Chapter One - Part One: Greenest In Flames

Governor Nighthill’s face turns serious as he listens to your acccount of the temple rescue. "By the sound of it we’d need a new door, which we have no time to contemplate now. We’ll barricade the tunnel from the inside and post a guard in the basement."

Governor Nighthill takes you over to a cooking fire where a heavyset woman is passing out soup and bread. You realise just how hungry you actually feel as you sit down up against the wall and eat your first meal in a while. It’s getting quite late and it’s been a really long day for you all.

Zachary you see Eadyan talking to a few townsfolk and as you approach him, he smiles at you. "Thank you for helping us out my young man".

Nighthill looks gravely at you Kirsk, "Unfortunately I believe it is worse than that. We had a good, long conversation with the cultist you brought us. He divulged that he's a member of The Cult of the Dragon. He's apparently a new recruit so as far as reliable, detailed intel goes...it's sparse. They are in Greenest to collect loot for...and I quote...the great hoard that will usher in the reign of the dragon queen...whatever that means. They've been looting small villages up and down the Sword Coast and right here in the Greenfields trying to amass as much wealth as possible. They're operating out of a camp nearby, and they're lead here by the woman in purple, Frulam Mondath and her right hand man, the blue half-dragon, Langdedrosa Cyanwrath. But the one who planned the attack was apparently another half-dragon named Rezmir. If you want to talk to the prisoner yourselves, you're welcome to do so, I'm just not sure he has much left to tell you".

Eadyan looks curiously at you, "Leosin?...hmm...Ah! Yes! The monk. Leosin has been in town for almost two ten-days, he’s here with a couple of other monks. They’ve kept to themselves, but they’ve been to the temple a few times. It is...was...a good place to meditate. It definitely will need a bit of cleaning.". Eadyan looks sad. "I haven’t seen him or his friends since the chaos happened. I’ve been at the temple all night.

Kel, there is a ton of lore on Tiamat but here’s the very basics. There are two dragon gods, Bahamut the god of the metallic dragons and Tiamat, the god of the chromatic dragons. Chromatic dragons are of course by their very nature evil and so is Tiamat. She is a five headed beast with one head in each colour of the chromatic dragons. The stories go that she was banished to the nine hells and still reside there to this day.

Nighthill sighs wearily, he rubs his injured shoulder and looks at you with a look of a man way out of his depth. "Honestly...I’m not sure...there might be more clusters of people around the town, but we have no idea where and with that army out there it would be isuicude to try and find out. But first things first, come I’ll take you to the prisoner.".

Governor Nighthill takes you into the keep and up into the tower. He opens a locked room and shackled to a chair flanked by two guards is the young cultist you captured outside the tunnel. His left eye is swollen and his lip is cut, but other than that looks relatively unscathed. "We haven’t set a date for his trial, but as soon as possible after all this mess. I have made no promises to him".

The young man looks at you, Kirsk, tears forming in his eyes. He hesitates for a second and then speaks, "I haven’t been with the cult for very long. I come from a small village here in Greenfields, my parents had nothing, I just wanted...something.... He looks down. "I’ll...tell you what I know, although it’s not much...there are maybe 100 members of the cult in the camp of various ranks. Add to that maybe a couple of hundred kobolds...that’s just an estimate. We all went to Greenest, we were supposed to go in, grab as much as we can and get out before sunrise. The wealth will go to the camp, what happens with it after that, I’m afraid I don’t know. We were told that it’s for Tiamat...I’m...I don’t know...I mean, I don’t think it can be FOR Tiamat, she’s...I mean, she’s not real, right?. It looks like he’s never really contemplated the bigger picture of the cult.

Kirsk, when you joined the cult, your understanding of what it was doing was that they devoted their lives to try seek out evil dragons to transform into dracoliches and serve chromatic dragons in order to try and gain their favour. This sounds like something else entirely...

Eadyan looks thoughtfully at you, Zachary. "From my impression of him, my best guess would be out there somewhere, helping the townsfolk". He puts a reassuring hand on your shoulder and smiles, "Don’t worry, I am sure you will find once all of this settles down. May Chauntea’s light shine upon you."

As you walk back out into the courtyard you all of a sudden hear a horn from the outside of the keep. The people in the courtyard grow quiet and you hear a booming voice shouting from the outside. "Citizens of Greenest!". Governor Nighthill looks gravely at you and motions for you to follow him up onto the parapet. When you get there, you see that the large blue half-dragon, Langdedrosa Cyanwrath, has stepped out in front of the army of raiders, he looks directly at you four as he continues. "It is so nice to see this town's hospitality, you guys have taken so good care of all of us tonight and the gifts you have bestowed upon us will help usher in a new world for all of us...you have all been amazing hosts...except for you". The half-dragon smiles coldly as his stare bores deep into you. "I've been told that you've slain multiple of us...and that I cannot abide...so for each of our slain brethren, we will pay you back tenfold...my father will see to that.... He turns his head to the sky and lifts his arms as he shouts in draconic.

You hear a roar and then the faint battering of wings above you. The blue dragon starts to descend on the keep. You then hear a booming, deep voice speaking in common. It takes a second before you realise that it is in fact the dragon himself. "You should be happy, it is a great honour to be annihilated by the almighty Lennithon!". He opens his maw and you can see electricity start to crackle and build up in his throat.

Kel, coming face to face with a dragon fills the bravest with fear and you are no different. It overcomes you and you start to hyperventilate, crouch down and squeeze up against the wall. From there you see the lightening stream out from the dragon’s mouth, it hits one archer on the parapet directly, fully evaporates him, and 4 other archers get violently thrown to ground, they look really hurt.