Category: Princes of the Apocalypse

The party descends the stairs spiraling down around the black column. An alarm wails, but no one remains to summon. The stairs land in a chamber dimly lit by fluorescent lichen seemingly activated by the prevailing magic. Theridan remains behind to guard a door south as the rest of the party follows a center-pivoting stone door to the west.

This chamber is stale and thickly coated in dust, distinguished otherwise by two ore cars parked on a section of track. Meega chooses one of two doors that opens into a short hallway and Theren stacks up behind her, ready to depart this clearly abandoned area. Four grimlock specters emerge from an unexamined ore crack and mob Lefty, leaving her permanently less robust. The party quickly frees the specters to eternal release and resumes exploration of Meega’s hallway.

The hallway opens to a purple crystal-studded room housing a pair of hill giants indulged in a game of chance. Although the two groups share no spoken language, the hefting of bags of gold pulled from the hill giant’s loincloth is universal. The gambling begins. Unfortunately for the hill giants, Theren, Meega, and Bromsby outmatch them in cleverness and luck so team Quastarte dominates in winnings. Bromsby taunts the hill giants until they become inconsolably agitated despite Theren’s generous refund policy. A fight breaks out. Although formidable with their great clubs, the hill giants are again outmatched by Meega’s enthusiastic application of her Giant Slayer, Theren’s boosted rapid-fire crossbows, Lefty’s blendering claws, and Bromsby erupting earth through Iron Oath. Bromsby heroically loots the defeated hill giants’ loincloths and comes up with 160 gold, 22 platinum, 3 red spinels [100 gp ea], an amethyst [150 gp], and a mummified human head [hopefully].

Bromsby picks a door to the southwest and finds an oily, black fog that seems to block sound and light across the passage. It is not a creature. Theren waves a purple crystal enticingly at Lefty and tosses it into the fog. Lefty follows compulsively and experiences some psychic trauma and nausea, but otherwise comes through the fog into a chamber. She retrieves the shard thrown by Theren but of course does not return with it. Theren wonders if Bromsby has any recommendations for Lefty’s feline replacement, but Bromsby is not ready to give up on Lefty just yet and attempts to dispel the fog magically. The fog persists. Meega and Theren go through the fog, experiencing the same psychic and nauseating effects, but also do not return. Bromsby conjures a warding wind which ripples into the oily fog but does not disperse it. Bromsby goes through the fog with reduced negative effects but does not return. Haerelben sits on the foot of the hill giant’s bedroll lamenting the meaningless loss of all his mates. Windy Bromsby pops back in and beckons Haerelben to join him. Oh, well, back to work.

All entrances to this chamber are shrouded by the oily fog. The reunited party turns its attention to a centrally located statue with large tentacles posed in a stooping bend. Its single eye is a large purple crystal. Smarmy Haerelben positively identifies the subject as the obscure drow god Ghaunadaur, god of oozes. In an attempt to decode the statue’s relevance, Bromsby thorn whips the crystal eye. It shatters. Bromsby is gone. An ochre jelly oozes from the eye hole. Meega and Theren reflexively attempt to murder the jelly, but it moves away from them defensively. Haerelben experimentally casts greater restoration dispelling the curse on Bromsby and prescribes a short rest to bandage his wounds.

The short rest is interrupted when Marlos Urnrayle himself, attended by a pair of gargoyles and a pair of monks, strolls purposefully through one of the oily fogs. He locks eyes with Meega in mutual recognition. She shakes off the impending sense of petrification. He shakes off the impending future of axe gashes. The gargoyles strike out for Meega and Bromsby. Haerelben attempts to banish Marlos along with one of his monks, but only the monk departs. Marlos closes within snake hair distance of Meega. Meega has the misfortune of finally discovering where Iron Fang is: sticking out of her neck. Haerelben makes a second attempt at banishment, bringing back the banished monk. Fortunately this time the spell removes Marlos from the fight. Haerelben is pinned down by a monk and wastes no time complaining about the possibility of concentration-breaking personal injury. Lefty swoops to the rescue and drops the monk. Haerelben patches up Bromsby and retreats while his cohorts finish up the remaining foes with axe, shillelagh, bolts, and claws.

Theren digs out the muslin face shields for those who want to minimize the risk of petrification. Bromsby and Theren both sternly warn the others not to be in their respective paths of destruction. Positioned and ready for violence, the adventurers receive Sehanine’s blessing as Marlos is released back to the plane. His first trial is a barrage of daggers flying from Theren. Merely a flesh wound. Next is an enormously powerful eruption of earth through Iron Oath, one of the most powerful Bromsby has ever conjured. Marlos chooses to avoid the worst of it. Meega makes a charge for Marlos, a run that takes her the long way around the statue for all the piles of earth. Lefty elects no running and pops off some magic missiles from her wand so she doesn’t have to actually look at Marlos. Marlos closes with Lefty and buries Iron Fang into her. His gaze falls on Theren. Theren begins to petrify but gets off some excellent parting crossbow shots as he turns to stone in a heroic crossbowing pose. Bromsby has another go with an Iron Oath earth eruption, but again Marlos decides to forgo that particular outcome. Lefty cuts Marlos down with good old martial trauma. Meega, chasing Marlos around the statue, arrives in time to watch his body disintegrate into mud ruining her plan to cut off his head and point it her enemies like in a play she once saw.

Bromsby boops statue Theren on the nose with Iron Oath and Theren is back to his old self again. In fact, after scooping up Iron Fang out of the Marlos mud, Theren feels even more disposed to breaking things than before. Iron Fang goes into the bag of holding for safekeeping returning Theren to his regular disposition for breaking things. 

Bromsby points out that their approximate location in this sub-subterranean paradise places them more or less in the center of the four cult areas. Then it hits Haerelben like a voice in his head that they have found themselves in the Feign of the Eye which Simon first read about in Marlos’s journals at the Stone Monastery. With the realization that it might not be safe to be found resting here, the party resolves to sterilize the scene and return Iron Fang to Quastarte lest it be taken from them by whatever has orchestrated this elemental incursion. The bodies are arranged into an apparent gambling session gone wrong with the hill giants stabbed by monks, and the monks smashed into forensically unhelpful pulp by Meega with the hill giants’ clubs. Theren tosses around gold and spinels to add authenticity to the staged scene. Haerelben mends the crystal eye back onto the statue and the party beats feet back to Quastarte.

The party easily finds the elf gate at the statue-guarded room of columns of the Black Earth. Stepping through to the Quastarte supply basement, the party finds a candle lit path through the crates arranged to guide the party up to the quartermaster’s exchange with a minimum of confusion and shrinkage. At the ground level they are met by Corporal Sorliss Phanq who diligently refers to his standard operating procedure. Phanq visually authenticates the one-two-three-purple-five party members and upgrades Theridan’s record from MIA to just IA. Phanq seems very accommodating so Bromsby requisitions six healing potions which Phanq records in his ledger.

The party heads for Ardak’s manor house, eager to rid themselves of the responsibility for Windvane, the late Ahtayir’s implement of evil. Just when it seems that knocking on Ardak’s door will never be answered, regent Ardalia, Ardak’s daughter, approaches from the street. She grows concerned by Ardak’s unexpectedly prolonged absence and takes some comfort that Theridan so recently received a sending from him. She allows them into the manor and Theren retrieves Windvane for her inspection. Ardalia magically shrouds the evil artifact to conceal it from divination and then stuffs it into a table leg of holding for safekeeping. She mentions that there are reports of militia skirmishes in Dessarin Valley, possibly suggesting open hostilities among the elemental cults.

Ardalia offers the manor for respite and excuses herself. Haerelben requests that Theren acquire some arrows of lawful evil manufacture for him while he makes a quick visit to the local temple of Sehanine to anchor his recently acquired word of recall spell. Theren, accompanied by Theridan, returns to Phanq and fills out a requisition for 20 arrows of lawful evil construction plus one each of every bowstring type in stock, preferably of chaotic good origin. Phanq assures Theren that supplies arrive without any such documentation and that quality is consistent independent of the creed of the manufactory. He does bring up an armful of bowstrings, one each of all stocked types including a ropey arbalest string. Phanq records the requisition and refers Theren to the university arcane tower for his shady inquiries of lawful evil equipment. Theridan, irritated at the ridiculously prolonged quest for lawful evil arrows, transforms to a wasp and attacks Theren with negatively reinforcing stings. Theren persists through the pain until detained by spellguards at the arcane tower who also halt Theridan’s attempted bird escape. Theren and Theridan are released into the custody of regent Ardalia who admonishes Theren to be wary of pranks. Meanwhile, Lefty has knitted a pair of socks.

The party elf gates back to the earth cult and returns to the statue-filled chambers of Marlos Urnrayle. There is no sign of activity since their encounter with the medusa. Bromsby’s passage-blocking piles of erupted earth remain undisturbed. The party retraces the path of pursuit through the escape crack in Urnrayle’s bedroom. Flute floating Theren explores the 50’ drop into the chasm below and follows it around to a bridge from a second entrance where they have not yet explored and from which Bromsby overhears voices speaking common and undercommon. Theridan solves the challenge of rounding the chasm to the bridge by transforming into an earth elemental, melding into the rock wall save for one mighty arm used to convey the party’s more pedestrian members. Theren covers the movement without a trace so that not even the three sentry gargoyles Haerelben spots notice them. Lefty, with feline independence, shadow steps around.

The party readies a surprise assault on the squad of hobgoblins across the prepared defensive kill zone set up to repel intruders. Bromsby kicks off the action with a high level eruption of earth that kills a few surprised hobgoblins. Projectiles from Haerelben and Theren find the unfortunate hobgoblin caught in front of the eruption. Hearelben blesses up the violence. Theren takes out a cultist with heavy crossbow. Meega and Rock Theridan leap into action and bottle up the gathering opposition which now includes a few giant dwarves and a charging mounted  bulette who topples Rock Theridan. A hobgoblin steps to Meega’s waiting axe, and she cuts it down. Bromsby reprises erupting earth crushing a giant dwarf. Lefty and Meega finish the last hobgoblin as Theren’s bolt volley rains down. Rock Theridan squares off with the bulette and uses his sentinel skills to keep it engaged. With a final eruption of earth Bromsby claims a cultist and a giant dwarf. Lefty slays the bulette leaving only the rider who quickly succumbs to the violent attentions of the focussed party.

Haerelben emerges from the safety of a barricade of barrels and bumps into an invisible something with a beard. Theren finds it as well. Meega finds a second one. Rock Theridan, with tremor sense, punches unto death and visibility a duergar. The other duergar enlarges to a state of visibility and Theren quickly kills it as well.

Theren loots the wealthy bulette rider [15gp, 5pp, 5 citrines @ 40gpea] and collects up extra crossbow strings. Surrounding rooms, mostly barracks, are searched but there are no survivors found. Bromsby leads the party into an unexplored corner of the area where they find a dark, deep chasm and stairs encircling a sinister black column down. The party descends into darkness and also walks down the dark stairs.

Theridan, narrowly escaping the roiling underground lake, easily follows the party’s trail of carnage to the pair of defeated ogres outside the hagdoor. Blood trails and drag marks inform him the party is within so he cracks the door and pokes his head in. Theren abandons a readied overreaction to destroy the next person opening that door. Theridan seems injured from his solo adventure but doesn’t like to talk about it.

The reunited party debates whether the hagroom is a safe place to pause and refresh. Hearelben is concerned about the possible presence of a dragon as indicated by the hagsword and recites a memory mnemonic of the four known indiginous aquatic dragons: orange, purple, yellow, turtle. Bromsby has erupted a bulwark blocking the passage from the roiling lake and riled cultists. Theren reckons the ogre bodies could help block the hagdoor. It might work for an hour as long as they aren’t discovered. Lefty cracks the door and pokes her head out to see if anyone is outside. She is discovered by a watching lizardman.

The lizardman runs off to gather all his cohorts. Theren casts pass without trace. The party slips out of the room using the dead ogres, defunct fountain, and shadows for cover. The evacuation is interrupted by an arriving double column of lizardmen. Bromsby interrupts the arrival of lizardmen by erupting earth under their formation, crushing eight of them and leaving only one trapped in vines summoned by Theridan. Lefty, with her irresistible feline affinity for an incapacited lizard, punches the lizardman dead but resists the urge to toss its corpse around while pretending it might get away.

The party retraces back to the troll’s bridge where Bromsby and Theridan explored the canal north. The roiling water now overflows the canal edges and the bridge. Theridan dashes over the bridge. The current knocks him down but he crosses safely. Theren makes the next attempt and the current washes him off the bridge. Next, Bromsby washes off but transforms into a shark before making a zero-splash dive. Haerelben uses the moonbow to fly a line over to Theridan. Meega pulls on her water breathing mask and slips off the bridge “on purpose” into the drink. Monk Lefty simply runs across the surface of the water. Haerelben, steadied by Theridan holding the line, crosses with difficulty. 

The party safely retraces back to the padlocked gate separating the recently vacated air cult area from the hopping mad, roiling water cult area. The gate and padlock become the objects of a competitive exhibition of groupthink problem solving. Lefty and Theridan keep the coast clear. Theren judiciously applies acid to the gate hinges while Bromsby digs a bear trap out of his inventory. Meega disassembles the bear trap and improvises a lock pick. Divinely inspired Haerelben, with a little luck, picks open the padlock. Meega forces the gate open despite its ruined, screeching hinges. The party escapes the water cult.

The recently abandoned air cult dorms offer a bit of respite. Attention deficient Theren experiments with the air flute relic and discovers he can levitate and move by flamboyantly pointing the flute in the desired direction of travel. He floats hither and thither without, mercifully, having to actually play the flute.

The party discusses its next move and elects to revisit the earth cult to locate and finally deal with Marlos Urnrayle. An additional benefit is access to the secret elf gate into Quastarte where Windvane, the air elemental relic, could be banked for safe keeping. 

Bromsby guides the party through the underdark to camp just outside the earth cult. A heavy fog rolls into the underdark during Meega and Theren’s first watch. Meega attempts to rouse the party to see if anyone might join her in worrying about this otherwise impossible underdark phenomenon. When the fog lifts suddenly revealing a bronze dragon, the party is ready to worry. The bronze dragon casts zone of truth and makes an inquiry that only Lefty, recently certified in draconic, recognizes.

Are you their leader?

Heck no!

Bidrierrag the bronze dragon switches to common.

Whom do you serve?

Gin!
Sehanine!
Kittylord!
Ardak!
The Harpers! Oops, I mean…DANG IT.

Besides learning that Theren was a Harper all along, everyone discovers a mutual purpose with Bidrierrag, that being the destruction of pure evil vis-a-vis vanquishment of the elemental evil eye. Bidrierrag picks up on a whiff of pure evil from the party. Theren quickly, yet respectfully, produces Windvane. Bidrierrag concurs with the plan to entrust Windvane with Quastarte. Lefty hints at the possibility of Bidrierrag joining the party, but he has a thing later so they part company.

The party awakens refreshed and slightly more powerful.

Meega drags the unconscious reaver back to the bugbear dormitory. Haerelben revives the reaver and casts a zone of truth. Nagum is captain of the guard. His late coworker, Morbeoth, or Billy Eyepatch Guy to the authors of his recent demise, was transformed in some kind of elemental ordeal that turned one eyeball whiter than usual. Nagum does not know the immediate whereabouts of Gar Shatterkeel; he is not his prophet’s keeper. Bromsby presses for a cult passphrase which Nagum reveals as, “A rising tide lifts all boats.”

Once Nagum has answered all queries, Haerelben suggests that he lead them to the temple proper. Nagum compulsorily agrees to the escort, but implicitly does not agree to not surreptitiously drop an item into the canal to alert any troll waiting under the bridge.

As Nagum leads the party across a canal bridge, he surreptitiously drops an item into the canal, alerting a troll waiting under the bridge who reaches up and yanks Meega into the canal with him. The proverbial tables turn again when Meega dons her water breathing mask and begins chopping down the giant troll with Giant Slayer. Lefty knocks Nagum out again, compounding his susceptibility to traumatic brain injury. Bromsby jumps off the bridge and transforms to a hunter shark just as he dives into the canal, landing teeth first on the troll. The troll claws and bites at Meega as he maneuvers under the bridge, out of sight of the rest of the party. Theren drags concussed Nagum across the bridge and holds up a steel mirror so that Haerelben can use the troll’s reflection to envelope him in sacred flame.

Lefty leans way over the edge of the bridge to fire her magic missile wand at the troll. Shark Bromsby critically bites the troll and it dies. The party scatters away from the troll when Theren wildly hucks a flamestone at it to finish the job. The troll regenerates and grabs at Haerelben up on the bridge. Lefty ignites and drops on the troll’s head, interrupting his regeneration. Theren boosts a hand crossbow bolt into the troll and he expires more permanently.

When Shark Bromsby doesn’t rejoin the land lubbers, Haerelben has a brief convo via message. Shark Bromsby is going to have a reconnoiter swim up the canal with Shark Theridan to see what their dead shark eyes can see. They follow the canal upstream where it opens into a wide underground lake with steps that emerge to the east. Bromsby drops hunter shark form and sneaks up the steps to discover what must be the cult larder, abundantly provisioned with foodstuffs. Several cultists, who may or may not be Sword Coast celebrity A-listers, loiter around a prominently positioned gong. Bromsby erupts earth through Iron Oath. The discombobulated cultists ring the gong without priming it first. The lake begins to roil ominously. Bromsby, uncertain about his chances soloing this pull, drops a fog cloud on the whole situation and beats feet as he hears more cultists pour in.

The party continues along sans Bromsby and Theridan in the direction Nagum led them but this time with unconscious Nagum in tow. They stealthily turn north entering a plaza with a dry, merfolk-decorated fountain in the center. Haerelben and Theren listen at a side door that features cult motifs that have been defaced with long scratches. Three voices speaking an unknown tongue can be heard through the closed door. From the north exit the party hears a mighty eruption of earth followed by the ringing of an unprimed gong. Theren posits that the earth cult has launched an attack. A fog cloud drifts in, and Theren posits that the air cultists have joined the fray. Lefty attempts to dissuade him of these notions. Bromsby runs in, fleeing his own chaos. Safe at last.

The motif side door throws open inwardly and out squeezes a pair of ogres. Bromsby erupts earth sealing off the imminent angry swarm to the north and injuring ogre Left. Haerelben moonbows Left, but Lefty goes with clawing Right. Theren crossbows to Left and Meega slays Left before axing Right. Theren is just finishing Right when the ugliest creature to behold, complete with seaweed hair and lifeless eyes, emerges from the side room. She envelopes Lefty, Theren, and Meega in some kind of frightening mental attack. Bromsby rays frost at her and Meega chops at her relentlessly as the hag pleads for her life and promises to take them all to Gar Shatterkeel. The hag simply drops Meega unconscious and returns to her room.

A monstrous roar from the north unerves everyone except of course unconscious Meega and unconscious Nagum. Haerelben delivers a mass healing from Sehanine. Meega springs up and pursues the hag into her room, appointed with fine wooden furniture and gold and green tapestries but devalued by the hag’s own brand of feng shui to include tiny little crabs running everywhere. Meega knocks the hag prone and resumes her chopping until the hag’s woeful pleas turn to mortal pools of blood. Meega takes a nap.

Haerelben tosses the hag’s apartment and finds a warm longsword in her bed. A quick identification reveals the bone longsword with ruby encrusted hilt is magically effective [+1] and turns warm in the presence of a dragon. Either the hag was sleeping on the longsword thusly warmed by her body, or the longsword, presumably in the perpetual presence of a nearby dragon, was warming the hag’s bed. One of these possibilities is extremely disturbing, and the other involves a nearby dragon. A nearby chest yields the hag’s life savings of 190 gp, 8 pp, a potion of hill giant strength, and a potion of resist fire.

After a brief rest in the dank drowning hole room, Theridan recasts water walk and the party advances west over the underground lake. Lefty probes ahead and is first to find three dilapidated boats on a natural beach.

The party carefully examines the surroundings for threats. All is calm. Two trolls calmly pull Bromsby and Theren into the water. A boat mimic calmly reaches an oar out to Lefty and grabs her. Meega, equipping mask and mullet weapon, and Snake Theridan attempt to free Bromsby. The troll drags him away into the murky water forever. Lefty breaks away from the boat mimic. Theren breaks away from the aquatic troll and flees right into the newly available boat mimic who knocks him grappled to the beach. Haerelben tries to taunt the mimic off Theren while channelling Sehanine’s healing authority into him, but Theren is enticingly vulnerable and the mimic bites him enthusiastically.

Meega pounds the troll relentlessly but accidentally flings her mullet, unimpeded by aquatic viscosity, into the murky distance. Snake Theridan gets tied in a knot trying to hold it still. Theren, unable to escape the mimic, is barely a step ahead of death. Lefty, reluctant to approach the mimic, pops magic missiles from her wand. She finds the courage to swoop in and punch the boat mimic into purple goo. Meega switches to Giant Slayer and works on the troll while Snake Theridan straightens himself out. Snake Theridan squeezes the troll dead. The troll regenerates and avenges himself on Snake Theridan. Theren, having broken all his crossbows, takes a run at the troll with a looted flaming longsword. Despite his lack of strength, Theren manages enough fire damage to wipe out the troll permanently.

Meega and Theridan begin a grid search for the tossed mullet. Lefty and Haerelben listen for clues as to Bromsby’s whereabouts, dead or alive. Theren yells helpfully from the beach until boredom grapples him. He begins experimenting with the magic flute. His playing improves from deplorable, but the noise attracts the unfortunate attention of several bugbears and another aquatic troll.

The bugbears, reluctant to pursue the water-walking group into the lake, hurl javelins from the beach. Lefty attacks the aquatic troll. It pursues her. Haerelben banishes the troll just as Snake Theridan locates Meega’s thrown mullet. The party retreats into the lake and retraces back to the drowning hole room for an uninterrupted long rest.

Refreshed for the day, the party prepares to locate Bromsby’s bloated corpse, pre- or post-troll digestion. Bromsby immediately rewards their efforts having spent the night just outside the drowning hole room. Only an oil trap prepared by Theren at the entrance prevented him from rejoining sooner.

The group returns to explore the beach. They find the other side of the locked gate previously discovered from the air cult side. Down an adjacent hallway, Theren pauses to listen at a closed door behind and overhears the bugbears having a discussion in goblin. The party bypasses the bugbear room only to wander past an arrow slit they are closely monitoring. Bugbears pour into the hallway behind the party. Reavers, led by Billy Eyepatch, pour into the hallway ahead of the party. Theridan entangles the reavers. Haerelben confuses the bugbears. More reavers pour into the middle of the party from another door. Snake Theridan and Lefty team on the disadvantaged reavers ahead. Theren and Haerelben work on the bugbears at the other end. Meega works middle out. Billy Eyepatch quaffs a few potions until felled by Haerelben’s sacred flame. Snake Theridan knocks the last reaver unconscious for questioning.

Meega severs the head of the troll she stands on. Haerelben searches the Dark Tide Knight formerly known as Lance. She had a lot to live for: in a waterproof leather pouch are 16 gp, 5 pp, 5 coral gems [80 gp each], and a potion of healing. Haerelben keeps the potion and surrenders the rest to treasurer Theren. Lance’s bound shark circles restlessly along the edge of a quiet underground lake.

Meega calms the shark. Haerelben gives Theren some pointers on handling the shark as a mount. Theren attempts to board the shark and falls into the lake. The shark tries for a nibble of Theren, but Lefty distracts it away with some bits of cultist ‘n troll.

Theridan casts water walk and the party explores upstream to the source of the canal. Water ghouls grasp at Theren’s legs from beneath the surface. Meega dons her water mask and spear kit and battles the ghouls submerged. Theren fires crossbow bolts through the surface. Bromsby and Theridan whip at the ghouls. The ghouls are defeated.

The shark has returned to prospective new friend Meega and scoops her up into its saddle. Meega rides the shark around triumphantly splashing her cohorts.

Theren probes ahead and finds a few more ghouls. The ensuing fight attracts the attention of a nearby pair of chuuls. Theridan goes to snake form. Bromsby erupts earth at the ghouls. The chuuls concentrate on snake Theridan and they get into a grappling circle. The party focuses on the disadvantageously grappled chuul which Theren subdues with some final short sword chops. The remaining chuul and ghouls beat snake Theridan back into elf Theridan.

Bromsby erupts the last two ghouls. The chuul drags Theridan and Theren to the lake edge to drown them but Bromsby thorn whips it back forcing it to drop them into the lake.

The party realizes Lefty and Meega have not been any help with the chuuls when shark-mounted Meega arcs through the air, driving the water spear into a giant octopus that snatched Lefty when no one else was watching.

Theridan and Theren clamber back ashore.The chuul manages to paralyze Theridan until Haerelben restores him. Bromsby destroys the chuul with an earth tremor.

Victorious Meega sails through the air again, this time holding up most of an octopus corpse. Lefty drags herself out of the canal for some oxygen. Meega names the shark Nennak, orc for water fighter. Bipedal Meega and unevolved Nennak know the good times can’t last and so part ways after Meega removes Nennak’s saddle.

The party explores the room liberated from the ghouls and chuuls while enjoying a short rest. A red symbol like an X connected at the bottom adorns one wall. A square of eight black water-filled holes in the floor and a scattering of ropes tied on heavy stones suggests systematic drowning. Haerelben draws no conclusions from a sample of the foul water so Theren jumps into a hole experimentally. He is grappled and held under by a water ghoul.

When Theren does not emerge, Theridan ties off Meega with some rope and she dives in. She can feel one head of decaying mush and one of living hair. She jams the water spear into the mushy head a few times while Theren fights off the ghoul with his hand crossbow. The water ghoul is defeated and the party drags Meega and Theren back to the surface. Theren wastes no time jumping back into the hole to loot the water ghoul but finds the ghoul had no apparent possessions. Theren drops rocks into all eight holes.

One cultist gets away.

The party explores back in the direction of the most recent attack. A sluggish, murky, twenty foot wide canal flows through the room. Movement in the canal precedes a sudden obscuring fog and a solid clubbing of Lefty and Haerelben standing at the edge. Bromsby wards the fog with a deafening wind that reveals seven lizardfolk armed with clubs. Meega charges in. Haerelben charges out, his mirror shield heated to a painful temperature. The fog is withdrawn. Theren and Meega pick off the lizard club members. Theridan summons an ironic tidal wave that knocks over Theren along with the lizards. A few lizardfolk succumb to the wave. Four crocodiles appear, and one locks on to Theren who fires from his prone position slaying a lizardfolk shaman and his conjured crocodiles. Meega delivers two perfectly calibrated killing blows on the remaining lizardfolk. Theren helps himself to the shaman’s seaweed quarterstaff which is magical only in the satisfying sense that it belonged to Theren’s vanquished foe.

The party decides a short rest would be ideal just as the one cultist who got away leads a few of his friends back for a flanking attack. Meega and Lefty charge in, bottling in the reavers as Theridan turns them advantageously blue. Bromsby rays frost and Theren rays crossbow bolts. Theridan entangles the crowded hallway with vines. Someone momentarily paralyzes Meega, but she snaps out of it. Meega and Lefty stand on growing piles of corpses to continue their reaver rampage. Having worn out another bowstring, Theren charges through with his shortsword. The commanding priest, Frost, yields.

Lefty interrogates Frost. Gar Shatterkeel is the boss and Frost is merely defending his home from invaders. Frost declines to voluntarily demonstrate the cult recognition sign so Haerelben suggests it spell-wise. Frost, his hands bound behind his back where no one can see, happily accommodates.

The party, the still-playing-dead prisoner, and Frost the priest all take a short rest in the locked bunk room. Theren busies himself breaking the jaws of the deceased cultists so they can’t be spoken with. He uses their spreading pools of blood to write, Air Cult Rulez, on the walls. He fashions a mask from the flayed face of one of the more intact lizardfolk. A secret vote condemns Frost to a quick death, but no one executes on that plan so Frost remains tied up in bed for now. The party ventures further into the ruins.

Wending through the hallway the party discovers adjacent rooms that contain identical smelly, dusty pits surrounded by a walk. Lefty offers Theren a couple of shaped sticks to improve his lizard “disguise”. Theren accepts the sticks and experimentally tosses them into the pit. Nothing happens.

Theren finds a simple sleeping quarters devoid of any treasure. A nearby bridge, engraved with dwarven battle scenes, spans the canal. Theren finds a door secured by a hasp on the outside, his favorite kind of room. Inside are straw pallets and some water apparently intended for prisoners but now empty. A vertical slit looks out upon the canal.

Meega explores ahead. She peeks around a corner in the hallway into the waiting face of an aquatic troll. Meega reflexively smacks the troll with her axe. Lefty pounces in and discovers a second troll behind the first plus a few cultists. The trolls bulldoze through the hallway collecting party members. Haerelben banishes both trolls leaving just the priests and reavers to deal with for now. Theridan charges full-boar at the cultists. Theren marks a reaver. Lefty sprints to the rear of the party to engage a snake-shaped water elemental sneaking up from behind. She punches the snake until it reverts into a blue man. Bromsby erupts a mighty earth and kills him. At the other end of the battle, Lance, the officer in charge, lances Boar Theridan. Boar Theridan circles around and charges the reavers, knocking one prone. Theren slays the other reaver so that Meega can stand on it to attack Lance. Boar Theridan and Meega keep Lance knocked prone while Theren punctures him with point blank bolts. Boar Theridan slays Lance and an alarming splash is heard from the canal. Alarm turns to empathy when the party realizes the splash was caused by Lance’s bonded hunter shark mount lamenting the death of his master. Then empathy turns to glee when Theridan realizes he has just seen a hunter shark.

The banished trolls return to a prepared welcome, well-lit by Theridan’s faerie fire and then Theren’s actual fire. Meega’s axe trips the front troll so that Lefty can attack its face. Bromsby’s erupted earth smashes them into the ceiling. The first troll regains his stance and bites into Meega. Theridan produces some Haerelben-blessed flame and Theren slays the first troll so that Meega has something to stand on to slay the second troll.

The first troll, under Meega, stays dead but the second troll pops back up. It fumbles a counter attack on Meega and is slain a second time. Theren, acting on a hunch, shoves Meega onto the second troll. Neither troll seems to revive.

After an exhausting battle with fire priests and their chimera and their hobgoblins, the party elects to conceal itself in a closet to dress wounds before attempting to move. Theren barricades the room by piling corpses against the doors. Before anyone feels any better, the fire cult returns in force. A fire genasi apprehends Theren despite his impersonation of a distraught fellow cultist. Bromsby et al come out of hiding to rescue Theren from the arresting fire genasi Bastian Thermandar. Eventually.

Meega charges up to Bastian and knocks him on his back, but he steps to the other side of the room and launches a fireball back at the party. Snake Theridan and Lefty whittle away the small force of hobgoblins. Auroch Bromsby pursues a priest and cultist out of the room and down the hall. Snake Theridan bites Theren’s hands free of their bonds. Theren recovers his gear.

Bastian departs abruptly when a tremendous force hits the red cauldron door. A couple of fiery arms reach through the doorway forcing back the blocking pile of corpses. The owner-operator of the fiery arms is plenty ticked at the desecrating invaders of his temple. If Bastian doesn’t want to be here, neither does the party times a hundred. The party cheeses it out of the fire temple.

. . .

After a pleasantly safe and uneventful evening of convalescing, the party makes its way through the underground Besilmer network by way of the iron gate in the air cult area into a compact entry way outside the water cult area. Theridan listens at the door and hears the perfectly unsurprising babble of running water.

Through the door is a badly damaged chamber save for a conspicuously undamaged, engineered fountain of clear water running into a basin. Lefty immediately spots a couple of critters camouflaged against a rocky outcrop. She attempts a friendly greeting and they attempt a telepathic invasion of Theridan’s brain. Lefty approaches them and finds herself staring into the necrotic eye beams of a couple of nothics. Meega charges, Theren shoots, Theridan whips, Lefty punches. The nothics are quickly subdued.

Bromsby and Haerelben check out the fountain situation. The water has some magical healing properties which Meega readily confirms with a practical ingestion test. Theren and Theridan fill their waterskins for later.

The party proceeds through the opposite door into another hallway. A metal plate in the stone door at the far end of the hallway pops open and a challenge for the cult sign is demanded. Helpless shrugging is not the cult sign and the plate slams shut. Meega forces the plate open again and Haerelben commands the occupant to open. The cultist unwisely opens the door for the party and is rewarded with a blue faerie fire painting and thorn whipping from Theridan. A concealing fog fills the room, but Theridan dispels it. Theren leans around the doorway and slays the blue man with a bolt from Diplomacy. Lefty knocks out the other cultist.

Haerelben zones up some truth to question the prisoner. Meega locks the other door into the room. More cultists arrive from the hallway and a paradoxical circle restraining ensues among the cultists and Snake Theridan. Meega, Lefty, Theren, and Snake Theridan quickly defeat the cultists.

Haerelben and Bromsby extract a bit of new information from the prisoner. Gar Shatterkeel is the local boss, possibly prophet, and in fact he does have a favorite weapon called Drown which will be the party’s demise. Gar serves presumed elemental prince Olhydra, all hail.

The interrogation of Sud, of the Eternal Flame, and Orgaal, of the Crushing Wave, winds down. A short rest follows the expiration of the zone of truth. Sud and Orgaal behave but don’t reconcile on any personal or professional level. They are allowed to depart through the eastern hall which connects to the earth cult area, or so Sud claims. The group follows to ensure Sud’s orderly egress but immediately attracts the attention of a nesting chimera when Haerelben clamorously trips down the stairs. The party backs slowly away with the implicit cooperation of the chimera.

The party backtracks in the presumed direction of the fire temple proper. Theren peeks into a room along the hallway which has been secured from the outside by a hasp and pin. Four hellhounds rest peacefully unaware of Theren’s intrusion. Theren resecures the door.

Bromsby produces a flask and takes a swig. Meega realizes they have similar flawed predilections and takes a pull off the flask. Lefty scowls righteously. Theren charges at the flask, predictably agitated by the sudden presence of his second greatest nemesis: alcohol. After an unsuccessful attempt to snatch away the flask from strongly determined Bromsby, Theren resorts to a scientifical explanation that the brain is the body’s main filter for alcohol, and that filter needs to be in prime condition for LOGIC. Bromsby and Meega drink to that. Prosit!

Theridan explores ahead to discover a room of meticulously maintained machinery. Haerelben, enrolled at Ardak’s college of technomancy at Quastarte, studies the works through the proficiency of divine knowledge of the ages. Nudging the single obvious lever ever-so-slightly causes the mechanism to satisfyingly drive and then settle again.

A temple rando runs by the foot of the stairs at the end of the hallway. The party sneakily deploys at the corners of the intersection to reconnoiter the hallway. Nothing else is coming, and the runner is out of sight. Haerelben stomps into the hallway. Theren takes the lead and finds himself the punctured subject of an ambush by a room full of waiting cultists and hobgoblins. Theren trades back some crossbow bolts. Meega bashes in a cultist. Theridan speeds things along with a maelstrom summoned into half the room slamming half a dozen cultists to death.

A high level caster enters the far side of the room and immolates Theridan. Theridan maintains concentration on the maelstrom. A hobgoblin captain, singing encouragingly for his troops, comes at Bromsby who has flamboyantly presented himself in the geometric center of the room according to Lefty’s calculations.

Haerelben conveys Sehanine’s blessings and ducks around a corner. Theren marks the caster and sends crossbow bolts across the room. Surrounded Bromsby goes to snake form and Theridan trades his maelstrom for boar form. Meega charges the hobgoblin captain and knocks him down. Lefty claws up a cultist. A clog of magmen join the fight.

Theren’s wounds are lightly cured just in time for the caster to drop a wall of fire through the party. Walled-in Lefty ignites. She and Meega take out a couple of the magmen. Boar Theridan charges around the tussle toward the caster. A guarding magman smacks Boar Theridan afire which makes everyone else hungry. Snake Bromsby puts the choke on the hobgoblin captain.

Refreshed Theren charges through the crowd of druid animalia, fighty fighters, cultists, goblinoids, and prodigious piles of perished people to get to the caster who inconveniently ducks around a corner between casting her hurtful spells. Here’s Theren!, he yells at her. She regrettably does not yell her own name in return but instead suggests that Theren will find the power he seeks behind that curtain over there. Theren demurs the invitation and instead shoots her lethally in the face with his heavy crossbow.

Encouraged by the demise of the troublesome caster, the party focuses its efforts on a heroically dressed tough. Flaming Lefty puts the final hurt on him and he explodes violently. Lefty evades with cat-like agility and finishes off the troublesome hobgoblin captain as well. He does not explode. Meega chops down a pair of cultists and they don’t explode. Flaming Boar Theridan gores a magman and he explodes.

Theren is just finishing off the very last hobgoblin when in runs the chimera, evidently summoned by the caster as a desperate final act. Bromsby summons a fire wall around the chimera. Lefty and Meega strike blindly through the fire wall at the chimera. It bursts out, fire breaths Meega, and flies over for a bite of Theridan. Theren marks the chimera and slays it with a bolt.

The party observes the room for the first time. There is a red door to the east which someone wanted to paint with a black cauldron. There are forges with anvils and bedding around the sides. Twenty-one recently created corpses are strewn around, but a search of their pockets yields no intelligence or treasure. It’s all very compelling and difficult to leave, but the party is too weary to risk any more encounters today.

The party takes an hour in the secret Findon and Gitte tomb to dress wounds and plan the next move. Fortunately for the safety of Faerûn, if not the entire natural world, the next move is to continue exploration into the fire cult.

The party retraces its steps to search the sleeping quarters of the slain dullard and fire priests. Bloody drag marks down the halls indicate the slain were dragged toward the foundry. Scorch marks indicate not all the slain had sufficient remains to leave drag marks.

Soggy documents found in the living quarters invariably end with hails to Imix and Vanifer. The documents reveal that the forge produces weapons and armor for an army, specifically the army who attacked Shrine of the Iron Oath. Documents also reveal the extent of Enit’s annoyingness.

Theridan stealthily probes ahead to the foundry where the bloody drag marks terminate into the channels of lava that power the forge. A pair of guards conspicuously protect stairs exiting the opposite side of the foundry. Haerelben trips in a clatter of purloined hobgoblin half plate, attracting the attention of the guards nervously anticipating another wave of rampaging liberated salamanders. The guards relax when Theren offers the correct passphrase, Fire is Eternal. The guards tense again when Theridan, transformed into a fire elemental, crosses toward them crackling in ignan. Theren joins in the ignan convo. The guards beg forgiveness at their lack of diligence learning the ignan language so Haerelben translates: you are relieved, go away. That directive is countermanded by a supervisor who emerges between the guards. His ignan and spear are both sharp.

Supervisor demands to know why this unscheduled fire elemental is here, standing in his forge. Theren explains he has tamed a wild elemental. Supervisor is impressed but also ambitious. He looks forward to presenting this accomplishment to Vanifer personally. Theren would accommodate that desire if he only could, but the elemental only answers to Theren’s commands. Supervisor becomes suspicious. Theren shoots him with a couple of debate-ending bolts.

The cultists attack Fire Theridan, but fighting fire with fire is less effective than rumored. Bromsby erupts earth and ignited Lefty punches in with yet more fire. Fire Theridan jogs through the guards while the party focuses on Supervisor. Meega fatally plants Giant Slayer into Supervisor and he explodes. Bromsby calls up some lightning through the guards slaying one of them. The other goes to strike Meega, but Fire Theridan sentinals him dead.

Theren adds a looted flaming longsword to his collection. Haerelben looks around for a lava control panel to flood the forge but, to Meega’s relief, does not find anything. Fire Theridan begins opening doors in the now unguarded hallway. He finds a couple of rooms piled with junk, both sorted and unsorted. Fire Lefty and Theren poke around in the rooms. Theren comes up with a few gold pieces, but otherwise it’s really just junk.

Fast moving Fire Theridan backdrafts around the passage ahead. He impresses a couple of guards with his fiery presence, but the ignan language barrier prevents any meaningful contact. Theridan finds a decorative dwarven brazier and some furrows of ash. He reports the situation back to Theren who then translates back to the rest of the party. Theren is challenged by the guards but flubs the passphrase and then breaks a string trying to shoot them. Très awkward.

Bromsby erupts earth around the brazier to injure the guards. Fire Theridan and Fire Lefty rudely burn through the party to get to the guards. Lefty non-lethally fire claws down one guard while Meega and Theren lethally take out the other. Another guard enters. Lefty and Meega soften him up so that Bromsby can kill steal him with a thorn whipping.

A door opens allowing through a fireball that envelopes most of the party. The party attacks the fiery source of the fireball while Lefty engages a guard. Meega knocks the caster down but catches another fireball before Lefty extinguishes the priestess. Theridan, out of elemental form, shillelaghs the guard to death.

Haerelben revives the unconscious, unbound guard. The guard comes up swinging, gets knocked out again, and is bound. With everyone but Theren gathered around the guard, Haerelben casts zone of truth.

Sud the guard got here a month ago or so, drawn to the lifestyle by the cool, yet hot, weapons and armor. Prophetess Vanifer has the coolest weapon of all, a dagger named Tinderstrike that she uses in service to Imix, all hail Imix. Sud knows how to get to the fire temple, of course, but is terrible at giving directions to others. His schedule today was mostly to torture a water cultist there in the back room, breaking his wrists as one does. Theren drags the broken water cultist, Orgaal, into the zone of truth.

Orgaal serves Gar Shatterkeel who serves Olhydra. There does seem to be a satisfyingly symmetrical artifact of elemental water, and Orgaal proposes that it will be the party’s demise.