30th Fire (4/27/18) - Knittin' but Trouble

Hathun, Second-Week, Seventh-Day, The Now-Year

The PCs descend from the Ayrie of the Ancients with their strange prisoner, and arrive at the fog shrouded village of Misthome, built upon another Carver rune. The construction here is far more modern and sturdy than most of the Ten-Tribes, and they note the populace is heavily balanced between dwarves, humans, gnomes and others. A dwarf mountaineer named Murv is serving as a sentinel when they arrive, and gives them some pointers on where to go to seek their information. After meeting back up with Mamma Boe, the PCs split up to visit the Ayrieside Reliquary and Wyrmshade's Wonders. At the Reliquary they receive some information from Old Dwolv about the Carver civilizations, and he tips them off that they should visit the Blue Lantern Society with their captive charge. Meanwhile, Wyrmshade identifies several of the magical items they've accrued, and makes a trade with them to do more in the future. Flearikz offends him by asking that he evaluate a pair of dragonskin boots, and then when the dragonborn refuses, tries to bargain with him by putting on a play about his life...which the wood elf knows nothing about!

The two groups of PCs converge upon the Blue Lantern Society where they meet with High Hood Lavener, the leader of the organization. He is shocked by their discovery of the strange captive, and tells them that he himself has found the corpse of a similar being, along with one of the weird, illuminated metallic altars. He also knows that there has been a comparable sighting near the Isle-of-Idylls, off the banks of the Moonmirror. They decide its safest to keep the captive at the Society while they get more information around the town. Mamma Boe enlists her posse of Flearikz, Greech and Za'ku to scope out the Sisters of the Mist for the cooking guild from which she was expelled due to her peculiar habits. They find a group of six elderly local women knitting at one of the twin taverns, and then Boe confronts them, casting a grease spell which ruins the newly-dubbed knitting guilds projects for the day. A 'melee' ensues, a rather sad one, before it is broken up by Mother Henn, the Elder of Misthome, who settles both parties down. Despite the deadly brawl, one of the old spinners is infatuated by Flearikz the elf after he orates from the top of the bar.



Later that evening, Flearikz holds his mock-tribute to Wyrmshade, who is not impressed, and almost gets into a battle with the elf. The old woman infatuated with Flearikz does, however, invite him back to her domicile for the night...

Hathun, Second-Week, Eighth-Day, The Now-Year

Once the characters have finished their dealings with Wyrmshade and gathered up other supplies, they decide to leave Chief Wralasar behind for the time being, and take Lavener with them to get to the bottom of the mysteries by speaking with Farstriker Ferrikan at the Isle-of-Idylls. Travel there is relatively uneventful, and they arrive that night, using mirrors and flame to summon up a lake guard, thanks to Kymyl and Flearikz' knowledge. The guard arrives, and despite Yukkbutt trying to destroy the parley by cannonballing the guard's canoe, he agrees to send a party with Ferrikan out to meet them in the morning.

Hathun, Second-Week, Ninth-Day, The Now-Year
The PCs meet the elderly, wizened Farstrider by the morning light, accompanied by a sizable retinue of her elven guards. They speak to her of the ogre menace, which she already knows about, and then about the strange altars and their captive. She tells them of her distant past, but when questioned, says she was far too young to know what had caused the great cataclysms that caused the people of neighboring lands to migrate to the Cleft Plateau. She does know there were rays from the sky that destroyed her village, but does not seem familiar with the captive creature. However, she draws a map of the region, connecting the sightings the PCs have come across, with Lavener's finding, and the rumored grotto near the Moonmirror, and discovers they form a square or diamond shape...the PCs decide to investigate further, taking Lavener along to this grotto.

PCs: Borracho, Flearikz, Greech, Kymyl, Mamma Boe, Slakethirst, Vraal, Yukkbutt, Za'ku
XP Rewarded: 2800
Inspiration: ---
Renown: ---

NPCs

High Hood Lavener (gnome male): Adorned in a cloak and gem-studded leather armor, all died in a rich blue, Lavener strikes a fashionable figure by any measure on the Cleft Plateau. Atop his oiled, salt & pepper hair he wears a tricorn hat upon which a blue lantern clasp rests, and his kind eyes seem to contain an unshakeable curiosity at whomever and whatever they cross. He leans upon a sheathed sword as tall as he is, and over his shoulder is strung a fancy bone crossbow and a fine polished wooden bolt-case.

Mother Henn (dwarf female): As broad and square shouldered as any of her male kin, Henn is a gracefully aging dwarven matron who views you with a coyle, wide smile beneath deepset brown eyes. Her chestnut and silver hair is tied off into two thick braids which flank her jaw, and she wears robes of a deep green, her fingers bejeweled by bone and jewels, and she shuffles about on a walking frame of dark, lacquered wood with leather embroidery.

Murv Ruckspike (dwarf male): Black, shaggy hair awkwardly hangs over a furrowed, friendly face. Darting brown eyes, set wickedly within their sockets, watch enthusiastically over the village they've grown affectionate toward for so long. An old tattoo of a small eagle is subtly placed on the left side of his neck, and he wears heavily padded clothing, a coil of rope, and a pair of leather satchels which burst with tools.

Old Dwolv (human male): A crooked, elderly man with greasy gray hair, Dwolv’s neck is constantly hanging to the left, while a stump of some sort lies atop his shoulder on the right side. His face contorts into a painful looking grimace as he speaks. He wears a thick leather apron and gloves to cover his twisted wrists, while a stone short sword is never far from his person.

Wyrmshade (dragonborn male): This olive-scaled, lithe dragonborn male wears a bone vest of fashioned links which is lined with hide pockets, fine tools and picks of stone, wood, and bone. He has a narrow face with several teeth broken from the left side of his mouth. He has a glass lens framed in wood above his right eye, and seems to constantly twitch and lap at drool running from the sides of his mouth.

29th Fire (3/16/18)

Hathun, Second-Week, Fifth-Day, The Now-Year

The PCs search the cloudy, acidic cavern high and low. Slakethirst, Mammae Boe and Un'krug head to the mouth of the lair to question their dragonborn prisoner about what it was that they just dealt with. Greech, meanwhile, has returned after guiding the dragonborn to the lower plateau and the waterfall they can climb to escape back down the Ayrie. He transforms into a baboon, trying to scale the cliff, and falling half to his death. Mamma Boe then spies him and helps him out. After probing around the acid-filled cavern, Vraal and Un'Krug wander off into a neighboring corridor, while Yukkbutt begins to goad and defile the sleeping, ancient dragon they see on one side of the cavern. The cleric and barbarian find Chief Wralasar in the neighboring chamber, minus a leg and an arm that were removed from him, the wounds cauterized. More PCs drift into this chamber, and they all search the area and find some curiosities strewn about the refuse that has piled up there. Flearikz jumps from cage to cage near the ceiling, but finds no more surviving prisoners. Borracho notices something a little strange, one of the sleeping ancient's eyes opening, but doesn't pay it much heed.

The PCs decide to go rest their wounds in the monastery ruins below the cavern, but SlakeThirst, Yukkbutt and Greech remain behind. The dragonborn transforms into a tyrannosaurus rex to start chewing out his slain father's heart, while Yukkbutt watches on with glee. In the midst of the carnage, both the polymorphed SlakeThirst and Greech notice both of the sleeping ancient's eyes opened, and Greech notices a reflection that is not his own before the eyes shut again, possibly some automatic sleep response. The druid also hears a mechanical grinding. The trio then heads down to the ruins below to inform the others of what they have seen. Mamma Boe flies off to nearby Misthome, and tells them she'll be at her home there if they need a place to gather their thoughts. Vraal reminds the group that they have a potential war with the ogres on their hands, and need to get back on the brutes' tracks across the Plateau. The group then rests the nights, the only disturbance being a massive avian that glides over the ruins but does not appear to be another dragon.

Hathun, Second-Week, Sixth-Day, The Now-Year

After waking, Borrach and Kymyl decide to dimension door back up to the lair briefly to check on the sleeping dragon once more, and investigate the odd occurrence with its eyes. Sure enough, after a brief wait, they notice the strange reflections as the eyes flitter open once more. Kymyl begins to hear some strange clicking and squealing noises from inside the cave, and examines it to find a hatch on one of the dragon's jaws...it turns out that this is not in fact Saurvax, but some sort of false, detailed proxy for the legendary creature. Once he and Borracho get through the hatch, they are stunned to find a strange corridor filled with odd, shining structures and devices similar to others the PCs have come across in the past couple months. They also find four of the weird 'reflections', one of which attacks them with a ray weapon while the others retreat to a ledge on the back of the mountain. The pair are able to drive them off, knocking the shooter unconscious. Greech, meanwhile, thinks they've been gone too long and climbs back up to the cave in a spider form.

After defeating the strange humanoid, Borracho takes it and dimension doors back to the ruins below, where the PCs bind, blindfold and mute it. Kymyl follows the rest to the ledge above, but they seem to have disappeared...for a moment, he notes a strange hum, his hairs standing on end, and then a displacement of the light. A moment later, the sun seems to disappear, replaced by blue sky, only for an instant, and then returns. Greech surprises the monk later, before turning back into half-elf form, and then SlakeThirst and Yukkbutt come up to explore what Borracho has found. Below, Vraal begins to interrogate the strange creature, using tongues. It claims to be a deformed orphan from one of the Ten-Tribes, and would prefer death to captivity. It is also quite snarky and condescending to the PCs, calling them all savages. It claims that it and its friends were just wandering around when they themselves find the strange cavern, and then witnessed the fight outside the false-dragon. Un'Krug recognizes the thing as looking just like the enigmatic bounty hunter Diedeath the Mad which was pursuing Cynjak some weeks ago, only dressed much differently. Vraal also recognizes that it looks like the being on one of the giant engraved panels down in the City of the Carvers.

After searching and looting what weird charts and items they can from the glimmering corridor, the PCs above shatter some of the tubes and cylinders and return to the monastery. They all decide they will go to Misthome and seek answers from some of the scholars there about this strange turn of events.

PCs: Borracho, Flearikz, Greech, Kymyl, SlakeThirst, Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt, Za'ku
XP Rewarded: 2700
Inspiration: --
Renown: All PCs maxed out at 15 with Place-of-Scales.

28th Fire (2/2/18)

Hathun, Second-Week, Fourth-Day, The Now-Year

With the emergence of Greech, Flearikz, Za'ku and Mamma Boe from their cages in the monastery, the tide of the battle swiftly turns, with the last remaining dragonborn cultists and their scaled pets either driven away from the ruins or slain. Borracho clings to life after being healed, and then the group surveys the ruin for any hidden enemies. While several of them are being magically healed, or brought back from unconsciousness, the innocent Place-of-Scales Villagers are set free, and Greech the druid decides to march them down the mountainside to relative safety before setting them back on track to their home village. The PCs learn from a captured guard that Chief Wralasar is probably in the cavern up the wall of the Ayrie from the plateau on which the monastery lies. They recover all their equipment and then set about arming the surviving villagers with bone weaponry that was stolen from their home. Then they decide to rest for a day before risking the cavern, where they suspect Pergeron's handlers are hiding.

Hathun, Second-Week, Fifth-Day, The Now-Year

Using Mamma Boe's magical ladle, the PCs transport themselves up to the cavern and find some torches flickering faintly near the entrance. They decide to leave the guard prisoner hanging by rope form the entrance so he can't go anywhere or alert any of his higher ups. The caverns and corridors beyond are quite large, and after some scouting, Kymyl and Za'ku find out why...the next area is full of glowing green slime and acrid fogs, and also the lair of a huge, misshapen green dragon. As the rest of the party catches up, Slakethirst screams in bloodthirsty recognition of his father...and while there seems to be some faint acknowledgment from the beast, it doesn't seem to be entirely there, so warped and mutated by the glowing green gunk pooled in the center of the room! A battle ensues, with Acidtongue dealing damage with its breath attack, claws and bite, then flying up to safety in the eaves of the cavern when possible; but even though he's able to bring down a good percentage of the party, his disfigurements have neutered his power...he can only take so much alone, and the PCs, through a number of spell attacks, the last of which is delivered by Borracho...destroy the thing.



PCs: Borracho, Flearikz, Kymyl, Mamma Boe, Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt, Za'ku
XP Rewarded: Experience Totals were Reset in this game due to a broadening level spread and disparities between blog-recorded XP and what was on a lot of the character sheets. These have been recorded on the player roster and then the 3800 XP from this session added.
Inspiration: ---
Renown: ---

27th Fire (11/17/17)

Hathun, Second-Week, Fourth-Day, The Now-Year

After their narrow victory in the tunnel below the Ayrie, the PCs rest and heal from the mortal wounds so many of them suffered. They backtrack a little to search the giant's hovel below for anything of use, and then decide to press upward and onward. Soon after, they discover that the tunnel has been blocked off with a large mass of stone rubble, which requires a great long time and some magical assistance. Once through, they pass the rest of the tunnel uneventfully, eventually arriving at daylight. A sole dragonborn guard and its pet drake are guarding the tunnel, but the mighty Slakethirst bears a disguise and cons him into thinking he has taken the non-dragonborn prisoners for the cult. They pass by the poor scaly sucker, though his drake does seem a little less trusting.

Within one of the small pyramids among the green dragon cult's ruined monastery, the Misthome adventurers continue to stay imprisoned. Guards arrive and drag off the elf Flearikz, taunting the others in the process, while the neighboring cells are full of nervous chatter from the captives from Place-of-Scales. When a ruckuss breaks out at the monastery's walls, the two guards move to the entrance of the structure's dungeon, giving these heroes their chance to break out. And true enough, the main body of PCs has breached the outer wall of the ruin, alerting the green dragon cultists within, including the young dragon itself, Pergeron and Mosshe the Markswyrm. A frenetic and violent battle breaks out, with the chained and malnourished dragonborn prisoners staring on in shock and desperation...

The PCs take a hammering, but through a mixture of might and magic they manage to bring down most of the ground guards and their pets, even Pergeron eventually falls. By this point, the PCs held captive have now managed to break free and take on their two guards with nary but their skills, spells and bare hands, and they have grabbed their weapons and begun to fight out in the monastery. After a grueling trial, Borracho manages to let loose the final spell to bring the young green dragon crashing, before he is himself laid low by the drake guard-dogs. As the two groups of PCs, one recently liberated and fresh for battle, and the other weary and largely unconscious, the dwarf bard clings on desperately for life...a contest which will only be determined by the roll of a die...

PCs: Borracho, Greech, Kymyl, Mamma Boe, SlakeThirst, Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt, Za'ku
XP Rewarded: 3200 (though XP reset is coming up)
Inspiration: ---
Renown: The Ten-Tribes (a point), Place-of-Scales (5 points)

26th Fire (9/29/17)

Hathun, Second-Week, Fourth-Day, The Now-Year

A younger green dragon carries a dragonborn up to the mountainside monastery, and then tears her apart to make an example to the other Place-of-Scales prisoners. Among them is a quartet of Misthome-based adventurers, including Flearikz, Greech, Mamma Boe and Za'ku, who were captured by the green dragonborn ascendants some time ago. All recoil in horror at the grisly feast, fearing what might become of them next.

Backtrack, one day prior: Kymyl scales the stalactite that exits the City of the Carvers to the mountainside above, and proceeds along the path that his companions' blazed before him. He finds the mysterious dome, the broken automaton, and other signs as he tracks them across the mountain trail and to the waterfall, which he deftly begins to ascend. Above, Slakethirst and Borracho have finally finished their aerial scouting mission, when they notice the lone monk's climb, and swoop down to assist him. The three press on through the trampled jungle plateau, discovering Nexos and his sister's remains. After a brief conversation, the handsome lad decides he should leave with whatever he can salvage of her. The trio of PCs then discover the bodies above...and the stone lean-to which leads to the tunnel into the Ayrie...

The battle within the tunnel is joined by a group of dragonborn ascendant berserkers, sorcerers and trained drake pets, and it gets brutal quickly, with the sorcerers weaving magic to hinder the half-orc brothers and their companions, and the melee combatants beginning to take chunks out of them. The dragonborn escapee Noogal is taken down after valiantly standing her ground for as long as possible, but there is new hope when, unbeknownst to Yukkbutt, Un'krug and Vraal, their struggle has been heard further down the tunnel.

Meanwhile, the quartet of adventurers are forced into a pit fight against four dragonborn from the Place-of-Scales, presumably to convert them into bloodthirsty ascendants. However, they have met their match and are quickly disarmed by the veterans, even without their regular equipment! The green dragon observer is quite amused, and realizes it can use these 'guests' to further his cause, and potentially force a large conversion rate to serve his master Saurvax. The group is marched back to its cell below the monastery grounds.

At last, SlakeThirst, Borracho and Kymyl arrive to assist their allies in the tunnel brawl, and nearly too late, as they are overwhelmed and swarmed by the tactics and ferocity of the ascendant and their pets. But they don't simply lie down and die, rushing further in to face off against the casters, and are only finished off through a desperate combination of healing and self-sacrifice by the heroes. As the last of the dragonborn berserkers falls, the reality dawns upon the party of how beaten down they have come, how uncertain their near future, as their numbers are so greatly diminished...

PCs: Borracho, Flearikz, Greech, Kymyl, Mamma Boe, SlakeThirst, Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt, Za'ku
XP Rewarded: 3800
Inspiration: ---
Renown: ---

25th Fire (8/18/17)

Hathun, Second-Week, Fourth Day, the Now Year

The PCs begin to hike further up the Ayrie, arriving at a rocky area pocked with cavern entrances and overgrown vegetation. Within one of the caverns, two dragonborn have been hiding, after escaping from Pergeron's cultists with the held of the witch Shaul Lutrang. She was slain during the escape, but her two charges, Hogarth and Noogal, managed to eke out shelter and some weapons. Slakethirst is hesitant to believe the pair, thinking they might be a trap sent by Pergeron, but they prove their story the best they can, and win the trust of the party. The group travels further north, until the mountain hits a steep incline and they have to climb ledges through a waterfall to traverse any higher. Slakethirst air-lifts Borracho up to scout ahead, disappearing from the party.

After the grueling trial up the waterfall, led by Yukkbutt (who finds a jeweled grappling hook in the process), the PCs arrive in a misty, small, dense jungle plateau, in which they find several trampled paths and an abundance of wildlife. After traveling another quarter or half mile through the vegetation, they arrive at a shabby stone lean-to which serves as the home to a strange mountain giant and her massive, quadroped dinosaur pet. Unable to communicate with these creatures, she and the beast decide they must be snacks, and a melee ensues, with Nexa and the giant exchanging ranged attacks, and the rest of the party closing in. Cynjak and Nahar are laid out a number of times by the pairs' massive clubbing and stomping, only to have Vraal standby to revive them, and the fight is eventually turned against the mammoths...first, the giant falls, then her enraged companion. However, through the fight, Vraal and others have noticed that several winged enemies, possibly of Pergeron's cult, are circling above, noticing the clamor below...

Then Nexa fires off a spell at one of these winged creatures...a dragon! It in turn dives and breathes a poison cloud over most of the already-weakened party, killing Nahar outright and taking down the other paladin and Hogarth, one of the new dragonborn to join the party. Nexa runs off, terrified at the damage she has caused, while the half-orc barbarians, Noogal the dragonborn and Vraal all make a path straight for the giantess' shelter. Within, they find a cavernous slope that seems to lead up to the next shelf of the Ayrie, on which the dragonborn refugees are apparently being imprisoned. Outside, the green dragon lands and rends the corpses of the paladins to pieces, also snatching up the ailing Hogarth and taking her off to the monastery for a later snack... Nexa exchanges fire with the two winged dragonborn (the other two flying shapes), and they eventually bring her down with witch bolts and proceed to devour her corpse, in a grim twist of irony!

Racing up the slope, the four survivors halt in the darkness when they hear the sound of a small force of drakes and dragonborn berserkers bearing down upon them. Vraal uses as much healing as he can before the inevitable confrontation...

PCs: Cynjak, Hogarth, Nahar, Nexa, Noogal (NPC), Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt
XP rewarded: 1900
Inspiration rewarded: ---
Renown: ---

24th Fire (7/28/17)

Hathun, Second-Week, Third-Day, the Now Year

As Nahar and Barnowl scramble up the rope to the Carvers' stalactite exit route, the paladin slips and plunges into the darkness of the city below. Nexos strikes off to look for him, while Slakethirst flies near the top of the rope to provide cover for his friends. Once Barnowl gets up the rope, a few of his allies slowly start making their way up after him, but at a normal pace. The mercenary is pressed on all sides by a wave of horrid aberrations, gricks and grells and some sort of super-grick, and he is quickly overwhelmed and left unconscious while the melee is joined. The creatures' climbing and flight abilities give them a heavy advantage in this terrain, plus there is an invisible, cackling wild card flinging spells randomly at our heroes!

At one point, Borracho is mentally compelled by magic to flee, and uses his feather fall to get away from the fighting up on the stalactite, then attempting to himself suggest to Cynjak and Nexa that they should also depart the battle. Upset, the sorceress flings a lightning bolt at one of the grells above, making sure it also slams the dwarf in the face! Bewildered, he doesn't retaliate, unsure of why she doesn't see the sense in his actions. Above, the PCs finally manage to get a hand on the melee against the aberrations, making their way through them and eventually taking down the larger grick and remaining grells, one of which had flown low...but not before Slakethirst has been knocked down onto the stalactite, also unconscious and playing the death game! Nahar manages to rejoin the fight right before its end, offering some added melee power.

Alas, Barnowl doesn't survive the bleed-out...but the dragonborn warlock gets lucky in the nick of time. The PCs briefly curse and mourn, and the party members below make their way up, trying not to slip on the brains, guts and tentacles strewn about the battle site. Yukkbutt claims the large grick's beak for himself, to strap on as an impromptu helmet. Vraal discovers that a robe covered in eye-like patterns has been left behind for the PCs, with a note inside on parchment that reads 'IRONY' in the Dwarf tongue. The heroes make their way further up the stalactite, to emerge in a half-eggshell shaped dome on the mountains surface above. More scenes are carved into the walls of this area, like the mosaics below in the city, but seem to depict a normal skyline, with dragons and hawks, sun and moons, clouds and stars. From outside, Cynjak hears an unusual, slight grinding sound, and when she looks outside, sees something moving slowly about the structure in a semi-regular pattern.

Hathun, Second-Week, Fourth Day, the Now Year

Once morning arrives, the party investigates the moving object, which appears to be a slim stone automaton wielding an ancient bronze bell, part of which is destroyed. As they approach, Yukkbutt gets the idea to attack it with one of the animals from his bag of tricks, and a bear appears, moving to maul the unfortunate construct. Once it realizes its not food, it doesn't know what to do, so the half-orc moves up and dismantles the automaton, and Cynjak mercifully smashes up whatever parts of it are still moving. Mend is cast upon the bell, and then Vraal tolls it, causes a reverberation in the dome they slept under, and then a massive booming in the city beneath, which shakes the mountainside a bit before stopping. The PCs then decide to scale a path heading further up the Ayrie.

PCs: Barnowl, Borracho, Cynjak, Nexa, Slakethirst, Un'Krug, Vraal, Yukkbutt
XP rewarded: 2750
Inspiration rewarded: ---
Renown: ---