Daelkyr Forces, Adoption Choices, & Jewelry Sightings

GREETINGS EVERYONE!

Welcome back to the Lore Master’s blog for The Tales of Umbra Victus! Your Neurodivergent-friendly recap of what your favorite crazy adventuring party has been up to! You’re probably all as anxious to get back into this as we were to get back after being left on that DRAGON of a cliffhanger!

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A DRAGON’S PREROGATIVE

Sinking down into the realm of Khyber to join our adventurers, Vraak, had turned the corner & exposed more of her body, showing Umbra Victus and their traveling companions that she was not only an Ancient Green Dragon, but an Ancient Green Dracolich with nothing but rotting flesh & bones hanging from her mammoth frame. Everyone but Talia shows deference to this creature who towers over them in every conceivable way. Unphased, the Gnome stepped forward - making herself appear as she had in her dreams of the Clan Druids - and displayed an image of the dimensional Seals that they are trying to save, showing as much bravado as a tiny 3’ body can. Seeing this, Vraak told them that their mission of saving the seals was “simple thinking” and “foolish”, beckoning the party to follow her to her lair, where she continued to tell Umbra Victus that Xoriat itself doesn’t make sense, that the Seals exist in a state of duality: both broken & unbroken, because time doesn’t work there like it does in Eberron. Loosely translated, that means that the Dalkyr aren’t as sealed as everyone involved has anticipated. After her monologue, she called out an associate named Gaari, a Githyanki appearing to be in her service, who explained why Vraak now had the desire to see the Dimensional Seals binding Xoriat fail. They both desire to re-write time so the Gith may once again hunt the Dalkyr, and travel will once again be possible to Xoriat, effectively ending life as it is currently known on Eberron. In addition to keeping these secrets, it was also revealed that she was closely guarding a stanza of the Draconic Prophecy that she regarded as her own & had particular interest in seeing come to pass. Talia recites the stanza that she heard when she touched the Sul Katesh dragonshard in Fairhaven, and Vraak seems interested, but says hers is different. Vraak looking upward, our adventurers following her gaze, toward scratches into the ceiling of her cave that she proceeds to translate to the following:

“If the Champion of the Silver Flame

kills the High Cardinal on the Day of Ascension,

The binds will break”

Staring at the scratches, Talia copies them down, along with the translation given by Vraak, in the hopes that one more piece of the Prophecy puzzle will be useful in the future.

After this reveal, Umbra Victus continued to probe Vraak for information, asking questions regarding the Illithid that they had encountered, which would appear to be a common enemy between them, and discussing working together in the future against the Daelkyr forces. In further trying to gain her trust & possible allyship, the party asks what sent her into hiding in the first place, and it came out that her soul is no longer bound to her physical being, causing her current situation. That revelation culminated in Sir Valerian making a simple inquiry about where her soul might be, and how “such a glorious creature could be in such a state of decay”. Unluckily enough, this ended up being pure offense to the vain nature of a green dragon, resulting in her telling the whole party that she willingly gave up the hold on her soul so that she could live to see the failing of the Dimensional Seals, and what lies beyond. To gather more information. And with a pointed warning of “You saw nothing, I am dead” to the Druids Umaak & Vaan, she kicks everyone out of her chambers, and into the corridor, where weirdness ensues.

FORCED PERSPECTIVE

When they check out the tunnel, Talia realizes that they are in a very similar situation to a traumatic experience in her past, when she was in Khyber before. The corridor was not how they left it; there is now a fork in the cave where there wasn’t one before. After some brief deliberation, Valerian decides to flip a coin to decide which way they should go, and his coin ends up on the ceiling, rather than back in his hand. Attempting to scramble up the wall after it, he ends up standing on the ceiling. Reaching for something she half remembers, Talia turns to the wall and walks halfway up & stops. Using both her and Valerian’s hanging braids as a sort of compass, she works through a plan to get them out of the tunnel, which she ends up being able to name as a manifest zone to Xoriat. They all must walk in a line together, in a repeating, swirling pattern that tracks from the floor, around the walls & then over the ceiling and back again, much like the stripes on a candy cane. Coming to the end of that tunnel, they end up on the beach of the Keeper’s Maw, which was - coincidentally - exactly where Orianna’s patron needed them to go. Umaak grew a tree on the beach, and wanted to immediately leave. After some convincing, Umbra Victus strikes a deal with Vaan to wait until Kor & Orianna contact the Leviathan, and then to bring them back to the Keeper’s Maw via that tree at a later time.

As Kor joins Orianna in her communicative trance, the Leviathan shows them both a merfolk city under the water with a Key that she orders Orianna to retrieve for her, an obligation to her pact. After they come out of it, everyone heads back to Umaak & Vaan’s hut, and Umbra Victus now has some work to do to prepare for an underwater excursion. The Druids leave on foot to get answers from the Gatekeeper Druids, unclear as to their return plans. Contingency plans are made, and while gathering supplies & means for breathing underwater for those not blessed by an ancient sea creature, Valerian begins to get more information via his mark in regards to an old foe, powerfully calling him North, back toward the Keeper’s Maw. This new twist further binds them together, Valerian pledging his sword to Orianna’s obligation, and making his mis-step against her on the ship less important in comparison to the path that has been laid out before them. Beginning to more fully understand the predicament they are in, Umbra Victus prepares to turn the Orc’s hut into their base of operations for the foreseeable future.

PREPARE THE PREPARATIONS

Running with this plan of action, the party plans to head into town the following morning to obtain provisions to sustain themselves as they wait for word from the Druids on what everything they learned from Vraak actually means. Before the evening is out, Kor & Orianna had a conversation regarding the kiss the Tiefling stole before they ventured into Khyber, which resulted in some very deep emotional reveals from Orianna, and some heartbreaking, real connection. As they came inside, everyone engaged in some much needed lighthearted decompression with Ice Whiskey from the Alchemy Jug, belching snow and pelting each other with snowballs, attempting to dissipate some of the day’s tensions and stress.

In the morning, as they head into Zarash’aak proper, Valerian splits off to attempt to find some meats, while the Vixens head to the docks and then into the shops to locate some staples: eggs, bread, flour, spices, vegetables. After realizing that a lot of the staples are closely controlled by House Tharashk, the Dragonmarked House that controls this port city, they are directed to a shop run by someone called Oyou, who happens to be an adorable, small goblin child, about 2 years old, that just so happened to have just about everything on their list. Kor, Orianna, and Talia all end up desperately wanting to protect this little child, and when he immediately closes up shop to sprint off in an attempt to find them flour, they agree not to tell Valerian how they procured the items in an effort to keep the Paladin’s ‘better nature’ from creating a problem where there wasn’t really one. Heading back to the hut, the party reconvened over a well-prepared brunch using some of the supplies they were able to obtain. After brunch, Kor & Orianna went to blow off some steam via sparring and *ahem* having a roll in the grass. Meanwhile, Talia & Valerian head off into the woods to forage for some local flora & fauna, locating an extremely rare type of berry which could come in handy later.

UNWELCOME VISITORS

While the party headed back to the hut from foraging and sparring, an eerie hush fell over the woods, the surrounding fields, and in the distance, the split party all separately notice an Illithid, and their thralls, whom our adventurers ultimately recognized as the escaped cultists from the Eternal Dawn. At that point, a portal flung open in a nearby tree and Umaak & Vaan barreled through, returning from their excursion to the Gatekeeper Druids’ lands with an older half orc none of them recognized. Umaak, not knowing what was going on, cast Thunderwave at the Illithid, initiating combat. With the help of the three Druids, Umbra Victus successfully, and soundly, defeated the Mind Flayer and their thralls, searching their bodies to find a Ring of Spell Turning that wasn’t “quite right” after Talia identified it, among other useful things. After the battle, the other Druid was revealed to be Dhak, the leader of the Gatekeeper Druid tribes, and he walked over, picked up Talia by her face, and called her “an imperfection” due to the Blood Seal that was cast upon her family line, dropped her, and stormed off into the hut.

Once everyone had arrived back at the hut, Dhaak elaborated on the Blood Seal magic that had been performed by Umaak & Vaan as a bolster to help strengthen the failing Dimensional Seals. He explained that it was ‘wrong’ & instead of increasing the protection, it added another layer of complication to the matter, as it is one more form of magic to be corrupted by the forces of the Daelkyr, thus allowing another possible way for the forces of Xoriat to make their way into the Material Plane. After Dhak has finished ripping the Clan Druids up one side and down the other, he leaves heading back from whence he came, with no love lost between him and the rest of the party, considering how he had acted upon arrival. After further discussion, and emphatic pressing from the gnome, the conversation with Umaak & Vaan that followed his departure was very illuminating, showing that they had not only lied about Talia’s mother, Jade, willingly participating in the Blood Seal ritual, but that they had actively tricked tricked her into participating, now possibly endangering her entire bloodline. During the course of this conversation, the Clan Druids also revealed that the magic used to perform the Blood Seal ritual was stolen. However, when pressed they could not implicate the source directly, could not even speak its name aloud. When a piece of paper is offered to instead write down some clue, Vaan instead takes her staff & writes “H-A-G” in the dirt to communicate in good faith the source of the stolen magic. After that conversation, parting on unfriendly, but understanding terms, Vaan agreed to still take them to the Keeper’s Maw when the time came, and the Umbra Victus headed back toward the Eternal Dawn, with Talia contacting Jorlin via sending stone on the way to see what he knew about these new revelations.

A NEW PLAYER ENTERS THE CHAT...

As the party hits the downtown area of Zarash’ak, they literally run into Oyou, who is being chased by the House Tharashk guards. As a distraction, he threw the flour he had successfully located in Talia’s face & sprinted off in the opposite direction with Orianna hot on his heels. After some brief convincing of Sir Valerian, he speaks to the guards, convincing them to spare their little goblin friend from a full run-in with the Dragonmarked House, and once they are alone, the Vixens ask Oyou to come along on their adventure with them, effectively adopting him. He agrees enthusiastically, tearing down his whole “shop”, and dumping all his contents & worldly possessions into a freshly infused bag of holding courtesy of Talia.

Umbra Victus returns to the Eternal Dawn with their new goblin companion/child in tow, and after a brief conversation of where to go next with Captain Damian, they are left alone in his office for a moment. Ever the opportunist, Orianna uses it to her advantage, and inspects the contents of his desk, finding an Amulet of Proof Against Detection in one of the drawers. This is an item that Talia had been in-search of in hopes to hide or shield some of the “beacon” energy that she seemed to be giving off, presumably by being part of the Blood Seal. Orianna is convinced to leave the necklace where it lay, in order to not break their budding trust with the Captain, but this initiates a battle of wits between the gnome and the Captain, to see if she can convince him to allow her to procure that necklace for her own use.

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And this is where we leave our adventurers for now; what comes next for the freshly minted parents of Umbra Victus? You’ll just have to join us next time to find out!

Until then, be respectful to each other, we love you, and we’ll see you next time. Byeeeeee <3