Session 7: Seals and Sacraments#

Summary#

The party spends the day gathering intelligence from the three major factions with an interest in the Scepter of Saint Vitruvio before plunging deeper into the city than they’ve gone before. Blackjack Mel reveals that the Queen needs six lost magical seals to claim Drakkenheim’s throne. Deep in the ruins, they defeat a Wailing Undead using the scepter’s Flame Strike, bluff their way into a Hooded Lanterns safe house, and lose Crumb to a stone dragon. The day ends at Champion’s Gate with a transformative encounter: Lucretia Mathias, leader of the Followers of the Falling Fire, delivers her philosophy of delirium as salvation — and sends the party after a missing disciple.

What Happened#

Scene 1: Morning in Emberwood — Shopping and Plans#

The party debates the scepter over breakfast. Heda leans toward the Falling Fire; Cory urges that the scepter’s existence should stay quiet around the Queen’s Men. They’ll visit both factions first. At Caravan Court, Margareta makes a spirited case to Aldor the Immense for the slippers of spider climbing — royal favors and Uncle Olaf’s stone are offered, but he’s only interested in gold. Theobroma buys scrolls of Shield and Scorching Ray. Margareta a healing potion from Zoya.

At Hendrick’s Farm, Nathaniel Flint is pleased to see the scepter in hand. His plan for it: safeguard it, keep it from wrong hands. When Heda presses him on how delirium connects one to the sacred flame, Nathaniel defers to Lucretia Mathias — bring the scepter to her at Saint Selena’s Monastery for a boon and answers.

Scene 2: Buckledown Row — The Seals of Drakkenheim#

Cory and Margareta meet Blackjack Mel at the Padlock Tavern while Heda and Theobroma wait outside with the scepter. Mel explains what the Queen is really after:

The Six Seals of Drakkenheim — six artifacts required for the coronation ceremony, held by the city’s most powerful officials before the meteor fell:

Without all six, no coronation is possible. Note: The Scepter of Saint Vitruvio is not one of them. To prove loyalty to the Queen: bring a permanent magical item. Mel introduces them to his appraiser, Donovan Marlowe, who isn’t familiar with the descrpition of the rod they had seen at Saint Tarna’s statue.

Scene 3: The Hooded Lanterns Safe House#

Searching for Hooded Lanterns supply caches near the crater walls, the party runs into a Wailing Undead. Heda uses the scepter in combat for the first time — Flame Strike brings the creature to near-dissolution, and Cory finishes it. In the quiet afterward, the party debates keeping the scepter vs. handing it to the Falling Fire.

Cory picks a lock on an unmarked building and talks her way into a safe house with six resting Hooded Lanterns scouts by mimicking a human soldier and name-dropping Lieutenant Petra. The party takes a short rest and learns that structurally intact buildings tend to be on the city’s outskirts, not near the crater. When Cory pushes for other safe house locations, the soldiers grow quietly suspicious — authorized personnel are told what they need to know.

Near the Drann River, the party spots stone gargoyles on the wall crenellations and two stone dragons at the river-wall ends. Theobroma sends Crumb to investigate. The dragon animates within 120 feet, breathes a line of purple lightning, and Crumb is instantly destroyed. The dragon returns to its perch as if nothing happened. The river crossing will require a gate, not the wall.

Scene 4: Champion’s Gate — Lucretia Mathias#

After three hours circling the crater, the party reaches Champion’s Gate, which is shrouded in deep haze. Falling Fire pilgrims camping around it seem unbothered in the mist. Stepping through, all four take necrotic damage and gain a contamination level. Heda develops a mutation due to his contamination: his eyes go milky white and he develops blindsight to a range of ten feet.

Lucretia Mathias is standing waiting for them at the gate as they arrive — older, austere, wisened. She tells her story: she saw the meteor in a vision a decade before it came, told everyone, was not believed. Since then she has been trying to understand why it came. Her conclusion is that delirium is not an enemy but a force with purpose — those who take the sacrament pass through something terrible and emerge changed, immune, elevated. She was the first.

Heda shows her the scepter. She examines it carefully, then returns it: “I can see the flame in you. I trust you. Do not lose it.” He holds it as caretaker, not owner. She then raises a problem — disciple Balthazar Adamos has gone missing; last seen at the Black Ivory Inn (NE Drakkenheim, across the river). In exchange for searching for him, she cures the party’s contamination. Heda asks to keep his mutation. She almost smiles.

Scene 5: Ooze on the Way Home#

Searching for delerium on the return trip yields nothing — but near The Green Alchemist, an ooze drops from a bridge overpass onto Cory. It’s highly resistant to physical and fire damage; Margareta goes down before Heda revives her with Lay on Hands. The scepter’s Guiding Bolt finishes it.

Back in Emberwood: Theobroma crafts a Mage Armor scroll. Cory sends a letter to Lieutenant Petra Lang asking what she knows about the circumstances of Cory’s brother’s death under Commander Drexel. Cory also attempts to forge a birth certificate from the Giantfrost Ordning for Margareta — and rolls a natural 1. Margareta keeps it anyway. Cory casts Alarm ritually around the scepter before bed.

Key Discoveries#

• Six Seals of Drakkenheim: Six artifacts jointly needed for any coronation — the Queen is hunting them. The Scepter is not one of them
• Scepter: Lucretia Mathias examined it and returned it to Heda as caretaker
• Stone dragons: Ancient wall guardians; animate within ~120 ft and breathe lightning
• Heda’s mutation: Blindsight 10 ft, retained through long rest — consistent with Lucretia’s claims about delirium’s transformative potential
• New quest: Find Balthazar Adamos at the Black Ivory Inn (NE Drakkenheim, across the Drann River)

Loot & Rewards#

• Scroll of Shield, Scroll of Scorching Ray (Theobroma, purchased from Aldor)
• Healing potion (Margareta, purchased from Zoya)
• Uncommon undead parts — animus, ectoplasm, dust, hair
• Uncommon ooze parts — contaminated ichor, acidic bile, ooze organs, goopy fluid
• Heda: Blindsight 10 ft — contamination mutation, persists
• 1,050 XP each

Memorable Moments#

“I love books.” — Theobroma, a characteristic contribution to the post-combat debate about the scepter

“Sir, you have chosen violence.” — Margareta, to the ooze

“I’m not usually a fan of lying. But it’s a skill I have.” — Cory, after bluffing six Hooded Lanterns scouts into letting the party use their safe house

“So as a species, we are ascending. Is that what’s happening here?” — Heda, to Lucretia Mathias, on her account of delirium as salvation