Chosen Group Session 47

Izaki chose to explore the first of five tunnels radiating from the disc cave, while Victoria, Matthias and Finduilas opted down a passage smelling strongly of the sea. The ice down this way was eroded and the its stone and crystal buttresses exposed, many shining brilliantly and likely what gave the Crystal Caves their name.

Nearing an elbow turn, the group walked into a violet slaad woman, who could barely muster much of a defense before a combo of Matthias and Victoria dispatched her. In a grim incantation, the necromantess raised the slaad back to life as a tireless servant forced to earn eternal peace.

Matthias moved on ahead to a large, open cavern, half flooded with sea water. Below the water, something stirred, and the zombie was sent to explore. Moments later it was flung out, skidding to Victoria's feet, and a cool and confident voice welcomed the group through telepathy.

The skald shed his gear and dove into the water after a redeployed zombie, finding this voice to be exactly what he feared, the Beholder, who in one barrage of ten eye beams utterly destroyed the zombie. He traded an electrified blow with it, then felt the full wrath, one of which overtook him and sent him floating to the surface, dead (though that depends on your definition, since Matthias is very unlikely to admit oblivion at the hands of a floating cyclopean head).

Meanwhile, the girls watched the lights flash under the water, and were met with a challenge from the side cave, two gray slaad that attacked with fervor, though Victoria slew the first with a finger point. The other feigned surrender and managed to belt a summons. The summoner manages off a lightning bolt before also succumbing to Victoria's bane magics, and the summoned green slaad had quite a time tearing into the cleric.

With Matthias dead, Fin fell into a disparaged rage, and conjured a celestial baleen whale into the pool to handle the beholder. The tactic worked long enough for Victoria to conjure a circle of death powerful enough to send even their hidden enemy into the nether. It washed along shore in a violent geyser, a twelve foot monster head of blotchy orange and green, followed by Matthias' husk.

Fin fell over him, a complete mess, praying with all her love and will for his return. The power of the Phoenix overcame them both, Matthias igniting in spectral red-orange flames, and the firebird shrieked in the distance. Within ten minutes, the body regained color, warmth, breath and consciousness, Matthias returned from death, the first so resurrected in a thousand years!

In some dark, poetic fashion, Victoria spent her time beside the restoring Finduilas performing her own returning ritual, bringing the beholder back from the dead as a ghastly servant under her control.

Exp: 3000
Objectives:
1. Purify the first well
2. Find, clear and purify the other 3 wells
3. Save the survivors, if any, and deal with Tasha