Kingdom on the Brink - Session 22

General Summary

The party short rested and Vogs, the chieftain, asked them to protect their sacred grounds while Vogs and Sukba go and gather the rest of the kobolds to meet them there. The group follows the river and Stormsong sees a group of three humans and tries to wave to them, Runsha sees what's about to happen and stops her, but the party is seen and begins to attack. The gladiator and the dirty fighter and begin to move up and take evasive maneuvers, Oneiro uses his ring of water walking to walk out to a rock in the middle of the river and begins to fire a volley of arrows. The party moves up and Del Varis engages the dirty fighter, The conjurer moves behind a tree and summons an air elemental over the river, Ashara moves to engage the air elemental and then moves back to Runsha's aura. The air elemental flew towards Oneiro and engulfed him in a whirlwind, slamming him against a rock. The conjurer throws a fireball at Hendred, Ashara, and Runsha. The party starts to focus on the elemental, Hendred focuses her energy and casts control water, causing a 100 ft wave to come crashing down on the gladiator and conjurer, the Gladiator manages to stay standing but the conjurer gets knocked over and lost concentration causing the elemental to disappear. Ashara sprints up with her boots of speed, provoking an attack of opportunity from the dirty fighter, and emplaces herself in the way of the gladiator. Oneiro fires a grasping shot at the gladiator, which reduced his movement, Del Varis and Artimus finish off the dirty fighter and Runsha starts to move up to the gladiator. The gladiator attempts to remove the grasping shot, but fails, then tries to engage Ashara but between the difficult terrain of the water and the reduced movement he comes up short. Stormsong hurls several firebolts at the gladiator, the conjurer stands up and sees the situation has drastically changed and begins to teleport away, Ashara sees the rest of the party has the situation handled and begins to chase the conjurer. Oneiro shouts "take him alive", referring to the gladiator and fires another volley at him, Del Varis moves up and stuns the gladiator and Runsha begins to tie him up, Hendred and Stormsong move up to help, Del Varis punches the gladiator once more for good measure (attempted another stun but fails). Oneiro runs by on the river and tosses some manacles up to the party and continues on to help Ashara, Runsha attaches the manacles to the gladiator, and Artimus also runs to help Ashara. The group begins to interrogate the gladiator, Stormsong emphasizes that Runsha could eat him if he doesn't cooperate while menacingly resting her blade on his shoulders. Runsha finds out that a noble paid a large sum upfront with the promise of a bonus upon completion of the task, he also finds out the size of the group ahead and that they are more highly skilled, insight tells the party he's being sincere. They strip him of all his equipment and shoes and begin to tie him to a tree.

While the interrogation is going on Ashara starts to catch up to the teleporting conjurer and takes out a chunk of them with her greatsword, the conjurer (being out of tricks) decides to drop a 4th level fireball at their feet, killing the conjurer. Ashara sighs and begins to drag the corpse back, Artimus catches up and orders his skeletons to take the corpse and begins to mend Ashara's burnt clothing. Ashara returns to see the group tying the gladiator to the tree, she exclaims she is tired of fighting the living and wants to strike a deal. She tells the gladiator she will pay him to go to Strongfare and tell his associates about the army of the dead that is coming this way, showing him Artimus's skeletons and the portable hole full of gold. Runsha writes a letter giving official authorization from house Valerous to fund the mission, stating that any inquiries should go through Runsha, not his father. The gladiator is released and the party decides to press on and negotiate with the mercenaries at the sacred grounds, Del Varis slips away from the group.

The group finds the sacred grounds and sees 3 casters, a dirty fighter, an archer, and a fighter wielding a glaive, they're standing before a giant dragon skeleton. Oneiro and Ashara approach them, in a way that shows they don't want to fight. The diviner approached the group and asked what they want, Ashara tells them that an army of the dead were coming and that what they were doing was to their detriment. Oneiro approaches the ledge and sits down, he asks them if they were willing to trade their lives for gold, the diviner says he doesn't see how getting paid now hurts him, it will allow him to leave and go somewhere else and make money. Oneiro points out that he could do that but the dead wouldn't just stop at Bralor but they would continue to spread all over Menorith, the diviner asks why should he care in the here and now, Oneiro turns to Ashara and asks her to describe Kalzoz to the mercenaries, this sends Ashara into a rage and strikes one of the enchanters and combat ensues. The conjurer moves away and attempts to cast a spell, but Artimus counter-spells it, the fighter wielding the glave (Blackguard) moves and engages Runsha, unleashing a critical smite against him. Hendred blinds the conjurer and Ashara kills the enchanter and moves to attack the diviner, the diviner realizes he can't move without provoking more attacks and decides to cast maze on Ashara, banishing her to a maze demiplane. Hendred and the dirty fighter move to engage and Artimus commands his skeletons to help Hendred, Ashara attempts to escape the maze but fails (which causes her rage to stop). Stormsong moves up and casts 4 scorching rays at the diviner, causing him to lose concentration on the maze and released Ashara, she then quickens a firebolt and launches it at the blackguard, Oneiro turns his attention to the diviner and sends an arrow which causes his body to rot away. Runsha (Being exhausted by the previous battles), begins to beat at the blackguard with his warhammer and attempting to knock him back with his shield, taking down a third of it's HP before the blackguard knocks him out. The enemy archer starts to focus his attention at Hendred and the skeletons finish off the dirty fighter, but she is quickly engaged by the blackguard, Artimus finishes off the conjurer and runs over to help Runsha. The diviner, being close to death, sees the tide turning and teleports out of the area, Hendred uses preserve life to restore Runsha, Ashara engages the blackguard but is weakened do to being in the maze. The blackguard turns his attention to Ashara and manages to drop her, but as that happens Runsha attacks him and is able to knock him to the ground, Stormsong sends her cat to the blackguard and casts inflict wounds. The Blackguard whispers to Ashara he's heard of her and will permanently keep her from getting up, he stands up and delivers several blows with the last one separating her head from her body. The party focuses on the blackguard, killing him under their combined might, Oneiro moves up from the side, flanking the archer. The archer sees that they need to retreat and attempts to cover himself while pulling back, but is finally felled by a guiding by Hendred. As this fight was going on Del Varis catches up with the gladiator and kills him, retrieving the letter and gold.

The party collects the dead, placing Ashara next to the dragons skull, Runsha ceremonially prays over the kobolds and asks Sirlith, The wiseto condemn the blackguard. The kobolds make it to the sacred grounds and express their thanks to the party. Hendred looks at the dragon skeleton as it's a perplexing sight and begins to pray, she is given a vision of 9 dragons in a pitched battle, with the silver dragon appearing to be mortally wounded, leaving Hendred in great distress. As the day winds down Vogs and Sukba can be heard arguing. Runsha approaches and sees what was going on, they explain that Sirlith had given them a charge:

One day there might be those that seek to summon the Ancient One's shadow and destroy the anchors that keep it contained,

if that day comes then a group would be sent to be the champions of the 9 dragons.

They will find their way to my resting place, in your hour of need, give them this.

Sukba gives them a piece of parchment written in draconic, it's instructions on how to build an artifact of legendary proportions. Vogs continues his heated discussion with Sukba, saying that their charge is over and that the elf was right, there's much worse out there and they have already suffered much. Sukba counters that they should be doing more now that their charge is complete. Runsha tells Vogs that no matter what he shouldn't be talked down to or made to feel small by anyone, Vogs decides to remove himself but Runsha asks the name of the elf and where they went. Vogs answers with Allisa and to Strongfare. Runsha returns to the kobolds, Artimus casts tiny hut to provide shelter, Oneiro pulls out a dragons chess set and begins to play it next to Ashara, playing her moves as well as his. A storm starts and Stormsong exits the hut and communes with Nyroth, it continues on into the night and starts to die down as dawn draws near, as Oneiro awakes he hears Ashara say checkmate and he smiles. The party packs up, they tell the kobolds they should consider building big walls with many escape tunnels, as the times will be getting darker. They proceed to Strongfare, finding large shanty and tent villages outside the city walls.

It is the morning of the 24th day of Kyzet

Rewards Granted

1800 GP

2 shortswords

spear

Plate mail

Spell scrolls (Summon elemental, stinking cloud)

2 shortbows

Glaive

Plans for a legendary magic item

Missions/Quests Completed

Saved the Kobolds

Character(s) interacted with

Vogs, Kobold Chieftain
Sukba, Kobold Dragon Guard

Report Date

27 Nov 2021

Primary Location

Eastbrook