15th of Eleint, Early Afternoon
Chapter 1: Arrival at the Green Goblin
After a quick lunch with the Greenleafs, we gather into a circle, hold hands and Atalaya puts on the helm of teleportation, gets out the memento for the Green Goblin and directs the helm to transport us there. We feel the strange sensations that are becoming more familiar to us as Cirdan’s house fades and is replaced by the bright light of the teleportation spell and then the feeling of ground materializing under our feet in the yard across from the Green Goblin.
We enter the tavern, are greeted by our friends there and Aristotle brings us all kinds of desserts which he places on one of the tables. We sit, sample his goodies and make small talk until we can legitly take our leave and head upstairs to the rooms we had rented. Gathering in the large room, we start discussing the upcoming attempt to destroy The Eye, and the Thayians portal. Nevil says that she wants us to have a way back that does not depend on the continued cooperation and assistance from Mennek. She wants to know if the helm has any charges left on it. Atalaya reminds everyone that it only holds up to three charges and that we never know how many charges it regains each dawn. We have already used two charges today. Inman says that he can determine that, using a ritual spell. He takes the helm from Atalaya, sets out his materials and begins his spell casting. About 10-15 minutes later he finishes and tells us that there is still magic in the helm. We should have one transportation left from the helm today.
Atalaya asks a final time if Inman and Sorrow know what they need to do to destroy The Eye. They say they do. It is said? Implied? That all the rest of need to do is to keep the Thayians away from them. Accepting that they know what they are doing, we make our way to The Lady Luck Tavern.
Chapter 2: The Final Plans and Reaching the Gatehouse (Midafternoon)
The group walks silently through the streets, making their way to the Lady Luck Tavern. Cirilli seems very subdued and makes a point of walking beside each of the party members that will be heading to the nexus.
When we arrive at the tavern, Curan motions us into the planning room. The other members of the Riverport group have already gathered in the room. Cirdan is also there. Sir Isteval nods in welcome as we enter.
We are asked if we are ready to do our task. Nevil replies, “Yup.”
Isteval says that Hadarr says that there may be a problem. He thinks that the second group needs to go with us to provide us the time we need to do our task. They need to run interference for us.
Mennek says that we are headed to a portal called “The Bloodgate.” He says that there will be Thayians in the room where we arrive when we get there. He says that blood and elemental energy runs the gate.
We are asked again if we are ready. Atalaya says that we are as ready as we can be.
Isteval that there is a portal here that goes to a hideout. Nevil says something about it not being in the tavern. Isteval replies that it is in the tavern. He then directs Jekk to move the crates that are hiding the entrance to the portal. Jekk does so, revealing a portal in the very room they were meeting in. Sir Isteval says that The Lady Luck Tavern is an important place for “us” in Riverport. It has a permanent portal to their hideout.
Cirilli looks terrified and hugs all of us asking for reassurances that we will all come back. Atalaya tells her over and over that the plan is for us all to come back. But that there is no guarantee that we all will. She can’t promise that. But we are all going to do everything that we can to return safe and with our job done.
Everyone heading to the hideout post enters the portal. Cirilli has grabbed Atalaya’s and Nevil’s hands to do this. We step in and then exit in a tiny cabin in the woods. As we move away from the portal we see it inscribed in the floor. This is a permanent portal. Nevil says something about it costing a lot of money to make.
Mennik tells us to make sure that we are ready before we enter the portal he is going to send us through. We all get prepped, making sure our healing potion bottles are on our belts, that our weapons are ready to be drawn. Atalaya and Vasilya string their bows and have an arrow in hand. When we appear to be ready, Sorrow takes a deep breath and says, “I guess this is it.”
Chapter 3: The Battle at the Bloodgate (Late Afternoon)
We step through the portal that Mennek opens. We feel the strong pull of arcane power rush through us. We hear it humming in our ears, it tastes a little like metal. There is bright light all around us.
We step through into another room. The room is hot and flickering with a dark red light. It smells like blood and death. The floor is tiled and channels run through it in a weird random pattern. Flowing in the channels is a deep reddish thick liquid, clotting blood.
That this is scary would be an understatement. Nevil’s spider sense is telling her that this place is VERY EVIL!!!!
We stumble into chamber. Atalaya, Nevil and Vasilya first followed quickly by Sorrow and Inman. Atalaya and Nevil take in the altars at the walls surrounding us. Most have victims sacrificed on them. The channels start at the altars and drain in the portal. At the same time we take in the Thayian Red Wizards, two of them, in front of us.
Boz shots immediately as he sights them aiming at Apprentice 8. But he is so unnerved by the room and all that is in it, that his shot misses. He mutters under his breath.
Sorrow comes through the portal and starts pulling things out of the bag of holding that was given to him at the hideout by Atalaya. The capped jug containing the eye and the Trident.
Apprentice 3: Fires a Firebolt at Sorrow.
Atalaya takes two shots and both hit their targets; one at Apprentice 8 and the other at Apprentice 3. Apprentice 8 takes 8 points of damage. Apprentice 3 takes 12 points of damage.
Inman is helping Sorrow. Sorrow has taken the container with the stone (Eye) out and rolled it into the depression of a bowl in the pedestal. The portal has changed colors to a bluish tint. In the pedestal a depression forms with the outline of a trident in it. Inman takes the Trident from Sorrow and places it into the depression. The stone glows with blue light. The light seems to move from the Trident and into the stone. Sorrow and Inman exchange glances.
Nevil: Bangs her mace on her shield to draw the attention of the two Thayians. Stepping up to Apprentice 8 she says, “You get one chance to step away from the sacrifice. She holds her action waiting to see what he does.
Apprentice 8: casts Mage Armor on himself.
Boz: takes another shot with his shortbow at Apprentice 3 and hits him for 9 points of damage. He sidesteps.
We hear running feet, but don’t actually see anyone approach.
Apprentice 5: Casts Scorching Ray as he is running. He trips in one of the channels and twists his knee. His second and third rays hit Boz.
Sorrow: An impression of the War Hammer has formed in the pedestal. Sorrow pulls out the War Hammer from the bag of holding.
Apprentice 3: Casts Mage Armor on himself and starts running away.
A screeching sound is heard and a creepy undead head forms and calls out, “Intruders!” (Tarul Var)
We hear Sorrow call to Inman, “Just cover me!”
Inman: casts Meteors. The meteors are circling him waiting to be cast at specific foes.
Apprentice 7: Runs up and casts a Firebolt at Sorrow and misses.
Nevil: Wacks Apprentice 8 (with held action). First strike hits and deals 12 points of damage. The second strike hits for 10 points of damage and Apprentice 8 dies. Nevil moves close to Sorrow.
Boz: Shots at Apprentice 3, hits doing 4 points of damage.
The second team arrives. (Jekk, Kelson, Shalendra, Hadarr)
Apprentice 5: Casts Mage Armor on himself.
Sorrow: Slams the war hammer into the socket for it in the pedestal. Light flares with an earthy green glow. Sorrow uses the pot as a shield. “That’s two!” he calls out.
Apprentice 3: He is really hurt badly. He continues to try to run out of the doorway in front of him. (West side of the room)
Atalaya: Shoots one of her lightning arrows at Tarul Var. It flies straight at him, but he flicks his finger and it falls harmlessly to the ground. Growling deep in her throat, she aims and shoots a second arrow (+1 magic arrow). This one hits Tarul Var for 11 points of damage.
Hadarr: We can hear his voice somewhere on the other side of the portal. We hear arrows being shot.
Inman: Activates Blade Song. Then casts Witch Bolt and targets Tarul Var. The spell hits and causes 5 points of damage. He then tosses 2 of his prepared meteors. The first meteor misses its target. The second hits between Apprentice 5 and 7. Both fail their saves and take 9 points of damage from the meteors. Apprentice 5 dies.
Shalendra: Moves towards Apprentice 7
Tarul Var: holds up his hands, whispers and a huge thing of black tentacles erupts from the floor where Boz, Sorrow, Atalaya and Nevil are standing.
Apprentice 7: is attacking Hadarr
Nevil: Dex save, fails and she takes 6 points of damage from the tentacles and is grappled. She casts Bless on Atalaya, Sorrow and Inman.
Jekk: Runs to Apprentice 7.
Boz: makes his saving throw and moves away (N) from tentacles.
Sorrow: Fails his save and is grappled. He takes 14 points of damage from the tentacles. [Nevil reacts to this with Rebukes the Violent. Tarul Var fails his save and takes 14 points of radiant damage.] Sorrow digs into the bag of holding and pulls out the sword Black Razor. The table?pedestal?flares a light blue outline of a sword.
Apprentice 3: Has run away.
Atalaya: Makes her save against the tentacles and moves away (NE). She shoots +1 arrow and hits Tarul Var causing 7 points of damage. The then pulls out one of her thunder arrows and shoots him again. This arrow misses.
We continue to hear fighting that we cannot see happening on the other side of the portal.
Inman: Makes his save and moves away from the tentacles, moving out of the reach of the tentacles. Continues the fire bolt at Tarul Var doing 4 points of damage. He sends 2 meteors at Tarul Var. The first hits and does 3 points of damage. The second misses.
Shalendra runs to fight Apprentice ____.
Tarul Var: Steps up to Inman and casts the cantrip Chill Touch at Inman. A skeletal hand appears, trying to grab Inman’s shoulder, but he is able to evade the touch and takes no damage.
Apprentice 7: Is fighting with Jekk and Hadarr
Nevil: Attempts dex save, fails. Is still grappled. She takes 14 points of damage from the tentacles. She tries to break the grapple (strength check 21) and is able to break away from the tentacles and moves out of their reach.
We hear Thayians running, shouting.
Sorrow: Takes Black Razor and jams it into the table. There is a flash of light that seems to move from the sword to the Eye. Sorrow calls out, “That’s three!!!”
Apprentice 2: Engages with Kelson and Shalendra.
Apprentice 4: Chases his fellow. (???)
Atalaya: Shoots at Tarul Var. First arrow hits causing 9 points of damage. The second arrow hits, causing 13 points of damage.
We hear more arrows.
Inman: Discontinues Witch Bolt. He pulls out his scimitar and strikes at Tarul Var. His first strike causes 8+4 damage. His second strike is a critical hit, causing 13 points of damage.
The other team continues their fighting.
Tarul Var: Casts Killer Circle. (60 foot radius sphere catches Atalaya, Sorrow, Nevil, ____________, ____________, ??? Atalaya takes 20 points of damage. Sorrow takes full damage and is down to 4 points. (Not sure of the rest. It was bad)
Nevil: Does 30 points of healing on herself. She hopes to be able to take damage done to Sorrow who looks really hurt, but she can’t reach without going back into the tentacles.
Apprentice 6 runs to engage.
Jekk moves 60 feet.
Boz: Runs up to flank Tarul Val, swings his sword and misses his shot.
Sorrow: Breaks the tentacles grapple and runs out of their reach away from Tarul Var. He pulls his healing potion from his belt pouch and quickly drinks it, gaining 10 points of healing (now has 14 total health points) He looks at the table. He looks at us. He puts his hand on the table… We hear a shot of fire energy that flows into the stone (Eye). It rips the top of the stone (Eye) off and it falls to the floor and shatters. A column of white energy reaches into the ceiling and dissipates. We hear a howling, a wailing of souls as they are released and go screaming down the corridors.
And then we see Sorrow lying crumpled on the floor. The portal blinks a few times and then goes out. The Eye is lying in shattered pieces of rubble on the floor around Sorrow. The weapons that had been placed on the pedestal/table are all broken.
We hear fighting from the other side of the portal.
Atalaya takes 2 shots at Tarul Var. She stumbles on the first shot. The second hits him causing 7 points of damage.
Hadarr: Attacks Tarul Var causing 6+6 points of damage.
Kelson is fighting.
Inman casts Phantasmal Killer at Tarul Var, but he saves against it and takes no damage.
Shalenda: is fighting
Tarul Var: Is in bad shape. He shimmers and then disappears and takes the tentacles with him.
Nevil uses her Divine Sense to search the room for Tarul Var, but doesn’t sense him. Nevil runs to Sorrow, laying on hands to restore 10 points of health. Nothing happens. There is no transfer of power. Sorrow appears to be gone.
Boz: Runs to Sorrow who appears dead to him. He takes in all the shattered pieces of the weapons and the Eye.
Nevil: Beseaches her Goddess. She feels a sense of calm come over her and feels the stillness of Eldath. She seems to feel or hear a “Hush Child.”
We hear swearing and thumping/thwacking as the other team finishes up their fights.
Jekk and Hadarr come around the corner and call out, “What happened?”
We discover that Kelson and Shalendra are missing. No one seems to know what happened to them.
Chapter 4: Retrieving the Keys (Late Afternoon)
Jekk?Hadarr? calls out that we need to shut down the nodes.
Nevil says that we need to put Sorrow into the bag of holding. Atalaya sputters and doesn’t want to do that. She doesn’t want to admit that he is dead.
Nevil insists that we do so. Atalaya gives in. Nevil and Boz place him in the bag as Atalaya holds it open for them. Nevil and Boz think that he feels lighter than before.
ATalaya casts Cure Wounds on Boz (Level 2) and heals him for 14 points.
Inman: “He lied to me!” “He set me up.”
We realize that we have to get the keys from the nodes. Our group chooses to go into the yellow node. Jekk and Hadarr head into the red node.
Inman says: “I think it took his soul. I didn’t think he would. I don’t know why? He left out the something. He told me he knew what he was doing. I think he knew. I think he knew… There was something into the stone, something other than a fire element. I think he threw something into the mix that overloaded everything.”
We head into the Yellow Node. It is hot! The walls look like they are not solid. There is smoke, It is uncomfortable. There are red hot spots in the walls.
We investigate, moving through the caverns and tunnels until we find one that actually goes somewhere. We find a chamber and in that chamber we see a chain hanging down by a fire. The key is there. It’s hot! Inman casts Mage Hand and uses that to pick up the key from it’s hook on the chain. As soon as the Mage Hand touches the key there is a big whoosh, a gust of fire that is shaped like a humanoid. It blasts off fire at Inman. The elemental misses.
Boz: draws his sword and swings at the fire elemental and hits, doing 20 points of damage.
Atalaya draws Amaurea and hits, doing 13 points of damage with each of her (2) swings.
Inman: Casts Chromatic Orb. It connects doing 14 points of cold damage.
Nevil: swings her mace and hits both times doing 9+9 damage.
Fire Elemental dissipates.
Inman now completes getting the key via his Mage Hand. We all run to the gate taking the key with us.
When we get back we see that Jekk and Hadarr have also gotten their key.
We go to the other side of the room where the other two nodes are. Atalaya looks at Nevil and says, we’ll take water. Which one is that? We enter the one that is determined to be for the water element. Atalaya wants that one because surely Nevil’s devotion to Eldath will help us there.
As we enter, we realize that we are in a flooded cavern. There seems to be a mix of air and water. It’s strange. We can breathe this, but it is difficult. Atalaya,Nevil, and Inman have no problems with it at first, but it takes Boz a bit to get accustomed to breathing this substance.
We make our way through the foamy air/water mix. Sometimes swimming, sometimes walking as we search for the key. As we get near the key both Atalaya and Nevil start to have trouble breathing. Inman uses his Mage Hand again to grab the key and we leave the node as quickly as we can make it out.
We have to wait a bit before Hadarr and Jekk make it out of their node with that key. Once we are all together, we remember that we have devices to call the group in the hideout cabin. We do so, telling them we are ready to come back. We talk to Isteval. He asks if all is well. We say that we have two people missing, Kelson and Shalendra. And that Sorrow is dead. ‘
We are directed to look for a design in the floor in the passages out of the portal chamber. We pick one and head to it. Finding the design we wait and when it begins to shimmer we step into it. We are brought back to the tiny cabin in the woods.
Cirilli runs around calling out, “Where is he?”
Nevil says that his spirit went somewhere, but his body is in our bag of holding.
Joan is very upset.
Boz collapses by a wall, his head in his hands.
Joan: “Someone has to tell me that this is a joke.
Finally Joan looks into the bag of holding and then stalks out of the cabin into the woods.
Atalaya sits down next to Boz.
Nevil remembers something of Sorrow’s heritage. That he is of the lineage of Bel and Zarile. And that Zarile was a fallen angel. She carried a part of the Seven Heavens in her. She suggests that this is the something extra that Sorrow brought into the transference of the elements at the portal that caused it to shatter everything. That he brought something incompatible to the Eye pulling people’s souls.
Nevil: “He had to do it.”
Mennek: “He corrupted the ritual.” “I take it you destroyed the other things.”
Nevil: “The souls are free now.”
Mennek: “It pulled part of the angel soul. That’s what did it.”
…
Mennek: “You trusted a devil.”
Nevil: “I think that’s really going to piss off his family.”
Mennek: “I heard there was a teifling this family in Baldur’s Gate … Oh well, that’s not my problem.”
Nevil: “Someone should go after Joan.”
Inman: I’m a little afraid of her.
Mennik: I think his family wanted to harness him. The people in my team wanted him to o. I get satisfaction that they won’t”
Atalaya: A bit of divine spark that destroyed our artifact.
Mennek:
Nevil: ,,, Go home now Mennek”
Mennek: I have to bring your friends back.”
Nevil: “Joan. We can’t stay here. We have some new information.
From a distance we hear Joan call out, “What?”
Nevil: “He was part angel. That is why he had to do it.
Joan: “You tell me he knew it?”
Nevil: “Yes.”
Joan: “Fucking asshole.”
She returns.
We step into the portal and return to Riverport.
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