Session 122 - October 27, 2022 Report
General Summary
1306 - 1st Moon of Spring - Koral (24th Day)
- As the party then takes a few moments to look at the rock slide covering an arc into what would have been the 5th area of the "Experiment" section. Alethra goes up the wall to the top of the cave in. There seems to be no clear way in, and so Roth flies up and then pop Olly into the space deep in the rock, and then further into the rock slide of the space. Once Olly goes into the rock slide room, she seems that the floor is covered in several feet of rock, and no shelves or desks visible.
- Olly then finds two small pieces of black obsidian rock and then a odd green leaf, which is party or mostly petrified. Olly then is magically taken back to Roth and the general thought is that anything of interest in the room is buried under many feet of rock. Alethra and Merry identify the rock as obsidian and are unsure how a leaf gets like that, but likely druid magic, and Olly gives the leaf to Roth.
- The group then plans to go down the unmarked tunnel to see what is there. After about a mile of a marked decline, the party sees a light at the end of the tunnel, that was made by druids or earth movers. The stealth was high and there did not seem to be any traps, or nothing was set off. Once the party reached the entrance to the larger cavern, 75 ft long, 120 wide, 40 tall with several rock islands on a sea of lava and an exit in the back left of the cave.
- Once Beartrum walked into the cave proper an illusion appeared of a human man, who looked about 40s and wearing a druid robe. He speaks to the party letting them know he is busy, but if they can defeat Polly, he will speak to them, otherwise, they can leave and no harm will come to them. Roth, with a combined 54 insight/perception realizes that this person is likely related to Alethra (dad? Uncle? cousin?). And suggests to Alethra that she looks like the man in the illusion.
- Bearturm is confused to what a Polly is, and Roth explains it is usually the name of a parrot, and Olly is confused if they make fire parrots. Merry is not sure, but now is curious. As the party did not automatically turn around the leave, a large phoenix of fire comes out of the second cavern entrance, and things get interesting.
- The party went into combat. Ari casts the storm sphere (dropped two rounds later after damage). Alethra tries speaking to the phoenix, but it does not seem to have the intellect to understand her. Merry got in a 7th level shatter spell, Alethra, Roth and Beartrum then facing off against the small magma mephits that were summoned. A poison gas cloud got Ari, Roth and Beartrum for several rounds. The phoenix once blooded took a reaction to send small cloud of fire feathers at the party. Merry had a very well timed mass cure wounds, and after taking more damage, the magma surged, all the magma mephits had died and the Phoenix was able to use the cone of fire spell. Merry went down twice, but did get the final kill spell in on the Phoenix. The creature is now an egg which is very, very hot.
- The party takes a short rest to heal up and get ready for the next cave. Ari and Roth both message Gregory about the phoenix egg, and Gregory does not want the item to be brought back to Benroth. Gregory thinks 5-7 days for it to respawn.
- The group goes down the second tunnel and walks into a much larger underground cavern, with a small elevated outcropping on it, overlooking a large uninterrupted expanse of lava. At the top is the man from the illusion and a gate similar in size to the Fey gates the party has seen.
- The man turns around, very surprised, and introduces himself as Fentonshire La Costa. He is a researcher and not sure why the party is there, but willing to listen as they got past Polly. Merry is upset they had to fight both Polly and the mephits, which Fenton apologizes for. Alethra then asks him why he did not came back after his naval service. Fenton is very confused and asks if they have meet before.
- Alethra shows him the photo of her and her mother, and there is a lot of confusion and explanations. Roth creates the mansion and goes inside to give the two privacy, leaving Olly with Alethra for support. Both Ari and Merry stand on either side of the entrance to the cave waiting to make sure Alethra is ok. Beartrum also waits to make sure Alethra is ok.
- Fenton explains his ship was pulled into the water plane and he was stuck there for almost 5 years and when he returned he learned at the university that Alethra's mother went searching for him and never returned. Fenton did write to Alethra's grandparents, but they did not tell Fenton about her existence. Fenton then spent the next 60ish years trying to find Alethra's mother, hopefully using the gate to be able to explore the water plane, where he assumes Alethra's mother is still lost in.
- Alethra puts a sending stone on the table, asking if Fen wants to answer the question about if his love is still out there, but once realizing it may not work across planes, decides to wait until tomorrow and get to know Alethra first.
- After Alethra shows Fen the drawing, Fen pulls out a similar image, but this one just of Alethra's mother. They have tea on a small table Fen creates and they a short and very scholarly chat about the water plane, a kraken, and the special high heat mushrooms that they found. Fenton explains that he would like to get to know Alethra and can cast spells through trees in the orchard to somewhere near where she is.
- After about 30 mins of high emotion on the part of both, Alethra introduces Fenton to the rest of the party, including Olly. Olly then tells Roth what happened and is happy to invite everyone inside for lunch.
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