DoA|Chapter 13|Part 3: Into Cor'Athvaarn

General Summary

Reunions

Cor'Athvaarn, the eldritch conglomerate city of Urguzuth, the Eldest Evil, drifted southward toward the Svimmelhed Range , where the exalted were nearing the end of the exaltation process. In the heart of the city, those who had survived the battles of Mount Tratador and Castle von Lamalet wandered. They had all been separated from one another due to the ever-changing, confusing nature of the city.

Kegginston Cogglesworth, wandering through the ruins while avoiding the dyendeirii searching for him and other beings ripe for reaping. As he wandered, he noticed something familiar to him: Wolfhowl Tavern, jutted sideways into a rock. Upon entering, he was met with Adalius von Lamalet and Anca Bree-Lamalet.

A short way behind Kegginston though unbeknownst to the wayward bard, Bolkos Norvison was wandering the rubble of Cor'Athvaarn, gravely injured and struggling to move. He could hardly see through the bloodstained sweat dripping in his eyes, but through that blurred vision he made out a sign in the distance: "Balr--", it said. He didn't need to see the rest. He knew he was looking at the remains of the tavern he'd built in Minde: Balren's Ballad. He searched through the rubble, moving aside large wooden beams and crumbled brick walls to make his way down to the basement where his family had lived. While it was hardly intact, he searched through what he could find in a desperate hope of finding something—anything—that would have held sentimental value to his late son. Unfortunately, he found no such thing. As he pulled himself out of the rubble, dejected, he noticed Kegginston entering Wolfhowl Tavern in the distance and began making his way over to his fellow Chaos Legion member.

Lana Vahnce, who had little to no trouble slipping through the labyrinthe city, noticed something glinting in the rubble ahead of her. Drawn as always toward shiny things that were likely to hold significant value, she made her way toward the object and discovered it to be Fathom's Edge, the blade that had been bound to her friend Erakhan. She knew the moment she saw the blade that the only way it could be separated from him was in the event of his death. After solemnly lifting her friend's weapon from the rock, she glanced around to see, off in the distance, a familiar structure atop a mountain of ruin: Medrekk's home, where she had first met Wetzel, Cafley, and Medrekk. Lana made her way up the rubble and, therein, found Wetzel accompanied by Triq's iron squirrel... but no Triq. They had only a moment of peace before the lumbering form of Charlie appeared, eager to great his brother. But when Charlie noticed that Triq was not around, he began asking about her. Wetzel couldn't do much to explain to the golem what had happened, but Charlie seemed to understand. He'd lost a parent before, after all.

Varga, having come out of his own battle mostly unscathed, had made short work of many kaorti on his single-minded journey through Cor'Athvaarn. The noble brimstone-descended aristocrat had one goal in mind: find his stuff. He believed he'd found the bulk of Caldtown itself, but it took much longer to find something that was explicitly his. Then he saw it: Whisperhood, the tavern of Joggor's Mongrels. He made his way inside and, annoyed to find he wasn't alone, heard the sounds of guzzling and gulping. After scanning the room for a moment, he saw a little fairy chugging away a mug of magically bottomless ale... and he seemed to be trying to drink it all. It was Llassar.

The Mongrels

Llassar was trying—and failing—to find out how many sips it took to get to the bottom of an ale mug. He offered Varga the mug with his small fairy hands, his belly engorged. Varga waved the mug away as a shadow fell across him and the small fairy on the tavern counter. The enormous, bulky form of Hrokar stepped into the tavern and snagged the mug of ale from Llassar, then began to pour the endless liquid down his throat, hardly bothering to swallow. Even Hrokar failed to empty the mug, but soon they were graced with the presence of a haggard Udel and Brel "Bamdor Jr." Nyumar III, though they were of little help in draining the mug as well. Eventually Trudy arrived and though she wasn't normally one to drink, she did sip at the ale, a show of acceptance for the state of things. Sure, they'd all one their battles, but the toll had clearly been great, and it didn't yet feel like a true victory. That pillar of brilliant moonlight in the south, which they were drifting closer toward, had been there for several hours now and had been unchanged since it had appeared. In her own studies of the process of the Exaltation, Gertrude had read nothing about this pillar of moonlight, and so could not even say whether it was good or bad. It did inspire hope regardless, and that was all they could cling to in those moments.

Chaos Legion

Little remained of the original Chaos Legion. Bolkos, Kegginston, Anca, and Adalius stood in Wolfhowl Tavern. The large stone statue of Valadreth Rotweaver, magically carved by Triq after the man's final death (which had seen him turn to tar, though the nature of the substance had been unknown at that time) had crashed through the roof of the tavern, though thankfully left the small party of old friends unscathed. They stood in silence, Bolkos's pained breathing the only sound they could hear over the din of Cor'Athvaarn. Kegginston and Anca offered Bolkos a bit of healing, though they were largely tapped from the past battles and didn't have a lot to offer in his moment of need. The man was on death's door both physically and mentally, seeming entirely to have drifted elsewhere in his mind. So the deafening silence remained.

Travelers

It was only Charlie, Wetzel, and Lana in the homestead of Medrekk. The overwhelming weight of what they had lost sagged their shoulders. Whatever dwindling hope remained in them was dashed as the sound of gargling groans outside the cottage walls echoed in their ears. Weary, but not without some fight still in them, the group gathered their weapons and drew in deep breaths, bracing themselves as infested grozavar denizens slammed into the doors of the cottage, others crawling through the window. This, it seemed, was their final stand.

Found

Brilliant arcs of moonlight shot down from the sky, illuminating vast swaths of Cor'Athvaarn as the exalted from the Crescent Temple slammed into the rubble around their companions and friends. Norran, Sidra, and Selm rushed at the mortii while Caiomhe sniped them through the cottage windows. Elsewhere, mortii were attack Wolfhowl Tavern and Whisperhood, where other members of the exalted crew were arriving. Gerty obliterated the last of the Mortii around the Mongrels while Bheldrak flew down to aid Chaos Legion's members with the aid of Salvor.

With the mortii assailants slain and the exalted seven present, it seemed that there really was hope anew. As the old friends each greeted one another, visages appeared before them of those they had lost. Girda, Triquiis, Erakhan... and they spoke in their own voices. The voices gave them an offer: if they were to lay down their armaments, surrendering them to the city, Urguzuth would allow them to live out the rest of their realities days in isolation, killing them last. He expressed that he knew there was a chance of their victory that day, and that he was willing to make a compromise in exchange for the certainty of success—he would give them a time of peace before their absorption. As soon as Bheldrak refused, however, it was rescinded to all. Urguzuth told them to come and finish the fight, then, if that was what they truly desired. Rubble began to shift and form a staircase, spiraling upward to the top of Cor'Athvaarn, where Castle von Lamalet was suspended. After receiving blessings and farewells from their companions, each of the exalted ascended the makeshift staircases and convened on the bridge, where they saw a vast, endless hoard of mortii and dyendeirii waiting for them.

Castle Approach

With moonlit armaments aglow, the seven rushed into the fray, battering those in their way into oblivion. Any who met their deaths at the hands of their weapons were reduced to glowing ash that evaporated in an instant, leaving nothing behind. Even the dyendeirii, previously so horrifying, stood no chance against them in their new forms. Even if they had, Sidra brought forth a powerful, violent storm of ice that stopped the majority of the hoard in their tracks, freezing them in place so that they could easily be shattered and destroyed by strong gusts of winds... or blows from a particular warrior's maul.

Once those standing in their way had been cleared, the party had nothing barring them from Castle von Lamalet. As they drew nearer to it, the great oak and iron doors of the entryway were pulled inward on their own, revealing rays of brilliant golden sunlight, and the sounds twittering birds... things most of them had not seen, felt, or heard in many years. Once they had stepped through the doorway, they found themselves not in a castle, but in a vast, endless meadow of tall green grass, gentle winds, and warm sunlgiht. The rolling hills had no distinguishing features among them save a large, purple bonsai tree at the center and multicolored flowers scattered throughout the fields.

Urguzuth

Beneath the strange tree stood a man in white robes, a magical sword sheathed at his side, which he drew as he turned to face them. With each movement of the blade, rifts crackled around its edges. Urguzuth, wearing the guise of a platinum-haired elven man, leveled Realmrend at the exalted. Three partially-translucent copies of him appeared, mirroring his movements in confusing patterns while striding toward Norran.

Too Easy

Urguzuth, it seemed, had been right to believe that he would fail in his endeavor in this second attempt at obliterating their reality. It only a took a few swings of Gerty's axe and a pair of well-aimed arrows from Caiomhe to rend through the disguise of the eldest evil. However, just as it seemed the battle would be over before it had truly begun, Urguzuth snapped his fingers, vanishing across the field as time slowed around him, giving him time to recover. To make matters worse, Rifts were appearing throughout the field, sucking people into various realities, separated from the battle and placed into other harrowing positions, subjected to horrible monsters, mechanations, and even gunfire. The scales had already tipped drastically against the exalted, and things were about to get even worse.

Suryphia, the Mad Sister

Descending from the sky with a web that disappeared into the clouds far above them was Suryphia, the Mad Sister, in her malformed, half-incubated body. Still partially resembling Cafley Youngshout, who had served as her host during her regrowth, the spider-like being covered in endlessly flowing blood snatched Caiomhe from the battlefield, restraining her to give her brother more time to recover and get to Norran so that he might stand a chance against preventing the Rite of the New Moon. Suryphia, though, was not long for the world as she found herself beaten to pulp quickly before set ablaze by moonlight from Selm's spear. Any remnants of her were obliterated by Bheldrak's radiant flames, leaving only a few skittering spiders behind.

Shed This Mortal Coil...

At last, the dyendeirii Urguzuth had called to aid him were slain and it was only the exalted and the eldest evil left. While Urguzuth did succeed in nearly killing many of them, their resilience and perseverance kept getting them back to their feet until the last of Urguzuth's skin was shed, revealing a black mist that quickly dissipated, along with the mirage of the meadow. This mirage faded to reveal that they had moved from the Castle above the city to a collection of loosely floating islands below it, which began splitting apart and separating, causing increasing gaps to form between the exalted.

The End is Here

Rifts opened.

The first saw an enormous, clawed hand dripping with ink burst through. A second emerged from a separate rift elsewhere on the battlefield. Finally, through a third and finally rift, the tremendous, true form of Urguzuth emerged. His face split open, causing writhing, slime-coated tentacles to spill out. Long, gnarled horns jutted outward from the back of his head, as if they had been shoved into his skull ages ago rather than growing naturally. A screech that was heard both in the ears of the party and in their minds echoes across the city. Even the unexalted, high above them, felt the vibrations that caused blood to trickle from their eyes and noses. The true form of Urguzuth had been revealed.

Norran began preparing the Rite of the New Moon.

Session Meta

Rewards Granted

Fathom's Edge, retrieved by Lana from rubble in Cor'Athvaarn.

Character(s) interacted with

Suryphia, the Mad Sister (Defeated)

Urguzuth, the Eldest Evil (Phase 1 Defeated)

Report Date

16 Dec 2023

Primary Location

City of Cor'Athvaarn

Secondary Location

Degera

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