📘 Session 18 – The Haunted Forge of Sondar

🎵 Music

🖼️ Images

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🪐 Campaign Arc


🧭 Overview

After surviving the roadside lich battle, the party rested, leveled to 8, and resumed the push deeper into the Underdark under the pressure of both Primus’ mandate and the Illithid task tied to a rumored crown. Early progress was cautious rather than heroic: Rigg and High Jinks scouted a distant light, discovered three fire elementals, and wisely chose not to add “burned to death in a cave” to the party résumé. Along the way, Valen used downtime to transcribe Misty Step and later Shield into his spellbook.

Travel grew stranger as the ground turned damp and the party stumbled into the territory of a black dragon. They backed off without a fight and continued until the mountain fortress of Sondar came into view: a dead dwarven kingdom carved into stone, its great gates torn from their hinges and its streets littered with the old remains of dwarves and Illithids alike. Inside, a cold forge and a lantern-lit echo of the past revealed ghostly dwarven smiths trapped in a repeating scene. What first looked like a haunting or time-loop became something more dangerous when Dino disturbed the forge’s tools, causing the figures to twist into nightmare shapes. The session ended on initiative.


🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Party Members

Character Player Class/Subclass Race Notable Actions
Garrick “Rigg” Dalhart Ben / Elemunk Rogue (Swashbuckler) Human Scouted ahead with High Jinks, helped avoid the fire elementals, and investigated the ruined entrance to Sondar.
Laydrick Gefinhal Jared / Galindis Cleric (Life Domain) Dwarf Spotted distant light in the Underdark and helped guide the party toward the dwarven ruin.
High Jinks Kate / Keitachan Warlock (Great Old One) Tabaxi Joined Rigg on the stealthy scout, investigated the forge’s looping ghost-scene, and tracked its pattern inside the lantern light.
Dino Roar (Dynoth Rokos) Robb / Baconbuff Artificer (Battle Smith) / Fighter Githyanki Took point at the forge, climbed in through the window, manipulated the lantern and hammer, and triggered the final hostile shift.
Valen Pyre Justin / Slitzer Wizard (Evoker) Human Used downtime to transcribe Misty Step and Shield, cast protective camp magic during the second rest, and used Detect Magic at the forge.
Rook Varrek NPC Ally Guide / Rapier Fighter Human Led the party onward through the Underdark, identified Sondar as a ruined dwarven kingdom, and pushed the group to keep moving toward their objective.

📍 Key Locations


📑 Session Highlights


🎭 Key Scenes

1. “Three Lights in the Dark” — Rigg & High Jinks

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Far ahead in the black of the Underdark, three distant lights drifted like torches. Rigg and High Jinks slipped forward under cover of darkness and discovered the truth: not wanderers, not campfires, but three fire elementals moving through the caverns. For once, the party chose good sense over violence and went around.

2. “Get Out” — Dino & the Black Dragon

The floor turned wet, the air turned foul, and the next problem announced itself without subtlety: a black dragon in the swamp. The encounter lasted only moments, but that was enough. A warning, an apology, and a careful retreat kept the party alive. Sometimes heroism is knowing when to stop walking forward like an idiot.

3. “The Broken Gates of Sondar” — Laydrick & Rook

When Sondar finally emerged from the darkness, it did not look like a kingdom waiting to be reclaimed. Its great metal doors had been knocked from their hinges and left on the ground, and beyond them lay silence, bones, and the distant outline of a keep. Rook called it safe enough. The ruin itself disagreed.

4. “Lantern Light” — Dino & High Jinks

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Inside the cold forge, the dead did not linger freely; they only existed inside the glow of a single lantern. High Jinks traced the loop in the scene while Dino pushed closer, prying at the edges of the mystery with magecraft and curiosity. The moment the forge’s rhythm was broken, the dwarven echoes stopped being echoes and became a threat.

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🧵 Ongoing Threads & Plot Hooks


💰 Loot & Discoveries

Item Finder Description / Status
Sondar Party A fallen dwarven kingdom cut into stone, littered with the remains of dwarves and Illithids.
Status: Entered and under exploration.
Ghost-Lantern Party discovery A lantern whose light reveals dwarven echoes repeating the final motions of forge-work and panic.
Status: Still in the forge at session end.
Magical Anvil Party discovery A silent anvil radiating magic, central to the forge scene and whatever memory or haunting is anchored there.
Status: Unclaimed; still under investigation.
Forge Hammer Party discovery The striking tool in the repeating forge scene; disturbing it caused the ghostly dwarves to become hostile shadow-forms.
Status: Not secured; interaction triggered combat.
Spellbook Progress Valen Misty Step and later Shield were transcribed during travel downtime, expanding Valen’s prepared options for what is very obviously becoming a terrible place to stand still.
Status: Completed.


🧨 Cliffhanger


Revision #8
Created 2026-03-08 07:03:46 UTC by Slitzer
Updated 2026-03-15 10:43:30 UTC by Slitzer