Session 101

As the party sleeps the night away, Merrick completes his meditation and begins to read through his Book of Shadows. At some point during the night, his candle blows out and the room grows black as the night sky. He hears a guttural groaning behind him and turns to find the eyes of The Deep One staring at him from the darkness with the barely perceptible forms of something twitching about in the darkness. He asks the Deep One what he wants, and the Deep One tells him that he knows Merrick will be going to the Royal Court soon, and has three tasks for him. He tells Merrick he must seek information about how succession is determined for the Dwarven throne when a king dies; the names of all of the Imperium Arcanum's governmental officials; and knowledge of how to create Aetherstorm Alloy. The Deep One tells Merrick that if he does not bring at least one of these pieces of information to him, then he will "dispose of him", but that if he brings more than one piece of information to him, he will reward him. As Merrick starts to ask him a question, the Deep One recedes into the darkness and leaves without another word. Disturbed by this, he waits out the night, trying to continue reading. In the morning, the party gathers in the hallway and realizes Gardain is not in his room. They head down to the dining area and find Gardain speaking to an Ashenfolk that they recognize as being an associate of Marnia's. They speak with the two, learning the Ashenfolk's name is Belgar, and he says that Marnia has been sent to The Vault and is scheduled for execution in two weeks. He says that a member of the Underminers must have betrayed them and they had planted a Runetech surveillance device in Marnia's home, and had heard their conversation plotting to overthrow King Rangrim. He says that the window to get into the Royal Court to confront King Rangrim is closing, and they don't have the time to be mounting a rescue mission, so they'll need to proceed and hope they can find a way to earn Marnia a pardon once King Rangrim is dealt with. He goes on to say that the defenses of the Royal Court are pretty airtight and that there's a large contingent of Runeguard in residence, and if they have any hope of getting in to confront King Rangrim, they'll need to provide a distraction in the hopes of luring out some of the Royal Court's Runeguard. To that end, he suggests that the evidence Dain found could be handed over to him and he could disseminate the knowledge of what King Rangrim has been up to in order to stoke a fire under the citizens of Shimmerwind and cause a riot. He suggests sneaking into the Royal Court while the Runeguard are occupied dealing with the riot, but that once inside, it is certain that King Rangrim will seal the Court. Balvin says that the Court has large metallic shields that slide out from the sides to cover the entry doors that are an alloy of steel and Zegrumite, so they will be unable to teleport inside or get inside through other magical means, and that magic will be difficult to begin with due to low levels of Flow. Dain remembers the talismans that Jeryl gave him and shows them to Belgar, who is astonished to see a relic of his people outside of The Ashlands. He says this will be an incredibly helpful tool, and suggests that they use one of them to get through the shielding. Finally, he tells the group that he has called in for backup from the rest of the Underminers, and one member in particular will be arriving to help once they get inside the Royal Court, but that he doesn't know the man so he can't say whether he'll be reliable -- saying that all he knows of the man is that he is one of his people; that is to say, an Ashenfolk. With that, Belgar points out that the sleazy innkeeper has been listening in, and nonchalantly says he's off to go kill him now. Summer, amused, offers him her Dagger of Certain Death, to which he gleefully accepts, leaping over the table and chasing the innkeeper into the next room before a scream is heard. Belgar re-emerges, wiping the bloodied dagger on his pants and handing it back to Summer, telling the party not to worry, as the man was involved in some nefarious dealings anyway, as all in this area are known to be. Afterwards, Merrick took a moment to tell the party of his nocturnal encounter with the Deep One and his list of demands. Dain recognized one of the demands, specifically that he wanted to know about Aetherstorm Alloy, as dangerous, and told Merrick that it was a critical component of Flow Cells, and under no circumstances was he to tell the Deep One anything about it.

Belgar asks the party to wait while he spreads the information of King Rangrim's actions and not to go out on the streets, as they'll know their faces by now, and suggests locking up the inn. He points out however that Rylin, being a new addition to the party, would likely not be known, and perhaps he could go purchase some clothes to disguise their appearances enough to safely travel to the Royal Court when the time comes. He leaves saying he has propaganda to spread. With that, Rylin heads out, giving the party a secret knock to identify himself, and heads to the market to find a clothier. Walking through the now snow-covered streets, he finds a small shop with a woman putting clothing out on display, and asks her for help picking out some warm clothing, as Rylin's group's clothing had fallen out of their cart on their journey and they had nothing to wear. The woman gladly accepted and gathered up some clothing for the group. After Rylin paid for the clothing and head back to the inn, along the way he spotted several posters depicting drawings of the general appearance of each of the party members with "WANTED" written on them, offering rewards for their capture. Rylin took a moment to use his Emerald Pen to doodle on each of the posters, ruining their appearances, before heading back to the others. Giving the secret knock, Merrick answered the door, and Rylin produced one of his artworks, the defaced wanted posters, and told Merrick they just couldn't see to get the giant wart on his face right. The party tried on their disguises, and Gardain noted with annoyance that his clothing seemed to be designed with a woman in mind, and that he looked ridiculous. While the rest of the party waited for Belgar to return, Summer took her new disguise out onto the streets to go find Nuggie, whom she had left in Marnia's house, and was hoping had escaped into the streets. Walking around and seeing the Runeguard still swarming Marnia's home, she managed to track Nuggie's paw prints in the snow to an alley where she saw Nuggie being chased by some other dogs. She managed to scare them off and then went back to the group. Later that night, Belgar returned, telling them that it seemed to have worked, and that now they just needed to wait for the news to reach the city's inhabitants and for the noise to begin.

After another day and a half passed by, Belgar went out into the streets looking for some word of the state of the city and heard that the citizens had quickly spread the rumors amongst themselves and were planning a gathering outside the Royal Court. Belgar quickly assembled the party and told them to head to the Royal Court and wait for the fireworks to begin. As the party sat outside the Royal Court waiting, they saw a Dwarven woman in regal apparel emerge from the Royal Court and address the crowd, using some manner of magical object to amplify her voice. She commander the crowd to disperse, but they were having none of it. An enraged man shouted at her that King Rangrim must answer for his crimes, and the woman responded that he need answer to no-one and that they would disperse immediately or else. Someone in the crowd threw a large rock which hit the woman square in the head, leaving a gash on it, which sent her sprawling back inside the Royal Court. With that, the Runeguard began pushing the angry crowd back as they shouted "JUSTICE!". More Runeguard began to emerge from the Royal Court, brandishing weapons and forming a line to keep the citizens away. Taking this as their cue, the party began to sneak around the line of Runeguard, with Merrick choosing to become invisible, and they managed to get through the front gates.

Entering the long main hallway of the Royal Court, the party took notice of a series of large stone statues of various Dwarves lining the sides of the halls. They read the plaques at the bottom of each, learning that they were some of the founding members of Shimmerwind and all members of the Felbor family. Proceeding down the hallway, they noted the large double doors to the court were blocked off by two large metal slabs with an arc of magical energy passing between them. Deciding to explore a bit, they came upon the royal library, where Dain perused the collection, finding most of it boring, but finding two books in particular which seemed to have information on two of the tasks the Deep One demanded Merrick look into, pocketing them, before leaving. They quickly spotted Runeguard in the hallways, and it wasn't long before they managed to get spotted by a pair of them, who charged and attacked Dain when they caught him trying to sneak around. This led to a series of skirmishes as each time the party was spotted, the Runeguard would call for backup from other nearby Runeguard. Eventually, they managed to take out most of the Royal Court's remaining garrison before finding the Royal Court's Flow Repository room. Dain used Vortex Warp to teleport the man into the hallway where Gardain grabbed on to him tightly while Dain interrogated him, promising he would release him if he told him what the controls in the room did. The man seemed to initially resist and be unwilling to betray his king, to which Dain responded by showing him the copies of the documents he took from Overseer Kali's office in The Nexus that implicated King Rangrim in the Forgeborn plot. The man seemed unwilling to accept this information initially, but after wrestling with it, seemed disappointed. He told Dain that the levers in the Flow Repository room were a safety mechanism to open the large shields protecting the Court, but that if they were thrown in the wrong order, he would be electrocuted by the energy of the Flow Repository. Dain managed to coax what he thought was the correct combination out of the man, but after trying it, realized painfully that it was wrong. Growing impatient, he decided to vent the Flow from the repository, leaving it dark and without power. He returned to the hallway and allowed the man to go. As one last stop however, he decided to go to the armory, where he encountered a lone Runeguard who demanded to know what he was doing there and saying he would call for the guard. Believing he had wiped out the Royal Court's garrison, Dain called the man's bluff and began to pick the lock to the area containing all the Royal Court's weapons and armor. The man banged his fist on the wall, saying "Wake up, you idiots!". Moments later, as Dain managed to pick the lock, Merrick saw four Runeguard emerge from the barracks.

After another bloody battle, Dain began to wonder what to do about the doors, as turning off the power to the shields did not cause them to go back into the wall. Balvin said it was a safeguard and reminded him of the Runescribe talismans that Jeryl had given him. Seeing no other option, as they were not strong enough to open them by brute strength, Dain touched the Run'nazate talisman to one of the large metal shields and whispered "nazate". The talisman glowed briefly before crumbling to dust, and as an identical rune appeared on the shield, it began to slide into the wall, revealing the door into the court. Opening the door and cautiously walking in, Dain saw a large court lined with pillars and a throne at the other end with a Dwarven man sitting on it. Dain asked his father, who confirmed it to be King Rangrim, and noted with confusion that his throne appeared to be "different" in some way.

Dain proceeded into the room, where the king went on a vitriol-ridden rant, calling Dain and his father traitors. Dain told King Rangrim that he was the traitor… to the Dwarven people, wanting to take over the rest of Aellorah. King Rangrim seemed to think it ridiculous and didn't seem to care what would happen if he took magic away from the "lesser races", saying that it was the Dwarves' birthright. Dain appealed to the spiritual, telling King Rangrim that he would just anger the Seven Sisters, but King Rangrim thought that hilarious, saying they did nothing for anyone and asking when was the last time he actually saw any of them. Dain said it "had been a few months", but that he had seen them plenty. King Rangrim seemed to think Dain was some sort of comedian and told him that it was good he could have a sense of humor, because shortly he would paint his nice white floors red, along with his wayward companions. King Rangrim snapped his finger and six Elite Runeguard emerged from behind the pillars. King Rangrim said that it was a shame he couldn't just serve him, but that the money they were carrying would go a long way to kickstarting producing new Forgeborn to replace the ones that Dain destroyed at The Nexus. With that, the battle began…