[Alliance] Chapter Five: Session Forty-Nine
Appearing Characters: Aelthalyste Everpost, Gilveradin Windrunner, Hedanis Poisonbloom, Jaina Proudmoore-Menethil, Lankester Merrin, Liadrin Everpost, Lirath Windrunner, Maraad, Mercy, Natalie Seline, Parvaen Phoenixlight, Remnii, Rhonin Windrunner, Rommath Pyrewing, Seria, Uther Menethil, Vereesa Windrunner, Victor Prestor, Zabra Hexx
October 21st
As everyone returned to the castle, there was a brief check in with everyone as the party shared what they had found as well as what their plans were.
Rommath furrowed his brow.
Remnii looked to the group.
Remnii knew the Void was the realm of shadow and it affected the mind. There was some sort of connection between madness and shadow.
She looked at Victor.
Victor glared at him.
Gil put his hands up.
Remnii nodded.
She explained the readings she had gotten from the naaru implied that Natalie had astral projected into the Void.
He looked at Gil.
Rommath nodded.
Rommath nodded.
Rommath nodded and confirmed he would. Jaina looked at Victor.
Victor smirked.
Jaina put a hand on Victor’s shoulder and assured him they will get to the bottom of everything, as Calia was technically her sister as well. Victor thanked her and said until they found Calia there was no use fretting, but he was going to get some rest, and it was wise for everyone else to do so.
Gil thanked Rommath for the help.
Rommath nodded and set off while Gil went to go and find his uncle Rhonin, who was actually in Vel’s room. He was sitting with a mug of coffee and clearly hard at work trying to detangle Vel’s journal. There were pages and legends and notes all over the table. He looked up as Gil entered.
He looked at him, but then immediately returned to work.
Rhonin stopped again.
He gestured at the book.
Gil asked if it was upsidedown or backwards, and Rhonin said it was both with additional letter replacement and other things. It had evolved since she left him the code. However, he said he had learned the spell at Andorhal as Vel had apparently given it to the priests and mages there before she left so they could better help their own people.
He handed his mug to Gil.
Gil took it and as he walked away Rhonin called if it was decaf he would kick his ass. Gil retorted he could try. He dropped off the coffee and then also contacted Krasus to keep him in the loop.
Late that night, Lirath came back, and he didn’t say anything, but he approached Gil and gave him a tight, slightly desperate hug. Gil hugged him back. Vereesa hugged both of them.
Remnii had gone to check on Victor before he went to bed. She softly knocked on the door with a soft call of his name, and Victor told her to enter. Remnii stepped in, and she saw Victor as he was throwing a tunic back over his chest. She got the sense he was probably trying to tire himself out by exercising.
Remnii closed the distance between them.
Remnii shook her head.
Victor chuffed.
Victor asked if she had ever been to the Void, and Remnii confirmed she didn’t, but there was a priesthood among the draenei that touched upon the void and death and she had been working with them since she had been reunited. Victor said they would need to be prepared for anything, and Remnii said she will prepare some preventative magics on the morrow.
Victor thanked Remnii for letting him doing this, and Remnii said that withholding him from the matter would do nothing as it was important to him.
Victor thanked Remnii for checking on him, and he said he was going to try and get some rest, as he felt a bit better. Remnii decided to sit for a bit and she told him about her father, and also offered a massage to calm him down and soothe him to sleep. She tucked Victor in and then left.
October 22nd
The next day, everyone awoke and went down for a quiet breakfast. They headed out to get the gemstones they needed so they could astral project into the void.
Gil opted to leave a letter with some money for the kind Scarlet Crusader he had spoken to, expressing thanks for how kind he had been about the refugees. He had signed it as “Camtheas Glowsun”.
When the Crusader received the letter, he asked around if they had heard about a Camtheas Glowsun, and he had also headed over to the elven refugees to ask as well. An attractive young elf informed him that he was a big deal where he was from, as he was trying to make some big changes and recently raised a bunch of money for people in need. The Crusader explained he had left a message for him, and the elf assured him he had done well if he attracted Camtheas’s attention as he didn’t give his praise out simply and he should just keep doing what he was doing. The Crusader thanked for the information and tried to give him one of the gold pieces, but the elf assured him that wasn’t needed.
The young elf smirked as he slinked back into the shadows and mused “don’t say I didn’t do anything for you, Gilveradin” before Hedanis shifted back into his normal disguise and he teleported away.
The Crusader then approached the stables and asked after a Parvaen Phoenixlight, as he had heard he was collecting funds to help the refugees, and he just wanted to make a donation. The Crusader handed a much heavier satchel of gold over to Parvaen and told him to ensure it got to the people that needed it. He also said that he may have more in the future, as he knew the winter wouldn’t be easy. Parvaen thanked him graciously and said he would ensure it fed a lot of people. The Crusader headed back to the barracks with his head held high, and he mused he wouldn’t just keep doing what he was doing, as he didn’t think that was enough.
Seria had gone to the orphanage early. Mercy saw her as she was pulling clothes off the line and asked how she was with folding.
Seria froze, and she said not very well. Mercy was flabbergasted and asked what she was going to do when she had kids.
She folded a tunic with one simple motion and then ordered Seria to do the same. Seria concentrated really hard, and then she did the same motion. Mercy said she was a natural and said she maybe had what it took after all.
She looked at the other clothes.
Seria nodded and moved over to help.
Seria nodded.
Seria nodded again.
Mercy got a dire look.
Seria got very silent, but her ears got a bit rid. Mercy smirked.
Mercy smiled and sighed.
Mercy laughed.
Seria wasn’t sure how to respond.
Mercy laughed again.
She bumped Seria with her elbow.
She shrugged.
She winked.
Seria continued folding and Mercy finished up her pile. She stood up with a groan, and she told Seria to never get old as she stretched out her back. Inside the orphanage, Zubi, Seria’s fox, had arrived and got the attention of some of the kids. However, Lankester Merrin was trying to gather up the kids for some reading, and he suggested the kids go outside for a picnic.
All the kids eagerly followed him outside, and Zubi tired himself out in the lap of one of the kids.
The rest of the party arrived in time to find Seria suckered into doing dishes with Mercy. She relented to allow Seria to go take care of her business, but she told her that she would hold down the fort, but she needed to be careful so she could ensure her man lived up to his promise. Mercy winked at her and thanked her for her help. Seria had got the basics of Mercy’s story, including the fact her mother was a sailor and her father was a jungle troll. At one point, her mother’s ship got hit by a squall and she was thrown overboard, but she was rescued by a troll ship. The captain of the ship had stepped in and made sure she was safe, but they spent several months on the sea together, and the captain had ultimately snuck her off on a boat and sent her back home. But then she had found out she was pregnant when she arrived back. Mercy had never met her dad, however, and he was likely dead by now.
The group assembled in the basement of the orphanage with Rommath, Liadrin, Maraad, and Zabra Hexx. It was evident Liadrin had a passenger, as Aelthalyste manifested as well.
Aelthalyste smiled warmly.
Aelthalyste told them to steel their minds and second guess anything they saw in the shadows. Zabra agreed and explained the trolls had old stories about the shadows and the Zandalari empire as they faced off against the forces of darkness. There were mountains of flesh and living shadow, and even swarms of beings that crawled like insects but schemed and plotted in the darkness. He wasn’t sure what they were going to find, but he would monitor their vitals along with Liadrin and Aelthalyste. He said they should trust in themselves and their friends, but nothing else.
Remnii thanked them for their advice, and Uther said they will hopefully avoid mountains of flesh. Gil asked what they would do if that was the most normal thing they saw, and Uther retorted they’d get used to it very quickly.
Victor smirked.
Remnii harnessed her magic to cast [Astral Projection] as she sprinkled a circle around the pillows where everyone’s heads would rest. She told everyone to hold their gemstones and get comfortable. In the first twenty minutes it didn’t seem like much was happening, but then their eyelids started to get heavy and the sounds of the children started to fade away. A dome of scintillating dark purples and gold began to manifest over them, and they were enshrouded by the magic and their souls were freed from their bodies as Remnii called for them all to get up. There was a conscious moment they could see their own bodies, but then they entered the dark.
It was nothing but darkness. They followed Natalie’s tether, but that was all they could see. All around them was a complete absence of light, but it was a darkness that was somehow tangible. It was thick and oppressive and nothing but an inky blackness.
Those among them that could see in magical darkness, however, could see. Everything was a twisted facsimile of where they had come from, and nothing was right. Outlines didn’t seem to hold, and everytime focus was directed in one place, the other things around them shifted. There was a sensation of things close by and watching.
And then suddenly they could all see and were standing in the basement, but none of their bodies were there. Instead it was a warped vision. They heard the sounds of the playing and singing children up above, but they were discordant and distant and seemed to come from all around them and also from them at the same time.
Each of them had a thin golden cord connecting them to the shadow behind them. Uther asked if they were all there, and Remnii confirmed. Victor said he didn’t know what he expected, but what they were now faced with was not it.
Uther took a step forward, and it was like stepping on and off a moving plane with no recognizable pattern. It was as if the ground was challenging them with each step. They headed up the stairs, which seemed to be simultaneously longer and shorter than on the material plane, but they finally reached the top of the stairwell.
It was almost comforting, but if they turned their heads too quickly, there was almost an after image. But the dark was darker, and it felt as if moving through water, but also everything was dry.
They were all on alert, and Remnii projected a light from T’uure out from them. As she did that, the sound of the children’s laughter both stopped and got louder. The orphanage did not look the same. The toys and the beds were more like those at Shattrath to her, Gil saw an image more like the room he grew up in at Windrunner Spire, and Seria saw more like her former homes in the wilds. There were mockeries of Kala’s pottery, but the colors were wrong, jagged, and imperfect like a poorly remembered memory.
Gil heard a voice waxing about truth in his mind, and the nature of it. Everything seemed to be as it was supposed to appear, as he was in the twisted reflection of the material plane. If it was anything else, it wouldn’t make sense.
They could still see Natalie’s thread like a thin lifeline leading them away. Gil suggested they make the trip as short as possible, and they continued after the thread.
Rommath informed them that Remnii was the one that could return them to the waking world with a single thought. They were not above reproach, but damage here was impermanent as long as the cord remained intact. He said it was important for Remnii to be careful, as if she was sent back, the only way the rest of them could return was to follow their cords back or find some other way to remove the spell.
They entered a strange reflection of Lordaeron. The buildings were crooked, as if the bricks were smooth, soft, and wrong. The buildings were sideways, and the streets didn’t go straight. They looked down various blocks, and they could see buildings half constructed with buildings in the air. Overhead was nothing but inky blackness. There were no stars, no planets, no sun or moon or anything that would offer any sense of normalcy. But then they blinked, and the sky lit up with thousands of stars, each of them impossibly far away but also close. They were calling to them, as if the very stars were alive and offering to show them endless wonders if they were there.
But then the stars were gone and replaced with the city. If they closed their eyes, they could possibly see it all again.
Uther shut his eyes and he could see the stars again. As the rest of the group turned, they saw Uther and Victor’s eyes were just gone, as if there was no need for eyes. Remnii approached to look closer, and it appeared to be impermanent because they were in an astral form. There was a magic to it, and Uther realized he couldn’t open his eyes again.
Uther grunted.
Remnii used her magics to cleanse the blindness away, recalling what Victor and Uther’s eyes looked like. Then they opened their eyes like a shutter of flesh. Uther saw so much more than he did before. The stars were now present even while his eyes were open, and he saw the same level of detail Gil could normally see as he suddenly had truesight with no limit to the distance.
Uther blinked and looked around.
Victor thanked Remnii and expressed it was all very strange, as he wasn’t certain what her magic did. He suggested they keep moving after the cord. It led them deeper into the heart of the twisted city. They found themselves at the end of the streets, and as they looked back, they could see the section of the city they left curve upward. The cord continued into the blackness and became hard to see, but there appeared to be a visual illusion spell in the void of space beyond where there was a road to walk.
Uther asked if anyone else saw it, and Gil squinted and he could also see it. It was cloaking the entire area in a mask of darkness.
Rommath scowled.
Rommath’s hand crackled with arcane energy and he shot a [Dispel Magic] in the direction Gil was looking. The magic seemed to almost graze off something, and Rommath scoffed.
Remnii looked around and Uther wasn’t standing next to her despite her believing he was right there. However, Uther’s words rippled through her mind as she prayed to guidance from the naaru. She felt a pull coming from T’uure, and she looked at the staff. Its soft harmony seemed to have become discordant, and it felt like it was trying to show her something. She held the staff out, and the radiant golden head of the staff started to shift and swirl as if watching a ripple in the waters of the cosmos itself. The gold turned white, and they all heard the discord in the harmonious sound. There was a pulse, and the staff shifted to violet black as it warped into its darker cousin. A psychic blast of energy slammed into Remnii.
But then the powers of the staff connected with the world around it as the staff became Turend. The discord spread out as part of the antimatter around them formed into a path of violet stained glass stairs that built themselves into nothingness. They hit a shroud of darkness, and the illusion was pulled aside to reveal a whirling mass of violet and blue energy. It was protecting something in the center of the false city.
There was a sound of breaking glass, and the shield collapsed. Floating in nothingness was a perfect recreation of the Basilica of Saint Mereldar at the peak of the stairs.
Remnii wiped away a wisp of shadowy tears.
Rem: Well… where the light is the brightest, the shadows are the darkest.
Rommath narrowed his eyes at the artifact.
He looked up at the stairway, and Remnii walked directly up them as she thanked Uther for his support.
They all ascended the stairs. They were not straight, but instead curved and spiraled. In a way, the strange version of the cathedral was almost in the same place it should have been on the material plane. Or at least, it was close. It looked very much like it did before it was burned, but instead of a great domed ceiling covered in stained glass of golds and whites and blues, it was black, violet, and other colors of the void.
It was solid, however, as if someone’s will was holding the representation.
Uther pushed the doors of the basilica open, and they saw a darkened reflection of its interior. There were rows of empty pews and a high ceiling that bathed the chamber in voidal light. Everything was a bit off. The symbol of the Holy Light was inverted, creating an almost x like pattern. The statue of Saint Mereldar was whole, but it was different. She held a libram, but it was a strange tome wreathed in shadow and wrought of stone and marble. It had spikes upon it, and its center seemed to have an eye made of a bright purple gemstone. Instead of the sword of Lordane in her hand, it was a dagger with a matching gemstone eye in its pommel. Kneeling before the altar in front of the statue was a single figure wreathed in shadow that was like mist pouring off her.
It was Natalie Seline.
Their footfalls echoed on forever. They could hear Natalie chant quietly as she recited a prayer of centering over and over. But it wasn’t one Remnii had ever heard.
It was repeated again and again. Remnii called out Natalie’s name, and she gasped. She turned, and her eyes were bright violet.
Natalie got to her feet, and the shadows around her did not dissipate. Her form seemed insubstantial, and it was if she had become one with the shadow around her.
She looked around.
Victor stepped past Remnii.
Remnii put a hand on Victor’s shoulder.
Remnii explained what they had done in speaking with Natalie’s corpse and how they got to the Void. Natalie said it had been good thinking as she was unsure she would have been able to reach them otherwise. It was good she had reacted so quickly when everything happened.
She gestured up to the blade held in the statue’s hand.
Rommath furrowed his brow.
Natalie looked between Uther, Victor, and Remnii.
Victor shook his head.
Remnii looked at Rommath.
Rommath nodded.
Natalie nodded.
Victor went quiet and looked down at his hand, clearly in deep thought. Rommath withdrew Vel’s soul cage component to begin the incantation.
Rommath started the incantation as tendrils of crimson energy reached out to bind Natalie.
He looked over to Remnii and said that as soon as Natalie was safe, she was to bring them back. Remnii nodded.
Victor shook his head.
Remnii and Uther shared a look as Rommath continued the incantation. The shadows in the cathedral got a bit darker. They started to hear whispers at the edges of their perceptions. And then the echoes of children laughing again.
Remnii started to approach Victor, who was still quietly murmuring that it was his fault. Remnii took his face in her hands and told him to look at her.
The dark was creeping in on them. The word “parents” started to echo, and Remnii heard “we are not our parents” said back in Shaspira, Archimonde, and Aracyra’s voices. The shadows grew deeper and deeper.
Victor snapped out of it as Remnii’s eyes started to dilate.
The shadows started to move as the whispering grew louder and louder. Remnii blinked, fear gripping her heart as, from the dark corridors, roiling, shadowy creatures started to emerge as they whispered in a language none of them had heard before.
Wispy shadow entities and bulky roiling living shadows emerged along with thin, long, narrow entities that had an almost wraith-like appearance.
Shadows manifested on the pillars and there were ravens with three eyes cawing down at them as, in Vel’s voice, they repeated “we are not our parents”.
The shadows started to surge toward the group. One of the shadows appeared next to Seria and repeated the same statement in Taldaram’s voice. A voidwraith also appeared in Seria’s shadow as its claws grew into shadowy tendrils. It opened its maw, revealed a massive hole of inky blackness, and it tried to bite down on her, but it scraped against Seria’s armor. Inky blackness scattered and reformed into a ripple that melted into the ground and then reappeared in each of their shadows and cleaved into their backs.
Seria shifted into a massive bear with flaming claws and started to tear into the nearest voidwraith. She heard a deep laugh in Taldaram’s voice.
Gil summoned his magic and used [Meteor Swarm] as he fired four beads of fire into the air. They grew into massive meteors that exploded across the floor of the cathedral. A rain of shadow-paned glass and stone shattered across the entire battlefield. When the flames cleared, most of the creatures were gone, leaving only a few critically injured voidwraiths and overshadows.
The entire cathedral was now on fire, which shed the entire area into a bright light. The shadowy creatures that remained rushed forward and one manifested next to Remnii and also created multiple ripples as it also lashed out of the groups shadow.
Victor leaped out of the way of a slash as he then vaulted over Remnii and landed with an explosion of fire that sent lines of [Web of Fire] across the creatures that remained. One of then went up in flames as Victor then wrenched his sword from the ground and drove it into one of the weakened shadows. As he then arced the sword around, a wave of fire washed over the two that remained near Remnii, and he exploded through the ashes of another one as it went up in flames and drove his sword into the body of the remaining creature. Uther finished it off with a swing of his hammer before he vaulted over to the lash overshadow and exploded it into a blast of light.
They didn’t see any other shadows, but they felt something else happening as a chill went up their collective spines.There was something else coming.
Rommath continued to concentrate on the spell as the magic wrapped around Natalie. Remnii used [Spirit Guardians] in preparation for whatever was coming. The naaru images manifested, but they darkened in a flash of black light that accompanied the sound of breaking glass. She heard it humming in harmony with Turend.
More shadowy creatures started to crawl from the deep shadows caused by the fire, but suddenly a rift in space ripped open to reveal a bright, bluish white energy that spilled from it. A swarm of strange creatures that were almost batlike in appearance emerged and landed to skitter crustacean-like entities. They started to attach to the shadow creature and completely devour it. There were hundreds of small creatures, and another rift opened as even more emerged.
Then there were humanoid creatures with a strange dish-like head and gangly arms that also ambled forward and began to draw upon the energy of the void. There was an otherworldly clicking sound that accompanied them. One of the devourer controllers looked at Rommath and one of the swarms also turned their attention to him.
A swarm of devourers rushed at Gil and he was stabbed by barbed mouths that seemed to sap his very magic. They were fully gripped on and refused to let go. The aura of the darkened naaru washed over the creature, but it seemed to be taking less damage than it should have.
