Freedom from the Coil
It was mid-day by then. We decided to return to the Minting House with the intention of questioning some of our fallen enemies through necromancy, but by the time we got back, we saw that all corpses had mysteriously vanished. The Yuan-Ti sorcerer who had fled had likely warned the Crimson Pirates about this setback, and they had probably sent more Bar-Lguras here to remove the bodies. It’s a good thing we had looted them before leaving. We carefully searched the building, but no one was waiting for us in ambush.
We returned to the chapel of Demogorgon and ventured into the underground tunnel. After about a hundred feet, we passed a ladder leading up. Lagaan climbed it and went exploring under the cover of invisibility. He only found an abandoned house with an old drug addict squatting in it. We then continued and found a fork in the tunnel. We went south, and after some distance, the tunnel ended at a ladder leading up to a warehouse. There, we found a group of Seventh Coil thugs torturing one of their own. We understood that the victim was one of those who had fled from the terrifying screams of the Demogorgon idols at the Minting House. Clearly, the rest of the organization had not appreciated such cowardice, and the man was now paying for it.
We made our presence known, and after a quick struggle, the five thugs lay dead. We approached the captive, who begged to be set free. He was pretty battered up and claimed to be an innocent who had been molested by his captors. But we knew better.
“Please, set me free!” he cried, struggling against the chains from which he dangled. “Those freaks tortured me!”
“Oh, you poor thing, did they torture you… like this?” I asked, piercing his leg with my trident. He screamed. “… or more like this?” I asked as I pierced his abdomen.
“Please…” he wailed.
But this miscreant deserved no mercy. For all I knew, he was one of those who had messed up my ship. I ended his miserable life by stabbing his throat.
Lagaan suggested setting the building on fire, but the rest of us vetoed that pointless idea. Instead, after looting our enemies, we left their bodies on display and left the warehouse doors wide open. We also placed a sign just outside the building that read: “The Seventh Coil is having a liquidation sale. Come on in! Everything must go.”
We then returned to the fork in the tunnel and headed west for a good distance; it was clear that it extended far past the limits of Scuttlecove. We finally emerged on the side of a hill near the town, in a spot hidden amidst the jungle. The tunnel opened into a small fort where another group of Seventh Coil slavers were stationed. After a bloody but not especially remarkable battle, we defeated them, and were able to free the fifty slaves they had in their custody. Most of these were human, and all were young, able-bodied men and women. They had all clearly been chosen for their value as workers, gladiators or prostitutes.
We took the time to talk to them all; we knew that freeing them in Scuttlecove would prove rather dangerous, and as it turned out, most of them hailed from Sasserine, innocent sailors and merchants who had been captured by pirates on the high seas and sold to the Seventh Coil. Most of them yearned to return to the safety of Sasserine, but we were curious to see if any of them would like to start a new life in Farshore instead. As could be expected, few of them accepted the offer, especially since Raguhl revealed the fact that the town had been raided by pirates, demons, and demonic pirates on no less than four occasions so far. Nevertheless, Sparkillo gathered the five brave souls who volunteered to go there and teleported them to our home on the Island of Dread, returning a few minutes later.
Indeed, we felt we had done enough fighting and exploration for the day, and we felt confident that a decisive blow had been dealt to the Seventh Coil, hopefully one strong enough that they would stop bothering us. Therefore, Sparkillo spent much of his remaining magical energy to teleport back and forth to Sasserine, bringing another fifteen slaves back to the city. It is my hope that these people will spread some good word about Trouble over there, and undermine the smear campaign that Zebula Meravanchi, Edvanda Balak and other sordid villains have mounted against us.
This still left thirty prisoners under our care. We decided to bring them back to the Sea Wyvern for now, as we could likely accommodate so many people thanks to Sparkillo’s Magnificent Mansion.
Before we left, though, Lagaan mentioned that one of slaves would not receive shelter. He looked at a skinny youth with long dark hair. The man’s eyes went wide with panic, and he quickly turned and fled. Lagaan watched him run away with a calm smirk and casually fired a few arrows after him, clearly with only the intention of scaring him.
“What are you doing?” growled Raguhl, perplexed. The other slaves also looked at the rogue with a fearful expression, wondering if perhaps he was some sort of murderous maniac.
“Ah, this guy was just an old acquaintance of mine,” replied Lagaan with a shrug. “We just had a little debt to settle…”
“All right, then,” said Ulfgar. “Let’s get moving, people!’
The hand that heals
We traveled back to Scuttlecove through the underground tunnel, then made our way through the streets toward the harbor. Of course, the dangerous crowd watched us lead the thirty dirty and half-naked slaves back to our ship, but none dared to challenge or hinder us. Once we reached the docks and pointed to the Sea Wyvern, a few of the slaves displayed worried expressions.
“Err… Why is the ship stuck among the wreckage? Are you sure this is safe?” asked a man.
My companions turned alarmed gazes toward him, fearing that this fool would incur my wrath, but the harm was already done.
“If the accommodations are not to your liking, my good sir,” I said through clenched teeth, “you are more than welcome to swim back to Sasserine.”
A few crewmembers came to pick us up in the Sea Wyvern’s lifeboats. It took several trips to bring everyone on board, and once I arrived, I was pleased to see that the crew had been hard at work in our absence: they had already begun the repairs. Good lads!
Once the prisoners had been given places to rest, I briefly spoke to Stragdar. The repairs were starting well, but he would need funds to buy additional supplies. We gave him a portion of the valuables we’d looted from our enemies: once sold, it should be more than enough to cover his needs. When I questioned him about Harliss, he informed me that she had passed by earlier, but that she had not yet finished gathering the information on how to reach the Crimson Pirate base. I was not impressed.
I parted company with the dwarf, knowing that I still had unfinished business to attend to. I headed to the room where Kaskus was kept. I found him there, along with Zan. Apparently, the half-elf had kept him company since his rescue.
“Good afternoon, Jade Ravens, how’s everything?” I asked them as I entered.
“Fine, I guess,” replied Zan. “Kaskus has almost fully recovered, except for his tongue, of course…”
“Good, good. So, Kaskus,” I said, turning my gaze toward the dwarf. “Have you reconsidered my offer? Are you ready to start behaving like a civilized person, or are you still stubbornly bent on biting the hand that heals you?”
Kaskus still had some pieces of parchment in his lap, and I could see that several of them were covered in his clumsy handwriting. He had clearly had quite a conversation with Zan. Instead of replying to me in writing, though, he nodded toward Zan.
“He won’t betray Tolin, if that’s what you ask,” replied Zan. “He heard what happened in Farshore.”
“Really?” I said, arching an eyebrow. “You heard what happened in Farshore, Kaskus? So, then, if you know all about the situation, you know that Tolin and Moretta fled like two fools for no good reason. They just packed up one night and fled like thieves, without any actual threat or even a harsh word from me. They sailed over the deadly ocean, and came to Scuttlecove of all places. Oh, yes, that was a truly brilliant plan. And now, I am led to believe that they might be in danger, yes?”
The dwarf looked at me in silence.
“So, hypothetically speaking, if I restored your tongue, what would you do then, Kaskus?”
He wrote down a few words on a parchment, then held it up so I could see: “I would go help my friends.”
“Ah, then, that means they do need help. And I assume that it would be easier to help them if you could actually cast spells, yes?”
The dwarf nodded reluctantly.
“So by refusing to let yourself be cured, you are in fact endangering their lives, you see? That seems like poor behavior on the part of a friend, wouldn’t you say?”
He watched me in silence for a few moments, then nodded again.
“But you see, Kaskus, I’m tired. I’m tired of providing services with my considerable divine magic, only to be treated like a villain by the very people I heal, nurture, protect and nourish. Nothing I do is ever good enough for you people, and why? Because you’re afraid of my religion. The way I see it, Kaskus if I perform this miracle for you, it seems to me that I’m still going to be treated like some sort of horrible monster. Well, that won’t do. I’m tired of being taken advantage of. I want things to change. I want to be respected, and I want to be trusted. I’m tired of handing out freebies to ungrateful little nitwits. So, Kaskus, knowing that the lives of your friends hang in the balance, do I have your word, on your honor as a dwarf, that if I regrow your tongue, you will treat me with trust, respect, and decency?”
Kaskus looked at Zan, and the rogue nodded. The dwarf wrote down: “YES” on his parchment.
“Will you finally tell me where Moretta is? If she’s truly in danger, we can go together to save her.”
He wrote down another “YES”.
“Very well.” I gripped my medallion of Umberlee and began chanting the words of the potent prayer. After a few moments, a wave of healing energy washed over Kaskus. I could see that he felt a strange sensation from within his mouth. Finally, after a few more moments of silence, he spoke at last.
“Uh… Uh… Aahhh… Th… Thank you.”
“My pleasure.”
“Yes, Moretta and Tolin are in danger.”
“Please, tell me your story. What happened when you arrived in Scuttlecove?”
“Well, we sailed aboard a pirate ship for some time,” said Kaskus, his words still heavy as he learned to use his tongue again. “Moretta had gained much respect from the crew as a priestess of Umberlee. Once we arrived here, she sought the cult of your goddess, in hope that they would provide sanctuary for us. She sought a man called Father Shondesh.”
“Yes, I was actually the one who told her about this man,” I replied. “And he’s the one who’s behind this ludicrous misunderstanding of cosmic proportions.”
“What do you mean?” asked Zan with a puzzled expression.
I sighed. “I won’t go into the details of my life story, but I was once an acolyte of Father Shondesh. I was pregnant when I served in his temple, but when my baby was born, Shondesh sacrificed him to Umberlee.”
“That’s … sick…” said Zan with a disgusted grimace.
“Yes. But you see, I told that story to Moretta, and somehow, she came to believe that I would perform the same horrible ritual on her baby once it was born! Do you realize how insane that is? Why would I ever do something like that? I had thought she would’ve been smart enough to realize I would be the last person to do such a thing!”
“Well, we didn’t find this Shondesh after all,” said Kaskus, who didn’t seem all that moved by my tragic story (what did I tell you about ingrates?). “We went to the temple of Talos, but the priests there only laughed at her. They claimed that the cult of Umberlee had been wiped out, and that Shondesh was now their puppet, controlled by a deadly addiction to some drug. Nowadays, he wiles away his days at Porphyry House.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad,” I mused.
“The priests of Talos are monsters,” continued Kaskus with a grim look in his eyes. “They attacked us and captured us. They tortured us…” Kaskus’s gaze grew even darker, and he looked into the distance for a few moments, surely recalling some especially harsh memories. “Moretta and Tolin ‘entertained’ them most, and they decided to keep them longer than me. They grew bored with me, cut off my tongue, and cast me away to be finished off at the Hanging Plaza.”
I nodded. It was a simple story, and I was sure there was more to it. For one, he had made no mention of how he had come to be considered so important to the Protectorate. He also made no mention of Moretta’s baby… I shuddered to think of the treatment the fiends serving Talos would’ve had in store for the defenseless infant. I seethed with anger at the thought of all that the followers of Talos had done, first to Shondesh and his acolytes, but more recently to my poor Moretta. And to think we had almost gone to pay them a cordial visit the previous day!
Things would definitely not be cordial the next time we showed up at their temple…
Alas, as much as I yearned to exact vengeance upon the zealots of this rival faith and to save my dear Moretta, I knew it would not be prudent to rush there right away. Sparkillo had used much of his magic for the day, and our warriors were weary. In fact, Ulfgar and Lagaan had been making many lewd allusions to a visit to Porphyry House they had planned for later that night. Now that I knew that Father Shondesh could be found there, such a visit seemed more tactically relevant than ever.
What happens in Porphyry House, stays in Porphyry House
An hour or so after sunset, Trouble returned to the streets of Sasserine. We had washed in preparation for the night’s special event. Harliss had described Porphyry House as the fanciest brothel imaginable: according to her, it was a veritable palace, offering every possible form of pleasure, but also heavily guarded by wicked demons serving mistress Tyralandi.
Lagaan and I used the magic of our equipment to weave illusions of magnificent clothing over our armors. The others were not so splendidly dressed, but at least they were clean. We had seen the building from outside, and it indeed looked magnificent and strangely out of place in this miserable town. Yet it looked even more beautiful inside. As we entered, we saw a number of scantily clad, extremely attractive people of both genders displayed in the large entrance hall. We were greeted by a splendid succubus who made no effort to disguise her demonic origin.
“Welcome, dear visitors,” she purred, “we are pleased to finally receive the visit of the famous adventurers of Trouble.”
“Thank you,” I replied, “are you Tyralandi?”
Her giggle was soft as velvet, and Lagaan said: “No, it’s not her, she doesn’t look anything like her sister.”
I turned to give the rogue a puzzled look, and the succubus answered: “Indeed, I am not Tyralandi, but I serve her in this place.”
“We would very much like to speak with her, if that is possible,” I said.
“I will go and see if she is available to see you. In the mean time, you are welcome to sample the delights we offer here,” she said, waving delicately toward the brothel’s ‘staff’.
“Really?” asked Lagaan. “Are you going to be gone that long?”
“I should be back in about fifteen minutes,” said the succubus.
“That’s long enough for me!” grunted Ulfgar, who was already leering at a few pudgy dwarven ladies.
And so we waited in the entrance hall of the brothel. Ulfgar had gone into an alcove with a dwarven girl and Sparkie was speaking to a small group of pretty human and elven women. I could guess that he was telling them about our adventures, because he was gesturing frantically, and I overheard phrases such as “super awesome!”, “at least a hundred feet tall” and “pew pew pew!” The whores around him seemed more amused than impressed or attracted to him.
Meanwhile, I stayed close to Lagaan and Raguhl. Although Lagaan and I had seen a few specimens that were to our liking, we remembered, unlike Ulfgar and Sparkie, that we were in a dangerous place, and that we were here on a mission. As for Raguhl, he didn’t have much choice but to wait, as there were no females of his kind around (“lizardman women” as Sparkie had called them).
After a while, the succubus returned, and she told us that her mistress was ready to see us. Ulfgar also reappeared around that time, and we followed the lovely demoness up the grand staircase.
`You were pretty fast”, said Lagaan to Ulfgar, “I’m actually surprised you managed to take off your armor and put it back on in such a brief amount of time.”
“Well, I didn’t need to take it all off,” replied the dwarf with a grin.
We were led through several lavishly decorated halls on the way to the mistress’s chambers. Harliss had been right: this place looked like a palace. I hadn’t seen such finery in any of the noble mansions I’d visited in Sasserine. Finally, we were brought into a beautiful boudoir whose main decoration was the statue of a magnificent naked man. But none of us paid much attention to the furniture, because standing in the middle of the room… there SHE was.
I find myself struggling to think of words that can adequately describe Tyralandi’s unearthly beauty. I cannot find any that do her justice. The sensation of meeting her was unlike any I’ve ever experienced. I believe I can honestly say that I am a very beautiful woman, but she was more than just beautiful: she was beauty personified. She was gorgeous in a way that no mere mortal can ever hope to be: her magnetism transcended the physical perfection of her body.
I know that my companions, who are all males, immediately felt a powerful attraction toward Tyralandi, but strangely enough, so did I. Although I’ve never been seriously attracted to another woman physically, this time, I really felt an undeniable and irresistible lust stirring from the deeper parts of my being when I laid eyes upon this otherworldly beauty. I felt my heart begin to race; I ached to touch her, to be touched by her… My mind began to fantasize about her… I had trouble concentrating on anything other than that… I had never felt such a strong desire before, not even for a man!
She was dressed in a long, translucent dress that hid nothing of her splendid body, but only enticed us even more. She spoke to us, and her words rang like beautiful music in our ears. I cannot remember what she said exactly, but we found ourselves sitting down on comfortably padded chairs. Everything that followed, I remember as if it had happened in a dream: the details seem lost in a blur of ecstasy.
In that sweet voice, she welcomed us, told us that we would find sanctuary and pleasure in this place. She walked around us, touching us one after the other; the contact of her soft fingers sent pleasurable shivers in our bodies. The smell of her perfume made us dizzy with lust. When she walked among us, even the air that moved after her caressed us like a silken scarf. Her beauty was truly beyond anything human: everything in the room seemed to focus on her.
I remember speaking to her, but I cannot recall the words I spoke. I remember it concerned our crusade against the Crimson Pirates, and a possible alliance with her. Tyralandi smiled and acknowledged that her master, Graz’zt, hated Demogorgon and wanted to oppose him. She agreed to help us. She knew how we could get to the Crimson Fleet’s base.
I think I also asked her about Shondesh, and she told me that she knew him well, and knew he was a priest of Umberlee, just like me. She was willing to bring him to us.
But Tyralandi wanted something in return for those favors. My heart raced as I hoped that she would ask her for the ‘favor’ that I was dying to perform for her. And thankfully, that is exactly what she asked for!
“My dear Trouble, I will indeed help you,” she said, “but only if you prove worthy of my appreciation. I shall give two of you the occasion of pleasing me this night…”
She paused…
“Belessa, you are beautiful and dangerous like the stormy sea. I have already been in contact with your soul when I sent you that magical dream, but tonight, I want to be in contact with your body,” She held our her hand, and I took it lightly within mine, rising up to stand by her side. For a moment, her hypnotic eyes held mine, and then she turned toward the men.
“Lagaan,” she said, “you are cunning like a fox and deadly like a cobra. I know you have already met my sister, but I can tell you that she could never offer you what I will offer you tonight.” She held out her other hand toward the young rogue, and he took it and joined her as well.
Lagaan and I were standing on either side of Tyralandi. Beaming, she looked at each of us in turn. “We will be together tonight, all night, my lovelies. We will go to my chambers soon.” She turned toward the other three members of the group. “And you, my dears, are also welcome in my House: my servants will tend to your every need this night.”
Our companions had very different reactions from one another. Ulfgar looked very pleased at the prospect, but Raguhl looked grim and defiant, while Sparkillo seemed outraged, and on the verge of tears.
“I… I wasn’t chosen?” he stammered.
“All right lads, let’s get this started, then!” said Ulfgar with glee.
“I will have no part in this,” growled Raguhl as he gripped the hilt of his sword. “Your demon-magic will not win me over, foul succubus!”
“Be at peace, Raguhl,” said Tyralandi in a voice as soft as a caress. “There is no danger for you in this place. We are all friends, and you can find pleasure just like your companions.” She gestured toward an alcove, and a thin lizardman emerged from it, nodding gracefully at Raguhl. It’s only after a moment that I understood that it was probably a female.
“Stand back!” said Raguhl to the creature. “I know what you really are, shape-shifter! If you approach me, I will cut you to pieces!”
Thankfully, the potentially violent situation was defused by an outburst from Sparkie, who behaved like a petulant child. “I can’t believe you didn’t choose me!” he wailed at Tyralandi. “You picked Lagaan? Lagaan?! Come on! And Belessa? She’s a girl! Look at me! I’m gorgeous! Look at this beautiful elven hair, it looks like golden threads! And my face! Look, look, it might as well be chiselled out of marble!”
Tyralandi chuckled softly. “I’ve made my decision, Sparkillo, there are many beautiful elven women awaiting you downstairs.”
Sparkillo stood up like an outraged prince. “I will not have your pity!” he said. “I will leave with my dignity! Come on, Raguhl!”
The two left the room, with Ulfgar following after them.
“Come, my pretties,” said Tyralandi once they were gone, “I want to feel your love.”
Lagaan and I held each other’s hand as we followed her into her bedchamber.
Nightal 30th, 1376
The morning after
It was late this morning when we all gathered around a table in the main room of Sparkillo’s Magnificent Mansion, in the company of Brissa, Harliss and Kaskus. Lagaan and I hadn’t gotten much sleep at all, but we still felt wonderfully energized from the incredible experience. Ulfgar also wore an easy grin, as he had enjoyed the finest things that Porphyry House had to offer. In contrast with the three of us, Sparkillo and Raguhl wore definitely glum expressions. They had both spent the night alone on the Sea Wyvern…
Things were strangely awkward between Lagaan and me. We had just spent a night of passion together, but now that we had gotten to know each other so much better, we shyly avoided each other’s eyes most of the times, only giving each other small, intimate smiles every now and then. Last night changed everything. Things will never again be the same between the two of us.
I had trouble concentrating on the discussions around the table, as I was still bombarded with flashes of the glorious ecstasy of being in contact with Tyralandi’s flesh… and of the love-making with Lagaan, too.
I hid a sudden smile behind my hand while the others were talking. Lagaan was a better lover than I had expected… Now I could understand why Liamae was always coming back for more.
Unfortunately, we needed to focus on less pleasant things: Moretta, Tolin and their baby were still captives of the priests of Talos. Every moment that passed, they might be sacrificed, so we had to strike today, and we had to strike hard. The priests of Talos deserved an especially harsh punishment for causing so much harm to our allies, and for disrespecting their divine alliance with the church of Umberlee. Fortunately, dealing harsh punishment is Trouble’s area of expertise.
We had also learned some information about the Crimson Pirates from Tyralandi, once we had proven to her that we were worthy of it. Of course, it had taken many hours of pleasuring her to be deemed “worthy”, but Lagaan and I had shown great perseverance in this task. The Crimson Pirate base is called The Wreck, and is in fact located on the same island as Scuttlecove, only ten to fifteen miles away. Unfortunately, it is protected by powerful illusions hiding it from view, and it is warded by aggressive anti-scrying protections, as Sparkillo and I had discovered earlier when we had tried to locate our kidnapped friends. And of course, the place is always crawling with pirates and demons of all kinds.
Based on the descriptions we got from Tyralandi and Harliss, it seems that a frontal assault of The Wreck would be suicidal, even for us mighty heroes. The Wreck is almost impossible to navigate, and the only ones who can do that are the captains of the Crimson Fleet, who are all half-men, half-demon Lemorians like Vanthus had been before that unfortunate ‘death and resurrection as a Death Knight’ business. It means that they are quite powerful. Harliss suggested that we could try to locate one and gain his help in order to enter the base, but I found that very unlikely to happen.
While we were busy discussing various attack plans, none of which seemed too promising, Zan joined us. He was late because he wasn’t staying on the Sea Wyvern with us, but rather, at the Rusty Shunt with his new Protectorate buddies. After politely listening to us for a few minutes, he informed us that he had been approached by a man at the tavern. This fellow had claimed to know how to enter The Wreck, and had asked Zan to contact us about it. We were surprised, as we had been pretty discreet about our mission so far.
“Who is this man, exactly?” I asked Zan. “Did he give you his name?”
“He said he’s called Amit.”
Lagaan snorted derisively.
“Does it ring a bell?” asked Ulfgar.
“Yep,” replied the rogue. “That’s that guy who dodged my arrows yesterday.” He was referring, of course, to one of the slaves we had rescued from the Seventh Coil stockade.
“And you said he was an acquaintance?” I asked Lagaan. “What do you know about him?”
“Enough to guess that we can’t trust him. He used to work for me back in Shadowshore.” Of course, we all understood this euphemism to mean that Amit had been a member of the same thieves’ guild as Lagaan. “But he defected to join the Lotus Dragons, a few weeks before we slaughtered them.”
“Not a smart career move,” said Ulfgar with a chuckle.
“Not at all… Then, somehow, I know he became an ally of Vanthus. I think he was at Kraken’s Cove with him and survived the mutation cloud of the black pearl.”
I turned to look at Brissa. The poor girl was holding her clay jug so hard that her knuckles were turning white. She had been at Kraken’s Cove. She had turned into one of those horrible mutants because of Vanthus’s treachery. She would’ve perished there if we hadn’t rescued her.
“And do you suppose that afterward, he joined the Crimson Pirates with Vanthus?” asked Raguhl.
“That would be my guess,” replied Lagaan.
“Well, I’m just delivering his message to you,” said Zan. “He said he’s willing to give you the information in exchange for five thousand gold pieces. And he wants to arrange a meeting with only one of you, because he doesn’t want to put himself in too much danger.”
Lagaan snorted again. He turned to me and we exchanged a look of dark amusement.
“Oh, I’m afraid he’s going to be in a fair bit of danger,” I said. “There’s no way we’re going to pay five thousand gold pieces to that scumbag.”
After a brief discussion, we asked Zan to tell Amit to meet Sparkillo at the Rusty Shunt that evening. We figured the mage would be able to charm him discreetly, and besides, Lagaan would go with him, invisible, in case things went wrong.
We then began preparing ourselves to assault the temple of Talos. We decided to go with just the members of Trouble. Even though Kaskus wanted to help, he was still too weak to fight, so he remained behind on the Sea Wyvern. While we got ready, I asked him why the Protectorate had wanted to free him so badly. He seemed confused by this, and it was Zan who replied in his stead: Kaskus had never actually been in the guild, but when they had seen him being displayed at the hanging plaza, they had realized by magic he was someone powerful and benevolent, someone who would fit well into their organization, and that is why they had asked us to free him.
Zan also passed on to us the thanks of the Protectorate for dismantling the Seventh Coil, who had been among their most bitter enemies in Scuttlecove.
A broken shell
On our way to the temple of Talos, we decided to stop at Porphyry House to question Father Shondesh. I remembered him well from Calimshan, where he had held a position of authority. He had been a powerful and arrogant zealot of Umberlee, unflinching in his confidence in our goddess and in his own faith. I hated him, but I still wanted to see if he could be of help.
It felt strange to be back so soon. I felt like climbing up the stairs to go be with Tyralandi again, but I wasn’t sure how she would receive me. Had Lagaan and I been anything special to her, or had we just been two mortals among the thousands she enjoyed throughout her long depraved life?
The same succubus hostess we had met the previous night welcomed us again. When I asked her about Father Shondesh, she led us to a drug parlor downstairs. Several people were lying on low couches, smoking weird pipes. Their eyes were closed or lost in vacant gazes. The air was thick with the smoke of their opium.
We made our way through these unmoving addicts until we reached the couch where Father Shondesh was resting. He, too, was smoking one of those pipes. He looked like but a shell of the man I had met in Calimshan, a man so powerful I had not dared to retaliate against him for murdering my son before my very eyes. His hair was still long and mostly black, but there were now streaks of grey in it. He was still fully clad in plate armor, but its edges were now rusty. He still wore an abnormally large holy symbol of Umberlee, but it hung to the side, neglected. His cheeks were hollow, his eyes were surrounded by dark circles of fatigue. He shivered as if he were cold, and yet his brow was damp with sweat. It seemed as though he was suffering from some form of jungle fever, but I knew the source of his illness was in fact the terrible drug that the priests of Talos had forced him to take. If he ever stopped taking the addictive substance that kept him in this miserable state, he would die.
We asked to question Shondesh in privacy, and the succubus led us to a torture room where we dragged the barely conscious wretch. As we did so, he mumbled barely intelligible words in the language of Calimshan. I spoke a prayer to enable myself to speak that language, and I understood some fragments of his delirium: “let me go”… “everything’s over anyway”… “we’re all doomed” … “let me forget the lie”…
I felt that the room was warded against so-called “good” creatures. Its essence resonated well with me. It was a good thing that Raguhl had decided to wait for us outside the building. While Ulfgar and Lagaan checked out the torture implements, I tried to reason with Shondesh, but it was in vain: he was too far gone. Even a powerful Heal spell wasn’t sufficient to restore his mind. After examining him for some time with Sparkillo, we deduced that he had likely been administered a rare drug from the Abyss, which couldn’t be cured in this world by any means.
Listening to his mad ravings, I believe that Sparkillo and I managed to piece together the main lines of his story. He came to Scuttlecove some time ago to build a temple to Umberlee, but was tricked into a contest of faith by the followers of Talos. Somehow, they won, and Shondesh was completely flabbergasted by that; his arrogance was so great that failure had never been a possible outcome in his mind. Later, when he had turned to Umberlee to get some advice through divinations, he had been terrified to discover that it had been Talos who had answered him in a mocking tone, claiming that Umberlee did not exist and that it had been him all along who had toyed with him.
This “epiphany” had shattered Shondesh’s faith along with his sanity.
I knew, of course, that such a thing was impossible, and that he had likely been the target of a devious plot. It did not surprise me that this arrogant fool had fallen for it, however, it seemed highly suspicious to me that the brutish priests of Talos would’ve come up with such a convoluted stratagem instead of just, say, killing Shondesh. No, that seemed more like the works of priests of the devious gods Cyric or Mask.
As I discussed this with Sparkillo, we suddenly realized that Lagaan was standing frozen in place. We feared at first that he was under some sort of magical or mental attack, but he then spoke hurriedly.
“She’s here… She’s close… I can sense her!”
“What??” asked Sparkillo.
“Who are you talking about? Tyralandi?” I asked.
“No,” replied Lagaan. “My soul… I can feel the fragment of my soul nearby. I can feel the Death Slaad holding the prism. She’s on the island! Somewhere… in that direction!” he pointed toward a corner of the room.
“What is he talking about?” asked Ulfgar, turning toward Sparkillo, who shrugged confusedly.
“When Rowynn killed me aboard the Sea Wyvern, you guys brought me to Fort Blackwall to have me raised from the dead, remember?” said Lagaan. “The place looked like a temple of Lathander, but it was in truth a temple to the Queen of Chaos. And when we returned to the ruins of Fort Blackwall about a year ago, I went down into the temple and met this Death Slaad who was holding a strange prism which contained a fragment of my soul she had taken while I was dead.”
“Ooooh yeah… her…” said Ulfgar, remembering at last.
“There’s still a link between my soul and that fragment, which is in the prism. I can feel the link much more strongly when she’s in our world. And I feel it now!”
“Can you tell how close she is?” I asked.
“Well… She’s not THAT close… But I’m pretty sure she’s on the island.”
We decided to get going. Shondesh didn’t have much information for us after all, not that my hopes had been very high. There was nothing we could do to cure him for now. I looked at his prone, helpless form, and of course, I considered ending his miserable life there and then, to glean a small measure of vengeance for the loss of my son. But in truth, it would accomplish nothing, and Shondesh had been but a crazed zealot who thought he followed the whims of our goddess. For all I knew, perhaps it truly had been Umberlee who had asked him to sacrifice my son. Either way, his current fate was probably worse than death, so I saw no need to show him any mercy with the tip of my trident.
Crushing the zealots
We approached the temple of Talos with murder on our mind. Before we entered, I protected the group from lightning and death magic, which proved to be a very good move on my part.
Inside, the huge planisphere of twirling metallic stars and planets at the center of the main worship hall still crackled with lightning. Thunder bolt motifs decorated the floor and the circular walls of the grand dome. Around the temple stood six statues of Talos, and the pools of water between them were animated as if by a constant storm. Two wide stairways at the other end of the room led up to a series of spiralling balconies, and three doors opened near their base. It was really a very nice-looking temple. We would have to try not to damage it too badly.
Three acolytes of Talos busied themselves across the temple. They obviously wore heavy armor under their metallic-looking robes, and they carried heavy silver flails. One of their comrades, a dwarf, was on a platform at the center of the planisphere, hard at work repairing one of the device’s mechanisms. Two pirates also stood near the complex machine and prayed to Talos.
“Good morning everyone,” I shouted, “what a wonderful day it is to worship the mighty UMBERLEE, uncontested mistress of Storms!”
As expected, all eyes turned toward me. One of the acolytes, a broad-shouldered man with an ugly scowl, approached me with his fingers on the hilt of his flail. Alas, his attempt at intimidation fell short when Raguhl and Ulfgar stepped up on either side of me. The warrior-priest realized that we meant serious business.
I flashed the acolyte a confident smile and gestured to my two warriors. “Let’s clean this place up, boys…”
The acolyte drew his flail, but not fast enough. Before he could even try to use it, he collapsed to the floor, his body hacked to pieces by Raguhl’s heavy sword. Ulfgar rushed the two innocent bystanders, as he loves doing so much. They drew their sabers to try and defend themselves against the furious dwarf, but they didn’t stand a chance. One of the acolytes at the back of the room fled through one of the doors to go warn his superiors, and in the mean time, the dwarven priest amidst the machine cast a Silence spell around us. Thankfully, I wasn’t affected by it, as I had protected myself against this precise spell before entering. I gestured toward the offending midget with my ring of telekinesis and flung him down into the machine, where he had to dodge the moving parts or be crushed by them.
From the six statues of Talos scattered all around of the room, six bolts of lightning arced in our direction to try and shock us to death, but once again, we were left unharmed thanks to my magical protections. Since I had known what kind of adversaries we were up against, I had been able to ward us very well.
One of the two pirates collapsed under Ulfgar’s waraxe as Raguhl charged the second acolyte. Sparkillo moved to the right side of the machine, and I couldn’t see Lagaan, for he had turned invisible. The dwarven priest of Talos got back on his feet and cast another Silence spell close to Sparkillo. I joined Ulfgar in his fight against the pirate captain, who took several wounds from both our weapons. The man focused his attacks on me, since I wore the illusion of being dressed only with flimsy pirate clothes, and his eyes widened in surprise when his blows were deflected by my unseen armor.
One of the far doors opened, and the acolyte who had fled there returned with a tougher-looking priest armed with a spiked chain. Sparkillo waved his staff at the two enemies, blasting them with a Cone of Cold. In fact, he also caught Lagaan in the area, as he couldn’t see him: he had, as usual, neglected to cast See Invisibility on himself, a move that was especially poor in this particular fight, as we will see a bit later. Thankfully, though, Lagaan completely avoided the effects of the spell.
The second acolyte was felled by Raguhl, and Ulfgar left me to deal with the captain while he ventured into the metallic chaos of the rotating planisphere to go fight the dwarven priest. By then, most of the room was covered in magical silence, but we were still able to communicate with each other through our usual telepathic link. Also, Sparkillo was talented enough to keep using his spells through the silence, although it was more difficult for him to do so without uttering the incantations out loud. All the while, the statues still attacked us (and only us, not our enemies), with lightning, but it was in vain, for Umberlee’s magic protected us completely.
My trident bit deeply into the captain’s flesh, and his features took on a look of terror. He realized he had no chance of besting me in combat, and decided to flee. As he did so, I wounded him one last time, and it is with a heavy limp that he moved toward the entrance doors. I could’ve easily chased after him, but I didn’t see a point. I actually wanted him to escape and spread rumors of our terrible wrath throughout the city.
Lagaan let out a mental curse through the link. The priest with the spiked chain had somehow sensed his presence despite the invisibility, had somehow managed to avoid his trip attempt despite the invisibility, and had somehow managed to touch him despite the invisibility, unleashing a spell that would’ve surely slain Lagaan, had he not been protected by one of my Death Wards!
Raguhl rushed toward the third acolyte, but suddenly, a Wall of Stone appeared near them. Lagaan and the man with the spiked chain were on the other side of the wall. I couldn’t see who had cast the spell, because as I suspected and as we would soon discover, that person was invisible. If Sparkillo had seen the invisible caster, he would’ve been able to attack him, but instead, the so-called genius was wasting his time firing his heavy crossbow at the spiked chain wielder.
Ulfgar killed his Talos-worshipping kinsman, whose limp body was crushed a few moments later by the moving parts of the planisphere. An invisible woman then materialized out of invisibility next to Sparkie and wounded him with a nasty Harm spell. Just after that, Ulfgar and I became surrounded by the thick morass of a Solid Fog. My movements became sluggish, but I cast a Freedom of Movement spell on myself and ran out of the fog’s area. Just as I escaped the mist, Sparkillo teleported near me, and I could tell he was badly wounded. He had done this to get away from the deadly woman who had mistreated him like that. I saw her from afar: one side of her face was ruined by a hideous scar, but she moved with a lethal grace. Somehow, I guessed that she was the leader of these cultists.
Ulfgar also escaped the fog’s area and appeared close to the two of us, but immediately after, a Wall of Fire came into being not far from us, blocking access to the far side of the room where Lagaan was fighting for his life. On the other side of the huge machine, we knew that Raguhl was also fighting, but that his way was also barred, this time by the wall of stone.
This invisible spellcaster was starting to get quite annoying, so I cast an Invisibility Purge which allowed us to see him, a nasty-looking tiefling flying with impunity on the other side of the whirling machine, casting spells left and right. Sparkie took the three of us on the other side of the walls through a Dimension Door. We appeared close to Lagaan, who was fighting two tough-looking opponents: a man in black armor, and the high priestess. At their feet lay the man with the spiked chain: Lagaan had pierced his vitals with his deadly blades. Just as we materialized, a section of the stone wall crumbled into pieces, and a very angry Raguhl emerged from the opening, also coming to Lagaan’s aid.
The black-armored man touched Lagaan with another powerful spell, which thankfully, Lagaan resisted. Otherwise, he would’ve been sent to another world!
We faced three powerful foes, but things got even worse as two other doors opened and several more opponents came through. Some were acolytes, with their metallic robes and silver flails, one was a half-man, half-demon, and another was… Tolin?!
His new appearance was truly horrible, for he was now some kind of undead wielding his two swords. The wicked priests must have tormented him beyond imagination. My companions stopped for a moment as they realized the atrocity of what had happened to the leader of the Jade Ravens.
Me, a satisfied grin crept over my face. The jackass had gotten exactly what he deserved for turning Moretta against me.
The man in black armor turned to face Raguhl, and tried to send him to the Abyss with another spell, but the lizardman resisted as well. Yet, turning to face the barbarian proved to be the priest’s last, and fatal, mistake. He died an instant later, struck in the back by Lagaan. Never turn your back to a rogue…
Of the entire group, I was the closest to the new enemies, and several of them charged toward me, including Tolin. I tried to block his powerful attacks as best as I could with my shield, but one of them got through and wounded my thigh.
Lagaan was hit by another powerful spell, this one cast by the High Priestess. He was bleeding from many wounds by now. Sparkie had also been badly wounded by the disfigured priestess, and the tiefling fired a volley of Scorching Rays at him, but thankfully, the elven wizard dodged most of them.
Another silence spell surrounded us, the entire great temple was now covered in a zone of silence. It wasn’t a very good move on their part, since both Sparkillo and I could still cast our spells, but the acolytes could not. It seemed that the High Priestess had protected herself the same way I had, for she was also immune to the silence. I cast a Slay Living spell at the tiefling, but he resisted it and took only minor damage.
So as usual, I was relegated to the humble rank of healer/defender, for it was our glorious wizard who had the pleasure of slaying this particularly annoying enemy. The tiefling was struck by a blast of deadly green energy, and he was disintegrated into a small cloud of ashes (and pieces of equipment falling to the floor).
“SPARKILLO!” came the usual cry of victory through our telepathic bond.
“Hey, you’re getting pretty good at disintegrating flying tieflings!” remarked Lagaan.
I was still defending myself from Tolin and the remaining acolytes. I was able to block all of the undead Tolin’s furious attacks from that point on, but the acolytes were very skilled fighters as well, and they were able to deal a few wounds to Sparkillo and me. I held my ground well, but I could tell that the wizard was in great danger. Focusing my thoughts, I closed all of his wounds with a single mighty Heal prayer.
Meanwhile, Lagaan and Raguhl were dealing heavy blows to the priestess. She had moved to position herself in a corner, so she wouldn’t be backstabbed to death like her black-armored lieutenant, but nevertheless, it was clear that she wouldn’t last very long against our mighty warriors. Then, Ulfgar charged her and rammed his axe into her chest, killing her instantly!
Raguhl rushed to my help and attacked Tolin. The undead monster reeled from the impact of the barbarian’s glowing sword and turned to face him. In the mean time, Lagaan approached one Sparkillo’s assailants and assassinated him. Sparkillo took a few steps back and combusted another acolyte with Scorching Rays.
“He’s running away, help me, Belessa!” yelled Ulfgar telepathically.
I looked around quickly and spotted the half-fiend fleeing about twenty feet above the ground. He had cast an Air Walk spell on himself, but he moved slowly due to his heavy armor. Ulfgar moved much faster thanks to his boots of speed, but had no way of getting off the ground. Reaching at a distance with my magic, I imbued him with the same capability to tread on air as if it were solid. He hurried in pursuit of our foe.
Lagaan killed another acolyte, and the last one was incinerated by more fiery rays emanating from Sparkillo’s fingertips. As for Tolin, he was cut to pieces by Raguhl. As his foul undead body fell to the ground with a spasm, Raguhl stared at him with a morose expression. Knowing him, he surely felt badly about the whole thing, as if he had killed a friend.
Over the wall of fire, Ulfgar caught up with the fleeing half-fiend and ended his retreat with a vigorous blow to the spine. Death by dwarven waraxe… the cowardly creature crashed down into the flames.
And there it was… The minions of Talos were all dead… The honor of the church of Umberlee was restored!
The hidden temple
Once the battle was over, I tended to the group’s wounds as usual. Neither of the fighters had been harmed, actually, and I had only been superficially wounded despite Tolin’s best efforts. It had been a difficult fight, but we had survived thanks to our great might, some luck, and especially Umberlee’s protection against death magic and lightning.
“She’s here!” suddenly exclaimed Lagaan. “She’s in the temple!”
“Who?” asked Ulfgar.
“The Slaad! Quick, follow me!”
He led us downstairs, into a dark hallway. Further ahead, the Death Slaad was waiting for us, a hideous being holding a small shape in its bony arms. We all understood what the little bundle was: Moretta’s baby. The Slaad smiled at Lagaan with its disgusting long teeth and vanished, along with the baby, of course… It had all happened too fast for us to react.
We explored the underground level. A strange, rhythmic noise could be heard from further ahead, a sound of metal hitting metal. We eventually found a zombie that was mindlessly banging a shield with a mace to create this cacophony. Only once we killed it did silence settle into the dark catacombs once again. We then realized that we were in a corridor with jail cells, and that the zombie had been making this noise, most likely, to keep the prisoners from sleeping and regaining any spells at their disposal. We looked into all the cells and found three men in some of them. In the last cell was a woman… the woman I had been looking for.
Lagaan quickly unlocked the door and I stepped inside.
Moretta was chained to the far wall. She was dressed in filthy rags and her hair was unkempt. I could see marks of torture on her body. A glimmer of fearful hope shone in her dark eyes as she watched me enter the cell like a majestic savior.
“Belessa!” she cried in a voice made hoarse by countless hours of screaming and crying. “I understand now… I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…”
With that, she fainted. She was clearly suffering from sleep depravation due to the zombie’s cacophony.
I approached slowly. I had been thinking about this moment for so long… I had pictured it going so many different ways. Sometimes, I had imagined that our reunion would be filled with tears, and that I would hug her tight, with an open heart ready to forgive anything. At other times, I had foreseen that I would not be so lenient, instead punishing her soundly for the trouble she had caused me.
And now that I finally found myself in that situation, I felt somewhere in the middle. I still greatly resented Moretta for betraying me, for abandoning me, for playing me for a fool. I had so many enemies in Farshore, among the Jade Ravens, Lavinia, and even within my own band of adventurers; the only person I had really trusted had been her. But she had broken that trust…
And yet, the greatest portion of my rage had been directed toward Tolin. I had fantasized about the various torments I might inflict upon him as punishment for turning Moretta away from me. But alas, as usual, I had been robbed of the satisfaction of such a revenge. Someone else had tortured him. Someone else had killed him. Someone else had turned him into an undead plaything. I found solace in the knowledge that his last few days had been atrocious… But now I was left with nothing. Moretta was a broken woman. She had been captured and tortured. The man she loved was dead. Her newborn child had been taken to another world by a monstrous fiend. She had betrayed her mentor. And it had all been because of her own stupidity. At least, it seemed she was aware of that fact now. But unfortunately for her, it was far, FAR too late.
Moretta was finished. She had lost everything. Even if I had wanted to punish her, there was nothing left I could’ve done to her that could’ve worsened her misery.
So I did the only constructive thing I could do. I healed her physical wounds while Lagaan unlocked her manacles. Even though most of her bruises and scars vanished, she remained unconscious. I told the others I wanted to bring her back to the ship. They nodded in silence. They had some idea how I felt about the whole situation, and they were wise enough to remain quiet. I was neither in the mood for jokes, nor for lectures on morality.
We then looted the corpses of our enemies and found many precious magical items once again. We also found a secret door in the staircase, which led down to another flight of circular stairs. We followed it into a deep underground chamber which contained an altar to Cyric and a pentagram in the middle of the floor. Cyric, the Prince of Lies… So at least now I had some confirmation that Talos hadn’t been behind this convoluted plot, as I had suspected. One or several of these clerics had in fact served Cyric, the god of murder, deception and illusion. It indeed seemed quite typical of his worshippers to manipulate a simple-minded bully like Shondesh.
We had seen a smaller shrine to Cyric in town, close to Red Foam Whaling, and I found myself wondering if there was any connection between the two… Perhaps we should ‘visit’ it some time.
Sparkillo examined the pentagram and informed us that it had likely been used to perform special rituals, such as the reanimation of Tolin into a special kind of undead we had been unable to identify, and the warding of this temple against scrying.
In Cyric’s shrine, we also found several treasure chests.
“There should be more than enough in these to pay for Amit’s information,” said Sparkillo.
“I disagree,” I said. “We shouldn’t give a single gold piece to that snake. I don’t trust him. Remember: we’re talking here not only about a thief, but about a thief who betrayed the thieves’ guild and became an ally of Vanthus…”
Sparkillo teleported us back to the Sea Wyvern, along with Moretta, the three men we had rescued from the temple’s cells, Tolin’s grotesque corpse wrapped in a blanket, and the severed heads of three of the higher-ranking cultists. I might try to interrogate them later by necromancy if the opportunity ever presents itself.
Once again, the crew greeted us with a healthy dose of fascination for our latest battle. Kaskus gasped when he was shown what remained of Tolin.
“I’m sorry, my friend,” said Raguhl. “We had no choice. We got there too late…”
Brissa helped me to carry Moretta into a private room of the Magnificent Mansion. Together, we washed her and clothed her with a clean robe. Brissa looked worried about what I might do to Moretta. She knew how angry I felt toward my former acolyte. She had caught glimpses of my fury during my darkest moments.
“Don’t worry, I won’t harm her,” I said after a while. “She’s safe now. She has suffered enough… I will not push the cruelty further. Everything she’s done, she did out of stupidity, not out of malice. Once she regains consciousness, she will be free to leave if she so wishes. I will not try to stop her.”
“What about her baby?” asked Brissa. “Did they…”
“The baby was still alive when we got there,” I said, looking straight into Brissa’s dark eyes. “But alas, it was captured by a terrible foe, the same Slaad who captured a fragment of Lagaan’s soul while he was in the Fugue Plane. Now, it seems she has brought the infant back to Limbo with her…”
Brissa paled. She realized that whatever fate was in store for that unfortunate child was a terrible one indeed.
“Yes, Brissa, it’s a tragedy,” I continued as I glared at Moretta’s unconscious form. I was unable to feel sorry for someone so pathetic. “And it’s all because of her! What a fool! She is dead to me. I will not harm her, out of respect for the friend she once was… But I feel no pity for her. She brought this doom upon herself.”
Guilt and sorrow
Evening approached. Tonight, in cities across Faerun, even in the hellhole that is Scuttlecove, people would celebrate new year’s eve. However, aboard the Sea Wyvern, the mood was rather dark, and few were those who felt like celebrating. This was the case despite the day’s threefold successes: defeating the local clergy of Talos, freeing Moretta, and destroying Tolin after he suffered abominable torments and was turned into an undead!
Unfortunately, Harliss visited us on the ship and brought bad news with her. She claimed that the Crimson Pirates surely knew about our victory over the Seventh Coil, and that their retaliation would like be quite deadly. She suggested that we should free the Sea Wyvern from its current predicament and go hide it in a secluded cove she knew about, not far from the city. She was right, of course. Our vessel remained much too vulnerable as it was, stuck against the wreckage at the entrance to Scuttlecove’s harbor. We decided that we will leave this dangerous location tomorrow.
Then, there was the case of Amit. The rat claimed to have knowledge that could allow us to infiltrate the Crimson Pirate base. Lagaan and Sparkillo returned to the city with the hope of learning what he really knew by magic and/or coercion.
During the evening, Moretta regained consciousness. Once again, Brissa and I were alone in the room with her. She was filled with shame for what she had done, and apologized profusely to me. But I remained hard as stone even in the face of her tearful apology, which came far too late. When she tried to hug me, I kept her at a distance. I would not be swayed by her tears. In a hollow voice, I told her what had become of Tolin and of their child, which of course only increased her miserable sobbing.
“But look on the bright side,” I told her with a drop of venomous sarcasm,” at least your little darling is safe away from me now…”
Brissa had not suffered as I had from Moretta’s actions, so she was able to comfort her. A tiny part of me yearned to do the same, a part of me wept alongside Moretta, but I kept it tightly restrained. This was the part of me that had been foolish enough to confide in her, to trust her, and to tell her the story of my son’s sacrifice. Moretta had been the first person I had told my story to. And ultimately, it was this weakness of mine that had triggered this entire chain of events: if I had not trusted Moretta enough to tell her how my son had been sacrificed, she would never have fled Farshore in the first place. None of this would’ve happened. Her child would still be safe. Tolin would still be alive.
So in a way, this was all my fault. Like all mortals, I am flawed, and despite my great strength of character and my divine powers, there is a part of my being that is soft, gentle, trusting. And it is this flaw in my soul that caused so much harm. Do not worry, Moretta. It will never happen again. I will never be so weak again. Especially not toward you.
After one last hard look at the whimpering fool, I turned away and closed the door behind me so I wouldn’t have to endure her pitiful sobs anymore. I then spent some time on the deck, under the stars, with a few of our sailors, standing watch in dark contemplation of recent events and of the foreboding future.
So much death and suffering surround us… We are locked in a constant, terrible struggle, and for what? Our enemies are but pawns of the Prince of Demons. Do they even understand WHY they oppose us? Probably not… We are all but pieces of flotsam drifting on a sea of pointless hatred and petty selfishness… Condemned to drown ignorant and alone…
I was brought out of these dark musings by the return of Lagaan and Sparkillo. They didn’t go into the details of their meeting with Amit, but I got the sense that it was somewhat less than a resounding success. They didn’t have any actual information about the Crimson Pirate base, nor did they bring back a charmed prisoner as they had planned on doing, so I wondered what they had actually accomplished… It seemed that the negotiations with Amit were still in a rather vague territory. He claimed that he had worked for the Crimson Pirates in the past, and therefore knew their base well, but that he had been sold into slavery to the Seventh Coil due to a disagreement with a rival captain of the Crimson Fleet. Yet the only clear way of getting information from him was to pay him his ransom, which due to what I could only imagine had been some sort of blunder on the part of my companions, had now doubled to ten thousand gold pieces.
I saw no need to spend so much money, or to even deal for a minute longer with this despicable cur, since Harliss had assured us that she could deliver the same information. The other members of Trouble weren’t sure what to do, but I gave them my opinion again: I didn’t trust Amit, and we would be fools to give him our money. If he was callous enough not to give us the information we needed after we had saved him from the Seventh Coil, information that we would use against those who had put him in captivity in the first place, but instead tried to leech an exorbitant amount of money from us, then he could go to hell as far as I was concerned. Or to the Abyss, whatever awful lower plane he preferred.
Hammer 1st, 1377
War is brewing
Today is the first day of the year 1377, the Year of the Haunting. Such an ominous name; I wonder if it will have any special meaning for us?
Following Harliss’s suggestion, we spent a good part of the day finishing the repairs on the Sea Wyvern with tools and magic, and then trying to free it from the wreckage. It was a good thing we had all those freed slaves with us, because it was tiring work. Finally, around mid-afternoon, the ship became un-stuck, and it was repaired enough to sail safely. We left Scuttlecove and Harliss guided us to a hidden cove where the Wyvern would be safe – for now.
We now count three more members in our crew: the men that we freed from the cells below Talos’s temple. They were all hardy sailors and decided to join our cause when they heard we were going up against the Crimson Pirates. Over the past two days, Sparkillo has also returned twenty more of the slaves we have freed back to Sasserine. Fifteen slaves remain with us at the moment, including the receptionist and the four ‘whores’ from the Bird Cage. These were in fact regular people who had been captured by pirates, and who had happened to be attractive enough to be sold to the harpies to serve in their brothel.
Tonight, Harliss claimed that she knows some pirates who could help us mount an attack against the Crimson Fleet. Now that our reputation is getting stronger in Scuttlecove (and as more and more sites become littered with the bloody corpses of our opponents), she hopes that she will be able to gather a large enough pirate fleet to attack the Crimson Pirate base known as the Wreck. Since a frontal assault with just the Sea Wyvern would be suicidal, she claims that if these allies can draw the main Crimson Pirate forces out of the base, Trouble will then be able to infiltrate it discreetly and hope to defeat Vanthus and free Lavinia.
Of course, those attacking the Wreck will be in great danger, so it would be greatly beneficial if we could rally more people to our cause, like Bone’s troops or perhaps the Dire Hunger Monks. Harliss feels confident that the Protectorate will help us as well.
It will take Harliss a few days to gather all those people. In the mean time, we will be able to venture into the ruins of the Ur-Priests’ palace and try to find Tyria and the information regarding Lagaan’s father.
Hammer 2nd, 1377
Alone in the tower
In the morning, we prepared for our excursion into the Ur-Priests’ Palace. We had three goals today: to find new information about Lagaan’s father, to find the book of the Dire Hunger Master, and, most importantly, to find Tyria. I hoped that our little friend was somehow still alive, but my rational mind calculated that her chances of survival for such a long time in the deadly citadel were dramatically low. Nevertheless, we had but to find her corpse to save her: if we did, I would use my potent magic to bring her back to life.
We returned to the monastery of Dire Hunger, where the old master of the order gave us the medallion with the skull and inverted pyramid symbol. Then, we approached the palace of the Ur-Priests. It was menacing indeed, but we felt that if that other group of adventurers have ventured within and lived to tell the tale, then so would Trouble! Following the old monk’s advice, I protected the entire group against lightning; I also cast a Wind Walk spell on everyone, and our minds were once again joined together in a Telepathic Bond by Sparkillo. We flew, like little storm clouds, toward the top of the main tower. As we did so, the defenses of the keep were activated, and suddenly, we were beset by lightning; but Umberlee protected us and we were immune to the blasts.
We entered a room with no visible exits except a great shimmering portal. It was decorated with a great fireplace within which roared a great fire, most likely magical in nature. On one of the walls, a large painting showed a beautiful landscape, and a few blood-red sofas were placed around the room. On one of them sat a skeleton draped in old robes. As we approached it carefully, its skull became animated and began speaking with us. Although we were wary, we soon realized that this creature did not wish to harm us. Rather, it was the deceased spirit of a philosopher left here by the Ur-Priests. In life, this man had pondered the meaning of life in all its forms, and was now condemned to an eternity of undeath. This was a sane but tormented soul, who regretted the evil he had done in the last years of his life. We offered to end his miserable existence, but he doubted he would find safe haven in the afterlife because of all the sins he had committed.
The skeleton, whose name was Kutugar, claimed that he used to be visited by Ur-Priests and Dire Hunger Monks in the past, but that nobody had come into this room in the last five years. He warned us of a terrible construct guarding the room of many doors beyond the portal. Sparkillo took pity on this poor wretch, who was all alone here, and teleported him to his family’s mansion in Sasserine. He even took the time to write a note:
“Greetings, Mother.
Please do not touch my talking skeleton.
Your loving son,
Sparkillo”
After examining the portal for a little while, Sparkillo understood the runes that adorned its archway. The text was written in Celestial, which he spoke, and said that this gate was marked with the code C7. The Dire Hunger Master had told us we should seek the door B13.
This portal was powered by energy from the celestial plane, stolen and channelled here by the Ur-Priests. Even though its radiance sickened me a bit, it pleased me to know the energy of the high and mighty do-gooders was being used here without their consent. With a bit of work, Sparkillo managed to activate the portal, and we all stepped through it together.
The Seven-Headed Juggernaut
We entered an immense room with about fifty other portals: this was clearly the ‘room of doors’ we’d been told about. Its guardian stood at the center of the place: it was an enormous seven-headed hydra made entirely of metal. It slowly lurched to life and its fourteen eyes began glowing with an infernal light. Its belly shone as brightly as if it were made of molten lava. It rumbled ponderously toward us, ready to attack, and we had no choice but to defend ourselves.
Sparkillo quickly told us about iron golems through the mental link, but we soon found out that this creature was entirely different. We briefly wondered which strategy to take: attacking it normally, or trying to avoid it, finding the correct gate, activating it, and fleeing. As usual, we were badly coordinated, and ended up doing a mixture of both.
Ulfgar and Raguhl bravely charged the colossus. Lagaan shot arrows at it, but soon realized they bounced harmlessly off the creature’s almost indestructible shell – he then turned invisible and tried to locate the portal ‘B13’.
Using some divination magic, Sparkillo understood that the creature was slowed by cold energy. I blasted it with an Ice Storm, and indeed, it moved more sluggishly after that, but still it breathed on us with the terrible energy of its many heads. Each seemed to have a different power: fire, ice, magic-negation, poison… The most annoying of all was an unbreakable cage of crackling lightning that imprisoned victims within.
I moved around the battlefield, casting healing spells here and there to help my companions – I knew that none of my magic powers could seriously affect this creature, except for cold spells. Sparkillo used his teleportation magic to save Ulfgar and Raguhl when they got stuck inside the lightning cages. Raguhl, who was enraged as usual, ended up doing a great deal of damage to the monster. Sparkillo also called upon the powers of a Limited Wish to be able to create rust on parts of the monster with a mere touch, a magic normally mastered only by druids. He also caused much damage to the juggernaut with this trick.
Thankfully, as I acted as a mere healer in this battle, the construct mostly ignored me, only blasting me with a single stream of ice at one point. My joints were half-frozen and my movements got much more sluggish afterwards. My companions suffered much more, especially Ulfgar and Sparkillo, who were trampled on several occasions by the immense creature. With Umberlee’s blessing, they survived.
To keep it slowed, I cast a Freezing Sphere at our enemy once the effects of the ice storm wore off. Suddenly, the metallic hydra realized that one of the portals had flared to life: it was Lagaan who had, under the cover of invisibility, been able to activate it. The titanic machine breathed several cones, clouds and rays of energy in the thief’s vicinity, desperately trying to protect the gate. Poor Lagaan suffered much from this ordeal, but survived it with my help.
Finally, just as the gate swirled open, Sparkillo touched the construct one last time with his rusting grasp, and the entire structure of our opponent gave way; the mighty draconic golem crumbled to the floor in a deafening cacophony of twisted metal.
We caught our breath as I healed our many wounds. I had expended a great deal of my magical powers during the fight, but it had been worth it: we had slain the terrible guardian placed here by the Ur-Priests.
The Hall of Artefacts
Beyond the ‘B13’ portal was a room with stairs leading up to a wide balcony. The rest of the group went up the stairs, while I levitated up there using my magical boots. We took one of the two hallways that opened before us; it led to a strange place that seemed suspended in the night sky. We stood on some kind of platform, and from there, we could see three other platforms that looked like repositories of strange artefacts. Doors seemed to lead way from those platforms into other dimensional spaces. Stairs led upward/downward in a square formation, impossibly coming back to the save level after climbing up an entire turn. On our platform was a weird three-dimensional chess game called a planar board. The Halfling-sized figurines turned to watch us enter. We had been warned that this place was filled with cursed artefacts, so we weren’t supposed to touch anything except the book the Dire Hunger Master wanted. I saw Ulfgar hesitate for a moment, gripped by curiosity, but he thankfully decided to use his brain for a change, and did not touch the chess game.
The next “room” was a library, where an invisible creature (whom Sparkillo saw looked like a cat-headed man… perhaps a Rakshasa?) helped us find the tome with the symbol of the skull and pyramid. When we asked him other questions, though, he became extremely rude, complaining that he was bound to this place for eighty-five more years and that his orders were only to help visitors find books. Clearly, he refused to provide any other kind of help. Satisfied that he would spend the next several centuries alone and bitter, we left this odious creature to its misery.
Next, we found ourselves on a platform with four petrified armored men guarding a complex magical cube. We tried restoring one of the men to flesh, but it didn’t work. We understood that the cube was the prison of a powerful being: but we wondered if we should risk releasing it… Since this would be an important decision, I performed a Divination ritual to ask for Umberlee’s wise counsel, noticing as I did so that the corrupted magic of the Ur-Priests made it very difficult to contact the gods. Still, I was able to learn that a shadowy power from the Abyss was locked within the cube. We decided not to let it out.
Then we entered a laboratory where two powerful spectres asked us to leave. We retraced our steps and entered a section of the place where the walls were once again made of stone. It was a strange place nonetheless, where up was down and down was up depending on the sequence in which we entered the rooms. The first room held some chairs and a table that appeared to be on the ceiling, but the next time we entered it, they were on the floor; or perhaps we were now the ones on the ceiling…
We found ourselves in a room with several exquisite paintings of fantastic beings I recognized as some of the gods of Faerun. Half of them were upside-down. After experimenting a bit with them, we found that we received some effects associated to their portfolio, depending on the orientation of the painting. Ulfgar thus gained a bit of wisdom from the bird-headed god Toth, and Lagaan some bad luck from his own goddess, Tymora, which he cancelled the next time we passed through the room and found her in the opposite position. He also tampered with the painting of Bane, god of tyranny, and seemed to get gripped by positive emotions, because he started looking at me with what I would call friendship and compassion. For now, Lagaan seems to like me even more than after our night of passion in Tyralandi’s bed, but who knows how long these feelings will last?
We passed a room with wooden sarcophagi, another one with a black adamantine pole going from floor to ceiling, and found ourselves in a room with more paintings, which seemed to serve as windows showing us some other rooms in the area.
The helpful dead
The next room we entered contained a pentagram on the floor, and was bathed with a strange aura of peace. At the center of this pentagram sat a skeleton. He was dressed in the tattered robes of a Dire Hunger Monk. Over his mortal remains, the ghostly form of an elf appeared before us. Strangely, he proved quite helpful, especially once we showed him Lagaan’s medallion indicating that we worked for the master of his order.
The undead elf was called Thentyr and had been meditating in this place for several years. He was able to give us instructions to reach our destination: the Observatory of the Unseen Sky. Alas, he had not seen Tyria. In fact, we doubted that she was in any of these rooms, as it was unlikely that she could’ve gotten past the construct.
We made our way back toward the chess-board room and went through a door there. It led us into another room where we found four more undead wearing Dire Hunger Monk robes. Judging by their appearance, they seemed to have been turned into wights. Just like Thentyr, their leader proved to be quite talkative and helpful. He knew Lagaan’s father, Arafern, who he considered to be very smart. Arafern had apparently left this place two years ago by teleportation, with the help of an adventurer. A month ago, he had contacted the head wight by magic, telling him that he was doing all right and that he was still in Scuttlecove. Apparently, he can be found at the Rusty Shunt, by talking to Lars Landicaster, a man we already know.
The four monk-wights were still in the grip of the terrible hunger even in their state of undeath. One of them, clearly not possessing the same discipline as his leader, suddenly attacked Ulfgar, but his attempt proved quite ineffective, as he only managed to bite down on the dwarf’s nearly impenetrable armor. I channelled my divine power through the symbol of Umberlee and took control of the wretch, forcing him to his knees. I then allowed his brothers to sate their hunger on his miserable flesh. While they were devouring their former comrade, we made our way down the stairs at the far end of the room.
We reached a place with a telescope that we immediately guessed was the Observatory of the Unseen Sky. After examining the device for a little while, Lagaan was able to figure out how to make it work. This incredible apparatus enabled us to look at any location throughout the multiverse. We examined several places of interest, from heavenly landscapes to the bowels of the Abyss: the Gaping Maw, Demogorgon’s domain. We beheld the black fortress of Saint Kargoth the Betrayer, champion of Demogorgon and first Death Knight. Lagaan was also able to tune the device to look at the fortress of Demogorgon himself. He saw the Prince of Demons on a balcony of Abysm. But Demogorgon was aware of the magical connection, and he interrupted it with a wave of his tentacles.
I also asked Lagaan to look at the Halfling realm of Greenfields. He was surprised and claimed that he saw that the little guards there looked grim and alert. It seemed they had been attacked recently… But I didn’t explain that it was to this place that I had sent the exploding Shadow Pearl and the putrid flesh monster of Taboo Island.
Red and blue
We had reached two of our three goals so far, but we still needed to find Tyria. The mistress of the Skindancer Academy had claimed that she had sent Tyria to an area called the Vault of Death. We returned to Thentyr and asked him about it. He said it sounded familiar, and could be found either beyond gate C9 or C19. He also explained to us that the gates numbered “C” led to locations in the palace that were truly on the material plane. Those with the code “B” led to extra-dimensional ‘pocket planes’, such as the one we were currently in. Those marked “Z” led to other planes altogether.
We made our way back to the chamber of so many doors, and located the two gates Thentyr had mentioned. First, we went through C9, appearing in a room where half the floor was tiled in red, and the other half was tiled in blue. Standing on the red tiles was a towering Ice Devil, and on the blue tiles stood an Astral Deva.
“You shall not pass,” they claimed in unison.
We tried to learn from them if this was the vault of death, but they proved most unhelpful. The Deva appeared so bored that he was itching for a battle against mortals. He was also quite rude and arrogant. The devil seemed more subtle, but would also probably be forced to fight us by the ancient magic that bound him here.
The Deva summoned a Blade Barrier behind us to prevent us from leaving through the portal. It seemed that a battle was inevitable…
A promise kept
As it turned out, we were able to avoid combat and convince the two outsiders that it wouldn’t be in their best interest to pick a fight with Trouble. The Deva cancelled his Blade Barrier, and we were able to return to the room of many doors without any bloodshed.
Once we were back in the room of many doors, Sparkillo began the incantation to open the other door we believed might lead to the Vault of Death, but as he did so, we noticed that his cursed axe began glowing strangely. This mysterious weapon, which he had discovered in the ruins of Tomoachan, allowed him to create holes through walls, a potent power, but we knew that along with it came a curse: sometimes, these holes instead became portals to Tanathos, the layer of the Abyss that is ruled by Orcus. Such an occurrence had only happened once before, back when we were in Journey’s End during our first trip to the Isle of Dread. A deadly shadow had emerged from the portal and had attacked Sparkillo, Lagaan and Raguhl. Just before the portal closed, a gigantic being of pure darkness, a dreaded nightwalker, had looked at us and had promised that we would meet again.
It’s not clear what caused the axe to activate this time, whether it was Sparkie’s tampering with the room’s portals, or just some devious side-effect of the omnipresent magic of the Ur-Priests, but once again, a portal to Tanathos opened near us. Beyond it stretched the bleak landscape of black hills upon which roamed the tormented souls of the dead. Stepping through the portal, towering over us, came the nightwalker we’d already seen once before. It made good on its promise of seeing us again. But this time, he proved much less agreeable and attacked us.
There are very few living beings who can boast about having defeated a Nightwalker, one of these terrible undead denizens of the lower planes. But then, there are very few living beings who are as powerful as Trouble. The deadly undead had clearly underestimated us, and paid the price for its arrogance. Surely, it was very powerful. Its mere presence made our hearts clench with fear, but some of us were still shielded from this effect by the morning’s Heroes’ Feast. Only Lagaan and Sparkie stood frozen in place, cowering before our enemy. Raguhl and Ulfgar rushed it and it soon felt the sting of their blades.
The Nightwalker created a miasma of darkness around us that seemed to cause pain to my companions, but I am used to such dark magic and it had no effect on me at all. It blasted us all with a Cone of Cold, and also tried to kill Raguhl with a Finger of Death, but the raging barbarian survived the deadly magic without even flinching. That’s all our enemy had the time to do before being hacked to death by Ulfgar’s frost-imbued axe.
We were still in danger, though, for the portal still gaped open, and through it, we could see many dark shapes approaching toward the material plane. Gaunt and twisted they were, foul skeletons with purple fungus growing inside their torsos. We knew that if they reached the gate, we would be doomed. Sparkillo used his magic to try and dispel the portal, but it was in vain. The thing was incredibly resistant due to some disturbance related to the Ur-Priests’ magic. The elf threw his cursed axe through the portal, but that didn’t help either. Eventually, by focusing as he had rarely done before, Sparkillo was able to disrupt the magic of the portal with one final spell. The dark gate vanished… We were safe!
Once that threat was gone, I healed my own wounds as well as Raguhl’s. I had already healed the nasty frost burns that Sparkillo had suffered during the battle. I approached Ulfgar, whose beard was still covered with shards of ice, but he shoved my hand away, grumbling that he didn’t need any healing magic. I shrugged and turned back toward Sparkillo and Lagaan, who were trying to figure out why the cursed axe had reacted that way. But in the end, they were unable to reach any meaningful conclusion.
The undead collector
We finally opened the portal leading to ‘C19’ and stepped through. It led to an old mausoleum containing many alcoves and coffins in which rested some corpses. Clearly, we had reached the Vault of Death, where Tyria was supposed to be. Sparkillo used a Locate Object spell to discover that she, or at least, her flying carpet, was located several hundred feet from us. We made our way through the dark corridors in that direction. Along the way, we found several massive doors protected by heavy locks and deadly magic. They were adorned with the symbol of Kelemvor, god of death.
Lagaan, despite his best efforts, proved utterly inept in detecting the traps, and narrowly avoided a ray of negative energy when he tried to open the first door. For his safety, we used magic to open doors from that point on, the first with a Babau demon I summoned, and the others with Knock spells from Sparkillo.
At some point, we reached a vast chamber that was filled with swarms of buzzing, flying insects. The vermin hovered in thick clouds around what appeared to be the bloated corpse of a long-dead reptilian monstrosity of enormous size. As we approached, though, we realized that the thing was still animated by a sinister presence; perhaps it was some form of undead. As it turned to face us, we saw that it oozed new swarms of those monstrous insects from various foul orifices. We recognized the parasites as bloodfiend locusts, terrible creatures capable of draining the life energy of victims caught within their swarms. Clearly, we needed to be very careful here.
The monstrous dead slug-lizard spoke in a deep voice: “How did you get here?”
“We used the door,” replied Lagaan in his usual insolent tone.
“How?” rumbled the massive creature.
“Well, it’s got a knob, you see,” continued Ulfgar, who was also feeling quite sarcastic. “You have to turn it, and then, you can get through the door. It’s quite simple, really.”
As soon as that tremendously vital information was revealed, a vast quantity of insects flew right by us in the direction of the exit. We decided not to stick around in this dangerous place and made our way toward the corridor at the far end of the room, since the giant dead lizard didn’t seem to want to stop us. As we walked through the room, we saw that there were many coffins lined along the walls in a sort of macabre exposition. Their lids were transparent, and within, we saw that a great number of undead were trapped.
Only one short, squat coffin appeared empty, and as we passed by it, a dwarf approached us from around a pillar. His hair and beard were quite wild, and of the same grey color as his skin and armor. Only his eyes glowed with a dull red color; he was apparently some form of ghost.
“Hey, you,” he grunted in Ulfgar’s direction. “What’s your name?”
“Ulfgar Dorunn, at your service,” replied our companion.
“Descendent of Dorunn the Great?”
“Mostly…” replied Ulfgar in an uncertain tone.
“I knew Dorunn the Great, your ancestor. I was the one who killed him.”
“Well, that’s a shame.”
“He was weak,” continued the ghost, who was clearly trying to pick a fight. “He was afraid of being underground. What kind of dwarf is afraid of being underground? Pfff! What a sissy!” We all remained politely silent, even though we knew that Ulfgar was also quite nervous underground. “Your ancestor was the heir to the throne of our dwarven kingdom, lad. For killing him, I was banished. But it was unfair! I, Barjack Blackfist, did the kingdom a great honor by killing such an unworthy heir!”
“If you say so,” replied Ulfgar.
The ghost seemed appalled at his restraint. “What’s the matter, man? Don’t you have any balls? Is your beard made of sissy elf hair? Won’t you try and avenge your sire?”
Ulfgar remained silent. He appeared to be thinking about it.
“Well…?” asked Sparkillo through the mental link.
“Friend Ulfgar, I will aid you in avenging your slain ancestor!” pledged Raguhl in his usual heroic tone.
But the ghost Barjack seemed to get impatient because of Ulfgar’s hesitation; he roared at us, changing his shape into a vision of horrific appearance. A few of my companions were shaken by this, but it takes more than that to scare me. I raised my holy symbol and exerted its power on the ghost, forcing it to its incorporeal knees.
“Bow down before the power of the great Umberlee!” I hissed. Then, once it was clear that the ghost was helpless, I motioned for the rest of the group to destroy it. It took quite a beating before dissolving into flimsy shards of ectoplasm, but eventually we got rid of it.
The sphere
After getting past another viciously trapped door, we found a room in which a large, multi-colored magical bubble floated in the air. Sparkillo sensed that Tyria was kept inside. We tried to understand the nature of this strange sphere by using our magic and knowledge, and also by experimenting with a few arrows. Everything seemed to be getting stuck inside the sphere, but couldn’t come out of it.
While Sparkillo was analyzing the sphere with more attention, we heard the sounds of someone approaching. It turned out to be a hulking man in battered armor: he was the fighter of the other group of adventurers we had met previously at the Rusty Shunt. I don’t remember his name with great clarity, so I shall call him Wart in this text. Apparently, the rest of his group had suffered tragic fates within the ruined palace during the last few days. Their wizardess had been turned into an undead; their cleric had vanished mysteriously; and their dwarven rogue had gotten stuck inside a prismatic bubble just like the one that currently kept Tyria captive. Poor Wart seemed so miserable that we agreed to help him get out of the dungeon.
While we were talking, we heard the sounds of a swarm of locusts approaching, so we closed the door to avoid them. Sparkillo ended up figuring out how to break the sphere: it was a matter of casting one spell of each of the eight schools of magic at it. He did so, finishing with a Magic Missile which burst the bubble.
“SPARKILLO!!!” he exclaimed majestically.
Where the bubble had recently hovered, we could now see a tiny woman wearing brightly-colored clothes, sitting on a flying carpet. Her expression was terribly bored, and she seemed to be playing a game of patience on a long scroll that was filled with weeks’ worth of her handwriting.
She blinked in surprise. “Sparkillo? … Raguhl?... Lagaan?... Belessa?... Ulfgar?... Is it really you!?”
We all smiled at her, happy to see that she was still alive.
“Yes, Tyria, we came to save you!” said Raguhl, who gripped the little Halfling in a tight hug. Tyria giggled and kissed his scaly cheek.
“Wow guys it was awful I was stuck in there for soooo long it totally sucked I tried so many thing to get out but nothing worked I tried all my spells but nothing worked I’ve never heard about a bubble like that it’s so bogus I even tried a scroll of teleport and it didn’t work I didn’t know what to do I was soooo bored I almost ran out of room on my scrolls playing tic-tac-toe with myself you have no idea how mind-bogglingly boring this was it felt like an eternity by the way what year are we now anyway it’s all right at least I survived I didn’t need to eat or drink or sleep well sleep a bit but barely because I bought a ring of sustenance like Belessa because you know me I love traveling and I can’t waste too much time sleeping gotta see it all so many places to see and so many things to do and people to meet anyway thanks a lot guys for saving me but I’ve got things to do so thanks a gain you guys rock anyway thanks bye.”
She hastily produced another teleportation parchment from her pack, read it, and vanished in a puff of smoke along with her flying carpet. We all stood dumbfounded for a moment… she had disappeared so quickly.
“What the…” started Ulfgar.
“Well, that was fulfilling,” I said dryly.
“Hmm…” Even Raguhl seemed a bit bitter that she had left us without the slightest regard for our predicament or that of Lavinia. “Well, at least she’s safe.”
I snorted. “Yeah, until the next time we need to go save her sorry ass…”
By that time, Sparkillo and I were quite tired, as we had used almost all of our spells. He summoned a Magnificent Mansion and we all stepped through the portal for some well-deserved rest. Raguhl seemed to bond quickly with Wart, and they shared stories about our adventures, sitting at the huge table in the center of the mystical house. Apparently, the other group had fought mostly stone golems, bound demons, undead and traps. They had not been able to get any rest as they had been beset by nightmares when they went to sleep. Also, the layout of the dungeon had been constantly shifting, so they had gotten hopelessly lost.
Hammer 3rd, 1377
Stubby’s rescue
We were not disturbed by monsters or even by nightmares during the night, so we woke up the next day fully rested. As we ate our daily Heroes’ Feast, though, Raguhl informed us that he had taken the liberty of promising Wart that we would find and rescue his captive dwarven companion. I sighed heavily, for I had been looking forward to leaving this dreary place.
Another small surprise was that Sparkillo’s cursed axe had magically reappeared at his belt. A larger one was that, once we exited the portal leading to the mansion, we realized that the door we’d closed the previous day to prevent the swarm from passing through had been destroyed. We returned to the lair of the big lizard-slug and found it gone. The vermin swarms were gone too. The slimy tracks indicated that the enormous abomination had left in the direction we’d come from: the chamber of many doors…
Next, we spent some time looking for the captive dwarf (who I believe was called Stubby). Sparkillo used his magic again to locate his eyepatch, and we started moving in that direction. We triggered a painful cloud of fire, which we escaped thanks to a Dimension Door from Sparkillo. He in fact brought us right next to the location of the prismatic bubble holding Stubby captive. That would’ve been a great thing, had it not been for the massive swarms of locusts that hovered within the room.
Sparkillo blasted the entire room with a deadly Horrid Wilting spell, which caused us all great pain, and didn’t even manage to destroy the swarms… The insects swirled around us furiously, and drained some of Ulfgar’s life energy. While my companions were busy battling the vermin, I quickly used a Wall of Ice spell to create a frozen hemisphere to shelter us temporarily. I protected us all from negative energy, and then we broke the wall and finished off the swarms. It was a long and painful process, but eventually, we dispelled the vermin. Sparkillo used eight more spells to break the prismatic bubble, thereby releasing Stubby.
Alas, within the sphere, there were yet even more vermin, which we also had to kill. Once we were done with that, we realized that our bad luck did not end there: it turned out that Stubby was in fact quite, quite dead.
“I’m sorry, Wart,” said Raguhl, seeing that the big warrior looked quite morose. “We did all we could.”
“I can resurrect your companion for the standard fee if you wish it,” I told Wart.
“What about their cleric, we could look for him too,” offered Lagaan.
“NO!” I said firmly. “No, categorically no. We’ve spent more than enough time here already. We’ve found the holy book, we’ve found the information about your father, we’ve rescued Tyria, and we’ve even recovered what’s left of Stubby. There’s no way we’re going to roam aimlessly in this vermin-infested place looking for a cleric who might or might not still be alive. No way. He’s on his own.”
Lagaan looked around at the rest of the group, but none of the others, not even Wart himself, looked too keen on sticking around.
The big mess
Sparkillo tried to teleport us directly to the main room of the Rusty Shunt. He missed his mark a little bit. We all appeared in the (suddenly very crowded) latrines.
“Idiot…” I snarled as I stalked out of the tiny room.
I stopped suddenly. Something was wrong.
The main room of the inn was completely empty. Tables were overturned, beer stains covered the floor. Clearly, this place had been evacuated recently, in a hurry. We heard screams and the sounds of battle coming from outside. For a moment, we all thought the same thing: the Crimson Pirates were attacking Scuttlecove!
We hurried toward the windows and saw what was actually going on. The entire town was being attacked by… countless swarms of locusts…
“What…” began Raguhl.
“The…” continued Ulfgar.
“Hell…?” finished Lagaan.
“Is it just me or do those insects look kind of familiar?” asked Wart.
“Of course they do, you nitwit!” I hissed.
“Hmm,” said Lagaan with a perplexed expression. “Maybe we shouldn’t have told that big slug-lizard-thing how to open the door, after all.”
“But… I don’t get it…” said Ulfgar. “How come it only left now? Couldn’t it open the door by itself?”
Lagaan shrugged.
“Well, come on!” said Raguhl with his usual zeal. “Let’s go help defend the city!”
And so the men hurried outside the inn, eager to fight the swarm while they were still protected from its energy-draining effect by my magic. I followed them much more slowly. I suddenly felt very depressed. Obviously, it was because of us that the town was being threatened by this cataclysm. Perhaps the lizard-slug-thing had left because it had guessed we had destroyed the seven-headed juggernaut. Perhaps it had remained in its lair beyond portal C19 all those years, patiently biding its time and spewing locust swarms until the day a group of adventurers would kill the construct and enable it to leave.
We had gone into the palace with the best of intentions: we wanted to help Lagaan find out about his father and to rescue Tyria. Someone once said that no good deed ever goes unpunished. That person was clearly very wise. Much wiser than me, that’s for certain, because I keep falling into the same trap over and over again.
I watched numbly as the local populace fought the swarm with whatever weapons they had at their disposals. They used torches, mostly. It seemed that the town would survive the onslaught, but with a heavy cost in human lives. Corpses littered the streets, and pale, shrivelled people who were still alive, crawling in the mud, feebly raised their arms and begged me for healing. I felt no desire to help them. What good would come out of it? Clearly, every time I try to perform a good deed, it turns against me. Besides, the villainous scum of Scuttlecove deserved nobody’s help.
We learned eventually that the devils that serve Kedward Bone had been instrumental in the city’s defense, and that they had slain the big undead lizard itself.
I noticed that Lars Landicaster, the owner of the Rusty Shunt, was on the roof of his establishment, trying to fight off the swarm. I was worried that he would die before giving us the information about Arafern, Lagaan’s father, so I levitated up to him and protected him from death magic as well. The others soon joined us and dispersed the swarms around the inn. Then we helped Lars back to the ground and entered the inn with him.
“Thank you kindly, folks,” he said gruffly. He was covered in sweat and insect bites, and his skin was quite pale. “Oh, it’s a terrible tragedy what befell our lovely town today. Once word comes out of who’s responsible for this, there’s going to be retribution against these curs for sure.”
The rest of the group stared at him blankly, except for Raguhl, who looked miserable and guilty. Wart wisely remained silent. I glared at the innkeeper… I could’ve obliterated him on the spot if I didn’t care so much about Lagaan’s quest for his father. Retribution, huh? Let them come… Anyone who seeks Trouble will find Trouble… And suffer the consequences. They’ll find that we’re considerably more dangerous than a cloud of insects.
When Lagaan asked Lars about Arafern, the innkeeper looked surprised and wary. He instructed our rogue to return that evening to learn more. Since it was only mid-morning, Sparkillo teleported us all (minus Wart and Stubby’s corpse) back to the Sea Wyvern, which was still anchored in a semi-secret bay some distance from town. Thus, they had not been attacked by any locust swarms. Everything appeared to be going well on deck. I headed straight to my cabin, locked the door behind me, and collapsed on the bed. Even though I had not been drained of energy by the locusts, I felt completely depressed. The bizarre and strangely un-rewarding adventure in the Ur-Priests’ palace had drained me of emotions. I felt tears flowing down my temples, and for now, I wanted only to be swallowed up into the black oblivion of sleep…
Hammer 3rd, 1377 (continued)
Father and son
I woke up early in the evening and went on deck, noticing that there was a lot of activity on board. My companions were giggling like silly little boys as they played with Raguhl’s decanter of endless water. Tyria was with them; she had somehow made her way to the Sea Wyvern, who knows how... It seems she has not left us as seemed to be the case earlier; she is going to stick around after all.
I went to see Brissa, who had done a good job of keeping the crew in line while I was gone. She told me that Harliss wanted to meet us at the Rusty Shunt tonight. She also talked to me about Moretta, but I really didn’t give a damn at this point. My former acolyte wanted me to perform an atonement for her, but I informed Brissa that Umberlee had not granted me the power to perform such a ritual. Moretta would have to go find another priest for that.
I really didn’t feel like socializing tonight, but the others convinced me to go to the Rusty Shunt with them to meet Harliss and for Lagaan to finally meet his father. He also wanted to return to the palace of the Ur-Priests to scry on Vanthus and the Slaad that had stolen his soul. While I understood his concern and agreed that further scrying might be a good idea, I reminded him that I had used a lot of my most potent spells already today; it seemed that another excursion within the dangerous ruins would be ill-advised.
Sparkillo’s magic brought us back to the Rusty Shunt. It was quite crowded, as it would’ve been on a normal night, but there was a lot of tension in the air due to the attack of the killer swarms in the morning morning. Many people wore bandages; they were at once grim and agitated. It turned out that the first victims of the locusts had started turning into vampire spawns, so all the others had been put to the torch to prevent an outbreak of undead. I was also convinced that some of the locals must have taken advantage of the chaotic situation to get rid of some bothersome rivals, using the excuse of cleansing the town of an undead infestation.
The hero of the day was Kedward Bone, who had slain the giant lizard-slug-thing with the help of his devils. Many of the tavern’s patrons praised him, and some even said he should be elected mayor. Good for him.
Nobody seemed to know that we had, very indirectly, been responsible for today’s attacks, and instead they blamed the Crimson Pirates, who had been absent from Scuttlecove for some time now, most likely too busy with their plans for world domination and/or destruction. I of course used this to our advantage and fuelled those rumors to turn even more of the locals against the Crimson Pirates.
Harliss found us among the crowd and brought us to a table in a corner for a more private discussion. She and her allies at Red Foam Whaling had been attacked by the swarms, but they had all survived nevertheless. She told us that she had contacted enough people in Scuttlecove to mount a convincing “decoy attack”, meaning to have a bunch of ships sailing to the general area of the Wreck, hoping to draw out the major part of the Crimson Fleet. We hoped that our enemies would fall for this crude trap despite their cunning, due to the fact that they wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation of destroying lesser pirates aboard lesser ships on the sea, where they have always dominated. Meanwhile, and hopefully, before our allies all got butchered, we would infiltrate the Wreck, kill the remaining Crimson Pirates who stood in our way, which hopefully included Vanthus, save the damsels in distress Lavinia and Liamae, as well as Dolmord, and somehow make our way back to safety.
There was just one tiny flaw in this bold plan: we had no idea how to infiltrate the Wreck. Tyralandi had promised us this information, but we hadn’t had any contact with her since the night when we had entertained her.
Lars then came by and spoke to Lagaan, no doubt about his father. The rogue excused himself and disappeared. Clearly, he wanted to spy on his father under the cover of invisibility before making contact.
We spent a few more hours at the Rusty Shunt. Sparkillo, Raguhl and I discussed some strategies for the upcoming naval battle with Harliss, while Ulfgar downed a large amount of beer as usual. After a few hours, we still had no word from Lagaan, and since we were getting tired, we decided to return to the Sea Wyvern without him.
Hammer 4th, 1377
Another me
This morning, Sparkillo brought us back to the Rusty Shunt for our breakfast. As we had hoped, we met Lagaan over there. He looked at once excited and disturbed, so I wasn’t sure how his meeting with his father had gone. He answered some of our many questions, but it was clear that he was only revealing part of the truth.
His father, Arafern, knew much about the Crimson Pirates. He had powerful abilities of mind control, and had at some point captured one of the captains of the Crimson Fleet, and had thereby gained much information about the Wreck. This included knowledge about a special ritual that enabled people to teleport inside the Wreck, a feat that was impossible with ordinary magic. The only catch was that one of the people in the circle of teleportation had to know a willing male subject in the Wreck.
“But we only know Lavinia and Liamae inside,” said Lagaan, “except for Vanthus, who I’m sure is not willing.”
“Well, perhaps he’d be willing to let us teleport to him if he knew he’d get to fight us,” offered Ulfgar.
“I’m not sure,” replied Lagaan. “But we could also try to capture a Bar-Lgura and charm it instead.”
“I believe I have a simpler solution,” I said while the others were contemplating alternatives. “I know a willing man in the Wreck.”
The others all looked at me with puzzled expressions. “You do?”
I had never told them about my captive lover, but I felt it was now the time to reveal his existence.
“Yes. Before we met, back when I lived in Calimshan, I had a bodyguard, a strong warrior named Dolmord, who was captured by the Crimson Pirates. For a long time, I thought he was dead, but in recent months, I learned through divination that he was in fact still alive, but kept prisoner by the Crimson Pirates, in what I assume to be the Wreck. If I am right, we could use his spirit to enter the base…”
“Would it work?” asked Raguhl.
“I’m not sure… But I think so,” replied Lagaan.
“We could ask your father,” I said. “When do we get to meet him?”
Lagaan’s expression suddenly turned darker. “Err… I don’t know. He’s a very private person.”
“Aw, come on!”
“I don’t think so. He’s very cautious. And he warned me that we should all be more careful as well: it seems we’ve trusted Tyralandi too much.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Well, when we were with her the other day, apparently, she kept some of our hair or something and made clones of you and I…”
The other members of the group guffawed at this ludicrous turn of events, but I felt my heart clench with dread and anger. I felt so betrayed… That b$~~%! How dared she!!!
My mind raced with the possibilities. Would my clone have the same abilities as I did? Would Umberlee grant her access to her divine magic? And what about her free will? Was she Tyralandi’s slave, or would she act like me, like the original?
There were too many variables to the equation, too many possibilities and too little time to consider them. We had to focus on the upcoming Crimson Pirate attack. But I felt certain that some day, sooner or later, this would come back and bite us in the arse.
Of course, to Raguhl, Ulfgar and Sparkillo, this was just a grand joke. They said that Tyralandi had wanted to keep copies of Lagaan and I in her bedroom for nightly enjoyment; they also suggested that we should capture the clones and turn them in, back in Sasserine, to claim the reward on our heads.
Farewell to the Wyvern?
Later in the morning, we returned to the Monastery of Dire Hunger to give the Master his book. He seemed most pleased and removed the quivering palm from Lagaan. He also assured us that some of his monks would join our naval assault on the Wreck.
The rest of the day was spent in preparations for the attack. Sparkie wasted much of his precious magic to bring the remaining slaves we saved from the Seventh Coil back to Sasserine. I sailed the Sea Wyvern to the bay outside Scuttlecove, where we met many ships of our allies. There is a palpable mixture of excitement and dread on board, for we know that tomorrow, we will sail against what is surely one of the strongest fleets in Faerun. It is clear that many of our allies will die. Perhaps all of them. In a way, I wish I could take part in this heroic battle, but I will be needed elsewhere, in a place that will possibly be even more dangerous than here on the high seas.
Before going to bed, I took one last walk around my beautiful Sea Wyvern, knowing full well that she might get sunk tomorrow… Whatever happens to her, and to me, we will surely be together again one day in Umberlee’s domain deep below the surface…
Hammer 5th, 1377
Gateway of the mind
I left my ship in the capable hands of Harliss this morning. Along with her, Brissa, Zan and Tyria will be leading the Sea Wyvern’s crew. Our little bard friend won’t come with us on this daring adventure, but she will surely provide some much needed help with her arrows and potent magic to the crew of the vessel… I do not know if it will make a difference, if it means that the Sea Wyvern will survive the attack… But before leaving, I prayed to Umberlee so that my ship and my friends might be blessed by her overwhelming power. They will surely need it…
Sparkillo brought us back to the Rusty Shunt yet again. There, we met a strange hooded elf who greeted Lagaan. I thought at first that this was his father, but I later learned it was not the case. We held hands, and he teleported us to a dark underground crypt with a stone table and a beautiful tapestry. We spoke only briefly, but I got the distinct impression that this elf was under some sort of magical control. I mentioned it to Lagaan via our mental link, but he brushed my concern aside.
“Is this really your father?” asked Raguhl.
“No, my father is controlling him,” replied the rogue. “It’s fine.”
“So where is your actual father?” I asked Lagaan in a very sceptical mental tone.
“He’s… err… taking a bath at the moment. Listen, it’s not important. Just trust me, guys, all right?”
I studied Lagaan in silence for a few moments. The situation was truly strange, and quite propitious for a devious trap of some kind. Yet Lagaan seemed quite sure of himself, and not under the effect of a domination spell, like the elf was. Since we didn’t have time to argue or to be too paranoid, I agreed to go along with the plan.
“If you’re ready, then we must all hold hands,” said the elf. Once we’d done so, he looked straight into my eyes. “Priestess, think about the gateway… Think about this man who will let us enter the Wreck… Focus your mind on him.”
The elf gestured as though he were casting a spell, but I could clearly see it was only an act. Surely, the actual spell was being cast by someone else. Was it Lagaan’s father? Where the hell was he and why was he putting on such a show?
I thought about Dolmord, that strong, handsome, protective man, the father of my child, the one who had allowed me to be brought back to life… Dolmord, I owed him so much… He had suffered so much, for so long… How I yearned to set him free…
I caught glimpses of a room with walls of stone… Blood, splattered on the walls… Pain… Darkness… A rasping voice, coming from the right… Pain… Always the pain… The bodies… the others… hanging, hanging limp… Dead… All dead… Why wasn’t I dead? Why wouldn’t they just let me die?
I was in Dolmord’s mind… I saw through his eyes… ached through his flesh.
An impossibility…
A joining of the minds.
Belessa… Is that really you?...
“You are doing well, priestess,” said the elf. “You are all doing well, except the dwarf, whose chaotic thoughts are noisier than his armor and smell fouler than his ale breath!”
“Sorry,” grumbled Ulfgar.
In the blink of an eye, I was staring at a macabre chamber littered with bones, filled with the stench of rancid meat. Hooked chains dangled from the ceiling. Mutilated bodies hung from some of them. My body was afire with the pain of a thousand cuts… Just as it had been every single day since I had been captured by the Crimson Pirates, what felt like so long ago… This never-ending torment, only so rarely and so briefly interrupted by the visions of my love, my beautiful Belessa, pale of skin, dark of hair, the mother of my child, bringer of hope… she said she would come to set me free…
“Awake again?” hissed a sinister, inhuman voice to my side. “Twice in a day, that’s a lot for you, Dolmord. You know your prayers won’t be answered. The day hasn’t come yet when you will die… hmmm… oh, no… hmmm….”
I hung from those chains… They bit deep into my wrists… I felt numb, and yet I could feel every ache, every cut, every bruise. My body was a vast throbbing expanse of tormented flesh… When would it end?... When would I be set free?…
And suddenly, the pain was gone. I didn’t feel the world through Dolmord’s body anymore. I was back in my own body… But my body, along with the rest of Trouble, as well as the elf, now stood in the torture room at Dolmord’s side. I saw my poor lover hanging limp from the chains wrapped around his wrists. His form was covered in scars, yet it was still whole… He was not beyond the salvation of my healing magic. But as our eyes met, the glimmer of life left his gaze. The magic of the ritual had drained so much from his spirit, to yank us into this room, that it had snuffed the tiny flame that remained of his life. Dolmord was dead, but still within my grasp to heal. I just had to be fast.
I was only vaguely aware of the humanoid frog-headed creature with grey skin that stood next to Dolmord. This was the monster that had tormented him like this. Under any other circumstances, I would have blasted it into oblivion with my most destructive spell, but alas, I had to focus all of my will on weaving healing energy into Dolmord’s body to restore it and to bring back his recently departed soul.
The frog-creature, which was a horrible Death Slaad, apparently gave a sickly smile at Raguhl and nearly obliterated him with a single spell. The lizardman reeled back from the blast of energy. Lagaan attacked the Slaad. The elf who had brought us here shook his head in surprise. It seemed the enchantment that Arafern had laid on him was now gone. With a snarl, he drew his scimitar and attacked Lagaan, but failed to cause any serious wound before being slaughtered by Ulfgar. Lagaan would later explain to us that he had just been an evil denizen of Scuttlecove under the mental control of his father, a control that had been broken upon entering the Wreck.
A short and brutal battle followed. Sparkillo failed to disintegrate our enemy, but he was able to break his mind with a Feeblemind spell. The Slaad turned into nothing more than a ravenous beast, but it was still dangerous with its physical attacks. It badly harmed Lagaan, but was soon hacked to pieces by Ulfgar’s axe. Its death had been far too swift, I fear, but life is often unfair like this.
Together at last!
So powerful was my magic that within moments, I had not only brought Dolmord back from beyond death, but I had healed most of his wounds. He was still dazed from the years of torture, but he was physically and mentally whole again. He stood tall just as I remembered him, but he was much thinner than before, and a dark beard now covered his chin.
“Belessa…” he said in a hoarse voice.
“Dolmord, my dear, loyal bodyguard,” I said, making it clear to him that I was hiding our true link from the others. “How happy I am to see you again. You are free now, I will never let them hurt you again!”
We both had tears in our eyes, and we hugged each other. It was glorious, after having been separated for so long, after both suffering so much… It was a miracle that we were together again!
There was so much I wanted to tell him. I wish the others had not been there, I wanted to kiss him so badly! But there was no time. We were all still in great danger. We had to keep moving. I quickly introduced my companions and explained what we were doing here, and that we still had to save Lavinia and Liamae. We also had to kill Vanthus.
Dolmord confirmed that Vanthus had come to talk to him, but could not remember what he had said. It seemed to be lost in a haze of pain. He had not seen the two women, but had an idea where they were kept.
Indeed, we were not in the prisons. This torture room was in a tower situated near the entrance to the Wreck. There were windows in the walls, and we saw on one side the open ocean where the great naval battle between our forces and the Crimson Pirates was starting. On that side, the entrance to the Crimson Pirate base was blocked by a huge tangle of debris. According to Sparkillo, the Death Slaad had likely been able to use its magic to clear the way when ships needed to enter or exit the cove.
On the other side of the room, we saw through the windows the tangled mess that was the Crimson Pirate Base. It was a chaotic jumble of shipwrecks, trees, rope bridges and docks. It seemed mostly deserted, so it appeared that Harliss’s plan had worked: the Crimson Fleet had left its base mostly unguarded. Of course, here and there, we could still see a few pirates, and we were sure that vile demons lurked in the shadows of the docks and ships. Dolmord also warned us about the emaciated bodies we saw here and there, hanging in rusted iron cages. They had been told by the Crimson Pirates to yell in case they saw us, fed with the false promise of freedom if they helped in our capture.
At the center of the base was a trio of immense trees upon which were impaled several large pirate ships. It was a disturbing sight, taken straight from the nightmares of a mad old seadog. Dolmord pointed at the largest ship, the one at the bottom, and said he had been kept prisoner there before. He believed that Lavinia and Liamae could be found there. He wasn’t sure why he had been taken from there and brought here instead, but only knew that his tormentor, the Death Slaad Velzigarus, had also been some kind of prisoner of the Crimson Pirates. The powerful creature, which should’ve been a lord among its kind in Limbo, wore only dirty rags. Yet we had no time to question its corpse to learn what it was doing here, why it was a prisoner of the Crimson Pirates, and why it had smiled at Raguhl before trying to destroy him.
Dolmord quickly told me that he had been kept alive for a reason. He had seen countless other prisoners here over the years, but they had all been slain by Velzigarus eventually. None of them had ever endured a tenth of what he had suffered. Yet to keep him alive, he had periodically been visited by priests of Demogorgon who had applied their healing magic to keep his body whole.
Part of my mind screamed that they must’ve had some wicked reason for doing this, that this was a trap, that they were using Dolmord as bait, but I ignored it. I was just too happy that he was safe and sound… I would never let them take him away from me again.
While I was talking to my lover, the men discussed where to go next. A watchtower stood at the center of the base, and seemed like an obvious target to attack, but the prison ship was our real goal.
“I say we go to the prison right away,” said Raguhl.
“Hmm, I don’t think so,” said Ulfgar. “It would be better to neutralize the tower.”
“But in the prison, we can find Lavinia and Liamae,” said the lizardman.
“And maybe some loot, too,” added Lagaan.
“And Vanthus!” said Sparkillo, shaking his dainty fist in the air.
“I’m still not sure…” said Ulfgar.
“Come on, man!” said Raguhl. “Women, loot and bad guys! What more do you want?”
And so we decided to go straight for the prison. Dolmord was in no condition to come with us. Even though I had closed his wounds, I feared he would not be able to keep up with Trouble, for we were bound to face foes beyond his level of power. He was a strong fighter, but my allies and I had evolved beyond the reach of most mortals: we were far more powerful than Dolmord and I had been when we had lived in Starmantle. What’s more, he assured us that nobody ever came to this tower: he would be safe waiting here. Nevertheless, I opened my portable hole and we found a good magical armor and sword for him in there… At least, he would have a chance to defend himself if he did get attacked, but I clung to the hope that it wouldn’t come to that.
To allow us to reach the prison in stealth, I cast a Wind Walk spell on all of us. Normally, Sparkillo could’ve teleported us there directly, but Lagaan’s father, whoever and wherever he was, had warned us that using teleportation magic within the Wreck was extremely difficult even for someone like Sparkie.
I regretfully left Dolmord behind and followed my companions, in gaseous form, toward the big impaled ship. We circled around it and saw that it was hermetically closed except in one place: a stairway leading down from the main deck. But it was guarded by two pirates and a monstrous Retriever… we would have to get past those somehow…
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Great stuff!!! I'm looking forward to the clones!
Plenty of leads, drama and things to think about (will the Wyvern survive?) - and - ready to kick off in spectacular fashion! :-)More! :-D
Yeah, the clones thing was really unexpected... And it's funny, because just a few minutes before the DM told us about them, we were joking about cloning ourselves and turning in our clones to cash in the rewards on our heads. ;)
Hammer 5th, 1377 (continued)
Ratline Sid
There were several ships impaled upon those three great trees, and as we observed them, we saw several foul enemies, not only Crimson Pirates, but also harpies and Yuan-Ti. We carefully moved in gaseous form to remain hidden behind the hull of Fortune, the prison ship. Then, Sparkillo regained his solid form and opened a magical hole into the ship with his cursed axe. We all entered into a dark storage room, where we regained our solidity as Sparkillo closed the gap behind us.
We quietly made our way into the next room, which contained several cells. To our right, steps led up to the deck where the Retriever stood guard. We did not make a sound, for I had shielded us with a Silence spell: we wanted to avoid alerting the entire Wreck with the sounds of battle. But no battle awaited us in this first ship, for there were no guards downstairs, and only one cell was occupied by a poor sod that had been beaten almost to death. His body was covered in bruises and his jaw was unhinged. As we examined him, we easily noticed that he was something more than human: dark wings hung from his back, marking him as a Lemorian, a half-demon just like what Vanthus had been in the final stage of his life.
We took pity on this unfortunate wretch and I healed him, allowing him the use of his jaw again. We had reasoned that he would be willing to aid us against his former allies, since they had treated him so badly. Fortunately, that is indeed what happened. Raguhl took hold of the piece of string upon which I had cast the Silence spell and stepped away so the rest of us could discuss with the Lemorian. His name was Ratline Sid, and he had once been a captain in the Crimson Fleet. In the recent past, after Vanthus had returned in great power with his new status of Death Knight, a few of the fleet’s captains, including Sid, had tried to manipulate Vanthus and Cold Captain Wyther into fighting each other, hoping they would weaken each other so much that the leadership of the fleet would become up for grabs in the mayhem.
But as could be expected, Vanthus became aware of these shenanigans and fought back harshly against the rebellious captains. Some were killed, some fled, and poor Sid was captured, tortured, interrogated, and finally placed in this cell to rot. He seethed with anger toward Vanthus, and confirmed what we already knew, that Vanthus hated us greatly. It was nice to hear that: it made us feel special.
Sid was quite helpful in answering our questions. We learned that Liamae had spent some time in a nearby cell, but had been adopted as a sex toy by a female captain called Bilgerut Norah, who had come by regularly to take her to her cabin for a few days at a time. Lagaan searched her cell and indeed found signs of her recent captivity. From what Sid told us, Liamae had been in a sorry shape every time she had been returned here from a long session with Norah. This brought a smile to my face.
As for Lavinia, apparently, Vanthus kept her on a leash at his side. Our arch-nemesis had taken residence in a small ship hanging higher in the trees, which had apparently previously belonged to a powerful mage working for the Crimson Pirates, a summoner named Zaliax Carvanxi.
When asked about the Shadow Pearls, Sid informed us that they had been scattered to the four corners of Faerun. He himself had delivered one to some shady people in Baldur’s Gate. Surprisingly, he seemed completely unaware of the danger these pearls represented. Could it be that the bulk of the Crimson Pirates were being manipulated into spreading the pearls across the world? All of this time, we had assumed they had been in the know… But was this merely a demented scheme hatched by Demogorgon and only shared with a few of his most trusted minions? Could we, Trouble, know much more about what was really going on than the Crimson Pirates themselves?
We informed Sid of the danger these pearls represented – that each one could destroy a city, though we did not elaborate as to the why or how.
We also learned a bit more about Cold Captain Wyther, who was likely still in the Wreck despite the naval battle being fought in the nearby waters. He was a legend among pirates, for he had been the first Lemorian; he had been turned into this half-demon, half-man hybrid by Demogorgon himself. Several demons lurking in the Wreck were tied to him: the Retriever upstairs, a monstrous beast in a nearby warehouse that everyone avoided, and Ziovayne, a strange demon with two baboon heads, a snake’s body, and many arms.
As pleasant as it was to talk with Sid, we were on an urgent mission and had to move on. We quickly discussed his fate. Ulfgar, that murderous psychopath, insisted on killing him, but the rest of us opposed that idea. Sid had helped us, and could prove to be a useful source of aid against the Crimson Pirates. We decided to let him go.
Lavinia’s message
Sparkillo decided to use a scroll of Sending to contact Lavinia and try to get an idea of her location. He frowned upon receiving her reply, and passed it on to us in a tense voice: “I believe I am somewhere in the Abyss, prisoner of Vanthus, after going back to Sasserine. Something’s afoot with Vanthus, don’t see him much…”
Our next destination was the small ship that now served as a house for Vanthus. We had little hope of finding him there, or anywhere in the Wreck for that matter, as we now guessed he was in the Abyss along with Lavinia. Indeed, the house was empty, and we entered it easily and without being detected by the guards in the central watch tower. We searched the place thoroughly, but found only one item of some interest. It was a small piece of parchment on which someone – almost surely Lavinia – had scratched a message with their nails:
“Vanthus lives. Back from death. He’s taken control of the fleet and wants to make me into one of them. To take me to Demogorgon’s realm wher”
It ended like that. Poor little Lavinia had likely gotten interrupted in her writing. Raguhl’s fists shook with impotent anger when he heard the words of his beloved mistress. But unfortunately for him – and for her – it appeared there was nothing we could do for her, at least not today.
Lagaan then asked me to contact Liamae, to try and gain more information on her location as well. For a moment, I considered playing a trick on him and pretending she wasn’t answering, but I saw the anguish in the poor young man’s eyes and I took pity on him. I spent a few minutes performing the complex ritual, and I sent my message to Liamae.
“Hi, b*&*&. We’re in the Wreck. Give me information to help us save your sorry ass.”
Of course, Liamae was in too deep a predicament to reply with any kind of sarcasm, so she responded with:
“Currently below deck on the Anger, in room with two pirates. One she-b!#%& from hell, one normal-looking man, more to him than meets -.”
Of course, if she had been more strategic in her wording, she could’ve given us a clearer warning (as we later discovered), but in this instance, I found it easy to forgive her, as she was being horribly abused at the time (as we also later discovered). I relayed her message to the others, and we prepared to invade another ship: the Anger was a short distance above the prison ship.
Damsel in distress
Once again, we manage to elude the guards and moved in gaseous form to the deck of the Anger. Lagaan regained his solid form, which now looked like a Crimson Pirate thanks to his hat of disguise. He opened the trap door leading into the ship and saw four Lemorian Captains playing cards downstairs. His offer to play cards with them was most rudely rebuffed: this was a place for the fleet’s captains, and a low-ranking human grunt like what he appeared to be wasn’t welcome there. Lagaan complied and shut the trap door.
Unfortunately for the four captains, their card game was rudely interrupted only a few moments later by the trap door opening again; by Lagaan shooting arrows at them; and by Ulfgar and Raguhl jumping down with their weapons drawn… all in the most complete magical silence, once again, to try and avoid alerting the rest of the base.
We had heard much about these Lemorians, powerful pirates who had undergone a terrible transformation in Gaping Maw, transcending their frail human nature. Vanthus had become a Lemorian, and had proven to be a powerful adversary. However, these four were quite unimpressive. They failed to cause any serious wounds to our warriors, and three of them were slain in the blink of an eye. The fourth tried to flee down a corridor leading to the back of the ship, but he was impaled simultaneously by Lagaan’s rapier and Raguhl’s greatsword. His corpse fell to the ground in a spectacular shower of blood and gore, all in total silence of course.
Raguhl was in a rather foul mood by then, and he tends to be a creature who lets out his anger in more spectacular ways than most people. Two of the doors in the hallway were reduced to splinters by his furious blows, and beyond the second one, we found a bedroom where a man dressed in a bathrobe was groping a nasty tattooed b+@$# dressed in leather – surely the “Norah” we had heard about before.
Beyond the two love birds, tied up by chains attached to her wrists, was a naked woman who had clearly been abused in a most violent, sadistic and perverted way. Clearly, those two sick freaks had made the poor woman’s existence a living hell for the past two weeks. That woman, of course, was Liamae. As we had done back in Lavinia’s manor when she had been harassed by Bullywugs, we were once again rescuing a naked and utterly humiliated Liamae from monstrous tormentors who had discovered the only thing that such a dumb b!@*+ was really useful for.
Our two warriors charged into the room. Norah fought rather well, but she wasn’t even close to being a match for Ulfgar and Raguhl, and parts of her body soon found themselves flopping to the ground in a rather messy way as she was hacked to pieces.
The innocuous-looking man was, as Liamae had tried to warn us in a roundabout way, more dangerous than he looked. That’s because he wasn’t a man at all: he soon turned into a big snake-like thing with two baboon heads (a common theme among Demogorgon’s minions, it seems), and twelve arms, each wielding a wicked scimitar. This demon was quite powerful, resisting some of Sparkillo’s spells and shrugging off most of the damage from Lagaan’s arrows. He also caused many wounds to Ulfgar, a feat that few of our enemies have been able to perform since the dwarf is nowadays clad in such a powerful armor. But eventually, the fiend was slain, as is often the case, by a simple Magic Missile spell cast by our wizard.
“SPARKILLO!!!” exclaimed the elf in his usual cheerful tone.
He seemed oblivious to the murderous glare that Ulfgar turned his way. The dwarf was furious that yet again, Sparkie had stolen the glory of victory from him. I believe he felt that Sparkillo had insulted his honor as a fighter and as a gladiator of Zelkarune’s Horns by using this cheap tactic. I sometimes wonder if perhaps one day the dwarf will seek revenge against him…
Victory over the demon Ziovayne had come with a price: some of the wounds Ulfgar had suffered were more badly infected than anything I’d ever witnessed before. I told him my fears: that such vile wounds could only be cured by a particular sort of healing magic, one I have heard is, alas, only available in the hallowed temples of the zealous gods of light. What’s more, Ulfgar, Raguhl and Lagaan had some of their spiritual energy drained by the demon, and that, also could only be cured by the so-called ‘good’ gods. Finding such healing will be difficult in a place like this. Perhaps their only hope is the priest of the Protectorate. Or perhaps Liamae, once she has recovered from her ordeal of the past few weeks.
Of course, once the fight was over, Lagaan hurried to free his beloved, chivalrously wanting to come to her rescue even now that she was such a bruised mess of ‘damaged goods’. The hapless girl had lost consciousness from the mistreatment she had been subjected to; but I was merciful and spent some of my precious healing energy to bring her back to her senses. She had been so thoroughly beaten that she was drained of all of her magical energy and could not even heal herself further. She sobbed bitterly in Lagaan’s arms, and when her tear-filled eyes met mine, I saw that my victorious smile drove the final nail in the coffin holding the remains of her self-esteem. The message was clear: I was the heroine here, and she was just a toy condemned to be captured and used by our enemies in the most demeaning ways.
Lagaan questioned her about her captivity, but of course, she wasn’t willing to reveal the sordid details in my presence. I left them alone and went to search the rest of the ship with the other members of Trouble. In one room, we found many maps and scrolls detailing the activities of the Crimson Pirates. We found information about the handling of the Shadow Pearls, and indeed, they had been sent to dozens of cities throughout the world of Faerun, including Sasserine.
Another room seemed to be some sort of shrine to Demogorgon: it contained a scrimshaw idol of the demon lord, which held a mysterious iron sphere with its tentacles. We also looted the corpses of our enemies and took the platinum pieces that they had been using for their card game. Finally, we cut off both of the heads of the baboon-demon and placed them in a chest within the portable hole, for an eventual interrogation in the future.
Liamae was, obviously, in no shape to accompany us, so Sparkillo used his magic to enable her to fly under the cover of invisibility. We then escorted her back to the tower at the entrance of the Wreck, where we placed her in Dolmord’s protection.
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Hi Guy,
Our next game is scheduled for tomorrow night. So you can hope for a new log entry hopefully some time this weekend.
However, our DM is going on vacation in France for 5 weeks, so there won't be any games until he comes back.
And I regret to inform you that our group has made the decision not to play through the entire Savage Tide campaign. This was a tough decision, but our DM is burnt out and completely fed up of playing high levels. I really, really wanted to play through the whole thing, but I can see that for the past year (at least), he's really not been enjoying himself DM'ing this. Also, we started this campaign almost 3 years ago, and he wants a change of scenery, different characters, etc.
So right now, the plan looks like this: when he comes back in august, he'll run us through a home-made adventure in Sasserine where we will face some of our nemesis's there. And this will be the conclusion of our Savage Tide campaign.
It's sad. I wish we could've kept on going all the way to Demogorgon. I really enjoy playing Belessa and would've been fine playing her another year or two. But I am tired of seeing my DM being so stressed out.
On the bright side, our plan for this fall is that our group will play Curse of the Crimson Throne. I will be the DM this time. If I have the time and the courage for it, there will be a brand new campaign journal for this.
Ciao,
Moonbeam
Hi Moonbeam!
Sorry to hear that your DM won't run you through the last adventures of STAP: some of them are quite innovant, and would have provided quite a change of scenery... I would have been glad to read about Belessa's planar adventures!
But I can also understand that he feels worn out by three years of intensive play. That's a common problem with long campaigns : either you have the same guy DMing all the time, either he can alternate with other campaigns under other DMs, at the cost of extending the duration of his own... In both cases, weariness can set in. It's best for all involved parties to tie up the campaign before it becomes really bothersome and dull, or maybe to take a break and play something else for a little while.
IMC, the players took almost a year to complete The Whispering Cairn (part one of Age of Worms, for the record), and we are playing nothing else! I would gladly run them through all the Adventure Path, but somehow I doubt it will be possible...
Well, I still have your other campaign journal (still unread) to look for...
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Well I can understand your DM's decision. High level stuff is hard but I hope he ends it appropriately and gives your PCs the finish they deserve. I really like the plot twists he's thrown into the game and although he has been a bit heavy handed at times I really liked the changes he made and how he dealt with some somewhat difficult characters. Ulfgar in particular seems like a bit of a nightmare to control ;)
I think none of the characters are giving him too much trouble, because all the players are very reasonable. Ulfgar is actually pretty easy to manage for him, except perhaps for his very high AC that frustrates the DM who needs to roll a 20 to hit him with most monsters.
Belessa is probably the character that required the DM to do the most work to make an evil PC fit into his campaign, but I think he enjoyed it, and I made sure to always remain within reasonable bounds with her in-game behavior (even though she wrote very nasty stuff in her journal).
Anyways I'm still enjoying your journal and I hope you do another (in character).
Thanks, that's of course the ideal scenario.
I'll see in the fall if I have enough time and energy for another one of these.The character (DM-PC) I have in mind for that campaign should be pretty cool, so it would definitely be worthy of a journal.
PS I'm actually playing in an AoWs campaign and I'm going to try my hand at playing an evil character. It's been a long long time since I've gone evil and this could be fun :)
Oh, nice! What kind of character is it?
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Sorry to hear that your DM won't run you through the last adventures of STAP: some of them are quite innovant, and would have provided quite a change of scenery... I would have been glad to read about Belessa's planar adventures!
Yeah! Me too!!! That would've been so cool... And would really have brought Belessa as an evil character to a whole new level, I think. I was really looking forward to it for a long time.
<tear rolls down cheek...>
Hammer 5th, 1377 (continued)
The Wreck will fall
When she was introduced to Dolmord, Liamae told us that she had heard his name mentioned before. A few days ago, in between two sessions of debased torment at the hands of Ziovayne the many-armed demon, while she had been hanging, barely conscious, from chains on the wall, the Cold Captain had come for a visit. He and the demon had talked about the upcoming battle with the fleet that Harliss had put together. Ziovayne had tried to convince the captain to attack us in Scuttlecove instead of on the open sea, but the captain had refused. He had also ignored Ziovayne’s complaints that his plan to crush us at sea would leave the Wreck too vulnerable. The Cold Captain had arrogantly claimed that the Wreck would never fall, in part because it was almost impossible to find, and in part because Demogorgon had told him long ago, in a divination, that the Wreck would only fall the day Dolmord died. Because of this, he had kept my lover alive these past few years, ensuring that the torments of the Death Slaad never actually brought him past the threshold of death, and having him healed regularly by priests.
I smiled, because I knew Dolmord had already died today, for an instant, when the energy of the spell that had brought us here to the Wreck had snuffed out the last flickering flame of his life. Through my divine magic, I had been able to bring his soul right back into his body, and his death had not been in vain: that part of the prophecy was fulfilled. Dolmord’s torment had been the terrible price to pay for what we were about to do: slay Cold Captain Wyther and cause the downfall of the Wreck. Today was the day spoken of in Demogorgon’s prophecy.
Nevertheless, Ulfgar was looking dubiously at Dolmord, holding his axe in both hands. “That’s very good, Belessa, but he was only dead for a moment, according to what you said. What if he needs to be dead for longer than that for the prophecy to work? Maybe we should kill him a second time, just to be sure.”
The rest of the group joined me in replying a firm: “No, Ulfgar!”
Lagaan suggested setting fire to the Wreck, but I pointed out that this place was made of very humid wood, so this would be unlikely to work. Sparkillo also added that the structure was protected by powerful abjuration magic, making this strategy even less likely to be effective.
Death of a legend
Still under the effect of my Wind Walk spell, we headed to the Two-Headed Wretch, where we believed that we would find Cold Captain Wyther. A sinister two-headed figurehead stood at the prow of the ship. On the deck were several large bells that could surely attract some undue attention from the rest of the Wreck’s defenders if they were rung. While the rest of us waited, hidden behind the tree trunk, Lagaan turned invisible and disabled the bells by removing their strikers. As he did so, I looked around for magic, and saw that indeed, the place was protected by some strong abjuration.
I cast a Silence spell to help us enter the ship unnoticed. Lagaan examined the trap door, and once he announced it was clear through our mental link, we went down inside the ship. We found ourselves in a room with a table and several chairs. On the table were some nautical plans of the battle that was currently going on between Harliss’s ships and the Crimson Fleet. We also found some scrolls with Sending spells, which had likely been placed there to enable the Cold Captain to communicate with his troops during the battle.
We looked at the maps for a minute or two, trying to get some idea of our enemies’ strategy. Lagaan in particular got a good grasp of it in that short amount of time, and explained its more subtle points to us. We then decided to warn our allies about this. Sparkillo took the scrolls and floated back on deck, to be out of range of the magical silence. He then communicated with Harliss and informed her of what our enemies were planning.
When he flew back down, he told us mentally that Harliss was still alive, but that the fight was not going too well. Our allies were badly outnumbered, and would need every break they could get – hearing about the Crimson Pirates’ strategy would surely go a long way. Harliss had mentioned in particular that a powerful mage among the Crimson Fleet was causing a lot of damage. We assumed that this was the one we’d heard about: Zaliax Carvanxi. The only good thing about that was that it meant we wouldn’t have to face him here in the Wreck.
There were two doors leading out of the room. One was a huge vault door that was protected by a powerful trap of necromantic magic and the most complex lock Lagaan had ever seen. We guessed it led to the vault containing all of the Crimson Fleet’s treasure.
After I left my “silenced” string on the deck above, we tried the other door, which opened into Cold Captain Wyther’s luxurious chamber. We found the dreaded master of the Crimson Fleet there. He was as impressive as the legends had led us to believe: extremely tall and muscular, he had the wings and horns of a half-demon. He stood bare-chested and wielded a large bastard sword. He seemed ready for battle and scowled at us as the door opened. When he realized that his inner sanctum had been breached by invaders, he let out a few obscenities fouler even than what we normally hear from Harliss, then he licked his blade, cutting his tongue and grinning evilly as blood flowed down his chin.
“Dolmord died, by the way,” said Lagaan in a matter-of-fact tone.
“So will you!” growled the captain.
And then, the fight began!
Lagaan shot a few arrows at Cold Captain Wyther. They lodged themselves inside his chest, but the powerful man stoically broke their shafts with his blade. The demonic captain then charged Raguhl, who stood in the doorway. His bloody sword sliced through the lizardman’s chest, almost killing him instantly. It had been a tremendous blow, one that would have killed pretty much any mortal except Raguhl or Ulfgar. Somehow, Raguhl survived it and entered a state of terrible rage, fighting back against the captain with the help of Ulfgar.
Sparkillo tried to cast a Dimensional Anchor on the Cold Captain, but missed. Meanwhile, I used my magic to completely restore Raguhl’s body with a Heal spell.
The captain struck Raguhl again a few times, but none of his blows had the impact of his first attack. He was wounded by a few more arrows from Lagaan and a few hits from Ulfgar’s axe, but it was Raguhl who struck the deadliest blows, finally cutting off the captain’s head.
The ship shook for a few moments as its master was slain…
We could scarcely believe it was over already… it had gone so fast, in just a few moments, we had destroyed the master of the Crimson Fleet… Our true enemy was Vanthus, but still, we had achieved a tremendous victory by killing Cold Captain Wyther, the scourge of the southern seas.
I cast a Gentle Repose spell on the captain’s head, and we placed it in our “decapitation chest” which contained the heads of a number of our prior enemies as well. The chest was kept in my portable hole, where we also put the captain’s powerfully magical and valuable possessions.
We took some time to search the cabin, where we found many more items of value, such as magical poisoned daggers hidden in the bed’s headboard, bottles of excellent wine and expensive clothes. We also found a scroll on which was written a strange series of spells:
“Fear
Rage
Crushing Despair
Crushing Despair
Rage
Fear
Tasha’s Hideous Laughter”
The treasure
We found a large key ring on Cold Captain Wyther’s belt, and amidst the keys there was one that allowed us to open the large vault door leading to the rest of the ship. Lagaan opened it and was the first to see beyond, that in a large room with walls made of magically enhanced lead was being kept the Crimson Fleet’s treasure: heaps of gold pieces, sacks of plundered loot and chests overflowing with coins and gems. However, this hoard was guarded by a large and vicious daemon armed with a big sword. Lagaan only had time to shoot one arrow at the creature before being rushed by it and knocked out momentarily by one of its claw.
The two warriors moved to the doorway, where they fought the terrible monster. It was powerful, more powerful in fact than the Cold Captain himself, and worst of all was its claw, which could stun even the mightiest warrior. Sparkillo blasted the daemon with a Disintegrate spell that didn’t do much, and then switched to Magic Missiles. I protected Raguhl with a Death Ward, and then kept him alive with two Heal spells. Finally, after dealing many strong blows to the daemon, our warriors vanquished it. Raguhl’s sword opened a large gash in the monster’s chest and pierced its last heart.
Once Raguhl and Lagaan were healed, we entered the treasure chamber. We stood at the entrance for a few moments, stunned by the wondrous sight of so much treasure. We could scarcely believe our eyes: the accumulated treasure of the Crimson Fleet from so many years of raiding cities and villages across the region… And now it was ours!
We spent about half an hour going over the treasure, selecting the most valuable-looking items, because we knew that all of this wouldn’t fit even in the portable hole. One item of particular interest was a chest of dark metal decorated with seven gargoyle heads. Sparkillo identified this as the Chest of Athruman, a legendary arcane trickster who had created many highly trapped and secure containers. This was apparently his masterpiece. Thankfully, Lagaan remembered the sequence of spells we’d found in the Cold Captain’s quarters, and noticed that the gargoyle heads could be manipulated to have different facial expressions. He then handled them one by one, placing each with the mood related to the appropriate spell in the list: fear, anger, sorrow or joy. Once that was done, as he had guessed, the chest opened safely.
Within it, we found more treasure, including six black pearls (normal ones, not Shadow Pearls), a gold crown set with four rough emeralds, and the biggest gem anyone of us had ever seen, a ruby of almost impossible size and beauty. Sparkillo told us that, according to legend, those who claimed it were destined for a quick death. Nevertheless, we decided to take it, but not to touch it yet, so I used my ring’s power of telekinesis to place it within the portable hole.
Another of the items in the magic chest was a round metal plate with abyssal runes written on it. Sparkillo said this was a wake portal, a device that could be attached to a ship’s wheel to enable it to travel to other planes of existence, such as the Abyss. He then surmised that it explained why there were so many deformed fish in the region: perhaps it was not because of the Shadow Pearls after all, but rather, because some of the Crimson Fleet captains had used wake portals to sail to and from the Abyss, bringing back with them some deformed abyssal fish.
Another item we found in the room was a crystal ball that had been hidden underneath a cloth. Sparkillo found that it could be used to scry on people and communicate by telepathy. He used it to look at Harliss, who was fighting on the Sea Wyvern’s deck, which was littered with corpses of friends and foes alike. Several Dire Hunger Monks fought at her side, slaying Crimson Pirates all around them. In the background, we saw a number of ships on fire, and others that were sinking. Tyria floated, unconscious, on her flying carpet. A Crimson Captain approached Harliss from behind to attack her, but he himself was stabbed in the back by Zan and fell on the deck.
We had slain the captain of the Crimson Fleet. We had taken as much as we could carry from his treasure vault. We had freed Dolmord and Liamae. Lavinia and Vanthus were, seemingly, not in the Wreck. We had done all we could here. Now, it was time to go help our allies against the Crimson Fleet. We locked the vault’s door, knowing the remaining treasure would quite likely remain safe in our absence, since the place was secured by such powerful wards. With our magic, we returned to the tower where Dolmord and Liamae were waiting for us. Using magic to enable Liamae to fly (as she was not under the enchantment of Wind Walk), we all left the tower and flew to a secluded location in the jungle, away from the Wreck’s anti-teleportation magic. From there, we teleported back to the Sea Wyvern, to join our allies in an epic naval battle…
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Dun dun duuuuuuuun
hahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh boy... I did not know that existed. I sure could have used it recently.
I've got another update in the works, but I've been busy and lazy lately, so I don't know when it's going to be ready.
It's one of those logs about the transition between 2 adventures, so there's a lot of material I have to write that was only briefly mentioned in a hurry at the end of the last game, so it requires a lot of effort on my part to sit down and actually build something interesting from it. Now that I know that the campaign's going to be aborted, my motivation is way less than it used to be... It seems to all have gone into the preparation of Curse of the Crimson Throne (coming soon to a Korvosa near you).
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Thats too bad but from what I read in these recaps it sounds like your DM did it to himself as far as burnout goes. It looks like he took you guys waaaay of the rails with this AP. I DMd all 12 ST adventures so I am seeing stuff in these recaps that is totally home grown.
It's a shame you won't get to see the end of ST. If your DM would have stayed on (or even near!) the AP path you would have finished over a year ago I bet. Better luck next time.
Thanks!
There are 3 things that burned out our DM:
1/ He doesn't like playing at high levels, mostly because the fights take too long and are too complex mathematically and rules-wise.
2/ He got bored of being a mere "narrator" who presented to us what was written in the modules. He wanted to use his own creativity as well.
3/ He got bored of playing the same campaign for almost 3 years in a row.
So when he added some of his own material, it was in an attempt to get rid of point #2... But as you said, it increased the duration of the campaign and made point #3 worse.
But really, the worst thing for him was point #1. He absolutely despises the length and complexity of high-level (by this I mean roughly above level 10) combat in D&D. Many fights take about 2-3 hours of real time to go through for our group.
I don't mind it as much as he does, but I agree that even I have gotten frustrated lately that it takes 15-20 minutes in between the time when my characters can actually do something (and then typically my actions get resolved in less than 10 seconds, as in, "I cast Heal on Raguhl").
Thats too bad but from what I read in these recaps it sounds like your DM did it to himself as far as burnout goes. It looks like he took you guys waaaay of the rails with this AP. I DMd all 12 ST adventures so I am seeing stuff in these recaps that is totally home grown.
It's a shame you won't get to see the end of ST. If your DM would have stayed on (or even near!) the AP path you would have finished over a year ago I bet. Better luck next time.
Thanks!
There are 3 things that burned out our DM:
1/ He doesn't like playing at high levels, mostly because the fights take too long and are too complex mathematically and rules-wise.
2/ He got bored of being a mere "narrator" who presented to us what was written in the modules. He wanted to use his own creativity as well.
3/ He got bored of playing the same campaign for almost 3 years in a row.So when he added some of his own material, it was in an attempt to get rid of point #2... But as you said, it increased the duration of the campaign and made point #3 worse.
But really, the worst thing for him was point #1. He absolutely despises the length and complexity of high-level (by this I mean roughly above level 10) combat in D&D. Many fights take about 2-3 hours of real time to go through for our group.
I don't mind it as much as he does, but I agree that even I have gotten frustrated lately that it takes 15-20 minutes in between the time when my characters can actually do something (and then typically my actions get resolved in less than 10 seconds, as in, "I cast Heal on Raguhl").
While high level play can take longer (not that I consider level 10 high level play), it shouldn't take that much longer. It sounds more like poor time management and the bane of being a healbot. I've seen the same problem at level 2 if the GM isn't careful about what he is doing.
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While high level play can take longer (not that I consider level 10 high level play), it shouldn't take that much longer. It sounds more like poor time management and the bane of being a healbot. I've seen the same problem at level 2 if the GM isn't careful about what he is doing.
Indeed, different groups will have a different threshold to what they consider high level play. In our case, this is only the 2nd campaign we play where the PC's reach above level 9, so it definitely qualifies as such.
As far as the speed at which combats go, different people have a different capacity to handle the relatively complex math involved in calculating your bonuses for iterative attacks, adding up the damage done from multiple dice, remembering all of one's spells and figuring out the best spell to cast on a given round. So for some of the players who don't get to play other campaigns on the side besides Savage Tide, it takes longer because they don't have as much experience.
At lower levels, this was less of a problem since fighters had only 1 attack per round, there were less buffs and situational modifiers, spellcasters had a smaller amount of spells available, etc.
As for being a healbot, yes, I feel it's getting worse the higher level Belessa gets. Thank god I get to roll for Raguhl too, otherwise I would be very bored indeed.
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Well the fights can take longer but I think the ST AP did a great job of balancing DM duties during the upper level fights including tactics for the opponents. He did know this AP went to 20th level right?
Yes, but this was the first AP that we started. We (just the DM and me) finished RotRL a bit over a year ago but we actually started it six months AFTER we started Savage Tide. That one went much faster because we played every week.
So we didn't really know what we were getting into at that point. The DM did not anticipate it would take us that long to go through all of it, that he would get bored, or that high-level combat would turn him off so much.
He knew this was an AP right? ;)
Let's just say this has been a interesting experiment because it has enabled us to get a better idea of what we are looking for in an RPG.
For me, AP's are perfect.Unfortunately, for my friend who DM's Savage Tide, not so much.
3/ He got bored of playing the same campaign for almost 3 years in a row.
It should not have taken 3 years.
Ideally, no, I guess one big problem too is that mostly we only got to play every 3 weeks because of the busy schedule of the other players.
2-3 hours for a 10th level battle seems excessive. I guess it's possible but it should not be the norm. Maybe at 15th or 18th but even then everyone should know there characters well enough to speed things up pretty well. Especially since at 10th level plus you rarely have to spend time traveling from one location to the next or worrying...
At 10th they probably weren't taking so much time, I meant mostly about the fights from City of Broken Idols and Serpents of Scuttlecove, so I guess level 14 and up.
But when you think about it, we started City of Broken Idols if I remember correctly in august 2009... so in one year we've only done 2 out of 12 adventures of STAP... something's definitely wrong.
CoBI is about half way along the campaign trail ... oof.
You make it sounds like a race, cibet. The point isn't to hurry to the AP's conclusion, but to have fun while playing it. As far as I am concerned, a campaign could last ten years (and some do) as long as everybody is enjoying it. As MB said, it's all a matter of taste : some likes to change scenery, others like to linger in the same good old campaign for a long time.
And I bet that if his DM had hurried along, jumping from a combat scene to another, Moonbeam himself would have got bored...
No I don't think an AP is a race but I do think the point of starting an AP is to get to the end, otherwise why bother? You can have a long term campaign that just uses one off adventures or locations without ever bothering with an AP. An AP is like reading a novel, the point being to see how it ends and of course enjoy the story along the way.
I am increasingly getting the impression that many groups are starting APs but never finishing them. If this continues it will have many effects on Paizo and future APs and I would like to help reverse this trend. I believe the DM is primarily (not exclusively) responsible for seeing his group through an entire AP in an timely (not a breakneck) fashion.
I agree that playing an AP through the end is best, but again, rushing things can be counterproductive, especially with roleplaying or thinking types among your players. It all depends on your group. They have to enjoy the ride, so driving them before you while hearing their wives lamenting isn't always best (hint: a famous line is hidden somewhere in the previous text).
You can easily bother people who like interactions, puzzles, long planning sessions, etc. by setting a too quick pace, depriving them of RP opportunities. You can address part of this problem with some e-mail play between live sessions, but it's not exactly the same thing as in-your-face RP.
In this regard, powergamers are much easier to manage...
As far as Moonbeams group I think it's pretty obvious everyone would have preferred to finish the AP rather then abandon it mid way. I believe they could have finished ST and even finished another AP in the time they spent on HALF of this one if the DM would have done his job. <snip>
I think not, but Moonbeam would know better than me. And please, don't assume that everybody can find time to play every week. Scheduling playing nights can be much more difficult than that for working parents.
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I agree, I've been DM-ing ST for three years now and we're not even as far as Moonbeam's group. We play for two-and-a-half hours every two weeks. Everyone is having fun so I don't see that as "not doing my job" either.
Play time, kids, illness... that all plays a role too. If we'd been playing like I played 20 years ago (about 30 hours a week) I'd have been able to DM or play all those nice Pathfinder APs too, instead of just having them on the shelf.
Still, even though I love STAP I'm also starting to look at Kingmaker and stuff with covetous eyes. A single, challenging combat is taking a whole session and we're only level 12. Level 20 is going to be fun :-)
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This is a very interesting discussion. :)
Indeed, the main reason we don't play more often is that everyone in our group except me is married with at least 2 children age 0-9.
One funny anecdote, by the way, is that I clearly remember a discussion I had with my friend who DM's Savage Tide back in summer 2008. At that point, we had been playing the STAP campaign for about a year and had finished the first 4 adventures. And we were extrapolating that it would take us until approximately - GASP! - summer 2010 to finish the campaign. OMG!
Now 2 years later and of course, we are very far from this early expectation...
If it can ease your worries, Cibet44, I subscriber to the AP's, so I am getting a new one every month and financially our experiences with STAP are not affecting Paizo. And despite his bad experiences with level 10+ gaming with ROTRL and STAP, our STAP GM has agreed to play in my CotTC campaign once we wrap up STAP. This time I will be the DM, so hopefully, that will help.
Smarnil: one thing that adds a level of complexity in our group (maybe it's the same for most groups, I don't know), is that different players like different things.
- I like role-playing, I like combat, I enjoy playing high-level characters, but I prefer a low level of challenge.
- Our current DM likes role-playing but is most comfortable RP'ing only one character at a time, doesn't like high levels, likes puzzles, mystery and exploration, prefers a high level of challenge.
- Ulfgar's player mainly enjoys combat. He doesn't hate RP'ing, but he doesn't especially crave it either.
- Lagaan's player is probably the most easygoing and seems to enjoy everything we've done so far.
So it's not easy to find an adventure or campaign perfectly suitable for me and DM. It's pretty ironic, since we've been playing together for about 20 years, but have only recently really analyzed what we were looking for in RPG's and realized how distant a lot of our expectations were. Although there were some unpleasant experiences for him when we played STAP and ROTRL (and the first 4 adventures of AoW), we could not have realized this without playing those campaigns.
Exactly. You don't play like you did 20 years ago (neither do I) so maybe you can't DM like that either.
We see your point, cybet, but you have to concede that it isn't possible to turn roleplayers or thinkers players into powergamers just because it would be more convenient to end an AP earlier.
If they like taking their time, they will take it, busy schedule notwithstanding. Getting rushed along by their DM will only alienate them. See my point, too?
Exactly! That's my whole point. Why have them sit on your shelf when you could be playing them?
Because you don't have the time? And playing them in a way that isn't fun for all people involved isn't a good way to solve that conundrum.
Edit: Oh, and it isn't very fair to tell that Moonbeam's DM did a "bad job" just because he tailored the AP a bit here and there. He did what was necessary to better the experience for his players (by creating ties between the PCs and various NPCs).
Against the Crimson Fleet
We materialized inside the captain’s cabin - my cabin - on the Sea Wyvern. We could hear the sounds of a furious battle raging over us, the thud of heavy booted feet scrambling up on deck, the howls of bloodthirsty pirates rushing into battle, and the screams of men being cut down by sharp blades. The other members of Trouble stood at my side, ready to bring the pain to the hated Crimson Pirates: Ulfgar, squat and stable like a slab of granite, dressed in his massive, gleaming plate armor, carrying a heavy shield and his beloved dwarven waraxe that shone with magical ice. Raguhl, the enormous grey-and-green scaled lizardman and whose strange amber eyes blinked in readiness for battle. Lagaan, who looked less boyish than ever and who seemed quite ready to deal death with the Nimbus bow that the Olman gods had given him. Sparkillo, dressed in black robes and wielding his frost staff, his brow furrowed over clear blue eyes as he focused his magical energy for the difficult fight ahead.
I had removed the glamer that had given me the appearance of a Crimson Pirate and had regained my true form: dressed in my deep blue plate armor engraved with sharks, wielding my trident that glowed with a blue flame and carrying a heavy shield of dark metal.
Dolmord also stood with us: he was dressed in an ornate plate armor and wielded a large sword. Despite everything he had gone through, he would fight at our side today.
Last and least was Liamae. She was dressed in rags and most of the bruises of her mistreatment still showed. She had no magic left in her, so her usefulness would be more limited than ever, but there was still something she could do: I gave her one of my healing wands, so that she might help the wounded.
I fetched a bloody trophy from the portable hole, and then we hurried upstairs. The deck of the Sea Wyvern was littered with corpses of allies and foes alike. Only a few members of our crew were still standing against a tide of Crimson Pirates. Among them were Harliss, Brissa and Zan. Many of the pirates turned to face us when they noticed our arrival. Ulfgar and Raguhl stepped forward ahead of me with their deadly weapons drawn. I lifted high the trophy that I had retrieved from the portable hole: the bloody head of Cold Captain Wyther! I saw the shock and fear in the eyes of the Crimson Pirates when they beheld their former master. They could never have believed that he could be slain…
“Crimson Pirates!” I shouted above the din of battle. “Behold what remains of your master! He is dead, slain by the merciless blades of Trouble! And now, you despicable worms, you are going to pay for daring to attack the Sea Wyvern!”
A wave of anger and dread washed over the pirates on board. Some howled in rage and rushed toward us, only to be cut down by the blades of our warriors or slain by Lagaan’s arrows. Others panicked and jumped back on their ships, spreading word of our arrival and of the Cold Captain’s demise.
The Crimson Pirates had been on the verge of victory. They had outnumbered Harliss’s forces two to one from the start, and they were mightier combatants than most of our allies. When Sparkillo had been able to inform Harliss of the Crimson Pirates’ battle plans by magic, it had prevented them from achieving a quick victory, but still, they had maintained the upper hand and their victory had been all but assured. Once we joined the battle, though, and showed them that the Cold Captain had been slain, the tide of battle turned. The Crimson Pirates’ spirit was broken at that moment, and from that point on, they fought chaotically and inefficiently. Their blades shook in their hands, and many of them regretted ever joining the Cold Captain’s cause.
The enemies that had boarded the Sea Wyvern fell quickly before our deadly onslaught. I hurried and levitated toward Tyria to revive her. Once she regained consciousness, she directed her flying carpet toward the deck of the Sea Wyvern, where she helped us finish off the enemies. Meanwhile, Dolmord fought alongside our warriors, Liamae healed Harliss and the others with my wand, and Sparkillo was already blasting some enemy ships with his deadly magic.
Once the Sea Wyvern was clear of enemies, we teleported aboard an enemy ship, bringing the battle to them. The pirates were shocked to see the deadly members of Trouble – this group of adventurers they had heard so much about – appearing suddenly out of nowhere. Raguhl and Dolmord charged into the fray, while Ulfgar roared merrily: “Let’s start another contest to see who kills the most!” And with that, he crushed a pirate’s ribcage with his dwarven waraxe.
The carnage was going on all around me. Pirates fell to the deck, skewered by Dolmord’s blade or cut in two by Raguhl’s massive greatsword. Many others fell, pierced and shocked to death by Lagaan’s electrical arrows. Others were frozen in place by the icy magic of Sparkillo’s staff. In the mean time, I called upon Umberlee’s power to assault our enemies. I knew she was watching the fight, and relishing the rage, the fear, the pain and the countless deaths. I could feel her power surge through my being more strongly than I ever had. I could sense her reach out through me, her Hierophant, to crush the pawns of Demogorgon with her furious power.
A cyclone appeared on some Crimson Pirate ships, causing mayhem amidst their crew. A huge maelstrom suddenly opened within the blood-red waters, twisting and turning madly, inexorably drawing several ships into its crushing vortex; all the poor fools aboard those ships perished within moments, their souls sent straight down to Umberlee’s watery domain deep below the surface, damned for all eternity.
Many of Umberlee’s servants answered my summons, air elementals and creatures of the deep sea, coming to the surface to gorge themselves on the flesh and blood of the foolish land-dwellers who had dared intrude upon the domain of the goddess of storms. I watched them all die, those hated Crimson Pirates, those raiders, murderers, rapists, thieves, liars, cheaters, those heretics who had turned away from the goddess of the sea to serve a treacherous Demon Lord who had used them to threaten the very existence of our world. It was because of them that the Shadow Pearls had been sent to the four corners of Faerun. So it was with a great sense of satisfaction that I savoured their screams, the look of fear in their eyes as I saw them be devoured by sea monsters or torn asunder by the fury of Umberlee’s storm. Through me, she rained ice and lightning on the enemy, freezing and burning the flesh of all on board.
It was a long battle, but we did it: we crushed the Crimson Pirates. All of our enemies either died or fled. This day, the reign of the Crimson Pirates ended, and the legend of Trouble grew greater than ever before.