Sol Povos: The Sword of Kaz

We're down in the base of the dungeon with Old Man Kaz and the Death Door that guards the Sword of Kaz. Apparently the globes used to tingle and be warm to the touch. Neither of them are uncomfortable now. Old Man Kaz -- whatever he is -- considers this a very good sign.

We consider other ways of testing the door, and... well, some time back Leira turned a couple of young dragons into lizards. Marshall extracts one of them and tosses it through the door. It seems uninjured, but slips around the corner and there's a horrible whirring sound followed by a crunching.

Giant saw blades. It's giant saw blades cutting into the corridor from various angles. The former dragon is now a very deceased lizard.

Leira thinks it might be a variant of Wall of Blades, and tries to dispel it. She fails, but she doesn't think it's impossible; it's just harder than she first thought. She tries again, and manages it.

We advance, and find that the blades are all through this passage as we wind back and forth. Leira moves us along by alternating between teleport and Dispel Magic. We go forward until we find a key on the ground; then we try the other passage and find more blades. This method is working, but we're burning through Leira's spell slots at a ferocious rate, which might be a problem since we intend to teleport all the way out once we get the sword.

Then we hit a point where the blades prove highly resistant. Tavros: "Don't worry, when we get there you just turn invisible; we'll handle the smashing."

We blow all but the last of Leira's spell slots, and get to a door. It's locked, but we have a key. We open the door to an ancient crypt, with green marble floor titles and vines growing all through this.

There's a mummy standing behind the altar at the far end. "You have come at last! You are the servants of the dark one!"

Tavros: "Indeed we are, good sir!"

Mummy: "Wait a minute... you befoul this place with your presence, paladin!"

...We've found Destrian. Who was the personal priest of Kaz, who has clearly turned himself into a mummy.

Old man Kaz apparently didn't know.

Marshall: "Never fear. Mummies are my specialty."

Tavros charges, and in the process steps onto a magical symbol and triggers it. He is wracked with pain, and as a consequence misses his attack on the mummy.

Destrian casts Shield of Faith, making himself even harder to hit. Also, he animates the vines that have grown throughout the room. Tavros manages not to be trapped, but the only way out of here is going to be to kill this guy.

Marshall moves into the room and is entangled by the vines. Alexej makes his way along the edges of the room, positioning himself close enough to attack. Leira drops a ball of cold on Destrian and Tavros (who is immune) and does the mummy some damage.

The mummy casts Silence over by the door, to block off Leira and Marshall's spellcasting, but fails against Marshall. Then he reanimates the vines, entangling Tavros.

Marshall hits him with Searing Light; Alexej trips Destrian but fails to damage him. Leira sends her familiar, a talking seagull, into the room in her place. The seagull moves out of the range of the Silence and speaks her magic words for her.

Destrian dies.

Alexej and Tavros search the body:
Cloak of Resistance +2
Ring of energy resistance (fire)(minor) (+2)
Magical half-plate armor that we'll sell for gold.

Tavros casts Detect Evil on the sword on the altar, and immediately passes out. The sword is very, VERY evil.

Marshall makes his way over the sarcophagi and around the pentacle; then Marshall put his hand on the hilt. There's a whispering just outside his hearing, as the overwhelming evil of the sword tries to take him over.

He drops it, but there's still a voice in his head. He wraps his hand in cloth, and tries to pick it up without touching it. The sword is clearly still talking to him, because he's shouting answers back into the pommel (which he's holding like it's a microphone).

Tavros stirs, sits up, and says: "WHY THE HELL ARE YOU HOLDING THAT THING? ARE YOU TALKING TO IT?"

There's a switch by the door; Alexej throws it at Marshal's instruction. The sword wants us to kill Old Man Kaz, who is actually the demon Marduk.

We're... basically okay with this, but Tavros really wants Marshall to put the sword in the bag of holding first. Marshall wraps the sword up in a blanket and ties it across his back.

We take a quick show of hands, and decide that yes: we're going to kill Marduk. Apparently the servants of Asmodeus are working against the Dark Lord.

The sword continues talking to Marshall as we make ready, warning him that Marduk can teleport at will and that we probably don't have time to rest before we fight him. The sword is also trying to convince Marshall that he should wield the sword against Marduk.

Marshall cast Align Weapon (Good) on our weapons, and we teleport back to Old Man Kaz. He's been pacing the room, and we teleport in basically on top of him.

Marshall uses a Quickened Divine Favor, and slashes at the "old man" with his twin-bladed scythe ("the fangs of Artem-hiss"). Alexej and Tavros move to flank; Leira sensibly turns invisible.

Old Man Kaz reverts to his demon form, swelling into a large monster; we're all knocked away. It follows up with Power Word Stun at Alexej, and stuns him. Leira casts Greater Heroism on Tavros, which mostly counters the pain he's in from stepping on that glyph.

Marshall slashes Marduk, and nearly takes his head off. The demon staggers back, and it is pissed. Tavros attacks, but misses; then Marduk attacks Leira, clawing her twice and biting her; he picks her up and says, "You stop now or she dies."

Leira promptly teleports to the far side of the room. The demon looks frustrated.

Marshall attacks again, missing; Tavros bounces his falchion off Marduk's knee, adding a bit more injury. Marduk reaches across the room and attacks Leira again, injuring her badly and grabbing her again; she's unconscious at this point.

Alexej comes out of his stun, rages, and attacks.

"Fool! Do you want your little girl to die?" He tries to intimidate Alexej.

Alexej hesitates, then attacks anyway but misses. Marshall attacks again and finishes Marduk.

While the sword is busy telling Marshall how useless the rest of us are, Tavros uses a wand of Cure Light Wounds on Leira, and we stagger back up to the surface. 

According to the servants, here's another party scheduled for tonight.

At the manor, the sword keeps whispering in Marshall's ear while we gather the servants. We explain the situation, tell them to split up the remaining gold, and then attend the party before crashing out and getting a full night's rest.

...And now the sword wants us to go to one of the northern cities, Styre, before we find the tower and depart. The sword wants us to teleport there.

After some discussion, we teleport to Styre -- Leira casts the spell. Sture is split by a river called the Grand Gulch. There's a bridge across it called the Skybridge, but with half the city on each side it's almost two different cities.

We take advantage of the opportunity to shop for supplies, because holy hell we need some. Alexej needs +3 Mithril Full Plate... or maybe +5 Mithril full plate. Marshall also needs better armor, and Tavros needs some additional options with different compositions and damage types. Considerable discussion of strategic options ensues.

The sword guides us across the skybridge, which is a market square of its own. The sword is trying to lead us to someone who has something that we need in order to get out of this place.

At this point, we will leave these characters and return to the elves. The elves will be level 14 at this point.

This is yet another Vecna manipulation, where we're almost certainly bringing back something that the god's followers will use to try to resurrect him -- and even if we get it back to the palace, it will never be well-protected enough to avoid being taken. But at this point, we're back to the Duendewood elves and their arrival at Renfall, which is going to be... interesting, given what we know they'll find there. 

Pro-tip: if you want to negotiate with elves, don't execute elves by hanging them off the ramparts so everyone can see them if they approach.