Session 30 - "Transformation" Report

Jundar 29, 1246

Micaiah Louvre, still clutching the orb in the protective fabric that the party has used to put a barrier between it and their own skin, sneaks out after everyone else has gone to bed.

She heads for Two-Brothers Pass, following the various paths within the gorge's rock walls until she finds herself at Incenderre's brazier. There she stands, as she carefully unwraps the orb and holds it between her hands, gazing into its depths as the glowing geometric patterns begin to creep up her arms and eventually her whole body.

The patterns begin to expand, until her whole body is brimming with this arcane light. It burns as it seeps into her, and then her body becomes... transparent. Clothing and jewelry dropping through her form and clattering to the ground as she slowly lifts into the air.

Then, Micaiah is gone. She blinks her eyes as the light from the orb (and her body) fades from overpowering to simply enough to see by. She stands in the same cavern, but also not. It doesn't take her very long to realize that this is not the same plane of existence - instead, she is suspended in the Ethereal Plane.

She concentrates, and is able to force her body to rematerialize in the Material Plane, the orb thumping down into the midst of her clothing pile. As Micaiah begins to redress, however, she notices that her red skin is now a swirling, shimmering blue - like a shifting galaxy. Her form is also much light (almost a third of its weight). She is not a tiefling anymore, but something else entirely.

Rather than tell her party about this change, Micaiah uses her oft-used disguise self to reinstate her normal skin tone and slips back to the villa.

Jacob Sterling is the only one still awake, and hears the warlock slipping in. He confronts him on slipping out to (allegedly) examine the orb without the party's interference, but Micaiah denies it. Without much proof to go on, Jacob lets it go.

The sorcerer and warlock each eventually find sleep in their own separate rooms.

Breakfast the next morning, courtesy of Foenix Stolnent, goes well enough. Thais Argyri spends time in the garden with the wyrmlings, teaching Kona the word "stop," while Olena uses her paper bird to send a letter back home.

Micaiah joins last, still using his illusory abilities to keep his new body a secret from the party. He asks about Dharma, who has been sleeping on the couch since the night before, sound asleep. Thais says that she doesn't want to wake him, but that doesn't stop her from accepting a two-gold bribe from Micaiah to tickle the paladin with Micaiah's scarf.

Thankfully, it doesn't do much to disturb Dharma's sleep besides him rubbing at his face and turning over to face the cushions. Micaiah amicably pays up, as Foenix suggests that they should start selling off their loot and stocking up for their next journey: traveling into the desert to slay the serpent Vishrak for Olena. This is agreed upon, and so Olena uses her new diadem's tongues ability to dictate a note to Dharma, letting him know where they are going, and the party sets out.

The first thing that Foenix wishes to do is settle his debt with the halfling grandmother and her grandson that watched the place while the party was away, and so they stop by Brighthollow Pots, where Tula at first attempts to stall out Foenix, claiming that they had agreed on 120 gold, not 100. He doesn't fight her own it, though he does insist that the extra 20 be put into a trust for her grandson, Samwell (Sam).

After that, the party goes about making preparations: the horses Patty and Matty, as well as the cart, are sold off. Other items sold include the stuffed tiger, the giant elk hide (from which a modest 57 gold is acquired), and various smaller items.

For provisions, the party buys 30 days of rations each, as well as winter clothes, extra blankets, sandshoes, and a notebook, ink, and a quill to map the area as they travel. They also look into buying a spyglass, but due to cost decide to leave it for now.

Thais also takes the time to buy a small orb of handwarming and a decanter of endless water, knowing that they will be traveling across a desert in winter time.

As they continue to shop, they come across a small crowd of people surrounding a gnome in priest's garments. He is preaching about the inadequacy of the city (and country's) government, with his three main points being:

• The Vakwaran guards were so lax as to allow the Still Sands Massacre to occur. How was someone allowed access to the field with such devastating magic at their disposal?
• The Bannercrushers, a local gang and malcontented ex-military types, are allowed to roam free within the city. The people of Vakwari are, of course, grateful for what they did during the war, but have they now traded foreign bullies for homegrown ones?
• Shazi Mishra, Bellahan of the canton (county), claims to be working to elevate the poor of Vakwari by taxing those who are making a moderate income (or more), but still 40% of Vakwarans live at or below the poverty line. It seems like the only one benefitting are the city's safes, as those are completely full. Mishra says that these are in the process of being spent to expand infrastructure and social safety nets, but where are they?

As they listen, Foenix notices that the teleportation circles for the city guards are alight, and the uniformed protectors of the peace have begun to spill into the street. He nudges Thais, and as he lets off a silent image of the gnomish orator running away into the crowd, Thais yanks him under her cloak and speed walks away. The guards seem rather uninterested in following the illusion, instead working to disperse the crowd.

The gnome is displeased with being carried like luggage, but Thais does not set him down until they are within the courtyard by the old prison, where there are no prying eyes.

They ask him about what he was saying, and he reiterates that Bellahan Mishra is at the very least incompetent if not outright corrupt. Bellahans take so long to decide policies that it has become a joke. If something is taking an arduous, extended period of time to be completed: "It has been sent to the Bellahan's floor." It is a disgrace to the people who are being harmed that change should take so long that the children needing food are grandparents before their requests are approved.

Thais and Jacob are uninterested in involving themselves with this revolutionary gnome, and Foenix only enough so that he asks if the gnome wants their help. Unfortunately, the Fate-Steppers have as of yet not proven themselves trustworthy - and they are outsiders besides - and so all the gnome cryptically says is that in two weeks they will see what he is working towards.

The party shrugs and leaves the gnome to his devices. They decide to wait and see what he means with his warning, but that is the most they will do to involve themselves.

Still, when they visit Jhota to collect their reward later, he is able to fill them in a bit: Marion Wishbacker is a priest of Politia, who believes that the Karasan government is failing its people and duty to uphold civilization.

Jhota doesn't disagree that sometimes the pace of justice is slow in Vakwari (he can't speak to the social services angle of Wishbacker's complaints), but he thinks that it is necessary in order to ensure that they are getting things right.

The party is asked to testify in Truth's (the tiefling Unabomber) trial, and Foenix even offers Olena's new abilities to speak with the dead to get answers out of Malum Artis's corpse... for a price.

The funds will take time to get, and so the party travels back to their villa, where Dharma is finally up and about. He thanks them for the food and message, but does tease Thais's phonetic spellings of Olena's dictation.

They ask him what he wishes to do, and while he would very much like to get home, he has no idea how he could get back to Immithar - if there are any sea vessels that travel there.

Foenix offers up his paper bird so that Dharma can get a message to someone back home, which Dharma gratefully takes.

As he retreats to write his missive, the party discusses what they will do if Dharma decides to stay in Mercuria. Foenix thinks that he would be a fantastic candidate to tend to the grove, and Thais agrees, thinking it would help him learn Common and would give them someone trustworthy to leave the wyrmlings with.

It is at this time that they realize that there are only two wyrmlings in the garden. Aker is missing.

The culprit is immediately obvious: scattered raspberries and other fruits that lured the tyke towards the garden wall where someone has left their rope that they used to scale the wall and snag Aker.

Incensed, the party strikes out back into the city, using Olena's nose and Foenix's eyes to track the four perpetrators (from the size of the footprints, Foenix immediately identifies them as children) to a hedge in the city, overgrown in such a way that it forms a natural castle.

The only one small enough to fit, Foenix makes his way through the hedge until he finds the draco-thieves: an elf, a gnome, and two humans. All children, who are at first not scared by Foenix - until he bashes one of them in the forehead and threatens to kill them all if they don't give the plant dragon back to him.

The elf girl reluctantly reaches into the branches of the bush-ceiling and retrieves Aker, dressed in a little vest made of leaves, and hands him over.

Foenix stalks back out of the hedge, where Micaiah immediately scoops Aker, cooing over him and lamenting the horrendous fashion choice given to him by the children.

All's well that ends well, I suppose.