Session date: September 9, 2026
King Harral and the Crown
The party returned to King Harral’s crumbling hall, dragon’s head in tow, to find him and his last four graveknights still holding the throne room. Harral confirmed what you’d already guessed: with Veshumirix dead, the undead factions that served the dragon had scattered, and Saggorak was his again, for whatever that was worth.
He walked back the history he’d given you before — it wasn’t Veshumirix who first destroyed him. His kingdom fell to invaders “through guile and not through honor” long before the dragon ever arrived, and Harral rose from death to reclaim it and held the ruins for centuries before Veshumirix came and took the crown from him a second time.
On Kovlar: Harral confirmed there was never open war, just an old understanding — his land, their land — and that Veshumirix was the one who started pushing into it. He corroborated everything the party had already pieced together about the Scarlet Triad’s sabotage campaign against the city.
Harral had nothing left to offer and said so plainly — but asked for the crown back anyway. His people wouldn’t trouble Kovlar, and with the dragon gone, he felt Saggorak needed to heal rather than stay frozen as it was. Cain handed the crown over with a line to the effect of “I hope your soul rests, now that it should.” Harral put it on, sighed in relief, and crumbled to dust along with his knights. The crown stayed behind on the throne.
Reward: a +2 thundering striking maul, and a wand of smoldering fireballs that the party immediately flagged as a keeper rather than something to sell. The party also earned experience for laying King Harral to rest.
Good table color from the session: Cain picturing the hourglass on his chestplate glowing as souls returned to the cycle, and an extended riff about some future adventuring party stumbling on the empty city, picking up “a cool crown,” and instantly repopulating it with four hundred hostile undead.
Return to Kovlar
Walking in through the front gate carrying the dragon’s head got the party a dwarven honor escort straight to the Court of Regents, led by a guard named Guildy Stonehat.
The big news: Mountainheart Chiselrock, the corrupt Stonemasons’ guildmaster the party helped expose, has been investigated, found guilty, and imprisoned. Commander Grokar Hammersong now oversees the city guard in addition to the Guild of Arms — a temporary arrangement while the court sorts out something more permanent — and the guard ranks have been filled out with honest men-at-arms in place of Chiselrock’s old crew.
The Court welcomed the party as heroes for the dragon’s head and thanked them for exposing the Triad’s operation in the city. Rewards: citizenship in Kovlar for the whole party, and a full decade of free training from any of the city’s guilds — genuinely a decade, not a shortcut. Nobody’s picked a guild yet.
Kovlar also agreed to a standing monthly contact on the 15th, and the question of the portal’s single key — awkward for trade between the two cities — got raised and set aside for now, since it isn’t the party’s call to make alone. The party made their case that Citadel Altaerein is effectively siege-proof, with six friendly cities on the other side of its gates.
The party also hired several dwarven stonemasons on contract to help speed up the citadel’s renovations, and brought them back to the citadel with free room and board for the duration.
Citadel Altaerein — Renovations
All of the citadel’s basic repairs are finished — clearing the courtyard, rebuilding the battlements and stairs, patching the walls. Everything from here is upgrades, and the party built out several:
- Infirmary, run by Peoux — doubles as his personal pharmacy and the site of his own graft work
- Library, run by Martin, in the room the party’s been calling the War Room
- Forge / blacksmithing workshop, run by Tinker
- A second workshop as a tattoo parlor, also Tinker’s — already got its first customer (Cain)
- Upgraded defenses, handled entirely by the hired dwarves, on the general feeling that a siege is coming
They passed on building a training facility.
Some room notes for the map, once it’s updated: the infirmary sits in the lower-level room Peoux was using, with a secret door added to the north for quick access and a second requested for the south side. The tattoo parlor took over two adjoining rooms with part of the dividing wall knocked through, split between a sterile side and a smoky lounge. The library reuses the old War Room, with a few side chambers cleared out for study space — the wall paintings in one are being kept. The forge went in at ground level near the courtyard rather than upstairs. The courtyard itself is becoming a garden with a gazebo, and the old courtroom is being turned into a shrine to Pharasma.
Shopping
Big-ticket purchase of the session: Martin’s Dread Blindfold, a striking magical eyepiece the whole party chipped in to fund. It gives him darkvision (permanently in black-and-white, as the price for seeing through it), a boost to his already-fearsome Intimidation, and an aura that can frighten enemies who look at him — on top of a nasty effect that triggers when he lands a hit. The table immediately compared him to Daredevil.
Other notable purchases: Cain upgraded his armor’s save-boosting rune and picked up a new bow suited for flying targets after the fight with Veshumirix, plus some new casual travel clothes. Tinker and Peoux split a damage-boosting rune upgrade and a fire rune between them. Peoux also picked up a stack of potions for the road (water breathing, quickness, flight, and more).
Downtime: Earning Income
With the shopping done, everyone spent a stretch of downtime working:
- Cain joined hunting parties out in the Mwangi jungle at Acravolt, doing whatever a successful dinosaur hunt requires
- Martin worked as an operator on loan to a local information network in Cantorgo, trading on both his reputation and his connections — fully kitted out with the new blindfold
- Tinker did blacksmith work in Kovlar under the guild’s forgemaster
- Peoux spent his downtime implanting a graft on himself (see below)
Everyone came away from the stretch with solid earnings, and the party is now considered heroes — not just acquainted, but genuinely celebrated — in all three cities they’ve worked in this arc: Acravolt, Cantorgo, and now Kovlar.
The graft
Peoux had himself implanted with a set of camouflaging skin grafts, capping off the work on the new infirmary. The short version: it lets him blend into his surroundings and vanish into hiding even out in the open, without needing real cover. His first attempt at using it went hilariously wrong on purpose — wrong colors, a visible learning curve, and eventually the word “yes” showing up across his chest in response to something Cain said. Full chameleon.
Duskgate
Back at the mysterious door the party’s been carrying a key for, Peoux took a careful look at the lock and the gate itself and came away impressed — the craftsmanship on this one is noticeably finer than the others they’ve used. Martin then identified it: the gate is dedicated to Findeladlara, the elven goddess of architecture and art. This one’s being called the Duskgate.
That makes three gates used so far — one that led to the Mwangi Expanse, one that led toward Cantorgo, and one to Saggorak itself — with the Duskgate now identified but unopened. Guesses at the table for what’s on the other side ranged from Shadowlands to desert, and the party spent a while joking about their habit of opening every new door and immediately firebombing whatever’s behind it.
They were told to expect the usual strangeness that comes with these portals, that the crossing point is extremely old, and that there’s no peeking through and pulling back — once you start the crossing, you go all the way through.
After weighing whether to keep earning money or push forward now, the party decided: they go. First order of business next session is stepping through the Duskgate. Last bit of prep, obsidian goggles for backup darkvision, got priced out but the party couldn’t quite afford them this time.
Next Session
September 23. Kicks off with the party stepping through the Duskgate.