Frostgrave RPG Campaign - The Summoners' Tale - Chapter VII - The Battle of The Two Kings

Just as the party was absorbing what they had seen through the Eyes of Amato, they saw the Lich Lord turn to the invisible, demon-possessed bear and began a casting.  The bear suddenly became visible.  Far worse, the bear's demon-induced rage suddenly calmed and it walked slowly over to the Lich Lord, taking up a position defending the undead sorceror, completely in his thrall 

The party began pushing into the room, realizing that surprise had been lost.  Sir Emerick raised the Horn of Destruction to his lips and blew...

The Horn had the effect of a Crumble spell and the horrific Bone Wheel collapsed with a shattering crash, nearly burying the party in a gruesome cascade.

As the dust settled, Greg the Bear and the writhing demon creature flung themselves on the party who soon were being pressed back out of the room.

With the bone wheel now destroyed, the Lich Lord flung a cauldron containing water from the Crystal Pool onto the magic gate.  Soon, another nightmarish creature emerged from that dark dimension.  However, the arcing energy of the gate ended with the last drops of the water.  Realizing that the plan to bring more of these creatures to his aid had failed, the Lich Lord fled the room through a side door, ordering his minions to continue the fight against the hard-pressed party.

With great reluctance, Bozydar struck hard blows against Greg the Bear, while Dame Roswith struck at the tentacled creature.  This gave An'var the breathing space to cast a Banish Demon spell.  The spell took effect and Greg returned to his normal form, looking shocked and confused from the wounds inflicted by his friends.  The tentacled demon was sent back to the dimension from which it had come.

An'varr, who was still glowing from the illumination trap he had triggered earlier, called out, "How was that!  Shouldn't I get an impressive title, like Atlantia.  What about Demon-Bane?"
"Let's worry about that later, Firefly!" retorted Redmaine.

The party spread out into the room to attack the remaining enemies.  Redmaine teleported to the prisoner magic users and began freeing them.  This included his Apprentice Thisbe.

Roswith fell upon the last of the inter-dimensional creatures, hewing wildly with her magic sword.  In a great flash, Roswith's mighty blow smashed the demon's corporeal body and sent it back from whence it came.  

The party shouted, "Hail Roswith Demon-Bane!"

"O come on!" shouted An'varr in frustration.

With a grunt, the Summoner said they needed to follow the Lich Lord.  Ril gave An'varr his magic Elven dagger that he had coated with demonic essence from the great Leviathan they had battled on the frozen river.  An'varr knew that the dagger possessed the great destructive power of the Leviathan but using it could result in the utter destruction of his soul, eternally possessed by the Leviathan. Nonetheless, An'varr knew the Lich Lord must be stopped.

                                   

The party rushed through the short tunnel through which the Lich Lord had fled.  They saw it came to the surface near a ruined manor house.  The party made to the surface in time to see the Lich Lord with the aid of several human necromancers working a great magic.  With an unaccountable din, the whole hillside on which the manor stood rose into the air.

As it did so, a terrible keening came from the necromancers.  Soon, every undead creature within the sound of the call lumbered together under the floating mountain.  It was an army of the undead of Frostgrave, marching now under the command of the Lich Lord.

The party had just enough time to seize hold of branches of several trees that had fallen when the mountain soared into the air.  With difficulty they scrambled onto the floating cliff as it flew over the ruins.  They soon realized they were heading South, towards the settlement of The Two Kings.

The party crept towards the Lich Lord and noticed he still had a small cask of the waters of the rustal pool at his side.  The Lich Lord soon noticed them.  He sent his two Wraith Knights against them.

A fierce battle ensued. 

Emerick attempted to use the Horn of Destruction once more, to bring the manor ruins down on the Lick Lord's head.

However, he only succeed in bringing it down on Garamond who had gone into the ruins to get a shot at the Lich Lord.  The agile Treasure Hunter avoided being burned in the crumble.

Ultimately, the party dispatched the two fearsome warriors.  The Lich Lord then put the cask to his lips, drinking deeply the remaining magical waters.  The undead sorcerer's body began to enlarge and change.  Before them, the party saw, where once the Lich Lord stood, an enormous Frost Dragon spreading its great icy wings and drawing back it's breath.

Meanwhile, the crowd at The Two Kings observed with great shock the flying mountain and the army of the undead, supported by frost trolls, that was rapidly advancing towards them.

A great panic ensued as the inhabitants sought to escape the oncoming doom.

 In the midst of this panic, a single high but powerful voice cut through the confusion.  Sweetflower was not about to lose all she had worked to hard to gain to a bunch of moldy corpses.  With her bodyguard she rallied the mob.  She had all of the bards from the tavern take an inspiring song, "We Have No Fear for the Wraith-Slayer Will Soon Be Here!'

As the strains of this song reached the floating manor, An'varr threw his hands up and shouted, "Really!"

Sweetflower soon had a ragged line of defenders formed in front of the tavern.

It was none too soon, as a wave of skeletal cavalry crashed into the line. Fire for the gathered wizards and bowmen drove this first attack back but there were far more undead following.

Back on the floating mountain, the Lich Lord-turned-Frost-Dragon rose into the air.  A great blast of black ice rushed from its mouth, striking down several members of the party.  The ranger, Midgonn, was pushed back off the edge of the hill and plunged to his death.

Atlantia fell, her leg smashed by the blast of the dark ice.  An'varr seeing this leapt onto the back of Greg the Bear, kicked the creature into a lumbering charge toward the hovering dragon.  

He stood on the bear's back and then leapt onto the foot of the fearsome dragon.  He plunged Ril's demon-cursed dagger into the dragon's foot and then dropped off into the snow below.

As the Two Kings inhabitants battled the undead, several trumpet calls range out.  The Gudlub tribesmen, true to their promise of peace with An'varr came rushing to the outsiders' aid.

As An'varr lay back in the snow, he saw the spot where the dagger had struck begin to fold into itself.  The dragon cried out in tortured horror and its great body was being collapsed into this alternate form of existence.  Soon as small black ball, throbbing with a dangerous energy was hovering over the party. The floating mountain, no longer under the control of the Lich Lord-Dragon began to glide towards the earth.  Most of the party jumped into the snow below, preferring the risk of falling.

Braanx the Rangifer chose to leap into the midst of a horde of zombies.  He hacked with great force at the hated undead, his war cry echoing over the battlefield.

His cry was answered by dozens more, as the whole tribe of the Rangifers charged from the forest 

They drove into the hordes of the undead wreaking destruction.

Then, the hover black ball burst in a huge explosion, a wave of magical energy engulfing the hillside.  The wave cascaded over An'varr and Greg, the bear loyally using his bulk to shield his master.  In a moment, An'varr realized what had happened when he struck the Lich Lord-Dragon with the Leviathan-imbued dagger.  Bringing these two greater demons together, each strove to possess the other.  Such a battle was waged across the dimensions, opening and closing portals numerous times in a split second.  The power released in this battle caused the dimensions to fold over onto themselves, ultimately destroying both entities, at least insofar as they had manifested on this material plane.

The hill plummeted into the heart of the undead army.

Sweetflower order her bards to sing a charge and her ramshackle army of adventurers charged foward.

Leaderless, the undead fell before the three-fold onslaught.  The Two Kings had been saved.

 An'varr emerged from underneath the bear, calling out, "Did anyone see that?  I destroyed the Lich Lord, I survived an interdimensional chain reaction, I live through a mountain falling from the sky! No one else but me could have done that!"

He heard a slight cough behind him.  He turned to see Ril the Elf, who brushed back the single strand of hair that fallen out of place and said blandly, "Yes, I was right here for all of that.  Very impressive, Firefly."

They looked to Atlantia who was unconscious, her leg a mangled mess.  The rest of the party soon reached them.  All save Midgonn had survived the fall.  Despite magical healing, Atlantia's leg was permanently injured.

For the next few days, the party were the heroes of all Frostgrave, feted at The Two Kings.  One day, however, the eyes of the inhabitants turned once more to the skies.

A strange airship approached from the South.  It proved to be the famed Airboat of Armera, the great flying vessel of the Invisible School of Thaumaturgy.

A group of wizards asked to see the party. "Thank the gods," the elder wizard exclaimed, "There is a terrible menace...we need someone like you to stop it...."

Frostgrave RPG Campaign: The Summoners' Tale - Chapter VI - Lair of the Lich Lord

After resting for the night with the Rangifers, the party set off toward the receding glacier.  The area through which they traveled was lightly wooded but soon opened into what had once been an area of wealthy estates on the edge of old Felstad.

They were guided by Braanx the Rangifer.  Now that Atlantia was a wizard in her own right, she summoned an animal familiar.  This was a wolf that she named Chuck.

The party soon came to an ancient temple still half buried in the glacier.   Chuck the Wolf was sent forward to reconnoiter. They had placed on him one of the treasures they had gained on the wreck of the Dracolyth, the Eyes of Amoto, a pair of amulets that let the wearer of one see through the eyes of the wearer of the other.   

At the entrance to the temple, a half dozen cultist, led by a cultist Templar, were unloading a large ornate casket-like box from an oxen drawn sled.

The party moved quietly through the ruins of a nearby estate, hoping to surprise the cultists and force an entrance to the temple.

The walls of the old estate proved excellent cover as most of the party moved into position.

All that is, except An'varr himself who stubbed his toe on a fallen rock and let out an involuntary shout. Garamond the Treasure Hunter rushed to his aid, forgetting the danger from the nearby cultists. The demon-possessed Greg the Bear proved surprisingly adept at hiding himself from observation after his master's error.  

An'varr used the error as an opportunity.  After being shot at by the alerted cultists' bowmen, An'varr feigned that, as a Summoner, he was seeking to join the forces of the Lich Lord.  Four of the cultist went forward to disarm An'varr and Garamond and lead them cautiously into the temple.  As the majority of the cultists were now out in the open, the party decided to spring their surprise.

Captain Bozydar opened the attack by performing an amazing trick shot, striking the Templar with an arrow through the visor on his helmet, killing him instantly.  The other archers in the party reined more arrows down on the surprised cultists.

The rest of the party dashed out and quickly struck down the remaining cultists.  The doors to the temple slammed shut from within, those cultists inside obviously alerted but taking no obvious aggressive actions.

 With the momentary lull, the party drew the sled off to examine the strange casket.  It proved to be a stasis chamber of great age.  They were able to open it to find the body of a pre-Cataclysm man within.  Much to their shock, the man was still alive.  Speaking Old Lloroi, the language that was the basis of the modern Common Tongue, the man was, with difficulty able to tell them that he was Shafri, 3rd Storm Warden aboard the treasure galleon Dracolyth, out of the port of Manapor in the Fortunate Isles.  They had brought a cargo of tribute to the Lloroi Emperor that including a small firkin of water from the great Crystal Pool. Shafri said that they had just arrived in port when a huge wall of ice and snow rapidly descended on the city; he managed to get to the captain's cabin and flung himself into the stasis chamber there before the ship was engulfed.  This was the last he remembered.

The party explained to the shocked Shafri that 1400 years had passed since then and that the treasure had been seized by the Lich Lord.  Putting aside the horror of his predicament, Shafri said that the waters were highly magically and must not fall into evil hands.  The party then moved to assault the temple.

Bowmen and spellcasters formed up outside the door.  The rest of the party positioned themselves to attack as soon as the doors were forced open.

Inside another half dozen cultists led by a Knight awaited the assault. They were unprepared for the havoc that was about to be unleashed upon them.

Redmaine cast a grenade spell that blew open the doors.  Immediately after that An'varr and Atlantia hurled Elemental Bolts into the chamber.  Shafri then brought up a wind to interfere with any return fire.  Half of the cultists were brought down in the initial attack.  The members of the party waiting by the door rushed in and wiped out the remaining cultists.  They saw a small door at the side of the chamber.

Garamond confirmed there were no traps on the door and was able to easily pick the lock.  It opened onto what had once been a library.  A zombie shambled out from behind a bookcase but Garamond supported by Braanx easily dispatched it.

While Garamond checked to see if the bookshelves were trapped, An'varr rushed over to a large book on a lectern.  When he opened, he was sprayed by a cloud of gas that left him cover in phosphorescent glowdust, making him an easy target for anyone shooting at him.

The next room, a small alcove, contained another zombie.  Braanx destroyed it with glee.

The alcove led to a curved hallway divided by two large pillars.  A wizard and Wraith Knight lay in ambush.  Chuck, who had been sent forward again with one of the amulets of Amoto, was crushed when the wizard crumbled a pillar onto the poor creature.

The enraged party charged forward, Atlantia killing the Wraith (her third now) and Greg avenging his fellow mammalian companion.

The party then came upon a set of stairs descending into a dark passage below. Garamond was able to disable a large swinging axe that had been set as a trap.

The came across an abandoned shrine to some forgotten dark god.  They had just about crossed the room when a valporine sprung down from the ceiling, attacking Ril.  The ape-like creature was incredibly fast but proved no match for the combined blades and claws of the party.

Beyond the shrine, they could hear the dull thumping of some type of large machinery at work.  They burst into the next passage where two cultists briefly tried to stop them.  They came to a door behind which the thumping sound seemed to come.  Casting an invisibility spell on Greg, An'varr sent the still demon-possessed bear, now wearing the amulet of Amoto, into the room.

An enormous wheel of bones rotated slowly in the center of the room, powered by arcane forces.  The desiccated bodies of wizards bound to each arm seemed to be providing the power. Bolts of energy arced from the wheel to a large gate-like structure at the end of the room.

A number of wizards and apprentices, including Redmaine's Thisbe, were held prisoner in one corner, awaiting their turn on the wheel.

Presiding over it all was the grim form of the Lich Lord, sprinkling water from the firkin of Crystal Pool upon the wheel.

Slowly, a huge glistening, pulsating, bloated, multi-legged abomination oozed its way through the gate.  The Lich Lord had opened a portal to a dimension of horror.