The group had just debriefed with Cronin and Keff, leaving the Manual of Crystal Golem and other books with the Protectorate. Cronin and Keff tell the group to continue their search of the other wasteland locations, but there is no need to rush. They give the group leeway to take their time and regroup in Denaus first.

The party heads home, spending the first night debating whether or not they should trust Cronin and the protectorate. Cronin seemed very eager to acquire more Earth Blossoms. Sumira is particularly suspicious. The group agrees they should keep their eyes open, but there is not enough information to take a side against the Protectorate. Also, it’s too dangerous to investigate the Protectorate without committing treason.

When Elan wakes up in the morning, he notices that Cronin’s cat is present in the home. Georgia confirms that someone stopped by saying that the cat belonged to the party. It is obvious that the group will have to be careful when discussing matters under the watchful eyes of Cronin. The cat follows Elan for the rest of the session.

Elan prepares a Greater Restoration spell for Julien’s undead affliction. Julien is still having dreams of the dead Lenorans, and Dahlia is terrified of his appearance. Thankfully, the spell works and Julien is able to calm Dahlia and reclaim his sword from Sumira.

Elan is tasked with casting Hallow on the house as an added level of protection. The spell takes 24 hours to cast and requires 1000 gold worth of incense and components. Julien and Sumira each contribute 500 gold for the spell. As part of the spell, celestials, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead cannot enter the house or charm, possess, or frighten those within. Additionally, any creatures other than the party can’t move or travel into/out of the house by using teleportation, extradimensional, or interplanar means. Elan is able to finish the spell and rests afterword.

Julien heads out for the day to sell some of the loot they acquired from the Dead City. He heads to the Steward of the Prince, who purchased relics from them in the past. Julien is very persuasive in hyping up the loot to the Steward, who pays 800 gold to the party for 2 gold vestments, a white robe, and two purses with gold and silver pieces. Julien and Sumira each keep a couple coins.

Sumira heads to her guild for news since she’s been away. She meets with Cassandra (?). Sumira becomes very annoyed when Cassandra presses her for information about the loot that was discovered in the wastes. Apparently the Steward of the Prince had spread the news of the possible treasure troves in the wastes. Sumira snaps at Cassandra, wondering if she should stop contributing so much gold to the guild. Cassandra relents and they discuss some jobs in town. (Please add more Viona!)

Oskar goes off for the day to work in the forge with his friend. Afterword he decides to go on a bender. He gambles his money at the orc fighting pits, losing a considerable amount before jumping in the ring himself to come out ahead.

Zabbo researches the fiction book that was based on the old Lenoran text. The book was written 70 years ago and was published in (whatever city it is that Zabbo wants to visit so badly).

While the party was gone, Georgia explains that she found a smoldering fire in the home one night. There was no indication of what could have caused the fire. It is possible that Dahlia is exhibiting magical powers. Elan offers to have his mother meet with Dahlia to give her opinion on what could be going on. She is an ex-Seer and works with children. She agrees to meet with Dahlia when asked by Elan and explains that it is possible for children to exhibit magical powers – However, Dahlia is really young for this, and the Protectorate might want to siphon her magical powers away if it becomes a problem.

Julien spends a day hiring a groundskeeper for his new estate east of Denaus. He hires Sergy for 3 gold per month and takes him out to the property to get him settled with the understanding that Georgia and Dahlia may be moving there soon. Julien also informs the Dudyiks next door that he is their new neighbor and they seem excited to be rid of the Melneks.

Oskar heads out again for the day but is able to resist the temptation of alcohol. Instead he heads to the Keepers and begins the process of joining their ranks. His first task is to memorize the daily holidays.

Elan notices when he gets home that the same bird that delivers messages from Barkskin is waiting. However, instead of talking, the bird falls over and dies. This ominous message worries the party. Julien casts Dream that night to Dolan to assess the situation. Dolan is antagonistic and claims that the two sides are now enemies. Julien tries to dissipate the animosity and avoid future conflicts, but Dolan claims “we know more than you think we do”. Is it possible they know about the Manual of Crystal Golem and the party’s recent travels? Julien plays dumb and pretends nothing has changed, but a frustrated Dolan tries to kill himself in the dream to wake up. He fails and Julien dispells the Dream spell after this pitiful display.

At Elan’s urging, the groups decides to meet with with Markus after many days without checking in. At first, Markus seems grateful and impressed with the group’s recent triumphs. However, as time goes on his disdain for the group shows through, probably because of the favoritism they receive from Cronin and Keff. Even so, the group warns Markus of possible retaliation from Barkskin and tell him about the recent encounter with the bird and Dolan. Markus has little to offer the party, except for a new Protectorate mandate to seek out possible demonic influences in Denaus. Markus believes there are domonic forces mingling with the high society of the city. The party seems excited to investigate this except for Juilen, who finally confides in Sumira about his secret.

The group first went around searching the emperor’s palace and the great hall, or something. In the house, Elan found dragon scale. Then the group went down some stairs into the Crypt of Aurelis. It was here that ghosts attacked the group, eventually killed by the party and some were turned by Elan. Some were turned by Elan before in a previous attack – forgot to mention.

Anyway, the crypt had become broken rubble and the group found a gold ring in the crypt. The gold ring opened doors in the dorm houses, the special corner rooms. It was to a demiplane in a different part of the world. It shoudl also be mentioned that when Julien sucked the life force out of the ghosts he got white hair and resistance to necro, so he couldn’t stay attuned to the radiant sword. He gives the sword to Sumira, who laments that it does nothing but +2.

Julien, with his necro resistance, opens the gold door in the necro-ish room. As he does so a Wraith (the wraith of Canu/Kanu) rushes towards him. It attacks Julien, who then uses eldrich blast to push it back in and close the door.

The group, suprised to still be alive and that Julien is not in a dragon’s belly yet, goes back to Danaus to regroup. Zabbo learns that Duncan’s wife ends up being ok. He researches wraiths while Julien hides his wraith-like face from dahlia. The group then heads back to take on the wraith.

Zabbo is given a necro aura by Sumira and tries to dispel the magic. He tries once with a scroll and fails, then tries again and succeeds. However, he is distracted by Julien going on and on about how the group should have gone through the other door, and is then surprised attacked by a wraith that opened the gold door. This comes as a special surprise to zabbo because really julien, if the gold doors all went to the same place and the wraith could open them it would have escaped the demiplane long ago. While zabbo didn’t realize it at the time, this exact thought pulses through his brain at the exact moment the wraith sinks its cold, lifeless claws into zabbos frail body – giving zabbo that rare but delightful feeling of simultaneous pain and pleasure.

Zabbo cries out and the group comes to his aid. Sumira charges right into battle with two effective blows from the radiant magical sword. Then Julien goes in and eldrich blasts the wraith back. Elan then charges in and casts something, probably radiant in nature. The wraith tries to book it, flying past oskar, who hits it again. Then Zabbo runs out and tries to contain it in a wall of force (there was a resilient sphere in there too at some point). Oskar and sumira are contained in the force for a cage match of epic proportions, but the wraith cancels the pay per scry event and tries to fly away, finally being felled by oskar, sumira, or elan.

After felling the beast, sumira takes the platinum ring and the group tries to destroy the ashes. The group then heads back to the platinum door. They get past the golem win an extra trap and so on… and into the PLATINUM DOOR.

The platinum door leads to another demi-plane, this time seemingly untouched by the necro magic. There is a studio building with some stuff inside. The group finds a magic white robe, various books/scrolls TBD, and a MANUAL OF THE CRYSTAL GOLEM.

Supposedly the cat was around for all of this but we seem to have forgotten about poor Whiskers.

The group continued exploring the magary of lychia in the “past” and “present”. In the PRESENT, the group found some magic good and some rooms with some weird necro stuff going on. People had to be convinced not to stuff the bag of holding with more bodies.

The group then went under the library and waited until the time switch to the PAST, and waited to see if they could find access to the rooms. Eventually Zlobin and ??? walked past, both with PLATINUM rings. The group followed them invisibly, Oskar doing some crazy acrobatics stuff. Zlobin retried the EARTHBLOSSOM STAFF from a room guarded by an iron golem Gor. Zabbo acrane eye followed him, finding out that he teleported with the staff to the Mage Forge.

The group tried to gain access to the room where they retrieved the staff. Oskar disarmed the golem and others attacked it and then zabbo enclosed it in a otisuke’s resilient sphere, allowing enough time for everyone to push open the door to the next area. Of course, waiting for the group was a PLATINUM door, which the group couldn’t get past without the ring.

So the group prepares to teleport back and then go visit the mage forge.

Last session, the group floundered around trying to find the info in the Acropolipolis, with no success. This post is to BRAINSTORM what to do next:

What we know:

The PRESENT

• if you stay until nightfall you WON’T die
• black dragon is likely afoot / awing
• commune spell said info in library can help, and west part of it can lead to that info
  • more precisely I think Aperisi said western doors/passages lead there, not necessarily that it’s in the western part of the library
• under library, the far staircase leads to a trap area like the teleportation circle
  • but all the secret passages seem to go nowhere (transmutation spell)
  • one secret staircase goes up and doesn’t seem to have transmutation spell
• under library, another big spiral staircase goes down, to two(three?) transmutation never ended stairs
  • also 10 circles of white tiles that turn into fire, plus room of white tiles also fire
  • white circles can be set off with sumira’s magic aura thing
• under library, one set of square hallways behind a secret door transports wanderers into a demiplane
• magic ring can open doors made of special metal
• all information is probably rotten/unreadable – will need to go back to PAST to read it
• dragon also probably has some sweet loot
• but the dragon didn’t get past the magic doors

The PAST

• if you stay until sunrise you WILL die
• it is the day before the cataclysm
• lots of guards/mages around
  • two guards dead. Killed by elves
• but we did get past them one time
• magic ring/rune can probably open doors to library
• mages wear cloaks that signal how cool they are
• xenophobes everywhere
• necro magic everywhere (necro/ghost city?)
  • similar thing happened in a house somewhere in present

PAST and PRESENT

• Acropolis has walls that have a magic force aura

Ideas?

• There has to be something up with the never ending stairwell with no magic aura
• Go down the other stairwell in the library first floor.
• go to library or other place in PRESENT and stay until the switch to the PAST and continue
• teleport in during the PAST and use the magic ring to get where we need to go
  • could also be in PAST and tail a mage to see how to get past the traps, then go back to PRESENT and repeat
• does dragon lair have key/ring we need to access the information?
  • dragon lair could be its old dragonarium (did we ask commune spell where the dragon was located in the day or night time?)
  • how the dragon which is alive in both times (allegedly) interacts with cataclysm / necro city is interesting in itself — could we bargain with the dragon by offering to teleportation circle it to a different location — freeing it from the shadow anomaly? ( assuming you can’t travel through shadow anomaly on your own)
• try to find more dead bodies behind magic doors, hopefully some will have more rings
  • do we need only people with rings to be present to get past some traps?
• could try blackmailing harpist mage about his secret underground love nest

Shitty Ideas

• brute force dispel magic on everything
• keep searching around everywhere looking for secret doors, every session, all session. Please no!!!!
• see how far up that staircase really goes

Very Important Miscellaneous Information Not to Ignore

• Greggin foretold Julien’s death BY A DRAGON in the dungeon

Having escaped through the teleportation circle, the party recovers and regroups. They search the library for information that can help them and begin planning a return trip to the dead city.

Part of the preparation is asking more questions to the deity with the commune spell:
[insert questions here]

The party re-enters the teleportation circle, trying to reach Ariopoli earlier in the day this time. However, what they find is exactly what they weren’t expecting. Again. Now the acropolis is in ruins, as if it is the present day. There are no zombie guards or signs of any life and everything is in ruins. There is a sulfur smell permeating the world that may or may not be caused by a green or black dragon. There are some decayed corpses and their riches have already been stripped (as if some treasure hoarding dragon came along and stole it).

The group finds a secret door in one of the dormitories where two unpicked bodies were hiding. One still has his magic ring. The group takes the ring, Sumira attunes with it and successfully uses it to open the door to the library. The group travels into the library and down some stairs. Faced with a crossroads in a corridor below the library, they travel on the straight path, on their way towards more dungeons and dragons…

This week, on BERRYQUEST…

Having prepared themselves, the group heads through the teleportation circle to visit Ariopoli. Immediately after entering the teleportation circle, something is amiss. Instead of seeing a deserted city, they are greeted by four guards of the Loran Empire. The guards appear to think the group is a band of invading elves, because a separate invading force had arrived minutes before the group teleported in. This alarms the guards, who are already standing over two bodies of their slain comrades.

Zabbo tries to comfort the Loran guards from there elf-phobia by walking towards them and pointing out that his ears are round. This doesn’t seem to work, and eventually everyone starts fighting. Actually, people talk a bit first about how it is 300 years in the past, then everyone starts fighting. The guards lance out with their spears/pikes/whatever, but aren’t super effective, and are quickly-ish dispatched by the group. Elan also revives Zabbo who was killed for a bit.

A hidden door is discovered, as well as some traps. The group also detects a permeating Necromancy type of magic, as well as some evocation magic from a magical trap and a blue eye. The magic trap is later found to be a fire trap that flushes the whole room with flames.

The group proceeds through some gates and locks and such, checking the guard quarters to discover that everything seems pristine. It seems as if the group traveled back in time to right before the cataclysm (the calendar date is right before). The group is unsure if they traveled back in time or if they are in some sort of necro-city.

BTW, because it is a possible zombie situation Julien cuts all the heads off the guards and piles them on the opposite side of the teleportation circle as the bodies. This (hopefully) isn’t seen by the magical cat construct that Keff sent with the group to keep any eye on everybody.

The group proceeds up the stairs from the circle and finds themselves in Arolipoli, a bustling potentially necrotic city on the verge of complete annihilation. Sumira disguises herself as a relative of Zlobin and the rest of the party as her entourage. The entourage convinces the guard to let them all have a look around.

The entourage tries to look around but is overall pretty ineffective, except at killing a harpist mage, but even so that took a bit of time, because Oskar wasn’t helping. Also there are magic doors that must be opened with magic rings. When the group tries to use the harpist’s ring on a door, it doesn’t work. It is possible that each ring requires attunement to work. Eventually the guards get suspicious of the group, probably because of the pile of heads that Julien left in the teleportation room. Sumira is separated and questioned, but then narrowly escapes with invisibility and a wall of fire cast by Julien.

After Sumira escapes, the group heads back through the teleportation circle, curious what the protectorate will say and as confused as ever.

9/16/289
- Julien has a dream. Sumira finds him in the barn. [insert dream here, if desired]
- Oskar learns of brother’s death in a battle in the dwarf lands

9/17/289
After turning the library upside down, Zabbo finds the book he hid earlier. It is a Loran book called Magus Asphelia. A group of people who were like DARPA of the loran. Previously we read about their [illegible]. The sites mentioned in the book are connected by teleportation circles. It mentions where the HQ is. It mentions four sites:

• [Zlobin Castle] – where we found the books
• [Planary of Adargadus] – the Grand Library, on the Aedus Peninsula, a hub for ex-planar travel
• [Monastary of Stratanascia] – located in the deligie wood, where people went for reflection
• [Magoforge of Blondus] – located in Blondus (perhpas in the purple mist)

9/18/289
The group attended the trial of skyrene, with Oskar coming in late and drunk. Oskar and Elan speak on her behalf, and Zabbo against here. Skyrene is sentenced to 1 year and loans a magic weapon to Oskar who is a bit disappointed it is a longsword and not a mace.

The group then meets with Marcus, who is told to use the planned check in for a truce proposal (return alexi, barksin surrender, in turn – cease fire and wild ppl survive). He give the group a scroll of terms.

Zabbo find shte blue egg was sold to soemone in gnometown.

Marcus flinched when the shadowcat is mentioned because he is one shady bastard.

9/20
There is the Cultist Trial of Philip, rest of cultists, and servants. Philip is sentenced to death (cut off heat and burn body in barrel of acid), rest of cultists are sentenced to life, but the turncoat is left off, and stabber is sentenced to death (beheading). Servants are dismissed on charges.

9/21
Messenger bird – dolan says to meet in mosswall at the mossy boot. After 2-4 days travel the group meets dolan, and is taken to the same place as before. Then to a magical facility.

Elan puts some lotions on his hands and tries to kill Alexi because of his secret mission, but barkskin has none of that and sends him and the rest of the group off after refusing their terms. Barkskin is quite interested int eh party’s knowledge of the staff location.

9/26
The group decides ‘fuck it, lets go full teleportation circle’ and convinces keff et al to let them go through the circle. They decide to visit the Magary of Lycia first.

Btw, oskar’s brother is maimed and julien starts a trust fund.

Keff/Cronin allow the group to ask for some assistance on the travel into the wastes. Cronin also puts the tome of teleportation circles in the vault, and keff says the boulder people are the ones responsible for oskar’s brothers demise.

The group has six questions to ask about [Aurelipol], the city that has the [Magary of Lychia]. After soem research in teh library, it turns out there is a zoo with a black dragon and potentially some iron golems.

Answers to questions:
“Will we find information in Aurelipol that will help us find the staff?” – Yes
“are there other creatures we can talk to, without the aid of commune with nature or a trident of fish command?” – Yes, but they tremble at the dawn’s light.
I forget the rest…

Iron Golems: immunite to lots of stuff (fire, poison, psychic).
Black Dragon: acid breath, amphibious, resist to magic, immunte to acid

We get some magic items: a cube of dispel gas and an amulet of proof non-detection

These are my notes after a few weeks off and having no idea what they say/mean:

After slaying the beast, Tronin says he speaks for the group. There are 4 moutah? , 10 prisoners.

We get:
- scroll of Protection from Friends (DC 15 Ch to overcome, invisible barrier 5 ft radi cylinder 5 minutes moves with you)
- potion (sweet) and hervby) – aug – superior healing (8d4_+8)
- Magic bead → marble – abj/evoc, bead of force, thwo 60 ft, explodes 10 ft radii, dc15 or 5d4 force fail and total w/in trapped 1 min

Hissing(?) attacks Julien. Zth order rev grav spell. Julien finds tracks and it paced around house. Cat like like giant paws. (Shadowcat Watch Alert!).

Book about the cult. Zabbo can’t find it, turns library upside down. Julien bribes for Malvic Manor (to have a house? I dunno, maybe he and dahlia are moving to the ’burbs).
Elan searches for shadowcat in books. Finds an account from fox religion about a battle with a shadowcat. Cat has 4,6,8 legs (any even number really), is powerful, sneaky, [illegible] , territorial.

Thats it?

The group approaches the house where the cult is being all cult-like. Zabbo has an arcane eye on the cult basement room, and is carried towards the house by Julien, behind an invisible Sumira, a detecting-magicing Elan, and a grumpy Oskar. After Elan sees that the door has a magic spell on it, Elan casts silence on a window and Oskar breaks it open, and the group goes in through the window.

The party assembles at the top of the stairs, taking a moment to discuss the plan, which appears to be remaining at the top of the stairs and shouting for the demon and cultists to come up and surrender. With this plan in mind, Sumira casts comprehend languages to hear the cultist chant, Zabbo dispels magic on the door to stop the abjuration spell, Sumira unlocks the door, Oskar opens it and charges down the stairs, Elan charges down after him followed by Zabbo and preceded by an invisible Sumira, and Julien stands at the top of the stairs shouting for them to come up and surrender (as The Plan dictated).

Sumira runs invisible into the room. Oskar runs into the room upon which the protectorate member Philip turns invisible, but then he casts a light spell with his sword, and the divine light someone makes Philip the Protectorate Person visible again. Everyone is shouting for the cultists to stand down. Then, Zabbo, hobbles down the stairs and casts Evard’s Black Tenticles. Squirming tentacles come out of the floor, engulfing those on the closer half of the table. Four of the cultists are strangled, including the Lady Melnic of the house. Alexis Melnic tries in vain to save her from the grasp of the withering black tentacles.

The demon Zabgonan charges the group, unleashing a fearsome presence that momentarily frightens Zabbo. Oscar starts hacking away at the demon and submitting counter-blows into the demon’s rotting flesh. Julien casts Hex on the demon and attacks with his sword as well. Zabbo unleashes a flaming sphere that he sends to the demon, though it does not do much damage, so he also unleashes a magic missile. Philip starts casting spells on the group, so Zabbo dispels his Flamestrike. Sumira stabs him with a poisoned blade, inflicting massive damage, and Julien casts Blight on him, draining him of his life force and turning him into a raisin of a person. Though downed, somehow he survives with the faintest of heartbeats. Elan also casts Sacred Flame on the demon that deals radiant damage, and uses Guardian of Faith around his person which also damages the demon.

As these blows slowly bring the demon down, Oskar finally makes a couple final strikes, cleaving his mace into the demon’s neck, and bringing it to the ground. Oskar and Julien ensure the demon is dead.

PREVIOUSLY: The group had investigated the case of the mysterious toads. There is a lake with two families, the Dudyic and the Melnic. The group interviewed Vaneric dudyic, who had been complaining about cats being killed by strange toads. The group also interviewed Alexis Melnic, who lived in the manor on the other side of the lake.

While the Vaneric’s were normal, the Melnic’s seemed suspicious, so an arcane eye was sent to investigate. The eye found a table in the basement and a possible sacrificial knife, and some blood stains. The group decided to return to investigate on the full moon.

The party then went to find Dolan and speak with Barkskin. The group is led to a tree that they pass through blindfolded to be taken to Barkskin. The party finds barkskin plus 3 others by Alexi, who is bound in a stasis. Barkskin allows the party to probe Alexi’s mind.

The probe:
crystals? — Alexi asks someone to buy earth blossoms, with one othe rperson and his current clerk. He put the crystals in the vault.

what you planning? — crystal staff controlling a golem, sitting in grand palace or castle

where is the staff? — smoky / crystal

how you find staff? — he’s in office reading papers, the books were from the castle in the wastes

what of Marcus? — gives slayers club staff

how to get into vault? — Alexi walks in

and so on…

Barkskin says there are 5 others looking for the staff, and a 6th will be looking for it. The danger comes from “fire as the sun rises, six as the sun sets”

The group heads back to Danaus and does some housekeeping.

Zabbo finds out at the bathhouse that ther eis a rematch for Grogarus Gromin at the pits. The group also visits Vadim, the jewler, and finds that the protectorate (alexi) bought the earth blossoms. The group tells Vadim to let them know (at the bank) if anyone is looking to buy earthblossoms. Zabbo also finds from Duncan, the clerk, that the earthblossom purchases were off the books.

The group also learns that a special visitor in town, an Archmage named Cronin.

The group does some research. Elan finds that there is a cult of indulgence related to the toad quest, that worship Zagonan.

Zaboo reads the books, finds that one is about a denoran spy in the Loran emprie. the spy speaks of an elite group of mages, working to weaponize magic in Loran. The group is called Magos Asphelia, and was a war council and had mages all over. they had the ability to go between cities quickly, and wer workign on a crystal golum. This involved linking magic to other planes, and getting pwoers form other planes.

The other book Zabo reads speaks of the final battle. The conflict was a territory dispute, and the battle happened in this territory. Two large armies fought, but the Crystal Golum could hurl meteorites. An army of elves also arrived to fight the Loran empire.

Julien resists a magical effect when confronted by Dahlia while she is holding Greggin. This leads Julien to think the doll may be magical or cursed. He decides to return to the shop it was purchased from, but finds out nothing from the store owner. Is it possible that Dahlia has some innate power?

on 9/14, the group meets with Keff, who introduces the party to Cronin, who is slow and statue-like, and wears a cowl. The group relates their info to Cronin. Zabbo suggests a prisoner trade for alexi or a meeting point in a neutral zone. Cronin seems to reject this, dismisses Alexi as dead, and suggests the group might be able to help locate the staff.

In the downtime, Zabbo reexamines the books and finds one is of the Magos Asphelim, however he does not have time to read it and hides it. A box arrives at the house for Zabbo, with one of his messenger’s heads and the words “stay away from our egg”.

Sumira queries guards about Marcus and is squire, both in emo dress.

The group then heads to the lake and meets with Vaneric Dudyick. the group sends a couple arcane eyes in, finding that several people are gathered in the basement. Eventually, they start chanting, and then a demon appears.

The demon is Feshne – strong, high con, resistance to magic and elemental magic, resistant to non magical stuff, immune to poison, terrifying in appearance, and so on.

The group prepares to confront the demon and the cult…