Session 75

# June 16th, 2022 - The Final Battle Begins

## The Final Battle Begins

The session began the morning after the War Council, with all the leaders sleeping in quarters upon Blagothkus’ cloud castle. The morning was dark and gloomy, as the wind howled through the night bringing Sobek’s storm upon the day. It was a few hours later by the time the collected army had gathered in their ranks and they had made the final march upon the volcano. The storm really began to strike as the army marched up amidst the enemy's artillery fire.

The Champions were all aboard the cloud castle, with most upon the walls looking down as they flew above the marching army, providing air cover. The enemies dragons had been harrying their forces all morning, but the combined efforts of the friendly metallic dragons, and the cloud castle as a fortified defensive position with all its ballista and giants firing great bows from its walls kept the army advancing. It was hard for them to see what was going on below, as the storm’s fury truly swept in from the east it became dark and hard to see through the clouds, but there were many flashes of *lighting bolts* and *fireballs* being unleashed.

It was around this time that the battle truly began, the enemy dragons began attacking and circling the cloud castle in earnest, as it continued its steady pace heading towards the center of the caldera, while they floated above the battle. The Champions fired their weapons from the walls, and tried to fend off passing dragons that were picking up or knocking off defenders. One swooped down right upon Rachen who narrowly evaded its impact, slamming down hard with the *Blade of Dragonfell* into its nearest hind leg. He held on tight pinning the beast down as ax wielding giants rushed over and slashed away as it flailed.

Then, among the lighting raging in the sky, a bolt pierced right into the heart of the castle’s courtyard striking true hitting Cadmus. The power infused the cleric, causing him to give off a white aura and he burst alive in power. His once meager god-gifted *Javelin of Lightning* exploded in bright light, and magically elongated into a tall spear - becoming the Spear of Sobek. Cadmus floated into the air, and realized he was flying, and had to now move forward with the castle, unable to truly land. Here he lifted his new glowing spear and focused his sight on particular ancient dragons.

Just like he saw in his vision the night before, with his focusing on specific dragons, the lightning bolts streaked through the sky, arced, and connected with them. He was directing Sobek’s fury as his Avatar. The lightning the castle could direct during such a storm however was being targeted at the green crystal pillars around the nearest edge of the volcano’s caldera rim. The group noticed from the castle ramparts the arrangement of thirteen glowing green motes of light around the rim of the caldera, and they had seen this type of magic multiple times before. The enchanted crystals on the pylons were forming a thin and almost invisible dome of green energy over the caldera - which would prevent any magic from passing until it was taken down.

Thia and two of her three dragons, with Rufus climbing atop the now adult sized Maximus, all went flying down to help the army and to get some intelligence on how the battle was progressing. She left her youngest, Kiruna as safe as possible in the ice castle courtyard to relay information to the group they may have found. Before heading down to the side of the volcano, her group first flew over the caldera’s barrier to get a better idea of what was going on below. Flying over the temple in the center of the caldera she could see through its open top ceiling into the enormous one hundred foot portal in the center of its floor - the ritual had already begun.

Around the inside rim of the caldera, were thirteen intricate ritual circles painted in silver, with giant metal cages next to each. Sitting within each circle was at least an adult dragon, feasting on prisoners. Rufus and Thia could see thin lines of energy streaming from each circle towards the portal in the center. Thia’s group then flew down along the outer edges of the battle, and fired their acid breath at soldiers atop a few emplaced towers, melting those manning some artillery. Lachlan watched from the castle ramparts and tried to stay close to guard Cadmus, whose focus was in the skies.

After Thia noticed a few of the green pylons along the rim of the caldera had gone out, she wondered how to test if the caldera’s shield had been weakened enough. The ranger settled on picking up a friendly battle wizard, and after calming him and convincing him she was on his side (she was riding a black dragon after all), she instructed him to cast a *fireball* at the shield as they passed over it. In the moment, her mount Elysian had to dodge a *lightning bolt* and ended up flicking the battle wizard - who dutifully cast the *fireball* anyway. The spell exploded on the dome of the spell, but showed it destabilizing with the loss of a handful of pylons already.

Alburt watched from the ramparts of the cloud castle waiting for the caldera’s dome to be broken. As soon as he noticed the *fireball* explosion and the green rippling of the dome collapsing, he looked to his *simulacrum* standing to his side, and said “now”. The snowman copy of Alburt looked to the sky, and waved his wand and said the appropriate words to cause four massive *meteors* to come streaking down out of the storm filled sky. As they had discussed, the *simulacrum* directed three of the meteors each to a separate sacrifice circle within the caldera rim, and one towards the temple and portal itself. The massive fiery boulders streaked through the sky with dragons dodging them and they each obliterated their sacrifice circles, leaving large craters.

But the ritual continued, the light of dozens of lives streamed continually from the various sacrifice circles towards the central portal. The Champions upon the castle’s courtyard conferred, that now may be the time they had to venture down into the caldera and try and stop the remaining sacrifice circles. They had no idea how long the ritual had been going on, or how many lives needed to be sacrificed. It was that, or delving through the portal to destroy the phylactery before the ritual completed.

And that is where the session ended, it was the afternoon of the two hundred and seventy fifth (275th) day since the raid on Greenest.

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