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Dunmari Frontier - Session 39

Pandemonium Confrontation: in which the party ends the werewolf threat in Tokra

Featuring: Kenzo, Wellby, Delwath, Seeker, Riswynn
In Taelgar: Jul 03, 1748 DR
On Earth: Sunday Feb 06, 2022
Tokra and surroundings

The Dunmar Fellowship battles werewolves at a fort ruin, uncovers cult plots, and captures prisoners for interrogation before splitting up.

Session Info

Summary

  • The Dunmar Fellowship investigates the werewolf lair and decides to check the Drankorian fort ruins.
  • They use clairvoyance to spy on three people at the ruins; two guards and a muttering man tied to a post.
  • They approach stealthily but are noticed, leading to a battle with the werewolves. During the battle one werewolf commits suicide, summoning a monstrous entity that fights with confusion and whispers.
  • After a disorienting battle, they defeat the creatures and rescue Riswynn from a mist-induced daze.
  • They interrogate the werewolf captives, learning more about the Fraternity of the Empty Moon and their plans.
  • The party returns to Tokra with the prisoners, splitting up as some head north in search of Saka.

Timeline

  • Jul 03, 1748 DR, dawn: Search for remaining signs of werewolves, returning to the werewolf lair. Follow secret tunnel back to the ruined Drankorian fort.
  • Jul 03, 1748 DR, morning: Use clairvoyance, and scout area, spotting several guards. Stealthy approach is foiled by unstealthy dwarves. Fight werewolves, forcing two to surrender; suicide of third werewolf summons a cursed avatar of some kind from Pandemonium. Kill it. Interrogate captives.
  • Jul 03, 1748 DR, late morning: Return with the captives to Tokra. Leave captives with Riswynn; Kenzo, Seeker, Delwath, and Wellby gather gear for the journey north to find Saka.

Narrative

We begin as the party wakes in the pre-dawn light to search for signs of werewolves. Heading back to the lair of the Fraternity of the Empty Moon, the guards there report no disturbances. While all seems quiet, the party decides to exit through the secret tunnel, and perhaps investigate the ruins of the Drankorian fort near the Extraplanar Weak Point to Pandemonium on their way north. 

Traveling a few hours from the tunnel exit, with no sign of fresh tracks, they stop to magically spy on the ruins with clairvoyance before approaching any closer than a half-mile vantage point. With Seeker’s magical eye, the party sees the interior of the one occupied tower, partially ruined but with intact walls, for the most part. There are three people camped here: one is sleeping on a straw mat, one is keeping watch, and one, in ragged clothes and tied to a post with a long rope, is muttering inanities to himself. 

The party begins to sneak closer, and while Wellby, Kenzo, and Delwath move silently and swiftly towards the tower ruins, Seeker and Riswynn are not so quiet. By the time the party is within 50 feet of the camp, the people are alerted. 

As the party rushes forward into combat, it becomes clear that these are werewolves. The party attempts to intimidate them into surrender, in part by warning them the rest of the werewolves are dead, and their plot is ended. This seems to have the desired effect on the two regular werewolves, one of whom runs (only to be chased down and knocked unconscious by Kenzo) and one of whom, restrained by Seeker’s quicksand, cowers and tries to hide. However, the muttering one in the ragged clothes looks up and grabs a silver dagger, while muttering about how it is not time, it is too soon, the way is not prepared, and slits his own throat. As he falls to the ground, his body begins to grow mouths and the blood congeals into some gibbering beast, while a shadow whispering about madness and secrets emerges from the mists. 

The party quickly engages these new threats, which seem to fight in large part by confusion. Reaching into the minds of the party, it stuns them, turns them against each other, culminating in a nasty slash from Wellby at Delwath, cutting extra sharp with the magic of Wellby’s blade, acquired from the leader of the Fraternity of the Empty Moon. However, slowly the party chips away at these creatures, and before anyone dies the enemies are dispatched, the last blow dealt by Kenzo’s fists of planar power, although not before Riswynn finds herself lured into the mists by the sound of irresistible voices. However, she is rescued by quick use of mage hand from Delwath to tie a rope around her waist, and a solid pull from Seeker and Delwath together, the combination of them barely strong enough to jolt Riswynn out of her daze. 

As the fog of combat clears, the party searches the camp, finding another seven ritual spears, and retreats a bit, out of sight of the fogs of the Pandemonium rift, to interrogate the prisoners. 

The woman was apparently a Dunmari, a refugee living in the camps outside Tokra, an unwilling convert cursed with lycanthropy a few months ago, and brought into the cult by convincing her their was no cure, she had no choice. Promised a cure, she is willing to speak with the party. She says there was one other recent convert, a man named Umber of Dunmar, also a Dunmari, but the rest were from the east. She also seems to feel like when the one who cursed her is near, she cannot think as clearly and the curse is stronger in her mind. She tells them a bit of the plan, that the mad one who killed himself was meant to be the sacrifice that would summon Jinnik’s avatar, give the curse of lycanthropy new strength and power. 

The man is less cooperative. He was one of the members of the cult that traveled from the east, and is not willing to speak, until Seeker’s magic turns his mind and he opens up, speaking of his history.

As the party finishes interrogating the captives, the story of the past few months becomes clear. The leader of the Fraternity of the Empty Moon found the scepter, somewhere near or in Kharsan, and traded it to Agata in exchange for her help getting them unnoticed into Tokra. This required two things: a way to create a refugee crises, and a way past Shakun’s maze. Agata gave the werewolf cult leader a scroll to summon a demon in order to provoke a border crises, and implemented her plan to lure Cintra out of Karawa with Heart of Shakun in order to lower Shakun’s defenses and allow the werewolves, and the gnolls created by the demon, into Dunmar. While the prisoner did not know all the details, you recall that Agata had a deal with the Centaurs to not travel or interfere in the north, and probably wanted to meet the letter, if not the spirit, of that agreement by putting as much distance between her and the gnolls as possible (although she also obviously twisted some for her own purposes, such as guarding the entrance to Shakun’s Wellspring).

With the sun climbing towards noon, the party escorted the prisoners back to Tokra. We end as the party splits up, Riswynn staying in Tokra in charge of the prisoners, while Delwath, Kenzo, Wellby, and Seeker get their gear and mounts and head north in search of Saka.