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Dunmari Frontier - Session 81

Scepter’s End: in which a cursed scepter is finally destroyed

Featuring: Seeker, Delwath, Kenzo, Wellby
In Taelgar: Dec 17, 1748 DR to Dec 25, 1748 DR
On Earth: Friday Jul 28, 2023
Tollen, Antaka, and Vetta

The Dunmar Fellowship defeats Urgall the Black and a demonic entity in Vetta, ultimately destroying the cursed Scepter of Command.

Session Info

Kenzo gets a tattoo from Cecilia Lister
The party finds the Flaming Tempest Hoard

Summary

  • The Dunmar Fellowship meets priestess Iskra and learns about the sacred waters of Vetta.
  • They gather information from Umli the Stoneborn and Caelynn the Seer on how to destroy powerful artifacts and about the Elemental Plane of Fire.
  • At Antaka, Skalme reveals the Scepter of Command’s origin and how to destroy it.
  • In Pyhlla, they learn of Urgall the Black’s sacrilege and demonic ties, and plan their assault.
  • The party infiltrates Vetta through lava tubes, confronts and defeats Urgall and a massive demon, purifying the sacred waters.
  • After vigilantly guarding the scepter in the sacred waters for 24 hours, they successfully destroy it at dawn.

Timeline

  • Dec 17, 1748 DR, afternoon: Meet Iskra at the Temple of Kaikkea. Meet Nika at The Windward Sail, who takes party to Umli and then Caelynn. Speak with Umli; speak with Caelynn. Kenzo returns to speak with Iskra for the afternoon.
  • Dec 18, 1748 DR: Kenzo gets a tattoo and collects Cecilia’s story. Delwath purchases furniture. Party leaves north on the skyship.
  • Dec 19, 1748 DR: Fly north and east towards Skaer Islands
  • Dec 20, 1748 DR: Fly north and east towards Skaer Islands
  • Dec 21, 1748 DR: Meet Skalme on Antaka, learn about how to destroy the Scepter of Command. Arrive at Pyhlla, talk to Vaallinen, learn about Urgall the Black. Talk to Tulvak about the raid.
  • Dec 22, 1748 DR: Blessed by Kaikkea at dawn. Fly to island. Scout, find lava tube. Enter under the temple complex. Surprise Urgall and kill him. Attack demonic entity corrupting the waters, kill it. Rest.
  • Dec 23, 1748 DR: Kill the undead hordes remaining. Search the island, return treasure to rightful place, clean up and lay out bodies. Loot pirate ship.
  • Dec 24, 1748 DR: Place the Scepter of Command in the sacred waters. Stand guard, not sleeping, for 24 hours.
  • Dec 25, 1748 DR, early morning: Destroy the scepter at first light. Emerge, meet Skaer coming to investigate the clearing of the mists.

The Mirror of the Past

Narrative

Part 1: Tollen

We begin as the party leaves Melindir’s apartments, after having made plans for dinner the following night, and walks through the rich part of Tollen, full of elaborate palaces of merchants and guild leaders. They reach the Temple of Kaikkea, and ancient building of white marble on a empty plaza. Inside, they meet Iskra, the priestess of Kaikkea in Tollen. From her, the party learns of Kaikkea, and also hears about the dangers on the island of Vetta that have prevented the Skaer from making pilgrimages to the sacred waters there for 10 months. Iskra gives the party letters of introduction to Skalme, the fire priestess on the volcanic island of Antaka, and Vaallinen, the priest in the town of Pyhlla, the launching point for pilgrims to Vetta.

Around noon, the party leaves the temple to meet Nika Hyne, who is going to guide them to meet Umli, the Stoneborn, and Caelynn the Seer. Umli is interviewing new students at the dwarven tavern The Fire and Stone, in the Magus Street district, near the University of Tollen. After watching her a while, Seeker presents his miniatures of glass and stone, which doesn’t go over super well. Delwath, however convinces her to speak by catching her interest with strange metals: the shadow shard from his breastplate, and the adamantine shield (which Umli describes as being made by a medium-skilled smith, which feels like high praise from her). From Umli, the party learns about the volcano at Antaka, and some general information about volcanos and destroying things in them, including the fact that powerful magic can reveal the weakness of artifacts. Caelynn the Seer, in Tollen, possesses this magic, as does Skalme, on Antaka.

After speaking with Umli, the party meets Caelynn the Seer at her small, elegant apartment, unassuming from the outside. Inside, it is twilight, but feels larger and more spacious that it appeared from the street. While Kenzo waits outside, Seeker, Wellby, and Delwath enter and speak with her. She is a tricky conversationalist, and the party does not want to give away much, any memories or secrets. But she does eventually reveal to Delwath that many of his kind ended up in Dreamhaven, a fey realm across the mountains. And Seeker decides to trade his book “Infinite Gates of Kenzo: a book in which one selects one’s own adventure. Fight the gnolls? Close the gate? You decide!” Caelynn is fascinated with this, and tells Seeker much about volcanoes and the Elemental Plane of Fire in return. The party learns about the elemental portals that linger in the world, and the way in which the elemental planes can both create and destroy, depending on the weakness and resonance of whatever is to be destroyed, and that the safest way to enter the elemental planes is with an invitation.

Leaving Caelynn’s, Kenzo returns to the Temple of Kaikkea to bond with Iskra, collect her story, and impress her with his large spiritual presence, while the rest of the party returns to the inn.

The next morning, Kenzo returns to Cecilia Lister’s tattoo parlor, listens to her story, and has his tattoos of Lengau and Motua magically enhanced, as well as receiving a letter of introduction to Escobar Garavito, a well-connected student at the University, supported by a Dyer’s Guild scholarship. The party reschedules dinner with Melindir and postpones meeting Sarah de Gray, as after lunch they depart, heading north and east towards Antaka.

Part 2: Skaerhem

The party spends the afternoon of Dec 18th, as well as all day on the 19th and 20th, flying north and east, crossing the forests and rocky coasts of Vostok, and then the open sea of the Western Green Sea. Around dawn on Dec 21st, the party reaches Antaka. This is a medium-sized rocky island, dominated by a single large volcano, still very active, and connected to the plane of fire. The Skaer have a temple here, built of dark volcanic rock, with a roof of polished obsidian, arranged to echo the shape of the volcano behind it. The priestess Skalme is waiting here, as her morning prayers warned her the party was coming.

They speak with Skalme, about the volcano, hoping to learn more about how to destroy the scepter. She takes their offering of gold and silver, and prays, learning that the Scepter of Command was created when Apollyon bound the soul of a fiend to it, which protects it from fire, and almost all other damage. It can only be destroyed by immersion for 24 hours in sacred waters, during the full moon, which will weaken the bond of the fiend enough to shatter the object (potentially releasing the fiend).

The party then heads to Pyhlla, the Skaer village that is the base from which pilgrims to Vetta depart. On the way, they fly over Vetta, seeing the mists that surround it, and using Clairvoyance to observe some demons milling around the entrance to the caldera temple complex.

Arriving at Pyhlla at dusk, the party meets the priest, Vaallinen, at the temple, which appears to be the center of the community. It is dark when they arrive. Most of the village is lit by Continual Light torches that give off no heat, but a bonfire is burning at the temple, and it warms the party as they eat and drink. Vaallinen tells the party more about the problem: the sacred hot springs on Vetta were attacked about 10 months ago by a pirate – a Skaer exile – named Urgall the Black. The island of Vetta is protected by Kaikkea, and those who steal from it or dishonor the sacred springs can supposedly never leave. However, Urgall attacked anyway, perhaps aided or encouraged by the demonic fiend he bound himself to for power. Only one person – Tulvak, the ferry captain – escaped from the island alive. Since then, nine Skaer warriors, and four Tollender mercenaries, have sailed into the mists, and not returned.

After dinner, the party talks amongst themselves for a bit, and then speaks with Tulvak. He tells of the attack – pirates with flaming swords, lead by the captain with fire magic who blasted the entire long house where Tulvak was staying with the pilgrims. The only reason he survived was that he was outside relieving himself. Tulvak also tells them of a hidden cove, in the north, where they can land, and also that the temple complex is connected by lava tubes, which provide connections between the various hot springs.

Part 3: Vetta

The next morning – Dec 22 – the party is blessed by Kaikkea at dawn, and then leaves for Vetta, flying Vindristjarna over the mist barrier, before hiding it with hallucinatory terrain and proceeding to the cove on the north side of the island, beaching their folding boat on a narrow black sand beach surrounded by cliffs. At the top of the cliff, Seeker sits down to look at rocks for a moment, and notices that the lava on the top of the cliff is much older than the lava forming the sand beach at the base of the cliff, inferring that a newer lava flow must pass under the cliffs.

Thinking about the lava tubes, Seeker decides to search the base of the cliff, using Kenzo’s cloak of the manta ray, while Kenzo and Wellby scout the caldera and Delwath keeps watch. Although the water is freezing, Seeker (with the aid of Delwath warming his clothes to keep him from being exhausted with cold) finds an entrance to a flooded lava tube, maybe 10 feet below water. Meanwhile, Kenzo and Wellby see the layout of the temple complex clearly, and observe a large vulture-like demon flying around in circles, keeping watch on the whole area. Kenzo jumps 500 feet down to the caldera floor to further scout the priest’s quarters, hearing the raving mutterings of Urgall, the pirate captain.

The party decides to attempt to enter via the lava tube Seeker found. The first few hundred feet are underwater, a challenge easily surmounted with quick swimmers, the cloak of the manta ray, and a potion of water breathing. More difficult is the collapsed roof a thousand feet further in, forming a 20-foot section blocked by rubble. A mouse scout summoned by Wellby dies after crawling though, but the party proceeds anyway, using a potion of hill giant strength to allow Seeker to be strong and clear the boulders over the course of an hour.

Moving forward in the lava tube, through the poisonous water which poisons Seeker and Wellby, the party finds a trapdoor leading to what was once Jorma’s quarters (the priest of the waters). Urgall the Black now dwells here, mostly undead and brooding obsessively over his treasure. The party surprises him in his obsession, managing to get the jump on him and do a considerable amount of damage (especially with Seeker’s holy water launched with the catapult spell) before he can react. Once he finds his footing, he manages to infect Wellby briefly with his madness of greed, forcing him to chase after illusory gold, but is quickly dispatched by the party.

Returning to the tunnels, the party finds there way to the heart of the complex, the sacred waters of Kaikkea, where a massive demon sits, corrupting the sacred pool. An epic battle ensues: the demon flings water, poison, and blinding acidic spray while attempting to grapple and drag people with its tentacles and gnaw at them with its vicious teeth. Kenzo – immune to poison – locks down the monster, keeping it frightened and forcing it to consume his tentacles to resist Kenzo’s frightening strike. Seeker gets the worst of it, caught by acid and bile and poison, until falling unconscious in the poisonous waters, slipping below the water. But in the end the party prevails, and the demon is destroyed, and the waters run clear.

The next day, after a much needed rest, the party explores. They quickly dispatch the remaining zombies and other undead (the demons apparently being forced back to the Abyss with their master), return the various looted treasures of the sacred springs to their proper places, and tend to the bodies of the dead. Hoping to find out more about what happened, the party also uses the mirror to look at Urgall’s Helm Vision. Finally, during the day they find and search the Flaming Tempest, Urgall’s ship, finding trade goods, some gold, and a ciphered scroll.

The next dawn, Dec 24th, the party returns to the sacred waters and places the scepter in the water to soak for 24 hours. Over the next day, everyone keeps watch, unable to sleep, as the scepter soaks. In is tense and difficult, as the scepter seems to gather visions of its power around it, and the party is on edge as the sun rises at dawn. At this moment, Delwath uses his sword to create a magic circle, in case a devil emerges from the scepter. Kenzo draws up his staff, the power of the deep, untamed ocean, the power of Kaikkea flowing with him, and strikes the scepter, shattering it. As he does, an evil wind blows, blocked by the magic circle, and a faint howl can be heard as the tattered remains of the soul of the devil bound to this thing fade out of existence.

The scepter destroyed, Wellby walks into the morning sun, followed by the rest of the party.

We end the session on the morning of Dec 25th, as the party hails a ship from Pyhlla, and speaks with Vaallinen and Tulvak, telling them all that happened here.