Trina

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Trina Aliosh, also known as the Obsidian Dragon Knight, is a Tiefling Warlock from Breme.

Trina Aliosh.

About

Trina was born in 799PR (she was 26 to 28 years old during the Greedy Green events) in Breme. She is about 1.70 meters tall, with a slim built. She is dressed in rich gowns; rings adorn her red fingers and horns. Her long black hair is tied in a tight ponytail. The most distinguishing part of her appearance is a diamond necklace. Trina never shies away from a drink or scaring anyone she can to death.

And a warning, if anyone tries to touch her, or restrain her or do anything to her without her explicit permission, she can and will unleash her full power on them. No one is handling her like that again.

Family

Trina is from a large family, but she rarely talks of them. If she mentions some of them, it is her mother (after spitting on the ground) and her brother Tenor, who brings out more fond feelings in her.

Her uncle Elias brought her under his wing, only to find out he wanted to marry her off for political gain.

Powers

Close to her twenty seventh birthday, she walked into the Sparrow and Ink Shop. She commissioned a barrier tattoo to increase her weak defenses and mark permanently significant parts of her: otherworldly hands for the first spell ever used, the tears for all those that she had shed under her mothers care who did die by her first spell and the crown of madness for the moment, which revealed to her the potential of the dark power she has in her possession.

Her favorite attack is her dark blasts, close second her witch's black lightening.

Religion

Trina tolerates being around God believers, such as her travelling companion Arlin. They feel familiar... until they start preaching about Gods and duty towards them, in which case she just gets into a fight with them.

History

Trina was part of the Aliosh family. Unlike the other branch of her family, her great grandparents, grandparents, and parents took pride into having found God and being devout Paladins and Clerics in service of their God.

However, she, the youngest child of four, was a disappointment. She was neither physically strong enough, nor devout enough to keep up with the tradition of serving the Gods. According to her mother, the only logical step for her was to keep praying for guidance inside a monastery until she was of age to be married to a loyal knight. After all, she could still produce the next generation of good and holy warriors. With that in mind, her parents spend a lot of money to her education. She was taught to read, do basic calculus, embroider, stitch, draw, cook and dress herself up. The skill though that she excelled into was playing the lute. Trina would often play the lute for her family and their guests. People would travel to listen to her perform. She would lie if she ever claimed to not enjoy that attention, the stranger's praise and applause was never enough to cover for the lack of her family's affection.

Trina disliked her family. Growing up she only wished to have pretty dresses and expensive jewelry and most importantly, a say in how she lived her life. Besides, who cared about what the Gods wanted? Instead of listening to the morning prayers, she would draw moustaches on the statues of the Gods, earning her a thrashing. Instead of going to her classes, she would ski on the deep snow, earning her a pinch behind her ears. Instead of hiding her father's words, she would softly daydream of a powerful Tiefling sorcerer claiming her as his child, earning her a night without dinner.

A scene from the past: Trina attracts His favor for the first time

Bremen winter mornings meant darkness, cold winds with icy fingers going through your clothes and soft snow falling from the sky. Bremen winter mornings were as cold as the winter nights, but somehow even worse. They were worse cause the hope that came with the morning sun only lasted for a few brief moments, barely coloring the sky and then it was gone.

Trina hated winter.

Despite the crackling fire, the chill was not kept entirely away from her room. Her fingers were cold that fateful morning. She was supposed to practice the lute. Practice, practice, practice. That was all she did those days. She would practice the lute and then practice singing in front of the mirror till her performance was perfect. Trina never understood why her mom was obsessed with her performing, she admittedly looked down upon actors, singers and any performers.

Perhaps that was her way of punishing Trina for being born a girl and a sickly one at that. Small of frame and small of stature, nowhere close to the rest of her holy family. She would never be good enough for any of them, despite their prayers.

The tiefling maiden set her lute down and moved to the kitchen. A pot of warm coffee would help. It always did. She only had to reach there before her Mother realized that she was gone. But she should be fine, her whole family was on their morning prayers at the moment.

The one good thing about her training daily for hours was that she skipped praying sessions. They were all so obsessed about those little details. As if excessive praying would hide who they trully were. Where they came from.

Trina knew who they were and she hated them for denying her heritage. Cold mornings like those she could feel the cold hatred matching the weather.

The water with the coffee was boiling by now, the steam started escaping the pot. Trina allowed herself a childish moment, a child's play that cost her a beating. She raised her hands, extended her fingers and allowed herself to imagine the same thing as back then... Trina imagined that it was her fingers that shaped the steam into its chaotic patterns, it was her inner will and fire that weaved its passage through the pot.

She focused on the hot steam, not paying attention to anything else but her thoughts. Maybe what she shaped here was the result of her inner fire, finally being awoken, escaping from within her and engulfing all her world, to bring it to the ashes it deserved. Maybe, she finally could escape, she could finally travel and fullfil her dreams, and her *waving the cold deathly hands and the full sheer force of darkness itself...*

Trina took a step back. Her hands had been amongst the steam and still were icy cold, were the tips of her fingers black? No, it must have been the lightening casting shadows on them. They were their normal red color...

And yet her heart thumbed against her chest fast and hard. Her body was full of an unfamiliar energy, an agony, an intensity that came from within her but was not caused by her. There was someone else, something in this room with her... Why else did her whole body have goosebumps and chills as a breath blew on her?

She looked around but the kitchen was empty. No one was here. Silly, her, of course. Everyone else was at the Chapel and their guests would not arrive before the evening. *I cannot let my imagination run away from me, not tonight". She chastised herself. "Not tonight of all days*.

Tonight was the night that would seal her fate. Her Mother had told her so, and above all, her heart knew it. She served herself coffee. She was doomed to be a wife; a wife of a man or of a God. And tonight, she will get to know.

With a heart empty of hope, she went back to her room.

She often got into fights with her mother. She rarely was in place to win those fights. Her mother had all the power of a full fledge matriarch, the blinding conviction of a devout paladin and the wrath of a Tiefling bloodline. Her mother had enough of her daughter's attitude and took a drastic decision. When she was about to be shipped off to a monastery as her lack of obedience and devotion caused a dent to the family's image, a deity did answer Trina's prayers for power. Trina has no clue why the Great Old One got an interest in her, but she didn’t pass on the offer. After one typical long fight with her mother, she gave in and let Him guide her. The first time she used her necrotic touch on her dear mother, she knew she was not going to stay around her and her painful disciplinary methods. She would never have to perform for those people again.

At age 15, Trina hit the road to look for her distant cousins. After a year of searching, she encountered her uncle. Elias was a rich sorcerer in the service of various noble people. He was willing to help out his niece. He gave her a lot of care, clothes and jewelry, but he was unwilling to introduce her to the rest of the family or more importantly, his craft. Another year passed till Trina figured out that Elias wanted to marry her off in order to gain a political alliance. Fed up with being seen as a breeding mare, she run away.

Enter: The Wizard

Now, she was hell bend to prove to all of them that she could be the master of her own fate and do as she pleased. While staying with Elias, Trina had figured out that a few generations back, a member of her family had created a strong artifact, destroyed by her great grand parents when they decided to be holy warriors. Trina started traveling the world in hopes of finding the means of creating an even more powerful artifact. Surprisingly, it was in her hometown where she met a young wizard. The wizard was visiting Breme in hopes of encountering rare magical components. After a few drinks and a few intimidating stares, he said that he could help her in her quest to create what she had in her mind. however, he needed her to collect various magical extracts from powerful creatures...

Trina was in search of the the artifacts for two years. Luckily for her, dragons are back!

Trina into the Greedy Green

It was two years before she heard of the dragons, though. She was traveling with Arlin, the Firbolg cleric. The two of them met a few months ago during one of her few visits to her home. Trina's mother had died and even though she still hated that woman, there a small part of her that needed to go home and mourn a lost childhood. During her way South, she found herself in a quest for saving Atnas, alongside a few other travelers. A few brushes with Krampus, a weird snowman and a very malicious child led to her gaining a very expensive diamond necklace and a traveling companion.

From zero to a million dragon encounters, no moderation at all.

Arlin and she arrived to Synara, just in time for the great festival of Asar Ogalas. The festival was as boring and predictable as any elven festival ever was. Not enough drinking or dancing and neither any good trinkets for sale. The festival though took a dark turn, when the siren blew; dragons arrived in town! They were three and all looked terrible; she felt scared, awed, but also a bit... greedy. What could she gain out of killing one? Trina joined the other warriors in their efforts to save the civilians from the wrath of the great black dragon, Velathidros. She was not sure why she did that, perhaps being around a war cleric of Bahamut or just her upbringing had left a mark for heroics. The young tiefling woman was not sure if the glee by landing the final blow was due to that, or the greed for gold and fame.

Being a dragon killer brought forth more opportunities to encounter more of them. Arlin and she answered the call of the Church of Innovation in Deeplake city. They wanted them to acquire Caeruleam, even if this meant that they had to kill Blue Dragon babies. The Church leader was a bit weird, but this opportunity to get a bit of the substance for herself was too good to pass. She was very happy to join that group of adventurers, especially since she met again another of her Atnas' saving team warriors; Buho. Searching for caeruleam led to more trouble than she cared to admit; she was not always as effective as she would like to be against the Behir monster. On their way back, she was still too frustrated to plan well on how to acquire that substance for her. That led to her sneaking in a closed off part of the Church (thanks to Violet's help, an exceptional Tiefling). There she uncovered too many dead blue dragons... and more caeruleam. Her attempt to get was not very successful; but this sneaking around did help to figure out the involvement a weird Green Stag. Trina was not clear what was all of this about; but she cared not. Her wizard friend would be happy with what she acquired.

The caeruleam, Violet, Arlin and Trina sought out information about a ruby egg... that apparently a child had stolen it? Well, she couldn't really blame the child who did that, those parents were insufferable. One of them was so controlling that they had even locked the kid's window! Tarian was dreaming of the forest through a bolted window... how could she not remember all those time she was locked into a chapel expected to just pray? Violet did not recquire much persuasion in helping her freeing him from his own house. That choice ended up being... bad. Tarian did have the ruby egg and now they had to track him into the forest. Fighting for the egg, turned into fighting for their lives. All six of them realised that Bleucorundum, the Sapphire Dragon, was best to be left alone with the egg. They could lie to the town, keep the egg safe and get the gold! But she did get another blessing with this deal...

Gammelgard was a strange town to be in, the man who paid for all their drinks and food even more so. Falgrim (possibly?) claimed to be a dwarven alchemist, interested in discovering if the entrance to some ruins was where he thought it was. She was surprised to find such a basic task laid ahead of them; they had to face dragons in their previous trips. She did not care much though; he promised a hefty price for their discoveries, which included a… goblin head. What was the deal with everyone wanting a piece of monsters? I mean, she had her reasons, but why is it such a popular sport lately? Trina was a bit disappointed when Arlin put an end on Violet and her plan to steal a cart. She was not fond of walking, and she had to suffer through a lot of it lately. The travel was as boring as expected; for once they might earn some coin the easy way. Only those orcs that they encountered ended up worrying her; they talked of a Green Dragon nearby… perhaps he was the Green Stag. Or perhaps they made stuff up; she had been too intimidating towards them, so of course they might think that everything was way scarier than it actually was. Or maybe not (she had to sleep on it for a bit longer). The rest of the trip was a bit more fun, but also dangerous. The goblins in this area had sparkling red eyes and they could hit hard. That explained why the dwarf wanted a sample from them. She would have been more interested in the goblins if not Dad Bot challenging her ability to murder them. That insolent pet. Perhaps if she had not been so offended by him, she would have paid more attention to the big statue or to Farlgrim when he received their report.

Important prophecies, who cares? Better ship the priests together.

For the first time since they embarked on this trip, Trina decided to travel separately from Arlin, which promptly turned out to be a mistake. He ended up having fun fighting dragon like creatures, while she ended up escorting that refuges around. Truth is that Seglock had some good wine to offer, but now she had to babysit people. Initially, the trip seemed to be boring and tedious… she had to listen to the old lady talk of the dark side of the moon and its God. The old priestess could weave a good tale and according to Buho bake as well, but both of those were of no interest to her. It was when the old woman started talking about a Sage of that God, that Trina’s heart started warming up to her. She looked like a blushing young maiden (or as much as a wrinkled, sun exposed face could resemble that of a young maiden) when she mentioned her God's Sage. Or priest. Or something like that. Trina could not contain her excitement, what marvelous chaos would be if those two would be together! With a promise to bring back a love letter, her companions and she headed out to find the old Priest.

The priest’s entourage was camping on top of a hill. He appeared only under the starlight, as all mysterious priests tend to do. His presence was marked by the most comfortable magic aura; it warmed her up the same way the old sauna in Bremen did over winter. He came out only at night, his eyes were burned to their core by hot tears, which also had marked his ancient face. His voice was as smooth as honey. And yet, he could truly see her as she was a friend of the dragons... Well, Trina could see why the priestess was into him. The Sage offered to ask questions his God on their behalf. None of them could resist the offer; what was the worst thing that could happen?

He led them to a well and lit a candle. He called out to the lord of the Moon. The tiefling was bored, all seemed to be a normal charlatan experience till it was not anymore. The moonlight led all its magic power, and they all got their turn to ask their questions. She listened to their questions, while she suddenly struggled for her own. What to ask for? What is logical or what is her desire? On her turn, she asked the former and she was disappointed; be careful with the dragons because none is really her friend. She should have known, never anyone proves to be a real ally or friend. Communing with the Gods is always dissatisfying and even though this priest was charming, she did not leave this evening with more piety instilled in her. Trina did take note of the promise of the lord of the moon coming to their aid when their need is dire. She would remember for the future, just to whine about that when that God failed them like everyone else. The Sage's offer of a magical well that could ward them against dragons was generous, but it came from a mortal and not a God.

At least the priest was into the old lady as much as the old priestess was into him. He dictated a rather romantic letter for Gertrude, a letter that she would be very happy to deliver... Alongside the well that they decided to use for building a base in Seglock of all places. At least the place has good wine.

Trina firmly believes that we should ban festivals, aka the Seglock disaster saga.

Somehow the locals thought that it was a good idea to have a festival. Had they not heard of what happened last time there was a festival? Dragons attacked the town. Well, this time all hell broke loose. Trina was sipping her free drink when explosions shook the town. Grandmush, the sorcerer and a few others run towards the source of trouble. The university was on fire, which made her assume that it could not have been anything worse than a failed experiment. The heroes had set up the moonwell here, so they were safe. But no, Tiamat(?) themselves broke out from within a building wrecking additional havoc to everything. Trina would have loved to get her hands into his evil essence… if she did not die first. Those Cheshire goblins were everywhere, threatening everyone’s lives. They were as tough as she remembered them and unfortunately Buho was not there to rain poop on them. However, a mad university professor had been making a drakkoth blood poison that could kill those bastards. It was a long and tiring fight against the attacking horde. Trina had never had to use all of her resources before, nor had she felt so tired and battered.

The only bright spot on that disastrous night was the dragon essences she found while snooping around the laboratories. Once she was resting alone, the tiefling pulled out the formula. She had ripped out the piece of paper from her uncle’s notebook; he would call it theft but she had developed this one as much as he had. With the golden, red, black and brass dragon essences added to the blue and silver which were already in her possession, she now had six in total. Only a few more…

Thankfully, she got those essences out of the festival ordeal because the town was not showing any signs of compensation for her troubles. On the contrary, the local Baron (Faron? Farrown?) was preaching against them and moreover he had decided to cut funding to the crazy university professor! The man was a typical rich noble man; full of himself and too sure of the power he can exert over controlling other people. Why did anyone with a bit of power had to abuse it in order to shape the world in their gain? Peer pressure during his illegal meeting convinced him to fund the crazy professor again, even though part of the damage had already been done. The university had no more drakkoths at hand.

The very public standoff with Baron Faron prompted a certain agent from a certain secret heroes’ guild to approach her companions and her. Archie was friendly enough; he took their word for Baron’s sex orgies and offered to introduce them to his fellow conspirators. The Protectors of the People funded heroes hunting dragons; they even had a good number of bounties on different dragons. Did they really want to get rid of them? Did they just want their hoards? Or maybe they wanted another egg… their leader already had a golden dragon egg, why not be greedy and get another? Oh, how much would Trina have liked to snatch an egg for herself. Instead, they picked the high way and hunted down Drakkoths for the crazy professor.

The hunt was dangerous, but not as dangerous as the sensation she got while facing them. The same cold, external touch which had given her the chill touch to ward her against her mother, now provided her with the dream of a crown of madness. It was not so easy, she had to let the fear and anger to flow towards one of her enemies and to dominate his mind, and then the jagged crown could emerge from the skull. Maintaining her control over him was not as easy as she made it seem, it took all her energy to concentrate on that only. It was worth it in the end, because they could subdue not one but two of those ridiculous draconic monsters for the benefit of all.

Unable to get rid of Baron's smug face from her mind, Trina joined forces with like minded people in trying to get rid of the self important, pompous ass. There was a lot of commotion and disagreement on how to proceed, so she ended up splitting ways and mixing with the locals... hopefully this would give her some insight of how to take off the Baron's head, or at least his power.

Trina did not choose the escort's life; the escort's life chose her.

However, a call by Falgram and the Order of the watchful eye got her attention. They were looking for a group of heroes to talk with a nearby drakkoth clan. Apparently, they wanted to sign a peace treaty. In exchange for protection the drakkoths would supply them with blood, freely.

The way there was almost uneventful, but for a bunch of greedy Lizardfolk. The actual meeting with the drakkoth clan was more interesting. The chief was not against joining forces, even though he complained that his people would be bled dry if they tried to provide this volume of blood. Arlin and the rest had an excellent idea of providing healers during the blood donation process. Trina knew enough of bodies and their functions to realize how useful this would have been for them. The chief agreed and was ready to sign the peace treaty, but then things got heated. His lieutenant challenged him and chaos unleashed. Her group tried got dragged into this civil war; keeping the chief alive was their priority. Trina got a few harsh hits on her; it was so painful and scary. Thankfully, a few new necromantic draining spells kept her alive. Nevertheless, she decided that being up so close to combat was not worth it.

After spitting blood (literally and metaphorically), they were able to subdue the drakkoth and barely keep the chief alive. Trina just needed a moment to take a deep breath, ask Arlin for help with the aching bones, but then a fucking gold dragon showed up. He (or she) killed everyone. Literally, every last drakkoth. Her friends and she barely made it out alive. On her way back to Seglock and the protector's headquarters, she could barely contain her rage. All of this effort for nothing, they were so close to fulfill their plan. How would they kill the Chesire monsters now?

This was an interesting question, but one that she had no answer to. Her mind was focused on the essenses she needed... There were a lot of rumours about dragons and also some whispers about crawling into a dragon's lair reached her ears... And yet, she was in Gammelgard and another employment opportunity came her way. With Arlin gone who knows where and with need for extra cash, she took it. Besides, Violet and Grandmush (with her sheep) were part of the party. Trina had grown weary and a bit lonely over the last months events, which meant there was no way she would not follow familiar and somewhat dear people around. A very odd dwarf who had no clue how to properly drink his coffee (aka no alcohol in it) told them to escort stones to Sneerwell. All was a bit sush, and predictably enough, they were told that the previous drivers had been knocked out and the shipment stollen.

Great, another escort quest.

This one was kinda boring though. Her driver, Hollandaise Sauce Dude, turned out to be talkative and very fond of cooking for his family. And arguing with his wife. She never heard the end of his latest holiday food drama, as a destroyed bridge interrupted them. The overconfident bard, who sometimes responded to the name Tristram, made a worrying discovery: invisible mechanical centaurs on wheels. The statues were horrifying; they had gems on them that hurt a lot upon impact. It was a frustrating battle, with a lot of their hits not landing and so many of them dropping like flies. When they finally managed to kill one of them, the rest tried to run away with the cart and its shipment. Thankfully Tristam was not only talk; he smashed the cart to pieces in his big animal form (she refrained to tell him that he looked cooler as a T-rex than as a bard).

Once they dispatched the Rock'em Sock'em Centaurs, they managed to make their way towards Sneerwell. Not before obtaining all the gems. Not before looking (in vain) for information of their maker. At least this time, she got paid.

Trina cannot find what she is looking for, but instead she finds other things.

Rumours of an enemy known to her from her childhood (and her last year’s adventure) reached her while sitting around the Protector’s of the People headquarters. She had just gotten her tattoo, when Feyjin talked about visiting the mountain tribes chasing rumours of a horrible monster. Being rather bored and suddenly homesick, she joined her alongside some others in chasing down Krampus.

During the trip she could not stop thinking about how ridiculous it was that she missed her stupid home, how weird it was that a monster could both comfort her and ignite that homesickness, and finally she could not stop thinking that Cecil just cannot shut up. They arrived at the first tribe (whose name was mentioned multiple times on the way but she just kept forgetting it) to only find peaceful naïve people throwing Krampus’ name around like nothing. Their chief, Brian son of Brian, did mention though that the big, warmongering nearby tribe was very afraid of Krampus.

Two days and a silence spell later, they found the warmongering, fully jacked tribe people known as Gerbels (probably). They were tall and unwilling to talk to them, but her awakened mind helped her figure out that they were forbidden to talk in fear of accidentally summoning Krampus. Apparently, a sinister cloaked figure carrying a huge black sack was seen approaching the third clan in the area and rumours of a disaster had reached them. As their rumour hunting led them there, Trina made a mental note to come back and look for the guard’s finished version of an erotic romance novel. She would probably just need to arm wrestle for it anyways, which was good as she was short on gold.

They arrived at the third tribe, the Hammsteers (she was almost sure this one was the correct name), at night. Their place was silent and for an evil reason; most of them were dead! Dead except for a young boy and a distorted figure clouded by a weird mist in the center of their village. Cecil was useful for once and dispelled the mist to reveal an old guy holding a… dragon egg. The guy was not Krampus, she was sure of that but he was possessed by an entity that creeped her out and all her hair stood still along her arms.

Unfortunately, a fight ensued before they could get all the information they needed. In the process, they cracked the egg, beat the guy to death and the entity entered the egg. They were left with the possessed dragon egg and a young Hammsteer boy, whose father had just killed. Oops.

Trina is going to start a petition to ban festivals aka all hell broke loose. AGAIN.

That was the third festival that Trina found herself in the midst of and a weird sensation was putting pressure on her chest, weighing her down… anxiety. That must be it. She tried to distract herself with something else than alcohol. Instead, she heckled Pottu and Airavata’s tree climbing competition. “Your ears are floppy!” she said, but the ridiculous insult had the desired effect. That action did earn her though the company of an unfriendly owl, pecking on her horns. The best course of action was to pretend that it was not there. This was hilarious and annoying, and she started calming down… and of course it was at that moment that all hell broke loose. Again.

An explosion echoed through the distance, from the location of no other than the Pendergrass Industries factory. Trina did not even spend a second thought on the course of action she had to take. Alongside other friends and co-adventurers, they made their way to the Factory. On top of them, she saw no other than the same weird centaurs from the past. She remembered how painfully they hit and their obsession with the woven stone. They were trying to steal it, to do... something good according to Durian. The CEO of the Industries was furious about the ongoing heist, but Trina had adventured before with Durian and she trusted him. Thankfully, that was true for the rest and so they all ended up helping those gem encrusted centaurs.

Well, that was turning out to be fun again. They fought a bit and looted a rich ass’ persons possessions and she had started to relax, until Violet appeared. She joined the fun, but she had a few bad news; other places outside Sneerwell were in trouble as well. But here they were not in such big trouble, were they? Well, she stood corrected as soon as an ancient red dragon descended upon them from the skies. Some of the other companions seemed to know the beast’s name and a lot of them were scared of it. They wanted to run away. No, she had never faced a dragon attacking a city and run away. There were few things drummed into her by her paladin brother, Tenor. You help the weaker people.

Some of them fought, some of them fled, but it was a fight worth fighting. It was epic and dangerous but also *exhausting*… how could four of them fight this bitch of a dragon? Thankfully, reinforcements arrived and she took a long break to heal. The road took her to Seglock… which somehow was also threatened. By shadow creatures? They were terrifying, smelly and a lot of heroes and civilians were in danger of dying. Trina cursed once again: 1. Festivals and 2. Her brother. Trying to fight those creatures proved long and difficult. But it did not matter much because the DRAGON SOMEHOW REACHED SEGLOCK! Did she follow her over here?! Damn the dragons.

She was not in full health to keep fighting but the well was reactivated and they were trapped under its dome, all together. A lot of them gathered around the beast and kept firing at it. Trina got a dizzying hit at some point that brought her to her knees. Thankfully Airavata administered first aid to her.

How long did that fight take? Who knows. Maybe a few seconds, maybe an eternity. But it involved blastes, flying beasts, arrows, magic and a lot of fire. And at the end they brough the beast to its death…

Yeeting into the shadows; a saga of chaotic actions

Trina found herself fighting Gideon, the never dying shadow, the one their last attack just pushed him back into the shadows for a fourth time. They had been tracking him around the shadow infested forests of Seglock for so long that the days turned dull and grey… Linden created sunlight in an effort to bring their spirits up, but that attracted more shadows than it dissipated.

*The one who fucking waits* himself appeared, dragging the shadows behind him. He was the scariest thing she had seen in her life and yet oddly… appealing. A creepy fascination took her over, overriding the fear that should have been there. She had felt this chilling sensation in the past, the pulsing energy of raw power so close to her. It was almost the same fearful, overwhelming and yet appealing experience to the first time she was given her powers. Trina was not the only person drawn to him like moths to flame. In fact, most of them moved closer and talked to him! They tried to communicate with a being that could only psionically infiltrate their minds and say… *fall, fall, fall*.

And she fell. Why? How could she not? This however did not end up ideally… Nope, not at all. She was dead. She was part of his shadow fungal network, not herself, but a thousand people all over the continent, people unimportant or very important who were slowly corrupted by TOWIE. Trina then saw a cavern deep in the northern mountains, that seemed to hold him there… a dark cavern full of faces on the walls and pillars holding everything up. And then she felt; a fuzzy, warm arm linking itself with her. Snowball pulled her out of the abyss.

She realized not only that she could breathe again, but also that she enjoyed the solitude of being her own person and just being alive. Trina would have to find a way to make it up to Snowball, but for the moment she was too numb to think through all of this properly. It did not help that a blond woman appeared out of nowhere talking of a city without a name being taken over by the cult of Att-Annalo. Drang said a lot of things to her, but the gist of the long discussion was that they would go and help her recover a magic key from the Manor she used to live in. (Apparently she was married in that rich family and they did not sound fun, so Trina was all too happy to even remotely inconvenience rich people).

A day later, they found themselves outside this nameless city. First of all, she had no recollection whatsoever of seeing it around Seglock. Secondly, it was protected by the shadows, and thirdly, it looked close to ruin. Whatever power held the dome of protection together, it sucked buildings from the ground, pieces of wood, stone and other materials floating eerily in the air. And at the center of this town, there was the mansion. They had a lot of long loud discussions about what to do next. The citizens of the city were under quarantine by the Cult and some of them wanted to use them like a distraction so they could sneak in. Some of them (Drang) wanted to cause chaos and destroy everything as ‘distraction’. But in the end, they decided to teleport inside and snoop around quietly for the magic item.

Well, they succeeded teleporting, but Drang made sure they would not be snooping around quietly. He decided to just cause a ruckus and bring everyone upon them in a fight. The Heart of the Protectors of the People was not so much into protecting even his companions after all. Nevertheless, they managed to subdue their enemies and start looking for the key. Nockdus however, found something way more fascinating than that. Within the fireplace was a draconic eye. It belonged to Smargag (they did fail a few times to guess correctly who he was, they are just too many dragons around lately, ok?). They did not offend him, probably because he desperately needed their help. The One that Waits is trying to take down the Gem Dragons and he is stuck in his lair. He gave Linden his location and then requested to call Durian and the Loxodon.

Well, she would have to talk with Durian soon.

It came to pass that she had to go out soon again, to face the same apathy as before. She had to search for someone and yet when they found him, Trina was stunned. She had heard a lot of rumours and descriptions of mighty Sro, the silver dragon but she had not understood the vastness of his beauty. He was gorgeous. Traveling through the shadow realm for that dude it was totally worth it. Sro wanted help. Towle was looking for him as well as every other dragon left alive. All he asked them to do was simple, to escort him to Bleucarandums hidden lair.

A smile formed on her face. She had encountered the majestic dragon before! She remembered where the city was and of course she could lead them. Only problem w23 Traversing the shadowy forests and awaiting Towle. Easy task. Trina gathered her strength and off they went.

Carrying Sro in cute mouse form and his silver hoard they embarked on a journey facing the shadows. They had to be careful while Scaling mountains and Sailing on rivers. The one that waits was always on the move always somewhere nearby or far away. It was hard to know where he was but sometimes it felt as if he was only a breath away. And there were also the towns. The ones that had been lost to the shadows devoid of real life but only what is seen in this apocalyptic landscape. And the shadow people, not lost yet as charming them could remove the monster's hold on them.

Ten days later, they arrives at the town where she had seen the gem fragon before. Memories of those kids who stole the egg came to mind. But s dragon was around. Only a stall protected by the shadows due to moonflowers was left intact. with an annoyed Sro hidden in their arm sleeves, they kept Searching the area for the lair. Up the mountains, Through the forests. Six more days they kept looking while they could tell that the one who waits was getting ever closer to them.

And then they found it! It was in the river and Sro was happy, while they were relieved that they got out of there alive. In fact Sro was ast only happy enough to give them a portion of his silver but he was also happy to give her a few of his silver scales for her artifact.

Of dragons, bombs and time travel: how to cut off shadow supply to towie.

Weary of the shadows, Trina stayed at Bleucorandum’s lair. Being among dragons was more boring that she would have expected, even though sometimes it was hard to deal with more than one of them at once. She started getting fidgety and unsatisfied, her dreams haunted by the shadows, its cold darkness and the deep black well deep within the Snowy Mountains… what did the one that waits have there and why on earth was it so appealing to her?

Durian’s arrival and all the news about the Gem Court, Sardior’s revival and the rest of the greedy greeners could not catch her attention. It was only the one that wait’s true name, Feredemius, the shadow corrupted ancient gem dragon and his connection to the shadow realm deep in a lost dwarven Citadel stirred her. That’s what it was the image that haunted her dreams ever since she died. The rift enabling the flow of shadows from the Shadowfell to their plane… But why was she still so attracted to its shadows? That night, as she went to sleep in her corner, a curious thought entered her mind. Perhaps, her patron was the evil itself? Its shadowy embrace was so familiar to her… no, it could not be that. She refused that possibility. She would blast it to pieces if she had, with her black blasts, as beautiful as an obsidian stone…

Trina went to sleep. Her dreams were empty, her body and mind rested. Her gut was not warning her of the creeping shadows for the first time since the mountain erupted. And as she woke up, she realized that she was not in the dragon’s lair. She was at home. Or a nicer version of her home; more friendly, warmer and full of spices in the air. That was not her home. Quickly, she dressed and exiting her room she came upon her friends; Arlin, Violet, Durian, Grandmush and even Harold was there. The archfey known as the Curator was standing in front of them. He had gathered them all in his realm to talk about a very important matter. He firmly believed that our bonds were what could lead us to… success. But success to what? He gathered our group so we can find and talk to the green dragon known as Longfang. Trina was surprised to hear that Longfang was Farlgrim’s awkward assistant, Dippy, but she was even more surprised to know that Longfang was undercover now and had information about Feredemius.

The surprises did not end there. The Curator mentioned that their world was at a tipping point… One of the purple progenitor dragons was turning her attention to their reality… and in order to fix the TOWIE problem, she could just wipe their reality. Trina did not worry much about that prospect. Why not let her fix it all for them? She was not afraid of death; she had died once after all. But no, when she stared upon her friends’ faces, it was clear to her that she could not afford to lose any of them to death.

So, with no choice left, they started asking about Gammelgard, where is the undercover Longfang was located. They did talk Farlgrim into helping, but also got him and the rest into trouble with the authorities (as per usual, nothing new here actually), but with the help of a certain cooper dragon and some fast talking Trina’s group got out of trouble. Gideon, the purified Cooper dragon, who happens to be the Green’s uncle could lead them to the lair... And like that, after a long trek via the sewers they entered the full of jewels, gold and monster apes lair.

Green dragons are greedy and quick to anger, two traits that Longfang had in abundance. Trina was sure that if the handsome Gideon was not around (and a heavy diamond) they would have never received all the information they needed. They did convince Longfang to tell them about Feredemius/TOWIE. What he had to say was surprising; he basically told them that in the past the two of them worked together... and that Longfang wanted to dig deep into the ancient Citadel caverns to build a nice stable portal around a rift to the shadow realm. However, once Longfang realized the thoughts and desires were not his own but instead planted into his mind by Feredemius, well, he left him. Trina could only shake her head, of course she would have done the same. He also believed that Feredemius was keeping the rift open using ancient gem dragon power, which equal power to that could close the rift. One last interesting detail was that the rift should have been created around 1,000 years ago. All that information was especially interesting and useful, thank you Longfang! They left Longfang, but not before Gideon hugged his nephew and Trina got an opportunity to join in the hug. Now, she had smug rights to saying that she has hugged not one, but two dragons at once.

With the gained valuable information, Trina and her friends could start discussing all the ways to reach the rift and how to close it. A lot of possibilities came up, including traveling through the shadow realm, or asking some other metallic dragon such as Sro to sacrifice himself to combat the magic fueling the rift... At some point, the all known Curator asked Trina if she had already asked for an essence from Gideon for her artifact, which sparked a thought. What if they did not need to sacrifice any dragon to close the rift… what if they completed the formula and added to it? What if they started adding gem dragon essences to the mix and see if a nice explosive surge of power could close the rift? It was a gambit, but it could work. Farlgrim could create a bomb for them. There was no moment in her mind that she was hesitant about this plan. What best way of closing the rift, not kill anyone and also honoring her ancestors by creating an artifact so powerful that save the realm from shadows? The only thing left, was to figure out how to find the right spot… and in that a time travel was dimmed the best option.

Plan:

-create a super powerful bomb,

-get back in time 1000 years when the lost Citadel was not lost and the rift was not open

-come back into the present, being in the right place

-Bomb the portal to oblivion.

All in all, easy, what could go wrong?

The first step was to collect more dragon essences, was for them to talk more dragons into giving her some scales, spit, nails. Anything really… All the gem dragons that they had access to willingly and without hesitation gave her what she asked for. There was a missing one though; the obsidian gem dragon. Durian did not fail them; his knowledge of dragons unparalleled. He had encountered vague recollections of an ancient obsidian dragon named Kristang, but no one knows where he is. Trina and the others, eager to get the bomb as powerful as possibly, ask a dwarven God for help. He said he could take us to him, but they decided against it. It was too risky… and Trina could not stop herself from feeling disappointed. She had a strong urge to go and find Kristang. Next, Farlgrim makes a bomb for them and the Curator takes them to visit the progenitor purple time dragon. In exchange for stories of their adventures and entertainment, he granted them the boon of time travel. They could only travel through time, not space, so they had to be at the right spot. They had exactly one trip to the past and one trip to the present, so they had to be extremely careful when and where they activated it.

With the bomb and the boon, they were set to go.

The night before going back in time, Trina’s patron, the great old one, talked to her in her sleep… he called to her, come to me, I shall lead you. We have met before, we will again. Trina woke up confused, scared and excited. It was her patron, she had heard that tingling and voice in the past... She shared the dream with her friends, which led her to confessing an act that she had never talked of before. When Trina was young, she always seeking for a patron as a warlock/sorcerer instead of a cleric sponsor God. A mysterious entity courted her, but she willingly embraced the offered power when she had enough with her abusive mother and killed her.

The trip back in time was smooth. She had been close to the Citadel before; once again when Buho was still around. They went back in time and managed to mingle with the 1000 year old dwarves. Well, they were not 1000 years old, they just lived 1000 years ago. Usually, Trina would have this distinction clear in her mind, but she was so distracted. There were a million thoughts and sensations overwhelming her and yet, somehow, she was the one leading her group the correct way via the mountains, all the way deep into the underdark.

The rift was there… and also Feredemius having just chained an obsidian gem dragon above the rift opening. The black scales of the dragon led them to believe that it was no other than Kristang. He was being used to start steadily channeling shadows from the other realm into their own. Scared of the sighting, they did not linger. As soon as they saw that, they used their boon to come back to present time. A thousand years into the present, they saw that Kristang was still there. Chained, weak, harnessing the shadows. A horrifying sight. All of them tried to break the chains, to release him from his torture. It did not have to be eternal. It was at that moment that Trina heard the familiar voice in her head again: come to me and the dragon was looking right through her.

A moment of realization; the obsidian dragon was her patron! She grabbed the chains, which caused a lot of energy to go through her, transforming her in ways she did not realize. She only wanted to go to him, to free him as he had once freed her from her own chains. But it also disrupted the enchantment that held Kristang in place and the rest hugged Trina to help increase the power drainage. That did it, they broke him free! They grabbed the weak dragon and booked it out of there, with only Arlin staying behind. When they were far out enough, Alrin, the total badass that he was, dropped the bomb in the cavern with the rift, jumped into the shadowfell through the rift and then banished himself back to their realm.

All of them felt the vibrations that shook the very foundations of the snowy mountains. All of them felt the combined power of dragons shattering the cavern and disrupting the rift for ever… The bomb closed it and now there were no more shadow reinforcements for Feredemius to draw power upon. It was by the gates of the Citadel that they felt the success of their plan. For the first time, Kristang addressed all her friends. Time for you to go back. He transferred Violet, Grandmush, Durian and Harold out and away in momentary safety.

But Trina did not go with them.

Trina and her patron; aka she gets a cool new title.

Trina was still with her patron. Kristang turned around to watch her, his presence like a warm embrace. Can you feel my power through you? He asked her. Can you feel my favor transforming you to what you were meant to always be?

Trina felt stronger, she felt faster, wiser, more charismatic than ever. The shadows of death responded to her ever more willingly and black light orbs came to her fingers willingly. With a crown of the light orbs she smiled. For the first time in my life, I can see my path clearly. I can see that I have a destiny.

Kristang smiled at her. Come, join me, my dear Obsidian Dragon Knight. We have a lot that we must do.