The party left Dravens’ Port after preparing for a couple of days. They traveled north to Halfsett, with Ailekk checking on Gienme and Elleker villages along the way. Gienme was fine, Elleker had been attacked and were hostile, they fired arrows at Ailekk. In Halfsett, the humans and halflings there were happy to see the party, offering them a 50% discount on services. The party left the next day and on the road to Dwarfsett they encountered 20-30 goblins, who they slaughtered. Towards the end of the day they made it to Dwarfsett, where they found 100+ goblin corpses outside of the town. While they were greeted at the village, the dwarfs didn’t make a big deal about the party being there like the halflings did in Halfsett. The party spent the night and then left towards Ogremire. They reached Ogremire after 3 days, where they were greeting with a jubilous celebration. All services were free, although Ogremire looked less populous and less defended than the other villages. After some looking around, it seemed as though Father Bigmug and his party never made it to Ogremire, or went around it and continued directly to Dree. Checking the visitor logs, the only people who had been through the city from the south in the last couple of days were two halflings. After traveling almost a day from Ogremire towards Dree, the party noticed snow on the trail, and the mountain peaks were covered in snow and seemed to almost move. After seeing them more they realized the mountain peaks were covered in zombies and skeletons covered in snow. Down the trail four zombie-ish ogres approached them. The four ogres roared quite articulately, and also in unison, “Halt. Produce your papers.” and then strode up to the party. They seemed to be much more controlled and articulate than regular ogres. Urd said something like “You are all being controlled by someone aren’t you?” and they responded in unison “Absolutely not.” Less than an hour before crossing the Dree border, an armored and masked figures with two undead wielding two handed swords approached the party introducing itself as “Andy” who job it was to escort the party to the Seat of Shrave to meet with the royals. Andy wanted them to walk straight through, but the party insisted they needed rest. At one point, Andy offered to make Ron’s horse (Roger) more “efficient” and Ron agreed and cast a spell killing the horse and raising it from the dead. Description of the journey: “The mountains are a rough journey, even on the roads. The elevations are steep, and go both up and down much of the way. The roads are not well kept and in low points are muddy where the party must go around or get caught in the mud, or else just trudge through it. On the high points of the mountains, nearby cover has been hacked clean for firewood and there is no shade during the middle of the day when the sun beats down on the snow and the sun becomes relentlessly hot despite the cold air. As they travel to the Seat of Shrave, they see an increasing number of slave caravans. The caravans are coming from castle Grykk with goblins, kobolds, some light-skinned humans, and various members of the under realms including children Drow, Duergar, Deep Gnomes, Tieflings, and even other creatures they don’t recognize and have never heard of. In the high mountain passes, creatures accustomed to being active only 5-6 month out of the year are just coming out of their burrows and are both skinny and aggressive from hunger. Amidst this wondrous cycle of nature, are skeletons and zombies walking around, covered by snow, patrolling the area. They seem controlled, mostly. But occasionally you have to beat one off with a stick, mace, sword, or whatever else is at your disposal. Coming out of the mountains, they can see the Seat of Shrave and Grand Dree from many miles off, even at night. Smoke bellows out of both. At night or in the evening, they can see a hundred thousand lights coming from buildings that must be 10+ stories tall. All about the towns are shadowed movement, slow, but there. From them there is the sound of just the howling winds of the mountains, and occasionally a scream echoed from far off, as if caught by the wind.” During the journey Ron figured out Andy was neither an undead nor a construct, but something in between he calls “Necromatons”. They also learned Andy used to be a powerful wizard named Andrasia. Andy talked to them a lot about achieving perfection and constantly offered to make them more efficient, as it did the horse. It’s revenant guards were named Rosanna and Riptide. The party tried to read Andy’s intentions, but it was quite difficult. Only towards the end of their journey when Ailekk was trying to get Andy to “spar”, did Rurrick pick up that Andy’s answers, and questions, are quite methodical and deliberate. The creature may not have discernable emotions but it definitely has an agenda. The Seat of Shrave and Grand Dree were a massive sight. No one in the party, except Ron, had ever seen metropolitan area so massive. With an estimated 80-100k living people (Andy’s estimate), although there might be some confusion about Andy’s definition of “living”. Entering the Seat of Shrave from the west they see some undead on the streetside, and lots of slaves who seem to outnumber their masters about 10 to 1. Many houses have been burned and are being rebuilt, the houses are mostly made of wood. Along the way to the Seat of Shrave fortress (which is 10,000+ feet across), Ron noticed a gnome slave getting lashed severely by a Dree wizard who is taunting the gnome about being a magical creature who is also, however, terrible at magic while the gnome attempts to work. Ron recognizes the gnome as a dark-skinned gnome of Indra and attempted to free the slave through deception. The plan didn’t work, and the wizard pulled a wand of polymorph on him. Urd rushed to his aid, reminding him to back off. When Ron did, the wizard turned the gnome into a mouse and then stepped on him, slowly crushing him with his boot. Ron and Urd walked away. Andy, who had been coming over, intervened, dispelling the polymorph spell that the wizard had cast and slapped the wizard. Andy never spoke to him verbally but it was obvious they were having some manner of conversation. The gnome went back to work and the part continued. Moving to the squares before the fortress, they entered a tourist trap for green dragons. Slave elves were on display as “delicious edibles”, some soaking in brines, and various other monstrous establishments. There were other luxurious service establishments like “Get Your Scales Polished Here” and the like. In the area, the party saw 5 young green dragons and 10 wyrmling green dragons. Urd saw some half-orcs and orcs enslaved cleaning and hauling refuse. Urd and Cassius both managed to remain stoic to the events (both Deception 19 scores) going on around them. Rurrick honestly didn’t care, Ron was obviously slightly disturbed (the wizard before may have outed him as a wizard of Dree), and Ailekk was obviously disturbed by crouching down and actively “hissing” (is that right?) at those around him. The party finally arrived the halls of the fortress and went through the side entrance with multiple doors and checkpoints until finally they reached the hallway which was 100 feet wide, 100 feet across, and thousands of feet long (to the point of losing sight). Ron cleaned everyone up with magic, and the part decided to meet with diplomats, then royalty to see what they could do.
