The Time Has Come

The adventure continues in Dexin, where the group is preparing to go to Yarafad’s lair and rescue Choranus.  Trinity has caught back up with the group, so they head back to the Temple of Choranus to pick up the head priest, who leads them uneventfully to the foot of Yarafad’s lair in the mountains to the northeast.  He leaves them partway up the mountain at the foot of a large stairway, where he provides them 3 scrolls of Protection from Evil and information about a phrase that might be helpful to the group – “The time has come”.

The group then proceeds up the rest of the stairway to an inverted pyramid that is carved out of the mountain.  

Standing guard at the opening to the pyramid are 2 Minotaurs who see the group, but do not really seem to care much.

After some small talk in Giant, Florence says “The time has come”.  The Minotaurs respond by knocking an odd series of knocks on the door and then leave – literally just walking right by the group and heading down the stairs.

The group is trying to decide how to handle this when the door opens and a monstrous Minotaur comes out.  He says in Giant – “You Chosen – the time has come”, and then proceeds to attack them with his great axe.

The group defeats him and heads in to the room.  Theon, during the process of decapitation, notices that the Minotaur has a black pearl for one of his eyes and takes it.

The room is clearly the Minotaur’s room; there is a large sleeping pallet in the northeast corner, a huge maze painted on the north wall, a chest near the southeast corner, and a large Minotaur statue in the northwest corner holding a hammer.

It is observed that the statue has no eyes (just sockets), and the black pearl from the Minotaur outside fits perfectly.  They surmise that another pearl is needed, and that it will be in the chest.

The group discovers that there is a trap on the chest that will launch a javelin at them, which they are able to disable, and a second trap that will activate a magical fire in a large cone.  The group votes Remy to deactivate it, since he has the Ring of Torag (helps to absorb fire and reduce fire damage).  He opens the trap from behind it, which was a good – although futile – idea, since the trap was in the wall behind the chest.

The ring absorbs the damage though and amongst the treasures the group finds a black pearl ring.

They pop off the pearl and stick it in the other eye of the statue, which activates it.  The statue turns and starts smashing the wall behind it, opening a hole large enough for the group to move through, then turns back to stone (including the black pearl eyes, unfortunately).

The room behind appears to be a dusty old dining room,

with nothing of note in it other than a spiral stairway heading to the second floor.  The group heads up.

At the top of the stairs is a long landing to the west which leads to a door to the south.

The group opens the door to find a nice sitting room with comfortable chairs and some end tables with pitchers of healing potion in it.  

(It is surprising to me that no one speculated that pitchers of healing potion might be a bad omen for what was about to happen.)  There is plain door to the south and a black door to the west with gold speckles throughout.

The group heads through the black door,

behind which is a room with 6 hanging practice dummies (casting lots of shadows from the torches), 

and 3 mirrors with large diamonds at the top of each (North, East, and South walls).  Almost immediately, Remy is the victim of a Magic Jar spell cast by a Shadow Demon,

which sends his soul into one of the gems (the East gem).  The shadow demon possesses Remy’s body and slams Emrys into the wall.  A few of the group aren’t in the room yet and don’t notice, a few have entered and confront Remy, and Trinity just quietly starts prying the North diamond off of the mirror.

Remy begins attacking the group, who then try (at varying levels of success) to hurt/grapple Remy (including an arrow to the shoulder).  Remy (the Shadow Demon) even tells them at this point that they need to kill him or destroy the jar, or he’s going to kill them all.

(Note:  When the priest of Choranus gave the group the scrolls of Protection from Evil, someone asked what they did, and Ryan mentioned that they prevent various mind/spirit type attacks from evil creatures.  I was hoping someone would remember this and cast one on Remy to kick out the Shadow Demon.  Alternately, had someone performed various knowledge or spellcraft checks, especially once the phrase “jar” had been uttered, the group almost certainly would have learned that destroying the jar would have released Remy back into his body.  It was actually a complete coincidence that Remy was standing next to the Jar diamond (the one on the East wall) when he was possessed; it was just a die roll, but I assume that would have been the one the group would have destroyed.)

Once the group has subdued Remy (and Trinity has popped off the first diamond, breaking her dagger in the process),

the Shadow returns Remy’s spirit to his body and casts a Deeper Darkness spell, bringing the room to an almost complete unnatural darkness, and telepathically whispers “the time has come” in the group’s ears.  Most of the group decides to bail at this point, although Trinity decides the darkness is a good cover for popping off the other 2 diamonds.  Desna and Ang stay in the room with her, while the rest of the group heads out and through the south door (thinking everyone came out with them).

Through the south door is a library, with an old librarian sitting at a desk on the south wall.

He looks up thoughtfully at the group and says “You’re here for it, aren’t you?”  The group responds “Yes”, and follows up with “The time has come”.  The old man nods knowingly, picks up his old lantern and hobbles over to the east wall, where he smashes the lamp on the wall, setting the closest bookshelf on fire.  The group responds quickly with a water spell that saves the bookshelf.  However, the fire was not put out before the old man steps back into the fire, says “The time has come”, and his skin melts off to reveal a huge fire elemental.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch, the Shadow demon has cast a Wall of Ice in the doorway,

trapping Trinity, Ang, and Desna.  Luckily the Shadow rolled very poorly and Trinity didn’t notice how close to death she came while popping off the East wall diamond.  At this point, Florence uses a sonic spell to shatter the ice wall (Note: people seemed surprised that such a thick wall could be shattered so easily, but it was actually a shadow conjuration, so it was 80% weaker than normal, making it fairly easy to break), and Desna used her Spiritual Weapon to start firing at the Shadow Demon.

In the library, a battle has ensued with the Fire elemental.  During this battle, Desna’s Spiritual weapon does some damage to the Shadow Demon, which, being incorporeal, the demon is not used to, so he teleports to the library, unexpectedly appearing basically next to a living fireball, which greatly weakens him.  The group then quickly finishes off both the Fire Elemental and the Shadow Demon.  The library seems to have lots of random books and scrolls (ship captain logs, tax records, etc.), but upon closer inspection many of them have prophetic insertions that seem to mention “The Chosen” a lot.  The group realizes this is a task for the Pathfinders, and focuses more on the usable scrolls they find (Excruciating Disfigurement, Analyze Dweomer, Waves of Ecstacy, and Create Treasure Map).  Also, there is an accounting of the 3 diamonds from the Shadow room by the Monster Hunter, to make sure that Trinity hasn’t accidentally taken one without telling them.

The group then goes through a door to the west, to find a long passageway leading up to the third level.  As they are climbing the stairway, Emrys notices a small device in the wall which when activated opens a secret door behind the stairway.  The group goes through to find a long passageway that is essentially an art gallery,

with many paintings of a grand wizard in battle (presumed to be Yarafad), demons, demon lords, Choranus in pain, etc.  They avoid a trap that would drop them out of the bottom of the pyramid and at the end of the hallway a beautiful archway appears for a few moments that Florence is able to associate with Choranus.

A few of the group (Remy, Theon, and Ang) walk under it before it disappears, giving them True Sight for the next few hours (although they did not notice anything at this point).

They then take the stairway up into what is essentially an arena - sand floor and cheering crowd (sound only),

with a cage for monsters in the southeast and a viewing platform on the south wall (some people notice a large figure watching from the platform, but it’s hard to see details.  There is also a large puddle of blood in the middle of the arena.  Those with True-Seeing can see a massive amount of magical symbols all over the walls and ceiling.

A big-ass Manticore comes out of the cage and attacks,

but he’s taken out pretty quickly.  During that fight, the pool of blood congeals into a man-like shape – a blood golem – and also attacks the group,

but is also taken out fairly quickly.  At this point, the figure on the platform ascends some stairs in the east wall.  In the Manticore cage the group finds some small treasure and a +1 Ring of Protection.

The group climbs to the platform and up the stairs, to the roof of the inverted pyramid.  They see a door to the North, into the mountain, and a small room that sits on the top of the pyramid.  They enter through the door and find Choranus, chained to poles as seen in both the temple basement and the art gallery below, shaven and bloody.  They also see a throne on the south wall with a large demon sitting on it, and a chest next to the throne.  Those with True-Seeing can see that there is actually a crippled wizard sitting on the shoulders of a Nabasu demon,

and as the wizard realizes the gig is up right away, he has the demon set him on the throne and speaks to the group.

In a nutshell, Yarafad tells them that he has been crippled his whole life (surprisingly, no one brings up the art below that shows Yarafad in grand warrior fashion – clearly some artistic license was taken there), and was basically approached by demons at a young age to help him get back at those who tortured him for being a cripple.  He then makes demonology the study of his life, getting stronger and stronger, to the point where he even began travelling abyssal planes and met once with a Demon Lord.

It was even demons that showed him how to make the shackles that hold Choranus.

At some point in his life, he discovered there was a large amount of prophecy regarding him and his ascension to power, and became a collector, trying to understand the future.  Through this prophecy, he came to know that the group would come to his lair on this day to free Choranus, and this would be the day he would die.  At this point he seems a little confused, analyzes the group, then asks Desna “Are you the Archer or the Healer?”, to which Desna responds “Both”.  Yarafad is not happy with this answer, but decides whatever his issue is, it’s not worth pursuing.

He tells the group that the keys to unlocking Choranus are in the chest next to him, and that by opening the chest, they will kill him, which he seems oddly ok with.  The group opens the chest, and there is a maelstrom of wind in the room, basically forming a mini-tornado.  Half of the wind comes from Yarafad himself, which is a black smoke, and the other half comes from the chest, which is a white smoke.

The smokes whirl rapidly around each other, until they blend into a grey smoke ball, which starts bouncing around the room.  Those with True-Seeing can also see that the entire room is completely coated in magical runes (similar to the arena, but much more dense), as well as lots of lines and angles that meet at specific nexuses.

The Nabasu demon

walks under a point in the ceiling with the most dense nexus of lines, and strikes upward with his weapon, breaking a huge hole in the ceiling and releasing the smoke ball to go shooting into the night.  The demon then turns to the group and says in Abyssal – “Master says you are the Chosen, and I’m not to hurt the Chosen”, and then he disappears.

In the chest, the group finds the key to unlock Choranus and a scroll.  They unlock Choranus from her binds, but initially she is fairly unresponsive.  They open the scroll to find an ancient text stating:

The time has come…

The blood is spilled

The Chosen are marked

All Hail the Chosen

The time has come…

The child is born

The Lord is released

All Fear the Chosen

The time has come…

Geysers of blood will cover you

Screams of the innocent will haunt you

All Praise the Chosen…. and despair

The group at this point notices that all of them have a strange green marking/tattoo encircling their left ring fingers (kindof like a Celtic Knot).  Despite anyone’s best efforts, these marks seem permanent.

Once they are done reading, Choranus is back in action.  She’s clean, hair’s back, etc., but she indicates to the group that something’s just not right.  All she can do to repay them for freeing her is to give them a diamond with a Wish in it – to use the wish they just need to break open the diamond.  Then she vanishes.

The group leaves the room and heads through the door in the mountain, which is basically just a winding passageway back down to the base of the pyramid.  They find the priest of Choranus there as well as some Pathfinders, whom the priest summoned when the group went into the Pyramid.

The Pathfinders collect all of the books and scrolls from the Library, and everyone heads back to the main Pathfinder headquarters on the eastern side of the Center.  It takes a couple of weeks of analysis before the Pathfinders have anything to share with the group.  In trying to transcribe and link the different prophecies, it seems that the following has been determined (some of this is historical/known information to give context):

-          Demons are not created; rather they are born by the spirits of evil beings when they die.  The type and magnitude of the evil determine the demon (i.e. A lustful man or woman might turn into an Incubus or Succubus)

-          In rare cases, someone is evil enough that they might become a nascent Demon Lord (the difference between a nascent Demon Lord and an actual one being the amount of Abyssal land and armies they own.)

-          Yarafad was evil enough that his spirit would create a nascent Demon Lord.  Additionally, his spirit was combined with hundreds of years of Choranus’ suffering (which was captured in the chest), so the combined evil and suffering probably created the most powerful nascent Demon Lord yet.

-          Something unusual happened during his death though – due to the magical runes surrounding the room where he died, his spirit was unable to enter the Abyss.  This caused the nascent Demon Lord to stay in the Material Plane.  The breaking of the seals on the room by the Nabasu demon allowed the spirit to flee and find a body to inhabit.

-          This has happened in the past a couple of times before, and each time the Demon Lord was driven back to the Abyss by a collection of heroes referred to as the Chosen.

-          It appears this situation is unusual in that the term Chosen is also referred to by the bad guys as the group that would release Yarafad’s spirit when the Time Had Come, so it seems for the first time in history, the good Chosen and the bad Chosen are the same people.

-          There seem to be two specific wildcards in the prophecies.  The first is that there seems to be something unusual about the body that will be (already is?) inhabited by the new Demon Lord.  Historically, the basic human-ness of the body put a limitation on the Demon Lord’s power, helping to level the playing field with the Chosen.  Something seems different about this body that may prevent this limitation, although they have not been able to track that down yet.

-          The other wildcard is an apparent missing Chosen.  The Pathfinders, similarly to Yarafad, analyze the group and eventually ask Desna if she is the Archer or the Healer (to which she again replies “both”).  While this didn’t seem to bother Yarafad too much, the Pathfinders have a specific passage where the Archer hands something to the Healer, indicating that they must be two separate people.  The prophecies clearly state that “The Chosen were there from the beginning”, so it’s unclear who might be the missing Chosen.

The Pathfinders will continue to do research to clarify the prophecies, but in the meantime there is some bad news about problems in the southern city of Magnamar that might be related to the Chosen and their upcoming quest to banish the new Demon Lord they have set upon the world.

To be Continued…