In the far future of Eberron, the people of the world were vanishing, and the great forest that covered the continent of Khorvaire was growing dark and receding. Jackie, a warforged mystic and time traveler, had returned from the distant past. He was one of the band of brave Chrononauts who had leaped back in time by eating the fruit of the Delorean Tree. Their mission was to stop a rogue time traveler named Stephen who had gone back in time to change history.
This is a summary of the second adventure in The Branches of Time Season 2, which took place on January 24 at The Dice Latte. A new band of chrononauts (Teromil, Ronald, Jackie, Saladin, and Vaelen) travel to the distant past in pursuit of a rogue time traveler who is plotting to change the course of history.
Stephen was a shifter archdruid from the future who had returned to the year 832 YK at the height of the Silver Purge, an inquisition launched by the Church of the Silver Flame to battle the lycanthropic plague that swept the land. The shifters, being suspected of carrying the plague, were targeted as well, but now Stephen planned to fan the flames of paranoia and suspicion so that all the shifters would perish. He was driven by the belief that eliminating the seed of the lycanthropes and shifters – his own ancestors – in the past would prevent a greater calamity in the future.
Jackie and his companions, Targaryen the dragonborn sorcerer, and Muthak the goliath fighter, had discovered Stephen’s plot. They stopped one of his schemes – the elimination of a shifter community in the town of Aruldusk – but they failed to apprehend him. Instead, Stephen’s soul had possessed the body of Bennin Silverclaw, a powerful shifter warrior and inquisitor of the Silver Purge. Now, Jackie returned to the future to find that the world that he knew was vanishing before his eyes.
Jackie rushed to the Delorean Tree, where he found the keeper of the tree, an ancient druid artificer named Dr. Morris, and a ragtag band of survivors. These few had arrived in the vault of the Delorean Tree, which was shielded from fluctuations in the timestream, before they were swallowed up by the temporal waves. They had not yet vanished, but the vault would only protect them for a time. Soon, history would be rewritten and even those within the vault would be affected by the new timeline. For these few survivors, time was running out.
Dr. Morris asked for volunteers among those within the vault to return to the past and stop Stephen from altering the timeline. Jackie stepped up to make another attempt at completing his previous mission. He was joined by four new chrononauts who would enter the bodies of four adventurers in the past. They were Teromil Lauredu, a dragonmarked half-elf monk and disciple of the Sun Soul who bore the Mark of Detection; Ronald, a human mystic and scholar from the Order of Immortals; Saladin, a half-elf hexblade warlock of the Raven Queen and a planeswalker from another realm; and Vaelen, a Valaes Tairn elf and Keeper of the Past.
In addition to their main objective, each time traveler had their own reasons for volunteering to join this dangerous mission. Jackie wanted to learn the reasons for his own creation, for he had never seen another warforged like himself, and he leaped into the body of an advanced construct from among the relics of ancient Xen’drik. Teromil was an anthropologist who wanted to see firsthand the manners and customs of people who lived in the past. Ronald was also a scholar who wished to collection the lost lore and records of ancient times. Saladin was a wanderer who wished to travel across the different planes and periods of history. And Vaelen was a member of the Keepers of the Past, a sect of the Valaes Tairn warrior elves who worshipped their ancestors by emulating their glorious deeds.
The chrononauts chose Teromil, being the wisest among them, to guide them safely across the turbulent river of time. Teromil was given three apple-like fruit from the Delorean Tree. She ate one and began to have swirling visions that propelled her consciousness through time and space. The chrononauts joined Teromil, and their minds were hurled into the distant past. But even as their souls traversed the timestream, Teromil sensed that someone, or something, was watching them… and waiting.
The party arrived in the year 842 YK, ten years after the events of the mission undertaken by the previous team of time travelers. They hoped to gather crucial information about the changes in history that resulted from the previous mission. They went to the Library of Korranberg, the largest repository of knowledge on the continent which was operated by the gnomes of Zilargo. Here, Teromil and Ronald each had a bag of holding that belonged to them waiting to be retrieved from a special vault in an enclave of House Kundarak, the dragonmarked house of warding and masters of the banking industry.
The rest of the party explored the vast halls of the library in search of information. Jackie looked for the whereabouts of his previous companions, Targaryen and Muthak. He found their contact information in the Sending Stone Directory. Saladin read the Korranberg Chronicles for news pertaining to the Silver Purge from the past ten years and the incident at Aruldusk in 832 YK. He found that there had been an upswing in terrorist attacks by shifters and lycanthropes in the last decade. They seemed to be organized by a mysterious shifter who had silvered claws, a description that matched Bennin Silverclaw.
Vaelen saw that his companions had already found some useful information, so he looked for stories about his own ancestors. In books of lore, he read about the legends of Aeren, the savior of the elves during the Age of Giants thousands of years ago. It was said that the elves during that time were the slaves of Giants, but Aeren and a hundred of the bravest elves sacrificed themselves in a ritual of immense power so that their people could escape. In a great exodus, they arrived at the land which they called Aerenal, and they enshrined the memory of their martyrs in the halls of Undying Court.
When they were finished, the three companions gathered at the House Kundarak enclave to meet Teromil and Ronald. But the anthropologist and the scholar were nowhere to be seen. The vault custodian, a dragonmarked dwarf of House Kundarak, was not present either. And the vault door was ajar. Inside the vault, they found two bags of holding, the items that Teromil and Ronald had come to retrieve. But where were their owners now?
The chrononauts asked a passing gnome librarian if she had seen their companions who had visited the vault. However, the librarian had not seen them. In fact, she seemed oddly perplexed by the vault itself, for she had never seen such a vault in this part of the library. She looked inside and picked up one of the bags of holding. When she opened the bag and peered into it, a slimy tentacle emerged from the bag and wrapped itself around the hapless gnome, pulling her inside. She barely had time to shriek. In an instant, she was gone.
Now the chrononauts new that their companions had fallen into a trap. Someone, or something, had tracked them across the river of time and laid an ambush for them. They had no choice but to investigate the bags of holding and search for their friends. Saladin tied one end of a sturdy rope to a column inside the library and the other end around himself. Then he leaped inside one of the bags of holding.
Saladin found himself crushed inside a dark, slimy tunnel. The spongy walls were yielding yet tough, and they were covered with a hot, sticky mucus that burned like acid. The gnome librarian was nowhere to be seen, but Saladin surmised that she had not survived the entry. He delved into the tunnel, and he soon found Teromil and Ronald lying unconscious on the floor where the acid was burning them alive. Swiftly, Saladin grabbed them and tugged on the other end of the rope. The three companions were pulled out by Jackie and Vaelen, but not before a purple tentacle had grabbed hold of Teromil’s leg.
As the adventurers were pulled out of the bag of holding, covered in acidic slime, the bag was inverted, and there came forth a gigantic worm whose grotesque flesh looked like it had been turned inside out. Around its toothy maw, there were many large tentacles that swayed in the air. The horror of the creature repulsed the chrononauts, but there was something more. Inside their minds, they felt an immense wave of agony and terror. The sensation emanated from the creature and surged across the library like a shockwave. All the gnome librarians in the vicinity, who had been standing in dumbstruck horror at the sight of the worm, were struck dead in an instant by the psychic blast. The chrononauts were strong enough to withstand the worm’s assault, but they knew that they were in grave danger.
The heroes gathered all their strength – with sword, sorcery, and powers of the mind – to battle the worm. It proved to be a fearsome adversary with powerful psionic defenses. But Vaelen and Saladin’s blades struck true while Jackie and Ronald harried it with their psychic attacks. Somehow the chrononauts gained the upper hand. The monster turned to escape from the library and went on a rampage, knocking over rows of books and scrolls and crushing them under its mucus and acid covered belly. And in the chaos of battle, a stray bolt of magical flame launched by one of the chrononauts was deflected by the worm’s hide and struck a row of ancient tomes, setting them ablaze.
Ronald looked at the burning books in horror and dismay.
“Noooo!” he shouted. “We must save the library!”
The Chrononauts tried to divert the worm’s path and force it out of the library. Seeing that the worm would leave even more destruction in its wake, Teromil pursued it. Discovering the weak points upon its hide, she jabbed it with her fingertips in many places. Bright flashes of light appeared across the worm’s segmented body, and the wounds that had already been made by Teromil’s companions split open and spilled the worm’s hot entrails upon the library floor. The worm collapsed in ruin. Soon, it was melted by its own stomach acid. Within minutes, there was nothing but a pool of slime and mucus. The worm was no more.
Gnome custodians and guardians of the library arrived in time to see the chrononauts in a hall of destruction, amid collapsed bookshelves and burning books. They hurried to put out the flames and salvage what books they could, but many ancient books and scrolls were lost. The heroes tried to explain what had happened and pointed to the vault as proof of their testimony, but the vault had vanished. In fact, the librarians seemed to not remember a vault having been there at all.
The gnomes blamed the chrononauts and held them accountable for the destruction of the priceless tomes in the library. They were apprehended and held by the local magistrate. A few days later, they would be put on trial for arson and wanton destruction of property. They were offered a chance to contact their legal counsel or representative, but they were only allowed to send a single message by sending stone.
The chrononauts sent a message to one of their predecessors and Jackie’s former companion, Targaryen the dragonborn sorcerer, informing him of the party’s mission and their current plight. Then the day of the trial was upon them. Each of the chrononauts pleaded their case and tried to convince the gnome judge presiding over the trial of their good intentions. They told the story about the vault, the worm, and the fierce battle that ensued. But their pleas fell upon deaf ears. The gnomes, both the prosecutor and the judge, seemed to care little about their fantastic story, which could hardly be believed.
“So, you’re telling this court that a giant worm popped out of a bag from a vault that no one else has seen and ran amuck in the library for no apparent reason?” said the prosecutor, repeating their testimony in a mocking tone.
“Who ever heard of such a thing! Your honor, these adventurers are clearly mad. But that does not absolve them of their heinous deeds or the damage done to our great library. For the loss of so many priceless tomes, they ought to be thrown into the Dreadhold for the remainder of their natural lives. Must I remind you of the library’s extensive list of damaged and destroyed works which I am happy to read aloud once more…”
“No, no, you’ve quite made your point, prosecutor,” yawned the judge in a weary voice.
“If there is no other testimony and the defendants have no legal counsel to represent them, I will now pronounce their sentence. This court finds the defendants guilty of arson and wanton destruction of property in the Great Library of Korranberg and the loss of priceless tomes from the library’s collection which we will not list again. I hereby declare that they are to be…”
Before the judge could finish his sentence, the doors of the courtroom opened. A tall dragonborn clad in fine robes entered the hall, but his back was stooped and he clutched an oaken staff which he used to steady himself. It was Targaryen, the former Chrononaut. For Jackie it had been mere moments since he had last seen the dragonborn sorcerer in the year 832 YK. But Targaryen looked aged, as if decades rather than years had passed since their last parting. The dragonborn stepped up to the bench at the front of the courtroom and whispered into the judge’s ear. The gnome judge, his expression even and unchanging, touched his gavel upon the block.
“This case is a mistrial. The defendants are free to go.”
The prosecutor blustered and protested, but the judge was already calling for the next case. As Targaryen led the chrononauts out of the courtroom, Jackie greeted his old friend.
“It’s good to see you, Targaryen. But what has happened to you? You are much changed.”
“I see that you too have found a different body,” Targaryen replied in an aged, raspy voice. “Much has happened since I last saw you. I am no longer young Targaryen. I am called Lord Blackfire now. There is much we must speak of, but for now, let us depart. There are many eyes upon us, and time is not on our side.”
To be continued…