The Phandalin Torment

Hello, welcome back and a Happy New Year to all. Now, imagine living in a small town nestled between gorgeous green forests, there's a handful of shops, a couple taverns, a nice inn and a town hall. It's been a few hundred years since a War ravaged your lands, and aside from the gang who occasionally cause some ruckus, it's quite nice. One day you're going about your business when a group of adventurers appear on the towns border, they're armed to the teeth and with them is your Mayor. Wish goodbye to your peace and prepare for some anarchy.

The group got their loot after killing the Bugbear. It was time to leave the cave and head to Phandalin. They made their way out of the cave and headed back to the wagon they'd left two sessions previous. If you remember from my previous post, although it's been so long since I wrote that I'm not sure I remember myself, a Goblin managed to escape from the cave to go and warn a nearby settlement and spring a surprise on the party.

The party made their way out of the cave with Sildar in tow, their plan was to head back to the wagon, figure out how to get around the wall of thickets and head into Phandalin to retrieve their money and drop off Sildar. They headed back down the nature strewn path back towards the small ravine. Someway along the journey they noticed thick black smoke billowing over the trees in the direction of their wagon. They decided to race toward the smoke, ready for any kind of battle they might come across. They burst through the brush, ready to kick ass, and were met with something they did not expect.

Before them was a small army of Goblins, all dead. They inched forward and stalked the singed battlefield, aiming to figure out what had happened. They noticed that half of the dead Goblins were killed instantly by a powerful blast. The rest were killed using more hands-on attacks. They continued to stalk the battlefield, collecting clues until they had sufficient evidence.

The Goblins all gathered in the ravine, they tipped over the wagon, rifling through its contents. They waited there with bated breath. A small singe mark on the grass nearby indicated something appeared using magic, it left faint markings, too faded to distinguish. The Goblins all turned to face the being, half of which were immediately met with an immensely powerful Eldritch blast, killing them all instantly. Their corpses and the ground around them was blasted to oblivion. On the ground near the spot where the being appeared seemed to be a lot of arrows, all of which broken. It seemed that the Goblins unleashed a melee of arrows at the being, all of which were stopped mid flight and were destroyed before landing in a pile. Then carnage occured. The being made its way through the latter half of the Goblin army, killing each one in especially gruesome ways. Some were beheaded, some were dismembered, others burnt alive. The being made its way through the Goblin hoard, ensuring each one suffered violently and painfully, but never repeating how they killed them. The final Goblin suffered the most. It lay there, on the brink of death, holding its own heart, slowly fading away. Before the being departed it embedded an arrow into the wagon. The wood was not of this realm but the markings were written in ancient Elvish.

Slightly shaken by the carnage before them, and bewildered at what could cause such death, the group picked up the wagon, reloaded it and made their way through the thickets, hacking at them.

Before long they were heading in the direction they thought they ought to. The sounds of life began to fill the air, Phandalin was close. They pushed through some lavish green trees and found themselves at the foot of a small but thriving settlement. It seemed peaceful and undeterred by any carnage going on in the world around them. The group decided to head in, the odd stare coming their way. They dropped Sildar off at the town hall and decided to head to Barthen's Provisions to get their payment for securing passage of the wagon. Once they got that, they decided a drink would be the most suitable next step.

On the other side of town was a small but notable inn called the Laughing Rat. The group made their way over and headed inside the shabby shack. Inside they were immediately met with life, people were drinking and having masses of fun. Amongst them was a halfling who appeared to be having the most fun, perhaps at the detriment of the rest of the patrons. His name is Esh (Hi Ayhan) and he was about to make things very interesting.

Through a series of hijinks, mainly down to Esh, they are kicked out of the inn. Immediately however they were face to face with some rather nasty looking men. They were harassing some locals and generally not being very pleasant, the group decided to intervene and managed to successfully stop the group. One of them survived and the group managed to get some information out of him. He was part of a group called the Redbrand, they all lived in the manor which overshadowed the town, the manor was known as Tresendar Manor and their leader was a mysterious figure called Glassstaff. Maybe he was the being that decimated the Goblins? The group knew what they needed to do next. But were they ready? Absolutely not, they were level 2, don't be so ridiculous.