Session Seven: Mummy on the Orient Express

We see a long pathway leading up to a mountain pass. We head up the pass and when we get to the top, there are 30 foot high doors that have statues of dwarves on the front of them. A small door opens to the left and a dwarf appears and asks who we are. Tempest and Leland talk him into letting us all into the hold.
 
We get escorted by a dwarf who helps us avoid traps on the way. We ask him about cold iron forge masters, and he says that hasn't been done in a long time. We may be able to find forgers in The Center that may have experimented. But the pioneer of cold iron forging, Duran has been long dead.
 
We head to The Center and see a huge forge in the middle. While Tempest and Leland argue, Faenore grabs Lyra and sneaks away with her to a nearby tavern.
 
Leland and Tempest want to try and hunt down the leader of this hold to talk to about the fold iron forge. They walk away and see a very short dwarf taking piss into the lava below. He's the forge master for this forge. He's the only one who knows how to use this forge.
 
Leland asks him what the easiest way to Forgestone is. He tells them to avoid the Al-Zephyre Dunes because it's a dessert and they would surely die. They learn that this forge master has studied Duran's work about cold iron forging, but cold iron is really hard to find as it's deep in the ground where drow live.
 
He says if we bring him cold iron, he can try to forge it for us.
 
Meanwhile, in the tavern, Faenore and Lyra charm the patrons there. They make friends with the chair master of this place as well as the shoulder pad guy.
 
A guy runs into the tavern that the caves are caving in. Leland and Tempest and Callun get the same message and we all run towards the mines. We learn the Tempest and Leland know of someone else that might be able to help us with the cold iron issue.
 
We run towards the cave and we learn that the cave fell into the water and there are dwarves drowning. Tempest uses shape water to create 5ft size ice cubes for the dwarves to hold onto so they can paddle themselves out.
 
Leland assists by throwing in a rope and helping pull people out as well. Faenore helps him when he starts to fail terribly, and he believes he did it on his own.
 
One dwarf sinks and starts to drown and Tempest dives down and forms an air bubble around his head and saves him. This dwarf was a young dwarf who brings us all to his father as a thank you for saving his life. His father's name is Maudrin. Maudrin tells Tempest that in his kingdom, Tempest is a dwarf and offers him one of his 3 pieces of armor/weapons. since Tempest doesn't wear armor, Maudrin offers him the cape off of his back. It holds the symbol of his house, and anyone who sees this will know Maurdrin owes him a favor for saving his son. (It's a cloak of protection)
 
Tempest asks Maudrin about cold iron, and he says the best he can do is grant him an audience with Pyotr. Tempest asks if he knows of a safe way to get to Forgestone from here. Faenore suggests that we could travel down the coast in a boat south and then cut through the mountains.
 
Maudrin doesn't have a boat, but he puts us in touch with a man named Morpheus. We learn that Morpheus is the only known person who can go through the rift and back. Once he is aback Maudrin will set up a meeting with us. We hang out for a couple of weeks waiting for Morpheus to arrive back.
 
When Morpheus gets back, we learn that his boat was destroyed when he was coming back through the rift. We learn the rift is a pathway to the Abyss.
 
We learn that a long time ago he was pursuing someone named Avalora when he was turned to dust by the rift. However, he gained his consciousness and somehow survived. We also learn that Arud is his mother. He tells us he used to be part of the guard with his best friend Franz in New Ver Deaux. While pursuing Avalora, they got to the rift and when he touched it, he turned to ash, but he has no idea how he lived.
 
He actually saw Franz again when he chartered a boat across the way with him, but he held his identity from him, as he is not the man he used to be.
 
While travelling with him, their boat crashed, and he thinks Franz may have died.
 
Morpheus says if we can get him a ship, he will take us. We learn we could possibly trade with a high elf own a few days away for some wood.
 
They introduced us to a high elf that works in the vaults. His name is Kainon. He looks quite troubled. He's just upset about the smell.
 
He says he could garner a trade for wood for 50 garnet and 25 diamonds. Kainon sends his contingency to pick them up. We go back to Maudrin and we tell him the cost of the wood, and Maudrin is shocked because he meant 50 thousand and 25 thousand diamonds. He's quite upset, but agrees to cover the cost for us.
 
This will cover for 2 boats. After a couple of weeks the boat is built. However, Morpheus detects that the mast has an issue and won't be able to support the sails. Tempest is able to figure out the issue and ix it by redistributing the ropes around the ship.
 
Seven dwarves volunteer to go with us to sail away. A human lady approaches us and asks if she can take a ride on our ship with us. Lyra tries to ask some questions, and the lady ignores them. Tempest allows her to travel with us for 25GP.
 
We head out and after about a day of travel, we run into a fellow named Jeremy . He was a really depressed guy who had some kind of death wish. He joined us on the boat, but kind of disappeared after a day or so. After some time, we learn that people are starting to disappear. People think people are just getting sick and committing suicide.
 
Darren the dragonborn after Jeremy has disappeared. Faenore investigates and finds a weird tiefling fellow that has a tin foil hat and sage smudging people with it. He thinks that the suicides are actually sacrifices to demons. The tiefling noticed that both people that disappeared were both sick. There was a small girl on board who had the sniffles. The tiefling thinks she could be next.
 
That night the little girl is heard screaming. We go check it out and she is standing against a wall screaming. She says she sees someone covered in bandages with red eyes coming for her. He's apparently only a few feet away, but we don't see anything.
 
Tempest goes to check out Morpheus's room and see Morpheus lieing there. He sits up. His eyes are blue. Not red, and he's upset that he's being woken up. Tempest kind of insinuates that Morpheus is possessed by a demon. Morpheus declines this accusation.
 
Meanwhile. The little girl says she sees the guy in bandages very close to her. Lyra picks her up and tries to take her away from the area. Tempest casts Sanctuary on the little girl to make her feel safe.
 
When he does this. This invisible monster disappears for the little girl and starts heading towards Leland.
 
Leland notices that this guy has military garb underneath his bandages. It is getting closer and closer to him. Leland casts faerie fire on it so we can all see an outline. The tiefling that was smudging with sage runs towards it to try and help. The mummy reaches out and touches him and he falls over dead.
 
Meanwhile, Faenore discovers a coffin with a mummy in it. He stabs it with a crit to see if this does anything. It does appear to cause it to stumble a bit.
 
At this time, Callun runs over to grab the mummy's body to throw it into the ocean. Tempest runs into him and as Callun throws him over board, Tempest shatters the mummy's body. The body starts to sink and the invisible mummy is now only 6 feet away from Leland. As it gets 4ft away Lyra tries to convince it that it is attacking the wrong person. This works, but now it is targeting Lyra. Lyra sees that it is wearing military clothing. She tries to pretend that she is a commander and commands it to stop, but this does not work.
 
Faenore casts Protection on Lyra and this brings the mummy's attention to Faenore. Faenore runs to the sarcophagus. There are some engravings on it that seem to indicate it has something to do with New Ver Deaux.
 
Tempest leaps into the water to try and destroy the body. Leland tells the spirit that it can stop attacking as it's duty has been fulfilled. This works successfully. The mummy salutes and disappears. It's body also disappears, and this makes Tempest believe he was the one who killed it. They argue about it, and it's funny.
 
This is where we end. 2 days into the trip. Who the heck brought this thing on board, and why? Next time maybe we'll find out.