Session 120

As the party set out from Archmage Kyran's tower and headed south, an almost two month journey ahead of them, they had a scenic route that passed by the city of Catarvoss, which Chandira advised the party to steer clear of because apparently the Myrmidons of the Rathmore Empire had been snooping around there recently trying to find a way to attack Catarvoss. Instead, they circled around a lake and head along the road west, where they reached a crossroads north of the town of Parigus. At the crossroads, they saw a large group approaching, and once they got close enough, they noticed several heavily armed soldier looking types escorting a large group of Letheni who were shackled and chained together. The men, whom Chandira identified as Myrmidons, were driving the Letheni forward, hitting them when they didn't move quickly enough. Though most of the party were content to heed Chandira's advice to avoid them, the Myrmidons eyed the party as they passed, noting their weapons, which were clearly not conventional, and called out to them, antagonizing them, and treating Chandira like a child when she tried to diffuse the situation. Skinner took issue with this and began aggressively telling the Myrmidons to back off, which backfired, resulting in one of the Myrmidons bashing Chandira in the face with the butt of their spear before deflecting Skinner's punch and throwing him to the ground. The group jumped into action, and as Dain went to polymorph himself into a bear to maul the Myrmidons, the Flow that he charged to produce the spell suddenly jumped toward a nearby Myrmidon, flowing directly into his shield -- which appeared to be made from some kind of blue metal. The Myrmidons shouted, calling the party heretics, before gathering into a battle formation, placing their shields together to protect each other, and attacking Dain. Merrick attempted to call down a Flamestrike on top of them, but was flabbergasted when the flames redirected and were absorbed by the shield of one of the Myrmidons, having no effect whatsoever. Chandira called out, advising the party that if they were going to use magic, to put some distance between themselves and those shields and to not target the Myrmidons directly. She then cast a spell which summoned a giant toad-like creature into the fray -- a Slaad, which engaged the Myrmidons, but was quickly taken down by the efforts of two of the Myrmidons in the rear. Dain backed off before polymorphing himself into a bear and rushing in to maul the Myrmidons, but his terrifying roar had seemingly no effect on the stone-faced men, and one of them managed to stab him with enough force to break his concentration, reverting him to his normal form. Merrick then backed off and used True Polymorph to transform himself into some sort of gargantuan nightmarish beast and then charged into the formation, which barely managed to hold him back, before he began emitting a burst of energy from his eyes which immediately caused one of the Myrmidons' shields to glow brightly, apparently overloading the Eskite. Merrick then bit the man's head off, after which, his shield detonated, catching several of the party members in the blast. Merrick's intimidating form tore the Myrmidons apart as Skinner beat the life out of two of them himself, with two more shields detonating in the process. After the battle concluded, the terrified Letheni nearby begged for their lives. Merrick reverted to his normal form and they managed to calm the prisoners, who were meant to be slaves to the Empire, and broke them out of their shackles. They then took the remaining Eskite shields off the bodies of the Myrmidons and continued on their journey.

Along their journey, Dain finished enchanting a set of studded leather armor, which he presented to Summer. As they came near Artus, Chandira directed their gaze upward, where they saw the clouds roll by to reveal several large islands of floating rock in the sky, about a half a mile up. They could make out some manner of line connecting each of the islands which had some kind of object moving along it. Getting closed, they began to see signs warning them to stick to the road and avoid the craters beneath the city, which Chandira explained were where the city originally resided before ascending during the end of the Reckoning period of Aellorah's history, about 1,500 years ago, and that due to not having much exposure to the sun being directly below the city and because of Myr's high level of spirit activity, the craters were infested with spirits and undead. Nearing being directly below the city, they came upon a very small village where they found a long line of people filtering into a single building that didn't seem large enough to support the number filtering in and out of it. As they approached and were greeted by the Luminari Marshall at the entrance, they entered a gateway which transported them to a similar building on the main island in the sky a half a mile up. Emerging into the bustling cityscape, they got a better look at the "line in the sky", a rod suspended above the city stretching between the islands of Artus, and witnessed a large metallic box of some sort moving along the rod, slowing and stopping in front of the gatehouse. Chandira ushered the group onto what she called the Tram before telling them a bit about the city and its history, explaining how after its ascension, when their food and water supply became scarce, Archmage Kyran had come to their rescue along with ten other sorcerers, creating magical infrastructure in the city to provide water and allow them to transport to the ground, and establishing the Atrautum School of Wizardry to teach the residents about magic so they could care for themselves. Chandira led them through the city after the Tram dropped them off, stopping in a courtyard with statues of Kyran and the other sorcerers commemorating their contribution to the city, including a statue of a Dwarf named Kalin Jendor, ancestor of Nola and Riswynn Jendor, famed pioneers of magic and Runetech in Reshyk. Afterwards, she led them to the Cloudtop Cafe, where an outdoor seating area and a line leading to a store front selling pastries seemed to be one of the city's most popular attractions, with clouds rolling through the streets themselves. Seeing the clouds rolling through made Dain curious, and he asked what it was like to live here during a storm. Chandira explained that Kyran had established rods to conduct the lightning harmlessly, but you still didn't want to be outside... especially since being directly within the source of thunder wouldn't be good for your ears. She then purchased a pastry she called Plomatin and continued along, leading them to the western edge of the city where they came across the Atrautum School, which resembled architecture in Mythwell more than the stark white stone architecture around them. They proceeded inside and upstairs to meet Medril.

Speaking to Medril, Chandira told them of their mission to recruit those willing to help, and told him what they knew, showing him an illusory image of the creature they had seen in Takoni's Sifting vision. Medril seemed eager to help, offering to research whatever he could about this creature and the Dreaming Wastes, and gave them three names to look into for help -- Vargas, Sindri, and Mahani. He explained that Vargas was itching for adventure, while Sindri was a problematic type that they would not enjoy dealing with, but was the most skilled abjurer the school had produced in many years. Mahani, however, would be the least desirable candidate, being a Dew addict who used her transmutation skills to produce drugs. Before leaving, Dain handed Medril one of the Myrmidons' Eskite shields, astonishing him. He said that having this could shift the tides of the war between the Rathmore Empire and the Commonwealth. Afterwards, they left to go find the three recruits. Along the way, they stopped at a small side street shop named Tresta's Mysteries, where she offered to portent their futures, which they declined. However, she had another product to offer which piqued the interest of Merrick and Summer -- a Hacralla Deck, which boasted the ability to provide those who drew a card with a boon... so long as they only drew one card per day. She cautioned that though some great rewards awaited those who drew multiple cards per day, each consecutive card was gambling with fate and could result in disaster. Summer decided to purchase a small deck of 7 cards, an auspicious number, and the group made their way out. Dain made a point to stop at a forge along the way which was out in the open, allowing the city's winds to stoke the forge's flames. Speaking to the smith, Dain took out the remaining two Eskite shields, offering them to the man. Realizing what they were after quickly testing it by throwing a simple spell at it, the man excitedly offered to buy them and asked Dain for his price. Dain asked for 4,000 gold for the pair of them, which the man eagerly accepted without hesitation, producing the payment. He began rapidly firing off spells at it, excited to test it, when it began to glow. Dain cautioned him not to feed it too much Flow, or it would overload. However, the man had fed it just enough Flow to cause something wondrous to happen... a small nugget began to grow from the shield, as if consuming the absorbed Flow to grow more Eskite. The man ran inside with his prize and the group continued toward The Roost in order to locate Vargas, their first recruit.

Arriving at The Roost, the party witnessed several people dashing off of wooden runways jutting out from a tower at the edge of the city and jumping over the edge of the city toward the ground way down below. Shocked, they quickly saw that the jumpers were wearing harnesses with large framed cloth behind them that allowed them to glide down at a controllable pace. Seeing a Human man above, Chandira realized this may be Vargas and called out to him. The man seemed uninterested in the party's motives and said he'd be willing to talk with them if they could beat him to the ground down below in a race. Everyone except Merrick agreed, paying for a harness and stepping onto the runways above. After strapping themselves in, and after the countdown, they leapt off the edge of the city, seeing the ground a half mile down in astonishing detail. They raced through the high winds, with Vargas easily riding the currents with skill while the party lagged behind. Dain attempted to cheat by casting Fly on himself, but this seemed to have no effect with the glider acting like a parachute preventing him from moving faster. Instead, Skinner tried to simply dive bomb toward the ground rather than gliding down slowly, resulting in him losing control and ending up in a free fall. This seemed to startle Vargas, and Dain used the distraction to gain on him, beating him to the ground. However, the distraction caused Vargas to be blown off course toward the craters below the city. Dain quickly reacted, using Vortex Warp to transport the man next to him. Skinner then crashed into the ground after managing to correct his free fall just in time, marring his already torn face even further. After accepting defeat, Vargas agreed to go with them without hesitation, seemingly excited about the prospect despite their warnings of the danger. They agreed to contact him via Sending once they had gathered the other recruits, and then head back to the city. Along the way, they asked Vargas about Sindri, the next recruit, and he apparently had heard of the man, commenting that he had heard of him peeping on women at the Oasis bathing area. With a sigh, the party began to head toward The Oasis.

After taking the Tram to one of the outer islands, the party began to search around the grounds of the Oasis, not sure where to find Sindri. They didn't have to look for long, however, as they found the man climbing to peep over the fencing leading to the women's bathing area. With a sigh, Dain attempted to use Vortex Warp to grab the man, which failed, but startled him and caused him to fall. As the man got up and attempted to flee, he ran right into several Humans who stared daggers at him, screaming at him for spying on their wives in the Oasis. Sindri began stammering uncontrollably, frightened. The party attempted to diffuse the situation, but the men grabbed him and began to drag him toward the edge of the island, with the intent to throw him over. As Skinner yelled at two of the Humans, Dain rushed over and forced the other away from Sindri, telling him that they would take him away from the city. The men seemed intent on killing the man, not caring about Dain's assertion that this would get them charged with murder, but after a bit of de-escalation, they managed to convince them to allow him to leave as long as he never showed his face around the Oasis again and left the city. Sindri thanked them, and they brought up the prospect of joining them, which Sindri seemed very against. But with a bit of convincing, they managed to entice him to join them. They asked Sindri about the final recruit, Mahani, and he said he thought he remembered her from his first year or two at the Atrautum School, but that she had dropped out. The party told him about her Dew addiction, and he said she would probably be in the Undercity, a network of catwalks and platforms underneath the islands where criminals hung out. With this, Sindri led the group to a shady back alley with stairs leading through rough cut cavern passages to below the main island of the city.

As the party followed the catwalks, they eventually came across a Vesperkin woman, handing off a vial of some substance to Humans twice her size, in return for money. They ignored the undesirables staring them down and went to approach the woman, which Dain then used Vortex Warp to grab from afar. The woman freaked out, especially once Dain mentioned her name, thinking they were the Marshalls. They attempted to calm her down unsuccessfully, and she refused to go with them, saying they couldn't make her -- which Dain responded to by saying she didn't have a choice, and that he'd turn her into the Marshalls if she didn't come with him. However, as he argued with her, looking down due to her size, he didn't notice a group of approaching figures. As he looked up, he saw these figures across a bridge, and noticed in alarm -- their glowing pink eyes.