The information that the gnome gave us led us to a barren part of the mountains. The cold weather and the snow started to become so dangerous that it became impossible to rest properly outside. Luckily, it did not take long before we found the origin of this evil and unnatural weather.
The wizard's tower was covered with ice as if a giant cascade had fallen on it before freezing. It seemed lifeless, but very soon we discovered that some evil ice creatures were guarding its entrance. They proved to be very difficult to defeat and I would have been in serious trouble (even more serious that usual, I mean) if Vistra had not helped me with her healing powers.
After accessing the entrance hall, we decided to explore the tower itself before further investigating the tunnels beneath it. The source of the cold seemed to come from the top of the tower, so it seem obvious to go straight up.
The tower was empty except for the lifeless body of a halfling, but we found a lot of information about a wizard that lived here and was doing some kind of evil investigation. In his logs he talked about getting supply of something to continues his investigation.
As we went up to the tower's roof, we finally found the source of the cold.
It was a big cristal encased in a dome of ice above the tower. Inside the dome there was a chest with a portal to somewhere horrible and a frozen monster. As soon as we got up on the roof, evil ice beings tried to attack us coming through the portal. They were pretty weak but they were many and they kept us busy until Sariel used one of her best tricks to block the portal. Unfortunately, by the time we realized that the portal was blocked, a new, BIG monster had had time to detach itself from the ice dome.
It looked like a giant frozen scorpion with lots of tentacles and spikes and ugly parts everywhere. It occupied most of the dome as it stood on the center of the tower's roof, perched on the chimney. We did not have a lot of space to manouver and its tentacles were very long.
Although the monster was very powerful, it became obsessed with killing Tyrion and that way we could prevent it from attacking my sister or the cleric, so the combat was going pretty well for us.
However our luck did not last long and the monster finally was able to grab Tyrion with two of its tentacles and lifted him into the air.
It was at that moment that Tyrion decided to use his famous and very appreciated teleporting ability. He had used it before to help others, and we all respected him for it. He had helped an elven mother and his baby during the attack on our village and he had freed Vistra from a giant spider's web. Every time before, he had teleported someone out of harm's way to put himself in danger instead.
This time, he teleported out of the ice monster's grip. It worked wonderfully, with only a small detail to regret.
By teleporting himself to safety, that cowardly sack of monkey dung teleported me into the ice monster's grab in his place.
The monster looked surprised for a second and then happily went on hitting me instead. When it realized I was too tough for it to kill swiftly, it simply rose me up on its tentacles and threw me down the chimney.
I fell three floors down to the kitchen, insulting Tyrion during the fall.
I could have taken a lot of damage, but my sister Sariel used another nice spell and I could start running up the tower without even a scratch.
It took me forever to climb back to the tower's roof, I had to climb threee floors and use a really slow magic elevator. However, I still had not finished insulting Tyrion when I stepped back into the roof.
The monster was almost dead by then, but it had managed to throw my sister Adolfiel the same way than me, down the chimney. When it saw me coming back to the fight, it grew afraid and ran away melting back into the ice dome.
As we stood there catching our breath, we realized that the cold coming from the crystal was so intense we could not resist it and would end up killing us. After trying to study it's properties, we saw it had been manipulated to alter it's powers and decided we could not control it, so we destroyed it.
The cold stopped being so dangerous so we had the time to think about the portal. It had not closed, but the evil beings did stop trying to come through.
We investigated a little more and found some Wyllflower near the portal, I think it is this stuff that was being supplied to the wizard. But why, I have no idea. So we just left the portal there, inside the chest, open to somewhere very cold and probably dangerous.
When we came down the tower, we were spent. Adolfiel had almost died with the combat and the fall. I also was so tired and so worried about Adolfiel that I decided to let Tyrion live another day and kill him the next morning.
A lot of questions remain open to me, as I go to sleep:
- What is the Wyllflower doing here?
- Where does the portal go to?
- What happened to the wizard?
- What are we looking for in the caves?
- Who manipulated the cristal?
- What is the frozen monster in the roof?
- What are the jewels in the walls of the corridors of tower?
- Where is Vistra going to find a new bodyguard?
