Balthazar stands before a glowing wall of light. His enemy regards him motionlessly from the other side. The intensity in it’s eyes betrays a great hatred. Contempt radiates from the dragon like heat from it’s bath of magma.
The whining sound of groaning metal on metal reverberates around the cavern as the ages old dragon begins to move, it’s metal plates reflective like chrome moving almost independantly from one another. A wave of motion travels up the dragons spine and through its neck, culminating in its head which quivers slightly. A metal mouth plates creaks open like a trapdoor. Hissing fills the chamber, then a deep, low tremor. A tremor so fast its like ones heart is buzzing. And from the noise culminates a raspy grinding voice.
“So, you have come.”
“It’s time to end this, Sanarm.”
Balthazar places a hand on the warm glowing wall. He concentrates his effort for a moment, and pushes through it like it’s a curtain of water. The rest of The Friends follow suit. Now they feel, even more, the heat of the volcanos magma chamber. They gaze upwards at the shaft, smoke billowing up and around them, escaping into the air of Nildazi. Lining the shaft is vegetation of all kinds - tropical fruits, vines, moss, bushes, palm trees. An unnatural, yet entirely natural, menagerie looks down on them, leaves apparently unfettered by the heat.
The groaning noise of the dragons internals, come back to life with fire, continues to grow. More parts of it’s body begin to shift, one plate at a time.
“You thought the same 200 years ago, Balthazar. And you could not tame me.” the dragon hangs for just a moment with it’s mouth open. It rather resembles a dumbfounded animal, but for it’s obvious calculation. Beneath the glow of it’s eyes, The Friends can feel Sanarm regarding them all.
“It seems you plan to employ the same trick. You think it will not fail this time? Tell me, Balthazar, do they know what fate awaits them?”
“They have been told.”
A rush of hot air expels from the dragons mouth. “Ahh… but have they been told of my power.”
Now the cavern rocks and the dragon begins to move. It’s plates bunching together and screaming with exertion as they grind against one another. The dragon heaves its great mass onto its hind legs, lava sliding off of its shiny exterior and leaving no mark. Now it’s wings unfold. The skin between its fingers is like molten metal. It catches and displays the orange underglow from the magma. Sanarms snake-like neck rears up and flicks his head towards the sky.
“I am the chrome chaos warrior! I am the dragon of legend! You call me Sanarm, but I have no true name, for I am beyond your understand. I am beyond this world. I am…”
The whine of metal straining echoes from the dragons body as pressure builds within it. Then at once, a ear-splitting roar explodes from the dragons mouth, shaking the leaves of the cavern, twisting a spiral through the smoke. It fills the chamber entire, fills the heads of all those within. It blankets the countryside away from the mountain. In it, every memory the dragon has witnessed, every triumph, every scorn, and the bitter, bitter taste of its defeat. As if it has been stewing here for hundreds of years.
(I don’t think I sold this very well at the table, but the idea is that big dragons, the true cosmic dragons, introduce themselves with a roar that carries their life history. This also settles disputes over who should be in charge.)
When the roar is gone it’s remains are in the cavern, bouncing off the walls and ringing in the ears of The Friends.
“You cannot sway them, beast. They follow the path of the divine.” Balthazar pulls forth The Sceptre of Languard. “I’ve more guidance now than before. Grace is with us.”
Balthazar invokes the rod, creating a bright white light overhead. Descending from the volcanos opening comes an angel riding a winged horse made of storm clouds. He is the aspect of the guardian of Navaerde, the base level of the celestial mountain, gatekeeper of Heaven.
Still high above them, the dragon seems unfazed. “By passing the barrier you have ensured only it’s destruction.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Balthazar says, drawing his sword. The Friends brandish their weapons, “This time you leave on my command.”
And then… roll initiative!
I’m writing this about 4 to 5 months after it took place, and I know for a fact it didn’t go down like this, but this is what happened in my head.
The fight itself was, though a but scuffed cos it was kinda last minute, pretty dope. The first thing Sanarm did was smash the platform The Friends were standing on and create a deep gorge that lava started flowing into. The chunks of the platform became floating rocks that players had to hop between, but this didn’t really come up because they all ended up in about the same place, and realised quickly that the best move was to climb the vegetation on the walls.
Sanarm himself is really cool. I at least think I sold the idea of a megaboss chaos dragon pretty well. He had plant themed legendary actions and a big fuck off breath weapon that did tons of damage. Even touching the thing or hitting it with melee requried a save against magic corruption.
Because the dragon was so big I had the player pick from a list of parts they were near to attack, and that worked well. The juice of the sanarm fight is that his armor has to be destroyed first to actually deal damage, and it makes him easier to hit as his armor goes away. It also makes his DCs go up, so it’s a double edge sword. Friend kind of janked the pacing because he spent all his unleash incarnation attacks (an echo knight thing) to deal like 100 or 150 damage or something like that. Sanarm has a hard coded half-HP effect that sheds the armor but creates a chaos duplicate of the armor, and we got there before the armor pieces mechanic really got used I think.
It was a fucking cool moment when the chaos dragon showed up. It also recharges his breath weapon, so it just fucked up the characters. Already beaten down, now we have to deal with two dragons!? Total bullshit. Awesome stuff.
I’m not usually big into encounter designs but I thought for the last few sessions I should maybe try to lean into the game we’re playing and not the one I wish we were playing. At this point I cut my losses and said if it’s not gonna be a sandbox, then I guess it better be a fun rollercoaster.
It had some really cool moments. Highlights:
The fight did not go in their favor either. They did some serious damage, but midway through the fight the guardian of Navaerde revealed that the characters suspicions that the scepter of languard was not at full potential were correct. The sceptre reads that it needs a sacrifice of blood, which I thought might be the army they massacre in New Ornos, but they were fighting the dragon and I decided that one of the PCs could also count as a great sacrifice of blood. I guess heaven respects class levels. Siriel voluntered, kinda, maybe she just got pressured, but she was beheaded and the sceptre powered up. They brought her back by sacrificing the guardians storm horse.
Friend also got destroyed, torn apart by Sanarm, but his evil curse mark brought him back to life.
(I don’t know if I’ve mentioned that yet. His mark is a curse that will drive him into some crazy evil monster for a future campaign, but for now a beneficial power it has is bringing you back to life. They found it in Cortier castle and used it on Friend before leaving Solemnity.)
The last step for the sceptre of languard is that “the voice of heaven must fall silent for half of one hour”. A pretty cruel riddle with a cruel answer: Balthazar has to die. He did so during the battle with the dragon, and his divine light shot back off into heaven, shattering the glass wall over the ceiling, and letting Sanarm free. The dragon, seeing Balthazar gone and thinking good enough, escaped for the castle.
So, three deaths, but zero losses? Still a pretty major impact for the dragon. As much as the drama of the table was reduced by my inability to improvise, I think the fight had the right effect.
The Friends lick their wounds and return to the army, which Sanarm has breathed fire on. The soldiers are dealing with burned corpses and the occasional chaos monster risen from the chaos breath. Even a dragon as large as Sanarm doesn’t really make a huge dent in the army with just one breath weapon, so they’re fine for numbers. One of the sobering things about The Ruby Crown was trying to make realistic numbers of soliders sound cool. An army of 400 doesn’t sound that impressive to people used to fantasy movie fight scenes.
Balthazar re-appears right on the dot, and now has a fully empowered scepter of languard. The one he has to use it on is already right on its way to Solemnity.
Baron Voghtairi has also seen the dragon fly past. He messages The Friends.
“There is yet hope, if you meet my demands. We must speak.”
The Friends (kind of course correcting from this extreme detour) decide they should probably deal with Voghtairi before going to Solemnity. He’s on the way anyway.
They meet him and his three fire giants at a crossroads, about half a day from New Ornos. The conversation is short. The baron asks for the friends complete cooperation, and to surrender their troops.
The players don’t know this, but Baron Voghtairi needs a great sacrifice of blood to power a secret magical ritual, which has been his real goal the entire time. Without letting them know, Voghtairi only eludes to “some power” he has to stop the dragon. Voghtairi is 100% convinced it is the only way to save Orthos, but he doesn’t know about the scepter of languard. The Friends refuse, and Voghtairi realises that he has to act now, while The Friends are sore from their dragon fight, or he stands no chance.
I think Voghtairis most crucial error was during this fight. He teleported away before really getting involved. I think three fire giants and the sorcerer baron could have stopped The Friends, but Voghtairi has always prioritised his own life above all. Maybe the stress got to him. The Friends dispatched the fire giants, and the session ended there, with the army on Voghtairis doorstep.
Whew, long diary! The dragon has escaped, and now wreaks havoc on Solemnity. Pretty much the worst outcome has come to pass, but The Friends have the sceptre of Languard, and Voghtairi in their sites. It’s not over yet!