Previous Next

Returns & Revelations

Last week, the party sadly parted with Ellenforma at the edge of the woods twisted by the magic of the Sekerren Ruins. Ellenforma promised she would see the party again and went back into the woods to wander around happily for a while doing witch things. The party made their way back to Praxis with Gregory and plotted what to do about what they discovered in the Ruins. When they got to Praxis, they split off from Gregory and agreed to meet him that night at the Gallivanting Turnip after he did some research on his own in town. The party tried to enter the city, but were stopped by the guards at the gate, who warned them that Praxis was on edge because the mayor had been killed by a tiefling.

Once in town, the party went to the guardhouse to update Captain Tam on their discoveries. She was very interested to hear what they had found, and gave the party more information about the mayor's death. She told them that he had apparently been assassinated using life-draining magic by a tiefling named Alvah Sable. Worse, Captain Tam announced that the tiefling was from Camilla's family. Camilla took the news rather poorly and ran off into the city, and Ayala went after her to comfort her. While she was gone, Captain Tam warned the rest of the party to keep an eye on Camilla to make sure that they knew where her true allegiances lay. She also explained for those who didn't know that the Donovans are one of the oldest and most powerful families in Praxis, with networks of both legitimate and illegitimate business that touch almost every aspect of life there. After a while, Camilla and Ayala returned, and the party talked with Captain Tam about what to do with that information. She explained that the deputy mayor, Lilian Smith, was running the town in the mayor's absence. Lilian was taking a firm hand to control the city, and both her and a number of established interests in the city - especially the Donovans - were focused more on the assassin's magical nature than his family ties, intensifying anti-magic sentiment in the city. On another note, the gate guards at the northern gate saw Frank Smith heading north out of Praxis, apparently as part of a mission in the Expanse.

The party decided to stay in Praxis to keep investigating for the time being. Their next stop was the Landowner's Association, where they received their reward in exchange for the cancellation of the original Sekerren Ruins quest. Their exchange with the snooty clerk was somewhat strained, but they managed to get their reward without significant incident. The guards at the door were not so lucky, and Camilla responded to a barbed comment by setting a nearby shrubbery on fire, which Ayala quickly extinguished with magic. The Association guards responded by calling for the official town guards, and there was a small cluster of confusion where the guards tried to pressure Ayala into not being so public with her magic, but were rebuffed by her persuasive talents and the fact that publicly using magic is not actually against the law at all.

Armed with their ill-gotten gains and still processing the city's changed atmosphere, the party decided to go to the Hedges for moral support and advice. They were greeted with tea, cookies, and friendly banter, all of which the party appreciated. Ayala and Camilla used that time to re-enact the ancient debate between Rousseau and Hobbes regarding the origin of evil. The Hedges were relieved to find out that the magic used to build the Havens did not seem to be related to the magic of the Sekerren Ruins. Mrs. Hedges insisted that the Landowner's Association was purely motivated by money, so their strange behavior in creating the investigation quest and then quickly cancelling it must somehow be helpful to them, though no one could figure out how. After a pleasant afternoon there, the party decided to go to the Gallivanting Turnip to meet with Gregory.

Gregory was in disguise waiting for them in the inn that evening as expected. He told them that the Nullwardens were in the middle of a major upheaval. Apparently, the Nullwardens had been infiltrated by an extremist druidic circle called the Circle of the Black Sun who were trying to use the power in the Sekerren Ruins to intensify the power of nature somehow. They had apparently tried to use their position within the Nullwardens to prevent their plans from being discovered. After the confrontation with Gregory, the surviving Nullwarden fled to Praxis and warned his allies that their plans were about to be revealed, so they all left to seek refuge to the mountains where it would be difficult to chase them. The Nullwardens were investigating their ranks to make sure that there weren't any lingering infiltrators left. Gregory expressed misgivings about the whole situation, but didn't have any concrete ideas about what was wrong. The party decided to go with Gregory to follow the Circle of the Black Sun into the mountains to figure out what was going on.

Join us this week to venture up into the mountains and discover why people in Praxis avoid them if at all possible!

Stupid Awards

Chort: Ayala: Mikolash: Charlie: Camilla:
Previous Next