The Copper Piece Gang

D&D Session Summary

Having escaped from Shadowmire through the tunnels beneath Kalton Manor, the party paused to recover and decide whether to continue. The black dragon had warned them that opening the forbidden door would lead to death and that the truth beyond it could destroy them all. Their recent battle had proved that Shadowmire was powerful enough to make that warning difficult to ignore.

This time, however, Shadra had rejoined the group. The party was once again four strong, and she remained the only companion who retained the full knowledge revealed by the archive’s Memory Rends. The group considered walking away, but everything they had experienced—from their entanglements with Vladyn and Artemis Entreri to freeing Avarice, traveling through the Shardhold, and returning to the Nentir Vale—had drawn them toward the same mystery. They were already involved in forces far beyond them, and leaving the First Witness unexplained would not free them from those consequences.

Rather than attempt another direct battle, the companions decided to negotiate.

They worked their way back through Zarnak’s narrow tunnel toward the chamber where Shadowmire waited. Krovuur went first, followed by Rae, Zarnak, and Shadra. Near the surface they could hear the dragon’s heavy movements and the occasional clicking of his unnatural attendant. Shadowmire had stopped digging frantically, but he clearly expected the party to emerge somewhere nearby.

Krovuur tried to approach quietly, but Shadowmire heard him and moved toward the opening. The dragon drew in a massive breath. With only an instant to prevent another acid attack, Krovuur called for parley and pleaded that the party wanted only to speak.

To prove his intentions, Krovuur extended his staff from the tunnel and placed it on the ground beyond his reach. He then emerged with his hands raised. The gesture was sufficiently sincere to make Shadowmire exhale without attacking.

Standing alone before the dragon, Krovuur refused to grovel completely. Shadowmire studied him closely, then acknowledged that his willingness to emerge was impressive. He called Krovuur either crazy or stupid; Krovuur allowed that he might be both. Shadowmire added a third possibility: brave.

When the party attempted to question him, Shadowmire demanded that they first answer the same questions themselves. Before explaining who had charged him with guarding the door or what he protected, he wanted to know why the companions had come and how much they understood.

Krovuur did not attempt to deceive him. He admitted that the party had been compelled into the search and revealed that they knew of Avarice and the First Witness. The reference changed Shadowmire’s manner immediately. He did not know exactly what the First Witness was, but he understood its meaning, its danger, and the scale of what was being concealed.

The exchange revealed that Shadowmire was more than an ordinary dragon. He had once been something else and had bound himself to the area through magic older than dragons. That power connected him to the Vitriol Fulcrum, Nyssglass, the wards, and an ancient source unlike any magic the companions had otherwise encountered. His long guardianship had not been imposed casually; it was part of a design reaching back almost to the beginning of history.

Krovuur signaled for the rest of the party to emerge. Their willingness to leave the safety of the tunnel and stand before Shadowmire represented a profound act of trust. In response, the dragon offered them evidence he hoped would convince them to leave the secret undisturbed.

His clicking attendant approached and produced a hidden journal bearing the initials of Arrol Kalton. The document had been removed from the lower Kalton chambers before the party explored them. Had it remained there, they would likely have found it before entering the ancient archive.

The journal spanned generations of Kalton history. It explained that the family had inherited responsibility for guarding something they did not understand. Some Kaltons mistook that responsibility for proof that they possessed a great treasure. Notes throughout the book repeatedly warned, “Never open the black door,” although some had later been scratched out and replaced with doubts that someone might already have opened it.

The entries discussed obedience without explaining whom the family obeyed or why. They also recorded centuries of dragon activity and eventually described Arrol’s confrontation with Shadowmire. Arrol’s certainty that the door should be opened gradually weakened as he learned more.

The name Avarice appeared repeatedly in the later pages, often intruding into otherwise unrelated sentences as though the writer could not prevent it from entering his thoughts. Near the journal’s end was a reference to “the bearer who remembers what must remain forgotten.” The book also mentioned the Vitriol Fulcrum without explaining what it was.

A diagram showed four symbols in sequence: a mask, an eye, a mouth, and a hand. The surrounding annotations implied that they represented successive stages. Encountering or breaking one would lead to the next.

Reading the journal created more than an intellectual understanding. The words acted as a channel to an otherworldly presence, transferring an awareness directly into the companions. Most of the party was swept helplessly into the experience, although Rae retained enough clarity to observe what was happening.

The chamber disappeared.

The companions found themselves beneath a sky filled with stars, with no world beneath their feet. Colossal figures of impossible size and terrible beauty surrounded a lone mortal. They might have been gods, primordials, or beings older than either. The mortal’s face could not be seen, but the party knew one thing with absolute certainty:

It remembered.

Chains of light descended around the figure. One voice declared:

“The knowledge must die.”

Another replied:

“It cannot die.”

A third answered:

“Then make the world forget.”

The mortal turned toward Rae, and a final message echoed through every mind:

“Avarice remembers.”

The vision vanished, returning the party to the underground chamber.

Then Vladyn appeared.

He entered without footsteps, spellwork, or warning. One moment the party stood with Shadowmire and his attendant; the next Vladyn was simply at the far end of the room. He regarded the companions, the dragon, the ancient stone, and Arrol’s journal before observing that he had wondered how long it would take them—and that it had apparently taken longer than it should have.

Shadowmire reared to attack, but Vladyn met his gaze. The dragon immediately settled and remained motionless, whether by compulsion or recognition of the power confronting him.

Vladyn then looked toward the entrance and announced:

“We are out of time. The guardians of the lie are arriving. Prepare yourselves.”

The ancient prison had been constructed so that immortals could not directly access or manipulate its central truth. Only mortals—the weakest beings involved—could pass through its protections and change what had been sealed. Vladyn had therefore used the party to go where he could not, recover what he could not perceive, and awaken a channel to the First Witness.

He forced the companions to make a choice: did they want to know the truth?

The party answered yes.

A black circular door appeared before them, carved with the mask, eye, mouth, and hand. The choice drew upon everything the companions had ever desired or needed. As the symbols began to dissolve, an ancient voice spoke directly into their minds:

“They called themselves creators. They built temples, demanded worship, and rewrote history in golden thread. But they were thieves. Before their thrones were forged, they bargained with the Origin. They took divinity that was not theirs, and when the debt came due, they erased the bargain. Avarice found the original names. He knew the debt remained unpaid. That is why they built the Fulcrum to rot his mind, and why they built this door to silence me.”

The door disappeared.

Shadowmire exploded into blood and gore, his centuries of guardianship ending in an instant. Vladyn passed through the opening without the party, no longer needing them to lead the way.

The surrounding reality began to tear apart. Golden archons and angels descended from above while devils ripped upward from below. Vladyn’s infernal legion collided with divine, primordial, and otherworldly forces in a conflict unfolding across another plane. Although the battle surrounded the companions, it occurred in unnatural silence.

At the center of the conflict was the First Witness.

The First Witness was not a person or creature. It was the living memory of the first theft: the moment when the beings now worshiped as gods stole divinity from something older and remade themselves as creators. They had erased that truth from history, leaving this memory as the only surviving record.

Avarice had learned the original names associated with that theft. A contract tied him to the First Witness and prevented the gods from simply killing him. Instead, they built the Vitriol Fulcrum to corrupt his memory and imprisoned him within the Shardhold of Silence, ensuring that he could neither remember the truth clearly nor communicate it to anyone else.

The companions entered the manifested memory while immortal armies fought around them. Four narrow paths led toward four points associated with the ancient wards. Primordial defenders blocked the routes: an enormous spider-like creature, a floating fish-like entity, a living fog, and other forms drawn from the same impossible memory.

The creatures were not ordinary enemies. They guarded the routes and attempted to push the companions into the surrounding void. Entering that void exposed a mortal mind to unbearable knowledge and carried a genuine risk of death. Those who survived suffered psychic harm and disorientation, but each contact also revealed another fragment of the truth.

The party learned that divine emissaries wanted the Crown of Nyssglass destroyed. They saw inside Vladyn’s intentions and perceived an infernal contract bearing Avarice’s name, with an empty place prepared for someone to replace him. They also learned that the Vitriol Fulcrum had been deliberately designed to corrupt Avarice’s memories while he remained imprisoned, preventing even someone such as Vladyn from extracting the truth from him.

The mask symbol represented the Vitriol Fulcrum and the first ward. It was already broken. By freeing Avarice and destroying the Shardhold’s purpose, the party had begun dismantling seals created at the beginning of the age to hide the theft of divinity.

The companions initially tried to defeat the defenders. They blinded, dazed, stunned, cursed, and wounded the creatures while Rae’s shielding protected allies from their attacks. Zarnak inflicted brutal wounds and prevented one defender from healing. Krovuur spread debilitating divine power across the battlefield, and Shadra used moonlit bonds and other magic to control the narrow paths.

Their attacks could not solve the encounter. The defenders reached into the center of the memory and restored themselves, erasing most of the party’s progress. The companions realized that the battle was not about killing the guardians. They needed to pass them and occupy all four ward points.

Reaching the points required increasingly dangerous improvisation. Party members leaped over defenders, negated attacks, teleported through the void, and deliberately allowed themselves to be pushed into the memory so they could emerge on the opposite side. Each arrival granted a healing surge, but the psychic exposure continued revealing truths that no mortal mind was meant to hold.

When all four companions reached the ward points, the final defender appeared: a vast incarnation of the ancient magic used to steal divinity from the Origin. The creature charged along the paths, trampling the companions and throwing them back into the void. Its arrival also revealed that Vladyn’s army was steadily losing ground against four opposing planar forces. The party did not have long to act.

Shadra created a Fey Sinkhole to daze and restrain the final defender, preventing it from freely disrupting the group. The others returned to their assigned points and coordinated their actions. Further insight revealed that merely standing upon the wards was insufficient. If they truly wanted the First Witness, all four had to enter the memory simultaneously from the four separate points.

The companions readied themselves.

At the signal, all four jumped.

The psychic force struck them together, but they survived. Their coordinated entry ruptured all four wards. In doing so, the companions replaced the ancient seals with themselves.

They became the new protectors of the memory.

They became the First Witness.

The party now carries the truth that the gods stole their divinity and erased the bargain from history. Vladyn still does not know that truth; as an immortal being, he cannot comprehend it directly. If the companions surrender it to him, however, the knowledge could elevate him beyond his present power and allow him to challenge both gods and archdevils.

The session—and this chapter of the campaign—ended with the companions facing three possible futures.

They could release the memory into the minds of every mortal in the world. No single power could then control it, and the gods would lose their unquestioned authority. A new age of mortal agency would begin, but the collapse of faith and divine order could plunge the world into chaos.

They could sacrifice their life force and memories to reforge the four wards. The world would remain stable, safe, and ignorant. The gods would retain their power, while the companions became the eternal silent custodians of history’s greatest lie and passed into legend.

Or they could accept Vladyn’s deal. They would surrender the memory to him and forget it themselves. Vladyn would bind the First Witness’s true name into an unprecedented infernal pact, becoming an untouchable planar broker capable of balancing gods against archdevils. The result would be a tense cosmic equilibrium whose future depended upon Vladyn’s intentions.

No final choice was made.

The party had reached the truth they had pursued across worlds, through Hell, and backward through time. They had survived the Shardhold of Silence, freed the one who remembered, broken the wards, and uncovered the lie upon which divine authority had been built.

For now, their story closes with the four companions standing at the center of history, holding a secret capable of remaking the world and deciding what price—if any—they are willing to pay for the truth.

Quick Recap

• The September 4 session resumed with the party sheltered in Zarnak’s tunnel beneath Kalton Manor.
• The opening spoken recap covered the August 28 session and was not part of the new session’s events.
• Shadra rejoined the group and remained the only companion who retained all the archive’s revelations.
• The party considered abandoning the forbidden door but decided they were already too deeply involved to ignore the First Witness.
• Rather than fight Shadowmire again, the companions attempted to negotiate.
• Krovuur emerged from the tunnel, surrendered his staff, and called for parley just before Shadowmire breathed acid.
• Shadowmire accepted the gesture and described Krovuur as crazy, stupid, or possibly brave.
• The dragon demanded that the party explain its own purpose before he answered their questions.
• Krovuur revealed that the companions knew of Avarice and the First Witness.
• The party learned that Shadowmire did not know exactly what the First Witness was, but understood its context and danger.
• Shadowmire had once been something other than a dragon and had bound himself to the ruins through immensely ancient magic.
• His power was connected to the Vitriol Fulcrum, Nyssglass, the wards, and the same unknowable magical source.
• The rest of the party emerged from the tunnel as a deliberate show of trust.
• Shadowmire’s attendant produced the missing journal of Arrol Kalton.
• The journal explained that the Kaltons inherited responsibility for guarding something they did not understand.
• Repeated notes warned, “Never open the black door.”
• Later writings questioned whether the door had already been opened.
• The name Avarice repeatedly appeared in the journal as though intruding upon the writer’s thoughts.
• Avarice was identified as “the bearer who remembers what must remain forgotten.”
• The journal contained a sequence of four symbols: a mask, an eye, a mouth, and a hand.
• Reading the journal connected the party directly to an otherworldly source of knowledge.
• The companions saw a chained mortal surrounded by immense beings beneath a star-filled void.
• The beings declared that the knowledge could not die and therefore the world must be made to forget.
• The vision ended with the message, “Avarice remembers.”
• Vladyn appeared in the chamber without warning and immobilized or overawed Shadowmire with a glance.
• Vladyn warned that the guardians of the lie were arriving.
• The prison had been constructed so that only mortals could directly reach or alter its central truth.
• Vladyn had used the party to recover and activate something no immortal could access alone.
• When Vladyn asked whether they wanted to know the truth, the party answered yes.
• A black circular door appeared bearing the mask, eye, mouth, and hand.
• An ancient voice revealed that the beings worshiped as gods had stolen divinity from the Origin.
• The gods erased the bargain and rewrote history to present themselves as creators.
• Avarice discovered the original names and knew that the gods’ debt remained unpaid.
• The Vitriol Fulcrum was built to corrupt Avarice’s mind, while the black door was built to silence the First Witness.
• The door vanished, and Shadowmire exploded into blood and gore.
• Vladyn passed through the opening while divine, infernal, primordial, and otherworldly armies tore into the surrounding reality.
• The First Witness was revealed to be the living memory of the gods’ original theft of divinity.
• Avarice could not be killed because a contract bound him to that memory, so he was imprisoned and made unable to remember clearly.
• The party entered the manifested memory and found four ward points guarded by primordial creatures.
• The guardians included a spider-like creature, a floating fish-like entity, living fog, and other impossible forms.
• The surrounding void inflicted psychic damage and risked death, but also revealed hidden knowledge.
• The party learned that divine emissaries wanted the Crown of Nyssglass destroyed.
• A glimpse into Vladyn’s intentions revealed a contract bearing Avarice’s name and an empty place for a replacement.
• The mask represented the Vitriol Fulcrum and the already-broken first ward.
• The defenders repeatedly healed themselves from the center of the memory.
• The companions realized that defeating them was not the objective; they needed to reach all four ward points.
• Rae protected allies with his Aegis while Zarnak, Krovuur, and Shadra blinded, dazed, stunned, restrained, and wounded the defenders.
• The party used leaps, forced movement, teleportation, and deliberate exposure to the void to pass the guardians.
• Reaching a ward point granted a healing surge.
• Occupying all four points summoned a final defender embodying the ancient magic used to steal divinity.
• The final defender trampled the paths and pushed companions back into the void.
• The party learned that Vladyn’s army was losing ground against four opposing planar forces.
• Shadra used a Fey Sinkhole to control the final defender and protect the party’s positioning.
• The companions discovered that all four had to enter the memory simultaneously from the four ward points.
• At a coordinated signal, the entire party jumped.
• Their combined action ruptured the four wards and replaced them with the companions themselves.
• The party became the new protectors of the memory and collectively assumed the role of the First Witness.
• They now know that the gods stole their divinity and erased the truth from mortal history.
• Vladyn cannot comprehend that knowledge directly, but acquiring it through a contract could elevate him beyond gods and archdevils.
• The party was given three possible futures: reveal the truth to every mortal, sacrifice themselves to restore the wards, or surrender the secret to Vladyn.
• Revealing the truth would end the gods’ absolute authority and begin a potentially chaotic age of mortal agency.
• Restoring the wards would preserve the world and its divine order but cost the companions their lives and memories.
• Giving the secret to Vladyn would make him an immensely powerful planar broker and create a cosmic cold-war equilibrium.
• The party did not make its final choice.
• This chapter of the campaign ended with the companions holding the greatest secret in history and deciding what the world should become.