Story 11/1/2020

The session started off with the group freshly leveled to 13! They had recently defeated Sekuja, and started to make their way to Gewalo to find "The Gambler". As they traveled, they started noticing signs that they were going in circles. They never found strict evidence like repeated tracks, but they kept coming across familiar landmarks, and their overall judge of travel time was way off. Being high level adventurers, they should have no reason to get lost, so they started to look for clues. Beorn noticed a

strange reflection of the world repeating around them from atop the trees, and Khaelis was able to tell that there was some sort of Arcanic magical twisting of the world around them.

They decided to go back the way they came, and that was when Klon noticed the symbol of the Raven Queen on some nearby moss. He checked it for religious significance, and found that it was like a trail marker (a cairn), meaning the Raven Queen was telling them they were going the right direction.

They continued to follow it, and eventually found a circle of dead trees within a circle of living trees, a perfect grove in honor of the Raven Queen. At it's center was a well in the shape of a Raven, with no bucket and no bottom they could see. Klon was struck with such power and significance, that he realized he would never again have trouble recreating this type of grove again.

The group decided to go down the well, and found themselves in the Shadowfell. The Shadowfell was the plane of existence that the Raven Queen ruled over, and was an echo of the Mortal Plane, meaning it was a near perfect copy. The only 2 modifications were that she created the Fortress of Memories as her main place of study and rejuvenation, and a frozen fortress at the furthest southern reaches of the world called Letherna. The Raven Queen was supported by a race of elf like mortals called the Shadar-kai, who lived with her in the Shadowfell and helped her with various things. Whenever a mortal died, unless they were involved in some special magic/ritual, their soul would go to the Shadowfell. The Raven Queen (with Shadar-kai help) would help them let go of their memories and feelings (which were stored in the Fortress of Memories as a mist that enveloped the area), and then usher their souls to Letherna, where they could travel to the afterlife.

Upon entering the Shadowfell, they were met with a grim reaper like creature with a Raven on his shoulder who called himself The Curator. He told them the Raven Queen wanted to speak with them, and he would show them to the Fortress of Memories. Along they way, he explained all about the Shadowfell and how things worked, and he also talked about the growing strain on the Raven Queen to maintain her realm and her order. He mentioned that the Shadar-kai were lower in number than previously in history, and that there seemed to be souls going missing, and they didn't have an answer for what was happening or where they were going, but were relatively confident it was the Orange Robe Crew.

The group eventually got to the Fortress of Memories, and met the Raven Queen in her main hall. By met her, there were hundreds of copies of her all running around frantically, reading books, writing things down, and hurriedly doing things. When she spoke, one of the copies would speak one sentence, then another copy would speak the next sentence. Anytime she looked at one of the group directly (Beorn specifically), they would take psychic damage.

She said that she was calling on her Order to mobilize, and the time for subtlety was over, it was time for war. She wanted Klon to stay his current path, and lead the group to the artifacts. She said she could not say for sure they would survive, but they were critical to her work, and if they failed she would pay a great price to win. She also said that she was responsible for them getting lost on their way to Gewalo, but it was to throw Desmond off their tracks.

Khaelis and Erevan noticed on of the Raven Queen copies seemingly exhausted, only to seem to suck in some of the mist around her, then become re-invigorated.

Beorn grew less impressed with her, and eventually asked if they would get their souls rejoined, and if his own fate would be corrected. She said if they succeeded, they would be rejoined, if they failed, they would not. She also said he would "reach the outcome he was seeking, but it would not be the outcome he wanted."

The group decided to leave, probably with more questions than they arrived. As they were leaving, Desmond seemed to intercept them as they were leaving the Shadowfell, and they found themselves at an intersection of 4 points on the mortal plane. At that intersection, 4 mortals were dead, and a 4 distinct groups of Shadar-kai were preventing their souls from entering the Shadowfell correctly, confirming the theory that there was dissent amongst the Shadar-kai...

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