Storm King's part 1 - Arrival in Nightstone

Prelude

As the Adventurers and the LEGEND* “Solid” where occupied with problems in Beverna, other GREATER things happened as planned. 

In a presumably secret room, Random and Nixi** are waiting for something or someone, Random playing skillfully with his knives while Nixi was reading from a human skin book but keeping an eye out (the magical one) pointed at Random. Both are trying to look calm but the tension in the room was there nevertheless. 

Finally Pazuzu*** arrives. It seems that even if Pazuzu failed in his previous attempt to get rid of the Adventurers he was brought back to the plane of the living by their MASTER (the name of the MASTER remains a mistery for now).

Clearly Nixi is the brain of this party as she puts a map on the table and start sharing the plan with the others. It seems that the orc invaders were expected to fail, but they were necessary to keep the humans, elves and dwarfs distracted while BIGGER (even GIGANTIC) plans are already in place.

Pazuzu was left to gather brute force for the upcoming events. Random was sent to pick up his assassinations list from the usual contact, while Nixi will start training the NEW FRIEND for the SURPRISE she has prepared.

The adventure begins

At the end of Zarek Valley, the Adventurers found out that 3 cities needed help in the Forgotten Realms**** so mercenaries by choice we took the road to fame and glory but mostly gold :)

The pirates of Captain White-Face that we helped the campaign before opened a portal and left us near the city of Sundabar.***** Our great geographical sense pushed us to take the safer path (meaning the road) to the city.

While traveling along sharing stories, we see in the distance a storm approaching. The big bulk of the party chooses to take cover in a nearby cave****** while the monk Zen******* driven by some sort of personal quest chooses to stay and wait for the storm in the middle of the road. “Wisely”, the paladin Solid chooses to stay by his side while the storm approaches.
Zen offers his magical bound item as an offering to the storm.********

After the storm passes we get out of the cave only to find the two courageous adventurers frozen to death in the middle of the road. Luckily we have a Cleric with us that will stabilize and heal them quickly so no harm done (except for the lost magic item).

Translation: Son, never piss against the wind.

We follow the road trusting Zen’s senses on the bound item and we reach a crossroad. The party chooses to move towards the humble settlement of Nightstone. Closer to the settlement we hear bell sounds stronger and stronger as we approach.

Finally we reach the walls of the city and the gates are open, the city seems to be besieged and deserted. After some investigations it seems that some goblins are looting the city. In a chamber of the half destroyed inn we meet with Kella********* who offers us a deal on opening a chest for us and  giving us the content if we clear the city and offer her and “her associates” the ruling. Not knowing what happened to the city and hungry for the chest's wealth the party accepts the deal.

We kill the goblins all over town and head to the isolated castle of the city where we found the royal guards morning their rightful ruler, a dead baroness.

They tell us that in time of need the citizens run to the safe place in the mountains and so when rocks started falling from the sky they did what they knew best and abandoned the city to safety.

In the meantime Kella’s associates********** arrive and offers us more wealth if we bring the citizens back to the city in order for them to rule over them as they see fit. Groin the cleric in the party, doesn’t truly believe Kella so he casts Zone of truth in order to find what will happen with the villagers once they return but Kella is fine tuning her words to sound just right and not to lie. So to the safety caverns we march… To be continued.

         

* Reminder that anyone suicidal enough can become a living legend.

** They were PCs in our 4E adventure and became villains in the current one.

*** The end boss and acting villain of Menace in the Zarek Valley, yet to be published at this point.

**** Which is the setting. The continent is called "Faerûn".

***** Explaining the presence of a seafaring ship on a small lake.

****** An excellent Survival check by the ranger actually found an abandoned hobbit house, leaving the adventurers to spend their night in relative comfort.

******* Ren

******** By this point, each party member had a powerful artefact.

********* She introduced herself as a travelling monk, forgotten about when the villagers evacuated.