Storm King's Thunder: Session 13. Shark and Kuo-Toa Sashimi

Drying themselves off, they investigated the small office on the other side of the chamber and found two young men - Timothy Salzberg and Jakkob Dawnflower. They couldn’t remember anything from the last couple of weeks except that they had gone out, met a beautiful woman and woke up here. The Legends of A Work In Progress then found a treasure trove of coins, fine clothing and Artan’s family ring. They bid Jakkob and Timothy to follow them behind at a little distance and started back to the sewer entrance.

On the way out they heard the same voice calling out for help. The room the voice was calling from was full of rotting rubbish and waste but the voice of a young man called out, begging for help and told them they were at the back of the room. As Darius edged closer an enormous monster burst out of the ground, it’s tentacles lashing furiously as it tried to eat them. They fired arrows, bolts and magical blasts at it and then heard a voice charging towards them from the adjacent chamber.

Bibbleth screamed in rage at the Work In Progress’s killing of it’s god Oosith. Kuo-Toa and a giant constrictor snake followed him in battle against the heroes. The Otyugh fell quickly under Darius’ sword and Korrak’s axe and the party then turned to face the Kuo-Toa. Maganose cast Shatter, which killed several of them and other fell to Fenris’ short swords. Bibbleth himself died under Korrak’s axe - split in two.

Still cursed by Oosith, Korrak and Darius felt their skin drying out and immediately plunged into the Kuo-Toa’s pool, not realising that several sharks dwelling within. Darius was savaged by one shark and two more sank their teeth into Korrak. Fleeing the water they gradually whittled down the savage fish until Korrak seized one and suplexed it out of the water. After much blood was shed the sharks lay dead and the party found a wand of enemy detection at the bottom of the pool.

Escaping the sewer, they told Atalia of the battle against Oosith and the fact that he was an aboleth, which shocked her. Reeking of sewage, they washed themselves off in the river and headed to the Stick and Pig Inn. The confused innkeeper let them in, fed them and set up some rooms for the night. Still feeling the Aboleth’s curse, Korrak and Darius slept in bathtubs overnight to stop drying out. Atalia, Jakkob and Timothy elected to return in the morning.

They woke up at 09:00 and immediately headed to the Elder’s Hall to speak to Felix. Felix was shocked to hear that such creatures were in the sewers and paid handsomely for solving the problem and rescuing the young men. He told them the Aboleth’s curse could be cured at the temple of Mielikki in the eastern part of the city. They next paid a visit to Dezhia Rossolio, who was delighted to see the return of the family signet ring, shocked to hear about the events of the night and paid the agreed 1000gp for solving the mystery of Artan’s disappearance and finding the ring. The Legends of A Work In Progress then headed to the temple and were cured by the priestess. Being a humble, homespun place the temple did not trigger Amadeous as much as the grandiose temple of Lathander in Silverymoon.

The party visited Jakkob’s home and his father Perry was ecstatic to see his son returned home and he gave them a gift from his great-grandfather’s adventuring days: a rope of mending. They gratefully accepted the gift and Timothy also gifted them one of his few remaining family treasures: a ring of protection.

They decided to go to the tavern “Danivarr’s House” in the western part of the city. A dive bar in a rough neighbourhood, they soon spotted Thel Drenev (the cross-eyed half-orc barman). Darius confidently walked up and asked for “A bottle of Silverymoon’s finest: the kind that’s best enjoyed with friends” and presented the Triboar badge. Recognising the code, Thel said he would prepare the private room and they followed him out to the back of the bar. In a private room he poured 6 shots from a special bottle and said they would all need to drink the wine. They all toasted and drank the wine and everything went white.

They found themselves teleported to the top of Moongleam Tower: a tall black stone tower that stood in the middle of Everlund. A voice called out to them and greeted them, which turned out to belong to an elderly human mage named Krowen Valharrow. The party introduced themselves and Krowen revealed that Fenris had been sent to guide them here, but also assess them as a group. Fenris delivered his report: a scathing assessment that also pointed out a silver lining: they were surprisingly good at killing things and would probably be easily replaced if the need arose. Krowen explained that the need for heroes was dire in these troubled times and explained the problem with giant attacks was repeating itself all over the Sword coast.

He explained the Ordning: the caste system of giants and how the Storm King Hekaton usually maintained order but for some reason had ceased and each Giant Lord was now following running amok and following their own schemes. To find out what happened they would need to find the court of the Storm King, which was nearly impossible as the location was not known, even to other giants. The last option was to find the Eye of the All-Father: a holy temple to the giant’s god Annam and that might reveal the way. This would be hard, however as the location had been lost 30,000 years ago in the war between dragons and giants. The only leads they had were that maybe dragons may know something (being ancient magical creatures and the eternal foe of giants) or whether any giants may have clues to the location. This led them to thinking that they had two choices: to speak to the cloud giant Zephyra (currently moored at Mithral Hall to the north west) or Chazlauth Yarghorn (the dragon expert living in Waterdeep that Naxene Drathkala had described).

Needing to travel great distances, Krowen took them deep beneath the tower and showed them the Harper teleportation circle network. This network of teleportation circles connected Mirabar, Neverwinter, Waterdeep, Yartar and Loudwater and could be used by them to fast travel instantly. Each circle was in a hidden location in each city, not easily found to enemies of the Harpers.