2

The dragon recovers its breath weapon, but does not use it, instead clambering back to the mouth of the cavern and attacking the newly-appeared Soar.  Before it does so, you all feel a wave of power and fear begin to come over you; Soar and Jalt, survivors of the attack on Greenest, will remember this feeling well.  Unless you are immune to fear effects, you all need to make a WIS saving throw, DC 14, or be frightened of the dragon.  You all have advantage from Beacon of Hope.

The dragon now makes its three attacks on Soar:

Bite Attack: 22 Damage: 14 piercing damage plus 6 cold damage.

Claw Attack: 31 Damage: 21
Claw Attack: 12 Damage: 15

Is Soar still up?

(Giant WIS saves:  7 9 10)

(OOC:  Did Jalt include the giants in his spell?  The stone giants were too far away, but he could have got Blagothkus, I think.)

Yes... he would have. Sorry I meant to type allies not friends. 

Jalt save: 23

Nate looks up and likely sees the dragon at the mouth of the cave now as he was watching Soar get lifted up by Blagothkus.

Nate WIS save: 21

The dragon surprisingly doesn't seem to spook him, but although he doesn't see exactly what's going on he senses Soar might be taking a licking. 

Soar has heroism still active from her successful concentration check, so she's immune to fear.

She's still up. The 28 healing brought her to 45, plus 3 temp hp from heroism. So the 38 damage she takes from the bite and the one claw drops her to 10hp. 

Soar concentration check: 11

Seems like heroism drops, then. Does her immunity mean she's beaten the save for the purposes of the dragon trying again? (This is, of course, assuming she lives that long.)

(OOC:  I would say Soar has immunity.  Can I have Nub's WIS saving throw?)

Blagothkus's advantage roll:  4  That's enough.  So he's not frightened either, and only the stone giants and possibly Nub are affected.)

(Thanks for the reminder)

Nub WIS save: 24

Thanks.  So that's it for Glazhael's turn; he's in melee with Soar and Jalt.  

Soar or Nub are up.  Can you take a turn for either Soar or Nub, but not both as Glazhael may want to use a legendary action afterwards...

Soar fends off the dragon teeth and claws, nearly losing her feet in the terrible attack. She spits out some blood through a feral grin. "That all you got? You should surrender now, or leave this castle for good!"

She tries to circle around the dragon in the tunnel so she's behind it, with Jalt on the cavern side (if she can't do this, or flanking doesn't work, ignore the second rolls), and then raises the greatsword for two full-body swings at a vulnerable-looking part of the dragon.

Bonus action: cast hex on the dragon

Attack: 21 Damage: 20 plus another 9 necrotic damage
Extra Attack: 23 Damage: 16 plus another 11 necrotic damage

Level 1 smite on first hit: 14 radiant damage
Level 2 smith on second crit: 19 

Also forgot the extra 7 necrotic damage from second hit for the crit on a 19

Another d6 necrotic damage on first hit, and then 2d6 on second hit for the crit for hex damage: 4 and 11

Please describe how Soar kills Glazhael the white dragon.

(OOC: YOU'RE KIDDING ME HOLY FORKING SHIRTBALLS!!!!!!!)

Soar tries to move around behind the huge white dragon before her in the tunnel, still staggering from her bite and claw wounds, blood in her teeth. She smiles up at it, and raises the greatsword in both hands, preparing for a sideways strike, the sword leaking tendrils of black smoke behind her, which the paladin does not see.

She sees the dragon head move for another bite, and the tail moving for a massive hit, and, with a brief prayer to Kelemvor, preparing to meet her god, she strikes. The sword bites into the dragon's chest, and in a reverse crossways swing, the sword slices completely through the neck, severing it completely. The head drops to the bottom of the tunnel, poking out into the cavern. 

Soar's eyes are still closed, and it takes her a few beats to realize what happened.

Silence falls over the cavern, interrupted for Soar only by the gleeful chuckling of her sword:  Delicious.  Quite delicious.

Then Blagothkus pokes his head into the tunnel, regards the dragon for a moment, and then smiles.  Good riddance to bad rubbish, he says, and then makes a comment in giant to his fellows, who both laugh.  I'm glad I was able to give you a lift, at least.  You are very skilled for small folk, I will admit.  Perhaps I underestimated you.  He looks around the room.  Feel free to take whatever you wish, but be quick about it.  I will make the landing soon.  Ah, it will be good to have my castle back, he says pleasantly, and he turns and the three giants walk from the cavern, leaving you and Jalt still in the mouth of the new tunnel, thirty feet above the ground.

What would you all like to do?

Soar opens her eyes, not believing that the dragon has been slain, and poking Glazhael's jaw with a toe. Then she turns to Jalt and hugs him. This is probably the first time she's hugged him, but she can't help herself. "We did it! I was pretty sure I was going to be a dragon snack, but we did it!"

She smiles, lets him go, and turns around to plop down on the edge of the tunnel, looking out over the cavern.

In response to Blagothkus, she says, "your lift was a big help, thank you! I'm curious where we are right now, and where you plan to land. Do we have most of the day? And, well, there's still the vampire. Do you need help getting rid of it?"

She mutters happily at the sword. "We make a pretty good team! I miss my shield, and Talon's probably a bit jealous," (she grabs Talon from her pack and makes the longsword 'talk' in an absurd falsetto about how she's really the best sword and the greatsword takes itself too seriously...) "but maybe we can figure something out. You helped me hit that dragon pretty hard, though I have Kelemvor and my new friend from the Feywild to thank for that."

Sitting down, catching her breath, she lays on hands for 10hp, helping close some of the wounds from the dragon's claws and teeth. (She also gets 5hp healed back from hexblade's curse.) She kind of kicks her legs a bit, suspended 30 feet up over the cavern, taking in the fight, much quicker than she was expecting. She hops up, ties an end of her rope onto Glazhael's wrist, and throws the other end down. "Nate, I wonder if you can help try to harvest some things from this dragon. He won't need them anymore. Teeth, scales, claws, blood, bones, anything else that might be interesting or useful? I'd love a tooth and a claw, and maybe Jalt and I could make some cool black and white dragonscale armor."

Then she rappels down to the ground and pulls out the sword, remembering it talking about being able to detect magic. She pulls it out, and like a senior on a beach with a metal detector, begins waving it over the hoard, slowly casting detect magic and looking for anything magical. She has not idea how she'd get anything out of the hoard, covered as it is with a layer of ice.

-----

Nub blinks slowly as the dragon is beheaded. Perhaps this odd paladin really does have a predilection for beheadings. Ahem. That illusion worked fairly well! So many spells to learn, and that one was a very helpful one. He listens to Blagothkus speak, and then turns his attention to the hoard.

There was a lot here. Frozen in ice. Ice melts. He begins experimenting with create bonfire and some torches, and eventually, if needed, rolling hisflaming sphere about the hoard, focusing on places in the structure that might help reveal hidden areas, to see how quickly the ice melts and how easily items can be removed from the pile. He searches for anything secret, any place the dragon might have hidden particularly valuable items. Not just on the ground in the pile, but, with Jalt's help with flight, among the stalactites in the ceiling and higher up on the walls.

He is careful not to ignite anything flammable, and eventually begins working with Soar to help unearth anything magical she finds with her terrifying sword dowsing rod. He'll grab any gold, jewels, and platinum he finds, as well as, of course, anything magical, and set them aside in a pile.

Nate's just standing there wide eyed in disbelief after what just has transpired. He would be eagerly awaiting Blagothkus's response to Soar's questions, specifically about where we are right now and when we plan to land. He also somehow feels at peace. Maybe because the threat of imminent death is gone. Haha. No, it's not that. Something else.

Nate would do as Soar says, climbing up the rope and now getting a really good look at the beheaded dragon body. He kind of remembers the last few years of his life and what has happened from back then up until now as he stares at the decapitated dragon. He'd then try to harvest all of the things that Soar has asked of him;  teeth, scales, claws, blood, bones, anything else that might be interesting or useful. Here's a roll if needed: 8

He would also most definitely take a good few handfuls of the best looking gems from the pile that might be loose and/or come off from Nub's magic and shove them in his robes.

After being hugged, Jalt would move towards the body of Glazhael and drop to a knee before it and place a hand on him. He bows his head.. May you find peace and redemption in the afterlife. He'll stand back up and hop down with his flying powers still intact I'd suppose. He'll take a look around just to see if he finds anything that would interest him or be of interest to the Platinum Cadre. 20

Soar, through the ice-covered treasure your detect magic is able to detect magic around an axe, a small flat stone, a set of studded leather armour, and a pair of bracers.

(Nub would be able to melt the ice to get through to these items, as they are on the top, though it would be hard for him to melt the entire hoard.)

Blagothkus does not respond to Soar's questions - he's already halfway out of the door by the time she starts asking them.  You might have to find him later if you want answers or further conversation.

Nate,  you don't have a great time harvesting items, despite your training in such matters from your mother, the dragon's physiology is unfamiliar.  You get five unbroken teeth, and three scales that didn't break, but the blood doesn't seem to want to be harvested.  Make an Investigation check to grab some gems, at disadvantage as dealing with the dragon took so long.

Jalt, you estimate the total value of the hoard to be over 10,000 gold, though it's clear shortly after Nub gets to work that most of the gold was sprinkled over the surface, and there's a lot of silver and copper underneath.  It would also be very hard to carry all of this, though you can attempt to.  In terms of interesting items, you see nothing religious or dedicated to Tiamat - the treasure as a whole was that, you suppose - but you see the same items that Soar detected.

For simplicity's sake, you have a limited time in this chamber.  I would say that Nate spends his time recovering dragon parts, Soar and Nub recovering the four magical items, and Jalt taking some of the treasure - does that work for you?

Soar and Nub grab the items, and Nub will ritually cast identify on them later. Soar will grab any handfuls of gold or platinum or gems she sees as she digs through and retrieves the items. Makes sense we're not getting 10,000 in gold, but she'll grab whatever she can, assuming Blagothkus and his people will make use of the rest. She's disappointed the dragon's carcass didn't yield very much, but she'll help stow away anything Nate can't. But she wants to follow Blagothkus to ask her questions again.

(I’m fine with the simplicity)

Soar picks up 161 gold pieces.  Nate and Jalt each grab 5 small blue sapphires, each worth 300 gold pieces.  Nub grabs the magical items and stores them in his pack, ready to identify later.  As this is happening, you start to feel the castle dropping, slowly at first, then faster, and then slowing again.  As you return to the lower courtyard, you feel the castle touching down on land.  

Blagothkus is not there, but the two stone giants are clearly keeping watch for you and wave you amiably in the general direction of the gate.  You then do hear Blagothkus descending the great spiral staircase and walking over to meet with you.

Soar tries to run and jump up to high-five the two stone giants with a grin, cheering them on and thanking them for having her back.

(Did we get our hidden bags of rescued treasure items from the guest room? If not, we will go grab them either before or after talking to Blagothkus.)

When she sees him, she basically asks everything she meant to ask earlier, except the bit about how long until we land.