Session Summaries

''As you move to free the wagons from the muck of the Firewisp Swamp for the third time in the last ten minutes, you can't help wanting to go back in time and kick yourselves for accepting this job. It seemed so easy at first, and you can practically see the face of one of the Institute of Ascension's proctors.

"We've got an expedition's worth of researchers heading into the swamp, and we need you to guard it. Well, not so much guard, as to make sure things that go wrong get fixed. You all seem like a... capable lot. Capable, and relatively cheap. We've already hired a guide from Murkheath to get you through safely, and a few other locals from Brèyor to assist with the animals, camp, etcetera."

"Of course we're not sure what we'll find, as the expedition was more or less a hunch by its leader, Marie Quinlan. I presume you've met her by now, she's a perfectly agreeable woman. She'll be handling the academic side of things, and making sure the researchers do their jobs. Like I said, you're the ones in charge of keeping them safe."

"The pay is acceptable, as we have already discussed. Two hundred gold to cover your equipment, with potential bonuses based on the quality of the find. Any questions? No? Then off with you, get to the wagons!"

That was two weeks ago. A few days' ride from Brèyor you rolled into Murkheath, a tiny little town at the edge of the Firewisp Swamp, and acquired your guide, a dragonborn who only answers to Skar (oddly, you see no scars on his person). A week and a half later, and as far as you're concerned, the expedition is hopelessly lost, as Skar leads you "around" brackish mudhole after mudhole.

But today is apparently different, and somewhere near dusk you reach solid ground. Skar insists that you make camp at this spot, and within an hour you're all seated around the cooking fire. Marie has been wandering around the edges of camp for about an hour when she finally takes her seat, a huge smile on her face.

"We're here! I can feel it. Tomorrow, we start excavating."

The bewildered looks around the campfire remind you that this is the first solid ground you've camped on in days. But at least this means that you won't necessarily be tromping through the muck tomorrow.

"...as soon as our roamers have checked out the surroundings to make sure it's safe, of course."

There's a relieved sigh from the researchers. Dammit.''

Session 1 - Safe Passage (7/25/12)
After two weeks of rolling (or squelching) through the Firewisp Swamp, Marie finally decided it was time to make camp and start excavating. Naturally, the party was tasked with looking around the area to make sure everything was safe.

In the morning, Krytos was discovered to be missing, with a note written in Grippli left in his cot. The note invited the party to a nearby Grippli village to negotiate for their comrade's safe return, as well as the expedition's safe passage through Grippli lands.

The Grippli chief, Vardethol, challenged the party to prove their worth (while a bound Krytos looked on in annoyance). Excited by the prospect of a challenge, the party accepted and faced off against the village's champion, Glubbalub. First, Zorn very nearly triumphed in a drinking contest against the Grippli, but was eventually overpowered by the horrifyingly-awful Grippli brew. Then, Heineken proved the party's bravery by gracefully leaping from a tall platform into the swamp-muck (having caught Glubbalub off-guard with a bagpipe blast). Finally, the party defeated Glubbalub in combat, when Krytos hurled the Grippli across a lake, skipping him four times.

Shortly after the challenge concluded, a pack of shocker lizards burst into the Grippli village, and the party defeated them soundly (despite some electricity burns and near-drownings). That, on top of the successful challenges, was enough to convince Chief Vardethol to allow the expedition to work in Grippli lands without being bothered. A luau featuring fried shocker lizard followed, and the party returned to camp.

Upon returning to camp, the party discovered that several of the tents were on fire, and the rest of the expedition was visibly incapacitated by a gang of kobolds preparing to drag them all away. After narrowly defeating the horrible things, Bruce put out the fires, and the expedition's wounds were tended to. Marie only remembered being surprised by something sticking out of her arm, and other accounts were similarly cut off. At any rate, Marie was pleased to learn that the party had negotiated their safe passage, and even more pleased that they had been saved from the kobolds. With some degree of order returned to the camp, the expedition retired for the night.

Session 2 - Snakebrooooooo! (8/8/12)
The following morning, the party went to be briefed by Marie, only to find Skar arguing with her about his pay. The argument ended with the dragonborn storming out of camp, allowing Marie to brief the party and show them to the ruins she had found. The exterior was covered in Draconic graffiti, more than likely the work of kobolds. The interior radiated intense magical auras from every square foot of stone, nearly blinding Draika when she tried to decipher them.

Diving down into the swamp, the party found an elaborate temple complex guarded only by some of the same kobolds. Granted, these kobolds were fairly organized, having apparently united under a kobold devoted to Ansilvund, and their weapons were at the very least annoying. After thoroughly routing the kobolds (melting several with acid), their thunder bees (combining True Strike and Create Water), and their thrown snakes (using a timely Speak With Animals), they interrogated the kobold priest and let it go, after learning of a powerful staff somewhere in the temple.

While exploring the temple, the party came across four crypts and sarcophagi, each containing what seemed to be an important hero's remains. Each seemed to be warded so that only certain party members could get at the sarcophagus, and each one they opened contained a magical item. The four crypts belonged to: The party theorized that the crypts were somehow attuned to the temple complex, and perhaps set to screen out certain alignments, but were quickly distracted by a hidden trapdoor in Kustin's crypt.
 * 1) Amara Blackscale, Scion of the Paragon - An apparent cleric of Phol-Phoram, the party left her sarcophagus alone out of respect to Krytos.
 * 2) Solanar Wildblood, Guardian of the Realm - A halfling druid, whose sarcophagus contained a shovel.
 * 3) Ekka-Thar, Champion of the Arcane - A lacewing spellcaster of some sort, whose sarcophagus contained a dagger.
 * 4) Kustin Doorbreaker, Stalwart - A dwarven monk, whose sarcophagus contained a silver sash.

Descending deeper through makeshift kobold warrens (which the party thoroughly smashed), more ancient stone doors and walls appeared, each with signs that the kobolds had tried to dig through. Eventually, the party emerged into a wide open chamber with a huge pit in the center, and an chain-tethered platform floating in the center of that. Here they found a ghostly kobold who was enraged at the rest of his tribe's abandoning their ancient draconic masters for new gods. They also found Skar, who had more or less wandered in after going on a kobold-killing spree (to convince Marie to pay him more).

When the party finally provoked the ghostly kobold into attacking, they discovered that the pit went all the way down into... the Roil. Luckily, Grizz was able to climb out safely with a potion of Spider Climb, and he successfully grabbed the fragment of a staff from the center platform. Rotfoot however was not so lucky, falling down into the pit when he tried to cross. Much to his surprise, a shimmering plane of force bounced him right back out of the pit, later enabling him to reach the center platform by using it as a trampoline.

Eventually the party defeated the ghostly kobold and his exploding skeletal minions, and found that he wasn't actually a ghost when Zorn splattered him with a well-placed musket bullet. With the staff recovered, the party readied itself to return to camp... when Skar took the staff right out of Grizz's hands and fled the cave.

Session 3 - Through the Muck (8/29/12)
With Skar's sudden and confusing betrayal fresh in their minds, the party set out to track him down. Marie was able to assist the party by using the expedition's book of footprints (kept around in case someone disappears like Skar), and the expedition's alchemist, a human named Themal, volunteered to come with the party and try to track their former guide across the Firewisp Swamp.

The party almost immediately lost the trail upon entering the swamp, leaving them with only a general heading and the knowledge that Murkheath lay somewhere ahead. Fighting their way through the swamp, the party contended with increasingly ridiculous kobold attacks, giant walrus-frogs, oversized snapping turtles, and seemingly omnipresent quicksand. The very swamp itself seemed to want the party dead, as vicious plants and sinkholes threatened to stop them in their tracks. Krytos in particular had a bad run of luck, as he frequently fell face-first into the nearest available pile of muck while Draika would Feather Fall right behind him onto something safer. Still the party persevered, eventually emerging into a clearing near the edge of Murkheath.

Here the party discovered what appeared to be an herbalist's shack, and signs of a very recent struggle. With almost no regard for his own personal safety, Rotfoot charged ahead and looked inside, discovering an unconscious elven woman and a heavily-potioned Skar. The dragonborn bellowed, hefted his bone greatsword, and charged, another potion in hand. Unfortunately for him, what he thought was a Cure Moderate Wounds turned out to be a potion of Vomit Swarm, and he swallowed the resultant spiders in surprise. This did allow Skar to discharge a breath weapon full of acid and spiders onto the party, but ultimately gave the party the opening they needed to throw everything they could at him. Despite nearly killing both Rotfoot and Grizz, the dragonborn was eventually brought down when Krytos leapt up at Skar's face, and funneled his own fiery breath weapon into the traitor's throat. With the kiss of death applied, the party recovered the staff fragment and stood ready to question their former guide, and hopefully figure out exactly what possessed him to do all of this.

Session 4 - The Murkheath Mystery (9/12/12)
With Skar subdued, the party finally had a chance to figure out what's going on. Unfortunately, Skar stuck to a simple story: "I just stole it because it looked valuable." Unable to coax any more information from the dragonborn, Rotfoot ripped a mysterious black scale from the back of Skar's head (which immediately crumbled to dust) and the party turned him in to the guards of Murkheath. Said guards were mystified by this, and gave the party the evil eye all through the streets of Murkheath.

After meeting with the mayor of Murkheath, one Russ Kerden, a few facts were established. One, Skar had falsely passed himself off as a member of the Murkheath chapter of the Huntsman's Guild, which conveniently overlaps with most of the town guard. Two, Krytos really needs to stop saying offensive things to powerful people who can kill him with a single full-round action. And three, the town of Murkheath's children were disappearing, utterly baffling the town guard. The party quickly agreed to help, and Krytos was happily not killed by a pissed-off dwarven ranger.



The party fanned out and started questioning residents of Murkheath. After visiting several of the families with missing children, and determining some of the powers of Bruce's magic shovel, they had a basic lead and two plans. Plan number one was to round up all the goblin children in the town and use them to lure the kidnapper into a trap (since the goblins were infuriated over not having any of their kids stolen). Plan two was to disguise Draika as a child. The party chose plan number two, and it worked... a little too well.

A vicious stone hag burst up through the rock, after dragging Draika down into a prison of solid stone. After a pitched battle that was finally ended by Krytos cutting through the hag's defenses with Bruce's magic shovel, the party was able to question the child-stealer. Unfortunately, they didn't get much before she uttered two words and teleported away: "Kyer-Ixidar."

Session 5 - The Cockleburr Inn (9/26/12)
As the party prepared to depart from Murkheath, Draika decided that the party's adventures were proving too much for her, and elected to stay in Murkheath. Luckily for the rest of the party, a wanderer from Eldril had just arrived in town, looking for work. So shortly after Rotfoot tried to eat the staff fragment the party had recovered, seemingly causing an island-wide earthquake, Delphine joined the party.

Now wary of their precious cargo, the party departed for Bréyor, left with the unnerving feeling that someone was watching them. After being "waylaid" by perhaps the least successful bandit in the history of Emden, and traveling for a few days, the party arrived at a remote tavern in the Silver Forest, called the Cockleburr Inn. The party pretty much ruined the performance of the resident bard, one untalented halfling named Giancarlo, and thoroughly bothered the rest of the inn's guests.

In the middle of the night, the inn's residents awoke to a scream, and rushed outside to find Giancarlo's dead body, seemingly torn limb from limb. Few tears were shed, particularly once the halfling appeared in the PCs' room later in the night. He told them that there was a powerful magical item buried underneath the inn's outhouse, and this caused Grizz and Bruce to dig down into the filth and look for it. By the time the party realized Giancarlo had lied to them, and was actually dead and haunting them, it was too late.

Eager to rid themselves of the caustic and annoying halfling, the party set off into the woods to look for whatever had killed Giancarlo, hoping that would put him to rest. In what would later be called a catastrophically bad plan, Krytos walked out into the forest with a steak dangling from his neck, with the rest of the party following behind him. This of course brought out the predator, an immense dire-looking bear that nearly tore several PCs apart. After a pitched battle, the party brought the bear down, where it quickly changed shape into a tired-looking elven druid.

The party learned that the druid, one Scorch, had been patrolling the forest when a mysterious wolf-like creature appeared and killed his animal companion, causing the normally-peaceful druid to fly into an uncontrollable rage. After Bruce offered up Snakebro as a replacement companion, the druid went on his way, with the party convinced that he wasn't evil or anything heinous like that. Shortly after this, the party arrived in Bréyor, where they encountered some quasi-illusionary creatures that matched Scorch's description of uncanny wolves. After being informed that the city was dealing with a plague of these creatures, and that the trouble had started roughly around Rotfoot's chewing-induced earthquake, the party quickly decided that it was time to rush on into the Institute of Ascension, and get to the bottom of all of this.

Session 6 - Poof the Magic Dragon (10/10/12)
As the party prepared to enter the Institute of Ascension's grounds, Zorn and Heineken suddenly reappeared, carrying a load of artifacts from the expedition's excavations. With yet more reason to trek inside the incredibly dangerous 50/50, they set off. Almost immediately they were beset by various magical anomalies, and rescued a supply caravan from a seemingly-trapped (or at least pointlessly-dangerous) ruin.

After suffering through the firestorms, magical hallucinations, and flying semi-illusory snakes of the grounds, the party finally reached the Institute proper, meeting up with a detachment of the Bréyor guard, the Warders. After being informed just how poorly the situation was going in the Institute, the party quickly agreed to help the Warders clean up the mess and get to the bottom of the anomalies. To that end, they headed into the Institute's practice chambers, where a great deal of anomalous magic seemed to be afoot.

Inside the halls of the Institute, the party found a bloatmage seemingly possessed by the illusory mist. The man was busy conducting some sort of ritual involving runes and more mist, so the party quickly subdued and killed him, only later being informed that it was one of the Institute's more influential instructors. But, unburdened by this knowledge, the party headed towards the central halls of the Institute, where the Warders were certain the source of the anomalies would be found.

Here the party found an enormous mass of the swirling mist, which quickly coalesced into more strange and dangerous creatures for them to fight alongside the Warders and assorted Institute battlemages. However, the center of the mist quickly formed into an honest-to-gods dragon, which demanded the party hand over the staff fragment. The party obviously refused this request, and after enduring its attacks (and watching Rotfoot briefly ride it), Zorn was able to summon all of his alcoholic fortitude and disbelieve the dragon out of existence. The anomalies around the Institute almost immediately subsided, back down to levels that Bréyor locals would bitterly refer to as "normal." With that, the party was finally able to turn over the staff fragment (as well as a few other items) to the Institute mages, so that it could be properly identified over the coming weeks.

Session 7 - Institutionalized Insanity (11/7/12)
With the staff fragment safely in the hands of the Institute of Ascension, the party had some time to kill during the identification process. Grizz, for one, left the party and returned to the Cockleburr Inn to take care of some unfinished business. He did not return, but a lacewing by the name of Moegid joined up with the party.

The rest of the party kept closer to the Institute, with most of the party working in the Institute's bestiary. Rotfoot attempted to ride pretty much anything that would stop moving for long enough (and everything else too), culminating in an incredible feat of... well, not so much riding, more like surfing on an air elemental. Bruce went around the Institute trying to dig up more details on the recent catastrophe, while Zorn helped the Institute's chief abjurer (one gnome named Corazon) identify the staff fragment.

Of course the day that the identification process was concluded, all hell broke loose. The party encountered a would-be assassin in the Institute's gardens while Zorn was taking a leak, and they later found Corazon dead and the staff fragment gone. Following the tracks leading from the scene of the crime, the party found a pair of apparent miscreants holed up in an abandoned Institute building. Of course, once they identified one of the "miscreants" as a follower of Mariona, combat was averted. After they introduced themselves as Beeson and Hikara, they gave the party a deal: come with them, and nobody gets hurt.

The party accepted the deal, and joined hands with their two new acquaintances. With a single word, "Talaro," the party found themselves teleported... somewhere. All that remained was to introduce the party to this Talaro figure, when he simply walked into the room. Needless to say, nobody quite expected an ancient gold dragon.

Session 8 - Popcorn Spiders (11/28/12)
Faced with the prospect of talking to an honest-to-gods gold dragon, the party showed remarkable restraint in neither attempting to kill it nor fleeing. The dragon known as Talaro informed them that the staff fragment needed to stay safely in his custody, and he explained some of the power it theoretically controls. With a promise of more information as long as the party cooperates, Talaro sent them back to the Institute with a replica of the staff, claiming that "the real one is safest with me, the fake is safest with the Institute."

After arriving back at the Institute, the party returned the fake staff to the Archmage, who seemed to be fooled by the forgery. She instructed the party to go and check out the late Corazon's office, to see if they could turn up any clues as to why he was murdered. Never ones to turn down rifling through a dead wizard's possessions, the party agreed. Almost immediately, they accidentally activated, broke, and ate an expensive and immaculately-crafted beetle construct (as of press time, Rotfoot was still digesting the darkwood-and-clockwork beetle, modeled after a particularly deadly species).

As they searched Corazon's office, they found that his notes and journals had been visibly rifled through and partially-destroyed. Nonetheless, Zorne was able to decipher the wizard's notes, and uncover some of the wizard's motivations. Apparently, he had been working on unapproved side projects at the direction of an "old crone" named Zia, and this same woman had even encouraged Corazon to push for the Firewisp Expedition that started this whole mess. The party spent a little bit of time messing with Corazon's experiments, before being confronted by some rogue Institute wizards investigating the death of Alistair Enberg (aka, the bloatmage the party killed in session 6). The wizards quickly flew off the handle and attacked, just as one of Corazon's experiments randomly exploded (sending a wizard who had gone invisible flying into a bookcase, knocking him out cold). The party subdued the wizards without excessive bloodshed, leaving them free to conduct one last experiment.

Inside Corazon's lab, the party had found a small sculpture of a spider with a metal needle shoved through the center. Both pinged as magic, but the party couldn't identify them. Conveniently, the machine Corazon had used to tease apart magic auras to identify items was in his office. Upon realizing that the machine could only identify one item at a time, Zorne took the needle out of the spider, and chucked the latter into the machine. About 30 seconds later, the machine exploded in an ever-expanding swarm of tiny spiders, causing the party to run like hell and allow the Institute's battlemages to deal with the problem. This prompted a tense conversation with Archmage Kessalia, wherein the party explained what they had found, and sort of ignored the whole spiders thing. Kessalia sent the party back to the swamp, arguing that if whatever Corazon was working on was important enough to get him killed, then his pet expedition should be as well-defended as possible. On the way out they were almost killed by another giant spider, but they prevailed.

Bonus Session 1 - "Show me on the doll where the sea touched you" (12-19-12)
Before the party could leave Bréyor, they were caught up in the annual Quickling Festival, held out at the unusual Quickling Lake. Here they met up with a dragonborn sorcerer by the name of Acerbitox, and soon he joined Delphine and Moegid in competing at the strange festival, where competitors attempt to walk across the magically-unstable waters of the lake.

After a day's preparation, wherein the party swam in the lake, experimented with the lake's alchemical properties, and tried reasoning with the lake, the competition began. The party quickly found that the 7-time reigning champion, one dragonborn paladin by the name of Yannick Grayflame, was unknowingly cheating at the festival thanks to a wizard friend of his, and exposed his deception to the entire festival. With the leader disgraced, Moegid was able to snatch victory from the watery jaws of defeat by getting seventy feet out into the lake, winning the grand prize. Acerbitox took home a small prize for taking third place, and the rest of the party soon collected itself to set back out for Murkheath to meet up with the rest of the expedition again.

Session 9 - Reach Out, Touch Slug (1-16-13)
Upon returning to Murkheath, the party almost immediately received a cryptic warning from Lady Tenzing, the town's resident crazy tengu. That night, the Treany was attacked by a burrowing team of kobolds, and the party vigilantly beat back the attack (as well as the giant slug the kobolds brought for some reason). Now concerned for the expedition's safety, at least mildly, they set out to scout the tunnels left behind by the kobolds. After Rotfoot set off an unprecedented number of traps with his face, the party found a small swamp boat that had apparently been stolen from the expedition.

Setting out into the swamp proper, the party discovered the site of an attack on a local patrol of Huntsmen, who had been routed by a large force of kobolds. Something about the bodies didn't sit right with Bruce, particularly once they stood up and started attacking everyone. Once the threat was dealt with, they moved on to the expedition camp.

Everything seemed normal as the adventurers returned to the expedition's camp. The researchers were all fine, the Huntsmen guards were able to identify their fallen comrades, and for once nothing was actively on fire. However, that changed when Marie came charging out of the ruins, leading a group of kobolds back to the camp. Following those kobolds was none other than Skar, toting a massive bone greatclub. He claimed to be leading a massive attack on Murkheath, telling the party to run and tell the city of its impending doom.

Well, obviously that wasn't going to happen. After a pitched battle, where the party dealt inhuman amounts of damage to a still-standing Skar, Acerbitox finished the evil dragonborn off when he tried to flee the party's wrath. Of course, this still left a massive invading force of kobolds behind (stunned by the death of their master), so the party calmly packed up the expedition and headed back to Murkheath.

Session 10 - Kobold Skin As Currency (1-30-13)
Knowing that a massive army of kobolds was about to bear down on Murkheath, the party retreated to town to inform the townspeople of the coming attack. With the help of Mayor Russ Kerden, the town was quickly mobilized to defend against the kobolds. With Moegid helping Izeria produce alchemical gear, Delphine boosting morale, and Bruce constructing barricades and trenches around the town, a mere two days saw Murkheath transformed into a formidable bastion. During the organization phase, the party was joined by a catfolk ranger named Purrfa, eager to kill some kobolds.

The attack began with a hostage situation, as the town's headstrong carpenter had set out himself to try and end the threat with just a single rifle. When Acerbitox ordered the opening volley of arrows, narrowly saving the halfling's life, the fight was truly joined. A battering ram gang appeared, though it was quickly glued to the ground and crushed under the weight of their own ram.

Like before, kobolds soon burst out of the ground inside of Murkheath, but these were no ordinary kobolds. They seemed stronger, better organized. Of course, soon they mostly seemed dead, with the party emerging victorious once more. They quickly collapsed the tunnel leading in, and returned to their posts, ordering volleys of arrows, dumping of boiling water and caustic chemicals, killing scores upon scores of kobolds.

The town seemed to be holding up admirably, until giant slugs full of fungus and kobolds started flying over the walls. As this was ultimately a very bad thing, the party set out into the swamp to find the weapon responsible for the launches, leaping from shadow to shadow much like a panther would. They discovered a clearing with a well-armored catapult, a gang of kobold operators (led by an incredibly unlucky wizard), and several snipers waiting in the brush. The party dealt with this threat in style, launching a kobold away with their own catapult, and bravely leaping into the wizard's own pit to... land on him, in Rotfoot's case.

After flinging themselves back into the city with the catapult (destroying it on the way out), the kobolds started coming in waves. Large waves. Waves that threatened to crest the walls of Murkheath, and in some places did. But when the dust settled, over a thousand dead kobolds cluttered the walls of Murkheath, and the town yet lived.

Session 11 - Bambi-ing Slurks (2-13-13)
With Murkheath safe, the party was able to take a good five days for crafting and planning the reconstruction of Turntimber Manor, and then escort the expedition back to camp into the Firewisp Swamp. Upon arriving at the expedition's old camp, they found that it was overrun with slurks. Naturally, Rotfoot tried to ride the first one he saw, and the rest set upon the party, including the local slurk broodmother. Once the party triumphed over the frog-walruses, they headed back into the ruins to figure out what exactly Skar wanted with them.



Deep inside the ruins, Marie led the party to the chamber Skar emerged from. Inside, the party encountered a strange series of archaic barriers and wards, as well as what can best be described as an underground lair. Empty aside from spiders and an angry roil spirit, the party explored the abandoned rooms, finding evidence of a previous group's passage in the dusty floor.

Perhaps the most significant discovery was a room piled high with treasure, with a simple inscription above:


 * Take only what you need, for though our time is past, this is the fate we have chosen for ourselves.

And after claiming some of the treasure, the party discovered an illusory barrier that hid a staircase leading down to parts unknown...

Session 12 - So When Do We Get Paid? (2-27-13)
As the party descended further into the ruins, they encountered more strange barriers and cryptic murals. After dealing with the barriers, they stumbled across a chamber crumbling into the roil and crawling with lava bats. Once they were all solidly stabbed, punched, and knocked into the Roil, Rotfoot led the party into a barrier-encased haunt, and very nearly set off what turned out to be a self-destruct console for the entire complex.

After re-uniting and healing up, the party strolled through one last barrier into a massive chamber with what looked to be a massive pyre covered in bones. And perhaps more importantly, the ghost of an insane tengu that nearly killed Rotfoot before Bruce showed it the shovel of Solanar Wildblood. This stalled the ghost enough for everyone to relax and talk for a brief while Marie caught up with the party to see what they had discovered. Strangely, Marie was damaged by the barrier, which seemed to be sorting for alignment like previous ones.

Things started to make slightly less sense when the insane ghost charged directly at Marie, and then Marie walked in through the barrier behind Marie. This prompted the first Marie to turn into an irate black dragon, who announced himself to be none other than Kyer-Ixidar. The fight that followed was intense enough that Rotfoot didn't even try to ride the dragon, though Acerbitox did manage to block the beast's throat with an Immovable Rod for a short time.

When the dust settled and the beast lay slain, the party went back to negotiating with the insane tengu ghost. They learned that Skar and a group of mercenaries had previously raided the complex, and Kyer-Ixidar was indeed their master in some fashion (emphasis on was). Also that the ruin complex was previously owned by another dragon, more than likely the Ferralakoar that had been found in script across the ruins. Lastly, they learned that the old dragon was participating in some sort of game... which was about all they got before the ghost attacked them. However, Krytos quickly sprinted over to the pyre, and lit it with a torch set ablaze by the ghost's own fiery gaze, laying the angry spirit to rest at last. And at the end of the day, the ruins lay quiet once more.

Session 13 - Well That Escalated Quickly (3-13-13)
With the expedition able to quietly continue its work, the party settled into a comfortable routine of helping explore more of the ruins, along with crafting more supplies and studying their newfound relics. The only major breakthrough on the latter front occurred when Bruce dug up some sort of warped earth elemental that seemed to want him dead, having mistaken him for the Solanar Wildblood who once owned his shovel. After dealing with that mess, the party was summoned back to Murkheath by Mayor Kerden, and they set out with due haste.

Upon returning to town, they learned of a tense hostage situation occurring out in the swamp. The town's high priest of Amadan, one Jens Fletchman was kidnapped by orcs while allegedly tending to a sick individual outside of town, a situation which the party was understandably skeptical of. Despite these misgivings, the party struck out into the swamp again, with an armload of invisibility potions and a collection of thrown-together plans.

While no plan survives contact with the enemy, this one barely survived the planning process. While scouting the exterior of the abandoned mill where the priest was being held, one of the orcs was able to sniff out an invisible Moegid. This ultimately caused a panic in the ranks, and Krytos, who was for some reason negotiating (and the word is used loosely), charged in and started a fight. An orc dedicated to Chak-Tha immediately cut the priest's throat, and it was truly a divine miracle that he stabilized at all.

The fight itself was almost as confused as the planning, with Acerbitox collapsing the building's roof with a breath of acid, Rotfoot messily beheading an orc before almost being slain himself, and one poor orc becoming blinded, intimidated, and on fire. But when the dust settled, the party was once again victorious, if confused. The orcs all carried unholy symbols of Chak-Tha, but the leader also wore a pendant eerily reminiscent of the stone hag pendant that almost killed Rotfoot. But at any rate, the party had succeeded at its rescue mission, further endearing themselves to the people of Murkheath.

Session 14 - Boot Soup (4-10-13)
With a seeming break in the action, the party set about doing good around Murkheath, or at least trying to. Bruce helped the town's craftsmen reinforce the walls in case of future attack, and the party soon learned of an opportunity from the Treany goblins. This of course led them back into the swamp, to hunt for a certain type of giant slug and bring back "some of the squishy bits". Krytos, eager to avoid the swamp as long as possible, delayed until he had to venture in alone after the party.

The battle turned out to be fierce and deadly, as the goblins had understated the size and power of the slug. Unfortunately, Rotfoot died in the fight, after trying to mount the massive invertebrate. Once the beast lay dead, the party was forced to take cover from a flock of migrating devil birds, before dragging the slug and Rotfoot back to town.

After collecting a reward for their squishy bits, the party sought out Jens Fletchman at the Hall of Amadan's Rest, for help in getting Rotfoot back into the game. This in turn sent the party on a quest around town, seeking out things that could be used in the ritual to lure Rotfoot's soul back to the land of the living. Food, taxidermied animals, a saddle, and even bees were brought in, but the deciding factor might've been Bruce convincing Mayor Kerden's falcon, Lightning, to be present for the ritual. Of course, the bargain struck involved trading one of Rotfoot's fingers, but it was a small price to pay for bringing Rotfoot back to life.

With this out of the way, the party met up with Lady Tenzing outside of town, responding to a cryptic summons regarding "someone they should all meet". The mysterious tengu gathered them together, and then with a single word, they all reappeared in front of none other than the gold dragon Talaro. After everything that happened in the expedition's ruins, the party finally learned something of the great game that had been referenced so many times, and once Talaro explained his position on things, the party agreed to join the ranks of the dragon's exarchs. While much remained unclear, at least the party finally had an anchoring presence, and more importantly someone who could explain things.

After much discussion, the party was teleported back to Murkheath, where one last trial awaited them. Krytos, eager to please his seemingly-intelligent idol of Phol-Phoram, went to volunteer at a soup kitchen of sorts functioning out of the Slurk's Tusk tavern. Unfortunately, at some point the soup went cold, and Krytos, with the best of intentions, breathed fire to try and heat it up... and naturally burned down the entire tavern. Later, once the rest of the party sorted out Krytos's bail and restitution to the tavern owner, the party was reunited with the dragonborn just in time for Bruce to diagnose him with a bad case of boot soup from having trodden through the swamp alone. It seems that not even the gods themselves would let Krytos forget the soup incident... certainly nobody in Murkheath will.

Session 15 - ALL THE THINGS (4-24-13)
With Krytos having only recently been freed on bail, the party decided that it might be best to stay away from Murkheath for a while. Specifically, they decided to head back to the expedition and see what dangerous new ruin needed delving. Conveniently, Marie did in fact have just such a mission for them, sending the party into what seemed to be the ruins of an old alchemist's lab.

Before the party could take that much of a look around, Rotfoot jumped into an ancient oversized cauldron full of fetid water, causing two enraged fire elementals to bust out and start attacking the party. Even though the elementals were able to briefly punch Rotfoot into the future, they were ultimately defeated by Rotfoot throwing priceless alchemical equipment full of random substances at them, until the lab fell quiet once more.

Of course, this quiet was quickly shattered when Moegid opened a cabinet full of potions labeled "NOT SAFE: DO NOT USE", and was attacked by a strange glittery ooze. It seemed as though the party was going to have some serious trouble with killing it, particularly after it blinded and deafened Krytos. However, the fight was salvaged when Bruce decided to pick up the entire cabinet and throw it (and the potions inside) at the ooze.



While this might've seemed like an excellent idea at the time, it was actually an incredible idea. The area around Bruce, the ooze, and Rotfoot filled with smoke, and angry monkeys, and birdsong, and suddenly everyone grew beards, and then there was this big wolf made out of smoke, and then suddenly there was this big spray of acid, and then Rotfoot turned to stone, and then there was this big flash of lightning that struck the beard-covered ooze, which obviously exploded in an immense cloud of beard-based shrapnel.

When the dust settled and the monkeys vanished, the party gathered up all of the alchemical supplies they could carry, and hauled their new Rotfoot statue back to Murkheath to get fixed up.

Session 16 - Please Bring That Owlbear into My Inn (5-8-13)
After getting Rotfoot un-stoned (de-stoned? un-petrified?), the party decided that it was time to help Bruce with a rather unusual experiment. To make a long story short, the experiment succeeded, and miraculously nobody died in the process, though some significant injuries were incurred (along with a mild concussion).

Once the more grievous wounds had healed, the Scales of Justice (as the party had begun calling itself) decided it was time to check up on the situation in Havelock that Talaro had spoken of. En route to the miniscule town, they encountered a caravan that had just left Havelock, warning of werewolf attacks. While this wasn't exactly news, given that Concord had been dealing with such attacks for weeks, it was definitely a poor omen. The poor omen was followed by an even worse one, as an angry owlbear attacked the party during the night. The beast was quickly dealt with, and after discovering that it had a collar engraved with "Biggles", the Scales elected to just drag the unconscious owlbear along with them to Havelock.

Upon arriving in Havelock, the party headed straight for the village's only inn, the Dry Well. There, they met with a gnome by the name of Siegfried, who had been assisting in the town's defense for the last few weeks. He informed the party that the village had lost several prominent citizens in recent days, and that he suspected a reclusive wizard living in the nearby woods. Armed with this information, the party set off into the night to go find the wizard (and return his owlbear).

Stumbling through the woods at night seemed like a great idea at the time, but soon the Scales started finding traps woven into the treeline. The traps quickly led to a small compound of wooden buildings, including what appeared to be a kennel for the owlbear, a disused workshop/barn full of wrecked machinery, and a small cottage. Upon investigating the workshop, Rotfoot disturbed a group of giant mantises that seemed to live there, and the noise of battle soon attracted an honest-to-gods werewolf. Worse yet, the werewolf seemed to possess some rather complex magical abilities. But eventually, the party slew the werewolf outright, turning it back into a frail and old-looking human man. After a moment's consideration, Bruce brought him back to life with a scroll of Breath of Life, and the Scales tried to bring him around...

Session 17 - The Poison Drinking Contest (5-22-13)
After waking up the unconscious ex-werewolf, the party set to questioning him. Learning that his name was Victor, they also quickly established that he was one of Talaro's chosen allies, or at least that he was before dying... unfortunately, he had no recollection of the last few weeks, nor did he have the slightest clue as to what had destroyed his workshop. His last memory was drinking and conversing with Siegfried.

Armed with this knowledge, the party returned to Havelock with Victor, and set about searching the shop of the town's recently-murdered herbalist. There, the party discovered a cache of wolfsbane-infused tea (which the entire party accidentally drank), in addition to numerous other unpalatable things that Rotfoot tried to eat. At this point, knowing that multiple PCs had been bitten by Victor in werewolf form, the party started downing shots of wolfsbane to ensure that nobody turned. Notably, Moegid managed eight full doses of wolfsbane before being even slightly affected by it, which unfortunately almost killed him once it took effect.

With all of the poison drank, the party awaited Siegfried's return to town, so that they could adequately question him about this whole werewolf thing. This led to another night patrol outside Havelock, where perhaps unsurprisingly, the party was assaulted by werewolves. Perhaps surprisingly, Siegfried turned into a werewolf himself, resulting in a pitched battle where a great deal of blood was shed. The end result was a bunch of unconscious werewolves, one bound gnome werewolf, and of course... more shots of poison for everyone!

Session 18 - Sack of Bitching (6-5-13)
With Siegfried defeated, the party elected to keep the gnome bound and unconscious... and in a sack. They dragged him back to Havelock, relayed the good news that the werewolf problem was probably at an end, and immediately set about curing their various forms of ability damage from the de-wolfing. This was also when Bruce decided to surprise Krytos with a new magic item, the crafting of which nearly roasted several party members.

At any rate, the party soon set off for Murkheath with Victor, at least partially in search of more wolfsbane, since they had basically exhausted an entire small town's supply of it. On the way back, the party spent a lot of time arguing with the sack-bound Siegfried, promising the gnome that they would cure him of his curse. Siegfried, for his part, seemed reluctant to be cured... or at least to be dragged along in such an undignified fashion.

Upon returning to town, the party was immediately sought out by none other than Lady Tenzing, who welcomed back Victor as a close friend would. Rotfoot and Krytos accompanied the two of them back to Talaro's lair, so that both Rotfoot and Victor could be re-attuned to be exarchs of the dragon... a fairly painful process. Meanwhile, the rest of the party visited Izeria for information about wolfsbane sources, and received a message from Marie about more ruins having been uncovered. So naturally, the party tromped back into the swamp, found some wolfsbane, and immediately force-fed Siegfried said wolfsbane. Once they reached the expedition camp, the Scales left Siegfried to recover in a tent and delved into the ruins again.

Once inside, the party was immediately confronted with chasms open to the Roil, and angry roil spirits. After several close calls with almost falling forever into the Roil, the Scales found and cracked open another one of the strange barriers. Unfortunately, they quickly trapped themselves in a sealed, freezing-cold room upon activating another barrier, which also roused the tortured spirit of a dead adventurer. The weight of the despair in the room almost caused Acerbitox to kill himself, but Krytos unexpectedly saved the day by laying the spirit to rest (and carrying the frozen body out). The party still had to blast their way out of the sealed room, but they were rewarded by a collapsed room full of treasure... and the discovery of several young kobolds, who Acerbitox intimidated into following the Scales back to Murkheath.

Session 19 - Ride the Lightning! (7-3-13)
Shortly after emerging from the ruins, the Scales learned that Siegfried had vanished from the expedition camp, leaving behind a cryptic note. Unfazed, they set out for Murkheath again... only to be jumped by a group of orcs. Despite nearly losing Krytos and Rotfoot to a particularly tough and unusual orc, and Purrfa to a giant swamp octopus, they prevailed. The lead orc had another pendant reminiscent of the stone hag's, as well as some worrying abilities that suggested a tie to Illarath.

Once everyone was revived and back up to reasonable health, they continued on to Murkheath, stopping only to capture and interrogate one of the orcs who had fled from them. His raiding party had been operating up in the mountains by the halfling village of Hond, only to take an inexplicable detour down to the swamp after their leader came back from somewhere looking... different. Showing a surprising amount of mercy, the party allowed him to live, and escorted him back to Murkheath, whereupon he joined the Huntsman's Guild.

The party spent some time chilling out in Murkheath, allowing Acerbitox to train his new kobold cohort, Grak. But in the meantime, Purrfa spent time training with the Huntsmen, Delphine worked to help set up more housing for people displaced by the kobold attacks, Moegid trained with Bruce and Izeria, and Krytos fixed up a violin he's apparently been carrying this entire time. But the most notable achievement was Rotfoot's. He spent an entire week hiding in a bucket, trying to sneak up on Russ Kerden's celestial falcon, Lightning... and finally succeeded. He climbed aboard the surprised falcon, and successfully rode it! Until it managed to throw him off, roughly 160 feet in the air. Both Acerbitox and Moegid tried to fly up and catch him in midair, but in the end Delphine saved the day with a timely Feather Fall.

Session 20 - "You rode me, didn't you?" (7-17-13)
With the whole orc problem getting out of hand, the party was approached by Taric Axelbord, the patrol master in Murkheath. The mission was simple: figure out why the orcs are raiding the forests below their normal ranges, and ideally put a stop to it somehow. With Krytos and Delphine staying back, the rest of the Scales immediately headed south in search of tracks.

The exploration began uneventfully, with the Scales trekking along the road through various inclement weather patterns. But soon, they started finding orc tracks, and then some odd cairns. Before they could properly investigate either, it came to light that Purrfa had actually contracted lycanthropy back in the fight with Siegfried, a fact which was made perfectly clear when she leapt out of a tree and attacked Rotfoot. One short fight later (wherein Rotfoot unknowingly rode Purrfa), the party realized exactly what had happened, and Purrfa was force-fed the Scales' favorite nutritional supplement: wolfsbane.

The morning after the surprise werewolf attack, the Scales investigated a graveyard that had been defiled by apparent worshippers of Illarath, culminating in Bruce shattering an unholy altar to pieces. A few days later, they came upon a circle of massive stones, which they learned was apparently trapped by some powerful spellcaster to animate the huge tree standing in the center of said circle. A crisis was narrowly averted by the diplomatic intercession of Grak and Bruce, and the party skittered back off into the woods, following orc tracks.

After the encounter with the awakened tree, the Scales wandered into a valley of massive boulder formations, where a strange cold fog seemed to cling to everything. Moegid noticed runes pertaining to soul-trapping magic, which was enough to warrant one giant NOPE from everyone else, and they fled before the disembodied whispers in the fog could drive anyone mad. Unfortunately, they fled right into an ambush of more orcs, who seemed to take a keen interest in Acerbitox's new horns. But before the orcs could deal with him, Rotfoot charged straight at the orcs' unholy leader... which led to the orcs bludgeoning Rotfoot to death. Naturally, the Scales would not let this transgression go unpunished, so Bruce dropped a tree on the orcs' leader using Warp Wood. As the crushed orc let out his last (creepy and raspy) breaths, he gave the Scales one final, cryptic message: "She waits."

Session 21 - Into the Dark (7-31-13)
Not long after losing Rotfoot to the orcs, the Scales discovered a ruined temple deep in the forest. Before they could give it much thought, they were visited by an emissary of the Horizon's Warden herself, Esther. This vision told the Scales that the evil inside this temple needed to be purged, and quickly, and gifted them a bottle of blindingly-magical liquid before disappearing. Seemingly unfazed by all of this, the Scales entered the temple.

Almost immediately, the doors to the temple slammed shut behind them, which was particularly odd given that the doors weren't visibly attached to the frame anymore. The temple's interior crawled with black spiral stonework, and thick cold fog clung to the floor. As the party explored the twisting passages, they came upon a torture chamber full of restrained orcs and awful-looking torture implements, some of which turned out to be a kyton. After defeating it and breaking out of its enchanted chains, the Scales liberated one of the orcs, who seemed willing enough to come along and take revenge on whatever imprisoned him and his comrades.

No sooner had the orc (named Carrug) agreed to come along, than the doors leading out of the torture chamber abruptly moved. Forced into a new passage, the party came to what looked astonishingly like the Firewisp ruins where they first had their staff stolen by Skar. There, Acerbitox was possessed by the ghost of Skar, and he was nearly killed by the party's attempts at disabling him. Once he was forced out of his host, Skar summoned a zombified Rotfoot, who was thankfully tripped into the Roil by Bruce. Thankfully, before Skar could take proper revenge on the Scales for his death, Carrug re-killed him.

Moving onward through the increasingly-nonsensical temple's halls, the party found themselves floating high above the clouds, looking at what seemed to be the emissary of Esther from before. However, they quickly realized she was more of the "fallen angel" persuasion, as she began to blast the party and summon angry ice elementals. Crisis was narrowly averted when Delphine shredded the angel with a timely shuffle of the deck, just as the tide of ice elementals looked like it would overwhelm the party.

After healing up again, the party stumbled onward through the foggy corridors, this time arriving in a warped chamber full of rime-covered bones. And standing by a warped altar was none other than the stone hag, revealed in name as Lyzora. Cloaked in black mist and chanting to Illarath, the deranged hag set upon the Scales, blasting them with every unspeakable spell imaginable. When Carrug and Acerbitox went to close with her, she simply turned and slew Carrug, taking one of his hands clean off with a magically-charged claw. It was only because of Bruce's true-striked dispelling needle (see Session 8 - Popcorn Spiders) that the hag was forced down to the ground, where Acerbitox gored her to death.

With the stone hag dead, the temple brightened and seemed to return to something like normal. If nothing else, it seemed to be spatially possible again. The emissary of Esther appeared before the Scales, and congratulated them on a job well done. But just as the party collected the loot from the hag's body, it and the rest of the temple vanished, leaving them in a crumbling ruin open to the sky. With a foot of snow on the ground.

Session 22 - Time to Drink from the Spider Hose (8-21-13)
After realizing that at least two months had passed, the Scales trudged back to Murkheath, surprising most of the town with their return. Krytos, having been absent for the dungeon crawl, was equally surprised, having headed off to Quare for the past two months to conduct his own business. At any rate, the party was shocked to find a pile of mail outside Turntimber Manor, and no sign of Acerbitox's kobolds.

Inside the manor, the Scales found their home base trapped to hell and back, before locating the absolutely terrified kobolds. The kobolds explained that spiders had overrun the basement and eaten one of their number, just as an immense swarm of acid-dripping spiders burst from the basement and overran the party. While Carrug set a new record for being most dead (at -54), the rest of the party was eventually able to take out the horrifying swarm and clean up the manor.

Once the dust and acid settled, the Scales had to explain the ruckus, their absence, and their new party member to Russ Kerden. This was when Acerbitox decided to make the mayor a new gift (see picture), and the party put out ads for a new housekeeper.

As the cleanup continued, Lady Tenzing whisked Delphine away for some undisclosed reason, and the Scales learned of a mysterious mechanical woman... thing, that the Huntsmen had picked up outside of Murkheath. After practically having to restrain Bruce from his enthusiasm, they went and discovered Yvaine, a seemingly half-clockwork human who agreed to... well, agreed to hang out with the Scales at least until she figured out what was going on.

Then the crafting began. Bruce replaced Carrug's missing hand with one of Kyer-Ixidar's claws (sadly, one of the other claws had been eaten by spiders), replaced Acerbitox's feet with dragon claws, and grafted wings onto Krytos. But he had one last trick up his sleeve, an honest-to-gods airship that he'd been working on in a secret sub-basement of the manor. Christened the Flying Brick, the Scales took off into the sunset towards Concord, to hopefully deal with that city's horrendous plague.

Session 23 - Scrounging Around the Shaft (9-4-13)
As the Flying Brick descended outside Concord, it... well, descended really rapidly. Really, it crashed, perhaps having gotten clogged by one too many dead birds in the exhaust. After the Scales hastily bailed out of the faltering craft (all except Acerbitox, who survived the crash), they found that Concord was entirely locked down to visitors and travelers, the result of the deadly plague and spiders sweeping through the city. Several unsuccessful negotiation attempts later, the party elected to enter the next best thing, the Shaft.

After acquainting themselves with the town and its connection to Concord (and the literal connection to the city's walls), they settled down for the night at The Worn Pommel, an apparent inn/brothel. A case of mistaken identity led Acerbitox to a mysterious woman named Aira, and then nearly being charged with assaulting Aira, but nonetheless the party was pointed in the direction of some sketchy buildings by the wall of Concord.



The next morning, the Scales headed for the sketchy edge of the Shaft (which says a lot), uncovering a secret passage within a rundown shack. The passage led them underneath the wall and into the city proper, technically entering the sewers of Concord. Here, the party learned just how badly the city was infested by spiders, and passed through another strange barrier that only seemed to admit the diseased. Luckily (?), enough of the party was either already infected with the plague, or had conveniently-accessible diseased spider corpses to get them through.

The secret passage popped up inside a safehouse where clerics of Mariona were tending to plagued Huntsmen and other citizens of Concord trapped by the quarantine. However, something about the head cleric didn't sit right with Bruce, who literally ripped away the cleric's tabard to reveal an unholy symbol of Hurak. After a quick chase through the unfamiliar streets of Concord, the party confronted and slew the imposter cleric, as well as the corrupted earth elementals serving him.

When the dust finally settled, the party gracefully exited the city and was almost immediately granted clearance to go back in and help with the city's problems, seeing as... well, yeah, exposing the imposter cleric and whatnot. But before they could head back in, Victor appeared and teleported the entire party back to Talaro's lair.

Session 24 - Obligatory Sewer Level (10-2-13)
After debriefing the Scales from their most recent mission, Talaro made an executive decision and reassigned Bruce and Krytos to another part of the island. To replace them, the dragon introduced the party to a cleric of Mariona by the name of Lucian. Along with this new recruit came warnings of another player on the island...

But of course there was still the issue of Concord's plague, and to that end Victor teleported the party back to the city. With the Scales' recent triumphs, the guards of Concord proved more receptive to their help, and quickly allowed the party inside the gates. There they met Olandis the Swift, reigning mayor of the city, who brought the party more up to speed on the plague's timeline, and the ex-paladin Yannick Grayflame, who offered to join the party in scouring the sewers of Concord for answers.

Before they could delve into the sewers, the Scales needed to try and track the origin of the infestation. Fortunately, Olandis had suggested the city's shrine to Korossos, site of one of the first outbreaks. The temple was of course covered in webs and overrun by flesh-hungry spiders, prompting the party to rest up before the true delve began (since Carrug took a total of 22 strength damage).

The next day, Yannick accompanied the Scales down into the sewers, where his tracking abilities would benefit them most. After defeating one of the city's custodial black puddings (narrowly avoiding slicing it into multiple oozes), they discovered what could only be the source of the spider plague... an enormous mound of chitin, disgorging spiders into an already web-choked and spider-filled chamber. When their initial attacks proved futile, Carrug made the decision to leap inside the beast while it was spawning more spiders, carving the abomination up from the inside. This strategy proved strangely effective, to the point where Yvaine also launched Yannick into the spider so that they could truly end it. Once the two inside had damaged it enough, the rest of the party found their attacks to be effective again, and the horrifying mound of awfulness was sundered.

With the dust settling and the remaining spiders skittering for the nearest exit, the party turned their attention to an apparently living dwarf webbed to the ceiling. While initially mistaking him for a lost sewer inspector, the Scales were alarmed to see him cackle maniacally, summon another giant spider, and abruptly disappear with said spider. But nonetheless, the sewers lay (mostly) quiet once again, with the hope that the Huntsmen would be able to handle things from there on out.

Session 25 - Hearingfailed by the Soundlessness (10-16-13)
Inspired by Talaro to get Bruce's grafts blessed by one of the good gods, the Scales set out for Lightpeak in search of a cleric who wouldn't ask too many questions. Yannick Grayflame accompanied them, having decided down in the sewers to seek redemption from Phol-Phoram, and luckily was able to supply a cart capable of carrying the Flying Brick in its downed state.

Almost immediately after departing Concord, the caravan was attacked by more giant spiders reminiscent of the huge one fought so long ago at the Institute of Ascension. While the spiders were no challenge for the dragon-blessed Scales, the party had more trouble tracking the spiders' source, only finding maniacal laughter in the snowy woods.

A few days further down the road, the party discovered a strange glittering gem embedded in stone a short distance into the woods. After examining it, Carrug ripped it out of the stone and smashed it on a tree, revealing the treasure inside... three tortured, fiery spectres intent on devouring the party wholesale. Yvaine also detected a scrying spell focused on the party, but the source was never made apparent (and honestly the spectres were more of a concern). Further attempts to investigate the site proved fruitless.

It briefly seemed like the party had earned a respite a few days later, when they found a campsite full of apparent Liean worshippers. Shortly after making camp with their newfound friends, the Scales found themselves surrounded by what were definitely not Liean worshippers, all brandishing kukris and clearly meaning business. A quick battle followed wherein Carrug was permanently blinded by the leader's vicious strikes, but the Scales still triumphed. Unable to capture the leader (who seemed to teleport away), they interrogated the two survivors (out of eight) to no avail. Neither one could remember any details about their leader, though Yannick (of all people) seemed to think he recognized the leader's face...

Session 26 - The Miracle of Life (11-13-13)
When the Scales finally reached Murkheath, they were warmly greeted by the original members of the Firewisp Expedition, who gave the party a simple task: take a cart loaded with precious research materials back to the Institute of Ascension on their way to Lightpeak. However, upon realizing that all of the artifacts and research could potentially expose too much of Talaro's "game" through the activities of the late Ferralakoar, the Scales decided that the best course of action was to make sure something unfortunate befell the cart. So it came as a surprise to nobody when the cart suddenly turned into a giant slug shortly before reaching the gates of the Institute... except perhaps the still-blind Carrug, who was inside the cart.

Fortunately, the road to Lightpeak proved quiet, and the Scales soon found themselves relaxing in Yannick Grayflame's own home. Lucian excused himself to visit Mariona's Spire alone, hoping to simply meet more members of his faith. So it came as something of a surprise when he was attacked by the paladins guarding the door... though the warriors turned out to be under an evil compulsion, that was little reassurance. After berating the fallen paladins, Lucian led his new charges up the spire, dealing with similar enchantments and curses in the rest of the temple's clergy.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Scales observed a massive explosion erupting from Liea's Spire, and immediately... jumped out Yannick's window. They reached the spire and found a raging inferno, but not the kind that Liea normally likes. The party immediately split up (...so, split a second time), successfully dividing and conquering the  fire as they climbed. At the top, they found and interrupted an assassin about to kill the Liean High Priest. Fortunately, Yvaine was able to Dim Door him out of harm's way, while the rest of the party dealt with the assassin and the fire elementals she conjured. While the (vaguely familiar) assassin fled, the party successfully took out the remaining fire elementals before they could cause any lasting damage.

...meanwhile, back at Mariona's Spire, Lucian found another heresy at the top of the temple. The High Priestess of Mariona was attacking a beacon that normally powers the city's defenses, so Lucian did the sensible thing and trapped her with a Wall of Stone. This did not impress the two succubi masquerading as her acolytes, who promptly confused and disabled Lucian and his new cohorts.

.....MEANWHILE, the rest of the Scales were joined by none other than the Flying Brick itself, mysteriously crashing in through the stained glass of Liea's Spire. They decided that the best course of action was to make a break for Mariona's Spire, having not seen Lucian in an uncomfortably long time... and that specifically, the best way to go there was to ram the Brick into the top of the spire. Fortunately, Moegid narrowly avoided crashing the Brick into the temple's beacon, or the High Priestess of Mariona, or Lucian, and the rest of the Scales beat back the succubi. With the threat seemingly ended (though the Priestess's madness persisted), the Scales were greeted by clerics of both faiths, as more explosions ripped through the tranquil Lightpeak night.

Session 27 - There Goes My Fan Theory (12-11-13)
While the combined clergies of Lightpeak and the Scales of Justice worked to figure out what was going on, Bruce and Hikara arrived via teleport in the middle of the party. Unfortunately, they brought news of a dire threat to the city, in the form of massive hordes of trolls and aberrations headed in from the Crumbling Wastes. And armed with the knowledge that the six temple beacons power the city's most potent defenses, the Scales immediately set off for the Spire of Laredos, as more explosions echoed from across the city.



Having learned their lesson from splitting the party previously, the party immediately split itself into a group teleporting straight up to the top, and a group flying up on the outside. The teleporting group found several rock trolls about to murder the high priestess, and an uncomfortably-large and -complex bomb attached to the temple's beacon. Fortunately, Yvaine was able to disarm it from a safe(er) distance while Lucian and Bruce disposed of the trolls by way of overly-aggressive scenery, and so the beacon was saved. The Scales took some time disarming other traps on their way down from the spire, and set out for the Spire of Balthazar, over which the skies had darkened considerably.

The scene at the Spire of Balthazar was dark and unsettling, in a very literal sense. Lights would falter and fade, and it seemed like every corner harbored some horrifying phantasm to scare someone to death (again, literally). The Scales stormed their way up through the darkness, shaking Balthazar's faithful out of their collective hallucinations and generally trying to restore order. Once at the top, they found the high priest doing battle with what appeared to be a weretroll... but before they could engage the troll, it seemed to die of fright. A mysterious and hidden voice called out "you're welcome," and after Acerbitox had finished yelling at it, the entire party (and the high priest) gracefully leapt off the spire to rejoin the commotion below.

Sprinting across the city, the Scales headed for the Spire of Esther, which they found infested with spiders and signs of planar mischief. Fortunately, the party's successes had freed up groups of Balthazar- and Liea-worshippers to help combat the infestation, and the Scales were able to easily climb the spire. At the top, they entered a tranquil wooden glade (quickly revealed to be a demiplane) where they saw the high priestess of Esther grabbed by a monstrous phase spider and dragged off to... somewhere. While initially the phase spider seemed like a significant threat, once the party hit it with a Dimensional Anchor, Acerbitox and Yvaine happily and calmly turned it into a tentacled lawn statue monstrosity. And once the high priestess was safely back in the right plane, the Scales turned their attention to the last spire in Lightpeak... the Spire of Phol-Phoram, where nothing could possibly be going wrong right now.

Session 28 - Sac Your Knock to Knock His Sack (3-15-14)
After settling on turning the previous spire's tentacled spider statue into a "playground sculpture," the Scales set off for the Spire of Phol-Phoram... much to the confusion of the clergy there, who had not seen anything amiss. Despite the chaos found practically everywhere else in Lightpeak, this spire was calm. Fortunately this made it a bit easier for the party to seek an audience with the High Seer of Phol-Phoram, just to make sure that everything was okay. And to be absolutely sure, Bruce pulled an allegedly-psychic mule from his Robe of Useful Items to... help detect trouble? Or something.

When the Scales reached the top of the spire, they found nothing out of the ordinary. The High Seer stood calmly in the middle of the room, fiddling with the spire's complex telescope system. At least until she spoke a single blasphemous word that shook the spire itself, and started summoning archons to fight the party. As the chamber grew steadily colder, Bruce and Yvaine immediately sprung into action, trying to undo the Seer's work by figuring out the complex telescope mechanism. Meanwhile, the rest of the party tried to breach the Antilife Shell that now surrounded the Seer.

Reaching deep into his faith in Phol-Phoram, Yannick smote the Seer, and immediately regained his paladin powers, much to the surprise of all. And not a moment too soon, as the first bomb thrown by Moegid revealed the Seer to actually be a horrific Ecorche that had been wearing her skin. It was also fortunate that his powers returned, as the foul creature almost immediately tried to rip Carrug's skin from his body... unfortunately, Yannick sacrificing himself to save Carrug merely shifted an incredibly serious problem to another PC.



Even while staggered from... well, missing all of his skin, Yannick was able to smite and batter the fake Seer with the holy fire of his goddess. And once Yvaine and Bruce halted the telescope's mechanism, Yvaine was able to finish what the party's fighters had started... by punching the ecorche across the room and into a pillar.

The dust finally settled, and the unnatural chill in the chamber faded. Whatever ritual the ecorche had tried to start, had failed. Miraculously, the Scales discovered the actual High Seer alive in another room, stabilized and immersed in a pool of holy water (though without her skin). This made it significantly easier to get Yannick and the seer's skin regrown, and soon the Scales were back down in the streets of Lightpeak, being honored by the six main churches of the city. Of course, the ceremony had to be kept on the shorter side, as the advancing hordes of the Crumbling Wastes would not delay for celebrations...

Session 29 - Lizard Shouting Match (1-29-14)
The assembled high priests and priestesses of Lightpeak were quick to organize the city, with the Scales assisting to the best of their abilities. A great deal of attention was paid to the crime scenes in the six spires, though not many of the culprits seemed to actually show themselves. That said, reports suggested that the dwarven summoner from the sewers of Concord and the mysterious assassin who blinded Carrug were mixed up in the attacks (granted, the Scales already knew the second part).

Fortunately, it seemed that by protecting the six spires' beacons, the Scales had virtually assured a victory for Lightpeak in the coming siege. As long as they could help deal with the initial onslaught, the city would endure. To press that advantage, the clergy proposed a plan to the Scales: that they should go into the Crumbling Wastes and track the invaders back to wherever they came from, before the invading forces dried up.

Of course, that still left one big task... namely, to disrupt the first waves. The Scales set to their task with gusto, leaping off the wall and charging at the walking artillery employed by the invaders. Dodging a rain of gibbering mouthers, the party tore through the ranks of trolls and generally caused havoc. When the invaders upped the ante to larger and larger trolls, the Scales retaliated by killing larger and larger trolls. Even a pack of destrachans was no match for the party (who quite honestly had a better shouting lizard in Grak).

And when the attacks slowed, the city had held. Losses were mounting all along the walls, but it could definitely have been worse. So the Scales climbed aboard the newly-improved Flying Brick, and chugged off into the Crumbling Wastes, hoping to find someone whose ass could be kicked over the whole affair.

Session 30 - In the Event of a Water Landing (2-12-14)
As the Scales departed Lightpeak, it was clear that the siege was well in hand. So they turned their attention to the Crumbling Wastes, and tailing the horde back to wherever it came from. Of course, there was some trial and error involved in figuring out the proper cruising altitude, given that they needed to be able to see the horde's progress through the snowfall, but they didn't want to be hit by any sort of projectile. This was also approximately when the party decided that Acerbitox was not allowed to pilot the Flying Brick.

Two days into the journey, the Brick was struck by some unusual lightning... unusual in that there was any lightning at all. This turned out to be the work of a pack of harpies, who seemed to be specifically hunting the Scales. While the attack was repelled without much trouble, thanks largely in part to the various traps and mechanisms added by Bruce, the harpies managed to strike most of the party with confusion.

Fortunately, Yvainne managed to restrain a confused Carrug via telekinesis... until she also fell victim to the confusion and forcibly ejected Moegid from the Brick. Acerbitox managed to climb out onto the rigging and melt one of the harpy leaders before becoming confused. A great deal of the party spent the fight confused and either babbling or damaging the Brick in some fashion, culminating in a fight over the landing gear button as the still-lucid Bruce fought his confused compatriots to soften the landing to some degree. Before he was ejected, Moegid managed to bring the Brick down to a "safe" cruising altitude, but in the end not even Bruce's useful-but-not-timely hunting dogs were able to prevent a crash landing.

Miraculously, nobody died in the melee, and the Brick was repaired before the next morning, allowing the Scales to continue tracking the horde. Thankfully, the panicked course adjustments during the previous day's fight had taken them away from the horde's path, so there was no additional trouble during the night.

Two days of flying later, the horde's path narrowed to a single cave entrance. The Scales cautiously parked the Brick and investigated, finding an immense round chamber with a single narrow doorway at the far side. Most noticeably, the horde's tracks abruptly started in the middle of the chamber... but the party's investigations were cut short as a massive stony serpent burst up from the ground, oozing bad vibrations and clearly intent on wrecking some face.

Session 31 - Two Down, Four to Go (2-26-14)
Picking up where they left off, the Scales summarily beat the un-living hell out of the enormous stone serpent guarding the cave. Of course, Carrug was nearly devoured and ground up in the serpent's gullet, and Grak momentarily died when the monster sucked all the moisture out of the area. But the party's clerics patched up the damage, and even found a hidden cache of healing potions.

Past the serpent, the PCs encountered a familiar face... specifically, Siegfried the werewolf. Seemingly unfazed by the Scales' presence, the gnome explained that he planned to let them into the lair and escape with his own life. He did so without any interference, after answering some questions about the lair and his colleagues, namely: Siegfried declined to name their team's draconic patron before disappearing, leaving the Scales alone and deep in enemy territory.
 * Rinna, the human assassin who blinded Carrug
 * Machrone, the dwarven summoner behind the plagues in Concord
 * Zeek, a halfling gunslinger
 * Ambrose, an elven alchemist
 * Khespyr, a dragonborn cleric of Illarath

Moving deeper into the hastily-dug complex and "disarming" several vicious traps, the Scales found a ghastly laboratory full of vivisected corpses and bizarre alchemical equipment. Presiding over this macabre scene was a deformed elven alchemist, who happily unleashed nightmarish abominations and armloads of explosives onto the Scales. Fortunately, the PCs were able to wall both the alchemist and the horrible abominations into bubbles of stone.

Of course, that only dealt with one of the team, and the Scales quickly found themselves flanked by Zeek, Rinna, and multiple alchemical abominations bursting out of containment tubes. The fight did gradually turn in the Scales' favor, with their adversaries abruptly deciding to escape. Rinna, the victim of multiple Dimensional Lock spells, was unable to teleport and merely hid herself... until the entire party caught up with her. Expecting no mercy and showing less, she "killed" Carrug one last time before the combined power of the Scales ended her... which caused her to explode in a massive fireball that "killed" Carrug again and destroyed her gear.

When the dust settled, the Scales had the run of a creepy-looking lair. Most notable in the leftovers was an ancient-looking tome that radiated a blinding level of magic. As soon as everyone in the party was technically alive again, they cracked open the tome... and were immediately teleported to... somewhere. Somewhere swampy, with columns of smoke visible in the distance. Acerbitox, still under the effects of Clarion Call, immediately broadcasted the party's presence to this new place.

Session 32 - Swift Action Mustard (3-12-14)
Finding themselves in a new and strange place, the Scales immediately dug into a small cave to take shelter and rest up. Unfortunately, the welcome wagon came looking for them the next morning, in the form of a family of mythic ogres. A pitched battle ensued, with many people being dragged through walls of acid, and culminating in an aerial battle between an ogre bloodrager and Acerbitox. Luckily, the Scales were able to fend off the attack, and Carrug only had to die twice... but it was still a short adventuring day for the party.

With their remaining energy, the party set about gathering up the ogres' grisly treasure, and examining more of their new surroundings. Lucian found himself unable to communicate with Talaro, and also found that Plane Shifting from this new land was at least difficult, if not impossible. Bewildered but still alive, the Scales dug in once again and prepared to explore the surrounding swamp, hoping to be able to summon the Brick back from Emden.

Session 33 - Fart of Darkness (4-9-14)
Re-emerging from a cave now surrounded by dead ogres, the Scales took stock of their situation. Bruce sought guidance from Harosh, but his attempt to Find the Path simply gave a vague impression of going south. Armed with that small amount of knowledge, he summoned the Flying Brick.

...unfortunately, the summoning seemed to create a strange planar anomaly, allowing the party to hear the voices of their nemeses. Unclear on what the villains were up to, the party eventually heard a voice command to "let it through", and the Brick suddenly appeared in the swampy clearing with the Scales. Then the head of Kyer-Ixidar, still serving as the ship's figurehead, came to life. Then giant wings and limbs of shadowstuff grew from the ship, and the adventurers found themselves locked in combat with their primary mode of transportation.

The battle raged on for a while, with Lucian, Moegid, and Yvaine all sneaking into the Brick proper (which now resembled the interior of a dragon). Carrug and Acerbitox entered the Brick through different means... namely, being swallowed by the newly-reanimated dragon head, and disappearing into a formless shadowy prison. Bruce was nearly killed by his own traps as Kyer-Ixidar fought him for control over the Brick's mechanical workings. However, between Lucian searing the inside of the Brick with positive energy and Acerbitox detonating from inside the beast's shadow-stomach, the reanimated spirit of Kyer-Ixidar was defeated. Thankfully, the blast from Acerbitox's parting spell launched both him and Carrug back out into the land of the living.

Of course, this left the Scales' ship without its primary motivating force, and the heart of Kyer-Ixidar seemed to show diminished signs of life. Upon trying to remove the heart to examine the damage, Yvaine accidentally caused the battered remains of the Brick to explode again, sending the heart rocketing off into the swamp and leaving a giant smoking beacon to (once again) highlight the Scales' position in this strange land. While Carrug and Moegid went to locate and retrieve the errant heart, the rest of the party set about restoring... well, as much of the Brick as they could (and Acerbitox even helped!).

Once the ship was at least operational again, the Scales decided that it was time to start moving, lest more trouble find them. They set off following the path left by the now-dead ogres, glimpsing volcanoes in the distance (a new sight for all) and swamp as far as the eye could see. The first landmark to break up the landscape was the ogres' disgusting encampment, thankfully empty of more ogres. Yvaine made a thorough search of the camp, finding some strange totems and crude maps, while the others continued debating what this new strange place actually was. Lucian even tried testing teleportation again by Plane Shifting some summoned weasels... but the only result was the untimely demise of one said weasel. Still unsure what to make of all this, the Scales set off the next morning towards the nearest volcano, following one of the ogres' crude maps.

Session 34 - #Lava Is Trending (4-23-14)
Landing at the base of the nearest volcano, the Scales disembarked to explore the area. They found a rough-cut entrance and a featureless tunnel, which eventually led the party to an enigmatic magical barrier. After discovering that the barrier could potentially kill them if they tried to pass through, a short period of experimentation began. Yvaine found that she could pass through unharmed, and concluded that it would be safe for her to teleport people to the other side... until she actually tried it, and the barrier began choking the life out of the people she'd brought through. After almost losing Grak to the barrier's foul magic, the party finally realized that Yvaine had been safe due to the crude totem she'd picked up back at the ogre encampment.

Further down the tunnel, the Scales found a collection of crude cave paintings, generally depicting scenes of brutal conquest, death and devastation. Most of the paintings shared a common image: a three-tailed fireball streaking across the sky. The party also found numerous piles of ashes, but were unable to determine what they might have been before their incineration.

Eventually they emerged into a central chamber full of lava, and covered in more elaborate paintings. The room was dominated by a diamond-eyed stone statue of a cyclops at the center of the lava lake, which of course drew the party's attention almost instantly. However, as soon as they ventured near the statue, it came to life and questioned their presence in this most "holy" place. Unable to come up with a good reason for their presence, the Scales battled the monster and eventually turned it back into a flesh-and-blood cyclops with a timely Rod of Wonder activation. This of course spelled the end of the cyclops, and Acerbitox barely managed to save some of the body to use for magic item components.

Left alone in the sweltering heart of the volcano, the party examined the more detailed paintings (assumedly created by the cyclops). They found similar themes of death and conquest, and determined that the volcano was used as some sort of sacrificial chamber, where hordes of individuals would come to throw themselves into the lava for their "great one". Unfortunately, none of the paintings did much to clarify who this great one was, though the party at least determined that nothing matched the pantheon they were familiar with.

Bonus Session 2 - What if we go to the broom dungeon? (5-21-14)
After departing the volcano, the Scales flew further into the swamp, occasionally glimpsing movement in the trees below. It seemed innocent enough until something impacted the bottom of the Flying Brick and tore a huge chunk out of the cargo deck, sending Acerbitox, Grak, Lucian, and Yannick tumbling down to the ground (albeit slowly, thanks to a timely Feather Fall). The ship immediately started plummeting from the sky much like its namesake, forcing Yvaine to possess the airship and identify the problem.

This left Moegid, Carrug, and Bruce to sort out the Brick's many, many problems... all while keeping the ship from leaving a crater upon landing. Seemingly everything broke at once, from the hexcord to the floating throstle to the spectral drum. Luckily, Moegid was able to barely keep the ship aloft while the trio sorted things out, and the remaining Scales "gently" touched down in a fairly soft part of the swamp.

Reunited at the crash site, the Scales discussed what had happened, causing Lucian to head belowdecks and examine the stunted heart of Kyer-Ixidar. Determining that it had been damaged to the point where flying the Brick would be hellish at best, he elected to revive the heart... and soon Kyer-Ixidar's voice rang from the Brick's interior.

Once the initial awkward moment passed, Bruce managed to calm the disembodied dragon enough to learn something surprising. Namely, that Kyer-Ixidar was familiar with the dragon whose exarchs now troubled the Scales, and that he was willing to cooperate with the Scales in order to exact some vengeance upon their mutual enemy. Specifically, he would help keep the Brick aloft, and possibly give the Scales some more information about said mutual enemy, one Xarra-Thel.

Session 35 - Squid Pro Quo (6-4-14)
Kyer-Ixidar immediately confirmed that the Scales were indeed on another plane, one known as Heshaforr. He also explained that travel to and from the plane is controlled by an artifact currently in Xarra-Thel's possession. While uncertain about the specifics of Xarra-Thel's plans, Kyer-Ixidar did hint at a past clash between the two dragons on an island that sunk into the Roil, seemingly as a direct result of Xarra-Thel's brutal approach to the Great Game.

Armed with the knowledge that whatever Xarra-Thel was doing, it was probably incredibly bad, the Scales headed south again, with Kyer-Ixidar willingly minding the Flying Brick's subsystems. Witnessing plumes of dark energy shooting from a nearby volcano, the party investigated and found that a large contingent of orcs had recently marched into the volcano and died. Fortunately, there was no sign of another guardian like the stone cyclops, nor was there any evidence of Xarra-Thel's exarchs.



In absence of more evidence, the Scales followed the orcs' tracks back towards wherever they came from, hoping to find more clues. However, on the way, Acerbitox decided it would be wise to pick a fight with some half-glimpsed creature in a nearby lake. Which seemed like a great idea, until the party discovered that a mythic kraken called the lake home, and did not particularly like visitors.

...after a pitched battle which nearly saw several Scales torn apart and/or dragged down into the depths, the party essentially dredged the lake for treasure, recovering numerous powerful items from the kraken's underwater lair.

Once the Scales' wounds were (mostly) patched up, they resumed following the orcs' trail, eventually discovering an abandoned-looking orcish village covered in enormous and ominous (enorminous?) spider webs...

Session 36 - Battle of the Bulge (6-18-14)
Faced with the prospect of even more spiders, the Scales carefully investigated the abandoned orc village. Unfortunately, their searches alerted two of Xarra-Thel's exarchs (Zeek and Machrone) who happened to be sorting through the village's wealth. Even worse, they alerted several deathwebs that had been lying in wait, and an intense battle ensued.

While Machrone more or less tackled the Scales head-on, Zeek tried to snipe at them from range, until Acerbitox enraged her into letting more lead fly. Fortunately, Acerbitox forced her to temporarily retreat with his noxious bite, allowing the group to focus on Machrone and his spiders. This, along with some timely support from Yvaine and Bruce (and plenty of healing from Lucian), allowed the Scales to slowly tip the balance in their favor.

With Machrone about to teleport himself and Zeek out of the village, Bruce made a fateful decision to ruthlessly taunt the deranged dwarf. Machrone heeded the cleric's taunts, and simply teleported Zeek away while remaining to try and shred Bruce to tiny bits. This bought the group one more precious moment to deal with Machrone, and allowed Acerbitox to forcibly Plane Shift him to... well, somewhere else.

Once the village fell quiet, the Scales cleared away the webs, sorted through the magical items left behind by Zeek and Machrone, and plotted their next moves. In the piles of loot, they also discovered some mysterious glass jars seemingly full of dissolved items. Before anyone could figure out what the jars did, Acerbitox drank one.

Session 37 - Sticky Situation (7-2-14)
The next morning, Acerbitox finally woke up from the coma-like state induced by the magic glass jar, with a strange (and fragrant) new magical ability. Once the party had adjusted to the new odor, they set off in the Brick, following a set of orc tracks that Carrug located. Several days of tracking later, the Scales found an abandoned chapel up in the mountains, with signs that the orcs had been there.

Investigating the chapel proved horribly dangerous, as the structure revealed itself to be an enormous mimic! Carrug was nearly crushed by it, and Acerbitox found himself hopelessly adhered to the exterior, before Moegid managed to blow it up.

Searching through the rubble, the Scales found signs of dead orcs. They found even more when Acerbitox elected to dive into the mimic's stomach and dig for treasure. However, the tracks continued, so the party (still following a very intrigued Carrug) continued on.

The next day, the Scales stumbled upon a small enclave of orcs, who claimed to be members of Carrug's home tribe, the Edgewalkers of Emden. They explained that they were hiding from someone called The Purger, and confirmed that they came from the village where the Scales defeated Machrone. Unfortunately, all the information they had was that something important was about to happen.

Glimpsing an unnatural storm on the horizon, the party made a beeline for it, stumbling upon a deserted village with a lone figure conducting some sort of shadowy ritual. This turned out to be none other than Khespyr, the last of Xarra-Thel's exarchs. Unsurprisingly, she was not alone, with Zeek and Ambrose backing her up. However, the Scales were prepared for them, and effortlessly disrupted the ritual, managing to send Ambrose away with a Plane Shift and petrifying Khespyr before she could raise a hand to stop them.

Looking further south, the Scales saw only the hellish glow of more volcanoes...

Session 38 - The End (7-16-14)
Setting off for an ominous ring of volcanoes to the south, the Scales tried one last gambit to improve their chances against Xarra-Thel and her exarchs. Bruce sent a message in a dream to Zeek, attempting to recruit her to the Scales' cause. With that measure taken, the party charged straight into the ring of fire. In fact, they literally charged through the volcanic gas and lava geysers towards a column of evil-looking fire surrounded by black stone obelisks.

At the center of this magically-charged spectacle stood a familiar figure: Khespyr. Dimly visible through the swirling flames, the party watched her conducting some sort of powerful arcane ritual. However, before the Scales could confront her directly, she revealed her true form... that of Talaro! This revelation caused Carrug to blindly charge through the column of flames and attack the dragon, who then morphed again into a three-headed dragon even larger than Talaro. All deception finally cast aside, Xarra-Thel laid into the Scales.

Beset by a gang of mythic hill giants, lava raining from the sky, poisonous volcanic gases, both Zeek and Ambrose, and of course Xarra-Thel herself, the party immediately split their focus. Bruce and Moegid attacked from and with the Brick (much to Kyer-Ixidar's chagrin), Yvaine drew Zeek's attention and was forced to fend her off personally, Lucian valiantly tried to keep people from dying, and Acerbitox confronted Ambrose. Carrug, for his part, stayed inside the maelstrom with Xarra-Thel and... mostly bounced around inside while confused, and then fought the dragon toe-to-massive-toe.

Eventually, Ambrose fell, in part due to having drawn Zeek's ire. Acerbitox essentially shouted at Zeek until she switched sides... for a brief moment. As soon as she turned on her master, the dragon ended Zeek's life with a mere thought. However, the rest of the party had been busy destroying the obelisks around Xarra-Thel, weakening the barrier keeping the Scales out.

Despite the immense mythic firepower of Xarra-Thel, the Scales shrugged off multiple brushes with oblivion, including a Destruction that nearly ended Lucian. Carrug was nearly disintegrated, though Xarra-Thel did rend most of his body into tiny bits after the spell failed. In the end, the Scales took down the barrier, flung their remaining spells at their nemesis, and Acerbitox finished her off with a breath attack.

When the dust settled, all that remained of Xarra-Thel was a familiar-looking book. Opening it whisked the Scales and the Brick back to roughly where they entered Heshaforr, looking directly at an army. An army led by the rest of Talaro's exarchs (and Siegfried), and a mysterious warrior in golden armor. An army that had vanquished the remnants of Xarra-Thel's forces on Emden. An army that could proudly return to Lightpeak and rest.