Session 70 - Into the Breach

5 Eirmont 1010 - 6 Eirmont 1010

General Summary

Marching into a heavy wind and facing a long trek up a glacier, the party diverts at the tantalizing sight of a cave ahead. Perhaps they can get a long rest in before moving on to whatever they are going to find where the other piece of the Chronolometer lies. Approaching the cave through deep snow, suddenly three steaming-hot giant centipede-like creatures burst out of the ice and snow beneath - deadly Remorhaz. Leo and Seraphina, too preoccupied with finding good footing, do not notice the creaking of the ice just before the ambush and are caught by surprise.
The largest of the three creatures immediately chomps down on Seraphina, while Leo falls into a 10' deep pit under thin ice. Tork, torn by the situation, elects not to rage for his own defense, instead trying to stun the creature with Seraphina clamped in its maw, in the hopes that she can escape. He is successful at stunning the creature but, to Tork's and most of the rest of the party's surprise, she forgoes an escape elects to try killing it from inside its mouth! Meanwhile, Stavos is fending off the young Remorhaz on the left flank, clearly fueled by his terror of it. The third Remorhaz decides to attack Leo, leering down into the pit containing him, landing a reasonably devastating blow.
With their counter attacks the party finds that direct melee against the creatures results in burns to the attacker, and pretty quickly this is draining all the fighters. Elinicia has summoned her dragon and is using it to pretty good effect, ripping up the creatures with its claws, though its fire breath weapon is ineffective. Leo envelops himself in Spirit Shroud and blasts the Remorhaz attacking him in the pit, dealing significant damage and pushing it away from himself. A cloud of steam begins to surround the largest Remorhaz, but Elincia uses her Wind Fan to disperse the cloud and allow the rest of the party to still see the monster.
Tork continues to try to kill the creature that is eating Seraphina, taking more severe burns. Seraphina's prior attacks and resulting burns weakens her enough that when the Remorhaz chomps down on her again she falls unconscious. It raises its head and her limp body high and then swallows her whole! Thankfully she has the Periapt of Health, which stabilizes her condition, but the acid damage keeps her from recovering. Also, now that she is completely inside the creature, Elincia can't heal her, complicating the situation further.
Stavos, tamping down his terror of the centipede-like creatures, refreshes himself and uses a surge of attacks to kill both of the smaller creatures in a remarkable flourish of blows. Tork, now barely able to stand himself, valiantly continues to fight the remaining huge creature, along with Elincia and her Dragon. Leo continues to struggle to escape the pit he finds himself in, effectively removed from the fight for now. This despite having spells that would allow him to escape; he just isn't capable of connecting these dots under the pressure of the scenario.
As the huge creature tries to flee, belly full of paladin, the party (except Leo) is able to get in a final set of attacks, and Stavos rushes forward and stabs the creature one last time, causing it to collapse to the ground in a steaming heap. They are able to cut the creature's belly open and drag Seraphina out, healing her up. She's a bit cowed by the situation, but at least they all survive this terror. It seems Stavos may have conquered his fears of centipedes after facing not only these terrible creatures, but the Giant Centipede he faced in the nightmare of Seraphina's execution dream .
Worn and wounded, the party tentatively enters the cave and finds it is well sheltered from the storm. They see signs it had been the Remorhaz next, but find no more of the monsters and are able to get a full long rest in, restoring their resolve for the next phase of this wintry mountain escapade.
The next day, feeling refreshed, Leo has attuned to the Chronolometer, and it magically indicates to him the direction they need to go. After a long trek along the glacier they find a very large, canyon-like rift in the ice. The weather has become quite windy, with the terrain around the rift acting to funnel this wind. They send Leo's owl down to scout the two sides of the breach. There seems to be cave systems on both sides of the rift, below the top layer they are currently standing on, with calmer winds along these sides. There isn't an entirely obvious benefit to one side over the other, so the party elects to explore the rightward (westward, as they are headed generally south at this point) cave system on the side of the rift, and climb down to this mid-level.
They explore this western ledge, which just a little ways further splits, with a path of ice steps worked into the ledge continuing further down. Seeing this, the party decides to make sure there's nothing in the cave system up on this level that will trap them down below.
In the first cave they explore, they find six Yetis. These attack on sight, and probably regret this pretty quickly, as Synaptic Static is dropped on them, greatly hindering the attacks for five of the Yetis. They do have some sort of Icy Stare attack though, which induces a form of chilling paralysis; first paralyzing Tork, then later Elincia, and killing Leo's poor owl familiar. This drives Leo into a rage, resulting in him dropping yet another spell on the hapless Yetis - Sickening Radiance. With the radiant cloud to deal with, the party takes the last ones down by ranged attack, and Leo lets his Sickening Radiance drop. Relatively little harm was actually done to the party, so they continue exploring the cave system.
In the next segment of caves they find a Frost Giant. Seraphina eats one of the magical tasty treats that gives universal language knowledge, and she says "hello," and that they are merely exploring the area to the Giant. It says "You will leave immediately", while pulling his very large axe from his pack. She backs up a few feet, but the party responds to the provocation in the normal way, by fighting right back. Five against one makes this feel pretty safe to the party, but the Frost Giant hits remarkably hard and calls out a cry of alarm - they shortly hear more heavy footsteps coming from a side passage to this chamber. This first giant is down before any more show up and the party is alert, trying to triangulate the source of the incoming footsteps. They think they have it figured out, and array themselves to be most effective against the incoming group, but pretty quickly they find that there are actually four giants coming from different directions, effectively surrounding them.
Tork and Seraphina focus on the two giants headed up the center hallway, while Stavos protects the right flank of the party. Elincia also keeps her focus on the center giants. The first one is taken down pretty quickly, but the devastating blows are wearing on the party. Even with Raging, Tork is getting hit hard. One of the giants in the smaller hallway is able to burst past his compatriot to engage Stavos. The other Giant coming from the party's right throws a rock, more like a boulder, at Stavos, but it flies well wide and is easily avoided. The left-flanking giant throws a similar boulder at Leo, but also misses the mark. As the second is getting severely wounded, he calls out (and only Seraphina can understand) "We need more men!" but his colleagues are more enraged by the intruders, and they charge into the fight rather than seeking further allies. Leo is dodging through traffic after blasting one of the giants but, realizing that Tork is in no position to take yet another devastating blow from the hard hitting Frost Giants, puts himself in the space to protect Tork and Elincia. This lets Elincia get off a powerful Heal spell, while Leo absorbs some remarkable amounts of damage, enough that he is unable to maintain his Spirit Shroud. With Tork reinvigorated and smaller heals handed out to Stavos, the party is tough enough to take down the remaining Giants.
After Elincia gives out handfuls of Goodberries and some additional healing, the party decides they should try to take a break to further heal their wounds.

Report Date

01 Jan 2023