Ultimately, your negotiations are successful, and the merchants agree to the Siege Lord's terms.
"You're right," one of the merchants says, stepping forward. "We should have kept faith in our city and never listened to that woman. This woman came around beginning a few weeks ago and kept talking about the falling prices of weapons, which caused many of us to hide our wares to create a false scarcity. I'm sorry for that. My contacts did manage to get her name, though. It was Muhlia Al-Jakri. That's all I found out about her."
Male Half-Elf Druid 7 (HP 59/59) (AC 26/11/25) (CMD 20) (Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +8) (Init +3) (Perception +18)
Radagast nods.
"Thank-you for your understanding in this matter. Hopefully, we can all pull together, and make the besieging forces pay dearly for every inch of ground!"
Ollysta Zadrian is not in the Lodge, and you are forced to seek her within the city. Following lead to lead, you finally find her in the midst of destroying a skeletal warrior. When the skeleton falls, she motions to civilians hiding in the alley and directs them toward a safer part of the city. She then turns to you, cleaning her blade.
“I’m pleased to see you have come to Absalom’s aid in its darkest hour. As you may have heard, undead creatures have attacked various locations within the city, and scouts have reported that an army of demon-flesh abominations is assembling in the Cairnlands. The holy warriors of the Ascendant Court would be instrumental in a war against such unholy creatures, and I have begun coordinating the faithful. I know Absalom is home to more of the faithful than I have seen. Most notably absent are Sarenrae’s blades, and my close ally Scion Lady Xerashir of House Shamyyid at the Temple of the Shining Star has not answered the call to arms. I can only assume that something has waylaid her and her comrades. My presence is required here, but I am trusting you to investigate the matter and lend any aid necessary.”
Taking on the assignment, you make your want to the Temple of the Shining Star.
The smell of incense is heavy in the air at the Temple of the Shining Star, but it is ominously quiet in the vast Sarenite prayer room. Statues and other religious objects have been placed in concentric circles atop a massive sundial. Opposite the sundial is a portable lens-like device that seems to focus light like a magnifying glass.
Three locations to investigate:
Floor: Perception or Survival Lens: Knowledge (arcana or planes) Sundial: Knowledge (religion) or Spellcraft
Thran, fighting off a frog in his throat, finally breaks from his silence to help. Fascinated, he checks out the sundial. the only hint he gives that he paid attention is a singular raised eyebrow. Spellcraft:1d20 + 16 ⇒ (7) + 16 = 23
Thranalas determines that the sundial was used as a central focus for a powerful spell, and the objects around the sundial were intended to function as foci for a conjuration spell, determining the parameters of the spell.
The Dark Archive has recovered the missing codebook, allowing Zarta Dralneen and her agents to create contradictory signals that confuse the Black Echelon undead.
Table GMs, the Dark Archive mission has been completed, and that faction’s special condition on page 10 is in effect. No new groups may start the Dark Archive mission; those groups already in progress may complete the mission and report the success towards one of the other missions.
Chandu and Bonaventure determine that the lens is designed to concentrate magical energy, and that it should be aimed at a magical focus (such as the sundial).
Radagast realizes that the small objects littering the floor and the drag marks suggest that a sudden, powerful force drew the contents of the room toward the sundial. Everything stops abruptly approximately ten feet from the sundial.
You know you have a lens that should be aimed at the sundial, and you have tracks suggesting that everything in the room was sucked toward a focal point 10 ft from the sundial.
When Grog and Radagast move the lens toward the sundial, a swirling portal of intertwined bright and dark energies forms and promptly sucks all of you through.
Knowledge (planes or religion), DC 20:
You recognize the realm as the Ivory Maze, Baphomet's domain in the Abyss.
You find yourselves with a winding labyrinth before you and the whirling portal still behind them. In the distance, they hear a woman shouting commands in the Kelish language over the sounds of battle—the Sarenites are near.
For the sake of expediency, just let me know if you're walking or flying (by some means), and I'll jump to the action, though you might want to arrange yourselves in a marching order. Totally not a hint.
LN Female Half elf Bard 7|DD4 Init +8 | HP 99/99 | AC 25, T15, FF22| Fort +13, Ref +15, Will +12, +2 vs ench, +4 vs bard | CMD 29 | Perception +22, Sense Motive +30
AMF:
AC18, HP44/88, F +8, R +8, W+8
Resources:
Claws 8|8; IC 13|21; LM 1/1; Reroll: Used
Spell Slots:
7/3/0/2
| Conditions: Delay Poison
Chandu is walking. She will use a scroll of miror image and activate wands of longstrider, shield and bless weapon before they activate the device. She cannot fail the UMD check.
Mirror Image:1d4 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 1 = 3
Quickly, we must help those people she shouts and runs off towards the cries for help.
NG Male Human (Ulfen) Sorcerer (Celestial) 6 | HP: 46/46 | AC: 12 16 (12 Tch, 10 14 FF) | CMB: +2, CMD: 14 | F: +10, R: +6, W: +7; +1 vs. curses| Init: +2 | Perc: +0, SM: +0 | Heavenly Fire 7/8
Current Conditions:
none
Active Spells:
good hope, mage armor
Ready an action to cast grease when the first minotaur is 10' away from Chandu/Grog (one square between them), I'm guessing where that will be by putting the spell template there. Reflex DC 17.
Edit: don't forget to have the second minotaur make an Acrobatics check and move half speed through the grease, assuming it walks through the grease.
The minotaurs advance while the companions hold their ground. The sides of the maze seem to warp and shift to allow the giants through without impeding them. Just as the first nears the front line, Bonaventure summons a wide pool of slick oil under its hooves. The beast skids to a stop but manages to maintain its balance.
Despite his precarious footing, the minotaur swings its axe at Chandu. The other minotaur swings his axe at Grog. Both attacks fall short of their targets--surely the minotaurs are not intimidated by the numbers.
The 19 does hit, actually. I inadvertently parsed that as an AOO.
Chardu stabs the first minotaur deeply in the gut as it approaches and swings. Then she draws back her spear and slams it into his chest. The tough beast is not finished yet, though.
Thran's eyes squint a bit as he does some mental math. With a flick of the wrist, bat guano and sulfur fly forth and explode in a fireball DMG:5d6 ⇒ (5, 3, 5, 1, 5) = 19REF DC 20 for half.
NG Male Human (Ulfen) Sorcerer (Celestial) 6 | HP: 46/46 | AC: 12 16 (12 Tch, 10 14 FF) | CMB: +2, CMD: 14 | F: +10, R: +6, W: +7; +1 vs. curses| Init: +2 | Perc: +0, SM: +0 | Heavenly Fire 7/8
Current Conditions:
none
Active Spells:
good hope, mage armor
Just a quick note, Chandu and I readied actions which were triggered by the minotaurs, so our initiatives should be adjusted to directly before the minotaurs.
Thranalas releases a pyroclastic explosion within the ravine, charring one of the minotaurs to a crisp. The other looks nearly finished but struggling to fight. Jinsa summons a trio of force missiles and puts the last minotaur out of its misery.
As Grog wonders if he will get a taste of the action, a rumbling can be heard coming from behind the companions. A massive, fiendish bull charges around the ravine and tramples Thranalas and Jinsa as it skids to a stop in the middle of the group.
Combat! Round 1 & 2. Bold may act.
---2---
Bonaventure Radagast Chandu Thranalas (-20 hp: Reflex DC 19 for half; OR take full damage and make AOO with a -4 penalty vs. Bull)
Jinsa (-21 hp: Reflex DC 19 for half; OR take full damage and make AOO with a -4 penalty vs. Bull)
Bull of Baphomet
---1---
Grog
I'm going to submit the success because one way or another the bull is dead, but need the reactions from Thranalas and Jinsu, and we should give Grog a chance to kill something.
In a flurry of activity, the fiendish bull is brought down. Its ambush came far too late.
Several hundred feet down the maze-like ravine, you encounter a group of battle-worn Sarenite priests coming the opposite direction. They appear very grateful to see you. The priests relay what happened in the temple as you make your way back to the portal and to safety.
“Someone must have tampered with the magical foci we used, causing the spell to fail. When we completed the ritual, a gateway formed that drew us into that Abyssal realm. As the portal closed behind us, I could see a woman’s silhouette as she tossed something through the portal and grimly intoned, ‘My sister’s memory earns you mercy.’ It was this,” she reports, holding up a silver holy symbol of Sarenrae, stamped with the word ‘Oppara,’ and notched as if by a blade. “This style only saw use in Taldor by hidden congregations, including one that reactionary Opparan officials tried to stamp out about six years ago. Was there not a prominent leader in the Society who lost a sister in that incident? A pasha who went rogue? This alone may not be evidence of her involvement, but whoever sent us to the Abyss seemed to want us trapped, not killed.”
