(38 days total, 7 days until the New Moon)
The Favor
During the night, unbeknown to the group, Thamior took Relic aside and asked him for a very important favor. The robot refused, even for the sake of honor. The two went back and forth for some time in regards to it, until the others woke...
Strengthening Bonds
Rested, with the dungeon clear and lock-down commencing in the city above, the group weighed their options. They could either try and return to the Weeping Stone, potentially crawling with inquisitors, or risk using Ghisidhran's ritual to pass into a random point in the Wild.
Kaylan had some extreme reservations about Diana, Relic, Portia or just about anyone else going into the Wild. She heaped the responsibility on herself, afraid she'd lose yet another. For her the pain of Giers disappearance was still too near and understandably so. The rest of the group resolved to go, siting strength in numbers, entwined fates and a goal much greater than themselves (the sparing of a whole city).
A new fellowship had be forged.
Fey Passage
With the notion they could return to Othyr if they didn't like where they ended up, the group chose to use the ritual. Relic and Kaylan sat across from each other and began a ten minute incantation...
(insert quote)
The Canyon
They materialized in an overgrown canyon...
(insert quote)
Selja Torban
A shriek from the clouds, the slipping of rocks along the canyon side, and everyone was on edge. Suddenly there was screaming and a boggart fell clean out of the sky! She was a young half-goblin dressed in the trappings of a druid or mage. Slowly rising, her spellbook crashed at her feet, giving her a second fright and sending her on her rear.
It only took a second for Portia to realize just who this was: her kid sister! She rushed up and gave the little one a great, big hug, exclaiming "SELJA!" The young boggart, having been grabbed from behind, struggled in fright until she turned and saw her sister, missing over a month. She hugged right back and the two shared a warm reunion.
The group relaxed, welcoming her into the fold, though Kaylan kept some reservations. She recalled all too well the trickery of that Changeling back in the Savanna, and how much trouble that caused. She hinted as much to Portia, but the rogue was convinced it was her sis.
After some informal introductions, Thamior couldn't help asking why she was here, and more importantly how she was here. Selja was rather vague, explaining Portia had gone missing and she was determined to find her. She eventually met a wizard powerful enough to help her and he ported her here... though she didn't much like falling out of the sky.
Bugs
Throughout the reunion and introductions, the bugs began taking a heightened interest in the group. Fearless, for they'd never encountered Othyrians, they curiously began to land and crawl on them. At first it was a fat bee here or there, a butterfly on Kaylan's brow, crickets over Relic's feet, but all too soon the group was blanketed in creepy crawlies.
Portia asked Hoppers II for a little help and he heroically climbed onto her shoulder and gave a loud RIBBIT! The bugs immediately cleared out. He proceeded to bow and blow kisses to an adoring couple group members. This, however, sparked something in the Strangeheart, jealousy. It angrily flashed, killing all bugs within five feet of Diana, and leaching life out of the grass. The sorcerer assured the belt it was still her favorite Heart and then followed the rest to the top of the slope.
The Vista
The group moved out of the canyon and were met with a Wild view...
(insert quote)
Kaylan was able to identify the distant mountain as Highmist, the seat of the Tesseract and Reedthagn's lair. It was over a hundred miles away. Given distance and conditions, the cleric guessed it'd take about a week to cross (if all went smoothly).
Birds
A blue jay landed on Thamior's shoulder, prompting a curious attraction much like the bugs in the canyon. A myriad of bird species ranging the worldly gamut began to flock to the group. A crow landed on Diana's head and even laid an egg! Sparrows, pigeons, finches, robins, they kept on coming. Diana was quickly learning to hate the Wild, expressing as much, which prompted Relic to open his arms wide and bask in the beauty and grace of the avians. Like some ineffectual scarecrow, hundreds of birds suddenly swarmed him, to the point none of his metal body was showing, just feathers from so many birds.
Portia and Selja seemed spared, until a growing shadow cast over the rogue and an ostrich landed on her back. The half-goblin promptly flattened to the ground, as Selja pointed out "You have a big bird on you." The wizard was suddenly pecked in the rear, turning to find a confrontational turkey.
After managing to get the bird off her by plucking a feather, Portia again asked Hoppers II for aid. The gem frog climbed up onto his haunches, took a deep breath, and had his thunder stolen. Selja mustered a Ghost Sound roar which not only scared the turkey away, but all the birds. Relic was dripping in bird shit...
Couatls
Noting they seemed to be climbing the foodchain, Diana wondered if cats were next. Shadows passed through the clouds overhead and the next species revealed themselves. Eight rainbow-scaled serpents with white, feathery wings moved through the sky, looking like they were swimming more than flying. They shrieked and chased one another, but it was obvious they were playing. Each was around ten feet long.
Thamior and Diana was able to identify them as couatls. Diana reasoned they had little to fear from the creatures, but some might have heard the ice elf darkly label them as turncloaks. They were truly a beautiful sight, like so much in the Wild, but like with all the plane's beauty there was a predatory side. One of the couatals wriggled in low and took a mouthful of birds, chomping hungrily and drizzling blood and feathers. Sentiments of pretty turned to let's keep moving.
Treacherous Path
Portia identified a narrow, slippery pathway from the edge of the waterfalls, across the mist-drenched cliff face, behind the waters, and eventually down into the valley. There seemed little choice but to take it down, despite fears of taking a three thousand foot plunge.
Thamior tied ropes around everyone's waist. Portia would lead, having a knack for climbing, and Relic the rear, a good anchor in case anyone fell. Selja, knowing her limitations, hitched a ride in Portia's magic bag. Ready as they'd ever be, the group began across the ledge.
Falling
Not more than ten feet, Thamior, Kaylan and Relic took a tumble off the edge. The feladrin's knotting had been falty and the rope came undone. The three met open air with looks of terror. Kaylan was able to use the power of her fey leaf sandals to teleport back onto the ledge, whispering a soft thanks to Isabella. On Diana's sudden order, Relic grabbed Thamior by the waist. She summoned a Sorcerous Sirocco granting the machine man flight, if but for six seconds. It was enough time for the two of them to find the ledge again.
Diana plopped down, needing a moment to catch her breath and regain the life-saving spell. As it was, Selja saw the whole thing from her pack and looked like she'd just had a heart attack. The others were also shaken up, well accept for Relic and Portia. The artificer greatly enjoyed flying and postulated he'd have had a chance of surviving the drop (He's no Rend!). Portia simply didn't see the fall happen, turning and wondering what in the world possessed everyone to untie themselves. The rogue redid the knots and they continued on.
They passed closer to the falls. Had they extended their arms out they'd be sucked into the water flow and torn to oblivion. It was extremely slippery on this part of the ledge and suddenly Diana and Thamior slipped and fell into the flow! Diana tried to use her sirocco, but the force of the water pushed her down. Thankfully the knots Portia tied held, allowing Thamior to find his footing and fel step back to the ledge. It also allowed Relic to give a great yank and tear Diana back up, sopping wet but alive.
After that second close call, another break was called. They'd hardly gone five hundred feet! A discouraged Thamior took out his old sword, using it as a balancing schtick. When the group felt ready, they continued behind the other two falls, finding a widened ledge and a small cave. Ignoring it, they moved on, eventually coming to the end of the ledge. It dropped ten feet and then began again on a different narrow pathway. Shockingly, no one fell, and made it down with little trouble. Thamior even flipped onto it, impressing everyone (though proving a little excessive).
The Power of Cooperation
They traveled another thousand or so feet closer to the ground before they came to an impasse. The path abruptly ended, worn away by constant spray, dropping three hundred feet before picking up again.
The group paused a moment and tried figuring a better way to descend than relying on their climbing abilities. Portia began tying the group's collected ropes together, but the ritualists eventually uncovered an even better solution...
(Bear with me now) Using the Tenser's Floating Disk ritual, Relic created a sound platform. Kaylan made one of her own, a perfect execution, and then stood upon Relic's disk. By nature of the spell, the disks always remained close to their casters. The group then boarded either disk and Selja cast a Feather Fall on the machine man. Taking a step off the ledge, Relic gently descended, his disk and by extension Kaylan following with him. Her disk and the rest of the group followed her in turn. Humming a light tune, they managed to land safely on the ground in no time.
Camp
They touched ground on a sandy shore in the desert region, on the edge of a small lake basin of fresh mountain water where the falls crashed into and from which the three rivers emerged. Portia went off to fish, Selja tagging along to cheer her sister on, as the rest made camp. Kaylan, disgusted with her green frock, decided to take a bath. Relic, noticing the vile garment, offered to repair and improve on it. With Kaylan's blessing, he sat down and went to work, rather good with a needle and thread.
By nightfall, Portia returned with ten large trout, caught with nothing but a dagger! The thankful group cooked them up and dug in. During the meal, Relic's independence from food prompted Thamior's questioning if Relic need sleep. He did not, though he did enter a sort of inactive state, but one in which he was constantly aware. The feladrin offered to join him in watch regardless, which the robot welcomed. Diana remarked how handy it was to have Relic around, even as he continued the garment, prompting him to cheerily chime that even though he was built for war, he preferred not to destroy. If anyone had any curiosities about Relic, they were slowly being revealed.
As everyone eventually found their way into their bedrolls, Kaylan sensually beckoned Thamior to join her and keep her warm. Thamior expressed his reservations, though joined her for a time. He respected Giers too much to betray his love, where Kaylan saw it as an expression of joy. Neither meant the other harm, though there were vast differences between Kaylan's openess and Thamior's sense of honor and duty.
Diana was floored by Kaylan's advances, where as Selja curiously began asking Portia about the funny workings of grown-up love. Relic was busy with his work, but offered Diana ear plugs and remarked now and then.
Thamior eventually showed Kaylan the private parchment he'd slipped into Relic's pack earlier, his last will and testament, which struck a sad chord in the cleric. Kaylan told him he put too much on himself (the girl who wanted to go to the Wild alone and spare everyone hehe).
Vilthanos
Talk turned to Thamior's guilt and perceived incompetence, eventually revealing the feladrin had no recollection of leaving Bertrum Manor all those days ago. This brought into question his black outs and occasional lapses into cruel, ugly moods. Kaylan had tested if it was some enchantment, only to find it was not. Relic echoed his concern, at which point Thamior as the group knew him slipped into the fissue of a cracked psyche, even as an entirely different personality emerged.
Maniacal laughter heralded a person who called Kaylan half-human and showed nothing but contempt, viciousness and mockery. Kaylan defended herself, proud to be both human of House Martel and the granddaughter of the High King Gloriandel. He was astonished by her audacity.
He revealed his name as Vilthanos, Exile in the elven tongue, self-labeled Thamior's true self. He vaguely alluded to the death of someone close to him at the hands of humans, a death which lit an ravenous fire for vengeance on all of humanity. He claimed the High King had been too kind, and that his ultimate goal was the total destruction of the human species for all the evil, war and destruction they inevitably caused. Kaylan and Relic, shocked and appauled, tried to counter his reasoning, only to find him unreasonable. He was obsessed, a sadistic, bitter creature that inspired even Selja and Portia to defy him.
Vilthanos made his argument to each of them, alarming in its glimmers of truth, but at the same time entirely, mercilessly evil. Selja had heard enough and tried casting Sleep on him, but the elf resisted. He threw a history book to Relic, suggesting he read up on his history and see how wonderful humanity had made history, before releasing control back to Thamior.
The frightened feladrin begged the group to help rid himself of this other half. All the group could do was comfort him and promise...
A Quiet Talk
Kaylan asked Relic if he wouldn't mind discussing some things in light of the Vilthanos revelation and all that had happened leading up to it. The machine man agreed and the two formed a closer bond while the other's slept.
The Chosen Desert
The next morning, the group decided on the desert. If they followed the river, they'd be all right, and if worse came to worse they could ford the boundary and try their luck in the tundra. They refilled their waterskins, gathered their resolve and struck out into the sandy, arid expanse.
Relic was quite used to the heat and the sand, though it sometimes got into cracks and compartments he'd rather it not. Diana, on the first day at least, also seemed unperturbed by the heat of the blaring sun. The others trudged through the first day of hell, an arduous march that left them feeling dried out and miserable. Selja took the lead on that first day, recalling the lessons of her father to see them through.
The next six days grew increasingly worse. Thinking to wait till nightfall and travel in the cool, the cursed fey region never dropped below sweltering. Like the essence of a desert more than any sort of natural desert, it always provided the worst conditions. Night or day, it didn't matter, for every step in the dunes took a little more of their vitality. Resting did nothing for them, as even with eight hours sleep their muscles still burned and their bones ache. It became a race to the end of the desert, in sun or beneath stars, before the magic wasteland consumed them utterly.
Sun-burned, blistered and sweat-drenched, the group thought they might just crumble into dust and blow away. Kaylan rose to lead them in their hour of need, a pillar of strength, driven by something beyond herself over every sandy hill. Like a prophet of old she urged onward, fighting the baking breezes and lashing sand. She could swear she was being led by a distant, golden woman with fiery wings. Mirage, or could it have been a servant of Kalinda? She grew increasingly confident it was the latter, even as Highmist grew closer in the distance. A sandstorm threatened to swallow them on the final day, but Kaylan would not be deterred, taking two of the group by hand, who in turn took the others. With a holy cry, she pulled them out of perdition and into the wet, forest air.
Primeval Foothills of Highmist
Portia and Selja went out to hunt while the rest of the group made camp in the green, primeval foothills under the shadow of Highmist. Humid and misty, it was a blessed reversal of the week spent roaming the dunes... at least for some. The place was so very alive, and amplified, with great howls, shrieks, creaking, rustling, a rolling fog and everything that would put a city girl like Diana on edge.
Selja used her Web spell to stick a few deer and Portia respectfully took care of one of the infirm. They returned to camp, where the group ate, drank and promptly went to bed. Kaylan, more familiar with the atmosphere and tired from the journey, drifted right off. Thamior, unafraid, slipped into his meditation. Relic fiddled with this and that, finding the great din of nature pleasant. The boggarts had little trouble getting comfortable. Diana... hugged her bedroll with a frazzled look, jumping at every broken twig and flittering night bug, sighing she'd never get to sleep tonight.
Selja, trying to better earn her spot in the fellowship, offered to help. Removing her wand suddenly, she bopped the sorcerer over the head and cast a Sleep spell. The Saspish girl was knocked right out.
And so they slept...
Experience: 400xp (12,291 total)
Magic: None
Money: -140gp (Kaylan, for ritual)
Loot: Ostrich Feather (Portia), Wild samples: flowers, grasses, feathers, insects (Relic), Crow Egg (Relic), Thamior's parchment (Relic), Tinkerbell Outfit (Kaylan)
New PCs
Selja Torban, boggart wizard with heavy druidic leanings; Portia's kid sister
Featured NPCs
Wild Bugs, a varied assortment of fearless, curious little critters
Wild Birds, ranging the worldly bird kingdom and both fearless and curious of strangers
Hoppers II, Heart of the Wild in gem frog form (see entry)
Strangeheart, Heart of the Far Realm; the unnatural purple gem attuned to the Void, sharing power with horrific dimensional entities, oozes and abberations; proved capable of emotion, showing jealousy and anger, leading one to believe it can and will eventually reveal its sentience and humanoid form just as Hoppers and Adej did
Couatals, winged rainbow serpents some ten or more feet long; created by Kultuss for the God War, but they developed such love of life and nature that they turned on their father and joined Lordanna's forces; they are subsequently despised by dragons; Couatl detest defilers of nature and will not tolerate them if they can help it
Vision of Faith, a golden woman with fiery wings who guided Kaylan through the desert; what she knows in her heart of hearts was either a manifestation of her faith or a servant of Kalinda
Vilthanos, Thamior's darker personality whose hatred for humanity demands total genocide; Thamior's source of guilt and internal struggle
Cruel Ultimatum
- The Elder green dragon Reedthagn agreed to house Blight so long as the group did him a favor...
- The group must assassinate the rebel dragon Ghisidhran, a traitor to dragonkind and convert to Reedthagn's hated foe the Green God. Ghisidhran is hiding somewhere in the Nors city of Provia, leader of a Green Cult.
- Ghisidhran's tongue must be returned to Reedthagn before the new moon or else Blight will be dropped on one group member's home city.
- Reedthagn also offered Hulda, Giers, Portia, Jeda and Kaylan side quests, tasks that would ultimately reveal a hidden truth for each of them.
- Kaylan discovered Ghisidhran beneath Blackdelve Asylum and learned of his personal ambitions to use her and her uncle's unique hereditary abilities to become a "god".
- Kaylan escaped and managed to trap Ghisidhran in the ancient elven tomb of her uncle Dazeen the Uniter.
- Portia completed her side quest, at least she thinks...
- Kaylan is yet unsure how much of her side quest she completed, or if what she's learned in the attempt was in fact the hidden truths Reedthagn spoke of.
- A party of old and new companions entered the fey lurks beneath Blackdelve and confronted Ghisidhran. They prevailed and took his tongue, though with one last curse the dragon banished Giers and Hulda to some unknown reach of the Wild.
- Heartbroken, yet determined, the party returned to the Wild via one of Ghisidhran's rituals
- Scaling a cliff alongside three raging waterfalls and crossing a desert for an entire week, the group eventually found their way to the foothills of Highmist
- All that's left is delivering the tongue to the Tesseract, sparing a city the wrath of Blight. Then they can try and find their missing friends.
GREAT JOB RPING THAT CAMP SCENE EVERYONE. VILTHANOS IS AWESOME.
No comments:
Post a Comment