Session 40: Markessa Lives!

After a short rest, the party regrouped in a room with 3 exits. Moving straight ahead, they found themselves in a wide cavern with a bridge crossing it. Up and to the right, sharp eyed Tywill spotted a group of 10 kobolds waiting in ambush. Reacting quickly, Flint smote one with a guiding bolt, illuminating the rest. Lynnya unleashed the fury of nature on one with a hail of thorns that tears him to shreds along with 4 of his small comrades. Tywill climbs to the ceiling with his spider boots and bolts across the deep crevasse surprising one of the lieutenants with a backstab, only to be ganged up on by the remaining leaders. One of the kobolds knew enough magic to send scorching rays at Flint, which singed his whiskers. Goblin killed the caster with a radiant attack, and Volodemir and Lynnya finished the last few before they can act again.

Tywill explores the exit behind the ambush, while the rest of the party crosses the bridge, only to meet up again on the far side at an intersection in the tunnels. To the west, there is a large dark cave full of bubbling mud and a path of stepping stones across. Sensing danger, Tywill once again takes to the ceiling, and notices a sleeping kobold floating near the center of the cave. A few shots in the dark dispatch the would be ambusher. Not wanting to risk the safety of the rest of the party, Flint attempted to cross the stepping stones, bravely triggering the perilous trap. After falling in the thick mud, he was helped out of the mud, sputtering but unfazed, by Goblin with the help of his entangling rope.

Moving ahead, the party came to a room with a mural of Cerberus and about 20 prone bodies of kobolds seemingly sacrificed ritually. As they were feeling there way through the dark abattoir, four kobolds jumped out to ambush the party. Two were killed by Flint's spirit guardians and spiritual weapon before they could act. The leader fell victim to hideous laughter followed by an Eldritch Blast and sacred flames. Adreham's servant was further protected by the spirit guardians as they dispatched several remaining kobolds who were only pretending to be sacrifice victims but were in fact lying in wait.

Within this room there was a collapsed exit which sadly held the body of a dwarf of a local noble clan, cut down by kobolds but had apparently triggered a collapse to hold them off.  Some investigation showed him to be of a local noble family. Flint noted the identity and laid her body to rest at the site of her noble sacrifice.

Passing by the rubble, the party noted an ankle high rope connected to nothing, and stepped past it to avoid any traps. Half way up the slope in the following passage, the sound of a tumbling boulder gave way to the snickering of a group of 6 kobolds who thought they had set a cunning trap. The boulder bounced off of Flint, and the party did not flee, but after dispatching the kobolds, discerned the true purpose of the tripline they had passed.

After this, they came upon a large room with 5 colored pillars surrounding an altar, and 5 colored tapestries on the far wall. On the altar, a young blonde man stricken with agony tried to warn the party to leave, just as his heart was replaced with a stone and he transformed into a demon. Accompanied by an invisible tormentor, the demon did battle with the party, at times breathing fire upon them. Tywill found his way past the circle of pillars, which appeared to deal elemental damage according to color, and disengaged the acid trap from the black pillar. After some more hideous laughter and a long fight involving many missed attacks, the demon was dispatched, and after some more blind lunging about, it was determined that Markessa had escaped for now.

Some thorough searching after disabling the pillars found some treasure. Perhaps this was an altar to Tiamat, the many headed dragon goddess? The party took a moment to regroup and decide what to do next...

Session 39: Kobold Kapital

The party continued their exploration of the mines under the Tower of Bells. While resting Marcus the warlock comes through (or kicked out) of a portal he claims was from the Land of Faeries to rejoin the party, cheerfully asking what they have been up to, and if they speak blink dog yet. The party immediately sees a use for the sometimes slow (but not mentally handicapped) warlock and have him go back to the frightening looking black device in the other room inscribed with runes. Casting comprehend language Marcus is able to tell them is says that "he who opens this will be damned as is the demon trapped inside." The group decide to leave the demon trapped and move forward in the mines.

They quickly come across a kobold and an evil looking imp creature, Marcus thinks it is a quasit, meaning the kobold has a demon familiar. This is quickly confirmed when the kobold himself transforms into a demon. The party begins an attack, Flint is grabbed by the demon, but quickly drinks a potion of enlargement to break free. Marcus attempts to slow the demon, but it resists the spell and goes on pummeling members of the party, the next to get grabbed is the rogue, Tywill who had been backstabbing him. The party further their attack until the demon is slain, saving Tywill and collecting a map that the demon had on him. The map leads to the kobold headquarters.

The party quickly patch themselves up and go on their way to the kobold stronghold. Outside they see rows of Viking heads put on spikes. Undeterred they walk up to the guard kobolds and ask to see their master. The kobolds are pretty skeptical of the party and despite the amazing charisma tell them to stay put while they inform their master of the groups arrival. Despite trying to talk their way in, the group quickly abandons peaceful solutions and sleeps some of the kobolds and slays the rest as to not ruin their surprise on the other kobolds.

The party moved inside, with Tywill scouting ahead, he finds a trap in the hallway, disabling it for everyone else and moves into a large cave with a guard tower in the middle. Immediately he is set upon by a band of kobolds. The rest of the group runs ahead to catch up, with Flint falling into a pitfall trap that had been undetected. After pulling him out the party engage the kobolds and after a bit of effort chasing down stragglers, they defeat the kobolds and begin to look around to get their bearings.

Session 21: First Fight with Markessa

Having learner of the lower levels of the keep and assuming we had dispatched all of the hobgoblins, our group pushed on. Galathil rejoined the group after having kept watch in the keeps tower and was quickly brought up to speed on events and our new adventurer.

Markessa

Expecting an ambush, the party set themselves up in a defensive order prepared for battle. Clearing as they went through the hallways the group came upon a set of double doors. Bursting through the doors we were horrified to see two mutated looking humans and in the distance a female elf and a group of goblins. Seeing the cursed creatures that attacked his village and kidnapped him, Gylfi sprang to action. Knowing that the elf presented the greater danger, Gylfi asked the gods to burn her with holy magic. Alerted to our presence the female elf hurled a bolt of lightning at the doors killing one of the mutants and striking the group. Only Volodemir had moved and was poised to react. Galathil had other plans and thought to communicate with his elven sister, but was soon cut down by a second bolt of lightning. The goblins attacked with bows and we were fully engaged in combat. When the tides of battle seemed in our favor, our dwarven companion decided to engage the female elf directly. At this point two owlbears came out of hiding to join the fray, immediately engaging with Gylfi and Volodemir. As Lynnya was busy picking off goblins, Flint was forced to fight Markessa on his own.

Eventually we were able to subdue our enemy, but before we could deal the final blow Markessa fled leaving a stinking cloud to stymie out pursuit. But she didn't count on the hardiness of dwarves! Flint was able to pursue. In his haste to defeat Markessa he took little head of his wellbeing and was almost defeated and left for dead when Lynnya killed Markessa with an arrow.

Patching up Flint and saying goodbye to our dead we decided to rest and recoup, sadly though luck was not on our side. A group of goblins came to retrieve the mutated humans and found us and their dead kin instead. Defeating them easily we realized that we could not remain here with little cover and strength to repel a large force. Onward me move but to where?