30: The Sundering

General Summary

Vash's Tale

Vash, bloodied and beaten, stumbled into the Silver Spoon. His allies rushed to his aid as he clutched his wounds. Vash told the tale of what had occurred.

He had gone alone to the site of The Sundering in service of the great dragon Galdraskol, where he had battled with the unspeakable horrors which had spilled from the deep crevasse. The druids of Shepherd’s Grove faced the onslaught from below, leaving Vash to face the largest entity, an otherworldly ooze creature, alone. The druids were able only to bolster Vash with their spells before blocking him and the enormous ooze off with walls of fire.
The ooze, later learned to be an Oblex (and judging from its size, an Elder one), manifested the likeness of warriors of the past and assaulted Vash’s mind and memories. Vash gave all he could, but the ooze still stood, and Vash knew he would not survive much longer. He retreated through the fire. Injured and trapped behind the fire, the Oblex retreated back into the abyss of The Sundering.

Naturally, the Crimson Eight would regroup and make plans to face the aberration as a team. Vash barely got a night of sleep before dawn broke and the group gathered to return to The Sundering.

Thickthicket Cavern

Biggs, the Loxodon druid of the Blue Banner Brigade, came to the Silver Spoon to retrieve the Crimson 8. The Eight gathered with Biggs and were swept away to the entrance of the Thickthicket Caverns- where Blue Banner leader, Sir Finly; the silent Slayer, Summer; and the thief-turned-hero, Nibor, awaited them. The Crimson 8 were informed that goblins had been seen leaving and entering the caverns, and so it was believed that they must connect deep below to where the problem lay.
(They were also informed of the casualties of the battle at The Sundering. Casualty count: 14 Druids, 1 Blue Banner Hero (Watsin). Receiving care: 9 druids, 3 guards, Zephyra [critical])
Biggs returned to the druids at the Sundering to help heal the land, and the rest of the rival adventurers proceeded into the caverns together in the name of the greater good. The supergroup was quickly attacked by goblins which appeared to be acting in a peculiar trance-like state. The goblins were accompanied by living brains- intellect devourers- a sure sign of Illithid presence.
Eager to outdo each other, members of each party dispatched the monsters with exuberant showboatery. As they pressed deeper into the caverns, the threats quickly magnified far beyond mere goblins. Following ample bloodshed, the heroes were able to rescue a group of kidnapped villagers, which included Brokkr the blacksmith, Lukyn Gempecker the mining leader, Lowin the Emberguard, and little Winnifred Montgomery (daughter of the General Store owner). Nibor escorted the villagers safely back to town.

Shadow Clone Jutsu in Thickthicket's Inner Chamber??

Ultimately the winding caverns came together at a single path that was guarded by a tentacled creature, nearly like a beholder, that we later learned was a mindwitness.

Recognizing that it seemed to be similar to a beholder, Rowan had his gazer familiar, Vati, attempt to convince the mind witness to leave the area. Surprisingly, this crazy plan worked and the floating creature simply floated away down a different path. The path behind the mind witness had suffered a recent cave-in, which Sir Finley and Summer handled with explosives.
Beyond was a grand chamber, thick with overgrown vegetation. The adventurers encountered here the last thing they had ever expected- Vash, standing in the middle of the room looking heroic and out-of-place. An intense standoff ensued. Two identical crimson champions, both possessing the same personal knowledge and memories, held their blades to each other. Even dear Bob (the flying monkey) could not tell them apart.
Luckily, Rowan had already used his most powerful tool- the library card! He had determined the source of these ooze clones; this was the work of an Oblex. The clone Vash would never be able to stray too far from its source, and so it was clear that the one in the caverns was the clone. The party attacked! The Vashs’ weapons clashed and clanged throughout the chamber in a dance of perfectly symmetrical violence.

The rest of the group was a reckoning force, holding back more intellect devourers and taking shots at the False Vash. Kedar sent multiple blasts of eldritch energy at the enemies, knocking them around like nothing. Rowan brought the wrath of the light of dawn down on the False Vash’s head. Summer and Sir Finley attacked as a careful duo. Aralia used the forces of nature itself to attack, with rocks and vines lashing out at her enemies.
“If I can’t match you…” The false Vash muttered to Vash. It’s gaze fell to Rowan. “I’ll destroy what you care about the most!” A mighty sword fell and was reflected by the magic shield of Rowan's signet ring- and another- but the third strike tore through Rowan and his blood painted the cave walls.
In a rage, the real Vash attacked the fake, swinging again and again, dealing the final blow. The enemy, defeated, melted into a disgusting ooze.

Return of the Oblex

The tendril of ooze that had tethered the false Vash to its source seeped, squelching over the rocks and foliage, growing and growing until an enormous and terrifying Oblex stood before the group.

The amalgamation towered over the heroes and thirsted for their thoughts. It attacked, attempting to hypnotize the heroes, but only managing to bring Aralia and Rowan under its spell. Another battle ensued, with the heroes striving to bring the Oblex down.
Kedar, realizing Aralia was hypnotized, made a choice that they hoped would be forgiven, and struck out with three eldritch blasts: two at the Oblex, and one at Aralia, hoping to snap her out of the spell’s control. It worked, and Aralia stood, prepared to show the abomination the power of her wrath. Using her immense power, Aralia drew all of the moisture from the ooze, destroying it entirely. Vash noticed Rowan was still down, injured, and quickly scooped the wizard into his arms and rushed him over to Summer, who stood with Sir Finley in the middle of the room, to be healed. No sooner had the healing spell taken affect when the floor beneath them gave out and the four adventurers found themselves falling down an incredibly deep (and meaty) hole in the ground. Such is life in the Thickthicket Caverns.
Vash instinctively used his psionic powers and sent Rowan flying back up out of the pit to safety. Aralia, quick to react, jumped into the hole while transforming into her dragon form. She dived as fast as she could, followed by a transformed Kedar carrying Rowan. With no room to use her wings for a burst of speed, Aralia tucked herself in as much as she could to cut through the air, but it was not fast enough.

Broken in the Bowels of the Island

Vash, Summer, and Sir Finley met the bottom of the pit at full falling speed, leaving their bodies broken and bleeding. Vash alone managed to cling to life by the smallest thread, strengthened by something in the back of his mind that he did not truly understand. The druid, Aralia, enveloped his thoughts in those agonizing moments as Vash shuddered in pain, unable to breathe without his broken ribs piercing more and more into what remained of his flesh and lungs. The druid Aralia, who we would later learn Vash could not remember, who, in his mind, he had just met that day. And yet, it was she who he saw in what was nearly his final moment.
Kedar landed swiftly behind Aralia who had rushed to Vash. Kedar ran over as well, and tapped into the healing powers Gabriel had helped to unlock, channeling heal after heal into the fallen fighter until he was nearly back to perfect health. Then, taking in the broken bodies of the members of the Blue Banner Brigade, the warlock rummaged through their bag, tossing items aside until a scroll of resurrection was found. Kedar used the scroll on Summer, successfully deducing that Summer would then be able to resurrect Sir Finley.
Exhausted, the group took a short break there in what felt like a relatively safe chamber (despite being surrounded by bones and corpses). It was here that Kedar also discovered a magical item, a tentacle of some sort, which was given to Rowan. After the short rest, the Crimson 8 was ready to press on into the depths but the Blue Bannermen stayed behind to rest longer, exhausted from their resurrection.

Shar's Temple or Mind Flayer Lair?

No longer were they traversing a cave system- but an ornate and ancient temple of some kind. The party slowly crept through this awful and forbidden ruin. They arrived in a place of dark worship, a lost temple of Shar. Kedar was visibly distressed by their travel further into this dark temple, and when questioned, Kedar reminded Vash that Shar was their warlock patron, and that they did not get along. Kedar added that they had been eluding Shar’s detection for some time now, but would not be able to do so in her own temple.
In the ornate main chamber the group saw someone they did not expect, standing at the balcony at the other end of the room - it was Bowie the Brave! Dragon Aralia quickly trampled the few squishy intellect devourers that were in the room and the team made their way through the room, taking in the out-of-place brine pools full of dead mind flayer tadpoles and the jars of brains that sat around on the worship benches. The pathway up the stairs was blocked by electricity that reached back to twist around two giant statues of hands. Aralia, still in her dragon form and with cat-form Kedar hitching a ride, merely flew up to the balcony, to Bowie. What could these monsters want with an orphaned child?

The walls of this vile chapel showed grand depictions of both history and prophecy. Rowan recorded these images in his journal. Moons, orbs, dragons- suddenly it was all starting to make sense. Vash collected a stone carving of two ancient heroes which caught his attention and felt oddly familiar. Kedar transformed back into themself and warned the others not to mess with the alter at the head of the room, warning that it was there to alter memories.

Rowan used his knowledge of the arcana to investigate the electric barrier and the hand statues, and figured out how to deactivate the trap. He and Vash joined the others at the top of the stairs, where Bowie was quiet and reserved. Beyond that point was a passageway which led even deeper into the darkness, and so, deeper they dove–with Bowie in tow.

Illithid Domain

The party entered into a fresh hell. The walls silently writhed with unnatural life and the powerful presence they felt here was nowhere to be seen. Hall after hall of what had once been Sharran architecture that was now nigh-unexplainable, with twisted mechanisms that the group passed by with no sign of resistance. Tanks of acidic brine, suspended brains, mindflayer corpses… it all added up to one thing: the true master of this lair was drawing nearer.
In one room they found a hiding goblin, who, upon seeing them, threw himself at them with gratitude. In his blubbering they learned that he and the other goblins had been lured there with magic, and the others had been brought under control of an elder brain. This one had escaped, and had been hiding in the temple ever since. He begged the heroes for freedom, but they informed him that they had gotten here by falling down a lengthy hole. The goblin reluctantly followed the heroes, hanging behind Bowie.

The Brain in the Brine

The group eventually threw open a large set of doors to a massive room with many canals of the bright green brine. Before them, in the center of the room, resting in the brine, was a true cosmic terror of legend–an elder brain. The massive mind throbbed and pumped. Its various brain stems grew like roots, reaching through the brine and floor, to every corner of its acidic throne room and beyond.

Cranium rats and intellect devourers swarmed the party. Though exhausted, Vash, Aralia, Rowan, and Kedar blasted through the elder brain’s forces. Dragon Aralia went for the metaphoric throat and flew through the air onto the elder brain, where she began shredding its brainy layers with her claws and blasting the monstrosity with jets of poison breath. The elder brain defended itself using its indomitable psychic power.
It seemed like the elder brain was growing weaker from their barrage of attacks. Even the cowardly goblin had joined in, attacking another goblin in the room, one that had fallen to elder brain control. The tide seemed to be turning, when something unthinkable happened.

"What?! No way!" - Beholders and their Dreams

Down from the shadows above the elder brain floated a beholder. It went straight towards Rowan. Rowan, aware of this creature from his studies, paled to see this new powerful enemy appear, and he braced for his imminent death.

“Get down!” shouted Kedar, before firing a volley of eldritch blasts over Rowan that exploded in the beholder's face. The monster sprang to life with a horrible shriek, its large middle eye flying open in surprise; Kedar woke it up! The elder brain, the cranium rats, and even the state of the throne room were all were revealed to merely be the beholder’s dream-made-reality. Dream melted away and the truth was revealed: the elder brain and her legion were long dead fragments of the distant past.
The beholder, however, was alive and well. It began firing beams from its eye stalks at the group who had dared enter its domain. The Crimson 8 fought hard but the beholder was a great and awful force. A petrifying ray caught Vash’s feet and turned them to stone, making him an easy target for the monster’s most brutal weapon: the death ray. Though he tried to overcome the power of the ray, he failed, and in an instant.. Vash was dead. His body fell to the ground and continued to petrify until he was fully stone.

The Heroes Falter...

The remaining heroes were devastated. They were exhausted, and injured, and had already fought through so many enemies. They continued to fight, giving it their all against yet another enemy of legends, and they began to believe all was lost. They would perish here, failing in their mission, and failing to protect the orphan Bowie, who was possibly their biggest fan. How could the situation get any worse? There simply was no way it could, they thought.

"You've Got to be Kidding Me!" - An Unchecked Tadpole: the Neothelid

But they were wrong. The walls rumbled. An earthquake? If only they had been so lucky. Massive stones exploded and a gargantuan worm-like creature burst into the chamber. The worm’s slime- drenched mouth splayed open four ways and mindflayer-like tendrils shot out of its throat. It was the ultimate illithid abomination, a neothelid, and it snapped the terrible beholder in its jaws and swallowed it whole in an instant.
Already pushed past the breaking point, how could these heroes stand up against an enemy that had simply eaten the one that had already nearly destroyed them?
Sir Finley and Summer dashed into the chamber and could not believe their eyes. Summer retrieved a finely cut diamond from his satchel. “REVIVIFY!” Vash rose to his feet, still weakened by the necrotic force of the death ray. Vash grit his teeth once more. Aralia and Rowan found a new glimmer of hope and bombarded the behemoth with their mightiest spells. Sir Finley attempted a heroic leap across the acid pools… and slipped! He fell into the caustic bath below. Vash followed with a heroic leap… and did not slip! With his last scrap of energy Vash stuck his landing and shredded the worm until its insides were mostly on the outside. Not even this ancient titanic worm could withstand the devastating power of friendship.

Victory! ...right?

Show spoiler

Rise of Dark Bowie

The group cheered! Easily their most historic victory to date. Rowan fished Sir Finley out of the acid and it appeared everyone was in one piece. This den of evil had been cleansed for good and no threats remained! Until…
An eerie aura fell over the team. They glanced around and noticed the dear orphan, Bowie the Brave, was not himself. Bowie bore a terrifyingly sinister grin and a blank, steely, stare with eyes that swirled with purple magic. The monsters had all been destroyed, but the heroes were still in the house of the Lady of Loss- Shar’s dark embrace had taken Bowie’s soul just as it took Zephyra’s cloud giant matron.

Before the team could process the gravity of the situation, Dark Bowie raised his hands and a volley of green purple fireballs were launched at the party. They did their best to dodge his attacks but Dark Bowie’s powers were that of the Goddess of the Starless Night. Nobody had the heart to harm Bowie, corrupted or not, and the situation grew dire indeed.
Kedar knew what was happening and knew what had to be done. The lost child of Shar fell to their knees and reached out to the Dark Goddess. Some dark deal was struck- Bowie suddenly snapped back to his normal self- and Kedar, with one final, sad look of farewell, vanished in an instant. Shar had gotten what she had been after all this time, and had stooped this low to get.

Rowan dove to the floor where Kedar had kneeled but he knew it was too late. His fists pounded the floor helplessly as the others gathered around. Rowan rose slowly, paused in a moment of painful reflection, and turned to his party. They all gave each other a knowing nod. Rowan, Aralia, Vash, Finley, Summer, Bowie, and the nameless goblin they had rescued, teleported away. The day was done, with great victories to celebrate, and terrible losses to mourn.

Rewards Granted

• Dyrrn's Tentacle Whip

• Dimensional Shackles

• 3000 GP

• 20 Ornate Books of Knowledge 15 gp each

• Reward from Villagers (Promised, but not yet granted)

Character(s) interacted with

Notable NPCs Present:

• Summer the Slayer (Blue Banner Brigade)

• Sir Finley (Blue Banner Brigade)

• Nobir (Blue Banner Brigade)

• Biggs (Blue Banner Brigade)

• Bowie the Brave

Rescued Villagers:

• Lukyn Gempecker

• Brokkr

• Winifred Montgomery

• Lowin the Emberguard

Recap written by Rowan

Report Date

21 Oct 2023

Primary Location

Ember Island

Related Historical Events

• 5563
  The Ember Island Sundering

Player's Present:

• Aralia - Katie

• Vash - Juston

• Rowan - Ernie

• Kedar - Mel