Preemptive Explaining

I've written a whole one post about the current matters of this campaign, and it made me realize just how much context a reader might be missing out on. Therefore, I want to fill in those readers (you) on what the group's goals are, exactly what they're adventuring for:

The single most important goal they're working towards currently is preventing the release of a demon from a magical prison. The story goes that about a thousand years ago, there was a horrible demon who was summoned from the netherworld. This demon went on a rampage and, by itself, destroyed several kingdoms and even changed the face of the continent. Granted, the changes to the continent were minor considering the size of the continent as a whole, but moving mountains around is still pretty impressive.

The demon's prison is empowered by five magical crystals, called "keystones". The first keystone they discovered was underneath Fort Siege, a small fortress I described when I told you of Dravis the illusionist. This keystone crumbled when they tried to remove it from the bowl topped stand it was found in. However, in this fort they found the key to the room. Upon entering the room and using the key, they realize they found a similar door before, and made plans to go back and see if this same key worked on it.

When they managed to get back to the ruins where they saw a similar door, they encountered a dragon sitting atop the building under which the mystery door lay. This dragon told them about the keystones, and that it was there to make sure nobody meddled with the one at that location. The dragon told them the legend of the mighty demon, and the purpose of the keystones. The dragon's presence also led to the imps who had been tricking the group to leaving on a semi-permanent basis. These imps led the group here under the impression the demon was a mutual enemy, and they told them that the keystones being whole and in place would lead to the demon's escape. For a while, the group did not know who to believe, but the dragon was the larger immediate threat, so it seemed wise to assume it was being honest. Also, imps are known for being tricky, while dragons are known primarily for being very powerful.

After this, they traveled north, to other locations they were told keystones were.One of those locations was another gnomish ruin called Denorgon. They had already been here once. This first time they were there, they found many of the robognomes deep underneath the city, in an underground base of sorts. They destroyed some, but a very small fraction of the total. Fortunately, most of them were not activated. Due to playing with the consoles and machines they found, they communicated with a colony of the robognomes somewhere they couldn't figure out, and those robognomes did something which resulted in Denorgon exploding. This was the fault of Titania, who claims the explosion was impending anyhow, though she has no reason to presume that's so.

Since Denorgon was nothing but a crater the second time around, they bypassed it. They followed a river to the next site claimed to have a keystone, Methogan, another gnomish ruin. Unlike the other gnomish ruins, this city still had a population. Of gnomes. They avoided the destruction of the rest of their kingdom not be designing and quickly implementing dangerous technologies. Instead, they simply abandoned the city and moved to an underground shelter. In the few hundred years since, the gnomes of Methogan developed an underground city, powered by "turbines run by natural underground rivers". The gnomish leaders were aware of the nature and purpose of the keystone they had with them, and told the group they will remain guarding it as they always have.

However, they told the group of a lair of doppelgangers who had been giving the gnomes trouble. The group traveled to the north, the source of the doppelgangers, and discovered their lair. In one of the most hilarious examples of my group's hi-jinks yet, they all fell pray to the very first trap. The very first trap was a pit covered by an illusion of floor. Those who fell into the trap found themselves in a prison cell. Once every last member of the group either fell on accident or on purpose (to follow the rest of the group), they all went to work breaking out of their cells. Long story short, they once again discovered the dwarven mage who had something to prove, and defeated him in combat. He retreated via magic, and they haven't seen him since.

The mysterious woman they found at Fort Siege was also found there, with her tongue cut out. The doppelgangers didn't have any reason to torture her, they were simply malignant. This led to a side quest involving finding diamonds of the proper value to regenerate her tongue with and it not happening because she disappeared and "Iron Mike" lost an arm, so they used it for that. It also involved their first encounter with a reoccurring antagonist; a succubus. The succubus took the form of the mystery woman while she was still around in an attempt to get the group to go after the keystones again.

At this point, they decide to go after something else the dragon had told them about. In one of the largest mountains in the known world, Mt. Sierra, there laid a gem. This gem was similar to the keystones, except it had one major difference. It accumulated arcane energies constantly. It may even be getting to the point that it's getting so powerful that it could create a disaster. Along the way, they found one of their friends, a bard by the name of "Iron Mike". He was face down in the dirt and almost dead, having an arm missing again. They healed him, but they could not give him his arm back. When they made it to Mt. Sierra and discovered where the gem was, Iron Mike took it and ran. The group was confused, but then he turned into the succubus they encountered before, and she flew off. Boy did they feel dumb for not noticing the Bard never used his bard powers or acted like Mike or had a transmutation spell on him!

And after this, they traveled on to Pergon. I look forward to not condensing the story so much in the future! I will have to have a few posts about the campaign setting of course. The pantheon of gods is a mystery to you all at the moment, for example. Anyhow, if you keep reading, or if you don't, I'll keep updating after each session.