Session 060

# Shadow Realm Horrors

**Age of the Wolf, Year 5, Autumn, Laelun Toil 1, Day 3**

*The heroes use their time in Trondheim wisely, and Jor is steeped in the ways of foreign wizardry. Esbjorn finally gets time at the forge, Valindr learns the ways of forge craft and seeks out information, Nygaar makes an impression on the people of Frisia, and Heida sows the seeds of Crom's destruction. Traveling in the shadow realm towards the Boars Wood, the party encounters horrors unimaginable.*

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## Player Characters Involved

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

## A Fruitful Layover

The party used the twenty days Jor required wisely, recuperating and making ready for the next stage of their quest to free Seron of the foreign invaders. Esbjorn worked tirelessly, day and night, infusing his armor with new runes of eldritch power. He also forged a new bastard sword, using the druchite ore captured from the demon Abraxia. When not hard at work forging himself, the giant blooded warrior assisted Valindr in her new vocation, giving her pointers on the finer points of forge work.

Valindr took Heida's shield and sword and infused it with seidr power, using Esbjorn's hammer the party had found in a long forgotten forge in Storm Hammer Keep. That task finished, she moved on to enhancing Nygaar's gear, adding magical components to his leather armor and creating an armor crystal for use when the heroes found their way onto the sea. When not forging, Valindr sought to learn more about the Mixin reaver known as the Sea Serpent. With Nygaar's help, she was able to learn a number of things. It seemed the Sea Serpent had long been lost in the far reaches of the Xi'an empire and had been presumed dead, and had only recently been welcomed back by Kol Thorstarrson, the Mixin clan jarl, and promoted to lead the Mixin fleet. He had spent years in Kai-feng, a city of the Xi’an empire to the west. He had a daughter named Bai with a noblewoman named Ru-Shi Li (Fang Li's mother). Valindr pondered the implications of this connection between a hero of her clan and the enemy wizardess they had encountered in their travels. Valindr also bred her beloved horse Glaer with the common Frisian horse stock, making a deal with the Frisian horse master Bork the Woodsman to claim her pick of a foal as part of the bargain. Meanwhile, Nygaar had not been idle.

Nygaar wanted to command respect and attention during his time in Trondheim, and spent gold freely to do so. Buying two massive wolfhounds, he traveled the city spending gold freely, trying to win the respect and admiration of the common foot soldiers of the Frisian clan. His plan largely succeeded, in no small part due to the treasure he lavished on the bard Kolbruun to sing his praises. Nygaar also worked with Arn Odinsight to convert some of the followers of the false god in the city, and his charisma and lavish spending made headways in that regard. Beyond his spending, Nygaar spent many long and furious hours dueling any man who would partake in the exercise, and made quite an impression with his formidable fighting abilities. One individual who he became friends with was Crom's cousin, a warrior maiden named Nefja Holmunsdottir. Known as Wolfseye, Nefja took a liking to the would be king of Seron, and took him on a sea patrol in her lean and wickedly fast longship named Ormen Skamme ("short snake" in the old tongue). Nygaar was impressed with her skill at arms, and noted the terrible speed at which she fought with both swords and spear.

Heida too kept busy during her stay in the vast Frisian city, seeking out Roskva the Black at the behest of Gunnar the Peaceful. She learned that the young and ambitious Frisian witch wanted to be the clan volva, and wanted her mistress Teeka Ravenwalker out of the way in order to take her place. Using her powers of persuasion, and her connections with her father Grim, Heida was able to convince Teeka to leave Frisian lands and return to Furkat, the training grounds for the volva kind of Seron. Teeka, a vain old woman, was assured that she would speak with Heida's voice and have authority over Frida Shadow-Walker in the training and discipline of prospective volva girls in the weirding ways of seidr. While Heida never explicitly gave Teeka this authority, she reasoned that Frida would set the foolish old woman aright with little trouble. With an assurance from Roskva that she would poison Melkorka, which would then allow Gunnar to help the party depose Crom, Heida judged her work to be done and the seeds of Crom's downfall firmly planted. Roskva asked after Melkorka's son Axel, and the party agreed to allow the young witch to do with the infant what she would. Speaking to the spirits over the course of twenty days, Heida learned many things about their continuing quest, and passed on many tidbits of useful information she gleaned from the spirits to the other heroes.

Jor magical instruction finally complete, and adorned in the robes of the Ruegian wizards guild, the newly trained wizard told the party he was ready to depart. Thinking long and hard about his son, Jor determined he would have to seek out the boy's mother in order to win him back. The party awoke on the twenty first day of their stay and headed towards the Thor gate. Nygaar implored Jor to make a show of their power, and the party entered the shadow realm in full view of the soldiers and townsfolk shouting greetings out to Nygaar. In an instant they were in the dark lands, racing across the landscape towards the Boars Wood to seek out Gullinbursti's harness and finish the blood oath Esbjorn had been compelled to make.

## Demons and Worms

The party sped across the landscape, on the borderland between planes. The darkened landscape, which had hinted of danger in the past, finally bore the terrible fruit of dabbling in the dark seidr arts. The heroes came across a strange scene, encountering a number of caterpillar-like tenebrous worms, the larval form of creatures known as gloomwings. Those steeped in the knowledge of dark planar lore recognized these creatures as voracious predators that hungered for mortal flesh, and Jor called out a warning to avoid their acidic bite. The pallid beasts clattered upon dozens of small legs, their writhing bristles twitching on their backs as they scuttled towards the party. Relatively pale-colored, their internal organs seethed and roiled with shadowy energy and dark fluids. As the party closed to fight these horrors, Nygaar spotted some nearly invisible creatures in the gloom, perched on the branches of a dead tree.

Winged and demonic, only the shadowy bat-winged teeth and claws of the creatures had any sense of physicality to them—the rest was lost in darkness. With growing dread, the heroes realized the demons were incorporeal, and a long and frustrating battle unfolded. For every attempted strike, the heroes blades, arrows, and axes were just as likely to pass through the demons as to harm them. The demons tore vile and ripping wounds into the flesh of the party, creating black and terrible wounds which would not heal even with magic. Meanwhile, the worms had fallen upon the heroes, and their savage jaws were dripping with acid which burned their flesh with terrible caustic consequences. Jor newfound abilities proved to be the key to their survival, as he first used magic to slow the worms and then dropped an impenetrable fog upon their enemies to slow their progress further. Nimbly avoiding the barbs upon the worms backs, and connecting with enough strikes to bring down the demons, the party breathed a sigh of relief as their last foe was finally slain. Riddled with wounds that couldn't be healed, the party looked to one another in the near darkness, and took a moment to breath deeply in a welcome respite from the horror of the terrible encounter they had just endured. It seemed traveling quickly through the shadow lands had its consequences. Only half way to the outskirts of the Boars Wood, the heroes pondered their next step.

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