Present Party: Keviks, Lupan, Nana, and Wren. Keviks was a bit late to the session, and came in just as the party left town.
Setting: Briefly Dragon's Valley, but mostly the town of Riverside in the kingdom of Midtia.
With the comfort of having some allies in this place, the party was eager to move forward from Dragon's Valley, and down to Lanti. They just had a few loose ends to tie up on the way out.
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| Desire Garros Tiefling, age 18 (Art by whalis on DeviantArt) |
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| "Spark" of Summer Half-Tabaxi, age 18 (Official Art from "Twisted Wonderland") |
Before they left, Fang gave a letter to Wren, and asked if she would deliver it to Spark. She happily obliged. When she did, Spark had the idea that they were leaving in a bit of a hurry. He told her that when Fang seemed to be unsure of himself to remind the prince of what he'd told him.
Lupan also took the time to inform the prince's little cousin, Flower, that she would likely start her training at the Heimdall temple soon. He said that the high priest had been spoken to, and he believes some persuading had been done. At their meeting the night before, there had been. She was very excited.
Nana used Sending to contact Queen Wisps, Fang's mother, once more. She told her that she should visit Dragon's Valley, under the guise of visiting her mother. Once here though, she should visit Guildmaster Ruz, the changeling guildmaster of the Horizon Walkers, the queen's former guild. They would be able to fill her in. The queen admitted Ruz was an old friend, and assured Nana that she would do so in the coming days.
She also went to the Heimdall church to speak with Jack once more before they left. She asked him why he was doing this, and he admitted that he had a wife and children. He allowed her to look at a small sketchbook he had in his inside jacket pocket. It contained sketches of a dragonborn woman and two human-appearing children: a girl about seven or eight years old, and a boy about three or four years old. She read his mind using Detect Thoughts, and probed deeper. She saw a memory of Jack's where the Erdian army burst into his home and took his wife and children from him. Xade had been the one to threaten them. When asked if he knew where they were, he said they were in Gilden. Nana asked him to share what he knew, as a parental figure to the king and the princes; she was worried for her family as well.
Jack simply replied, "If I have to choose between your family and mine... I choose mine."
Nana turned to leave, and on the way out, Jack telepathically wished her good luck. He claimed she would need it.
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| Lilli Robertson Hero's Way Guildmaster in Dragon's Valley Kalashtar, Celestial Warlock (Art by Cmy Cai on Art Station) |
Now, feeling like that might be Axel, a Dragon Lancer like Quest, they suddenly had a reason to do some quick investigating in Riverside. Hopefully, they'd be able to solve the problem quickly, and keep going to Lanti.
Before they left, they picked up Finch as well, who was also invited to Orion Mulcaster's engagement party. He was splitting off from his own adventuring party. They'd stay here where it was safer until they could risk bringing Casper, their five-year-old half-tabaxi charge, with them to Lanti.
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| Map of Midtia and its surrounding countries (Made my me, using Inkarnate) |
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Their travel from Dragon's Valley was fairly uneventful, though they did learn something new about Quest. In his time, before becoming a Dragon Lancer, he told them that most people believe that he worked in Saspar as a court jester. While that was partially true, he was also the Sasparian spymaster.
Nana asked him if he'd ever met Ego - the gnomish Miditian spymaster - before, and Quest actually had. Quest had caused one of the biggest social gaffs of Ego's whole career at a Sasparian ball. Ego had been noticed when he shouldn't have been, and he was nearly arrested.
"Imagine the man's surprise when I turned up a little more than five years later like 'Hey, I'm here to save your country!'" Quest said, laughing. "He tried to come at me, and I kicked him across the room."
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| Dragon Lancer: Quest Carron Tiefling form College of Satire Bard (Art by @guttertongue on Twitter) |
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| Quest The Copper Dragon Demigod |
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The party arrived in Riverside: a small town with many wood and log based structures. On their way in, they noticed a few homes and other buildings that had their walls completely smashed in. They opted to hurry to the guildhall and ask questions. They didn't want to stay long, and they didn't want to alert the local nobility to their arrival so they needed somewhere for the prince to be safe. Fang stayed with Finch in one of the rooms that Finch was able to secure as a guild member.
Hero's Way was currently flooded with townsfolk complaining about the monk and the damage he'd done. Lindsey - another identical Simulacrum of her, it would seem - directed the party to see the guildmaster immediately if they had any questions about the monk. She did warn them, however, that the guildmaster himself had fought the monk six times, and hadn't been successful.
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| Lunelis "Lune" Waelonyl Guildmaster of Hero's Way in Riverside Sea Elf, Class Unknown (Art by @domeddi on Twitter) |
They met with Guildmaster Waelonyl (but he preferred "Lune" or "Luney"): a massive sea elf gentleman with white hair, and bruises all over his chest. It was an easy guess that they were from fists, likely the monk's.
When they spoke to him about their suspicions regarding the monk's origins - thinking he may be a Dragon Lancer, looking for a staff - the guildmaster was a little confused. Then, they added they'd heard about it from Lilli Robertson, the guildmaster in Dragon's Valley. The only staff that Lune had seen recently of any note was the one brought back by a small adventuring party who'd recently lost their monk. His name had been Eraxan Vallhaleren, and he was a blue dragonborn. He and his party had taken many trips to Helheim, and apparently, their last hadn't gone so well. All of his effects had been returned to his family, and they lived on the outskirts of the town, by the river.
The party made their way there, and Castilian informed Keviks and Lupan that Elicia and Liam - the changeling Veers's party members who worked for the lich guildmaster Hugo DeMarco - had mentioned someone with the name Eraxan.
They entered the Vallhaleren house, which was occupied by an elderly blue dragonborn woman and her very strange cat. A series of strange things happened here, in the party's short stay.
- The woman herself appeared to be Eraxan's mother. She was upset by his death, but not distraught. She claimed that he was a good man. She was very hospitable, and made the party some tea while they talked.
- The cat's name was Starchild, and Mrs. Vallhalern claimed that she had pawed at the door for several minutes one day until she was let inside. She hasn't left since.
- The cat was cold to the touch.
- The cat seemed to understand anyone who spoke to it.
- The cat had strange magical abilities that Mrs. Vallhaleren appeared not to notice or be concerned about.
- It nullified the magic of a robe in the bedroom where they found the staff they were looking for when Nana attempted to touch the item.
- It could allegedly warp reality in some way, and made it seem as though the city of Gilden was visible from Riverside when, in fact, it was nearly 70 miles away.
- It cloned itself, or, at the very least, made some kind of copy of itself.
- Quest telepathically told Nana when she asked whether or not that cat was actually a cat, that it was not, and that he would explain later.
- When they did get the staff and were able to leave, Quest explained very simply that the cat was an eldritch abomination that that they were all very lucky that it liked them.
Aside from those points though, with some convincing, they were able to get Mrs. Vallhaleren's permission to take her son's staff for the good of the city. At the bottom of this wooden staff was the letter "A" in Sylvan - another sign that this might be the Dragon Lancer Axel's staff.
The party quickly filled in Finch and the prince, and then went to go find the masked monk. They planned to let Quest give him the staff, polymorphed as his old tiefling form, hoping that if it was Axel, he'd recognize him.
They found the masked monk further into the city. Guards were helping people out of the area as quickly as possible. Seeing the adventurers coming, they made sure to clear out as well. The monk was wearing a flat, white mask. His body was obscured by some kind of mist or smoke. His robes were ragged and torn, and his hair was up in a ponytail. He wore wraps around his hands, and he was punching relentlessly on the side of the building.
Quest called out to him, and the monk turned. Seeing the staff, it approached. Once it was within five feet of Quest, it slowly removed its mask... to reveal a very haggard looking Axel with sunken eyes and wrinkled skin.
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| Dragon Lancer: Axel Changeling form Way of Mercy Monk |
Quest nodded. "My gods, brother, what happened to you?"
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| The Silver Dragon's Staff Semi-Divine Artifact Contains the spirit of Axel (Art from "Elder Scrolls") |
Axel didn't reply. He reached for the staff, and when Quest gave it to him, Axel began to glow with white light. His age and tiredness melted away to reveal a young and handsome changeling. Translucent silver wings sprouted from his back, and the head and neck of a silver dragon erupted from behind him. The head looked at Axel fondly, and then nuzzled him gently. Then, Axel disappeared, and the wooden staff transformed into silver, with a dragon's head at the top of it.
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| Item Description (Made by me) |
Nana cast Identify on the staff to learn its properties. Once those were known, the party decided that Keviks, the ranger, would be the best person to keep it. He attuned to it as a spellcasting focus. They also asked Axel where they might be able to put him to rest, as they had done with Quest in Dragon's Valley. Axel, through illusion and images, asked to be brought to his temple, where he'd first learned martial arts. That temple was in Bervuo, on the opposite side of the kingdom.
The party debated on whether or not they should keep the staff with them, to be prepared for the dangers of Lanti, or if they should send Quest to fly the staff to Bervuo, so Axel could rest and they could have two demigods on their side. However, the flight would be long, and there was no guarantee that Quest and Axel would make it back to Lanti from Bervuo if they were needed.
Ultimately, the party decided they would wait to see what Lanti held for them. If all was well or went well, they'd send Quest on his way with Axel to Bervuo while they continued on their journey.
~~~~~
ART LINKS:
https://www.deviantart.com/whails/art/Ephestra-Efe-692643261
https://twisted-wonderland.fandom.com/wiki/Leona_Kingscholar
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/2YJmA
https://twitter.com/guttertongue/status/1045505333265924097
https://twitter.com/domeddi/status/1259919452377931783
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/396386/coolest-looking-staff/p2
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