Session 29

Day 124 (2nd cycle of summer, 9th day)
The Sons sneak past the skeletons guarding outside the fort, with Urnyx stealing their gong so that they can not warn those inside the fort. The skeletons are quickly dispatched and the Sons try to find out how to enter the fort.

As they are spotted by a skeleton on the wall and subsequently showered with arrows. Nevron opens a Passwall through the fort's wall, and the Sons rush in. Quickly they find themselves surrounded by about another 10 skeletons in the courtyard. They manage to kill off the skeletons and search the premises. They find an altar and a cauldron, along with some necromancy notes. They deduce that someone must have been making these super-skeletons.

They also find John-John, a cook trapped and forced to make food for Katy, a young woman that the black knight apparently thinks reminds him of some long-lost love. They also find a map of the region, along with some figurines carved of wood. The figurines in question are a cyclops, placed in the Swamp of Death, a noble-looking fellow in Starkhold, a hag in Oakwood and a wizard-looking fellow holding a skull atop a dracolich.

As they leave the building to investigate further, they find themselves facing the death knight and his nightmare. The fight is brutal and hard, and while the Sons manage to defeat their foe, the fight is a very close one.

Session 28

Day 114 (1st cycle of summer, 36th day)

With Xuk dead, the fight rages on. The Sons find themselves facing a lot of orcs led by a shaman, but eventually they defeat them all and Ironville wins the battle, sending the rest of the orcs fleeing chaotically. 

Day 115 (1st cycle of summer, 37th day)

The Sons are honored with the contribution against the orcish menace and are named Iron Defenders of Ironville and given a spot on the House of Nobles. Nevron is also given a tower that is being rebuilt for him.

It is also the Day of Mating, so the city is full of life, and the Sons experience a bit of what being famous means. The celebration ends as it always does, although only Nevron and Urnyx partake in the late night festivities, while the other two stay at home.

Day 116 (2nd cycle of summer, 1st day)

The Sons are woken by Elias calling on them. He has had a vision, seeing them traveling to the volcano Hellmouth and also a black-clad figure looming over them. 

Day 117 (2nd cycle of summer, 2nd day)

The Sons leave for Hellmouth, in order to find the elemental key of fire. On a whim, they decide to find Petyr's corpse first. 

Day 121 (2nd cycle of summer, 6th day)

The Sons locate Petyr's corpse out to the west, near Darion town and proceed to head further west in order to find a shaman or cleric of Tempus, so that he can receive a proper burial.

Day 122 (2nd cycle of summer, 7th day)

The Sons find the Green Lizard barbarian tribe and convince their Tempus shaman to bury Petyr.

After burying their friend, they head north-east towards Hellmouth

Day 124 (2nd cycle of summer, 9th day)

The Sons stumble upon a fort in the middle of the mountains. As they approach it, they notice a flag sporting the red lily that the black knight also wore on his armor, 

Cult of the Dragon

And the Oracle said: In the Year of the Broken One, a great purge will strike Gemnos, causing never seen death and destruction. From the ashes the dead dragons will rise and rule, as they were meant to. So I have seen, so it will be.

From Draconis Lore

Cult of the Dragon is a quasi-religious cult that venerates dragons and believes that undead dragons will at some point assume their rightful place as rulers of all of Gemnos.

This is why the cult spends it's time equally between hoarding gold to gift to the dragons, making alliances with evil dragons and last but not least, convincing and helping those dragons become undead dracoliches.

The cult has existed for about 400 years, and so far, no one knows where they came from. They are widespread across the lands of Gemnos, but as far as it is known, the different chapters or cells are extremely independent and there is no central organization.

The most prominent members are necromancers and priests, but the dragons have worshipers of all kinds.

The Black Robes

Worshiping gods distracts you from your true master, Magic. They are a waste of time, as they can not help you get all you want from life, only you and magic can do that. So take that symbol and destroy it, before I polymorph you into a mouse and feed you to your familiar.

Yii, Black Senator, year 5491 

The Black Robes are an organization of wizards. They have been the ruling class of Uruak for more than 600 years.

In the old days, the Black Robes were rarely seen outside their borders, but around 300 years ago, something changed. After many years of internal rebellions and wars against kings of the 100 Kingdoms and the Empire of Ortygal, the Black Robes seemed content with what they had and focused on keeping it, instead of expanding further. 

The next logical step was to build embassies in big cities all around the world, to keep lines of communication open with all potential allies or partners - or something.

At the top of the organization, you will find the Black Senate. The Black Senate is the ruling body of the organization and of Uruak. The Black Senate is comprised of 101 Black Robes, each chosen for their individual qualities or because of their alliances. The Black Senators rarely leave Uruak and generally spend a lot of time hatching plans and ruling Uruak.

The rest of the Black Robes are divided into cells. Each cells consists of 7 people, and although not all of them are necessarily wizards, it is rare that a Black Robe does not practice magic in some form. A cell usually runs a city, a town or a number of villages reachable within a day's travel. The cells also serve outside the borders as each embassy typically holds a cell.

While any race can be found amongst the Black Robes, humans are by far the most prevalent. However, no matter the race, they all have in common that they remove all hair above the chest and instead decorate themselves with tattoos instead of eyebrows, beard and hair.

Given that they run a huge country, he Black Robes are not at all a secret organization, but they are very secretive. This coupled with their non-aggressive expansion (the establishing of embassies everywhere) without a purpose has caused a number of rumors about them and most common man outside of Uruak are very distrustful (and usually very afraid) of them. Yet some are inadvertently drawn to them, after all, they have a vast magical knowledge, especially of magical items.

Also, since their embassies are always considered Uruakian soil, local laws do not apply there. This fact is not widely known, but it has certainly come to some's attention that it can be significantly easier to procure certain items through the Black Robes.

The War of Opposition

The War of Opposition? Sure, I remember that. Fun times. A pity it was stopped so soon. I had a brilliant plan, just waiting for the right moment. But Eletha wants what Eletha wants. And what she wants, she gets. Always. 

The War of Opposition is a holy war between the church of Bahamut and the church of Bane, which lasted from 5779 to 5784.

To this day, it is still unclear, at least to those outside the two churches, what precipitated the war. Most sages think that it was something that happened elsewhere, in another part of the world, or perhaps in Heaven or Hell, that forced the hand of the churches. Contrary to popular opinion, it was actually Bahamut that officially instigated the war, declaring holy war against Bane.

For two years, the "war" was kept out of the cities and limited to fairly small skirmishes. Quite a few died, but only devout followers of the two churches. The situation in the Seven Army Nation was tense, but not untenable.

However that changed in 5781, and the first big - and perhaps the greatest - casualty of the war was the Temple of Bane in Ironville. For years, both gods had dominated the city life. Since the war had been announced, Ironville had been split down the middle, literally, until the church of Bahamut broke the deadlock. For months, they smuggled loyal soldiers and mercenaries into Ironville, in very small group so that no one would notice. When they had enough men, they attacked the temple of Bane. The temple, which had stood since before the Second Demon War, was sacked and all the Bane clerics were executed on the temple grounds.

From there, the war spread and swept through the Seven Army Nation. Old allies suddenly found themselves on opposite sides of the war, and the warlords were incapable of stopping the churches.

At some point, the war ceased to be about Bahamut and Bane, at least for the common man. It became an ideological fight of good vs evil, as more and more began to take sides.

Fast forwards to the end, in 5784. The Seven Army Nation was on the brink of complete and total war, the fragile alliance buckling beneath the pressure for the warlords to declare for one of the two churches.

Out of her wood came Eletha Moonray once again, this time to meet with the two high priests and a last attempt to stop the war. They met in Ironville, in the ruins of the Bane temple. Details of the meeting are sketchy, but the result is not. The war was stopped, documents were signed and sealed and a lot of gold changed hands between the churches. Also several temples were destroyed and consequently a lot of followers had to move their home. This is why no city or town in the Seven Army Nation holds both a church of Bane and Bahamut. Whether it was a demand of Eletha or some elaborate part of the deal struck, not many know for sure.

The Empire of Zun

The Empire of Zun started as a beautiful idea, at least in principle. When Zun rebelled and the people followed him, it was to make a better life for themselves. In some ways, I guess they did. At least no one is starving, everybody, or at least almost everybody, is equal. But do they like this life? I have visited more than one of the trade cities of Zun, and everyone I met seemed fed and in good health, but not one of them seemed happy. Resigned might be a better word for their state of mind. I do not know, but something is definitely off.

Maester Rickaff, Hall of Knowledge, year 5734

About 500 years ago, in the lands now part of the Empire of Zun, was a great many small kingdoms, all led by greedy and self-centered kings. In one of those kingdoms lived a monk named Eric Zun. He belonged to the Temple of the Earth Dragon, a temple built on principles of helping each other and sharing with those who had less.

After 10 years at the temple, Zun took upon himself a pilgrimage around the kingdom, visiting the many remote villages, most of which were struggling with hunger. What he saw broke his heart so much that he travelled straight to the capital and gained audience with the king. Zun passionately told the king about the state of his country. He thought that surely the king, who had so much, had to be unaware of how bad things were out there. But when he had finished his story, the king merely laughed and told him to leave.

Zun left, now determined to do something. On his trip home, he devised an idea on how to help people. He simply applied the principles of the Temple of the Earth Dragon more broadly and to everybody, Zun convinced his village to do so. The concept was simple to understand. Everybody would share everything they owned equally, all decisions would be taken in unison, for the good of all.

Of course, that meant rebelling against the king and refusing to pay taxes. But once implemented, the concept spread like wildfire, from village to village. It worked, mostly because since everybody were suddenly accountable for the collective wealth, everybody worked harder and helped each other more. There was as synergy at work that most had never experienced before.

Civil war followed, and once that was won, the neighbor kingdom soon followed, and then another and yet another. Zun died of old age, many years later, but at that time, there was already an Empire of Zun. Empire might not be the most correct way to describe what they have, but it was the name chosen.

Of course things had already changed somewhat during his lifespan. There were a lot of laws, for the common good, jobs were assigned to a person when he came of age, houses were torn down and rebuilt so that everyone lived in exactly the same way and each area had a committee appointed to make the big decisions. Since then, many more things have changed, for example, the inhabitants of the Empire of Zun no longer worship the gods. In fact, as far as we know, they do not worship anything, except perhaps the common good, the collective. But it is hard to know, as few of them travel outside of Zun and even fewer of them speak of how things work there.

Notes about the campaign

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