Aerois - Episode 34: Stranger of the Storm

Kim Richards as Nova V'ger

Mark Hulmes as Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto

Ravsas Johan

Rhiannon Frost as Oriya Marius

 Tom Hazell as Pyri Adhara

**Stranger of the Storm** is the 34th episode of the Aerois Campaign. It was broadcast live on both the Yogscast Twitch channel and highrollersdnd Twitch channel on 12th May 2019 from 5PM to 8PM BST.

*We begin our journey to the Midwife's Forge, and meet a mysterious stranger along the way...*

## **Summary**

### **Announcements**

* Mark welcomes everyone and introduces the players. Trott is away this week as he is in America – the gang will join him there soon.
* There are two sponsors this week: D&D Beyond and Displate. There is a giveaway raffle for one of the crew’s Displate selections today.
* HR will be in the D&D Beyond Theatre as part of D&D Live next week. They will be playing a prologue for a new mini-series that will be played using their Lightfall characters. Rhiannon will play with a new character.
* Merch: There is a new barbarian shirt featuring the slogan, “I’m a Delight”. There is also a bundle that you can buy to save money and use the code HIGHROLLERS for a discount.
* Check the HR Twitter tomorrow for some big news.
* The donation reader was broken last week, so Mark thanks everyone who made donations, particularly those who made big donations and were not acknowledged.

### **Recap**

"*The party had returned from the Night Eye, a dungeon where they had faced off against a witch or a creature who used unusual magic of the void, which the creature called Hadar(sic). Qillek ad Khollar sadly fell in battle, and the party returned to the village of Stenhill with his body. They conversed with the dwarven priestess Skaldi Ravenscar, and made plans to take both Sentry and Quill to a place called the Midwife's Forge to see if they could have them returned to life. As part of this, as they were about to leave the town, a strange series of portals began to appear, and falling through one of them was a fire Genasi, who called himself Pyri Adhara, who appeared having been separated from some sort of team that he was part of, sent to investigate some ruins. Shrouded in mystery, the party grilled Pyri for a little bit, trying to get more information, but were quickly distracted when another series of portals began summoning creatures that threatened the town of Stenhill. Fighting off most of the creatures, including denizens from an ice plane, a strange fungal plane, and a Pixie princess and her royal guard from the Feywild, the party quickly saw an end to them, including the death of the Pixie and her guards by Lucius, who was very frustrated at having been put to sleep way too much. The Pixie princess left behind a flower crown, which was placed upon Lucius's head, to much amusement, as it appears to be a sort of magical item that he cannot remove, giving him Pixie-like traits. The rest of the party prepare themselves, you have acquired a wagon and a clack, a large lobster creature, Skorb, who will pull the wagon as you begin to set off on your trails.*"
### **Part 1**

*The team encounter a potentially dangerous individual on the way to the Forge!*

Aila suggests that they distribute Sentry and Quill’s magic items while they are unable to use them and Lucius is given the Barrier Ring for the meantime. The wagon that they have acquired will have enough room to carry two up front, one of whom will have to drive, the two bodies in the back, and two more can sit with the bodies, two more will have to walk. Skaldi drives, Pyri and Aila start walking beside the wagon and Oriya rides up front with Skaldi. They think it is going to take them at least a day and a half to get to the Forge by wagon.

As they travel out of Stenhill, the road quickly goes from stone to a dirt path that takes them up into valleys and hills. The path follows the Langstrom River, a narrow and fast-moving river. As they travel, the path elevates as the river and the valley become deeper and the cliffs higher. Eventually, there is a deep, sharp decline towards the river on their left and a gentler sloped incline on their right that is heavily forested with thick fur trees with sturdy roots and thick branches that are able to withstand the regular storm winds of Myrskyr.

Around three to four hours into their journey, Aila sees a small shrine carved into the side of the cliff face to their right – there is an effigy of two figures: one is a winged humanoid with their feathers folded backwards, holding a staff, and the other is an Orc woman holding a trident up to the air – they recognise these to be H’esper and Zephyr. The shrine has a small altar with a few offerings but most curiously, there is a robed Human male in his late 50s and a number of charred and injured Goblin bodies around him, the man has a small fire going and looks to be cooking fish on a hanging string. Some of the Goblin bodies have large black spots as if something focussed burned through them. Aila informs Skaldi of the shrine and she halts the wagon.

When they look closer, they see that the man is wearing long blue robes, and has a long, slicked-back hair and a messy beard with grey patches in it, and they now see that he is covered in blood, presumably from killing the Goblins that lie nearby. The man has a fishing rod on his back that is half-broken and charred, and there is a backpack sitting next to him as he cooks and eats his fish. The man, although he notices the curious travellers, does not react to them.

Pyri addresses the man and asks him if he was responsible for the Goblins being in that state: the man says that he was, because they attacked him, and he had to cook some fish. They ask him if he has seen any more Goblins around but he says not – they all seem to be hyped up, mad, and very loud. When the man sees Skorb, he asks them to keep it away from him, he has had dealings with Klakks before, and they are monsters when they are encountered at sea. Johan tells them that he has sailed the sea and has previously caught fish with his somewhat destroyed fishing rod.

Skaldi looks at the man as if half-remembering him and is trying to place him. Oriya has heard from locals of a figure, a fisherman, who was supposedly out at sea one day when he called down a storm to destroy a boat to kill the crew, but he survived. People are afeared of him, but no one knows his name, only that he is a fisherman blessed by the storm. He is known to travel around, sometimes stopping at towns to buy supplies, and Oriya has been warned to be cautious about the fisherman who walks the roads.

The mysterious man pulls some more fish out of his backpack and offers to cook them for the group (which Nova finds odd, given that they are some distance from the ocean). Nova asks how fresh the fish are (the man tells her no more than a couple of days old), and Lucius flies over on his new wings, ready to eat any fish that the man has since he “loves fishies”. The man says that he has Stormfish, Trout, and Koi, but having seen the fish, Lucius says that they do not look very nice.

Oriya asks why a fisherman is so far inland: the man says that he can no longer get work on the ships, that he has been having dreams, and is now following his destiny. The man tells them about his dreams – he has been dreaming of a one-eyed hawk being chased by the storm and falling from the sky (Skaldi glances at the rest of the group with a curious expression), he believes that these dreams are linked to the storms, and he wants to find out why. Nova asks the man if the bird in his dreams had one wing, and he thinks that it did, although the dream was hazy.

Skaldi asks where the man is headed, and he says that since the bird in his dream landed somewhere near The Midwife’s Forge, that is where he is going, although he may need to go to The Valley of Storms. The man says that he does not know why he is having the dreams, only that he feels bound to follow them, and denies being a priest of H’esper when Skaldi asks him: he says that he follows the gods of the sky, the seas, and magic, but is just a simple fisherman. Pyri asks how a simple fisherman killed so many Goblins in the way that he did, but the man declines to answer. On being asked his name, he answers with a simple, “Johan”.

Growing up in Stenhill, Skaldi has heard stories of a Johan: while she does not put much faith in gossip, she is aware that people are afeared of a lone fisherman going by the name of Johan. She asks if he was involved in an accident a few years ago, which he acknowledges, then says that she attended to the dead from his ship. Johan tells the story of a day that started like any other where the ship left the village hoping to haul in a big catch when, all of a sudden, a huge storm swept over them and destroyed the ship with fire. He remembers nothing except waking up on a beach with his charred fishing rod on his back; people have generally blamed him for the occurrence and since then he has not been able to find work because people see him as a bad omen, a curse, and will not have him on their crew. Johan now seeks answers so that he may clear his name.

Pyri asks Johan if he can bring the storms, and he says that he can, “somewhat”, but that the storms do not bother him. When asked, he tells Pyri that he last brought the storms about an hour ago but that he can bring the storm again if he has to. Oriya, still sitting on the wagon, notices through the trees on the right, ten to twenty small figures a reasonable way off – she sees scraps of cloth, flashes of white bone, green pointed ears, and hears guttural yelps and mutterings on the wind. She sees them clustering around the hills as if searching for something and warns the party while taking out her bow. Johan looks over but cannot see what Oriya has spotted.

Nova subtly uses a blanket to cover Quill which Johan notices but does not see the body that is covered. He tells them that he is happy to walk alongside the cart but does not want to get too close to the klakk which Oriya feeds some worms (an armoured mouth plate opens, and a number of tendrils emerges to suck them in). Johan gathers his things as the wagon continues ahead and Pyri introduces himself. Aila and Oriya keep an eye on the creatures they had seen ahead: one wears a headdress of charred bones in a mohawk style on its head and watches them keenly with its large yellow Goblin eyes. As they begin to approach, the Goblin stands up and starts shouting, resulting in multiple sets of eyes appearing followed by more shouting, and eventually a small group of Goblins starts to pour down the hill towards the wagon.

Oriya is the first to spot them: dozens of Goblins split into two main groups, screaming down the mountainside at them, all are wearing ragged clothes, but many of them have scored into their skin ragged symbols of lightning bolts. Some appear to have been struck by lightning and have a peculiar pattern down their arms and legs, their eyes are bloodshot yellow, and they are generally clutching broken blades (although some are carrying exquisitely made axes and hammers). In the middle of the swarm is the Goblin in the bony headdress, shouting in Goblin and pointing down at the wagon.

Oriya pulls out her longbow but misses with her first shot, Johan moves up to the cart, pulling out his crossbow, and shoots the leader who is delighted to have been hit, starts shouting excitedly, jumping up and down and licking its own blood. The Goblins begin to swarm around the party and the wagon, Pyri hits with a *Sun Bolt*, and Skaldi encourages Skorb to dash forwards, running over some of the Goblins, which try to slice at the wagon and get trapped under the wheels. Aila is swarmed by the Goblins and unable to get an effective swing of her hammer in against them but blasts them with her lightning aura, destroying a number of them. Goblins then rush past Aila towards the wagon and she strikes out at them as they pass, killing one. The leader points at Johan and Pyri and a group attacks them, slashing at Johan.

Nova uses *Major Image* to create a large Griffon to fly out of the dark clouds towards the wagon – she points to the image and the Goblins start to retreat in fear. Oriya stands up on the wagon and shoots her longbow, taking out the leader in one shot. Johan pulls his fishing rod from his back, points it to the sky and it is struck by lightning – he channels the energy into a *Thunder Wave*, attempting to push some Goblins down the mountain and potentially into the ravine but they manage to avoid the worst effects, Johan rises ten feet in the air and gets back to the cart. The Goblins give chase and swarm Aila and Pyri.

Pyri retaliates with multiple fist and foot attacks, taking three Goblins out, but more remain around him, Skaldi thanks Nova for her quick thinking and readies herself to heal anyone if they need it. Aila sends some massive blows and lightning blasts into the Goblins, and they begin cackling as the lightning hits them despite the fact that it is clearly hurting them. Nova moves the Griffon image to a spot behind Pyri in order to frighten the Goblins off him – they are convinced of its reality, so turn to face it as the greater threat. Johan pulls at the shark tooth necklace around his throat, blows on the tooth that immediately rises into the air, seeks its target and pierces through one Goblin’s throat, hits the Goblin behind it and explodes in lightning; both Goblins are killed. Pyri scorches a Goblin with a blast of fire and Aila knocks another two off the cliff with her hammer as they turn to run away. Oriya finishes off the last of the Goblins and they are surrounded by silence and a multitude of dead bodies.

### **Part 2**

*After a dangerous Goblin attack the party continue their journey with a new ally!*

Oriya begins picking her way through the bodies as Johan asks them about the origin of their powers. The Goblins do not have anything on their bodies but several of them have beautiful weapons – two hand axes, a hammer, and a dagger – that are crusted with grime and blood. They are covered in Dwarvish runes (possibly to imbue them with power) and have the symbol of an anvil wreathed in flowers on them. The shaman with the headdress has tucked into its leather jerkin a piece of animal hide rolled up like a scroll and sealed with a leather cord – it is scrawled in Goblin. Oriya knows that the weapons are old but not where they are from, and she knows that the symbol on the weapons is that of Valena, the goddess of Craft and Life. Johan regains his shark tooth dart, and the group decides to take a rest.

Johan now sees inside the cart – there is a body that has been well-covered by a blanket, and next to that, the body of a Guardian, which he has heard of but never seen before. Johan wonders if they are grave robbers but Skaldi takes umbrage at such a term, telling Johan that she serves the goddess of Death and would not stand for that sort of behaviour. Aila asks Johan about his powers, which he has told them were granted to him by a storm. He now says that he assumes that a storm gave his powers to him: he survived his boat sinking and did not have the powers before that.

Oriya hands the scroll that she has found over to Nova who reads it with *Eyes of the Runekeeper*, noting that it says:

*Glek, do not forget the midday shadow of the raised claw points the way. Go until the rock turns to gold and glitters, search the crystal forest for the anvil, and follow its root.*

Nova looks at the weapons noting that they are non-magical but are covered in runes that would normally be used to enchant a weapon. She thinks that either they were once enchanted and lost their strength, or they were never enchanted but never got to be.

Johan, believing that everyone is too busy to notice, decides to peek under the blanket and notices an Aarakocra’s foot – he is caught by Aila who clears her throat and startles him. He claims that he dropped one of his fish in the cart and was looking for it before she warns him away with the threat of injury.

They resume travel and the road becomes far less treacherous as it moves away from the steep sides of the valley below them; fir trees begin to grow more thickly and dark stormclouds begin gathering overhead as a storm heads towards them. As night falls, they are left with the noise of the storm, the babbling of the river beside and below them, and the nocturnal noises of the animals around the place. They notice, curiously, that despite the howling winds and storm, Johan’s robes barely seem to move, and he is damp but not soaked through. They decide to camp for the night and Skaldi uses the chains and pitons to anchor the cart to the ground. As soon as he realises that the cart will not be going any further for the night, Skorb’s eye stalks retreat into his head, and he hunkers down, gripped onto the ground and looking like nothing so much as a rock.

Aila worries about the bodies in the storm, given that there is no roof to the cart, and Johan offers to drive the lightning away if it tries to strike the bodies – the party agrees. They hear a soft jingling and see Lucius appear walking out of the woods, bedraggled, and wide-eyed but carrying arms full of berries that he is eating and offering to the party – Oriya recognises them as mildly poisonous as Lucius collapses, unconscious.

Johan offers to take first watch which leaves Aila suspicious: she talks to him about his dreams which he says that he has been having every night since the storm a year ago. Originally, the dreams were just of a place, a mountain, and the hawk has been a recent addition since about a month ago. Oriya says that she dreams of getting her ship back, she longs for adventure, searching for treasure and the good life. Nova dreams of the stars and sailing a ship through the stars.

Johan wants to know more about what the party is doing heading to the Forge with two bodies and Skaldi tells him that she has heard stories about bringing people back there. She knows that the Forge is somewhere in The Stormwall, past the Bridge of a Thousand Hammers, but that they will have to search for it. Aila asks Johan if he knows where the Forge is, but he grew up in a village and has only had dreams of it – he has seen a hawk landing on a piece of stone that rises from the ground and looks like a clawed hand. Nova is immediately reminded of the Goblin scroll and Johan tells them the details of his dream: a one-eyed and one-winged hawk landing on a stone claw, the wing appears scorched and burned, and Johan does not understand how the bird could fly.

The party has a huddle, leaving Pyri, Johan, and Skaldi to one side. They decide to show Johan Quill’s body and call him over to the cart, gently lifting the blanket aside: Johan sees a one-winged, one-eyed Aarakocra with a staff engraved with the holy symbol of H’esper. Given the circumstances, Johan thinks that their meeting on the road is unlikely to be a coincidence. Nova begins to question Johan: is he a worshipper of H’esper? (yes) Has H’esper ever spoken to Johan? (yes, through dreams) Has H’esper ever called Johan his Champion? (no). They tell Johan that Quill died three days ago which is when Johan’s dreams stopped coming, and Sentry died about three days before Quill, although Johan has not seen her in his dreams at all.

Aila takes the first watch and all is peaceful, but Johan dreams for the first time in a few days:

*Johan sees the same Stormwall chasing over the landscape, but it is not chasing the hawk any more, it is following him. He is running through the mountains: he crosses a bridge with dozens of broken hammers littering its pathway. He runs into the mountains, The Stormwall is just close behind him but he knows that he has to run from it, that he has to keep ahead of it somehow. As he is running through the mountains, he becomes lost and comes across a stone pillar – the raised claw – at its foot is a hawk and he can see that it is lifeless. Now, perched on the clawed rock is a very faint, ghostly outline of a Human man with wings, a book in one hand and a staff in the other. The man, H’esper, looks at Johan, reaches down, picks the bird up and enfolds it in his hands as he points deeper into the mountains. Johan hears in his mind, “Travel with them to this point, but then come to the valley. Your destiny will meet this one’s,” he opens his hands to show the bird, “but not yet.” The dream ends.*

Johan wakes Nova and tells her that H’esper has spoken to him in his dream. He tells her about it and the party considers it a good omen before they complete their rest for the evening.

They resume their travels in the morning and the road begins to travel again along the cliff that leads down to the Langstrom River. Up ahead, they see and incredible sight: a stone bridge that spans 700 to 800 feet across, rising 300 feet from the river on huge arches, dangling from its sides are a thousand chains that each end in a single, broken hammer. The bridge seems to have been partially destroyed in places and repaired with wood, but the stone sections seem ancient. Skaldi points to it and names it the Bridge of a Thousand Hammers – Johan chooses this point to tell them that he also saw this in his dreams – Skaldi tells them that the bridge was built by the worshippers of Valena while she was constructing the Midwife’s Forge. The bridge allowed her followers to reach the Forge, and this was before the Sundering – every time a hammer broke, they attached it to a chain and let it drop over the side of the bridge to show how much work was involved in its construction. During the Sundering, the bridge was partially destroyed and split in the middle – she indicates a section that seems to have collapsed then rebuilt in wood – but the Shepherds commissioned the repair of the bridge so that people could cross the Langstrom.

As they approach the middle of the bridge where the wooden repair has been made, Oriya notices that part of the wooden repair has collapsed: she can see three large creatures, Thunder Eagles, perched on the bridge. She thinks the eagles must be nesting on the bridge somewhere. They either need to pass (and possibly fight) the eagles, or they can make their way down to the river and go across it and then back up the other side of the ravine.

Nova suggests casting levitate on the wagon, but it is so heavy that levitating will only assist them slightly. Aila suggests trying the bandore but when she tries to play it, takes damage because she is not a bard. They take a vote and Nova abstains, so they decide to take the bridge route. Before they can take off, they decide that the river might be safer, so Skaldi takes the wagon slowly down the side of the ravine to the river. Skorb gets very excited as he nears the water which is 5-7 feet deep, 80 feet wide, and flowing swiftly. Nova says that she can levitate the wagon, then teleport herself and another person (Pyri) across the river, Johan offers to help push the cart with a wind, Lucius can fly across (and does so), Skaldi says that she will have to drive to direct Skorb, and Oriya and Aila will carry the bodies across.

With Skorb’s strength and the assistance of Johan’s *Gust of Wind*, the cart makes it across very swiftly. Aila makes it halfway across safely, but Oriya and Quill’s body start to get taken away by the swift current. Pyri tells Nova to take Johan by teleport then dives into the water to help Oriya with Quill’s body – he grabs Quill’s body then hits his watch, Pyri is teleported to the other side of the river, but Quill’s body does not go with him, and starts to float downstream. Aila makes it safely across the river with Sentry’s body, Oriya is struggling in the current, and Quill’s body is now 60 feet downriver, being slammed against rocks as it rapidly disappears. Nova yells to Johan that there is a change of plan before she dives into the river and takes off after Quill’s body, and Johan assists her with the last of his wind current – she manages to grab Quill’s body before using *Thunder Step* to get to the other side of the river, unfortunately catching Oriya in its blast wave. Pyri is dragged along by the current, smashing against rocks as he goes, Aila runs along the bank and Johan moves down the bank and blows wind against Oriya to stop her from moving further downstream. Aila dives in and grabs Pyri, dragging him to the opposite bank while Johan and Oriya make it back out to the bank from which they started.

## **YouTube Timestamps**

00:03 - Episode Start
07:57 - Intro
09:06 - Part 1
1:19:34 - Break time/Donations
1:29:28 - Part 2
2:58:27 - Outro/Donations

*feel free to add extra timestamps of significant events!*

## **Featured Characters**

#### **The Stormchasers (Player Characters)**

* Aila
* Nova V'ger
* Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto (played by Mark)
* Pyri Adhara
* Oriya Marius
* Johan (Guest PC)

#### **Returning NPCs**

* Skaldi Ravenscar
* Skorb

#### **Mentioned NPCs**

* Quill
* Sentry
* H’esper
* Zephyr

## **Featured Locations**

* Myrskyr
	+ Stenhill
	+ Bridge of a Thousand Hammers

## **Trivia**

* Johan was the first guest PC of the Aerois campaign. He would be playing Johan.
* Because Mark does not want to be responsible for playing Pixie Lucius, he has Lucius turn invisible and fly away.
* Scarring caused by lightning is called a “Lichtenberg figure”.

* Mark describes Skaldi for Ravs (playing Johan): a Dwarven woman with Nordic, pale blonde hair, black leather bands tying it up, she has black lines of make up over her eyes and wears all black with bones and skulls and stuff.
* Mark had planned to give Johan the dream from H’esper, not knowing that he would beseech H’esper to speak to him beforehand.
* Storm Eagles have a flight speed of 80 feet per round.
* Mark initially says that the wagon would be 300 pounds when empty, and that Sentry would be 200 pounds, so is prepared to allow Nova to cast levitate on it (max 500 pounds). Tom does some quick Google work and finds out that a typical prairie schooner weighed about 1,300 pounds when empty. Mark then rescinds his permission for Nova to levitate the wagon and gives Tom inspiration: the rest of them are pissed.
* Continuity error: Mark says the bridge is 700-800 feet across, then later changes it to 600 feet.
* A fan art video was played at the end of the episode after the dono readout.

## **Quote**

* Tom (as Pyri): I once had a dream that I walked into the Academy without, like, any clothes… and they saw everything.
* Ravs (as Johan): Are you fiery down there, too?
* Pyri: Personal question…
* Mark (as Skaldi): That is somewhat of a very important question, I feel.
* Pyri: Is it important??
* Skaldi: Well, I’m curious now that Johan has mentioned it. Is the flame all of your hair, or…?
* Rhi (as Oriya): Does it burn when you pee?
* Pyri: I mean yeah, doesn’t it do that for everyone, or…?
* Skaldi: No. See a herbalist.