GoCorral

This session was attended by everyone! We’re on a roll here! The session was held using Roll20 as a virtual tabletop with Skype for voice and video like usual.

Chore Days

There was some discussing and voting about what to do. The group agreed to spend a day doing small chores before tackling the important task of completing the Druid’s Prophecy.
First, Hektor scried Aldarian to find where he was waiting for them in Nomingburg. Aldarian had been sent to the city to ensure that the assassins guilds within the city would war with each other after their unifier, Duke Jingo, had died. In exchange for creating chaos in the city, the Dahak monster had promised them his Pitchfork of Doom. Possessing the Pitchfork was the only way to bring Zeus back.

Aldarian was waiting for them and a tad bit annoyed. Amalius was supposed to pick him up the previous day. Aldarian told his friends that the city was heading towards an internal conflict. The guilds were already carving out territories and it was dangerous to cross the border between one neighborhood and the next. Aldarian had tried to spur the chaos onwards by assassinating a few individuals. A little bit of murder would heighten the city’s growing uneasiness. The group idly dismissed Aldarian and thanked him for his service.

Next on the list was to search for Zelus’s magic rod once more. The party made themselves invisible and returned to Phoenix. The city, once ruled by guilds, was now flooded. The water level reached above the first floor in most of Phoenix’s buildings. A few land-dwellers remained, walking around on the roofs or the upper floors, but most of the city’s inhabitants were now merfolk, locathahs, kuo-toas, and the like.

With too much ground to search and most of it underwater Amalius tried a different approach. He reached out with his mind and contacted one of the merfolk, “I seek a rod.”
The merfolk paused before replying, “Who is this?”
“It is I, your Lord Poseidon!”
“Your eminence! Forgive me. What can this humble servant do for you?”
“I seek a rod which was dropped in the city streets yesterday.” Amalius went on to describe the rod and send a mental picture of it to the merfolk. “Get your friends to look for it as well.”
“Yes! Right away your eminence!” The merfolk swam off out of Amalius’s telepathy range.
Amalius told the others what he had done. “We’ll come back in a day or two. They should have the rod by then,” Amalius explained.
“But how will we get the rod? You didn’t tell him where to bring it!” said Danar.
“We’ll figure it out later,” said Amalius.

The party regrouped at Lakatia. Before going on their last errand of the day Amalius dropped Aldarian off at Bradel Fields. Aldarian’s mission would be to collect anything of value and fill his portable hole. With the entire city dead it would be an easy feat. Aldarian said with a grin, “Open season.”

Putting the Prophecy Together

The Alliance Exiles knew three out of five pieces of the Druid’s Prophecy, the part kept by the wolves, that kept by the bears, and that kept by the druids themselves.

The druids’ piece was:
Should one of the gods forever close his eyes
Find the weapon that caused him to die
Add it last with great caution
Then pour the mix on the great god’s coffin.

The wolves’ piece was:
Go to where the Creator of Men hung
To where the eagle to its dinner would come
Take a piece of blood-red stone
And add it to the cauldron when it begins to foam.
This was correctly interpreted to mean taking a piece of the Rock of Prometheus. The Rock had been disintegrated and collected.

The bears’ piece was:
Go to where the Best Smith fell
To where in his fiery forge he dwells
Pick up the pieces of a broken god
Stir them in first with a golden rod.

The Rebellion had been collecting the other parts of the Prophecy. Perhaps it was time to go check on the Rebels? The group teleported to Gazeara and walked up to the palace where the Rebels had set up their administration after taking the city from the Xorians. At the palace entrance the party expressed to the guards at the door their intent to talk with the Rebel leaders, whether they wanted to or not. A few minutes later the party was led in to meet with Major Dactirian, Princess Tarigananata, and Druid Alkmene.

“Welcome,” said Dactirian. “To what does the Rebellion owe this visit?”
Amalius began, “We’ve worked with you in the past to claim the items mentioned in the Druid’s Prophecy. We feel it’s in the best interest of everyone fighting the dragovinians to work together to bring Zeus back. You had a group of… soldiers looking for the pieces of the Prophecy. What happened to them? Where are they?”
Dactirian answered, “They obtained the last pieces of the prophecy, but have since left the Rebellion’s service.”
“Oh? Do you still have contact with them?”
“No and I doubt we ever will again.”
“That’s too bad…” Amalius trailed off for a moment. “So they could be anywhere? Up to no good?”
“As long as they are under the sun I know we can trust them to do the right thing.”
Gears turned in Amalius’s head. Under the sun… The voice… The bright light in Stanton’s head… Titandra’s prophecy that Apollo is with the Rebels… Were Dactirian and Apollo one and the same?
Amalius broached his suspicions, “Anywhere under the sun you said? That wouldn’t happen to be because we are in the presence of the sun god Apollo?”
Anger flashed across Dactirian’s face. He pursed his lips and moved to stand, shaking with fury. Tarigananata delicately placed a hand on his arm. He looked at her and his face softened slightly. Dactirian unclenched his hands and slowly lowered himself back to his seat. Gritting his teeth he said, “I will forgive this impudence. Do not test me.”
Amalius continued, “How else would you know these things?”
Dactirian rose from his chair once more and left the room. Amalius stroked his chin and wondered. After a bit more discussion, Princess Tarigananata gave the party the other pieces of the Prophecy.

The shark piece was:
Go west to the river of the world,
To where the Black Kelp Plant is unfurled
Take a clipping of this seaweed
For it is the penultimate ingredient you need.

And the condor piece was:
Find a voice both strong and pure
Better than the gods to be sure
Sing the song both well and true
When the potion’s foam turns blue.

All together to revive Zeus the party figured they would need:
1. The weapon that “killed” him, Dahak’s Pitchfork of Doom. The Dahak agreed to give them this weapon if the destabilized Nomingburg. They did this, but then they crashed the Dahak’s city, Greshendale, before getting the Pitchfork from him.
2. A piece of the Rock of Prometheus, already acquired.
3. A splinter of bone broken off from Hephaestus’s leg when he fell from Olympus to Lemnos.
4. A golden rod (easy enough)
5. A piece of the Black Kelp Plant. The Black Kelp Plant is the sacred plant of Oceanus. It is situated in the Atlantic Ocean where Oceanus’s court rules. It’s said that any who take a piece of the plant without permission will be hunted by the Kraken for all their days.
6. A voice better than the gods? This was the one that stumped the group on what it meant.

After getting home Amalius cast divination to clarify, “How could they reach the Black Kelp?”
The response came, “Sail west out of the Pillars of Heracles and the Island will appear from the sea.”

With knowledge of the group’s next goal in hand everyone split up to do a little shopping.

Go West, Young Adventurer

In the morning everyone suited up before joining hands in a circle. Hektor said the magic words and they teleported west. The Pillars of Heracles (Known in modern times as the Rock of Gibraltar and Jebel Musa, the mountains at the Strait of Gibraltar that separates the Mediterranean from the Atlantic) were so far away that Hektor had to repeat his casting of the teleport spell another two times. Within a few seconds everyone had arrived at the base of the northern mountain.

Danar had been chosen to provide transport through a new spell he’d learned, dragon ally. He went down to the shore to make the appropriate preparations. Once done, Danar assumed his meditative stance while slowly working the magic of the spell. After a few minutes passed a large shelled form appeared in the summoning circle drawn in the sand. Detail came in revealing the summoned creature to be a dragon turtle with a shell large enough for the entire party to ride upon easily.

Danar intoned the final words of the spell and the turtle began to look around at its new surroundings. Danar spoke, “I am Danar, your summoner. By what name are you called?”
“I am known as Boromir.”
“Do you know the way to the Black Kelp Island?”
“Yes, just swim west. It always gets a bit stormy, but it’s not too hard to find.”
“How long does it take?”
“Depends on how stormy it gets. Fastest I’ve done the journey is in two or three days. I don’t remember which.”
“Will you take us there?”
“For a price.”
Danar negotiated with Boromir and got him to agree to journey with the party for several days for a few thousand gold pieces in gems. Danar gave Boromir the gems and the turtle swallowed them.

There was much talk amongst the group about ways to speed up Boromir’s travel with wind or water magic. Boromir was eventually allowed to interject into this heated discussion to say that Oceanus let people arrive when they arrived and that there was little the party could do to change that. Satisfied, the group hopped on Boromir’s back and settled in for a voyage out to see, taunting Atlas’s mountain on the northern shore as they left the Mediterranean for the Atlantic.

While Boromir swam Hektor attempted to scribe a new spell into his spellbook. Unfortunately he found this quite difficult with water constantly sloshing onto Boromir’s back. He attempted to move into his portable hole to continue writing but found that keeping it open on the shell still allowed water to splash in and disrupt his quill work. Frustrated, he asked Tagenadi to hold the hole in the air above the shell while he continued to scribble in his spellbook within the shell (He couldn’t simply close the hole to shut out the water because then he would suffocate). Hektor managed to get one spell written on the parchment of his blessed spellbook before a storm picked up preventing any further scribe work.

The storm tossed the party around on Boromir’s back for a day and a night. Lightning flashed, rain came down in buckets, and waves pounded. Occasionally the wind picked up and blew at them from the sides or seemingly from below. All the adventurers found they had places to get drenched that they never knew existed before. As the storm neared it’s end Hektor cast teleport anticipation to prepare for the typical ambush King Jevaninada and his compatriots had used in the past. This spell would warn of any teleportation magic within 100 feet of Hektor and allow the party to prep before the attack.

The storm broke with the dawn and up ahead the party could see a small island.
Danar asked, “Is that it?”
“Yup,” said Boromir, “That’s Black Kelp Island.”

Black Kelp Island

Black Kelp Island was made of hard, cracked, red rock that jutted straight up out of the water. The rock was dampened by the constant surge of waves splashing against the sheer eight foot tall sides of the island. The whole space could not have been more than a hundred feet on each jagged side. A crude wooden fence was constructed on one half of the island. Squeezed into the enclosure were perhaps two dozen poorly dressed humans in manacles along with barrels, crates, and sacks. Outside the fence a few of the manacled people attended to a dozen dragovinian soldiers, feeding them blood drops from wounds in their arms or massaging their backs. Upon sighting the dragon turtle laden with adventurers the dragovinians struggled to redo the clasps on their armor and grab their weapons. The blood slaves pulled the cranks on crossbows and loaded bolts for their masters.

Our heroes flew forward off Boromir’s back. Everyone prepared for a pitched battle, but the fight was concluded rather quickly. Amalius teleported forward and caught the dragovinians in a cold energy wave that made ice statues of them on the red rock of the island. A few slaves were slain in the blast as well, but the bulk behind the fence were spared.

Zelus followed Amalius up with an earthquake spell that broke the island into a thousand pieces. The ground rumbled and the sea roiled. Fissures opened in the rock and the slaves’ legs caught, pulling them slowly down into the sea salt slurry that was forming. Of the four remaining dragovinians, one was pulled into the muck while the others found miniscule shards of solid ground to cling to. They shot at Amalius with their crossbows, but his iron body deflected the blows.

“Surrender!” Amalius shouted.

The dragovinians dropped their crossbows at their feet and surrendered.

Amalius dominated the three of them and set to questioning them while the other heroes rescued the living slaves by moving them to the safety of Boromir’s back and an open portable hole. Amalius’s interrogation revealed that the Black Kelp Plant was nearby, but protected by Oceanus the Titan of the Waters. The dragovinians had been here for some time, feeding on their slaves for blood. When asked about their communication with their superiors the dragovinians kept their mouths shut. Even the dominate could not force that answer.

Amalius did not have long to puzzle out the reason for this refusal. Eathirilu got a tingling from his foresight warning of imminent danger. Hektor’s teleport anticipation had not succeeded. Eathirilu threw up a magical tornado of wind with a large calm eye around the party. If dragovinians were coming they would be in for a surprise.