Opening Scene: Emerging from the Wells
As you stumble from the shattered well-chamber, you are met with the crisp light of dawn. But the morning does not feel like renewal, it feels like collapse. The earth shakes beneath your boots in short, violent bursts. A deep tremor hums under the cobblestones like a distant roar that never ends. Screams echo from the distant streets. Somewhere, a bell tolls out of rhythm, an alarm or a death knell, it’s unclear.
Velara looks at Momeline with an urgent look in her eyes and says: “We can’t stay here. Not with that hammer. There’s a smugglers’ tunnel that runs beneath the Sunmarket. If we reach it, we can vanish.”
Scene 1: Protest at the Emerald Bank
Description:
The crowd hits you like a wall of sound, chants rising from protestors gathered outside a pristine Emerald Bank office building. They wave signs, raise voices, stand together in defiance. But the moment the ground shakes again, you hear a loud crack from the bank walls. It’s just stone shifting, but the guards don’t wait.
One of them shouts—
Guard Captain: “They’ve planted explosives! Archers, fire!”
From the rooftops, guards begin loosing arrows, and panic erupts. Protesters scream, scatter. A woman falls to the ground clutching a child.
Velara (yelling to the group): “We need to move—now! Help if you can, but we can’t get bogged down here!”
Scene 2: The Dead Rise
The world stills for just a moment. A garden square. Rows of flowers, quiet graves, wind chimes.
Then, A snap like breaking branches, and the soil erupts.
From shallow graves and flowerbeds, hands claw through the dirt. You see a corpse in a baker’s apron rise, face twisted in silent agony. Another figure lurches forward with rusted armor, long since buried.
Lyrian’s voice is hollow as he stares.
Lyrian: “The dead… they’re rising. This ritual, it’s already changing the city.”
Scene 3: Cult Scouts in the Alleys
You move through narrow stone corridors, the buildings leaning in like eavesdropping giants. Then—shadows move above.
Crossbows. Blades. Hooded figures silhouetted on rooftops.
One of them shouts—
Cult Scout: “They’re here! The hammer-bearers! Dead or alive!”
A lantern crashes at your feet, fire licking across the stones.
Velara (ducking behind a crate): “They were waiting for us. Someone told them. Go fast—kill if you must!”
Tactical Detail:
The cultists are not afraid to die—they will leap from buildings, throw themselves into spells, and attempt to grapple or detain.
Scene 4: Ritual in the Square
You hear chanting—low, rhythmic, dark.
Three cultists circle a halfling woman, her arms bound by shimmering chains of shadow. A ritual circle glows beneath her, pulsing with sickly light. She sobs, barely audible over the spellwork.
One of the cultists hisses:
Cultist: “The Offering is ready. Let her soul feed the tide.”
Velara (tense): “interrupt that ritual, or she dies.”
Halfling (if saved):
Name: Dessie Pindlehop
Background: A former tea merchant’s apprentice who’s been caring for her ill mother. She was taken after overhearing cultist plans in a tavern cellar.
Dessie (shaking, post-rescue): “I—I just wanted to get herbs for me mum. They said I heard ‘too much.’ They killed mum and… ” she drops the herbs she was carrying to the ground and starts crying.
If the party asks, she can provide intel about nearby cultist movements: She heard they let Sandwalkers and hobgoblins into the city.
Scene 5: Lieutenant Marvos
A familiar figure stands amid the rubble—Lieutenant Marvos, armor dented, blood trailing from his brow. He levels his sword at you, recognition flashing in his eyes.
Marvos: “You’ve got the hammer. I should drag you back to the Obsidian Hall in chains.”
(He pauses, glancing around at the chaos unfolding.)
“But I know what I saw this morning. Corpses walking. The sky bleeding magic.”
(His voice lowers.) “Talk fast. I need a reason not to stop you here.”
Scene 6: Sandwraith in the City
A boom rocks the street—sand floods from shattered buildings like a river of dust. Massive sandwalkers, titanic constructs of stone and grit, tear through the plaza, smashing stalls and walls alike.
On a nearby rooftop, a shifting figure of dust and darkness watches.
A Sandwraith—its voice like wind through a crypt—speaks:
Sandwraith (telepathically): “This city has outlived its usefulness. It will now serve the master.”
Tilly (horrified): “They’ve breached the city’s wards. Sandwraiths… they’re not supposed to be here.”
Scene 7: Hobgoblins and Surrounded Civilians
Smoke rises from a battle ahead—screams, clashing steel. In the center of the road, a dozen civilians cower behind overturned carts, surrounded by guards forming a desperate circle.
Charging toward them: a unit of hobgoblins, banners flying, weapons ready.
One shouts:
Hobgoblin Warlord: “Take the hammer! Kill the rest!”
The guards tighten their line—some already wounded. You hear a child sobbing beneath a blanket.
Guard Captain (yelling): “We hold here! If you can fight, help us—if not, get these people out!”
The Escape
As the party reaches the entrance to the smugglers’ tunnel
Lyrian Brightwind stands just outside the tunnel mouth, watching flames rise in the distance. His face is set, but his eyes are tired.
Lyrian: “Go. I won’t run. This is still my city, even if it’s burning.”
Velara (stepping forward): “Lyrian, don’t be a fool. You’ve done all you can. Come with us, please.”
Lyrian (softly): “Someone has to stay behind and try to hold the pieces together.”
(He meets her eyes, steady.)
Lyrian: “Keep the hammer safe. Don’t let what we lost be for nothing.”(She turns away, voice cracking.)
Velara: “Let’s go.”