Out of Abyss Session 3: The Maze Remembers

The session begins with the party departing Gracklestug for Gauntalgrim to seek high-level healing for Thavos and Valentia. Drogan stays behind to assist the city, while Brand uses Transport via Plants to move the group to the chilly mountains outside the Dwarven stronghold. At the Iron Tabernacle, Thrain Ironbeard successfully restores Thavos's heart and Valentia's missing eye. However, Thrain identifies a severe infection of demonic madness in Taryn, gifting her a golden amulet to help resist the influence of Graz'zt. The party then has an audience with King Bruenor Battlehammer to report the death of Yeenoghu and the rising threat of Graz'zt before resting and returning to the Underdark. After three days of travel, the party enters the Labyrinth, a geometric domain shaped by the Maze Engine and claimed by Baphomet. They discover a consecrated cleft filled with severed gnoll heads and Abyssal runes. In these tunnels, they encounter Gash, a scarred gnoll guide who offers a secret route to the Maze Engine to avoid Minotaur scores. Gash leads them to the Gallery of Angels, where the party finds eight petrified celestials in poses of agony. By interacting with the statues, they collect eight angel feathers for a future ritual and learn that Graz'zt has moved his operations to the surface city of Baldur's Gate. The party eventually reaches the Maze Engine, a massive bronze sphere suspended over magma. As they attempt to stealthily approach, their Modron guide rushes toward the device, prompting Driddle to ruthlessly execute the construct with Telekinesis to prevent an uncontrolled activation. This alerts a Nalfeshni guardian, initiating a high-stakes combat. Taryn demonstrates incredible martial prowess, severely wounding the demon with a series of critical strikes that cause internal organ damage and leave the creature frightened. In the heat of battle, Driddle uses Telekinesis to activate the Maze Engine's levers. The device begins to rotate and glow, pulsing with the power of the Great Wheel. On the engine's first initiative count, a flash of white light erupts, targeting Thavos. The Paladin is instantly vanished from the present. The session ends on a massive cliffhanger as Thavos wakes up in the cold, wet slave pens of Velkynvelve, fully geared and leveled, but trapped at the chronological beginning of the campaign.