To Aid and Avenge

Second Ptolus Campaign Journal, #55

Session CV -- 15th of Wind

Bright and early we go down to the rubble where the Siege Tower once stood to help out following the devastating explosion. No one has been able to locate Phadian's body, but the knights want to try to get her raised once they find her. Sir Othun is missing, too, but Sir Mirauch is alive and trying to organize the search and rescue mission.

Meanwhile, Diethan noses around town. Everyone is talking about the explosion. Many people think it was a massive attack of undead that razed the Siege Tower, but that's sheer speculation. It seems that the explosion came with no warning. Some witnesses note that the resulting burst of flame was bizarrely multicolored: a chaositech flash of light that caused part of the tower to melt before it collapsed, we believe.

During the excavation, we can tell that some of the stones still glow with a grayish sheen and were melted together. The word "chaositech" is bandied about. Suddenly we don't feel too good about our recent purchase from the Cinderpriest. Clearly he was the author of last night's destruction.

The rescue effort is sadly reminiscent of a week ago, when we cleaned up after the fire near the Tower of Science. It's a sorrowful work, pulling bodies from the wreckage of the once proud fortress. One good point is that help has streamed in from all over Ptolus -- even the Commissar arrives with some of his men! Many people send food and other aid. The Keepers of the Veil was one of the few groups in the city that was universally loved, it seems.

The golden Lord Abbercombe is there helping too and says he recalls having seen an effect like this in the dark elf caverns of Ul-Drakkan. Interesting. Wizards on the scene are having difficulty finding a divinatory trail to the perpetrators. People draw obvious associations between this attack and the recent assassination of Sir Beck.

As soon as Diethan makes it clear that a bomb like this from the Cinderpriest could turn Pythoness House into gravel, Barbatos is down with the plan to go confront him.

Session CVI -- 16th of Wind

We head up to the Nobles' Quarter toward the ruined pile of stones that used to be the Soaring Idyll (a floating apartment house that fell during the day the Vallis moon returned and magic failed). Beneath it used to be a hidden secret temple to Arachthon (Dweller in the Caverns of Chaos), and it is there that the Cinderpriest makes his lair. We take about twenty minutes to locate a disguised entry into the enormous pile of rocks.

When we remove the stone plug, we see a shaft that leads twenty feet down. Barbatos warns us to beware necromantic magic as we head down. Walking down the hall we are surprised by flying ashy creatures with hooklike claws and gaping maws. As if those features aren't bad enough, they also have a mesmerizing ability and a horrifying suction attack (as Diethan can sadly attest). Calista stirs up a huge cloud of ash as she casts a wind spell to blow them off Diethan. Sir Feruch and I clean up the rest of them.

We continue on a bit and are confronted by a magical wall, which we discover is composed of some sort of heightened decaying magic -- the same sort we can sense all around us in this crazy place (I can see that my friends look strangely haggard now compared with when we entered, a direct result of this decay-magic). Calista suppresses the wall's magical effect and we move forward, emerging into a horrid shrine featuring an altar caked with dried blood. Statues of iron line the walls.

Just as we're taking it all in, two figures enter: one bulky knight wearing molten armor and carrying white-hot swords, and a bald guy with a completely featureless face. Freaky! When these two walk, they don't even disturb the ash on the floor.

"Your presence here is anathema," the faceless one says. We guess him to be Bergathor, the Cinderpriest. When Feruch accuses him of providing the bomb that took out his order's headquarters, the figure seems unconcerned (as much as a person without a face can seem like anything). "Destruction is all that matters," he says. "One achieves sanctity only through destruction." He won't tell us the name of his client who purchased the massive bomb, saying only that our needs matter not.

Well, we'll see about that. We launch our attacks at him, but he handily retaliates with a wretched spell that chills us to our very souls and lays low Diethan's trusty wolf Lunes. While we're dazed, the molten warrior proceeds to fell Sir Feruch, but Calista encases him in one of her trusty bubbles of force. At least that gives us a breather to focus our attentions on the Cinderpriest. As we pound on him (Diethan falling in the process), he gloats, "Even with my own disintegration I gain strength!" We hate this guy! We're almost giddy to see him fall under a barrage of Calista's magical assaults. Diethan limps to his feet and smashes in the man's skull to seal the deal. The priest's body turns to ash under the blow.

We all turn our attention to the warrior about to burst free of the resilient sphere. As soon as he does, we jump him, and Barbatos slows him, too. But this guy looks like he can take damage all day. Diethan goes down again under his retaliation, but thankfully Calista restores him again. We pummel the sturdy warrior until at last he falls.

Then we collapse in exhaustion. And the Siege Tower has been avenged.

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