The Lamia (dead)

Awnshegh

Once an itinerant dancer named Keta Pechaya who traveled the Shining Coast of Khinasi, the Lamia revelled in a life of petty theft and drama. An encounter with a minor awnshegh which slew most of her troop resulted in her slaying and usurping the beast, twisting into form of the Lamia shortly afterwards. 

Later captured by the soldiers of Besaïam, the King ordered her brought before him so that he might win prestige by slaying one of the divinely maimed. The Lamia proved more than his match and has ruled Besaïam since.

Session 112 - Killed by Horgin

Session 112

Heroes (lvl 14): Deet, Horgin, Rhys, Nura

676 MR - Spring

The Heroes cast aside their disguises and announce themselves openly, revealing their true names and purpose. Word spreads quickly through Cravengate’s perfumed streets, and before long, the Lamia’s envoys arrive — elegant, masked courtiers who extend an invitation to the grand masquerade ball in her palace. They bring with them silks, jewels, and ornate costumes, ensuring the guests of honor look suitably magnificent for the night ahead.

The ball unfolds in a haze of music and incense. Beneath golden chandeliers, nobles sway and laugh, their eyes glassy under the Lamia’s spell. The air itself hums with enchantment, every note of the orchestra and every breath of perfume tightening her hold on the revelers. When the Lamia finally appears, radiant and terrible, she commands the room without a word. Her gaze finds the Heroes, and with a smile, she invites them to her private sanctuary to “discuss alliance.”

Within her opulent sanctum, illusion gives way to truth. The Lamia’s beauty twists into monstrosity — lion’s body, claws gleaming like polished bronze, eyes burning with hunger. Her offer is no alliance, but enslavement. When the Heroes resist, her children descend from the shadows, snarling and shrieking.

The battle is vicious and desperate. The Lamia bends light and mind alike, weaving illusions around the party while her children tear through the marble halls. Yet one by one, her glamours falter, and her perfume turns to ash. When silence finally falls, the throne room is littered with broken masks and shattered mirrors.

The Lamia lies slain. Freed from her enchantment, Cravengate stirs from its long dream — its people uncertain, its beauty hollow. In her treasury, the Heroes find riches beyond measure and, among them, the Perfumed Veil, the second relic needed to unseal the Palace of the Suncrown.

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Session 111

Heroes (lvl 14): Deet, Hassan, Horgin, Rhys, Nura

676 MR - Spring

The Heroes reach the oasis city of Cravengate, jewel of the desert and seat of the Lamia’s power. They know that she holds one of the four relics needed to break the genie seals — the Perfumed Veil — and decide to infiltrate the city under the guise of wealthy merchants.

Within the walls, they find a place steeped in decadence. Golden-masked guards patrol perfumed streets, ensuring that nobles remain drunk on vice and illusion. Slavery flourishes openly. The rich lounge in silk-draped pavilions while the poor and disfigured are herded into shadowed alleys, unseen and unwanted. Servants drift through the streets offering mulled wine and spreading incense, both laced with subtle alchemical compounds that leave minds pliant to the Lamia’s magic.

The Heroes make contact with the underground resistance, a desperate network of beggars and outcasts clinging to scraps of freedom. From them, they learn the truth: the Lamia wears the Perfumed Veil herself, never parting with it, a constant source of her power.

When night falls, the masquerade ends. The streets empty as lanterns dim, and those foolish or desperate enough to linger are set upon by the Lamia’s children—creatures of lion’s haunch and woman’s face that prowl the darkness, devouring stragglers. The city breathes like a living thing, its beauty a thin skin stretched over rot.

The Basilisk (dead)

Awnshegh 

The Basilisk is said to have been Kassim el-Badr, son of prince Malik el-Badr. A dark bitter son to a man widely noted for his wisdom and fairness, Kassim studied sorcery and shunned his fellows. The taint of Azrai fell upon Kassim. Some say simply it is due to his bitter spiteful nature. Others say he slew his own father in a bout of rage. 

What is known is that Kassim massacred his father's courtiers and all those who did not flee from the city about the family fortress of Golden Horn. As he traveled seeking others to vent his rage on, Kassim took on full awnsheghlien form and began poisoning the very land about him. 

Session 110 - Killed by Rhys

Session 110

Heroes (lvl 14): Deet, Ryel, Hassan, Horgin, Rhys, Nura

676 MR - Spring

The canyon shakes with thunder as two Brazen Gorgons emerge, iron beasts blazing with molten fire. Their breath scorches the air, their hooves shatter stone, but the Heroes stand firm. Steel and sorcery smash through iron hides until the constructs collapse into cooling heaps of obsidian.

The way forward leads into the shattered shrine of Basaïa. Once a radiant temple, it now lies corrupted — halls lined with petrified priests, mosaics warped into shadow, veins of crystal crawling across the floor. The very air hums with the Basilisk’s curse. The Heroes press on, pushing through collapsed passages and avoiding traps where divine light has twisted into necrotic flame.

Then the tremors rise. Dust rains from the ceiling as the Stone Tyrant emerges. The Basilisk towers from the sanctum, marble-scaled and many-eyed, its mane bristling with shards of stone. Around it lies its hoard of bones and statues, and at the center gleams the Obsidian Eye.

The battle shakes the temple. Gaze after gaze threatens to turn flesh to stone, columns collapse, and shattered statues lurch to life. Yet the Heroes endure. With a final roar, the Basilisk shatters into fragments of blackened stone.

The Obsidian Eye is theirs — the first relic to break the Seals of the Suncrown.

Session 109 - The Suncrown

Heroes (lvl 14): Deet, Ryel, Hassan, Horgin, Rhys, Nura

676 MR - Spring

The Heroes gather in Dorotheas, the sea-born capital of Hassan’s realm, where they meet with Lord Thalion to plan their next great expedition. The council turns to a single prize: the Suncrown, the sielshegh-encrusted diadem that embodies rulership over the people of Basaïa. Thalion reveals its resting place, hidden behind four elemental seals woven by ancient genies. To break them, four relics must be recovered — each held within the hoards of dreaded awnsheghlien: the Basilisk, the Lamia, the Sphinx, and the Magian.

The Heroes set their course for the lands of the Basilisk, a cursed canyon where none return. There they encounter the canyon nomads, who refuse to aid strangers without proof of worth. Through trials of survival, endurance, and faith in Avani, goddess of the sun, the Heroes win their trust and earn a map that guides them toward the monster’s lair.

As they press deeper into the valley, they find a landscape littered with statues — men, beasts, even entire warbands frozen in stone. One figure draws their attention: a paladin of Avani, petrified for more than a century while on her own quest for the Obsidian Eye, the relic tied to the Basilisk’s hoard. The Heroes break her curse, and she warns them of the creature’s true danger — a gaze that can sweep across many at once, turning all to stone in an instant.

The air grows foul with sulfur as they near a cluster of caverns. The ground trembles with thunderous hooves, and from the haze emerge brazen gorgons, iron beasts with molten cores. Their charge shakes the canyon walls. The Heroes draw their weapons, ready to face the guardians of the Basilisk’s domain.

Session 108

Heroes (lvl 13): Deet, Ryel, Gregor, Alyona, Voron

675 MR - Winter

Wyrm's Rest, Realm of Tuornen

The Heroes prepare for the awakening of the ancient dragon Tuornen. Deet and Voron remain by the petrified wyrm’s side, while the rest of the company positions themselves thirty miles away, waiting within a cavern chosen as a refuge and a cage should the dragon’s fury prove unrestrained.

With a surge of magic, Deet dissolves the petrification, scales shifting and eyes flaring as Tuornen breathes once more after a century of stone-bound slumber. At the same moment, Voron calls upon his spells to signal Alyona, who unleashes the Orb of Dragonkind. Compelled by its ancient power, Tuornen takes wing toward the mountains, Deet and Voron clinging to her tail from their dragonnels as they hurtle through the skies in her wake.

The dragon arrives at the cavern, bewildered but not enraged, her massive form looming in the shadows. There, her son Belzekyr awaits, lending the moment both tension and gravity.

The Heroes approach with care—offering reverence, promises of treasure, and the bond of shared purpose. They speak of Raizhadik, the ancient dragon who razed the Giantdowns and once slew Tuornen’s mate. The words strike true. Old hatred stirs, and vengeance steels her resolve. At last, Tuornen sets aside suspicion and accepts her place once more as the protector of Tuornen, now an ally bound by honor and cause.

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