Dragons Conquer America Part 2 of 4

by | Nov 10, 2017 | LoTT Actual Play, SoundCloud MP3s

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/burninggames/dragons-conquer-america-season-1-the-dawn-of-a-new

Maria Milagros Castaneda – Kurt

Sebastian Alonso – Danny

Citlali – John

GM – Kevin

The entryway is dark but there are lighted censers casting a weak light below. While investigating the monstrous carvings it almost looks as if they are moving on their own, independent of the torchlight and in the distance they can hear a faint chanting. Entering the inner chamber the floor shifts revealing a descending staircase.

With no place to go but down, the ragtag party follows the stairway down.   As they reach the bottom the chanting seems to intensify as they can make out the name Haa’hiu. Before they can investigate, three more shadow demons materialize attacking fiercely if ineptly. Maria and Citlali are able to make fairly quick work of the shadows but not before one of them is able to touch Sebastian freezing him in place. When the last demon is killed its hold over Sebastian is broken.

Moving deeper into the temple the carvings on the walls tell the story of the temple.

This temple was not part of any city, but a stop for religious pilgrims and journeying kings or diplomats. Here, the ancient priests gave blessings, food and water to travelers, or made the trip themselves to sanctify a building or a new royal birth.  The head of the priests was Haa’hiu, the Chanter Man; they said it was him who first learned and taught others how to pray and give worship to the spirits and Saints of the otherworld. Once Haa’hiu fund a strange stone, the size of a large water gourd, but polished as a gem and heavy as a boulder. Haa’hiu ordered the stone brought to the temple, and it took three men to carry it back.

The first night after the stone was carried to the temple, thunder rumbled and the skies parted, and a dragon flew down to the pyramid. It was the Old Dragon, the Heaven Snake, which the Nahua call Mixcoatl; and he had come to talk to Haa’hiu, for the stone was one of his eggs and he wanted it back. Haa’hiu didn’t return the egg, but instead threatened the Old Dragon; he said that Mixcoatl and his kin should serve mortals from that day onward, or else Haa’hiu would kill the egg and Mixcoatl’s son.

The Old Dragon accepted the deal, but on the condition that mortals sacrificed their children to the dragons, just as Mixcoatl had sacrificed his child to mortals. Thus, the covenant was sealed, and the Mixcoatl dragons came down to human cities and blessed and protected them, and in exchange mortals fed them with their children. And the Dragon Stone, the Ancient Stone, remained in the temple as a witness of the pact; and the egg never hatched, and the dragon never was born, because it was a witness to the pact between dragons and mortals.

Continuing onward the path diverges into 3 separate paths. Maria hears the chanting loudest from the center so they cautiously move forward. They reach a stone slab with the symbols of a priest, a dragon and a precious stone. There seems to be no way to move the slab, but approaching it, they notice a small circular depression at the center that seems to be missing a disk shaped piece. Searching for clues on the wall they find more of Haa’hiu’s story:

One day there would come warriors, Haa’hiu knew; warriors that would break the covenant between dragons and mortals. When that happened the egg would break and the dragon would be born, and he would be like his father in glory and godlike might, and he would serve the warriors that came for him. So Haa’hiu didn’t die, but remained a living shell, a deathless guard, watching over the temple for centuries after centuries, until the age of the breaking of the covenant; until the warriors came that could reclaim the egg of Mixcoatl and summon the Child of the Old Dragon to battle. Both the left and right wall also show what appears to be pieces of the disk.

Assuming that the pieces will be found down the other pathways they retrace their steps and head down the right pathway into a chamber of white stone adorned with bas-reliefs of the four dragons on the walls: the Sun Dragon of the East, the Storm Dragon of the North, the Heaven Dragon of the West and the Earth Dragon of the South.

There are symbols asking visitors to kneel before the Four Dragons and as they move into the room Citlali sees a glint of gold near the ceiling. Once they all enter the room however, a stone slab blocks the entrance and the chamber begins to fill with water. Sebastian quickly kneels on one of the plates and the dragon carving opens its mouth and the water begins slowly draining out of the room.   Citlali and Maria follow suit and the water drains out of the chamber. Once the water drains, the stone slab in the archway raises freeing them from the room. Citlali is able to knock down the disk with his spear, acquiring one half of the key.

Returning to the leftmost path they follow it down to a room containing a large stone statue at the center. The statue, as tall as a man, represents an upright snake. The snake’s jaws hold a metal object that glints by the torchlight: an engraved half-disc made of gold. Sebastian notices that the floor tiles look different and that are slits in the walls. Citlali pushes on one of the plates and a dart flies out. He slowly makes his way to the statue pressing the tiles in front of him and knocks the disk out of the statues mouth onto the floor.

With both halves of the golden disk they return to the center door opening it to revealing a square chamber is flanked by four censers in full view, and so its monstrous carvings are both better illuminated and scarier than the rest of the pyramid. There’s a stone slab on the floor, just like the one on the entrance, except this one doesn’t slide on its own.

There’s a small, moon-shaped pedestal on a side. The codex states that when the moon turns red the priest will rise to find his death.

 

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Theme music created by Brett Miller http://www.brettmillermusic.net/