Hada the Black, a necromancer who was apprehended during an investigation of five missing orphans perished last night in the custody of city officials. The inquisitor who questioned Hada is certain that the children are still alive. After the characters hear of a contract offered by the city guard, they discuss the situation with the inquisitor. The tired and disheveled man smooths his crimson robes as he speaks.
The infamous Scorpion Prince ruled his domain centuries ago, but the lands are still desolate, a testament to his poisonous influence. His terrified subjects rejoiced in his death but also feared he would return if not interred properly. To ensure the prince's happiness in the afterlife and his tomb's security, his people erected a great monument and created trap-filled chambers to house and protect his body and his wealth.
"Ruins of the Umbral Tower" is a shadow fey hunter lair suitable for four or five 8th-level characters. This adventure can be completed in a single session. The ruined Umbral Tower rests deep in the forest, in a marshy region avoided by all but songbirds. Long abandoned by its original occupant, the tower features a malfunctioning gate that connects this place and the Plane of Shadow. The site serves as a base for a group of shadow fey hunters and their entourage of hounds and guardians. The hunters used the gate to travel from their home plane, and they now attempt to bag as many trophies and as much loot as possible before returning home when the gate reactivates.
Rumors fly up and down the river. People have vanished. Bodies have appeared, horribly mutilated. Death stalks the streets of Zobeck, and the people are afraid. Will you stop the killer before he strikes again, and again … and again?
Jobel the genie was famous for his bejeweled creations. But when a job to build a wizard’s tower took a turn for the worse, Jobel was imprisoned in a massive gemstone and buried deep within the earth. For one hundred years, the genie plotted his escape, using subtle magics, and slowly, he was able to work the gem toward the surface, where he’d be much more likely to be found and freed.
"House of Reeds and Whispers" is the lair of a pair of red hags, suitable for four characters of 8th level. This adventure can be completed in one session. Two red hag sisters recently exsanguinated an eccentric collector named Nahl Fry and took up residence in his swamp-side home. Liori and Ijith were seeking an artifact from the ancient city of Talitheos, the sunken stronghold of the red hags. They found the artifact, a pair of knitting needles made from blood-infused coral. in Nahl Fry's collection. The sisters yearn to understand how the artifact works, and so they are testing its dark powers against a nearby hamlet. They have knitted rapidly growing crimson reeds that funnel the blood of fauna and farm animals back to the house. The hamlet's leader, Galnas, hires the PC's to investigate. The party must press through the reeds, defeat the sisters' guardians, face the hags, and end the reedy infestation.
"The Alchemists' Guildhall" is a rusalka lair suitable for four or five 6th-level characters. This adventure can be completed in one session.
"Monument of the Thunderer" is a desert half-dragon lair intended to challenge a party of four 7th-level characters. Near the city state of Makuria, on a small island in the middle of the Green Nuria River, an immense stone sculpture of a dragon watches over the mighty Red Cliffs and the waterfall that pours off them. The monument was built by ancient worshipers of the Mharoti conqueror known as Zulatil the Thunderer, but now serves as a base of operations for a band of sinister thugs who call themselves the Red Cliff Raiders.
"Temple of the Deep Ones" is the lair of a group of deep ones and their god, suitable for four or five 7th-level characters. This adventure can be finished in one session. Ship captains report that a mysterious island has surfaced in the middle of a heavily trafficked trade route. Worse, ships that venture too close to the island are assaulted by a terrible creature and its servants. The island is disrupting trade throughout this part of the world, and several ships have already been lost. Unbeknownst to those that know of the place, the island rises at the will of Shar-Ngolyeth, a long-lost deity also known as That Which Lurks Beneath the Waves. The island is populated by a cult of deep ones and the beasts they have subjugated in the name of their dark god. The creature responsible for sinking ships is an aspect of Shar-Ngolyeth, a kraken. It is not meant for combat encounters; it's largely a plot device in this encounter.
Fane of Serpents is a titanoboa lair suitable for three to five 10th-level characters. A rocky butte covered with soaring ruins looms over the landscape. Legend describes it as a monument raised by an inhuman race that was wiped out centuries ago as retribution over foul practices. Locally, the spot is known as Titan’s Height. It rises starkly above the surrounding area, with four terraced plateaus. Each level is covered with the ruins of many-columned halls in an architectural style unlike anything else in the area. Their age and strangeness alone are enough to generate fearful legends. The stories grow worse when travelers or livestock disappear near Titan’s Height, which they sometimes do.
The city is plagued by an affliction being called "stone sickness" or "the gorgon’s touch" that disorients people and turns them to stone. Those with, or suspected to have, the affliction are being banished from the city. Some demand a cure, but most are just scared for their loved ones. A ravenfolk woman named Spinel Larkdon, mother to a child with the gorgon’s touch, begs the PCs for assistance. An artifact known as the Shroud of Tiberesh, capable of curing any sickness, is locked away within The Umbers' vault of spoils below the city. Passionate, she is determined to save her son and all those afflicted. Fortunately for the player characters, completing the Umber’s Gauntlet alive means they are not only entitled entrance into the cult, but also a single item from its vault of spoils. The PC's only hope of procuring the Shroud is by traversing this initiation Gauntlet – a series of traps, monsters, and puzzles devoted to the demon-god Nakresh - and claiming the Shroud as their prize.
Goblins have taken over the town you live in. They are ransacking each and every building. You must either convince them to leave, or take them down.
The people of Feycircle believed the fairy ring for which their town was named protected them from the encroaching sands of the Western Wastes. When the ring withered, they learned they were right. Feycircle’s dewflecked pastures and verdant forests succumbed to the Wastes in an instant. Feycircle sank deep into the sands and was soon occupied by a tribe of fanatical dust goblins, a herd of dogmoles, and the giant worms that caused the blight. The PCs may explore the keep—the only structure remaining in the dusty sinkhole now called the "Pit of the Dust Goblins." Inside the keep is an entrenched gatekeeper who can divulge that two children remain in town, imprisoned by the goblins. The dust goblins have summoned and imprisoned a selang—a shadow fey—inside the blighted fairy circle. The goblins fear open combat and have laced the sunken keep with traps, and would sooner parley than fight.
Lo! The corpse of poor, departed Scholar Zubayr, washed up on the shores of the River of Sand, lies in the charnel house…destined to become dinner for a cult of cannibals. Though distasteful in the extreme, this isn’t your concern—except that Princess Karima Gamila, the most beautiful gnoll in Per-Bastet, has begged you to rescue her friend’s body and help discover his fate. Still unmoved to action? Know then, adventurer, that the Scholar was hot on the trail of lost treasure! If you can claim his body from the cult and decipher the clues he left behind, long-buried riches and powerful magic might be yours. But nothing is simple in this city of dark wonders: others converge on the charnel house in pursuit of wealth, vengeance, or both. Can you out-fight and outwit vile cultists, undead catfolk, a cunning werecrocodile gnoll, and the deadly secrets that lie buried beneath the River of Sand? Set in the city of Per-Bastet in the Southlands Campaign Setting, it is meant for play either as the thrilling sequel to Cat and Mouse, or as a standalone treasure hunt! Also available in Pathfinder format.
The earth churns in a city graveyard, revealing not the undead but an ancient war machine. A great iron transport bores its way up from depths below, disrupting funeral rites and sending the citizens into a panic. With an opportunity to investigate and reap the rewards of bravery, the party closes on the graveyard. There they discover that the pilots of the strange vehicle are soulless automatons who have spent an eternity burrowing toward the battlefront of a long-forgotten war. In this action-packed and gritty adventure, the party must battle automatons, breach the iron transport, and put down its mad and malfunctioning commander.
The follow up to the ratfolk warlock lair, A Rat Among Us, Part One. It is suitable for four or five 3rd-level characters. The lairs can be run separately or together as one longer adventure. The Demon Lord of Rats is making his play for control of the city. Will our stalwart adventurers find the source of his power and thwart him?
Navigate court intrigue in the Shadow Fey realm to save the city of Zobeck. Earn status in the court through duels, quests, and negotiation to survive the machinations of factions and nobles to gain freedom for the city of Zobeck from the King and Queen of the Shadow Fey. Also available in 5e format.
The first part of two lairs—a ratfolk warlock lair and a rattok demon lair—suitable for four or five 3rd-level characters. The lairs can be run separately or together as one longer adventure. Demon Lord of Rats is looking to corrupt the city with his influence. They have grown in number and now seek to infiltrate and influence the guilds of the city.
The trouble began several weeks ago when a duergar excavation team went to work in a long-abandoned temple. Drawn to the temple by stories of riches and artifacts, the duergar hired several giants as laborers before cracking the temple’s sealed doors. The largest of the giants, a loathsome Thursir mutant named Huppo, used his acidic vomit to expedite tunneling into the temple’s collapsed hall of worship. Then, Huppo found the horn—an unusual instrument made from a single piece of stone, with a mouthpiece so intricate only a master carver could have made it. The horn became the giant’s obsession. Seeing only the horn’s potential sale value, the dwarves demanded Huppo turn it over to them, but Huppo refused. To force compliance, the dwarves stopped feeding the gluttonous brute, but Huppo had already found his own source of food; in deep areas of the temple, worms were chewing out of the rocks, and Huppo ate them by the fistful. He also played the horn. Then, after several days of blowing the horn and devouring the strange worms, Huppo released a belch so noxious the dwarves had no choice but to lock him in a sealed chamber and carefully consider their next move. The horn’s call, however, had caught the attention of passing nomadic orcs. They set up camp outside the temple entrance in the hope of finding the horn and its player. That’s the current situation at the temple: the giant refuses to stop blowing the horn and belching out deadly clouds of stomach gas; the dwarves are frightened and edgy while their leader is obsessed with malevolent whispers; orcs are threatening to overrun the place; and the population of worms grows steadily as something awakens deep in the stone beneath the sanctuary of belches.
A welcoming desert oasis offers respite from the searing wasteland, but this paradise has perils. Castle of Sand is suitable for three to five 4th level characters.