With Sabrith's and Grogza's return, they were brought up to speed and let in on what truly happened, GM's possession of Ishtar and all. For the rest of the players, the exchange with the GM was kept secret, and the official story for Ishtar was that she saw the error of her ways after an impassioned plea on Rayne's part forced the succubus to empathize with her victims. It wasn't too far from the truth, and it had the side effect of making Rayne something of a hero among the survivors.<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>New allies</strong><br/><br/>Fortunately, neither Charlatania nor Hawtness were collared, as far as Rayne could tell. Charlatania was wearing a choker, but it wasn't a collar, as she proved when she took it off without any undue effort.<br/><br/>Charlatania had a blank look, having not heard of the deal with the collars before, but Hawtness nodded in recognition. "It was after dying inside the iron maiden, but instead of rezzing I found myself in this hellscape and there was this devil that said I was going to turn into a zombie, but he would rez me if I just put this collar on - I guess it must have been the same type of collar you were talking about. It was tempting, but in the end I rejected the deal on the grounds that it was too good to be true, and besides, I thought it would be cool to be a zombie for a while. I just didn't expect to turn into a cum-zombie, but from what you said, I guess zombification was the lesser of two evils."<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>Magic item crafting</strong><br/><br/>"Well, thanks," Lizzy said, putting away the griffon hair into her inventory. "Who knows, maybe I'll make something for myself out of it soon, I'm at the point in my wizzy career where I should start flying more often." She laughed at her own pun.<br/><br/>The wizard's eyes followed the hem of Rayne's skirt appreciatively as the archer gave a twirl, at least, before she flicked her eyes away pretending she hadn't been staring. "A starbow, huh? Now that's not something you see everyday. In my experience, trying to craft a specific magic weapon will trigger a quest where you need to retrieve some MacGuffin before it lets you finish the thing. Normally you'd be able to check a guide to see exactly what you need so you can get it in advance, but I suppose that's not possible now. So you'll have to gather up the gold needed, and then I'll have to start crafting it, and only in the middle of that process you'll get the quest."<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>Ishtar's debriefing</strong><br/><br/>Everyone agreed that Telathrax had to be eliminated, especially after what he had done to sixteen players. Ishtar was by no means innocent, responsible for the fate of six of them, but everyone also agreed that with her change of heart, first helping to rescue the prisoners, and then seeing how else she could contribute to the players' cause, was a much more constructive option than punishing her.<br/><br/>"The people without dual natures like you, I believe you call them 'NPC's? According to Telathrax, they cannot give birth to more monsters or lay viable eggs - but he still has hundreds of them in the spawning chambers, some of them men even, subjected to the same treatment, simply because he finds their suffering amusing," Ishtar explained. "Speaking of which, the magic circle I drew in the bazaar is a teleportation circle that leads directly to the spawning chambers. When last I saw Telathrax, I told him that I would return with more... women... if possible, so he should have left the corresponding circle on his end alone in case I go back. You can use it to bypass the sewers and launch a surprise attack... I can also help you scry the exit point to make sure it is not trapped."<br/><br/>"Scrying, that's probably a good idea regardless, to figure out what we're up against," Starstrike said. "And now that you mention it, the players being assholes and attacking other players on the first day, I don't remember any of them wearing collars. Actually, now that I think about it, it's a bit strange how none of them have resurrected back in town or tried another raid. But we can save that for after we've dealt with Telathrax."<br/><br/>Zombs spoke up. "Rayne's got the right idea. Between what we can get from IC knowledge and what we can remember from guides, we can probably figure out everything there is to know about Telathrax. Firstly, Ishtar... can you describe exactly how old and how large Telathrax is, to the best of your knowledge?"<br/><br/>Based on Ishtar's description, the group figured out that Telathrax was almost certainly in the Mature Adult age category, and all the pertinent abilities and statistics that went with it. (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon/chromatic-black/black-dragon-mature-adult)