In tonight's game, it picked up where the previous game left off, with the group receiving a gift from another plane that may have been the home of the D&D group's previous campaign and therefore their former characters.

One of the gifts was a belt with giant runes carved into it. It said "the strength of the storms." They also saw a staff, intricately carved in runes. The last gift was a pure crystalline dust that could be used for alchemical purposes in exchange for any material.

Rhylaed spent the next little bit identifying the items to find out what they were. He told Taria what they were, and then the two of them talked a bit about the flower that had grown as well as whether or not they should bring the Wayward Cartographer's Society there considering how much history was to be found.

Siân and Tornech were both there and letting the two of them talk. Thalrysian semi-listened to the conversation while distractedly looking in the direction that Uri had left in.

Eventually, Thalrysian suggested getting some rest. Taria went over to the statue that was once Kovar and settled down on the ground in front of him to meditate for a while. Remnants of his recent emotions were running through the ley lines, and she could tell that he had mostly been tired but there had been something else at the end when he'd met the group.

Another item then started to appear, a gift from the other plane. It elongated into the form of a shovel, with a note attached: "Do not sell this." The group discussed why on earth someone might have sent that.

Rhylaed and Taria went off to search the room a bit, looking for anything helpful. They found a lot of general knickknacks and general living supplies that were much too large for any of the group to use as they were designed for giant hands. They did pocket some tea, an oversized children's toy, and a giant board game.

Taria found a chisel with runes inscribed on it. One rune said "Warm" and one rune said "Cold." Once per dawn, it would allow someone to carve a temporary giant rune into stone to create a pocket of warmth or cold.

Rhylaed found a very dense stone with runes carved all over it. It appeared to be humming with ley line energy, and when he spent the time to identify it he quickly realized that it was a waystone seed, shaped by Kovar and never planted. It would take an hour-long ritual, but if it was set into the earth or stone then overnight it would grow into a fully active waystone that was permanently joined to the network.

Taria and Rhylaed were both very excited to realize just what it was they'd found, and Taria started shouting for Thalrysian because she knew it would be important to him. She handed it to him, and his oath stone started humming loudly just from him holding it.

Thalrysian told him what little he knew about the waystones, that they kept the darkness at bay and that restoring them protected his lady who was inter planar.

They pulled Siân into the conversation, although she was confused as to why because she might be a cleric but she didn't even entirely know where her powers came from so she was far from being properly religious.

After some back-and-forth, they decided to stay there for the night to figure out what to do next. Tornech volunteered to go check on Uri to be sure he hadn't wandered out of the mountain or anything since he'd been gone for a bit. Rhylaed told Tornech to let him know that they were closer to bringing Zhea back now that they had the alchemical dust that had been sent.

By the time Tornech made it to the first chamber where the group had entered the mountain, Uri had come back inside although Tornech could tell that he'd been outside at some point. He'd clearly fallen asleep by accident.

From that height, Tornech could see the Scorched Basin far in the distance. He settled in to rest beside Uri for a bit.

Rhylaed went to try to attune to the staff that had been sent over. Once he did, a very dry voice was in his head, and the staff introduced itself as Magister Ashquill Veyl, Ninth Archivist of the Arcanum's Obsidian Athenaeum, Keeper of the Unsolved Indices. Rylaed could call it Ashquill. It wasn't thrilled to be in another plane.

The two of them started in on a very long conversation about the differences in the stars between the two planes.

Siân eventually went searching for Tornech and Uri, waking them up and convincing them to come back downstairs to join the rest of them. She also filled Uri in a little on what he'd missed, since he hadn't even been there when the talking to other planes happened.

They all headed back down, where Rhylaed confirmed that he was talking to his staff and not himself much to everyone's relief. They then talked some about the plans for bringing back Zhea.

Later in the evening, Taria gave Uri the tea she'd found as she thought he would appreciate it. Then she asked Taria to lend him the shield she made him out of the beetle carapaces. She mixed together some alchemical properties into a runic pattern to try to make some changes to it over the course of that night.

Rhylaed practiced some of his newer spells, including the ability to teleport as he hadn't tested it before and he'd bragged to the group that he could do it so he wanted to be sure it was fine. Before he turned in for the night, Ashquill told Rhylaed that the aurora in the sky over the mountain was the essence of Kovar. The two of them talked a bit.

Everyone eventually settled in to get some sleep for the night.

The next morning, they briefly discussed having Rhylaed attempt to teleport them to their destination in the Scorched Basin, but Ashquill highly suggested they not do that. The staff had spent the night reading the ley lines, and it got the impression that the ones from the north were static-y in a bad way.

They decided to use mounts to travel instead. Rhylaed, Thalrysian, Taria, and Uri created some steeds for them to use, and they set out into the Scorched Basin.

As the day proceeded, the temperature started to rise as they descended from the mountains. It grew warmer and warmer as they headed through a brief section of green before reaching the desert.

They quickly realized that the heat was coming from the ground itself, not the sun. There were vents of mud that bubbled and occasionally geysers.

Rhylaed and Taria quickly realized that the ley lines there were broken. Something was wrong with that entire land.

They wanted to travel as quickly as possible, all things considered, so Rhylaed created some Oil of Slipperiness to put on all of the horses so that they could travel quickly since it was difficult terrain.

Rhylaed studied the terrain as they started traveling, taking in everything that he could. Ashquill chimed in occasionally with commentary.

That night, they lucked out and found an almost calm place to camp for the night. As the sun set, they saw an orange glow in the sky far in the distance. The stars were also extraordinarily bright.

Unlike a normal desert, it stayed warm at night as the heat was coming from the ground rather than the sun. Taria used the runic chisel she found to keep them cool.

Siân studied Light in Shadows a bit searching for any references to the Scorched Basin. She found a story about a trader being asked why the lakes boil there, and the response was "the basin has a landlord, and its rent is heat."

Then everyone went to sleep for the night.

The next morning, several of the group noticed that Taria seemed somewhat... off. She'd rolled out of the cooler area back into the heat in her sleep. Her knuckles looked dry and a bit scaly, and her teeth were somewhat pointed. There was some conversation about it, and Rhylaed gave Tornech a magic item to let him see what had happened the night before.

Taria talked about hearing music from another camp at some point in the past, like someone was playing drums. Tornech saw her skin start to change in the night, just before she rolled into the heat. He didn't hear any drumbeat, though.

Everyone took a closer look, and they got the impression that whatever was happening to her, she didn't seem fully mammalian. Reptilian, maybe? It seemed likely since she seemed to deal with the heat much better than the rest of them.

Around that point, Rhylaed tried to get something out of the bag of holding only to realize it seemed like a normal bag. There was no way to get anything out of it.

They talked to the people inside the bottle, who told them that they seemed fine - no sign of scales or pointed teeth - but the door had disappeared.

Siân suggested that maybe they avoid any type of teleportation magic since things seemed to not be working correctly. The staff agreed with that statement in Rhylaed's head, who shared its warning.

The group set out, with Siân trying to flip through her book for anything else that might be helpful information-wise. They ended up coming to a giant mesa, with melted obsidian along its side that had runes carved in it.

Taria read them and realized that they were Draconic runes that simply said: "Territory of the sovereign."

When she said "sovereign," it felt right on her tongue. There was a hint of pleasure at saying the words. Which seemed like a bad thing.

Rhylaed put 1 and 1 together and realized that only a red dragon would call itself sovereign, and anything calling the wasteland they were in "home" was probably ancient.

Without warning, Taria suddenly transformed some more - becoming more noticeably dragon-like in her appearance.

At that point, a bunch of kobolds started shooting fire arrows at the group out of nowhere.

And that's where we left off.