Catalyst Side Stories

A set of non-canonical, alternate-historical events starting from early spring 206 AC, exploring one destiny of the Catalysts.

Events

• Exploring Hammerhead. The Catalysts opened the portal to the ruins outside Hammerhead and found a different experience than that discovered by the Wild Cards in the mainline history. They found the city under siege by frost giants from the Nocthian Caldera and beset by tribes of human barbarians under the command of a trio of hags. The residents of the buried city were much more welcoming, but the heroes found themselves enmeshed in their politics, eventually discovering that the Archivist had been manipulating their civilization since the Cataclysm. After making peace between the dwarves and giants and defeating the Archivist, they made allies with the people and Crit Bot received a mechanical body as a reward.
• Side trip to the Plane of Stone. From Hound's Rest, they received word of an ancient library at Tal Elamor unreachable even by divinities. They entered the Portal Network aiming for that ancient city's terminus, but intervention of a shadowy entity misdirected them to the Plane of Stone. After doing some work for the angels of the legion there, they made it out to Shadvaal and thence via portal to Tal Elamor.
• Upon entry into the arcane maelstrom surrounding that city, they discovered it sectioned into zones and under threat by heavy Awakener infiltration. To reach the inner city, they first dealt with Wrath (possessing an archdruid) in the Primal sector before dealing with Gluttony (possessing a demilich) in the Merchant's Quarter. From there they defeated Greed and captured Lust (disembodied) in the Alchemy quarter, resolving the inter-faction war there. That gained them entrance into the inner city via the Arcane quarter, where they dealt with Pride (possessing an eye tyrant). Their last foe was Envy, who was posing as an angel-figure in the (mostly eaten by the sea) Divine Quarter. Sloth, as it turns out, had turned coat and gone native in the Quarter of Artifice and was not a threat.
• With the city purged of Awakener influence, they turned their attention on the Eternal Library. Here they learned that the real reason for their presence was the manipulation of the Librarian, seeking candidates for the Fourth Wish, as the Cosmic Forge was primed for such an event. While they pondered, they were interrupted by the approach of several large armies from the southern nations. The most pressing threat was the Dragon King of Bel's Kush, who had gathered souls to attempt the Wish; his goal was to create a "real" afterlife and enforce a notion of cosmic good and evil (partially undoing the free-will of mortals). The Catalysts opposed him, and met him in a debate battle in the Abyss (so as not to cause collateral damage). In the ensuing argument, the Dragon King was convinced that he had violated his own laws and was evil, which caused his grasp of the souls he'd taken (voluntarily and not) to waver and he...exploded. Good thing they were in the Abyss...
• With no other candidates, they decided to ask Crit Bot to make the sacrifice for the Fourth Wish, bringing about the beginning of the Age of Artifice.
• After returning home (sorely missing the entity they could no longer remember), they were contacted by a demigod they'd met--the Celestial City was under attack by Awakener-empowered demonic forces under the Twisted, who was personally attempting to destroy the Core of the Great Mechanism. This they decided wouldn't do, so they came to do battle. And did battle, slaying the demon prince.
• From there, their battle took them to the outer edge of the universe at the Crystal Sphere, where the Awakener had burst through. There they bought time for angelic forces to repair the breach, sealing the malign entity out. Vassarian Kabir realized his true nature as a shard of the mate of his patron, long-since destroyed in combat with the Awakener in that strange Dark realm beyond. He reunited with her, leaving the mortal coil forever.
• The rest of them retired, mainly to run a drug trade and be hippies.