GoCorral

This session was attended by everyone. It was held over Google hangouts using Roll20 as usual.

A Fishy Cathedral

While the party pondered what to do next, a sending came into Amalius from Aldarian. “Lich attacked Björn’s Palace. Came with shadows. Björn escaped. Died and escaped. Palace staff are now shadows. Am at Dalleer Cathedral. No return to Palace.” Amalius informed the group of the contents of the message.
Eathirilu said, “What should we do?”
Hektor said, “We don’t have enough magic left to take on the Lich and shadows right now. We have to regroup.”
Tagenadi disagreed, “If we don’t act now, then at nightfall those shadows could spread throughout the entire city. We have to do something.”
The party discussed it for a few minutes and decided they should meet up with Aldarian at the cathedral before making any concrete decisions. They teleported out and away to the large cathedral in Dalleer.

The cathedral held twelve large statues to the Olympians, six on each side, with a stone altar at the far end opposite the door. Smaller offering pits with burned remnants of previous offerings lay at the feet of each of the statues. Three corridors on each side of the giant hall led out to other parts of the religious complex. The cathedral was devoid of people, save for Aldarian who approached the group.
“You made it! When you didn’t respond to my sending scroll I thought the worst had happened!”
Amalius asked, “What happened at the Palace?”
“The Bane attacked. He brought a few shadow undead with him. They got me. I saw the Björn slip away during the chaos. When the shadows were occupied with killing the Palace staff I resurrected myself and fled here. I think the lich is laying a trap for your return.”
“Do you know where the Björn went?”
“I don’t, sorry.”
“Where are the priests in here?”
Aldarian looked around in a circle and said, “There was one here just a second ago. I got the scroll and was talking to him while I waited for you to reply. Where did he go?”
Aldarian turned around again and a priest appeared behind the altar. Had they missed him before or was something else going on? Amalius and Tagenadi immediately became suspicious.
The priest approached them. “Is there anything I can help you with?” he asked.
Amalius cast detect magic and focused on Aldarian and the priest. All seemed normal with Aldarian, but a powerful illusion aura covered the priest. Amalius issued a telepathic order to Aldarian. The elf reacted quickly and grabbed the priest, holding a dagger to his throat.
Amalius hissed between his teeth at the priest, “What’s going on here? What’s this illusion magic?”
The party rolled to disbelieve and the truth filled their eyes and ears. The cathedral wasn’t empty, but filled with worshippers and priests giving offerings to the gods and goddesses. Most of them clustered around the gods associated with love, trade, and war.
Tagenadi drew his weapon and held it over his head. He shouted, “What are you all doing here? Where did you come from?”
All the priests turned in unison from talking with the worshippers to look at Tagenadi. The priest held by Aldarian wailed, “I’ll explain everything, just let me go.”

Grave Mistakes

The priests announced to the worshippers that the cathedral was closed for the day and began to usher them out the main doors. A few priests ran off down the side corridors. Tagenadi began swinging his kusari-gama over his head, ready to hit anybody who came within his reach. Hektor, Torin, and Eathirilu took up defensive positions while Amalius began manifesting a mind probe power on the captured priest to figure out what was going on. The priest continued to plead for his release while the party questioned him about why the illusion spell was in place.

Soon all the worshippers were ushered out. The priests at the door turned to engage the party as the sound of metal bootsteps echoed out of the side corridors. The other priests returned at the head of a robot army!

Tagenadi was now convinced that the priests were agents of Xoria in some way. He began striking out at them to keep them at bay. Eathirilu began to cast a summon monster. The priests hit the party with a few sound bursts disrupting Eathirilu and Amalius’ spells. Torin animated the statue of Dionysus at the other end of the cathedral and had it engage one of the robot squadrons.

The robots rushed to engage Tagenadi. He tripped a great many of them up, but one made it through and slammed against his undead body, chipping off a decent portion of bone. Fearing for the lives of his companions should the robots make it past him, Tagenadi used his hell given power to create a blazing inferno around the majority of the robots. One priest was caught in the blast and died a horrible death.

Torin cast a wall of force between the party and the opponents, leaving Tagenadi alone on the other side. Amalius and Torin then proceeded to teleport everyone out. Amalius took Tagenadi and Eathirilu to his old quarters at Astyanax’s estate in Bradel Fields. Torin took Hektor to Torin’s home in the caverns beneath Jord. Aldarian, left behind, turned invisible with his magic ring and fled.

Temporary Teleport Apart

Torin elected to simply remain within his house and not visit his family. Since he had now effectively allied himself with undead and possible traitors to the Alliance he felt ashamed to see his family. Better to pretend his self imposed exile had never been broken by this visit home. Without the option of a sending, Hektor asked to use Torin’s mirror to scry Tagenadi and, after receiving the dwarf’s approval, began to cast the spell.

Amalius, Eathirilu, and Tagenadi looked around the suite and thankfully found it unoccupied. They began to bicker about Tagenadi’s use of excessive force during the battle. Their arguing was interrupted by a maid opening the door. Amalius instantly cast psionic charm. Amalius recognized the woman from his previous stay, but couldn’t recall her name.
Amalius asked, “What’s your name, sweetheart?”
“It’s Telerie, my lord.”
“You remember me from before, right?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“How have you taken to the new changes Astyanax made?”
“There’s a bit more work for me around the house, my lord, but otherwise everything is fine.”
Amalius thought for a moment then said, “Could you go outside and wait for us?”
“Of course, my lord.” Telerie exited the suite and closed the door behind her.
Tagenadi said, “What do we do?”
Amalius answered, “We’ll go out the window. I don’t have enough power left to teleport again. This was just the first place I could think of. We’ll have to meet up with the others tomorrow.”
Amalius called Telerie back in.
“Telerie, we arrived here through magical means on an emergency. We’re going to be leaving the same way. It’d be best if no one knew we were here. Can you promise me you won’t tell anyone, not even Astyanax?”
“Yes, my lord. I shaln’t say a word.”
“Perfect! Now could you leave and close the door again?”
“Yes, my lord. Goodbye.”
Telerie left and closed the door. Tagenadi used his hat of disguise and Amalius cast invisibility on himself. The three of them clambered out the window and headed for a bar by the town gate to hide out. Amalius feared he would be recognized, so he kept his cloak hood pulled up.

While waiting at the bar, Korm, Amalius’ intelligent dagger whispered to the party, “I don’t think Dalleer is a place we can go back to. Maybe we should go to Aractrash instead. Aren’t Eathirilu and Hektor from around there?” No one responded the dagger, so it remained quiet for a while.

Hektor finished his scrying and found Tagenadi. He asked Torin, “When we get there are you going to attack him for killing that priest or just scold him.”
“Worse than a scolding, but less than an attack. I think we may have to break our ties with him. But I owe it to him to at least hear out what’s going through his head.”
Hektor grasped Torin and they teleported to the middle of the bar. All the patrons turned and looked at once. Hektor shouted, “Alliance business! Go back to your drinks! Nothing to be alarmed about!” Grumbling, the people went back to talking. A few grumpy patrons paid for their drinks and left.

A Tragic Tale

Hektor and Torin soon found the other party members. Hektor requisitioned a back table from another group, citing Alliance business once again. The party sat down with ales in hand and began to talk.
Torin started it off by narrowing his eyes at Tagenadi, “I’ve got something to say to you. We can’t go around killing innocent priests in temples. Their spells were minor, only meant to incapacitate and yours… Well yours was black magic from who knows where. It’s come to my realization that we have not been traveling with a person, but with a beast! A thing!”
Korm interjected, “A thing? You saying there’s something wrong with being a thing? That’s a compliment, buddy, and don’t you forget it.” Korm was ignored once again.
Tagenadi said, “You’re right, I am a beast. I traded my soul and my humanity, because we all need to make sacrifices to defeat the dragovinians. You don’t know what evil they’re truly capable of, Torin.”
“Maybe you can make sacrifices. You chose what you are now, but that priest didn’t. We can cast aside whatever we need to of ourselves in this quest, but we cannot make those decisions for others. You should be ashamed of your actions!”
“No, I agree. I have done monstrous things, but I speak not of the priest. For the things I have done I have been punished and turned into a monster. And I don’t think we should force our own decisions on others. I made the deal with Hades, no one else. But I felt we were under attack by dragovinian accomplices in that cathedral. Why the illusion if there was nothing for them to hide?”
Eathirilu said, “Something fishy was happening in there.”
Torin said, “We can’t know for sure, but my conscience tells me those priests were acting only to protect themselves. Why wouldn’t they use more powerful spells against us if they truly wished to hurt our cause? And that one priest held by Aldarian kept shouting that he could explain if we only let him go. There was clearly more going on than we realized, but I highly doubt that the truth was nefarious in nature. Your actions still stand.”
Tagenadi responded, “How much are you willing to give up to defeat the dragovinians, Torin? I gave up everything! How much do you think that priest would’ve sacrificed? He might’ve sacrificed his soul as I had, or his life, or his home, or his family. We can’t know. I feel terrible that I killed him, but I can’t take it back as much as I can’t take my deal with Hades back.”
“You slew an innocent without provocation. How can we trust you anymore?”
“Because… Because of how much I hate the dragovinians. I’ll tell you a story that I hid when I first joined the Alliance, but I think its time you heard it now.
“I grew up among a military family. My grandfather was in the military, my father was, and my older brother joined the army as well. With our family history he became an officer quickly. You’ve met my brother. He was there at the Rock of Prometheus when we fought the dragovinian King himself. My brother, Darudanano, didn’t use to be like that, by the way. He told me not to go to war. But I didn’t listen back then. Anyway, you’ve met Daru, but I had a sister, Danaranena too. And parents obviously.
“Anyway, I came back from my first tour with the army. and I found out they wanted to make Daru a dragovinian. It wasn’t particularly surprising – he was a ranking officer who had made a name for himself in the wars. But he didn’t want to be. I didn’t really get it at the time but it freaked me out. So when he left us to…
“He left and he’s not there anymore and I decide to leave the service. Devanane is my brother’s best friend, he was the other dragovinian at the Rock. He comes to me as I’m leaving but he starts with these vague threats. I didn’t know what to do so I ran.
“But I got captured at this village the Xorians were… well they were burning it to the ground. Devanane wasn’t a good man even before he was a dragovinian. He brings in this mage and they tortured me some and then brought me back. I was an officer and needed to be made an example of.”
Tagenadi took a deep breath and said, “I killed my parents. They… the mage did something to my mind and I had to. But I killed them. The worst thing you can do and I did it. I might have killed my sister too but she saw and ran away.
“My soul belongs to Hades. I’ve deserved it since that day. But if I’m going to die I need to do two things. The people of the Xorian empire don’t deserve this. They aren’t the enemy, it’s the dragovinians with Blendegad and Jevaninada at the top. They’re the evil in this war. We kill them and we can end this.
“And I need to make sure my sister is okay. I haven’t seen her since that day. I doubt she’d want to see me since I killed… but I need to make sure she’s okay before I die. Again. You know.”
Korm said, “That’s some heavy shit, man.”
Amalius said, “Given the circumstances, I think we can forgive you, Tagenadi. How do the rest of you feel?”
Eathirilu said, “I’m still here as long as we vanquish the dragovinians first and the undead we’re using second. Nature will survive.”
Torin said, “I’ll let it pass this once, but you had better not slip up again. I’ll be watching you.” Torin glared at Tagenadi.
Hektor said, “I’m glad that’s all settled. Working with undead isn’t my first choice, but if we need to bring down the dragovinians, then so be it. Now we still have a separate undead problem. What are we doing about the lich in Dalleer.”
Amalius said, “We can’t take him on today. We’ll have to return tomorrow. Then we can kick his boney butt.”

The party decided to rest at Hektor’s small fiefdom called Lakatia in Aractrash. Hektor typically teleports from there to the party every day and then back at the end of the day. The only difference is that he was bringing them along this time.
Before teleporting away, Amalius had a private word with Tagenadi, “This dragovinian guy, I think I might know where he is.”
“Who? Devanane?” said Tagenadi.
Amalius said, “No, the mage who played with your mind. There is only one dragovinian who could have bent your will to such tragic deeds. I too was wronged by his malevolence, yet pity stayed my hand and I let the wretched little thing live on, knowing that his destiny dwelt elsewhere.
“I see now that in prophetic grace I saw true. For he took from me naught but what he had weaved before my eyes, but you, my forsaken friend, he damned your soul and your blood to hell.
“Let us rid the world of the terror he once was… and the terror he will become again. Only by the bloody toll of vengeance may your kin pay Charon and find peace before the gods. I can lead the way, Tagenadi, but you must wield the sword.”
“Where is he? Who is he?”
“He is an albino halfling. He has lost his memory and his dragovinian state. He travels now with a small band of other ‘fixed’ dragovinians like himself, doing some work for the Rebellion in Xoria. I can find him and then…”
“I see… But innocents are at stake in Dalleer now. We can hunt down the mage at a later date.”

The party rested, recuperated, and prepared in Lakatia for their final battle with the Lich.