Tomb of Annihilation - Session 11
General Summary
The party passes through the secret door marked with the symbol of the Kimbala to the tunnel beyond, their path lit by the Gem of Brightness. After some twenty minutes, they see a dim natural light ahead, and soon come upon a natural cave in the rock, with an opening to daylight some 90 feet overhead. Across the cave the tunnel continues. The walls and ceiling are covered in spiderwebs.
Cautiously they attempt to pass through without disturbing the webs, but Dunch's helmet snags on one partway. With a chittering sound, two giant spiders descend on them from above.
Making good on his misstep, Dunch strikes a crushing blow to the nearest spider, chopping off two of its limbs. A bluish ichor streaming from its wounds, it tries to retreat, but Dunch strikes it again, and it dies with a high-pitched scream.
The second spider climbs back up into the webbing, spits its fluid at Gero to encase him, then starts to lift him upwards. Drawing their bows, Chibuzo and Ixtli hit it with arrows in its abdomen and eye, killing it. Gero plummets to the floor but is only mildly injured.
The party resumes their march up the tunnel. After another twenty minutes, they find themselves in a short passage of finished stone leading to a circular chamber. A stone staircase leads upwards some 90 or 100 feet, bringing them to a square room with a single stone door marked with the symbol of the Kimbala. The ring Dolan bears opens the door, and a low mist spills into the room from the hallway beyond.
Exploring further, they find what appears to have been a small dormitory for cult members; a musty room lined with bookshelves, its floor covered in scattered, fragile books and scrolls; and a storeroom reeking of rot and filled with blackish mould, its door smashed in. Leaving Gero and Mokomoko to examine the scrolls, they ignore for the moment a wide upwards staircase and pass through the persistent low fog into what seems to have been an audience chamber, with a large dais at the far end—like one they saw in the ruins below the Temple of Zann in Port Nyanzaru. A set of double doors leads into a smaller room containing an intricately carved wooden throne, and a fresco on the opposite wall depicting an axe-wielding woman at the head of an army, fighting lizardfolk and a giant wormlike creature. Embedded in the chair are three gems, two of jet and one black opal, that they pry out and take.
Past the throne room is a bedroom, filled with luxurious furnishings. A bronze censer sits atop a tripod, fog spilling out from it. When Dolan investigates, the mist moves around him, and he feels his blood draining out through his skin. The nearby miasma takes on a reddish tinge.
Chibuzo pulls him to safety, and they attack the mist. Their nonmagical weapons have reduced effect on the creature; thinking it to be some kind of undead, Ixtli uses his hand of healing on it, but only manages to repair the wounds he just caused. Chibuzo tries to capture it in a blanket, but it floats free. Finally, they slay the creature with a succession of minor blows, Dolan's magic missiles, and Ixtli's Blood Spear; when Ixtli strikes the final blow, the spear absorbs the blood out of the air as if inhaling it.
The only item of interest they find in the room is a small, ornate golden box, empty but marked with the symbol of the Kimbala in obsidian stones, which Dolan takes possession of.
Through another door leading out of the throne room, they find a short passage that leads down some stairs, through a smashed-open set of double doors and past a shattered statue of a Marakuran warrior to a rectangular room with a glowing circle of sigils carved into the floor, surrounding a man-sized obelisk of black rock. As with the similar teleportation circle they found below the Temple of Zann, Dolan takes the time to memorize the glyphs.
They return to the room with the scattered scrolls. Gero relates that he has found two texts of particular interest. One is a history of the Kimbala, relating how Saja N'baza and her followers "liberated" Orolunga from the Aldani and the Ancient Dweller they served. The other is a treatise on the god Ubtao and his five champions, one of whom was Ras Nsi.
They ascend the stairs. The hall branches to left and right; they take the right branch, which curves back around and opens to a central atrium, some twenty feet high, with a circular opening high above letting in daylight. The floor is covered with skeletal remains in tattered linen robes, and a shattered marble statue that seems to have depicted the naga Saja N'baza herself. Chibuzo finds the statue's head: the face of a human woman with eyes of yellow diamond, framed by the hood of a snake. He places it atop the pile of rubble.
Exiting through a set of double doors, they find themselves atop a squat, two-tiered stone ziggurat. A set of stairs leads downward. Some 500 yards to the east are the partially collapsed walls of the upper city of Mbala, smaller than its counterpart below the plateau. They glimpse something metallic atop one of the crumbling buildings.
Mindful of the approaching Blood Moon, they leave the ruined city behind and press on to the west, under an overcast sky. There is increased wind atop the plateau, but sparse vegetation. In the distance a mountain range lines the horizon.
They maintain a steady pace, camping overnight. The next day brings rain and another long march. As the sun starts to set, they spy a more densely wooded area ahead, but Gero can't quite muster the speed to reach the shelter of the woods before night.
They spend the next two days marching through the woods in the rain. Near the end of the second day, the trees start to thin out, and they can see the edge of the plateau a couple of miles away. Dunch uses the lenses of Nyemba's Might to scan the distance, and spots a vine-covered, 25-foot-tall obelisk at the plateau's edge.
Overnight the rain stops, and the sky clears. Beyond the mountains to the west, they can see the red moon slowly waxing.
The next morning, they walk the remaining distance to the obelisk. A promenade hangs out over the edge of the plateau. Affixed to the obelisk is a plaque in old Marakuran: "Raised in the 5th year of the founding of Mbala by their royal highnesses King Mbalawa and Queen Ngozi."
Looking out from the promenade, they see a large hill, topped by a single large tree, rising from the jungle between the base of the plateau and the distant river Tath. Beyond, a stone bridge crosses the river—and beyond that, a ziggurat of black stone rises out of the jungle. They estimate a good two days of travel before they reach it.
The party takes the switchbacked path down the side of the plateau and follows the faint outline of a road towards the river. As the sun starts to go down, they arrive at the base of the hill, and decide to climb it rather than follow the road to the north. The ascent is exhausting, fatiguing all of them except Dunch.
Once they arrive at the top, Gero identifies the great tree as a sinda tree, whose berries are said to have medicinal properties. Dunch eats one but finds it unappetizing. Dolan picks a couple dozen berries to take with them. They camp overnight at the base of the tree.
The next morning, after a few hours' travel, the noises of the surrounding jungle are joined and then overwhelmed by the echoing calls of baboons from up ahead. The party emerges from the jungle at the edge of a cliff, with the river a hundred feet below. A stone bridge, 25 feet wide, extends most of the way across the chasm. The bridge is covered in hanging vines, from which dozens of baboons dangle and swing. Their cries echo off the walls like an unsettling laugh, rising and falling in volume as the monkeys periodically take fright and fall silent before resuming their cacophony.
Statues of men and women bearing yklwas line the edges of the bridge, and in its centre is a large statue like the one of Ubtao that they saw in the Soshenstar river. Beyond the moss-covered statue, part of the bridge has collapsed, leaving a gap of some fifteen or twenty feet.
The inscription at the base of the statue reads, "all who wish to pass must display the mastery of the path." Anticipating that this statue too has a maze carved on its front, Dolan starts to clean off the accumulated moss when the statue suddenly attacks, punching him twice.
Dunch's mundane weapons have no effect on the stone giant, but Dolan reads the scroll of Shatter against it, while Chibuzo and Ixtli attack with Atsu's Lance and the Blood Spear. Finally, Dolan's magic missiles shatter it into pieces.
Ixtli, Dunch, and Chibuzo have no trouble vaulting across the gap in the bridge and securing a safety line. Dolan, Gero, and Ndidi also make it across without much trouble, but Mokomoko falls short, plummeting downwards until Dunch and Ixtli are able to halt his descent and haul him back up with the rope.
They continue westward. The sky is darkening when they emerge from the jungle into the ruins of a city. A thoroughfare extends for hundreds of yards past collapsed buildings to a three-tiered ziggurat of black stone. Distant figures are visible against the red moon rising behind.
Dunch once more uses the crystal lenses in Nyemba's Might to inspect the scene. In front of the temple atop the ziggurat, a serpentine figure hangs in the air, seemingly suspended by beams of energy emitted by two glowing crystals to its left and right. Beside each crystal stands a robed figure. A dozen armed and armoured men stand guard, as well as the same well-groomed man they saw in heated conversation with Grandfather Zitembe back in Port Nyanzaru. In front of the serpent stands a solitary figure robed in white, his arms raised as if conducting a ritual—Rashaad.
The party resolves to attack. Gero and Mokomoko stay back and out of sight, but Gero first casts invisibility on Dunch. The group advances towards the ziggurat, keeping to cover as much as possible. Dunch and Chibuzo drink their Elixirs of Heroism as they get close.
The well-groomed man spots them as they approach the base of the ziggurat. "Stop them!" he commands.
Chibuzo opens the battle with an arrow at one of the fighters, casting a spell to spray the surrounding foes with thorns. Ixtli races up the stairs to the nearest fighter, stabbing him, while Dolan reads the scroll of Melf's Minute Meteors, bombarding their enemies with two exploding rocks followed by a volley of magic missiles.
The well-groomed man raises his hand, and a glaive materializes in it. With an unsettling smile on his face, he attacks Ixtli, who parries the first blow but is struck by the next. Two of the fighters move towards Chibuzo, while the others fire their bows at Ixtli and Dolan, striking them both.
Dolan blasts two more of Melf's meteors and more magic missiles at the well-groomed man and the nearby fighters, killing two of the enemy. Ndidi claws and fatally pounces on one of the fighters on the stairs. Her companion Chibuzo fires an arrow into the well-groomed man, who slashes Ixtli even as an enraged Dunch appears behind him and axes him in the back. The nearby fighters attempt to swarm Ixtli and Dunch; Ixtli spears one through the neck, then kicks another to death, as he himself is struck by an arrow from one of the bowmen atop the ziggurat. In his mind, Dolan hears Saja N'baza's voice, weakly saying: "Free me."
The well-groomed man looks from Chibuzo to Ixtli to Dunch, with the same unsettling smile. "Finally, a worthy challenge!" he says with relish, and grows into a giant, horned ogre-like creature, his glaive becoming equally enormous. The worst of his wounds heal visibly as he moves away, ignoring Dunch and Ixtli's passing attacks in order to catch both of them, as well as Ndidi, Chibuzo, and one of his own fighters, in a devastating cone of cold. Ndidi falls to the ground, unconscious and dying.
Dolan launches the last of Melf's meteors, killing another of the fighters, then enlarges Dunch, who strikes the ogre with his battleaxe. Chibuzo invokes the power of the Circlet of Blasting and two of its rays of fire burn the ogre's flesh. Ixtli quaffs a Potion of Healing, then stabs the ogre with the Blood Spear, dodges a volley of arrows from the bowmen, and stabs and bites the still-smiling ogre again.
Chibuzo raises the Gem of Brightness: "Smile at this!" he snarls and unleashes a blinding ray. But the ogre avoids the magical attack. Deciding that they must prevent Rashaad's ritual from proceeding, he hurries to the top of the ziggurat and grapples the white-robed man. Seeing their master under attack, all five of the remaining fighters fire their bows at Chibuzo, three of their arrows striking home.
Following Chibuzo to the top of the ziggurat, Dolan passes by the clashing blades of Dunch and the ogre and runs towards the crystal to the left. As Saja N'baza screams in pain, her suspended form twisting and contorting, Dolan positions himself behind the robed figure and summons a stream of caustic acid, missing the figure but shattering the crystal. Its beam of energy stops, and Saja N'baza drops slightly, though still suspended by the remaining beam. In retaliation, the robed figure points at Dolan and speaks a word of command: "Flee." The sorcerer retreats as far as he can.
Rashaad teleports away from Chibuzo. In his wake, a thunderous boom sounds, and a shockwave envelops Chibuzo and all five of the fighters, killing one. The Nizamish magician flies to the top of the temple.
Badly injured, Chibuzo heals himself, then casts another spell and moves away with the force of the wind. Two of the remaining fighters attack him while the other two move against Dolan, both of the adventurers taking more injuries.
Dunch and Ixtli attack the continuously-healing ogre with battleaxe, spear, claws, and teeth. Ixtli takes another blow from the glaive, answered by Dunch's axe. Then Rashaad casts another spell. The stairs explode around the two adventurers, wounding them both and blowing Ixtli down the stairs, unconscious and near death.
Passing through his foes, Chibuzo attacks the robed figure near the remaining crystal. The energy beam ceases, and Saja N'baza drops to the ground, free. As Chibuzo retreats to take cover on the next lower level of the ziggurat, he senses the death of his leopard companion on the stairs below.
Overcoming the compulsion to flee, Dolan returns to the battle, releasing another caustic stream that kills two more of the fighters and covers the nearest robed figure in acid. As Dunch strikes the ogre another blow, Saja N'baza heaves herself upright and casts a spell of Mass Cure Wounds, restoring some health to Dunch, Chibuzo, and Ixtli, who regains consciousness.
After Rashaad summons a wall of wind across the top of the stairs, Chibuzo turns to attack the ogre, spearing and slashing him. Dunch strikes another blow with his axe; the ogre still smiles, though now through bloodied teeth. Ixtli finally kills him with the Blood Spear.
Behind the wall of wind, one of the robed figures dies from the persistent acid, and Dolan kills the other with three more magic missiles. Saja Nbaza spits a powerful poison at Rashaad, striking him despite her exhaustion, and doing enough damage that the magician can no longer maintain the wall of wind. Dunch and Ixtli close with the two remaining fighters, killing them both. Chibuzo climbs to the top of the ziggurat and aims his bow; when his arrow pierces Rashaad's shoulder, the man cries out in pain, then casts a spell and disappears.
In the battle's aftermath, Dolan approaches the naga. "Are you okay?" he asks. She answers calmly, in a dreamlike voice. "I am thanks to you. I knew you would come."
Chibuzo kneels before her. "We came to save you," he says, "but you saved us."
Her tongue flickers. "There is one thing I can do for you," she says. She slithers down the steps to Ndidi's corpse and touches it with her tail. The leopard starts to breathe again, and Chibuzo weeps in joy as he embraces his resurrected companion.
They return to the temple atop the ziggurat, where Dolan bows deeply before Saja N'baza. "You've come a long way to find me," she says. "I appreciate the effort. Why are you here? Though I have my suspicions."
The party explains that they are here to stop Rashaad from getting the Crown, and to obtain it themselves—in order to destroy it. It must be destroyed, Ixtli says. Dolan adds that it is causing problems in the afterlife with the newly dead.
"That has a different cause, further to the south," Saja N'baza says. If her visions are correct, the source is Ras Nsi and his yuan-ti followers. He still lives, she says; as one of the five champions Ubtao created to serve him, he is immortal. Dolan asks of the other four. She has seen at least one other in her visions: Lar'lenek, the Champion of Ubtao in Omu. But the naga does not know where he is.
She looks at Dolan. "I see you have claimed some of my power as your own," she says. "Do you wish to serve?"
"Yes," he answers, going to one knee before her.
"So," she declares, "without reservation, you choose to serve. I need your kind to unite this land, whose people have lost their king, and then their god."
Chibuzo joins Dolan in kneeling. "I also wish to serve," he announces.
The naga leads them into a chamber where a liquid drips slowly from a floating rock into a pool beneath. She dips the tip of her tail into the pool, then draws on the foreheads of Chibuzo and Dolan. The liquid burns as the symbol of the Kimbala appears on Chibuzo's brow. On Dolan the symbol is formed from draconic scales.
"Hear my command to you," she tells them. "Find and kill Ras Nsi." She frowns slightly. "But I don't believe you are ready for that." She states that the former champion of Ubtao is in Omu, to the south, and that the Death Curse is his doing. Something is preventing the spirits of the newly dead from passing on—and it is gaining strength.
Chibuzo asks of the god Ubtao: where is he? What happened to him?
"The people of Omu... found a way to access and make use of Ubtao's divine energy," she answers. "And eventually their use of that energy killed him."
Ixtli turns the conversation back to the original object of their quest: the Crown. "You did not create it," he states.
"No," she agrees. "Your people did."
"And only one of my people can destroy it. One like myself. I bear the Legacy of Gol."
She studies him. "Yes," she replies, "you bear the mark of one of the Great Profanities. But you are not yet able to use that power. There is another, nearly as old as I, that may be able to guide you: Kurat, an ancient black dragon who dwells in the marsh. The folk that once dwelled here now follow him. Find them, and you will find Kurat."
She turns her gaze to Dunch. "You remind me of Queen Ngozi," she tells him. "Long ago she travelled to the city of Hisari to deal with the yuan-ti, but she was lost and so was her axe. The axe was gifted to her to slay the snake-men. If you could find it, it would be a great boon."
The naga then addresses Dolan. "Sorcerer, you've chosen to follow me in anything. Will you become my Voice? Will you help me rebuild the Kimbala?"
"Yes," he answers eagerly.
"A symbol is needed," she declares. She utters a spell, and a sceptre of silvery metal appears, bearing six snake heads at one end. At her invitation, Dolan takes it.
"With this you can use the Serpent's Way," she declares, and teleport to any of her shrines across Marakuru—except for Omu, where the circle has been damaged.
As they begin to rebuild the Kimbala, she instructs Dolan and Chibuzo, Port Nyanzaru may be the best place to collect the faithful. It would also be wise for them to find and deal with Rashaad al-Tahir.
Comments