epic Chessenta campaign

[Reno]

Session 1: January 9, 2011

At the druid enclave on top of his Soar Whale, Ragma discovers that there are a couple of people flying toward the whale from below. Ragma commands two of his druids to ready to summon the air elementals, but not to summon until he gives the signal. Then he strides out to see for himself what these two strangers approaching the whale are about.

When they approach, the two casters identify themselves as representatives of the CAC (Cimbar Air Control). In a calm but authoritative tone, they ask his business in flying over this land. Ragma replies that they have no business here, and are merely flying by.

The CAC representatives ask whether Ragma’s group are mercenaries. He says they are not. They ask whether he would be interested in working as mercenaries, but before he can say much, two elder air elementals rush past him toward the men. It seems Ragma’s followers have jumped the gun and summoned the elementals without waiting for his signal.

Ragma is forced to attack his own elementals, summoning his personal elemental companion to help hold back the even more powerful elementals. The elementals are distracted just long enough for the druids to realize that they are not supposed to be attacking, so they call off the summoned elementals, looking sheepish.

The CAC reps approach once more, cautiously and with wands and staves at the ready. They seem to realize that Ragma was not making an attack on them, so they address him once more. They inform him that if he does not want to see more CAC representatives flying up to visit him, he will be accepting their mercenary commission.

They want him to go and check out a place called Dorrow-Dwelf, because they have lost contact with it for a week. Cimbar had sent a force of thirty soldiers to Dorrow-Dwelf, and have not heard from them since. Ragma says he’ll go ahead and do it, but his whale moves very slowly. Since time is of the essence here, he decides to have his air elemental make the whale move faster. The CAC representatives give Ragma an insignia of a red dragon’s head to identify him as working for Cimbar, and then leave him to do his work.

Meanwhile, at his private villa outside of Akanax, Jandar Lycurgan, the Hero of Adder Swamp, is lounging around with not much to do. His serfs are out in the fields, and the only other person still living in his home is his freed slave, an old woman. The old woman finds Jandar reclining in his trophy room (which is full of captured weapons, armor, and shields), and tells him there are official-looking men from town. Jandar reluctantly tells her to send them in.

In comes an official from Akanax, flanked by an honor guard of four soldiers. The official tells Jandar that King Hippartes “respectfully requests” him to perform a mission. Hippartes wants to join in the war brewing between Cimbar and the other cities, either as a third side or in the alliance against Cimbar. Hippartes wants Jandar to assemble his best troops (knowing full well that Jandar has none), and go scouting. Jandar wonders aloud if the messenger would be quite so polite were Jandar’s sword not within arm’s reach. The messenger takes a step back and says that he’s pleased we don’t have to find out.

As the man and his guards back out of the room before leaving hurriedly, Jandar grumbles to himself. He spends a few minutes loading gear into his pack and then sets out, admonishing the old woman not to turn the manor into a halfway house while he’s gone. She asks what if they really need the money, but Jandar doesn’t respond, and walks out the door.

On the airship Storm’s Anvil, the ship’s captain Azriel has picked up a passenger named Tristan and offered him a ride. Tristan is wandering more or less aimlessly, so he doesn’t particularly care where they go. As the ship is flying, Tristan and Azriel spot a village on fire, so Captain Azriel orders the helmsman to descend. As they are flying toward it, they see a large eagle flying toward them.

The eagle lands on the ship and transforms into Ragma. Introductions are made, and Ragma realizes that the airship and its captain both bear the same dragon’s head symbol that he was given to wear, identifying them as in the employ of Cimbar. Ragma explains that he isn’t really sure of his duties as a hired mercenary because he wasn’t really listening. Azriel finds this suspicious, and wonders if Ragma came by his dragon head symbol by taking it from someone else, but eventually decides they can work together.

The three of them decide to check out the burning city below, but first Ragma flies back to his Soar Whale (which is not that far away) and retrieves his air elemental companion. Ragma and the air elemental come back to the Storm’s Anvil, which descends toward the ground. As they disembark from the airship, they see a lone man walking along the road nearby, dressed in light armor and wearing a sword on his back.

The lone man is Jandar, who introduces himself to the others. Captain Azriel asks which city he is from and why he is here. Jandar explains that he is from Akanax, and he is supposed to be scouting. When he notices the dragon symbols, he realizes that he is probably supposed to be scouting them, and says as much out loud. But before anything much can come of this, another person comes by – another mage calling himself Melchior.

After the introductions are made, we decide to finally check out the burning town of Dorrow-Dwelf. Tristan sends his eagle companion to fly into the village and take a look at what’s going on there. The eagle comes back after a minute or two, communicating to him that there is something very large which Tristan figures out could be a giant. There are also people in the town. Melchior sends his familiar, a pseudodragon, into the village as well. It returns and describes the giant well enough that we conclude it to be a storm giant.

Tristan withdraws a special arrow from his quiver and fires it into the town, not at anyone or anything in particular. While the arrow is in flight, Tristan is able to see as if from the perspective of the arrow. At the high speed which it is flying, he is afforded a brief glimpse of the overview of town, and sees the storm giant near the large manor house at the far end of town. The arrow actually strikes a soldier in the Achilles tendon, and the magic of the arrow is destroyed upon impact.

Armed with a bit more knowledge, we decide to go on ahead into the burning town. Striding ahead of the others, Jandar walks calmly ahead of the others without waiting to see what they do. He keeps his weapon sheathed but his senses attuned (though they aren’t particularly well-honed). People look at him as he strides through the town, but nobody moves to stop him.

The others are still near the edge of town, but even from that distance they notice something that Jandar fails to see – the soldiers in town bear the symbols of the army of Soorenar, a city-state which is at war with Cimbar. Since Dorrow-Dwelf is an outpost of Cimbar, this makes the situation a battle between the two sides.

Thanks to the magic of the robe he wears, Melchior sees something further that the others do not – an invisible figure some thirty or forty feet ahead of Jandar. This invisible man has his brow furrowed in concentration, possibly casting a spell or something like that.

The appearance of people wearing the emblem of Cimbar at the edge of town has drawn attention, and soldiers start to pay more attention. A few other people who might be mages show up as well, and a second giant emerges from the manor house.

As this second giant heads toward Jandar (who is nearly close enough to sense the presence of the invisible man), the first giant starts moving toward the end of town where the others are gathered. Reacting first, Tristan fits another special arrow to his bow and lets fly at the mages gathering not too far from Jandar.

The arrow explodes into a pool of acid, spraying the mages. Realizing that battle is now breaking out, Jandar draws his sword and attacks the nearest soldiers not caught in the acid burst.

The second giant strides right through the acid toward Jandar to attack him, bellowing out an order for the soldiers to kill us. Jandar exchanges blows with the giant. One of the mages tries to use magic to put Jandar to sleep but he shakes it off with ease. The invisible one uses another spell that shrinks Jandar to the size of a child.

From some barns around the edges of the village, half a dozen magma drakes respond to the call. The drakes, large elemental dragonish creatures, all head for the cluster of people wearing the symbol of Cimbar.

Ragma sends his air elemental companion over by Jandar, where it transforms into a large whirlwind. The powerful winds snatch up nearly everyone in the area save for Jandar, the invisible man, the storm giant, and another mage who is outside the range of the whirlwind.

Thanks to a magic ring he wears, Jandar is unaffected by the whirlwind. As it pulls the bodies of soldiers swirling through the air around him, he quickly and calmly dispatches them one after another before returning his attention to the giant.

The invisible man casts a spell which allows him to fly, then moves beyond the radius of the whirlwind without Jandar’s ever knowing he was there. He heads for the other battle happening near the front of town.

There, the magma drakes have closed the distance to everyone else. Azriel, still floating a foot off the ground like he has been doing almost the entire time, dispatches another bunch of soldiers with a lightning spell which leaps from one target to another in a chain.

Melchior handles some of the drakes by dropping balls of freezing flame on them, and Azriel assists with another lightning spell and a blast of cold energy. By that time, the first storm giant has reached the group. Melchior tries to deal with that while the others turn their attention to the remaining magma drakes.

Tristan, who has hidden behind the corner of a building, is nonetheless inadvertently squashed against it as a magma drake comes through without even seeing him. Ragma turns himself into a fire elemental in order to protect himself from their fire attacks. And while he cannot do much damage to the drakes with this form, Ragma is able to hold them back and protect the others.

The invisible man moves up to the surviving drakes and casts some spells to bolster them. However, Ragma decides to turn instead into an earth elemental, and also uses another spell to trap two of the drakes underground. In his new form, Ragma then merges with into the earth, causing the ground to shake a bit in the process. The last drake not stuck underground takes a snap at Ragma as he slides into the ground, but misses and inadvertently strikes the invisible man, wounding him badly and biting off his nose.

Meanwhile, Jandar forces the spell reducing his size to end through sheer force of will. He then launches into a quick series of slashes and kills the storm giant he is fighting, as the whirlwind dies down and the air elemental returns to its normal form. One lucky soldier survives the whirlwind of death and is dropped on the roof of a nearby building, where he takes a hard fall but survives.

Stepping toward the lone remaining mage near him, Jandar gives him a feral grin before launching into another series of slashes with his sword. Surprisingly, some of them seem to bounce off.

The mystery is soon revealed, as the mage reveals his true form – a colossal undead red dragon. Seeing it in its native form, we are all affected by a surge of fear, save for Melchior. The man on the roof tries to flee in terror, and falls off the roof in the process, breaking his leg.

The dracolich moves closer, turning its gaze on those nearby. Once again Jandar’s ring protects him, but the unfortunate wounded soldier is paralyzed where he lies. And unbeknownst to everyone, the invisible man is also paralyzed by the gaze. Unfortunately, the paralysis does not stop the flow of blood leaking from his missing nasal cavity.

Jandar does his best to attack the colossal dracolich, but his strikes glance off its bones as often as they land true. The air elemental attacks at Ragma’s order, providing some backup. Melchior dominates the remaining storm giant and orders it to attack the dracolich as well.

The dracolich releases a gout of flame from its mouth, destroying the air elemental and badly wounding the storm giant as well. It then turns its attention back to Jandar, buffeting him with teeth, wings, tail, and claws.

Safely beneath the ground, Ragma mourns the loss of his elemental companion, but quickly summons a larger, more powerful earth elemental called an elemental monolith. Unfortunately, maintaining the summoning requires concentration, keeping him from doing much else.

The last magma drake is seemingly dealt with, until the other two manage to break out from their underground imprisonment. Azriel begins battling them again, and with a few spells takes them out.

Tristan switches to another bow. He mutters a brief phrase in Elven, “Swift death to those who have wronged me,” activating this bow’s magic. The arrows become specially attuned to damage the dracolich, and he begins firing at it.

Eventually all that’s left is the dracolich. Many of Melchior’s and Azriel’s spells fail to penetrate its natural resistance to magic, and both Tristan and Jandar have trouble inflicting damage with their weapons, but eventually we begin to wear the mighty creature down.

However, this triggers a contingent spell the dracolich had cast, causing another (thankfully smaller) blue dragon to appear, which moves to assist the undead red dragon. The elemental monolith turns to hold off the blue dragon, and succeeds at doing so for awhile. But Ragma observes from his safe place beneath the earth that Jandar is wounded from being in prolonged melee combat with the dracolich, and dismisses the summoned elemental so that he can heal Jandar’s wounds.

With nothing holding it back any longer, the blue dragon joins the fray in earnest, unleashing its own electrical breath weapon. Jandar finds himself in the unenviable situation of being caught between two dragons, so he tries to dodge away from it to focus on the larger threat. Even so, Jandar still gets severely wounded once more, and Ragma is forced to heal him again.

Finally, the combined assault of Jandar’s sword (augmented with a special crystal that makes it more effective against undead), Melchior’s and Azriel’s spells, and Tristan’s arrows bring down the monstrous dracolich. Tristan gets the last blow, felling the abomination with an arrow straight through its eye cavity into the remains of its brain. The dracolich’s body immediately crumbles into dust, which all of us are pretty sure is an unprecedented event. We don’t know what implications this might have, but can’t worry about it yet because the battle is not yet over.

The blue dragon remains a problem to be dealt with, as it declares it can still collects its reward for finishing them off. However, compared to the dracolich, the blue dragon proves to me far less of a threat. Ragma, still in earth elemental form, rises from the ground and beats its brains in with his rocky fists, breaking its neck in the process.

With the sounds of battle finally dying down, we look around to find ourselves the only ones standing. Or, almost. Melchior finishes off the invisible man, causing the body to appear. Most of us never realized he was there.

Tristan finds that the only other survivor in the immediate area is the wounded, paralyzed, but incredibly lucky man who fell from the roof of the building earlier after trying to flee in terror. The dracolich’s body collapsed on the building upon which he had fallen before, and crushed the building before crumbling into dust.

Tristan revives the survivor as the rest of us survey the damage to the town. A few buildings are completely obliterated, but several others, including what appear to be some shops, are still standing and mostly intact.

XP Awarded: enough to get us to level 21

[Reno]

I am cross-posting this here and on Noj's board so that everyone can see it.

[Reno]

Session 2: Saturday, February 12, 2011

As the only noble in town right now, Jandar officially names Tristan as the Hero of Dorrow-Dwelf. He wakes up the surviving soldier, and learns that his name is Francois. Jandar goes into the general store and gets parchment on which to write a certificate to make it all official.

Since Tristan needs lands, Jandar grants him his own lands outside of Akanax. Tristan decides to abandon his journey to Cimbar and instead relocate to his new lands.

Tristan and Jandar speak to Francois, and Jandar asks him what they were doing here. Francois says they came from Soorenar, and were going to use Dorrow-Dwelf as a strategic staging area for an attack on Cimbar. The dracolich was posing as a man named Lord Lowell. He was the commander, but liked to pose as someone who wasn’t the commander.

Jandar goes into the magic shop and finds that the proprietor is grievously wounded. Part of his body was melted by the attack that hit the shop, and he’s now dying. Jandar alerts the others, and Ragma heals the man enough to wake him up.

The shopkeeper, whose name is Daryl, is at first hysterical until Jandar calms him down. When he realizes what happened to the town, he is grateful to us for saving his life. We suggest that he should probably move his shop to another town, and Tristan offers to have Daryl open up shop on his new lands. Daryl accepts, and in return for saving us he gives us a bunch of free elixirs, most of which Jandar puts in his bag. He also buys a Ring of Feather Falling.

Francois decides to go with Tristan as well, because he wants to open a vineyard and a brewery, and Tristan wants to make his new lands more prosperous than they were under Jandar.

Before Tristan takes his leave with Francois and Daryl, Jandar writes up a scouting report and resignation letter for Hippartes, and asks Tristan to have them delivered to the ruler of Akanax. Tristan agrees.

With nothing else to do, Jandar decides to travel to Cimbar with Azriel and Ragma. Melchior comes along as well.

When we get close to Cimbar, a winged person and a dragon approach us. The winged man is named Teneth, and his dragon companion is Rijov. They are part of the CAC, and once they see the red dragon of Cimbar, Teneth and Rijov escort the Storm’s Anvil and Ragma’s flying whale to the city, where the ship docks and the whale continues circling.

Teneth brings us to his boss, Dockmaster Skywatch. Azriel delivers his report of the events at Dorrow-Dwelf, and Jandar chimes in. Jandar also asks Teneth about his job with the CAC, how it pays and what the work is like. He considers the possibility of employment with the CAC if he ends up staying in Cimbar.

Skywatch tells Azriel to take a letter to Soorenar, which he is told not to read. The rest of us are encouraged to go along. Teneth is ordered to go with us, and we are told that we will have an agent of Cimbar along with us as well. We are introduced to Arawn, a silver-haired man with feathered wings. He has his own airship, which is of elven make but is crewed by tieflings.

We are asked to head out the next day. Each of us has a few things to do in the meantime. After we divide the loot from the battle at Dorrow-Dwelf , Jandar takes the rest and sells it off.

When we’re all ready, we set off for Soorenar. Our little fleet is made up of Azriel’s airship, Arawn’s airship, and Ragma’s soar whale. Jandar and Teneth both ride on Azriel’s airship. Melchior elects to stay behind, citing research he needs to do, but offers to catch up with us later.

When we arrive in the city of Soorenar, we are allowed to land under escort. Since we are on an errand of peace, we are allowed to meet the ruling nobles, but are not allowed to bring weapons into their presence. This is an inconvenience for Jandar and Teneth, but not so much for anyone else. The Soorenarians don’t want to allow Azriel’s or Teneth’s dragons to come in either, but somehow we manage to talk them into allowing it.

We are brought into a courtyard where the ranking noble, Lord Thurik, is meeting with some other people. A man and a woman have four other men behind, who look to be either attendants or guards. Although they were already having a meeting, the urgency of our errand is enough that we are allowed to interrupt.

Naturally, Lord Thurik is suspicious of our intentions. However, the situation rapidly gets worse when Ragma (whose vision is so keen that he is able to read a document in the other man’s hands from the reflection of his eyeballs), informs Thurik that the man and woman are deceiving him.

The man holding the document reveals his true form: a great green dragon. The woman turns out to be a powerful druid, and she and Ragma begin to do battle. Even the guards are not what they seem, as they revert to their own true forms: Balors.

Azriel, Ragma, and Arawn immediately go to work with their magics. Jandar runs out of the courtyard back to the guardhouse outside, and yells to the guards that there are assassins attacking Lord Thurik. He then grabs his sword and Teneth’s weapon from the guards before they can react and charges back into the courtyard, where he tosses Teneth’s weapon to him.

The green dragon attacks Thurik, while fending off attacks from the rest of us. The fight is quite brutal, but eventually we defeat the balors one by one. After swallowing Lord Thurik, the dragon turns its attention to Arawn, whose powerful healing magic is keeping the rest of us in the fight despite the serious wounds we have been taking from the dragon’s magic and the four balors.

The dragon swallows Arawn whole, but the winged man survives and even manages to force his way out when the dragon is killed. By the time the bloody battle is over, the druid woman has been captured and the dragon and balors all slain. Our captive insists that we have doomed everyone because the dragon (who she insists was not who she works for) was trying to stop something much worse from happening.

XP Awarded: 9,240 + petition

[Reno]

Session 3: Sunday, March 13, 2011

Arawn agrees to cast a true resurrection spell to bring back Lord Thurik, since all we have left is a skull. When he casts the spell, the regrown body starts screaming and then dies again. We are stumped as to what this means, since none of us have ever seen anything like it before. Arawn starts pondering what could have caused something like this to happen.

In the meantime, the rest of us decide to see who else we can speak to. Lord Thurik was the head of the three ruling lords. The other two are Lady Yashur and Lord Brolkchant. Brolkchant is away with the army, so we need to talk to Lady Yashur.

Before we actually go anywhere, Melchior arrives via teleportation. He asks what we’re up to and we quickly bring him up to speed on the situation. Melchior is able to figure out that something must be disrupting all resurrection magic

We get one of Soorenar’s resident clerics to cast speak with dead on the dead dragon. From him we learn that the dracolich we defeated at Dorrow-Dwelf had inhabited the corpse of Tchazzar, dragon god and founder of Chessenta. By defeating the lich, we caused him to lose control of the corpse. We learn that the dracolich’s name is Telmander, but unfortunately we are unable to learn the lich’s current whereabouts or the location of its phylactery.

Meanwhile, Ragma questions the lady druid, whose name is Clair. She tells him that she was not working for the green dragon (whose name was Skuthosiin), but rather for Lord Gestaniius, who was aiding them. Apparently they wanted to destroy Cimbar in order to prevent it from being used to ethnically cleanse the neighboring land of Unther. Ragma asks how and why Cimbar would ethnically cleanse the land, but she is unable to give a satisfactory answer to him. Apparently this is part of a plan of Tiamat’s somehow.

Lady Yashur enters the courtyard, and is clearly unhappy to find a partially buried dead dragon there. We briefly explain everything that’s happened, and they try once more to resurrect Lord Thurik. This time Thurik lives long enough to sit up before coughing up blood and dying again.

Arawn presents the document we brought, which is a peace accord. As one of the two surviving rulers of the city, she agrees to sign it. However, she tells us that the document needs to be signed by Lord Brolkchant, which means we need to find him. Arawn volunteers to take the document to him for signing, so Lady Yashur tells him to go to the fleet that is sailing for Cimbar. She tells him to fly a yellow banner so that he will not be attacked as he tries to land.

The rest of us return to our various forms of flight. Jandar and Teneth hitch a ride on Azriel’s airship. Since we fly at the pace of Ragma’s whale, it takes us a couple days to catch up to the fleet. When we get close, Arawn flies down to the Soorenarian fleet and presents the peace treaty to Lord Brolkchant. Brolkchant willingly signs the treaty, so Arawn prepares to fly over to the Cimbarian fleet to let them know.

But before he can get there, we see a bright ball of fire in the sky, as if the sun itself was coming closer. The fire eventually turns out to be a gigantic red dragon, with one eye of pure magma and another eye missing. We recognize this as the red dragon we fought at Dorrow-Dwelf, but now no longer a lich. It seems to be Tchazzar, alive once more.

As we watch, Tchazzar’s missing eye grows back. He descends toward the fleet of Soorenar and begins attacking the ships.

Clair, who has been riding on the soar whale as sort of but not really a prisoner, jumps into the water to do battle against Tchazzar. Ragma does the same, and both turn into water elementals. Meanwhile, Arawn quickly casts some spells that cause the water to rise up and engulf the enormous dragon god.

Azriel prepares to cast some of his lightning magic at the dragon, but decides against it because of the risk of collateral damage, since the dragon is engulfed in water and there are two druids in water elemental form down there. Melchior, however, decides to use some magic of his own, flinging acid spells at Tchazzar.

Realizing that he is useless on the deck of an airship, Jandar pulls a flying carpet out of his bag and starts heading toward the dragon. As he gets closer, Jandar realizes that the dragon is not attacking our group or even the Cimbar fleet, so he decides not to attack just yet and instead concentrates on flying closer.

Clair summons a giant fiendish kraken, which appears in the water next to the dragon and begins attacking with its tentacles. The kraken is clearly outmatched, and despite being healed a few times by Arawn, it is eventually defeated. Meanwhile, Ragma changes into a force dragon, an extremely powerful and rare sort of dragon with glittering diamond-like scales, and bursts up out of the sea to attack. Tchazzar releases a mighty gout of flame at him, to which Ragma responds with his own breath weapon, a cone of pure force energy.

Finally, Jandar nearly gets close enough to do something. Instructing his flying carpet to follow him, Jandar leaps from the carpet onto the neck ridge of the dragon god (of which Jandar is, in name at least, a follower). Now that he’s close enough, Jandar starts using his new helm to try and read the dragon’s thoughts.

The battle continues for a bit, then suddenly Tchazzar (who has been fighting as if in some kind of battle frenzy) suddenly flies off, with Jandar hanging onto the dragon’s head for dear life. Tchazzar finally realizes that Jandar is there, and then tries to burn him off by heating up his body from the inside.

However, when Jandar’s attempt to detect the dragon god’s thoughts becomes apparent, Tchazzar takes the opportunity to converse mentally with him. He recognizes Jandar as one of his own, and asks who the other dragon is that’s following them. It’s Ragma, who is able to keep pace because of his superior flight speed, but Jandar doesn’t know that.

Finally, Ragma closes enough distance to try calling out to Tchazzar. He tries a few languages until discovering that the red dragon speaks Ignan, and they converse a bit. Meanwhile, Tchazzar also speaks mentally to Jandar, who is unable to follow the verbal conversation as he doesn’t speak the language.

Both Jandar and Ragma want to know where Tchazzar is going, and he replies “home” to each of them. When Jandar asks where that is, Tchazzar says Cimbar, and asks if Jandar wants to come with. Not seeing much of an alternative, Jandar agrees to go along. Tchazzar explains that he wants to be a better god to his people, though Jandar wonders what he means by that.

Tchazzar continues to fly toward Cimbar, with Ragma keeping pace but not approaching too closely. Eventually we reach the city, and Tchazzar sets down on the beach. The dragon god assumes human form, though his eyes remain fiery. He says he is heading into the city to reclaim his home, and asks Jandar if he wants to come along. Jandar decides instead to wait on the beach for his carpet (which fell far behind because it isn’t as fast as the dragon) to catch up to him. Tchazzar goes into the city by himself.

Ragma sets down next, and we decide to wait for the others to catch up. Once everyone is there, we start discussing the situation. Arawn points out that the dragon didn’t attack us, so maybe it isn’t that bad. But Melchior is sure that Tchazzar was known to be evil, and doesn’t believe we should trust him even if he is the god of Cimbar.

For now anyway, we decide not to do anything just yet. Ragma disappears, having set off for his druid enclave in far-off Icewind Dale. Since he was named the Hero of the Courtyard of Sorrow, Ragma is going to get some land in Chessenta and decides that he will move the rest of his druids (aside from those on the soar whale) to these lands, wherever they are.

Meanwhile, Jandar expresses a desire to get some food once his carpet finally arrives. The others decide to do that and do some drinking as well. The two dragons with us (Teneth’s companion Rijov and the dragon with Azriel) both assume human form, although Rijov needs a spell from Azriel to do it since he does not possess the ability himself. We head into Cimbar to relax a bit.

Having never been in human form before, Rijov gets drunk rather easily, especially after Arawn gives him a swig from a flask that he carries. Fortunately, Rijov proves to be the nonaggressive type when he’s intoxicated, and expresses a desire to “get some skirt.” Teneth and Arawn, a little drunk themselves, both decide to aid him in this dubious quest, and eventually they find a nice lady for their “young friend” to bed down with.

Jandar decides not to drink too much, and when Ragma comes back, Jandar goes with him to find out where they can report that Ragma has been proclaimed a Hero. Eventually they locate a place where the appropriate paperwork can be filled out. It turns out that there is some available land in Cimbar’s holdings: the village of Dorrow-Dwelf is (for some strange reason) currently unoccupied. Ragma proclaims his intention to change the name of the area.

The following morning, we all assemble again. Ragma reveals that his druids have already arrived at Dorrow-Dwelf and begun terraforming the area to turn it into a small forest. Arawn once again expresses his growing conviction that Tchazzar is either not evil or has reformed.

However, Melchior reveals some knowledge he has uncovered after putting the pieces together in his head. Specifically, he reveals that Tchazzar was an aspect of Tiamat, or rather one of her heads. In addition, the green dragon Skuthosiin and the druid Clair’s employer Gestaniius were also aspects of Tiamat.

Melchior goes on to elaborate that when Tiamat was killed in the Time of Troubles, each of the aspects of her various heads began fighting one another. Tchazzar killed Skuthosiin and Gestaniius and took their power in an attempt to become a full-fledged god himself. However, Tchazzar in turn was killed when a bunch of Tiamat worshippers captured and sacrificed him in a ritual to resurrect Tiamat. Evidently all three of the aspects recovered (although we know that Skuthosiin had his heart replaced with that of a demon, thanks to information that Clair revealed to Ragma).

None of this convinces Arawn, especially once we start asking around about a man with fiery eyes and hear stories of Tchazzar performing miracles. It seems he is going out among the city, proclaiming his identity, and doing things like raising people from the dead. Tchazzar seems out to take the city by winning the hearts of its people. Jandar wonders if this is what Tchazzar meant by saying he would be a better god to his people.

Since most of us still don’t know what to make of Tchazzar, and are worried about whatever plan he’s up to, we decide to get away from Cimbar and move the group to Dorrow-Dwelf. Ragma points out that he can scry the city from there, and that we can get back to the city right away if necessary.

Arawn, however, is becoming increasingly convinced that Tchazzar is doing good, and that we should maybe even be helping him. He decides to stay in the city. Jandar, who is becoming conflicted by these events (since he is supposed to be a worshipper of Tchazzar but doesn’t know what to make of him now that he’s met him face to face), decides to stay as well, mostly to keep an eye on Arawn.

Jandar suggests that we buy some Sending Stones, pairs of linked stones that allow the possessors to send messages to each other. We end up buying a bunch of them, with each member of the group having stones that can send to each other member of the group. After that, Ragma takes Azriel, Melchior, Teneth, and the two dragons to his enclave at Dorrow-Dwelf, leaving Jandar and Arawn behind.

Arawn decides to seek out Tchazzar, which isn’t difficult as the dragon-god is becoming increasingly public with his efforts, to the point that someone is posting flyers advertising his presence.

When we find him, Arawn speaks with Tchazzar. He immediately brings up what we know about Tchazzar being an aspect of Tiamat, which the red dragon is surprised to hear since it’s not common knowledge. He suspects that some powerful and learned wizard supplied this information, and Arawn reveals that it was Melchior. Hearing this, Jandar quietly slips away as the other two continue to talk.

Once he’s out of earshot and around a corner, Jandar takes out the Sending Stone keyed to Melchior. He warns Melchior that Arawn has just told Tchazzar about him, and asks what the situation is at Dorrow-Dwelf. The response he gets is that there are a lot of trees there now.

Jandar heads back to where Arawn and Tchazzar are, to make sure Arawn doesn’t get us into even more trouble. But first, he takes out his magical mug and fills it with ale, so that he can say he left to get a drink without technically lying, in case he is asked.

When Jandar rejoins the conversation, Tchazzar begins pressing him to openly support him. The dragon wants someone of Jandar’s noble status to proclaim his allegiance publicly and help him win followers that way. He also promises Jandar plenty of battle and glory. Jandar points out that we are technically at peace now, and Arawn reveals that he still has the signed peace treaty, which he was supposed to deliver to his superiors but has not yet done. Tchazzar takes the treaty and keeps it himself.

As his god continues pressing Jandar to support him, Jandar tries to be noncommittal and vague as much as possible, but is unable to get out of it completely. Unwilling to openly defy such a powerful force (at least not yet), he reluctantly agrees in as vague terms as possible.

XP Awarded: 6,720 + petition

[Reno]

I didn't realize until last night that I hadn't completed the notes for session 2, so after I finished the notes for last night's game, I went back and wrote the rest of session 2's notes from memory.

Unfortunately my memory sucks sometimes, so I'm probably missing A LOT of detail from session 2. Hopefully I didn't get anything outright wrong, but if you remember something that I forgot, please mention it.

[Reno]

Session 4: Friday, April 08, 2011

After Tchazzar takes his leave from us, Jandar asks Arawn why he’s cozying up to the dragon god all of a sudden. Arawn insists that he’s not, he’s just trying to figure out what Tchazzar is up to, and he wasn’t willing to risk drawing the god’s ire. He seems to be sincere, so Jandar asks what he plans to do next.

Arawn replies that he is going to go away for a couple of days, and then he will come back. Jandar can’t think of a good excuse to come along, so he tells Arawn to get in touch with him via the sending stones if he needs to. Jandar decides to stay in Cimbar and keep an eye out to see what’s going on.

Over the next few days, word of Tchazzar’s return continues to spread. More and more people begin to follow him, although the government of Cimbar continues to remain silent on the matter. Jandar is unable to tell whether they are ignoring the situation, unaware of it, resisting Tchazzar, or even might have already capitulated to him.

The following night, Jandar has a dream in which he is visited by a beautiful woman. Although he fails to recognize her, it is Aasterinian, the dragon goddess of invention, in human form. She tells him that Tchazzar is not what he appears, and that she senses Jandar is not accepting of him. She offers him power to resist the dragon, and he is given a power through the god Kord. Kord presents him with a sword, which Jandar finds at his side upon waking.

Meanwhile, Ragma’s enclave of druids arrives at his new lands. They begin transplanting saplings from the back of his soar whale into the soil of this land, and Ragma uses his druidic magic to instantly turn them into full-grown trees. He then spends the next couple of days awakening all the trees, granting them sentience and the ability to move.

At one point, Ragma is visited by a tree which he initially mistakes for one of the ones he awakened. However, this particular tree reveals itself to be Obad-Hai, a god of nature. While he recognizes that Ragma worships the land itself rather than him or one of the other nature gods, he nonetheless grants Ragma some power and information. He grants Ragma’s shield the ability to deflect spells targeted at him, and he also reveals to Ragma that Tchazzar is not a true god. However, he is trying to become one.

Deciding that he needs to get away from this newly enchanted forest for awhile, Teneth heads for the city of Airspur with Rijov. There he learns that they have been having problems with raids from the Flaming Spike orc tribe, which lives in the nearby Akanapeaks mountain range. Teneth and Rijov decide to do something about it. They fly up into the Akanapeaks, locate the tribe, and set down.

Teneth finds the leader and tries to persuade him to leave Airspur alone. However, the orcs are having none of it, and threaten Teneth and Rijov since they are heavily outnumbered. Teneth slaughters the leader, and the other orcs agree that the tribe will leave the area. Teneth takes the orc leader’s head back to Airspur, tells them that the Flaming Spike tribe will no longer be a problem, and then heads back to the druid enclave. He also claims the cave system where he found them as his own land, and asks the soldiers of Airspur to keep it safe for him. In gratitude for what he did, they agree.

Arawn goes to Mulhorand, picks a location, and uses magic to create a castle. Once he’s satisfied with it, he uses a sending stone to call Ragma and asks to arrange a meeting. He leaves the choice of time and place to Ragma, but asks him to have some of his druids attend.

Melchior heads for the Dalelands, but is secretive about what he does there. He also learns that his mentor Elminster is away, somewhere in the Nine Hells trying to retrieve the Eye of Vecna.

Azriel remains on Ragma’s lands, living in the keep for a few days while everyone else is away. He finds the animated trees very disturbing, and tries his best to avoid them.

As each person returns to Ragma’s lands, he informs them of the meeting with Arawn, which he has chosen to host here at the grove. No one gets around to telling Jandar about it, whom they haven’t talked to since he sent the warning about Arawn and Tchazzar.

The appointed meeting day comes, with the entire group in attendance except for Jandar. Arawn tries to reassure everyone that he has not betrayed them, and is not serving Tchazzar. He says that if he was “cozying up” at all to the dragon god (Ragma chimes in here that he has learned Tchazzar is not in fact a true god), it’s only to try and discern what he’s up to.

Arawn reveals that he once was a worshipper of Aasterinian, the same goddess that Teneth worships. However, he was lured by the promise of power and became a servant of Tiamat instead. This elicits gasps from the group, as no one really expected it. Even though Tchazzar is connected to Tiamat, Arawn is not going to serve him, and in fact seems to be losing whatever loyalty he might have possessed to Tiamat as well.

Upon noticing Jandar’s absence, Arawn questions why he isn’t there. When he finds out that nobody has talked to him in a few days, he goes looking, finds Jandar in Cimbar, and brings him back to join the meeting. Jandar is quickly brought up to speed on what’s going on.

As a gesture of good faith, Arawn listens to Ragma’s explanation of why he considers the Moaning Diamond, an artifact that Arawn possesses, to be an abomination. Afterward, he gives the bag containing the diamond to Ragma, which Ragma says he will hold on to until he can discover a way to destroy the Diamond.

On a sudden flash of inspiration, Jandar asks to see the Moaning Diamond. Suspiciously, Ragma asks what for, and Jandar says he has an idea on how to get rid of it. Ragma hands the Diamond over. Jandar places it on the ground, then draws his new sword (called the Sword of Swords for lack of a better name), and tries to smash the Moaning Diamond with it. The Diamond is destroyed in two blows. A surprised Ragma thanks him for destroying the artifact.

The conversation continues for awhile, until it is interrupted by the sudden appearance of an approaching dragon. It is not Tchazzar, but something far worse – an aspect of Tiamat herself. Tiamat sensed the betrayal of one of her most powerful servants, and has sent a piece of herself to personally avenge the betrayal. The rest of us are to be destroyed as well, for either knowing too much or being a hindrance to Tiamat’s plan.

After a quick mental conversation between Tiamat and Arawn, he warns us of what’s going on. We quickly take to the air, fan out, and commence the battle.

Thinking to end the confrontation before it begins, Arawn opens a gate to one of the heavenly planes, directly in the path of Tiamat. She is flying at too high a speed to get out of the way in time, and passes through the gate right out of the Material Plane. Arawn quickly closes the gate behind her.

Unfortunately, this proves only a temporary setback to Tiamat, as her aspect simply plane shifts right back and unleashes a powerful gout of flame from one of her heads, catching most of us off-guard.

Though Tiamat is heavily resistant or outright immune to many forms of magic, she is not immune to the Sword of Swords. Although he receives a painful and near-fatal wound from Tiamat’s poisonous barbed tail, Jandar attacks with a very quick flurry of strikes that deals serious damage to the deity’s aspect, and even cuts open a huge hole in her gullet.

Melchior positions himself a good distance away, apart from the others so that he is less likely to be caught in the area of Tiamat’s attacks. He then starts unleashing attack spells, most of which penetrate through her magic resistance. He alters each spell from its normal element to pure sonic damage, knowing that few things are resistant to this kind of attack. It proves an effective tactic.

Ragma turns himself into a powerful force dragon, and breathes a powerful cone of pure force energy at Tiamat. He also conjures up a powerful air elemental monolith, but unfortunately it is unable to do much to affect Tiamat. His second-in-command summons another and sends it to join the battle as well, but it proves no more effective than the other monolith.

Teneth joins the melee as well, and his scimitar flashes in with such a deadly hit that Tiamat recoils in pain, falling back a few feet from the two swordsmen. Tiamat rushes by, repositioning herself in order to deliver a series of devastating breath attacks, one after another.

Arawn keeps everyone in the fight with his healing magic, and also turns his unique gift from Tiamat (the ability to call on nearly any spell at any time) on her, until Tiamat revokes the power from him, leaving Arawn with only his own magic. Well-timed healing is once again the only thing that keeps Jandar from being slain in battle.

Through the party’s combined might, the aspect of Tiamat is eventually brought down. Jandar delivers the killing blow, slicing off one of Tiamat’s heads with the Sword of Swords. Unfortunately, since we’re still high up in the air, gravity now takes over. Tiamat’s body plummets to the earth below, crushing about ten of Ragma’s druid followers who were watching helplessly.

XP Awarded: 11,200 + petition

[Reno]

Session 5: Friday, April 22, 2011

Arawn, thanks to his new deific powers, perceives that three sets of very large feet are marching toward somewhere that will affect a great many people. After taking some time to find out where it is, he finds three colossal figures beneath the water north of Chessenta. They are heading southwest, possibly towards Cimbar.

Arawn contacts the others, and one by one everybody comes to see what the fuss is. As usual, Jandar is the last to arrive. By the time he gets there, the others have figured out that they are a trio of iron colossi. Melchior knows that it would take an incredibly powerful caster, much more well-versed than even he is, to create one of these gigantic constructs, let alone three of them.

Ragma, as a demigod with power over the earth, tries to use his new powers to stop the colossi. Unfortunately, the giant iron constructs are protected by an antimagic field which is even able to keep out his ability to reshape the land.

Jandar drops into the water to get a closer look at one of the colossi. In the process, he discovers that as a demigod himself, he no longer needs to breathe. However, the giant constructs are so far under the water that the sunlight barely penetrates, and it is too dark for Jandar to really get a good look at them. He swims back to the surface and rejoins the others.

Since none of us are really adept at underwater combat without the aid of magic, there is really nothing we can do right now. However, since the colossi are moving so slowly, it will be days before they reach land so we do not need to act yet. A little bit of backtracking suggests that they came from an area near Thay. The group begins to suspect that Thay is now allied with Tchazzar somehow.

Each of us goes our own way for another couple of days, to gather more power or make what preparations we feel like. Melchior agrees to stay near the colossi and keep tabs on them in case they do something unexpected.

Ragma and Arawn both go to the Plains of Purple Dust, a wasteland to the southeast of Chessenta that is covered in strange purple dust from a magical incident in the past and haunted by the souls of those who died in said incident. They combine Ragma’s mastery of earth and Arawn’s ability to alter reality in an attempt to cleanse the wasteland of its magical taint.

They gather up all the purple dust into a huge chunk, much more sizable than either of them would have expected. The concentrated arcane force of all the purple dust creates some sort of vaguely sinister object with unknown but potent magical power. Unfortunately, this attracts some unwanted attention to the two demigods.

Over the past couple days, Arawn has noticed Ragma occasionally seeming to talk to himself. This is because Ragma has been receiving messages from Nerull, a god of death, trying to form some sort of accord with Ragma. Ragma believes that Nerull wants him to become a sort of god of natural disasters. Ragma believes that natural disasters have an important place in the world, but also worries that a god like Nerull would try to encourage such disasters to occur more often, in order to increase his own power.

Nerull now wants Ragma to give him this thing they’ve created from the purple dust. Ragma does not want to do so. When he and Arawn hear something huge lumbering toward them in the distance, they once more combine their powers to push it away. Soon, three more of these things (which turn out to be aspects of Nerull) start coming for them.

Arawn and Ragma realize that the stone made from the purple dust is too large for them to move, but neither they cannot fight off three aspects of a powerful god like Nerull. So they encase the rock in a mountain made of the hardest material they can, and flee the area.

Meanwhile, Jandar returns to Rashemen, his birthplace and center of the small-but-growing sect of his worshippers, and visits the first few of his new priests. They have already begun to form something of a hierarchy among themselves (which Jandar is pleased to have done without his having to worry about it), and tells them he wants a temple built to him. He gives them 50,000 gold pieces to finance the construction, and slaps them each a high-five to encourage them. Thereafter, the high-five becomes a gesture associated with worship of Jandar, at least among his faithful.

From there, Jandar returns to Akanax, the warrior city near which he had been living before he became embroiled in this latest quest. First, he returns to his old lands to visit Tristan. Jandar sees the progress Tristan has already made in redeveloping the lands, and knows he made the right choice. He also warns Tristan that he is going into the city, and things there could get ugly.

Jandar heads into Akanax, and heads straight to the royal residence of King Hippartes. Along the way, he makes quite a stir as people see him pass. Jandar ignores them all and continues toward the king’s residence.

King Hippartes has an arena set up in which he watches gladiatorial combat to pass the time. When Jandar arrives, Hippartes is watching a man trying to fight a lion (the lion is winning). Hippartes is not at all pleased by the interruption, as he has never been fond of Jandar. He demands to know why Jandar has returned.

Jandar explains that things are different now, because he has ascended to something more than a mortal. He wants to establish his religion here in Akanax now. Hippartes is not happy, nor does he want to cooperate. Jandar offers to settle their differences in the arena, and Hippartes agrees to it.

Though the King of Akanax is a highly accomplished and respected warrior, Jandar easily bests him in single combat. Gravely but not mortally wounded, Hippartes wisely concedes defeat and announces that he now believes in Jandar.

Jandar explains to Hippartes how he wants to establish his religion, and gives Hippartes 50,000 gold for the establishment of a temple. He tasks the king with spreading word of his new religion. There is one small problem though: Jandar abhors slavery, and will not allow his followers to practice it. Unfortunately, most of Chessentan society practices slavery, and in fact slaves are an integral part of the economy. Akanax is no exception. Jandar says that this must change, and pledges to find an alternative that will be acceptable in Akanax.

Before leaving, Jandar also tells Hippartes of his eventual goal: to mount an attack on Thay. Hippartes disdains wizardry almost as much as Jandar does, so he likes this idea as well.

At the same time, Teneth learns of a town where he can increase his own influence. Unlike some of the others, Teneth has chosen to gain his divine power by tying himself more closely to his own deity, Aasterinian. This town is having a series of athletic contests to replace their ruler, who has fallen deathly ill and is not expected to live much longer. If he wins the contest, Teneth can become the new leader of the town and spread the worship of Aasterinian there.

By the time he gets to the town, the contest is already underway, and Teneth has missed several events. He is permitted to enter the contest late, but is told that in order to win he will have to place first in all the remaining events: distance jumping, javelin throwing, and wrestling.

Teneth easily wins the distance jumping and javelin throwing events, and then proceeds to the wrestling tournament. His first two opponents, though quite skilled, are overpowered by his superior ability. By defeating them, Teneth advances to the finals. His final opponent, a man named Goldberg, does not prove so easy. He very nearly pins Teneth, but eventually Teneth overcomes him as well and wins the tournament.

Teneth is proclaimed the winner of the contests, and is set to become the new ruler as soon as the old one succumbs to his illness. Since Teneth does not want to stay here, he speaks to Goldberg and convinces the man to be his lieutenant here. Teneth then returns to the group.

In the meantime, Melchior has discovered that the iron colossi are not headed for Cimbar, but instead for Soorenar. When everyone else returns to him and learns of this, we suspect that Tchazzar has had these things sent after Soorenar so that he may arrive just in the nick of time, defeat them, and win the gratitude of the city to gain more followers. Unable to prove this for certain, we decide that the only way to stop Tchazzar is to steal his thunder.

As a group we teleport to Soorenar in order to warn them about the approaching danger. Once there, we begin making preparations to help defend the city. Ragma and Arawn reshape the land around the city into bulwarks, and help to bring in weaponry with which the town can fight back.

Not too long after we show up, Tchazzar does as well. He wants to help defend Soorenar as well, and shows no outward sign of displeasure at our already being there to assist.

Jandar and Teneth decide to take matters into their own hands and carry the fight to the colossi, rather than wait for them to get near the city. As soon as Tchazzar enters the city, they leave. Teneth tells Rijov to stay behind, as he does not want his friend (and cleric) to risk himself in this battle. The others, and Tchazzar as well, are not far behind once they realize Jandar and Teneth are gone.

Teneth and Jandar are the first to reach the colossi, who by this time have emerged from the sea and are a relatively short distance from Soorenar. They make no reaction to us as we approach, and once within the radius of their antimagic field, Jandar discovers that the Sword of Swords is not affected by it. It still possesses its full might, although otherwise Jandar’s gear and Teneth’s are rendered inert and nonmagical.

Both Jandar and Teneth, however, find that their divine power is still in effect. Both of their weapons are able to punch through the heavily armored bodies of the colossi with ease, and thus they simply charge full at the gigantic constructs and attack. Jandar’s attacks are almost too fast for the eye to follow, and he quickly cripples one of the constructs with help from Teneth.

Unfortunately, the colossi have no trouble striking their opponents either, and they rain down blows with their massive arms. They also spew cones of poisonous gas, but both Teneth and Jandar are immune and pay it no heed.

The others arrive to see one of the constructs on the verge of collapse. Unfortunately, there is little to be done by anyone who cannot wade into melee against the building-sized golems. Even Ragma cannot do much up close, because the antimagic field would revert him to his natural form.

Tchazzar, however, suffers no serious impediment. Even without his magic, he is still a colossal red dragon. He flies in and joins the combat.

The first iron colossus goes down. The second is on the verge of destruction as well when it rains one last blow on Jandar. The former Hero of Adder Swamp’s broken body collapses to the ground and does not move.

As this is happening, lightning begins to strike the remaining colossi. It seems that someone is controlling the weather, and using natural lightning to strike the giant constructs, which are healed by the electrical energy that passes through them. Melchior spots the source of this event: a group of what appear to be foxes or other small animals, but are obviously something more. He manages to kill one, and the others disappear to safety.

As Teneth and Tchazzar make short work of the second colossi and turn their attention to the third and final one, the Sword of Swords begins to glow. In the heat of battle, this fact goes unobserved as everyone concentrates on the giant iron colossus that is still menacing us.

Eventually, the last colossus is defeated, and as it falls to the ground with an earth-shaking impact, the antimagic field dissipates. Arawn quickly reaches Jandar and casts a spell to temporarily resurrect him. The glow surrounding the Sword of Swords slowly fades away, still unnoticed by everyone.

When Arawn’s spell ends and Jandar temporarily dies again, Arawn is on hand to use another spell, which brings him back to life permanently but must be administered immediately after death. Once Jandar is up and moving about, we all return to Soorenar.

Upon our return to the city, we are greeted as heroes. Ragma removes the earthen fortifications, returning the land surrounding the city to normal. Arawn, having learned that the barrier preventing people from coming back from the dead is now gone, Arawn asks to see the body of Lord Thurik, the former ruler of the city who was killed when last we were here. He is brought to Thurik and this time is able to raise him successfully.

A celebration is held that night in the city. When we get a moment apart from the people, Tchazzar tells the group that they had better stop meddling. He considers Chessenta his domain and his alone, and outside of it he does not care what we do. However, everyone and everything in it belongs to him, as far as he is concerned, and he wants us gone.

Unfortunately, that includes Ragma’s druid grove, Jandar’s growing base of followers in Akanax, and other people and places that are important to us. Jandar replies to the draconic demigod that everyone in Chessenta must be allowed to make the choice for themselves whom they will follow. Tchazzar finds this unacceptable, but is not willing to move against us in front of the eyes of all Soorenar. He departs, leaving us to confer with one another about what to do.

Jandar decides to teleport himself to Akanax, where he locates King Hippartes and informs him of Tchazzar’s pronouncement. Jandar vows to protect those who follow him, but insists that worship must not be compulsory.

XP Awarded: 40,320 + petition

[Reno]

Sorry for the delay in getting this posted. Also, please let me know if I missed any important details, as I feel like I might have missed some stuff towards the end.

[Reno]

Session 6: Sunday, December 04, 2011

At his cave stronghold in the mountains near Airspur, Teneth discovers that a construct with multiple bladed and spiked weapons called an Anaxim is attacking. Teneth goes out to fight it off, wielding his scimitar against it.

Meanwhile, in the desert of Mulhorand where he has gained some followers, Arawn comes under attack by a big red dragon and a centaur-like creature with the upper body of a catfolk, and a shadowy appearance. Arawn casts a time stop spell and uses his opportunity to cast a few more spells to grant him an advantage.

In Akanax, Jandar is approached by King Hippartes, who tells him his outriders have taken note of an army approaching from the direction of Cimbar. Leading the army are two individuals that match the description of the human form Tchazzar took when he went to Cimbar. Jandar tells Hippartes to mobilize his own army.

Teneth handily defeats the Anaxim, then receives a message from Arawn through one of his “rock phones” that Arawn needs help, so Teneth teleports to his location.

As Hippartes arrays his army against the much larger force from Cimbar, Jandar moves to a good vantage point to look at the approaching force. He sees that the two men who look like Tchazzar’s human form are riding out to a parlay position. Jandar teleports down to meet them. Both of them turn out to be aspects of Tchazzar.

Tchazzar, speaking telepathically through one of his aspects, tells Jandar that because he refused to leave Chessenta, it has come to battle. He offers Jandar a choice of whether to fight the two aspects, or let their armies fight it out first. Seeing no point in allowing his followers to be overrun by superior numbers, and also not trusting Tchazzar, Jandar chooses to battle them.

Quickly Jandar discovers that these two aspects of Tchazzar have some sort of spell that makes their scales nearly impenetrable to his sword, despite his divine power that lets him cut through nearly anything. Due to this, and the aspects’ very thick hides, Jandar finds himself almost completely unable to hurt them.

Meanwhile, the red dragon attacking Arawn turns out to be another aspect of Tchazzar, so Arawn and Teneth to their best to defeat it while also watching out for the shadowy centaur-catman thing.

Jandar swaps out one of the rings he’s wearing for another one, and uses that ring to make himself begin blinking back and forth between the material and ethereal planes, so that Tchazzar’s attacks will sometimes pass through him harmlessly. Due to his own specialized training, Jandar knows how to pierce magical concealments, and so is able to keep up his own attack without being impeded by the blinking. However, Jandar discovers that while he is now surviving just fine against the combined onslaught of the two aspects, he is having little to no success hurting them, particularly one which seems to be stronger than the other.

Suddenly, Azriel arrives and blasts one of the aspects with lightning magic that somehow is effective despite the fact that divine beings are normally immune to electricity damage. Though there is not time to say anything, Jandar is grateful for the help. In addition, an unfamiliar young man shows up, calls to Jandar that he was told to come help, and attacks as well. Wielding impressive psionic powers, he creates tornadoes and fires them at the aspects, as well as summoning an astral construct to attack.

Jandar continues to be the main focus of the two aspects, and he finds himself hard-pressed until he remembers that he has his own magic from his divine portfolio. Although he does not like to use that magic, Jandar knows that not only is his own life on the line, but potentially those of his followers as well, so he tries a disjunction spell. It successfully destroys the magic that was preventing him from cutting through the aspect’s thick hide. Jandar redoubles his attack, as Azriel casts another spell that breaks the similar enchantment on the other aspect.

The two separate battles, happening simultaneously in two different places against three aspects of Tchazzar, continue raging on. Meanwhile, the whereabouts of Ragma and Melchior remain unknown.