5e D&D Dwimmermount Session 11 - Don’t eat the stuffing

The battle for the baby starts

Bittersalt got a 23 for her initiative and went first. Despite her usual uncaring bravado and swagger, her instinct is to save the infant, and rushes forward to snatch the baby away from the goat-man. Surprisingly weak, she easily snatches the baby and tries to tumble away but has overreached and only just gets past the blacked skinned being. This thing spins around and claws at her head. It’s fingers pass through her as if insubstantial, dragging fleeting filaments of sanity out of her mind, doing psychic damage. She then managed to get the baby into the arms of Paulo.

Errol bounds out of the forest, as most of the naked congregation start screaming and running. He smashes his hammer into the goat-man, and quick as a flash a transformation occurs. Standing before them is tall smokey shadow, all horns and gloating teeth, Brother Spenzar pales, and whispers “Shadow demon”.

Brother Spenzar measures Heresy 

The leaders of the congregation draw weapons, the haughty woman bares a pair of shortsword and the cynical man has a scimitar and dagger in his hands before they know it. The burly thug had hidden a mace, while the other guard who had scouted ahead took off a huge longbow. Finally one of the followers, who remained at the edge of the group starts chanting. This cultist fanatic started chanting in a miserable droning tone, and cast a spell of holding on the elf. She however was of strong mind and resisted it.

Zoilus moved in, trying to keep his allies and the child safe by avoiding his infamous rages. A barbarian such is still a deathdealer when calm though. Calphis the warrior mage shot bolt after bolt of magical force into the demon from the wand he’d found in Dwimmermount, while the warlock pounded free standing targets with his eldritch blasts.

A mixture of vicious close combat and magical blasts fills the battlefield. Errol surprises everyone by launching a scorching cone of fire from his hands, worrying Calphis that the demon has somehow possessed him. Flandar summons the freezing void of the stars about him and encases himself in the Armour Of Hadar, to which the cultist has no response and is blasted in the face by the gnome. Brother Spenzar brings the pure light of Typhon upon the demon which reels from its lawful glare. The demon fails to strike again, and even with it’s abyssal essence resisting nonmagical attacks, it is brought down. Errol’s last glimpse of it is of it’s 6 fingered claws desperately clinging to reality as it is sucked back in the abyss.


However the remaining human fighters are clearly veterans and right with relentless accuracy. Even the goats are not safe, as a firebolt goes wide and cooks one off. The battle though is eventually won by the party, and all the cultists are put to the sword. Paulo, scare and hiding in the woods, has kept the infant safe so they return to Adamas and rest before meeting with Saidon in the morning. Bittersalt takes care of baby, asking for some milk in the Inn she is staying in. The racism that elves face rears it’s ugly head as the watch bang on her door demanding the ‘stolen baby’ be handed over. It takes invoking the name of Saidon the High Archivist to fend them off.

The next day the party pay another visit to the archivist. When they explain that the cult was some kind of front for a shadow demon the high priest is visibly shaken and shows far more concern than he previously exhibited. He said he wanted the party back in Dwimmermount and acting as his eyes as soon as possible. Taking them into his secret arming room behind his main chamber he gave them a single scroll of protection against demons and each a potion of healing. He also provided them all with horses to speed their journey back to Muntburg and Dwimmermount. On his own side he said that he’d heard nothing from Typhon’s Fists, the adventuring party he’d sent to Dwimmermount when he’d heard rumours of the fall of the shield around the dungeon.

The party left Adamas immediately, stopping in Muntburg to drop of the baby, who they’d named Olivar, with Paulo’s mother who they felt would be best placed to look after him. The blacksmith had finished the sets of splint mail armour he’d been making for Errol and Bittersalt, who were both impressed with his handy work. Then party left again for the vast stair before the gates of Dwimmermount, with the aim of destroying the spider queen of the kobolds.

We left it there. The combat session was fun, with the players being 3rd level they have more options now and it was a good gauge for me to judge what they can and can’t face. It was by far the most complex we’ve had, and certainly the shape of things to come as the dungeon wakes up and things more foul and magical start to make their plays within its depth.
 

Before initiative rolls

Late battle

The Shadow Demon appears!