The Storm and the Faithful

The faith of the Kisjan is shaken. Can they really trust Sventisko ? She's decided to place her faith in her friends and invites them to join her as she leaves Ioth Academy and meet with the Eluitholel, her contacts on the outside.

Running this Adventure

Everyone who is going down to the refugee settlement is in the same group.
During each phase, you will need to come up with a solution to a challenge, then roll a skill check or use an item/spell/class feature.
If you fail on one of these checks, you may have to roll to see what happens.
You may help your friends out. However, if you help your friend by granting them advantage or making a skill check on their behalf, and you still fail, BOTH of you must roll for consequences.
For example, if Sventisko rolls an Athetlics check to climb down the spire and fails, the failure for that challenge says she takes 2d6 falling damage. If you decide to help her by rolling a Dexterity Saving Throw to catch her, and you fail, you also take 2d6 falling damage.
Some challenges involving rolling on the encounter table. Roll once for each group. You can travel as a single group and make a single roll, or split up.

Plot points/Scenes

Challenge 1: Escaping the School.

It's time once again to sneak out of your chapterhouse and escape the ring. Figure out a way to get out of the school. Describe your plan (are you sneaking out? Lying to caretakers? Climbing out a window? Casting a spell?)
Make a skill check DC 12, or cast a spell/use a magic item.

• Success: No complications, you get out of The Ring without difficulty.
• Failure: If any member of your group fails, your group must roll on the Ring Encounters table. For each student who fails, you must add +1 to your roll

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RING ENCOUNTER TABLE

1d8 + 1d12	Encounter
2	A sleazy sixth-year selling illicit substances to students
3	1d3 Satyrs looking to cause trouble
4	A perfectly normal shrub (Awakened Shrub hiding from being replanted)
5	Two students desperately chasing after an escaped dust mephit
6	1d4 Invisible Pixies
7	Two suites of Animated Armor patrolling and reporting students out of position.
8	A student who's been polymorphed into a chicken. Help them?
9	A worrisome caretaker who wants you back in bed
10	A non-Kisjan community character
11	1d2 Wardens on Patrol
12	Two students making out in secret
13	A non-Kisjan community character
14	Boggle Grease. If you slip and fall, it could attract attention
15	1d4 Boggles. Happy Boggle Day!
16	1d4 monodrones wandering around, having escaped from an artificers lab
17	3d6 frogs. Explanation unknown.
18	Extremely suspicious caretakers
19	A box of 1 dozen starving crazed weasels
20	1d4 Wardens who are not taking any nonsense.

Challenge 2: Reach the Undercroft

The Ring hovers thousands of feet above the Undercroft. Getting there will require flying/falling magic, avoiding Wardens and Caretakers on the floating paths down, perilously climbing the Spire, or something even more creative.
Athletic/Physical checks to make the climb are DC 13.

• Success: You reach the Undercroft without complications.
• Failure: You slip and fall. A friend can catch you with a DC 13 Dexterity save. On a failure, you BOTH fall 10-40 feet. Roll 1d4 and take that many d6 falling damage.

Deception/Charisma/Stealth checks to sneak down are DC 13.
At the end of this phase, the whole group must roll on the Ioth Academy Encounters table, unless all of you climbed down the spire/otherwise avoided traffic.

• Success: Well done! Subtract -1 from the Ioth Academy Encounters roll.
• Failure: You attracted attention. Add +1 to the Ioth Academy Encounters roll.

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Ioth Academy Encounters Table 1d8+1d12Encounter 2

Dropped Scroll -- gain a Level 2 Spell Scroll[
3	Dropped treasure -- gain a Potion of Healing
4	Beautiful Vista -- gain Inspiration
5	Shortcut -- Gain advantage on your next skill check
6	1d3 Satyrs looking to cause some trouble
7	1d6 Suspicious Sprites (they'll try to knock you unconscious)
8	2d6 First Years being escorted by 1d3+1 caretakers
9	2d6 Second Years being escorted by 1d4+1 caretakers
10	Lost! Roll a DC 13 check to become unlost, or lose an hour and roll again.
11	1d6 Distracted caretakers
12	1d4 Wardens on patrol
13	1d4 Pixies looking to cause chaos
14	A graduate Mage on their way to the Towers of Wizardry
15	A patrol of 1d6 Wardens keeping watch
16	1d2 Mages on their way to the Cove with 2d3 Caretakers
17	1d6 Wardens and a dokkalfar Mage investigating infernal activity
18	1d3 Teachers (Mages) with 2d4 Apprentice Wizards.
19	A bronthan Priest and 2d4 Guards on a diplomatic mission from Brontha
20	An Archmage on their way to an important meeting

Challenge 3: The Undercroft Itself

The area beneath Ioth Academy is filled with alchemical runoff and discarded experiments, and recently it's been more dangerous than ever. You'll need all your wits to survive.
Find a way to navigate through the Undercroft. You may use Alchemical Tools proficiency, Survival, or any other skill you can think of (DC 14). If you use up a consumable resources or have special gear for this, you may gain advantage on this check.
At the end of this phase, the whole group rolls on Ioth Academy Encounters (below).

• Success: You make your way through the Undercroft to the Golden Sphere! Subtract -1 from the Undercroft Encounters roll result.
• Failure: Roll on the Undercroft encounters table. Add +1 to this roll for each failure in the party.

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UNDERCROFT ENCOUNTERS

1d8+1d12	Encounter
2-	Fey Crossing -- You've discovered a breach that leads to the Otherworld.
3	Find a discarded common or uncommon potion
4	Stumble across a mysterious mushroom.
5	1d3 satyrs looking to party
6	1d4 Suspicious Sprites
7	1d4 Pesky Pixies
8	Dancing Lights, roll DC 12 Wisdom save or be led astray (lose an hour, roll again)
9	Quicksand. DC 8 Survival or passive Perception 8 to notice. Sink 1d4+1 feet per round (DC 10 + Feet Sunk Strength to remove)
10	Grasping vines. Roll strength DC 11 or be restrained. If you fail three saves, another encounter occurs.
11	Noxious Fumes, as Stinking Cloud, DC 12, take 1d6 poison each failure
12	Explosive Fumes: Until you leave the undercroft, any fire explodes (2d8 fire, DC 11 Dex half)
13	Shrinking Fumes, roll DC 12 Constitution or shrunk per Enlarge/Reduce for 1 hour.
14	Encounter 1d3 Insect Swarms
15	1d4+1 redcaps
16	1d4 Gray Oozes
17	1 Ochre Jelly
18	Unstable Magic (roll on the Wild Magic Table in the Player's Handbook)
19	You are hunted by a yeth hound
20+	A Green Hag appears and tries to eat you (50%) or a beautiful seelie fey attempts to enchant you (50%)

Challenge 4: Breaching the Sphere.

Don't read this spoiler text until you've all reached this scene!

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Watching left and right as if suspicious of spies, Sventisko slowly removes a dragon's tooth from her cloak. It's embellished with copper filligree and ensconced with rubies. There's a stopper in the top of it--the tooth has been hollowed out and turned into a vial. She whispers a phrase in draconic: "Irral vur janikupilti!" and removes the stopper. Shimmering blood flows out into the air, the blood of dragons, and weaves itself through the air like crimson thread into a complex, living pattern of runes. The runes boil mid air as they flow into the Golden Sphere, slowly working their way into the surface of the sphere. It ripples and parts like flowing liquid honey or slowly melting glass, and in a few seconds the glowing blood parts a small hole in the Sphere. Sventisko gestures for the Kisjan to follow her through it quickly, ready to withdraw the blood into its flask again when the last ally is through.

Intelligence (Arcana) DC 12

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This magic blood isn't piercing this enchantment, it's just causing the sphere to flow around it. It's definitely made from dragons blood but likely has some other ingredients as well. The flask is enchanted to refuse to open if you don't know the keyphrase.

Intelligence (Arcana) DC 16

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The enchantments on this blood are incredibly powerful. The rune that it formed was derived from Ioth's own unique runes (your character may never have encountered them and thus may not be able to identify them).

Intelligence (Arcana) DC 20

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In addition to draconic energy, this enchantment that bypasses the sphere also employs a mysterious, poorly understood type of energy called Shadow Magic. It's practiced by recluses and outcasts, and relies on the contrast between sources of energy and the Hungry Dark, or void.

Wisdom (Insight) DC 16

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Sventisko is defensive about this magic, but doesn't actually understand too much about it.

Charisma (Persuasion) DC 13

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Kepesk, Sventisko's contact in town, gave her this magic vial in her second year, when she started helping the Eluitholel and set the roots of what would become the Kisjan. She's used it to enter and exit the Sphere ever since. It doesn't cut a hole in the sphere, it just wraps it around itself, so nobody notices.

Charisma (Persuasion) DC 15

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After a traumatic dream in her first year, Sventisko was unhappy with her life at Ioth Academy. She wanted to do more for the outside world. Near the end of that year, she met Kepesk when he was meeting with the Academy to demand more medical aid and infrastructure assistance from the wizards of the academy. When they spoke together, he hinted at the existence of the Eluitholel outside, and of their work. She was determined to get involved and the next year, they met again and she told him she wanted in.

Challenge 5: The Refugee Settlement

The Wrath of Boreas left a mark on the settlement outside the Academy. Repairs are still underway, tensions are high, morale is wavering. Sventisko knows the way but that doesn't mean there won't be trouble along the way.
Describe how your character helps avoid trouble and navigate the debris and twisting alleyways of the refugee settlement (DC 12).

• Success: You help the party avoid trouble. Subtract one from the Refugee Encounters roll.
• Failure: You get the party into more trouble. Add one to the Refugee Encounters roll.

When all players have made their rolls, roll on the Refugee Encounters table, modifying it based on the results of your rolls (see above).

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REFUGEE SETTLEMENT

1d8+1d12	Encounter
2	You find a random trinket--roll on the TRINKETS table in the Players Handbook
3	1d4+2 Bullies (use COMMONER stats) are antagonizing another COMMONER.
4	A young urchin who dreams of being a mage latches on to the party
5	An academy MAGE and 1d4+1 WARDENS patrol the town
6	3d4 GOBLINS working for BIG GOB sneak up and attempt to rob or pickpocket you
7	A stumbling drunk is so loud, he could give your position away.
8	A thief (use stats for a SPY) sneaks up and attempts to pickpocket one of the party
9	1d4 Vutazon Loyalist Thugs are angry with anyone associated with the academy
10	A funeral service for someone lost in the attack
11	A hungry refugee needs food
12	An injured refugee needs medical assistance
13	A friendly refugee recognizes someone who helped earlier, and offers aid.
14	1d4 Bronthan Loyalist Thugs confront anyone they think is suspicious
15	A FIRE breaks out nearby! Do you intervene to assist?
16	A group of Vutazon loyalists protests against a MAGE and 1d4+1 WARDENS. Rocks are thrown
17	A brawl between 1d4+1 Vutzaon Loyalists (THUGS) and 1d4+1 Bronthan Loyalists (THUGS)
18	You stumble across someone who's been stabbed and is dying.
19	Stampede! 3d4 CAMELS are running through the streets. Don't get trampled!
20	a GOBLIN BOSS and 1d4+2 goblins ambush our heroes and try to abduct them!

Challenge 6: Kepesk

Read this spoiler text when the entire party has completed Challenge 5!
Show Spoiler

At last you duck into the bottom of a precarious stack of tenements near a cobblestone square with an empty fountain at its center. Inside past two curtains and several human and dragonborn guards, Sventisko eagerly introduces you to KEPESK. An grim blue dragonborn missing several fingers, Kepesk hums to himself in a raspy, reptilian voice.
Sventisko introduces each of you, unless you don't want your names given away, and speaks firmly about your dedication to the world. She highlights all the work you did during the Wrath of Boreas, saving townsfolk, installing safety measures, rallying the community.
She then looks to the rest of the group for some guidance. She brought you here to introduce you, and to ask for help getting through the Prismatic Wall in Ioth's office. How much do you want to tell him, and what questions do you have for him?

It's time to choose:
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WHEN YOU REACH THIS POINT, DISCUSS AS A GROUP. COME UP WITH A LIST OF QUESTIONS (no more than one question per party member) FOR KEPESK, AND DECIDE WHAT YOU WANT TO TELL HIM IN ORDER TO GET THE MAGIC HELP TO BREAK INTO IOTH'S OFFICE

Challenge 7: Returning Home

Congratulations! Now you get to do the whole thing in reverse.
Revisit challenges 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1. If you roll for an encounter that's already occurred, you can reroll it.

Challenge 8: The Kisjan's Choice.

Decide among yourselves who will be your leader, and what the future of the Kisjan holds.

Parent Plot

The First Seven Years

Related Characters

• Sventisko Gneshgnesh di Bothotlo

Related Organizations

• Kisjan

Related Locations

• Ioth Academy