Session 0004 - The Order of Ix

General Summary

Game Session 4 (27 Oct 2022) Roll 20

Cathlynn casts Healing Word at the 5th level and restores nearly half of Verbena's HP max.

The party realizes they are in some sort of funerary antechamber. They see 6 urns, 4 bows and 4 different piles of gold, silver and copper. In the middle of the room, a game (later identified as a tiger's eye agate) sets upon the top of a pedestal. The agate is unusually large, about the size of a golf ball.

Funerary antechamber

Matteu checks the pedestal for traps and successfully spots a spring-loaded mechanism that sits beneath the agate. The party hears the frost giants trying to open the door, but the giants are thus far unsuccessful in figuring out exactly which direction to push, pull or lift the door.

The party spots a set of stairs at the opposite end of the antechamber and decide they should move as far away from the door as possible.

As they move towards the stairs, they hear what sounds to be arrows glancing off the side of the dark door and they hear the booming yells of anger from the frost giants.

The party enters the next chamber, which is pentagonal in shape, has columns arranged in a similar fashion, and has a statue of a silver king-like figure sitting on a throne, also made of silver, in the center of the chamber. To the left and the right of the figure lies two tables. The table to its right has a two handed sword stood upright on its tip, and the table to its left has a dismembered left arm made of what appears to be solid gold.

Krypt chamber

The figure wears a king-like sable fur robe, holds a scepter in its right hand, and wears a bronze crown, all three of which are removable from the figure.

The party explores the walls of the chamber and sees that on each wall, what appears to be a mural of this King's life through different phases of his life, youth through about 50 years old.

A few minutes later, the specter of this King emerges from the silver figure and begins screaming at the party, accusing them of stealing his treasures.

The party fights the specter for several rounds, the. highlights of which include Cathlynn being hit by its Life Drain attack, causing significant amounts of necrotic damage to her. The fight ends when Verbena polymorphs the specter into an itsy bitsy spider (the song she played on her ukelele "Baby Dave" in order to cast the spell). Matteu steps on the polymorphed spider crushing it to death.

As the party assessed the items in the room, they hear the dark door in the antechamber open fully and see torches held by two individuals as they walk towards the chamber they're in.

The party prepares to engage in battle as soon as what they presume to be the giants as they cross the threshold into their chamber.

To their surprise, frost giants aren't invading their chamber but who they later learn to be the NPCs Keesha Knight and Melek. Cathlynn remembers Keesha after a few moments as Keesha was friends and an adventuring partner with Cathlynn's twin sister Cuthaleon many decades ago.

Keesha walks over to the silver figure and sits down at the throne's dais. Keesha motions the party to come near her so that they can "have a little talk" as she puts it.

A few minutes later, another NPC, Pries walks in and joins them. As Keesha begins to have her conversation, Pries casts Create Food and Water, wanting to let the party know that they are going to have a civilized conversation.

Keesha begins by letting the party know that they have taken care of the Frost giants by sending them back to the northern glaciers where they belong. They had to force the two that were after the party and they bribed the other 4 giants who were still on a hunt. She explains that the giants were down from the north in order to hunt for food to bolster their food stores in preparation for the winter, and that they were not here to wreak havoc. The giants were merely using the tower as a campsite.

Keesha asks the party if they know who they are working for. The party explains they don't feel Pranax is who he says he is but are unsure what to make of it, as they are just feelings. They further explain that in their mind, a job is a job, and as long as he pays, they don't really care who he is for the most part.

Keesha explains that while Pranax presents himself as an archaeologist, he certainly is not one. Before Keesha continues with her story, she must have assurances that the information she's about to tell them does not leave the room. She also states that she would like to enlist their help in something involving Pranax after she tells them what's going on. In order for Keesha to feel comfortable in disclosing the information, she asks each of the party members to wear a necklace. This necklace is magically charged to shrink from the 18" loop that it is when in a normal state to a 1" loop. The necklace will cut through anything in its way, with the purpose of severing the wearer's head. The necklace will alert its giver of certain keywords, phrases or subjects of conversation, repeating what was said to the giver. The giver could then decide whether to utilize the necklace or not.

The party is hesitant and states to Keesha that if what Keesha has to say is disagreeable to them, or they decide not to assist Keesha, that they would like the right to walk away and not have to wear this necklace.

Keesha initially gives them an ultimatum that if the party does not either assist her after hearing the story or wears the necklace, that her only choice is to kill them after gaining the knowledge from her story.

Pries offers Keesha the option that Pries could wipe their memories instead of killing them. Keesha agrees to this and makes the party the offers.

The party decides to wear the necklaces after all.

Keesha tells the party that she and others from an organization that she is part of have been watching them ever since their interactions began with Pranax. They have been monitoring Lord Pranax's actions for months and seek to know the extent of every relationship he has with everyone he interacts with.

Keesha tells the party that Pranax is actually Lord Pranax of Lankhmar, a council member of the King's Counsel. She relays that the King of Lankhmar wishes to seize the power of all Nehwon's city-state Kingdoms by cultivating a fleet of black dragons and green dragons. The Cult of the Dragon has infiltrated the royal government and convinced the King that they could bring dragons for the first time in this world's history via a portal to another world that does have dragons. The possibility of power has so gripped the King's mind that he has given free licensure to the leaders of the cult to do whatever it takes to bring these dragons through. Thus far, the cult has been successful in bringing four black dragons who are in their wyrmling stage of growth.

The cultists have been feeding the wyrmlings children from orphanages from all around Nehwon in order to get them to grow as quickly as possible. Keesha tells the party that she knows of Tara and has confirmed that Tara has been abducted and subsequently fed to the black dragons.

The party, and in particular Cathlynn, become enraged upon hearing this. At this point, they swear fealty to Keesha's cause in helping her to take Lord Pranax and the cult out.

Keesha describes the organization that she is part of that counters the Cult of the Dragon. This organization is called " Ix", sometimes pronounced "icks" and sometimes called "9" due to its similarity to roman (Nehwon) numerology.

She continues to explain that Ix is comprised of denizens from the other world from which the cult is getting its dragons as well as denizens from Nehwon. This other world is called Eberron.

Not all members of Ix are adventuring types. Many of them hold governmental, military or other positions of power to try and leverage strength in counteraction against the Cult.

Melek and Pries are both from Eberron and work closely with Keesha in her particular missions for Ix.

One of Ix's goals is to also bring dragons through from Eberron but ones of the good kind. Ix is currently working on bringing through a few silver dragons but so far are unsuccessful.

Ix believes that the best way to counter the burgeoning fleet of dragons is to cultivate their own fleet of dragons (might vs. might ideology).

The dragons come through via portal currently, but the portals are very unstable and require an immense amount of mana to attempt (requiring dozens of spell casters to work in unison). Ix has the same complexity of portal establishment between worlds, but because a discharge of the amount of mana required to create the portal would garner attention from the sensitives in the Cult, they have additional magical efforts working at the same time in order to conceal the amount of mana being expended by Ixian spellcasters. For this reason, it takes nearly double the number of spellcasters to create a portal as it does the Cultists.

She explains that the cult is currently attempting to bring through 2 green dragons to add to their fleet but is as of yet unsuccessful.

Keesha also explains that the golden canary the party encountered at the tower ruins is an aspect of a golden dragon. An aspect is a projection or "hologram" of the dragon into Nehwon from the dragon's homeworld where the dragon actually is. This golden dragon is attempting to help Ix as much as possible, but due to the instability of the magics involved to project his aspect, he can only help in small periods of time and in limited ways.

The party restates their commitment to this cause and agrees to wear the necklaces for as long as Ixia feels comfortable. Keesha assures them as they gain a positive reputation within Ix, they will feel comfortable with them at one point and the necklaces won't be necessary after some time.

Keesha asks the party to help Ix in the following ways:

Maintain a relationship with Lord Pranax so that they can report his whereabouts to Ix (since Pranax hired them and has a relationship with them already

To help prepare a lair site that Ix has in mind for the impending silver dragons they seek to portal from Eberron (upon acceptance, Melek will guide them to the site).

To donate any and all silver items, including silver and silver-colored coins, silver and silver-colored metals, all gems lighter in color (the color of ice and snow as a guiding principle), and any other resources they can spare to help pay for the expenses that it costs to run Ix (some of which include bribery used to gain information or sway decisions of important or influential individuals).

The party agrees to these ways, pledges fealty to Ix, and pledges imminent revenge upon Lord Pranax. Keesha tells the party that should they need her, they could go to any settlement with a thieve's guild, and leave them a note with Keesha's personal sigil (no more is needed than that), and word will be sent that Keesha is being summoned. Cathlynn offered the same service in return, the signal being to send a Peregrine Falcon to her to notify them that she's being summoned by Keesha.

Keesha' Sigil

The party returns to Karja and finds an incredibly drunk Lord Pranax at the Black Swan. He was busy groping and hurting a whore he had sat on his knee. Pranax sends the whore away when the party gets to his table by slapping her face so hard she fell to the ground. The party barely contained their rage but knew they had to let it pass in order to maintain the relationship with Lord Pranax.

Lord Pranax commends them on their success and wants to view the items they claim to have found

Lord Pranax invites them up to his room. There, he pays everyone the 250 gold he promised (although he "misremembered" the amount several times and attempted to only give them 25 gold each).

Lord Pranax seemed mildly disinterested in the King's robe, scepter, and sword but Matteu observed a telling gesture in Lord Pranax's facial expression that told him that Lord Pranax was keenly interested in the golden arm.

After Lord Pranax leaves, Cathlynn bids everyone good night and to wash their pits, tits, slits, and dicks (which evoked much cackling IRL, lol).

Rewards Granted

the party donated the sapphires, the tiger's eye agate, two of the four bows they recovered from the antechamber, and all the silver-colored coins they found and possessed at that point.

Matteu kept a bow, revealed to be a Longbow +2 when he later attuned to it.

Verbena kept a short bow, revealed to be a named sentient item by the name of Rammstein. Shortbow +3 that has a chance of petrifying its targets as well as the wielder of the bow, both only for a duration of 1d4 hours for all non-evil creatures, permanently for evil creatures. Rammstein is Lawful Good and communicates via emotions sent telepathically to the attuned wielder. If the wielder is petrified, Rammstein will communicate with the wielder for the duration, discussing things of Lore and Histories, stories and kingdoms, and other such novel discussions as this are the particular interest Rammstein has. Rammstein will also attempt to gently nudge the wielder towards living a Lawful Good lifestyle but will tolerate any lifestyle as long as it's not evil.