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- Adrian Silverstrength (Human Paladin)
- Morsus Firebeard (Hill Dwarf Cleric)
- Sephrenia (High Elf Cleric) – Missed this session
- Ragnaroc (Aasimar Warlock)
- Don Kannin (Half-Elf Ranger) – Missed this session
- Korra (Air Genasi Rogue)
- With the Children of the Damned defeated and the Carnival destroyed, the town tries to figure out what to do with some of the exotic animals who’d been held in captivity all of their life and could not be returned to the wild, such as the placid Owlbear and the remaining Hippogriffs that did not fly off in the confusion
- The town decides to train the Owlbear to help be a part of the town’s guard and use the Hippogriffs as flying mounts for guards, as well as delivering messages to nearby towns as needed
- The local authority also rewards each of the party members 100 gold, for their part in finally finding a way to bring down this dark Carnival
- Sephrenia is helping those who had their souls siphoned and returned to their bodies, while Don Kannin is helping the local authorities with managing the animals (both players were absent this session)
- Adrian pulls out the ring in his pocket that was given to him, and in the gem he can see Isabella, whom he’d proposed to, in her shop
- Adrian looks at the party and mentions how he’d like to go speak to the rich, Tiefling businessman (of questionable dealings) that’s been on the caravan that they’ve had numerous encounters with – Kraun Torodon.
- During down time, Kraun had watched Adrian fight in the non-lethal pit fighting ring (Session 42)
- Kraun propositions the party to recover a very specific gem; and then proceeds to donate a great amount of money for the people of Lakefront, whose town had been destroyed by an undead black dragon (Session 44), the undead dragon was from another group’s quest
- The party meets the Thieve’s Guild leader of the Ravenclaw, none other than Kin Ravenclaw who says he’s familiar with Kraun and his “business dealings” (Session 45)
- The party recovers the gem and delivers it to Kraun for their reward (Session 47)
- Korra offers to go along with Adrian to go see Kraun, while others around are packing their wagons, getting ready to leave Redstone
- Adrian greets Kraun, who welcomes them as his “friendly band of heroes”
- Adrian shows the ring that he’d been given it and asks if he – or one of his people – can look at the ring he’d been given by the Carnival owner
- Kraun takes the ring into his hand examining it and smiles, “Ah, definitely some dark magic in making this ring,” he nods, with some excitement. “Would you like one of my employees to look at it?” Adrian agrees, and Kraun shouts for “Squeven!” a number of times, and a halfling cleric appears, sighs, and asks, “How can I help you?”
- Adrian presents the ring to Squeven who asks if they’re with the caravan, and Adrian agrees; and Squeven explains that Kraun has him doing so much, and that identifying the ring is very, very, very lower priority (he says while rubbing his fingers together) and Adrian offers 50 gold, but Squeven says, “Look at all that Kraun has me looking at…”
- Adrian asks how much would it be to cut to the front of the line
- Squeven thinks about it, and says, “Ah, about… one hundred gold.”
- Buppido eventually finds them at Kraun’s wagon and says, “Why is he waiting a whole day? I could have probably helped in just a few minutes.”
- As Squeven walks off, Adrian takes note of the symbol on the Cleric’s breastplate – which is a dwarf in front of the moon light and immediately recognizes that as the symbol of Brezden, the God of Greed, from the Circle of Shade
- Buppido, meanwhile continues along the way, and heads for the Innkeeper, believing he’s the mayor of the town and explains that the Children from the Carnival were actually demons (Succubi and Inccubi) who had impersonated them – baring exact resemblance of the Children – except for wings and tails found on the Succubi and Inccubi
- Buppido goes on to explain that there’s no need to fear the Behir that the carnival had captured; that the party had the help of a red dragon that killed it and now roams the country side feeding on the corpse of the behir – but it should be fine – the red dragon should have a full stomach for weeks to come
- Buppido arrives back at the caravan as they’re ready to begin their ascent up Redstone Mountain and make their way into the Longstone Mountain range
- Adrian and Korra take the front of the wagon that they’d purchased, as the caravan makes it’s ascent up the steep mountain pass
- As the caravan makes it’s way up the path – the party experiences some trouble, the higher they go – the temperature gradually drops, as snow begins to fall and darkness creeps over the ride up, as thick, grey, chilling clouds block the moons and stars from making the path before them visible
- There are a few times where the wagon loses control slightly, and the wheel breaks; but Buppido is able to step off the wagon and repair the wheel magically; and there are a few times where the wheel hits the edge, throwing the wagon to one side; but none of the party members, thankfully fall out of the covered wagon
- The party looks ahead and sees how others have hung lanterns on their wagons to help be able to see the path in front of them
- Adrian lights a torch, holding it with one hand, while grasping the wagon’s rail with the other, as it rocks and shimmies up the mountain side
- The caravan eventually reaches a plateau that is riddled with caverns all around, which is where the caravans pull their wagons into, taking shelter both from the snow, and the biting, chilly winds
- The party pulls their wagon into a cave and pull the horses in; Don Kannin spends his time with the horses, keeping them calm, while Sephrenia goes through their inventory to make sure they have what’s needed (as some stuff had fallen out on one of the times the wagon’s wheels had lurched over the side) – DM Note – this was just an excuse to explain what these two are doing in the cave since they were absent this session
- The rest of the party, once their wagon is secure, looks down in the cave they will be calling home for a night or two – depending on how bad the snowfall is – and sees that it goes deep into the cave. Their footsteps, and very breath, seem to gently echo.
- The party leaves Don to care for the animals and Sephrenia to guard their wagon (DM Note – again, easy ways to keep their characters “there” but busy since these two had missed this session)
- As they go deeper into the cave, they realize it not only extends deeper – but there’s holes along the walls – ranging from halfling size to humanoid size; and just then Korra begins hearing the sounds of fluttering
- Korra points out to the party – but Bupiddo seems entirely too distracted by the holes in the walls that he could easily walk into – and undoubtedly – get lost in – until Korra grabs him and tells him to stop wandering around
- He looks up at the fluttering sound and sees what looks to be bats; they look unusual, and there isn’t bat guano on the floor, as far as Bupiddo can see – he sees nuggets of poop that resemble feline poop and simply answers Adrian, who asks what kind of feces it is, that it’s “Cave Cat Poop.”
- Korra, not native to the Prime Material Plane, looks at Buppido, “Is that even a thing?”
- “Sure,” he answers confidently, “cats live everywhere.” He proceeds to walk around whispering, “Kitty… kitty…”
- Korra looks up and shakes her head, “No, those are Stirges…” (Which the party is wholly familiar with)
- Once the Stirges are pointed out – the party can see the Stirges seem aggitated – but it’s unclear why – it could be the presence of the adventurers or something else may have them spooked – there’s little time to figure it out when Buppido suddenly unleashes a fireball on the ceiling, destroying all 30 Stirges in an instant, sending their charred corpses falling to the ground and sending an intense wave of heat bursting through every nook and cranny in the cavern
- The party all turn to face Buppido in shock as he shrugs and says, “What? I hate those things,” then proceeds to call for the “Cave Cats” he’s confident are still somewhere in this cavern with all these holes in the wall
- “Was that necessary,” Korra asks.
- “Very,” Bupiddo replies.
- “Well something had them nervous, before you killed them,” Adrian points out. Then asks, “Can you cast light on this stone? I want to throw it further down the cave – see if there’s something down here.”
- Buppido looks agitated to be pulled away from his search of the Cave Cats and approaches Adrian and casts light on the stone. Curious if it will illuminate the cave and reveal where the Cave Cats might be, Buppido stays put and watches.
- The rock sails across the cavern, quickly revealing more holes along the walls in random sizes; until bouncing a few times and coming to rest – much to everyone’s surprise – near an armored corpse slumped against the cavern wall, about 90′ feet deeper into the cave
- From this distance, it appears the figure – still adorned in tattered armor – has been here for awhile – and may have either frozen to death or died of starvation, trapped in the cavern due to some great snowfall many years ago
- The party moves forward to examine the body – when suddenly, a massive insect like creature bursts from one of the holes, surprising everyone!
- It’s heated body emits intense damage to everyone who is caught flatfooted by the arrival of this uncanny beast
- Ragnaroc is able to blasts with Eldritch Blast – and pushes the beast 20′ away (10′ for each hit)
- The party quickly realizes that the beast’s body emits so much heat that they will take damage if they’re too close; which it has run up to Adrian to attack
- Adrian however, uses his magic longsword to cut into the monster; but remains near it, so that the beast’s body continues to emit intense heat, damaging those nearby
- The creature bits into Adrian for extremely heavy damage (29 points of damage!)
- Korra attacks with her daggers, however – just as she lunges forward, her dagger is not able to pierce its chitin hide, and she quickly uses her Cunning Action to step away from the creature before taking heat damage
- Bupiddo attempts to cast Faerie Fire, however the creature misses and sighs, “I know we were cold before – but this is ridiculous.” As Bupiddo uses his “lens flare” spell to step away, the young Remorhaz uses a reaction to lunge at him – landing a solid hit and doing extensive damage to Bupiddo despite being at disadvantage
- Adrian casts Shield of Faith on himself, as a shimmering protective field covers his body, then casts Cure Wounds on himself
- Ragnaroc backs away from the creature, positioning himself behind Adrian, and lands a hit once, but the second one misses – but the first hit manages to push the creature another 10′ away from the party
- The creature dashes back up to the party; and the party realizes the creature is driving them back slowly and they’re getting closer and closer to their wagon and horses; and they realize that if it senses or sees the horses – and begins killing them – it would cripple their wagon and force the party to potentially continue the caravan journey on foot
- Adrian yells to the party that he’s going to get on the other side of it and try to lure it away from the horses and back, deeper into the cave
- Korra manages to to hit the creature with the dagger – and she injects the venom from the dagger – and additionally gets Sneak Attack damage; and she moves around towards Adrian to try and lure it deeper into the cave
- Both Adrian and Bupiddo realize that the blood of its body is what is emitting this immense heat (they both rolled Natural 20s on Nature checks), as they had both been bitten by the creature
- Bupiddo casts Poison Spray which hits and quickly uses Misty Step to get further away
- As the creature takes more damage, it’s spine begins glowing a brighter red, and the heat that it emits seems to double
- Adrian strikes the beast and expends Divine Smite from his blade – killing the beast – and it quickly falls forward, and it tumbles forward, collapsing on top of Adrian as he pulls his blade out and tries to leap out of the way
- Despite being deceased, the creature’s body continues to emit heat within the cave for several hours
- Bupiddo knows a little about the creatures; and explains that the eggs are highly regarded for being extremely tasty (DM Note – he’d roll high enough on Nature to know the Eggs were valuable as they can be raised and trained – but simply decided to tell them that the eggs are delicious)
- The party moves closer to the corpse slumped against the wall, and as they do they can tell the cavern is getting colder and colder the deeper they go in and the further they go away from the heat source that the young Remorhaz is emitting; although it’s still not clear what may have led to the warrior’s demise.
- The party begins to Investigate the body; and realize he has no wounds that would have come from a Remorhaz (both Adrian and Bupiddo having been bit by the beast would know!), and it doesn’t look like he was killed by Stirges; but rather, when they move the corpse’s tattered leather armor to the side, they discover two three to four inch puncture wounds in his chest
- Buppido (Natural 20 on Investigation) spots that there’s some kind of liquid around the wounds – like sap – and that the wounds have a blackness around the edges, which clearly show this wasn’t some giant spear – but undoubtedly some form of venom or toxin – which once again rules out the Remorhaz and the Stirges
- At that moment, a giant spider – like one they’ve never seen before – drops from the ceiling!
- It manages to land a surprise attack, burying it’s massive fangs into Bupiddo’s back, who takes a massive amount of damage – but is spared the poison damage (Natural 20 on the Save)
- When Combat starts, the Phase Spider goes first (followed by Adrian, Ragnaroc, Korra then Buppido)
- With Buppido and Adrian already wounded from the Remorhaz and didn’t heal, this looks like it could go poorly
- It lunges for Ragnaroc next, and Adrian uses his defensive stance to put it at Disadvantage, but it still sinks its fangs into Ragnaroc for massive damage, since he fails against the poison (25 damage!)
- That single hit is enough to bloody the Phase Spider
- Adrian strikes next and hits – upcasting his Divine Smite – and manages to finish off the Phase Spider
- As they take a deep breath, Buppido and Korra both notice that the corpse is rising – and Buppido is able to heal himself quickly as the corpse is revealed to be undead!
- Adrian rolls a Natural 20 on Initiative, giving him an extra action
- However, in his haste in spinning around – sensing an undead behind him – his drawn sword cuts into Buppido for trivial damage
- Adrian recognizes the undead as a Wight
- His next swing hits – and like the attack on the Phase Spider – he expends his Divine Smite, launching an incredible amount of damage
- Korra casts Firebolt and hits it quite hard and uses her bonus to Stealth (at Disadvantage, due to Adrian’s shield being lit up with the Light spell) but still manages an incredible Stealth
- Ragnaroc fires two Eldritch Blasts, but only one hits – but it’s enough to perish
- Buppido heals himself with Healing Word
- The party kicks the sword away; and after making sure it doesn’t rise – the party determines that they’d best head back to the horses and tell Don Kannin and Sephrenia as to all that happened
- Ragnaroc and Buppido mention how bloodied they are
- The party proceeds to get a long rest