The party had received a delivery task by a man calling himself Basavaraj, a name the party know to be the name of the Info-merchant.
However, the delivery task was not a simple one: Deliver a small box to non other than Fierna, the short-tempered co-ruler of Phlegethos.
Our heroes first instinct was to bring this matter to the attention to Belial, their current sponsor and the dad/brother/lover of Fierna, but it quickly became clear the box had a sort of a compass spell on it and the further it moved from Fierna, the more it was phasing out of reality.
Crossing the bridge
With no other choice than to follow the direction given by the box, the party soon found themselves out in the desert-like world of Phlegethos approaching the Crystaline Retreat, Fierna’s vacation home.
As they closed in, they noticed the huge crystal spire had a moat of a dark cloud type substance with a single wobbly bridge across.
Not trusting the bridge, Thorga dispatched his Pseudodragon that he further more cast Enlarge on so the weight of the creature would be closer to that of the heroes as he instructed it to walk across the 300ft long wooden bridge.
Half way through, the bridge vanished as it was an illusion and fortunately the Pseudodrago was quick to take flight.
The Hellbenders, not keen on dipping their toes in the dense fog, decided on a two part plan: Pestilence would open a Dimension Door for her and Thorga to teleport across to the Spire and the enlarged Pseudodragon… with some additional magical buffs… would carry Kaari and her pet Owlbear cub, across.
Pestilence and Thorga made it successfully across, but the smooth surface of the crystal gave them no foot hold and they slid down in the dark substance.
Kaari, watching this in horror, was keen to get across and to land successfully on the Spire, she cast Spike Growth on the Spire and although she did hurt herself a bit jumping across, at least she had something to hold on to preventing her from sliding down.
A moat of liquid nightmare
Meanwhile Pestilence and Thorga had realised the moat was filled with liquid nightmare and horrifying ancient statues.
Pestilence kept her cool, but Thorga saw visions of childhood nightmares. And that nightmare came to be and suddenly Death Tyrant, an undead Beholder, appeared as if straight out of Thorga’s childhood nightmares.
And while the Death Tyrant was the stuff of nightmares, it’s rays and its healing-nullifying gaze were very real. And Thorga and Pestilence quickly realised that this was a foe stronger than anything they had met.
Fortunately Kaari’s Spike Growth made it’s way down the side of the spire and last minute, the heroes frantically climbed up.
All three heroes united opened a doorway in the otherwise seamless crystal surface.
And they were now inside in a waiting room with one door leading further into the spire with a female and male statue on either side.
Reflections
Opening the only door out of the waiting room, the party found themselves in a room of mirrors.
The path forward into the room divided into two path and as Thorga ventured in using the right path, he duplicated with another Thorga going down the left.
Both Thorga’s seemed equally Thorga and Kaari and Pestilence followed with the same effect, effectively doubling the party’s size.
Having recovered from the confusion, the party looked around and Thorga spotted a mirror showing a reflection of his older self.
Immediately, he smashed the mirror, but the shattered pieces of the mirror regrouped into a Mirror Golem and the fight was on.
The heroes dispatched the Mirror Golem after a fierce fight, but had all noticed a strained voice coming from somewhere else saying the words “release me”.
Now the fight was over they tried to find the source of the voice and Pestilence found a Mind Flayer trapped in a mirror.
The creature, not used to communicating in words, kept projecting “release me”.
While Pestilence had never seen or heard of a Mind Flayer, he was able to spot that its right eye seemed to not look like the rert of the Mind Flayer, it almost looked like it had been grafted into the face of the creature.
While he stared at the eye he almost lost control to the Mind Flayer, but quickly pulled away.
And just in time as Thorga and Kaari had found the way out, by looking at the reflections of the door way in the mirrors.
Quickly all the Kaaris, Thorgas and Pestilences ran up the spiral staircase that had now been revealed in the centre.
A short audience with Fierna
As the heroes walked into Fierna’s lounge, they realised they were no longer duplicated.
On the sofa Fierna lay casually like a cat bored waiting for prey.
The party was acutely aware they were in the presence of one of the most sensual and dangerous beings in the world.
Wasting no time they told her they came with a delivery for her which she boringly accepted.
Opening the box, the heroes could see her read a small note that she smirked at, placed back in the box which she then threw in the fire and exclaimed: “you can go now” before she left the room.
Quickly, Thorga recovered the box from the fire. It read:
My dearest rose of the nine hells.
I will prove my love for you once and for all and bring you what you are rightfully owed.
All I ask is for your hand in return and to rule by your side in eternity.
My whiskers stirs at the thought of us finally together.
B—
The journey back to Abriymoch
Having left the tower, our heroes made their way back to Abriymoch, capital of Phlegethos.
As they walked Pestilence noticed Thorga was becoming translucent. As he pointed it out, the three heroes noticed they were all getting increasingly transparent.
They kept walking towards Abriymoch. Not only were they becoming more and more see through, their minds were losing focus, not really sure who they are and what they were.
And as they neared the gates of Abriymoch, they simply no longer existed.
DM notes
What have I done?
The situation above really came from me being faithful to dice rolls so now I have to figure out where the hell we go from here 😅.
Also, I wasn’t 100% confident on how the mirror room would look so I actually made a dress rehearsal of that room on my painting matt.
