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DRider and the SunSword

Curse of Strahd
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Session 55 – 2022-04-16

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Session Summary

This session stats with Kyana casting a Daylight spell. It effectively dispels darkness, and our party can see again. The Drider that Rinn spoke isn’t there. Misty moves out to look further around the corner but doesn’t see anything. Rinn is invisible and remains in the room hidden from the others. Ezmerelda asks Snoggly what is going on, he tells her there is some sort of spider creature out here. She moves to a good vantage point to but still doesn’t see anything. Haldar looks up the wall and doesn’t see anything but visibility due to the mist is very low. There are bits of falling debris but he’s unsure if it’s form something climbing or Rinn’s yelling. He see’s no track leading back along the main path. Dain stands as a barrier to the room and watches the ground for any sign of movement, possibly from and invisible source. He moves up to the corner and around. Snoggly comes out and picks a place near Haldar and looks up where Haldar has been looking and throws a fireball up there. This causes a small avalanche. Dain pulls out his shield to deflect some of the falling snow for himself. Everyone manages to avoid any serious damage except Skald. He is still standing though.
 
Helwa pulls her Axe and charges toward Kassamir, demanding to know what we have done and where is Freda. Kassamir is only able to note that he doesn’t know what is going on. Rinn speaks from his hidden forma and tells her that Freda turned into a giant spider of sorts and attacked him, almost killing him. Zanfyr calls out asking what has happened and is told, and not seeing an enemy, tells everyone that we should pull back to the room. This would force it to confront the whole group should it return. Harald follows suit and steps forward and calls out to the disembodied voice of Rinn, to show himself.  Kassamir tries to calm the situation inside. Keldai and Astrid also arm up. Skald runs up and past Dain heading down the main path until he vanishes into the mists. Rin moves to Kyana, drops his invisibility, and asks for some healing. He also announces, before she casts anything, to the whole group, what had happened using his body as the evidence. Snoggly tries to get everyone back inside. Rinn, finding out that Skald had moved off along the front path, attempts to message Skald, telling him that the scent he needs to track is Freda’s that may be why he didn’t smell any new scents around Bjorn’s attack. The scent isn’t any unusual scent, it is the scent of a friend. 
 
Haldar asks Helwa about how well they know Freda, to which she replied, very well, we grew up together. Rinn asked if they are all able to shapeshift into Drider’s. No one knew what a Drider was. He Elf splains to them. Zanfyr has heard of the Drow, understands their character type. Skald returns to the room. Astrid and Helwa and Astrid are still guarded but the men, Haralda and Keldai lower their weapons and take a less guarded posture. Dain asked if they were sure that the person with them was really Freda, is there a chance she had been replaced before you arrived here. Skald pushes through the people towards Helwa and tells her, it is Freda’s scent. She has entered the temple. Kyanna suggests that someone may have taken over her, controlling her. Helwa and Astrid do start to relax their posture. Helwa suggests that she wouldn’t know if Freda were replaced here. Skald says “No, I know her scent, that was Freda!”. Rinn asked how long Skald has known Freda. He’s been with the tribe for about 6 years and has known her for most of her life. Snoggly asked if there have been deaths at home like Bjorn’s. Helwa told him no. It is decided that we need to rest again. Zanfyr and Rinn take the watches. During the rest, Haldar whispers to Kassamir, Ezmrelda, and Kyanna to watch the other women carefully as he does not trust them. Kyanna moves around the room, like she’s checking no supplies and such but she’s really keeping an eye on the people in the room.

As Zanfyr watches, he feels something like a tendril speaking to him in his mind, telling him to leave and to come out to the front side of the temple. The voice says, “Come to me, Come little one! I hunger! Come to me!”. The voice is very compelling, and he almost takes a step that direction but whatever was luring him as stopped. We finally complete a long rest. Zanfyr tells us what he experienced. We decided to go through the door that is supposed to hold the guardian and the overlook to the temple. Rinn examines the door and determines it is not locked or trapped and hears nothing from the other side. He suggests to Helwa that they leave the room while we open the door and enter. Come back after the door is closed again.  She sends her people away but stays behind to see what happens. Helwa assigns a team to take Bjorn’s body back to the village and tell them what has happened. She and Skald are going to stay. They are staying in the room, and she’ll be here to help if we need it. She is also staying, hoping to help Freda! Rinn tells her that for a time, he will be able to message her. He casts the spell letting her experience it before he does it while in the temple. She understands it as they have a Shaman and is not totally new to the experience.

Rinn finally opens the door to a dark room, with a 20-foot-wide balcony of black marble with a broken rail overlooking the temple with two marble staircases on either end descend 30 feet to the temple floor. The vaulted ceiling is 30 feet above the balcony. The walls and ceiling are covered in an amber glaze, lending the gloom, a golden sheen, with a set of amber doors opened to the east, directly across from us. Rinn steps in and is hit by an extreme cold. He doesn’t note anything moving within visual range. There is another amber door on the south as well. Looking out over the dark room below, he can’t see a lot of it, so he casts Dances with Lights and puts three globes of light out into the room. Not seeing anything moving, he starts sweeping the room with the lights making sure that he sees everything. Haldar moves into the room and moves down the stairs on the far side. As he reaches the bottom, he can see the stairs of the tunnel leading out to the front archway. 

What we see are four black marble columns supporting the vaulted ceiling of the temple. At the north end of the chapel is a forty-foot-tall statue of a cowled figure in flowing robes, the statues stony hands are outstretched as if in the midst of casting a spell, it’s face is void and utter blackness. The statue stands between two marble balconies, one of which has collapsed and fallen onto the temples black marble floor. There is a doorway to the north below and behind that balcony and the other, I shift the lights around some, trying to get light to all of the corners. Snoggly moves onto the top of the stairs, Kassamir comes in behind Snoggly. He moves to the balcony and looks out across the room.  Looking back at Snoggly, a look of awe on his face, says, “Can you feel the power here?” Snoggly said, “Can I feel the what lad?”. Kassamir says, “The power?” to which Snoggly replied in his usual crass style, “All I feel is me balls freezing!”. Kassamir asks, “Have you lost touch of your Arcane senses? It washes through you”. Snoggly says, “Wait a minute and I’ll check on that for you.” Kyanna steps into the room, Zanfyr follows, Snoggly replies, “No, I still feel me magic fairly well!”. Both Zanfyr and Snoggly attempt to feel what Kassamir feels, and they both do feel the power emanating from all around them. Kyanna feels the evil permeating structure.

Rinn listens to the door to in the back of the balcony. Haldar begins moving into the darkness below, traveling down the stairs. As he moves down the stairs, a deep voice speaks into everyone’s mind. 

“Hold! I am the voice of the guardians of this ancient temple. You are tresspassing this sanctum. If you have come to plunder the secrets of the Amber temple leave now. For the greedy and arrogant it is a place infected with a scourge of malevolent divinity. The darkness shelters only doom and nothing else.”

Snoggly replies, “We don’t won’t none of that lad, we just want the sword!”. Rinn checks that back door, hears nothing coming from it, and finds no traps. Haldar moves towards the center of the room and halfway there, the room lights up and the voice returns, “You have been warned!”. Suddenly, two fireballs go off in the room just out of reach of Haldar. “Thief! Robber! You will be doomed to stay here forever!”. Haldar rolls backward, attempting to avoid being injured. As he does, he draws bow and fires at the statue. It hits the statue and though it might have chipped it a little, it doesn’t do any real damage. He hits it again, with a crit, same affect. Rinn casts Long Strider on Dain to give him enough speed to keep up with us. Haldar says, “I don’t think they want us here!”. We discuss this fact and afterward, Snoggly calls out, “Hey, if you give us the Sun Sword, we’ll be happy to leave!”. Dain argues that we are here to recover the Sunsword, which shouldn’t be here anyway, it is being hidden here. And that if we happen to do away with the evil in this place, then that is just a bonus! The voice echos out again, this time he speaks Dain’s name. He lists off the deity he follows, where he is from, his lineage, his many titles and other such pieces of information. 

“Know this…to pass safely you must pledge an oath of honor to take no treasure that is not freely given from this place. And a tribute of knowledge or great power must be offered by each.” 

Ezmerelda comes down, approaches and kneels. The voice rattles of the same information about her. Most of these things we did not know either. Afterward, she made an offer of knowledge, with the information that Rudolf Van Richton is in Barovia, for no other purpose than to end Strahd Von Zarovich. The voice responds, “Hmm, Van Richton you say, and where is he now?”. To which Ezmerelda replied, “I do not know, only that he has come through the mists!”. He accepts her offer and she may now pass. Snoggly offers the misty globe that lets you communicate over great distances. The voice says, “I would gladly destroy a tool of Von Zarovich!”. And the globe is then destroyed! He allows Snoggly to pass. Rinn said, “That begs the question, are you an enemy of Strahd Von Zarovich?”. He receives no response. Rinn gets pushy about this and eventually gets this response.

“I am the guardian of the temple, one of many!”, Rinn asked, if this meant that we’ll have to give something to each of these guardians as we come across them? The guardian replied, “I am the only one you need present tribute to!”. Dain steps up and lays before him, the “Tome of Strahd!”. The guardian accepts the offering and grants entry. Dain then asks if he will be able to remover the Sun Sword once found? The guardians only ways, “You may not remove anything from the temple that is not freely given!”. Misty comes down and offers information about the death of Night Claw. The guardian says, “The affairs of the werewolves ore of no concern to me!”. Haldar tells him that he has nothing magical to offer but he will offer a pledge to unseat Strahd Von Zarovich and his ilk. The guardian said, make a persuasion check. Haldar stared at the guardian blankly for a few seconds, then said, 6! Nothing happened! Kassamir steps up and offers the information that the family of Vargus Vallakovich, and Vargus Vallakovich himself have been executed. Pheona Watchter is now the leader of Vallaki. The guardian accept the news.

Zanfyr offers the Decanter of Endless Water that he retrieved from beneath the Gulthias Tree on Yesterhill. It is a start! Is there news of the druids? Zanfyr then recants how we destroyed the druis and thei Gulthias tree. This time, he was given advantage, and the Guardian accepted the knowledge offered and let him keep the decanter. He did make it a point to say that the tree will return. Kyanna steps forward, gives some information about who she is and abut the diety she follows and pledges to destroy Strahd Von Zarovich. He does not accept this as he says, “I care not, if you kill Strahd Von Zarovich!”. A disembodied voice whispered, “fine!”. Haldar offeres the information that Baba Lysaga is dead. We destroyed her, her plots, and her hut in the swamp. The voice says that the Witch of Berez is mighty indeed! After granting access to Haldar, the guardian asks for more information about the slaying of Baba Lysaga. Kyanna relays the information that the light of Argynvosthold has been returned and it lit once again. He accepts that as well. 

Misty relays that we have destroyed the Roc. Rinn offeres the Battle Axe of Plant Bane. Misty tells him of the Mad Mage, telling him information about what we experienced and of the conflicting identities we were given about him, identifying him as Mordenkainin and Kazan. As she says Kazan, the building shutters and shakes, and the guardian Yells, “Do not give that name utterance here!”. The voice calms and accepts the information and allows her pass. Rinn messages Helwa to let her know that we have negotiated with the guardian and has been offered access to the rest of the temple. She peeked in, her curiosity getting the better of her, but Rinn cautioned she should close the door and stay out. She did that. 

The voice states, “You shall have safe passage to and from the Temple, so long as you take no treasure that is not freely given. Be warned - I and my guardians are not the only inhabitants of this place, and those that dwell deeper within may greet you with hostility or violence. Your safety is your sole responsibility. And remember - those that break the accords of this Temple shall be condemned to haunt it forevermore.” Rinn says, “Did you hear that Misty?”.  She said that she will not take anything from here and that if it appears she is trying to take something, Snoggly is given permission to hit her in the butt with a magic missile.

Dain asks, “Can you tell us where the Sun Sword lies?”. Dain recalls he has a Locate Object spell and casts it to locate the Sun Sword, he has seen it in his visions granted from the Tomb of Strahd. I sense the location to be North West, in the direction of the closed door. Rinn checks the door for traps, finds none. He can find no mechanical method for opening the door and how it might be unlocked. The other door appears to be smashed. Misty determines that something obliterated the door. Snoggly suggested that we take part of this statue and use it to break down the door. Misty calls out to Dain to look at the weapons in this room. He steps up to the broken-down door and uses the Locate Object spell to see if the sword is in that room. It’s not. We go back to the other door and use the statue on the floor as a battering ram. This works well and destroys the door after several strikes. The door is destroyed and inside the room are piles of gold and treasure. As Dain focuses on the Sword, he is guided to a treasure pile. We are having a difficult time keeping Misty in check. She wants to be a queen. Dain uses a sword to stir the pile and eventually finds a platinum hilt.

A 10 foot tall statue materializes in the room and Dain asks for the Sun Sword. Haldar speaks to the statue asking who he is. He gets no response. Zanfyr speculates that we may have to do something for the temple to receive the sword. Kyanna holds her hand open in front of the sword, asking the powers that be, if they will give us the sword to be used to destroy Strahd Von Zarovich. Nothing happens. Dain tries as well, nothing happens. We decide that maybe the sword leaving the room, or the building is the problem. We might be able to touch it to examine it here and incur no wrath. Dain picks it up. It is the Sun Sword. Dain gets a very strong sense of vengeance from the sword. There is an intelligence within the sword. The vengeance seems to mix with Dain’s spirit, growing within him. The vengeance is directed at a single point, at a single person, one Strahd Von Zarovich. At the same time, the great Amber statue next to Kyanna begins to move. Also, to our south, we hear a horrifying scream. Kyanna gets spanked. 51 points of damage, and she is stunned! Zanfyr notices that Kassamir doesn’t appear to be with us anymore. He had been in the treasure room but is no longer here. We roll initiative.