Wrath of the Righteous

[Richard Loh]

24th Pharast AR 4714

It seems that Sister Perversion, the matron of the Yearning House is expecting the Heroes of Drezen. Entering the building with minimal fuss, they confronted Sister Perversion only to realise that it was actually Nocticula possessing Sister Perversion that the heroes are able to gain entry with minimal effort. Giving some advice to the heroes, Nocticula divulged some information regarding the Suture's nature. The first demon to enter the Worldwound, the energies of the Worldwound utterly transformed the powerful derakni into a dretch, the basest of the demons & a crippled one at that. Its fate is inextricably tied to the Worldwound & Queen Galfrey believed that its presence in the Worldwound will enable the heroes an easier time at closing the portal.

After that, they plunged in through the mirror of mental prowess, they engaged the leader of the Deskari cult, Mistress Anemora, a drider of immense power. Sensing difficulty with the protective spells on Anemora's body, Kira Mai gave up and with a sigh of resignation, unravelled all her spells with a well-placed mage's disjunction. Making short work of her and retrieving the Nahyndrian chisel shortly after, the party proceeded to the Soul Foundry.

At the entrance of the Soul Foundry, the party found the remains of the ancient silver dragon Terendelev, now transformed into a foul ravener, whom is now acting as a mere guard. Encountering a mythical elder fire elemental who claimed to serve the Elemental Prince of Fire himself, the party sought to free it from its unwilling servitude to power the fires of the Soul Foundry. A series of actions are needed to successfully remove the seal of binding which the heroes executed flawlessly. It was here that Emrys was ambushed by the leaders of the place, the Filleted Man & a pickled punk known as Lord Stillborn. After dispatching the duo, Kira Mai handed the amulet of the planes to Anferno and request that he send the elder elemental back as Anferno is immune to fire. After the deed is done, Anferno, suffering from negative energy ravaging his body decided to go to the Plane of Life, aka the Positive Energy Plane in an attempt to neutralise the negative energy. A chance encounter with a xag-ya resulted in the burning of the negative energy in his body but not before leaving a gap in Anferno's essence which must be purified. Returning to the Prime Material Plane, Anferno begged Emrys to channel negative energy into his body, to fill the gap in his essence.

The heroes finally found the Suture after a little bit of side-tracking by Anferno. As they were preparing to bring the Suture away, they hear the roar of Khorramzadeh the Storm King. Knowing that further failures on its part will most likely result in eternal torture at the claws of Deskari, the Storm King will have no choice but to attempt to destroy the party personally or die in the attempt.

A desperate fight occured with the eventual beheading of the Hellknight Anferno, Venture-Captain of the Pathfinder Society. With a brilliant flash of light, Lazencia revealed her true form, that of a beautiful woman, dressed in full plate with a veil over her face. The face most of her ten thousand faithful in Drezen would know. The would-be godling Vysanthe. Picking up Anferno's +3 vorpal longsword, she charged into the fray and succeeded in decapitating Khorramzadeh with a single flourish of her blade.

Teleporting back to Drezen, with duct tape handy, the party wondered if Anferno can be raised.

Next? To Threshold. The final closing of the demonic rift known as the Worldwound. For Anferno, is the negative energy dependence permanent? Such a solution to the effects of energy drain is completely unheard of. Perhaps, Anferno is no longer a living creature, but a foul creature of the Negative Plane. Will the Heroes of the Fifth Crusade ever find out the truth? Will the party succeed or will it be the last Golarion will ever hear of them?

----------

New character XP: 2,334,000

Mythic tier:
Emrys, Vysanthe - 10
Laurentius - 9 - 2/5
Anferno - 5 - 2/3

Items available for claim:
+3 construct-bane returning throwing cold iron warhammer
wand of enervation (20 charges)
wand of greater invisibility (9 charges)
wand of inflict serious wounds (20 charges)
+5 leather armor
sword of subtlety
amulet of natural armor +1
Belt of physical might +6 (Str, Dex)
Ring of protection +1
Sylvan scimitar
+5 thundering evil-outsider-bane heavy repeating crossbow
Lyre of building -> Kira Mai
Staff of the woodlands (2 charges)
Rod of security
Mantle of faith
Bracers of armor +6
+3 adamantine chainmail
+5 light steel shield
+3 vorpal longsword -> Anferno
Belt of physical might +4 (Str, Con)
Winged boots
Staff of the hierophant (8 charges)
Masterwork mithral chain shirt
Amulet of the planes -> Kira Mai
Belt of physical perfection +6 -> Emrys
Headband of inspired wisdom +6
Nahyndrian chisel
Ring of protection +5 -> Vysanthe
Ring of minor fire resistance
Robe of scintillating colors -> Vysanthe
61,206 gp

[Daryl Kong]

WHEN Hellknight Inquisitor Anferno gets resurrected and rested, he shall be using the Sending spell.

First message goes out to Venture Captain Ambrus Valsin, to mobilize the Pathfinder Society to Drezen.
Either have wizards teleport pathfinders over or have hao jin tapestry portal setted up.

Second message goes out to his brother Anfernal, Lictor of the Order of the Black Powder, to send reinforcements.

Last message goes out to Paracountess Zarta Dralneen, saying that he misses her so much and will be back soon.

[Richard Loh]

Storming the prison tower, Threshold and slaying many of their guards, the Heroes encountered little resistances as most of their enemies are non-mythic. Even the former ruler of Threshold, is but a mere non-mythic balor lord. Plunging through floor after floor of the Threshold via magical portals, the Heroes finally plunged between the layer of the Prime Material Plane and the Rasping Rift, a layer of the Abyss, ruled by the Locust Lord, Deskari himself.

With the mythical essence coursing through her veins, coupled with the chaotic energies of the Abyss when she first fell between the planes, Vysanthe was transformed. No longer a mortal, but definitely not that of a full-fledged god, she became something akin to that of a demi-god of self-preservation. A chaotic & fickle godling of sorts.

Realising that the base of Threshold itself is fully submerged in the Rasping Rifts and that the she-demon Areelu Vorlesh is in the midst of tearing a rift wide open in the Prime Material Plane which will consume the whole of Golarion, the party laid siege to the evil caster with the newly transformed undead-balor lord Khorramzadeh on her side. Facing off against epic foes with minimal action economy on her side, Areelu Vorlesh found that she is hard pressed to survive and alas, she was cut down in moments. Her pure selfishness and evilness for personal gain throughout the past century is no more.

Upon successful infiltration of the core of it all, the Heroes summoned all their past allies from Drezen. The resurrected dragon, Terendelev, the phoenix Pyralisia, Arashvanial, the Riftwarden & even Arueshulae, the reformed succubus teleported in to assist in the closure of the portal.

As the preparation of the ritual comes to a close, the lake of maggots surrounding the Worldwound freezes, as if time itself is stopped and an orange vortex appears from within the portal itself.

Vysanthe starts reading off the Lexicon of Paradox, a maddening text which will eventually drive the reader insane. Venture-Captain Anferno with his knowledge bestowed by the Order of the Gate was able to observe the magical pathways along which the Worldwound's energies travel & informed Laurentius of its weakest links. Laurentius visualing the Worldwound as an immense trap, tried to dismantle it by pulling just the right spheres of power from it until it collapses on itself. Sensing that the portal is going to collapse on itself, Emrys channelled his holy power into Radiance itself, and with light literally spilling forth from its shining white blade, he struck with a mighty blow into the heart of the Rift as if it is an actual, physical thing itself.

As Emrys struck it hard, the orange light winks out and it was here that Vysanthe hurled the Lexicon of Paradox into the Worldwound itself. Reality explodes in a blast of orange light that seemed to last for both an instant and an eternity. When the light fades, the party finds itself split up amongst a typical Pathfinder playmat called the Theatre and here, they are stalked by the demon lord Deskari himself.

Hearing cries of alarm, the party made short work of the mooks themselves, though the mooks are horrible CR 20 and CR 25 monsters, but such is the cheese of mythic rank 10 characters. Deskari proved to be a bit of a fight, except that Dr Mossy, I mean Laurentius' cheese plus Emrys' hard attacks drove Deskari to its knees. "Hasta la vista, baby" proclaimed Laurentius as his force shortswords made of an inky substance struck right in to the heart of Deskari.

The realm starts crumbling and with the amulet of the planes, the party planeshifted themselves back on to the Prime Material Plane. With two demon lords dead, what next? Will the Heroes turn their fury on the rest of the demon lords? Hunting them one by one until they do not threaten the rest of the multiverse any more?

Edit: Somewhere in one of the fights, Emrys did a combined round damage of 1k & he held the record briefly for highest amount of damage done until Laurentius wades in with his two-weapon fighting crit for a total of 2k damage. All in the span of a single day but I think it was in the Deskari fight.

[Richard Loh]

Now that the Worldwound is sealed, what will become of the land Sarkoris? Demons still exists in abundance in Sarkoris, but there will not be new demons emerging in huge quantities any more. The land of Sarkoris will probably never return to its original condition any more and perhaps, centuries will pass, before the chaotic energies of the Abyss will no longer corrupt the people staying there any longer.

What of the Heroes & Citadel Drezen?

Anferno, on his awesome success of saving the world is promoted to be a member of the Decemvirate, from which he will have to do his own Tale-spinning with his own agents proving his worth.

Doomguy had never been found again. Perhaps, as the Worldwound closed, a freak nature storm sent him back in time towards whichever planet he came from. Earth, he calls it. The 3rd rock from the Sun in his own world.

Emrys had been successfully atoned by Iomedae herself and was given 2 choices. Either serve at her side as her Herald, with all powers & abilities accorded to that of a Herald (read: Planetar), or to serve Her in his own way. Remembering that he still have a wife, Shandy Radler (who was once Six's cohort), who was heavily pregnant & sent to Numeria on her own to Torch. Putting Radiance aside & raising their child up, they decided to retire as farmers & leave their own prejudices aside, for how else could a paladin of Iomedae & a priestess of Asmodeus ever be together?

Kira Rin disappeared without a trace since the assault of Threshold. Some said she lost all interest in the Prime Material Plane & she have once again resume planar travelling & some said that she have just relocated her business elsewhere. For a mighty wizardess as herself, surely the concerns of Golarion does not matter, for if anything, she can always make her home in another world or another plane, easily. Her sister, Kira Mai remained on Golarion though and tried to grow her magical school & magical shops, but an accident resulted in a magical explosion which tore through half of Drezen. She survived but her hard work have all been in tatters.

Laurentius, controlling the taint of Zon-Kuthon in his veins took to wandering the world. As a living Herald of Vysanthe, it was rare indeed for him to offer his blades for hire, but when he did, the target will have no chance of survival. Righting wrongs of the world in his own way, one blade at a time. (For gold & magical treasure, of course.)

What of the demigod Vysanthe? She shaped her own realm in The Maelstrom, an everchanging infinite plane of Chaos, for such is the Goddess whose portfolio is Self-Preservation. What other news of her? Who knows? Nobody knows how a God thinks.

As for Drezen, the Order of the Black Powder was utterly annihilated and with the aforementioned magical explosion which tore through the city, the people eventually moved away. To supply a city which is not self-sufficient will put a heavy price on all supplies reaching the city. Without anything of value given to the merchants, trade runs became unprofitable & it stopped eventually. Most of its citizens migrated to the domain of Queen Galfrey, in the Kingdom of Mendev to resume their life of self-preservation. Let's not forget that most citizens of Drezen are followers of Vysanthe.

And so, ends the tale of the Wrath of the Righteous. A tale of discovery, adventure, redemption, & ultimately, one of making our world a better place.

07th Arodus AR 4715