Records from the second campaign

Set 170 years after the end of campaign 1, the group begins its journey in the town of Lothon in the Abberjadara region of the Kalstatti Empire.

the records below are incomplete and from varying perspectives

### First Arc: Rumblings in the Distance

Two adventurers, recently acquainted, enter the city looking for work. Their names are Theressa and Jackson, and they are soon tasked with investigating a series of attacks on travellers. For information they speak to the victims, and one of these is attended by the illustrious and idealistic Catarina. They note that Catarina's injured friend is lacerated by blades or claws.
The duo heads out to the woods to investigate and, wasting no time, are immediately jumped by the slasher. Masked and clad in black, he dives from a tree and knifes Theressa in the side, then flees. Jackson is eventually able to contain some of Theressa's blood inside of her, but before they can find the footpad again they are also attacked by a bear. The slasher seems to have a change of heart and runs back to help them fight the bear, and Jackson manages to down the beast with a quarrel to the head. In the aftermath, Theressa tries detain the bandit, but he snatches her sword
and dashes away, leaving it stuck in the road.
Nominally victorious, they take the bear's head and head back to town, where they are paid for finding the source of the attacks, and for the head. Jackson theorizes that the bear and not the man was responsible for the attacks, which becomes the source of much squabbling between the two bounty hunters.
The next day the duo walks to Catarina's house, for they had promised to update her on her friend's assailant. Once apprised, Catarina suggests that the city might offer further reward for actually apprehending the slasher. Herself a former mercenary and concerned about the safety of the citizens, Catarina joins herself to Theressa and Jackson, and they return to the bounty hall. There they negotiate for a contract on the footpad, and also hear of a man hoping to hire protection against the very same.
Arim is a local scholar researching a secret library said to be located in the evirons of the city, and has been trying to hire bodyguards for the road. The three gladly take him up on his offer, and hatch a plan with him to capture the slasher when he hopefully attacks during the trip.
**DM — 10/15/2018**
Stevenson Strongman, dragged off by wolves. May he rest in piece.
Ash. Off delivering that letter, totally coming back......
Myro the swordsman. Joined a group in need
Eden. Ate more vibrating meat?
Jackson "Totally not evil" the interrogator
Arim. Cast spells
**Jackson — 10/27/2018**
After arriving back in town, the party delivered the body of the dead cultist to the local constabulary for a reward. After a brief detainment the party was released and informed that the situation would be brought up at town hall.
The party arrived at town hall to learn of the local affairs, many of which having to do with the Empire's plan for moving troops to the North (rather than securing existing territories) Catarina was noticeably vocal in her displeasure with the situation.
The town hall discussion revealed that there was plans to scout the area where the cultists are camped. In the meantime, the party decided to pick up a contract to find information on a serial killer who was stabbing elderly women
This investigation was long, and tedious, with many loops and a lot of conflicting information. But after perseverance and a quick trip to the brothel, a suspect was found.
The potential stabber in question was a young elven girl with a nice ass and perfect tits. The party managed to bait the killer by disguising Eden as an old lady and setting up an ambush. The killer eventually was alerted that the party was on to her and ran away, though she was easily tracked to a ware house
It was here that the killer revealed that she was also an ancient shadow monster, and demonstrated her ability to phase into walls. The party having not managed to catch the killer, reported to the constabulary for further orders
**Myro — 11/01/2018**
During prayer day Myro heard about a hunt for Tallathel that he recruited Arim, Catarina and Jackson for.  After deciding on the second highest difficulty, they were quickly beaten to a pulp and turned to stone by a gorgon and were forced out of the hunt with a 45gp bill that needed to be payed.  With the bill costing so much the small group decided to look for work and came across a caravan needing some protection while it travelled closer to the shore.  After meeting Alexander, the caravan leader, the group was told they'd be setting out at night and travelling then and they would sleep during the day.  The first 2 days of the travel were uneventful and easy, but the dawn before arriving at their destination a small group of bandits attempted to collect on a non existent tax and the "leader?" (didn't stop to ask any questions) was beheaded by Myro.  Alexander offered us all a break and some food, which Arim warned us was poisoned and Catarina hypnotised Alexander and his thugs to eat from first.  They promptly fell unconscious and we brought them to the authorities within the town.  Unfortunately there wasn't enough evidence to incarcerate him and he was let go.  The group found a small caravan heading back to the small town where the rest of our friends were and we made our way back to town.
**Theresa — 11/09/2018**
The group reconvened at the tavern to go over the latest happenings. We then headed to the Constabluary to hear the news of the scouts that were investigating the cult activities. In the debriefing, we learned that the cult has been abducting people for a mass sacrifice. We made a plan to visit several nearby villages looking for cult activity. That night Catarina found a note warning her to stop causing trouble. Jackson and Myro got into a bar fight. We left to make rounds to the villages, the first one was uneventful, the second was being raided, after tracking the fleeing cultist for awhile, they attempted to ambush us. We managed to take two alive, the rest were killed, we didn't see signs of any of their captives.
**Jackson — 02/10/2019**
The group decided on to set out to an old desecrated church taken by the cult to use as a forward outpost.
Upon reaching the church Mac decided on a plan to scout the ruins using a mass swarm of insects. Unfortunately the swarm would take 4 hours to deliver any information. The group opted for a more expedient solution, sending Pu to scout the church
The cult shot Pu out of the sky, foiling the plan
It was decided then to go full send into that camp killing everything in sight
The cult put up a good fight, but after some careful cleaves from Theressa and few swings from some angry trees, the cult was put in a poor position. Still they were summoning undead at a concerning rate
That was until Pu, who had recently woken up, charged the necromancer, killing him and his summoned corpses causing them  to die instantly.
In the scramble of combat it was discovered that an enemy of Omylia was hiding within the ranks of the cult. He was successfully captured alive
Also Cat was a mushroom
**Omylia — 02/19/2019**
The group proceeded to interrogate Chetwin about his involvement with the mutiny staged on the ship along with the cults doings in the library.  After learning that the weird specter thing was Jorgan, Cat and Theressa both wanted to say hello to an old friend.  The party headed into the library and were met by a librarian and the tip of a spear which poked and prodded Theressa.  After meeting with the librarian there were two doors that could be opened and the party went with the hallway that cause people to bleed from their noses and caused them to hear humming and whispers! WHY WOULD YOU GO DOWN THAT HALLWAY!  Anyways, 5 cultists were running away from a large security golem and with our help we were able to prevent the cultists from causing anymore harm to the library.  Proceeding down the next hallway we found a door which was warm to the touch and caused a jet of flame to shoot out from it once it was opened.  the party found a small set of tunnels which led us to a room where we were able to surprise a group of cultists and an undead performing a ritual on Arim.
As we fought the party slowly got beat down and many of us dropped low on health.  During the battle Arim was critically wounded on the alter after Mac broke the wand of the lich over his knee, Mac fell unconscious after cracking the wand over his knee,  Kirk was run through the chest by a longsword, Theressa was knocked out by a skeleton, I was knocked unconscious by a wave of necrotic energy that Cat caused by smashing a gem thing on the ground (the phylactery of the lich).  After all was said and done we only lost Kirk and kriegbeist who ran off somewhere.  Cat, Therresa and I read a book written by Karados the chaos enchanter which offered great knowledge.  I also read a forbidden book which cause me to get some pointy ass ears and it showed me the true path to god (I'm now an elven cleric)
**Catarina — 02/26/2019**
With Arim's soul leaking out of him, the deputized adventurers scrambled to find a cure. First, he was stuck in the suppression cage to stop his deterioration. Then Catarina took Arim to Jorgen, who was unable to help and warned that the cage would stop working tomorrow. MacNamarra tried to borrow books on the subject, but found that they were invisible and intangible. While he was down in the library he heard a voice calling out from a magic closet. The team investigated and discovered a blind magical child which could only speak celestial and needed to be invited out of the closet.
After some negotiating and translating by a helpful golem, MacNamarra and Omylia decided to free the child, who was then pressured into taking a telepathic infodump of the entire language of common from the golem and was permanently retarded in the doing. The librarian also informed the adventurers that a skilled mage could bring Arim's soul back into his body, so they set out for Arta with cage and child in tow.
On the road, with the smoke rising from the cultist base in the distance, the deputies happened upon cultist and Praxis follower bodies with magical puncure wounds in their heads and imploded tattoos. They shortly encountered survivors from the Praxian host who reported that a third force of riders had attacked them mid-battle and routed both host and cultists.
The team found Arta almost deserted, and were told that the garrison had been withdrawn to Lothon. They staggered into bed in the inn but awoke to find the cage nonfunctional and Arim souling out. They rushed him to the town wise man, who started a ritual to bring his soul back from the shadow realm. Astoundingly, the ritual was only slightly botched, with two different entities entering into Arim's body and a living shadow and an imp escaping into the plane.
Unfortunately, any merriment was forestalled when Catarina announced that she'd recieved a message from a rabbit that Lothon had been taken over and many of her followers arrested.
**Player 1 (character unknown) — 03/09/2019**
The one who calls themselves Arim is okay now, he just refers to himself in the third person and has two souls. This is a marked improvement over being dead. As a weakling in my present form, and only having four days of meals left until starvation sets in, I set off with this bounty-hunting party to Lothon. Well, I remember visiting Lothon nearly 208 years ago on a mission to heal the sick refugees living outside the walls in slums.
It tasted like dirt and desperation.
The journey was uneventful while I explained that I knew Lothon and its sewer network quite well and expressed my intentions to stay with the party. While my adoptive parents grumbled about their responsibilities the well spoken Catarina made a case in my behalf.
I feel okay with this party now and I feel they are my best bet for getting fed in the next five days.
After cautiously making our way to Lothon the party decided to split up and search for clues. Actually it was more like Father MacNamarra transformed into a dog and took off to gather information by himself and everyone decided that looking around the slums was a better than waiting around for him to return. I traveled with Mother Omylia and convinced her that buying clothes that weren't over 200 years out of style might be a good idea. So we met with a shopkeeper that Omylia knew in secret. We didn’t buy clothes and instead started towards the front entrance of Lothon because Mommy wanted to try to hand me off to the guards as a lost child.
I convinced her that it was not good for all of us if I was captured and brought up my blood contracts.
Heading back to the market and meeting up with our group the cries of a public execution being announced were heard. Lothon has had a recent change of government, a group calling themselves the Shining Star has appeared seemingly out of nowhere taken over. The Shining Star has declared a ban on religion and is capturing those who defy them and performing executions. I was just about to cast my vote against getting involved in any way with an execution. But Omylia had to recognise the victim as her shopkeeper friend, and the woman suffering from misopedia Theressa had to insist on being a hero and saving him.
And then everyone agreed!
My magic is weak but I can create a cloud of thick mist that I can see through. So the plan was for them to create a distraction, I pop smoke, and then walk over to the hostage and free them. But no plan survives first contact with the enemy. The distraction methods do less than nothing and the guards are upon us. I pop smoke defensively too far from the hostage and am ready to run for it, but Theressa goes in to stop the executioner's axe fall.
I emerge from the smoke look up to sense Catarina standing on a far roof yelling words of challenge to someone on the ground and then look down and sense a perfect ass.
BOOOM, a magical wave of energy hits me square in the face. I fall off my feet. Everything hurts and the world is spinning. Theressa takes a massive blow from the executioner's giant axe and falls clinging to her spirit. Body sore I force myself to stand and make a show of stumbling to Theressa. ‘Don’t look like a threat,’ I think. I fall onto Theressa’s breastplate to protect myself from hand-crossbow bolts. Reaching into my cloak I produce one of my final rations. Theressa stands up abruptly and throws me aside. I sense a bear to my right and stumble out of there. Mommy Omylia after being penetrated by four men and one woman falls over due to her wounds. I perform the same charade and again seconds before eating one of precious rations Omylia rises.
The perfect ass called me evil but I am just misunderstood.
I step out of my mist again and sense that the executioner is now on fire and running away with a perfect ass. Everyone else is running away from a bear. The air smells like ozone as if a lot of fire was shot all over the place. And Catarina is telling everyone that enemy reinforcements are inbound. We scatter and then regroup at a broken-down watchtower on the other side of Lothon. I tell the party where the outside entrance to the sewers are. Before we enter the tunnel I admit to the party that I only have four days before I begin to starve.

### Second Arc: Against the Shining Star

After the encounter in the square, the party split up and made their way to the abandoned watchtower that they had agreed as their rallying point. They found the tower overgrown and decided to rest there to recuperate from the fight and to wait for the cover of night. While they waited, a man approached the tower and began discussions with the party. It was revealed that he had followed the group and covered their retreat by killing their pursuers. He said that Shaylana was in possession of his shadow and this was currently his primary goal. The party agreed to help him and he offered his services in exchange, giving three crow figurines as a means to contact him.
Before heading into the sewers, as was the next party goal, there was a lengthy discussion about Alf and the overall dissatisfaction around his habit of eating sentient beings. The party came to an agreement that he would guide us through the sewers and then he would need to leave the group.
With that settled, the party proceeded into and through the sewers, encountering several traps, a magically locked door, and a couple of monsters. After finding one exit to the sewers and a split path likely leading into enemy controlled territory, the party took a short break to get their bearings.
**MacNamara— 03/24/2019**
The party having gotten their bearings continued through the sewers, coming across two doors, one iron and warm to the touch, the other magically warded. It was decided after a lot of discussion that the party would open the hot door first. The door errupted with lava, alerting the enemies behind the enchanted door to the parties presence. A large group of enemies were behind the door, one amoung them a mage.
It wasn't long before the the patry was overwhelmed by the enemy force, and MacNamara was lost in the confrontation. The party escaped from the sewers with one less member, and decided to lay low in the now abandoned university.
In the university, Arim cast a spell to make their location apear incredibly uninteresting, in an attempt to keep the law off their heels. It was decided to go out and look for contacts and information back in the city, but first disguises were needed to move undetected. During the search for disguise materials, it was discovered that a member of the old constabulary was in the university waiting for reinforcements. The man's name was Michael Hunt, and he was just on the tail of Shaylana before the Order of the Shining Star took over.
With their new member helping them out, the party took to the streets, trying to find any useful intel. Not a lot of useful intel was recovered, but the Shining Star's long term goals were revealed. After uniting the empire under their banner, they were going to hunt down the Storm Wolf.
RIP MacNamara (2019-2019)
**Omylia — 03/26/2019**
The party awoke to a knock on the door.  S flamboyant tiefling stood outside and offered the party a trade, money and an item for the anomaly.  The party weighed their options and found out that the golems we're also looking for the child.  Ultimately the child decided to go with the tiefling and the party was all too happy that the annoying canibal was gone.  Hunt went to work for the day, and Robert took his servant Charles out for drinks.  Eventually the two parties met up at the fancy place and learned of Shalanas where abouts during parts of her day.  After drinking Robert and Charles returned and a weird gnome with a big beard followed them and became a squatter.
**Arim — 04/13/2019**
The party awoke to the bearded gnome squatter banging on the door; and after a long conversation where said gnome's sanity was tested it was revealed that he was a bodyguard. Catarina decided that since both of the SSs were after her she could benefit from a monetarily guaranteed protector. The group then disguised themselves and attended a rally being held by the SS. Teressa used the massed humanity and some magically conjured pigeons to distribute a large volume of Catarina's anti SS pamphlets. The use of overt magic led to Shalana calling out Omylia as a heretic, feigning horror Arim, Catarina, and the Gnomish bodyguard hid in the crowd as Omylia fled with Michael, Teressa, and Shalana in pursuit. After a brief chase Omylia was caught by Shalana and Michael, with Teressa close behind; Michael tried to arrest Omylia however Shalana was more interested in stabbing her repeatedly. After an attempted mid alley interrogation where Micheal and Shalana nearly came to blows over the treatment of  prisoners, Omylia was mortally wounded prompting Teressa to intervene and attempt to save her life. Michael ran off to get backup leaving Teressa to attempt to extract Omylia, however Shalana threw a  flask of Alchemist's Fire which killed Omylia and seriously wounded Teressa.
The surviving party minus Michael met up at the University where they grew suspicious that Michael was betraying them, prompting everyone to start packing and find a new hideout. The packing was interrupted by some looters, and the group decided it would be best to slip out unnoticed; as they were leaving Michael arrived and drove off the looters with a display of unarmed combat. He then called out to the group, asking them to hear him out. After some conversation where Michael's loyalty and the feasibility of killing him were seriously discussed, it was decided to keep working with him, however he had to swear an oath not to betray them with Arim; if he willingly intends to break the oath he will be teleported very far away.
**Catarina — 04/29/2019**
The revolutionaries layed low after the death of Omylia, licking their wounds and consolidating.
First, a strange girl was hanging around the town square, harrassing people and demanding to know Catarina's location. Arim was sent out to make contact with her, and after finding in her possession the very illegal pamphlet, he brought her back to base to be vetted. It was found that she was a follower of the Storm Wolf, (who the SS hoped to find and murder) and wanted to kill all shining star members. Needless to say, she was accepted with open arms.
Second, Omylia's will instructed to deliver her tattoo to her father. Michael asked after the body and was told that it had been lost. He returned to the scene of her death and found her a map with deirections carved into the wall. When followed, the directions led to a hidden note, seemingly from another anti SS group, but the note did note open up further leads.
Third, another rabbit with a message was sent to Catarina and Doromir got badly scratched retrieving it. The message was a plea for rescue from Lord Delwin, who was being held in the mayor's residence.
Fourth, the revolutionaries noticed that some SS soldiers had been posted outside the university, and after asking around found out that Arim's glamer was under suspicion.
It was due to this last bit of information that the team decided on its next course of action: returning to the sewers, ejecting its current residents, and reestablishing the glamer there as a new base of operations.
**Player 1 (character unknown) — 05/06/2019**
Entering the sewers the party faced off in the secret dining room. My charge Catarina wanted to enter the fray immediately, but I held her back as with teleporting assassins it is important to protect your back at all times. We stayed in an adjoining hallway Caterina guarding a wall that she thought used to be a door and I guarding her back. After the battle had turned I allowed my employer enter the room and attempt to deal some final damage. Now this this battle lasted less than a minute and the argument about whether to kill the unconscious hostiles seemed to last an eternity. Minutes of bickering passed and as soon as it became apparent that no one wanted to stay as the minimum guard for five men I decided to force the issue by slitting the throat of the nearest enemy. Better to make myself the villain now then allow the enemy to rally their forces and execute a counter offensive.
And then I was tackled down by the young fool Teressa.
Now this girl has some guts always spearheading the forward point in any confrontation with her wit and skill with the sword rivaling that of my own. On the other hand her brash idealism and her reckless positioning on the battlefield leave me me wanting to pass on my 150 years of failing to protect everyone I care about dampen her rash optimism that comes with youth. I struggle to get out of Teressa's hold and master Caterina orders us to stop. My breath catches in my throat and the air seems to be sucked out of the room. Everyone grabs their neck in silent strangulation.
I remember when the Pyrite clan tried to off me for a better place at governance and I had wrestled a Kuo-Toa assassin at the bottom of a limestone lake in full-plate. My lungs burned now like they did then. I let out a lung full of bad air and made a start towards the door. Teressa released me and ran for her life out of the room. The rest of the party followed her and I brought up the rear. We paused only a moment at the opening out of the sewers and onto the street to catch a breath of rank sewer air and her some manic laughter.We ran back to the university.
The university was occupied by the Shining Star’s inspectors and a clever use of invisibility paired with our own turncoat inspector Michael were able to convince them to come back with a permit. I made the call to call a meeting with the killing of unconscious foes to be allowed in expedient ambushes up for debate. This had lost us the element of surprise when attacking the sewer base and disagreements needed to be shored up before further action was taken. Maybe I had given this group too much credit as their charismatic leader Caterina seemed to have a good head on her shoulders, but in times of conflict the group had little coordination and had a propensity to deny direct orders. During the debate the tall grey man who calls themselves Arim cleared their throat and I was startled as they almost always take up a observative role during debate. “Someone has broken thru my barrier” Arim said and the enemy were upon us.
A large contingent of Shining Star officers teleported into the building and were upon us in an instant. I was pulling Caterina from the room towards the window where we had entered the building from. A squabble broke out in the hallway and I had Caterina behind me with instructions to flee out the window. With a finely controlled rage and my trusty bardiche I began to trip up my adversaries but more seemed to be coming from the front door. As soon as I felt too overwhelmed Caterina was there slitting the throat of a tripped foe. “Shalana Shaethe is outside the window” Caterina soberly states and I know we are trapped.
I fight for Caterina’s life in that hallway but she wants to feel helpful running out in front of me to kill our toppled foes. Suddenly ghosts appear down the hallway and out of the walls attacking the Shining Star militia. Caterina assures me that they are friendly and most likely the work of Arim.
With the help of the ghosts and a powerful surge of negative energy we slay every enemy but I am soon to learn at a great cost.
In the lecture hall the lifeless body of Teressa lays on the floor. Mara explains how she had gallantly protected her and Michael from a powerful orcish general by challenging him to single combat. Teressa’s armor had caved in from a mighty axe swing killing her instantly. Such wasted potential. Caterina was speechless and Michael looked like something had changed in his grief. We did not bury Teressa as there was no time to spare. We looted her corpse packed up our few belongings and fled into the sewers.
The sewers were suspiciously abandoned except for a prisoner in a cell. We all went to sleep. Early in the morning I awoke to the sound of footsteps in the hallway and drew a dagger. I heard Caterina’s door open and the sound of voices. Michael had come back after drinking in town. I opened my door a crack to let myself be known but then stopped when I saw the hollow look in Michael’s eyes.
**Baldric — 05/13/2019**
The party spent most of the session exploring their new digs and getting acquainted with a prisoner they found in one of the cells, he identified himself as Baldric and, after some confusion about who was and wasn't a member of the shining star, they came to an uneasy truce.   Other items of note was a troll that has been mutated in some manner locked in one of the rooms, this has been determined to be a problem to deal with later.  Several mimics were also found and almost killed Michael but were slain, except for one which had the ability to speak and so was befriended, named Booker and now resides in the form of a pouch on Baldric's belt.
Catarina also revealed that she made a contract with the entity residing in Arim to be teleported away when she speaks a certain word. She also revealed that she can now hear the entity in her head and made a further deal with them in exchange for a sword.
The assassin who's shadow is in the possession of Shaylana has also joined the party as a sewer dweler.
**Michael — 05/16/2019**
Mara and Michael had finally returned to the sewers with news that the captain of the guard  had been assassinated. Catarina, who had been growing more and more suspicious of Michael, suspected that he might know more about recent events than he was letting on.
The party began a long process of interrogating Michael, in order to get the truth out. Eventually it was revealed that Michael had not one, but two voices in his head. One was a fragment of the being  inhabiting Arim, the other was a less informative voice coming from the ring Michael had picked up earlier.
Eventually with the threat of excommunication, the ring abandoned Michael and chose Mara as a host. However the ring was not initially fast enough to attach to Mara, and ended up being covered by a barrel while the party vacated the sewers.
Once outside of the sewers, the party resumed bickering, only to be interrupted by the percussive sound of the ring chasing them down. It managed to latch on to Mara, and she heard it's voice. Michael attempted to knock Mara out to prepare her for the amputation of her finger, but on contact his voice fragmented into Mara, leaving only faint whispers in Michael's head.
On the bright side however, the ring fell off of Mara then promptly summoned a portal and disappeared from all of our lives.
Good riddance
With the ring gone, the party continued pulling the truth from Michael, an act made quite easy considering the entity inside Michael would periodically take over and tell all the truths Michael was trying to keep hidden
With all the information on the table, it was decided that Michael wasn't trustworthy enough to keep in the party, so instead he was cast out, still providing a useful contact to the constabulary/ bait to a well toned elf
**Mara — 05/21/2019**
After dealing with multiple voices in heads and Micheal leaving the party, it was decided that we would attempt to contact the other rebels.  Mara and Baldric went out during the day to scout and check for traps in the area around cats house.  Baldric started sifting through the rubble while Mara spoke with a weird homeless man.  After giving the homeless man the coin of the resistance Mara and Baldric left for the rich district.  after placing some pebbles behind a building a cat appeared on Maras shoulder which she and Baldric didn't question.  Returning to the sewers Cat questioned the cat which Mara said to be the result of a deal she made with her voice.  Arim started creating magical traps to help protect us from the shining star.
That night Mara and Baldric went to meet with the resistance.  Getting caught up with some members of the shining star who attempted to use big sticks to bonk us.  They were quickly executed and their bodies were dumped into a nearby warehouse.  After that the two made it to Cats house and spoke with the homeless man who gave them some directions which led them to a group of people hiding in the shadows.  Both sides questioned if the other were members of the shining star, after some deliberation the groups came to a conclusion that neither side were shining star and that the new members of the resistance would be allowed to set up camp in the sewers.
The next day many small groups of people came down into the sewer.  Each greeted by Catarina and the head of security Dormear (I think that's how moody spelt it).  The members were told the rules and that there were tons of traps to protect us.  some notable people that came into the sewers were: Some Italian guy Cat knew who became our treasurer, Jane the lead medic for the resistance and became a member of the inner circle it seems, Smith the man the myth the legend, Podrum some dick that tried to take the spot of leader, A guy who was sent by the shining star to blow up the sewers, and a tabaxi representing wing and paw who wished to speak to our leader.
Many conversations later!
The Italian guy mentioned a shipment of Gold coming in shortly that the resistance should think about stealing.
Podrum who mentioned he was 73 in line for the throne (far too often) was quickly outwitted and elegantly dealt with by Cat who gave him the role of Facility Manager, idea given by Jane.
The man sent by the shining star had a bunch of explosives and suffocation gas canisters which were promptly taken away from him and given to Arim to deal with, he was then put in a cell and the group learned that the shining star had captured his wife and kids and forcing him to do this.
Cat spoke with the tabaxi and set up another meeting for the next day at the same time.
After all the talking, the inner circle (and Jane) got together to discuss what comes next.  Jane was an advocate for helping the man rescue his family from the shining star.  After some deliberation the group agreed and set out that night to free them.  Making it to the guard barracks unseen Baldric and Jane hid at the side of the building while Cat used an illusion to lure the single guard into the alley.  Jane threatened the mans life, got the information as to where the family was being held, then Baldric snapped his neck and the group carried on with the job.  Making it into the building easily, killing a large burly man before he had a chance to react and pushing their way upstairs.  Baldric, Dormear, Cat, Arim, and Jane all made it up the stairs quickly leaving Mara at the front door to handle a mage, large armoured man, and The Orc.  The group upstairs managed to quickly cut through the shining star members and rescue the family.  The 3 shining star members that were downstairs were scared off by Maras cat giving the party an easy escape.
The next morning Cat met with the wing and paw letting the italian guy handle negotiations.  After coming to an agreement everyone broke for lunch.  During this time Baldric started training soldiers to fight back the shining star and to guard the base when the party went off on missions.  At lunch Dormear made a speech mentioning Big Dick Baldric and no one really payed attention past that point.  The rest of the day was spent planning the heist which would take place the next morning.
**Arim — 05/28/2019**
The heist preparation continued with the group proceeding to the intended ambush site to study the terrain, and further refine the details. After returning to town Jane was sent to watch the previous convoy arrive, and returned with some useful information, such as the wagons were made entirely of metal, and the guards were mounted. Armed with this knowledge the party got some rest before proceeding to the ambush early the following morning.
In the morning the group attacked the caravan as planned, waiting for the vanguard rider to pass before raising a tripwire set at horse-knee height, while simultaneously magically excavating the ground  from under one of the front wheels of the last wagon. The fight was over quickly with some highlights being: Cat creating an illusionary firestorm, Mara repeatedly face grabbing people with electrically charged hands, Baldric cleaving several people in twain, Jane creating a suffocating aura, Arim melting a large hole entirely through a heavily armored and divinely shielded knight, and Doormir actually using the blade of his axe--rather than just tripping people with it. Though the true showstopper was from Raegis(I've never seen it written out before, so I'm phonetically estimating) who, to save Catarina's life, created a portal that sent one of the knights somewhere rather less hospitable. The group then convened to discuss what to do with the prisoners, and wagons. It was revealed that the mages with the caravan had been sustaining levitation spells to lighten the wagons as a form of anti-theft system. After some discussion the entity inhabiting Arim teleported the gold from the wagons to the base in repayment for a favor done during the battle.
The group decided to execute the remaining prisoners as no one wanted to imprison them and it was decided we couldn't trust them, We then returned to base taking the surviving horses, leaving the bodies and emptied wagons to be found and puzzled over by the Shining Star.
**Catarina — 06/10/2019**
Then next day, the revolutionaries were greated by the news that Orguz The Undying was going to be executed publicly, presumably for failing yet again to catch them. Jane insisted on going to watch the execution, taking Baldric and Mara with her. She used a spell to inhabit his body and use his sense, and they watched as he was accused of aiding them and hanged until dead. Just as his consiousness was fading, he was spirited away in the middle of the crowded square by a shadow and taken to a nearby building, where he was wrapped in healing bandages.
Meanwhile, the others went on an expidition around the outside of the city walls, having been warned that their old associate Michæl Hunt had been drawing runs on them. The runes were rather amateurishly drawn, but Arim determined that they were part of a ritual, and that there must be a corresponding rune in the very center of the city.
They all met back up in their sanitative headquarters and determined that Shalanna Shaethe had rescued Orguz and taken him to the Old Church, now abandonded. They notified the assassin Gillian and sallied upwards to strike at their vulnerable foes.
At the burned church, the revolutionaries attacked Shaethe and the partially resurrected Orguz, and after a savage fight slew both of them! As she died, Shaethe rapidly aged and her flesh rendered into dust, leaving only her skeleton, which was collected along with Orguz's teeth and nails.
Dropbear
Sewers
Serial Killer
Cult
Order of the Shining Star
**Dooramir — 06/17/2019**
It was later found out that Baldric had received a note from himself inside of Shalana Shaethe’s armor. But when pressed to reveal its contents he refused. Dooramir pressed for an ultimatum but without the backing of Caterina there was little chance of any punitive action sticking. So Baldric kept the note that was on Shalana Shaethe to himself. Next orders for a victory party were declared through an almost unanimous vote. Dooramir always the party pooper was the only vote against the party sighting noise concerns, excelled ration usage, and drunk people generally not being the best at navigating a complex network of traps.
Slowly sipping on his only half-pint for the night Dooramir tried to keep the partiers from trying to wake the troll and walking into pits. Later in the evening Jane was given a note by a page which she pocketed. The party lasted till the early morning and Dooramir visited the sickbay. There he found a man who had been almost killed by an electricity ward but luckily no dead.
After everyone had the recommended 8 hours of long rest and nursed their pounding headaches with proper hydration they met in the common room. Jane walked in brandishing a note addressed to Baldric and began to read it out to the group he got about two lines in before Baldric snached the note from her. Jane was perturbed about how someone read her secret mail out-loud and everyone else was callous towards her for hiding notes about ancient beings with amnesia.
It was decided that Jane, Baldric, and Mara would go to the constabulary and try to find the vandal Michael Hunt. Dooramir trains his men for a bit but is called away by the administrator. “There are a few people who have gone missing since last night’s party,” The admin explains “you might want to get your men on it.” Dooramir explains that he will wait for the constabulary party to get back before doing anything out of the base.
The Constabulary group returned with the dead body of Gillian who was placed in the Lazarus wraps. They had found Michael Hunt’s house that was unfortunately shrouded in a death field. Jane had sent an unseen servant to recover Gillian’s body after sending in two guards who got three steps into the house and perished. As proof of the death field Mara showed off the desiccated tip of her middle finger. Dooramir mentioned the missing people and Jane fessed up to her involvement.
“Well,” Jane said, “you see I sent a small group away during the party to deliver a message to my family.”
“Humm,” pontificated Baldric “So you have no problem reading other people's mail but send your correspondence away under the cover of darkness!”
An argument ensued until Jane recited the first few lines of her letter from memory and Baldric called it even. Now since it seemed like a time for confessions Mara began to speak.
“So you guys know my new lightning horse ... well for that I had to put the blood of Shalana Shaethe spits into the central fountain.”
Mara said with a grimace, “And my lightning cat … I got that for throwing stones into a very specific alley.”
Everyone stood with their jaw agape.
“So the voice is getting you to help with the blood ritual,” Dooramir was the first to speak, “You are the biggest security hazard since Michael Hunt and we need to get this voice out of you before you give up anything more!”
The group put their heads together and this is the list of possible ways to get rid of the voice.
1. Ask the voice to leave: The empty spaces it takes up turns to void and collapses causing massive trauma turning your lifespan of years into months.
2. Move out of the range of effect: The same as above but worse.
3. Get Arim to remove it: Puts a great deal of strain on Arim and may cause his death.
4. Get Jane’s Father to remove it: ???
Dooramir saw the last choice as all upside
A. He gets to scout out the Farm and learn its hierarchy.
B. Nothing happens and he knows not to fear the Father as a powerful mage.
C. Mara is cured with no downside and Caterina could be cured next.
D. The Father dies and another dark mage is killed.
E. Mara is killed which rids the world of one of the possessed and gives cause to rout the cult before they grow in power.
It was decided with a vote and off to the Father they went. The party arrived just in time for an orgy and Dooramir started to check for dwarfs. He found a few in the center of the mating ball and also the messengers sent by Jane. They seemed to be enjoying themselves so Dooramir did not pull them aside for a lecture on information security. Jane took the group away from the festivities and into a dark tunnel.
Once inside the tunnel seemed to go on forever in both directions. But before feeling trapped enough to take any drastic actions they arrived at the Father. He was sitting in a dark room illuminated by a few candles. There was a brief discussion about the mechanics of the Father’s religion. It turns out the leader is a male role and is only told the name of their god during the previous Father’s death. Jane had a short whispered conversation with her Father. And then the Father told us that he would wait for Mara in the adjoining room.
All of this spooky ambience was putting Mara off of getting the Father’s help, but with some gentle coaxing from Jane and Dooramir she stepped into the room.
Inside she saw the Father who was shirtless. His nipples pointed at her menacingly. But maybe that was just the chill in the room. Mara fluffed a pillow on the floor and sat across from him.
“Umm, well … hi, again.” Mara stamered “Isn't it a little drafty in this room?”
The Father continued to stare at her.
“Just me then, okay” Mara focused her eyes on the candle above the Father. “So, um I know a lot about gods and I would feel a bit better if you told me the name of yours.”
“I cannot do that.” Stated the Father.
“How about you answer yes or no,” Mara suggested “It makes a big difference to me which god you are invoking and might make me want to back out.”
“I will answer yes or no” The Father said compliantly.
“Okay great is it Thraallherd?” Mara asked.
“No.”
“How about Yogg-” Mara felt a sudden pressure, then there was a popping sound inside her skull, and she smelled something starting to burn.
Mara stepped out of the room with a glazed expression. “My goodness you look like a clubbed fish” Dooramir said as he looked up from re-braiding a ring into his beard, “You ready to go?”
“Actually Mara and I need to have a little private chat,” Arim said as he slipped up beside Mara and took her by the arm. He disappeared down the never-ending corridor. Everyone else looked at each other and shrugged.
**Baldric— 06/24/2019**
Mara went off into the forest without much of an explanation, Arim also went off somewhere and the rest of the party went back to the sewers ahead of them.  After awhile in the sewers Arim came back half blown up having been attacked from behind by a disintegration blast.
After awhile more of waiting we went out to search for Mara. We lost her trail some ways into the woods and headed back. Once back we found a note from her, giving a brief farewell.  We decided to wait until the next morning to try and pick up her trail.
In the morning we went to the main road and sent Jane to ask travelers if they had seen anyone matching Mara's description. She found a wandering monster hunter by the name of Leo that had seen her. After gathering everyone we went to where Leo had seen her, we found her horse killed in what looked to be some sort of ritual. We found her body in a brain dead state close to that. Her body grabbed Jane and whispered something in her ear before returning to a lifeless state. Just then a group of corrupted beasts led by a chimera attacked us and tried to steal Mara's corpse. We dispatched them easily and then held a brief funeral for Mara and burned her body.
We set up a way to meet Leo in the future since we weren't ready to show him the lair quite yet.
**Mara — 07/10/2019**
The group consisting of Arim, Doormir, Jane and Leo were still looking through the black site they had found.  Doormir went to retrieve Catarina and Baldric to take a look at what was found.  Once they made it to the black site the group exchanged info except talking about the kids that catarina had passed to talk with the group or the blatant slashes and singe marks from explosions on Leo's body.  Catarina went to grab her reporter friend and Noah broke character for a second.  Arim answered the door and talked with some thugs who then tried to burn down the building.  the party began to attack the group but they ran away like panzy ass bitches.  the party went back into the building and spotted a person running out the back door, Leo gave chase but after getting splashed with something he lost the person running.  The party found a secret downstairs area with research notes on the deep tendrils being used to create the weird monsters.  The party made it back to the sewers and Leo was given a room.  Leo and Catarina talked about the favor she owed him, and agreed to help him kill the mayor of the town.  Catarina then wished to parlay with the monstrous races that had been attacking the caravans on the road.  Baldric, Jane and Leo went into the camp to talk with their leader.  Leo bribed the guards and asked to speak with their leader, they were let in.  Making their way to the largest hut they entered and began to talk with the leader.  Baldric nodded instead of bowing and was seen as our leader so he got to speak.  making what seemed like good requests the leader said he would need us to return in exactly three days which we could not since we had the plan of killing the mayor that day.
Returning to the group outside the town we informed them as to what happened inside and returned to Lothonn.  spending the next two days in the sewers to plan for their mission.  The night finally came when it was time to act.  The group decided to play dress up for 30 minutes while Leo stepped into his room for 6 seconds and emerged wearing a full set of silver colored armor.  The party made their way to the rich district and made it to the mayors mansion without any problem, silently killing the guards at the back door and making their way in.  Leo bolted towards the second floor while the rest of the party met a very, very, powerful butler and a couple of guards from the front door.  as the battle continued the butler was the largest problem but the basic guards were no match for the party.  Leo made it to the second floor before the rest of his party and barged into the room with the mayor and his lackeys.  The rest of the party managed to beat the butler who returned to his room and wasn't seen again, while Arim blew fire and incinerated a number of men who were lit af.  During all of this fighting Jane was casually wandering through the art gallery stealing the paintings.  Leo got himself surrounded and ended up losing one of his clawed hands.  The rest of the party was able to get to him in time and save his life.  Together they were able to kill the mayor and recuse Delwyn.  Escaping over the city wall the party made it safely back to the sewers having completed all the tasks they set out to do.
**Arim — 07/16/2019**
Taking advantage of the confusion caused by literally cutting the head off the enemy while most of their troops were out of town; the group took a day to plan out the taking of the city, talk to Jane's father who was peaching in the town square, and apologise, and offer reparations, to the orcish speaking neighbors. That evening the group went to the University to speak with Nymmeth about what would happen when she arrived.
The following morning at dawn the resistance formed up in the ruins of the religious district. Catarina, bearing the new flag of the resistance (a blue wagon wheel on a white background), drew a substantial crowd with a speech enumerating many of the People of Lothons' grievances with the Shining Star. The message of the speech was that the situation wouldn't improve until the Shining Star were removed from power; and the best people to do the removing were said People of Lothon. Catarina's speech convinced several members of the crowd to join the resistance in marching on the armory. There were about a score and a half militia guards at the armory, Catarina persuaded about half of the militia to defect to the resistance, and Arim knocked down all but four of the rest with a spell.
Having more effectively armed and armored the resistance the group led their forces to the second objective: the treasury. The treasury was unexpectedly unguarded, and was rapidly secured.  The resistance kept up the momentum and moved to secure the walls when the group received reports of a large number of enemy combatants massing at the east gate, to hold it open and let in the returning army. After a brief but heated debate it was decided to use the mass kill spell to kill the officers in both the returning army, and the force at the gate. once the vanguard of the army was in sight Catarina activated the ritual, killing all the officers in both forces and tearing a massive interplanar rift in the sky through which flew Nymmeth; a 150m long shadow dragon.
Nymmeth landed in the town square as shadows rose from the bodies of all the fallen officers. Shadow gathered around and flowed out of Arim and Catarina as well as an undefined third point, coalescing into the form of a nightwalker at Nymmeth's feet, as this was happening Jane tried to infect Nymmeth with a vial of deep tendrils. After several attempts to restrain Jane, she was successful at throwing the vial at Nymmeth; however the vial just bounced off and obstinately refused to shatter. Seeing the nightwalker forming Leo stopped attempting to restrain Jane and rushed the nightwalker, demanding answers to several questions  about the destruction of his village, and why his claws resemble nightwalker claws. After a brief conversation, including a job offer for Arim, which he deferred, Nymmeth and Thathrah, the nightwalker departed with their army of shadows.
The day was won, the resistance successful, and Catarina the new ruler of Lothon.
**Catarina — 07/29/2019**
Baldric then went to negociate with the Warband, who were very impressed that the Blue Wheel had managed to drive off a dragon and agreed to a peace treaty with no extra demands. Catarina started here work administrating her new domain, with Doramir guarding her. Arim took over the university and worked on his mysterious magics, and Leo stayed in Shaethe's old room in the sewers and conducted his alchemical experiments. Having lost her trust in the rest of inner circle (the Hub, you might say), and they in her, Jane left Lothon behind.

### Third Arc: Race to the Vault

A month passed, with some key events happening: Omylia's tattoos were sent back to her father, who responded with his thanks but warned that he would still work with the Shining Star. Leo finally revealed that his armour was sentient, named Silver, was staying with him for the company, and was infected by the deep, which he was trying to remove with alchemy.
A thief was caught breaking in to the treasury, and after unsuccessfully claiming to be an intern counting the coins he was jailed and tried. Catarina found out from Wing and Paw that the thief, Jerico, had made his fortune stealing from the SS, and so recommended a light sentence. Jerico was given community service, for which he chose to serve as Leo's lab assistant and guinea pig.
The troubling dreams continued, and Podrum eventually found an umemorable book that he thought had the answer to the riddle. Arim managed to disable the memory magic enough to let Catarina read it. The book told of a pre-cataclysm mage who had collected the most powerful weapons and artifacts from around the world and locked the up in a vault under guard of a dragon of his own creation. The dragon's description matched the arms from the dream, and reports had been coming in that the SS was sending a force to capture something at the reported location of the vault.
Catarina immediately assembled a small party to get to the cache first. She gathered Baldric, Leo and his lab assistant, a goblin representing the Warband, and some unkown who came recommended by Arim. She sent them all off under the command of Doramir, her most trusted lieutenant, with instructions to negotiate with the dragon and seal, destroy, or acquire the artifacts.
Zeshi — 08/26/2019
While Doramir talked to people in the village and gathered information, the rest of the party went to try to talk to a five armed dragon.
They met the splinter village centered around where the deagon was imprisoned. The group gaurding the dragon would only allow passage to the dragon if the party brought many himan corpses for a feast or captured a hydra in the area for them.  The party decided on the hydra as a safer option.
The party arrived at its lake home and saw they remains of a couple shining star members, deciding to first attempt diplomacy, shadow slayer spoke to the hydra in draconic. The beast grew aggressive, however and attacked. The group managed to repel the hydra, though several members took heavy damage, Leo just bately surviving. After a short rest we dicided to attempt stealth and sent Leo and Shadow Slayer in to the cavern to steal its young. They successfully stole two eggs and escaped. The hydra, enraged charged out of its cave and tore Baldric to shreds.
Stunned by this sudden loss, the party retreated back to the splinter village. They traded the egg for an audience between the dragon and two of the party members. During the audience, the dragon revealed how to free her. After the meeting the party promptly stole the crystal containing the dragon and went to fed it to the hydra, supercharging it.
Syver — 08/27/2019
The party met back at the village to fill in Doramire on the situation with the dragon. Before everyone was gathered together, Shadow Slayer, Leo, and Jerico decided to do some reconnaissance on the south east cairn.
The challenge was the trial of resolve, wherein the party was tasked to escort an old man across a tomb so that's he may die. The wrench in the machine being that the minute the man's life was in danger he freezes in space time. On top of all that, there were enimies that would atrack the old man. The trio decides that this challenge was a lot to take in at once, and promptly left.
Once the group was all together it was decided to go scout out other cairns. The first one they headed to was the trial of skill. This carnival styled experience included challenges such as axe throwing, obstical courses, and arts and crafts. After completing the challenges the party was deemed qualified to handle WMDs.
The next challenge attempted was the challenge of wisdom.
The party was put in a stone room and asked questions in a classic rock and basin style ballot. The party almost got completely deleted from existence because if these probably easy, but unanswerable questions.
In the end the fate of the party was thrust upon Leo, who was asked to judge his party members as "good" or "bad". Those judged good returned to the world of the living unharmed. Those not deemed good (Jerico and Doramire) were sent out of the cairn, naked and with a wicked case of amnesia, reducing them to their base personality.
On the bright side the party has three keys ¯\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Leo — 09/08/2019
The party returned to town after the chaos of the last trial.  A group of dumb fuck shining star members went into the vault while the party decided to attempt the last trial and escort the old man across the room.  At first the task seemed relatively easy but as time went on more and more enemies began appearing.  These enemies got stronger as the party made it further into the room.  A weird humanoid man continually screamed about his "children!" and one of those children cast wall of fire on the old man and doormir halting our progress.
John — 09/11/2019
As the party continued the trial, the wall of fire began to lengthen. Doormir put an arrow in the enemy leaderish bug-man thing, who responded by summoning a swarm of insects to devour him. Calmor was able to summon enough badgers to eventually bring down the emperor beetle, while Mery and Shadowslayer working together brought down the big tanky bug thing. Leo rent his way through some of the bigger bugs and most of the remaining spiters, bitey-explodey ones, and least bugs. once the wall of fire stretched across the entire room,it began to move down the length of the room accelerating as it went. This liberated the old man to once again run for his coffin. Calmor transformed into a hawk and flew over the wall, while Shadowslayer enlisted Leo to throw him over, Leo then charged through the wall. The trio proceeded top deal with the leaderish, bug thing, who had been forced out of his flesh puppet, the wizard maintaining the wall, and the last remaining bugs. Once they were cleared out the old man got in his coffin, got Leo the help seal it, and died. The party looted the room recovering several hundred gold each, a vorpal sword, and the fourth key from the corpse in the coffin. On their way out of the cairn, the party was accosted by a group of Shining Star heavies who demanded the keys, the party ultimately surrendered them, and began planning how to recover them while walking back to the village. After arriving at the village they were informed that the keys were ceremonial in value, a completion prize for materialistically inclined adventurers. The party, much relieved, decided to get a good night's rest before attempting the vault, and Shadowslayer was given a sack containing the processed( skinned, boned, and gutted) meat from the first group of Shining Star to enter the vault, by the friendly ent.
Shadowslayer — 09/18/2019
Everybody got up in the morning and tried to fleece the villagers for information about the vault over breakfast. Eventually they got around to actually entering the vault, where they found 4 braziers representing the trials of Resolve, Skill, Pain, and Getting Held Back from Graduating Because You Failed Planning 10. Each brazier had to be activated by the corresponing element (stone, air, fire, and tears of injustice) by someone who had actually passed the trial. The team managed this with only 4 members getting lighting bolted in the process and were treated to a nice show of a bunch of powerful elementals before a staircase opened downwards opened up.
Down in the vault they found the promised WMDs and a helpful custodian to give explanations and warnings. Some highlights were:
- Some relatives of Silver's who tried to trick people into wearing them so they could take over the world
- A bunch of scrolls, taken by Calmor
- Jack Slash's axe, taken by Willlliam
- A shapeshifting weapon that shocked Leo when he grabbed it then started melting through the floor and had to be levitated back up
- A black hole contained in a force field
- Nanobots that are about 50% more zealous about population control than Thanos
- A portal to the Fey Wilds
- Some guy in a cage
On the lowest floor the unworthy adventurers found Chulainn presiding in front of a broken seal, whith a four armed angery guy frozen in mid escape.  Chulainn explained that the four armed dude was a Very Old and Bad Person and that he had been fighting somekill other person who had since absconded. He also told of some sage's knowledge that might explain how to seal 4arms away again.
In exchange for Meryatum temporarily replacing him and powering his time freeze,  Chulainn agreed to come up and help get rid of the SS and the shard of Zeryl.
Vineet — 10/05/2019
The party was sent to fetch a Ring of binding from the Hydra they had left it on. But Dooramir had to get his stuff buried out of town. Finding it not there he and Shadowslayer tracked his stuff to the shining star camp. Dooramir let Shadowslayer cast non-healing magic on him and became an invisible flying dwarf. Leo and William stumbled out after a few hours of day drinking :beers: to find their friends. Everyone converged on a shining star ambush and Dooramir took a nuke to the chest.
Zeshi — 10/07/2019
The party continued on to the hydra's lair. They was a brief fight on the way with several SS members who ran off shortly after the fight began. Once the party arrived at the lake, the hydra gave warning to the members that they should leave, Leo responded with an insult leading to the hydra seriously damaging him through a mental assault. Most of the party left at that point, though William stayed and attempted diplomacy which proved very successful leading him to retrieve all of the rings. We eventually all made our way back to the village where Chulainn told the party they would now need to get one of the rings on to the dragon. Additionally he told them that the SS is preparing to mount an assult on the village. The party stopped by the blacksmith to replace some gear and prepared to head out.
Syver — 10/14/2019
The party started toward the Fang's encampment. William made the initial contact, attmepting to negotiate with the inhabitants. The Fangs refused to let William into the camp due to a magical compulsion forcing them to attack outsiders. William returned to the party to crack open a new plan.
William, Leo, and Doormir created a distraction at the main gate by challenging the Fangs a series of one on one duels to test their metal.
Meanwhile Shadowslayer, Ferala and Calmor snuck into the base but were unfortunately detected by a mage.
After some mild combat, the cave's barrier was deactivated and the trio entered the cave. Upon entering the cave, Shadowslayer, Ferala, and Calmor were struck with a discouraging feeling.
Despite feeling mildly depressed, Ferala managed to throw the containment rings on the dragon, knocking it unconscious and killing the shard. The rings were then removed and the Dragon healed. With the dragon operational, the Fangs stopped their attack.
The party joined the dragon to attack the SS camp, but were ensnared by a large chain net causing them to plummet to the ground, SilverStar hot on their heels.
Leo — 11/03/2019
With the dragon pinned down by large chains the group devised a plan, sending in a small group to attack the mages within the shining star camp and the rest to defend the dragon from the forces that were charging from the gates.
The group on the outside managed to defeat the main shining star forces but let some odd undead ghoul things within close proximity of the dragon, they managed to plant some rune etched spikes into the chains.  However the group on the inside managed to kill the mages that were causing the ghouls to operate and foiled the shining stars plan to capture the dragon for themselves.
Heading back to Lothonn on the back of the dragon the group made it safely back home.

### Fourth Arc: North to Leo's House

Doormir and William parted with the group and the rest began their trek northwards to the land of 100 conquerers.  After spending far too long in Lothonn trying to determine why a girl named Talon gave Leo a horse, the group finally set off.  meeting a weird old guy in clean clothes asked if the group would help him find his backpack, and a small kid named briar lotus attacked them, trying to prevent "the fated meeting".
after dealing with that nonsense it was determined that Calmors stalker was getting more and more dangerous.  everyone now on edge as they took their watches.  the next day the group ran into two idiot highway men and swiftly removed them from this plane of existence.  bedding down for the night a group of shining star approached the group and remarked that the bandits they were after were already dead and were surprised that the group had a goblin among them.  That night a pixie sprite thing tormented Leo and Shadowslayer while they were on watch, Shadowslayer set a trap which went off in the night brutally murdering the Sprite that was caught in it.  We can only assume that the entire forest hates us now... thanks shadowslayer...
John — 11/11/2019
The party woke to discover that maybe a pixie had been killed by Shadowslayer's trap, and decided to skip breakfast in favor of an expeditious departure. on their way out the party was again harassed by briar lotus, who had decided that the reason he had been demolished by the party the previous day was insufficient height, and deployed his latest stratagem, platform shoes; before being demolished by the party again. After a day's travel the party came upon an inn and decided to stop for a meal at least; however were asked to leave, but told they could sleep in the stables, when certain peoples' discussion with another group of patrons became rather heated. Shortly after leaving, while discussing bedding down, Leo told the group that the innkeeper had placed a note in one of our pockets. Calmor read the note, which stated that the innkeeper was having problems with the SS, who were coming most nights and taking his money, and asked us to leave a note on the door if we were willing to help.
After some discussion and deciding to help, the party noticed the innkeeper's mother leaving and sent Shadowslayer to tail her; and discovered that she was heading to a nearby SS camp. When informed of this the innkeeper argued that the camp was just another inn. A bit confused by this the party split up to wait for the the inquisitor; with Leo and Talon in the bar and Shadowslayer, Calmor, Ramiel, and Ferala waiting out back. the trio waiting out back were harassed by an animate bear trap that was pursuing Shadowslayer. Calmor's stalker also put in an appearance; though it left after realising it had been made. The group discerned that the bear trap was being animated by a fey circling overhead, meanwhile the inquisitor arrived.
This Inquisitor was initially suspicious of Leo and Talon, however was deflected onto some random bystanders when Talon used her mind to throw one of their mugs at the inquisitor's face. The bystanders were arrested, and the inquisitor cast some sort of spell to make the innkeeper think he had just had some money taken.
The party pursued the inquisitor, with the bear trap pursuing Shadowslayer, who returned the corpse of the decapitated pixie, as a form of peace offering, which stopped the bear trap, allowing the party to collect it. the party approached the SS complex and began a frontal assault... to be continued
Shadowslayer — 11/18/2019
With screams being heard from the inside of the H-block, the attack started immediately. Shadowslayer, Ferala and an Axebeak went after the leaders in a side building, but encountered unexpectedly stiff resistance in the form of an unlocked door. The others engaged the main force in the H-block.  The Shining star deployed trained howlers and managed to down Leo, but after Ferala and Shadowslayer regrouped with them the SS was quickly overwhelmed. The team left the complex with a young howler pup and proof that Gretta was a spy.
When informed of Gretta's betrayal, MMSoM was utterly disbelieving. The inquisitor had used mind-affecting magics to convince him that Gretta was his mother, and to hide their thieving from him. The Heroes marched upstairs to confront her, only to find that she'd tried to escape from the window and fallen to her death. Ramiel looted her spy money from her corpse and had to be shamed into sharing with the others.
While the Heroes rested in the inn for the night, Kalmour's stalker attempted to gain entrance through the window but was scared off by Ferala. With good restored to the area, the travelers marched off in the morning, without desecrating any graves or stealing any corpses.
After some travel, the Heroes reached a new village. The villagers told them that a necromancer’s tower had recently sprouted in the area, and those who went to attack it, including the local SS detachment, were killed and reanimated. The travelers were asked to get rid of the troublesome necromancer. They agreed in exchange for a place to sleep for the night. As they slept they received letters from Briar Lotus challenging them to a duel at the next full moon.
.
The next day, the Heroes approached the tower and attempted to negotiate with it’s inhabitant. Finding the necromancer quite social and welcoming, they entered his tower as guests and joined him up on the second floor. He bragged to them about his vast store of books and knowledge and offered to tell their fortunes, which they all politely declined. After hearing about Kalmour’s Chosen status though, the necromancer became highly distressed and told them all to leave, calling them such offensive names as “The Bone Collector” (to Ramiel) and “The Flesh Collector” to (Shadowslayer). Highly insulted, the guests left in a huff.
Vineet — 11/25/2019
Leo went to see the Necromancer. He got little info but convinced him to vacate the area. As soon as the evil tower began shooting out necromantic tendrils the speedy ones in the party went to try and save the villagers.
While this was happening Râmîêl and Talon had an extended conversation about the ramifications of teleporting into a building with no exits to fight a powerful necromancer mano-a-mano. Shadowslayer ran up to the tower and took a chunk out of it and ran away screaming that the thing was going to explode. Too engrossed in their conversation about whether to teleport into the now exploding building.  Râmîêl, Talon, a howler, and a hydra were Telefraged with two of them dying instantly. Luckily Râmîêl was able to quickly revive his howler and the Hydra merely started a regenerative hibernation.
We met Briar Lotus' brother who explained his buffoonish brother's job description which was basically stopping the destruction of the realms of magic. The party decided that it was better to help Briar hunt down those who can end some worlds then fight him in a duel.
So they offered to do that during the next full moon. Unfortunately Briar vehemently refused any help. Trying to understand the mechanics of the prophecy Râmîêl offered to kill himself but that wouldn't stop it.
(I think right now the party is the only ones who the prophecy pertains to but all of this fey logic is making my head hurt.)
The next night … right? Anyway the invisible thing is back and eating Kalmour's brain but this time we got a plan. We are staying in the village and plan to trap it in a building and dump a ton of ash on it till it's visible.
Well the plan went about as well as expected the invisible beast just stuck its head through the window. So while trying to fight the beast was able to pull an unconscious Kalmour out of said window. It has also hit Râmîêl with its tail sending him to sleep. Now it's up to the brave heroes Ferala, Shadowslayer, and Talon to take down an ash covered beast twice their size.
Zeshi — 12/07/2019
The party regrouped after the dream beast was driven off. Kalmour revealed that he spoke to someone calling himself "the lord of dreams, Osmium" and that he took away the "dream of a grand journey into consuming darkness", which apparently was what made Kalmour "the messiah".
It soon became apparent that Talon was missing and that she had left a loaf of bread with a note saying that she had gone off to keep an eye on Leo who separated from the party briefly to test some of the alchemy materials he has been gathering.
The group decided to continue on their journey, not wanting to waste more time.
On the road to the next town, a woman came running down the road towards the party. She seemed frantic and there were faint sounds of pursuit from further down the road.  With a quick decision to help the young woman, she was promptly thrown in a bush and Kalmour, in dire bear form, perched on top of her and Shadowslayer, completely hiding them. Her pursuers soon came around the bend riding horses, the group deftly lied and told then that we had recently seen a woman matching their description riding away some time ago. After they left the woman thanked the group and asked if they could deliver a letter to her father, a cook at a local inn. After agreeing she said that she would be heading off to join the Blue Wheel resistance, the party responded by recommending that she head to the inn keeper that they had helped a few days ago since they knew he had connections with the Blue Wheel.
Shortly after she left, Leo caught up to the rest of the party and everyone headed into town, though Shadowslayer decided to hide in Leo's bag to avoid the Shining Star's racism. Once in town they headed to the inn that the girl's father worked at. Ramiel promptly got himself kicked out by blatantly trying to pay with disappearing coins. Everyone else got a table and after Leo, under Shadowslayer's guidance, quickly brought them under suspicion of kidnapping the woman they had met earlier, it was decided that they should beat a hasty retreat, Kalmour turned into a mouse and joined Shadowslayer in Leo's bag to make the group less conspicuous.
Meanwhile, the inn had sent a runner to fetch a gaurd. Ramiel saw the runner leaving the inn and fearing that it was due to the fake gold, he attempted to intercept him with hold person, this caused a very abrupt commotion and he had to use a teleportation ability to escape.
Meanwhile, Leo bribed the barkeep to let him past, into the kitchen, handed off the letter and left through the back. He gathered the animals, met up with Ferala, who escaped through an upper story window, and quickly left town, continuing on their journey north.
Syver — 01/20/2020
After passing through a canyon, the party encountered a large chitinous man fighting a horrid eldritch abomination. Upon seeing the abomination several party members recieved gruesome mutations to their physical form.
Despite the inherent dangers involved, the party engaged in battle with the beast. Despite sustaining some minor injuries, the monster was eventually slain. Some revelations were made during the course of the battle, specifically the fact that Leo's horse had some kind of magic ability.
After the battle, the party came across a military camp where they rested and restocked provisions. During that rest period Leo anthropomorphized his horse so that it could speak to the group and explain what was going on. In short, the horse had no idea.
The next morning the party set back out North. Eventually they came across a small shanty town filled with bureaucrats who explained they had been evicted from their city. They had been evicted by a man who believed himself to be the chosen of Eskaren, and as such he sought to cull the weak.
The party entered negotiations with this cult, but ultimately combat proved to be the most effective form of diplomacy, and the "chosen one" was murdered to death. After his death it was found out that he had the influence of the deep driving him to commit his atrocities. The party settled things in the city, looted the body of the chosen one and set off once more, seeking after Leo's house.
John — 01/20/2020
The party left the town on a two day to the next city, with horses for everyone except Shadowslayer, who took a camel. after half a day's journey the party spotted an incoming sandstorm. after a debate about the best way to shelter, the party setteled on Ramiel using Create Water to make wet sand and Talon using the strings to form the wet sand into a windbreak. during the sandstorm the party was attacked by three Bulettes who burrowed up form the sand. After a difficult fight two of the Bulettes and one of the horses were dead, the Alpha Bulette was unconscious and Ramiel had been swallowed whole. After Ramiel was extracted from the dead Bulette's throat by Ferala, Shadowslayer decided to keep the Alpha Bulette as his new mount. After discovering that the Bulette seemed to obey Shadowslayer the party left the shelter and ran into some insectoid-humanoids riding Bulettes, who stated that they were persuing some wayward mounts. Eventually it came out that we had killed two of them, and claimed the third as recompense for the dead horse; they demanded recompense for the dead ones. After some discussion they settled on the Bug-man chitin from the Vault Trials, and both groups went their separate ways.
The party continued on to the city and were greeted by a surprised gate guard and were escorted to the castle by the guards; seated and served a meal. During the meal, the mayor, his wife, one of his friends, and the friends companion joined the party at their table and explained that it would take a couple of days to prepare supplies. They also offered the party a contract: kill a chaos-mutated werewolf that had been terrorising the area. The chaos had changed it to shapeshift every night, and also seemed to have amplified it's resistances.
Shadowslayer — 02/04/2020
The witchers went to the cactus fields where the werewolf lived, hoping to catch it while in human form. They followed a trail of carnage to a small hut, inside of which slept a human. Ramiel and Ferala also located the silver sword that the previous hunters had tried to use, but to their chagrin, it was a pure silver sword, and had been totally deformed and broken. Ramiel set about repairing it.
At the hut there was an argument between Kalmour, who wanted to kill the man in his sleep; and Talon, who wanted to open a friendly discourse. They were hampered by the fact that no one could enter the hut, being repulsed by some kind of compulsion. Shadowslayer couldn't enter from below either. Everyone also started to feel thirsty, and some of them realized that they were beginning to show symptoms of vampirism. As vampires they could not enter the man's home uninvited. The symptoms were only temporary though, and receded when they retreated from the house.
When Talon failed to wake the man by calling to him, Shadowslayer, Ferala and Kalmour burrowed underneath his bed, hoping to collapse the ground underneath him, removing him from the inside of the house. Once below the floor, he would be hitched to Levi and towed out. Unfortunately the collapse failed to bring the sleeper below floor-level, but succeeded in waking him up, and he was instantly afraid of the strange people tunneling under his bed. The excavators retreated and Talon stepped up to negotiate.
They learned from the man that he'd received the curse from the Chaos Enchanter's cauldron after he dropped his family ring inside. He proved most uncooperative however, flatly refusing to invite a hired death-squad of vampires into his house. Talon quickly gave up on the rude and misanthropic man and joined everyone else in the "Execute the Werewolf" camp.
First they burnt down his hut, but he declared a metal circle inside to be his new house and sat there, healing quickly from his burns and radiation poisoning. But Levi, it seemed, was resistant to vampirism, and on Shadowslayer's order she rammed the victim, sending him flying out. Then Ramiel bound him in place and plunged the repaired silver sword into his open ribcage, killing him. The witchers returned triumphantly to the townsfolk and were rewarded very generously for their fine work.
They set off on the road again, coming to a great city, where the king of Ostin lived. They were surprised and bemused to receive invitations to a great feast that the king was throwing the next day in their honour. The rest of the day was spent doing some shopping, and having dress clothes tailored for themselves. Ramiel was also permitted to set up a table in the temple district, beside the blood-cultists, and proselytized about his father all day.
Zeshi — 02/24/2020
The group prepared themselves for the party and headed to the castle. At the gate, they were searched for weapons and after some sight trouble with the gaurd, were allowed in. Ramiel, however, was taken off to the side to be questioned.
In the dining hall, there were festivities and the nobles had several of the group tell stories. Then, during ome of these stories, several figures snuck into the room, when they were challenged, the magically sealed the doors and toxic blood began pouring from the ceiling.
The fight was a brutal one, most of the nobles died, though several were teleported out by the Queen and Aster, herald of Sered, was sommoned at the party's moment of need which likely saved saved several of their members from certain death. After the enemies were dealt with, it was revealed that they were members of the blood cult, though their meathod of attack was different from how they normally operate.
The party ws thanked for their help and headed back to their inn to rest.
The next day, before leaving town, it was decided that they should stock up and prepare for an encounter with Briarrose that they had been warned several times would be coming soon. After buying some cold iron weapons, ShadowSlayer insisted on meeting the king again to try to get him to open diplomatic relations with the blue wheel. This delayed the party significantly.
They traveled for a couple days, thinking about what they would do when they met Briar. Ramiel eventually attempted to contact the Storm Wolf as a last ditch effort to gain some information. Another un-named entity received the call though. This entity was very evasive in its answers, thugh the group did manage to gain some useful information, including that most of the party had, wittingly or not, been recruited to various factions that are at odds.
Zeshi — 02/24/2020
They resumed their travels nd came to a cabin which seemed to be the location Briar had set up for their encounter, with a note that read "at midnight". Everyone readied themselves as best they could in the time remaining.
Briar appeared at the promised time and some brief words were exchanged before the battle begun in earnest. Briar had brought formidable allies with him and this promised to be a difficult battle.
ShadowSlayer and Leo quickly went after Briar, chipping away at his defenses and keeping him from casting spells while the rest engaged Briar's allies. Ferala was turned to stone early by a medusa and was out for a portion of the fight before being freed.
The battle wore on (about 45 seconds) and many of the group were on their last legs, Kalmour was unconscious after pulling a dangerous stunt, Feral, still weakened from his time as a statue, was in dire straits, near death from the doppelganger, and Leo was dipping in and out of consciousness from his extended fight with Briar. Ramiel flew down to heal Kalmour, though this choice left Ferala defenceless and he was stabbed through the heart. Briar was killed soon after and the remaining party members were able to finish off his allies with only a small amount of trouble.
Ferala, while he may have been saved if the party had acted faster, was covered in ice and accepted by his god to a monastery to live again. Talon slipped away in the night, leaving a short note behind.  The group weary after such a battle, continued on their way, knowing Leo's house was just a day or so away. That next night however had them waiting late into the night, knowing that the potion Leo had taken to figh Briar would wear off soon and that it would likely have devestating consequences. As midnight rolled around, Leo gasped allowed as his very body shrivelled and shrank, he had permanently lost much of his fighting ability, though he was, thankfully, still alive.
In the day the group continued on their way, determined to reach their friends house and see his journey complete.  Upon reaching Leo's village, they found that the grave where Leo had buried everyone was surrounded in a death field. As they pondered this, they were greeted by one of Nimith's servants, the very one who had killed Leo's friends and family. They talked and he tried tempting Leo to come with him but ultimately Leo refused. The party said their goodbyes to Leo at that point and Ramiel teleported him back to Austin, to be safe there until they could come back for him and possibly bring him back to Lothan.
As the remaining members of the party continued on their way, the met into and picked up several travelers, a mercenary, a little girl and an odd man who talked about patterns. This newly formed group continued on, towards the castle of a thousand conquerors and whatever awaited them there

### Fifth Arc: Nymmyth

The party backed off from the castle and it's Griffin rider guardians, favouring instead to camp with a band of gnolls. It was in the gnoll camp the party learned of the rules of the land, learning that in order to progress, they'd need to conquer their way forward
The part decided to head east toward a shining star outpost. On the way east they entered a region in control of some friendly vikings. The party drank with the sea raiders, but unfortunately, Booker got wasted and ate three vikings. The vikings were pretty chill about it all things considered, but asked the party to move along
The party then entered orc land. The orcs were rather friendly especially one named Krug. A little too friendly.  They had large piles of bones organized by races. Under the human pile was a pile of orc bones. It turned out that the orcs had been feeding the bodies to the ducks. The ducks were not ducks. Krug's trap was sprung.
Leo — 03/09/2020
The trap was returning the ducks to roc's, two roc's flew away after being unable to grab an easy meal.  Krug was slain easily, his behind torn to shreds.  Violett tamed a roc and the party saved a dancing orc.  The group journeyed towards the border and then talked with both Ghaxes and Sathona.
Also, we've let them in... finally
John — 05/18/2020
It arrived...
Stealing matter from our bodies, and Ramiel's clothes, to form a body. Syver loosed an arrow to no effect, and it responded with pulses of force, until Shadowslayer asked it to stop, and demanded answers to several questions we didn't know. After the mild removal of all the air in a 2.5 km radius, and a couple of attempts to escape, Shadowslayer was able to convince it that answers could be found in the library. It teleported away, presumably to the library. Shadowslayer was able to determine the radius of the airless zone, and Levy was able to dig a tunnel out. After figuring out how to transport the half disintegrated, but still breathing Ramiel the party traversed the tunnel. Upon emerging they saw another, much more powerful, pulse of force coming from the castle and except for Christophe, who used a teleport to skip past the wave, retreated back into the tunnel to shelter. The wave collapsed the tunnel and dealt significant damage to everyone except Christophe, after everyone was dug out the party noticed the ocean retreating and ran for higher ground. After the tsunami passed everyone rested, but only healed 1 HP and spell slot.
John — 05/19/2020
Violett snuck off in the night and Syver made motions to leave in the morning, but was shouted down by Kalmour. With patrons unresponsive the party decided that we still needed to push for the centre and take advantage of the destruction the wave caused. The first segment was empty and we claimed it by default. The second however was held by a group of Aarokroca, however as the party was deciding who would duel the leader, William, and a hand piper showed up. William agreed to duel the leader, and won easily. after resting and again only recovering 1 HP and spell slot, the party pushed for the third ring, leaving Syver to organise the Aarokroca and hold the line of retreat, and learned from the Aarokroca that it was held by a group of stealth archers. The party advanced to the border where a bunch of no trespassing signs were posted, it was revealed that they just wanted to leave, but the magic works both ways, so the party told them if they joined up, they could fall back one ring and if the party survived they would get to leave with us. The party also learned that the next segment contained a Marilith and her brood.
John — 05/19/2020
After he got over his panic attack Ghaxes informed the party about what it is, and how to maybe stop it
Shadowslayer — 06/01/2020
With no choice but to press on, the team advanced into the demon-inhabited territory ahead, relinquishing the one behind them.  An advance party of Goristros soon fell upon them, and in the ensuing battle, a much valued and respected team-member, Pan Flute, tragically expired due to health reasons, and his namesake instrument was abandoned on the field.
After defeating the advance party and thus demonstrating a modicum of worth, the diminished group was escorted to see the snake demon queen of the territory, who possessed a spawning pit which fed on corpses. One of the corpses awoke, claiming to be Pan Flute, and began looting the corpse of the late sir Flute, much to the consternation of all.
The queen refused passage, and threatened to feed them all to the pit unless they could offer useful payment. After much haggling she accepted the roc that Shadowslayer had been smuggling along with him, and the adventurers went forward, into devil territory.
Zeshi — 06/08/2020
Aftera healthy amount of debate about their next move. The group then headed out the next morning moving further in. In the next ring lay an army of devils. Not far into this ring the party was set apon by a succubus who effortlessly charmed almost the entire party. MacNamara, being the only person in their proper mind attacked the succubus and drove her and shadow slayer to retreat, nearly dying to do so.
Shadow Slayer, having brought the succubus to her fortress got laid and the remaining group members with some incubus influence used one of the Scrolls to open the gates of hell.
In order to save Shadow Slayer and under threat of an overwhelming enemy, Kalmour used a second scroll, scouring many kilometers of land , leaving nothing but dust in the aftermath.
After the scroll went off representatives of the heroes league approached...
Syver — 06/15/2020
The heroes league representatives expressed a desire to talk about having the party join their cause. The party agreed to meet with them the following day, and retired to the demon's castle.
At the meeting with the heroes league, it was discovered that the dwarves, the elves, and the giants refused to help with the war effort. The party agreed to help and headed back to to the castle to strategize.
Upon arriving at the castle, it was discovered that a roving band of chefs and cleaners had shown up to maintain the keep.
Kalmour stayed at the castle while Will, Shadowslayer, and Vierel went and talked with the giants. At the giants area the party learned that the giants have a totem that revives the dead by sacrificing another soul.
Vierel talked to the giant king, who offered his assistance if Vierel could acquire wings and power for the giant king.
The party then returned to the castle, when Muirdris arrived, responding to the party's request for backup
Syver — 06/15/2020
Turns out the Blue Wheel has conquered about 60% of the Empire. Muirdris released a field of mind affecting magic to make more aggressive factions more likely to discuss things with the party.
Leo — 06/16/2020
After a great night's sleep, the three clowns and Christophe left breakfast early to go and finish talking with the other races, leaving Calmore to eat alone.
Making it back to the wilder races, shadow slayer took over as diplomat.  Entering into the anti racism candles many of us felt very calm and shadow slayer discussed a possible alliance with the elders.  They were approached by Nymmith with a proposal as well.  Giving the party a side quest to deal with horsemen attacking their flank the party continued their journey around the inner ring.  Making it to the dwarven rubble, the party encountered a number of elves.  They seemed to have a strategy to take the center and were unwilling to cooperate with the other races as they wanted to hold the center themselves.  After learning they work for Andath the party continued their journey around the inner ring.  Making their way to the mages in hopes of talking about the knowledge or boon in the center.  First needing to save a man from the dream realm, the party asked Calmore about his patron.  Learning about Sathonas stake in the game and learning that she was a very powerful being that was locked away and hoped to never be found again.  After some talk calmore got furious for some reason, not really sure why, and told the mages that shadowslayer was a herald of the deep.  Getting the two of them thrown out of the castle cause they made a dumb, the other three were just left sitting there.
Mac took a very spicy pepper and waved it under the man's nose, waking him from his slumber, and the archmage warned Vierel about shadowslayer attempting to open a seal.  Shadowslayer and Calmore made their way through the wasteland in hopes to blow everything up and brought a large WALL of wraiths with them.  After discussing a little bit, a lich, a very powerful being, that won't actually die when you kill its body, I REPEAT VERY POWERFUL, asked if the party would like to parley as Nymmith had a proposition for us.  The party sat down to negotiate and after getting some info and began to formulate a plan Mac thought “Oh hey, I feel like putting the party in an unwinnable fight, and hopefully killing all of us” so he attacked the lich.  Shadowslayer managed to teleport us all out of the bad area, and everyone screamed at mac for the rest of the night while getting a better idea on what the groups priorities were.  Deciding that the only two priorities that really mattered were Stopping Nemesis from killing the group and getting the knowledge to save Mariatum.  The sun then rose and the party got a little bit of shut eye.  Making their way back to the castle and sleeping once again.  The next morning the party decided it was best to send Vierel to talk with Nymmith in hopes to chat more about what the alliance might entail.  Learning that she couldn’t offer anything to the party, that she wanted the dream seeds, and that she would burn out the corruption from them and that Calmore was a useless piece that didn’t do anything with the power he was given, Vierel returned to the party, and the party had a plan.  Hand over some fake seeds and use Calmores power to make her believe that they were real, then make it into the library with the all knowledge and kill the finger guy, then have a coordinated assault to distract Nymmith while the party escapes.  Bing-Bang-Boom we’re in and we’re out.
John — 06/29/2020
The group set up for the plan, finalising alliances within the inner circle, and binding Shadowslayer and Kalmour with the resurrection totem. Shadowslayer bought a soul gem from a drow merchant, for the low, low price of an absurd amount of gold and dinner at our castle that evening.
Macnamara and Vierel set out to speak with the horse lords but were ambushed by a group of elves. In the battle Mac was almost killed and Vierel died by picking up Carnifex and answering yes when asked how much power to use in a strike, this slaughtered the remaining elves, cut down a large swathe of forest, cut furrows into objects kilometers away, and shattered Carnifex. The rest of the group rushed to the epicentre, and recovered Vierel's body, and the shards of Carnifex. continuing along the path the group found Mac, still trying to speak with the horse lords. A passing gnoll offered a shortcut to the outer ring, a deal was made with the horse lords, and the archmages were called upon to open a portal back to the castle.
John — 06/29/2020
Back at the castle the group reunited with Vierel now in a warforged body, and set about preparing for the dinner with the drow and the horse lords. The drow brought four of her friends, and convinced the group that since this was a formal affair, nobody should wear armour, before suggesting a tour of the castle. The group's suspicions about the drow were confirmed when Kalmour discovered that they had stolen Shadowslayer's resurrection body. The four drow at the table darkened the dining hall and tried to flee, one was cut down by the horse lords, one was incapacitated by Shadowslayer atop the battlements, and, after some pattern consultation, two were killed by Christophe. Only the leader escaped, unfortunately with the body. the group resolved to continue with the assault the following day, however Shadowslayer would be in the main host, not the stealthy group.
Zeshi — 06/30/2020
The last of the preparations and organization was figured out for the assault upon the center castle.
Kalmour read the Calad Bolg scroll to guarantee that Nemesis would die, whatever else may come.
The group sans Shadow Slayer prepared the fake seed and went to Nymith. She brought them in and told them to plant the seed. It grew into a normal tree but she believed that they thought it was genuine and so let them into the knowledge vault though each person could only bring one item and a torch each.
Just before they entered they saw a signal flare go off towards the north east, signalling the start of the assault.  This wasn't supposed to happen yet but it didn't change much at this point.
After choosing their item they went in and prepared for a fight. Inside they were in a pitch darkness and lit their torches to reveal a library. The books all lacked titles and after a quick inspection appeared blank.
They moved further in towards the screaming to see Nemesis with what appeared to be a man of a likeness with Sered.
After a brief discussion, MacNamara drank the potion of strength and charged in, failing horribly and breaking three of his limbs. Vierel granted him flight to keep him in the fight, with which he immediately overcharged Carnifex, destroying it once again and killing him. Though it did cause massive damage to Nemesis and revealed his core. A brief but desparate fight proceeded with Kalmour and Christoph being drained for their life force as the fought. Vierel's soul was pulled from his current body and flew away to reincarnate in it's next host. The fight ended abruptly after that when Nemesis stepped over one of the discarded torches and went up in a dust explosion. The two remaining members took a moment to recover and asked Sered their questions, discovering where Vierel's body is, how to stop the Endling, as well as other smaller tidbits.
The two of them, now ready, left the vault, bringing MacNamara's body with them, so they could revive him later. On the way out, Kalmour had one last objective, to close Nymith's portal into Sathona's lands. He passed Galantine over to Christoph who cast invisibility on himself and crept up to the portal, he was detected just before he got there and though he was able to close the portal, the resulting explosion knocked him unconscious, Kalmour, unwilling to leave his team mate behind, attempted a poorly planned and executed rescue resulting in him dying. There was a moment of concern as he knew the body that was meant to revive him when he died was now inhabited by Vierel as his new host. In a turn of mixed fortune, he revived successfully but found that he and Vierel now shared the same body. Wasting no time, the dou set out to retrieve Christoph and MacNamara's bodies, Calling over Myrdreth to aid in the extraction they grouped up.
Throughout all this, Shadow Slayer was fighting the battle along with the coalition that the party had assembled. After they were no longer needing to fight the battle, Shadow Slayer killed Nymith, ruining the plan to leave her guarding the seal to the deep. With Nymith having fallen the battle appears to be a forgone conclusion though uncertainty remains if she has some final card up her sleeve.
Shadowslayer — 07/06/2020
The Ash Lords reunited on the walls of the central castle. With Nemesis dead, Ramiel returned to life, although he body was in a severely damaged state, and he found he couldn't reach into his father's realm.
They first went to collect MacNamara and Christophe's bodies so that Kalmour could theoretically revive them. The bodies were successfully liberated from a Vampire and a nightwalker, but the getaway was somewhat botched and the team had to beat wings to the throne room. Whiile flying around it was observed that the giants had turned against the rest of the coalition and were fighting them in the streets.
The throne room was guarded by a contingent of Nimith's loyalists, and as the Ash Landers arrived the deep elves made an assault on it. A temporary truce was formed with the guards against the elves and a skirmish began. During the fight Shadowslayer realized that he could be killed if the elves executed his deer corpse, and so decided to make himself scarce and not attract their attention. He was last seen hiding behind Christophe and MacNamara's bodies.
The fight was complicated somewhat when a mountain giant charged in and started stepping on everyone, but his mind was soon turned into a maze and he started running in random directions and was easily finished off.
With elves and giant dead, the Rulers of Ash (sans Shadowslayer, who was still hiding anyway) were invited into the throne room to talk to Nimith, who still clung to life, holding her soul together through will alone. She layed out their options to them:

Shadowslayer — 07/07/2020
Someone should sit on the throne, otherwise the deep escape. Deep-touched people can't do it. Nimith is deep-touched. The throne-sitter must stay in the castle. The throne sitter can abdicate, but the throne is addictive.
Candidates:
- Herald of Praxis, rejected due to being deep-corrupted
- Mages, rejected for being power hungry
- Wild Races, rejected, no reason given
- Ramiel's father, rejected due to untrustworthiness
- Tower Shield, rejected due to untrustworthiness
- Vierel, could do it, might be resistant to throne addiction due to not having a
  body, but he is needed to seal the endling
- Kalmour, could do it, doesn't really want to
- Muirdris, great candidate, designed from the ground up to protect the world
 from dangers like this, willing to do it but doesn't really want to

Shadowslayer — 07/07/2020
As they discussed candidates Kalmour noticed that upon the stump of the false tree there grew a true seed. He picked it and was assailed by visions of giving it to Nimith, giving it to Muirdris, and planting it himself. Nimith told him that if he gave it to her she could use it to transfer the seal to herself, and after much deliberation, he gave it to her.
As she planted the seed, Nimith told them that they must prevent the heralds of the Deep from releasing them as the wards went down. The Lords of Ash left the throne room and found Shadowslayer gone and not answering messages . . .
Leo — 07/13/2020
The party began to head down to the seal but was met by Levi with a note tied to her leg and shadowslayer walking beside her.  After reading the note, which was barely legible, the party was met with a different shadowslayer.  After being fairly confused for some time the party managed to chase away the imposter and deliberate over the wam bam plan
Not being completely united in their plans moving forward the party made their way into the depths to find Leo, Aster and Raywin guarding the wards from the onslaught of elves.  Working together they managed to defend the wards while Nymmith went to work on resetting the wards.  After some time the moss on the ceiling revealed itself to be Booker who had betrayed the party.  Shadowslayer using his infinite intellect decided to release the contents of his glove, nearly killing the entire party, inorder to injure Booker.  After some more battling Booker was defeated and Ghaxes was released but so too was a part of Andath.
After some talking the party managed to revive their fallen comrades and Leo managed to retrieve his friends soul from Nymmith.  Kalmore expressed his interest in taking a vacation and being lazy for a while so he and Vierel, who now has the soul of Natali within his body, planned their trek towards the village of lazy people.  Leo and shadowslayer now having an approximate location for the storm wolf and the details of another person they should track down set off in hopes of preventing Andath from taking control of the plane.

### Sixth Arc: Mysteries in the plains. Campaign End

Shadowslayer, Leo, and Syver got called to a meeting held by the heroes to form an expeditionary force and hunt down whatever escaped. they were joined by John, a human merchant; Vineet, a gnome dancer; and Zeshi, a naga sorcerer. The group was given the option to each take a magic item from the heroes armoury. As the group was getting ready to leave, a contingent of Shining Star arrived to arrest Leo and Shadowslayer. Leo challenged the commander to single combat. The commander swiftly broke the rules and ordered the rest of his men to attack. After a fireball and some stabbing the Shining Star were wiped out and the group proceeded on their way...
**Syver — 08/03/2020**
On the first day of travel, the day passed by relatively quietly, but party debated what question to ask the orb. The first night went off relatively without a hitch. Leo and Shadowslayer experimented that night with the dream dagger.
The next day it began raining. That night they stop and make a stew. They ask the orb about Exakas physical form. It is somewhere in the silverbrush forest.
The next day the rain increased. The party found an injured horse with an elven saddle owned by a tiefling knight. His journal had the early entries partially incomplete. That night Shadowslayer found the knights horse escaped from the camp. He woke up the rest of the camp based on a gut feeling. Syver found the horse dead a few meters away and left with Leo and Zeshi to track it.  The hunt turned up nothing, but had some defensive wounds on return.
The next day the party entered the woods, finding them eerily quiet. Further into the woods, they found more wildlife, but less than expected. They were followed by a Drow named Gareth who turned out to be a friend of Johns. He spilled the beans on Johns mission to break an "asset" out of prison. Shadowslayer had some trouble understanding the concept of prison. The party made it to the elf village, but had arrived too late to be vetted by the elf mystic.  Unfortunately they weren't allowed to enter the village, fortunately they were provided shelter. The night passed uneasily.
The next morning the party gathered and learned that there isn't actually a village mystic, which caused mass confusion. The party entered the village, which was full of women and men not able to fight. Zeshi asked about free houses. After some brief questions the party split.
Zeshi left to an abandoned house he was interested in, finding it mostly desolate but found a nail and some blood in the back doorframe.
Vineet and Leo stayed and pressed the guard and the village elder for some information. Vineet asked about the villages bandit defensive abilities. The elder left them. Apparently the village was peaceful and just stayed safe by being harmonious with nature. He challenged Leo to get a displacer beast named Patches to not bite him in order to make peace with nature.
The remaining three entered the tavern to find Gareth.
**Shadowslayer — 08/10/2020**
In the taven Gareth briefed them on the job:
- there are 3 prisoners being held in the prison
- the asset is a female half-elf
- an orb which was in her possession has been confiscated by the guards
- she will not leave her cell without the orb
- the prisoners' effects being held at the prison are very valuable, and constitute your entire
 payment
He refused to divulge any information about his and John's organization (and John didn't know anything about it), leading Shadowslayer to suspect that they worked for Andath. They argued about the lack of payment and information for a while and then Shadowslayer stormed off to complain to Leo.
Zeshi and Leo were investigating the abandoned house when Shadowslaye showed up. Leo attempted to commune with Patches and although he was viciously mauled on the arm for his efforts, he kept a stiff upper lip and didn't cry, and told Vineet he didn't need to be healed. Shadowslayer also made the attempt, and was successfully allowed to stroke Patches' fur.
Looking at the house, they concluded that the occupants had been kidnapped recently (the soup in the pot still tasted fine and was filling and nutritious), but the rest of the town had forgotten them. Zeshi collected some blood and a clawed chunk of wall for scrying, then they also went to talk to Gareth.
Gareth remained reticent, but Leo managed to strike a deal whith him that he'd get them information from his boss about the physical forms of the Gods. He said he'd send of a message and would get back to them the next day. Leo also found out that one of the other prisoners was dressed similarly to Vineet, but he withheld this from her.
**Shadowslayer — 08/10/2020**
While they waited, John and Syver went to scout out the prison. They found it at the end of a side path: it was an isolated stand of trees within an antimagic field, closely guarded by a squad of elves. They greeted the warden, who was surprised that they'd found the side path and inquired why they were there. Syver told him that they'd just been out on a promenade, had stumbled upon the path, and wandered down to explore.
The warden told them that two prisoners were there interned, each stuck inside a tree with an amulet on that prevented them from forming memories. The duo was allowed inside to talk to a prisoner who had tried to kill someone, and were told that if he apologised and they promised to escort him safely out of the forest, they could take him with them. John and Syver recognised that the prisoner, a dwarf in dancer's clothing (like Vineet's) was emphatically not the asset, but after he told them he'd been mistaken about the person he'd tried to kill they nevertheless proceded to free him and guarantee his peaceful departure from the forest. Then they left with their new ward without visiting or even enquiring about the other prisoner. They did notice on their way out that one of the other cell-trees had been torn open.
**Shadowslayer — 08/12/2020**
Back in town, Leo, Shadowslayer, Zeshi and Vineet asked around about the disappearences and the asset, and learned that the she had been arrested after ranting about mind-affecting magic, foaming at the mouth, and attacking townsfolk. They realized that the asset might be the physical avatar of Exaka, who they knew was somewhere in the forest, and so departed immediately to link up with the two scouts and break her out of prison.
The two groups met on the road and conferred. Vineet was reunited with the dancing dwarf, an old friend of hers, but he went off again (unsupervised) to gather intelligence. Then Leo, Shadowslayer, Zeshi and Vineet went to visit the prison while John and Syver stayed in the bushes so they wouldn't be recognised. The trio requested to meet the last prisoner and the warden complied.
**Shadowslayer — 08/12/2020**
The negociations between the team, the warden and the avatar of Exaka were long and convoluted and involved many accusations of uselessness from Shadowslayer and much paranoid ranting from the ex-Exaka, but in the end amounted to these points:
the avatar of Exaka claimed no name, but had apparently been called "Hess" at some point
the misterious organization behind John, Garrett, and Hess was Vilepaw Industries
the warden, who appeared to be a very old elf, was actually a green dragon
the warden knew of Andath, who had stolen the third prisoner
Hess claimed that the orb glowed in the presence of mind-affecting magic, and had been arrested for attacking people in whose presence it glowed (which was everyone apparently)
Hess had no other way to counter mind-affecting magic, but the amulets that the prison-guards wore could prevent their memories from being removed
the orb was stored in an unlocked box in the middle of the anti-magic field, along with the other artifacts
the orb glowed brightly in the presences of Leo, Shadowslayer, and the guards, and dimly for the others in the party, which caused Hess to distrust them
Hess refused to leave without the orb, and the warden refused to relinquish it
the warden was willing to let Leo take Hess if he promised to safely extract her from the forest
**Shadowslayer — 08/12/2020**
Although they now realized that Hess couldn't help them fight Andath, John still had a job to do and Leo and Shadowslayer decided they owed her for saving Shadowslayer's bacon all the time when she was his patron God. Shadowslayer haggled with the warden and ended up trading a gem of +1 ac and a dancing gem for the orb. But when the Warden went to retrieve the orb and the prisoner, he suddenly whirled around and accused Leo of negating the anti-magic field, and dancing dagger flew out of nowhere and started attacking the guards; it seemed that Hess had made her own escape plan! At this point Syver, who had been skulking in the bushes, started lighting up the tree-cells and the guards moved to engage him and Hess, who had broken out of her tree. The warden dragon warned the travellers that he would attack them if they attempted to assist the arsonist.
Vineet, John and Zeshi instantly waded in to assist the arsonist, while Leo abstained in exasperation and Shadowslayer walked around loudly protesting his innocence and quietly trying to help Hess escape. Shadowslayer ended up grabbing the orb, which he had fairly traded for, and Hess, which he had not, and dimenstion-dooring away. The others ran to the box of artifacts, and as Leo man-dropped in to protect them, they ransacked it and then were all d-doored away by Vineet just before the dragon could melt them.
**Shadowslayer — 08/12/2020**
Everyone met back up in the forest and they scuttled away from the green dragon which was now circling in the sky looking for them. They eventually found some far-away cover where they camped. From the loot-box and some murdered prison-guards they had enought amulets for everyone, and some assorted items of apparel. After Hess said her goodbyes they bedded down for the night. In the morning they returned to the village, and found it almost completely depopulated; only Patches and two elves remained, neither of which were Patches' master. They spent a couple of days fruitlessly trying to trap the misterious monster, which they dubbed the Bandit Beast, before giving up and moving on.
On the road they encountered a man covered in blood, listlessly ranting and swinging a dagger about. They came to understand that his dagger had somehow caused him to attack others on the road. Vineet offered him another dagger in trade, and so he tossed his to Leo, striking him and giving him a minor wound. Leo recognised the dagger as the missing one from the vault, the one that should never be removed. He decided to store it in Shadowslayer's glove where it couldn't cause any harm.
Further on they encountered the Bandit Beast again, and found the amulets mostly useless against it. It escaped after wounding all of them. This time though, Zeshi was able to scry it and ascertain that it was some form of deep creature that attacked from underground.
**Shadowslayer — 08/12/2020**
The adventurers continued on to a city sitting on the border between forest and steppe. Fearing another attack by the Bandit Beast, they rented rooms in the Iron Maiden, a dwarf-runn inn carved into solid rock, paying outrageous prices for the privilege. In the evening Syver went to a mystic to ask about the Beast, and had a ritual to restore lost memories prescribed to him; he was to arrange the four natural elements and the four "external elements" (positive, negative, force and psychic) in an eight-pointed star. He decided that this ritual had to happen in the midst of combat with the beast, and Shadowslayer enthusiastically agreed to help, supplying positive (a healing potion), force (a magic missile that he would keep suspended in concentration), and psychic (the dream dagger)
**Vineet — 08/28/2020**
The next morning Leo confessed to killing eight men (or was it nine men) protecting a local priest and got a sweet crown and dagger. The gang headed out to talk to the priest about the Bandit Beast.
The priest just gave a confused look when asked about BB. When asked about looking after an old displacer beast the priest pointed them to an equally old hermit out of town.
With many thanks and a universal blessing the Leonides collective decided to talk to someone more learned.
The party walked into the climate controlled mage’s tower. As the receptionist explained the business plan of the wizards Zeshi tried to look like he was listening. Zeshi’s eyes started to unfocus while staring at a red bean-bag chair.
If he squinted it could almost look like some fresh meat. Meat bag chairs would be a great idea to bring home. Zeshi is suddenly staring at an old, living, piece of meat. Zeshi flares his hood at the old wizard. Everyone in the party motions for Zeshi to calm down.
Zeshi’s hood folds down as he continues to stare at the old meat. Gold exchanges hands and some divination is performed, and the party is disappointed with the results. Zeshi is staring at the bean-bag again. He blinks as the party begins to walk out of the tower. Vineet finishes arguing with the receptionist and motions to Zeshi that it’s time to leave. No one ever explains anything to Zeshi.
Leaving the city after buying supplies the expedition sets out to the old hermit. They ride a short way and see a small company leading some captured lizardfolk towards the city. The company and lizardfolk number twenty in all with eight lizardfolk and five soldiers. Vineet waves to the soldiers and one waves back. The other two are struggling to keep their lizardman under control. The Bandit Beast! The party jumps into action stuffing their ears with whatever they have at hand.
The ritual is begun with the external elements. The Bandit Beast is nowhere to be found. The ritual is completed and Syver remembers the attack of the Bandit Beast on the wagons. The guard and his lizardman head into town.
The party runs back to town and finds the Lizardman in a pillory. The lizardman must stay there for three days relying on the kindness of the city to feed him.
A crowd has gathered to throw rotten fruit at the lizardman. The group decided to try and question the lizardman about the Bandit Beast that night.
That night the party talked with the lizardman. He knew nothing about the Bandit Beast.
After a protracted debate on whether to set free a man killer the group decided to leave him to his fate.
Later that night Syver set the prisoner free.
A dead man at the gates of the city sparks some grumbling about group cohesion, as the party sets off once again.
The hermit is happy to have a new friend in his old age and welcomes the displacer beast into his life.
The gang now heads out to the tribal council and trading post for the riders of the plains.
Along the way John gets a message from Vilepaw Industries to check out a temple of the Stormwolf a few days along their path. The party agrees to go and run into a confused “archaeologist”.
The archaeologist can’t remember why he didn’t pack enough food for his expedition. After his bodyguards discovered there was no food they stole the archaeologist’s supplies and raided the temple of the Stormwolf.
Invigorated by a promise of payment the gang set out to raid a temple.
Mercenary guards were seen protecting their horde of stolen goods at the temple. The party approached a guard and asked if they would be allowed into the temple to pray. The guard said sure, but a casual glance at a pile of burning clergymen made his invitation seem like a trap. The party decided to set up camp close enough to the temple that they could watch it. John reported on the state of the temple to Vilepaw Industries while Shadowslayer and Vineet scouted out the temple.
The scouts found out the patrol pattern and flew up to the windows of the tree temple and found out the temple's layout. Vineet also collected a little bit of charred clergyman to be used later.
A ritual was held that allowed the party to talk to the dead clergyman and find out the names and placements of the rooms of the temple and lore of the Stormwolf.
John then explained that they could take the loot now or wait for reinforcements in the morning. This immediately sparked off a furious debate. The debate raged on until invisible mercenaries put a knife to everyone's throat.
After talking with their captors about how much they needed to strip off the party started to comply starting with Leo.
As Leo grumbles about getting even more undressed, John issues a challenge. The challenged mercenary walks into the middle of the circle and everyone's body tenses.
**Zeshi — 09/06/2020**
A furious fight broke out and after most of the mercenaries had fallen the few remaining surrendered and were taken captive. After a brief interrogation, Leo dispatched one captive for having taken part in killing the priests from the temple.
After some discussion the group moved to set up camp in the now vacated temple of the Storm Wolf.
They found a number of boxes that seemed to be marked for Vilepaw and some miscellaneous items. They also found a locked door that was trapped with powerful ice magic.  Leo, being immune to cold, broke down the door and the group followed the path behind it upwards until they found a room where there were signs of a struggle which lined up with attacks they had associated to the Bandit Beast. They also found in this room a staff which grants awareness to its wielder of a large portion of the Serailly(how is this spelled) Plains.
**Leo — 09/14/2020**
After discussing what was seen through the odd stick the group began making a plan as to what to do next while Shadowslayer used the odd stick to look up into the astral sky and found what looked like openings into other planes.  After hearing about this Leo had the Fucking best idea ever and brought Shadowslayer outside and suggested he use the grappling hook to reach the other plane.  After 6 seconds the grappling hook found purchase and both Shadowslayer and Leo were launched into the sky.  The rest of the party continued chit chatting and eventually noticed that Shadowslayer and Leo where no where to be seen.  Using the odd stick they were able to locate the pair close to the destroyed town they had left just a few days ago.
**Leo — 09/14/2020**
While in the town Shaodslayer and Leo began looking around and looting a couple of the houses, but quickly realised they weren't alone.  Spotting one of the bandit beasts and a number of flesh carts and hummanoid figures looting the area.  Not only that but Leos' childhood friend Natali also showed up, not wanting anything weird, pretty normal stuff actually.  Leo and Shadowslayer made a run for it to try and reach their friends before the bandit beast.
The other portion of the group booked it towards the destroyed town to try and meet up with their friends after hearing about danger from the orb.  Managing to meet up the party set up a plan of attack to fight the bandit beast, not only defeating it but also managing to capture the dagger that was fighting back and attempting to escape.
**John — 09/27/2020**
After securing the dagger which absolutely refused to stay in the glove when worn by Shadowslayer, John put on the glove and was able to contain the dagger. With that sorted out the party returned to find Syver catatonic; Leo tried to use the dream dagger on him but also ended up catatonic. the party made camp  for the night, in a tree, and Leo awoke in the morning. Natali arrived around breakfast time having followed the grapnel rope, telling Leo to join her. When that failed she settled for a hug, which half killed Leo who begged us not to hurt her and man-dropped to safety; and we bravely ran away. after traveling for a bit, the group stopped to plan out a route. After some shouting our route was decided. While travelling the group ran into another convoy of meat wagons, where Vineet was almost eaten trying to claim a wagon.
**John — 09/27/2020**
The next morning Syver awoke, Shdowslayer finally finished winding in his grapnel. It was decided that a different method of storing the dagger was necessary due to Shadowslayer's incessant complaining about his missing glove. So it was decided to appropriate one of John's pots, fill it with wax and store the dagger in that, despite the fact it hadn't escaped the glove again. The party set out westward following the planned route. after a few days of soup pot swapping travelling the party came across a group of pirates on a landship looking for the dagger. after a brief battle the ship was destroyed an one of the pirates was captured. The party attempted to interrogate him but refused to talk, and the Leo cut off one of the pirate's arms and he disappeared. Zeshi was able to scry him in a base of sorts receiving medical attention. The party decided that the best course of action was to press on and deal with this new threat when it arose.
**Shadowslayer — 10/05/2020**
It rained. And rained. And rained. On the third day, the ground was so soggy that the carts couldn't go on. Fortunately, Zeshi was able to cast floating disk underneath them to buoy them enough to roll on.
As they walked, the adventurers heard a flute in the distance playing a depressing tune. The music seemed to affect them so much that some of them turned suicidal:
Zeshi crawled face-down into a rain-filled ditch
Syver gaped up at the sky and let rain fill his mouth
John started absolutely slamming down a bottle of alcohol from his cart
Leo started to stab himself with the Dagger, and was only saved by Silver immobilising him
Only Vineet and Shadowslayer managed to keep their wills to live, but soon found themselves mysteriously wounded. It was the Bandit Beasts! Vineet cast silence on herself, revealing a new breed of Beast, with huge club-like arms. The silence managed to rouse the others, and one by one they regained their wits and fought back, except John, who was shitfaced beyond recognition at this point. Fortunately, the club-Beasts turned out to be glass canons, and were dispatched after a hard fight. But the music didn't stop.
They kept on through the dreary weather and soundtrack and reached a ruined building with a man sitting around playing the tune. He paused his playing to tell them how he was an acolyte of the Stormwolf and how he only played the tune because "it was necessary". The travellers searched the ruins and came up with a non-magical amulet of the Stormwolf, at which the acolyte perked up and decided to stay and restore the building, which he now realized had been a temple. After helping him fix up a roof, they moved on, taking his flute with them, which he no longer needed.
~
The adventurers decided to go to the hunter's grove, where they found to fairies having a tea-party. Syver and Vineet bravely went to talk to them, and were bravely tricked into breathing water from their lungs and being paralyzed by poison, respectively. After the fairies had had their fun though, they agreed that Syver was worthy to receive the loot they guarded. They also asked the travellers to keep an eye out for a portal to the fey wilds, but those of the party in the know kept mum. Lastly, the fairies offered some special "not poisoned" cakes, which Vineet and Leo all ate, and felt hardier. Zeshi initially refused to eat his, tried to eat it after seeing the effect it had on others, and threw up
**Zeshi — 10/12/2020**
The group left the clearing and made camp a little ways away. During the night several drones approached the camp and began to retreat once they felt Zeshi's gaze on them. Shadow Slayer pursued and quickly dispatched them, leaving the question of if they were being hunted or if the creatures saught them as an opportunity.
They journeyed for a few days after that unimpeded, safely reaching the next temple which sat at a crossroads leading to a meeting with another instance of the crossroads demon.
Inside the temple, which served double duty as an inn, Vineet won a special set of StormWolf dice over a lucky bet.
After traveling the next day and seeing a giant Garuda on the horizon, Leo felt the tug of Sered to help those in need and brought everyone out to a group of haggard troops hiding under a magic dome, with things looking grim for them.
Enter the Heroes, the took up the fight against the beasts, driving off the smaller ones but the largest still outclassed by the largest one, the party prepared for a fighting withdrawal
**Zeshi — 10/18/2020**
As the battle raged, Syver took advantage of the raging storm on the sidelines of the battlefield to charge his divine artifact and launch a crippling blow on the Garuda matriarch, causing it to and it's kin to flee.
In the aftermath of the battle Syver went to the eye of the storm where he found it's source, a small kitten, crackling with energy.  Syver calmed the kitten, causing it to stop the storm and fall into a deep sleep.
**Zeshi — 10/18/2020**
The mage who had been protecting the group of survivors taught Leo and Zeshi the protective spell he had been using to keep them safe.  The survivors told the party that they had been tracking a wildcat which now lay dead near where the kitten was, they were tasked with escorting it as long as it bore the mantle of the stormwolf, which, now that it was dead had been passed on to the kitten. They mentioned that bearing the mantle would have an effect on the kitten's lifespan and that it could only be removed if the kitten dies or if it came into contact with an heir of the stormwolf.
One of the surviving members decided to join the party as an escort to the mantle.
After regrouping with the wagons they continued on towards Haywire's foundry.  As they got near, they came across a village of lizardfolk and secured a deal for passage on one of their ship's, leaving in two days.  In the time before that the investigated the foundry and discovered that to get access you need to be in possession of one of Haywire's successful object's. Zeshi's cannon counted as one and so he decided to go in alone to investigate, inside he found a delipidated reception area with the path further in being blocked off from a cave-in.
**Zeshi — 10/18/2020**
He also found a semi functional warforged, modeled to take the roll of a receptionist, he repaired it to the best of his abilities and spoke with it to gain more information.  After analyzing the rubble Zeshi thought that it could be cleared out but that it would take some time and a decent sized workforce to accomplish. 91 (the rececptionist's designation) told Zeshi that the repair force had been stolen and that if they were retrieved then they would clear the rubble and doing so would count towards letting the rest of the group inside without a Haywire artifact. 91 gave the location of the repair force and after confirming with the locals, found that it was the same spot as the pirate's base.
Having accomplished all they could the group headed back to the village to wait for their companions, Vineet and Shadowslayer to regroup before heading off on the river.
**Syver — 10/26/2020**
That night while waiting for their missing companions, a strange teleporting hut suddenly materialized on where Leo and and John were standing. Inside the hut was a rather chaotic man with a rather chaotic pot. The arrival of the shack attracted Shadowslayer and Vineet. The party experimented with the chaos pot and it's enchantment changing abilities until Syver had the brilliant idea to put the ancient dagger in the pot to try and neutralize it's danger.
The hut disappeared.
Before the party had time to work out what had just happened, they were ambushed by three hellions. Shadowslayer and Vineet hid underneath the Stormwolf tent while Syver turned into a tree, hiding Zeshi. The hellions smelled Shadowslayer under the tent and bathed it in fire, destroying the tent and injuring the party members underneath. The pair dimension doored away, and the hellions abandoned their attack.
The party reconvened and asked the orb what happened with the chaos enchanter. They learned that he had become a puppet, presumably to the dagger. Zeshi attempted to scry the chaos enchanter using an item obtained from the old man, but only saw a woman tending the wounds of some Shar riders.
The next morning the party returned to the lizard village and boarded the ship Ecdysis to head down the river. On the ridge, a land ship shadowed them. This prompted the Captain to explain that the land pirates frequently raided the water ships as they passed the pirate's base. The party planned to disembark the next day and approach the base on the Devil's Pass.
That night the party spotted Nimith flying around the astral sea. Shadowslayer shot his grappling hook at her to attract her attention.
She came to the boat and the party warned her about the dagger. She flew off, but arrived a few minutes later saying she had killed the chaos enchanter. She did not however, find the dagger. Nimith told the party she was holding them responsible for finding it.
In the morning the ship came across some high cliffs with a siren singing atop them. They party struggled to resist her call, and all ended up on top of the cliffs where pirates waited in ambush. The party saved the siren, by bringing her onto the ship. Shadowslayer fell in the water and couldn't get out. Vineet tried to save him but in doing so also almost drowned. Zeshi managed to save them both, but the party wasn't out of danger yet.
**Syver — 10/26/2020**
Syver had been deafened by Zeshi as an attempt to resist the sirens call, but had not heard any of the surround commotion as a result. He continued to climb the cliffs by hand, and had run into the pirates, down one siren, and still looking to take a prisoner. Syver unable to read the situation and thinking the pirates were friendly, decided to go with them and try to contact their captain diplomatically. Shadowslayer saw Syver board the land ship willingly. The party gathered to create a new plan of action.
**Leo — 10/31/2020**
John and Leo sailed up the river in hopes of finding the rest of the group.  Eventually meeting up with Shadowslayer, Vineet and Zeshi on the river where a group of pirates were asking for very very large sums of money in order to pass.  After some screaming at the top of the cliff each ship sent one member up the cliffside to parley.  Leo told john to drop something off the cliff in case of an emergency, some time later John nearly killed Leo with a potato.  Vineet, entered a tent to negotiate while the rest of the party got ready to assist if necessary.
**Leo — 11/02/2020**
After negotiations got a little dicey and Vineet had to escape.  The party regrouped on their ships and were attacked by boulders which could turn into birds, thanks to Zeshi's new magic bubble the ships were undamaged.  Unfortunately the party was attacked by an invisible creature that nearly killed Vineet.  The creature returned to the water and the party made their way back up the river.  Making sure to discuss things at length, coming up with a negotiation strategy (For the first time in ever) and learning more about Vineet's goals.
Making their way towards the pirate's base of operations a 5 (cant remember) headed Bandit Beast creeped and slithered over a destroyed land ship.  After the beast left the party went to investigate and found a scroll which could alter a single spell.
**John — 11/09/2020**
The party sailed the new land-ship to meet the leaders of the pirates. Upon arrival the pirates used magical darkness, and silence to prevent the party from seeing their defenses. The pirate leader held court in a room shrouded in anti-magic and served the party thé, a drink which dulled the mind. After some negotiation Vineet was told to prove her change of heart by bringing the pirates the heads of her conspirators. The party traded the damaged ship for Syver, and agreed to look at, and possibly repair, Haywire's flagship in exchange for his gear. On the ship, the party discovered an onyx, that almost killed Syver when he touched it, in a 7 layer matryoshka chest; and a Mimic pretending to be a carpet. Having split the party, with most going down to check the elemental core, Vineet and Syver were left to be almost killed by the onyx and mimic.
To Be Continued...
**Shadowslayer — 11/27/2020**
With Vineet's screams ringing in their ears, the rest of the team charged upstairs and started laying into the mimic that was stuffing her into it's mouth. Shadowslayer actually got fully eaten by a second mimic which dropped from the rafters and had to be extracted mid fight by Leo. Syver was unconscious the entire fight after having touched the Onyx, although at some point his pants mysteriously transferred to his hands.
With the mimics taken care of, they cast about for a way to dispose of the Onyx. Zeshi first tried to carry it with mage hand, but the stone's deleterious effect travelled through the magic link and almost killed him. Vineet offered to use her ten-foot pole which she kept on her three-foot person at all times, but she'd left it in the cart. In the end John sensibly produced a pair of barbecue tongs, which Leo employed to drop the Onyx back inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest inside its now-lockless chest, although even through the tongs the cold burned him.
Then they tramped back up to the deck, where they were greeted by a bunch of suspicious pirates. Halfway through talking to these, they realized that Vineet wasn't wearing the shackles that she'd promised to wear and slammed the door in their faces. They looked around down below and managed to get the shackles back from a pair of haywire gloves that had been tidying up. Vineet put them back on and they went out again.
**DM— 21/06/2021**
While resting and recovering from a recent skirmish with some of the pirates, the party made plans to sail away with Ilmarennen and be done with the pirates. The only hitch in the plan was an anchor that kept the ship grounded and crippled her movement. Shadowslayer and Syver went down to inspec the anchor while the rest watched from the deck above. Easily sneaking past the sleeping guard, Syver touched the anchor and had a brief conversation with the creature that was bound within it. The entity ask to be freed from its servitude so that it could bring vengeance upon its captors.
Syver immediately acted to free the creature, snapping the binding links of the anchor and freeing the entity. In the ensuring chaos of a vengeful god, the party quickly gathered their possessions onto the Ilmarennen and fled the encampment
They almost made it out woth everyone alive, but in the final portion of the escape, Shadowslayer ran afoul of a mimic that had crept up from the infested decks below.
Luckily he still had his pact with the death totem and awoke, still alive, withing the giants territory. As he started to make his was back to the party, Nymmith took the opportunity to pay back the last of her debt to the party and deliver Shadowslayer to the ship with all the speed she had
The party then rested for the night, with leo taking some extra precautions to ensure Shadowslayer wasn't compromised from the recent death experience
In the morning the party found themselves just outside the docking bay of haywires foundry. Upon entering they found the place devoid of life, with signs of a long ago battle having taken place. Vineet found a corpse in an adjacent hallways and asked it a few questions as the mystery of what happened grew
**Vineet — 07/07/2021**
Using the information gleaned from the corpse, the party knew that they had to disable the security system to get to the Idiot Button. They continued down a long hallway exploring rooms. A teleporter was found that was left unused, as the security system stabs the equivalent of a knife in the ribs for every 5 ft traveled. A lava pit with a lava golem in it making lava. The search ended abruptly when looting some wedding rings off of some corpses caused them to rise. The casters burnt some big spells that ended the fight rather quickly after Syver returned the rings. Vineet showed off her specialty of dancing raised corpses into destruction, but not before sticking her hand into an undead and getting Mummy Rot. Syver did some bloodletting and the rot seemed to stop. After seeing their first bit of combat the party decided the best thing to do was to split up into pairs to cover more ground. But by the time Syver found the control room, and had thrown charcoal in front of the defense cannons to the nearby armory, everyone had met up. Syver got dibs, so he warped the metal door to the control room and walked through. When the controls were written in a language that Syver didn’t understand he called his sophisticated snake sidekick Zeshi. Who, using their arcane knowledge and burning spells, opens up the armory and turns off the lockdown. This is done at the request of This Unit, a friendly automaton with blades in their arms. This Unit wants a soul and tags along with the party as they are all going in the same direction.
With some raven nonsense, Syver collects the armory’s contents. Trying on the loot, Syver and Leo both complete their god sets. Walking into the chamber of the Idiot Button, the party found Haywire forging the warforged race. Haywire wanted Syver and Leo’s divinity, which in exchange he would destroy the Idiot Button. Leo’s sub-dermis layer of living metal called Silver oozed out of his epidermis to say hi. Haywire agreed to make The Dagger that cuts things from existence if Silver possesses a warforged. Silver agrees and is given a body to imbue with their consciousness. Haywire makes The Dagger and stabs it into the Idiot Button, which depresses it and by doing so kills himself. High-fives all around as a major quest to stop the end of the world is done. Unfortunately the nineteen warforged without a soul charge our heroes in retribution for killing their soul granting creator.