From the Vault: E-Dawn 3

E-Dawn Volume 3: March 2004 Edition

Sollus-Riag Newsletter

Spoiler Alert: The following journal contains some spoilers pertaining to the LRG adventure Barsaive in Chaos.

Players Characters recap

To Throal!

After being paid a reward of 50 silver pieces per person, all the Pale Ones could afford really, we were to take two rafts to Earthroot’s Lair. One was to go back with T’chava, our guide, after he completed his mission back to House Ch’elann. Pavellis showed up with a Pale One Swordmaster named Juravis who had one eye replaced by a Astral-Sensitive one and wished to join Drudge’s clan, the Slayers. Drudge accepted, of course. Upon going to the docks we were greeted with a strange sight, brain millipedes in the shape of dwarves. They communicated in our minds somehow, showing a rudimentary intellect and seemed to absorb the knowledge of the Vodanicus dwarves when they consumed their brains. They communicated a need for more brains, and wanted to eat my brain! After a piercing pain hit all our minds, I dropped in pain, while our warriors charged and killed the pests. After that we returned to the River Tronos and went on our way. Drudge was troubled on this trip, but considering he possesses a dragon slaying sword, perhaps he should be. He’s truly lucky that Luke is a good friend of the Dragons of Barsaive and convinced them not to hunt Drudge and Evok to the ends of the earth in the emergency council after they discovered the sword in his possession and Evok’s role in revealing the key knowledges of the blade to him. He’ll probably never know this. The trip to Earthroot’s Lair was uneventful, except for the night we camped and Cave Troll Sky Raiders attacked us on a primitive raft. We defeated them after they communicated the reason for their attack; they wanted to eat Pale Ones, including T’chava and Juravis! We went to Earthroot’s lair and he demanded tribute or a story, so we told him the full story of the Blades quest, each taking turns to tell the whole story. Earthroot then snatched up the chain mail and crystal raider shields on the cave troll raft that we had tied to our own as tribute. He told us that there were two ways to Throal, one way through the dangerous Braza’s Kingdom (I swear Ela winced when he said this) and another through the old routes discovered originally by Jedaiyn Westhrall. Drudge decided on the safe route for once, deciding that going that way and unsealing the seal on that place would be too dangerous from Throal despite the three or four days travel time it would save. After this Earthroot flew into the middle of our group and grabbed our raft and us all, except T’chava who had already started to leave to go back to House Ch’elann.

Earthroot guided us through the earthen and watery passageways of the Subterranean Tylon, eventually leading us to an area that Ela recognized, and thus he left us and the raft there. During our travel towards Throal we fought some strange Stinger creatures at camp, and Drudge found a strange passageway while on guard another night, leading him to a white rat and a hydra. According to those who witnessed this, including Thorin and Rahl, Thrynn and Elarin attacked the white rat and killed it, then left Drudge to fight the Hydra alone. Revealing the full power of his dragon slaying sword he delivered a few punishing blows to the enraged Hydra. The Hydra responded by killing him. Gertrude used a Last Chance Salve on Drudge and he recovered miraculously back to being awake. He then got up and finished the Hydra off. I don’t know if this completes the deed for the sword or not though.

After this we reached the back of Throal, and Evok Nor was waiting. Evok Nor filled us in that 10,000 dwarves had died in a cave in of a district of Throal when Mount Horrorsbane was destroyed. Luke, Dram and some others were mounting a rescue effort, but it was presumed that they were all dead more than likely. We then went to go talk to Luke. He told us of the return of his friend Fenris, a storm wolf and the death of his pack mates at the hands of the undead in a Horror Cloud above Throal. He also told us some disturbing news, that those he die in the Horror Cloud’s rain are immediately raised as undead. It was then that Shaq Fu-Lou and Elarin made a deal with Warren and Evok for a teleportation to Cara Fahd and back to Throal and a weapon to defeat the Horror Cloud’s “Captain”, in exchange for their very souls. The next day we went to Cara Fahd via Teleportation.

From the Journal of Lilandra Silvertongue Sollus 2-18 1517 TH.

And the Deed is Done.

The next day we teleported to Urkula in Cara Fahd, and orks scattered left and right. Kids, mercs, trained military men, all left at the frightening sight of Evok Nor and Warren. Drudge and the rest of our group entered the tent of Krathis Gron. She accepted the deed being done and asked that we give up the Blades in exchange for a new power for the Potion of Agglutination and 8000 new Cara Fahd silver pieces. We gave up the Blades and Krathis cut herself on the hand allowing six drops of her blood to enter the potion. In addition, she rapidly aged from a young ork in her twenties to an elderly ork in her sixties. Krathis, weakened and aged asked Drudge to use the potion of Ixarcelf, her bodyguard. Drudge sat down and threaded the final two ranks to the potion on the spot. During this time, I looked for Evok, Warren, V’Dor, and Zim. Nowhere to be found. Strange. Drudge and Ixarcelf went to a secluded tent and had a long conversation, ending with him drinking the potion and remembering he was Scorn Earthscorch, one of the former leaders of the now defunct Vivane Resistance. After this, we all mutually agreed to disband the group pattern and gave the potion to those who needed it and convinced Evok and Warren to teleport us to Toke to save him as well. At the drakkar, we met Toke and Drudge convinced him to drink the potion and save his life. Toke then agreed to take the drakkar to Bartertown to help Drudge at a later date. With that we returned to Throal and slept. The next day we went back to talk with Luke and he informed us he was about ready to unseal the buried Throal city.

From the Journal of Lilandra Silvertongue Sollus 19-20 1517 TH.

And There Shall Be Chaos Part 1.

We unsealed the city and noticed a terrible sight, an army of dwarf cadavers and ropers fighting it out. Luke apparently had a plan in this contingency, Dram Grimrock, the dwarf Elementalist cast Purify Water to try and untaint the horror rain water and Farram prepared to cast Dispel Magic on a roper brought to him. Since Thyrnn and Luke are the best at Unarmed Combat, it was their job to grapple the ropers and bring it back to Farram. We defeated the ropers with a single spell. But the army of undead dwarves surged through the opening. Dwarf Miners and many of the Slayers pushed the debris back trying to push the undead back to whence they came. But then disaster struck as a gray bloatform appeared attacking Cracar. Drudge covered the blow and we fought a pitched battle against the horror. Attacked by the undead on one side and cadavers on the other, it was a tough battle, but we were eventually victorious. Many of us took a few days off to train, including myself.

When we returned Drudge and Luke informed us that they had followed a suspicious ork while guarding Dram at the Throal library. Farram told us of the Trial of Vestrial and Raggok that was coming. Dram told us what he had learned at the Throal library. We learned that they suspected that a coup was coming initiated by House Huari and the Crownbreakers, and that King Neden of Throal had been horror marked from V’Dor. We decided to start our renewed search at where the trail had lead us the first time, to an ozrim deep in Throal. At the ozrim, we looked for clues, and Thrynn saw something strange with his Astral Sight, a dwarf whose pattern was that of a Bloatform, we followed the Horror to a back alley, where it transformed and attacked us while trying to escape through the hidden passages of Throal. We cornered and killed the Horror.

Throalic Royal Guards came and informed us that Vazilia, a general of Throal had summoned us for a meeting on the situation, and were shocked at the sight of the dead bloatform. We placed it into a bag and left for our meeting. We ran into Elarin at this point, he held a suspicious letter, which V’Dor confiscated. At our meeting, Drudge clashed with Isam Derr about not letting him see the king earlier. Isam Derr said he was just doing his job as a bodyguard of the king in trying times. We offered up evidence of Horror activity in Throal, the letter and the Horror’s body. Why hadn’t we just used the other one? Well technically it could have been claimed that the other bloatform had come from the unsealed area and not Throal proper. There was no dispute about this one. We fought it in the middle of Throal. Ajmar the Admirable examined the letter. It appeared to have been written on paper from a textile factory in old Throal. Isam Derr offered to help us track and kill the Horrors. We accepted. Vazilia offered us access to Questors of Garlen for our wounded who gave us free wound healing and healing kits and then allowed us to recuperate in the palace itself.

 The next day, Isam Derr and a dwarf Nethermancer named Clang joined us on the horror hunt. The Nethermancer had Lifesight, which could discern life signs, since the dwarf/bloatforms were not truly dwarves, this talent could discern whether or not a dwarf was one of them easier than Astral Sight could. We then headed to the old textile factory. On the way we passed the Ozrim where we had fought the last bloatform. We were so close. We searched the old textile factory from top to bottom, no sign of the Horrors. There was a suspicious tavern in a well nigh abandoned section of Throal that Dram found, so we decided to check it out. It was here that we ran into the fight of our lives. 2 dwarf males and an old female dwarf as a barkeep were here. The dwarf Nethermancer Clang informed us that the life signs were wrong and Isam Derr used Radiant Circle to reveal the true forms of the dwarves, the two dwarves turned into the gray bloatforms we had seen earlier, but the old lady had turned into a black bloatform. This fight was much tougher than the last few. Early in the fight, Luke nearly used everything he had to bring down one of the gray bloatforms quickly. After this, the others changed tactics from long thread spells like Blood Boil, Razor Orb, and Doom Missile to Aura Strike. The attacks on Elarin and I were extremely painful. The leader frightened us all and we were left frozen in fear except Zim and Thrynn who escaped somehow. The black one ran upstairs. Zim and Thrynn were all that was left versus the remaining gray one.  Thrynn kept damaging it and the Horror focused on him. Wound after wound appeared and he fought on. When he went unconscious, Zim saved him. Eventually Luke, Farram and V’Dor got out of the Terror. Farram told us the Horror was upstairs and he could see it through a window. The Horror cast a flying spell and returned to dwarf form and ran, only to come plummeting to the ground when Farram dispelled the effect. Luke and V’Dor gave everything they had against the gray one, but nothing seemed to pierce the Horror. He had dispelled the terror effect on me and I ran to aid him. But the black one frightened us even more, and seemed to fail a spell then everyone was finally escaping the earlier terror effect. The obsidiman eliminated the gray bloatform with his Edge of Light. Githral took aim and eliminated the black one with a flurry of sword attacks. It was finally over. We rushed back to the palace.

King Neden was wounded and sleeping after a vicious wound, but he was alive and free of the Horror Mark. We recuperated in the palace, training and meditating for six days, waiting for the day when Throal would reopen on Riag 6, since the ropers were dead and quarantine was no longer necessary. We agreed to help bodyguard the king during the festival to mark this happy occasion. We can only hope that we can stop any coup and assassination attempt on King Neden.

From the Journal of Lilandra Silvertongue Sollus 20-Riag 5 TH 1517.

War recap

                Using the cover of the battle between the Theran Navy and the Horrorship we slipped away from Urupa towards Travar. Let the hunt begin!

-Moltaa, obsidiman Nethermancer/Horror Stalker of the Grim Legionnaires. Legion Journal. 45/1 TE 1074.

Urupa was saved from destruction when the Therans fought off the Horrorship. They then turned northwest to refuel and repair at the Theran Behemoth. I just don’t think the Horrorship fought as hard as it could have, it seemed like the rakken were scouting more than fighting. The Horrorship left southwest towards Travar and the Badlands. If I didn’t know better, I might think it was searching for something or someone. Thankfully we decided to not sign the Throal “Declaration and Separation of War” allowing us the aid of the Therans as a result of the people of Aras Sea’s wisdom. Time will only tell if our decision was the right one...

-From the Journal of Fellindra Jer, Chief Councilor of Urupa. Sollus 3rd TH 1517.

Finally, a Theran fleet worthy enough to do something in this Passion forsaken province. Now if only Drudge can succeed in unsealing Throal and convincing them of the need for a truce. With the combined power of the Theran and Throalic navies, we might stand a chance of stopping this thing before all of Barsaive lay in black ash.

-From the journal of General Nikar 46/3 TE 1074.

I have finally found it! Defeat of the minor Horrors around Travar was easier than expected. We started our search in the remnants of the Travar forests on the outskirts of the destroyed city. I have a feeling Travar will have a village like Haven someday, I doubt it’ll ever be what it once was. It was here that we found the wreckage of two ships. There wasn’t much left of them. We were able to find the Tome of Banishment. And now I now what the horror seeks. For with this book, not only banishment, but also summoning is possible. With this damnable book, he could summon as many Rakken from other nether realms as the horror desires. It can also banish them as well. This is the key to victory. We are now en route to Sky Point. We’ll lead the Horrorship on a wild goose chase throughout Barsaive and give Drudge the time he needs.

-Moltaa, obsidiman Nethermancer/Horror Stalker of the Grim Legionnaires. Legion Journal. 48/5 TE 1074.

Rumors

The undead are increasing. I saw an Ogre Zombie the other day. What do you mean that’s not possible? Then what about the Cave Troll Zombie I saw the next day? Incredulous? What’s that mean?

Throal is led by a coward, that’s why they left us to our own devices because of some stupid ropes.

There are rumors of cadavers that resurrect when cremated now. Even a funeral can be dangerous now. Scary!

Undead are the least of your worries in the Horror Cloud. Rumor has it that the rain itself can form and attack the unwary.

The undead of the Poison Forest grow ever more powerful. Rumors of Ash Zombies attacking Ioposians and Jerrisians studying the ash from the Wastes and the Poison Forest show they are becoming bolder as well.