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• Arhian Vos – Human Monk
  • Pet: Pabu (Young Red Panda)
• Hartmut Helmsworth – Elf Monk
  • Pet: Kalistia (Young Blink Dog)
• Sindri Waggletop – (Forest) Gnome Wizard 
• Rettniss Kulvith – Water Genasi Druid
• Avacyn “Jolyne” Uloth the Merciless – Half-Orc Paladin
• Twilight Skybane – Tiefling Bard
  • Pet: Gem (Sailor Parrot With A Mouth)
  • Pet: C.C. (Copy Cat, Mimic Bag Of Holding)

• Arhian asks Heima more about the Cestuses and Heima explains that, from the notes he has; it appears that after Baransu escaped from the Illithid, having rescued his son, but losing his wife; Baransu, with his mind fractured, became obsessed with the idea that the Illithid would one day come after his son, and daughter; so he recreated, what was once a single Cestus into two sets; the Cestus of Seikaku-Sa would go to his daughter, since she was spared the horrors of the Illithid; while Cestus of Kyoaku-Sei would go to his infant son, who bore witness as an infant to the horror of the Illithid, so he knew his son was touched by darkness
• Arhian also explains that while they completed the cestus ceremony, both he and Hartmut witnessed something that looked to be an open sea of nothingness; yet full of vibrant colors and moons (Session 17). Heima nods, “What you saw was the Astral Plane. A few have unlocked how to venture into the Astral bodies with their spirit and mind, but no one has found any ancient vessels known as Spelljammers that once existed. There are stories of a large group of elves who pursued a serpent worshipping cult – named Nebakrau – elves into the Astral Plane; but we’ve not discovered how they’d done so. This was several hundred years ago.” (This was revealed in The Adventurers – Session 69)
• Heima explains that travels to different Planes – such as the Plane of Fire, Water, Air, Earth is possible – he looks over at Rettniss and nods before looking back at Arhian. “I assume that’s how she got to be here on Kne’Urth from the Plane of Water.”
• Heima calls the party together and then looks at Avacyn.
• Heima explains that the Great Library, which is the Mage’s Tower, has a darker secret. He goes on to explain, centuries ago when the Wild Elves showed humans how to manipulate magic; humans were being consumed and corrupted by the magic, due to not being naturally magically inherent.
  • This corruption caused humans to become drunk with power, seeking any means to extend their power – and, extend their lives – turning to extremely dark magic, such as becoming a Lich in order to continue their lives and their magical abilities. For almost two hundreds years, this corruption ran rampant – and mages of all kinds – whether wizards, sorcerers, warlocks – even clerics and druids – became feared and hunted down. In those two hundred years, humans began to adapt and learn to properly harness the magic, but the damage had already been done. In the year 1,000 – several Great Libraries were constructed – but in truth these were Mage Towers. The Library was the veil, where tomes of books were stored, knowledge was gathered – but in the basements of these great Libraries, Mages gathered to speak about the state of the world. It was agreed that the Mages would need to hunt down those who practiced Necromancy and bring them back to the tower to see if they could be saved. If they could not, then they were… silenced forever.
  • Something has once again sent ripples through the world of magic; something sinister – like shadows whispering. A few months ago, several Churches reported that their gods had gone silent – Airana, goddess of fertility; Akanda, god of travel; Drakenfhel, god of wisdom; Elenar, god of wind, fire and water; Krauzden, god of wind and flight, Lauhzar, goddess of winter, Tavara, goddess of weather, and Tearak, god of judgement – all of them had gone silent. Eventually the clerics confirmed – their gods had perished during a battle in the heavens when Lakrona, Mistress of the Web, ascended. (DM Note – this was the conclusion of a large, 28 session story line, concluding in Session 41!)
  • Heima goes on to explain that, whoever sent these one eyed assassins – if it was indeed the Beholder, As’zar’vari’tium, and if he does indeed possess the Skull-Gem, it would explain the scrying spell we felt – he was looking for all of you, because of the weapons. And if he sensed you here in Ridgecrest, he knew that beneath this tower is an old teleportation disc that the mages once used to teleport between the various Mage Towers… but that teleportation disc has no been functional for a very long time. So he may have used his own magic to shunt his assassins here.
  • Heima explains that, because the Mages have not used the teleportation discs in a long time; and with all that has happened, he asks the party to investigate. He warns that while the outside of Ridgecrest contains a magical barrier sustained by the Mages, beneath the ground is not protected and that there is a good chance that some wildlife may have eventually buried beneath the ground and made its home beneath the tower, so to be careful.
• Sindri asks if there’s a map for the lower level and Heima explains that one was never made because as far as everyone was concerned there was no basement below the main floor of the Great Library
• He does explain it is a long spiral case downward, then it should be pretty straight forward with rooms, occasionally to the sides; though the mountain has shifted over the hundreds of years, so some of what is down below may be severely damaged. We’ve never worried about it until this very recent turn of events of gods dying… and what you believe to potentially be a Beholder with the Skull-Gem.
• Heima finally looks at Avacyn and says, “I am familiar with your mother. While I was not one of the ones who pursued your mother for the Necromancy she was doing, I am well aware of all she’s done. Down below you will see things… old things… that the Mages are not proud of… there are torture devices and the like below… things the Mages used to try and drive out the … evil of those mages corrupted by Necromancy… They are a tarnished mark on the Order of Mages who perhaps went too far themselves in their hope to save others…”
• Rettniss shakes her head and whispers, “OK, so I guess we’re going down to the super creepy, crazy place…”
• Sindri looks around, “Before we head down – do we need to stock up on anything?”
• Everyone looks over their inventory and determine they need potions
• Rettniss asks for directions to the Apothecary and Heima hands her a note, which explains that they are to get a discount, on the cost of the Mage Tower, signed by Heima
• They head to the potion shop directed by Heima, which is Stonesteam’s Dreams
• Inside they meet a young gnome, whose hair goes out in every direction, named Caraus Stonesteam
• The party notes that his accent sounds very dwarvish; and Caraus explains that he’s a rock gnome and grew up near dwarves; always dealing with them to get things and trade, before he left and made his living on the road, eventually coming to open a store in High Ridge.
• Rettniss hands Caraus the note from Heima; and Caraus mutters how one of these days he needs to get over to the Mage’s Tower and collect what’s owed to him
• Twilight asks if Caraus has Potions of Healing and he explains that he does and that the normal cost for them is 50 gold a piece; but because they have the note from Heima, he offers to sell them for 10 gold a piece
  • Rettniss purchases: 5 Potions of Healing
  • Arhian purchases: 3 Potions of Healing
  • Sindri purchases: 2 Potions of Healing
  • Twilight purchases: 2 Potions of Healing
  • Hartmut purchases: 10 Potions of Healing
    • Because Hartmut purchased 10 potions, Caraus cuts him another discount and only charges him 80 gold rather than 100 gold
• Rettniss asks if she buys 5 more can she get the total of them all for 80 gold as well
• Caraus agrees, noting she’s an odd looking lass (being a Water Genasi)
  • Rettniss purchases: 5 more Potions of Healing
  • Avacyn purchases: 4 Potions of Healing
• Sindri asks if Caraus has other potions; and the rock gnome explains that he doesn’t venture far out of Ridgecrest, so he typically just purchases the herbs he needs from vendors in Mid Ridge. When Sindri asks about other potion shops or magical weapon shops, Caraus explains that all of that is primarily in Mid Ridge, as High Ridge is the “rich people” area of town who aren’t the “adventuring sort” so they don’t need such things
• The party notes that a few of them don’t have rope, but most of them do so they should be fine; the party returns to the Mage Tower, and Heima leads them down a flight of stairs into an area that is unkempt – and proceeds to utter the magic word that allows a part of the wall to open.
• From below, the smell of old books and mildew quickly assaults their senses
• Sindri quickly casts Prestidigitation to create a forest pine spell
• They look and just as Heima had said, there is a long, stone, spiral stair case that leads into darkness. The walls are cold and damp and there’s a cold chill that comes from below, like a heavy, lingering fog in a forgotten graveyard
• Realizing Arhian doesn’t have Dark Vision, Sindri proceeds to cast Light on Arhian’s Quarterstaff to create some light
• Deep shadows cast down the seemingly endless spiral stairs which are slick with moisture; the party begins to descend and realize just how slick the floor is…

• Immediately, they all begin to plunge, with Avacyn slipping and colliding into everyone (DM Note – Technically they all failed; the DC for the Check was a base 10 and not a single person rolled it – but since Avacyn actually Critical Failed, flavored it as Avacyn causing everyone to lose their footing)
• Sindri immediately casts Feather Fall – however, the spell only allows up to five people to be spared from falling – Sindri watches as Avacyn tumbles down the spiral stair case, her metal armor clanging against the stone steps and railing, sounding like an alarm ringing repeatedly until Avacyn finally reached the bottom of the stairwell (DM Note – Avacyn took some damage from the fall)
• Thankfully, none of Avacyn’s recently purchased Healing Potions were damaged in the fall (DM Note – Since he did a critical fail and fell, I had him roll another DC 10 Dexterity Check to see if he managed to ensure he didn’t break any potions along the fall; had he failed, since he bought 4 potions and 2 on him, I was going to make him roll a d6 to see how many shattered in the fall)
• As the rest of the party reaches the bottom of the stairs, they see Avacyn – her armor a little more banged up – but otherwise unharmed. When they reach the base of the stairs, the musky smell increases and become overbearing – like standing in the middle of thousands of wet pages of paper.
• The hallway opens into a much larger section; everything here is much more raw. The halls look like natural stone rather than shaped as hallways. To the right as the venture forward an old room looks to be a library; several bookshelves are toppled over. Sindri, without even begin asking, begins walking over there – and Twilight draws everyone’s attention to him – and the party all follow him into the library.
• The books here are beyond ruined; the exposure to the moisture in the cavern had spread mold across most of the books that were not toppled over
• The book cases have some form of slime, which could be just the moisture and mold that has grown throughout this library
• Sindri is disappointed that these tomes of books, most of which seem to be records of some kind, are damaged beyond repair. Sindri assumes this may have been some of the records the mages kept from the days that they used these lower chambers to “cure” those driven to Necromancy
• An unusual scent also lingers the further they explore the library; almost like that of a corpse or rotting flesh
• Rettniss suddenly looks up and shouts, “There’s something on the ceiling! We need to back up and get out of – ” and just as he looks at the door, he spots a second one descending from the door, “there’s one by the door!”

• Twilight tries to cast Faerie Fire on the ceiling where they are – but their many legs allow them to quickly avoid it

• As they battle the Carrion Crawlers, things seem equally balanced. Avacyn is forced to crawl onto a crumbling desk in order to reach the Carrion Crawlers and swing her axe. One of the Carrion Crawlers manages to hit Hartmut with its tentacles and nearly paralyzes him.

• Hartmut warns his companions of the tentacles from the creatures, barely shaking off the effects of its touch
• The party cuts their way through the Carrion Crawlers, with Avacyn – once again – delivering the killing blow on the final Carrion Crawler, decimating the beast and losing herself in the bloodbath
• Arhian watches as Avacyn stomps the massive skull of the Carrion Crawler, even after it’d been killed and looked at Hartmut and whispered, “Are we sure she’s not some kind of barbarian?”

• After the bloodbath, Sindri covered in Carrion Crawler blood and mucus wipes his forehead and says, “It makes sense those creatures were down here… Heima did say that they used to bring Necromancy Mages down here to try and … cure them… and those that could not be cured were – as he said silenced forever – which I am guessing to mean, they were killed. Which means, somewhere down here there’s probably a burial ground with hundreds of corpses potentially of mages who refused to give up Necromancy…”
• Hartmut offers to cut up the Carrion Crawler, on Twilight’s request, to use as food for Copy Cat, the young Mimic Chest
• Twilight harvests some of the poison from the Carrion Crawlers
• The party moves on eventually coming to a cliff side, where it looks – just as Heima warned – that the ground had shifted, causing a massive rip in the underground surface. Peering down – it seemed that the drop was roughly 100 feet.

• Using Shadow Step to teleport 40 feet down, then Slow Fall to slow fall the last bit – Hartmut lands on the ground ahead of everyone else, barely taking any damage. He quickly steps into the shadows to Hide.
• The others look around – and find a large jagged rock that they can tie a rope to. Rettniss ties the rope around the rock and Arhian attempts to descend first…

• Rettniss’ bad knot quickly unravels as Arhian begins to descend – and Arhian and the rope go over the edge; and Arhian quickly uses his Slow Fall ability – and despite falling 97 feet – and by using Slow Fall – manages to negate 30 damage… and I rolled… 30 damage. So Arhian takes no damage, landing the “heroic landing” – with the rope hitting her on top of the head after striking her pose

• Twilight says that she has 50 feet of rope. Avacyn explains she doesn’t have any. And Rettniss explains that her 50 feet of rope just went over the edge with Arhian. Sindri asks if there’s any druid spells that Rettniss can cast that they can use as vines
• Twilight sends her bird Gem down to go get the rope (I gave the bird a DC of 14 considering it was a bird and 100 feet of rope would be heavy)… and… Gem came through.

• Gem manages to fly down – the entire time cussing how he’s had to get ropes before when he was on the pirate ship – and how he’s never seen anyone as loud as these adventurers and no idea why the Monk took the rope down with her when they clearly still needed it
• Rettniss offers to tie the rope again; but this time, Twilight offers the Help action – explaining, as Gem mentioned, she spent a long time working on ships and is an expert at tying ropes The party descends down the rope successfully.
• As they make their way through the cavern – it isn’t long before Sindri and Twilight hear someone speaking – and they’re speaking in Common – but they’re speaking in the Arcane tongue – casting a spell of some kind. As they listen – they identify the spell as some form of Summoning spell.
• “Someone down here,” Sindri whispers looking at Twilight, “casting a summoning spell can not be a good thing… could it be someone summoning more assassins?”
• “Or something worse,” Twilight replies, concerned.
• They report back – and using Pass Without Trace attempt to move forward… however, when Gem sees the portal – Gem lets our a few choice words… getting the attention of the caster… and whatever it is that is shimmering in the portal…

To Be Continued?

Why yes. Yes it will.