session 17 (23/11/2024)

date is 22nd Uktar 1519DR

• citadel of the open lord
  • entry
    • 8 to 10 well armed individuals can be seen
      • kind of standoff-ish
      • Quick is one of the groups
    • party is asked to surrender weapons and spellcasting focus
      • party passes through a screening
      • party gets their item back
      • 2 guards per members of the group escort the party
        • the guards are anonymised
    • there are cats
      • Calcine is alergic to cats (thx nat 1 :D)
      • on second thought these don't trigger it
      • they are familiars
      • the open lord, Laeral Silverhand, is an old cat lady
  • the room is empty appart from us an the group outside
  • after a few minutes the guards open the back door
    • revealing the open lord of waterdeep
    • 13 figures follow
      • long purple robes
      • expressionless masks
      • they are the masked lords of waterdeep
      • magics masks their true forms making them looking identical
      • their identities are not meant to be known
    • Nybarg bows
    • chairs are brought for everyone to sit into
  • Laeral Silverhand acknowledges the assembly before starting
    • thanks people to be present
    • mentions that there is a large threat looming
    • strange happenings
    • actions of a long forgotten cult
    • Calcine notices she is fidgeting with something before continuing
    • mentions they seek to bring about a second sundering
    • it would have catastrophic consequences
      • melding magic and darkness with the world
      • kinda corroborates with the vision Calcine had in the temple
    • called before her as everyone entered the shadowfell here
      • by choice or order
      • survived and came back
      • better call than using the guards
    • people here are free to leave now
      • they are simply seeking the least destructive option at hand
      • the group without Quick
        • all in red, similar to Jezz
        • looked disrepectful
        • they accept after deliberation
        • the group is the Crimson Accord
        • Quick's group agrees
      • party is staying
        • Vincent talks and accept
      • Laeral asks if the group has a name
      • about that...
  • Laeral mentions that some secrets will be revealed here now
    • bound by an oath for secrecy
    • asks to be given something of them to be able to be tracked
    • everyone is presented with a vial
      • Crimson Accord leader cut his hand and spill it around the vial
      • Quick's group do it
      • Nybarg asks for security with the blood after we are done
        • Laeral swears she'll personally seal it away
        • no one will be able to tamper with it period
      • Vincent cuts open his finger
        • before it falls around the vial Calcine makes it in a line to it
        • people acknowledge hemocraft but not that much
      • Calcine fills the vial
      • Nybarg allows the vial to be filled
      • after a moment Jezz agrees to it
    • Laeral asks the masked lords to ñlearve
    • Laeral asks to follow her
  • side chamber
    • 2 people
      • cleric of Sune
      • cleric of Ilmater
        • Alaric Damaris
        • the one that helped Calcine in the temple of Ilmater
    • staff brings some food
    • Nybarg sees that Jezz doesn't look good
      • only her
      • it just started when entering the room
      • Nybarg shields Jezz a bit
    • Laeral asks if people here are familiar with a certain old ass mage myth
      • no one is
      • a long time ago the planes were one thanks to a dirge
      • 3 gods separated it for the benefit of mortals
        • Sune
        • Ilmater
        • Mystra
    • everyone sits at the table
    • Laeral puts a book on the table
      • it is what she was fidgeting with earlier

      Thank you all for answering the call. The weight of these times is heavy, but we do not carry it alone. The city of Waterdeep, the heart of the Sword Coast, stands at the precipice of a threat that, if allowed to grow unchecked, could unravel not just the fabric of our city but the very world itself. You’ve all heard whispers, no doubt. Whispers of strange happenings, of unseen hands moving within the shadows of our streets. But this threat is far more insidious than mere rumors—it is the resurgence of a cult whose intentions were believed to be long buried in history.

      She pauses, her fingers briefly brushing the tome that sits before her on the table—the very book that Xanathar once feared. Its presence seems to add weight to the air around them.

      The cult, as we have learned, is not only working to open portals to the Shadowfell, a plane of eternal twilight and despair, but they seek a far more disastrous end: another Sundering. If they succeed, if they manage to bridge the divide between Toril and Aebir, the consequences will be catastrophic. The worlds will collide, their forces becoming intertwined in a collision of magic and madness, one that we may not survive.

      For some of you, this may sound like the ravings of the most desperate of scholars, but I assure you, the evidence is irrefutable. The tome before me—an artifact tied to the cult’s efforts—was brought into my possession under strange and disturbing circumstances. It was given to me by none other than Xanathar, the Beholder, who found himself so terrorized by it that he sought my counsel. That creature does not fear easily. Yet, here we stand, facing something that fills even the most powerful of us with dread.

      But we are not here simply to speak of fear—we are here to act. The cult is not only operating within the shadows of Waterdeep but has gained footholds across the Sword Coast, perhaps even beyond. Their influence is subtle, their reach wide, and they will not hesitate to strike when we least expect it.I have called you here not as allies of convenience, but as guardians of this city, of this world. I know that each of you has been chosen for your unique skills and strengths. Together, we will fight this threat on every front, be it through covert sabotage, magical investigation, or open battle. We will unearth their secrets and stop their machinations before the worlds collide and all is lost.

      We are at a crossroads. And it is up to us, to all of us, to choose the path of light, even in the deepest shadows. This book and the fragments of knowledge it contains are only the beginning. We must work together, act swiftly, and strike at the heart of the cult. This will not be an easy fight, but it is one we cannot afford to lose. I trust you understand the gravity of this task. And I trust that you will do everything in your power to see it through. We begin now, and we do so together. The future of Waterdeep, the Sword Coast, and perhaps all of Faerûn rests in our hands.

    • Laeral points at the book on the table before continuing

      Some years ago, long before the cult's schemes began to unravel, I had an encounter that still chills me. You all know of Kureiskai, the so-called Eye, a beholder who controls much of the city’s underbelly. For all his ambitions, Xanathar is not a creature prone to fear; indeed, I have seen him laugh in the face of death itself. Yet one night, one of his agents approached me, trembling and pale. He bore a message from his master, one so strange that I dismissed it as another of Kureiska’s manipulations. But then came the tome.

      According to this agent, this book had manifested in Kureiskai’s lair, summoned forth in the midst of a dream—or perhaps a nightmare. Xanathar saw it first as a vision: an endless tide of shadows consuming his treasure vault, drowning his greatest desires in darkness. He awoke to find the book in his grasp, and for the first time in his life, he was terrified. He sought to rid himself of it, yet every time he discarded it, the tome would reappear. He knew it held power, yet he dared not open it, for fear of the madness it might unleash.

      Kureiska’s fear drove him to an act of desperation: to seek my aid. I immediatly felt its power—a tether to the Shadowfell, whispering of a convergence between realms.Yet when I opened the book it pages were blank.

      Overtime we found that the book itself would only show its text when it was absorbed energy from object that held the latent energy of the shadowfell, however that was fleeting as these objects were quickly consumed.

    • Laeral asks what everyone saw in the shadowfell
      • Vincent mentions the adventures the party had in the shadowfell
        • bodaks and undeads
        • rift to the fiend demiplane
      • Calcine mentions the vision
      • Quick mentions what happened on his side
        • captured by cultists
        • they babbled thinking he was a harmless dumb bird
          • looking for rifts
          • seeking eternal dust
        • they want portals in more than Waterdeep
        • they are using the city as a key to open the veil
        • the seek a sundering like the one that happened in Elthurel
        • grow bolder every day
    • Jezz feels her axe pulling her to the book Laeral showed
      • Jezz removes her the axe from her back and places it on the table
      • it starts moving suddenly towards the book
      • Jezz catches it before it flies away
      • the shards only worked temporarily

      you owe me a new axe

      • Jezz lets it go
      • the axe floats above the book
        • shadowy tendrils of ichors are pulled from the axe
        • the pages start to flicker with stiff written in it
      • Jezz hears in her mind

        When the veil between planes shatters, the echoes of woe shall resound. Three worlds, once severed, shall sing as one, Bound by grief, shadow, and longing.

        In the shadow of the Weave’s unmaking, The sundering hymn shall rise again, A lament to weave the dying stars together.

        To call forth the union of realms, Seek the triad of lost sorrows: The Wound, the Heart, the Mirror.

        One must bleed. One must yearn. One must reflect. Through pain and passion, the path shall open. Through despair and devotion, the Shadowborn shall rise.

      • this is also what is transcribed in the book
      • this is a prescription of what the cultists want to do
      • fill interactions later
      • Jezz tries to pull the axe back after a while
        • the axe recoils
        • Jezz gets her maximum hp reduced by 24
      • more text is written
        • it is in netherese
        • even Laeral is having issue reading it
        • this book resonated with shadow and pain
        • proof that the threat is real
        • if the world is sundered again it will not survivie
        • they know that this book is the mirror and will seek it
      • Laeral closes the book
      • the axe still hovers over it
      • Vincent with Calcine help try to remove the axe
        • using mage hand
        • did not work, failed con save
        • discordant note is heard
      • someone from the Crimson Accord tries but fails
      • Nybarg tries by just doing it gently gently and silently
        • it works
        • Nybarg hands it to Jezz