Curse of the Crimson Throne Recap # 89 [RPG]

[Sunday, 9 Arodus 4708 A.R. continued]

Somewhere in the depths of Castle Scarwall, the Harrowed Heroes find themselves face to face with flaming, ghoulish apparitions of ash and smoke!  The Reckoner destroys three of the monsters in short order, but a fourth slips past him and charges Yraelzin!  Lorien slashes at the creature and slows it down just enough for Yraelzin to finish it off with a magical spray of razor-sharp shards of ice.

The trio continue searching the first floor of the haunted fortress for any signs of the dragon they believe is the fourth and final spirit anchor that binds the chained spirit and keeps the curse from being lifted.  Unlike the slow and careful, room-by-room searches of previous days, this time the group moves speedily, throwing open doors and moving on quickly.  Lorien makes sure The Reckoner doesn’t dawdle, and Yraelzin expresses his full support for the new approach.  Still, the group can’t help but ruminate over some of their curious findings, such as an Orcish message scratched into a wall that reads “Ukwar Lives—We Die!”  Yraelzin relates that, while in Urglin preparing to come to Scarwall, he learned of a small tribes of orcs called the Deadwatchers that see it as their duty to stand watch over the castle.  Ukwar was an ancient chieftain of the Deadwatchers.  As the group explore, discussion is also had about the group’s fallen member—Anorak.  The decision is made to try to bring him back to life, and Yraelzin successfully reads a magical scroll to do so.  He starts to fill the confused, newly-alive dwarf in on everything that’s happened since the fatal battle against the banshee but The Reckoner interrupts to hurry the group along—his magical protections dwindle with every minute!

The explorers decide to try some of the rooms off the castle’s interior courtyard.  One room, an old livery, contains thick swaths of shadowy cobwebs that turn out to hide monstrously-sized pallid caterpillars!  Anorak, bereft of spellcasting powers since his revival, decides to charge into the midst of the foes armed only with a borrowed battleaxe!  The worms’ bites drip with acid that converts the dwarf’s flesh into shadowstuff!  Quickly overwhelmed, he goes down and only Yraelzin’s stabilising magic keeps him alive.  The Reckoner and Lorien are able to dispatch the beasts, and the latter is also able to heal some of the dwarf’s wounds.  The Reckoner uses a wand for further healing, observing that its magical power is almost depleted.  Time, it seems, is not in the Harrowed Heroes’ favour!

 

Soon, the group enter a large chamber, perhaps once a stable or kennel, that has been gutted.  Wooden partitions that may have been stalls lie shattered and burned, leaving only divots in the walls, floor, ceiling, and a few stone support pillars. The floor is a tangle of broken beams, dung heaps crawling with vermin, and the occasional gleam of polished bone. The whole chamber is shadowy and dim, the darkness an almost palpable thing.  Dead, on the floor, is the body of Laori Vaus.  Here, the Harrowed Heroes find what they’ve been searching for: a massive but sleek, dark-winged serpent moving with speed and grace: an umbral dragon!  The resulting battle will be remembered only as a blur of fangs, magic, and flashing blades, because the epic aftermath blocks out all else: with the dragon’s destruction, the floor of the chamber collapses!  Anorak’s foot gets stuck in debris as he tries to flee with the others, and when the ceiling caves in, the dwarf is crushed to death!  The curse of Scarwall is no mere legend, and the dreadful fate of all who enter is hard to escape.

The final battle against the chained spirit is a mere footnote, as The Reckoner dispatches it easily.  When the tremors begin again and the entire castle beings collapsing, it’s almost as if Anorak’s spirit shows his allies what to do.  Lorien’s windwalking magic allows the three heroes to survive a cataclysm that buries Anorak’s body, nightmares uncountable, and, finally, the curse of Castle Scarwall forever.

And with the connection between Scarwall and Ileosa’s Crown of Fangs broken, the Tyrant Queen of Korvosa has become vulnerable. 

 

The end has begun.

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GM Commentary

This was the last session of Chapter Five, and a lot happened in it.  Moving quickly because of The Reckoner's predilection for having constant protection from short-duration, wand-cast buffs, the group expended some precious resources to bring Anorak back from the dead (he was killed by a banshee a session or two previously).  It was then the other players and myself realized that Anorak's player was secretly intent on bringing in a new PC, and so started having Anorak do more and more reckless things.  After another combat left him in negative hit points and he was healed up, he then died in a later combat in this same session.  It's a frustrating thing for the other players when they're working very hard to keep a party member alive and that player has a new shiny toy he's obsessed with and doesn't really care about the current one.

I don't honestly remember much about the battle with the shadow dragon.  From reading the forums online, I know Laori Vaus became a lot of groups' favourite NPC--but she only really appeared in a couple of sessions in mine (since The Reckoner turned down the alliance when the PCs first arrived at Scarwall) and she entered Scarwall alone to try to find Serithtial (with random rolls determining her fate inside).  It's another good reminder that you just never know what to expect when running an AP.

I added the collapsing building climax.  It was something I remembered vividly as a kid the first time I defeated the big bad in Ultima III and was shocked to realise I had to escape his castle as it started to collapse all around me.  I know the "building falls down when evil is destroyed" is something of a cliche, but I thought it would still be dramatic here and would make a clean ending to Chapter Five and set up Chapter Six nicely.