Session 31: Lightningbound Fortune

General Summary

Having finally gathered themselves from the battle with the blue dragon and his pirates. With the captain calling for immediate repairs of the ship, Nakor and Jeanne fetched the sail of the sinking pirate ship and searched it for other valuables. In the meantime, Conn aided in the repairs. As soon as they were ready to leave, they noticed that the storm above them had calmed. When they surfaced they noticed that the nearby coastal villages and plantations where they had previously seen people, were completely and utterly destroyed. They had been turned into charred and smoking heaps and no one seemed to have been left alive.    The party continued onwards back to Harasan. When they arrived they noticed that people had been gathered at the Emir's fort. Making their way inside they found a gathering of adventurers and the Emyr's council, as well as Aledain. They seemed to interrupt Aledein as he told them all what he saw of the battle from his telescope. It seemed that all of them thought the party to be dead. A fact that Jeanne pointed out to have been greatly exaggerated. As they confirmed what Aledain had told, except for the details of the slaughtering of the villages, which they did not witness.   When they had presented the sails of the pirate ship and collected their reward, they were asked to stay and listen to a new quest. After learning that the storm was the cause of a Blue Dragon, the Emir and the Eternal League needed to see this creature slain before it came for Harasan. With no time to send for a big military operation, they needed to at least see the dragon distracted for some time. Thus they needed adventurers willing to undertake such a task with haste. The first to volunteer was Aledain Al Ashbehein, the excentric collector who stood adamant in the fact that he had a plan for dealing with the dragon. He was appointed leader of this expedition but his ability to persuade others was less than stellar. Jeanne and Conn were also reluctant, but the righteous Nakor was determined. He was even angered to the point of going angelic when adventurers walked away from the meeting. In the end, 13 adventurers stayed to join Aledain's expedition. One of them was a pale man with grey skin who introduced himself as Um. They were told that they would depart the next morning.   The party went to the ship, except Nakor who first procured some potions that would help them stave off electrical attacks. Um went back to the tavern he had been staying it. After a lot of convincing and Conn being persuaded by the allure of the treasures that Aledain had promised would be present, the group decided to join the quest. The next morning they went to the outskirts of town, as they went they passed people packing up to leave Harasan. When they reached the decided place they saw that only three half-orcs and four dwarves had shown up. And of course Um and Aledain. They were in the process of backing some camels. As Aledain ensured them that this would still be enough, they soon left. The party also noticed that Um seemed to have had a hard night since he now looked almost ten years older than the previous day.    After traveling for almost an entire day, the group made it to the villages that had been destroyed. After traveling through the ashen landscape for a while they were halted by Nakor and Um who spotted a large blue figure moving amongst the ruined buildings. They were then confronted by a blue-haired elf. The elf introduced himself as the servant and son of the blue dragon Nolvenak. He proclaimed this territory to be the domain of his father and that they needed to leave or be killed. After some masterful diplomacy by Jeanne, the group managed to get an audience with Nolvenak. The dragon then took on his form and left, but as he did Conn uttered an insult, and to prove the seriousness of the situation the son came down and grabbed one of the dwarves. They never saw him again.    After traveling for the rest of the day, they reached the northmost river of the Yelanids and decided to spend the night there. During the night Um did his best to not scream as he was forcefully aged another twenty years. The next morning he was confronted about this fact and it turned out that he was cursed by the god Kronos, whom he used to serve. Every night he is aged either up or down, seemingly at random.    Traveling into the storm on the other side of the river, the party braved the lightning strikes for hours until they reached a tower, which seemed to be in the eye of the storm. Before approaching the tower they asked Aledain what his plan was. It turned out that he was in possesion of a powerful artifact of pure necrotic energy, which could be used to hopefully kill the dragon. Chocked by this they asked how, and he explained that he needed time to use it properly, a minute to be exact. The party thus needed to distract the dragon for up to a minute for him. Inside the tower, they were welcomed by the dragonborn who seemed to be extremely resentful towards them. They also noticed that he was now severely scarred, and not from their battle with him.    They were led down some stairs and ended up in a cavernous room filled with treasure. There they saw the huge blue dragon Nolvenak, as well as his son. They started to speak with him, mostly Jeanne. These discussions didn't seem to go anywhere though and when Nakor cast a spell to make Aledain invisible, the blue dragonborn who was spying on them from behind revealed their trickery. The battle began.   Nakor took on his angelic visage and began to cast spells, turning Conn into a bronze dragon. Conn then flew to meet the sun who had pounced on the dwarves and instantly killed all three of them with a well-flanked lightning breath. Jeanne took cover in the piles of gold. As the battle carried on, all the three remaining half-orcs also perished and had it not been for the potions brought by Nakor, so would the party. After a lengthy bout, and being brought back to his original form, Conn, Um, and Nakor managed to take the son down. This angered Nolvenak to no end and he began to fight with even more fury. Taking down Nakor, Conn, and Um. But with teamwork, and a lot of luck they managed to not only stay alive but to actually harm the dragon. Not nearly enough to be fatal though, but enough for it to be weakened, and when Aledain finally finished is invocation the ray of necrotic energy overwhelmed the dragon and it fell dead to the ground.