Session 7: "Scripture of Steel"

General Summary

The Ka-Tet took down the Darkalley Shivs with relative ease, but Rotten William’s defeat was not achieved without much anguish. He was a swashbuckler who also seemed to have sold his soul for luck in battle. As a result, Dak’kon was downed on three occasions, and Eilana once.
Eventually Willam's ‘swash’ was buckled tight, and the party could pause and take stock. Dak’kon was restored to consciousness but was barely awake.
Loot found:

15pp 265 gp 825 sp 2375 cp

10x Clot Charm

2x Charm of Infinite Recall

Upon returning to Krystall, she asked the party to also take down a strange warrior who had been slaughtering people from both factions of the alleyway.
Blackrose, was dressed in plate armour, scorched by flame, and embossed with the Sigil of a Rose. He wielded a spear of scorched wood, and was visibly fast.
Esmae of the Flowers discussed the temple with Krystall, resulting in her looking fearful.
Esmae’s doll also emitted a sense of fear, and transformed to become barbed with spikes. All of the party took damage, causing Dak’kon to again hit the floor.
Krystall said the temple was of a God that was killed by the Lady of Pain. The only people that go there are a faction that believed the Gods were not ‘gods’ but just lying bastard powerful creatures.

Taking a moment to converse with Dak’kon, I pondered the First Circle of Zerthimon and was able to know it.

We headed onwards to the Burned Cathedral, where Aola high priest of Aoskar greeted us. As we entered the Church we were struck by a mental surge and we all took psychic damage. A headache set up camp in our heads, and was followed by a nosebleed.
Aola told us that Aoskar will return, despite being a dead god. He referred to Sigil as ‘the Cage’.
Esmae showed him the accursed box and he willingly took it from her. As he did Esmae felt herself fall.
She dreamed of, and was transported to, the world of prophets in her head.
She then felt herself fall again and was transported to a verdant world, inhabited by halflings like her, at a time that appeared to be the dawn of their world. This was her home world, Athas.
She again saw time speed ahead, and saw the sky of her world rain down with colourless fire, turning it brown, boiling the seas, and leaving behind a baked dusty remnant of a world. In her heart she somehow felt it was all her fault.
She then moved to a temple, the temple of the last God of the land, and found an altar with a secret door behind. When she touched the alter she felt a distant voice in her mind and a hand over her hand, then feeling the hand of Aoska open the door to the stars (She gained a class skill as a result).
The rest of us only saw the priest chanting over the box, and it started to emit an acrid smoke. He opened the box and a huge demon emerged. Suddenly there was a tear in the fabric of the sky, revealing the stars, and the demon was sucked out of our existance. Remaining was a large heart shaped ruby, duly kept by the priest.

After exiting the temple we considered our options regarding Blackrose. After witnessing the demon he seemed but a simple foe.
We firstly demanded that he leave the alley but this was immediately refused, followed by him issuing a martial challenge to our party. We defeated him after a punishing fight, but for once, none of us got to sample the dust of that particular part of Sigil.
When he died he erupted into flames with his body and armour being consumed by the fire, leaving only his spear, some charms and some coins. (Spear = Holy Avenger +1, 1d8 + 1d8 vs fiends / undead, +1 to spell DC, and also 1d8 on crits / 20pp, 20gp, 35sp / 5x charcoal charm). Eilana suspected that she was also a knight of Blackrose’s order.

These activities gained enough gold for TNO to consider reclaiming his eye from Barkis.
To buy it involved the pain of parting with 500gp, but then the process of rejoining it to TNO involved the pain of extracting his current left eye, and inserting the preserved one in its place. Doing so fired off several visions of past events including:

• being in a vast chaotic wasteland with humanoid vultures plummeting towards TNO, cruel weapons in hand waiting to strike. He was similarly armed awaiting the attacked

• He was surrounded by three thugs, long daggers in hand. TNO saw his scarred hands and knew they would soon be covered in blood.

• An enormous frog-like creature came at TNO through stuff of chaos, baring its multitude of teeth. He hurled a javelin at it and impaled it upon a stone plinth.

• TNO was lost in halls of darkness, paved with the consequences of my choices, haunted by ghosts of the shadows of all who had suffered as a result of those decisions. He was in a place beyond time, beyond life, and beyond life, near the Void at the end of all things. Feeling *them* assembling around this place he raced to a high place and spoke words that I had wrested from The Illuminated ones who knew those words. The words summoning a surge of Power within him. (Gave me a feat - Skills Expert)

The Nameless One pondered the Second Circle of Zerthimon, and through this knew it.
Dak’kon manipulated the Circle, and from it a steel plate emerged. This was actually the Gith form of a spell scroll, that TNO was able to copy to his Spell book, and it taught him the Scripture of Steel spell. He also unlocked the Third Circle of Zerthimon for TNO to ponder. This was beyond his true understanding, so he would need more time to consider it.

After rest and recovery, we moved on and entered The Mausoleum, and upon doing so we were challenged by a spirit. TNO declared that if anyone had the right to enter, it was be me. The spirit agreed, then went on to tell us that a foul necromancer had taken over the halls and had raised the dead from their quiet slumber. We were urged to destroy that necromancer and to Clear the Mausoleum. To find him he said we should look in the farthest part of the halls. The spirit vanished.
The floor of The Mortuary tunnels were bronze plates that covered graves, some revealed to be empty but for abandoned treasure. We soon found the escaped occupants, namely in the forms of zombies and skeletons, and we defeated them easily.
Venturing further to one of the far corners of the mausoleum we found more skeletons and zombies being led by the skeletons of two giants. Another tough fight ensued, in the face of huge vicious axes being arced in our direction. Eventually we prevailed, again somewhat beaten and battered. Rummaging through the remaining detritus we found:

3 clot charm (heals + resist slashing 1 hr that stacks duration),

1 Blood Charm (heals + resist piercing damage 1 hr that stacks duration),

1 Bone Charm (+2 AC and resistance to bludgeoning damage for 1 hr that stacks duration),

2 Charcoal Charm (resistance to fire that stacks duration), and

Jewellery worth 35gp.

We again endeavoured to patch ourselves up and then headed in search of the necromancer.
Session end

Cant Dictionary

Report Date

19 Aug 2023

• Quests - Sigil
  • Find The Nameless One's Journal
  • Help Reekwind
  • Ignis - Return him to life
  • Unlock the Unbroken Circle of Zerthimon
  • Obtain Decanter's Password
• Completed Quests - Sigil
  • Find Pharod
  • Find and Bring Pharod to Justice
  • Help Ingress
  • Kill Starved Dogs Barking
  • Find Craddock
  • Clear the Mausoleum
  • Purchase the Eye
  • Free Angyar from the Dustman Contract
  • Iron Nall's Secret
  • Free Esmae from Moridors box
  • Find Former Drunk Companion of TNO
  • Find Eliath
  • Who is Killing the Barmys
  • Return the Prayer Beads to Porphiron
  • Convince Nestor to Leave
  • Find Pharod's source of bodies
  • Find Amarysse
  • Learn Magic
  • Return his Name
  • Retrieve Knife
  • Find Necklace
  • Kill Rotten William
  • Kill or Drive off Blackrose
  • Bring His Body to the Surface
  • Retrieve Bronze Sphere
  • Obtain the Decanter from Drowned Nations
  • Discover where Annah found The Nameless One