"We'll move out in the morning. Rest tonight." Sohil tells Severix. "We'll keep watch.
The morning dawns clear as your army moves out. The ruins of Drezen along the southern bank of the Ahari are primarily occupied by cultists, mercenaries, and other human and tiefling soldiers.
Sverix makes sure to check with Aron and Sosiel in the morning before the army sets out.
Aron looks tired. "I heard the voice again last night, but Sosiel, who also looks tired, "kept me from moving toward the voice. I'm going to keep fighting."
Sverixalint nods. "Good. Remember that you're not alone in this fight. We're all stronger when we fight together."
The Crusaders let loose with a volley of arrows on the cultist army as they move forward, but it doesn't seem to hurt them much.
The cultists use dirty tactics while clashing with our heroes. Their tactics don't work.
As usual, Sverixalint leads the Crusaders' charge. He does, however, have a portion of their forces circle around to flank their opponents.
The cultists try to attack again. They hit but don't do damage.
Sverixalint focuses his forces on trying to kill these cultists quickly, before the others arrive.
Our heroes army attacks and damages the cultists.
The tiefling army lets loose with a ranged attack at our heroes flanks. The cultist continue to engage the front lines.
Both their attacks are ineffective.
Not wanting to be surrounded, Sverixalint commands the paladins to focus on offense and smite the cultists, to try and rout them before the tieflings engage in melee.
The cultist army is heavily damaged. You can hear the commander rallying his troops, and the continue to fight. It manages fighting aggressively to do a little damage to our crusaders.
The tieflings also hit the field, and attack the crusader's army from the rear aggressively.
Now flanked as he'd feared, Sverixalint commands the wounded to fall back and heal themselves while the rest focus on finishing off the cultists, taking advantage of their more aggressive tactics to break through their defenses.
The cultist army breaks under the attack of our heroes and they retreat.
The tieflings continue to attack aggressively. They cannot break through the Crusader's lines to do damage to the army.
Sverixalint, seeing an opening, commands the paladins to strike hard and fast, trying to cut down the tieflings swiftly.
The tiefling army breaks under the crusader's attacks. It's a rout. A cheer goes up from your army as they find the stored items.
The stockpile of captured crusader gear includes a fair amount of magic armor. This can upgrade the Knights of Kenabres’s masterwork armor to magic armor, increasing the DV of the PCs’ army by 1 additional point. In addition, 15 units of food and water are stored in the area.
As usual, as soon as the battle is over Sverix makes sure the wounded are cared for before turning his attention to the captured gear. Not being the best at examining weapons and armor himself, he lets the others determine who can best use what.
Once the battle's aftermath is dealt with, Sverixalint turns his attentions to the next step. From what he recalls, the next target might be the graveyard, where a number of undead await, and its crypt which he and a few others will probably have to tackle themselves. He checks with Irabeth on whether or not the troops will need the rest of the day to rest and prepare before another battle, suspecting it probably would be best.
Sverix speaks with the others and decides to fight the undead at the graveyard first, then go into the crypt himself to see what lies within before turning attention to the catapult towers.
The cemetery is now a desolate place where nothing grows. Even a cursory observation of the graveyard notes that one vault seems particularly corrupted—this stone building stands at the western end of the graveyard, and seems to be cloaked in rippling shadows even during the day, not that daylight ever gets all that bright in the Worldwound.
Sverix is a bit tempted to ask Nurah to come along, just to see if he can discern anything further while fighting alongside her. But he'd rather have people he can trust. Let's see... maybe Anevia, in case there were traps, and... well, could he spare Irabeth from keeping command while they were gone? He hadn't fought alongside her in a while.
You arrive at the crypt to find it drenched in darkness with a feeling of dread and evil about the building.
Sverixalint carefully walked up to the door. "This definitely seems like it could be trapped. Can you see it to check, Anevia?"
Anevia moves up to check the door. Her fingers carefully move over the locking mechanism. She sighs. "I need a light." She pulls out an Everburning Torch, and activates it. "Not trapped, but it is locked." She curses as she can't open the lock, and she tries again. "Ok give me a few minutes." Finally after a really long time the door opens on an atrium strewn with bones.
Sverix waits patiently as Anevia struggles with the lock. He nods in thanks to her when she at last gets it open.
Cautiously he steps forwards and takes a careful look around the entrance.
The room is eerily quiet and so very dark. The atrium is filled with bones strewn about. There are two doors in front of you.
Anevia moves up and checks for traps. "No traps and not locked."
Sverixlint gives the double door a suspicious look. "There's probably undead or demons on the other side. I'm going in first. Follow behind me and be ready for a fight."
He then proceeds to push open the door.
The door opens with no effort. Sverix sees nothing moving from where he's standing. However he does hear something moving around the corner. It sounds like beating wings.
Sverixalint growls deep in his chest. "I hear something," he states, then calls on Apsu's blessing on his fangs. That done he steps through the door and looks around.
As Sverix moves around the corner he sees something flying above the ground.
The ladies move up behind you, weapons out.
Initiative Sverix: 20
Initiative Avebia: 20
Irabeth:18
Initiative Flying Thing: 16
"Apsu!" Sverixalint roars, a prayer answered with power as he takes to the air to meet the enemy.
Aneviaa slips up and fires her bow at the creature, but she misses.
Irabeth moves up takes one look at the creature and decides she's going to Smite Evil.
The creature smiles. "Little dragon you are going to taste so good. I haven't eaten dragon in a very long time." He smiles and then looks at Anevia. Anevia starts to stiffen and shakes off whatever spell he was trying to cast.
Sverixalint's only response is a low growl. He steps forward and tries to take a bite out of his foe himself, then lays in with his claws, and wings.
Avebia casts light so she can see what's happening in the room.
Irabeth moves up and attacks the creature with Radiance. She critically hits the creature, and it dies again. Crashing to the floor.
"That wasn't so hard." Irabeth pants. "Radiance did a good job."
Sverix grunts in grim satisfaction. "So much for its bluster. Now, let's see if there's anything else in here."
He starts searching around the large room for anything of interest.
You find nothing of interest in the vault. Only desiccated bones. The heavy evil feeling remains.
"This building feels like it has been Unhallowed. Do you have thoughts on how to remove this? We could destroy the building." Irabeth looks uneasy with the state of the crypt.
Sverixalint growls. "Apsu has not yet granted me the power to destroy such enchantments as yet. Perhaps one of the clerics in our company might have such? If not, then yes, we should raze this building as best we can."
"I don't believe Sosiel has that power yet either." Irabeth says.
"How should we raze the building? There's an army right outside. Brining our army might cause a battle."
Sverixalint frowns. "We need to fight the army anyway, right? Though having this here might making fighting them harder, since unholy places can make undead stronger..."
He trails off, thinking. "If I was an older dragon it would be easier," he grumbles. "Smashing the center wall here might cause the roof to collapse, though I'm not sure that would be enough to get rid of the unhallow even if we could do it without getting caught in the collapse. I suppose we could see if Sosiel or Aravashnial can dispel magic, that might work?"
"Let's go ask them. Maybe someone has some knowledge of engineering, and tell us how to bring down the building. You are correct. Having this ground Unhallowed could make the army fight worse." Irabeth answers.
"I guess it's back to the camp to see what we can learn."
Sverix nods. "Right. Let's get back."
The team makes their way back to the camp safely. The leadership is sitting in the planning tent looking at the maps of the area they have. It seems there are a couple of things left to do before clearing the area and being ready to head toward the Citadel.
"How did it go?" Sosiel asks as you return. "What did you find?
"We destroyed the guardian of the crypt, but it's been made into an unholy site," Sverix states. "Apsu has not granted me the power to undo such a blight, and destroying the structure would likely bring their army down on us, so we had to leave."
"That's concerning. Come eat. Let's make plans for tomorrow. Does anyone need healing?" Sosiel asks as he waves the dragon over.
"We're talking about what our next move should be. We've got the watchtowers. Each watchtower seems to be guarded by a few figures, and each is armed with a large catapult. Disabling as many of these catapults as possible makes the siege more effective. Then we have the last army in the Drezen Cemetery. Of course we could just ignore these things and move on to the siege. What do you think Sverix?"
Irabeth brings over dinner for the leadership, and they discuss the pros and cons late into the night.
Sverixalint advocates for destroying the army in the Cemetary and volunteers to attack the watchtowers. "Catapults aren't very good at hitting flying dragons, but lightning breath is good at hitting catapults."
"But we don't want the undead flanking us. Let's destroy them first, then I'll destroy the catapults."