Episode 26: And sometimes you fail

When we last left this party we had an extra soul with us in the form of one of the local nobles, Sir Esteval. We were tasked with going under the Grand Cathedral to secure the mausoleum while a more powerful team went upstairs to deal with the Lich. As a reminder, this party consists of:

Unit 2408, the Warforged (humanoid living construct) Barbarian

Luthis, the Kenku (humanoid raven who can not fly) Blood Hunter

Dancing Wind, a Tabaxi (humanoid cat) Wizard

Morlech, a Human Druid with a penchant for fire

Evangeline, the Tiefling Paladin of Tyr

After clearing out the main mausoleum of zombies the party paused to catch their breath. Unfortunately the necromancer went down another set of stairs to a 3rd level below Waterdeep.

But we're also isolated under the Cathedral with a major battle going on overhead, so we make the decision to return upstairs to gain intelligence and make sure the good guys weren't losing. One wouldn't want to be trapped underground in enemy territory afterall.

Quickly making our way back up to the Cathedral lobby we find Sir Esteval's two guards still controlling the stairway. They report it has been quiet for them. We find Waterdeep troops in control of the lobby, taking care of wounded, and the like, so things are fairly secure for now. At this point Sir Esteval decides to stay on the surface to help organize the ground troops and care of wounded, while the party dives back down under the Cathedral once more. He does leave his two guards at the stairway for now since things aren't completely secure yet.

Returning to the desecrated chapel one level below the Cathedral, Dancing Wind pipes up with the fact he wants to return to that hidden tomb to look for something that would help him. Evangeline was not a fan of this idea as one should never desecrate a holy resting place. But, as he promised to not disturb this soul's resting place, and he agreed that Evangeline can follow him and watch him like a hawk, they decide to once again enter the hidden tomb.

The instant Evangeline enters the tomb, an apparition appears and starts addressing her. Sir Rondal the Mighty, former Hand of Tyr, rests here. She, immediately, goes into formal kneeling knight position. He was the Hand of Tyr during the Ogre wars decades (centuries?) ago, successfully defending Waterdeep during that time.

He states that there is great danger to Waterdeep and that there are foul undead about still, so he wishes to gift her with his holy mace* to assist in this endeavor. A mace then zips across the small room, causing Dancing Wind to move very quickly out of the flying mace's way, into Evangeline's hand. The apparition then disappears.

Evangeline then grabs Dancing Wind and backs out of the tomb, closing the door. The party decides to continue after the Necromancer at this point. Down the second set of stairs into the main mausoleum, through it, to the third set of stairs down with no issue.

Proceeding a little more cautiously at this point we traverse the stairs down to find a hallway leading to an opening to what appears to be a room. We do hear voices though, so Luthis does his stealth and proceeds ahead to get the scope of the land. Evangeline pulls out her new mace as it offers light as well as undead destroying capabilities.

He overhears a voice berating someone for failing to destroy the party from Waterdeep and ritualistic chanting. A quick look shows a man in armor, 2 elite skeleton guards, the necromancer, and some sort of ritual underway involving a dwarf on an alter and torture.

So he hurries back to us and informs us of this information. Being in a 10' wide hallway, Unit 2408 and Evangeline decide to take the lead and walk up the hall to the doorway to block it and kill the melee troops.

That plan almost worked, we were heading down the hallway as the man in armor and the two elite skeleton guards enter the hallway and it was fight time.

Unit 2408 and Evangeline wade in to do in to do their part in destroying the armored guy and the two elite skeleton guards. Handy having an undead fighting mace when facing those two guards. Unit 2408 and Evangeline both realize though the armored guy isn't just a fighter, he's a paladin. An oath breaker paladin. Evangeline doesn't know if she wants to kill the skeletons or him more at this point.

Luthis goes to work with his deadly bow, raining destruction down. We really want to kill these things quickly so we can get into the ritual room. Dancing Wind adds to the chaos of course, and Morlech summons a fire friend to do damage as well.

At one point we had damaged one of the elite skeleton guards pretty heavily and in one final massive blow Evangeline destroys the guard. And when you destroy an undead with this weapon, you truly disintegrate things. After several taunts and many blows exchanged though, the oathbreaker escapes.

So the party hauls tail into the ritual room, unfortunately too late. The dwarf on the alter is unmoving. The necromancers are gone. And the crypt in the middle of the room is opened.

Unit 2408 and Dancing Wind proceed to investigate the crypt while Luthis inspects the whole room. Evangeline checks on the dwarf, confirming the poor soul is dead. Looking at his attire, she realizes that he was in service to Bahamut. He's one of the good guys. She says a quick prayer over him but leaves his body there as she doesn't know their rituals.

The rest of the party figures out there was something not quite right about the former occupant of the crypt in the middle of the room, so Unit 2408 uses his absurd strength to pry off the placard to take topside.

“Herein lies the Lord of Hollows,

Dalagor the Cold,

Master of the City of Skulls,

May he slumber here for a thousand thousand years,

And wake no more to Doom the world."

Realizing that this was the last room in the mausoleum, we wrap things up and head back up through the main room to the small chapel. The two guards are still doing their job, so we confirm to them the area is now secure. They head back up topside to find their liege.

We return topside as well and take in the scene. It is very quiet, aside from the normal post combat sounds of organizing, pain, and exhaustion. Looking about we find an older human with nicer robes that is probably one of the leaders of the Cathedral and approach him.

After a bit of back and forth with us trying to report in and a lot going on so he initially misunderstands what we are saying, the poor fellow turns far paler than he should be and almost faints. Recovering, he sends one of the pages he had summoned to find Rubis, and asked us to follow him as this shouldn't be talked about in the open.

We find ourselves in a small study. While waiting for Rubis, the priest pulls out some liquor and takes a swig. "Hope you don't mind, medicinal purposes of course, would you like some?" He then offers it to the party, as well as some bread and water. A couple people do partake, but Evangeline waves it off "Tyr's justice requires a clear head."

Once Rubis arrives they proceed to tell us what he knows about "Dalagar the Cold". It is not good. He was building his own undead army in the City of Skulls, but it was so long ago no one knows where that is or if it is a real place. The fact that Dalagar the Cold is once again loose is definitely a problem. So is that oathbreaker Paladin for that matter. But he promises to have Bahamut's order take care of the deceased dwarf properly.

Rubis fills us in that the Lich has been dealt with for now, and that The Hand of Tyr has returned. Him and his troops have taken up positions defending the north wall against the incoming undead army, but that's a problem for another day as we are all exhausted. He does look rather tapped, as does our party, but Evangeline was briefly tempted to go join him on the wall.

He takes us back to Blackstaff tower, which is surprisingly intact, and escorts us to the office room we were in before. There, a group of unseen servants had laid out proper food and we continued our debriefing, plus there were rooms for us to rest in.

Dancing Wind proceeds to scare the crap out of Rubis at this point, talking openly about being an apprentice of Halaster at one point. Our Tabaxi friend took a "full ride scholarship" to an unknown school of magic. And apparently Halaster doesn't have a sense of humor and didn't like his hijinks, so Dancing Wind is now cursed. Rubis stares at Evangeline a moment, "Really?!". She just shrugs and says "He may be pure chaos, but my divine sense says he's not evil. None of us do."

After some more chatter and winding down, Rubis summons Jarvis. He appears to be some sort of butler. "Jarvis here can show you to rooms where you will be safe for tonight."

"Rubis, do you by chance have a bath tub or bathing room in here somewhere? Unfortunately through the course of the past couple of days, I still have bits of the late Elniss in my hair." We all startle as Dancing Wind starts sobbing, loudly. But Jarvis gets us to our various rooms and Evangeline does get her bath.

And with that, we're caught back up to current games! More soon!