Prologue
At Boldar, a small village in the Kingdom of Bombelwind, which has mainly dwarves and halflings as population (this kingdom was defeated in war by the Elves centuries ago and even though they’re at peace now, they still have to regularly pay a lot of taxes), our heroes meet for the first time:
- Vaatu: Triton Prince of Parala (underwater city), banished due to a terrorist attack, trying to regain his honour.
- Thaia: Centaur warrior in search of her tribe, The Korassi (last time anybody saw a centaur was 100 years ago).
- Yhara: Fallen aasimar trying to find out why she one day suddenly fell.
- Aevian: Air genashi kidnapped and raised by The Brass Borns, a group of bandits.
We were asked for help by the villagers, since they’re being attacked by a pack of magical and very intelligent wolves. Brenise joins us after one of these attacks injured her father. We finally find the cave where the wolves are and realise they have a human pre-existence (Brenise took their corpses to the capital to analyse them at a temple), killed them and liberated the villagers. Vaatu took his chance adopted a pair of twin puppies from the lair, which he named Milo & Finn (safely kept in a bracelet/poke-ball* this happens later, to be rearranged). During the looting process, we also got a really handy Portable hole. Later on, celebrating the victory in the tavern, Yahra charms a female halfling in an attempt to prank Vaatu, but she ends up sleeping with her.
Chapter I. Welcome to Bombelwind
Act I. The Howling Caves
Once we were done in this village, Yahra had visions about Vogdorth -one of the rich Dwarf cities in twin peaks- so we decided to go there. However, on the way there, we are attacked by Aranil after which Yahra confesses that he is part of The Duskstriders, a group of fallen aasimar assassins who are actively trying to recruit her.
After some walking, we finally reached Vogdorth. Since we were in the city, we took our chance to both gear up and gather intel. Aevian bought an ancient map of some cave at an antique shop and while at it, Thaia argued with him about taxes. In the institutional side of things, we managed to get an audience with the King. Vaatu explained that he was in a diplomatic mission, but the princess Doldrebela already knew he was lying. Unfortunately, the King was assassinated shortly after the audience by The Duskstriders and so we were framed for it. It was then when we learnt that Yahra’s vision was caused due to a ritual from whoever hired the Duskstride, because somehow she was a part of it as well, and Fhaelor tries recruiting her.
As a consequence of the assasination, the city went under total lockdown. Luckily, Cemu Cemuphnil, the King’s Court Wizard, believed in our innocence and offered his help for us to escape the city. We had to fight our way through Doldrebela and we managed to flee kind of stealthily. Aevian cast levitate on Thaia, making her float like a baloon. Then, the party jumped into the Portable hole and Thaia carried it while being invisible thanks to (i forgor why she was invisible). Everything was going according to plan: Cemu was holding Thaia and approaching the gates to pass through the guards. However, Aevian had forgot to tell his friends that the levitate effect would only last for 10 minutes. At this point, the timer ran out and Thaia fell to the ground right on top of the guards. In a moment of clarity, she tied the magical cloth to her axe and threw it out of the city gates. The hole burst open and after a brief fight and a smoke curtain, we managed to escape. A bounty was placed on our heads (later paid off by the Elven prince* isn’t this a bit of a “spoiler”?).
We needed some rest, so we spent time thinking about what would we do if the news incident would spread throughout Bombelwind and what would our next stop be. Over the night, when it was Aevian’s turn to sleep, he suddenly started floating above the ground while a slight breeze surrounded him. He had unintentionally visited the plane of air and met Akadi. She told him that she spared the life of his mother, but that the Betrayer God was up to no good and he should seek the shard in what the mortals call The Howling Caves. Since we had the map in our posession, we followed Aevian’s map to the dungeon in the outskirts of Vogdorth and explore its tunnels. The exploration lead us to find Aevian’s father’s corpse, Arnald Felwood.
Furthermore, we encountered a couple of ice elementals that ended up killing Cemu, but we were aided by Flymrynn and Phteven. They happened to be there because the ruins inside the cave have some connection to Gruumsh the Ruiner (Thaia finds out that she already has a shard of him inside which was why she bled tears of blood of her from a vision given by a hag that brought her back to life* this should be further explained somewhere before, but idk when it happened). In this cave there should be one of Gruumsh’s 3 shards, but apparently it was already stolen by the Cephlopods. Thaia also finds an amulet of scrying, which allows to spy on somebody once a day.
We accidentally activated a trap and the tunnels got rapidly filled with water, but Yahra managed to shrink the lock the gates at the entrance of the cave and later returned them to their original size, so we could escape and not drown. Flymrynn left for Ilphenheim to inform the Elves after gifting us a ring to breathe underwater (and after passionately kissing Vaatu). With the ring in our hands, we we decided to go back into the dungeon to examine a mysterious egg we had passed by, which upon lifting it, opened a tunnel that took us all the way to the ocean through violent streams of water.
Act II. The underwater city
We make our way to Parala to find out what is going on and warn the Royal Family of the soon-to-be uprising of the Cephlopods. Since Vaatu is still banished, we hide in an old shipwreck in the outskirts (fun anecdote: we try to teach Thaia how to write her own name… unsuccessfully) until Atchulu sneaks them in the city, where they meet up with Mirana and Metrifa.
Together, they make their way into the cephlopods’ headquarters to stop them from bringing back Alphea (abyssal jellyfish and daughter of Gruumsh). When we barely defeat them (EPIC BATTLE BTW), as Thaia delivers the final blow, the second shard enters her and she multiclasses to cleric. They are declared heroes of Parala, invited to the Royal Palace and Vaatu is unbanished (yaay!) and they get a lot of moneymoneymoneyyyy.
Act III. Awakening
Now that these issues are solved in Parala, we decide to travel to Val’Eda (human city of elven past by the Bombelwind coast) because Yahra wanted to check on her friends + Thaia’s vision during her trance at the Cehplopods headquarters said there was a sacred place of her tribe closeby. We mount Lunala (Vaatu’s whale) to land. Once on land, while on our way across Bombelwind, near Bombelfeld (capital of Bombelwind), we get attacked by an Dao, the earth bitch that wants to capture Aevian and take him to the earth elemental plane (we manage to defeat her).
Speaking of attacks: we get attacked by some cephlopds on giant octopus, Aevian releases spores that get Vaatu confused and somehow everybody but him ends up overboard. At some point Vaatu is almost killed but magically receives the Wavebreaker Trident through a vision of his dad telling him about Persana and kills off the dark mage cephlopod (epic battle ngl).!
They drop us off on land (mainly because Thaia keeps complaining about being in the water) and get attacked ONCE MORE by Aranil who AGAIN tries to recruit Yahra and gives her a Shadoweye (allows her to see invisibility) as an incentive of the powers she could get if she joins them.
We finally reach Val’Eda and meet Yahra’s tiefling friends (Kriella and Makaria) who took her in when she was kicked out of her aasimar village. Yahra is happy to rejoin Kriella and Thaia is just happy to sip on their home-made tea. However, Makaria is acting like a lil’ punk and is hanging out with the wanna-be-gangster kids of Val’Eda, so Yahra helps Kriella look for her and put some sense in her head. After that happy reunion (and more tea to keep Thaia satisfied), Kriella offers to guide us outside of the city on our way to the forest where supposedly the centaurs are. On the way there, we are attacked by some dwarves trying to hunt us for the bounty Princess Dordrebela placed on our heads (spoiler alert: they are the ones who lose their heads).
We travel to said dark forest, in which we are continuously harassed by Odilia, the female Duskstrider, until we finally manage to kill her. In the depths of the forest we find a vine dome with petrified centaurs and manage to revivify Thimiopis (Thaia’s friend) with help of Lady Lima once back in her magic workshop in Val’Eda. Vaatu and Yahra also get rid of Odilia’s corpse throwing it over a cliff while weirdly having a romantic moment looking at the moon over the sea. At some point Vaatu also bought bracers of defense from Lady Lima and gifted them to Yahra.
However, we are arrested on sight in Val’Eda by Isadora Braag the Mythril Commander because apparently while we were out, a dragon asked for our heads or otherwise he’d destroy the city. We travel to a mountain far away so that the citizens have time to flee (also Thimiopis because she’s still in a very weak state), and we fight Azzacrotzz The Sizzling Death and the Dusk Striders (apparently they both worked together for The Unfothomable who wants the shards: the 3rd shard was inside The Wildmother’s Embrace, giant tree in Val’Eda, which the Dusk Striders managed to steal).
We are aided by Lady Lima and Voldria (Yahra’s aasimar friend/sister), who arrives on her giant eagle (later killed). EPIC BATTLE in which we knock out Fhaelor (leader of the Dusk Striders) and Aranil (and learn they have their base somewhere in Ilphenheim) and Vaatu takes on the Dragon by himself, seriously damaging him and blinding him of one eye.
At some point in the fight Thaia absorbs the 3rd shard and, now having all 3 of them, she duplicates herself into the Nightmare (and loses her cleric multiclass in the process). This fight is too much for our heroes and, in her final breath, Lady Lima transforms into a bronze dragon and teleports them to Ilphenheim (Elven kingdom) telling us to ask Dory about “Protocol Fallen Lizard”.
Act IV. Operation fallen lizard
We were dead for a month recovering in Inkalille (capital of Ilphenheim) and during that time talked with Korellon (Elven god). He tells Yahra that she has a spark of Avandra, the changebringer in her and she should look for a temple of her deity because she may be able to turn back to regular aasimar.
Once we woke up, Vaatu had beef with Flymrynn because he hooked up with his sister Mirana. They talked things out and now it’s kinda solved because they’re serious and he’s not fooling around. On the fun side: Yahra catches Vaatu in the bathtub and she’s not a shy lady. They all have a shopping day in which they buy gala outfits to have an audience with the Elven Imperial Family: the Elven princess seems a bit shady because whe wanted to use the weak situation of Bombelfeld to reestablish their power.
Later on Prince Aeson (also close friend of Flymrynn’s) went behind her back to talk with us in a tavern. We split: Voldria and Flymrynn decide to look for the Dusk Striders base in Ilphenheim, Mirana goes back to Parala (King Agledu is acting weird now so Princess Mirana and Queen Shaizess are managing the Kingdom while the King has locked himself up in his chambers) and we decide to go back to Val’Eda to look for Dory the robot (Lady Lima’s assistant to find more about her) + Aeson and Flymrynn also asked us to investigate what is going on in Bombelwind, because Aeson’s informants have heard rumours that something is going on.
We go back to Val’Eda by aircraft (we are attacked by flying demons on the way, EPIC BATTLE) and from up in the air we see that somehow now half of Bombelwind is sunken and attacked by elementals and demons. Once at where Val’Eda used to be, we dive underwater and try to recover the pieces of Dory in Lady Lima’s workshop to uncover what “Protocol Fallen Lizard” is.
We are attacked by elementals and aided by Nesbor the water genashi (Yahra multiclasses to rogue). We find some of the the refugees of Val’Eda and the archdruid under the roots of the giant tree and with Lunala take them back to the surface. While we wait for Lunala, Aevian has another vision of the Akadi the Queen of Air: he and Nesbor are Enkits, children of elemental gods, whose existance is forbidden and that’s why they’re being chased by earth-elementals to be killed (Nesbor still has to try to contact his water-god-parent, maybe at a temple in Parala). She also tells Aevian we should go to the air plane (she’s gonna give us powers).
Once we reach the surface to deliver the refugees, we found there was a battle between Bombelfeld guards and ???. Among the city guards we spotted Thimiopis, who joined us when the fight was over. She explained she was there because she was among the first refugees that fled Val’Eda and thus could survive the later flooding. Meanwhile, Nesbor and Yahra fought some wolves and lesser demons to defend the refugees. On our way to Bombelfeld, we discussed our plans and objectives since there has been a lot going on lately. In the end, Thimiopis decided to stay in the city because she isn’t ready yet to join us on our quest. She invited us to spend the night with the guards, but since Nesbor was with us, it wasn’t a good idea -y’know, piracy and whatnot. We agreed on letting Nesbor come with us so that he can try to get in contact with the Goddess of Water. We found a tavern to spend the night and even after all this time, Vaatu doesn’t seem to remember how Thaia sleeps -which is not standing, get it right. He also tried getting the amulet of scrying from Thaia, for which he gave her a finger trap in exchange. And Thaia liked it a lot. So she agreed on the trade.
Eventually we set out to gather intel and gear. We asked some random guy that was passing by for popular shops and we first headed to The Travelling Armadillo, a shop we’re already familiar with. There we geared up with various potions and armour, like the Cloak of the Manta Ray that Vaatu bought for Yhara. After that, Thaia spotted Eclipsing Cogs & Whimsy Widgets on the distance, where we found Brenda, a tinkerer from Crystal Crest. She agreed on fixing Dori’s head, but the energy core se had available only allowed the robot to ask for a protocol to run. We tried saying “Protocol: Fallen Lizard”, only to find Dori running out of power trying to initiate it. As Brenda said, if we headed to Crystal Crest and found her boss, at the Sparkling Gadget Emporium, we would find the extra energy core for Dori to function properly.