Unicorn (DM McEnroe): 8/26/18

2nd of Eleasis
Lyra | Karash | Xion | Fiego | Tully By Mark Kung

Xion, Lyra, and Karash were sent on a mission by Glenin to help investigate thefts of equipment from the kobold contractors working to repair the gaping chasm in the middle of Neverwinter. Tully, needing an excuse to get out of Waterdeep, pulled Fiego along as cover and they both joined the mission.   After meeting with Jerek, the foreman, they were directed down into the tunnels toward the site of the stolen equipment, led by a pair of Neverwinter Guards. Jerek had suspicions that a rival company might have been sabotaging their operations for having gotten the contract to repair The Chasm from Lord Neverember.   The group discovered a pile of barrels that looked suspiciously like explosives. They tried to defuse the barrels, but ended up setting them off, trapping them in the collapsed tunnels a hundred feet below the surface. The explosion opened up another set of tunnels below their feet that the guards knew nothing about.   Left with no other escape route, the group enters the darkness.   And dark it was. They soon discovered that they were in an entire subterranean compound of some sort, with signs that it had been cleared in haste and buried. The oppressive darkness seemed to press in on the light of their torches.   Questing for a way out, the group found themselves on the trail of some dwarves, quite probably saboteurs from the rival company out to discredit the kobold crew. When confronted by the group, the dwarves surrendered to the guards, but that was when the group began to realize that they were being stalked by something in the darkness, something that seemed to especially affect Tully. They also realized that even their keen elvish and orcish eyes could no longer pierce the shadows of the cave. Even magical moonlight summoned by Lyra's druidic magic was snuffed before she reinforced it with her will. One of the dwarves made a run for it and met a grisly end in the shadows.   When the creature finally showed itself, a skeletal being composed of darkness, it was held at bay for a moment by Lyra's moonbeam, and the group decided to retreat. Keeping the moonbeam defensively behind them, they hurried along and found themselves in the remains of a magical laboratory. The sound of possible rescuers digging in from above convinced them to make a stand, and they posted torches around the room to hold back the dark. some investigation uncovered the evidence that this had been a secret (probably illegal) factory of magical artifacts. The most powerful of these artifacts, a magical sword, was most probably the doom of the entire laboratory, breaking free and now in the hands of the shadow being. The artificers had quickly cleared the lab and then buried it to keep whatever they had unleashed from escaping.   No sooner had they made this discovery than that very creature attacked them. It moved with unnatural speed, slashing with its dark greatsword and sending fear racing through the group's veins with its dread gaze. Xion engaged the fiend in hand to hand combat and acquitted himself well though he took blow after blow from its shadowy blade. Tully attacked it with spells of frost and darkness but to little avail. Lyra kept Xion on his feet with spells of healing. Fiego summoned motes of green light, like leaves gently falling from midair, to highlight the creature before flinging daggers of silvery moonlight at it. Karash and Fidorash harried the creature with magical arrows and slashing teeth.   Every time the group seemed to harm the creature it retreated into the shadows and was healed by them. It seemed the shadow being was too strong for the group to defeat, but luckily the contractors broke into the tunnel from above and rescued them. They then proceeded to bury the laboratory again, in an effort to seal in the shadow creature.