Age of Ashes Story Thread

[dragonforgotten]

The city is alive with excitement. I feel odd and unnerved being showered by cheers. By the same people who once saw me bound in chains and displayed for sale. Do they even recognize me? Probably not. With the tirade driven out of kintargo we finally take the time to relax and breath. I suggest a shopping trip while Eliza the wizard says she’s going off to make some “friends” now that we are the hero’s of kintargo. I shake my head, disappointed. Ugh, this is not how hero’s should behave. Running around town getting hookers.
Im looking through the shops, the sun on my back when I run into a familiar friendly face. I must of caught his attention as well because Halleka turns around as I rise my hand in a greeting.
“Halleka! Morning! What are you doing here? Shopping as well.”
“Yes.” He smiles in that wispy voice, trailing his fingers under his jaw.
“Things have become quiet now that our names have been cleared. You have a new accessory, inferno?” I can’t help myself blush, tugging on the equilocation collar.
“Thank you. I thought it would be wise to understand your foes. It seems to always come in handy.”
He chuckles,
“How interesting. You must be one of the few priests outside of kuthite and other darker worships to take such a interest.”
His laugh should normally be unsettling if you didn’t know him well. To me it’s a sign he’s honestly amused. I smile back
“I hear that a lot from our wizardess but I’m not exactly normal to begin with.”
I look to the open coffee shop and get an idea.
“Would you like to get some coffee? We’re just past the breakfast rush so hopefully it’s not crowded with people.” I tug at my hood self conscious. The city has gone from darkly judging me from swarming me the moment they recognize me. Being the only Nidalese in bright blues and gold of the sarenrea kelegos see robes has made me a easily recognizable.
I get my coffee blacks which earns me a lot of jokes. I mean a lot of jokes from Halleka.
We’re still being stared at but no one approaches me with Hallake nearby. I the. Take him to the plays. I’ve always wanted to see one but I couldn’t do to obvious struggles. Being a enslaved doesn’t really give you pay or the freedom to do what you wanted.
I dragged him into a comedy that’s peppered with dark humor. He appreciates those bits
The suns set by the time we leave.
“Thanks for coming.” I tell him.
“It was nice.” He simply says.
We linger near each other as I let my thoughts be known. He knows we will be leaving the city tomorrow, he will be going back to Nidal. I wish he didn’t have to go back to Nidal. I painfully wish he could walk away from it.
“Halleka. I know we’ve only known each other for a few weeks but...” I trail off struggling with my words.
“I would never ask you to change. I know how devoted you are to the midnight lord. I understand the weight of his blessings.”
I sigh. His eyes linger on me, lingering on the beginning of the scar from the giants spiked chain.
“You are talented Arun.” He tells me.
“Though you walk the path of the sun I can not bring myself to resent you. It is a strange occurrence but I do care for you. You are so bright Arun, perhaps the lord believes in your cause....” he runs his fingers along his throat again in thought.
“This Dahak. I pray to him that your mission is successful. The world is still a blank canvas. Still young. We have witness the end. I pray for you just as you pray for me that our people will never see the end again. Experience that horror again for this is our pact.” He rises his hand to trace my darkened eye.
“You share our blood Arun Blacksun. You are Kin. Even as you step into the light your shadow grows longer and darker and thus we are tied.” I grasp his hand.
“I am your sun Halleka, if you find yourself lost or the pain too much Ill pray to ease your soul.
“Ah, the pain is never much. Pain is healing, as you’ve learned. I hope next we meet your scars will tell more tales.”
He smiles. I smile back but feeling sorrowful and understanding his thoughts.
“I hope you find happiness Halleka. I’ll message you when I can. I pray we are successful at stoping the god as destruction just as my goddess was in imprisoning Rovague. Our gods after all we’re once comrades in these fights.”
He chuckles as we step apart form each other and I know this may be the last time we could be seeing each other should the darkness claim him. I pray it won’t.
“May the lord guide your steps.”
“And May The light redeem. Goodbye Halleka.”
——-

We return home after A long track back a a step through the magic portal. I’m glade for the break. With the castle still being worked on and I take the time to work on the pups education. I have then resting in the garden. I’m weeding the flower beds when Skoll approaches me, basket in jaws.
“Flowers for dirt.” He growls between his vowls.
“That’s right! You’ve gotten so much better.” I take his basket and look into to see the seeds and point to each one.
“These are actually vetables. Could you dig a hole for me?” I ask him gesturing to the bed. He sniffs and begins kicking dirt everywhere. It’s a mess but he tired his best, I can’t scold that that.
“Thank you Skoll.” I tell him scratching his ear but then I realize how quiet the garden is and the absent of a black wolf sized pup.
“Where’s your sister?”
“Playing.”
“Playing? What kind of play?” He doesn’t say. Oh boy. I stand up.
“Skoll. Truth now. What is she up to.”
His tail stops wagging and he won’t look me in the eye. Oh goddess she’s at it again isn’t she? I storm back inside the castle to find her trying to chew on the goblins again. She’s actually managed to swollow one whole!
“Hati!” I call and she stops what she’s doing. She wags her tail trying to be cute but I fold my arms waiting.
“Now what did we learn last week.”
“Goblins friends.”
“Yes and.”
“Not toys or food despite screaming and thrashing.” Eventually the tail drops and opens her jaws wide as she regurgitates the shaken goblin. He runs away screaming as Hati pads towards me.
“Sorry papa.” I smile and reach into my pocket and throw her some meat as she snaps it up.
“It’s alright. We are all learning here and we make mistakes. Now let’s get you both something to eat.”
Thus begins the routine of creating 5 tons of raw meat. After the meal it’s a few hours of teaching nursery songs of sharing and careing and making friends to pups the size of grown wolves with unhinging jaws. Then it’s bath time where I get soak. I have to get Mikolas to help me get them into the tub and hold them down. It use to be so easy but now I can’t lift them anymore. I use to be able to hold them in my arms but now it feels like I’m trying to lift a small horse. Two small horses. They also don’t like baths. They realllyyy Don’t like baths.
When night falls I’m disturbed by Bill who is ready for or decent into jewel gate tomorrow. The pups are sad I have to leave but they understand. With the increasing deadliness of my mission I could never put my adoptive children in harms way.
The next morning we depart with the kobolds seeing us off. Then begins the gambit. First there’s the forgetful vengeful ghost and the screaming crystals, i should have stopped our cat fighter from knocking over her skeleton in time. leaving the way station we are attacked by ooze crystals and Daved the legion archeron was constantly engulfed multiple times before we are able to destory them. Then there was the worm. Oh Nirvana the purple worm. One of the biggest and terrifying creature I’ve ever seen. Though my list of scary creatures just keep on growing and getting bigger and toping themselves. It swallows Nadja whole! It stings and then eats Mikolas! Im face to face with the beast, my heart beating rapidly. I rise my sheild, focus my gaze as I widen my stance. As the last man standing between it and my spellcasting buddies I perpare for it to charge. Somehow in one miraculous moment my tiny buckler manages to deflect the massive stinger of the purple worm. I’m filled with such disbelief and bravado I laugh.
“I did It? I did it!”
I start taunting the worm, feeling confident only for it to bit into my shoulder and swallow me soon after. And I see it all. Oh gods I wish I could unsee the insides of a worm. I find my two companions. The barbarian is hacking away at its slimy walls while Nadja is slumped, pinned by the wall of muscles. Mikolas punches away at it while I position myself to help Nadja feeling my lungs cry out for air. With one great punch he kills its. It’s muscles begin to relax and a sensation of falling takes hold before we slam into the ground, trapped in the dead sinking worm. We have a new problem now. We can’t breath and we need to cut our way free! Through team work we manage to get out of its insides, reaching the dying Nadja in time before it’s too late. I fear what other horrors await us deeper within these underground caverns. My magic eye saw a group of strange creature cheering at a monstrous bat mauls some dwarven ghouls. I hope we are strong enough to face them.

-Arun

[Aileen]

It has been crazy couple days. First we fight crystals, then I nearly die inside a purple worm, and then we fight horrible gugs! As a reward for our pain we go back home to castle and do what make us feel best- shopping!

Our wounds closed and ready to go, we go back in star gate and walk through the mess of the worm and gugs to further explore. We find ghoul person in a cell, and a dwarven speaking evil wall. At last we leave, and are in a city of the dead as the ghoul told us about. Not far in we find nice dwarf lady, and she brings us to dwarf city council in underground dwarf city.

We have strange meeting where we have to convince dwarves to give us jobs by talking them up about our skills. Miklos and I are spectacular athletes, and that of course impresses tiny little men. And so we start doing their jobs they are too important to do.

A man left his wife after an argument, but that investigation just leads us to him having run off to another part of town, the Earth Wind and Fire zone or something. I get back to our hotel with Arun and Eliza to find my husband is very drunk and reenacting the improv show he and Bill saw.

Next missing person is pregnant dwarf, who also ran off to Earth Wind and Fire. So we investigate the dispute with the guilds- leading us to find that all the shoddy weapons are made by one particular weapon smith. I have much knowledge of weapons due to using all of them all my life, more so than our wizard who just worked as merchant. You can sell things and think you are expert, but using tells more.

I go in dwarf shop and accuse him of his craftsmangos se, and he confesses. Something about a cult, forcing him to make his bad weapons. He promises to stop if I don’t hand him over, and I am woman with soft heart- of course I will let him off easy!

I return to group and lie, telling them of cult but not of what he did. To the head dwarf guy I just say there was a bad apprentice, who made craftsmangos se weapons. I hope the dwarf will keep his word.

And so we set off to find crabs. Poor crabbies are being killed, and we will save them! Unfortunately we run into giant water snakes and nearly all are eaten to death- it’s a bit like the purple worm experience but now with more water!

Luckily, handsome husband and I kill snakes, and we are free to investigate our crab friends. I hope they are okay.


🦀🐍 Nadja

[Chris Leitzel]

After killing the snakes, we brought the city's archmage to see the gate which we had entered from. He seemed excited and even more excited to see the town we call home. I do not believe he gets out much. Then again, there is undead surrounding the city.

We returned and continued our investigation into the the cult of Droskar the dwarf merchant we investigated mentioned. Our investigation took a rather interesting and unfortunate turn after finding the cult's lair when two guards sought to arrest us. When we questioned the charges, they refused to answer and attempted to arrest us. Bill, Nadja and Miklos took a rather aggressive refusal to this, while Arun surrendered. We managed to subdue them before more guards arrived. But we are technically outlaws. That is unhelpful.

After a night's rest, we decided to take on the cult's base of operations. Disguised as dwarves, thanks to a spell of mine, we managed to move through the city and into the cult's base. Moving through the first level, we were attacked by two statues which we defeated after finding out they disliked cold. We then battled a duergar and a human slaver of the Scarlet Triad and defeated them, freeing a group of slaves before facing some sort of undead creature, and beating it. Bill, under a disguise, lead the slaves back to the city proper while we waited at the tunnel leading from their base further out. We found the missing merchant among the slaves and also learned a dwarf , not a duergar, leads the cult.

After Bill returned, we traveled down the tunnel and uncovered a door, leading to several human members of the Triad engaged in training. We dispensed them (with a bit of a liberal use of severed head) moved onward. We then encountered a group of duergar, who we fought before an alchemist of theirs joined them. Thanks to a lot of skill, magic and luck, we managed to defeat this group. As our fight was not quiet, we believe we are safe for the moment and can plan our next step.

Eliza-

We

[Aileen]

“Stop screaming Nadja! She had it coming!” Eliza shouts to me.

I pull my wits together and move past the decapitated head and the body rapidly draining itself of all its blood, and start attacking her friends. I feel really horrible that I sliced my Kukri clean through her neck, but I guess these people are evil and I shouldn’t feel bad.

We fight, long and hard, killing all but one jerk face who runs up the stairs with all us in hot pursuit. Eliza keeps weaponizing the dead person’s head, and there is something morbidly hilarious about it. Oh, how far we have fallen.

Up the stairs we engage with more enemies and an alchemist lady. She keeps bombing us as we tear into them, but the room is soon filled with horrible black tentacles courtesy of our wizard. We are all beat up and tired, especially the decapitated head- but we fight on and emerge victorious!

I’ll never get that image out of my head.

Dammit.

🏹 Nadja the Beheader

[Aileen]

As we rest in the chamber, a cat person shows up drawing their bow and ordering us to stand down.

“You’re under arrest, I’m taking you in!”

“Not worth your time or money, friend,” says Arun. “We’re not the people you should be worried about.”

“Then what are you doing down here?” She asks.

“Oh, we’re running from the law!”

“Black Eyed Priest, shut up!!!” I screech.

Turns out the cat woman is a bounty hunter, and a ranger like me, but she quickly is filled in on the situation. Luckily she decides to help us and not arrest us.

In searching these rooms we find notes referring to a Temple of All Gods, and a map to it. It’s right in the heart of the necropolis. As much as we wish not to enter it, it’s where we must go. My husband stays behind to guard our retreat with promise to catch up. We head out, and Eliza casts a magic light on me as I am the only one completely blind in the dark. We leave the tunnels, and head out into the dark and spooky city. Chee scouts ahead, and after walking for a while reports that there are scary ghostly things ahead.

As I engage them, pummeling with my kukris, Arun sets of a blast of sunlight that fills the sky with light and a resounding boom. It kills one devourer and weakens the other two, which we quickly dispatch. However, now everything knows there are outsiders here, blessed with the power of sunlight. We have to run.

Chee spots three gargantuan spiders ahead, and we approach. I activate my slippers of spider climbing and climb up a wall to reach two of them. One webs me, and I’m tethered to it, unable to go anywhere. The two spiders bite me, injecting me with poison over and over- but it’s fruitless. Arun gave me a poison resistance potion and Bill buffed me up with some dragon heart drugs. I’m going to be up here a good long while!

I slice into one of the spiders, it’s blood pulsating from its horrible wound. Angered, it tears into my shoulder, blood pouring down my armor and nearly making me drop my kukri. I slay the spider webbing me, and take on the other one. It tries to hit me but keeps failing, and soon it joins its friends in death.

I hop down to the ground, in quite a lot of pain but feeling good about taking down the massive spiders. Arun gets to work healing me, swearing about the amount of stitches he has to do. As I sit there next to Bill, both us being fussed over and wanting to get going, I see a dwarf like wraith floating in our direction. His hands are up in the universal sign of peace.

“Hold, ones who yet draw breath!” It speaks in dwarven. “I come not to steal your souls...”

“Nadja, friendly or unfriendly?!” Arun whispers, yanking the thread through my skin a bit roughly.

“Friendly! Ow, do you have to be so rough!”

“I’m sorry, I’m hurrying! Maybe don’t get your shoulder mauled next time.”

The dwarven specter continues to speak, saying his king sends a message that he wants our help, in exchange for offering us assistance.

“We agree!” I tell him back.

He beckons us to follow, turning around and taking off, but I’m still tethered to Arun by needle and thread.

“Wait! Can he finish healing me first?”

The ghost stops, and waits. What a guy! Arun finishes up, and the bandages are so stiff I can barely move my arm, but I should be fine to fight if it comes down to it. We are exhausted, I’m still sore from putting my back out, and I pray we can find rest in the kings halls.

We are led to King Harold’s halls, and brought before him. Our ghost guide was very chatty and caught us up on latest undead gossip. This place is ruled by several factions, and not all of them get along. King Harold cannot be destroyed, but a dragon came and tried. He stole his crown, but the King came right back. We are brought before the king, and find him to be, despite his undead nature, very kind and courteous. He is also an undead dwarf. He asks us to defeat the dragon and get his crown back.

There are allies of his below the Temple of All Gods, but the path there is rife with danger. He advises us to try and gain allies here, either by seeking the Bound and allying with them. That would entail going into their Haunted Halls and securing their regalia... but would involve having to get past some of their ghosts. Or, we could confront the leader of the Starved, the faction of ghouls and ghosts, and force him to swear allegiance. We all like the idea of going into the Haunted Halls, and getting the regalia.

“My king, may we rest in your halls?” I ask. “We are wounded and weary.”

“Yes, you are welcome here. However I must warn you your dreams may be not to your liking.”

“That’s all well, my liege,” I say. “Bill will give me my night night juice and I won’t remember anything!”

🏹 Nadja Kozlov

[Aileen]

We get our asses completely handed to us in the haunted manor. First the walls shoot me, then a column gropes my butt, and then the entire ceiling falls in! The door behind me smacks into me, the spirits coming out of the walls hurl rocks at mushroom man and I as the others escape the rubble, and things go very, very bad!

Everyone starts dropping, and soon I find myself waking up on the ground, only to get up and try fighting again. Bill calls a retreat, and I make it as far as the entry hall before everything goes dark again. I wake up outside, slung over the back of Chi’s riding drake.

We do some healing, all of us completely messed up, and make a new plan of action. Eliza did a locator spell and got a ping on the raiment, but it is upstairs somewhere. We can’t get there without going through the haunts. And then it occurs to me...

“Friends! I have plan!” I announce.

We head back to the tower, and I limber up as Eliza locates the raiment again. It’s up above, and there’s a tower with some large arrow slits that I may be able to get in. Arun casts a spell on me for protection, Bill gives me more drugs, and I’m ready to go! I activate my slippers of spider climbing, and head up the wall. I’m fast, scared of losing my grip on the wall or being tossed about, but I make it up! I climb in the arrow slit, my weapons and armor getting me a bit stuck for a moment (although could be my ass, I do like to eat a lot while adventuring).

I go forward, opening a door, and find myself in a bedroom. There on the floor is a cloak in perfect condition, just lying there in the dusty room. This is too easy! I step forward, and go for the cloak. The bed slams into me, hitting me in the shins and I scream and yell obscenities in Varisian as it nearly topples me over.

’Nadja? You alright, I hear screaming?!’ I hear Eliza speak in my head.

’The bed attacked me! I found the cloak!’

’Good, now get out of there!’

Suddenly the room is filled with ghosts, all attacking me. Rocks, claws, horrible noises- I take a licking, grab the cloak, and run for dear life! I make it to the door, but am pushed back into the room.

’The ghosts won’t let me leave! I’m trying! It’s all of them!’

I keep trying, and break free! I run for the arrow slit, getting one leg up, and haul myself into it. There’s no climbing down for me- I have to jump! It’s too far, but I have no choice. I get my other leg out, and leap.

“ELIZAAAA!!!!”

Oh no, her back is turned! What is she looking at?!

“AHHHH!!!”

She turns, wide eyed, and casts a spell. I float gently down the last ten feet, and land gracefully in a roll, then fall on my face.

“I got it!” I yell in triumph, holding the cloak up.

Arun helps me to my feet, and I immediately toss the cloak around my shoulders. I stumble, feeling very dizzy... and so... I start giggling, and sit down.

“Nadja? Why would you put that on, what if it’s cursed?!” Arun panics, immediately checking my eyes and pulse.

“I’m fine!” I giggle.

“Do you know what day it is, Nadja?”

“Yes.”

“Ok, tell me please.”

“It’s to-day.”

Eliza does her magicky thing on the cloak, and sighs.

“It’s literally making her dumber.”

“That’s fine, let’s go! We shall bring it to the king!”

We go back to the kings hall, and I take the cloak off. Immediately I feel better, smarter even.

“My king, is this the raiment you spoke of?” I ask, sweeping into a bow.

“That is it. I cannot wear it, one of you must. Take it and enter the Temple of All Gods, there you will find your allies.”

We give the cloak to Bill to wear, and rest and ready ourselves to go to the Temple. I wake up to Miklos sliding into my bedroll beside me- the ghost guy found him and lead him here! I am a very happy Nadja!

🏹 Nadja

[dragonforgotten]

The battle was difficult but we came out ontop in the end through luck and the skin of our teeth. We found a ghoul imprisoned in one room who told us of this great dragon who is the king of this mountain and of the city of the dead along with a nearby dwarven city. I nearly contemplate using my shadow magic to free him if he truely repents but I can not say he has. I leave the fates to decide. After nearly being devoured by a wall we leave and begin exploring this city of the dead. It’s not long till we find company but this time it is welcomed company as a dwavern preistess was out here with us. She was keeping an eye on the cypts should those giant multi armed abominations called gugs decide there home isn’t big enough. She leads us to city of Ssaroak to stand before it’s leader. We each do our part in proving our worth to them and come away successful though a few leaders still do not trust us. The physicians guild did not seem impressed by my methods of cutting and suturing wounds, they said it was alittle unorthodox. It’s a mixture of the church of sarenraes bed side manner and medical expertises with kuthites folk healing and suturing. Normal is anything but that with my methods but they work and that’s all I can ask for.
We spend a few days in the city, doing all manner of duties to the city in order to gain there trust. I was even once again eaten alive by a giant lake serpant. I was such a nice stay but then things went wrong. While we were investigating for this hidden forge where cultists may be gathering, looking for a missing husband and other unfortunate the guards suddenly approached us and demanded our arrest. I knew something was wrong, that maybe this was a set up but they have approached us in the middle of waking ours in the market square. There was no good way for us. I was perpared to surrender to the law, we had done nothing wrong and I trust in my goddess that truth would see us though. I do not want to harm these people and These people are our friends after all but then bill and everyone begins violently attacking them as I am left on my knees in shock. By the time I’m back on my feet Nadja has critically wounded one of them. By the time I reached him, pulling out my healer tools to stabilize him more guards descend and I’m pulled away by the insistence of the group. I breaks my heart to leave that man to his fate. I would like to say he was ok but I fear he isn’t. The wounds were too deep and there wasn’t enough time to help him without endangering everyone. My friends have gone too far that day but they were back against the wall and were left with little choice.
The first day of being outlaws was rough on my soul. I reminds me of the days before my initiation into the church of hiding through foliage and avoiding the watch or the hellknights in fear of being caught and brought back to my master.
Thankfully we know where to go next. All our clues have located the forge We leave for the next day disguised as dwarves. We fight our way through its guardians and it becomes apparent that this is in dedication to Droskar, the evil counter part to Torgid, dwarven god of the forge. It soon becomes apparent that the triade also has left its influence here. We fight tooth and nail within that complex. Freeing the slaves, killing a strange form of undead and finding a molten sheild. Though the battle leaves me feeling ill and drained of energy. We push on despite the odds, walking through the dark city crawling with undead. It’s not long till we find trouble. Fearing for our very souls I summon the greatest power I have and detonate a miniature sun ontop of these soul devouring monsters. They go down quickly after but we are forced to push even further with the rage and light of the magically created sun has certainly wakened the cities undead residences. After an encounter with golithe spiders we are confronted by a wraith who wishes for us to parlay with him and speak to his king. I agree but after I finish stitching up Nadja wounds. Meeting his king I feel a sense of pity for this undead dwarven king. He looks sullen and weary. He’s missing his crown do to a failed attempt to destory this dragon king and looks broken with the state of his realm and people. He tells us if the residences in this city and how a group of undead called the starved have aligned themselves with this mysterious dragon who calls himself king and the scarlet triade who seem to always have there hands in everything. He believes together we can topple them both. We agree to aid him and he tells us two ways we could stop them. By doning his lost regalia the bound undead will not harm us, also by destroying there leader the bound will abandon the dragon. Both are good but we all agree the less violent option would be best as we rest and head out to the dwarven kings keep.
It turns out to be more then we ever though. The entire building is haunted, attacking everywhere we stand. I was nearly crushed when the spirits collapsed the ceiling ontop of me. We fought as best we could but in the end we were force to feel the building to save our lives. With careful planning we found a better way. The next day we returned, knowing exactly were the garments lay thanks to Eliza. I blessed Nadja with healing and protective magic before she climbed up and slipped through the top window of the keep. Already the castle heaves and I pour my energy to silence it’s unholy whail. I fear for poor Nadja when at last she throws her self out the window and into our waiting arms. No ghosts give chase and the castle doesn’t fall ontop of us.
Nadja don the robes and it becomes apparent that it’s toxic to her mind so I hav two pull it off her shoulders. None of us can wear it without it happening our minds. So Bill volunteers to don the robes. High on success we countinue to our next goal of the temple of the all gods with Mikolas at last reuniting with us. Just as we near the temple we are attacked as it bursts form the ground. Oh heaven no!

Arun

[Chris Leitzel]

Whatever happened to this city, if I base it on what I have seen so far, I am amazed the dwarves remain. They are either truly enduring as the mountain stone, or they are stubborn beyond anything known with a mule.

There was nothing around the Temple of All Gods. As we approached, we were attacked by some sort of three headed centipede like monstrosity capable of shooting acid. With some difficulty, we managed to kill it. Inside the temple, we encountered a few duergars and dispatched them. We located documents proving a connection to the Scarlet Triad and the head of one of the dwarven guilds running the city. I suppose I should not be surprised by this as the Triad seems rather capable. Through a set of doors we encountered two demons, and then traveled upstairs.


There we encountered a shrine to the dwarf god of death, and a room filled with urns, and what appeared to be an amalgamated pile of corpses that would likely have killed us save for the robes worn by Bill. The corpses reacted to the robes like one would imagine loyal subjects would, and we avoided a fight. Unfortunately, we could not avoid combat for long as one of the doors opened and we encountered three giant skeletons that we had to battle. It was not an easy fight, taking most of our resources and leaving tow of us to deal with a hunger curse that prevents us from healing. Hopefully, one of a few ideas I have to deal with this is able to come to pass.

I do not know if we can defeat this dragon, but I do know we are going to attempt. We do not have the option of a rest or a retreat for concern what will fill the temple in that time. Hopefully, we live to tell our tale and do not join the restless dead of this city.

Eliza

[Aileen]

I must have misheard something. Apparently dragon king is inside this place, but I thought we were getting ghost army? My Dwarvish must be rusty.

We find a collection of rings in the wall of the chapel, which I advise everyone is part of dwarven marriage tradition, where rings are hidden to ensure strength of marriage. Despite this, Eliza dumps them all in her bag.

“Eliza!” I hiss.

“They’re all dead! Till death do us part, isn’t that how it goes?”

“Yes, you’re right. I still feel weird about it.”

We start exploring, and find a room with a lattice wall draped all over with small gold chains. Another marriage tradition, I remember, where couples put messages of love and offerings of jewelry in the latticework.

“Nadja, this is for you!” Miklos grins, handing me a gold chain.

“No, Miklos. That belongs to someone else. We must put our own message!”

Eliza gives me parchment and a pen, and the others watch our back as I write a love note to my husband. Miklos writes about slaying thousands of foes for me. I know he could, and I the same. We are on this quest to make a better world for each-other, and for our children. We must stop the evils of this world at all costs, or there will be no Golarian for our family.

Moving on we come to huge room with two dwarven statues and some stairs and a ramp. Above the ramp are two huge double doors, so I go there first. Opening them I see two massive demons, well built and terrifying.

“Sh**! Demons!” I screech to the group.

Bill comes up behind me and bombs, and then he, Eliza and Arun fall upward to the ceiling. I dash in, not waiting to see how they get out of this. I hit with my kukri, and it returns the favor, failing to bite me but then grabbing me in one huge clawed hand. The wounds throb with an evil pain as I struggle against it. Miklos takes on the other demon as I fight tooth and nail. At last I finish mine off and drop safely to the ground, running to help my husband. He finishes it off, and we all breath a sigh of relief.

Arun does some healing on us and the room is tossed. We find some scrolls, and then head upstairs. There’s some altars dedicated to a god of the afterlife, and skull decorations. Arun finds a golden vial with some kind of potion, and we move on finding nothing else.

I open a door off the next hallway and immediately regret it. First there is the smell, of death and decay. And then the horrible creature made entirely of corpses lashes out at me. The pain and sense of doom are immense, my blood running cold as death. It beats me senseless until Bill runs up behind me. The creature seems to bow at him. I flee the room, near collapsing, and watch him stare at it. He must be speaking in its mind. We back off and he shuts the door. The cloak truly does work!

Back in the hallway, Bill checks out another door as Arun sees to my fresh wounds. Before he can do anything, the door slams open! Inside a room that is much too small, a gargantuan skeleton attacks us. Two more are squeezed in behind it. I slam into it with kukri swinging through the air, digging into hard bone and bleeding the creature. I feel the warmth of a healing spell wash over me before the thing grabs me, biting me and trying to... swallow me?! Eliza poofs me out of its hand and back into the hallway. She doubles over in the room behind us, groaning in pain. I move back in to attack, killing it with a mighty blow.

The second skeleton takes its place, breathing a spray of bone shards at all of us. Miklos charges in and valiantly keeps it at bay, and I join him. It tries to bite Miklos and seems to bite its own tongue instead. I take it down with another flurry of kukri attacks, and run to the next one. It tries to bite and misses, then fails to grab me. Miklos charges in, and I get two more massive slashes in before it grabs me again. I’m shoved into its mouth, and feel an all too familiar awful feeling. I’ve been swallowed, again!

It falls a moment later, going still. I crawl, and find an opening. I realize when I take my first breath of air and the others start bellowing with laughter just where I came out.

“I have been reborn!”

🏹 Nadja

[Chris Leitzel]

Yes Nadja, the dragon is in the magma chambers under the Temple of All Gods. Your dwarvish is either rusty, or we need to get you a helmet to avoid blows to the head. King Harral told us this and of his battle with Veshumix in Kolvar's past.

So...as some of you may recall from our exploits, we had to take on a haunted house. For those of you who long to be adventurers and think taking on a haunted structure sounds like some great quest, no, it's really not. It is rather difficult to fight a house. But we did get the robes and that was important.

Now, the dwarven king had also mentioned that the ghouls and their leader had aligned with the dragon. We opted to not go kill the ghoul king and his minions and go straight to the Temple of All God.

So, we continued on the upper level of the Temple of All Gods, finding little to nothing in the room we fought the giant skeletons and having already checked the shrine to Magrim. Our exploration led us to a shrine of Dranngvit, the dwarf god of debt and vengeance, (I think that's the god in questions, I don't recall, I may have a concussion) and a few magic items, in which there were several cells and piles of dwarven bones. Honestly, I expected the cells to open and the skeletons to attack us. Instead, we witnessed a haunting as the cells opened, and a dwarf woman emerged. The ghosts of the dwarves in the cell emerged and attacked the woman, killing her. She then entered behind us, killing them in their cells. As much as I wonder what happened here, I also wonder why a temple has jail cells. We avoided the same fate due to Bill wearing the royal robes and the ghosts respecting them. Not sure if they realize a leche is wearing them, but I am not going to mention that to any of them.

We then encountered several several members of the Scarlet Triad in a room dedicated to Droskar, the duergar god. I am assuming this as the motif of the room was anvils and chains. We immediately set the tone for the fight with Nadja cutting man's head off, and Bill. Miklos and myself killing another. The rest decided to run up the stairs...the long, windy stairs...leading up to a large room. Who built this place? There are designs to this place I question.

We gave chase up the stairs and there she was, Ilssrah Embermead, priestess of Droskar with three golems, the ghoul king (I told you were should have killed him BEFORE coming to the temple!), and her three Triad members who we were pursuing. We trickled through, into the fight, trying to overcome the ghoul's odor and his paralytic bite, the Triad members shooting at us with blow guns, and Ilssrah, herself, as she carried a chain capable of producing fire and a light hammer she could throw and then call back to her. This was a pitched battle. Miklos and Nadja fought valiantly, but kept doing down to the attacks from the ghoul, Ilssrah and the golems. Arun was able to keep healing them, and the rest of us, while Bill threw bombs at one of the golems and I used what spells I could. I attempted to kill the priestess with a disintegrate and using the dragon form spell to become a dragon, which, as I had planned, did make me a target. Unfortunately, I was not able to shrug off the poison the golems kept hitting me with, nor their fists and I to went down in the battle. I will probably be tasting that poison for a week after this. Somehow, either through the favor of Sarenrae or luck or skill, or some combination, we managed to kill the priestess, the ghoul and defeat the golems, without any of us dying, but two of the surviving Triad members fled down a set of stairs and into a dark tunnel. Again, I question the design of this place, but at the moment, I prefer to focus on the hard fought victory as we eliminated a potential threat to the dwarves, even though they view us as outlaws, and will likely never know what we did, it still helped, and damaged another Scarlet Triad operation.

Now it is the time to try and rest and recover from the battles, and then hopefully, be ready to confront Veshumix, the magma dragon. If this is indeed the Temple of the All Gods, then I hope the dwarf gods are granting us their favor, although I doubt Droskar is thrilled with us.

-Eliza

[Aileen]

We found some Scarlet Triad grunts inside a big forge room after much exploration and running into ghosts. I run in as they scramble for weapons, and attack nearest guy with my kukri. We must have really caught them off guard, because my kukri cuts right through his neck. His head stares up at me from ground with shocked look on his face. I’ve done it again!

“Eliza! I got you a projectile!”

The rest of the Triad goons scream as Bill runs in behind me and bombs. They start to run, up the stairs, and we follow. Miklos rushes past me just as I hit the guy I’m following, and it’s a mad scramble up the stairs. I pass Miklos, still pursuing my guy, and he smacks me on the bum with his warhammer.

“Later, Miklos! I’m busy!”

I follow the man up into a huge temple to a forge god it seems. A female dwarf and some constructs or golems are here, as well as a dwarven ghoul. The woman turns to me with a look of annoyance.

“Why do you always interfere with my plans?!” She screams at me.

“I don’t even know you!”

“But I know you!” She draws a hammer, and chucks it at my head. It returns right back to her hand.

“Ow! You mother b***!” I wipe the blood out of my eyes. “What’s your name before I kill you?”

“Oh, I don’t think I’ll be the one dying today.” She smirks.

The ghoul bites me and her man tries to slice me with his rapier, but I’m too fast for him. Miklos flies up and stands between the dwarf woman and I.

“See, lady- that’s my husband, and he’s bigger than you!”

“I should certainly hope so!”

I laugh.

“Not what I meant, but yes.”

I quickly kill rapier man, and then jump up onto one of the tall tables to avoid the ghoul. The damned thing stinks to high hell!

“So, you’re the barbarian?” She asks Miklos, her ugly smirk growing. “I’m sure this will anger you.”

She turns and casts a spell at me, and I feel my life sapped away. It hurts really bad, but apparently it’s not enough as she throws her hammer again for good measure. Luckily it does not hit. Her goons and a metal man try to attack me, but I hop down off table and go for her. I hear Bill shouting at the others across the chamber, bombing and running around like mad mushroom man.

“THIS IS WHY YOU WILL RESPECT MY AUTHORITY!”

He runs over in our direction, causing the poor metal guys a lot of confusion.

“Arun, Nadja doesn’t look good!” He calls to our priest. No idea where he is!

“She made me bleed my own blood, Black Eyed Priest!”

One of the golems breathes a poison gas at me, but I avoid inhaling it just in time to be whacked with the dwarf lady’s horrible flaming chain, followed by that stupid hammer. She puts the hammer away and pulls out a pair of manacles.

“You’ll never get me in those, only Miklos can-“

Something smashes into my skull, and all goes black. I wake up on the ground, my wrists clamped in manacles, feeling Arun’s holy healing bring me back to the fight. I quickly rummage for my manacle key and start to unlock them. Dwarf lady sees me moving again and hits me with the horrible chain.

“Give me a second, would you?!” I shout.

The manacles come off, and I reach for one of my kukri. She keeps hitting me but I manage to get to feet and slash her with the corrosive kukri. She really does not like me. Also, Eliza is a dragon? Dwarf lady casts a spell on Eliza, and then tries to get me. My love Miklos drops to the ground, wounded, and the ghoul slashes poor Arun across his face. Dragliza breathes fire on dwarf lady, but the damned thing is still up.

I keep slashing away, trying to ignore everything else and focusing on taking down their leader. She’s horrible, taunting us by name and pulling out all the stops. I’m barely hanging on, exhausted and bleeding, my husband and friends not looking so great. The goons start to run away, but the iron golems and dwarf remain. I’m hit by a golem, the blow reverberating through my bones. I strike out at dwarf lady, and slice her in the bicep. Blood spurts out, and with one last scream of rage she drops dead.

I start fighting the golems, striking and getting into position with my husband who is back in fighting shape. I drop, unconscious, and wake up again to grab my kukri and start fighting again. Again and again I drop, but get up thanks to Arun’s regeneration spell. I wake up just in time to see Arun step in and kill one with his scimitar.

“Black Eyed Priest, you killed something! I’m so proud!”

There’s one more left, I peel myself off the ground and run toward it, joining my husband. I get one more hit, the acid bubbling on the metal, and then Miklos finishes the job. I throw myself into his arms, both of us half dead.

“Miklos, I need a nap.”

“Me too, my lady wife. Me too.”


🏹 Nadja

[dragonforgotten]

We manage to slay the giant horrifying centipede and make some progression through the temple of all gods. The scarlet tirades presences is overt along with the undead. Besides stumbling upon three massive skeletal undead cramped into a tight room the undead mostly leave us be thanks to bills news robes. Being in the presences of those undead caused both me and Eliza to be Ra anxiously hungry, a hunger so powerful it brought back memories of my time as a slave. Thankfully I didn’t throw out my supplies of jerky and I spit some with Eliza while the others search the area. I try asking more about herself but she is tight lipped and tells me to focus on healing much to my discouragement and annoyance.
Rejoining the group we find a dwavern statue dedicated to there god, a series of talisman resting inside a offering bowl in his stone hands. As the group snatch from the bowl I place a crying angel pendent and pray in respect to the deity so curses do not fall into my friends heads. Nadja seems to catch on and deposits some gold as well. We each inspect the tailsmens, afix them into our warriors and continue along our way. I only hope the stitches hold up on those two. The undead attacks from the warsworn and the vengeful spirits of this temple has drained and doomed Nadja and thanks to the misspellings of Elizas spell Mikolas is also a precarious situation. I just hope the spells I cast on them to relieve there pain has helped. The moment we open the next door we stumble upon a group of human triade agents huddled around the anvils with iconography of Droskar adorn on its surfaces. Nadja charges in and in one swift motion parts a mans head from his shoulders. The rest scream in terror and start to run for the stairs. I try to slow them down but they still get away. I manage to catch up to mikolas, regenerate scroll in hand.
“Mikolas, would you like me to cast regenerate on you?”
“No! Save it when we get up there!”
“But.” Too late. He’s gone up the stairs. I follow Bill up the stair and can feel my anxiety already taking hold when they just keep going and going and going. So. Many. Stairs. I can hear the fighting even from here and it doesn’t sound good. I hear more scream of pain from Nadja and Mikolas then our foes. What is going on up there? When atlast I make it to the top huffing and puffing I can really see the desperation of this situation. Nadja is barely holding her own against the spiked chain wielding dwarf and Mikolas is getting slammed by both a group of metal golems, the mooks, and a dwavern ghoul. Ahhh! Why is everyone so far away!?
“Eliza! Teleport me!”
“I’m working on it!”
“Now please!” I beg
“Patients!” I hussel as fast as I could towards Mikolas while healing Nadja. Suddenly I’m behind Mik and I’m able to heal his wounds and Nadja just as the ghoul bits my shoulder and claws my back. I have zero patients with undead but Nadja and mik both need me. I climb up the stairs till I’m perched on the table just as Nadja falls. Oh why! Can people not be dying every second! Scroll still in hand I cast regenerate on Nadja as I concentrate on healing. I allow the healing energy to wash over the mooks and the undead as I keep chanting and focusing. My focus is unshakeable even as the ghoul rakes his claws across my face. Eliza turns into a massive fed dragon like sweet Kyrion, Then Mikolas falls! Oh sweet nirvana! I just fixed him! When does it bloody end!? In one last pulse the ghoul explodes and Nadja cuts down the female dwarf and her flaming spike chain. The mooks, fully healed seem to lose faith and begin to run and escape down the stairs. I can only hope they will change there life chances after this encounter. Now all that’s left is the constructions as I knite together Mikolas skin and push him back on his feet with healing magic. Nadja is up once again after dropping from taking a hit from one of the constructions.they breath toxic gas but I’ve learned to steal myself against toxins. Eliza though is not doing well. Her dragon self wheezes and chokes before dropping and turning back into her human self. I heal her and she teleports out of the pit. Then Nadja drops once again. That tears it! No more! For the love of the dawnflower no more! I draw my scimitar, brushing besides Mikolas and Nadja and scream in rage and pain. I strike the machine from head to deep into his shoulder. The acid bubbles and hisses across its metal surface. It staggers and then drops as my eyes widen.
“Black Eyed Priest, you killed something! I’m so proud!”
She screams from the ground staggering to her feet.
“Well. I didn’t think that would work.”
Together we destory the last of the machine and I drop onto the floor in exhaustion, wiping the blood off my face.
We did it. Somehow we did it once again.

Arun

[Chris Leitzel]

Again, I question the architectural design of the Temple of All Gods. It feels like we have been in here and in this underground realm for months sometimes.


We had killed the priestess and her golems and managed to rest, and thankfully, I managed to learn a few new spells from a book I acquired from a Scarlet Triad wizard we had defeated awhile ago. After waking up, we traveled down the long staircase and tunnel and coming to a door.

Through the door were several undead with flaming swords that created some sort of fear effect with their gaze that we were able to defeat. Unfortunately, their swords were not fire swords after we destroyed these undead, not that swords of fire would help up where we were going.

Through another door, we came to what I can only describe as a level of the Hells. It was magma and rock, fire and death, something primordial and raw, like before the world was made, or something from the Elemental Planes. I have heard tales of wizards traveling to other planes of existence. To mew, this felt very much like stepping into a new world.

And there, we encountered a large creature of fire and rock, like a walking volcano, that spewed lava on us. It spoke to us, though I do not recognize the language. Fortunately, Arun was able to banish it before the fight really began.

Then came the bridge. A long, large stone bridge over lava where creatures of smoke and fire attacked up, leaping to the bridge or hurling balls of fire at us as we tried to defeat them, learning they explode upon death. Fortunately, they rather vulnerable to cold, which Miklos and I could provide, and were not resistant to any other type of damage, except the obvious immunity to fire.

We are singed and burned, but we are alive and victorious for the moment, somehow. And we still have yet to meet the dragon that lairs down here.
-Eliza

[Aileen]

Fire and lava monsters, everywhere! I open door to bring us down to what we believe is dragon’s lair, and immediately my eyes meet the gaze of a horrible creature with flaming sword. I freeze up in fear as it attacks me, more of the same creatures moving in to the doorway as well. I’m able to break away and assist my husband in fighting them as the others do their thing.

At last we are victorious if not very beat up. Arun is cross with me and husband for all our wounds, some of them still healing and stitches barely holding us together. Is fine, I won’t be scarred forever, I am already in thirties and still look young!

We proceed to next door, and come in to find huge rock monster. I move in and hit it with kukri, only for it to send a magma rock at my friends. Damn it is hot in here! The lake of lava makes it hard to breathe or be comfortable. Luckily Black Eyed Priest banishes the creature away, and we move on.

More lava creatures! These ones are like fire spirits, ascending from the lava itself and exploding upon landing on our ledge. I’m able to move around them effortlessly to get in position of advantage, and seem to hurt them pretty good, but they’re absolutely wrecking my friends. It is soon clear that they are well below my skill level, and ranger cat friend and I make quick work of ours before helping out my dear husband.

Soon they are dispersed, and we all stand around looking slightly toasted. Miklos snuffs out a smoldering dreadlock and grabs me, kissing me deeply before going to Arun for healing. If I get reaction like that from Miklos after every fight, I’ll keep fighting everything, forever. Bring on the lava dragon!


🏹 Nadja Kozlov

[dragonforgotten]

We descend into the depths of the temple of the all gods. The stairs seem to go on forever till we reach a door. Aligning Nadja weapon she opens the door to find a room filled with armored skeletons with gleaming eyes and flaming swords. Recognizing the undead nature of these being I project a feild of life aura in the room with us in its healing light. The gaze of the undead seems to chill some of my fiends to the bones, striking fear into there hearts but my resolve has long since harden by experience. It is not easy for me to cower from the undead anymore. They seem to regenerate as the battle goes on, some do not but I am not sure why. I can’t remember what these undead creatures are. Eventually they are delt with and I’m sewing up Nadja and Mikolas wounds again.
Beyond the next set of doors contains a room with a river of lava flowing through a side tunnel along with a massive stone creature. It speaks to us but non of us understand what it is saying. Nadja charges at it regardless much to my disappointment but my pity stops there when it throws a massive flaming rock at me and everyone. The cat folk ranger calls to us as recognition lights in her eyes.
“It’s a Dalos, a fey elemental.”
“Fey?” I ask intrigue and hopeful. Perhaps we don’t have to fight to the death after all. I call upon sarenrae, raising my hand forward.
“Be gone! Back to your home!”
And just like that it vanishes. Everyone blinks, left standing there as if they can’t believe it’s gone.
“Is it gone? It can’t come back can it?” The wizard asks nervous.
“Not if want to plane shift back here just to kill us.”
I hesitantly begin to treat the wounded and applying slaves to burns. The Dalos does not return and we all chance a sigh of relief.
Move into align we reach a narrow brigde. Boiling lava on all sides. We’re almost across when molten lava creatures lunge form the pool and block both of our escapes. They begin to savage Eliza and Mik while the ones that couldn’t fit on the bridge begin to lob bolted chunks of lava.
“I don’t Have another one do those today!”
“We should run!”
“No we shouldn’t.” I hiss at the wizard as the creatures very presences burns our skin.
“Well just make a even larger fight! We stand our ground!” I tell her enraged as I try to avoid getting splashed only to have flames lick up on Side of my body.
“I’m dying over here!”
“Then touch me and activate the vital beacon! I’m too busy calling upon my goddess to focus heal you!”
“You didn’t even buy me dinner yet.” I look back at her, shake my head, turn back to my concentration and practice breathing. Patient Arun, practice patiences. Oh goddess of light and healing give me strength enough to forgive this slight.
Ah f*** sake! I hiss as the flames burn up my leg.
“You know what. I think this is a now situation.” I weave my hands and cast a feild of protective energy circling around every one of my companions.
“You each have fire resistance now.”
The battle goes far more smoothly now that I don’t have to worry about the heat but I’m feeling light headed. I’m badly burnt, sake as I was one the mine explosion hit me all those years ago. I only have enough energy to pat out Mikolas flaming back before hobbling far away from the monstrosity fight. The deadly couple make quick work in the end. I spend ten minutes wrapping up me and everyone’s burns but it’s not enough. I need more time to properly wrap myself and everyone up. I’m going to need more aloe.

Arun