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How The Ingenuous Monk Became A Benevolent
Deity
This story was submitted by our viewer, Travis!
Thank you!
I am the Dungeon Master for a table of eight
players and in my campaigns I pride myself
on two things.
Roleplay is important and I will improv the
storyline based off the player's actions in
game.
I detest railroading players.
One of my players, Drew, was moving out of
state in a few weeks and I typically create
campaign arcs based off the player’s backstories.
As we had not gotten around to his character
yet, I felt I needed to send him off with
a small side quest that would wrap his character’s
arc up.
This is the story of how Adran the Firbolg
Monk unknowingly bumbled his way into divinity
and retired his PC as a demi-god.
The party consisted of 8x Level 15 adventurers:
Adran, a Firbolg Elemental Monk; Ang, a Wood
Elf Elemental Monk; Aurora, a Tiefling College
of Valor Bard; Wulf, an Aasimar Life Cleric;
Ronnerin, a Wood Elf Gloomstalker Ranger;
Took (Pronounced Two-k), a Gnome Arcane Trickster
Rogue; Caelan, a High Elf Swashbuckler Rogue;
and Norvik, a Human Eldritch Knight Fighter.
The party had just finished a quest and were
completing downtime in a local tavern within
the city of Silverymoon.
It was midday and a broken and hobbled shell
of a man entered the establishment and began
to plead with anyone who would listen.
He eventually makes his way towards the party’s
table and recognizes the distinct look of
the two monks in the group.
“Please, brothers!
You must help us!
Our monastery was taken over by a rival monastic
order and those who opposed the new abbot
were put to an early grave.
I barely escaped with my life.
I beg of you!
Help me get justice!
The city of Silverymoon refuses to interfere
in the political affairs of monasteries, so
I look to any willing adventurers for help.”
The party debates about the potential quest
and hinges their decision on how much the
crippled monk can pay for the job.
However, in an unusual act of empathy, both
monks seem genuinely interested without worrying
about payment.
“Tell us more about this rival monastic
order,” Adran the Firbolg Monk says.
“Yes, and who are you?”
Ang the Human Monk asks.
“My name is Talbot.
I am a monk of the Moncamura Monastery of
the Sun Sol Order in the Moonwood Forrest
northwest of Silverymoon and just west of
the logging hamlet of Quaervars.
This vile monastic order, called The Way of
the Serpent, killed my brothers and sisters
and enslaved those who were weak willed.
They first came to our monastery a little
over a fortnight ago with their leader, Holegre.
They were looking for room and board and would
offer payment in the form of manual labor
around the monastery grounds.
Of course, we would have taken them in, regardless
of the offer of payment.
They stayed a few nights proselytizing their
way of life and then left on the third morning.
Later that evening, they came back with an
army of followers and took over the monastery.
They used our hospitality to study our defenses
in order to exploit it for their invasion.
I am worried about my brothers and sisters
who are being tortured and…
I fear the “Tear of the Sun” could fall
into their hands.”
“Tear of the Sun?” the party collectively
ask.
“Over the past hundred years, our order
was given the duty of protecting an amulet
that was passed down to us.
Some say, it is a powerful artifact that imbues
its wearer with immense power.
Others think it is a tear shed by Lathander
himself and molded into a beautiful golden
topaz medallion.
Regardless, it has been our monastery’s
mission to protect it.”
Talbot explained.
After Talbot explained this, I had Adran roll
a wisdom check.
Sure enough, his character remembered that,
that a few days before his own monastery had
been destroyed by a green dragon, they were
visited by a wayward monastic order who called
themselves The Way of the Serpent and were
led by an individual named Holegre.
Everyone rolled for knowledge about the “Tear
of the Sun” amulet.
Unfortunately, no one had ever heard of it.
“I need to look into this.
There might be a connection between my monastery
and this Way of The Serpent Order.”
Adran said solemnly as every time he thinks
about his previous order, he remembers the
trauma that mentally scared him from seeing
his brothers and sisters slaughtered.
“This sounds like a dangerous and difficult
job.
How many Serpent Order monks are at your monastery,
and more importantly how much can you pay?”
Ronnerin the Ranger asked as he looked away
from Adran’s brooding.
“I think there are about two scores of Serpent
Order monks and I have…
20 gold… and whatever we can help you with
once the monastery is taken back.
We have blacksmiths, tailors, and artisans.”
Talbot replied.
A collective groan came from the group as
they realized this was not a high paying quest.
“I don’t care about the money” Adran
said.
“This is bigger than that.”
And so, the party decided they would help
Adran investigate this potential link to the
disappearance of this monastery.
The party traveled a few days northwest from
Silverymoon into a small hamlet called Quaervars.
It was known for its export of timber and
was within an hour walk from the monastery.
After traveling for several days, the party
decided they would stop in the local tavern,
the Whistling Stagg.
The whistling stagg was a small tavern.
But to the lumberjacks that worked the forest,
it represented the end of a long day’s hard
work with hot food and cold drink which were
both affordable and delicious.
As they entered the establishment, they spotted
four dusky gray skinned elf-like monks who
were adorned in black robes with green serpent
etching.
The party decided to wait and see what the
monks would do.
The monks finished their meals, paid their
tab, and left the tavern heading back towards
the monastery through the woods.
The party gave chase.
At this time, Aurora the bard had a clever
idea.
She would catch up to them on the trail and
question them while the rest of the party
hid on the edge of the wooded path with the
aid of Ronnerin’s pass without trace spell.
If anything went wrong, she would give the
signal to attack.
“Excuse me!
I was wondering if you could help me?”
Aurora said as she caught up with them while
unbuttoning the top two buttons of her blouse.
Unfortunately for Aurora, these monks were
celibate and her attempts at persuasion were
not going to be very effective.
The monks turn around to the approaching lass
and don’t seem to be affected by her attempt
at seduction in the slightest.
“What do you want, miss?”
The apparent leader of this small group asked
in a curt tone.
“I was just wondering what happened at the
monastery a few weeks ago and hoped you could
explain.”
Aurora said while twisting a lock of hair.
“Begone.
We have no time for entertaining your curiosity,"
the lead monk snapped.
They turned around, annoyed and started walking
away from her.
Aurora had not anticipated that her feminine
wiles would be fruitless and had obviously
not thought of a back-up plan if she failed
on her original idea of gathering information.
“Wait!” Aurora yells and with a dramatic
sigh she rips her blouse open, exposing her
chest, and pretends to faint.
I have her roll a performance check and combat
initiates with the rest of the party as they
ambushed the monks.
I had been describing them as monks throughout
the entire session, and since none of the
party members had ever encountered Shadar-Kai
elves they had no real knowledge of what kind
of creatures these monks truly were which
perplexed them when the “monks” started
hurling spells at the party during combat.
The encounter was not too difficult though,
as the party consisted of eight level 15 PC’s
versus four CR 12 Shadar-Kai Gloom Weavers
with a few levels of monk class of their own…
effectively boosting their CR to make it a
little more challenging.
The fight went about as expected in an 8 vs
4 fight would go… well…
7 vs 4…
Aurora continued to pretend to have fainted
and be exposed throughout the fight, lying
on the path, in an effort to convince the
monks she was seriously distraught.
Alas, the only casualty on the PC’s side
was against Norvick the Eldritch Knight as
a Shadar-Kai Monk cast an Arcane Gate beneath
his feet and placed the second gate 500 ft
in the air.
As the knight fell through the magical hole
and was now falling towards the Earth, I figured
Norvick would be ok and cast fly, which would
easily negate the arcane gate trap.
Boy, did he prove me wrong.
Norvick decided he would wait until he was
5 ft from impacting the ground and cast misty
step and teleported to a spot on the ground
of his choosing.
I ruled that since he did not stop his terminal
velocity fall, he still carried the momentum
from his fall and cratered into the ground
when he came out of his misty step spell.
He took impact damage from the fall and crushing
damage from his full plate armor to a grand
total of 167 hp worth of damage; plus he had
to make Con Saves for every piece of magical
equipment he held on his body while all non
magical equipment was destroyed or ruined.
He immediately went to zero hp and began rolling
death saves.
Meanwhile, the leader of this small group
of monks realized that they were outmatched
and outnumbered, and so he cast invisibility
and ran away.
While force feeding a goodberry to the unconscious
eldritch knight, Ronnerin said, “Great,
now they definitely know we are coming.”
“Don’t worry, we don’t have to go through
the front door,” Talbot replied.
“There’s a grate in the wall that allows
a natural stream to pass through and feed
the lake within the grounds.
Perhaps, we can sneak in using that?”
The party agreed this would be the best course
of action and eventually made it to the monastery
where they began to sneak around the walls
with the aid of Ronnerin's Pass Without Trace
spell, once again.
They found the stream leading to the grate
on the west side of the compound and Caelan
the Rogue went in first to make sure it was
not blocked or locked.
After clearing the blocked grate of a dead
body, one by one, they swam through the underwater
tunnel and into the compound.
Caelan and Ronnerin decided to do some scouting
around the nearby houses while everyone else
hid in the tall reeds next to the stream.
After searching around a few houses, they
discovered one of the houses was a dedicated
wash house for clothes, and two sun soul monks
were diligently washing clothes with one Serpent
Order monk watching over them.
Caelan and Ronnerin snuck in and killed the
serpent order monk to free the sun soul monks,
but the sun soul monks looked like they were
preparing to fight their rescuers.
Suspecting a brainwashing of sorts, Aurora
the bard cast domination on the female sun
soul monk and ordered her to stand down.
The other sun soul monk unfortunately had
to be put down.
After some interrogation, they discovered
that the main temple in the monastery was
being used as a base of operations by the
serpent order leader Holegre and that other
sun soul monks, who had yet to have their
spirit broken, were being tortured there,
as well.
Aurora decided to cast modify memory and effectively
“Men in Black mind-wiped” their encounter
from her memory.
Instead, the female sun soul monk remembers
a false memory of the serpent order monk giving
them the rest of the day off.
She was told to go home and take a nap.
Meanwhile, the party cleaned up the mess in
the washroom and devised a plan.
Ang and Aurora came up with a plan to release
the captured sun soul monks who were still
resisting the brainwashing and use them as
allies to fight against the serpent order
monks.
Perhaps, with the monks help and their fighting
prowess, they may be able to take the monastery
back and as luck would have it, the wash room
had several monk robes that they could use
to help disguise themselves and sneak into
the temple.
The party managed to roll rather well on their
disguise checks and entered the temple without
any complications.
The temple was a large two-story structure
with the foyer being a grand hall with a second-floor
balcony that encircled the foyer, and several
monks were making casual conversation along
the balcony.
An orange glass window skylight shown sunlight
through to light the room as the party entered
the temple.
The party decided to split into two groups
to search the temple as fast as possible.
One group was going to the eastern rooms while
the other group went to the western rooms.
In the eastern rooms, Caelan, Ronnerin, and
Took found what appeared to be torture chambers,
with one of the chambers currently in use.
In the western rooms, Ang, Adran, Norvick,
Wulf, and Aurora found a large hall lined
with beds.
Within those beds were beaten and battered
sun soul monks in various states of consciousness.
They realized their two rogues, Took the Gnome
and Caelan the High Elf, were in another room
unable to unlock the monks from their bed
manacles.
Wulf the Cleric conducted a medical exam on
one of the monks and discovered they had been
beaten to a state of exhaustion that magical
healing could not fix.
Even if they were freed, they would need several
days of bed rest to recover from their exhaustion
and were in no state to conduct a counter
assault against the serpent monks.
Meanwhile, Holegre the Serpent Order leader
was leaving the temple through the foyer.
He stopped and made an announcement to the
monks on the balcony to which the party overheard
as they were only one room away.
“Brothers and sisters, the time has come
for our ceremony to our master, Kovrym the
Protective” Holegre explained in a loud
and grand voice for all to hear.
“You are all summoned to join me at the
lake.
There… we will give thanks to our serpent
lord and provide an offering worthy of the
gods.
The day has finally come!”
Holegre lifts a topaz amulet and cheers.
He is then joined in his cheer with applause
and cheers from the other monks.
“That’s Holegre…”
Adran exclaimed to his fellow party members.
“I have to go confront him.”
Before anyone can really voice their objection,
Adran steps forward to confront Holegre in
the foyer.
“Wait!
I have questions that you need to answer.
You were at my monastery years ago and coincidently
after you left… a dragon appeared and destroyed
our home and killed my brothers and sisters.
If you are associated with this, I simply
can’t let you go on destroying other monasteries,”
Adran proclaimed.
A murmur of excited whispering began among
the monks who were watching from the balcony
above.
An obvious non-serpent order monk just boldly
walked up to their leader and demanded he
answer him.
It was sudden… and unexpected… which intrigued
the room as well as Holegre himself.
Holegre looks upon the Firbolg monk who approached
him with a chuckle, “and… who are you
supposed to be?”
“I am Adran and you are not going anywhere,”
Adran said with confidence.
“Tell you what…”
Holegre says as he takes off his tunic, folds
it in half, and hands it to a nearby serpent
order monk.
“You best me in one on one combat and I
will answer any question you have.”
Holegre stood before Adran in nothing but
pants, boots, and a topaz amulet around his
neck.
Adran accepted the challenge and combat began
with a flurry of blows from each opponent.
Everyone stood back to watch the spectacle
of the fight… except for Ronnerin.
Ronnerin decided that he had rather dispatch
the Way of the Serpent’s leader as quickly
as possible and to hell with honorable duels.
After preparing a few spells, he vaulted into
the combat with a critical hit zephyr strike
on the BBEG, dealing a little over 200 hp
of damage.
(Keep in mind I run a high magic item campaign
and he had some pretty awesome weapons that
dealt extra damage, plus I do not care if
my players Min/Max their characters… but,
they are fully aware that I will do the same
with my villains and make the combats equally
challenging with powerful villains).
I secretly rolled for system shock on the
BBEG since he took over half of his hp in
damage in one turn.
Holegre easily passed his system shock check
and at the top of the next round every Monk
in the temple jumped into the fray.
This fight went from a one on one honorable
duel to a 21 vs 8 one sided combat.
At this point, I am committed to letting the
dice fall where they may and if the party
is wiped out then that was the consequences
of their actions for starting a fight in such
unfavorable conditions.
Adran and Ronnerin were surrounded by serpent
monks from all sides with the rest of the
party trying to get into the fight to help.
By the end of round 2, Adran and Ronnerin
were re-evaluating their decisions as they
began to understand that they will likely
die by the next round.
Enter Aurora the bard, who utterly saved their
lives with an impressive mass suggestion spell.
“You guys are so stressed.
You need to take the day off.”
Aurora said as she finished casting her spell.
Surprisingly, about 8 of the monks failed
their save to include Holegre.
(Side note: Maybe 10 seconds after I announced
the enemy’s successes and failures on the
charm spell, I had noticed Shadar-Kai are
immune to charm spells… oh well, it was
my fault for overlooking that immunity and
I will not punish my players and go back on
that ruling now.)
“You are right!
We have been working ourselves every day for
as long as I can remember.
Alright everyone, let’s go relax by the
lake.”
Holegre said in a commanding voice.
The other monks who were not affected by the
mass suggestion spell simply looked at each
other, shrugged their shoulders, and everyone
began filtering out of the temple to go to
the lake for the already planned festivities
of joyous worship for their serpent lord.
With the temple cleared of the serpent order
monks, the party went on to rescue the sun
soul monks who were manacled to the beds.
Once they were unshackled, they transported
them outside of the monastery with a nearby
cart.
Weirdly, they noticed that all the gate guards
were asked to go to the lake festival as well
as any other monk that should have been doing
a chore or job of some kind around the monastery.
After about a half hour of making several
trips back and forth to the temple with sun
soul monks being transported to a clearing
in the woods just outside of the monastery
grounds, the party decided to go back to the
lake festival to investigate the ceremony.
They arrived to find that Holegre was handing
off his responsibilities as ceremony host
to a younger looking monk.
“Look, all you have to do” while placing
the amulet on the boy’s neck “is swim
out to the sand barge in the middle of the
lake, stand there, and say in honor of the
Serpent Lord, Kovrym the Protective, ‘we
bless you with this offering’ and then just
hold up the amulet to reflect in the sunlight.
Everyone will cheer and you will be remembered
by Lord Kovrym for all eternity.”
Holegre smiled, lightly smacked the youth’s
face, gave a wink, turned around, and left
with his entourage of monks who were firmly
under the mass suggestion spell to take a
nice relaxing day off work.
Seeing the youth looking worried and distraught
with the sudden responsibility of holding
a ceremony as a substitute host, Aurora had
an idea.
She approached the boy, still in her monk
disguise, and offered to do this in his place.
One successful persuasion check later, the
youth was giving her explicit directions on
how to handle the ceremony, what to do, and
finally thanked her for taking the responsibility
off his shoulders.
The party began debating about what to do
to ruin the ceremony, when Adran asked if
he could be the one to host the ceremony and
ruin it.
Adran was not known for his silver tongue
and most of the party had initially thought
this would be a bad idea as he might say or
do something wrong.
But Adran was adamant about doing this to
bring some sort of closure to him and his
lost monastery.
Reluctantly, the party handed him the amulet
and told him they would help him ruin the
ceremony and even look cool with special effects
as Ang, the other elemental monk, would be
underwater in the lake and causing the water
to ripple and swirl while sand flies around
Adran.
Everyone was very explicit with Adran that
he was not to complete the ceremony in the
fashion that the serpent monks wanted.
And so, Adran swam out to the sand barge and
stood on the raised sand to stand at his full
7 ft height.
Even though he had soaked fur from head to
toe, he still looked commanding.
What came out of his mouth next is near verbatim.
“This is for Kovrym,” and he lifts the
amulet up to the sky to reflect the light.
Everyone at the table audibly gasps and says
a collective “Nooo.”
Meanwhile, Adran’s player, Drew, had misunderstood
the entire plan and thought he was to conduct
the ceremony, but it gets ruined by Ang and
his special effects.
As a DM, I recognized the misunderstanding,
but took full advantage of it anyways.
So, I say…
“Cool, here’s what happens.”
As you proclaim this victory in the name of
Kovrym the Protective and lift the amulet
to the sky, the sunlight reflects through
the amulet and an ancient power is stirred.
Rays of bright orangish light emit from the
amulet and scatter in all directions from
the amulet.
Everyone within a 200 ft radius of the amulet
gets hit by a ray.
While this power was activated, it caused
the water to churn around Adran, and Ang,
who was positioned underwater, began to realize
his special effects were not making the water
churn anymore.
Ang began to wonder what was happening at
the surface.
The sand barge began to dissipate, and a pair
of sickly yellow eyes opened from the murkiness,
giving way to reveal an ancient green dragon
lurking underneath.
It was Kovrym the Protective.
As Ang shared a hesitant moment of vulnerability
with the ancient wyrm, both Ang and Kovrym
looked up, and where Adran was standing a
bright light was pulsating.
“Everyone will need to make a Wisdom Save,”
I proclaimed.
All NPC’s auto-failed and Took the Gnome
was the only person to fail their saving throw
in the party.
The effects of failing this artifact weapon’s
attack was that their soul was captured and
sucked into the amulet.
If you have ever seen Raiders of the Lost
Ark, I described that scene at the end when
the ark of the covenant was opened and all
the spirits swirled around, killed everyone
who looked at it, and then got sucked back
into the ark.
As Adran was looking at this powerful artifact
that he just activated, the ground gave way
beneath him and the great wyrm Kovrym swallowed
him whole.
Everyone at the table was in a panic.
Many of the players were shocked and asking
him why would he do that.
“Adran,” I say.
“You are taking acid and crushing damage
from the dragon's stomach.
The amulet you hold has started to crack and
the souls that it has collected seem to have
been transformed into a single radiant ball
of energy.
The ball of energy floats before you, then
begins to drift towards the wall of the dragon’s
stomach.
You can see the radiant ball of energy begin
to be absorbed by the dragon.”
“I reach out and grab it,” Adran says.
“Looks like you are rolling an opposed grapple
check with a dragon’s will to become a deity.
Your choice of either an acrobatics or athletics
check,” I say.
He chooses to roll an acrobatics check and
got a natural 20.
What makes this more special is that Drew
had been playing for several months and entered
the campaign late, but he had never rolled
a natural 20 before.
He always rolled really low numbers.
Everyone at the table erupted into cheers
to see him succeed on such a high stakes roll.
I rolled the dragon’s opposing check and
rolled low.
“The dragon got an 18.”
I say with surprise, “You take the ball
of energy, caress it against your body, and
absorb the divine power.”
I go back to describing the scene with the
dragon about to encounter the rest of the
party.
As the dragon flies out of the water, after
just swallowing Adran, it hovers in flight
above the lake looking down on all the dead
monks and the rest of your party.
It begins to laugh, thinking it has won and
will ascend to divinity at any moment now.
Then suddenly, it feels something amiss within
its belly.
The power it had consumed had disappeared
and now he felt a surge of divine power swelling
within him that was not being controlled by
him.
It was feeling like it was going to erupt
from him.
A moment later, the dragon’s body exploded
from the sheer force of power that was emanating
from Adran.
Adran was hovering where the dragon once was,
glowing in a radiant white light with his
fur, buffeting from the power exuding from
his body.
I pause the session to talk specifically to
Drew.
I explain to him that the moment he absorbed
the divine power, he ascended as a demi-god.
At that moment, time froze, and he was visited
by Aoi, the supreme deity above all deities.
Lord Aoi gave Adran the portfolio for martial
arts and elemental manipulation.
Lord Aoi explained that he was now a divine
force that could be worshiped by those who
wish to follow martial arts as a way of life
and those who sought the power to control
the weather.
He would give him a few minutes to say his
goodbyes to his friends and then he will need
to follow him to a celestial plane to begin
his training.
I un-pause the session.
To the other PC’s, they never even realized
time had frozen.
Adran explained to his friends what happened
inside of the dragon, his new power, and that
he does not have long before he must go.
“But, what about Holegre?”
Ronnerin asked.
“If he finds out, he might want to take
revenge on you for foiling his monastery’s
plans.”
Adran formed a celestial water whip and cracked
it on the ground.
At the location on the ground where the whip
struck, dirt flew up and settled.
Holegre was magically summoned by Adran.
Ronnerin smiled and challenged him to a duel
right then and there.
Champion vs Champion.
Holegre was missing most of his HP and still
magically compelled to have a day off from
work.
The spell was dismissed so he could fight.
Ronnerin wound up summoning two lions and
toyed with Holegre until he finished him off
in the name of Adran.
After Holegre was killed, Adran went to Took’s
body and searched within himself.
He found a fragment of Took’s soul and with
his divine power pulled free Took’s soul
from his divinity, reformed it, and raised
Took back to life.
Afterwards, as DM, I handed Drew the D-M-G
and opened it to page 228 where the supernatural
gift of blessings is located.
As a parting gift, I allowed him to give each
player a blessing with the stipulation that
everyone must have a different blessing.
7 blessings.
7 PC’s.
Adran then bestowed his blessing on each of
his companions.
“Ronnerin, I bless you with the power of
Valhalla.
With this power, I grant you the ability to
summon spirit warriors to your side in battle
if you ever need them,” Adran said as he
touched Ronnerin’s shoulder.
“Aurora, I bless you with the power of protection.
Just know that my spiritual presence will
be there to help protect you against attacks
that would seek you harm,” Adran said as
he touched Aurora’s shoulder.
“Caelan, I noticed you like to stab things
a lot.
I will bless your weapon,” Adran said as
he touched Caelan’s shoulder, then touched
the hilt of his rapier, making a magical divine
energy enveloped it.
“Wulf, my brother in arms.
I bless you with the gift of increased health,”
Adran said as he touched Wulf’s shoulder.
“Took, I bless you with magical resistance
in hopes of protecting you from devious traps
set forth by rival spellcasters,” Adran
said as he touched Took’s shoulder.
“Ang, I bless you with a better understanding
of the world,” Adran said as he touched
Ang on the shoulder.
“Norvick, I bless you with the ability to
supernaturally bind your wounds.
May this favor you in the future,” Adran
said as he touched Norvick’s shoulder.
After he gave them their blessings, Adran
floated into the sky and with a final farewell
wave… he disappeared.
And that is the story of how Adran the Firbolg
Monk became a God.
A bittersweet ending for an epic character.
Retiring a PC is always hard but the memories
are priceless.
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