Daggerford: Splitting the Party

Game Date: 8/7/2021

Location: Roll20
Campaign: Daggerford, Session 18

System: D&D 5e
DM: Mike

The Party:
Azul (Cliff) Dragonborn Fighter

Nikolice Gomez (Steven) - Human Fighter

Khemed (Rusty) Half-Elf Wizard
Navine/"Spider" (Steve) Elf Rogue
Vanya (Matt) Half-Elf Bard

The Session:

Last session ended mid-dungeon, on a quest to find the Elemental Key of Fire.  We were still hurting a bit from our last fight, so we took a short rest in the temple room.  During the rest, we felt like we were being watched, and we could hear some movement from elsewhere in the dungeon.  There was a large anvil in the center of the room, with "Praise Moradin" inscribed on it in Dwarven.  Khemed cast Detect Magic, and discovered that the anvil was full of conjuration magic.  We pondered trying to move the anvil, or interact with it in some way.

We tried striking the anvil with a hammer we found in a nearby room.  A spectral Dwarf child approached us, and gave us a warning. "Shh!  They'll hear you."  After a bit more interaction, he ran off.  We heard some other Dwarven voices from a nearby room.  Azul peeked around the corner, and promptly failed a perception check.  

A couple of Stoneghosts attacked Azul.  One of them phased through the wall and attacked Vanya.  After a couple of rounds, they both fled into the walls.  We decided to explore one of the rooms to the West, where we found the remnants of a classroom.  Azul heard another baby crying in the distance.  We noticed that the ceiling of the room was bulging, like it was about to collapse.

In another room we found a nursery, and some Dwarven picks in another.  Then we heard the howling of Orcs running toward us.  Several Clotskull Orcs and a Red Wizard quickly approached, and we rolled initiative.  One attacked Vanya, and two went straight for Khemed.  Nikolice pulled one Orc towards himself with his Psionic powers, and Azul finished that one off.  

The Red Wizard saw Khemed, looked afraid, and vanished.  One Orc hit Vanya with two greataxe attacks, dropping her.  Another one knocked Khemed down.  The rest of the party finished off the Orcs, and helped revive the downed party members.  Since two of us were out of hit points, the party retreated from the dungeon and looked for a safe place for a long rest.

While resting, Khemed received a message via Sending spell.  We managed to get through the long rest without any random encounters, and approached the dungeon fresh.  We checked a few more rooms on the ground level, nearly triggering a total ceiling collapse.  Then we approached the stairs.  Azul set off an alarm spell, but we proceeded upstairs anyway.  In the first room, there were some runes on the floor.  Down the West hallway, a couple of Dwarves hunched behind a table.  

Nikolice attempted to talk to them, and they shot him with a crossbow.  Then he held up some gold, and they stopped firing.  They gestured towards a North hallway, as if trying to warn us to be quiet.  Then a fireball came from down the North hallway, grazing Navine and Nikolice.  Some enemies approached from the North hallway.  Three Orcs, an Ogre, and the Red Wizard.

While the enemies were still clustered, Vanya fired off a Shatter spell, killing one Orc and damaging the rest.  The enemies charged down the hall.  On Azul's turn, he managed to hit three of them with his Lightning Breath.  When the Ogre missed Azul, the Dragonborn used his riposte to finish off the Ogre.  This left the Red Wizard, still down the hallway.  Khemed approached the Wizard, who recognized him, and dropped a wall of fire behind him.  We couldn't hear the discussion between Khemed and the Red Wizard.

When the flames finally went out, Khemed and the Red Wizard had vanished.  The rest of us ran down the West hall to talk to the Dwarves, who indicated that we should be quiet.  Navine tiptoed off to look for Khemed, while Azul, Vanya, and Nikolice followed the Dwarves.  The Dwarves didn't know much Common, but enough to communicate.  We asked them what happened here, and the Dwarves answered, "Curses."  The Dwarves gestured down one hallway and indicated that it held some prisoners.  

Navine kept sneaking around and exploring the hallways, found a nest of giant rats, and avoided them. Another hallway led North to a large room.  But before she could investigate it, some enemies in a South hallway spotted her and started to attack.  She fled and hid.  When one enemy approached her location, she sneaked past them and hid again.  

Meanwhile, the rest of the party continued to follow the Dwarves, unaware of Navine's plight.  Eventually they led us to the same hallways Navine was hiding in, and she rejoined the party.  The Dwarves led us to a room containing a distinguished older Dwarf, who they introduced as the King of Illefarn.  We ended the session on this cliffhanger.