#I was busy hyperfixating on a different campaign okay >_> | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

parasite-core · 1 year ago

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Last weekend in pathfinder, we learned about Xanthadon’s Fungal Kyonin Archers, went…TO THE LIBRARY, had an unexpected meeting with Calio’s master, killed another Crone Queen, got a powerful ex-Technic League wizard to join our cause, said wizard revived a child whose haunt we saw back at the beginning of the campaign, then we went to the Cold Forge to face our next Crone Queen. Who burst in riding on the back of a modified Annihilator robot from Numeria, so that’s not going to be an issue *at all*

@scarlet-the-girl

This is going to be a short one because I hyperfixated on a different pathfinder campaign and didn’t write more than the summary above for last week’s game and now I need to write *this* weekend game down 😂

We started out with Xanthadon proudly showing off her Fungal Kyonin Archers, who she made in Aenland’s image, ecstatic that they had killed one of Treerazor’s lieutenants. She quickly read the room that no one else was celebrating their victory. Aenland wasn’t sure how to take the fungal archers—he shoved his way into the crowd of them, looking for familiar faces. He saw a single member of his hunting party amongst them, but the rest were strangers—some likely from hundreds, maybe even thousands, of years before he’d been born. Xanthadon revealed that she gave them the choice to become this—they were all warriors that fell in battle, and she reached out to them in the Boneyard and gave them the opportunity to return to a semblance of life to fight back against the elves’ greatest foe. Some refused her—but most did not. She made no secret of who she was, or if the Demon Lord she represented. She claimed anyone who agreed to her deal knew what they were getting into, they weren’t stupid. Aenland was angry, feeling she had manipulated people who were in a corner who would obviously choose a chance to fight back one last time. But at the same time he didn’t feel like he could entirely blame the people and wasn’t sure if he was right to condemn them and take the choice away from them, when he himself chose to serve Baba Yaga in exchange for a weapon to wipe Treerazor off the face of Golarian.

Xanthadon told Aenland to think on it, then the fungal elves became a mass of writhing fungus again, and she sunk down into a sinkhole where Treerazor’s lieutenant had once been. Nestian warned us to stay back—there were spores in the sinkhole that would make an unfortunate host into another of those fungal husks. The sink hole closed itself, and we discussed what to do next. Aenland still wanted to help break the Demon Lord’s hold on Xanthadon—now more than ever, perhaps, in the hopes that he could undo what she had done to his kinsmen. The party decided to gather a sample of the spores to see if they could be researched and possibly be used to make an antitoxin or something later. Calio, being particularly resilient to poisons due to his partially undead state, collected the sample.

The party reconvened at the clocktower, got themselves disguised as upper class citizens, left their Dragonkin companions behind, and then went TO THE LIBRARY.

On the way they ran into a Winter Witch patrol, but Calio talked their way past, claiming to be members of the ruling class going to the Royal Library to conduct research. He provided his forged paperwork, and the patrol bought the lie and let the party through.

At the library Calio claimed to the receptionist that they were studying a means of countering ‘those filthy druids’ who had once created the pockets of summer in Irrisen, as a means of countering them for their ‘glorious leader’ should the need ever arise. He was informed of where the fiction and non-fiction sections were, and told if he had his papers in order he could show them to the guard at the restricted section if he required access there.

While Calio looked around, Nestian and Aenland spotted Keisuke browsing the non-fiction section in his human guise of Dren Fielder. Calio decided he was going to do talk to him. Aenland stalked off in another direction to go talk to Wuso, who they’d seen reading at a table elsewhere, and Nestian and Edeya went to the lower level of the non-fiction section to eavesdrop on Calio and Keisuke.

Calio approached his master casually, careful not to seem too intent as Edeya had also spotted three Grimm guarding the non-fiction section and Calio didn’t want to draw their attention.

Calio greeted Keisuke, apologized for not contacting him when they first arrived but he’d been running around like crazy dealing with Crone Queens. Keisuke pointed out that he should be careful what he says, glancing behind them, and Calio remembered the Grimm. He began speaking telepathically to Keisuke instead, pretending to begin reading a book over his shoulder.

He mused how amusing it would be to take control of a Crone Queen, and Keisuke noted there was one in this library. Calio agreed, sounding eager to try taking over the plague-bearing former queen. Keisuke warned Calio to be careful not to get on Urgathoa’s bad side, as the Crone Queen was up to something their patron would likely take interest in. Calio assured him that he’d been very diligent about staying in her good books.

Keisuke asked if Calio needed anything of him in particular. So Calio but the bullet and asked Keisuke about Nestian’s mother and her Eidolon. Keisuke seemed genuinely confused for a moment, then frustrated noting ‘so that’s who it belonged to’. He admitted he HAD taken the Eidolon—he was using her to power something in the Nonagon which he wanted to show Calio—and Nestian’s mother WAS in danger, but he denied it being *his* fault she was in danger. Calio at the very least believed him that he hadn’t known the people he was targeting were related to Nestian specifically—it hadn’t been done out of spite, just a very twisted coincidence. That didn’t make it better, especially because Keisuke had every intention of continuing with what he was doing since he’d already gotten this far. But at least Calio knew it wasn’t a purposely targeted attack, which told him where he stood in relation to Nestian and Keisuke.

Keisuke invited Calio to visit the Nonagon again, and told him he’d send him away with another one time pass to enter his realm safely. He had something he wanted to talk to Calio about, and something he wanted to show him. Calio agreed.

Keisuke noticed a rare tome on the bottom shelf—one that would be worth a pretty penny to a collector. He suggested that Calio could steal it if he wanted to. Calio agreed that he kind of wanted to steal it. Keisuke looked away for only a moment, and when he looked again the book was gone. The kitsune—usually the one being called The Thief—was impressed by his protégé’s quick fingers. Calio just noted that one of their shared patron Norgorber’s concerns is with theft—so he’d made sure to learn a thing or two.

Down below, Nestian and Edeya realized quickly that Calio must be conversing with Keisuke silently and that they wouldn’t be able to overhear their conversation. So instead they began searching for books that might help on other subjects. Eventually the two of them wandered over to Aenland and Wuso’s table to wait for Calio.

Aenland had talked to Wuso, and learned that she’d found a passage in a book that seemed to suggest that she needed a particular poison to counteract the spores of Xanthadon’s Demon Lord. Aenland looked over the poem she had been studying, and surmised that she needed a Cayden Cailean worshipper to brew it for her. And so the first half of the puzzle had fallen into place.

Calio returned to the party, and told Nestian he would share what he’d learned from Keisuke later.

For now, he wanted to focus on how to get into the restricted section.

He suggested he sneak through the bars using his Spirit Walk ability, with Roscoe in his bag of holding. Then he could release Roscoe to stick a crossbow to the halfling guard’s head and tell him if he makes any sudden movements he’s a dead man.

Aenland agreed with this plan, with the condition that he’d be outside with an arrow also trained on the halfling so once Calio made to leave he would still have to remain in place and quiet. Calio agreed. He handed over a potion of invisibility to Aenland, then used Spirit Walk to become incorporeal. He walked straight through the bars and into the halfling’s guard station. He released Roscoe, dropped his spirit form, and threatened the man. The halfling was terrified of the necromancer, and handed over his keys—although he did have the gumption to ask how Calio intended to leave this place alive after he made it downstairs. Calio told the man he had his ways—then he warned him that they had another arrow aimed for his head and if he made a single stupid move, he wouldn’t live to regret it. With that he put Roscoe back in the bag and used his second use of Spirit Walk to vanish back through the wall. He opened the gate and let the rest of the party through, locking the gate behind them in the hopes that it would keep the guard from calling backup once they were downstairs and no longer directly intimidating him into compliance.

The party made it down to the basement and stopped when they saw they were going to trigger a trap: a symbol of death was on the wall—it wasn’t a threat now, but they knew if they had to fight in the next room it would become a death trap. Edeya disabled it.

Calio identified the sound of a haunt coming from beyond the door—the sound of many women screaming. He surmised that the haunt in question was going to summon Banshees. He and Nestian suggested that Edeya stand back. Calio would be unaffected as virtually everything a Banshee could do was either a death effect or negative energy. And Nestian and Aenland were hardy.

So Nestian opened the door.

The party fought four Banshees and four giants. Calio made each member of the party immune to the banshees one-by-one with Oracle’s Vessel, leaving the Banshees completely defanged. The same happened to four wraiths that appeared soon after, as their negative energy attacks also fell under the effect of Calio’s curse. Calio ripped the guard’s heart out when he ran downstairs, and Aenland took out the woman from the front desk—who was actually a summoner.

While they did this, Nestian went toe-to-toe with the next Crone Queen, using his hearty constitution to keep from catching her virulent plague, and swiftly dispatching her.

Calio ended the fight by forcing the last remaining combatant sorcerers to bow to him as their new god, casting Overwhelming Presence to momentarily appear as the shadow of an unholy fusion of Norgorber and Urgathoa.

Afterwards the party looted the place—retrieved Zernebeth’s spellbook, Calio retrieved a book Keisuke was seeking, and they found information on the whereabouts of one Caigreal—Jadrenka’s mother, the Warden of Artrosa.

Upstairs they found one of the three Grimm that had been in the fiction section trapped in a time lock, and there was evidence of fireballs having gone off. He hadn’t stuck around, but Keisuke had lent his protege a hand and kept the three powerful guardians from joining the fight downstairs.

With that out of the way, the party returned to the clocktower to reconvene with the Dragonkin and return Zernebeth’s spellbook to her. They waited around for the requisite hour, and then Zernebeth said she had one thing she needed to do before she was ready to leave with us.

She went to go see Denya in his room. She took out the diamond she had told Calio she had prepared for this moment, and crushed it as she cast her spell, with no explanation given. As the Wish spell completed, Denya’s son Dominik was resurrected. Denya was crying, and hugged both his son and his old friend who returned his family to him.

With that done, Zernebeth was ready to help us in earnest.

We made our way to the Cold Forge. There, in the entryway we found no living things—and no immediate threats. Only a sign that said ��no living creatures beyond this point’

With that in mind, Calio decided to send Roscoe to investigate the next room—as an undead thing Calio figured he’d not set off whatever might be in there.

Roscoe opened the door—and came face-to-face with four Daemons.

The party sprang into action. Talsune flew forward—and Calio got shot with an empowered Disintegrate as a result of getting too close to the warning sign. However Talsune and Calio managed to together obliterate the nearest Daemon. The rest fell like dominos, given almost no chance to act before the party was upon them. Not even their bad luck aura could keep the party from wiping them out.

Nestian opened the next door, and the party saw a room full of strange, elemental-infused machines. Amongst them were also more Rune Giants.

And in the back, astride atop a modified Annihilator Robot from Numeria, was the next Crone Queen.

#pathfinder #PF weekly #yes I’m a week late cut me a break *pouts*#It’s the first time in like 28 sessions that I’ve failed to make an update within a week #I was busy hyperfixating on a different campaign okay >_>#(all offense is exaggerated for comedy)

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