Recap of the Ashen Company's journey so far (well so far-ish - last updated Feb 2022)
If you have gained her trust Lotty will gladly tell you the story of how the Ashen Company came to be and some of their adventures....
Act I
In the middle of an autumnal night at the Last Stand Inn in Sierrona five strangers are woken by the threat of assassins looming over them, after some considerable commotion and five dead assassins they group and discover they are:
- Elric - drow ranger/rogue
- Geshut - kobolt sorcerer
- Kimrel - gnome druid
- Lotty - gnome artificer
- Rhône - half elf barbarian
They meet Remmi, a halfling who explains he represents one of the powerful cartels in the Ulvari coast and the assassins were just a test of mettle to know the group were capable; and so begins the conscript of the group in to the Massani cartel. Kimrel disappears that very night, never to be seen again - a wise decision in hindsight.
Remmi sends a messenger to the group a week or so later to call them for another job, the message delivered by:
- Dolosius - tiefling warlock
After doing some jobs for Remmi involving travel up and down the coast fighting a manticore, a basilisk and a spectator Remmi introduced the group to the head of the cartel, Morrow Massani, a fiend not dissimilar in appearance to an overgrown and menacing toad. Massani explains he has further work for the group that even Remmi, his second in command, does not know about. The group meet an orc blacksmith named Endrea who tasks them with silencing Layla a halfling bard who runs her mouth against the cartel in her comedy set and a gnome named Arnon McFini (Lotty's cousin) who is skimming the books.
There ensues some McFini family drama as the group chase Arnon around town for a few days only for the end result to be that Arnon robs the McFini family shop (in Sierrona, owned by Lotty's dad) and absconds to Palirano, leaving his mother (Lotty's aunt) distraught and hitting the bottle.
The group manage to convince Layla to lay low whilst the group attends to further business for Morrow when they will return and help to travel north to Rhone's homeland so she can escape the cartel and Rhone can attend to his family business. As the group were travelling through Sierrona in the pursuit of Arnon they were confronted by Zanadonians, Rhone's kin demanding he return home, after defeating this shield wall in battle Rhone explains he is the bastard child of the previous ruler so holds a claim to the rule. Rhone's brother, Vjord, is the current Jarl and wants to see all threats to his power eliminated.
The last task the group need to attend to is "goods" that are going missing somewhere in the supply line along the coast to Sierrona. They track the break in supply to Delaroso where they find out the goods Morrow is trading in are slaves. The "missing goods" turns out to be the responsibility of Remmi working from within the organisation to free the slaves having risen through the organisation as a former slave himself.
As this revelation unfolds the group suddenly find themselves surrounded by Morrow's sicarrios as well as three of his generals: Endrea, Pono and Vi ready for a fight. Thankfully but unknown to the group they have been followed the last few days by:
- Singe Blackmountain - Dwarf (gensai) monk
That night, as Singe & Rhone took watch, Rhone felt like he had to return home. Seeing the slavery and the recent fight with his kin just remind him of how his people suffer and as noble as the group's current fight is; he can not stay away any longer and slips out in the night.
Remmi and the group devise a plan to put an end to the Massani cartel's slave trading. Whilst Remmi hunted down the changeling Vi the group took care of Morrow's other generals, over time the group mange to eliminate Trask (head of procurement in Cipado), Balla (oversaw exhaltium and tobacco - the group found her dead, someone beat them to it) and Sorsosa (head of market operations).
Whilst in Cipado to take out Trask the group learn Geshut was once a member of the "Brokers of Shadows" and they are able to get some help from Marcus, the 'Blackhand' for the Brokers, with their endeavours. They establish a rapport with Fallah, a half-elf who is Marcus' right hand and quite handy with a bow herself. After dispatching Trask they are able to meet Naliah Mishibi, the ruler of East Cipado. She explains that her and her brother rule a side of the city each and they are none too fond of each other. She explains they ousted the Tulli family from their previous rule of the city, having found a prisoner they believed to be a Tulli in Trask's place the group let her know the prisoner is still there (and they later see her guards taking care of the prisoner). Naliah tasks the group with steeling a key from her brother, Noric, in return she will let them take an item from the vault the key opens. In an attempt in reconnaissance on Noric's place the group push too far and end up in a fight they can not win against Noric before yielding and leaving tail between their legs.
Whilst in Benya to take care of Balla and Sorsosa the group stay at the Allen family farm who are friends of Remmi. As the night progresses they find out, the hard way, the Allen's are sadly long dead and in their place is the shape shifting Vi and her minions. Whilst the group puts up a good fight it doesn't stop Vi from grabbing Geshut and magically teleporting away with him.
When the group return to Sierrona, depleted in numbers, they seek out Remmi and find him sheltering with Layla (Lotty interrupts the story with lots of nods and winks about what their relationship may be), badly hurt from a fight with Vi. Also sheltering at Layla's house are Lotty's family and Fallah (Broker of Shaddows). There is only one general left standing between the group and Morrow - Fane. Fane is Morrow's personal body guard and a fierce fighter. Fallah explains she is there because they received a letter from Morrow saying they have Geshut and Rhone (who was seemingly also kidnapped after he left the group) but they would exchange them both for Remmi. With the sole reason of keeping the Brokers out of cartel business Fallah agrees to help and fight alongside the group as they lay out their plan. They agree to the deal, Lotty will disguise herself as Remmi and they will lure Fane to a fight on their terms.
The plan goes ahead but not without a hitch, sadly Singe gave his life in the fight against Fane that night and will forever lie in the woods outside of Sierrona and in the hearts of all who knew him. Watching the fight was:
- Cade - godforged (warforged) druid/cleric
The group set out through the sewer system under Morrow's palace (under the Last Stand Inn), guided by Fallah they managed to find Geshut and Rhone locked up and free them to join the fight, Fallah stood guard and sent word to Remmi to start his side of the assault over ground in the Last Stand Inn. The group confront Morrow and after defeating him he returned to his own fiendish plane, knowing he would eventually return the group follow and fight him once again on his home turf. They do succeed however and using a spell scroll Remmi provided Cade brings the group back to Morrow's palace. Before there is any time to rest, celebrate or loot Morrow's vault Vi appears, holds the group in place and steals something from the vault before teleporting from their grasp once more.
Geshut leaves the group to return to the Brokers with Fallah and Rhone decides to stay around in Sierrona after all and now act's as Remmi's head of security.
Act II
When the group next meet Remmi they see he is now a wheelchair user, having never recovered from the injuries Vi left him with. Remmi gives the group some magical items from the vault and shows them a strange creature who seems to be locked, sleeping, in a magical cage. After freeing the creature they discover:
- Experiment Two - fighter
Before Experiment moves on and the group decide to charter ship they have a few more adventures. They fight a fire demon of some kind that attacks them in the street, delivering a message to Dolosius that his father wants him to return. Whilst they managed to defeat their attacker, picking up the sword it dropped created such an explosion Elric was killed; thankfully Cade had since obtained a soul infusion diamond and could bring him back but nothing could be done to rectify the loss of life and property in the street around them. The group discover Dolosius made a pact with a powerful being in the hope of returning his home city of Portas to it's rightful rule. He explains when his real father died control of Portas went to him; his sister, Kharis, and his brother, Kolemos, but his sister used mind control magic on Kolemos to make him do her bidding and she has been ruling the city in this way ever since, banishing Dolosius when he discovered her cruel mind control tricks.
One of the shop owners in Sierrona, Raz'iel has become quite friendly with the group and they agree to accompany her to the Plane of Elemental chaos to retrieve an elemental node in exchange for a handsome amount of gold coin. The group fight air elementals but manage to avoid the dragons and fire elementals that also reside in the plane.
When the group were hunting for one of their monsters in their first task for Remmi they took a trip down to the sewers and wanted to return to explore the areas they couldn't reach before. They end up spending a couple of days exploring the sewers and caverns beneath Sierrona, battling their way past slimy blob monsters, a giant gelatinous cube and a venom troll they discover sprawling cavern filled with poisonous pools and strange, silent guardians. They eventually meet a giant being who describes themselves as the Ancient One a powerful being that holds up the city of Sierrona and ancient they are. They remember long before the fall of the Cataclysm and describes the fallen god Daes as "interesting" the Ancient One tells Elric the sword he has been carrying (taken from Fane's fallen body) was crafted by Daes and is called Elias the god breaker and to find out more it would need to be returned to where it was forged.
Experiment reaches out to the Ancient One to ask if they could help him find his family, the Ancient One offers to take Experiment away on a journey to discover where he is from and he leaves the group.
Before they head out to sea the group takes care of some business around town, researching dragons in a book shop Elric comes across the Demononicon, a book he reads and finds himself gaining new powers and losing others gaining the influence of the fallen god Azreal - the rest of the group know Elric has a book (albeit they believe it is stored safely in the bag of holding not tattooed on Elric's skin as it is) and the influence of this had caused his appearance to change but they don't quite know the extent of the book's power.
After hiring Captain "one eyed" Craz and his ship, the Booty Taker, the group first stop in Alya hoping to purchase more soul infused diamonds from the Divine Pansophical that are based there. Dol, Cade & Lotty go in to meet with the Devine who questions the group on their intentions and reads their minds only to determine they might not be as worthy as they think they are and maybe not all of the group have good intentions, she does give them one soul infused diamond as a show of good faith in the lessons they have learnt about the questions they may need to ask themselves.
A lesson they do not take enough to heart as they travel on their journey to Portas.
As the ship grows close to Portas they is attached by harpies, Capt Craz sends Dolosius to find a crewmember that's probably sleeping but is handy with a sword:
- Sailing Ship - tabaxi fighter
When the group arrive in Portas they set about finding Dol's allies and friends and agree to confront Khalis at the festival the city is having the next day to celebrate their independence so that Dol can peacefully convince the city to reject the rule of his siblings so he may return to power. Some of the group can't shake the nagging feeling that Portas seems to be a thriving city, the people seem happy, the economy is booming and everything they've seen of Khalis and Kolemos show they are just and kind rulers taking on the advice of a larger council in their rule. Even with the words of the Devine fresh in their minds the group sticks by their friend until the very end. As Dolosius confronts Khalis it is clear he is not going to win over the crowd so he sends work to his alley, Flynn, to create a distraction and tells the group to run. Flynn and his men attack the civilians of Portas and for the first time the group is divided in the chaos.
Sailing Ship decides he has made a promise to Dol and right or wrong he is an honourable tabaxi and will see that promise through.
Elric, ever on the side of what will be best for the group makes the tactical decision to continue to attack Dol's siblings.
Cade taps in to the power of his ring of insight and realises Dol has been lying all along and it is he that was using mind control magic on his brother. Cade can not stand the sight of Flynn's men attacking bystanders and joins the people of Portas, healing the wounded and summoning an elephant to take out Flynn.
Lotty is unsure and after fighting her initial urge to run she also feels the people of Portas are the innocents and joins the fight against Flynn's men.
In the end it is Elric who takes the killing shot against Dol seeing it is in the best interest of the group to end the fight. Whilst soft-hearted Lotty does stabilise Dol to beg for mercy he still meets his end at his brother's sword the next day and will forever rest in his home city.
As punishment for their part in Dol's attempt Sailing Ship and Elric are stripped of their possessions before being sent on their way with the promise that they can earn their items back by doing good in the world.
As the group sails on to Bordai they find a new passenger joined at Portas:
- Kel'zad - human wizards
They face a few more attacks on the ship as they sail, restock at Bordai with some basic supplies and head on to Ezra's island. As they travel the group spots a shipwreck they manage to find one survivor and pull her on board:
- Orchid - half elf fighter
The group meet up with Ezra and after testing their might and sending them on an errand of trust they become allies (the errand sending them back to Sierrona where Orchid decides to return to her family). Ezra tells of the threat from Magistar Alistar Azher. Alistar was one of 12 magistars from the families of the Aeoneon dominion. The families were cruel and brutal and ruled completely over their domain. Alistar was a necromancer and he used slaves as spell books; scarring the spells on to their bodies and using them as spell foci. Ezra was one of those slaves and was born as a result of his mother's rape by Alistar. During the cataclysm Ezra fatally wounded Alistar who then turned to lichdom and went in to hiding to survive. The Magisterium had allies and enemies alike and we have encountered two other families on our travels the 'Tulli' family (mostly dead, now possibly running a cult of necromancy on an island off the south coast) and the 'Missibi' family (Niallah and Norrik are twin siblings who rule Cipado - we mentioned them yesterday as Norrik[Norris!!] kicked our butts and Elric is working for Niallah). Vi (our shapeshifting enemy) has stolen a shard of divinity and we think she knows where another one is. We believe Vi is working for Alistar and plans to use these shards to bring back the return of a floating city using powerful rift magic - the city brings with it Alistar and the end of the world... more or less.
On a teleported trip back to Sieronna Orchid decides to stay with her family for a while and maybe pick up the adventuring life another day.
After chasing down Nassandrial, a green dragon that was threatening ships in the area (and happened to have a contract on it, a lair full of treasure and scales Cade could make armour from) the group fought the dragon only for it to teleport out. Wanting to make sure they left their mark Sailing Ship carved the group's name in to a stone on it's lair and the name of "The Ashen Company" came in to being; a name to symbolise charred past of the group but reminding them that they are a team and together they can do better.
Being continually stalked by the now humanoid shaped dragon - who likes to appear as a green eyed elf - who may or may not be aligned with their enemies the Ashen Comapny head back to Sieronna to take stock of what has been happening whilst they were at sea.
On the journey the group are attacked by a particularly vicious group of gnolls, organised by a furious leader who seemed intent on making her next meal a feline delicacy; whilst Cade was able to heal the physical wounds of Sailing Ship, the fight took a part of him that needed more than just healing magics.
Stopping in Pacapa the Ashen Company pick up a contract to kill a Yugo'oth, a Cannaloth that has been seen in a network of tunnels to the North, they manage to kill the beast and collect the bounty but it was the last straw for Sailing Ship who decides he's had enough adventuring and leaves in the night.
As the three remaining friends start to move on they discover stories of Elric's misdeeds since leaving the group. They get the impression the book as taken him over and hear reports that the Devine has been killed by drow poison. Discovering another friend has deceived them the trio make a pact to never lie to one another and always be honest with each other no matter what.
Stopping in Alya the Ashen Company meet with the Devine Pansophical and discover more of Elric's misdeeds and that his crossbow, Shadow Strike, had been found at the scene. In warning others the group felt might be targets of Elric they discover Kharis (Dol's sister and ruler of Portas) was also dead - probably at Elric's hands. The group discover a way to save Elric, albeit dangerous and knowing that many people are already hunting him down and may get to him first.
Having been lent some amulets to prevent the scrying eyes of Nassandrial the group head on to Palirano and meet up with their old friend Geshut who helps them sneak in to the city and keeps the safely sheltered. After some breaking and entering and a McFini heart to heart Arnon sees the error of his ways and agrees to return to Sierrona to help. Just as the group are about to leave Vi reveals herself - she has been masquerading as Geshut the whole time. She offers the group a trade to betray Ezra and steal an 'Oracle stone' from him but they refuse and she walks away - not before disintegrating Arnon.
Back in Sieronna the McFini family come to terms with their loss and focus on deciphering Arnon's notes and blueprints. The Ashen Company know that a war is coming and they know they can not fight it alone so they seek out friends, allies and any adventurers that may be willing to join them....