Recollections by Pearl
Recollections by Jeroy
We began our adventure at the Bogwater Tavern. Between adventures I had head that Arach, the last member of house Kundrak, was seen there speaking to a red-haired woman. I could only assume this was Velah's human form. We arrived and spoke with the Tavern's bar keeper. I paid 1 gold for a round of ale and asked if he had seen Arach or Velah by creating small figurines of them (magic!!). He said he couldn't remember. Dereth paid him 20 gold, yet he was still unable to remember. At this point Avant began to ask the questions. He remembered them but never heard what they talked about. He said he hadn't seen Arach in a while but Velah had come in a few weeks ago, looked around, and then left. Having learned all we could we left.
Hungry of more information Dereth recommended we commune with his goddess Vivian. We decide upon three questions to ask her:
Can we likely make Velah into an ally? She responded no.
Can we seal Velah within her plane with what we have today? She responded no.
Is Velah vulnerable to any elemental damage? She responded yes.
.....magic
Rezik teleports us to the entrance of the Plane of Night within the Vault of Night. It is as we left it many months ago, except I notice an envelope in front of the entrance to the Plane of Night. Within I find a letter and read it aloud to the group:
"Velah hasn't taken a mate since she killed Ashardalon and refuses to sell me another egg. You of the EO owe me one.
-M"
We look at each other with a moment of pause. I imagine they also have the same burning question in their head. Who is Ashardalon? Everything else seems mundane. After some contemplation I tuck away the letter, draw Bloodcrier, and motion to the Plane of Night. "Come friends, Velah and the Horn of Valhalla await."
We enter the Plane of Night to find ourselves on an expansive platform surrounded by expansive star scape. The cosmos continues on around us in all directions around, including below. There is no sound but the heavy breathing of a gigantic creature. It sounds as though it is snoring and we intend to be quiet so that it stays that way.
"I will link us all telepathically so we don't need to speak." Rezik announces.
Our platform continues towards a four-way intersection, to the right is a room with a 4x4 grid of un-lit octagons and to the left is tall spire. Around the spire a colored stones and up the spire are ten rows of four holes that are the same size as the stones. Directly ahead is a large expanse surrounded by a purple forcefield. Emerging from the floor are the tell tale scales of a Red Dragon. The scales rise and fall with the beasts heavy breath. We cannot see all of Velah, but enough to know we are in the right place.
Dereth, Kaylorr, Avant, and I go to the left platform. Pearl, Rezik, Gramph, and Twin Rezik go to the right platform. It appears that we have some puzzles to solve. On out platform are a series of buckets filled with colored stones: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. "Put in all red" I say. "She is a red dragon." We all shrug and place the stones and pull a lever at the base of the spire. As we do our platform is enveloped in a purple force field. From seemingly nowhere smoking, screaming, flying goblins emerge around us. At the top of the spire 4 gray stones appear. Kaylorr casts a spell and vaporizes the goblins. "Try all purple" Avant says. We shrug and give it a try. One black stone appears on the next row but more creatures emerge. We battle the creatures and the puzzle for several rounds. Fighting off blindness and confusion in an attempt to clear the room and complete the puzzle. We finally manage to unlock the puzzle (Orange, Blue, Purple, Orange) and as we do the forcefield around Velah's platform begins to melt away. She emerges, seemingly from the floor with a roar so fierce that it shakes the very cosmos. She is a huge red dragon, standing over 20 feet tall and stares down at us with disgust and anger in her eyes. The battle has arrived as Velah fires a fireball at Rezik, I see him stumble and hear his scream in my mind. After he catches his breath he speaks telepathically to us all.
"I'm immune to fire. That wasn't a fireball, something is wrong." Rezik says between breaths.
Pearl creates an insect plague around Velah to keep her busy, Dereth and Keylorr cast radiant magic, and I summon a flaming chariot. The battle is on in full force. Rezik and his twin stare into each other and cast some kind of magic and Rezik turns to face Velah. I hear his voice again.
"We have a problem." He says
"What now?" Kaylorr responds
"That's not really Velah." He responds. "I see the true Velah, this was an illusion. She is actually...."
Before he finishes we see was he sees. The true form of Velah appears before us all. A 50 foot tall Amethyst gem dragon. She stands over double the size before and now rather than anger in her eyes is something more unnerving. She looks at us with confidence, in a way that conveys she is looking forward to the battle. The battle is fierce. Epic spells are cast, epic spells are taken from our own party members and used against us by Velah, I fight with all the might of my ancestors, and after and unknown amount of time both parties still stand. Dereth calls out "we don't need to fight."
Velah turns her head and speaks "Oh we don't? You break into my home, wake me from my slumber, attack me in my lair, and now, NOW you say we don't need to fight. I think you're scared you will lose."
He responds with his chest thrust forward "We came to speak with you. The Eternal Army marches on all planes. If we can get here the so can they. We wish to become allies."
"Allies?" She laughs. "First lay down your arms." We oblige.
"Now beg." She demands
"I vote no and we kill her." Rezik says telepathically nearly....instantly.
Dereth looks over to Rezik disapprovingly and turns back to Velah. "We found what we believe is one of your offspring with the sorcerer Mordenkainen. Did you know that it was born?"
"I figured it would. I do not care." She responds.
"He has asked us for another egg. Have you taken a new mate?" Dereth continues his dialogue.
"No and I do not care to." She responds.
"Why does Mordenkainen want your eggs?" He asks
"He uses the shells to power items. As long as I am paid for the egg I do not care what he uses them for." She responds, each response is colder than the previous. But as she finishes it dawns on me - the dragonshards are gem dragon egg shells.
"May we buy an egg as a first step towards an alliance?" Dereth asks.
"You may buy one as a transaction." She responds. Rezik teleports to the Keep, takes 10,000 gold and returns. She is paid and rolls an egg to us. "Now begone."
I hear Dereth in my mind say to me "we cannot let an outsider like her remain, she may be neutral to our plights but the Eternal Army may capture and turn her like they did the giants. We have to finish this."
"How much for the Horn of Valhalla?" I call out to Velah.
She turns to me "that is not for sale. Now leave."
I shrug and to the group I say "Sorry everybody but I want that horn." As I snap the reigns on my flaming chariot and charge towards Velah, I draw a throwing axe and launch it at her with all my might - and it misses as she lifts off the ground and begins to hover 80 feet above us. Dereth and Rezik together cast powerful magic that brings the very dawn of the heavens down upon her and drag Velah back to our platform. As she descends I make more more valiant charge up to her. I swing with all the might of my ancestors with Bloodcrier. The strength of generations of dwarves behind me as I land a blow squarely onto her exposed chest. As I do I feel horrible pain in my mind and I fall unconscious.
I find myself surrounded by my ancestors, they look to me and say "Not yet Jeroy" and I am blinded by a light forcing me to shield my eyes. I awake to feel an immense pressure on me - It is the body of Velah. My final blow has slayed her. I crawl out from under her and check that everyone else has survived the battle. By the grace of Valhalla we have.
We search her treasure hoard and find the following:
- Arcane scrolls - Earthquake, antimagic field, enhance ability
- A shield of dark wood - Dereth attunes to it and immediately casts a remove curse spell on himself. "It spoke." He said and walked away from it.
- A shield of metal - A +3AC shield. I took it for my own.
- Leather Armor - It appears to be sentient
- A wand - It contains a spell that we have never heard of, similar to conjure animals.
- 37,000 gold
- 29,000 platinum
- 10 unfertilized gem dragon eggs
We do not find the Horn of Valhalla but we begin the process of returning Velah's body to the Keep to harvest what we can and prevent her body from being reanimated by our enemies. It is while her body is being dissected they find that one of her ribs was replaced by the Horn of Valhalla. I find it and immediately blow into it summoning countless ghostly warriors. They look at me with the look of combat in their eyes "You summoned us?" They say in unison.
"The Eternal Armies march around the planes to capture and destroy all they see. We need your help." I bellow out.
"Only call us when there is a battle to be fought." They respond together and they slowly disappear before my eyes.
I look down to the Horn, the symbols around it glow red. "This is my calling, this is my purpose. A call to arms and a call to battle. Let this be my mark that I leave on this world."
Recollections by Rezik
It all started because of Jeroy and his fascination with the Horn of Valhalla. He keeps muttering about his ancestors - I really don't understand it. He wanted to go back to the Vault of Night, enter the Plane of Night and confront Velah. We knew she was a red dragon of some power, but felt fairly confident in our abilities to at least stir the pot and learn more from her.
We started at the Bogwater Tavern, an old tavern we knew she frequented with Arak. It turns out she hadn't visited in awhile, but she had been there looking for something or someone.
Since that turned into a dead end, we knew we just had to go back to the Vault and start our journey through the portal to the Plane of Night. I teleported us all to the Vault and just outside the portal Jeroy found a small envelope.
The note had a handwritten message “Velah hasn't taken another mate since she killed Ashardalon. She refuses to sell me another egg, and so you of the Eternal Order owe me one.”
That name Ashardalon was familiar to me. He was known as the father of all red dragons. Looks like Mordenkainnen, wants another dragon egg. (He's probably not too happy now).
We decided to tuck away the note and continue on.
As we entered the Plane of Night, we saw a limitless expanse. There was a pathway through the middle leading to a giant dome blocked of by a violet force field. It sounded like Velah was sleeping in the center of the dome.
On the two sides there were two puzzles. Pearl and I went to the right and attempted the puzzle. There were a series of lit tiles that we had to turn on. As we stepped on each, a pattern appeared. At the same time, while we worked on the puzzle, we were continually inundated by Mephits.
We were able to solve our puzzle, but the other group was suddenly swarmed by Mephits. They worked to solve their puzzle, but not before taking a heavy toll.
We made our way to the center dome and suddenly, we realized that Velah was no longer sleeping. Instead, she was awake and stalking us.
As we entered the room and walked up the main area, she quickly attacked me. It seemed like all options for a diplomatic resolution were gone. The battle erupted in earnest now.
During the battle, we realized that Velah didn't act like a regular red dragon. Our preparations for fire did not help us. Instead, we realized that Velah was actually a psychic gem dragon.
When we realized this we attempted to stop the battle and negotiate with her. We learned that the dragonshards were her eggs, and that she had been selling them. We attempted to procure some from her, as a gesture of good will - agreeing to purchase some.
We had hoped that the transaction would lead us to a conversation and alliance; however instead, she told us to kneel to her and that she would not work with us in the upcoming battle.
Knowing that she could be swayed to our enemies, we gave her one last chance to change her mind and show that she could be interested in joining or even exploring alliance, but instead she rebuffed us.
We had no alternative, but to keep her from falling to the other side. It was a long battle, but in the end we were victorious. She shouldn't have underestimated us and she should've taken the moment to explore an alliance. Her death is on her actions.
We explored her hoard to see what had been stored here. As we searched, we found a series of items and gold - I'm sure someone will write out a ledger. The most interesting piece was within Velah herself. It was her rib, that had become the Horn of Valhalla.
I'm not excited about how this ended, but am happy that this quest is done. I've learned from our experience with Coin and now Velah; that this evil is becoming part of us and that for us to win, we'll need to do things we didn't expect that we were capable of. It means running headlong into what needs to be done, sometimes, regardless of the ethics or morals. We truly are entering a time where the ends justify the means.
Items: Arcane Scrolls - Earthquake, Anti Magic Field and Enhance Ability Darkwood Shield - Sentient Heavy Steel Shield +3 - Exceptionally well made Wand - Spell similar to Conjure Animals Hide Armor +2 - Sentient Tattoo - Peeled from someone’s flesh
Wealth: 37,000 gold 29,000 platinum