Session 50 - Armed

General Summary

Ifrit's Mission

Ifrit protected his dwarven clients, but one was already hurt badly. Ranier had three large puncture wounds in her side. He cauterized her the wounds with his fire magic, but the girl needed healing. Ifrit couldn't heal her alone.

He left her with another dwarf, Puget, and went to find help. Along the way to the control room he found the bodies of two astral dwarves. One was a bloody mess, almost unrecognizable. The other had been stabbed in the back but the pool of blood under him was small. Ifrit checked the man's pockets and found a small rectangular device and some coins of foreign made.

Ifrit walked to the back of the long narrow facility but the doors to the control room and healing pod were closed. Not only that, additional solid metal doors had been put in place over the original doors, so there wasn't even a window he could see through (or teleport through).

Lat'num saw Ifrit through a techno-scrying mirror and called to him from a magic mouth outside the blast door. "What do you want and who is with you?"

Ifrit told them about the Ranier's wounds. He told them of the coins and offered payment in exchange for their help. The heroes would not leave their containment but invited Ifrit to bring the girl back to them for healing. He trekked back to the dwarves' hideout but Ranier had already passed away. He expected her internal bleeding to be severe but this... this was something altogether different. The opposite side of her torso, the side without the puncture wounds, was torn open. Her body looked like it had been burroughed into and out of by a large rodent. She looked similar to the another corpses Ifrit had passed in the main corridor, the astral dwarf who appeared to have been ripped open from the inside out. The other dwarf, Puget, was... gone. Just disappeared altogether.

Ifrit decided he'd had enough of the dwarves and that he'd completed his contract to them. He escorted them into Kavern Proklet and had protected them throughout the search. Once they had found the secret of the astral dwarves and the mechanical beings, his job was done. He told Lat'num the others were gone and asked to join the party.

As the blast doors closed behind Ifit, the group heard a far-off clanking sound from the opposite end of the complex. It sounded metal-on-metal, as if another of the doors had either opened or closed. Then Red felt a faint hint of fresh breeze wafting down the hall. Someone had opened a door to the outside...

S'Thom's Vision Quest

S'thom awoke with a numb arm. She'd fallen out of a tree the day before and injured it and now she could barely move it. But... that event didn't happen yesterday, did it? she thought. This is a memory. I'm reliving my childhood.

Sure enough, S'thom was little again (or littler). She was a small tree frog with ambitions to best her schoolmates in competitions in the Youngling Adventurers. Kastor Raines was her mentor again. The gruff dragonborn taught her that relying on one arm was a weakness. She needed to train with the other.

She worked her to develop her offhand so that she was just as skilled with the left as she was with the right. She consiously fought the urge to use her main hand - why did she keep calling it main, weren't they both important? - and practiced for a whole season with nothing but her offhand.

S'thom was ambidextrous. She'd never be disadvantaged if something happened to her right hand. Or her left. She was perfectly fine fighting with either. Or both.

She groggily awoke in the cryo chamber and marvelled at the mechanical arm that had been grafted onto her shoulder. She didn't feel like fighting (she could barely throw a punch). But she admired the new arm, knowing that when she needed to fight, she'd be ready.

Lat'num's Waypoints

Lat'num Leng studied the teleportation circle waypoints on the datapad he'd discovered. Including the coordinates to Kaverna Proklet, the artificer now had seven teleportation circle sigil codes. They were:

Kaverna Proklet. This was the party's current location, the strange "cursed caverns" buried under the lumber community of Timberfall in the continent of Selduria.

Io'vanthor in the Serpentus Rift. Lat'num wasn't familiar with the name Io'vanthor, but when he'd used the local teleportation circle a few days earlier (almost on instinct, as if guided by Zeitundraum), the coordinates had led him to his friends in Golt-Vahlok, the foundry of the draconic Platinum Nexus under Nanoen in the Serpentus Rift.

Caer Madhrin in a country called Vailaindor. It appeared to be the closest location to Kaverna Proklet, somewhere to the south in Selduria.

Mountainroot Temple in Elsir Vale. Gorgoroth had experience with this area but warned that it would be near the lair of Vraxanault "The Slumbering King".

Granite Hall somewhere in the Altaran Peninsula. Ifrit recalled hearing something about Altaran, a group of mercenaries or profiteers, and something called "Iron..." something or other.

Sayre Univercity. Gorgoroth also had experience with the Univercity, explaining a convoluted time-jumping scenerio a long time ago when he had been much younger and had first met Randus Duthane, the child of Lizzy and Archie, two archeologists that the party had met near Xak-Tsaroth.

The island nation of Nefelus. Gorgoroth believed that Vinter, which he called "the Seed of Winter" might be in Nefelus.

The party discussed their options and decided that their next stop should be Granite Hall. They remembered information Orion Dragovic, a leader in the underground Resistance movement had told them about the Altaran Peninsula. The Citadel of the Iron's Grasp was the capital of the Iron Circle's territory. It was also the headquarters of the ISB.

The party decided they needed more information before teleporting to the other regions. First they needed to become spies.

Rewards Granted

S'thom's rewards:

One bio-magical-mechanical arm

One free feat: Dual-wielding

Teleportation Circle coordinates for several places on this plane:

Caer Madhrin, in Vailaindor

Mountainroot Temple, in Elsir Vale

Io'vanthor, in Serpentus Rift

Mithralfast, in Sarthel

Granite Hall, in Altaran Peninsula

Sayre University, near Elsir Vale

Nefelus, on an island

Report Date

23 Jul 2023

Primary Location

Kaverna Proklet