tulip bulb trader faint. The sky was of a purplish hew with a large low orange sun serving as a backdrop for a large mountain located right where Unova should sit. Thick vines, hanging from the trees, shuffled over the paved road that was moments earlier a dirt trail.

Alexander saw the pair a second ago. He rubbed his eyes when he only saw everything after the necks of their horses. Then he saw his two companions slowly vanish into a water like surface that rippled as they passed. Finally the asses of their horses were gone. By then, he had halted his horse and motioned for the rest of his companions to stop as well. The remaining party consulted amongst themselves and decided that with two of their own gone, all they could do was boldly follow and hope for the best. They charged through the portal and reemerged on the other side to find Sansarya and Jottenheim in this most strange and bizarre place. As the party road forward together towards the mountain off in the east - hoping to find answers - they noticed that trees in their path would nudge away from them.

Finding all of this fairly bizarre, Synkronos decided to stop and ask the unicorns for directions. Casting speak with animals, he cautiously approached the blessing. One of the unicorns turned from the water and pranced over to him, baying a "hello". The Druid inquired about where they were and learned that they had passed into the realm of Ohotian, the god of the hunt. The unicorn found it odd that they were there since he had never seen visitors here in ages. Knowing of Sansarya's fondness for unicorns, Synkronos inquired if any of them would like to join him and his friends on their adventure to which the unicorn politely declined, noting that it would be unfair to their master - who takes good care of them. Hopping back onto Clomp, Synkronos rejoined the party and they marched eastward.

Not long after, Sylfir spotted a bird like creature - somewhat obscured by the sun behind it - flying in their direction. As they rode, he kept his eye on it and noticed it grow larger and larger. As it drew closer, what initially looked like the shape of a bird looked more and more clearly like a dragon. The smith, panicking at the sight of the approaching dragon, called the party's attention to it. His message cut off halfway through, as he saw four additional large golden dragons emerge from the cover of the first to form a flying V formation heading directly towards them. The fleet began to descend as it approached overhead. Jottenheim suggested making a run for cover but Merkorios reminded him that the trees had been moving out of their path and likely would not be cooperative if they were used for cover. After dismounting, the party stood stunned watching the fleet approach over their heads.

Despite being focused on the 5 large dragons shimmering over their head, they managed to catch a shadow of an object drop from the first dragon. It came crashing down with the full force of gravity from a hundred feet up, cratering in front of the party with the impact of an earthquake. The group managed to keep their feet and now focused their attention to the elven man standing before them. While looking young in his years, the golden skinned shirtless elf carried an expression that suggested experience well beyond any of their years. A black bear belt wrapped around his waist, hanging over his broad white pants. He gave the party a once over glance with a mile long stare, after which he finally spoke. "I am Kranicius, the High Lord of the Hunt. Why do you trespass in my master's woods?" Before the party could reply, they suddenly realized that the monk's entrance was entirely intended to mask the arrival of his comrades - who along with the elf, now had the party surrounded. The elf, fully aware that they were keen on this fact, paused on the question to instead introduce his comrades. Pointing to a male dragonborn, carrying a large wooden oar, draped in furs from a large saber-tooth tiger with the head serving as a hood - "That is Trusk, the ever explorer". She is "Dytricia, the ancient viper" - moving his hand in the direction of an old blind dwarven woman, with long braided white hair, wearing a green and black patterned robe. A hawk perched on her shoulder appeared to constantly whisper into her ear. "You wont see Tax, but she saw you. She doesn't like strangers but she is ready should you choose to make any sudden movements." "The one with the bo staff is Isophisia, warden of the grove" pointing to a female tiefling wearing a white dress and carrying a large black bo staff that appeared to shift in size each time one looked at it. "Lastly, that is Lionidus Ironmane, champion of the hunt. Try not to piss him off." pointing to a male leonin warrior dressed in chainmail armor, carrying a shield bearing the sigil of a panther chasing his tail and a golden spear in his other arm. The lionfaced Lionidus snarled, "can we feed them to the pets yet?" Kranicius took a second to let the words hover over the intruders before replying "That is not up to us but largely up to their answer to my question."

The party nervously told the monk monk that it was never their intention to crash their masters demi plane. That they were riding towards Unova to look into a matter for the crown one minute and the next they had found themselves in this strange place and that were looking for a way to get back. Kranicius turned and motioned for the party to follow, with his comrades flanking them at the side. The group moved in silence and it was hard to tell whether the journey took eternity or if the tension made the hour long walk feel that way.

As they drew closer to the mountain, they found that a fortress had been carved out of it. Kranicius led them up a winding path towards the peak. In the lower levels, they saw kith training in martial combat and archery and others sparring. As they drew higher, the path was dotted with giant panthers, tigers, wolves, and bears who paid the party no attention. At the top, they found a black stoned mausoleum with large 10 foot marble doors. Kranicius approached the doors and swung them back with ease, revealing a dark lite room. He motioned the party inwards with a courteous bow and flourish.

#### Ohotian

The first thing that caught their eye was the dragon. It had to be almost thirty feet tall and at least sixty long. There was no way this thing could fit into the building they saw outside. For that matter, neither could the presence before them, which rested its hand on the dragon's head like it was a faithful golden retriever. The figure towered over the dragon despite sitting in a large stone throne. He had ram like horns, the maw of a saber-tooth, and bear like hands. His skin was crimson, which made his bright yellow cat like eyes significantly more terrifying. Long deep purple hair hung over his shoulders in a wild disheveled way. He was dressed in robes made up of patches of every hide known and unknown. While his left hand was busy stroking under the ear of his pet dragon Hector, his right was firmly gripped onto an enormous silver javelin. A vine pinned his right foot in its place. Sansarya's, Synkronos', Merkorios', Alexander's, and Maegor's thoughts all hovered to a single shared memory that they had experienced before - the room in the underground temple in Ashden. They were once again in the presense of a divine being.

His voice cut the tension in the room like a knife. For a being so clearly at the apex of the food chain, his voice was surprisingly jovial - with a definite unintentional cockiness. He chuckled as he spoke, taking joy in having company before him. "I am Ohotian, Lord of the Perpetual Hunt. You stand in my dominion. What brings you here?"

Merkorios stepped forward and told the god to tell him of the rebellion they were tasked with investigating. and that they were looking for a druid named Omnidorf who apparently had a part to play in the Count's decision.

Sansarya stepped forward to inquire more and the god spoke to her directly, "Ah, Daughter of Kalanthye, yes... I can sense her scent in your blood. My sister's Kalanthye and Deira, and I sought power to vanquish the Aboleths. We did so at a great cost, but thinking the matter done, we thought it was worth it. I had a hunch then that one escaped our grasp and it seems that I was right. It appears that your druid has been hearing whispers from it. He has allowed it to taint my temple in Unova with its filthy water, thereby leeching on my life force here." His eyes dotted to the vine on his foot before he continued. "The temple is a pond deep in the Unova woods. It is the heart of the hunt, a place where all animals must come to survive. Cleanse the temple of the tainted water and you shall have my boon."
Synkronos, being cognizant of the Squirrel Kings request, asked if Ohotian needed the party to kill the druid for him. Releasing a jovial belly laugh before pausing to look at the druid before him with a stern face, Ohotian replied "That man's life is inconsequential to me. The temple is what matters."

Finally, Jottenheim asked how they were to make it to Unova. Ohotian chuckled again, tossed his javelin up - catching it side ways before throwing it directly over the party's heads. As it passed over them, the javelin began to rip through the space behind them. When they turned, they saw the city of Unova shimmering on the other side of the portal.

Before leaving, the barbarian inquired if Kranicius was interested in the coat he found in the bunker. The unusually stern faced monk chucked and replied, "I see someone finally found that old stash house." A drop of sweat percolated on Jottenheim's forehead. Noticing his nervousness, the monk continued "Life is an endless hunt. What is lost to some is found by others. That is the way." As the party entered the portal, Synkronos heard the unmistakable crunch of an Ashden walnut, similar to the ones he left at the alter, coming from the Ohotian.

## Chapter 6

### Unova

The party exited the portal to a view of Unova basked in moonlight. It was around 10pm and the group was unsure of what the decorum was for entering a city in open rebellion at night. Eventually, after investigating the simple planked bridge and determining its passible sturdiness, Sansarya volunteered to serve as the scouting party.

She and Marybeth ventured across the planks. The bridge clicked and shifted as the princess rode across it but it proved sturdy enough. Upon entering the city, Sansarya found a system of silos and a barn - likely serving as storage space for the barley fields the party saw outside the city - to her right. To her left stood a guard house. A single guard, chewing tobacco and paying the visitor no mind, leaned against the building. On the left, across the street perpendicular to the one in line with the bridge, stood a large silent wooden building with a wheel shaped sign reading Speedwagon Stagecoach company. To the right, stood a stone and wood tavern. A sign over the door read "The Hornless Unicorn" with a wooden horse head hanging below it. Unlike the stagecoach building, the windows in this one flickered from the light inside.

#### The Hornless Unicorn

Venturing inside, Sansarya found a cozy three story bar, with the second floor consisting of a balcony overlooking the first. A few guards and commoners occupied the tables on the first floor. A bard played bagpipes on the stage. A wizard and a druid sat at the booth on the balcony and the princess couldn't help but feel like the pair was watching her. She approached the pair and tried to start a conversation. The mage - dressed in a ostentatious red and black coat - gave off a criminal vibe. Sansarya was not able to get much out of the pair and left them, with the mage offering his hope that she would enjoy the stew on her way out.

Afterwards, she made her way to the back of the room - where the bar was situated - and sat down next to a rat tailed halfling dressed in black leather. Despite her best efforts to get the attention of the burley mutton chopped bartender it appeared that the barkeep was doing his best to ignore her. Noticing her frustration, the rat tailed man beckoned the barkeep - named Two Dogs - to pour his "new friend" a pint. The bartender plopped an overfilled stein in front of Sansarya, spilling some of the content on the counter. Having his attention, the princess inquired about available rooms and was able to secure the last three. The waitress, Anya, a beautiful black haired woman in her 30s wearing a red skirt with a white top inquired whether Sansarya and company would like her to ready bowls of stew for Sansarya and company. Having paid for room and board, Sansarya returned to the party to inform them that she had secured shelter for the night.

The group rode into town together and pulled their horses up to the inn. Not knowing what to do with their horses, they asked the guard about where they could leave them for the night. The guard asked for a bribe and upon being paid, unlocked the stagecoach company garage and beckoned them to lead their horses into the empty stalls there. With the matter resolved, the group proceeded to make their way inside the bar.

Kilsworth and Alexander grabbed seats at the bar next to the rat tailed man. The rest of the group pushed two tables together and grabbed seats there. Food and drink was brought out to everyone - accompanied with unreciprocated flirtatious gestures towards the male members of the group - however Merkorios abstained from both. Alexander and Kilsworth indulged in the beer - finding it rather off flavored and watered down - but avoided the stew, instead choosing to chat up the halfling about current events. The man, named Wyn, rambled about how much life was better under Omnidorf who had managed to usurp the Akurkam - known more commonly as the Iron Count - with some form of "third miracle" that involved smiting the unbelievers. The halfling noted that he and Two Dogs were early followers of Omnidorf, back when they were loggers.

He returned to the group and suggested that they meet up outside to "check on their horses". Maegor, Merkorios, Sansarya, Sylfir, and Jottenheim followed. The horses were locked away, and the group had no way of entering the stage coach garage but could see that their mounts were okay for the time being. Before going back in, Synkronos pulled the group aside and mentioned how he had a bad feeling about things, primarily due to the cult-like vibes the place was giving off.

Upon re-entering the establishment, Sansarya again noticed that the couple upstairs were keeping a keen eye on them. Taking Sylfir and Jottenheim with her, she decided to confront the pair. When she approached the mage, he demanded to know if she was after his bounty - noting that the party had just eaten the first group of bounty hunters after him. Sansarya attempted to cast Suggestion upon the mage, but was thwarted by his Counterspell. Thinking that the druidess could be a potential victim, Jottenheim inquired whether she was being inconvenienced by the mage. She replied that while Maxim Maximovich was not inconveniencing her, the barbarian who was now in her face was.

Noticing that the mage was preparing an attack, Sansarya tried to strike first. She began to weave together an empowered chaos bolt only to again have the magic drained from her via Maxim's counterspell. Upon hearing combat, Kilsworth drew his bow and bolted upstairs as fast as he could. Figuring that all pretense had now dropped, the bartender with mutton chops assumed his true Were-Boar form and attacked Alexander with his maul. Wyn, having transformed into a Were-Rat, tried to follow suit but ended up tripping over his feet and dropping his short sword.

Before Jottenheim could react, Maxim took a step back and unleashed a psychic tendril at the barbarian, temporarily slowing his reactions down. Sylfir retaliated, striking the mage with his maul but the druidess, Tulip, came to the mages rescue - casting Cure Wounds on him. Meanwhile downstairs, Alexander, holding his longsword with both hands, took a swing at Two Dogs. The barkeep did little to protect himself, instead intentionally exposing his chest to the longsword. The blade struck its mark easily. However, the Were-Boar simply smiled at Alexander as his blade grazed along his chest, failing to pierce the Were-Boar's tough skin. Seeing the futility of striking their transformed enemies with regular iron, Maegor enchanted his longsword. His first blow struck true and pierced the enemies flesh. Knowing that the burly were-boar was not immune, he struck again, this time channeling the power of Beacon into a vicious smite.

Seeing her allies in trouble, Anya assumed her werewolf form and charged relentlessly into the fray. Not taking account of the spilled cups from the bar top, the werewolf slid on the slick surface and fell prone. Synkronos saw the opportunity and transformed into his trusty tiger form. The beast pounced on the werewolf, further pinning Anya to the wet floor. Synkronos sank his jaws into her neck but his fangs could not pierce her hide.

Taking Sylfir's advice to engage the healer before finishing the mage, Jottenheim fired two javelins pinning the druid to the back of the bar. This gave Kilsworth, who had by then rounded the corner upstairs, a prime shot at the couple upstairs - finishing both off with an arrow to the eye. Merkorios meanwhile exchanged fire with the guards downstairs. The first guard missed him with his greatsword. The second managed to land a crossbow bolt into the prince's thigh. The third ran out the door to seek help. Knowing that reinforcements could swarm them at any point, the prince backed away and cast a magic trap on the doorway.

With the enemies upstairs eliminated, Sylfir rushed back down the staircase to join the fray below. Jottenheim on the other hand decided to take a shortcut - jumping the railing and landing next to Alexander and the were-rat and were-boar. He swung his greataxe down on the barkeep. The impact shattered the tiles the two were standing on but failed to leave a mark on the bartender. Seeing that his sword was ineffective, Alexander backed away and fired a magic missile at each of the lycanthropes. Maegor followed that barrage up with another swing of his magical longsword, this time cleaving the wereboar's head cleanly off. The paladin whirled through the impact and followed up his attack with a deadly strike onto the were-rat standing near by.

Seeing the situation get more dire, one of the three guards ran for the exit to look for reinforcements. Merkorios' trap caught him off guard. The prince followed up his attack by viciously mocking the rat tailed halfling to death. Sansarya and Kilsworth, both trained in Marinnian tactics, took the high ground on the balcony and rained down death on the last guard and the werewolf - who Sansarya finished off with a thunderous chaos bolt. The room reverberated from the spell for a few seconds. When the noise died down, the room was quiet enough for everyone to clearly hear the sound of a warning bell ringing from a watch tower.

#### Escaping Unova

The party regrouped downstairs after the fight. Their attempt to hatch an escape plan however was cut short by a flaming arrow, which smashed through the window, catching a table on fire. Quickly evaluating their options, Sylfir suggested two modes of escape. He could either use his trusted Gate Crasher to demolish a wall or they could try to escape from a second floor window. The party chose option B and headed upstairs. There, they found a window facing west towards the stables. The view, although fairly limited, suggested that they had a safe path towards the stables. Synkronos offered to transform into a vine for the rest of the party to use to descend down but that proved unnecessary since one of the members of the group had a climbing rope and a grappling hook. Alexander, Sansarya, Sylfir, and Merkorios lead the way down the rope and over to the stables. Sylfir made quick work of the locked doors with his hammer which spooked the horses.

While the four of them worked on calming the horses and gathering them up for the rest of the group, Synkronos and Maegor made their way down to the street while Kilsworth kept watch from above. Upon landing on the ground, Synkronos and Maegor noticed an odd trifecta approaching them from the northern end of the road. The group consisted of a pale individual garbed in black robes surrounded by crows, a "member" of the city guard, and what appeared to be a tree like creature baring the form of a humanoid. The first two individuals continued approaching the group. The tree like creature however walked over to one of the odd thorn trees standing in the road and upon touching it, melded into it. A second later, the the three of them saw that same creature emerge from a similar tree in the alley next to the stables. Synkronos, taking tiger form, and Maegor made their way north to intercept the first two individuals. Seeing a clean shot, Kilsworth let lose two arrows at the wooden creature. The wood woad deflected the first with its left arm, which was shaped like a buckler. The block however opened up space for the second arrow, which struck the creature in the abdomen. To Kilsworth horror, the creature simply snapped the arrow off and its bark regrew around the arrowhead, closing off the wound.

Having gathered the horses and taking their places in their respective saddles, the four in the barn rode out onto the road and immediately spotted the strange wooden creature. Before any of them could react, the enraged woad charged at Alexander and walloped him with its right hand, which was shaped like a club. The rogue saw stars spin around his head for a second before the world grew dark. His companions saw him slump onto the neck of his horse before he rolled off unconscious. Seeing the enemy conveniently clump up together, the Crow Master followed up the assault by materializing a crow and charging it at Merkorios. Upon impact, the bird exploded releasing magical energy hitting the prince and splash damaging some of the allies around him.

Meanwhile, the city guard recklessly charged at Maegor, unleashing a ferocious slash at him with his greatsword. The young paladin's underestimation of his opponent proved critical. The sword struck true, finding a weak point in Maegor's chainmail and bathing the guard and his sword in the paladin's blood. The paladin felt his arm grow numb as he tried to stem the bleeding, but the blood loss proved too much for him him. Synkronos, seeing his comrade keel over, pounced at the guard in revenge. Cracker followed in tow. Finding space near Maegor, freed up by the druid's attack, the albino squirrel began applying a paste to the wound and forced a magical berry into the paladin's mouth. Maegor regained consciousness in time to see his comrade snap the guard's ankle with his maw.

At the southern end of the battle, Sylfir contended with another volley of crows from the mysterious pale man. This time, the explosion caused vines to grow from the ground, which reached out to ensnare him. The smith muscled his way out of their grasp and put his shield between Alexander and the woad. His hammer followed after, striking the foe in the chest. The tree like creature however was able to regrow some of the damage before it attempted to lash out at Fred, Sylfir's trusted mount. It however missed its mark. While Merkorios healed up Alexander, Sansarya let loose a might chaos bolt, scorching the woadout of existence. Seeing his two allies fall, the mysterious man retreated out of the party's range, who decided it was better to heal their wounds than to pursue the man further into Unova.

##### Peetrus Mend's Mob

The two healers, Synkronos and Merkorios, gathered their comrades and dished out a barrage of healing spells. Their diligent work however did not distract the group from noticing the growing clamor building southwest and southeast of them. Jottenheim, sensing the urgency of the situation, leaned on his former military experience to beratingly demand that the poor saps with crossbows guarding the gatehouse surrender. Although they did not drop their crossbows, Jottenheim knew his attempt to dress them down worked: their gaze no longer met his, their hands quivered, and their missed shots looked intentional. Alexander, sensing that the guards were distracted, made his way behind the guardhouse. Standing in his saddle, he leapt for the wall. His feet slipped the landing but the skillful rogue managed to catch the top of the ladder, stopping his fall. Remounted, Sylfir charged towards the city gate with his trusty Gate Smasher. Using the momentum, the smith drove the hammer into the gates sundering them into splinters.

Before Sansarya, Maegor, and Kilsworth had a chance to drive their horses forward, the mob that gathered to their left and right swarmed around them. A portly bald friar in grey robes wearing a strange golden sigil made up of an Ouroboros with an eye at its center made up of many eyes called to the mob to force the "duke's tax collectors" out of the city. The mob, made up of peasant men, women, and children moved towards the trio with pitchforks, rocks, and scythes. Maegor broke free and charged towards the gate house. Sansarya meanwhile diverted her horse closer to Jottenheim's steed and launched a chaos bolt at the portly friar, hoping to hit her mark despite the coward using the crowd for cover.

Luck was not with her however. The bolt failed to hit its mark, instead striking someone in the crowd. The princess' heart sank a second later when a older women lifted the charred remains of her child and let out a bone curling scream of "they killed my poor Timmy". The murder of an innocent child enraged the crowd further. They charged at Kilsworth, who stayed back to cover the rear, from all sides and attempted to pull him down from his horse. The friar began to chant in druidic and summoned a shadow clone of himself between Sansarya and Jottenheim. The shadow let loose a dreadful scream that left all but Sansarya, Kilsworth, and Alexander (who was out of its range) terrified of the being.

Jottenheim dismounted and, fighting his fear, recklessly slashed at the creature. Alexander, after pulling himself up onto the wall, charged at the two guards. His short sword finished off the first one with ease but before he had a chance to strike the second, the poor sap threw his crossbow at the rogue and bolted away along the wall's walkway. Terrified of the shadow spawn, Maegor and Sylfir attempted to get out of dodge via the bridge outside the guardhouse. However, before the pair managed to get far, the noticed the water below them churn and bubble. A blast of water shot up immediately below them, launching the pair of riders and their respective horses off of the now collapsed part of the bridge below them. Maegor's horse Ed and Sylfir managed to avoid the guizer closing back in on them. Sylfir's horse Fred and Maegor weren't as lucky. The elemental reformed around them, swallowing them inside as it took on the form of an aboleth.

Sansarya, mistakenly believing that both the shadow spawn and the elemental were derived from the friar, choose to focus on the portly man. She cast suggestion on her target, demanding that he call of the mob and drop his spells. The friar was unable to overcome Sansarya's spell and did as he was commanded. He told the mob to disperse and leave these guests of Unova be. To Jottenheim surprise and relief, the shadow spawn dispersed. The water elemental however remained in place. The princess, while digging into the friar's mind with her magic, sensed that an outside force, inside the man's head, was competing for control over his mind. The once commanding friar was now hunched over, drooling on himself, and mumbling nonsensically about the will of Rhiga, a druid named Yelcan, and the day Omnidorf returned.

Judging the friar to no longer be a threat, and seeing their knight in training in danger of drowning, Sansarya, Jottenheim, and Kilsworth rushed over to the gatehouse to focus on the elemental. Meanwhile, Sylfir, who had fortunately landed near the southern end of the walkway, pulled himself out of the water. Seeing his friend and more importantly his trusty steed in danger, the smith rushed towards the elemental with his magic hammer and began walloping it with all of his might. Maegor's Beaconite training kicked in right in the nick of time. The knight correctly identified the creature enveloping him to be a water elemental. With his last breath, he cast protection from good and evil, creating a magical barrier around him that forced the elemental to eject him out onto the landing next to Sylfir. He got up in time to see Fred kick for the last time before getting crushed by the water pressure inside the elemental. Maegor knew all to well that he could have shared that fate as well. Sansarya began hurling ice powered chaos bolts at the elemental. The spell froze parts of the creature long enough for Kilsworth, Alexander, and company to find weak spots to target. Their collective effort allowed them to bring the creature down, which collapsed and froze over the two ends of the bridge it destroyed earlier.

Yelcan called a tribunal to bring the order's attention to the effects the new path was having on them. He told them to gaze at their reflections in the pond to see the effects of the blight that Omnidorf brought. Their skin was turning to ash. Their faces were aging rapidly. Wildlife around them was decaying, becoming twisted and tormented. The old man's words had an effect and those not fully under Rhiga's influence began to see reason. Before Yelcan had a chance to fully cement a hold, Omnidorf stormed into the center of the grove. He chanted in a forgotten tongue and those who opposed them dissipated into the water, rising a new in the forms of the elemental the party had just fought. From that day forward, the grove spoke as one.

Omnidorf's actions, sometime during his absence, had irked the Akurkam (the traditional title given to the Count of Unova) enough to send his daughter Margred ‘Itea on a puntitive expedition against the grove. The young druid learned of the expedition early from his lycanthropes. He told the druids to clear out the grove and leave the matter to him. When his followers returned the next day, they were surprised to find the remnants of the expedition, including Margred 'Itea, fully under the druid's beck and call.

Omnidorf rode out with the expedition for Unova that afternoon. The Akurkam, thinking his daughter succeeded to capture the man responsible for all of his troubles, rode out triumphantly from the castle to show. Upon entering the square, the saw that the druid was not bound. The men under his daughters command, turned on him at her insistence. He ordered his own soldiers to attack. Before they could, Omnidorf released a pulse of energy throughout the city that turned all those opposed to him into thorny, dried out, twisted trees. At his behest, Magred took command of the city, with the friar (Peetrus Mend) and Omnidorf's loyalist, Nathrum the Crow Keeper, as her advisors and his eyes.

Sansarya inquired about where to find Omnidorf and the grove. The friar told her to follow the river north. After a day's ride, they would find their way to the heart of the forest.

##### Fei Fei and the Eye of Drist

Sensing that the peace Sansarya bought them was merely temporary, the party decided to leg it out of Unova. As the group regathered themselves, they noticed a mysterious tall hooded stranger approach them. Although first instinct suggested that they put their guard up, seeing a pig pulling a cart while accompanying the stranger somehow dispelled that notion quickly. "Hey friends. It looks like y'all are getting out of dodge and this cart is stolen, so I am as well. Mind if I join you? I am Fei Fei by the way, what are your names?" Sansarya, Jottenheim, Alexander, Synkronos, and Maegor made their introductions and beckoned the stranger to follow suit. Feeling a bit more at ease, Fei Fei lowered her hood, revealing her half orc features. She explained that she is a cleric of Lathander, the god of light and truth. That she is in search of friends and knowledge, is a fan of astrology (double check with Laurel) and can shoot magic out of her belly button with the help of her magic crystal.

Despite being absolutely fascinated with their new acquaintance, the group *knew* the peril of staying put right at the precept of a town overrun by insane cultists. Crossing the bridge, including the bit frozen over by the destroyed water elemental, they made their way to the woods to the south. Scouting out the terrain, Jottenheim was able to locate an excellent cave, empty of any inhabitants, along the sunken river bank. Fei Fei began making preparations for a karaoke "get to know each other" sleep over party, but was thrown off by how quickly her new friends called it quits. Little did she know that they were all being drawn into a most nefarious dream.

They felt as if hours or days, maybe years.. or even ages pass by before their respite was thrown asunder by a drifting shadow above which began to block out the sun’s warmth. What they initially interpreted as a cloud, now clearly resembles a large winged beast above them. As its enormous body eclipses the sun, the air turns cold. Their feet, dangling in the water, began to freeze. Frost began to creep up the bark of the great tree. Feeling the chill, instinct forces them to jerk their foot back from the cold water. As they did, they felt a heavy chain yank back with equal force.
They heard a winch churn deep below. The chain grew taut. As the gears continue to churn, they slipped off of the root despite their best efforts to stay on. Their body hit the cold water. They expected the shock to throw then out of the dream but it didn't. Something is kept them there, leaving them unsure of whether the dream was truly a dream.
By now, they were entirely submerged, accompanied by the sunken roots of the great tree whose twisted image is reflected off of the surface of the water above. Refocusing, thinking that they could save themselves if they found the source driving the chain. Looking down, their leg was no longer chained but instead grappled by a smooth tentacle. Peering down, they began to see a thousand eyes open up below, followed by a massive maw containing rows of teeth, all of which belonged to the tentacled creature dragging them down.
Panic engulfed them. They began to use all of their strength to try to break free, to swim to the surface. As they struggled, they began to gasp for breath, letting out bubbles of air which strangely floated down rather than up. As they watched them sink, they saw within them scenes of their regrets, their failures, and their fears. The beast dragged them further down. Lacking air, they began to lose consciousness and the strength to fight on. Before they did, they heard a deep voice in their head “You are now in my domain, submit before the tides of madness or perish.”
Awaking, covered in a cold sweat, gasping for breath, a choking fit seized them immediately until they each manage to cough up water reeked of the sea as Fei Fei looked on in horror.

Fearing the presence of a nefarious force at play, the cleric immediately called upon Lathander's favor to reveal all near by sources of magic. Although the god's blessing did show her energy emanating from equipment carried by her new companions, she did not pick up any outside magical pings. The energy from the Eye of Drist, which emanated in a duality between unknown cosmic energy and the power of Diera, did catch the cleric's attention. Panicked by the dream, Synkronos suddenly remembered that orb, in a past fight with Lord Collingsley, had revealed invisible foes. The druid organized the party in a circle and placed the orb in the middle. They drew on the orb's power once and the orb began to glow with purple light on the ground. At Synkronos' command, the group focused more energy into the orb. And yet.. nothing happened. Initially at least.. Then, as thoughts of the the endeavor being a failure began to build, the orb suddenly levitated off the ground and followers of Diera began to hear the soft tranquil song of song birds fill the cave. As the group approached, a small spider climbed out of the orb. Synkronos was ready to name the spider Charlotte, however they were taken aback by the spider revealing herself to be none other than Diera herself.

Before the spider disappeared, Jottenheim kneeled before the goddess and told her that despite not believing in her existence in the past, that he could no longer deny it. The goddess replied that "seeking and accepting knowledge was always the first step to finding truth." With that, the spider crawled back into the orb, which immediately dropped back to the ground. Synkronos, having retrieved their prized possession, immediately looked for Cracker, their trusty squirrel comrade, to share a morning meal and gossip about the sight that they had just witnessed. Cracker was however nowhere to be found. The party franticly searched for a trace of the squirrel that had saved their lives a number of times over, but were only able to find tracks leading out to the edge of the river. Although worried, most of the party was comforted that Cracker was likely safe. This was not good enough for Synkronos, who despite their code to defend nature, promised to burn down the whole forest if that was what it took to find their friend. Sensing the urgency, the party quickly packed up camp and set out north, hoping to find their trusted companion along the way.

### The search for the source

Leaving the forest, the party rode north along the western bank of the river. Passing through the grain fields and farmsteads outside the city, the group received many disapproving and suspicious glances from the folks they passed. As they curved around the island city of Unova, Jottenheim and Alexander noticed that parts of the city wall had been removed. Looking for more clues as to why the walls appeared to have been removed rather than destroyed, Jottenheim noticed a construction site for a tower in the middle of the city. His military training suggested that such a construction, in place of city walls, was likely not prudent when it came to defense.

As the party made their way past the city, the fields broke off into swamp lands. Their travel grew slow as the wagon and horse shoes sunk into the mud along the river. Pushing further, they began noticing elven ruins dotting the landscape. Investigating the ruins, Synkronos was surprised to find one depicting three elves - one taking on various aspects of beasts while wielding a mighty bow, another channeling spells from a spell book held up by a flock of birds, and a third flying in the air similar to Sansarya - fighting creatures that closely resembled the one they had seen in their dream. They concluded that the three elves likely were Ohotian, Diera, and Kalanthye. The druid, out of the corner of his eye, saw a figure - that they initially assumed was a mossy rock - skulking about. Synkronos alerted the party, and Fei Fei called her friends to her as she called upon Lathander for protection. The slimy hideous figure, which turned out to be a troll, charged at the group. However, Fei Fei's spell went up in time, leaving the troll pressed into the barrier it was not expecting. The group attacked the troll from the safety of the barrier but were surprised to find that the creature's venomous blood, spilt by their attacks, burnt them with acid. While Maegor and Jottenheim attacked the creature from the safety of the magical circle, Alexander dared to sneak out to try to backstab the foe. The creature was fully distracted with the barrier to could not burst through, giving the rogue a perfect opportunity to slip his blade between the creature's ribs. Alexander took his shot... only to be surprised by how tough the troll's hide was. The creature turned towards the rogue, and plunged both of its claws into Alexander. The orphan's vision went black from the pain as he saw the creature's jaw move in for the coup de grace.

Trolls however, are clumsy creatures. This one in particular. The troll missed Alexander with its bite, instead taking a bite out of its own arm. Seeing their companion hand lifelessly in the arms of their foes, the party sprang into action. Fei Fei called upon the powers of Lathander to heal her new friend back to life. Alexander gained consciousness long enough to see one of his allies strike the troll with a javelin, spilling acid on the poor rogue again, causing him to slip into unconsciousness all over again. Jottenheim meanwhile took a hard step forward, and cleaved the troll in half from the back, showering himself in the creatures poisonous blood. The troll fell to the ground, releasing the dying rogue. Maegor, feeling responsible for reinjuring his ally, ran over to Alexander. Channeling the energy of Beacon into his friend, Maegor closed up Alexander's wounds, bringing the orphan back from death's door.

The party ventured further into the swamp, where they encountered corrupted fey and plant matter. The second fight proved equally difficult and the group decided to move away from the river to find some dry safe land to rest, patch up their wounds, and regain their lost spell slots. They took turns keeping watch, with all but Sansarya not noticing the active forest and peering eyes all around them. Having rested, the princess warned the rest of the group about potential threats before they headed further up the river.

#### Omnidorf

Before them, the river opened up into a large circular pond with a small island sitting dead center containing an elf in druidic robes. Despite displaying signs of youth, black wrinkles emanated from his pupilless dark eyes. Seeing the party, his face curved into a cruel grin. "About time you showed your faces." He clapped his hands twice, gracefully, and the swamp around the party came alive. Wood Woads began to emerge from the deformed knotted trees around them, soon followed by all sorts of lycanthropic creatures slinking in from all corners of the swamp. Finding themselves surrounded and heavily outnumbered, the party's hopes were dashed.

Before the group could position themselves to make a last stand, a silver javelin pierced the air, knocking back the closest werewolf. The projectile was followed by others - more javelins and flaming and silvered arrows. The bewildered lycanthropes began wildly sniffing for those responsible for cutting down their numbers. Eventually their ears and noses pointed towards the south. Down river from them, a single white squirrel - riding a blonde corgi - emerged from the morning mist. Soon, more squirrels, corgis dragging wheeled wooden artillery machines, and a host of beavers armed with silvered spears followed. Cracker's army charged into the fray, throwing the enemy into disarray. A beaver dressed in a regal cape made of leaves, wooden armor, and a crown made from branches led the charge. As he did, he announced himself as King Castor, Lord of the Three Dams. As Castor and Cracker's host crashed into the Woads and were-creatures, Cracker called out to Synkronos. He told the Druid that they would handle Omnidorf's minions but that their success hinged on taking out their leader. Synkronos relaid the message and she and Sansarya began casting ray of frost to create an ice bridge to allow them to safely cross the pond. Omnidorf meanwhile summoned two Water Weirds to engage the party, while also throwing up a force barrier in front of him. Two were-tigers joined him on either side, firing arrows at the party from a safe distance while Omnidorf fired off blasts of ice. The group engage the Water Weirds as Alexander pelleted one of the tigers with arrows. A familiar reality ripple began to form next to the other were-tiger, from which emerged the Phase Spider the group had fought a couple days ago. To their surprise, it attacked the were-tiger instead of them.

The party carved their way through the weirds. Synkronos transformed into an octopus and snuck her way under Omnidorf's barrier and positioned herself for a sneak attack. Meanwhile, Jottenheim charged the were-tiger, tackling him in the process while Fei Fei dropped a flaming sphere next to Omnidorf. Despite Synkronos best efforts to sneak up, the corrupted druid spotted her instantly and went in for a melee attack. Frayed by the corrupting magic, the druid slipped and fell into the ball of fire. Alexander, Synkronos, and Sansarya took advantage of his stumble and rained down the final blows as the druid burnt to a crisp.

Witnessing their leader's death broke the morale of Omnidorf's army. A call for a retreat sounded and the Wood Woads and lycantropes began scattering in all directions trying to escape the onslaught of beavers and squirrels. However, just before Omnidorf's forces broke off, the werebear dueling King Castor managed to deal a fatal blow to the otter king. Jottenheim continued wrestling the were-tiger who began flailing and slashing wildly to escape. Growing desperate, the tiger bit the barbarian forcing Jottenheim to release him. Before slinking away like the rest of the army, he shouted at Jottenheim that soon he would join them.

#### Aftermath

Having slayed Omnidorf and routed his army, the party regathered themselves around King Castor's body which was being held up by the King's berieved son, Duke Beaverton. Cracker updated the party on his travels. The corrupting forces in the city of Unova worried him and he felt it important to find reinforcements. It turned out that the pollution of the river forced the beavers of Three Dams to abandon their homestead. This united the squirrels and beavers in a common cause.

Having morned the death of their king, the beavers formed a raft to place Castor upon and set him afloat onto the river. Alexander lit a flaming arrow and launched it at the raft as it began to take to the current. The two groups then split up. The party headed north to find the source of the corruption while the beavers marched south restore their home.

#### A fork in the river

After riding north for several hours, the party discovered a curious intersection in the river. The river's original source, a mountain stream, had been carefully blocked off. Instead, a dug up canal leading west was feeding the river. The party magically shaped earth to block the foul smelling canal and then released the spring water back into the river. They then followed the canal west to try to assertain its origin. The canal's path lead them to the coast of the Marinnian sea, a long expanse of water sitting between the Frozen Wastes, The Kingdom of Ior, The Kingdom of Rho, and the Kingdom of Marinnia.

## Chapter 7

### West Gholon

Having found and stopped the source of corruption in Unova, resolved the Squirrel King's request, and fufilled Ohotian's hunt, the party decided to travel south to West Gholon to stock up on gear and get some much needed rest. The journey there was uneventful, despite it taking four long days on horseback with stops at friendly farms and inns along the way.

They arrived at the city's Isle of Names northern gate in the morning. Witnessing the chaotic hubub in Ric Hathoair, the besieiged city of Ol' Gholon, and the absolute shitshow that was the City of Unova, the group was surprised at the vast baurocratic system in place before them. They joined the queue at the gate and were soon required to state their name and occupation before an older individual who required the aid of a listening horn. Fei Fei declared herself a merchant and was taxed as such. Not having the neccessary coin to pay, the old man stamped "debter" on her entry documents. Alexander, unable to pay the entry fee for an adventurer, ran into the same problem. Maegor and Synkronos meanwhile were let in for free due to the reputation of their established guilds. Jottenheim declared himself a hero and paid the tax to enter. Sansarya meanwhile declared herself a princess, taking the opportunity to cast charm person on the old beaurocrat. She then convinced the old man that the fellow party members were a part of her "diplomatic" entourage and should not have to pay money for entry.

Having passed through the gates, the group was stopped by a stablehand who offered to take their horses for a silver a day plus an additional one for an extra apple or carrot a day. The group obliged and received a numbered token in exchange for their respective horses. Fei Fei also chose to board Pig as well. They then made their way through the Victor's Gate into the City Proper.

Upon entering, they were surprised to find a large hippodrome directly infront of them. The arena was closed that day, however Jottenheim found a young lad selling newspapers near by and upon paying the chap a bronze piece, discovered that a race was scheduled two days from now. The group also inquired where they might find room, board, and drinks.

#### The Garrison

One of the recommendations, the Garrison, happened to be the one story stone tower like structure with stained glass windows sitting across the street. The wood lined, lightly lit interior proved to be slightly clausterphobic, particularly enhanced by the plethora of uniformed indivuals - some in similar garb to individuals the party encoutnered on the Isle of Lists, some in black uniforms, and Giffs in blue coats and white pants - crowding the establishment. A heavy thud accompanied by the crunching of bones rung through the air, followed by a number of cheers. The thud drew the party's attention to a roped off ring tucked in the back of the establishment. A two individuals in Gholian military uniforms were lifting a bleeding third off the ground - likely the producer of the loud shudder. Another individual, in a black uniform, stepped out of the ring and pulled a knife out of the wall. He moved over to a carving on the section reading "the Fist of Ghol", accompanied by a large number of tallies and carved another tally at the bottom. With the deed done, the bar exploded into a cheer of "another one for Blackraven, another for the black cloaks".

Fei Fei befriended an elf in a black uniform who joined her in a chant to Lathander. Maegor and Alexander posted up at the bar in order to get the lay of the land. Sansarya placed a bet on the Fist of Ghol for the next fight while Synkronos began ordering shots. Jottenheim meanwhile went over to talk to a goliath getting ready for the next bout. Fei Fei's elven friend volunteered to represent the Fist of Ghol in the next fight but did not prove to be much of a match against his much larger opponent. The Cleric of Lathander provided the concussed elf with healing and ordered him a drink.

Sansarya, having lost her money in the fight, decided to raise her spirits by contributing to Synkronos' inebriation. While the druid threw back shots, Sansarya threw hers over her shoulder - eventually pissing off a now somewhat wet Giff solider. An inebriated Synkronos, trying to back up her party memeber, made a crass remark about the Giff's significant other. The Giff, now completely infuriated by the pair, challenged the druid to fight in the ring. Synkronos obliged and joined the large hippo-like humanoid in the ring. When the fight bell struck, the druid transformed into a tiger. The bar went silent for a second before being filled up by rancorous "boo" chant followed by calls to kick the cheater out. Synkronos tucked her tail back and slunk out of the bar. She found a spot next to the door to nap off the alcohol while waiting for the rest of her friends. The rest of the group regathered and decided that they were going to catch the marauder. They consulted Yeslick, the establishment owner and bartender, and learned that most reported incidents were in the Marketplace and Forge Districts and that they could book a room at the Yonder Viel in the Marketplace or at the Leaky Bottom in the Forge District. Opting for the cheaper option, the group exited the Garrison, collected Synkronos, and made their way west down the main street. On the way to the inn, they passed Dierra's Nook and stopped in at Hadrick and Sons where Fei Fei sold the owner a magical perfumed bottle for his daughter. They passed by the Temple of Ghol and the Temple of Kord before finding the Leaky Bottom. Sansarya booked rooms - making a point of getting ones facing the pantheon shaped temple across the street - and posted up in one of the rooms, scouting out of the window. Fei Fei set up shop outside the inn, while Maegor, Alexander, and Jottenheim lingered about. Synkronos, still in tiger form, attempted to climb up the building but only managed to claw the side of the building. It did not take long before guards, dressed in the black uniforms of Ghol's Fist, showed up and chastised the group for panhandeling and hocking wares without a license.

#### The keepers of the lighthouse

Having been shooed away and ridiculed for thinking a criminal would strike in broad daylight, the party eschewed from the main thoroughfair and made their way into the Forge District. Although late, the district was still buzzing with workers making bricks, sawing logs, and hammering away at metal plates. After passing the Glenbour Embassy, a strange lighthouse at the edge of town caught the groups attention. From a distance, the glass structure appeared to be a normal tower. However, upon drawing closer to the buiilding, they realize that the glass encased a statue of three elves: a scholar, a merchant, and a beaurocrat who together lifted a torch which functioned as the lighthouse light. Jottenheim, with the help of Sansarya's elven background, tried to find a way to open the lighthouse door. Before they could find a way however, Synkronos's pocket was picked by a strange cat. The creature, having taken the Eye of Drist, began to scurry away. Sansarya hurled a bolt of fire at the creature before it could escape. The cat, having been incinirated by the blast, lost the orb which began to roll. Synkronos dove for the orb, catching it right before it had a chance to roll over the dock and into the bay below. As she did, she heard a loud pop above her as incinirated dust began to reform into the cat creature. Jottenheim rushed over to join the fray and noticed a purple light eminimating from the back side of the warehouse near Synkronos. Investigating the light, he found a swarm of rats eminating an odd purple glow from their brains, through their skull and skin. Focusing on the glow, the warrior began to lose his sense of being. He found his gaze drawn to the cosmos above, completely oblivious to the rats now crawling all over him - slowly prying his magical flail off of his hip.

Alexander dispatched the cat like creature and managed to take out a second one now trying to pick pocket him. Maegor meanwhile chased down the rats and destroyed them with a vicious smite. He recovered the flail of the ages and returned it to Jottenheim who upon the rats' demise snapped out of his confused state. Having his senses once again about him, Jottenheim noticed the swarm's nest. There the party found a diamond, a magic wand, and a bag that appeared to be bottomless.

Having split their treasure, Jottenheim made his way back to the lighthouse and began banging loudly on the door. After a few minutes, a very old elven woman unlocked the door in a panic, thinking the city was under attack while she was asleep on her watch. Jottenheim's exagerations of the presense of the darkest danger did little to help alleviate the woman's state but her condition did allow the group to push their way into the lighthouse. Abagail - the lighthouse attended - and the group made their way to the top of the lighthouse. There, the keeper began frantically scanning the ground around them for danger. Not finding any, and discovering that the barbarian lied to her, she now began to panic over the sudden invasion of strangers. Sansarya, sensing the situation devolving into a mess, cast suggestion of Abagail to try to calm her down and get her to go back to sleep. Feeling tired, the group decided to make camp around the lighthouse fire, taking turns serving as the lighthouse attendants. Maegor and Alexander took the first shift. Although thigns were quiet at first, the pair noticed a large blaze errupt on an island near by in the middle of the shift. With some quick thinking, the pair managed to jam the turning mechanism of the lighthouse, freezing the light over the island with the hope of drawing attention to the blaze. Feeling satisfied with their work, the pair woke Jottenheim and Synkronos for the second shift.

Their relief with the fire being contained did not last long. While keeping watch, Synkronos noticed a group of guards making their way directly towards the lighthouse. The pair frantically searched for lighthouse worker garb and managed to find some just as a stern knock rung from the glass and metal door. Jottenheim made his way down and was immediately verbally accosted by a large orc in an extravegant officer uniform who demanded that the "attendant" open the door at once in order to explain why the lighthouse had stopped and where the hell Abagail went. Jottenheim went to open the door, only to realize that he did not have the keys neccesary to do so. He rushed upstairs as more verbal abuses were hurled his way and found Abagail sleeping in her quarters. Having nimbely picked her pockets for the keys, he made his way back down. The orc, now having introduced himself as Captain Bernart, began to grow very impatient while Jottenheim made his way through trying five of the six keys on Abagail's key ring. With the door finally unlocked, Captain Bernart forced his way in and demanded to know who the hell Jottenheim and the odd druid behind him were, where the hell Abagail was, and if she was sleeping again on the job that this would be her last day at the lighthouse. Synkronos, now fearful that her actions would cause the poor elderly elf to lose her job, began to explain that Jottenheim and she were interns Abagail hired. Finding this explination suspicious, particularly due to the fact that Abagail only had the budget to hire one intern, the captain continued to press to see Abagail. Synkronos rushed upstairs, woke the old woman up from her magical slumber, and demanded that she collaborate their entire story. Once again finding herself in a state of panic, the shaking attendant made her way down the stairs in her nightgown.

Despite her nervous state, she collaborated the druid's story. However, Synkronos mentioning that she was an unpaid intern turned out to be the last straw for the Captain. Unbeknownst to the druid, unpaid work was highly illegal in the city. The Captain immediately dismissed Abagail, telling her to pack her things, and promoted Jottenheim to the new lighthouse keeper and Synkronos to his assistant. Feeling terrible for the "grave injustice" the druid had "suffered", Captain Bernart emptied out his pockets of gold coins, handing them to Synkronos to make up for the lack of pay she had recieved "on the job". Having "successfully" resolved the situation, the pair went to wake up Sansarya for her watch.

Sansarya did not at all believe that the "situation" was remotely successfully resolved. Having huffed and puffed at the pair for letting an elderly woman lose her job, the princess went to down stairs to calm Abagail and reassure her that she would personally see to her being reinstated after she explained everything to the Captain. Upon doing so, Sansarya stormed out of the lighthouse alone into the night.

#### The Marauder appears!

To her surprise, the captain she wanted to speak to was long out of view. Not knowing which way he went, the sorceress decided to make her way down Main Street over to the guard house they saw the day before. Remembering the warning from the Garrison owner about traveling alone at night, Sansarya was relieved to see Fei Fei traveling towards her in the opposite direction. The cleric frantically waved at Sansarya to hopefully alert her of the danger she sensed coming from the alley flanking Sansarya. However it was too late. A long tongue lashed out from the darkness, wrapped itself around the sorceress, and began to drag her into the darkness. Sansarya now saw the danger her friend tried to warn her of - an ugly demonic looking toad standing on its hind legs. Fei Fei charged into the fray and swatted and the large sneaky creature, forcing it to release Sansarya, giving the princess a chance to fire off a spell at the interloper. The toad changed tactics and attacked Fei Fei, but the cleric had no trouble deflecting the toads assault. Finding the cleric much more formidable and the sorceress, the toad returned to his earlier tactic and swallowed Sansarya whole and began to try to make a run for it. Sansarya, held within his mouth and now covered in slime, attempted to use her dagger to stab the creature. However, the slime proved too much, and the dagger slipped out of her hand before she managed to get a good swipe at the toad's mouth. The toad readied to leap to the rooftops. This gave Fei Fei an opening to swat his back with as much force as possible. The blow caught the toad off guard forcing him to release Sansarya before he jumped and teleported away.

The pair made their way back to the lighthouse, where Sansarya went for a shower immediately. Fei Fei meanwhile began drawing mustaches on her compatriots. She awoke Maegor in the process, who assisted her with the prank. They duo however succeed in getting mustaches drawn on the three sleeping party members. Upon waking up, the Alexander, Synkronos, and Jottenheim took the prank well but demanded that the duo mustache themselves as well if they were all to keep their mustaches for the day. Once Sansarya returned, Fei Fei and Sansarya recounted their encouter with the toad. The group made their way back to the alley. Having found a trail of blood, Synkronos transformed himself into a bloodhound and tracked the toad's scent back to an area of warehouses west of the two temples in the Forge District.

The party stopped by the Fog House Brewery for a pint, breakfast, and some information.

The party made their way over to the warehouses near by to see if anyone there had witnessed anything strange. Fei Fei approached the foreman to see if he could be of help but was brushed off immediately. Sensing that something was a miss with how uncooperative the foreman was, and the looks they were getting from the rest of the staff, the group decided to feign walking away while leaving Alexander near by to scout things out. Using the senses he honed as a street urchin, Alexander immediately spotted that a number of the workers bore a small silkworm tattoo on their necks. While the workers moved crates to various warehouses, occasionally a crate was marked with a similar silkworm symbol. Crates bearing the symbol were always taken to warehouse #8.

Alexander snuck back to the group to let them know that something suspicious was going on. They made their way back to the court yard between the docks and the warehouse. Before the foreman could brush them off, Sansarya cast suggestion on him.

He than chanted a phrase at Jottenheim, who suddenly turned towards the party with bloodshot empty eyes. Reacting quickly, Synkronos cast spike growth over the terrain around the two enforcers. The gruff one jumped into the air, and floated over towards the party - completely avoiding the thorns. Despite being out of reach from Maegor, the man swung his club. The weapon appeared to have widely missed but yet a metallic scrape echoed off of Maegor's chain mail. A melee broke out between the two groups. The younger looking enforcer hurled balls of fire at the party until a spell broke his concentration. His human appearance fell away, leaving a face Maegor immediately recognized as one belonging to a fiend. The gruff fellow proved odd as well. Attacks against him seemed to connect much earlier than they should have and his reached caught the party off guard a few times. The group did manage to break Jottenheim out the fiend's grasp. The barbarian, now fully enraged, charged at the gruff looking fellow, forcing him and his compatriot - now heavily barraged by arrows and spells - to mount a retreat.

#### The night before festivities

The party regrouped and took an early siesta at their lighthouse. When they awoke in the late evening, the city landscape was changing. Citizens were erecting sporting stages, stands and banners. Others were arranging flowers along the main thoroughfare. Having spotted the marauder the prior night, the group decided to set off on a night patrol.

During their patrol, they discovered a beer cart, tucked away in an alley, serving free beer. The servers. dressed in plain brown robes, were preaching word of Rhiga.

#### Unfamiliar friends

The hectic layout of the docks proved too much for the group, who found themselves lost in the favela. Maegor approached two locals to ask for directions but was surprised to find that the pair knew exactly who the party was. The two brothers, who called more thugs to their side, turned out to be related to the very Maxim Maximovich the party killed in Unova. A melee ensued. The two brothers were dispatched by Jottenheim's wrestling moves and the hoard of henchmen were cut down by a mysterious group of dwarves and a shield carrying construct.

The leader of the group introduced himself as Hari “Houndstooth” Sabotkin.

Hari offered to take the group to see his uncle, promising a reward. Before the party could set off, the Eye of Drist suddenly began to emit a chorus of birds. A matching song came from a near by warehouse. Hari quickly cut open the lock and opened the doors. The group found an elven woman, with her arms chained to the ceiling, trapped inside.

The group brought the freed captive back to Hari's uncles ship - the Crown Jewel, a floating inn and one of the finer establishments in the docks. Hari led the group past security and down a stairway over to the captains quarters. There, the group heard gruff questioning followed by the sound of fists breaking bones. A squeaky voice coughed up answers before hitting the ground. A minute later, the door was thrown open, and two dwarves carried out an unconscious man out of the room.

Fei Fei decided to seize the opportunity and attempted to barge into the captain's quarters. Before she had a chance to cross the threshold, she was met with cold steely eyes - belonging to a balding older dwarf - which held her at bay. The merchant cleric took a step back out of fear but Hari came immediately to her rescue, letting Uncle Arni know that this group had dispatched the Maximovich twins. Arni sent off for his secretary to fetch the gold for the bounty he placed on the two brothers. The party was handsomely rewarded and Arni invited the group to attend the Ludos Festival race as his guests within the balcony of honor. Noticing the group's rather ragged appearance, he sent them off with Hari to find more appropriate attire for the race.

Hari led the group to a warehouse on the docks. The owner - an old man - commanded one of his workers to fetch the Maximovich twins, to whom he had been paying protection money. Hari saved the poor worker the trouble, by tossing the heads of the two brothers at the owners feet. The old man's treachery would be paid back by outfitting the group with whatever clothes they desired, as well as a doubling of "union dues". The party picked out items for themselves and grabbed a dress for Ester, who was getting ready at the inn.

### The Ludos Festival

The party awoke the next afternoon after sleeping off a bit of a hangover from drinking and catching up with the enigmatic and flirtatious Ester Longfellow. Upon getting dressed, they headed over to the hippodrome to view the race, all the while keeping an eye out for the sole surviving Maximovich brother, Antwon Maximovich, who they learned the prior night had Ester's wand and would be racing on behalf of the merchant Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt. Most of the party chose to present themselves to the guards, surrendering their weapons in the process. Meanwhile, after losing the party while following a suspect, who happened to be a simple juggler, Alexander attempted to instead climb the hippodrome walls. The attempt was initially successful, but the gathering crowd made the street urchin scholar lose his focus, falling to the crowd below. Before the guard could arrive on the scene, Alexander slipped into the stadium.

Inside the balcony of honor, Sansarya was greeted by an eager Svetlana Arathorn who was quickly stiff armed by Count Marko Brakus. The pompous Count assumed that the elven princess was lured to the event by his charm and was not about to let some elven child get in the way of his potential payday. The Count was swiftly rejected, accompanied by laughter from his companions - Fletcher Colby and Antwon Maximovich - sitting at a near by table.

During the presentation ceremony, Sansarya met Marchioness Gwendoline Blackraven, commander of the Black Cloaks - the local police force within the city. Becoming bored by the no nonsense nature of the Commander of the Guard, the elven princess continued socializing, meeting the tiefling owner of the Pale Emporium, Wren Church, as well as her Firbolg lover and tattoo artist, Dwen Truss.

Synkronos met a talking dog named Bestest Boy, who was there with his owner, the dwarven master smith Raymound De Witt. The druid learned that De Witt was one of the premier smithies in West Gholon, that the smithy also worked with a construct named Gauger, and that despite Raymound's shy nature, the old dwarf made it out to the race in order to see Cohen Van Rook's newest mechanical contraption. Seeing Sansarya talking to Wren and Dwen, the druid joined the conversation and offered the former sailor and rogue, Dwen, a job - stealing the wand from Antwon. The tattoo artist rogue showed off his exceptional talents by making his hand incorporeal as he passed by Antwon, stealing the wand for the party. He promised to hand over the wand in exchange for gold at Wren's shop later that night.

Jotenheim spilled a drink on Count Marko Brakus' shirt intentionally. The count immediately challenged the solider to a duel, demanding that the challenge be held at the Crowe's Nest in the Villas District at dawn, fully knowing that Jotenheim likely would not be able to enter the district and therefore would forfeit his honor without bringing any danger to Brakus' life. Jotenheim also met Gladys, Rhys Arathorn's significant other and a popular gardener in the city.

After doing a bump from some of the cocaine procured from Hari, Fei Fei caught the ire of Marchioness Gwendoline. She put some distance from the Commander of the Guard and made friends with a fellow orc, Pier Aldenkamp, who happened to be Grand Ambassador of the Glenbour Confederacy - a collection of islands east of Nim't known for exotic spices, gems, and mercenary companies.

#### The Race Begins

A loud horn announced the start of the race. Antwon Maximovich, Coen Van Rook, Countessa Yodrisil Hammerhand, and Bey Ruby Eurialyte made their way down to their chariots:

* House Hammerhand’s Golden Pegasus: House Hammerhand’s golden chariot with folded golden wings (they can be retracted to gain additional speed) has recently been equipped with a team of four thoroughbred horses to help the chariot handle the adverse conditions. As a lifelong thrill seeker, Yodrisil Hammerhand captains her house’s team herself.
* House Eudialyte’s Flame Eternal: The Flame Eternal is a white and yellow striped chariot with orange wheels. Ruby Eudialyte recently imported four nightmares (demonic black horses with fire streaming from their manes and from their hooves) to use with his chariot.
* House Van Rook’s Das Mechanischer Streitwagen: Coen’s chariot is one of his prized inventions. Unlike the competition, the Streitwagen does not use living horses, instead being pulled by four iron mechanical horses attached to an iron chariot. Two odd barrel-like contraptions sit at the side of the machine. Coen, being the only one he trusts and the only one who knows how to operate the machine, captains his team hoping to earn more prestige and opportunities for his inventions.
* House MacRaibeirt The Defiant: After losing his council seat to Vastrida, Ruaraidh has become obsessed with outshining the Hammerhands and regaining his prior standing and influence. Purchasing the Defiant provided a twofold advantage. It would help boost his public standing and it would give him a chance to knock Vastrida and her Golden Pegasus down a peg. Ruaraidh has no interest in operating the chariot himself and has instead left that up to Antwon Maximovich, a grade A sociopathic evocation mage who has close ties to Margred Itea. The Defiant is pulled by a team of four thoroughbred horses of the highest quality. The chariot itself is black with large metallic wheels with spikes on the axel.

Looking to gamble, Fei Fei placed a wager on the Streitwagen with her new ambassador friend, who picked his countryperson, Bey Ruby to win the event. The pair gambled on each lap and Pier gained a lead in the wager after the third lap.

##### On the fourth lap, all hell broke lose

After passing the lap market in fourth place, Antwon Maximovich threw a wall of fire down in front of third place contender, Yodrisil Hammerhand. The former sailor, wanting to spare her horses, cut them loose and slid her chariot through the flames. The once rambunctious crowd went silent, stunned by the clear transgression against time honored race traditions. Maximovich stopped his chariot next to the now disabled Golden Pegasus, casting a second spell to freeze the Countessa in place. He summoned a portal behind her, kicked her through it, and vanished along with her.

The stunned atmosphere was broken by terrified cries as numerous lycanthrope attacks occurred throughout the stands.

Attendants in the balcony began trying to treat the wounded and poisoned councilmember. Meanwhile, Marchioness Gwendoline Blackraven and Bey Ruby engaged a werebear on the arena floor and Coen Van Rook attempted to investigate the portal residue. Several guards rushed onto the balcony, turning into lycanthropes themselves, to everyone's surprise. The party, with the help of Headmistress Nadia El Mahel's spell casting, were able to fend off the guards. In the heat of combat, Jotenheim began losing control of his curse. His hair began turning into stripped fur. The party managed to sedate him and calm him down before they could be confused for the enemy. Sansarya, with the help of Alexander, tried to spot her ex-lover in the the crowd, but he had already vanished.

#### Aftermath

Once the chaos settled, Marchioness Gwendoline Blackraven informed the party that she would need them at the Blackraven Barracks the following day for a deposition.

The party left the venue and made their way to Wren Church's shop to pick up the wand. Sansarya, a few drinks in, managed to piss off Wren by over haggling. The rest of the party came to the rescue and ended up taking Wren up on a job. In exchange for their choice of magic items, they agreed to head over to an old hill dwarf smithy to rescue the scion of the Pewter family and retrieve a lost and forgotten crown.

##### First Meeting with the Silk Merchant at the Yonder Veil

Wanting to decompress after the chaotic day, the party made their way over to the fanciest establishment in town, the Yonder Veil. Upon entering the establishment, they were surprised to see a show where a dragon born juggled pies while his fellow bard threw knives at them cutting them into slices, serving them up to the the crowded bar. The party made friends with the bard and other locals.

Sansarya slipped away to talk to a mysterious fox like creature who offered her a drink from his bottle. The poor sorceress did not realize that she was being offered demonic ichor and in her stupor, the fox devil convinced her to take a tracking coin. The drink left Sansarya in a terrible stupor that would take days to recover from.

Jottenheim and Alexander surmised that the largest room in the hotel likely belonged to Count Brakus, whom they saw enter and disappear earlier. They bought a room on the same level as the penthouse suite to facilitate a break in and investigation of the suite. Upon knocking on the door, the pair were surprised to find a familiar dwarf from the Ludos Festival race, the same dwarf who had sponsored the Defiant and Antwon.

Alexander caused enough of a commotion to get his companions attention. Synkronos ran up the stairs and threw a potion at Jotenheim to no effect. Fei Fei quickly healed the soldier, now on death's door while Sansarya tried to clear the air with the guards racing to arrest them. The party was thrown out and told never to come back.

#### Fever Dreams

That night, Jotenheim dreamed that he was sitting at an immaculate table lined from end to end with exotic delicacies. A tiger shaped devil sat at the head of the table, enjoying a glass of blood. Jotenheim was accompanied by the dead corpses of Countessa Yodrisil Hammerhand, Magred Itea, Antwon Maxiomovich, and Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt - all of whom were in various states of butchery. Portions of them were placed on plates at the table for the Silk Merchant's enjoyment. When Jotenheim awoke the next morning, he felt exhausted - strangely not having gotten any rest at all.

##### Morning Message

Fei Fei awoke to a panicked foreign female voice inside her head.

“Hello, is this Fei Fei… oh Kord. There is too much blood. Its freaking everywhere. Get a hold of yourself Effi. Ok… here goes. You…”

The voice disappeared and then reappeared a few seconds later.

“This is Effi, reporting on behalf of Hari Sabotkin. He has asked for your attendance at the docks. Meet him near Mads Malts warehouse… urgently”

The group, knowing that the Mads Malts warehouse belonged to Hari's rival Magred Itea, feared the worst.

Sansarya meanwhile was still delirious from the demon ichor she drank the night before. Ester promised to take care of her while the party resumed their normal business.

On the way out, the group passed a town crier shouting the days news:

* Ludos Festival interrupted by a vicious attack - rumored to be the work of Nim’t partisans.
* Countessa Yodrisil Hammerhand is still missing. Kidnapped by the rogue mage and race participant Antwon Maximovich.
* Questions loom over Marchioness Blackraven’s credibility in keeping the city secure. Sources have confirmed to Lynel Omato that the council is likely to take a vote of no confidence.
* Read all about it in this week’s edition of the Herald!

They made their way over the bridge and into the docks district, this time traversing farther north into the man made island. Hari's hounds had a much more prominent presence here than two nights ago, holding defensive positions throughout the island. Following their lead, the group made it up to Mads Malts warehouse... or at least what remained of it. They found a grisly scene. Chunks of wood jutted out as if they were formed into spears. Corpses and blood littered the the ground, walls, ceiling... Hari stood by calmly while a young dwarven mage, with a familiar whimpering voice, threw up near by.

"This wasn't us... We aren't capable of this..." Where Hari's first words. "That won't stop Blackraven from hanging Uncle and I for it though. If you can find anything, find who did this, clear our names, we would be grateful." The party briefly searched the property while Fei Fei asked around.

In true Fei Fei fashion, the skilled merchant found an urchin to question. The child told her that he briefly saw a hulking man with an iron bird mask leaving the property after laying waste to it. A beautiful red skinned woman was with him. The pair still haunted his dreams.

The party, preferring to cash in on Wren's offer of magic items, convinced Hari that his interests could be best served if he were able to sneak them out of town. The Sabotkin enforcer found a loyal barge captain who was capable of smuggling the party out of the city, past the customs officials at the Isle of Lists.

#### Calgamoore Mines

A mile past customs, the old captain prodded the group with his wet oar to let them know that the coast was cleared. They found themselves on a winding river passing through green hilly country side, dotted with ranches and farms. They showed the old man the map Wren gave them the prior night, estimating that they were fairly close to their destination, the old man nudged his barge over to the southern bank and let the party out. Synkronos located some horses on a ranch and convinced them to run off with the party. A few crossbow bolts from the ranch hand followed their escape.

After traveling half a day, the party found a hill with large steel doors buried in moss and overgrowth. Jotenheim managed to pry the doors open, finding a hallway leading to a second set of doors ahead. The party made their way in, not bothering to check for traps. A minute and a pressed cobble stone later, the door they went through shut behind them, a wall slid open, and the party was ambushed by a gelatinous cube and a poisonous gas. Alexander heard a voice on the opposite end of the hallway. The nimble rogue slipped past the poisonous fog while Synkronos summoned a dust devil to content with the vapors. Alexander, with the help of the stranger, picked the locks, encountering a fellow gnome rogue on the other end. The female gnome drew two daggers and sprung into action. At one point, Fei Fei tossed the gnome over the gelatinous cube, allowing the rogue to strike at it from above.

After defeating their enemies, the stranger introduced themselves as Dyrdree, or D.D. for short. The party told her that they were there to rescue the Pewter scion. Dyrdee told the party that she was actually traveling with Merinna Pewter before they were separated. During this conversation, D.D. realized that she had mysteriously lost a day. The new companion showed the party the old sleeping quarters she was using to heal up and the group began exploring the space. They found a temple room with column fountains depicting Kordian Soul Stichers healing various ailments. The space was guarded by a carnivorous plant that the party defeated. At the temple's alter, Fei Fei found a magical mace and a journal detailing how to utilize the temple's restorative properties.

The group found a ghostly murmur - a vision of three dwarves discussing the struggle of dealing with a growing plant infestation and Fisker's efforts to mitigate the out of control growth. The party chose to investigate a backroom leading to a second sleeping quarters. There, DD spotted Violet and Micky Novaguard trying to escape the room, pleading for the party's help. Dyrdree rushed into the room to try to rescue the pair only to discover that the two were actually corpses used as a lure to pull them into the room. Using the Oblex's fear of fire, the party defeated the ooze.

They took the staircase upstairs to discover the entrance Dyrdee and Wren Church's hirelings used to access the temple. An umber hulk, defending its nest, attacked them - making a few of the party members act sporadically. DD realized that this is what caused her to lose her memory. The party used a potion to mind control the bug like creature, forcing it to fall into the pit in the center of the room. After hearing water and commotion below, the party attempted to raise the platform but could not muster the strength to do so.

Unable to utilize the elevator, the party made their way back down the stairs. The staircase went down a level below the living quarters and Drydee tried to sneak down the stairs past the tangled mess of strings. The thief made a misstep, causing objects hanging on the staircase to rattle. She cut the strings and made her way further down the stairs to a landing, finding herself in a large roughly cut room with a square pit in it matching the elevator shaft they encountered two floors above. Before DD could get a read on her surroundings, a large bolt flew past her, striking a plant right above the staircase. The plant exploded, damaging her and lighting up the area around her. A number of Lizardfolk charged at the rogue.

The rest of the party sprinted down the staircase and helped DD fend of the Lizardfolk and a repurposed Dwarven siege engine. After defeating the scouting party alerted by their activity at the top of the staircase, the party found a caged Umber Hulk. Alexander cast comprehend language on the creature but choose to not free it after it wouldn't promise to not try to eat them.

They explored the remainder of the workshop level, finding a mimic disguised as a treasure horde and an alchemy lab full of ingredients. The lab was covered in dwarven writing. Alexander was able to magically decipher it and discover that it read "the Reclaimer Queen in a lie" a number of times before a final written note stating "Prerodyna comes for us all".

Acquiring the necessary items, the party figured out how to use the temple chamber to reverse the curse placed on Jottenheim by Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt. Having had a productive day, the group rested in the sleeping quarters, letting Jottenheim overcome his growing exhaustion. During her watch, Fei Fei - tripping on strange mushrooms - had a vision of Lathander warning her that a member of the party would betray them.

##### Thousand Teeth

The next morning, the party made their way down to the bottom level of the mine where the once worked stone walls were replaced by crude cave walls. Making their way along a raised cliff surface, the party spotted a Lizardfolk village below, floating in the waters resting above the elevator platform. Although they spotted a ladder down, their torches were spotted by the Lizardfolk guards. The guards held the party at bay while the civilians fled.

Descending into the space, the party found a stone wall with two statues depicting large Giant warriors. The wall was cracked, through which the civilians escaped. On the other side, the party heard a drumbeat accompanied by chanting. They made their way into the next room only to discover a large dark pool of water. Alexander and Jottenheim waded into the 8 foot deep water to rescue individuals tied to floating platforms. Synkronos began using mold earth to carve a path through the stone wall to the source of the drumming.

To Alexander and Jottenheim's horror, the platform closest to them was swallowed hole by an incredibly large crocodile. The pair began trying to fight it off before it could clamp down on the last sacrifice, Merinna Pewter. Jottenheim cut the chain below the Pewter Scion, allowing Merinna to join the fight, wielding the chain. With Prerodyna's champion distracted by Jottenheim and Merinna, Alexander was able to deal the creature a killing blow. A tattoo bearing the mark of Ohotian appeared on his arm.

Meanwhile, Synkronos, Fei Fei, and Drydee emerged from their tunnel to face off against the Lizardfolk King and his royal guard. The trio managed to fend off the group with the help of Fei Fei and Synkronos' magic. They then recovered the crown and decided to take a well deserved rest within the King's chambers. Drydee offered to take the last watch, using the opportunity to sneak off with the crown. The thief had been a double agent, working for Headmistress Nadia El Mahel of the Academy of the Unseen Arts - Wren's former teacher and now rival. Finding Drydee gone, Merinna completely unaware of the double cross, and a missing sending stone, Fei Fei yelled into the remaining stone about the values of friendship and how mean treachery is.

### Chapter 8

#### Return to West Gholon

The party made their way back that morning, arriving back at the Isle of Lists that morning. The group, not knowing that their recent actions had garnered them infamy with the local tabloid, was instantly flagged at the checkpoint. A Dragonborn officer of the City Guard, along with several Blackcloaks, was posted at the Isle at the behest of Count Brakus. While waiting for the Count's arrival, Readwald "Rusty" Pindragon obtained the latest issue of The Herald. After reading the rumors regarding the Lighthouse Gang, he passed the newspaper over to the rest of the group while they all waited. The party was surprised to find the following summary:

* Sansarya Purebreath - heir to the elven barony of Millimia. Her father tragically sunk the barony’s financial fortunes. His noble daughter has had to leave home to provide for the destitute family - one day as an adventurer the next as a demon ichor swigging vagabond. Is the leader of the Lighthouse Gang a hero or a Nim't saboteur? Stay tuned reader, more details will surely be broken in our next edition.
* Synkronos - known as the Tree which Walks, the Druid of Ashden has given credence to theories arguing that Sansrya and her gang are a force for good. The druid’s presence is surely a stabilizing force that keeps the gang’s more bloodthirsty tendencies at bay.
* Fighting man - Since his failed attempt to climb the Hippodrome, Fighting man has been the hottest gossip on the streets of West Gholon. Who is he? What is he? What is his purpose? Well, I Onola can confirm that the mysterious man is indeed a member of the Five Light-a-teers. Not only does Fighting man scale walls, but he is also a master of disguise - occasionally seen rocking Bone Armor from Glenbour or a suit of spiked armor. Do the outfits provide him different powers? Stay tuned readers.
* Fa Fey - It is still unknown whether this member is a priest or a merchant. Multiple eye witnesses have noted the half-orcs' displays of faith and cocaine abuse - some speculating that the whole “Lathander” thing might just be mad drug induced ravings. We, personally, have seen the calls for drug prohibition increase 10 fold since Fa Fey came to the city two months ago.
* Ester Longfellow - Besides Synkronos, the presence of the renowned elven author, historian, and philosopher has given the Lighthouse Gang much needed credibility. Who would have thought that one of the great headmistresses of the Unseen Arts in the last 400 years would suddenly surface as a member of this adventuring party. We truly live in exciting times, readers.

Two hours later, a retinue of guards arrived at the fortress. One sounded a horn to announce the landing griffin barring Count Brakus. The pompous Count demanded that the party be escorted to the Blackraven barracks for a citizens arrest. The group was attacked on their way to the barracks by Collingsley loyalists attempting to steal the orb from Synkronos. Count Brakus immediately had his guards provide cover for him while Rusty, the party, and accompanying Blackcloaks held off the Collingsley guards, a Shadowdancer, and Narcipious hidden in a sniper position. The encounter resulted in a route for the Collingsleys as more Blackcloaks swarmed the location. Fei Fei was able to procure the Shadowdancer's flying broom. Count Brakus re-emerged from the alley in which he was hiding, announcing his heroic triumph. Sansarya recognized that his armor was cheaply made, likely designed more as a show costume rather than actual battle armor. Peeved with the Count, she threw a dagger, striking him in the butt. His guards quickly swarmed her, knocking her out with a back hand slap. The party, along with the unconscious Sansarya, were escorted to the barracks where they had to surrender their weapons. They were then directed to Captain Bernart's office. The Half Orc captain of the guard, a bit taken a back from seeing the individuals who recently proclaimed themselves to be lighthouse interns, questioned the group. The party was transparent about what they learned about the Silk Merchant, and Bernart took rigerous notes. Believing that the group was of no danger, he summoned for his secretary for tea.

##### It All Began With a Murdered Captain

A few minutes later, a young elf entered the room carrying a saucer of tea. He walked around the large wood desk to place the cup before the captain. With the captain's back to him, the individual suddenly transformed into a red skinned Succubus. The tea saucer turned into a knife, that was drawn across the Captain's throat. The Half Orc bleed out in seconds. The assassin waved toodles to the party, and fell backwards through a portal, leaving the group alone at the scene of the crime.

Alexander quickly picked the lock and urged the group out of the room, As they made their way down the narrow hall of the old barracks, Jottenheim suddenly disappeared, only to reappear a second later. Something similar happened to a notary coming towards them.

The party rushed downstairs, where they encountered Captain Pindragon. He notified them that the Barracks was under attack and helped them procure their weapons. In the court yard, the party found a harpy and a winged demon terrorizing the Blackcloaks, throwing them down from the open walkways above. The group dispatched the pair while Alexander scouted the lower levels, disguised as a member of the Blackcloaks. Other members of the city watch plead for him to help them in the anti-magic field chamber but he returned upstairs to fetch the rest of the party.

Having defeated the assailants on the ground floor, the group descended below, encountering a spiked devil disguised as a guard. His hellhound companion came to help him in the fight, along with some spined devils. During the encounter, the group discovered that magic was having strange effects in the space, which likely would contribute to the whole structure collapsing and damaging near by residential areas.

Defeating the devils, the party rushed to the anti-magic chamber. There they found a brazier marked with infernal runes written in blood. The room also contained the body of a devilish giant wearing a steel bird mask infused to their head. The devil carried a large stone scythe and beared a resemblance to the "Johnny" figure they were told about at the docks, who was involved with the death of Magred. The individual had a ripped arm clutched in his other hand. Rusty immediately recognized it to be that of his Commander, Marchioness Gwendoline Blackraven. While investigating the device, they encountered imps who emerged from circular runes. Alexander discovered that the device could be shut down by pressing four panels simultaneously. Before the party could shut it down, Fei Fei accidently triggered a wild magic effect while fending off the imps, which caused her to electrocute her allies.

Having disabled the device, Rusty deputized the party in order to get their help to rescue Commander Blackraven. The anti-magic field room, and a trail of blood leading out of it, led to the archives. The party made their way there, finding a dead Gwendoline Blackraven perched against the double doors leading to the evidence room. Alexander picked up her katana on the way into the archives and was surprised to hear the voice of an old wizard talk to him through the sword. The sword turned out to be Reginald Blackraven, an ancestor of Gwendoline who imprinted his soul into the sword to protect his son who started the city watch. Reggie promised to help Alexander if Alexander helped him avenge Gwen and later find a rightful inheritor.

Rushing into the archives room, the party found imps burning evidence. They were accompanied by the succubus assassin and another devil. The group fought them off, killing most of them. Synkronos dropped a moonbeam on top of the succubus, but she teleported away before he could kill her. Having fended off the enemy, Captain Pindragon ran off to go fest help in putting out the fire in the evidence room. The party meanwhile proceeded to help the fire along before getting out of the place. On their way out of the barracks, they found Hari Sabotkin held captive in the courtyard with other prisoners and imposters. The party asked Pindragon to let Hari go as a reward for their help.

##### Dreams

Before returning to the Lighthouse, the party went to Wren's to pick up their reward for rescuing Pewter. On their way, they were rescured by Drydee, who noticed imps following them and managed to take one out with her dagger. Wren thanked the group and offered them their pick of three magic items. She also returned the sending stone Drydee left with her.

That night, Sansarya dreamt that she was a dragon. She was flying over the western edge of Powys, Marinnia, and finally an iced over island. When passing over the island, she was attacked by its guardian, a decaying white dragon. The dragon severally damaged her, forcing her to crash land between West Gholon and Unova. Four brothers with black hair found her there, taking her prisoner.

After a long day, Fei Fei found that sleep came quickly and full of vivid dreams. The dreamscape brought her back to the basement of the Blackraven Barracks, back to the room with the mysterious brazier, where she had unleashed wild magic upon her friends.
Despite her best efforts, she found herself reliving the harrowing event once again. This time, as the lightning gathered in her hands, Fei Fei felt time slow before it completely stopped. The shadows around her crept in, forming an endless void around her. Suddenly, a young blonde haired man wearing yellow and pink robes with a red and golden sash appeared in the abyss around her. The man comfortably lounged on a stone wall while chewing an apple noisily - an apple that constantly reformed and shifted in ripeness. He looked at Fei Fei, particularly at the lighting crackling in her hands. “Bring this light above, guide them to a new dawn” Before Fei Fei could reply, another deity appeared before her - a humanoid chimera, with ever shifting appendages: tiger claws, a crocodile’s maw, ram horns, and bear paws. The figure sat on a moss covered stone throne with an emerald dragon wrapped behind him. He snarled at Fei Fei, “Seize it. Every advantage further ensures survival. Hunt or be hunted, young one.” Next, an female elven monk meditating in an empty scorch marked tundra appeared before her. Her eyes honed in on Fei Fei as they crackled with lightning similar to her own. “Harness it, channel it. Let its thunder drum the beat of conflict.” A thousand eyes opened up behind the trio and then a thousand more. They loomed much further into the abyss and somehow deep below the panorama of gods looking down at Fei Fei. The voice hissed maliciously as it eyes Fei Fei’s friends, “Unleash it. Strike them down and take what is rightfully yours.” A familiar empty suit of silver plate armor appeared next to Lathander. The figure struck a shield resting on an anvil. Fei Fei swore that in the echoing resonance of the impact she heard “Master it. Reforge it.” Finally, a raven with eight spider spider eyes and wings crafted from spiderwebs appeared before her. The raven sang “Study it. Use it to peel away the mysteries ahead.” Looking at the pantheon before her, Fei Fei felt that she had a choice to make on whose advice she would accept.

##### Coup

The party awoke the next morning to find that one of Fei Fei's child spies brought her the latest addition of the Herald, presuming that the information would be welcomed and would result in payment. The Lighthouse Gang learned that with Commander Blackraven dead, Countessa Vastrida Hammerhand inconsolable over her wife's disappearance, and Rhys Arathorn recovering, three of the remaining councilmembers staged a coup and appointed Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt the new Commander of the City Guard. MacRaibert was then in turn able to use the attack of the Barracks as a way to implement Martial Law. In his new station, he also brought in the Golden Hand - a Rhoan mercenary company - into the city to replace the now weakened Blackcloaks.
The group began investigating the councilmembers still currently serving. They started with Joan Hadrick, the owner of the Hadrick's and Sons. Upon arriving at his shop and home, they discovered that the place was recently ransacked. Joan told him that he was pressured by thugs to vote with the rest of the council. The incident left him unsettled but his principles prevailed, making him the lone vote to oppose the return of Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt to the City Council.
The group next went to Fletcher's Finest to investigate Fletcher Colby's involvement. There, Drydee recognized a former colleague, Carol "Quick Fingers" Ceene. The pair worked together with Callum Ibbinfell on B&E jobs before Drydee started working for Nadia. She was surprised to find her old colleague working the front desk of a smithy, but managed to persuade Carol to get them an audience with Fletcher. Quick Fingers led them behind the curtain to the smithy workshop. Drydee and Jottenheim's suspicions were raised when they noticed that the men working the smithy were doing so more for show than anything else. Fei Fei noticed that a number of individuals working there bore symbols of the god Bhaal, an enemy of Lathander and the God of Murder.
The cocky Fletcher appeared above, on an office loft overlooking the space. DD attempted to parlay in thieves cant with him, but did not realize that she misspoke. Taking the party for fools and seeing an opportunity to please his master, the Silk Merchant, Fletcher ordered his Bhaal cultists to attack the party. Baronesse Molly Talbot, known as Midnight Molly, managed to strike down Sansarya. Meanwhile, Jottenheim quickly dispatched the cultists pretending to be smiths. Synkronos summoned his faithful spiders, who quickly turned the fight to their favor. Seeing the tide turn, Carol ran out of the shop to fetch the Golden Hand. Fletcher, seeing his allies fall, took a secret escape elevator to ground level and then ran to his escape hatch. Fei Fei got Sansarya out of the establishment to get healing at the Temple of Ghol. While searching the shop, Jottenheim found armor similar to the Blackcloaks, bearing Nim't colors. Alexander found paperwork detailing Fletcher's involvement supplying the Nim't rebellion with weapons and arms using funds intended for the Blackcloaks.
The rest of the party headed to Diera's Nook to try to understand what was below Fletcher's shop. They discovered that the shop was recently built and no basement was registered with the city. Alexander procured a map of the sewers just in case.
An hour later, they made their way back to the shop, only to discover the Golden Hand emptying the place of any evidence. Synkronos, in an attempt to avoid being caught, used mold earth to dig a hole underground. This led to the space below Fletcher's Finest. The group dropped down below, finding a makeshift temple to Bhaal, used by the cultists for their sacrifices. A stone golem attacked the party immediately, forcing them to take shelter in the staircase leading up to Fletcher's Finest. The noise attracted the Golden Hand above and the party had to fend both off. A healed up Sansarya helped turn the tide of the battle. Synkronos broke one of the skulls surrounding a pit of ash bearing the engraving of a skull. This resulted in him taking damage from a decaying spell.
Alexander and Jottenheim searched the rest of the cultist hideout. They found an alter depicting how Bhaal, Bane, and Murkyl acquired their domains. They also found journals from Fletcher's journal, talking about growing up in a Lathanderian orphanage. There, he and fellow orphans began having dreams about the past. The dreams led them to Tome of Bhaal written by his grandfather, beginning their conversion from Lathander to Bhaal. Synkronos noticed an indentation on the alter for where a tome of pure evil once sat but was now missing. Noticing sewer water enter the basement from a hidden wall, the party found the secret exit Fletcher used to get away. They found more journal pages on the other side, floating in the sewers. Deciding to not pursue Fletcher, the party found a quick exit from the sewers.

Drydee offered up her place as a safe house to lay low in case the Golden Hand investigated the Lighthouse. The party rested there. While Drydee got cleaned up, Synkronos located her secret get away stash and stole some platinum coins from it. While everyone was resting, Alexander ventured out to get kebabs for the party. While in line, he was able to pick the pocket of a member of the Golden Hand, stealing his papers. On his way back, he was pulled into Drydee's noisy neighbor's apartment for some tea and gossip.

In the morning, Sansarya decided to investigate the commotion at the Temple of Ghol. She discovered that the Golden Hand was attempting to set up their camp there, angering the monks working at the temple. Using her tempestuous magic, she convinced the commander of the forces that their leader had changed his mind and ordered them to set up shop else where. Svetlana Arathorn saw Sansarya and excitedly assumed she was there to visit her grandfather, Rhys. The sorceress learned that Rhys was getting better until a doctor sent by Count Brakus made him worse. Fearing that the poor councilmember and judge was being poisoned, Sansarya helped relocate Rhys Arathorn to a safer wing of the Temple.

#### Printing Disaster

Peeved by the recently written articles about them, the party decided to pay The West Gholon Herald and Lynel Omato a visit. Worried that their prior escapades would draw the attention of the Golden Hand, Sansarya and Synkronos polymorphed into milk maids. The group confronted Lynel at his shop and learned that he was taking bribes from Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt in exchange for favorable stories. Synkronos, wanting to break the link between the tabloid and the new Commander of the guard, snuck into Lynel's garage and blew up his printing press.

The party went back to Drydee's place to rest. The next morning, Sansarya co-opted the Lighthouse Gang to help her move a recovering Rhys back to his residents, where he would have his capable guards at the ready. They informed the councilmember about the information they learned regarding Colby Fletcher and MacRaibeirt. He recommended that they seek out Countessa Vastrida Hammerhand. Sansarya polymorphed Rhys and his daughter, creating a disguise for them to use to get back into the Villas District without attracting the attention of MacRaibeirt 's agents. Jottenheim used the time at the temple to attune to his flail.

##### The Harper's Nest

Arriving at De Witt's smithy, Bestest Boy informed the party that Raymound De Witt had stayed up all night working on Fei Fei's armor and that it was likely one of his best works yet. While the group was making the exchange, a bomb flew through the window of the shop, causing an explosion. A gang calling themselves the The Forge Tigers attacked the establishment, attempting to steal magic items there to pay for weapons they got on commission. During the fight, a half naked Raymound jumped out of the window with his trusty axe, assisting the party. A second bomb nearly killed Bestest Boy, but Fei Fei was able to provide some timely healing to the best dog ever. The party managed to kill a musketeering elf carrying a pistol (which Drydee quickly pocketed) and a Githyanki with a headband of blasting and a wand of holding. Jottenheim pinned down a large Giff named Early Diamonds (actually named Earl) while a female Aarakocra fled the scene after the battle turned sour for her allies.

Not wanting to draw the attention of the new hostile city watch (the Golden Hand), Raymound recommended that the party take Earl downstairs to interrogate him while he cleaned up the shop and persuaded the guards that the situation was handled. The party was surprised to find a number of portals in the man cave below the shop. While Raymound was handling business upstairs, the group managed to turn Earl. The Giff revealed that the gang's leader, the Aarakocra Sefina Swifthawk gained status with the Silk Merchant after stealing Princess Mariet’s Mirror from Headmistress Nadia while Sefina was a student at the Academy of Unseen Arts. Sefina had taken him and the rest of the gang to the Silk Merchant's base of operations, a club below the Yonder Veil. Earl described the Silk Merchant as a humanoid tiger, dressed in impeccable silks. He reluctantly offered to take the party there if they would help him get on the straight and narrow.

While Fei Fei was working on turning Earl, Sansarya and Synkronos decided to fuck with the portals. This resulted in them de-aging and aging. Raymound made his way down soon enough and told the pair off for messing with them. He explained to them that Braydon Birch, Elmer Sateen, and him started the Harpers as a way to defend Powys from various threats. Elmer Sateen built a network of portals through the Feywilds to allow them to quickly travel between places.

Now knowing how to reach the Silk Merchant, the party left Raymound and set off to face the Marketplace Marauder.

#### Below the Yonder Veil

Early Diamonds led the party to the Yonder Veil. The party played it cool to get past the doorman and followed Earl to the secret curtain leading to an elevator. The elevator descended for close to an hour before stopping in an elaborate foray filled with similar elevators and a fox devil attendant in the center of the room. The attendant called the party over by name and told them that he expected them to be on their best behavior. He then showed them to the double doors leading to the casino floor. Fei Fei's skin irked her in this place. A successful recall of her religious lore told her that the place they descended into was likely a pocket dimension of hell.

The luxurious casino contained a bar, dining area, and two wings of games of chance - ranging from hell themed dice and card games to slot machines provided by Coen Van Rook. The party partook in various games of chance, before discovering a djinn offering draws from a tarot deck in exchange for a platinum piece. Synkronos, Sansarya, and Jottenheim chose to take their chance at fate.

* Synkronos drew the Rogue. The card left him with an odd feeling that he had irked someone somewhere. Not liking the draw, the druid put down another coin, this time drawing Ruin. His pockets felt lighter as he discovered that all his nonmagical possessions had vanished.
* Sansarya drew the Idiot. As the card was revealed, a sudden line of drool began to form in the corner of her mouth. The djinn offered to let her draw a second card to make up for the bad draw. Her second try was much more fortunate, drawing the Throne. She suddenly felt that she was much more persuasive than before. An imp suddenly appeared before her to present her with a deed to a castle in Unova to which she was the inheritor.
* Jottenheim took one of the soul coins he won gambling and took a shot at the deck as well. He drew the Vizier. A strange feeling in the back of his head told him that he had an opportunity, at his choosing, to consult the fates and receive an answer to any one question.

Hearing the sound of a cheering crowd, Jottenheim went to explore the space behind the bar. There he found a large arena. In the middle of it, he saw Rusty Pindragon, Sefina Swifthawk, and Colby Fletcher fighting off a mechanical dragon. The dragon easily took out Sefina with a tail swipe. Before he could finish off Rusty and Colby, Colby pointed his crossbow up. Jottenheim initially thought the shot was aimed at the dragon, but instead it went up towards a tiger like figure sitting in a balcony overlooking the arena. The figure had a familiar succubus accompanying him along with Coen Van Rook. The bolt was true, but as it approached the edge of the arena, it hit a force field that deflected it. The Silk Merchant smiled from his perch as the dragon's fiery breath eliminated the pesky investigator and the underling that failed him.

While Jottenheim watched the spectacle, Drydee spotted an inebriated Callum Ibbinfell at the bar. DD went to go talk to her former employer, who looked disappointed and worried to see her there. He warned her about the Silk Merchant and the folly that comes from tying oneself to the devil. Drydee bought her colleague one more drink, before leaving him passed out at the bar.

#### The Heist

Jottenheim returned to the bar area between the casino floors. As he did, he locked eyes with Bey Ruby Eurialyte. The jeweler spoke to him telepathically and commanded him to grab a seat at their table. Jottenheim sat down and motioned for the rest of the party to sit down. Before he had a chance to speak, Bey Ruby silenced him, pulled out a candle, and lit it. The approaching group noticed how the conversation at the table, silent from a distance was audible when they drew closer to the candle. The jeweler revealed themselves to be a Flame Keeper - a royal guard within Queen Adi's court in the Fire Isles. They were there on a mission to retrieve an orb of fire essence stolen from the Plane of Fire by the Silk Merchant. The orb allowed the Rakshasa to maintain autonomy from the rest of hell itself, creating a pocket plane for him to rule. Bey Ruby chastised the party for potentially ruining their secret infiltration plans while also revealing to Sansarya that she was being tracked by one of the fox devils that worked at the casino - the one that got her drunk on ichor.

Bey Ruby's demeanor changed completely when he saw Esther Longfellow. They instantly recognized the renowned scholar and requested her help in forming a distraction. Esther volunteered to break out the prisoners held by the Silk Merchant, believing that doing so would help pull most of the guards away from the party's operation. Drydee, feeling that Callum needed a kick to remind him who he was, asked Esther to take the once daredevil and rogue with her.

Ruby informed the party that he had bribed Fimtor to allow them to carve a secret passage below his bath house, located one level below, into the inner machinery powering the arena and siphoning blood to feed Princess Mariet’s Mirror. The mirror was once used by the once Queen of Ior to rise to power. At the time, Mariet was a princess married off to the Duke of Nim't. The mirror, gifted to her by a demon, convinced her to sacrificed the Lathander diaspora living in Nim't to the mirror. Soon after her 3 brothers, a sister, 2 uncles, and 17 nieces and nephews died of a mysterious “sleeping sickness”, leaving her to inherit the throne of Ior.

The Lighthouse gang, per Ruby's recommendation, left the jeweler at their table and headed downstairs to the shops to not draw the attention of the fox devils overseeing the casino. Jottenheim procured a wand of holding and had the merchant attach it to his flail. Drydee purchased bullets and a silencer for their pistol from Van Rook's shop. Afterwards, the gang headed to the bathhouse to meet up with Ruby. They were surprised to find Fintor irrationally angry at Synkronos, likely due to the card the druid drew earlier. Ruby appeared quickly and helped intimidate the fire giant into backing off. A deal had been struck and it would not be wise for Fintor to back out now, after taking money from the Fire Isles in exchange for information on the Silk Merchant.

#### The Maze

To the party's surprise, Bey Ruby led them to a sauna room. There, they began dismantling boards to reveal a carved out passage leading below. The party descended downwards, finding themselves in a mechanical maze. Occasionally, walls filled with gears and other mechanical parts gave way to displaced elements of a run down home - a dirty sink, old paintings with faces scratched out, and dirty faded rugs.

The group bypassed several menacing traps before falling to a magnetic trap that got the best of Jottenheim and Alexander. While the pair were attached to the ceiling, a mysterious cat appeared before them, turned its butthole towards them, and shot magical fireworks out of it at the party. Before the group could gather themselves to face this strange foe, the cat began casting another spell. To their horror, Bey Ruby began shrinking down in size and amber began to encrust them. The cat tried to grab the gem but Synkronos got to it first. The cat then fled, hoping that the rest of his traps would finish off the group.

Making their way further down the maze, and outsmarting a few more contraptions, the party found themselves in a putrid bedroom. The bed in a corner had aged white sheets with crusted yellow discoloration. Broken furniture littered the space. The black cat appeared before them again. Its form slowly gave way to a hideous wilted old man with a handful of hair strands standing on his head, garbed in old worn rags. The individual introduced themselves as Zigron, a loyal servant of the Silk Merchant. He offered to send them out of his maze, back to the casino, if they surrendered the amber containing Bey Ruby. The party refused and engaged the mad wizard. Zigron cackled madly and unleased a blast of lightning that ricocheted through the party. When the smoke cleared, only Alexander and Fei Fei managed to withstand the powerful spell. The remainder of the party was downed and crisped by the lightning. The pair attacked the mage, who tried to transform back into a cat to escape from them. Alexander, quick on his feet, managed catch Zigron, forcing him to transform back. Fei Fei healed the rest of the party who decided it was better to kill the mage than trust his word that his power was the only thing keeping the space whole. After striking the killing blow, the space around them began to collapse, forcing them to make their way to the large gilded double doors leading to the Silk Merchant's inner sanctum.

#### The Inner Sanctum of the Silk Merchant

Throwing the doors open, the Lighthouse Gang found an elaborate open courtyard with a view to a fiery sky above lit by a humming fire orb floating at the center of it. Blood flowed down the old crumbling stone walls forming the courtyard, being drawn to a mirror sitting on a pavilion above. At the sides of the courtyard hung elaborate paintings, depicting various other planes. Drydee pocked one depicting the fey wilds. At the center of the courtyard, sat a large elaborate table decked out with delicacies from all parts of the world and multiverse. A host of decomposed and carved up guests sat around the table - the corpses of Countessa Yodrisil Hammerhand, Magred Itea, Antwon Maximovich, Count Brakus' father, and by far the oldest belonging to a rotting Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt. Realizing that the dwarf terrorizing them was long dead, the party pieced together that MacRaibeirt was a cover used by the Silk Merchant for some time to infiltrate West Gholon. Alexander pilfered Yodrisil Hammerhand immaculate necklace.

The group took defensive positions around the court yard. The Silk Merchant, a Rakshasa devil dressed in an elegant fur robe, angerly teleported into the space. The devil, Shadiq Shadowpaw, threw a familiar hand onto the table. Drydee's heart sank as she recognized the tattoed arm of her former colleague, Callum. The devil cursed the Lighthouse Gang, blaming them for causing problems for his master plan. He was aware of Rhiga's machinations and was the only one who could save the city he cherished. The mirror would give him the power to bind the city to hell, dragging it down into his pocket plane. There, he would rule over it, keeping it safe from the Aboleth god's madness. The party attacked the Silk Merchant but he repealed their initial advances, absorbing any spells they threw at him while directing a beam of force and swift kung fu punches and kicks their way. Things turned dire when Silvana, the assassin that orchestrated the attack on the Blackraven Barracks joined the fight in support of her master. Hope seemed lost.

The sky above cracked and a third foreign form descended into the courtyard at break neck speed. The female figure blindsided the airborne Silvana with a heavy punch, sending the succubus reeling across the room unconscious. Esther Longfellow crashed onto the wooden table, sending it and its contents in every direction. "Sorry that took so long. Seems like ya'll could use some help." With the succubus gone and the scholar joining their side, the flow of battle shifted. Jottenheim picked himself off the ground and he and Esther charged at the Silk Merchant. Fei Fei, Synkronos, and Sansarya meanwhile directed their attention at the mirror, using their magic to destroy it. The Silk Merchant, fearing that his plans would come to an end if the artifact were destroyed, ignored the two fighters barreling down at him and charged at Sansarya, hitting her with a hard right hook. The princess fell back, coughing up blood, gasping for breath. This was the last straw for Esther. The situation was too dangerous to continue to bear false pretenses. Her anger boiled over into smoke and her form began to shift as she shed her human shape. In her place stood an adult bronze dragon - Esther Longfellow's true form. Ester struck the merchant with her metallic claws, forcing him to engage her instead of the injured sorceress behind him. With the Silk Merchant distracted, Jottenheim pulled out one of his javelins and hurled it with all of his might at the Silk Merchant - unaware that the devil was weak to piercing projectiles by good aligned characters. The javelin struck Shadiq Shadowpaw in the heart. He gasped, collapsed, and bled out. Sansarya took this opportunity to throw one more spell at the mirror, destroying it - hopefully for good. Drydee, knowing that her opportunity to return the artifact to Nadia El Mahel was gone, quietly grabbed a piece of the mirror to give to her employer.

#### Aftermath

Esther beckoned the party to jump on her back. With the Silk Merchant dead, the space becoming unstable. She took flight but not before letting Synkronos pluck the Orb of Fire that was floating in the open ceiling above. The dragon hurried them through the sanctum, past the casino, and eventually back out through a collapsing hole that was consuming the Yonder Veil. The let the party down next to the ruins of the once famous inn and tavern, where a crowd had gathered. Countessa Vastrida Hammerhand approached the party to demand to know what had happened. Jottenheim chewed her out for her familiar to do her duty as a member of the city council. She was about to retort sharply, before losing her composure upon seeing her wife's necklace in Alexander's hands. Knowing that she didn't do enough in her role as councilwoman and as a wife to Yodrisil, the tearful Vastrida admitted to Jottenheim that he was right. To punish his arrogance, she appointed him Captain of the Guard, making him a member of the City Council. If he was going to chastise her, then maybe he could show that he could do better.

Upon being caught up on the news, Vastrida called for her assistant and demanded that the city begin seizing properties belonging to Coen Van Rook, Fletcher Colby, Marko Brakus, and Ruaraidh MacRaibeirt. She offered the party Coen Van Rook's estate as compensation for their services to the city. With the Market Square Marauder defeated, the Lighthouse Gang was heralded as the saviors of West Gholon. Drydee, not knowing what to make of the excitement and or what her connection to the party would be, sunk away from the celebration to gather her thoughts.

### Three Months Later...

Having grown tired of Bey Ruby Eurialyte's insistence that they be freed so that they can prevent West Gholon from becoming a smoldering crater, Synkronos and DD called the Lighthouse Gang back to their newly acquired Estate. DD also reached out to Headmistress Nadia El Mahel, knowing that her arcane background was second to none.

The scholar arrived for afternoon tea in her clay golem drawn rickshaw. She was let into the gated estate by Giovanni and Carlitto, who serve Jottenheim as personal guards and assistants in his capacity as Commander of the Fist of Ghol and City Councilmember. Drydee greeted the Headmistress in the estate's courtyard and led her inside to the sitting room next to the kitchen. The pair walked in on Synkronos and Fei Fei arguing over Pig's access within the Estate. Drydee left the Headmistress with the pair, and Sansarya who joined soon after, to go make tea for the afternoon. Sansarya treated the Tabaxi Headmistress to some herbs and ginger from her Marinnian homeland. Alexander, Jottenheim, and a tea bearing Drydee.

The Lighthouse Gang explained the Bey Ruby predicament to Nadia, who asked to see the amber containing the renowned Jeweler and spy. Synkronos initially balked at the idea of letting Nadia see the pendant but was over ruled by the remainder of the gang. Nadia summoned her spellbook and began investigating the arcane forces in play. Identifying the spell to be Imprisonment, Nadia asked the group to fetch her volcanic dust, a skull, and some lotus peddles. Fei Fei's coat of many pockets had the necessary lotus peddles, Jottenheim had a spare skull lying around, and Synkronos created volcanic ash with some druidic cantrip work. Nadia drew out a circle on the group's cocaine table which included circles within its pattern for the items. She placed the amber in the center and asked the group to hold hands while she muttered in dispel magic incantation. The amber hovered and began to spin and crack. As it did, Bey Ruby grew in size until they reached their normal size, sending them crashing through the table. The irritated Fire Genasi began yelling at the Lighthouse Gang over their failure to free them over the past three months. Fei Fei fetched the Flame Keeper Knight some water (which immediately began to boil in Bey Ruby's hands) while Sansarya gave the Ruby some coal... which was immediately thrown back at her face in the form of a diamond.

The group attempted to plead with Bey Ruby that the Fire Essence Orb they possessed was necessary for their plans to stop Rhiga. Although Bey Ruby was initially not having it, the group successfully calmed them down enough for her to agree to give them an audience with their mother, Queen Adi the Kind, ruler of the Fire Isles and representative of the Plane of Fire on Gaia. During this exchange, Bey Ruby emphasized the importance of the orbs while giving the group a historical lesson on the Fire Essence Orbs' connection to the creation of Gaia as well as the defeat of the Aboleths' at the hands of Kalanthye and her two siblings.

While the group was making plans on how to reach the Fire Isles, two messages arrived for Sansarya. The first, from Waldemar, described his failure to keep her brother safe during their trek north into the Frozen Wastes to find the source of the evil plaguing their kingdom. The second came from Narcipious who demanded that Sansarya bring the Eye of Drist to him in exchange for her brother's freedom. Fearing that time was of the essence, the group passed on Bey Ruby's offer to utilize their ship to travel to the Fire Isles, instead opting to try to use the portals below De Witt's Smithy to save on time.

#### Maegor returns!

Three months ago, after defeating the Maximovich twins, Maegor ran into one of his old training instructors, Batholomew Ozpin, during the party's post fight celebration at the Crown Jewel. Ozpin told Maegor that he had assembled a makeshift group of Beaconites and invited the knight to come train with them. Having felt doubt in his skills, Maegor took the now weary and cynical up on his offer. Under Ozpin's tutelage, Maegor's training proceeded at a breakneck pace. Yet, the aasimar, having spent time outside his own now felt alone amongst the other members of the academy. Frequent letters from the Lighthouse Gang did not help the issue, as they cheerfully told Maegor of their victory over the Silk Merchant, their rise to fame, and their new estate in the Villas District. After three months of training in the wilds, Maegor decided it was time to enjoy the company of his companions once again, and a feather down bed to boot.

The knight arrived at the estate as Nadia made her exit. He used his charm to pass through Jottenheim's loyal guards unimpeded and surprised the party as they loudly argued over their next steps. The group quickly caught up Maegor, and vice versa, on their respective adventures while Maegor got a matching Lighthouse Gang tattoo - inspiring success in the now re-united party. The knight was however disappointed to learn that the party was on their way out the door to travel to the Fire Isles and that the promised feather down bed would have to wait. Meanwhile, Synkronos cast Speak with Animals to inquire whether Pig and Marybeth wanted to travel with the party. The pair said they preferred the safety of the mansion but loved their owners very much. Scottie the stableboy was put in charge of watching over the pair, much to Gio's disappointment.

The group made their way over to De Witt's smithy. There, Maegor was somewhat surprised by the talking Bestest Boy but quickly made friends with the talking Gholian Sheep Dog. He purchased a new mace and new armor from the dog. During the transaction, Raymound De Witt made his way up from the basement to let the party know that Elmer Sateen had asked that Harper talismans be made for the party, making them new honorary members of the Harper Adventuring Party as well as giving them access to the system of eight portals the Harpers used for travel. The group asked if Raymound had a portal to the Fire Isles. The smith's brow perked up in surprise but said he had the next best thing, a portal to the Raptor Coast. His old friend Jimbo the Fish had settled down there in retirement. The gnome always had an ingenious nature to him. They could likely count on his artificer skills to find a method of travel to the Fire Isles from the Iswala Coast.

### Onwards to Glenbour

#### Raptor Reef

When the party exited the portal, they were surprised to see a perturbed humanoid fish woman who yelled at them for crashing into her living room. The situation was made even more awkward by the fact that they were not in a living room, but rather in the middle of a beach. Tensions were quickly lowered when her husband, the for mentioned Jimbo appeared out of a work shed in a disheveled state. The party mentioned their predicament and Jimbo offered to sell them a broken down ship for 200 gold. His wife quickly baulked at his unsavvy salesmanship and demanded a sum closer to what he paid for the heap of junk. Sansarya and Fei Fei convinced Oki to raptor race to settle the price, something Oki confidently agreed to and she and Sansarya selected raptors. Synkronos slyly convinced Oki's raptor to throw the race. Sansarya got an early lead and held it, after aptly picking one of the faster raptors. In the last lap, she managed to successfully cross the finish like unlike Oki whose raptor threw her from the saddle. The party spent the afternoon fixing up the ship, while Synkronos trained the raptors to not follow strange orcs and elf raptor rustlers. Before they set off, Oki warned the party to avoid the nearby reef.

#### Ghost Ship

After traveling for about an hour, Drydee noticed a fog building up on their starboard side. The Lighthouse Gang attempted to steer the ship away from the fog, but the winds changed on them, forcing them to go south. The mist too changed course, appearing to follow them. With her keen eyes, Drydee made out a damaged sail in the mist and heard the lapping of oars against water.

As the boat drew closer, the gang made out three hulking skeleton ogres rowing the ship and mist towards them. Jottenheim attempted to maneuver the sail to avoid impact while Alexander hurled scorching rays at the vessel to try to deduce if the ship, captained by a wraith, was tangible. The vessel did indeed catch fire, but the spell did not slow the ghost ship as it rammed into the party's boat. Fire began to pass onto their ship, followed by a rain of arrows from other wraith pirates aboard. Fei Fei summoned a protective circle on the ship, managing to deflect all but one arrow with the power of Lathander. Sansarya cast banishment on the captain and another wraith, permanently sending them to their home in the Shadowfell. With the captain down, Maegor called upon Beacon to raise the banner of a crusade, inspiring his allies. Jottenheim, in tiger form, and Synkronos, taking on the form of a water elemental, took up the call and charged the ghost ship. Fei Fei channeled her belly button, forcing the undead to flee in terror from the light of Lathander. Sansarya banished two of the remaining ogres, helping them find rest in a peaceful afterlife. The third ogre lamented his fate, being still chained to the ship. Fei Fei, inspired by Lathander, helped the last undead member of the crew pass on peacefully. With the crew gone, a whirlpool began to build below the ghost ship, dragging it back down to the depths. Alexander, having already studied a rune on the boat - that he identified as having a binding effect, decided to chance it. He grabbed the ruin and tossed it into the whirlpool. The waters calmed immediately and the fog faded. Drydee searched the boat, finding a strange blue stone. Alexander identified it using Reginald Blackraven's help, discovering it to be an Ioun Stone of Intellect. He gifted it to Sansarya, who instantly stopped drooling, having regained some of the intellect she lost from her encounter with the Deck of Many Things.

### The Fire Isles

Using Synkronos' water elemental form to give them a speed boost, the party made excellent time during the second leg of their sailing journey. As the jagged teeth like volcanos came into view, the Lighthouse Gang was greeted by a red dragon ridden by a Githyanki scout. Seeing Bay Ruby, the dragon hailed the royal before continuing his scouting.

The party sailed into Fireside Bey, a wooden port built on a barrier between the volcano's pool of lave and the ocean filed with turtle ships. Ruby directed them to sail to the left alcove, used for merchants and visitors. A Yuan-Ti, wearing a silver ring, greeted them and demanded documentation. He cut off his request upon seeing Bay Ruby, instead choosing to welcome the group as royal guests. Needing time to massage things over with their mother, Ruby told the party to make their way to the High Garden Ring, pointing out their palace in the process.

With Bay Ruby gone, a hobgoblin wearing a bronze ring and a frayed worker tunic grabbed Maegor's hand and plead the paladin to trade him his ship for several rubies. The party refused the transaction but the Hobgoblin's pleading attracted the attention of a fire myrmidon guard. Sansarya attempted to cast suggestion on the hobgoblin and the guard. The spell worked on the hobgoblin but the guard was able to resist it. Activating the hobgoblin's ring, he demanded to know what transpired. Upon learning that the hobgoblin stole gems from Queen Adi's mine, he commanded him to go to the dragon pits. The worker strangely complied with the command to go to his death.

Shaking things off, and remembering Bay Ruby's warnings to be on their best behavior, the gang decided that it was best to not get involved. They found the funicular leading up the slope of the volcano's interior and took the steam powered train up to the High Gardens but not before Drydree noticed an elf "dock worker" keeping an eye on them.

Upon reaching the gardens, the group found a fruit stand. Sansarya used her keen vision to ensure that the food was not being poisoned before grabbing a slice of pineapple. The hobgoblin attendant was a bit weary about giving her the food, unable to tell if she wore any ring collars under her covered neck. Synkronos had a much easier time with the exchange but both party members were surprised that the food was offered for free with no expectation of payment. Feeling liberated from the strains of capitalism, the party decided to take full advantage of the situation by finding a nice bath house to enjoy. Drydree scouted out the area, spotting a platinum collared elf making her way into a hidden bathhouse off the main street. The group was pampered by the gold ringed Yaun-Ti managing the establishment, with all of their needs - Salamander massages, volcanic silt baths, ice cold water baths with desalinated water, and strong coffee - being met. While enjoying the steam room, Drydree came upon the old elven woman she saw earlier. Sumina Keydove introduced herself as the head gardener of the Queen's Songbird Gardens. Answering Sumina's inquiry around what brought them to the islands, Drydree told her that they were there to seek a favor from the Queen for rescuing Bay Ruby. Drydree was surprised to find Sumina not impressed with the party's feats and sensed that there was more to the gardener.

Having enjoyed the baths and recovered from their long journey, the group set out for Bay Ruby's palace in their washed and ironed clothes. There, Alexander took a moment to study the city, Agonnya's Blessing, built inside of the volcano - taking note of the multiple dragons hovering around the palace and of the shift change bells marking midnight.