Session 47

=January 30th, 2020 - Ironslag Slugfest=

Ironslag Slugfest
The session began right where we last left our heroes, after having slain the fire giant leader Duke Zalto. The extreme heat in this central forge room was still not-so-slowly killing Cadmus and Rachen in their plate suits. Rachen recognized the iron flask on the fallen duke’s belt that matched the description given by the dwarves. With his hands literally burning in his gloved hands, Rachen took the flask over to the domed forge. The black-metal glowed red, and even further searing heat streamed out the forge door once they got it open.

Rachen opened the stopper and put the flask in the opening and braced, as the entirety of the fire primordial’s energy and mass was sucked into the bottle. With the stopper on the iron flask it was just slightly warm to the touch, and the source of extreme heat was extinguished - although it was still very hot.

The party started to discuss their next moves, as they needed to still find the Duke’s conch of teleportation, retrieve the fallen giant’s head - and/or rescue more captured dwarves. While they started to talk, Rufus picked the lock on the mace-head of the Duke. It was really just a barred cage, and now with the fight over and gate open he found the inhabitant to be a severally burned dwarf. Lachlan gave the dwarf some water while others attended to his wounds.

Most of the party wanted to have another escape route out of the fortress and started trying to budge the huge fifty-foot-tall metal doors in the room. Nothing worked, physical or magical - including a knock spell. Once the caged dwarf was conscious, he insisted on staying with his rescuers. Rachen agreed to carry him, if he told them what he could about getting the large doors open. The dwarf recalled a few hazy encounters where a fire giant spoke a phrase from the outside and the doors opened. The dwarf repeated what he remembered, and after a few tries Rachen worked out the correct sequence of words. In giant, he recited the phrase and the doors slowly opened.

Hot air rushed from the fortress out the open massive doorway. Not even a few minutes afterwards, as the party still discussed which way to go next, they were attacked through multiple doorways. Through the ground level door they had not yet gone through, entered two ogres with a dozen or so goblins at their feet. Behind those was what looked to be the female leader of the fortress - the fire giant duchess, clad in a black dragon scale dress.

From behind the party, through the ground level hall the party had entered the room from, swarmed more goblins. Finally, along the metal gantry circling the room overhead came four more fire giants, and a half dozen hobgoblins.

The battle erupted with Lachlan casting a fireball that exploded and killed most of the goblins, as Alburt polymorphed himself into a young silver dragon and took to the air along Elysian. The two dragons circled and fired their breath weapons - cold and acid - at the fire giants on the second level gantry. This slowed the giants, but after throwing rocks and metal objects from the gantry they jumped over the edge to attack the party members on the ground.

Rufus and Thia maneuvered and fired their weapons, trying to coordinate and take out fire giants one at a time. Meanwhile, Rachen and Cadmus engaged the ogres and giant duchess before more giants reached them. The two plate wearers were already extremely injured from the primordial’s heat, and while they were able to kill most of the first wave of foes, once the remaining fire giants who jumped down reached them, they both fell unconscious.

Thia had smartly conjured a spike growth in the center of the space, that slowed and killed most of the hobgoblins. Alburt, Lachlan, Rufus, Thia, and her dragon Elysian were able to kill most of the remaining foes and got the younger fire giant to surrender. The other fire giants were looking to this young male for direction, after the duchess was slain, of course. His proclaimed himself the prince, Zaltember.

And that is where the session ended, with Lachlan giving Cadmus a potion of healing, and the group preparing to what comes next in the fire giant fortress known as Ironslag.

It was still the two hundred and third day since the raid on Greenest.

Click Here for the Next Session