Castle Avernus
At a glance
A castle in Darkon saturated with dangerous magic. A shadow dragon or shadow-dragon faction has summoned the party there.
Known facts
- Carver knows the castle by reputation and believes people should not go there.
- Its magic is overwhelmingly powerful or dangerous.
- A red letter bearing secret shadow-dragon claw writing invited the party to come there.
- The invitation caused the Session 1 vision of the exploding fortress and red star to return to all three characters’ minds, though the connection remains unconfirmed.
- Garen Faulk reacted irritably when Ignatius asked whether he had traveled near it.
- An old history in Faith’s Library described raven swarms and the unusually large King’s Ravens around the castle.
- Black Lily proposed that the party travel there on behalf of the Kargatane and “fuck it up,” without explaining a precise objective.
- Erasmus showed the castle exploding, splitting apart, and freezing as Azalin’s body dissolved within it.
- Black Lily reported rumors of evil in the ground and said the castle is healing itself.
- The party accepted Black Lily’s expedition; he will arrange transport, and they received 40 gp toward explosives.
- A note from Black Lily found after Vermoth’s betrayal stated that “the phylactery must be hidden in the castle.” The party believes this means Azalin’s phylactery.
- The red star above the castle remains visible enough to guide the party south.
- A dwarven defender reported that the castle is breaking and repairing itself simultaneously and that many unidentified red-robed figures have been entering it.
- Its main spire is split open and pours light into the darkness while luminous webs bind or rebuild separated masses of stone.
- Its black base stands beneath the red star, with Azalin’s banners moving in an unfelt wind.
- The rocky approach preserved none of the party’s footprints.
- A corpse-like raven inspected the party’s invitation before the drawbridge lowered.
- Darian Corvrick welcomed the party as protected guests and offered a tour of the Book of Names and Conjuration Room.
- The Library of Names contains an immense index and personal records that write themselves in real time.
- Darian’s name is absent from the archive, which he says is because it was erased.
- The Conjuration Room contains a vast cracked cylinder, named funerary doors, and an invisible barrier blocking the tower above.
- A giant-scale throne room collapsed into a smaller ruin when its crowned undead occupant died.
- At a time-warped dinner, Ebb, Allaric Van Stradleheim, and Irik Zal’honan offered escape, conquest, and truth as competing futures for Darkon.
- Ignatius and Carver pledged themselves to Irik’s path.
- Irik suggested that something valuable waits on the sixth floor.
- An alternate route led the party into a slaughterhouse where it destroyed a flesh-built abomination.
- Different rooms appear to show different times of day, suggesting that the castle’s temporal fractures extend beyond the dinner chamber.
- A magical menagerie held reagents, beasts, a halfling woman, and the mongrelman thief Slippery Siv.
- Siv warned the party not to trust the halfling woman, and the group left her and the other creatures imprisoned.
- Construct guardians patrol the inner and outer bailey routes.
- The party bypassed the invisible barrier, reached an upper treasury, and removed approximately 6,500 gp, eleven gems, and three restorative spell scrolls.
- An elemental laboratory below the treasury contained four plinths representing earth, fire, water, and air around a fifth vessel filled with bones.
- Completing the four trials created a crystal able to summon a grave elemental. Carver became its keeper and named the elemental Pearl.
- Irik appeared during the party’s rest and endorsed using the recovered gold for the greater good.
- A moving treasury bookcase concealed stairs to a hidden library containing records of other domains.
- The library’s account of Har’Akir matched Ooru’s memories but named seven familiar gods under names he did not know.
- Greater restoration returned Slippery Siv fully to his original human form.
- Two skeletal guardians protected the amnesiac prisoner Voss in the castle’s crypts.
- The party freed Voss but did not locate Irik’s tomb.
- Lower corpse-filled chambers contain a sealed cache of mundane Azalin-faced coins and a gargantuan bone beast supported by lesser skeletal creatures.
- Carver first summoned Pearl in those chambers, revealing the grave elemental’s body of grave soil, bones, and shattered coffins.
- The party destroyed the large bone golem but learned that the lower ossuary continually raises new skeletons from its remains.
- An animal-dug tunnel from the ossuary leads to a hidden lower laboratory packed with spellbooks, experiments, preserved heads, and strange magical supplies.
- A dragon screeched above the lower laboratory, and the castle shook as though something enormous had landed in a roost.
- Irik later said that the castle was frozen as it had been, and that a dragon once lived here and still returns.
- The party freed Hyskosa and Lafing from new lower prison chambers and awakened a burning captive in a magical torture circle.
- Rage released a massive fire elemental from the torture circle; Pearl destroyed it after it summoned smaller elementals.
- Hyskosa’s blood scrying showed Ebbasheyth examining tower damage within the castle.
- The party regrouped with Ooru, Siv, and Voss, then left the castle grounds after hearing Ebb screech again.
History with the party
- Session 3: The party received an invitation delivered by crow but did not travel there.
- Session 8: Ignatius found historical references connecting Castle Avernus to the King’s Ravens.
- Session 9: Black Lily offered the party a new assignment to attack or disrupt the castle; the party did not accept or refuse.
- Session 10: Erasmus revealed the castle’s destruction and Azalin’s disappearance. The party accepted Black Lily’s expedition and began preparing explosives.
- Session 11: The party departed Martira Bay with explosives, survived the betrayal of Black Lily’s driver, and found a note pointing to a phylactery hidden in the castle.
- Session 12: The party followed the red star south, returned to Rivalis, and learned that red-robed travelers have been entering the self-repairing ruins.
- Session 13: The invitation admitted the party and Ooru. Darian welcomed them inside under a promise of hospitality.
- Session 14: The party explored the Library of Names, destroyed two giant undead horrors, chose Irik’s path, and became blocked from the sixth floor.
- Session 15: The party freed Slippery Siv, bypassed the upper guards, plundered the treasury, and completed an elemental ritual that created a grave-elemental crystal.
- Session 16: Carver found the hidden library and restored Siv, the party freed Voss from the crypts, and the group descended into an unfinished battle against a bone beast.
- Session 17: The party destroyed the bone golem but fled its endlessly replenished skeleton horde into a lower laboratory, where it recovered strange magic and heard a dragon arrive above.
- Session 18: The party freed Hyskosa and Lafing from lower prison chambers, killed a captive mind flayer and werebear, and activated a torture circle that revealed a burning, restrained creature.
- Session 19: The party released and destroyed the fire elemental in the torture chamber, used Hyskosa’s scrying pool, regrouped, and departed the castle.
Current status
Departed. The party escaped with Hyskosa, Lafing, Ooru, Siv, and Voss and returned to Martira Bay. Azalin’s phylactery and Irik’s tomb remain unfound.