SOTDL CAMPAIGN DIARY - THE MOON SPIRE PT 3, 5/16/2017

The Heroes:

Ecna Lubma; Dwarf priest grudgebearer

Gruntbelly: Dwarf magician sorcerer

Kane: Human warrior fighter

Mathias: Jotun jotun juggernaut

The heroes step through the portal into another level of the Moon Spire; this one appears to be the living quarters of someone.  It is furnished with various pieces of fine furniture of elven make and there are large mirrors upon the tall walls.  Windows also adorn the walls, and outside, swirling clouds float past in a well-lit but alien sky, with strange creatures flying about in the distance.  It is apparent that this part of the Moon Spire is not on Urth. 

The heroes find an elf laying in a large bed at the rear of the chamber and the elf awakens from a slumber, apparently pleased to have company.  He introduces himself as Guccione, master of the tower, and he offers the group his hospitality.  The group, anxious to find Lara and get out of the tower, simply want to know the way out, but Guccione has other plans for them.  He insists on them staying a while to keep him company, but when the heroes insist that he show them out, he tells them that they may only depart by his leave and he doesn’t want them to go.  They start to threaten the elf, but he says that any attempt to harm him will be pointless as the tower restores him – here, he is immortal.  The group then try to bargain with him, but the elf only wants their company and says he has no need of their trinkets.  Then Gruntbelly produces Circe’s ring, which they acquired from the fey shrine a few weeks earlier.  Guccione’s eyes light up and he immediately agrees to let them go in exchange for the ring, whom he claims belongs to his sister and who trapped him in this accursed tower long ago.  Taking the ring, the elf disappears and leaves an open portal for the heroes to depart from. 

The group grabs a treasure chest that the elf left behind and goes into the portal, arriving in a new part of the tower.  This room contains three swirling red portals that create a turbulent wind within the chamber.  In the center, a pentagram is etched in blood upon the floor and in the center stands the Oracular; the device the elf Guccione told the heroes they need to destroy in order to leave the tower; but he also warned them that it would tempt them and would try to control them.  Indeed, they see that their quarry, Lara, found the Oracular first and was now on her knees before it, seemingly in a trance or otherwise befuddled by the relic.  Angered by having to chase her and her master Nareesh across the Northern Reach, Mathias begins firing his crossbow at her, hitting her twice, but she seems oblivious to the wounds, continuing her strange rocking and muttering, which the heroes cannot hear due to the winds in the chamber. 

Besides the Oracular and the three portals, there seems to be no other way out.  The group is leery of entering any of the portals.  There are three large gongs in the chamber and the heroes decide to test to see what would happen if they ring the gongs.  When they do, various spirits begin to materialize and attack the heroes.  Their weapons do little to the spirits, but Gruntbelly’s magic manages to do more harm and between his magic and the other’s efforts, the spirits are dispersed.   Mathias approaches Lara and finds that she is muttering strange things over and over again, such as, “I didn’t know…it’s so vast, so empty… such evil within…I didn’t know…how could I know…He will consume us…there is no hope…”  and so on.  Even when addressed directly, she becomes almost maniacle in her ravings, which is apparently about the Void.  So Mathias turns to the Oracular and raises his maul to strike it, but the relic speaks to him, saying that it can show him where his greatest enemy is or where the object of his desire may be found (referring to the jotun relic, the Fang of Ages, which was stolen by Nareesh, and why Mathias is here in the Northern Reach).  The joten recalls the elf’s warnings and sees the affect that the relic had on Lara and resists the temptation, striking the Oracular hard with his maul several times until it shatters.  When he does so, the three red swirling portals converge upon the center of the room where the Oracular stood and merge to become a swirling blue portal.  The heroes step into it and find themselves returned to the entry level of the tower.  Apparently, they never physically left the first level of the tower, but it was their spirit forms that departed to the other parts of the tower.  Regardless, they return to their bodies, along with Lara and the chest that their spirits retrieved, and leave the tower.

In Carbunkle, they find their carriage driver and return to Crossings, but have no further leads on where Nareesh has gone or what the Brotherhood of Shadows next move may be.

End of session.