The Assault on Camp Var'Cha

The party begins their assault on Camp Var'Cha, but gets in a bit more trouble than they bargained for.

December 15th - December 16th

They spend the next few days moving quietly through the dense forest on the plateaus toward Camp Var'Cha. The journey is tense as the party expects ambush at any moment. Ellie painstakingly maps their journey to avoid getting lost but mostly just out of curiosity.  

December 17th

Several days of uninterrupted travel causes the party to let their guard down ever so slightly, and midway through their night's watch, they are awoken by back to back fireballs on their camp, causing severe damage. A nocturnal Orc ambush begins and the party wearily rises to meet their foes. While distracted with the Orcs, Carlos is assaulted by an invisible foe. Sending warning to Ellie and Roswyn, they seek out this invisible foe and reveal him before he can strike again. They are once again face to face with the Dark Elf known as Ambassador D'Vinn. This time they restrain him and prevent him from teleporting away. After slaying the Orcs, they turn to D'Vinn to begin his interrogation.   After some back and forth and a zone of truth, the party learns a bit about D'Vinn's origins; he was forced out of his home city of Neriak for "political differences" and has been working to help the Orcs. The Dark Elves have an invested interest in the success of Orcs as it limits the powers of the elves. He doesn't particularly like the Orcs, but respects the new Crush and his lieutenants. He was sent on an errand to Camp Var'Cha and that he would be greeted by the leader of the camp, but not told much else. D'Vinn was also concerned about the darker magics the Orcs have been learning since he arrived, but he mentions that he hasn't seen any undead around the Orcs. When Carlos asks about vampires, D'Vinn tells him that only Dark Elves can become vampires.   The party huddles up to discuss their next moves now that they have all the information they need from D'Vinn. Arya ops to knock him unconscious and leave him naked under a bridge, but Ellie and Roswyn doesn't like the idea of freeing him at all. As part of their deal, Carlos promised he would not kill D'Vinn, and he takes that promise very seriously. Carlos proposes that D'Vinn earn his freedom by assisting them at the camp, to which everyone reluctantly agrees.   Carlos doesn't trust D'Vinn, so in order to seal the deal, he does something very questionable: summons a fiend bound to his family. Roswyn is very unhappy about this. He pressures D'Vinn to sign a contract with this fiend, Macuth. Originally, the deal is to not do anything evil again, but D'Vinn knowing what happens if he breaks the deal says he'd rather die. So the deal is lessened to just leaving Faydwer. After the deal is done, D'Vinn is freed.  

December 18th

After a long, uneasy night, the party wakes and lets D'Vinn lead them to Camp Var'Cha. It takes the majority of the day, and they arrive well after sunset. They formulate a plot to get D'Vinn inside to draw out the leader: D'Vinn takes Arya in to the camp and claims they were ambushed and gets the leaders to come out. Then they attack the whole camp? As Arya is escorted into the camp, two war chiefs approach the pair. The rest of the party uses this distraction and Pass without Trace to sneak around the inner perimeter of the camp and assess the situation. Suddenly, Arya and D'Vinn are let into a large tent on the north side of the camp. Panicking, the Carlos casts invisibility on Roswyn so she can sneak towards the large tent. Her heavy armor almost gets her spotted, but some clever illusions save her. Once Roswyn is inside, she sees only one war chief, and no sign of Arya or D'Vinn. Roswyn notices a large stone table in the middle of the room that has been moved. She attacks the war chief in the tent and starts a large battle. The party outside works to kill all the Orcs before they can collapse on Roswyn.   Under the camp, Arya was taken to a jail cell in a dungeon complex. After D'Vinn leaves with the Orc war chief, Arya uses a vial of acid to destroy the lock on his cell. Under his cloak of elvenkind, he creeps through the complex. The stench of death permeates the area and he sees corpses and body parts in the cells he passes. He ventures further, carefully sneaking by two bodaks. Deeper into the dungeon, Arya hears the familiar voice of Mayong Mistmoore say, "they are dying too quickly. Keep trying." He sprints back towards his cell to warn the others.   After some time above ground killing Orcs, the party forces their way into the dungeon through the hidden entrance. The carefully press forward and open a door to an office, where they see D'Vinn pulling his dagger out of the skull of the Orc war chief. He leads them to the cell where he locked up Arya, only to find it empty. The party presses on down the corridors in search of Arya.   Arya and the party bump in to one another just before the jail area. Arya warns the party of Mayong's presence and Carlos immediately takes off toward him, almost as if he's possessed. Despite all protests, he leads the party down the hall to where Arya heard the voice. At the end of the corridor, they enter a large open room with chains, drains, and blood. As Arya scouts the room just ahead, he is greeted by The Prophet, and they hear the echo of locks opening behind them.   They are immediately thrown in to combat with The Prophet and a number of vampires and bodaks. The vampires are semi-desiccated and some are even Orcs, which according to D'Vinn should not be possible. The party rushes to overpower The Prophet before they are overrun by undead. Luckily, he teleports out of the battle after being caught off guard and wounded. The rest of the undead pour into the room, but Carlos turns Roswyn into a giant ape and they make quick work of the weakened undead.   After the battle, they investigate the rest of the dungeon. Carlos asks D'Vinn about orcish vampires and learns about the curse of the Dark Elves; they are corruptions of high elves by the god of hate Innoruuk. Ellie discovers clues that point toward blood transfusions and magic that was trying to create vampiric Orcs. Yarver discovers a vial that has a drop of metallic crimson liquid. During their investigations, D'Vinn becomes uneasy and asks to be released to return home to Neriak. Yarver is suspicious and inquires more about his plans. Yarver learns a few more details about D'Vinn's political differences back home. The party silently debates just killing D'Vinn, but they are unsure on the terms of the Devil contract and decide it's not worth the risk to their own souls.