Campaign Bible

Start-class article

The Campaign Bible is the master synthesis of the campaign as of the end of session 16. It draws from the per-session recaps in 02_recaps/ and reflects the cumulative knowledge the party has gained, with foreshadowing not yet resolved annotated as such. It is intended to be the single readable narrative-level overview, supplementing the chronological Timeline and the entity files in 04_npcs/, 05_locations/, 07_items/, and 08_quests/.

Overview

The campaign opened in Gloamhearth in 843 A.I., the Age of Illumination, with five strangers gathered at the Hollow Hall Tavern by a silver dragonborn chronurgy wizard named Sevryn. The world’s magic, Sevryn explained, is failing. He has an Egg that can absorb the essence of chromatic dragons’ hoards and, through some mechanism not fully explained even to himself, repair the damage. Sixteen sessions later the party has absorbed exactly one dragon’s essence, lost the egg to an Aurelian elite with a chain, buried two named player characters and a third one’s hat, watched a barbarian get fitted for an infernal ring he cannot remove, watched a fighter become whatever a “half-demon-elf” parasite-host is supposed to be, broken into a witch’s candy cottage, returned the wrong-coloured small dragon to a baker who turned out to be a brigand, and ended up on a skiff sailing south toward the city built specifically to outlaw everything they do. Sevryn’s voice arrived in their heads as the boat cleared the sewer outflow. “Everything is happening the way it’s supposed to.” This article narrates how the party got there.

The campaign as it stands at end of session 16 is a quest-arc gone deliberately sideways, with the party — Terry (tortle wizard, Bladesinger as of s14), Hugo (blue-skinned barbarian with a buried mind-control past), Caelumn (sorcerer of the Platinum Order), Vasquez (Mage Slayer fighter hosting an ancient demon-elf parasite), and Althea Stormsoro (white-scaled kobold cleric of the All Hammer, joined s15) — pursued from three directions. The Aurelian forces are the principal antagonist faction, hunting the party’s arcane-tainted bodies and the egg they no longer hold. The Black Mask, the dwarf-disguised devil who put the Onyx Ring of Barbed Hooks on Hugo’s finger, is a private antagonist and patron in equal measure. Mharos, the half-demon-elf parasite that Vasquez accepted in the Black Vein Quarry under the impression he was bargaining and not being colonised, is an antagonist embedded inside one of the player characters. Sevryn himself is a less reassuring quest-giver than he was in session 1: he has admitted to sending Harvo to a death he foresaw and has not yet apologised for it.

The setting

The world is Eldurae, briefed in detail in the world brief. Six great powers shape the continent: Aurelia, the Shining Bastion (divine empire of marble and golden law, magic outlawed); Arcanthys, the Floating Metropolis (sky-suspended magic city); Velkris, the Veiled Gate (river-toll merchant city); Umbrafall, the City Beneath the Dead Sun (cursed, perpetually dark, fungal-overgrown); Vhal’Zarim, the Bastion of the Platinum Flame (Bahamut’s cathedral-fortress, Caelumn’s origin); and Sablemar, the Dustbound Bazaar (lawless desert sprawl, never visited). The dwarven city of Khaldun Forgehold is the regional power in the Emberpeak Mountains. The party’s travel arc runs roughly: Gloamhearth (s1) → Wyrmbough Grove (s2-s3) → Mirestrand (s4) → Umbrafall (s4-s10) → Eldwythe (s12-s14) → Eldwythe sewers (s15-s16) → south toward Aurelia via the White Lantern Shrine (s16, current).

Among these powers, Aurelia has emerged as the campaign’s primary antagonist faction. Aurelian forces appear from session 7 onward as the corrupting hand behind the Dawn Mercy Clinic aquamation conspiracy, are confirmed in session 10 to be abducting magically-gifted residents of Umbrafall, occupy Eldwythe in session 14 with wanted posters of all five party members, and execute Ruin in session 15 with a chain attack that did not even bother with a saving throw. The other five powers are present as backdrop and as future destinations; Velkris in particular is repeatedly named as a future plot hub via the Maelis Dirn Duskwatch shipping ledger.

Arc structure

The recorded campaign breaks into eight arcs, each roughly two to four sessions in span. They overlap thematically — the Aurelian conspiracy thread, for example, seeds in arc 4 and only fully bursts in arc 8 — but the geographical and goal structure delineates them cleanly.

Arc 1: Wyrmbough Grove and the Green Dragon (s1-s3)

Sessions 1 through 3 are the campaign’s prologue: the meeting at the Hollow Hall Tavern, the bark-sample fetch quest in the Corrupted Redwood Grove outside Wyrmbough Grove, the descent into Sunset is Nigh’s Lair, and the absorption of Death-at-Sunset’s hoard essence by the egg. This arc establishes the egg quest, the original five-person party (Cholmondeley, Caelumn, Hugo, Vasquez, Harvo), and the cost of the work: Cholmondeley dies in session 3 to a yuan-ti woman’s double-bite critical, last words “I hate you all” [2]. The party returns to Wyrmbough Grove, holds a funeral for him, and is redirected by Sevryn’s telepathic message toward Eldwythe. The replacement player character Earthwing — an Owlin in a Vietnamese rice hat — sits down at the funeral feast at session’s end.

Plot beats: the Dryad’s riddle (answer: bark, party answered tree); Cholmondeley’s session-1 recap earning a Ring of Swimming on a d100 of 90; the rescue of Armin Whisperwind; Caelumn’s vision on Edvan’s burial mound; Sunset is Nigh’s Suggestion driving Hugo out of the cave mid-fight; Vasquez decapitating the wyrmling on an opportunity attack; the egg turning permanently green.

Key NPCs: Sevryn, Gwen Homora, Fergus, Sunny, Nancy, Selenor, Shamil, Harvo, Armin Whisperwind, Sunset is Nigh, the Yuan-ti woman (unnamed, killed by Vasquez), Edvan (vision/echo only).

Items acquired: The Egg (now green); the Dragonslayer Longsword (Caelumn attuned); Vasquez’s gunblade (forged by Shamil from the looted pistol); Sevryn’s Egg-Carrier (Harvo’s contraption, gifted s2); the Ring of Swimming (Cholmondeley); spell scroll of Web; eight portions of dragon meat.

Recaps: s2, s3.

Arc 2: Mirestrand and the Black Mask (s4)

The single-session bridge arc. The party — now featuring Terry in place of the briefly-played Earthwing — travels south through Gloamhearth, fights two sabretooth tigers on the road, and arrives at Mirestrand and The Still Current Inn, a stilt-built fog-village vassal of Velkris where all guests must wear plain reed masks and speak only in murmurs. There they meet The Black Mask, a dwarf-disguised devil who offers a wager, transports Hugo, Caelumn, and Terry to a black void to remove his helmet and reveal a horned humanoid devil, and reveals to Hugo a recording from the Project doctor describing Project Veilbreak: 140,000 candidates, viscous-fluid blood replacement, 1-of-100 arena combats run twice, seven survivors. He calls Hugo “Corvin”. This is a name nobody has heard before, including Hugo.

The session also introduces The Broker in Umbrafall’s Black Hollow Market, who contracts the party against Maelis Dirn for free passage through the Hollow plus payment. Hugo retreats to a private inn room, summons the Black Mask back, and signs a 7-year-post-quest service pact with a 3-year amnesty period, in exchange for the Onyx Ring of Barbed Hooks (cannot be removed) and the promise of intelligence on his erased family and on Bella, another Project Veilbreak survivor. The session ends with the party trailing Maelis Dirn’s collectors to a hatch leading to The Warrens.

Recap: s4.

Arc 3: The Warrens (s4-s7)

A four-session dungeon crawl beneath Umbrafall that establishes the campaign’s grimmer texture: bio-gloom fungus, regenerating fungal-zombies, Hollow Guardians asking “thieves or servants of the Hollow?”, a phase spider that nearly killed the party, a mind-controlling sentient bookshelf the party wisely abandoned, the Maze of the Minotaur, and the multi-session boss fight against the Titan and his binder Maelis Dirn. Maelis is the boss of the Warrens; she runs a soul-bound construct (the Titan, soul-bound to five fungal nodes), an experimentation-on-humans operation with injection ports, and a forged shipping ledger routing bio-gloom toxin through Duskwatch to Velkris. She recognises Hugo on sight: “Liar. I see the project’s work on you” [3]. She is the first person other than Hugo and the Black Mask to confirm Hugo’s Project Veilbreak / The Ascendancy origin in-fiction.

The arc resolves in session 7. After Hugo destroys the fifth fungal node, the Titan rises larger than before, looks at Maelis Dirn through the ring she was using to control him, declares “no more”, and slams her with two boulders — the second a natural 20 for 34, reducing her to “a fine mist into the ground” [4]. The Titan looks at Hugo before disappearing forever. The party loots the Soulbinder’s Packed Ring (which currently holds Maelis’s soul, plus an owlbear soul captured s11) and a Greataxe of Frost +1 (gifted by the Broker to Hugo as a bonus).

The arc closes with a street fight: two corrupt Nightwatch guards try to take a metal urn from a young woman (Risa); the party intervenes; the guards’ flare summons reinforcements; Vasquez is arrested. Session 7 ends with him being dragged off to jail.

Plot beats: Caelumn’s Produce Flame detonating an entire spore-filled chamber and downing himself in his own fireball (s5); Terry failing his Deception (“we are servants of the hollow”, rolled poorly with inspiration → “Thieves!” [5]; Hugo’s 80-foot-movement vision-buff during the Titan fight (s6); the Duskwatch shipping ledger found in Maelis’s research desk; the Wraith dream where Hugo reports to his Project handler (s7); the Whisper Coil Emporium potion shop; the bio-gloom experimental potion that gave Vasquez bioluminescent meeping bubbles for an hour.

Key NPCs: Maelis Dirn, the Titan, the Phase Spider, the Hollow Guardians, the Mind-Control Bookshelf (abandoned, never destroyed), The Broker, the Glomangol Inn bartender, the Whisper Coil Emporium dwarf (later named Alston), Risa (the urn-woman), The Wraith.

Items acquired: Soulbinder’s Packed Ring; Greataxe of Frost +1; the bio-gloom mushroom-cap-jar (Harvo, traded for 5 healing potions); spell scroll of Wither and Bloom; Gloom-Touched Buckler; silvered short sword; multiple healing potions and bio-gloom toxins.

Recaps: s4 (entry), s5, s6, s7.

Arc 4: Umbrafall, Mercy, and Bruise (s7-s8)

A two-session arc bookending the Black Vein Quarry. Vasquez wakes in a Nightwatch jail cell to find his cellmate Jack has decided his name is “Bruise” (Jack misheard “Cruz”). Meanwhile Hugo’s 22-passive Perception sniffs the lye in Risa’s urn — not ash, lye, the residue of aquamation. Risa’s sister was supposedly cremated at the Dawn Mercy Clinic at 10:00 AM, but the clinic’s logs show someone “checking on” the body at 10:20. Hugo: “I wondered if they aquamated her, that’s why it smelled of lye, because the chemicals they use for aquamation will somewhat resemble lye” [6]. This is the session that names Dawn Mercy and makes the conspiracy concrete.

Harvo negotiates Vasquez’s release from the corrupt jail clerks Jorin and Harak for 150gp under-the-table (down from the official 500gp; the log entry for Vasquez reads “bitch-ass elf”). The party heads north toward the Black Vein Quarry for the Broker’s missing-miners job, makes camp in a forest clearing, and is attacked by an old woman who turns out to be a succubus, alongside two stealthed crossbow archers. Terry finally completes his Find Familiar ritual mid-camp (“dancing” the bagpipe-Macarena ritual), summoning Earthwing the owl, named after the briefly-played s3 PC.

The arc continues into the quarry itself. Earthwing the owl is shot out of the air on its first scouting flight by an unseen creature with a 20 stealth check, foreshadowing the much larger sniper threat the party still hasn’t identified. The miners are confirmed dead, working a wall as ghosts; combat begins; the session ends with Caelumn and Harvo both downed by max-HP-draining ghost touch attacks. This is the campaign’s Christmas / New Year break cliffhanger.

Recaps: s7 (urn-woman intervention, arrest), s8.

Arc 5: Mharos and the Death of Harvo (s8-s9)

The Black Vein Quarry arc continues into session 9 and delivers the campaign’s second player-character death plus its most consequential transformation. Mid-fight with the quarry specters, an unseen presence offers Vasquez a bargain to take the weight he carries; he accepts. Pain blooms white-hot as nerves scream and your vision blurs [7]. Horns tear through Vasquez’s skull. His face heals (the metal bars holding his mouth closed fall out). His race rewrites from elf to half-demon-elf. The presence introduces itself as Mharos, also calling itself Empraros, identifying as “what remains when fear is carried too long and hope is set down. They buried me because I would not stop spreading that weight” [8].

The party pushes deeper into the quarry, finds a deceased priest of Ilmater (unexplained — a non-local cleric who came to investigate before them), and discovers the source of the corruption: a cracked red crystal radiating enchantment that has been corrupting the miners into ghosts. A succubus emerges from the chamber, drags each party member into a personalised vision of their greatest failure, and in the ensuing fight dominates Hugo and points him at Harvo. Hugo’s first axe hits, the second is a natural 20 for 23 damage — Harvo’s reduced max-HP from the spectres’ necrotic drain means he cannot survive the crit. Mordane gives his last words: “Well, fuck.” [9]. The succubus is killed shortly after but the cost is paid.

At Harvo’s funeral pyre, Terry attempts to play his people’s Rite of Returning to bring Harvo’s soul into the harmony, fails the Performance check (he is not yet proficient in it), and takes a permanent -1 Charisma. The voice from the failure-vision returns: “it’s your fault that she’s not part of the harmony.” The Mharos parasite reports being “weirdly enough, a little bit happy” about the party’s misery [10].

Recaps: s8 (cliffhanger), s9.

Arc 6: Ruin and the Aurelian Conspiracy (s10-s11)

Sessions 10-11 are the post-Harvo regrouping arc, transitioning the party from Umbrafall toward Eldwythe and surfacing the Aurelian conspiracy as the campaign’s central antagonist. A sealed letter from Sevryn appears at Harvo’s pyre confirming Sevryn foresaw the death and sent him anyway — “the path you’re on only stays open if the wrong thing happens at the right time. … There are more sacrifices ahead, bigger ones, the kind you don’t recover from” [11]. The letter introduces Ruin as a tiefling warlock, Mordane’s replacement character, who walks into the firelight at the next campsite asking if anyone has food.

Mharos manifests in physical-shadow form on Vasquez’s watch and refuses any negotiated partnership: “There is no deal. There is only this. There is only me feeding on your delicious misery” [12]. At the Dawn Mercy Clinic in Umbrafall, Caelumn rolls three nat 20s in a row on Intimidation under advantage and inspiration, breaking the orderly Drew, who confesses: “They were Aurelians. They came a few days ago. They had papers. They weren’t looking for patients. They already had a name. Mira Hale … they were taking her back to Aurelia” [13]. Risa’s sister was abducted to Aurelia for showing magical capabilities (telekinesis, lighting candles with her mind). The clinic was a coerced cover, not the conspirator. Drew confessed the full route: Dock 13 → Aurelia by boat. The Nightwatch had been paid off.

An Aurelian Paladin and three lighter-armoured ambushers attack the party in an alley en route back to the Broker. The Paladin’s greatsword deals slashing + radiant, and the radiant bypasses Mharos’s necrotic resistance, burning through Vasquez at full damage. The party prevails. Vasquez loots the Paladin’s plate and identifies it as Aurelian Plate Armour with Nullstone Runes: advantage on saves vs arcane spells; blocks the wearer’s own arcane casting; blocks barbarian rage. He spends the long rest re-engraving the Aurelian sunburst into his adopted-dwarf-family sigil. He attunes.

Session 11 is a travel-and-combat session. The party stocks at Starpoint Secrets (where Ruin’s failed theft attempt doubles the prices and points him at a string of severed hands hung from the ceiling) and the Whisper Coil Emporium (where Alston is named, and Ruin trials a paralysis potion for ten minutes plus one level of exhaustion). They meet Thomas Feld and his eight-year-old daughter Lysa on the road; Thomas warns of “berry figgets” and “big pigs”, confirms that Aurelians and Vhal’Zarim hunted the chromatic dragons together long ago and there are no chromatic dragons left on this side of the world to find, and mentions seeing a dragon flying once toward Palathorn. That night the party is ambushed by three owlbears; Hugo uses his newly-acquired Winged Boots to airlift Caelumn out of the engagement; Caelumn captures one owlbear’s soul in the Soulbinder’s Packed Ring at fourth-level slot. Vasquez’s player Polar is absent for this session.

Recaps: s10, s11.

Arc 7: The Candy House (s12-s14)

A three-session set-piece dungeon arc that doubles as a major plot pivot. The party arrives at Eldwythe, saves confectioner Edith Applegarth from a fire at her shop, and traces the cause to Phil Flowerforge, a dwarf baker who confesses to harbouring Briochebane, a gold dragon wyrmling with unusual red-gold coloring raised in secret from a stolen egg from his brigand days. Phil offers 100gp for retrieval. Ruin negotiates a private side-deal with Phil for 20gp + a dozen cinnamon rolls upfront in exchange for not snitching - a pattern the party (especially Caelumn) starts to mark down.

Earlier in the same session, on his long-rest watch, Hugo taps the Onyx Ring of Barbed Hooks and summons the Black Mask — appearing this time as a green-horned tiefling rather than the dwarf form of Mirestrand. Hugo proposes upgrading his pact to “champion eternal” with the Mask’s help destroying the Ascendancy; the Mask refuses but offers a counter-proposal: convert a party ally to the same pact and the Mask will help with the Wraith mind-control. The Mask explicitly names Vasquez as the recruitment target: “I do have my eye on the one they call Vasquez. He has unlocked something that should probably have been locked away. But now that it’s free, it’s very enticing” [14]. The Mask also confirms knowledge of Mharos and treats it as a rival: “Once he’s dead, the demon has no hold of him.” This is the first explicit confirmation that the Black Mask and Mharos are aware of each other and are in something approaching conflict over Vasquez’s soul.

The party follows a candy trail east to the Candy Cottage: pink wafer planks, sugar-glass windows, licorice-thatched roof, and a fruit-leather doormat that shouts “GASMUS WHITE FEET!” at trespassers who fail to wipe their feet. Inside is a magical-conjuration confection-cottage whose food regenerates ten minutes after eating, run by Uncle Nibblecheek, a toothless candy-eating hag who eats candy and people-turned-into-candy. The party works through the cottage room by room — animate flying rug, rocking horse that emits “HOT DOG HOT DOG”, three candy goblins (one of whom feeds Vasquez into a taffy puller, transforming him into soft elastic taffy, [15], the cyclops baby-doll guardian Bubba Walker (resolved with three kinds of candy after being beaten to bloodied state), three Gingerbread Steves in the basement tunnel, the Bubblegum Halfling (rescued from a candy-cane cage; later confirmed as Edith Applegarth’s long-lost brother who was betrayed by Edith years before per a children’s storybook found in the rock-candy library), and the Gummy Mummy (the so-called Gummy Prince — a glass-cannon undead with a curse-on-hit that lowers max HP by 3d6 every 24 hours until death). The Mummy’s curse hits both Caelumn and Vasquez; Hugo airlifts both unconscious bodies up the basement-tunnel stairs while Terry and Ruin retreat up the kitchen-tower stairs.

The arc resolves with a bluff. Terry (with the crooked broom from the rock-candy study) and Ruin approach Uncle Nibblecheek disguised as new candy-mill recruits and pitch — deception 18, persuasion 18 — that the party would make better workers than corpses (“workers feed him for a lifetime, corpses for a day”). Nibblecheek buys it, comes downstairs, lifts the curses on Caelumn and Vasquez, and immediately attempts to mass-mind-control all four; only Caelumn fails the save and becomes Nibblecheek’s eternal servant. Meanwhile, Terry approaches Briochebane (asleep on the wood-fired oven), feeds him a brioche-bun from Phil Flowerforge’s bakery, and breaks the small dragon’s mind-control. Combat re-erupts. Vasquez grapples Nibblecheek; Brioche breath-attacks; Nibblecheek pleads mercy and lifts all curses and transformations. The party leaves with Brioche.

The pivotal reveal: Brioche is not the chromatic dragon Sevryn’s quest is hunting. He is a gold dragon wyrmling with unusual red-gold coloring, not a chromatic, and the egg in Caelumn’s backpack does not resonate when Terry walks it past the sleeping dragon [16]. The DM later phrases it: “Sevryn’s magic may have misfired and accidentally sent you on the path to a golden dragon” [17]. The party plans to take Brioche back to Sevryn and explain.

The party hits level 4 at end of s14. Terry picks his Bladesinger subclass. They walk back to Eldwythe at nightfall and find it occupied by Aurelian forces: white-and-gold banners on the palisade, patrols inspecting every cart, and wanted posters at the entrance with descriptions of all five party members charging “unlawful possession and obstruction of divine inquiry” [18]. The Aurelians arrived in less than a day. The party retreats to the forest clearing.

Plot beats: Caelumn’s coin-grab triggering the Gummy Mummy (s13); the +1 Greataxe looted from a skeleton in the cottage tunnel (Hugo’s backup); the candied apple with dentures (Nibblecheek’s missing teeth, originally retained by Caelumn for leverage and subsequently returned to Uncle Nibblecheek before the s15 backpack snare per the DM); the crooked broom (likely Nibblecheek’s, retained by Caelumn and lost in the s15 snare); Vasquez’s Mage Slayer feat establishing once-per-day fail-to-succeed on Wisdom/Charisma saves.

Recaps: s12, s13, s14.

Arc 8: Aurelian Pursuit and the Sewers (s15-s16, current)

The current arc opens with the introduction of Althea Stormsoro, a 3-foot white-scaled kobold cleric/paladin of the All Hammer with a silver-and-golden gorget bearing a burning gem (Maluana’s first character, joining s15). She flees into the party’s clearing pursued by an Aurelian patrol who want to inspect her gorget. The patrol arrives. Mharos whispers to Vasquez: “This is your chance. Blame the arcane on her” [19]. Vasquez refuses, walks ten feet, raises his hand, and takes the blame himself. The Aurelian elite — the chain-master — responds with a chain attack that snaps around Ruin’s neck and pulls his head off in a scripted execution with no save [20]. Combat follows; Terry debuts Bladesong and decapitates an Aurelian recruit on a natural-20 scimitar attack.

Phil Flowerforge arrives with a smoke bomb and the line “Follow me if you want to live!” [21]. During the smoke escape, an unseen chain pulls Caelumn’s backpack — including the Egg — into the smoke [22]. The egg is gone. Phil leads the survivors into the Eldwythe sewers, reveals his brigand past (“I had all kinds of unsavoury business all over Eldray,” [23], and names his contact: Hett Varn, a red-headed dwarf with forehead goggles, met at the White Lantern Shrine south of Aurelia, code phrase “Phil sent us.” Phil parts ways at the sewer mid-point.

In the sewers the party fights four Kuatoa fish-folk with bone-whip lightning weapons, and then a needle-blight + rat-swarm + flame-skull encounter. Session 15 ends with the last creature down and the DM closing initiative.

Session 16 is the sewer crawl conclusion. The party finds the Hat of Disguise Phil hinted at — visible only when water hit the magical effect — and Althea ritual-identifies it; Vasquez attunes during the boat trip later. They navigate a seven-lock binary-language puzzle door (open/closed in seven languages, three readable to the party — Common×3, Halfling, Infernal, Giant, Undercommon), brute-forcing it after 20 minutes (open-closed-open-closed-open-closed-closed). They discover a quantum/illusion wall that passes through if walked into backwards, find a sarcophagus chamber with a 300gp diamond and an empty-feeling potion bottle, trigger an ambush of two flame-skulls and a ghoul, and barely survive (Caelumn down twice, two death-save fails to a ghoul bite). They stealth past the Aurelian patrol at the sewer outflow, find a small skiff, and choose to sail to the White Lantern Shrine — a half-ruined waystation roughly half a day’s travel from Aurelia (direction not explicitly named on-screen — likely a coastal waystation on the freight road approaching the city), several days’ sail away.

The session ends with Sevryn’s telepathic voice in their heads: “Everything is happening the way it’s supposed to.” [24]. The party — Terry, Hugo, Caelumn, Vasquez, and Althea — set their sails toward Aurelia.

Session 17 — new hands, renegotiated terms

Session 17 opens with two table changes and one in-fiction retcon, and ends mid-combat at a cold-water reef line a half-day’s sail from the White Lantern Shrine. The arc is still Aurelian Pursuit, but the cast and the pact terms have shifted enough to warrant a dedicated entry.

Player transitions. Brian joined the table playing Mike, a Vedalken caster built around the Mizzium Apparatus — a wondrous item that lets him cast any spell on his prepared list via an Arcana check, with a backfire risk on a fail. Mike’s list spans wizard / sorcerer / warlock / bard breadth [25] and was demonstrated this session with Mending, Light, Detect Magic (ritual, twice), Detect Thoughts, Phantasmal Force, Shield, Booming Blade. Ash joined playing Steven, a halfling Pact-of-the-Blade warlock — three foot nine, olive complexion, charlatan background, a dagger pact-weapon that “smells of expensive tobacco smoke” when summoned [26]. Polar (Vasquez’s player) and Maliwana (Althea’s player) departed between sessions; the in-fiction explanation is the s16 retcon below. The departures are explained on the player-handle articles.

s16 retcon: Vasquez and Althea departed offscreen via Aurelian capture. Before the in-fiction scene resumed, Nick laid out the framing change: the two PCs split off at the end of session 16 and were forced back to the sewer when Aurelians closed in. The party chose to flee rather than go back for them. The two were taken. Vasquez’s Hat of Disguise was destroyed in the escape [27], L134-136, L785). Terry briefly objected (“I object to that retcon. I want a different retcon. I want one where he keeps the fucking hat” - [28] but the change stood. Status flips: Vasquez and Althea move from active to departed offscreen; Hat of Disguise moves from carried/attuned to destroyed. Per Chris’s post-s17 clarification, the capture is the in-fiction send-off for the two PCs; the rescue is not the campaign’s direction. Vasquez and Althea sit in the same category as Cholmondeley, Harvo, and Ruin - former party members, not pending recovery. Future agents should treat them as departed PCs, not captured-and-rescuable ones.

Hugo’s race named: Voidforged. Out-of-character to Ash mid-session, Nick names Hugo’s race for the first time on-transcript: “Hugo is playing something called a void forged that don’t need to breathe” [29]. The visual reveal follows immediately when Mike sees “slight glowing veins underneath his skin… his eyes seem to be glowing ever so faintly” [30]. Earlier wiki text framed Hugo’s race as “Project Veilbreak survivor” or left it unnamed; Voidforged is now the canonical race, with Project Veilbreak as the in-fiction experimental program that created him. The blood-vision later in the session [31] — iron restraints, dark glass, no clean air) provides concrete physical imagery of the Project Veilbreak chamber that earlier sessions only hinted at.

The Black Mask’s renegotiated pact terms. Hugo wins a breath-hold bet against Mike (Mike unaware that Voidforged don’t breathe). Time freezes for Hugo alone, and the Mask appears in a new third visual form — a small gnome on a fishing chair on the water, lure in hand — and unilaterally revises her own contract. Her opening: “Rookie mistake. Always have them sign the thing before the bet” [32]. The new substitution clause keeps the substitute as a second attack-dog rather than replacing Hugo: “self, hmm, what is better than one attack dog? to attack dogs” [33]. Both Hugo’s mind-control AND the Wraith’s (“Rafe”) lift together when the substitution clears: “I remove the mind control that the sentency has placed on you and on the one you called Rafe. And in exchange, you will become my attack dog instead of theirs” [34]. Hugo restated the egg-quest immunity and Ascendancy-destruction clauses from his original pact [35], L716); the Mask agreed and pinky-promised. The largest faction-canon line of the session: “Fine I’ll crush your little ascendancy and probably send my little attack dog after he’s done fetching that egg” [36]. The Ascendancy is now an explicit mutual-target for both the party and the Black Mask after the egg quest. The Mask is, in her own framing, “kind of rooting for you guys” for the duration [37].

Mike’s verbal IOU substitutes for the contract. Back in real time with the contract on the table, Mike applied lawyer-brain in three escalating refusals — “You bet with something you don’t have I declare this contract null and void” [38]; “there’s an expectation of a reasonableness now i do not believe in any court of law in these lands that anyone would consider this to be something a reasonable person would consider signing” [39]. Hugo’s fallback was a verbal IOU. Mike committed to a single owed wish: “Ah That I can Commit to Eventually doing Should I live Long enough” [40]; he later clarified “wish” as a 9th-level spell slot [41]. This is the first failed substitute-recruitment attempt under the renegotiated terms — the substitution clause itself is still open and Hugo can try again. The written contract is preserved as a prop artefact, unsigned.

Nella, Pim, and Leo — the second on-screen Aurelian abduction pattern. Hours later the skiff rescued a fishing-boat family. Nella (the mother), Pim (small, quiet, watchful daughter who gave Mike a painted pebble named “Captain Stone” — [42], and Leo (younger child). Caelumn cleric-magicked their sail back into seaworthy condition with Mending; Mike gave two trail rations. Nella’s reason for being at sea was the campaign-canonical worldbuilding piece: “my husband was taken three nights ago into the road offices they searched our home and found old tide charts weather notes and a few pages copied from his father’s journal and the officers called it unauthorized studies what does that even mean” [43]. This is the first on-screen confirmation of “Aurelian road offices” as small-town arrest infrastructure and of “unauthorised studies” as an Aurelian charge category. It sits alongside the Dawn Mercy Clinic / Mira Hale conspiracy as a second on-screen Aurelian abduction pattern, with the Nella family receiving the survivor-survivor side of what Mira Hale’s family received as the abductee side. Nella’s husband (unnamed) is alive-but-detained; the family sails on toward Gloamhearth. Open thread: how many other Nella-family-equivalents exist across the coast?

Combat cliffhanger. Late on day 2 of the sail the air drops, the water ices, and the skiff drifts into a localised cold-water reef line. A Rimeclaw Skulker (a.k.a. Reef Stalker) ambushes from beneath with a pack of three-to-four water wolves whose luminous purplish-blue blood visually echoes Hugo’s own Voidforged biology. The session ends mid-Round 3 with the Skulker trapped in Mike’s Phantasmal Force lava-cube illusion (failed two Int saves), one Rimeclaw Skulker pup still alive next to Mike, and the rest of the party still up. The combat resumes in session 18; the party is roughly half a day from the White Lantern Shrine, which Hugo and Terry confirm sits on Aurelia’s north entrance, on the freight road approaching the city [44].

Recaps: s15, s16.

The egg quest

The egg quest is the campaign’s nominal main thread. Sevryn briefed it in session 1: magic is failing across Eldurae, the egg can absorb chromatic dragon hoard essence to repair it, and the party are to deliver the egg to chromatic dragons’ hoards in turn. The egg is a passive absorber, not a homing device — Sevryn has to redirect the party each time, and his foresight is fallible (“the sight blurs beyond that. I cannot fix its nature or lair,” [45].

Progress as of s16: 1/N dragons absorbed.

  • Death-at-Sunset (ancient green): essence absorbed s3, egg now glows permanently green.
  • Briochebane (small gold-with-red, NOT chromatic): the egg did not resonate, confirming Sevryn’s redirection in s3 was misaimed [46]. Brioche now travels with Phil Flowerforge separately from the party.
  • All other chromatic dragons: status unknown. Per Thomas Feld (s11), Aurelia and Vhal’Zarim hunted the chromatic dragons together long ago and “there are no chromatic dragons left on this side of the world to find.” If true, the quest may need to head west or be re-conceived.

Egg location as of s16: The Egg was stolen by Aurelian forces in s15 (L500-504). Its exact current location is unknown. Recovering it is now the top-priority quest. (The s10 Aurelian Paladin and the s15 chain-master are SEPARATE Aurelian elites.)

Hugo’s Project Veilbreak / Ascendancy thread

Hugo’s personal arc is the most heavily developed of the player-character backstories. He was a candidate in Project Veilbreak — 140,000 candidates selected, injected with a viscous-fluid blood replacement that killed 50% in 24 hours, biological-cellular rewrite, two rounds of 1-of-100 arena combat, seven survivors. Run by the Project doctor. The project is part of the larger entity Hugo names as The Ascendancy (named explicitly by Hugo to the Black Mask in [47] — the brand is Hugo-only knowledge; the other PCs know there is a project but have not been told its name). His pre-experiment name was “Corvin”, revealed by The Black Mask in [48] alongside a flashed-memory of holding the hand of a woman and a small girl in pigtails saying “daddy daddy see what I found”.

The mind-control mechanism is referred to as the “leash”. The Wraith is Hugo’s handler — appearing in his dream in s7 (“Subject. Status report.”) and again throughout — and is loyal to “the project”. The Wraith reports the project is concerned about Hugo’s loyalties drifting: “The project seems to have worries about your loyalties changing. Something about their leash weakening on you?” [49]. Hugo passed the loyalty Deception check, but the leash is weakening.

Hugo’s pact with The Black Mask is the leverage point. The Mask has promised intelligence on his missing family, on Bella (another Project Veilbreak survivor mentioned by name only), and on the Project doctor; help killing the doctor; and help destroying the Ascendancy if Hugo dies pursuing it. In return Hugo serves 7 years post-egg-quest, with a 3-year amnesty period in which his soul is forfeit only if he dies. The pact ring (the Onyx Ring of Barbed Hooks) cannot be removed and triggered for the first time in s6’s phase-spider fight (demonic-blade self-revive at 1d8 necrotic to attacker, restored Hugo from 0 HP to 4 HP).

In s12, on a long-rest watch, Hugo proposed upgrading the pact to “champion eternal” — the Mask refused, but offered a counter-proposal: convert Vasquez specifically to the same pact, and the Mask will help with the Wraith mind-control. Hugo has not committed.

The Titan Hugo killed in s7 was another Project subject; the Titan recognised Hugo and looked at him “before disappearing forever” [50]. Maelis Dirn also recognised the project’s signature in Hugo’s body in [3]: “Liar. I see the project’s work on you. You work for them and you will die and you will become a pet.” The Project / Ascendancy is therefore an entity larger than just Hugo, larger than just Maelis, and connected at minimum to the soul-binding experimentation in The Warrens and possibly to wider operations.

The Aurelian conspiracy

Risa’s sister was the seed; the conspiracy is the tree. The thread:

  • s7: Risa introduced clutching a metal urn outside the Whisper Coil Emporium as two corrupt Nightwatch guards try to take it from her. The party intervenes; one guard falls, the other arrests Vasquez.
  • s8: Hugo’s 22 Perception identifies the urn’s contents as lye, not ash. Risa’s account adds a 20-minute timeline gap between the supposed cremation (10:00 AM) and someone “checking on” the body (10:20 AM). The clinic name is delivered: Dawn Mercy Clinic. The cover-up is aquamation, not cremation. Risa’s sister had “turned a candle on with her mind” — latent magical ability.
  • s10: At the Dawn Mercy Clinic, Caelumn’s three-nat-20 Intimidation breaks the orderly Drew. Confession: “They were Aurelians. They came a few days ago. They had papers. They weren’t looking for patients. They already had a name. Mira Hale … they were taking her back to Aurelia” [13]. The clinic is a coerced cover, not the actual conspirator. Mira was taken to Dock 13 four days previously and shipped to Aurelia. The Nightwatch had been paid off.
  • s10: An Aurelian Paladin and three lighter-armoured ambushers attack the party in an alley. The Paladin’s plate is Aurelian Plate Armour with Nullstone Runes — anti-magic gear issued to Aurelian officers. The Paladin’s radiant-rider greatsword bypasses Mharos’s necrotic resistance. Mharos is weak to radiant damage.
  • s14: Aurelian forces occupy Eldwythe in less than a day. White-gold banners; Pure Light tabards; wanted posters of all five party members charging “unlawful possession and obstruction of divine inquiry”. The descriptions cover all five PCs including Vasquez, who used no magic in s12, suggesting the intelligence is witness-based rather than purely arcane-detection.
  • s15: An Aurelian chain-master with anti-magic capability decapitates Ruin with a chain attack that has no save, and steals the Egg during the smoke flight. The party flees into the Eldwythe sewers.
  • s16: The party heads south toward White Lantern Shrine and Aurelia proper. Vasquez attunes the Hat of Disguise for tiefling-form concealment.

The conspiracy’s purpose remains unconfirmed. The pattern: Aurelians are systematically abducting magically-gifted residents from outside Aurelia and shipping them to Aurelia for unknown purposes. The Velkris route is described as “the city of money” by The Broker [51] and recommended as a place to sell Aurelian-conspiracy intelligence. The Aurelians have anti-magic gear at officer level and detection capabilities the party has not yet fingerprinted — possibly arcane-tracing magic, possibly informants, possibly the Order of the Veil (Velkris faction, world-brief canon, not yet encountered in transcripts).

Vasquez’s Mharos parasite

Mharos, also calling itself Empraros (“I am more of a concept than a thing. I am what remains when hope is given up and misery gets to breed”, [52], accepted Vasquez’s bargain mid-fight in the Black Vein Quarry in s9 and forcibly transformed him into a half-demon-elf: horns, runes, ember eyes, healed face, oral bracing fallen out. The transformation was DM-introduced, not RAW; Vasquez’s character sheet was rewritten at the table. The wight in the upper quarry asked an unsettling question: “What makes you so special? Why did it succeed with you?” [53], implying others had been offered the same bargain and rejected.

Mharos has no negotiated relationship with Vasquez. In s10 he manifested in shadow-form and refused all bargaining: “There is no deal. There is only this. There is only me feeding on your delicious misery. … You and I will become one. You will be my terrible sword that sweeps across Eldurae and they will all bow to us” [12]. He is satisfied by group misery, including Harvo’s death. He is weak to radiant damage (revealed by the Aurelian Paladin’s greatsword, [54]. The Black Mask knows about him and considers him a competitor; per the Mask, “Once he’s dead, the demon has no hold of him” [55].

Mharos’s manipulation has escalated session by session. In s9 he is a transformation event and a shadow voice. In s10 he is a refusal to bargain. In s12 he is the recruitment target the Black Mask names. In s15 he whispers “blame the arcane on her” — Vasquez refuses, takes the blame himself, Ruin dies for it; later in the same session Mharos manifests in the smoke and targets Caelumn directly with a Wisdom save attack (“I have tried to be patient. … If you won’t bring me others’ misery, I’ll settle for yours,” [56], defeated only by Vasquez’s Mage Slayer once-per-day fail-to-succeed. In s16 Vasquez slams his head into a wall during a rest to feed Mharos misery, keeping the parasite occupied with the host’s pain rather than letting it manipulate the party [57]. The relationship is now openly adversarial, with the host imposing terms.

Major NPC arcs

Sevryn

The campaign’s prime mover. Silver dragonborn chronurgy wizard. Telepathic. Has the world’s best foreshadowing instincts (knew Cholmondeley would die, knew Harvo would die, sent both anyway “because the path you’re on only stays open if the wrong thing happens at the right time,” [11]. Quest-giver of the egg quest. Sent the Owlin, Terry, and Ruin in succession to fill PC vacancies — the party recognises the pattern by s4. Last in-person appearance: s1 in Wyrmbough Grove. Communications since: a telepathic message at the end of s3 redirecting to Eldwythe; a sealed letter at Harvo’s pyre in s10; a telepathic voice at the end of s16 (“Everything is happening the way it’s supposed to,” [24]. The party trusts him with significant reservation. He has admitted to using them.

The Black Mask

A devil disguised first as a dwarf with a special helmet at The Still Current Inn in s4, then in tiefling form with green horns when summoned via Hugo’s pact ring in s12. Trades in spell scrolls, poisons, magical items “fallen off a cart”, and pacts. Operates by infernal contract law: “we devils have a rule set. once a wager is set once a deal is made we abide by the deal. we don’t change it midway and we cannot lie” [58]. Holds Hugo’s pact (7 years post-quest service, 3-year amnesty). Knows about Mharos and treats it as a rival. Has offered Hugo an upgrade to “champion eternal” if Hugo recruits a party ally (specifically Vasquez) to the same pact. Ring giggles. A crow watched Caelumn through his window after the s4 audience, possibly a familiar.

The Broker

Masked figure of the Black Hollow Market in Umbrafall; bone ledger, green-stained gloves; “his word is his bond”. Hires the party against Maelis Dirn in s4 (paid out s7 with 50gp + 2 bio-gloom toxins + a Greataxe of Frost +1) and against the Black Vein Quarry missing miners in s7 (paid out s10 with 100gp). Identified Soulbinder’s Packed Ring for the party. Pointed them at Silent Intake in Velkris for the Duskwatch shipping ledger. Referenced The Rat as the major Umbrafall information broker who only contacts you when he wants to. Declined knowledge of the Dawn Mercy Clinic. Gifted Hugo a sending stone for future contracts. Transactional, useful, neutral.

Maelis Dirn

Boss of The Warrens beneath Umbrafall. “Coven Filth”. Ran a protection racket via leather-masked collectors and her giant minion the Titan; ran a soul-binding experiment with humans bearing injection ports; ran a forged shipping ledger routing bio-gloom toxin through Duskwatch to Velkris. Recognised Hugo on sight as a Project Veilbreak subject (s6). Killed by her own Titan in s7 (“a fine mist into the ground”, [4] when Hugo destroyed the fifth fungal node and the Titan refused to be controlled any further. Soul stored in the Soulbinder’s Packed Ring in Caelumn’s possession.

Phil Flowerforge & Briochebane

Dwarf baker in Eldwythe with a brigand past. Stole a dragon egg in his criminal career, used the haul to fund his bakery, raised the hatchling Briochebane in secret. Toasts pastries with dragon’s fire. Confessed in s12 when Caelumn showed his draconic scales mid-bead-of-sweat; offered 100gp + 12 cinnamon rolls reward (Ruin extorted +20gp privately). The party retrieves Brioche from the Candy Cottage in s14 only to discover Brioche is gold-with-red, not chromatic, and not the egg’s target. Phil rescues the party in s15 with a smoke bomb, reveals the brigand past openly (“all kinds of unsavoury business all over Eldray,” [23], names his contact Hett Varn at the White Lantern Shrine, and parts ways at the sewer mid-point with Brioche. Phil and Brioche are off-screen as of s16.

Uncle Nibblecheek

Toothless candy-cottage hag who eats candy and people-turned-into-candy. Lives in the Candy Cottage east of Eldwythe. Has been there long enough that Edith Applegarth visited as a girl and “betrayed her brother” to him in a child-bargain depicted in a children’s storybook found in the rock-candy library [59]. Encountered properly in s14: powerful hag with multi-attack, mass-charm spell with disadvantage, chocolate-cockatrice summons. Bluffed by Terry and Ruin (deception 18, persuasion 18) into lifting curses on Caelumn and Vasquez. Defeated in combat (Vasquez grappled him while Brioche breath-attacked from behind), pleaded mercy, lifted all curses and transformations, and let the party leave with Brioche. Still alive in his cottage as of s14. Future hostility likely.

The Wraith

Hugo’s Project handler. Female, no insignia, telepathic, appears in dreams. Loyal to “the Ascendancy”. First seen in s7 (alley dream after Maelis Dirn’s death): “Subject. Status report.” … “Lean in closer. Stick with the group. Learn what you can. We’ll be in touch.” Has informed Hugo that the project worries about his “leash weakening”. Hugo passed the s7 Deception check claiming his pull is as strong as ever. The Wraith has not appeared again on-screen but The Black Mask in s12 referenced helping with “your mind-control problem” — i.e. the Wraith — as part of his upgrade proposal.

Open threads

Resolved-but-pending consequence threads

  • The Egg’s location. The Egg was stolen by Aurelian forces in s15. Its exact current location is unknown. The party are sailing toward the White Lantern Shrine to meet Hett Varn and figure out a recovery route.
  • Brioche’s true significance. Per s14, he is not the chromatic dragon Sevryn’s quest is hunting. The party plans to take him to Sevryn once practical (Phil and Brioche are travelling separately).
  • The Mharos parasite arc. Mharos has not been silenced - only managed. Vasquez fed it his own pain in s16 to keep it occupied. The arc is closed at the party-table level with Vasquez’s departure offscreen in the s17 retcon; whatever happens to Mharos after the Aurelian capture is now off-table.
  • The Black Mask’s offer to convert allies via soul contract. Originally aimed at Vasquez. With Vasquez departed offscreen (s17 retcon), the substitution clause is open in principle but the named target is gone. The Mask’s s17 renegotiation reframes the clause around any second attack-dog rather than Vasquez specifically; Mike was the first failed substitute-recruitment attempt under the renegotiated terms (s17).
  • Hugo’s Project Veilbreak / Ascendancy arc. The Wraith, the leash, the destruction of the project, Bella, the Project doctor, his erased family — all open.

Foreshadowing that has paid off

  • Sevryn’s foresight that named characters die at narratively-required times (foreshadowed s2-s4, paid off s9 with Harvo’s death and the s10 letter confirming Sevryn sent him knowing).
  • The Black Mask is in tension with Mharos over Vasquez’s soul (foreshadowed s9 with Mharos’s transformation, paid off s12 with the Mask’s explicit recruitment offer).
  • Aurelia is the principal antagonist faction (foreshadowed s2 with Cholmondeley’s Aurelian background and his flight from them, paid off s10-s16 with the conspiracy reveal, occupation, and pursuit).
  • The Dawn Mercy Clinic cover-up (foreshadowed s7 with Risa and the urn, paid off s8 with the lye identification and s10 with Drew’s confession).
  • Hugo recognises the Titan and Maelis Dirn recognises Hugo (foreshadowed s4 with the Project recording, paid off s6-s7 with Maelis’s “I see the project’s work on you” and the Titan’s nat-20 turning on Maelis).
  • The egg is a passive absorber, not a homing device (foreshadowed s3 with the egg absorbing essence rather than the dragon, paid off s14 with the egg failing to resonate with Brioche).

Foreshadowing still pending

  • The Ascendancy’s identity, geography, and operations. Named in s12 but not located. The campaign has no in-fiction map of where the Ascendancy is.
  • Bella. Named in s4 by the Black Mask as another Project Veilbreak survivor. Hugo recognised the name. She has not appeared on-screen.
  • The Project doctor. Named at the recording’s sign-off in s4. Hugo wants him dead. Whereabouts unknown; canonical name unconfirmed.
  • The Order of the Veil. Velkris’s masked enforcement faction per the world brief. Not yet on-screen.
  • The Council of Factors (Velkris). Five merchant families. Not yet engaged.
  • The Duskwatch shipping ledger. Forged documents from Maelis’s research desk in s6. Held by Hugo. Should fetch significant reward in Velkris via Silent Intake near “the Talking Skulls” entrance. Major future plot.
  • The Mind-Control Bookshelf in the Warrens. Abandoned, never destroyed (s6).
  • The unseen marksman that killed Earthwing the owl in the Black Vein Quarry (s8) and the unseen ceiling predator that severed Earthwing again in the sewers (s16). Identity unknown.
  • Caelumn’s Platinum Order status and his draconic blood. Caelumn is from Vhal’Zarim and has draconic ancestry; the Platinum Order failure-vision in s9 suggests an unresolved family/clergy conflict. Not yet developed in-fiction beyond personal flashbacks.
  • Althea Stormsoro’s gorget. Silver-and-golden with a burning gem; the reason the Aurelian patrol pursued her in s15. Significance unrevealed. Closed at the party-table level: with Althea departed offscreen in the s17 retcon, the gorget left with her and is no longer in play.
  • The candied apple with dentures and the crooked broom. Looted from the Candy Cottage in s13, likely Uncle Nibblecheek’s missing teeth and broom respectively. Per the DM: the dentures had been returned to Uncle Nibblecheek before the s15 backpack snare; only the crooked broom went into the snare with the rest of the backpack contents (Egg, healing potions, gold). The s14 leverage on Nibblecheek was discharged with the return rather than lost in the snare.
  • The injured man in the sewer basin (s16). Unnamed. Vanished via invisibility potion. May resurface.
  • The empty-feeling potion bottle from the sarcophagus chamber (s16). Possibly an invisibility potion. Untested.
  • The Risa / Mira Hale thread. Party committed in s10 to investigating during Aurelia transit. Not yet acted on.
  • Edith Applegarth’s betrayal of her brother. The bubblegum halfling does not know. The party has not told him. Unresolved.
  • Uncle Nibblecheek’s continued existence. The party did not kill him. He will remember.
  • The Rat. Major Umbrafall information broker; only contacts you when he wants to. Not yet contacted (s10).

Open issues across recaps

A small number of contradictions and ambiguities surface across the recaps. These are flagged here rather than silently resolved.

  • The candied apple with dentures and the crooked broom. Per s13, both are looted from the rock-candy study and retained by Caelumn. Per s14, the broom is used in Terry’s disguise to bluff Uncle Nibblecheek and the dentures are still in Caelumn’s bag. Per s15, Caelumn’s backpack is stolen by the Aurelian elite in the smoke escape — and the Egg is named as the contents, with no explicit list of what else was in the backpack. DM correction (post-s16): the candied dentures had already been returned to Uncle Nibblecheek before the s15 backpack snare and were not in the pack at the time of the theft. The crooked broom was in the pack and is gone with the rest of the contents (Egg, healing potions, gold). The s16 callback list previously misreported the dentures as among the stolen items; that has now been corrected across the affected articles.
  • Thomas Feld and the orchard family. Per s11, Thomas Feld is the cart-encounter farmer with a wife and an eight-year-old daughter named Lysa. Per s12, the orchard scene with the apple-pickers and the daughter named Lysa is described as “the same Feld-style family on the road” but the s12 NPC list flags that the orchard man “is unnamed in this orchard scene” and only refers to Thomas Feld by name in passing. Either there are two Feld-adjacent farming families or the s12 orchard scene is the same family in a different setting; the recaps disagree. The s12 recap leans toward “same family, named only as Lysa for the daughter”.
  • Risa’s in-fiction name. Per s7 she is “the urn-woman” without a name; per s8 the recap uses “Risa” in the NPC list and dialogue but the recap’s note on her says “named through conversation as the urn-woman”. The canonical-names list confirms Risa is the canonical form. The line that introduces the name in s8 is not pinned down to an exact line number in the recap.
  • The succubus in s8 vs the succubus in s9. Two separate succubi: the first in the s8 forest-clearing camp (defeated, dropped the Charlatan’s Die), the second in the s9 Black Vein Quarry crystal chamber. Both recaps treat them as separate entities; no contradiction, but the canonical-names list does not clearly separate them.
  • The egg’s mechanic. Per s3, the egg “absorbed the lingering poison and the essence from the hoard” [60] — i.e. the hoard’s essence, not the dragon itself. Per Hugo’s s12 recap, the egg “absorbed the treasure of the wyrmling, not the dragon itself” [61]. Per s14, “Sevryn’s magic may have misfired” [17] — implying the egg is supposed to find chromatic dragons but the redirection is fallible. The internal mechanic of the egg is therefore inconsistent across narrators: is it dragon-essence or hoard-essence? The s3 narration is the most authoritative (it absorbed both the dragon’s residual poison and the hoard’s essence), but Hugo’s hoard-only reading in s12 propagates a partial misunderstanding.

Casualties

Cholmondeley (Chris’s PC, s2-s3)

Paladin of the Pure Light, on the run from Aurelian forces for rescuing Nancy from execution in his backstory. Half-moustache (Caelumn singed off the other half in s3). Killed in the second recorded combat of session 3 by an unnamed yuan-ti woman’s double-bite multiattack — first attack a natural twenty critical for 9 piercing + 21 poison [62]. Failed his attempt to stabilise; broke his neck on the death-save attempt. Last words: “I hate you all.” [2]. Funeral held at Wyrmbough Grove’s village green; Gwen Homora placed six sprigs of mosswort in the fire (one extra for him); Selenor played the carved war-horn of the Grove Wars; his holy symbol was passed to Nancy. His eulogy, delivered by his player: “Chumley, even though your life was long, I hope it was filled with experiences and your life burned like the platinum flame of Bahamut. and I hope that going forward, your soul will rest in his fiery grasp” [63].

Harvo (Mordane’s first PC, s2-s9)

Half-elf artificer, real name Harvalent Irsaron, from Arcanthes, Howville. Sent to the party in s2 by Sevryn’s letter; built Sevryn’s Egg-Carrier for the egg. Killed in s9 by Hugo under Succubus domination, with a hand-axe natural 20 critical for 23 damage [64]. Harvo’s reduced max-HP from the spectres’ necrotic drain meant he could not survive the crit. Last words: “Well, fuck.” Funeral at the pyre outside the Black Vein Quarry: Vasquez cut a small piece of metal from one of Harvo’s weapons and turned it into a charm to wear, Hugo gave a brief eulogy (“you were smart, probably smarter than a lot of us here,” [65], Caelumn said burial rites and lit the pyre. Terry attempted his people’s Rite of Returning, rolled badly on Performance, took a permanent -1 Charisma. A sealed letter from Sevryn appeared at the pyre confirming the death was foreseen.

Ruin (Mordane’s second PC, s10-s15)

Tiefling warlock with healing-type subclass; sent to the party in s10 via Sevryn’s sealed letter at Harvo’s pyre. Mordane’s player ran him as charismatic, capable, and not-quite-trustworthy (per Sevryn’s letter: “don’t confuse charm with harmlessness”). Killed in s15 by an Aurelian chain-master in a scripted execution: a chain that snapped around his neck and pulled with such force that his neck snapped and pulled his head off [20]. No save was offered. His body was not recovered; the party fled into the Eldwythe sewers under Phil Flowerforge’s smoke bomb. He was not given a funeral. He had been a member of the party for five sessions.

The party at end of s16

The s16 roster below reflects the session as it ran. Per the s17 retcon, Vasquez and Althea are now departed offscreen (captured by Aurelians during the sewer split; the party fled rather than go back). They are not pending rescue; treat them in the same category as Cholmondeley, Harvo, and Ruin. The active party as of s17 is Terry, Hugo, Caelumn, Mike, and Steven.

  • Terry - tortle wizard, Bladesinger as of s14, level 4. Has Cloak of Protection (Sevryn’s gift, s11), bagpipes, a silvered short sword, Earthwing the owl familiar (re-summonable; the s16 owl is presumed dead). Took -1 Charisma permanently in s9. Player: Chris.
  • Hugo - blue-skinned barbarian, Void-Touched subclass. Carries Greataxe of Frost +1 (s7), backup +1 Greataxe (s13), Winged Boots (Sevryn’s gift, s11), Gloom-Touched Buckler (s6), and the unremovable Onyx Ring of Barbed Hooks (s4). Pre-experiment name “Corvin”, erased family, Black Mask pact, Project Veilbreak / Ascendancy past (the Ascendancy brand-name is Hugo-only in-fiction knowledge; the other PCs only know there is a project). Player: Dylan.
  • Caelumn - sorcerer, draconic ancestry, Platinum Order origin from Vhal’Zarim. Carries (or carried) the Dragonslayer Longsword (s3), Soulbinder’s Packed Ring (Maelis’s soul + 1 owlbear soul, s7+s11), Charlatan’s Die (s8), and the Bloodwell Vial (Sevryn’s gift, s11). His backpack - including the Egg, the crooked broom, healing potions, and gold - was stolen by the Aurelian chain-master in s15 (per the DM, the candied dentures had been returned to Uncle Nibblecheek before the snare and were not in the pack at the time of the theft). Player: Toby.
  • Vasquez (departed offscreen, s16 retcon) - fighter, Mage Slayer feat. Hosting Mharos since s9; visibly half-demon-elf. Carried the Aurelian Plate Armour with Nullstone Runes re-engraved with his adopted-dwarf-family crest (s10), the gunblade forged at Shamil’s forge (s3), and as of s16 the Hat of Disguise (attuned during the boat trip, destroyed in the s17-retcon escape). Cellmate-given prison name “Bruise” (s8). Player: Polar (departed between s16 and s17).
  • Althea Stormsoro (departed offscreen, s16 retcon) - white-scaled kobold cleric/paladin of the All Hammer, joined s15. Carried a silver-and-golden gorget with a burning gem (the reason the Aurelian patrol pursued her), oversized pointed hat with skull emblem. Bless, Draconic Cry, Sacred Flame, Toll the Dead, Cure Wounds, Channel Divinity (Turn Undead). Player: Maliwana (departed between s16 and s17).

The party (Terry, Hugo, Caelumn, with Mike and Steven joining a few hours into s17) is aboard a small skiff, sailing several days toward the White Lantern Shrine - a half-ruined waystation on Aurelia’s north entrance, on the freight road approaching the city [44]. They have Phil Flowerforge’s note for Hett Varn (the red-headed dwarf with forehead goggles) and the code phrase “Phil sent us.” Their main objective is recovering the Egg from Aurelian custody. Their secondary objective is investigating Mira Hale’s captivity. The egg is glowing green from absorbing Death-at-Sunset’s essence in session 3; whatever the Aurelians intend to do with it remains the campaign’s most active question. As Sevryn has reassured them: everything is happening the way it’s supposed to.

References

  1. ^ per-session recaps s2-s16
  2. ^ Session 3, line 1260 — Inline citation.
  3. ^ Session 6, line 2538-2540 — Inline citation.
  4. ^ Session 7, line 612-614 — Inline citation.
  5. ^ Session 5, line 908 — Inline citation.
  6. ^ Session 8, line 161 — Inline citation.
  7. ^ Session 9, line 78 — Inline citation.
  8. ^ Session 9, line 187 — Inline citation.
  9. ^ Session 9, line 1316 — Inline citation.
  10. ^ Session 9, line 1513 — Inline citation.
  11. ^ Session 10, line 82 — Inline citation.
  12. ^ Session 10, line 383 — Inline citation.
  13. ^ Session 10, line 648 — Inline citation.
  14. ^ Session 12, line 223 — Inline citation.
  15. ^ Session 12, line 1325 — Inline citation.
  16. ^ Session 14, line 837 — Inline citation.
  17. ^ Session 14, line 1293 — Inline citation.
  18. ^ Session 14, line 1556 — Inline citation.
  19. ^ Session 15, line 111 — Inline citation.
  20. ^ Session 15, line 119 — Inline citation.
  21. ^ Session 15, line 448 — Inline citation.
  22. ^ Session 15, line 500-504 — Inline citation.
  23. ^ Session 15, line 590 — Inline citation.
  24. ^ Session 16, line 1753 — Inline citation.
  25. ^ Session 17, line 96 — Inline citation.
  26. ^ Session 17, line 1826 — Inline citation.
  27. ^ Session 17, line 130 — Inline citation.
  28. ^ Session 17, line 137 — Inline citation.
  29. ^ Session 17, line 622 — Inline citation.
  30. ^ Session 17, line 666 — Inline citation.
  31. ^ Session 17, line 1483 — Inline citation.
  32. ^ Session 17, line 697 — Inline citation.
  33. ^ Session 17, line 709 — Inline citation.
  34. ^ Session 17, line 711 — Inline citation.
  35. ^ Session 17, line 712 — Inline citation.
  36. ^ Session 17, line 717 — Inline citation.
  37. ^ Session 17, line 713 — Inline citation.
  38. ^ Session 17, line 738 — Inline citation.
  39. ^ Session 17, line 744 — Inline citation.
  40. ^ Session 17, line 757 — Inline citation.
  41. ^ Session 17, line 811 — Inline citation.
  42. ^ Session 17, line 927 — Inline citation.
  43. ^ Session 17, line 973 — Inline citation.
  44. ^ Session 17, line 1544-1545 — Inline citation.
  45. ^ Session 3, line 2046 — Inline citation.
  46. ^ Session 14, line 1293-1294 — Inline citation.
  47. ^ Session 12, line 194 — Inline citation.
  48. ^ Session 4, line 1670 — Inline citation.
  49. ^ Session 7, line 999-1014 — Inline citation.
  50. ^ Session 7, line 614-615 — Inline citation.
  51. ^ Session 10, line 1247-1257 — Inline citation.
  52. ^ Session 9, line 197 — Inline citation.
  53. ^ Session 9, line 495 — Inline citation.
  54. ^ Session 10, line 827 — Inline citation.
  55. ^ Session 12, line 235 — Inline citation.
  56. ^ Session 15, line 482 — Inline citation.
  57. ^ Session 16, line 1364 — Inline citation.
  58. ^ Session 4, line 1212 — Inline citation.
  59. ^ Session 13, line 1206 — Inline citation.
  60. ^ Session 3, line 1532 — Inline citation.
  61. ^ Session 12, line 778 — Inline citation.
  62. ^ Session 3, line 905-912 — Inline citation.
  63. ^ Session 3, line 1456 — Inline citation.
  64. ^ Session 9, line 1316-1318 — Inline citation.
  65. ^ Session 9, line 1627 — Inline citation.