A Shattered World Reunited

Fjalar the Otherwordly, a dragon that once roamed the world long before the Tear, got trapped when Anteus Esteban ripped Aerion from its former plane. After losing all the land he once ruled upon in his rage he challenged Anteus to a fight on top of the Scorched Summit, which later got the name from this very event. The battle was long but in the end, Fjalar had to flee to save his own life. With broken bones and pride, he was hiding out for hundreds of years, healing, scheming, before hearing from a goddess who he might be able to use to his advantage to work towards the same goal - reuniting Aerion with his original plane.
After showing himself to Aala-Leigh Chiron and explaining to her what Aerion really is, Aala is outraged. It is just a mere piece of a way larger puzzle, that fell under the table one day to be forgotten, or more likely was hidden there by Anteus Esteban for his safety. Seeing this act as selfish and ignorant towards the rest of the plane, Aala strives towards reuniting it with its origin and making the world whole again. Blind to the dangers, like total life's extinction during the process, she is still holding onto her belief that this is the only right thing to do and does everything to work towards this goal.
Her religion starts gaining more followers. In the beginning, most of them are just following the core believes of Aala, the striving for freedom, the right to live and never losing hope, but with time more and more people are seeing the deeper intentions behind her actions. This 'inner circle' of 'enlightened ones' starts to act more like a cult operating inside the religion, thinking of themselves as superior compared to other believers. They want to break out of this prison called Aerion and explore the "real world" outside, escaping its warden Anteus Esteban and be free for the first time. Many followers are elves and half-elves, who either broke free from the chains of the Sanguine Order or never felt completely at home in this world (since their capital is located in a desert where they were forced into during the the War between Ederaa and Cirabaen).

Act I

The campaign will start the party in the small town of Cynnes, which is completely cut off from the (to the player unknown) outside world. It is a nice town in the small valley of Eversummer. Every once in the while new people come out of the Sleeping Forest, having lost their memories of what lies behind them, but being welcomed with open arms inside the community.
The players will have a way to start the campaign without any knowledge of the world (no "learning" required) but only this small and nice "safe space" in the beginning, doing some smaller side quests while getting to know each other and their characters, etc.
At some point, things will start to change. The small river flowing down the mountainside (which is infused by the Azuremist, unknown to the inhabitants of the town) starts to run dry, the 'Mana Tree', a huge tree with blue leaves which is causing the summer to stick around, starts to wilt. With the fall of its first leaves, the temperatures also start to drop for the first time in the history of Cynnes. The party will be sent out by the mayor of Cynnes to see what is wrong with the river, while the town is starting to prepare for their first-ever winter.
The cause of the drought is the relocation of Isidar, the Avalanche, who provided water for the Mana Tree of Eversummer. With the retreat of the dragon to the Frozen Lake (for the simple reason that he outgrew his old hoard) the excessive amount of ice that he produced inside of Hailstone Peak started to melt for one last time. The party will be able to find traces of the Dragon inside the now empty caves and has several way from here to enter the world, either through the Azuremist or the Frozen Lake into Ederaa.
The party can now either focus on trying to get help from the outside world, relocating the people of Cynnes, finding another way of reviving the Mana Tree, or simply exploring the whole new world.

Act II

Inside the Voidwake a large eruption of void and arcane magic taints the land. After not being able to control the problem, the Elderin are joining forces with the Tainted, but even then the damage is concerning. To contain the problem even further the elves from Daladrin are asked for help. With their highly gifted arcane casters everything seems under control, until a second eruption happens, this time near the Garden of Bones. Arcane geysers are spewing raw magic into the atmosphere, forming clouds which are in return birthing uncontrolled Arcane Storms. In later stages, random magic zones start appearing that alter how magic is working and functioning, and cursed intelligent magic items are born. Creatures, like for example intelligent mud monsters, raise from puddles of the storm to attack passersby and drag them into the seemingly endless void.
This chapter should form around the party trying to help out in a way that suits them. They could either ask Anteus Esteban for help or meet him one way or the other. Maybe they even find his son and figure out his secret (that he is indeed the son of Anteus and able to cast the most powerful spells, but not without the help of the party). They will interact with the Tainted and meet the Elderin for the first time. Depending on where the party is located when the act starts, the story can unfurl differently and maybe even Aala's followers will be the first to inform the party what is going on and blame Anteus and The Tear for the events.

Outline

• In the beginning the party will learn the system and about the world in the safe environment of Cynnes and Eversummer, without the need of any prior knowledge of Aerion or its history and places.
• After solving the dilemma of Act I one way or another (or ignoring it completely) they will sooner or later get in contact with a group of elves - either trying to escape the Sanguine Order in Ederaa or inside the Azuremist, depending which way the party went in Act I. This group will introduce them to Aala as a deity.
• FILLER
• In the 2nd to last act the world sky shatters as the plane becomes unstable (similar effect basically as the Shadowlands sky) and you can see into the void. This is the height of the danger event clock before the big end, the last chapter before curtain call. Magic goes crazy: Arcane rains transform things they tough into sentient beings, good or bad (puddles try to drag you into a cold wet grave, suddenly sentient rock who panic cause they don't want to lose their intellect again and "die" etc...)

Goals

• Offer the players a lot of space to explore the world with a system that makes exploring fun again.
• It should become a moral dilemma for the players, since Aala's intentions are not bad to the core, but also bring a high risk with them.
• The party will need to infiltrate the cult to gather information during which they will learn about all the believes and dangers.
• A danger-event clock is running behind the scenes of the campaign, having events triggered every X days/weeks/months. Parts of the pocket dimension suffer from instability. Ambush monsters/ranged/packs with special senses, resistances, regeneration due to the increasing chaos.
• Players need to decide if they want to stop Aala and the cult or maybe even help them find a way to make the world mending possible. Some of the solutions should also benefit the villain (no matter if it is Aala or Anteus for the party depending on their decision) or be normally considered dishonorable actions.
• The plot will have multiple ending possibilities and room for DM additions and changes if they want to do it.

Ideas

• Aala could find out about Emazz Amazz and try to use him to reunite the pocket dimension with its origin.

Plot type

Main Plot Overview