Burn, baby burn!

Calistril 26, 4712

It's a blistering cold and windy day in Fort Inevitable. The weather has been dry, but the winds over the last three days has created major drifts along the streets of the town. Hellknights have tried to keep up with the digging but it has been almost impossible to remove enough and keep the streets clear.

On this particular morning, the Coopers are dealing with the meteorological conditions. Gerald is outside the walls of the Fort using flaming sphere to melt some of the snow. Darelle visits Dr. Mordel's house. Daryle is out hunting big game. Roscoe has ordered the Hellknights to pile as much snow as possible on Lord Warden Way to block the worst of the wind.

At nine o'clock, the residents of Fort Inevitable feel the ground violently shake and the sound of an explosion spreads quickly. Windows are broken, dishes fall to the ground, chimneys collapse, and much property damage happens. People are stunned. What just happened?

A large blue cloud quickly raises from the area near Dr. Mordel's house and reaches up to the sky. At the same time, the pillar of smoke quickly spreads outwards. Houses catch on fire and begin burning down. Seeing this out of the window, Darelle helps Mordel and his assistant Erynna move the patients to the basement to escape from the flames. Gerald notices the smoke pillar and immediately returns to Fort Inevitable. Daryle bags an elk and sees the pillar raising. She rushes back to the town.

With the smoke rising and the fires spreading, Roscoe orders an evacuation of Fort Inevitable. Hellknights rush in to fight the fires, and with the help of the inhabitants they manage to put it out. The smoke was debilitating, however, and the fires felt more like acid than flames. Unfortunately, over 400 people, including 87 Hellknights, perished in the explosion and its aftermath.

Investigating the scene, Roscoe discovers a crater about 50 feet deep. He can clearly see one of the main sewer lines, but further down there is another, older tunnel that has been cut in two. Water is slowly pooling at the bottom of the crater, and soon it will reach up to that second tunnel. Roscoe decides to investigate. He climbs down to the sewer. The ground is covered with a scorching blue ash, and soon the Hellknight is covered in blue.

Roscoe explores the tunnels, and discovers a strange creature radiating a strong evil aura. With six legs, four arms, and a triangular head with eyes all around, the creature seemingly stops, scratshes something on the wall, and proceeds down the tunnel. Roscoe follows at a distance, and takes a look at the scratches. They appear to be some sort of runes. Roscoe defaces the runes, then returns above ground to gather some help.

With the situation now under control, Maralictor Wirt reports that over 70% of the dwellings withing Fort Inevitable have been destroyed, including Darelle's cute little house. Even if people bunk up in the remaining residences and surrounding farms, more than a thousand people will be homeless. With the granaries burned to the ground, there is enough food left to feed everyone for the next three weeks, but then starvation will set in. Roscoe orders that lumber be immediately felled and that temporary shelters be built. Campaign tents are to be pitched on the training field, and rations are halved to stretch out the food. Messages requesting assistance are sent to Dimsdale and to other surrounding localities. Gerald proposes building temporary snow shelters, and Roscoe grimly agrees that, though this may be one of Gerald's worse ideas, it is worth trying. With the evacuation proceeding apace and a plan in place, the Coopers head back to the newly discovered tunnel.

Darelle is the first to notice that the crater stands exactly where Abernard's house was located. And no one has seen Cassandra or Nissa since the day before. Could there be a link between their disappearance and this explosion?

Down in the tunnel, the Coopers realize that it is quite old. It may in fact predate the Emerald Spire itself, and its construction is not Azlanti. Roscoe describes the creature to his siblings, and they proceed down the tunnel. This tunnel is straight and never deviates left, right, or up and down. It is made of large stones that have been tight fitted, and there is no sign of humidity or water. The creature has a few hours on them, but Roscoe is convinced that it can't be too far ahead since it stopped every few feet to scribble on the walls.

After a hundred feet they find the first rune that has not been scratched out by Roscoe. Gerald examines it, and notices that it is some sort of summoning rune. The creature appears not to know what it is trying to summon, but the rune repeats itself enough that, whatever will come through when the ritual is done, will be big. Gerald copies the symbols to discover who they might have been. The Coopers then remove every rune that they find.

They eventually discover a small side room connected to the tunnel that allows for travel up and down a shaft. There are no signs that the creature climbed either up and down. Daryle drops a coin down the shaft and when the sound eventually comes back she knows that it is hundreds of feet deep.

Continuing on, the Coopers estimate that they walked out of town about two miles in the general direction of Mosswater, and the tunnel has not deviated from its course. They walk in a large room with strange machinery and gears made of a metal they have never seen before. The mechanical devices appear oiled and greased and ready to be turned on. A control panel with strange symbols, levers, and buttons is present in one of the corners. There are more levels of gears below and above. The creature's runes are scribbled all over, and the Coopers spend some time removing them. Gerald speculates that these gears, when activated, would open some large gate, and that if they did they might be able to pick up the point where the gates opened from Fort Inevitable.

Right next to the gear room is another large room with several stories of metal walkways along the walls, going up and down, with the tunnel continuing on. The creature itself is on the third level, still scribbling on the walls. Daryle looses an arrow, getting the creature's attention. It jumps down, summons two large air elementals, and attacks. The creature's blows are vicious and dangerous, but eventually the Coopers prevail and Gerald manages not to die in the process.

Trekking back to Fort Inevitable, Roscoe crosses over the crater, and takes a look in the other tunnel. There are no runes carved in the walls on this side. The creature seems to have appeared at the bottom of the crater. Roscoe orders that Hellknights cement and waterproof a wall to close both of the tunnels, before the crater itself is filled with rubble. The other section of the tunnel seemed to lead in a straight line in the direction of the Emerald Spire...