Dungeons and Disasters

Alright so my players were all bards, new students at a renowned bard school. It’s sort of a boarding school, set on a big hill with miles of forest all around, old place with tons of history. And all new students tend to hear horror stories from the older ones at night - this particular story they heard involved the ghost of the man who founded the school.

Saint Barayas was part of the region’s legendary heroes, who overthrew the evil of the land and made it safe for people to live and grow. Barayas the Bard became jealous of the leader of the group, however! Wolfgang the Paladin was everything Barayas wished he could be: powerful and loved. Worse than that, however, Wolfgang had wed the daughter of the newly-crowned king, and had ascended to royalty. The wizard Eliniya became his court mage, and the rogue Irag-shul became his spymaster. But Barayas? There was no room for a bard in the royal’s court! Wolfgang had become absorbed in his responsibilities, and without realizing his error, cast out the fourth member of their group, dooming him to fade into the echoes of memory. 

But Barayas was not going to just be cast aside! He was not some disposable tool for the great warrior, no! He was mighty in his own way - and so he shed his flute, and found himself a new instrument. A mighty, jagged blade, fed by his spite and vengeance; with the side crafted into a harp. It was a cursed, unnamed blade, and into it went everything Barayas had become: anger and envy and rage. With his silver tongue and gentle songs on the strings, he seduced and charmed many into his grasp - and those who refused fell to his blade. Slowly, he crossed the land, leaving chaos and rebellion bubbling in his wake.

At long last, those who had called him friend heard of his misdeeds. They had long sworn to protect the land from evil, and that included from one of their own. They hunted the bard day and night, until at last, they found him cloaked in black and wielding his cursed weapon. Wolfgang, realizing that he was to blame for this, ordered his companions to stay back, prepared to challenge Barayas alone. Barayas cursed him, damned his name to oblivion, but he did not attack. Instead he fled, unable to face those he still loved, and no matter how they chased him he could not be caught. Upon returning home, Wolfgang learned that his bride and her father had been killed by a fatal poison slipped into her food, by one of Saint Barayas’ charmed subjects. Wolfgang became king, and though the weight of the loss weighed him down, he still ruled for many a year. And Barayas - the wicked, love-blind, envious Barayas, sealed himself away in a tomb, on the very grounds of the school he had created, left to be forgotten and rot away for the rest of time.

After that, the player characters decided to find Barayas’ tomb for themselves, two of them just wanting to know if he really existed, and the third craving the cursed weapon for himself in some odd desire to use it for good. Lyre the catkin (my sister) and Melody the high elf (sister’s friend) asked the teachers and were immediately forbidden from entering the forest on school grounds. Bongo the halfling (my nephew) snooped around in some offices and the library, and found a half-faded map and a depiction of the stone mausoleum. With this information, the three set off into the woods one night to find the tomb of the cursed bard. After some encounters with some forest baddies and a fog that mimicked their voices and turned them around in circles, the three found the ancient tomb, played the coded inscription above the door, and entered. 

Inside was a whole collection of traps and puzzles, such as: 

a room full of instruments, each of which had a mimic counterpart, along with another music puzzle that required specific instruments to be played

a duo of rhyming doors that tried to trick the players with puzzles, only for the players to discover the doors both led to the same room

a maze littered with pressure plates that played notes when stepped on, guarded by a massive but blind minotaur

a series of luck-based traps where a player could trade rolls with another, if they wanted to help/screw over their party members

etc. etc.

At last, they entered the room where Saint Barayas’ blade lay - however, so did Saint Barayas himself. Barayas was a beast in combat - slow but heavy hitting, a swarm of ragged black cloth, with a massive phantom mouth that cast vicious spells and could scream loud enough to stun them. They couldn’t injure him with any spells or weapons, and it was Lyre who eventually figured (on 1 hp) that they should just... talk to him. So she did. She told him her story, about the farm she came from and her family and best friend and ex girlfriend and pet cat, and while the other two called her crazy for ‘wasting her turn’ (even though talking is a free action??), lo and behold, it.. sort of worked! Barayas was listening to her, at least, and when he was doing that he wasn’t attacking. 

Bongo urged Barayas to tell his side of the story, and Barayas admitted he had been in love with Wolfgang, not his bride, and the betrayal had hurt him so badly he had wanted nothing but to make Wolfgang hurt like he did. He told them that for eons his mind had been just an angry cloud - but maybe he was wrong, to do what he did. He took his blade (much to Bongo’s disappointment), and swore he was going to use his time walking this earth to atone for his crimes and making sure nobody became like him. They each received his blessing, and brand new weapon-instruments perfectly tailored to them (Barayas just has a thing for weapons that can kill people, they guessed). They returned to school just as dawn was breaking, guided from the woods by a cluster of glowing lights, armed with new weapons, stronger and closer from their trials together - and promptly got detention.