The Final Recollections of Jorg'un Dal
Karnifax Interview
The Drow Emissary seemed very exhausted from being questioned by our superiors at the Magistery. He did his best to answer our barrage of questions and follow-ups. I did not expect Rezik to be so professional. I'm sure the others will fill in where I find Karnifax's testimony less interesting. Admittedly, my own penmanship is not as *ahem* practiced as Franklin's.
- Karnifax is from Ched Nasad, a former Drow city that was destroyed by a cave-in (becoming much more common in the Underdark). Karnifax was recruited by House Melarn, and is trying to join them because Melarn seems "less crazy and murderous" than the other Drow houses.
- House Melarn, a "young" house is allied with other smaller houses. Houses Kenafain and Horlbar follor Melarn's lead, for now. If any Drow house would accept Magistery rule, it would be House Melarn. House Duskryn, a ruthless meritocracy with a Master leading, may be amenable to recruitment to Melarn's side if the Magistery can offer something comparable to being a Ruling 8 house.
- Menzobarranzan's Ruling 8 is lead by House Baenre. The ruling matron is, on the surface, Yvonnel. Since the ruling clerics of Lolth have lost their divine abilities, they have tried to hide this crippling loss of power. However, long before the Silence of Lolth, Gromph has been the de-facto ruler of House Baenre. Karnifax mentioned several times how strong Gromph is to be able to control a house BEFORE Lolth's Silence. Lord Dyrr may be the only mage that could challenge Gromph.
- The Drow have many enemies in the Underdark. The Illithids have been a constant antagonist, but now the encroaching demons and devils are pushing into the Underdark, possibly due to the planar alignment affecting us, according to Karnifax. The Illithids are interested in the artifact we know as the Training Dungeon, which is MUCH more than we think it is, but Karnifax was ignorant to how.
- For our meeting with Halisstra Melarn, we should be weary of sedition from other houses. If one of the other houses is attempting to spy or sabotage our meeting "we'll never know who", according to Karnifax. We will not know what Halisstra looks like, nor will we have a password as eloquent as "Hune's head on a spike". The "chosen" may be recruited by drow houses offering "redemption". These half-drow half-spider beings are VERY hateful and are looking for a way to feel less cursed, but are NOT amenable to negotiations.
- The Golden City of Elves guards our world against the Shadar-Kai (they do NOT like being called "Forsaken"). The Shadar-Kai forsook Corellon for Lolth, and then again forsook Lolth for Corellon. They have come to be called The Nightshade Kingdom, also known as Shadowfell. In turn, the Shadar-Kai guard against the Underdark's intrusion. Karnifax warns us to be weary of parlay with the Shadar-Kai, for they may change their dispositions toward us several times.
That is all I can recall from our lengthy interview with Karnifax. I offered him a relaxing game of Dragonchess if he needed more friendly interactions. I hope this can become the beginning of a sustained acquaintanceship and diplomatic relationship.
Hunting Imphraezl
Now, we are off to hire House Dal for support in tracking down Imphraezl and stopping this Chaos Curse. I'll give Franklin a chance to show how he commands and cares for those under his charge.
We're off. I will be back later to update on Imphraezl's death and further investigation. We'll be bruised and scarred, but the after-quest ale will heal all wounds!
Recollections by Avant
Ode to Jorg
The Plot
Mask of merchants adorned,
We marched to the castle forewarned,
Of a scheme that was dangerously specious,
Giddy with fellowship we trekked on facetious
Three days three nights the wayfarers spent,
Crested the last hill and met with the first dent,
Prepare yourself , for magical defences are singing,
Songs of dirge , warning bells and chimes ringing,
But our collective is strong , buoyed by Dal loyalist,
A ranger , some soldiers and a fledgling violinist
We reach the castle , glimpse a fleeting figure,
Compelled into action we follow with vigour,
The apparition turns, countenance of an old man gaffer,
Its the fucking Lich! Our visage goes pallor,
With hail and fire the party is beset,
The grinning bastard doesn't even break a sweat,
He vanishes then without a trace,
We walk back nincompoops and in disgrace,
Inspecting the castle ingress,
Opening the door reveals a fleshy undress,
No way in, we scale the castle summit,
To enter the castle, in a plummet,
Falling feet, falling first , head last,
A look at our landing pad leaves us aghast,
What was cognized to be a lacuna at our toes,
Is but a ligament of a giant in Jesus Christ pose
While we gawk witless at what's befell,
Imphraezl appears and casts a spell,
And freezes us in place, unmovable,
Then a man sized insect rises, odious and abominable,
Suction cup mouth and needle teeth, it bedecks,
And extends its proboscis at our apoplectic necks
Insect sucks , we fight,
Rezik counter-spells with all his might,
Kaylorr and Jorg unfetter with sheer force of will,
And in concert, we asunder its wings and execute a kill
The ruse is still afoot, vacuous artifacts in guise,
Imphraezl comes out to bandy, for the beholders eyes,
Rezik palavers, but its not going well,
Gravity turns sideways and out of the castle we fell,
Stupefaction clears , deaths ugly head rears
Rezik has died in the fall, he was quite a guy!
We use the wagon to hold his corpus delicti,
Make our way back to the castle deflated,
Only to find Imphraezl having vacated,
Bjorn the giant is still here , hasn't moved,
We think it a good idea to have his chains loosed
Jorg announces himself and Bjorn rages,
A fearsome onslaught of strength and power wages,
We sound the retreat , but Jorg is mired in a fight for his subsistence,
And then giant arms descend, clapping away his existence...
Jorg
Panegyric, what a pageantry display!
Your mind and body has literally blown away,
You were one that stood for the crowd,
With a voice that was strong and loud,
Precepts subordinate to none and declarative,
You abided by your own categorical imperative,
Chest swollen with a disposition that was stoic,
With a face that belonged in the epoch of the Mesozoic
And now the dolphins have all moved to a another location,
Its time for your final ovation,
A green conflagration , your spirit is free,
In elysium say hi to Leia for me,
To ascend we must die,
And this is where my friend I say goodbye...
Recollections of Kaylorr
Imphraezl got away. Mission was a failure. We lost Jorg today. Lots of info but the grief is too much. As such I leave you with the haikus I wrote in memory of Jorg.
Enduring soldier
Symbol of righteous fury
Green flame will burn strong
Great sword of power
Uncanny strength unrivaled
One with the fire
Mentor of Franklin
Destroyer of all evil
Never forgotten
Refrigerator
Mighty warrior was he
Will be remembered
Recollections by Rezik
Our Interview with Karnifax
We had the opportunity to meet with Karnifax and ask him a few questions. We only had 30 minutes with him, it looks like many have been questioning him. He doesn't really know much, he's actually a houseless commoner in Menzobarenzan, trying to curry favor with House Melarn in the hopes of joining the house. When we finally had our chance to talk to him, he looked exhausted and annoyed.
We had prepared ahead of time, so I took the lead asking the questions. Knowing that this Karnifax would be our emissary back to the Underdark, I wanted to be as professional as possible.
I've included short notes from our conversation below:
- Karnifax knew the proper password "Hune's Head on a Spike"
- We asked about the Forsaken. He informed us that they are also known as the Shadar-Kai, were elves forsaken by the Underdark and the elves of our plane. The Shadar-Kai keep the Drow in the Underdark, and the Wood Elves keep the Shadar-Kai in the Shadowfell.
- The current leader of Menzoberranzan is House Baenre, lead by Yvonnel. Gromph, is the Archmage of Menzoberranzan and is said to have the real power. It's best to think about it as Yvonnel is the queen, and Gromph is the prime minister.
- There are a total of 8 ruling houses, with House Baenre being the highest house and House Melarn being the lowest. Danifae's house, House Yauntyrr is not part of the ruling council.
- We asked about Lord Dyrr. He's considered the second most powerful Wizard, after Gromph. He and Gromph are rivals.
- Karnifax then told us about the Silence of Lolth. That Lolth is currently missing. He wasn't sure why Lolth is missing, or what is being done to find out why; but he felt confident that people are trying to understand what is happening.
- The Drow have attempted to explore the Demonweb (another plan, similar to how the Underdark is below ours, the Demonwebs is under the Underdark), the home of Lolth. They've found it destroyed and without Lolth.
- We then learned about Ched Nasad another Drow city in the Underdark. Danifae had attempted to takeover Ched Nasad, with the help of Bregan D'aerthe, but failed. The cavern that Ched Nasad was housed in collapsed and destroyed the city about 9 months ago. Menzoberranzan is now the last city of the Drow in the Underdark.
- Karnifax also warned us about the Chosen of Lolth. We've run into these half-spider half-humans before in the training dungeon. We wondered who the training dungeon could know about a monster from the Underdark - we made a note to ask about this in our debriefing.
- We asked a number of questions about the Illithids and the artifact that we know as the training dungeons; he let us know that based on the questions we and others have asked, he believes that the artifact is more than just a training dungeon. However, beyond that he doesn't know much more about either.
- We thanked him for his time and told him we're looking forward to our travels to the Underdark. He told us that we should be prepared for anything. We should bring gifts if we plan to travel through the forest to the Underdark; to be prepared for the Shadar-Kai to change their mind about allowing us to travel through their lands; and to be prepared to be stopped by the other houses of Menzoberranzan.
Tracking Down Imphraezl
After interviewing Karnifax we started on our initial plans of tracking down Imphraezl. We had found out that a Wizard looking for odd ingredients was in a fortress about 80 miles north of Solace. We weren't sure exactly which fortress or what kind of force he would have with him.
We decided that we would pose as merchants leaving Solace. Our hope was to convince Imphraezl that we had beholder eyes (knowing that its an ingredient in the curse), so we could get close to him and better understand what he was doing. Jorg helped us get a caravan, and brought along a few men (and women) from his house to act as guards of our wagon.
The fortress was 3 days travel and after awhile we came across one that looked as if it was inhabited. Someone had boarded up the windows and take care to slightly fortify the ruins. We began to make our way to the fortress slowly, but as we approached it we were hit by a trap - it seemed to be some kind of variation on the Alarm ritual; not only creating a visual alarm but also firing a fireball at us.
That's when we decided to send in Eryn and Ichol, the bard and rogue that Jorg had brought along. Our hope was that they would be able to cast Invisibility and go scout the area. However, after a minute they quickly came back. They let us know that they had run into a drow that had seen through their invisibility then laughed at them. They told us that the drow was heading south.
Running Into Lord Dyrr
We decided we should follow the drow, see who it was and attempt to stop them. We parked the wagon at the front of the castle. Jorg, Avant, Kaylorr, and I started after the drow.
We tried to catch up to him, but boy was he fast. As we got closer, the drow suddenly surrounded himself in a wall of fire. We lost sight of him and he suddenly disappeared. As I look back on it know, I realize that this drow was Lord Dyrr himself.
Entering the Castle
Since we had lost Lord Dyrr, we decided it was time to go back to the castle. We attempted to enter through the front door, but it was blocked by a "Wall of Skin". We didn't know what it was at the time, but now we know it was the foot of a giant (they're pretty big).
We had to find another way in, so we decided that the roof was our next opportunity. We made our way to the roof. As we're on the roof we hear a voice from below "I told you, I'm not interested". We believe that Imphraezl thought we were Lord Dyrr - we're not sure what Lord Dyrr was offering Imphraezl - something for the team searching for Dyrr to consider.
At this point, we decide to jump into the castle. Jorg jumps and breaks the roof, falling onto the giant's knee. The giant was laying and chained down. Kaylorr and I followed after that.
Suddenly, we saw Imphraezl. He cast a spell and paralyzed us, while telling Cazic (a demon to attacked us). We found out later that Cazic was a chasme, an extremely dangerous demon. He had the ability to suck our blood and weaken us considerably. Cazic used this ability on us while we were paralyzed, knocking me out.
Luckily, I regained consciousness just in time to counter spell one of Imphraezl's spells. Jorg used this as an opportunity to completely decimate Cazik, and I finished him off with a quick cast of magic missiles.
We were excited that things were looking good. That's when things were obviously going to get bad.
The Death of Rezik
Before we could kill Cazic, Imphraezl had yelled to him to tell him to only subdue us, that he knew we had beholder eyes. I took this as an opportunity to tell him, if he wanted our beholder eyes, we would trade him for it but we need to get it from the wagon outside.
Imphraezl, agreed. He allowed us to leave and get the beholder eyes from our wagon. We decided to put a potion in a crate and use an illusion to make it look like beholder eyes.
We entered the castle with our full contingent, the guards carrying our crate. Imphraezl was no where to be found when we entered. We called out for him, telling him we had brought his beholder yes. We told him that in order for us to trade (we wanted the spell that he had cast on us previously).
It was at this point he began angered. He started to tell us he didn't believe us and told us to leave. We continued to press Imphraezl, when we suddenly felt the pull of magic around us. Gravity changed and we were suddenly falling outside of the castle.
The last thing I felt was the sudden lurching and the fall.
Rezik is Back!
Thankfully, Kaylorr and Avant brought me back to the magistery, where the house of yellow revived me. Death is a harrowing experience though. I've suffered for my pain and can no longer remember my childhood. I still remember who I am and it hasn't impacted my magic, but I seem to have forgotten specifics. It's a scarring experience, and I'll have to spend time finding out more about my past it seems.
Debriefing with the Seal
Once we were able to regroup, we were granted an audience with the Seal. We climbed stairs in the middle of the Magistery library, to reach a completely gilded room. The Seal was hidden behind a screen, but we were able to engage with her.
We asked her a number of questions, but due to my recent death, I was a little out of it. The most important piece that we asked her about was the training dungeon artifact. We were perplexed on how it knew about The Chosen.
The Seal informed us that the artifact is more than just the training dungeon. It was created by the creators of the Magistery; and is an extremely powerful artifact. The training dungeon is only one piece of it and that as we gain ranks in the magistery, we'll be allowed access to other aspects of the artifact.
She let us know that if the dungeon had shown us a Chosen, it was because it believed we needed to know about The Chosen. She then said something that will stick in my mind - "The Artifact, known to you as the training dungeon, doesn't do anything without a reason - everything you experience there is done with thought".