Session 46 - Quelling the Storm

General Summary

We’re looking for the prisons in Vas and find The Cage, a giant stone rectangular prison that holds people whose crimes were not serious enough for execution but too serious to be let off with a warning. We discuss how we want to get in there, be sneaky, be talky, be smashy? Xanthos and Ionessa go to Phaedra to ask for lighter armor so we can sneak around. She asks about our meeting with Eurydia, Xanthos tells her about her plan to fight the gods, which Phaedra believes is quite a bad idea. Cas can’t handle the word cuirass. Phaedra can source the armor but she wants to know why she’s being asked to do that, Xanthos says his armor is too heavy and he probably doesn’t need it in Vas anyway. She doesn’t buy it, he admits we need to be sneakier but beats around the bush until Ionessa tells her it’s to free Cylla and Sabyllos who are Fytanke cultists. She agrees to provide us with the armor but won’t aid us personally in the jailbreak so she can remain a potential aid to Aristion.
We also tell her that Eurydia’s willing to kill Aristion, Phaedra will tell the elders this news. Telling everyone might escalate things, though it would make the lines clear on who can be trusted, and it would be better if she admitted it in public rather than whispered rumors. Kestor stakes out The Cage but doesn’t see much more than the basics, there are 4 watch towers and lots of guards, but on the plus side the storm might make an escape a little easier. Neo casts sending to Cylla, she tells us there’s a magical warden, four guards outside, big rope? Ionessa convinces a rat to go inside the prison and uses beast sense to see through its eyes in exchange for two loaves of bread and we have to take him out of the city.
The rat sneaks in and gives us a pretty good view of the whole place. We decide to sleep for the night so that Neo can prepare Stoneshape to allow us inside as quickly as possible. The following night, we hit a section of the wall with major image to make the guards think everything is okay there, followed by the stone shape to let us through. We meet an affable half-elf who’s happy to be going free and see a drow woman asleep in one of the cells that they never unlock but we don’t know enough about her to think we need to free her. Ionessa and Ophia sneak through to free Cylla while Kestor teleports Sabyllos out of his cell. The half-elf’s name is Thymoetes, he tells us the drow is a cultist of some kind worshiping some kind of dark being. Kestor intuits this might mean devils, demons, Iasponas, Fytanke, undead, any of the general baddies.
We decide to head back in to save her! She might know about the rot or something like that. Ionessa cruelly pelts her with stones to wake her up and asks if she wants to escape, she says yes in kind of an evil way, oops maybe, her name is Tyrra and she’s got glowing evil eyes. Thym is a smuggler and he has a hideout he offers to us. Inside there are things like paintings, rugs, furniture, essentially they’re smuggling in luxury items that aren’t necessities that Vas does not provide for free. Tyrra was heading to the merchant republics when she was imprisoned, she’s cagey about her affiliations but tells us her patron’s name is Mausolos, a philosopher, who gives Tyrra her powers and employment.
She asks us what we know of underground places, far from the surface. We don’t know much, no huge settlements nearby that we’re aware of. Her patron is very old, if we want to know of things that are old then we should speak with her. She’s gathered many students over time. There is a way underground to her in the Merchant Republics in a lake south of Iroa and Limpani on the way to Spor, the larger of the two lakes, the entrance is at the bottom. WILD! Neo uses his fast acting all-surface tadpole cleanser which kills 99.9% of all tadpoles, but she doesn’t seem infected. We offer everyone a ride out of Vas on the ship, everyone but Thym takes it. The Evlogimenos leaves with them in the middle of the night, which is a bit suspicious but at least they don’t risk being searched once the city realizes the prisoners have escaped. We scoot back to the inn and crash.
The next morning there is a knock at the door, two Vassic hoplites who are checking all the rooms for escaped prisoners. They find NOTHING! We go to the temple of Kairemos to negotiate with the god and seek guidance as to what we should do next. It’s a tough climb up the temple tower and Ionessa almost gets blown off but we make it, it’s filled with spurned offerings. We beseech Kairemos and tell her Eurydia’s terms, Kairemos says the dead are on Eurydia’s hands. Ionessa asks the god to express their sympathies for the dead and to apologize for those who have died in exchange for an end to all of this. Together with Eurydia, they can both apologize to the people for their feud getting people killed. If she repents, the sun will return.
Ionessa pushes hard for a true apology from Kairemos, for them to express genuine remorse for what has happened, but it doesn’t seem like the god is willing to do that. Eurydia must come to Kairemos’ temple for most of this to go forward anyways, and to start things off Kairemos’ voice booms out of Neo across the land. “Hear me, people of Vas. I am Kairemos. I am the sky above. I am the rain and the wind and the thunder. My wrath has been called upon your Vasili, Eurydia, for desecrating the temple of my child. I weep for those who have been lost and there is nothing I can offer to those left behind but my sorrow. But until Eurydia comes before my temple and repents her actions, the rain will not stop. If she is unwilling to come before me then I will have her struck down.” A lightning bolt strikes the top of the Darid Acropolis, burning stone tumbling all around to punctuate that edict.
Kairemos asks if we have the tools to kill Eurydia if she refuses to come to the temple. We’re worried about her shield, Aspaitos, and Kairemos promises that should we fight her, one of us need only raise our weapon aloft and they will grant it the power to rival Aspaitos. We head down and see a bunch of devout folk paying close attention to us, as well as hostile faces who are offended by what we have wrought. Everyone knows where we’re going. We climb up to the Acropolis, nobody’s getting in our way, we’re big god whisperers. Eurydia meets us, she has her legendary shield and a spear. She mad.
Ionessa tells her we gave her a chance to do this quietly and with dignity, now she has forced our hand and she is being publicly called out. We’re here now to save the people while she and Kairemos bicker, it is time for some civility, no more brutish problem solving. 26 PERSUASION CHECK EVEN WITH DISADVANTAGE! Eurydia goes off shouting about how the gods don’t care about mortal lives, Ionessa accuses her of avoiding taking responsibility for the role she played in starting all of this. She proposes settling this by Vassic tradition, her vs our best. If we win, she will concede to Kairemos, but if she wins we have to go atop the temple and send Kairemos her rejection.
Ionessa tries to get her to just repent already without all this barbaric fighting nonsense, but Eurydia tires of words, which Ionessa says makes her a bad leader. She’s not worthy! All of this, falling apart like this is on you! You and your pride and your ego! None of this would be happening if it wasn’t for Eurydia’s hubris, a leader should be willing to sacrifice her ego for her people. Ionessa actually manages to talk her down from the duel! She marches past us and over to the temple of Kairmos… After some time, there is quiet as the storm around Vas dies down.
The End.

Notes

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Report Date

16 Oct 2023