Session 051

# The Outward Ascent

**Age of the Wolf, Year 5, Autumn, Aerlun Toil 3, Day 10 - Maelun Toil 1, Day 1**

*The heroes collect their spoils from their defeat of the hags, and venture downwards in search of Isorm. They learn the outcome of Fang Li's descent into the labyrinth, and make a tentative deal with the ancient linnorm. At long last, they taste the cool air of the outside world once more.*

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## Player Characters Involved

* Nygäär the Dark the Fey Blooded Rogue/Fighter/Dualist played by Dana
* Esbjörn Sigvardson the Fire Giant Blooded Barbarian/Cleric/Surtr's Chosen played by Greg
* Heiða the Mother Fucking Veleda the Dökkálfar Blooded Dread Necromancer played by Justin
* Valindr Ymirsdottir the Frost Giant Blooded Human Scout/Ranger/Cleric played by Donnie
* Jor the Emberwrought the Giant Blooded Human Sorcerer/Dracolexi/Incantator played by Jason

## A Hoard Collected and a Descent Below

The battle with the hags concluded, Jor contemplated the easiest way to free Droog and Heida, who were trapped in cubes of magical force. Summoning some shadow hounds, he used his seidr to swap out two of the summoned dogs with his companions in the cage to free them. Meanwhile, Nygaar found two secret doors, one of which was locked and another which seemed to be merely illusory. While Valindr boldly stepped through the false wall, Nygaar was able to unlock the hidden door with the aid of Heida's magic. Finding further winding passageways, Valindr waited patiently for Nygaar to explore what he found before venturing forward.

Creeping cautiously through the now unlocked secret door, Nygaar found an iron bound wooden chest. He examined it thoroughly, and determined that while it was not locked, it was trapped in some way he couldn't specify. Wisely hoping to avoid further injury, Heida summoned a skeleton and ordered it to open the chest. Unfortunately, the hags had one last trick up their sleeves, and a black ball of force rose from the opened chest, seeking out the closest living creature. Peering from behind a door, that living creature happened to be Nygaar, and the black magic struck him squarely in the forehead. Luckily, Nygaar's long hours in training had hardened his physical form, and he was able to shake off the ill intent of the hag's magic, suffering no effects. The chest held substantial riches, and the party gleefully doled this treasure out amongst themselves. Moving briskly, they followed Valindr through the illusory wall, eager to end their time in the hated labyrinth.

Heida ordered the undead howler forward to trigger any traps, but the beast encountered none. Soon, the party came upon a grisly scene:

*In this passage, you find the corpses of two recently killed ettins hacked up brutally by what looks to be a large slashing weapon. Before you is a dark spiral stairwell, a biting cold rising out of the ground that makes the dungeon you have just traversed seem balmy in comparison. Over the mouth of the stairwell is a large horizontal portcullis, and there is a mechanical apparatus used to raise it up to allow you to descend. Unfortunately, you can plainly see the lever and one of the chains that make up this mechanical device have been broken, by the looks of it fairly recently. Hanging on a nearby wall is a large draconic skull, and it hisses a greeting at you.*

Taken aback by the foul construct skull hanging nearby, the party attempted to communicate with it. The skull, which it seemed was tasked with guarding the stairwell, implored the party to fix it's portcullis mechanism, and promised not to harm them in return. Jor, feeling some sort of strange kinship to the skull, gave it a name, the draconic word for "guardian." The skull was pleased, and was even more so when Jor and Esbjorn were able to fix the mechanism. The guardian revealed in it's own way that it had seen Fang Li and a boy descend the stairwell, while Wulf and another boy stayed above, slaying the ettins and breaking the portcullis before fleeing. The heroes took some time to mull over a plan for their upcoming confrontation, and spoke openly of Jor' kinship with Loki. Strangely, at the mention of this, the draconic skull hanging from the wall went inert, and could not be roused. Noting that fact briefly, the party continued talking, and argued about whether or not to kill Fang Li if they encountered her. Pulling the lever, the party began their long descent into a frigid cold, walking slowly and cautiously down a long and slippery spiral stairwell hundreds of feet deep.

## Isorm's Lair and the Hel Gate

The end of the stairwell revealed a dimly lit cavern covered in ice. Before them there was a strange makeshift depression, consisting of jagged ledges of ice and stone descending down and then back up in a large v shape. Traversing that obstacle rather easily, the party continued on and soon the cave opened up before them:

*Standing at the top of the ice stairwell, you look out into a broad cavern, covered in icy walls and ledges and yawning high above and below your vantage point. The cavern floor is perhaps two hundred feet below you and is interspersed with half frozen water and stone. You see hundreds of skeletons littering the cavern floor, the grisly remains of both beasts and men alike. The icy cavern roof soars perhaps one hundred feet above your head. The narrow ledges on the cavern walls, some one hundred feet below you, seem to ripple under the ice with movement. Suddenly, two nearby walls erupt in a shower of ice. Some twenty feet above you two massive humanoids, formed of glistening snow and ice, walk upon the icy walls, facing down at you and standing impossibly upright as if the sheer vertical walls were horizontally oriented. Their inhuman faces grimace in a mockery of life. They glide slowly down towards you, waves of biting cold seeming to emanate off of their shimmering bodies.*

The massive ice creatures, which some in the party recognized as Ice Elementals, fell swiftly upon the heroes. The creatures could move effortlessly into and out of the ice walls, and everyone took their share of knocks in the fearsome fighting that followed. Jor exploded one creature in a fiery shower of ice and stone, while Esbjorn slew another with massive strikes of his vorpal blade and launched a number of heavy boulders at the elementals who seemed to glide and swim upon the walls and ceiling. Valindr peppered the creatures, who seemed to multiply in number the more the party looked around, with numerous arrows of magical energy. Esbjorn ordered Droog to investigate a large hole they spotted in the ceiling, and the quasit half-heartedly complied, but was relieved when Esbjorn changed his mind and ordered his servant to return. Nygaar sought in vain for something to bury his weapons into, yet it seemed the creatures were reluctant to engage with the would be king of Seron. The heroes did spot one thing of note while engaged in this battle; there was a dim sliver of what seemed to be natural light coming from the cavern ceiling on the other side of the yawing chasm.

Heida flew out into the wide open cave interior, trying to get a better handle on what they were facing. After suffering the collapse of a portion of the cave's roof, which had been deliberately broken loose by one of the elementals, Heida wielded Byrmoor with impressive aplomb, charging through the air and delivering a massive strike against one of the parties enemies and filling her companions with a surge of inspiration in the process. The onslaught of the creatures seemed endless, however, and Jor soon attempted to pull the party out of harm's way. Using a dimension door spell, he transported the heroes hundreds of feet away, to an adjoining cliff side on the other edge of the cavern and near the ray of light they had seen. Rushing towards her companions, Heida soon joined them, and they found a slick slope, which led down nearly vertically, arrayed before them. Ever the brave one, and inspired by Ymir's (mixed) blessing, Valindr descended the slope first, and soon saw a strange sight:

*You see what the seidr practitioners recognize as a closed portal, the stone carved in esoteric symbols of quixotic and arcane power. Dim blue flames burn in a circular pattern around the portal. A number of ghost-like beings, that look strangely like the wizardess Fang Li, seem to be hovering all around this dead portal, puzzling over it and speaking with no noise to one another. The mutilated corpse of a young boy lies prone in the center of the portal. It is some sort of spell none of you have ever witnessed; it’s as if the sorceress left pieces of herself behind to study the gate to Hel.*

## The Parley and a Long Awaited Ascent

While most of the party followed Valindr, Esbjorn stayed behind upon the ledge momentarily. Suddenly, a fearsome voice rang out, assaulting the heroes ears with its ferocity. One word, "ENOUGH," was all that it took for the ice elementals to suddenly disappear once more into the walls and floor of the cavern. Esbjorn called out, proclaiming his status as a champion of Surtr. Laughing, the elder Ice Linnorm known as Isorm peered out of a hole in the ceiling, the creatures massive head bigger than Esbjorn's whole body. The beast briefly mocked Esbjorn, and agreed to a parley. Esbjorn continued to spout oaths and warnings, and the creature soon grew tired of what it perceived as this tiny mortal's impudence. Isorm's head retreated into the hole, where the dim shaft of light shone down. After a short time, it appeared from yet another hole out of the ceiling of the adjoining chamber, and confronted the remainder of the party. Before joining the others, Esbjorn contacted the Fire Giant king Lumgrýmr, to display his power in dealing with the linnorm. Before severing contact, and unbeknownst to the rest of the party, Lumgrýmr briefly requested a boon from Esbjorn.

Isorm seemed to like Valindr, and commented on her fine frost giant features. The party had agreed to let Jor speak, but in the presence of the beast all those grand plans fell apart. With Esbjorn clumsily making his way down the slick slope to join them, the heroes attempted to reason with the linnorm, asking about Fang Li and what had transpired when she had come here. Eventually, the heroes learned a number of interesting details:

* Isorm told them Fang had been there, and that she went to the Rime Citadel (the frost giant stronghold) near Odin’s Heart
* She went to seek out the Eldritch Frost Worm, and bring its heart back to Isorm
* The Eldritch Frost Worm acts as a guardian for the Frost Giants
* In exchange, Isorm will give Fang the Rime Topaz, and she will bring it to Jungo to be awakened so that Fang can use it to open the portal to Hel
* Isorm was bound to guard this portal to Hel by the Aesir, and blames Loki for this fact
* Isorm cares very little for his duties, and cares not a whit if foolish mortals wish to venture into the pit of Hel

Nygaar, using Freya's torc to keep the bargain a secret from Byrmoor, attempted to make a deal with Isorm to have the linnorm take the cursed blade off Heida's hands. After a short time, it was agreed that should the party bring him the heart of the Frost Worm (which Isorm had apparently had a disagreement with long ago), and two hundred slaves for him to feast upon, that the creature would hand over the Rime Topaz and accept Byrmoor. That settled, the party used another dimension door to flee the hundreds of feet to the surface, following the shaft of light they had seen that they soon understood allowed Isorm to leave his subterranean lair for brief intervals. Breathing in the early morning air, they saw the entrance to the labyrinth some distance away, the charred remains of Heida's undead wolves lying in a pile and the Umbrians they had encountered two days before nowhere to be seen. The companions breathed a sigh of relief, and Valindr spotted her stallion Glaer running towards them gleefully. They looked to one another, making ready to discuss their next move. That they had survived the Hoarfrost Labyrinth at all was a testament to their luck and bravery, and the intertwined threads of their collective destinies would surely be noted with interest by men and gods alike. The green glow of the new moon of Maelun lit their relieved, haggard and bloodstained faces.

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