Interlude 

Welcome back to the D&D table! We took a break from D&D to give the DM (that’s me 😊) an opportunity to write up some homebrew and continue the story of Asterin, Aurelia, Wendel & Merric adventures on the Sword Coast. But first we’ll have to cover what the crew have been doing in game after their clearing of Wave Echo Cave.

The first session back was handled a bit differently. Each player provided me with a small list of tasks that they wanted to do during their month downtime and then I provided a narrative to suit. This was done to speed up the downtime and get players back into the action, as well as to avoid any players sitting there waiting for the other characters to finish. Especially for Merric’s player, who had opted to drop their character and roll up a new one during the downtime.

*Running individual player narratives was a lapse in my judgement. In the process of speeding up the game, I unintentionally removed player autonomy. 🤦‍♂️ Never remove player autonomy, it’s their character after all. In hindsight I should have run small, individual 1 hr sessions for each individual player so they could react as they saw fit. Lesson learnt and my players were nice enough to forgive my lapse. I opted to give a second opportunity for them to react to similar circumstances in later sessions. *

Asterin’s Narrative:
Threatening the other members, including her sister, for some peace and quiet Asterin retreated to her own room at the inn to puzzle over the tome that had been entrusted into her care. It was leather bound in an unknown animal hide that contained streaks of light silver, a closer look she discovered a three-leaf sigil faded in the spine. Asterin recognised the leaves as those found on the Evergreen tree, but the sigil was unknown to her.

The Tome appeared to be written in a dialect of Elvish Asterin was unfamiliar with, it had similarity to some writing structure of the elves of Mir or possibly Tethir, but it appeared to be much older than the writing forms Asterin knew of from these regions. Despite the writing, the book was filled with detailed sketches of various objects, possibly magical in nature. Each entry contained a sketch with a breakdown of detailed instructions involving magical runes, construction methods, spell casting and even metallurgy. Most of which was beyond her understanding.

Towards the end of the book, one item drew her attention. It showed a beautiful diamond-like gem which contains more than 60 sides to it, as if it was manufactured from pure ice. Asterin was unable to translate most of what the entry said about the gem, but after several attempts at deciphering the contents, the entry’s name suddenly resolves in her mind. The Calimemnon Crystal whispered in her head, as if from an unknown source. Scratching her head at this entry, Asterin could have sworn that she had heard of the Calimemnon Crystal before back home in Calimshan. All she knew was that she had a strong sense of foreboding when hearing its name.

Despite being holed up in her room for most of the time, Asterin hadn’t forgotten about Wendel’s offer to help train her in herbalism and she spend an hour a day with the halfling asking various herb related questions. By the time the dwarven crew arrived she was proficient with the herbalism kit.

Aurelia’s Narrative:

Aurelia attempted to go see Griska by herself, however all requests to see him in person were denied and she was rebuffed by Gregor who sneers at her, indicating that Griska isn’t taking any visitors. Instead, Aurelia spent some time at the Craven Dragon but true to Gregor’s word she didn’t see hide nor hair of Griska. Striking up a conversation with the dullard Danny, he accidentally blurts that Griska isn’t in town.

During one of her visits, she noticed a messenger of sorts come into the brothel and deliver a note to Gregor. It isn’t an unusual sight, but this time however, Aurelia thought she recognised them. It was only much later that it occurs to her that the person she saw had to have been one of the Redbrands that the party had previously captured. Determined to find out more Aurelia decided to try a different approach and tap Meredith.

She had been spending a lot of her spare time assisting with expanding upon the orphanage’s meagre education. Bringing in extra resources and more children, Aurelia had some success with Sildar who agreed that a small school was certainly needed. Adjacent to the Village Green a new school building was already in the works. Through her work Aurelia had become familiar with Meredith, who in turn has become more open to her.