4.24.21 - Be Prepared

The guard approached and began to lecture me about how stealing is wrong and how I would not be tolerated and examples must be made until Cannon showed up and yelled at me in order to get the guard to let me go. On our way back to the tower to meet up with Rhys and She-rah, Cannon wanted us to take a glance at the gates where he pointed out there were runes on them that weren't there before. Once back in the tower with the others, I relayed the information I had gathered about the need for papers in order to enter the city proper of Phlan we decided to take a rest and brainstorm exactly what we needed to purchase to be prepared for our attack on Vallejo Castle and Tyranthraxus.

   After our rest, we decided to contact our allies before going shopping. Cannon sent messages through his god to the Bukavock and the fae, Allied burial and the rebels, and the green witch and the elves. He told them about the plan and to meet us in three days at dawn to create a distraction on the surface while we snuck in. However, he also needed to contact  Doomguide Yovir and the undead to see if they could clear the tunnel they had previously collapsed for us and if they would help us by adding more distractions. Doomguide’s response was that he could but that we would owe him. This made Cannon twitch just a bit, but he soon moved on to contact Fistula. We decided to contact her on the off chance she and the orcs were close  by and could come provide more back up for our other allies. She told us it would be a stretch for everyone to come but that she could send us 50 ourock riders who would be there first thing on the day we planned our attack. Cannon was sure to tell them all dawn in three days time and to warn them of all of the other’s assistance and not to fight our other amassed allies.

   Our next step was to go to Waterdeep! We decided it would be easier to find all the magical things we wanted to get there rather than raise suspicion in Phlan where some of the items may not even be available. Also, Rhys made a very good point about Waterdeep having the best falafel in all of Toril.

   Upon stepping through the doorway leading to Waterdeep, we were immersed in large crowds surrounded by buildings that were multiple stories high, but everyone around us was looking at us in horror. The tower we had stepped out of was made of a dark onyx material with an overhanging over the door made of plywood with a skeleton stuck to it. Everyone around the tower was giving it and us a wide berth while we looked closer at the tower and the skeleton to determine the tower was not a great thing to be around and the skeleton was that of a human or half-elf. We quickly began to walk away from the tower in the direction Rhys thought the falafel might be before realizing we should find a guide, so I found a kid on the street who we offered money to in order for them to be our guide for the day. They were able to lead us to Rhys’ falafel destination of choice: Ilene’s Mazaken Delights on Trader’s Way, where Rhys fills She-rah’s bag of holding with extra chocolate, falafel, and a small barrel of tej. Our guide then took us through several of the different wards of Waterdeep until we reached an odd local called Balthore’s Rare and Wondrous Treasures. Inside, there were more people who looked to be adventurers like us and a wide variety of goodies scattered around. The patron of the establishment was a long haired tabaxi fellow who offered us a number of the potions we were looking for and even had some things we didn’t know we were looking for like a cool necklace of fireballs and a weapon for splitting orcs in half. (Needless to say we didn’t take the weapon.) He was even kind enough to trade the gems we had found for some store credit we put towards paying for the potions we wanted. He didn’t have any other weapons, but Cannon and I went to the armorer nearby and picked out a magical bow I can’t wait to use.

After that, we said goodbye to our guide and paid them a bit more for their assistance and we went back to the tower. It took some convincing, but we all eventually passed through the door in order to reenter the observatory. From there we decided to revisit Tamsin at his tower, which we discovered was in a rolling field of wheat instead of on the rocky island we had previously visited him on. He was exasperated for a minute while he wondered how often we would come and visit him, but was relieved when we assured him this would not happen as often once our Tyranthraxus problem was solved. Tamsin allowed us the use of his knowledge and his library to learn more about dragons and Tyranthraxus’ origins. We learned that the green dragons tend to be good leaders who like to toy with their adversaries, and that black dragons tend to be crueler and more tortuous of their prey. He told us the Maimed Virulence is said to have an entire side of him that is made of scar tissue and that might be a weak point for him. The gauntlets, as we learned, were forged by Moander after his follower’s first battle with Tyranthraxus in order to allow his followers to drain the pools Tryanthraxus needed to remain on the material plane and the dead could properly decay. There is a main pool that we will need to drain in order for all the pools to no longer function and the gauntlets will know if the correct pool was drained or if the main one still exists; these pools create ghouls and it would be bad to touch them. It is said that nooone has ever fought Tyranthraxus in his own body because he has the ability to jump from person to person to possess them and we should count on this being used against us because there is no way to prevent it.

After our study session with Tamsin, we headed back into the observatory to rest before our big day and Rhys and I contemplated going to go play with the dinosaurs and get corn dogs from Chult, but decided against it in favor of having more time to rest.