Last time, the team were almost annihilated by a gang of assassins. Breadon, the dragonborn flees and disappears. The party were saved by a halfling named Rainer, can he be trusted? What awaits the party in the city of Illinathar? Shadows and intrigues have begun to shift and sway. 

After the party dressed their wounds, they decided to rest for the night under the protection of Arcaelus’ home warded with magic. The next morning, the party awake and sort themselves out, while Jimmy receives a more chilling dream. It was the seven stars again, the forest was lit aflame, a strange half-rotten direwolf whispers the same chant over and over: “Seven stars in heavens high, seven shadows doth morning rise, the black sun rises in the north, the spear of destiny points west.” The druid awoke from his vision, and reassured himself to visit the mage archives of the Purple Order soon.

Arcaelus heard a few pebbles knock against the front door windows, knowing who the perpetrator was on the other side. He opened the door of his home and found Captain Murphy, a work acquaintance and friend from the city guard. The two discussed the happenings since the last time the they had spoken. Murphy informed Arcaelus of a recent arson case for him that required a second opinion. The wizard promised to look in the matter after dealing with some matters with the Purple Order. The rest of the group readied themselves for the rest of the day. Aydan ventured out first to the Tower of Guilds at the city center.

The city of Illinathar sat at the edge of a large delta where two rivers met; a large port for goods to leave the general region of Corinathar. In the city center, three large towers overshadow the rest of the city proper, each tower represented a particular faction within the city. The Purple Order of mages presided over one of these towers, a tower for all trade business and guilds resided within the Tower of Guilds, and finally the bureaucracy resides within the Tower of Lords.

Aydan returns to her business associates at Gemcutters & Co., an enterprise for gemcutters and master jewelers. She returns back to her workbench, where she finds a letter from her mentor, wherein the contents hint at a possible connection to an incident in her past. The sorcereress takes the note with her and reports with the branch office’s head chief. Meanwhile, Arcaelus and Jimmy went to the Purple Order in order to search in the various archives, Aydan eventually join in their search. Arcaelus heads out to find more material to aid their research, he stumbles upon a young librarian named Leslie, giving some insight to the “Seven Star Prophecy”. Aydan and Jimmy find Arcaelus with the curious tome, pondering on the information they gathered, though unaware of the lovely librarian that helped the wizard or the mysterious coin he found during their adventures.

The trio thought it best to eat and refresh themselves, they stumbled into the halfling Rainer on their way to a tavern. The team thought it best to learn more about their mysterious savior, though the conversation did little to ease the minds of the party. Rainer had received a new job contract while waiting on the party prior, as the group decided to retire for the evening, the rogue asked Arcaelus if he could assist him in a ‘simple’ job. The two ventured towards the central docks, Jimmy was still untrusting of the halfling and tagged along in the form of a weasel. Aydan returned back to Arcaelus’ home and conversed with the spirit of intellect, Bob.

Rainer and Arcaelus found themselves at the central docks, the rogue broke into an undisclosed storehouse, and instructed the wizard to stand guard. The halfling uses an implement given to him by his would-be employer. The halfling searched through the warehouse, until he happened upon an angelic statuette with a red gem on its breast. Rainer suspected the gem to be the key item,  and removed the gem with one of his daggers. The moment the gem became detached from the figurine, a large pulse of crimson energy erupted from the gem across the city. The energy began to take form and various stone statues and gargoyles came to life, attacking the citizens indiscriminately.

The party tried frantically to stop the gem that had now escaped from the halfling’s hand and flew into the night sky over Illinathar. The gem continued to pulse as the animated figures continued to terrorize the citizens. Eventually the gem stopped its pulse, various stone and metal figures began to disintegrate and merge with the gem in the sky. In a short time, a large humanoid shape of stone and metal formed and as luck would have it, right in the thick of the trouble with the team in tow. 

The gargoyles harassed Aydan on the ground, while Arcaelus and Rainer did their best to direct the giant stone creature away from the masses. Jimmy turned into a large tiger and took some severe blows from the animated construct. The stone creature smashed the building and narrowly missed the wizard, but the rogue fell down into the rubble from the collapsing ceiling. Their reserves were spent, the fight dragged, but the druid did not give up and assailed the gem powered creature with grenades of magical ice. The last blow encased the construct in ice, the weight from the ice caused the structure to crumble into the ground with the mysterious gem in ice.

What power does the mysterious gem possess? Why and who wants its power? Tune in and find out next time! Thanks again for reading and following the blog everyone, it really helps us grow. If you have questions or concerns, comment down below. Subscribe to us via email or follow us on Twitter or Facebook to get constant updates and chat with me. As of the writing of this post, I am still in the midst of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) so I only have enough time to do the Team BAJA episodic recaps. My other content will be posted next month back on its original schedule. See you guys soon!