Go to Hell

Sabah

Artemis

The morning after the flying ship attacked Alfenheim, Cassandra was told by Tarthurac to perform burial rites on those killed during the attack. However, as she was doing this one of the five burned victims’ empty eye sockets glowed purple, turned his head to her and said to her “Go to hell.” Cassandra was freaked out by this and left quickly to talk to Selena. She knew this was Dartak talking to her again. She took the ferry to NewTown and arrived that night. She went to see Selena and met up with her friend Sabah on the way, a fellow worshiper of Sutahn. Cassandra told Selena what happened and Selena said it was about time they made good on their promise to get Dartak a new body. She got her stuff together and headed to Fort Town with Cassandra and Sabah. When they reached the split in the River they caught the attention of Artemis who was heading to Alfenheim after hearing about the attack. They convinced her to come with them, telling her that they were doing it to help Tarthurac and it was more important.

They reached FortTown in the morning and Selena’s imp, Disarray, was instantly shot by one of the guards on the wall. She took an hour to re-summon him and together they blew up the fence that had been around the portal to Dis. The guards spotted them and Selena used her disguise self spell and convinced them that she was there to repair the wall. After the guards left the group entered the room and left Rowina, Artemis’ familiar on the other side to let them back out as the door was one way.

Once inside, the group encountered some imps that Selena had Dissaray lure into range so Artemis could blast them. A spined devil and a hell hound charged them and Artemis was badly hurt during the attack, but they vanquished the devils. After this exchange the group retreated to heal Artemis and stayed at the tavern overnight. They returned the next morning and disguised themselves as Tieflings this time.

Selena a Black Tiefling, Artemis a blue and Sabah as Têmtûm as they ventured down into the scorching layer of Dis. They arrived on the outskirts, in an abandoned tunnel only a few dozen miles from the pillar of skulls and the group headed off toward the entrance to Avernus beneath the pillar of skulls. Not more than an hour into their journey Artemis fell victim to one of Dis’ most dangerous traps. She looked over her shoulder and found herself standing in the iron city, but she wasn’t corporeal there yet. The rest of the group noticed she had looked over her shoulder, a taboo all travelers to Dis try to avoid. Selena was able to identify that Artemis' mind had been grabbed by the city and it was trying to get her mind to pull her body there. Selena blindfolded Artemis to cut off her visual link to the city before shoving her backwards onto the ground. Artemis felt the shove and fell backwards for what felt like a 270 degree fall rather than the expected 90 degrees. But it was enough, and Artemis took off her blindfold and the group was able to continue. Later on Sabah fell victim to the same trap, but Selena and Artemis handled it easily in the same way.

The group marched through the scorching landscape, the iron tower of Dispater constantly on the horizon no matter where they turned their heads. They finally reached the pillar of skulls, stacked higher than any mountain on the prime material plane, the base of the mountain was made of primal Balor skulls, ancient demons that only Obox-ob, first prince of demons, could create. Each skull was roughly the size of a carriage and together they formed the base of this mountain.

The group stepped into the pillar of skulls, and welcomed the temperature difference as it dropped to a much more reasonable 70 degrees. While traveling underneath the pillar the group encountered a few miscellaneous devils, including a large shipment of Lemures being lead by a chain devil. The chain devil almost spotted Artemis as a fake tiefling but he was distracted as one of the Lemures stepped out of line and he whipped it back in.

Upon exiting the other side, the group finally reached Avernus. The temperature rose again into the low hundreds, and they gazed up into the sky, filled with the constant fall of flaming meteors. The group decided the best place to find a dragonborn body for Dartak would be in the bronze city. They set off that direction, deciding to skirt the wyrmalnds rather than go through the pit of Maggots where souls newly arriving in hell were processed.

After a few hours of traveling a massive, two headed red dragon swooped over their heads and flew of deeper into the wyrmalnds. At this point Artemis and Sabah were ready to collapse from the heat. Sabah managed to pull it together, but Artemis was spent. Cassandra told Selena to summon a floating disk and she let Artemis ride on it. Cassandra put Artemis in manacles and removed her makeup, deciding to make her look like a slave rather than a visitor.

This worked as several more groups of devils and travelers sped past them. One horned devil went as far as to spit on Artemis as he passed. But as the group got close to the bronze city they could hear the earth shaking and the loud thunder of thousands upon thousands of feet marching in unison inside the city. As they approached, a draconic looking devil of unknown origin approached them. He introduced himself as Killik and said he could get them into the city if they wanted to sell Artemis to his employer. Cassandra agreed to this and Killik signaled several other draconic devils who had been hiding nearby to disperse. The group entered the Bronze city’s first bailey where the sound of the regimented marching from the second and fifth baileys was deafeningly loud.

The group was taken down the market street which had a surprising number of non-devil folk walking around. Drow, Duergar, Humans, Tieflings and even an elf here and there could be seen in addition to the intense bustle of lower level devils carrying goods, pushing carts and calling out prices. The group was taken down a series of alleys into a secret tavern where the doorman complimented Selena on her heritage as a black tiefling before being let in.

Once inside, the deafening marching was droned out and Killik took them to a table with a green and red dragonborn sitting at it. After some wheeling and dealing between Cassandra and the green dragonborn who said his name was Gothab, he agreed to get Cassandra a dragonborn within ten minutes of signing the contract in exchange for her telling him where the portal in and out of Dis was. Cassandra added to the contract that neither of their groups should be allowed to harm each other for a year, and they agreed to the terms. The bartender verified the contract and tied it directly to Zariel, the current archdevil of Avernus.

Selena and Sabah spent this time buying drinks. Seveal varieties of blood and a drink called Ether, which contained some celestial blood knocked Selena out when she drank it. They also bought a drink known as Targon, but neither of them tasted it there. Cassandra tried to sign the contract without letting Gothab know to run the timer out, but the moment she signed the magical contract set in and Gothab felt it. He nodded to his red friend and Killik and together they left.

A minute later the red dragonborn came back and called to several other red dragonborn in the tavern that the pyro king’s castle was under attack and they were needed. They all rushed out the door and there was a loud bang. The door opened and the red dragonborn came back in dragging one of the other red dragonborn who he had called out. Gothab's friend friend plopped the unconscious pyro legion member on the table and said their side of the contract was fulfilled. Outside the door they saw Killik and several other draconic devils massacring the other two unconscious dragonborn.

With their objective complete the group hightailed it back to the portal to Dis with their captive and Killik close behind. They showed him how to use the door and Cassandra tried to close it before he could get through, but he managed to step through before they could close it on him. He began to fly south and outran the exhausted Artemis who tried to follow him on her broom.

The group knocked out the dragonborn again as he began to struggle and blow fire at them. They decided they couldn’t wait any longer and they sent for Tarthurac as they brought the dragonborn to Cassandra’s temple of Sutahn. They told Artemis to leave and go recover, but she left and turned invisible outside the door to watch what they would do. Tarthurac arrived and Dartak took him over, making him punch the red dragonborn to death. Tarthurac regained control of himself and he left in a hurry, not sure why he had murdered the prisoner. A moment later the red dragonborn on the wall opened his eyes and asked if Cassandra would let him down. She agreed and he used his lay on hands ability, glowing with purple magic he healed himself and ran after Tarthurac. He got Tarthurac’s attention and cast a spell that put Tarthurac to sleep. He said he had modified Tarthurac’s memory, but Cassandra told him to go hide and she would take care of Tarthurac and the rest.

Artemis saw this happen and flew toward Alfenheim for help.