Astral

Discovery, Exploration

The Goliaths of The Outlands welcome The Bonner Boys and send them on a quest into the astral plane.

Braes isn’t looking too good as The Bonner Boys flies toward the Goliath settlement. Sanguine really did a number on him and he seems less jovial than normal. Indigo tries to ease his spirits, but he seems intent on feeling down for a while. A hawk brings letters for the party. The first is from Abilene Broadbent. She declines the party’s recommendation letter. It appears public opinion for the group has fallen in their absence since the death of Mirian. Indigo personally puts his Hero of Bonner badge and mails it back to the capital. The second letter is addressed to Lyr by his brother Farney in Dwarvish. It says that his life is on the line, and if Lyr wants to save him he must inform on the party and find a way to tear them apart. After being prodded by Danger, Lyr tells the party this. They don’t seem all that concerned about it once he tells them the truth.   Arrows fly past Braes. All over the snow below, Goliaths move around and throw things at the Dragon. They appear to be having a great time. Several Goliaths get a rope around Braes’s leg to pull him down, but they don’t have the strength. Braes lifts himself slightly higher, sending them flying, and lands hard with fire breath at the ready. The Goliaths cheer and start yelling at each other about points.   A Goliath nicknamed Clanleader greets the party and explains how their culture works. They have a Scorebook that gives points for just about anything. There are more points available for tasks that aid the clan, but the most are awarded for individual challenges. On the side of a mountain, they have listed the Leader Board. Whoever has the most points is made Clanleader, which means he has the most points. The party tries to wrap their heads around the system, speaking with Clanleader and Scorekeeper as well, when they enter the Goliath town square. In the center lies the Prime Berserker Axe, the one that didn’t come from an aborted future. Danger feels drawn to it, so they get out of their asap.   The party instead heads to the ground where The Last Outpost used to stand. It smells of death and carries a sense of despair. Clanleader tells them that one night a man in fancy dress appeared in the moonlight and took it away, making it vanish, which is too bad since he considered climbing the tower to be one of his favorite challenges and now nobody can do it. If anybody left in the village could tell them anything about this, it would be Spirit Guide.   They go to Spirit Guide’s hut, which smells of cookies and marijuana. Spirit Guide, a much older Goliath and akin to a witch doctor, lets the party inside. Clanleader and Scorekeeper leave them to their business. When Danger offers her some of his Elf Weed from way back in Chapter One, she squeals in delight. It turns out she can make a special tea with that so one could travel through the Astral Plane. In that state, you can see the entire multiverse. The party asks if that includes the Shadowfell, and she says yes.   Spirit Guide gives the party specific directions on traveling to the Shadowfell. They’ll need to enter the proper pool to take them into the Ethereal Plane, and from there they must go through the proper curtain to arrive in the destination. She advises them to be wary of psychic winds, plus all psychic effects they would feel if they traveled physically will be amplified in this state, and in an emergency, they need only pull on their silver cords to travel back to their bodies, however, if those cords are cut they will die. Her last warning is for the party to stay in the Inner Planes, for in the Outer Planes are Gods and even she can’t save them there.   In their Astral Forms, where Daryl is notably a Halfling once more, the party successfully gets to the Ethereal Plane, only to be blown asunder by a psychic wind. Danger winds up in the Elemental Plane of Air where Indigo follows to save him. Lyr winds up in the dark, where something shrieks and chases him. It’s Daryl however, who finds himself high in the sky of the Shadowfell. He sees the Last Outpost in the distance, with a massive maze in construction around it. But more importantly, he sees someone traveling the path below him toward the tower. They carry a warm lantern, drawing in the undead. Daryl moves closer and sees a skeleton knock the lantern to the ground. The hooded figure then draws a rapier and kills the skeleton with a single blow. It then pulls out a Driftglobe and commands it to light with a single word.   “Dawn.”   Daryl doesn’t quite know why, but he calls out to that globe.   “Midday.”   And it stops to hover in midair. The figure turns round toward it. Mirian. A revenant. But his eyes betray an intelligence the others did not have at Vaerand.   Before Daryl can make anything of this, Lyr flies out from underground and crashes into him. They fall upward into the sky, where they are joined by Danger and Indigo. Daryl tells them he saw Mirian, but they must focus on the current mission.   They fly over the maze and approach the tower. It appears Forrester has renamed it the Tower of the Moon. Around them, Shadar-Kai, elves of the Shadowfell, help construct the maze. Inside, a witch Shadar-Kai speaks about the date Ludomir is currently on. He’s out with her Celestial and Royal Majesty, Sarastra Aestruum, Queen of Night and Magic, Duchess of the Heavens, Countess of Thorn, Mistress of Air and Darkness, Lady of the Summer Palace. Even the party, save Lyr, know that name. Sarastra Aestruum is the Headmistress of Magiston, the Wizard University.   The party searches for more information on Forrester, but each winds up in a nightmare of staggering strength.   Lyr comes up to a set of metal bars. He’s in his group prison cell along with the other workers. One calls him over to the edge and has him help listen in on a conversation between guards. They say the King is dead, killed by Koster Mayhew. The worker tells him to send word to his brother. When he turns around Lyr is in his living room growing up. His brother as a child, clearly on the autism spectrum, asks him what a win-win scenario is. Lyr tells him there’s no such thing. His brother asks if a lose-lose scenario exists and before Lyr can say, “hell yes” a hammer is swung from the darkness to break through his skull like Gallagher and a watermelon. It’s his guard from the gulag, Slava Borti. Lyr runs after Slava, but the light flickers and she’s Danger, Daryl, and Indigo. They stand atop a tower, all looking past him at Slava. She has automatons on either side. Daryl asks what’s going on, but Indigo knows they’ve been betrayed. Danger says they never should have trusted Lyr and strikes him with his greatsword. Indigo strikes with shillelagh and Daryl follows with lightning breath. As Lyr lays dying he realizes he’s looking at a set of scales with both outcomes in miniature. They are balanced. His brother is with him and asks what they’re going to do.   Indigo steps foot into snow. A moonlit field. In a clearing, a circle by the light of the moon, three people await him. Kava, Samson, and Forrester all happy and healthy. Indigo takes a step. He’s on that ledge, overlooking his people taking an injured Meriele back to Morko. He takes another step. He’s in Bard’s Haven, listening to Aarden make plans to get stronger. He sets foot in the circle and the sky shifts with the moon staying in place until it covers the sun. Aarden appears behind Kava and kills her with an eldritch blast, giant green eyes glowing in the dark behind him. The others recoil in anguish from the eclipse, until Forrester rises into the air and transforms into the Moonlit King. He blasts both Indigo and Samson aside. A hand reaches down to help Indigo up. It’s Mirian. They stand in the haven battlefield, surrounded by people dying by acid breath from the Black Dragon. Mirian tells Indigo he doesn’t know where he would be without him. He takes off his mask, “I wouldn’t be scarred like this.” The battlefield turns into its Shadowfell counterpart. “Hell, I’d probably still be alive.” The Moonlit King blasts Mirian with moonlight. The Shadows retreat as Indigo steps back alongside Danger and Daryl. “But your demons will come for us all.” He turns around, they’re in Citadel Keep, where Lawrence Aarden stands with the king’s crown adorning his head. A green mass moves by the windows and the roof starts crashing down. Indigo runs for the door. The others don’t make it. He crashes out the front door and finds all of Citadel engulfed in flame. Dragons fly over the burning city. When Indigo blinks he’s back in ash-covered Morko. Everything around him is dead.   Danger’s father calls him to his side. As Danger walks his father gets further and further away, really he’s just shrinking back to himself as a child. Echoes of jeering Orc children fill his ears. They call him a half-breed. Rank takes Danger outside his hall to show a Half-Orc has killed an Orc in battle, becoming a full-fledged Orc. Rank tells him he has the same chance, to become an Orc one day. When he does, he should strive to be the best of the Orcs and father a great family. A good Orc death is one where their family fights by their side. The worst Orc death—Rank is cut off. Danger looks his way, but Rank is frozen through. Ivory rears her head and whips her tail at Danger. He falls backward until he’s standing straight up. Before him, Merielle holds a knife to Franklin Aarden’s neck. He takes her hand and draws the knife across his own throat. Merielle vanishes, his body drops, Danger runs to catch him and finds himself holding Wang, his son. He hands Wang to Mesikammen and his people. They shift into bears with scary toothy grins. They attack Danger, so he fights back. First attack, Façade dies, Mirian dies. In the second attack, Fury dies. They fall beside future Daryl’s body. The Berserker steps out of the darkness and attacks Danger. The canticle of quell plays. Daryl and Indigo leave with their dragons. Danger falls, bleeding out. Rank’s comment finishes, “The worst Orc death is to die alone.” Danger lies on the ground dying just like that.   Daryl’s younger brother Bruce yells to him that it’s time for dinner. Daryl moves through his Halfling home as a Dragonborn. He passes by the odd painting or picture of the family where everyone is a Halfling except for himself. Daryl sits down for a usually chaotic berry family dinner. Then the entire house is engulfed in flame. His family burns like tissue paper. Across the inferno, Koster Mayhew enters and yells after Daryl, “I will be the greatest Dragonborn!” He runs at Daryl with his hammer and swings, only all Daryl feels is a gust of cold wind. Two dragons are frozen in time mid-fight, Braes and Ivory. The scene is from the Outlands War, and Snowhide has taken the berserker axe. Daryl hears her heartbeat, and it’s both quickening and deafening. Despite everything else being frozen, she swings her axe and attacks. Next, he’s at the Amphitheater where an unknown Halfling, Ozan, brings The Ancient Copper Dragon out of the ground causing mass destruction. Now he’s at the Divine Falls where Leonis holds Demi against a tree. He tells her she doesn’t understand how important she is to all this. No matter what Daryl says he cannot allow her to run away. Leonis stabs through her calf to hobble her. The Black Dragonborn stabs and kills Queen Athena. Virescent cries out from the tallest tower in Eldamar. Lawrence Aarden steps over the broken bodies of the Elvish King and Queen. The Goliaths run around as the Silver Dragon and White Dragon duke it out on their peak. A trail of blood leads to the Bronze Dragonborn and his dragon. Daryl finds himself at the center of ten pillars, a Halfling once more. He hears screams and rallying against Dragonborn. People call them monsters. He’s opened the door for monsters.   A door shuts and the party finds themselves floating over the tower’s main foyer once more. The Moonlit King has come home. And he sees them. He tells his people they must improve their Astral security, and summons a Moon Devil with instructions to cut everyone's cords save Indigo’s. They all tug their cords to leave as soon as possible. As they fly away, Indigo spies Forrester’s journal, his old Druidic Focus, hidden away in a darkened room of the tower.   The party returns to consciousness with Spirit Guide. They thank her for her help and grow her some more Elf Weed for her concoctions. She hugs them and thanks them. They cheerfully say goodbye to the Goliaths having grown fond of their culture, but can’t help the growing realization that Forrester, The Moonlit King, may simply be beyond their ability to contend with. They receive letters. Demi escaped Leonis and is hiding in a town called River Run to the south of the Divine Falls. Leonis declares the party his enemies and is sending his Gold Paladins to find her. They fly for River Run to save Demi.