Abyss Modified Session 37: The Final Showdown

They had their big battle. Godric, Tamin, Xanaphia, Orion, Drifting Cloud, Syre, and Thelrum were faced with a dark decision. The big wizards had fixed the scroll in a way that it could be used to summon the demon lords together and hopefully cause them to fight each other and pick off the survivors. The party was given the choice to pick the place the battle would happen. This led to numerous ideas and plots. Options were weighed, caution taken, and a choice was had. They hunted down a volcano and looked for vents leading for any underground chambers nearby that could have a thin crust of cooled rock above a pool of liquid rock. Syre helmed this search and found a suitable location. The party prepared themselves the best they could and let the wizards finish the spell. Their allies consisted of Acererak, Eliminster, the Companion, Professor Pulldiver, Thuds the troll, and Anchor the oni. They planned on dividing the forces, letting them fight a bit, and taking out the survivors. Drifting Cloud cast forbiddance to damage the demon lords every round and Thelrum set up a wall of force to keep the demon lords stuck in the room as long as possible. As the party set themselves up and cast the spell I read this aloud to them.

“Tangible magic courses around you. You see as the weave buckles and bends, chains of light fill the chamber and create vortex of magic. The cave darkens and a loud tearing sound along with the rushing of water fills the world around you. Larger than imaginable, a massive worm like creature with random atrophied limbs crashes head first into the ground, its neck snapping instantly. Dark forms follow it, bouncing off its bulk and slipping in the waves. Orcus, demon prince of death stands up and looks around, seeing the dead fiendwurm and starts digging into its side. Another form rises, his horns wide set, Baphomet roars out a challenge for anyone to face him. Two massive baboon heads lift from the carnage, for a few of you, this creature is familiar, last seen destroying the Koa-toa town of Sloobludop . Demogorgon’s rage shakes the world around him. A smaller form can be seen sprinting away from the other demons, a large drow like figure that could only be Graz’zt himself. Attached to the large worm creature a black and green slime oozes, Juiblex searches for those who thwarted his attack on the gnomes of Blingdenstone. With a scream like a thousand screeching hyenas, Yeenoghu rolls to his feet, already swinging his flail in the air. A large cloud darkens part of the giant worm as mushrooms the size of houses blossom across its form. Zuggtmoy makes her presence known. You have your allies with you. How will you proceed?”

Pile of demon lords

The fiendwurm caught the party off guard. They realized that it was responsible for eating the krakens they had seen dead in the ocean, the water it had been swimming in had cooled the chamber and created steam. I gave the party a few moments to choose which of the demon lords they wanted to fight. After a few minutes they decided to fight Orcus and Graz’zt. Their allies watched each chose a few to fight as well, the mages took Juiblex and Zuggtmoy and the Pulldiver’s Delvers took Yeenoghu and Baphomet. Each group teleported to another chamber to duke it out. the party quickly realized Demogorgon was left in the room with them as well.

The crowded hallway

The party watched as Orcus walked over to punch Demogorgon, who did not like the damage he was taking from the magic in the chamber and climbed into the ceiling, digging into the magma tubes. Graz’zt looked at the wall and teleported within the party to sow discord. The group watched as Orcus carved a wicked smile into a ball of flesh he pulled out of the dead wurm and craft it into a pseudo beholder zombie with stringy gristle legs. Graz’zt started cutting into the party with his acid coated sword, dominated Godric’s mind with crown of madness, causing him to swing at his allies. The group was able to focus fire on Graz’zt while dealing with his brutal attacks and counter spelling his efforts to make more allies for himself. Orion made great work of him with many punches and kicks, he was able to resist the stunning attacks too well.

Orcus was approaching the wall of force as the party was phasing their spells through the wall, like tiny birds pecking at him as he took constant damage from the forbiddance spell. Thelrum dropped the wall of force and changed it up to a globe of invulnerability, shielding himself and others from lower level spells and Syre cast magic circle, to give everyone bonuses on saving throws.

Orcus

Graz’zt was the first to fall, the combined efforts of the entire party were enough to remove him from the situation, leaving only a pile of dissolving goo and a large great sword, Godric took the sword. At this point Orcus had made it to the party was swinging away with his club like wand, trying to clear a path out of the forbiddance spells. Xanaphia cast a storm sphere, filling that part of the room with lighting and Drifting Cloud dropped a dawn spells, spilling radiance into the chamber. They noticed falling pebbles above them and grew concerned, figuring that Demogorgon was in the rock above them. They watched as the fleshy monster Orcus made exploded into four smaller creatures from the storm sphere’s lightning damage. The group was not surprised with Demogorgon reaching out from a hole he made in the ceiling to attack Drifting Cloud. The group split their efforts against both foes, aiming to take them down as quickly as possible. Tamin took this chance to escape, and did.

From other chambers they could hear screams and explosions and hoped their allies were doing alright. Drifting Cloud spent most of the combat taunting Orcus trying to distract him. Orcus pushed against the party, trying to make it out of the chamber and into the hallway, but was having difficulty with the wall of heroes refusing to budge. His wounds became too much, the magics and constant radiant damage broke him, Drifting Cloud told him “Anubis says hello” as Orcus became ooze and gristle on the stone floor, leaving only his club like wand behind. Demogorgon pulled the rest of the way through the roof and started tearing into the party. The group, sensing the danger in this foe pulled back into the forbiddance room that would be their sanctuary or trap, having no other way out. Loud booms filled the hallway and from the western wall Baphomet burst through like a fur covered train, and started tearing into Demogorgon. The group double downed their efforts in pelting them with spells and attacks and eventually Demogorgon was brought down by a magic missile spell by Thelrum and Orion defeated Baphomet.

The Companion and the other survivors from the demon lords limped back to the party. The Pulldiver’s Delvers were defeated by Baphomet and Acererak had abandoned the rest to their own fate. Eliminster looked a little worse for wear. The group was given wishes from the Companion as a final payment, terminating their contracts as well. Godric wished to find his father, the whole reason he had gotten into adventuring in the first place. Thelrum went by the book, wishing for the entire party to forever be resistant to slashing damage. Drifting Cloud wished his khopesh of disruption to be sent to the next warrior that would need it in their quest against evil. Syre went the greed route, wanting money, and found her pockets were extradimensional spaces full of coins. After experimenting a bit, she realized it was one hundred thousand gold coins she could access from any pocket she wore. Orion wished for a tent like Daddy Fate's so he could set up a mobile orphanage to save kids in need where ever he traveled.

The party was successful, and much work would need to be done to push the minor demons from the realm, but for now their story is done. A new group of heroes calls for our attention.

Abyss Modified Session 36: The Tower in the Other World

Xanaphia, Orion, Thelrum, and Drifting Cloud returned to the flying ship after dealing with the beacon in the light house. They found Acererak and Ladwin interrogating a disheveled dark elf, Vizeran, who they were blaming for this whole problem with the demon swarms. Godric and Syre looked on very confused as the interrogation had been taking place in front of them. Their henchmen Ralph watched on in terror as well from an illusionary barrel he made. They talked with Acererak and found out the drow wizard had stolen Gromph’s spellbook and had been working with agents in the Underdark to summon all the demon lords to the same place, but something went wrong with the spell, it ejected the demons onto the surface world where they have been causing all sorts of problems.

Drifting Cloud called the Companion with his sending spell to ask if this Acererak was cool to be hanging out with them. The companion was confused by the question and teleported to the ship. He and Acererak gave each other a look, nodded, and set into a plan to help fix what went wrong in the spell. The group sailed the ship to the Sunset Mountains and followed the blip on their map to a strange swampy pond with three pathways that met in the middle. The party went to investigate leaving their employer and Acererak on board with Ladwin, Ixxon the imp, and Ralph the young halfling mage they pseudo adopted.

The party stood around using magic to determine what was going on at the crossroads for a bit until the sun set behind the mountains and a gateway appeared before them, leading to some desolate looking realm. they hesitantly entered and saw a large broken and ruined city with a central tower that had broken in numerous places, floating hundreds of feet above its original base. Thelrum used levitate to ignore the base of the tower and take everyone up to the top. He took Syre first and they discovered the top of the tower gave way to a flat platform with stairs down that appeared to have lost the higher levels as well as a marilith, a demon with six arms and a snake bottom. She was having a one-sided conversation with someone about the group not having arrived, possibly with a variant of the sending spell. The creature went on to explain her group was excellent at their job and would not fail. By this point the rest of the party had been taxied up and Drifting Cloud and Godric decided some trickery was in order. They approached the marilith and asked if she would be interested in purchasing some fine yeti meat they were willing to supply. The marilith was confused, but interested until one of her allies, an undead boneclaw came up from a flight of stairs situated in the center of the tower.

Combat was had, Thelrum banished the first boneclaw and a second one followed up the stairs and the Marilith resisted the spell. Godric pushed the marilith down the stairs and Orion was grabbed by the boneclaw. Drifting Cloud summoned a swarm of scarabs on the stairs, hitting both the feet of the boneclaw and the marilith. Orion was able to jump out of the way after pummeling the undead into the bug pile. Xanaphia and Syre used spells and threw around inspiration to the party. Eventually the marilith fell to the party and the banished boneclaw returned to its own realm via the magic of the spell. The group let the bugs clear out of the stairs and traveled down them, finding a strange doorway with shimmering energy inside of it. 

Through the doorway they found large chamber filled with odd walkways, multiple tables covered in historical documents, and a large wooden door on the opposite side of the chamber from where they entered. As they started rummaging through the room, they found out a few things. The ruined city was Andorel, it had disappeared and been stuck on the plane of shadow and been shunted around the cosmos for a few hundred years. It had been a city of mages before its destruction. They also discovered a strange scratching coming from the other side of the door. Thelrum used arcane lock to seal the door and Godric laid on the floor and looked underneath the door and saw massive strange feet on the other side, he tickled them with mage hand. The creature on the other side screeched and broke the door open. it failed to hit Godric with its massive claws. The creature looked similar to a bone devil and was some kind of guardian of this chamber. Thelrum banished it as well and another two showed up and they could hear noises from the back of the next chamber. As the party fought against the two strange bone creatures they were ambushed by three cloaked figures, bodaks, which tried to use their gaze attacks to kill the party. Many lightning bolts were thrown, many punches were made, and songs were sung. Eventually the party was victorious and decided to figure out what was on the next room.

They found two doors on opposite walls as well as a large pit with a writhing pile of teeth, gristle, and bones. The party threw some fire spells down at it but it seemed to have little effect. They checked the east door and found a room with a large brain eating monster in a glass jar and hundreds of empty smaller jars that once held brains. They locked that door and went to the western door. They found a hall leading north to a celestial map of foreign skies, which happened to be the heavens of Eberron. To the south was a closed door, which opened as they approached. At this point Godric had the idea to pull a prank on the strange pile of bones and teeth and relieved himself over the edge. At the same time the rest of the group found the last beacon of Mystra and lit it with holy fire.

The large pit filled with celestial fire, Godric assumed it was his donation that did it while the rest of the group came back to find him pulling his pants back up. The building started shaking so they fled. They feather fell to the ground and made it a good deal away from the structure before it hit the ground. They noticed a strange cocoon like structure made of bone slowly floating down from the sky and when they touched it a strange man in red robes with a long white beard woke up. They found out he was Elminster, a mage from their world, who had no idea about the demons. They gave him some jerky and he volunteered to help. He went through the portal with them and skeptically joined the group of mages working on the scroll to try to fix everything, or at least get all the demon lords into the same place. He had had some history with both the Companion as well as Acererak in this time line, and rather not talk about.

Now the group prepares, if the scrollwork goes according to plan, they will summon all the demon lords into the same place. With their blessings of Mystra they stand a great chance at turning the demonic horde.

Abyss Modified Session 35: the Quiet Chult

The party, tonight consisting of Thelrum, Orion, Drifting Cloud, Xanaphia, and Tamin, contacted their allies to fly above the dome of the Moon Well and drop a rope for them to climb out. They left the beholder behind, amazed the beast had not killed them. Back on their ship they contacted the Companion to see if their allies, Pulldiver’s Delvers, had finished up with the Thayan temple and heard back they were successful. The group decided to go to the temple on Chult next, the Sunset Mountains were not further away but sounded pleasant. While sailing above the water they watched for any strange monsters or demons and were lucky, nothing attacked or even noticed them. 

Eventually they could see an island off in the distance, and as they approached, they noticed the corpse of a giant dragon turtle split in half, floating in the water. They remembered hearing this creature was a protector of the harbor of Port Nyanzaru and guessed they would not have to pay tribute, so they flew on. Once they found their way into port, they found the town deserted. The normal sounds and sights were missing. Thelrum used see invisibility and noticed a leather clad figure breaking into one of the building’s rooftop vents and called out to him as the group dropped to the city streets, sending their airship to circle above. The figure, startled, dropped the wooden venting cover and it clattered loudly to the street. The group paused, feeling an odd quaking in the streets and could hear something large approaching.

The group turned to see from two of the alleys two huge sized tyrannosaurus rexes, no longer living but undead. The beasts roared and the party went into action. Orion charged up to one of them and laid into it with multiple strikes and was close enough to see dozens of humanoid forms within the belly of the beast, also zombies, pushing against the ribs trying to reach out and grab Orion. Drifting Cloud prepared to turn the undead when they got into range and the second rex charged him and Thelrum. Divine energy coursed through Drifting Cloud and hit the rex, causing it to turn and flee, but not before it coughed up a zombie, which turned to ash from the divine energy. Tamin made his way into one of the buildings and closed the door, finding himself surrounded by unmoving husks, corpses that had been mummified rapidly. Xanaphia slung eldritch blasts at the wounded rex, scoring multiple hits. The wounded rex coughed up more zombies around Orion and attempted to attack him but failed to find its mark. The zombies were ineffective as well. The group could hear someone bumping around in one of the buildings, hearing someone say that the group seemed to have it handled. Thelrum blasted the wounded rex with more magic while the turned Rex fled into the quiet jungle. Tamin made his away to the second floor of his corpse building and could see out one of the windows and launched a few arrows at the wounded rex, which eventually fell and burst open, releasing the zombies. The group made wuick work of them. The door to one of the buildings opened and a leather armored mask wearing figure came out to thank the party for their intervention. They could see a fancy jade dagger on his hip.

The figure introduced himself as Ladwin, it turned out he was scouting for any survivors and loot when the party came along. The group was rightfully concerned and asked what happened to the city. Ladwin explained that a new guy showed up and was pissing off his boss, taking control of the jungle and making an army of the undead. The party inquired about Ladwin’s boss and was told he specialized in making tombs, one was here on the island, the other had been around for a long time. He mentioned the name Acererak and the group went pale. A few of them relayed what they knew about the Lich and his Tomb of Horrors and Tomb of Annihilation. Ladwin asked if they wanted to meet the boss and they unanimously said no. He mentioned that the rival was some guy named Orcus, the group was equally pale from that name as well, knowing that getting between a demon lord of undeath and a super powerful lich would be dangerous. Ladwin took off his mask, revealing a skull and scratched his bare skull before returning it to his face.

Drifting Cloud broke off from the group to ask for guidance. He asked if Orcus was still on the island, finding Anubis answering yes. He asked if Anubis wanted him to deal with Orcus, and was given a strange no. He asked for a sign from Anubis, and was answered yes. The Khopesh Drifting Cloud was wielding lit up, now glowing brightly. When he started walking around with it out it glowed brighter when pointed to the south eastern direction. The party got back on their ship, Ladwin tagging along, and headed the direction the sword told them to go.

They soared above the silent jungle, seeing large areas of devastation and places where demonic creatures were burrowing out of the ground. They chose to avoid all that nonsense. The sword led them to an abandoned lighthouse with golden flame iconography. The structure was overrun with plant life and the once glass covered atrium was completely shattered. From the deck of the ship they could see the torch or brazier for the top of the lighthouse was missing. When they made landfall, they went in the atrium windows and found numerous bodies of slain monks, now skeletal, laying around the ground. Drifting Cloud used eyes of the grave and they dinged as undead. He turned undead, causing a few to rise and flee into the jungle and another to stand up start mumbling about the snake men and the beacon. Thelrum cast detect magic and massive energies were radiating from the basement of the structure.

The group left the undead alone and made their way into the dark interior of the lighthouse, finding a large room stacked with bits of shipwrecks, broken furniture, lumber, kitchen supplies, and paper. The doorway was strange, there seemed to be numerous teeth set in lines across the threshold of the room. The room had a high ceiling and many of the items within were stacked about fifteen feet high, cutting off the party’s views of each other. They split up and started searching for the beacon and Thelrum could feel the magical energy at the edge of his spell, and suddenly it was charging towards him.

A large spell stitched creature with the body of gargantuan bipedal lion, odd mantis armor, and multiple eyes crashed through the garbage in the room, and around its neck was a large stone beacon. The group jumped into action. They were unsure if it was a construct or an undead, but either way they unloaded everything they had on the monster. Orion got in close and the beast knocked him down, it spread out its attacks, bowling over most of the party, mauled Drifting Cloud and Xanaphia /dealing massive damage, this monster was not messing around. Drifting Cloud put up a guardian of the faith behind it, dealing some nice damage. Thelrum attempted to banish it but the magic was resisted. Xanaphia cast eldritch blast and shot at the beast with her crossbow, hoping to get a bolt to stick for heat metal. One of her higher spells surged, causing her to teleport around every round. Drifting Cloud cast spiritual weapon, which followed the monster around, the khopesh glowing with radiant energy.

After a few attacks were traded they could hear Ladwin using a spell to talk to someone mentioning the terrifying monster. Moments later a figure walked out of a shadow. Covered in purple robes, metallic staff at hand, large demon faced amulet around its skeletal neck and a massive helm, Acererak entered the fray, and he was pissed. He threw magical bolts into the creature and granted Tamin greater invisibility. Ladwin jumped on the beasts back and started stabbing into it with his jade dagger.

Thelrum got in a great lightning bolt on the beast and could see the strange lich summoning a ball of pure darkness between his hands. Tamin used his sneak attacks to great effect, Drifting Cloud kept himself and everyone else alive while dropping toll the dead on the beast. Orion constantly was bashing on the beast with multiple landed punches and sword slashes. Xanaphia was able to land the killing blow with eldritch blast. They watched as Acererak passed the black orb of shadow over the body of the beast, disintegrating it slowly, and as he finished he grabbed Ladwin’s shoulder and they teleported away without a word to the group. The group took the beacon from the room and carried it up the lighthouse, finding a grove on the floor sized perfectly for it and lit it. the party gained another level for their struggle, now hitting 12^th level. 

Abyss Modified Session 34: Behold, a Well Below

Our adventure started with the group talking with the Pulldiver Delvers about an escape plan and raiding the rest of the treasure hoard. The professor had a way out and would share it with the group. The party heard the sounds of battle above them as battle was joined and the dragon was back from its banishment. Orion reported Haskan was gone as he rejoined the group. They teleported back to their ship, found a wayward Tamin on board, also hired by the Companion, and set sail as far away as they could get. Their journey to the Moonshae Isles was quick. They observed swarms of flying creatures above Waterdeep so they kept their distance. Large swaths of destruction swept across the land, strange monsters could be seen hunting animals and when they hit the ocean, they found the putrid green water polluted with the corpses of dead whales and what appeared to be a dead kraken. As they watched something bit the kraken in half and pulled it under the water.

They sailed higher in the clouds as to not be noticed by whatever was eating krakens, and eventually started seeing islands in the distance, almost glowing green on the horizon. They flew over majestic mountains and forests that seemed almost untouched by the devastation found elsewhere. There were castles that looked as if they were under siege by other worlds creatures, but helping them was not the groups goal. They checked their map and found Oman, the island they needed to find within sight. They eventually found a strange tower next to a large burial mound with a deep cave on its side. The party noticed the piles of corpses littering the ground between the cave mouth and the stone tower.

They called out a greeting and watched as one of the windows on the tower, an iron slab covering it, lifted up and a small head poked out and asked who they were. Before they could answer the slab slammed shut and another one opened, again revealing a small face and vaguely they could see red hats on the figures. The party asked about all the dead bodies and were told the people had tried to rise up against the tower, and for that were struck down. the group asked who was in charge and was told the master was down in the mound, doing some sort of magics. The group thanked them and headed into the mound, avoiding the pile of humanoid corpses.

The tunnel was a perfectly smooth cylinder carved out of the stone. It led miles upon miles down into the island and eventually the party lost sight of the light behind them. They came to a chamber with two stone figures sitting in the center, facing the entrance and slightly blocking the way out, another smooth tunnel. The party was not sure what the figures were and Drifting Cloud started casting detect magic. As soon as he started the magic the figures started talking to each other, placing bets if Drifting Cloud would finish his spell or not. He stopped and one stone man passed the other a few coins. The group grilled the strange rock men, claiming that they themselves had come here to work with the master, with a high deception check. The stone men, Galeb Duhr, claimed that Many Eyes had come down and was doing magic with the old Moon Well. Many Eyes, or Zaelzorb as they found out, seemed to be some kind of monster with undead minions and was further into the mound. The Galeb Duhr demanded the party, even if they shared the same boss, that they would need some sort of tax to let them pass. Godric asked if they would have to pay on the return trip and the creatures laughed. They gave the creatures a few coins and headed deeper into the mound.

Zaelzorb and his henchmen at the Moon Well

Finding cover

They found a large chamber with a domed ceiling and a hill topped with a green glowing well.there were broken buildings and a few pillars on the field as well, almost as if the ground itself had devoured this chamber to lock it away. At the apex of the dome a faint ray of moonlight trickled in. Two cloaked figures and a huge beholder were staring deeply into the water of the well. Mild panic set in and the group separated, Xanaphia and Tamin running off towards the broken building, Drifting Cloud, Godric, and Orion attempting to hide behind a large boulder. Godric only got as far as a smaller outcropping of rocks. The beholder, Zaelzorb saw them. He turned his central eye on the ruined building, catching Xanaphia and Tamin within its anti-magic cone. It blasted at Godric, Orion, and Drifting Cloud with its eye beams, they were able to resist most of their effects. Drifting Cloud dropped a spiritual guardian of Anubis, which took a few chunks out of Zaelzorb before getting out of range. The beholder took to the sky, wanting to reduce the effectiveness of the two melee fighters closing in.

Chaos

As the battle progressed the cloaked figures made their way around the ruins and the pillars and attempted to restrain the group with magic so their master could blast them easier, one succeeded in holding Drifting Cloud in place. Orion was thrown into the air with telekinesis, Tamin found magic oils do not work while within the gaze of a beholder, various members of the group were blasted with death rays numerous times. Godric was able to get on top of the beholder and lop off one of its eye stalks, driving the beast into a rage. Orion attempted to throw his javelin of lightning but it failed to activate, falling to the ground. Once Orion was free, he attempted to get the javelin again but the beholder hit him with a sleep ray. Xanaphia wild surged quicker spells, which only helped a little bit, allowing for a spell and full weapon attack using the almost forgotten crossbow. Tamin made great use of his sneak attack, picking his shots carefully and attempting to not draw attention to himself.

Pesky adventurer being tackled by a bag of bones on a beholder

Godric, atop Zaelzorb, continued to hack into the beast, eventually getting tackled by one of the cloaked figures, a deathlock. He was being sick of getting blasted with terrible arcane energy and fled with misty step to run and heal up a bit. Around this time, he noticed Orion asleep so he threw one of the juggling mushrooms from his pack at him, waking him from his badly timed slumber. Orion was then hit with a fear ray, which he elected to ignore being a monk. Eventually they took down the two deathlock cultists and Zaelzorb had had enough. He started fleeing but Godric was in his way. He used his telekinetic ray and just shoved Godric into the corrupted moon well. Zaelzorb started retreating towards the domes moonlit peak but was struck down by the combined efforts of the group, almost falling on the submerged Godric.

Moments before Godric was in the corrupted Moon Well

The group pulled Godric out of the disgusting water and he was in drastic pain, possibly even cursed. Drifting Cloud cast remove curse twice, once on Godric removing his goopy affliction, and once on the Moon Well. They harvested parts of the beholder, tossing it into braziers and cleansed the demonic essence from the burial mound. We stopped there for the night, and the party leveled to level 11.  

*I did not make the amazing battle map, it belongs to my FLGS*