Session 20: There Once was a Tower

Afternoon, Kelehess 20th - Evening, Kelehess 25th
(26 days total, 18 days left until the New Moon)


The Choice
Sandwiched between bad and worse, the group despaired as it caught its breath out of sight of the guns. However, a glimmer of hope in the form of a tiny flower sprung from Hoppers inspired Portia to call on the gem frog's power to create something much larger...

Meanwhile, Jeda slunk up the tower ramp in efforts to treat with the gnolls. She playfully teased her breasts out and the gnolls, being demon worshipers, weren't horrified. In fact, they cheered her into taking everything off, at which point their leader grabbed her by the horns and began dragging her up thirty floors, the lot of them laughing all the way. She was off to meet the Lord of the Towers, finding all manner of horrors on her trip as the higher levels of the spire lost their metallic likeness and took on the characteristics of a fleshy throat, complete with writhing tongues and swallowing orifices.

The choice was made. The Liberators would not flee, come good or ill, nor abandon the Vergers fighting outside on their behalf. They would act. They would dare.

Father Oak
Portia coaxed a sprout from Hoppers, which grew into a sapling at the bottom of the ramp, which grew into an oak, and which continued to grow up and outward. The little gem frog trembled as it willed this tree yet larger and wider, its roots eventually overwhelming the pit below, its trunk bursting the tower walls, with its branches piercing all angles. The leafy top masked the group that clung to it as the tree soared upward, blasting out every level it passed with leaves and branches.

However the strain was getting to Hoppers, who showed cracks for the effort. Portia implored it to stop before it killed itself, but the little creature forced itself on anyway. When Hoppers looked about ready to shatter, it stopped, ten levels from Twisttongue's apex. The group climbed across the piercing branches and to the outside of the tower, looking to bypass the upper level guard by scaling to the roof, the Black Heart, and its master Al'kek'uma.

Lord of the Towers
But Jeda had beaten them there, taking the hard road of dragging, jeering and swallowing sections of living tower. She was spat out onto the roof and slurped by a giant tongue, undulating her up to a wide, metal disk. It hover through unseen power, bearing a great many rotted corpses like a small hill or high throne, crowned with the Black Heart. Four obese, mangy gnoll lieutenants stood sentry, each with a magic weapon (mace, maul, khopesh and axe). Naked, with her things cradled in her arms, she shivered against the wind six hundred feet off the Savanna floor and called on Al'kek'uma.

The demon master answered.

He's a twenty-foot giant with red and brown matted hair, blood-soaked, rippling with muscle from his clawed hands down to his clawed feet. His head is massive, nearly consuming half his body, great canine jaws with rows and rows of fangs. Dreadlocks like intestines dangle from his head and he has a beard of the same. Instead of genitals, he has a large, eyeless hound's head which snarls and snaps.

Al'kek'uma demanded Jeda succumb to him, and when asked what she might do he lifted her by the torso and threw her off the roof, replying, "Die for me." Thanks to the oak, however, she did not die, but instead fell onto one of the highest branches, the same as Giers' in fact, a joyful reunion.

The Offer
The group reunited, Jeda working on redressing, they scaled the tower to the metal disk where Al'kek'uma and his lieutenants waited. He climbed his hill of bodies and took the Black Heart in his claw, ordering the gnoll warlords to finish the group quickly. Quite the opposite occured, as the Liberators had the foresight to shoulder, side-step or otherwise direct the charging hyena-men over the side of the platform and to their deaths.

One survived, which the demon himself snatched up and bit the head off of. Amused, he offered the group their lives and the lives of the Vergers if they joined him. Portia demanded the Black Heart in the deal which, surprisingly, Al'kek'uma agreed to. He leaped off his mountain and dropped the heart at his feet, coaxing the boggart to come and fetch it. Despite cries not to, Portia approached. Kaylan, in her intolerance of that which was entirely evil, summoned the power of the sun, which misfired once or twice, but eventually struck with such blinding force it barreled Al'kek'uma backward. While the demon clawed at his eyes, Portia snatched the shadowy gem.

The Fall
No longer under the demon's control, all that had been made with the Black Heart vanished, namely the shadow tower which kept the real tower standing. The entire structure buckled and fell, causing all the forces below to panic and flee lest they all be crushed or consumed. Even those gnolls, lions and demons beyond the crash zone fled, knowing their master had been defeated. With a thunder and a cloud that covered thousands of feet in all directions and hundreds up, Twisttongue fell.

The father oak endured, which the group and the demon clung to for dear life. What followed was a chase down its many branches and great height. The Liberators could not catch up with Al'kek'uma, however, and he disappeared in the debris cloud. The group scaled the rest of the way down, save Portia, who was quickly learning The Black Heart was the antithesis of The Heart of the Wild.

Snake vs. Frog
Hopper, drained from sustaining the father oak, was quickly attacked by the Black Heart, turned to the form of an obsidian serpent. It wrapped its coils around the gem frog, despite Portia's best efforts, and began to swallow him! The boggart quickly began demanding things from the Black Heart to balance the power drain, but the Black Heart was cruel in its responses, giving Portia wings, then conjuring a requested sailboat on top of her head. The three of them plumetted toward the ground, though in all the turmoil the Black Heart was separated from Hoppers. Portia quickly through the evil gem away and attended to her friend, who was unmoving...

The black gem then fell into the possession of Jeda, who endeavored to master it. In serpent form, the heart wrapped around her forearm and bit deep into her vein, becoming a bracer of sorts that constantly supplied pain but offered its services as well. She conjured a shadow spider to pick through the wreckage for survivors, even as demon forces and able Verger forces fled the lingering cloud.

The Search
Kaylan rescued a golden-looking gnome from the cloud, then dove back in with the rest of the Liberators and choice, able Vergers to quickly find more survivors. Two days were spent in the search, producing less than half the army that had marched to Twisttongue. Many of the leaders of the Vergers were missing or confirmed dead, King Pongwa among them, and the surviving Dokur assumed leadership of the gnomes. General Rho was also among those that survived, aiding in the moving of rubble.

Of Frederick there was no sign, prompting Kaylan to work herself tirelessly in efforts to find him, and find either a miracle or closure. Instead she found nothing, not even in two days when the Vergers had decided to leave and the Liberators too. Giers tried to reason with her, but the heartbroken cleric was unreasonable. Still, on the third day she left with the others.

Farewell
The made for the Spitting Stone, the Wild counterpart to the Weeping Stone on Othyr, two days from their location. Before they left, Dokur wished them well and gave them a magic bag filled with some of the salvaged items collected during the search. And so the group retraced their steps, remembering all they had seen, accomplished and suffered in their weeks on the plane. No one was left quite the same, and some were not returning at all.

Return to the Weeping Stone
Much to Portia's joy, Hoppers was NOT dead, simply in a comatose-like state as it recharged. It had enough power to activate the Spitting Stone, however, and open a portal back to Othyr. The group took it, returning to the common room at The Weeping Stone Inn.

Kaylan broke the news to Petunia about Frederick's demise, sending her into shock before Jeda, for whatever reason, gave the girl a bit of hope he might still be kicking. Kaylan, distraught, moved for the stabled where she found Uncle Bart tending the horses. She asked him the way to Provia, all to keen on the task Reedthagn demanded of them, which he refused, saying she was asking him to kill her. They eventually found some sort of common ground and the cleric agreed to stay for dinner. When Bart met Jeda, however, he left with disgust to prepare things, questioning if Kaylan dared trust the half-demon.

Jeda got her small revenge in stealing from the wine cellar. Giers, meanwhile, went to comfort Petunia once she'd fled from the sight of the tiefling. Though wacked in the nose with a broom, his efforts seemed fruitful in that Petunia might have taken a shine to him. And Portia hung in a quiet corner, caring for the living Hoppers.

And so the group took a breather as the sun set over a cold, autumn forest in the middle of the Kingdom, Othyrian nation that despised the lot of them.


Experience: 400 xp each (6,988 total)
Magic: The Black Heart (Jeda), Dokur's Gift Bag (Group, to be decided on)
Loot: gnoll leg (Hulda); a fine wine, 2 bottles of vodka, 2 bottles of rum, 1 handle of whiskey (Jeda)
Money: None
Crafts: mechanical frog (Portia)

NPCs:
Al'kek'uma, the missing demon of the fallen towers
Pettil, gnome Kaylan carried through the cloud

Dokur's Gift Bag:
Kaylan: Eyesting Powder x2, Potion of Clarity x2, Medic's Mace +1
Hulda: Terror Maul +1, Basket of Everlasting Provisions
Jeda: Rending Khopesh +2, Bag of Holding, Strange Leather Tome
Giers: Fortification Plate Armor +1
Portia: Panther Spirit Leather Armor +1


Eyesting Powder (x2)
The fine black powder in a supple leather coin pouch has a bitter smell and burns the skin.
Level: 4
Price: 80 gp
Alchemical Item
Power (Consumable • Poison): Standard Action. Make an attack: Ranged 2/5; +7 vs. Fortitude; the target is blinded until the end of your next turn. Aftereffect: The target takes a -2 penalty to attack rolls (save ends). Creatures that do not rely on sight to detect other creatures are immune to the blinding effect, and instead suffer the aftereffect as the initial effect, with no subsequent aftereffect.

Potion of Clarity (x2)
A smoky glass vial contains cool cyan liquid that hones your physical and mental acuity at a critical moment.
Level: 5
Price: 50 gp
Potion
Power (Consumable): Minor Action. Drink this potion and spend a healing surge. You do not regain hit points as normal. Instead, once during this encounter as a free action, you can reroll a d20 roll you just made, gaining a +1 bonus on the reroll. You must use the result of the reroll.

Terror Maul
The crush of this weapon sends waves of fear through its target.
Level: 4
Price: 840 gp
Weapon: Hammer
Enhancement: +1 attack rolls and damage rolls
Critical: +1d8 damage
Power (Daily • Fear): Free Action. Use this power when you hit with the weapon. The target takes a –2 penalty to all defenses (save ends).

Rending Khopesh
When this crescent blade scores a devastating strike, you can continue your assault.
Level: 9
Price: 4200 gp
Weapon: Khopesh
Enhancement: +2 attack rolls and damage rolls
Critical: +1d6 damage
Property: Whenever you score a critical hit with this weapon, make a basic attack against the same target

Khopesh:
Military one-handed melee weapon
Damage: 1d8
Proficient: +2
Range: -
Weight: 8 lb.
Properties: Versatile, Brutal 1 (reroll damage rolls of 1 until you get something higher)
Group: Axe, Heavy blade

Medic's Mace
A divine warrior of any kind can use this mace to bring victory in the name of his deity.
Level: 4
Price: 840 gp
Weapon: Mace
Enhancement: +1 attack rolls and damage rolls
Critical: +1d6 radiant damage
Property: When you use a Channel Divinity power during combat, an ally within 10 squares of you regains an amount of hit points equal to your Charisma modifier plus this weapon’s enhancement bonus.
Power (Daily): Standard Action. Gain one additional use of Channel Divinity for this encounter.
Attunable: At the moment it is attuned to Krysarok, god-thing of demons and dragons, but can be prayed over to convert to any other desired deity.

Fortification Plate Armor
This bronze plate armor has pauldrons and a breastplate resembling shields, whose crests alter to those of your family or city.
Level: 4
Price: 840 gp
Armor: Plate
Enhancement: +1 AC
Property: Whenever a critical hit is scored against you, roll 1d20. On a result of 16–20, the critical hit becomes a normal hit.

Panther Spirit Armor
Crafted of supple leather from a fey panther’s hide, this armor is imbued with the panther spirit’s power and resilience.
Level: 5
Price: 1000 gp
Armor: Leather
Enhancement: +1 AC
Power (Daily • Healing): Immediate Reaction. Trigger: An ally within 5 squares of you hits an enemy with a melee attack and is flanking that enemy. Effect: The triggering ally regains hit points equal to half the attack’s damage.

Strange Leather Tome (not magical)
The book is written entirely in Dwarven runes. It's soft leather cover is oil-stained and its pages roughly-edged.
Category: Gear
Price: Unknown
Weight: 3 lb
Properties: Unknown

Basket of Everlasting Provisions
This plain basket radiates delicious smells.
Level: 4
Price: 840 gp
Wondrous Item
Property: After an extended rest, you open the basket, creating enough food and water to feed five Medium or Small creatures (or one Large creature) for 24 hours.

Bag of Holding
This item appears to be a simple sack of brown canvas.
Level: 5
Price: 1000 gp
Wondrous Item
Property: This bag can hold up to 200 pounds in weight or 20 cubic feet in volume, but it always weighs only 1 pound.
Drawing an item from a bag of holding is a minor action.

Alternates

I'll need the links for your alternate character sheets by next session. If you need anyone to help or bounce ideas off of, I'm available.

Session 19: Battle of the Twisttongue

Morning, Kelehess 20th - Afternoon, Kelehess 20th
(21 days total; 23 days until the New Moon)


The Fourth Day
After three days of preparation, the fateful time of attack had come. It was a gloomy morning, gray and drizzling, and morale wasn't much brighter. Light or no breakfasts were had as even the satyrs stayed quiet. Thoughts of what lay ahead began to bear down, the heart of Al'kek'uma's power, the last stubborn claw dug into the Savanna, manned by a reportedly superior force.

Arrival of the Moles
Then the great moles of Tahmuras came, ten in all, each of them some thirty feet long and erupting small hills of dirt. Their claws were like plows and their teeth shovels. Portia and Hopper treated with them (much to Pongwa's jealousy) and the war council laid its simple, perhaps reckless, plan out. Sap the tower, unbeknown to the demon's forces, while the Vergers provide the distraction.

Morale
The mood was somber as friends, family and lovers wished each other well and took the heads of their regiments. Sixty to each of them, a mix of four fey races, beside five other regiments consisting of the other Verger leaders. Newly present among the leaders was Arkith, Beastlord Hound and master of the Cu Sidhe, looking like Bannoch but all grown up and just about the size of a rhino!

The Vergers lined up and ready by mid-morning, the march began with a daring step from the king of the Wadi Hafa. However it was obvious the effects of the weather and the weight of the task at hand were dragging the troops feat. The scions attempted to boost morale all the miles-long march, but only Hulda was able to transfer her feelings, power and will into the ones that followed her, almost as if this sort of thing were in her blood. Portia tried her own hand at inspiring the troops, calling on a rhreen named Blaster as a perch, but a hard fall in the mud soiled her credibility.

Koorla
The army sloshed through wet plains and hardening rain until something was spotted in the distance, a great smoldering heap that once was the village of Koorla. The Vergers stole themselves, fighting the thought that all Savanna civilization could be reduced to black charr and their peoples wiped out or made low. The gnomes knew well the cruelty of demons, and rhreen the hurts of generational slavery as well.

In the distant haze of rain and river fog, the tower loomed but a mile away, with a darkness like the antithesis of light flickering from its pinnacle...

Twisttongue Tower
It was a good bet the enemy knew of their approach, but that was the point, and the Vergers marched through killing fields, mud churned with guts and gore, and through a heavy sheet of rain to the beacon of woe...

As if a curtain lifts, the heads of the column pierce a particularly fierce veil of rain and there it is... Twisttongue Tower no more than a thousand feet away in all its gruesome glory. Its a six hundred foot tower of twisted metal, welded by demon fires and flesh. Its base is almost entirely raw iron, blood stained and riddled with razors and spikes, but the further it climbs, the more it takes on the appearance of a giant limb, for hundreds, maybe thousands, of flayed skins of varying sizes wrap its higher reaches. Something like lips, a thick ledge of bodies, crowns the structure and from it erupts a spiraling, writhing pinkish mass like the tongue of a titan. At its tip is embedded a platform whereupon the black light shines.

Two great, circling barricades ring the elevated base, trenches dug from the river to provide moats, all of it filled with razor wire and sharpened bones.

And worst of all, an army of thousands stands the ready, positioned on the banks between moats. Mostly gnolls, large contingents of lions also lurk, as well as spots of unidentifiable abominations of mangled parts and flickering elements... demons. There is also a great and putrid smell seeping from the four holes in the hill that is the tower base, where hundreds of undead steadily creep.

Hundreds of black buzzards like a low-hanging storm cloud wheel their way around the tower heights, waiting to feed.

The Battle
Swallowing their fear, the Vergers stole themselves and charged! Their first obstacle was a nasty, sunken barricade meant to tangle, cut and drown. Scores of vergers were hung up on this grizzly wall, reinforced with corpses, of which their own soon supplemented. However, when enough bodies shielded the razor wires and bone shards and made stepping stones to the far bank, the army continued.

The wall had done its job, though, slowing the charge enough for the tower artillery to position itself. Then rained arrows, bolts, ballistic spears and even shrapnel-exploding devices. The vergers were trounced a second time, though many shields took the edge off, and grit kept them moving forward.

A wall of gnolls met the charge, fey crashing into monster in a cascading rumble. Both sides dug in their heels, pushing either way, the gnolls stabbing all the while with their simple weapons and shields, but superior skill and arms, coupled with some miraculous rallying and flanking tactics on part of the regiments, broke the lines and consumed the monstrous first legion.

Yet no sooner had the gnolls been dispatched savanna lions, corrupted from the noble kings of yore, enacted their own pincer flank. The vergers scrambled into ranks, meeting the ferocious pounce of prides. Heavy losses were had against these beasts, led by their demon-twisted beastlords, but Portia and her regiment laid in wait under the corpse debris, waiting as the lions circled back for those vergers unable to shake the harrying lions. As they came back around, Portia's unit pounced, allowing the last of the vergers to move on ahead, but in doing so getting trapped by the vengeful prides themselves. Portia's friends and their troops came to her aid, together smashing the lions out of existence.

They moved on to the second barricade at the base of the tower's hill, clearing it much quicker than the first, though not without losses. And losses there were, a dwindling of vergers that continue until Kaylan was on her own, her regiment decimated, a lone light in the sea of darkness. Still she persisted against all odds, expending boons and banes in the name of Kalinda.

Half-way up the hill, tremors and noticable sinkholes began to appear around the base. The moles were doing their part with furious efficiency, but were drawing far too much attention to themselves. If the tower knew of the plot too soon, they might take preventive measures and ruin the whole operation. Hulda called on the power of the twins to summon an arctic breeze from her homeland, crying out with the ring of the mountain storms, whilst Jeda expunged her own, more fiery roar, allowing the demon to take over as she surged with her troop up the gut-mud slippery slopes. The clamor was more than enough to pull the tower eyes and enemy troops on top of the verger threat.

However a second legion of gnolls, hyenas and scattered demon leadership bore down on them. The fight culled most of Portia's troops, leaving her with an elite team that managed to infiltrate beyond the initial vanguard and slay the demon strategists. The others followed, also taking more losses. Jeda continued to lead the way, to victory or ruin, more and more of her forces falling off as more and more enemies sprung. Yet the tiefling finally reached the doors of the tower itself, turning her back to them to defend against a breath-stealing horde of enemies quickly surrounding and closing around the comparatively meager verger army.

Eventually the remainder of the army stood huddled at the doors, a cresent formation defending against wave after wave of gnolls and undead, the occasional canine demon taskmaster lashing them on or attacking with particular ferocity.

Shadow of the Black Heart
And then the tower began to crumble. The spent fey army looked up with tears of hope as the great monolith swayed and a million cracks like so much lightning ran up the tower to meet their heavenly counterparts flashing wildly in the stormy sky. A great wail was heard from the tower top, a demon's voice like the end of all things, and the black antilight flaired.

The power of the Black Heart turned verger tears into those of despair as it created a shadow copy of the tower, one that reinforced and supported the buckling material structure. The moles erupted near the Vergers, their jobs done in as far as they could complete them, and began defending alongside the last hope of the Savanna. Lady Goldhorn and King Pongwa lamented, as General Rho, Arkith, Frederick and Dokur fought furiously to hold back the crushing evil with their sorry numbers. Nearly half the army was dead, now...

Eyes turned to Portia, Hopper in her hands, to counteract its ebon twin, but when the boggart held the gem frog up high all it could do was croak timidly. The transformed fey gem had failed them.

Newt Gibbings and Catastrophizers
There was but one option left: enter the tower and disarm the Black Heart. Then the abyssal antenna would be allowed to fall, hopefully wreaking untold havok on the The Lord of Twisttongue and his forces. The Vergers agreed the Liberators should go, miracle workers in a pinch, while they did they best to hold the lines. It wouldn't be more than a few minutes, at best...

Portia tucked Hopper away and began to unravel the complicated mechanical lock attached to the forty foot doors of the tower, whilst the others defended her from all sorts of attack. It was desperate maintaining even a foot as the vergers constricted into even tighter formation, but they allowed the swift boggart time enough to pop the lock.

Though wanting the entire army to follow her, the rest of the group quickly ushered Portia inside while the vergers remained defending their passage. The Liberators nearly fell into a huge, deep pit of collapsed flooring and foundations. Backs to the perimeter wall, they slowly edged their way toward the spiraling ramp up toward the Black Heart.

Mech Warriors
But the pit wasn't empty. Two great machine men, giants of metal shielding with huge, revolving cannons with long missile ribbons for hands, fought their way through the uneven mess below. These mechanical warriors were not automated, though, rather massive suits driven by pale, twisted, hideous dwarves with straggily black beards and glimmering eyes. They aimed their arms for the passing group and fired, spraying the group with a torrent of bullets. Had the firing arms of the mechs not been at such a distance and so sharp an angle, the group might have been slain outright.

Twisttongue's Throat
As it was, the Liberators endured, making it to the ramp and completely out of the mechs' sights. Yet they were exhausted, with a six hundred foot climb still ahead of them, the noises of machinery, gnolls and worse thundering the whole way up. Emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted, the weight of the vergers' fate and the Savanna's freedom on their shoulders, evil pressed on all sides, the future looked bleak...


Experience: 1000xp each (6588 thus far)
Money: None
Magic: None
Loot: None

NPCs:
Arkith, Beastlord Hound and leader of the Cu Sidhe
Blaster, rhreen soldier and Portia's perch

Session 18: Victims

Morning, Kelehess 16th - Night, Kelehess 19th
(20 days total; 24 days until the New Moon)


(space reserved)



Experience: 200 xp (5588 total, LEVEL UP 5)
Magic: None
Loot: -1 set of garments from Jeda and Portia

NPCs:
Gort, satyr rapist and Jeda's triumphant tormentor

Thanks for being so understanding last session, guys. Enjoy the level up! And be prepared for some action come Tuesday.