The Return: Session #25
General Summary
The heroes considered their options on what to do next.
Bartuk harnessed the divine forces to find Bellflower Sparkleweather in hopes she might be able to help Kurdan, and he received this message:
Thirty seven nights from now
Drown your fears and your breathe
Where striped steed was broken
Recalling their boar hunting trip with Aldern Foxglove, they knew where they must go when the time was right.
In hopes of saving their kidnapped neighbors and friends, the heroes headed to Harcourt to seek help from the Stevadors, and found the capital city filled with scared and hungry refugees. From the descriptions from one refugee, it sounded as if Oppoloppo was harvesting people from across the country.
The heroes bluffed their way into a meeting with Kesi Throm, but found the leader of the Stevadors in a foul mood. She had made a deal with the Amir of Kaduna that the country would seize any airships and hand them to the Stevadors in exchange for heavily discounted transport during an emergency. This started with helping to provide for the Amir's upcoming wedding, it has now taken over the Stevador's everyday business in transporting Kaduna's troops around the country.
Promising their mission may help end the current attacks causing Kaduna's woes, the heroes convinced Kesi to let them hire their smallest ship: The Merry Legacy with its swashbuckling captain, Henphar Vallen. Tiny Tymm and Vallen immediately started flirting with each other as Kesi made it clear that her crew and ship would not endanger itself with battle.
Bartuk made arrangements for some masterwork armor to be made, and the heroes were off to the Dimland mountains.
Being the middle of the night, it was easy for the heroes to find the Jorgenfist fortress. Surrounded by seven camps of stone giants with large bonfires blazing, the home of Mokmurian was brightly lit. Jorgenfist was a walled fort with three large buildings and a giant runewell inside. Outside, well over a hundred stone giants lingered about. They had ogre slaves and even some of the half-lion folk were present in their ranks.
While watching the fort, the heroes witnessed Longtooth returning from a flight. They located his lair, and decided that would be their best route into the fort.
The Merry Legacy left them in the dark of night, and the heroes snuck their way over Longtooth's lair. With Kurdan's boots, he was able to help the others down to the entrance. They found a carpet of bones ahead of them and a discarded leather item. Bartuk's sharp eyes also found a fresh trail of blood leading into the cavern.
The found Longtooth aware of their presence, but wounded. He was under some sort of enchantment that kept the wounds from healing. Angry and bitter from his fate, he offered no opposition to the party using his lair to get behind the walls of the fort. They looked to potentially dispel Longtooth's enchantment, but found it was of incredible power.
Inside the fort, they found two large wooden buildings, the giant runewell, and a strange building that looked like a rhino horn bursting from the earth.
Before they could explore, two stone giants came out... but one recognized the heroes before an altercation erupted. It was Hannah Velerin, the kidnapped midwife of Barrowmista. She had disappeared some time ago, and confirmed it was by the forces of Karzoug to build up his army. As most of the stone giants come from farmers and such, her healing skills made her an important person in Mokmurian's forces and an unofficial leader.
The heroes admitted to being there to kill Mokmurian, and Hannah admitted it was the ideal time. Mokmurian had promised his growing army wealth and slaves, but the losses from the raid on Barrowmista had many of his followers doubting his lead.
Hannah pointed them to the horn-shaped building, "the library", but warned that Mokmurian had been slaughtering non-Shung slaves on the door to open them. Kurdan took the chance that it would take a lesser sacrifice and used his own blood to open the way into the strange building.
Inside the library, they found a room much larger than the building. While there were exits, the walls of the building appeared to be resisting their very existence stretching to an infinite plane when not looked at directly. It was unclear if it was the nature of the room or a magical trap set off, but a warm glow covered the heroes and Tiny Tymm and Kurdan found themselves shrinking until they were only two feet tall.
At the same time, an undead stone giant with glowing runes stumble into the room to attack. The creature proved incredibly powerful and had an aura of death that sapped the life from those around it. Additionally, Kurdan's petite nature left him doing less damage regardless of his critical strikes. They eventually wore the giant zombie down, and Bartuk was able to dispel the shrinkage of his friends.
A side room was a magical laboratory where Mokmurian created the zombie. Other stone giant bodies were present. Tiny Tymm animated one and the heroes dismembered the other bodies so that they could not be animated against them.
The next room proved to be the library itself. A long warehouse room with countless rows of bookshelves and ancient rotting books. In the center of the room was a circular desk hosting a mechanical creature working to repair books. The heroes sent their animated stone giant, Cletus, forward to see if it would attack, but after saying something to the zombie... it went back to work. Tiny Tymm ordered Cletus to embrace the librarian so it could not see and raise an alarm, but little did they know that Mokmurian was already in the room; he was flying invisibly above them.
The evil wizard animated the bookshelves and created a giant worm of broken wood and paper to attack the heroes. The gargantuan creature surged forward, crushing the librarian, and attackin the heroes with devastating attacks. It swallowed Kurdan whole and lashed at Bartuk with a tail.
Tiny Tymm created a devastating wall of fire that did incredible damage to the worm, but the fire also caused the worm to burst into flames... making it even more dangerous. Bartuk turned into a giant crocodile, latching onto the worm, restraining it so it could not escape the flames.
As the battle continued, the ground beneath Tiny Tymm and Bartuk turned to a deep mud... and later solidified, entrapping Bartuk. Tiny Tymm escaped the mud only to also be swallowed by the giant worm.
Mokmurian thought he had the battle in had, dropped his invisibility and attacked the wounded heroes, but he underestimated them. With the worm shortly dispatched, the stone giant wizard wasn't able to handle the their combined assault. He fled the battle towards the front of the building. The heroes followed and found him in the first room with a dozen stone giants waiting behind him.
The wounded Mokmurian ordered the giants to attack, but they met his commands with open disgust. Finding their leader running from the "short" heroes was the final straw, and they turned against him. Hannah stepped forward to make it clear his time was done.
In panic, Mokmurian prepared to cast some spell, but his body went rigid as the Runelord Karzoug took over his body and began to taunt the heroes. He bragged he would soon return to the world and with his army in some place called Xin-Shalast. He was going on with his insults when Bartuk silenced the area. Outraged, the body of Mokmurian died and Karzoug's influence disappeared.
Hannah ordered the giants present to spread the news that Mokmurian was dead, and they would meet soon to talk. She kindly suggested to the heroes it would be best if they left, but the heroes had one final place to explore... Mokmurian's private chambers.
Missions/Quests Completed
The heroes killed the Runelord Karzoug's primary agent in the world, the stone giant wizard Mokmurian.
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