Session Summary #10

[Nathan Sherman]

Cast of Characters
Theren Moonshadow, a Moon Elf Bard played by Payson
Lutheo, a Halfling Paladin played by Dale
Otep, a Half Orc Fighter played by Nelson
Akronos, a Human Wizard played by Alec
Ceress, a Saurien Monk played by Graham


The party takes the assassin back to their room at the Tangled Riggings Inn.

They have Raradin, the human assassin that led the attack on them. Dead in the Snatch Pit is a human and half orc in chain mail and a human and half orc both in studded leather. All had short swords.

Raradin has a +1 Short Sword, the human fighter has +1 chainmail, the half orc in chainmail had the Snatch Pit and the half orc in studded leather had the Combat Shroud. In addition to the standard gear they have a total of 250 in gold pieces on them.

The party interrogates Raradin and finds that he is a local member of the thieves guild and was running this team, hired in by Delmanakan to kill/capture as many of the party as possible. Tobar was the human fighter in chainmail and he was one of Delmanakan's crew that was put on the snatch team to insure all the items on the captured party members got back to Delmanakan instead of ending up in the Aridorn underworld. Raradin doesn't have much more information than this except that Delmanakan seems very powerful, he has at least five more very tough guys with him and has hired in a slew of other muscle in town. He is well guarded and well entrenched, using multiple layers and buffers to protect himself as if he is used to working in a dangerous, backstabbing, treacherous environment.

Raradin tried to trade his little bit of information for his life. He was to bring the prisoners dead or alive to the warehouse like usual. He never saw anyone at the warehouse when dropping off Saurians, just dropped the body there, dead or alive and pick up his reward from another drop spot two blocks away. He was given this assignment through a street urchin. His description of the party was very detailed, down to what they were wearing and carrying. His instructions are to bring as many bodies as possible to the warehouse and all of their possessions. He was told that eyes would be on him at all times to make sure that every possession makes it to the warehouse in addition to having Tobar assigned to his party.

Up till two days ago the bounty was just for this grouping without the specifics of what they were wearing and looked like. Any Saurian that was thought to be suspicious would do and bring in a bounty of 50 gold but if they turned out to be the right one the bounty would go up to 1,000 gold. "It was a slow way to make 500 gold but a good way to get paid to practice ones craft"  Raradin said.

The Snatch Pit works like a Rope Trick but on the ground instead of in the air. Six people can survive in it for up to 4 hours. They can see out of it and can open it from inside if they closed it from the inside. It can only be opened from the side it was closed from. That is where the lever will be that opens it. It can be deployed on any relatively flat surface like a floor or road. The interior is 8' by 10' and 8' deep. You can look out of it if you closed it from the inside.

Raradin offers the party that the head fo the thief's guild would pay 5,000 gold for his return. The head of the guild is Kazik and according to Raridan he would pay this price then make Raradin an indentured servant for buying his life. Not exactly attractive to Raradin, but better than being dead.

The party spends some time debating if they could come up with a way to cash in on this opportunity and still survive the deal. They think of detailed plans of brokering in through Drakos at the Kettle, of using the reward to put out a bounty on the head of Delmanakan or a couple other opportunities. In the end, Otep decides that they all sound too dangerous and he walks over and takes a hatchet to the head of Raradin and kills him.

With this lack of leverage, a bounty on their head and uncertainty on if retrieving the remains of the dead conclave members is the right thing to do, the party decides to leave the city and travel across the country to ask the monks of Ynthar what they should be doing and what the items that they have found mean.

It is a long and boring trek. A week into their ride west they think to contact Boazman and ask him to send a letter to Drakos claiming it is from Ceress. The letter proclaims his victory over killing Raradin and that he and the party have left the city. Drakos is to get this information to the head of the thief guild in hopes this will help provide relief to the other Saurians getting slaughtered in the city. 

During this long trek Akronos spends a lot of time studying the Conclaves banishing book. He deciders much of it and finds that the first section was dedicated to banishment analyzing in general, all the how's and why's of banishment spells.

The second section was dedicated to Ynthar and the three paths of mind, body and soul. When he got deep into this section of the book it talked about all living things being made up of the mind, the body and the soul. The Conclave were all practitioners of Ynthar and decided to weave this into their banishment in an attempt to break Draxorith into these three separate parts to make it easier to banish the greater demon. The cost to them would be substantial though since they would all need to be there physically during the opening and closing of the banishment gate. They would all need to put their minds to the task of casting the greatest spell any of them had individually cast while wearing it into one incredibly powerful spell. And most critically, they would all need to dedicate a portion of their soul to the ritual in order to fracture Draxorith and then seal the gate forever against his or his minions attempts to bring him back.

The third section was dedicated to the riddle and trap coding. Each master was assigned to creating 9 symbols (three sets of threes) that would be anchor glyphs forever binding Draxorith to the banishment. To insure that each glyph was working properly they created a page in the book that had all of the glyphs on it tied to their corresponding glyph so that they would light up when detected for magic. Boazman had explained that this is the only part of the book that detects as magical but when Akronos detected for magic on it, all but one of the glyphs showed as magical.

A frantic set of communications back and forth with Boazman confirmed that they all showed as magical just three weeks ago when he handed off the book. All agreed that this wasn't a good sign and that Akronos should monitor the glyphs closely. Over the remainder of their trip to the monastery, two more glyphs stopped detecting as magical, as if their corresponding anchor glyphs had been snuffed out.


After two and a half months of travel across country, the party finally makes it to the Great Temple of Thandrimora.

Ceress and Lutheo are greeted warmly by the resident monks. They ask to speak to a master and are given an audience with Master Ta'hunaga, a human monk from Myria who stands about 5'2" and looks to be ancient.

The party shows Master Ta'Hunaga the gem, map, finger and skull of Geldan. They tell him the whole story and ask for his guidance.

He asks them many questions and confirms some details for them.

This is where session #10 ended.

Next session: Has the party completed their mission and are now free to buy an inn, retire and leave the saving of the world to the monks of Ynthar? Will they continue to help with this mission that they stumbled into in some capacity? Will Master Ta'hunaga spank them all for not coming to him sooner, or spank them for not trusting in themselves to finish what they started?