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We take a daylong trip to the castle area. On the trip we learn that this area had been attacked and taken over some generations ago by Orcus. It had turned all of the beings here into slothlike caricatures of themselves. They eventually drove him off (we didn't get into how) and now anyone eating more than a portion of food large enough to maintain them is considered slothlike. Haromyre is very upset that he can't seem to get a family-sized portion of food.
The city built near something called "the Stream". The Stream is a river that teleports and/or dimension travels any ship that goes past the edge of it - we find out that's how Orcus got here in the first place. The area around the Stream has become a giant trading hub. We entered the city along with what I referred to as the Chief of Staff and some guards. The king was not going to be able to see us for a day so we shopped around. We found that the city, named Calygeera, was home to a very famous and tasty type of fruit which only ripened every other year. They have a festival for it as traders from all over come to buy it. The fruit was just turning ripe and the festival was starting.
We also heard that the Stream had recently brought in a very powerful red dragon which went crazy when it arrived and started attacking the town. The Chief of Staff told us that the local guards and others around had killed it. Lastly, we learned that all magical power in the area outside the castle was drawn into the castle through a magical device located on each of the four towers of atop the castle. This resulted in the magic outside the castle being dampened. The reason we were given was this was done to protect the populace from powerful things that could travel in through the Stream. We shopped around and other than Azar enjoying some local fruit covered in chocolate, nothing major happened.
The next day we were invited into the Castle. We met with the Prince once we entered the castle who judged us immediately on our titles. I judged him as a pompous ass and despite my personal wishes, a detect evil on him revealed no evil.
We met with the king and his advisors. I gave a breakdown of what we did, how we noticed the corruption spores with magic, found the source was a beholder, defeated the beholder etc...The guards had actually brought back what was left of the beholder after we torched it. They showed it to the king who nodded rather unsurprised. I took it to mean he lives in an area where travellers from all over come through and he's used to crazy things. Haromyre took it to mean the King knew the beholder was there. The king thanked us for a great service and asked what he could do in return for us. I told him about Duulraam being missing. No one recognized the name or description but Haromyre got a pretty bad vibe off the king as did Azar.
Afterword, we were invited to a dinner at the castle. It was not going to be attended by the King but it was his way of saying thank you. The dinner was being held in a solarium which contained a pretty dense garden. When we got in the room, Azar was offered more chocolate covered fruit. I forget if he had some or not but at that point he became very sick. Using a kind of spirit healing magic, Garub discerned Azar was sick with the corruption. He successfully "pulled" it out of Azar. The corruption tried to bond itself to Garub but he was able to resist it. Now on high alert, Haromyre used True Seeing and saw the corruption everywhere. He quickly figured out that some of the food - specifically the Fruit of the festival covered in chocolate - Azar had eaten was corrupted.
Garub went into a spirit trance and found the spirit of red dragon in the room. He asked it a few questions, mainly about how it got here, why it went crazy etc...Haromyre, being a spirit shaman, also asked it a few questions. I forget who asked what.
In short, the dragon had also been enlisted by Duulraam to fight the corruption. It had gotten to Duulraam's home planet but had gotten corrupted itself. It wound up in the Stream (I forget if we found out how) which led it here. It said it was attacked upon sight and been defeated but that the corruption was still alive in it's bodily pieces. We looked over to the door and saw two guards wearing red dragon scale armor. Each of us remembered seeing the Chief of Staff - and many others around - wearing a dragon tooth. Senvassagas, our green dragon turned elf companion, asked if the King had done "the normal thing" and eaten the red dragon's heart. The red dragon said yes. We immediately assumed this meant the King and everyone with any pieces of the dragon was either becoming or was fully possessed by the corruption.
We also asked the spirit if Duulraam was in the castle. He said yes, Duulram was being used to power the magical dampers on the four towers of the castle. He also told us there were quite a few more of the "eye kings" - beholders. Great. Lastly, the dragon told us his skull was in the basement and asked us to find it and bury it. Haromyre and/or Garub agreed
It quickly dawned on us that we were in a castle filled with corrupted beings and had told them that we were travelling with the being that wanted to defeat the corruption. We decided this was, in short, a bad thing. I intimidated the guards into letting us leave. As soon as we were outside, Haromyre got on his broom and flew up to the top of the castle. It was protected by a wall of force but he was able to get a look at the magic dampening devices and got a basic idea of where Duulraam might be held.
We had a quick party discussion. Haromyre and I wanted to attack the castle to free Duulraam. Senvassagas, Garub and Azar said it was suicide. Garub suggested going to the docks to see if the corruption was being shipped into the Stream -something we eventually decided was "bad". After some debate we agreed with Garub and went to the docks.
We got to the docks and saw the corruption coming from about a third of the crates on every one of the many boats. Haromyre and Azar began convincing people to stop loading the ships. Senvassagas, Garub and I went to see the harbor master. They convinced some of the other casters in the area to cast True Seeing. Once they saw what we saw - the corruption - they convinced everyone else to stop loading their ships. Someone raised a water elemental to prevent any ships from leaving the docks - something which turned out to be fortunate just a few moments later.
Garub, Senvassagas and I met with the harbor master who was talking to two exporters. They had just brought some of the fruit in for a few merchants. I told the harbor master what was going on and asked him to stop any more shipments from leaving. After a quick explanation, and seeing the brewing chaos on the decks, he agreed. I looked at the merchants and all of us noticed they had dragon teeth necklaces. When I asked the merchants where the grove was located they immediately attacked.
We took down one of them in one round - he had about 250 HP and they could not be critted - they were plants now. Garub sliced him and the corruption spewed forth. We were resistant again thanks to Senvassagas protecting us but the harbor master took a full dose. He was in bad shape.
I smashed the plant Garub hit pretty good with my greathammer and took him out. A cleave attack onto the second merchant did not kill him. The second merchant threw his dragon teeth down which exploded along with the first merchant's teeth into a massive fireball (20d6, I think). It killed the second merchant. Garub takes no damage from fire (dragon shaman). Senvassagas and I took some but not enough to make us really worry. It almost killed the harbor master. We leapt out the window - two story fall. Everyone survived. I laid hands on the harbor master, and Garub drew the corruption out of him.
We spoke to the harbor master. I said I needed to see the manifest of ships that had left with the corrupt fruit. It was blown up in the explosion, he said.
We decided our next move was to go to the gourd and hope to take out the corruption there. Senvassagas thought we might be able to weaken the king's armies if we could fight them outside the castle. He realized that we had not seen a single mage or another beholder and if we didn't thin out that number before we went to the castle again, we were in trouble.
That's where we ended the session.
I think auto-correct turned Grove into Gourd on you.
ReplyDeleteNice Re-caps. They were all pretty spot on.