It all started on the road to Oakhurst…

We joined several members of the group in a carriage traveling to the small village that’s nestled north of the Fals river along the road between Veluna and Bissel. While their reasons for taking the voyage were divergent, their paths would soon align, owing to chance or fate. In the carriage we met:

• Anthe Etonnice, an elven monk
• Thora Kaeda, a young druid of mixed genasi and gnomish parentage
• Zenryl Shadowbow, an elven rogue

Thora and Zenryl were traveling companions, having left behind the small Velunese village where they had met. Thora was on a mission for her druidic mentors, investigating a lost ruin known as the Sunless Citadel, and the rumors of a fallen druid named Belak the Outcast who has been allegedly operating within the citadel, spinning dark magics. Zenryl is along for the ride, because the thought of remaining behind while Thora sought adventure seemed utterly unpalatable.

As for Anthe, she doesn’t say much but carries a sense that many secrets hide behind her quiet smile.

BANG!

The group’s small talk is interrupted when something huge slams into the carriage, actually rocking it over onto its side. Outside, they see an incredible sight: a seven-foot ogre tussling with a band of bandits. Rattled, they scramble out of the carriage and prepare for battle—and quite a fight, between the ogre, the bandits, and the hobgoblin lobbing arrows from the treeline.

Before long, however, a new wrinkle presents itself: a heavily armored dwarf, cresting a nearby hill and sprinting toward the battle. He’s yelling something, but what?

“DON’T…HIT…THE OGRE!”

Strange as it may seem, the ogre does indeed show no interest in murdering our band of heroes—just the bad guys.

The battle is joined, the bandits are defeated, and we meet the rest of our heroes:

• Kyffin Chiselfist, a dwarven paladin of Fortubo hailing from the Barrier Peaks.
• Dook, an ogre barbarian who thinks he’s a paladin because he killed a paladin and that’s how he thinks it works.

They’re a strange company, to be sure, but it is clear that Dook does indeed mean well and seems to be (mostly) on the path of righteousness, at least under the guidance of Kyffin and excepting an unfortunate habit of collecting his fallen enemies’ ears…

Kyffin and Dook are also traveling to Oakhurst, responding to the summons of Kyffin’s friend, Dem Nackle, a gnome priest of Pelor. The group agrees to travel the rest of the way together as protection from the dangers of the road.

They soon arrive in Oakhurst, where they receive a less-than-warm welcome from Oakhurst’s constable, Felosial, a half-elf veteran. She commands a force of sixteen guards and four scouts who keep the village safe. It takes some convincing that the party means no harm—mainly due to the ogre—but Dem soon arrives and vouches for them. Under Felosial’s watchful eye, the group travels to Dem’s shrine to catch up.

Dem had written to Kyffin asking for help recovering her friend Erky Timbers, a cleric of Fharlanghn who recently ventured into the Sunless Citadel and has not returned. Since it’s a good cause and their paths align, the group agrees to team up and venture into the dungeon together. They learn that the ruin is an ancient Baklunish temple, sunken into a deep chasm during some past cataclysm. Its origins and history are surrounded with more questions than answers, however.

Before they can set out, they are approached by Kerowyn Hucrele, a human noble who runs the local general store and who is one of the larger fish in this particular small pond. Two of her children, it seems, have also been foolish enough to venture into the Sunless Citadel—part of a group of adventurers who are now several weeks overdue. Kerowyn fears the worst, but she offers a reward if the group can find and return with the two lost members of her family—or at least return the gold signet rings worn by her missing son and daughter.

Setting out from Oakhurst, the group travels seven miles up along an old road into the foothills that become the Yatil Mountains. They find a ravine, narrow but running for miles in both directions. After a bit of searching, they discover the barest hints that the Citadel used to be above ground—crumbling pillars covered in dwarven writing. A few similar pillars were visible on the opposite side of the ravine, and a sturdy, knotted rope hangs from one of the leaning pillars and down into the depths of the ravine. The writing is soon identified as the warnings of a goblin tribe that has apparently taken up residence.

Undeterred, the group descends the rope.

At the bottom, they find a set of stone stairs carved into the side of the ravine wall, leading even further down. After a few encounters with rodents of unusual size, they reach the bottom…and the Sunless Citadel itself.

After more rat fights and a couple of unfortunate run-ins with traps (Perception rolls are not this party’s strong suit), the group soon encounters a broken cage and a sobbing kobold named Mep. They learn that tribes of both kobolds and goblin have taken up residence within the Citadel’s crumbling halls, and they have little love for each other.

The cage, Mep tells them, once held the kobold tribe’s prized possession: a young white dragon wyrmling named Calcryx. Mep, the tribe’s “Keeper of Dragons,” tells the group that the goblins had recently staged a raid and stolen the dragon, leaving Mep as the butt of the other kobolds’ displeasure.

Mep agrees to escort the party to meet the kobold leader. A short distance into the citadel, they reach the “Hall of Dragons” and meet Yusdrayl, the kobold chieftain, upon her dragon throne.

Wary but willing to bargain, Yusdrayl tells the group that her tribe had lived in the Citadel for some time, drawn to its history with an unnamed dragon cult and a long-vanished high dragon named Thesmothete. Yusdrayl also confirms two things: that the Hucreles’ adventuring party had passed through some time ago, and that Belak the Outcast does indeed reside in the depths of the Citadel’s lower level.

Yusdrayl offers to let Mep guide the party, as well as their choice of reward if they bring Calcryx back to the tribe. With their eyes on both the mysterious key clutched in the mouth of Yusdrayl’s dragon throne and the array of small treasures behind it, the party agrees.

Following the kobolds’ directions to a “back door” into the goblin-occupied section of the complex, Dook straps Mep to his back and the party soon battles against goblins, rats, and skeletons before encountering more clues that suggest the Sunless Citadel’s dragon cult once included elves among its number. After defeating several undead former residents, the group acquires several goodies including a magic whistle named “Night Caller,” which allows the user to cast “animate dead.” (Dook takes a liking to the whistle—he always wanted his own pet skeleton.)

Pressing onward past traps and monsters, the group eventually battles a bloated, grotesque mother rat guarding a filthy nest containing, among other things, the remains of one of the Hucrele party: Karakas the ranger is no more.

Tired and wounded, the group barricades the door and settles in for a long rest.