Session 156 - Delg
The lava came quicker than they thought. The maelstrom was unbelievably hot but it didn’t stick to the skin like expected. The party were sucked under the lava and swirled round in the inky blackness. The heat disappeared, and felt almost like air, gritty, like flecks scouring skin. The smell of sulphur and the feeling of scratching, watering eyes and uncomfortable feelings. They are falling, head over heels onto an ash grey plane that seemed to go on forever. The horizon is an odd curvature and seems to curve more and steeper than the normal world would.
Amongst the sky there are other spheres, other worlds? One is a pure white orb of frost radiating cold, one that looks to be a ball of fire and another which almost magically looks like a grey stone shape, but with structures of buildings on buildings, stacked. One huge structure.
Below the falling party comes a dusty cloud, smokey haze covering everything. A dull grey desert. Stones jagged reaching to the sky, but nothing else.
Falling, falling until it slowed to a descent. On the ground the grey reveals itself with interspersed yellow and red colours. Almost a scratch like a river or stream running underground but they are made of lava. Bubbling and waning back into the ground. The direction they are falling in it towards a structure, with roads leading into the centre. Along the roads march humanoid insects with bulbous chests and multifaceted eyes wielding tridents. Marching in small squads of 20-30 to and from this centre.
As the party landed they hit the centre of a coliseum.
Seats for 1000 spectators are unfilled. It is dark and no sunlight hits what is in front of them.
Braz had a vision of this - he was able to see there was something in the stands that was bigger than all the others in the arena. Made of mouths on stalks on a body that was a lump.
Braz jumps up to attention and starts scanning for danger. Xan follows him. Braz pulls his gem of brightness out and swings it around the area. He can see a few grated entrances, almost like portcullis. Over to the side there is someone stood with a wider hood on. The hooded figure asks them if they are Forgotten Soldiers.
“It appears you are my new recruits” she takes her hood off - Mother Bellis. Braz drops his spear to the ground in shock. Xan grasps it and holds it ready for him to retrieve. Mother Bellis asks them to come with her and to eat, ready to face what is to come. She leads them out of the arena, through a portcullis. Theo asks after Mother Bellis - Braz explains she was under oath to return the soldiers that she took to war but as they went to war she was called away. She had 1000 soldiers lost and needs to make amends to usher them to safety.
She laughs - “It get’s twisted with the telling.” They walk to a small alcove where there is a pot of stew on a fire. Served into some badly made cups she hands them out to the party.
“I was a leader of an army. Or at least the company within it a long time ago. I ailed from an island off the coast of Thylea. It was a gentle place but had a darkness at its core. They called it the Mouth of Monsters but really it was very peaceful. But we had lived there for a very long time. Others said our race was cursed and they still say this now. We were our peoples, twisted by living there. We were but we kept our wits. It made the island a little less hard for us. I think I was one of the last few to live there - it was no longer hospotable. When we left we were hardened to the world. We made good soldiers.
A group of five dragonlords rescued us from the island and a wizard of some power who saved us from this dying island. Those that survived set up a new home high in the mountains on the mainland. But I will never forget what the wizard and his friends did for us. I swore an oath to lead armies of liberated slaves that were freed in the battle against the titans. Dragonlords all fell - mostly.
The dragons first - disappearing - presumed dead. Then the dragonlords fell - Xander and the others.
Then well, the turn in the war was the gods arriving and we fought back. Without the dragons we built ships, without the dragonlords we relied on Telamok and Adonis the last two. In the end I joined Talamok to assault Praxis with the rest of the army. We laid siege while the lord of storms sent magic to defeat us but we had our own magics. He was stuck in his tower.
And one night when it seemed all would be lost and magic was wavering we all swore an oath to all 1000 of my men that this was the end - win or die, all of us. It felt like nothing at the time.
Then shortly after I was called away to meet an oath by the wizard Damon. He needed an escort to a secret meeting that could change the fortunes of the war. I had to say yes.
He moved us away.
What I didn’t realise is that we went to an island with a great tree, and there the five gods and the twin titan met and agreed to stop the hostilities. I was overjoyed - I thought this was the end of the war and I could raise my children and grandchildren but it was only after the oath I learned the truth.
Telamok and Adonis has grown patient and assaulted while I was away. They had attached an empty lighthouse but the person to attack was at the tree.
The army fell and the war was over. I could not fight. I tried to forget. I wanted to raise my family and I did. I lived to a good age. When I died of old age I awoke to find myself here. As healthy as the day I swore the oath.
I don’t know why I am here but I think it is to guide those who fall into this world. People who fell in battle who could have been saved but were instead abandonded. So I guide them here and they are tested - but come the morning they come to us and we fight in the arena together. Sometimes we win but that is rare. We are put against are strong. I always survive - I have to see the others fall and be powerless to help them. On the rare times we win, they come back into this alcove with me and we share more broth. If they survive, they fight agains the next day.”
She tells them they are all spirits here. Theo asks if they are released when they lose.
“No, they are consumed”
“By what… who?” Alke asks.
“The Mouth of Monsters”
Hipofilius asks “What if it is not a spirit that fights?” Xan looks down at herself and wonders if she is not a spirit. Hipofilius lets it slip that they may not be dead.
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A figure falls from the sky. Screaming until it gently thuds on the ground. Mother Bellis and a few of the party go to greet the gnome who is dusting himself off from the dirt. He is covered in blue tattoos and has a shock of orange hair. Xan holds out soup as the gnome aims his weapons.
The gnome answers Mother Bellis “Delg of the indigo Isles - the Whale Tribe. The Eel Tribe raided our lands. They took over! They came from the seas!” Braz addresses him.
“Delg my friend tomorrow we fight, but you have died on the right day.”
“Who do we fight”
“Yes we do.” Braz answers, ignoring the questions. “We will fight and win.”
Xan stares down his weapons. She recognises a strange metal that only appears on their islands. A single metal ore.
“My tribe are the only ones who have this metal - but we mine it, we break the rocks, we wash it clean, purify it and melt it into our own weapons. Myself and my dwarf tribesmen and we trade within the indigo isles.”
The gnome asks for alcohol and Theo happily passes over a small sack of wine. Alke leans over and asks if she can convince the dwarf to fight her to test his skills.
She decided to grab the gnome and pick him up from the ground, easily defeating him. He shouts he was surprised, so she demonstrates again how they will not be able to rely on this warrior.