Session 110: Tree House of Pain

General Summary

20th-21st Brussendar 836PD   20th Brussendar   “I Yield!” roars the wounded Bear King, the heavy breathing fey pulls Enessa’s arrows out, and labouredly stands before the surprised crowd of the Ball. His fellow huntsmen, down their weapons and the Unbroken follow suit. Raphael makes a very conscious effort to cast prestidigitation to help clear up after themselves.   Simeon follows suit in cleaning up their party’s mess, wasting no time with the pregnant pause in the challenge’s end, and rushes to the side of the dead Bear Folk. The Cleric uses his connection with the Moonweaver to revivify them, they wake back to life with a grizzly growl before quickly realising the fight is over. Simeon helps them to their feet, and they both go join with their respective groups as they all now stand before Queen Titania.   The Summer Queen confirms that satisfaction has been met between the parties, she dismisses them and rouses the other guests to resume their frivolities of the Ball. Raven and Orlando take a moment with the Bear King to lower any tension, reiterating that they are not their enemies and the need to face together the threat of Tharizdun in order to protect their way of life. The Bear King commends them on their skills in the fight, although he is stubborn in his ambition to one day lead the Wild Hunt, he can allow it to ‘hibernate’ for now.   Queen Titania invites the Unbroken to talk privately at her dais, protecting their discussion with an outward illusion. She commends Simeon for his quick intervention to revive the Bear Folk, and pointedly reminds Arthur, as he was at pains to confirm the conditions of the fight, that blood not death could hit the court floor.   She knows they have come to collect on her promise made at the God’s Council of Celestial, to provide the Summer half of the map to the Arch-Heart’s shackle of Tharizdun. But she reveals she does not have it, she has passed the burden of this knowledge to their top fey scholar, Xandria.   Queen Titania mentally tries to send to Xandria, but she receives no response. Concerned, Titania asks if the Unbroken would be able to investigate if something has happened to Xandria to stop a response, and will provide the resources, a silver coin with her signet as credentials and diamonds for resurrection, if the worst has come to Xandria.   With the Bear King’s challenge taking a physical toll on the Unbroken, the Summer Queen will allow them to stay and rest for the evening at their Court. She dismisses them to go and enjoy the Summer Ball, hoping it is not their last!   Raphael hangs back a moment to ask if her champion and his counter, the Summer Knight, is at the Ball. Titania confirms that they are at the Ball, but as the rest of the Unbroken enjoy themselves, Simeon in particular dancing like nobody is watching, Raphael ends up not finding the Summer Knight that night.   21st Brussendar   After resting in the luxury of the Summer Court, the Unbroken are teleported by Titania to Xandria’s Sanctum, housed around a mighty fey tree.   Arriving in the central trunk, Raven steps out to the outside platform and unknowingly triggers a Death Symbol of necromantic glyphs that erupt to cover the party, the force of the blast severely hitting Raven, whilst the others bear a lesser brunt.   With the loud crack of the magic trap springing, faint familiar skittering sounds begin to grow heavily, and soon corrupted fey Outsiders are crawling along the branches of the tree ready to swarm the Unbroken.   Raven uses his Circlet of the Moon to shine mirrored images of himself, and his fellow follower of the Moonweaver’s trickery, Simeon, summons a duplicate of himself out of his amulet. Arthur flies up, whilst Enessa, Ussi, Raphael and Orlando ready themselves at front of the group for the oncoming Outsider waves.   Over the course of several waves of Outsider swarms:   Once the outsiders robbed Raven of his mirrors, the wounded archer retreats with his magic rope trick, popping down from the interdimensional space to thin out the swarms, whilst he wears thin himself.   Arthur keeps himself in the air, although one outsider manages to climb the wall of the tree to launch themselves at him. He manages to shake it off, and the wise wizard keeps his distance, finding no qualms of using lethal force with these adversaries.   Enessa and Ussi hunt together as a pack, this has been her life ever since she left the Unbroken, felling Outsider after Outsider. The Lady of the Wild Hunt's arrows strike several from afar that Ussi can rush up to confirm the kill, and as the swarms grow closer, they both slice through the corrupted creatures with their sword bow and claws.   Simeon and his duplicate manage to outwit the Outsiders, with the creatures confusing each of them as an illusion and ignoring them once wasted an attack. In between his tricks, he saves a wounded Orlando from being felled by intercepting an Outsider with his shield and promptly squashing it.   Orlando stands his ground with Raphael against the oncoming tides, till the point where his guns temporarily jam with the spewing ichor of the felled creatures. Raphael hexes, slices and blasts across the swarms, getting the final Outsider with a well-aimed winter blast as it attempts to retreat.   With nothing else seemingly coming out of the woodwork, the party begin to scout the rest of this first level of the tree Sanctum. They find several dead eleven and fey bodies across the dorms and the large library. Anticipating further danger on the upper level, the group retreat along with Raven into his rope trick space, Simeon takes some time to say a couple of healing prayers, while Arthur links them up telepathically.   Ready, they move cautiously up the stairs, with no sign of any further bodies on the level. Arthur and Orlando steel themselves with discipline to move on from a planetarium and it’s grand clockwork orrery of the planes. Soon they find Xandria’s study, and see her body laying down on the floor, seemingly under the same enhanced sleep/dream spell that Jinarth was under when they found her in the Temple of the Dark Grasp.   Arthur successfully dispels the circling spell on her head, and Xandria wakes up. Thankful for her rescue, she shares what she can remember of a Tiefling, that the Unbroken recognise as Azeyeroth.   Surprised at the sudden trustfulness of Xandria, and the fact they hadn’t asked to see any credentials as Titania had forewarned she always would, Orlando focuses his keen eyes through his Guardian Goggles and see’s that they’ve encountered a painfully familiar trick.   For where “Xandria” stands, is in fact a mean looking Elder Black Hag….