If only the DM wasn't a Jerk!

When last we left the party they were at the base of a bell tower, taking a short rest before storming up the staircase to stop the mystical song of the ringing bells.

The group runs the spiral staircase without stopping at any of the prior five levels, rushing straight into a eladrin enchanter 6th, shadowfell witch 6th, and Mind flayer Master mind adjusted to 13th level elite.

Because of how poorly this combat went for the party the really really short version is appropriate, the trick was to stop the bells from ringing by some ranged means by stopping at some level before the baddies and looking up the long 4 square opening in the center of the room that looks up into the bell tower - with the bells stopped the two 6th level baddies would immediately drop from being thralls of the Mind Flayer Mastermind (MFM), and the group could focus on him alone. Fortunately one round into the dazed, stunned, dominated, or teleported effects, the wizard pulls off a fair use of a chilling ability that does immobilize, and I allow it to freeze the bells.

But because what you can do with the rules, isn't necessarilly a 'should' do, leveling the baddy from an 18 elite to a 13 elite - the maximum allowable by the book, is what you call a bad idea; at least when you are talking about a MFM. This baddy effectively drops or dominates at least 1/2 the party, and I have to use some fudge rules that says the bore into brain doesn't kill the player out right, instead it can just make them a thrall that once magically healing has been applied or the MFM is destroyed the effect of thrall ends.

One combat down, the party quickly rushes off lead by the bard to the last place their damsel could be, the master control room under the altar in the chapel.

under the chapel the group tries to talk down the damsel, unfortunately they are espousing things about her not being who she thinks she is, rather that she is Sehanine (the deity), which is to most NPC's crazy talk. But because she is a friend to them and doesn't want to hit the self destruct switch with them around is able to be partly talked down, can't recall this a couple weeks later what triggered her to go ahead and try to off herself by pushing the self destruct, but she does and a chasm opens beneath her and one in the party catches her with a save check. They flee the chapel grounds as the entire complex crashes down into a chasm beneath the earth.

The little girl kimico that they saved from the chapel earlier leads them through the town, to her manor on a hill overlooking the city. They rest and do the typical Naruto anime pervie sage bathhouse scene, where the swordmage over hears Kimico whisper to Lissera (the other damsel they saved) the passphrases to unlock Sehanine from the prison of the body of Lissera. Freed the young girl Sehanine bounds away in search of "kenny" a soul reaper who is back in the soul society - and teasingly berates the swordmage as she leaves for peeping.

Next session the group awakes to a new world that looks nearly the same as the one they meditated or when to sleep in the night before only the hues are grayer and the lighting slightly dimmer.

The swordmage wakes to find a skinned corpse disguised to look like his body on the floor in the entry to his room - turns out it is an undead flesh creature that was animated by a hell butterfly - an object of the soulsociety that can be used for scrying communication and animating bodies.

The wizard meditates until he leaves his room to find a casket in his entry which he arcane locks shut, then after the swordmage arrives they talk to the casket and find a potential vampire inside and so they decide to leave the casket locked shut - then they make note of the fact that the wizard has stepped out of his body when he got up from his meditations.

The Bard wakes to hearing noises outside of his room, that turn outs to be a two headed undead dog that hunts him down as he retreats to his fellow party members, they dispatch the pooch, to find another undead rot hound inside it's body that immediately imprints on the Bard as his new master - the wizard fearing for the Bard and just not liking the critter blasts it to gooy bits onto the Bard, then cleans the bard with a prestidigitation.

Soon after the group resigns itself to getting their bodies back, but first they have to save the last captain from the soul society that is trapped here. Sharina (Corellon). They run into town and notice the entire city over run by undead that are spawning more undead. The wizard pulls out a teleportation ability to link them to the permanent circle under the orphanage or primary headquarters of the Cercators.

They find this headquarters to be empty because all of the creatures are streetside creating havoc. Only beings left are three vessels brains in magical jars, that are used to contain the immense power of the hollows that would otherwise explode a normal physical body upon entering it.

Effectively the wizard puts to sleep the elite brain, leaving only the two weaker puds to dispatch - whence the group coupe de gra the main boss with 4 rounds of pummeling.

They free the damsel, but realize she can't see them in their soul forms, but have discovered ghost sound works to speak to the otherside. At which point they play her scary dark music after telling her that they were there to help her. she freaks out tries to get away and then runs into the invisible swordmage. They persist in chasing her around undersheets or in some other to her scary fashion until finally her and a group of henna tattooed potential vessel prisoners are told to wait that the group will get them out of there.

In the meantime the group finds a pool of alchemical regents acting as a capacitor or potential energy store for the hollows that would be allowed to flow into the mouths of vessels - usually unsuccessfully (boom goes the host). Also they discovered the lair of the Blue Dragon Head of the Cercators and looted his lair.

The group then escaped to the Swordmage's family house in Kyotenichi bringing Kimico with them - discovering her to be an avid reader of Ion books that were used in the Cercator rituals.

The swordmage discovers his father can see him in soul form, as well can his sisters - and apparently each has some new level of understanding of what has been going on, or at least of the soul society in general.

The group unable to immediately awaken Corellon from Sharina, decide to contact pelor and the raven queen, who tell them not to contact them in that manner again or it will give them away.

Pelor and the Raven queen show up in dog and cat forms respectively - attempting to hide their spiritual pressure from detection from hollows and soul reapers alike. They advise the party that they cannot help them, other than to instruct them at this point. Which is to say they should take care of their material world problem of the Blue Dragon Cercator head, as it doesn't matter if you get your body back if you have not world to come back to.

They do convince the Raven Queen to at least unleash Corellon - which she does, and upon discovering this, kimico gets very upset with the group, the Bard in particular who she has taken a liking to, and was severely disappointed in.

So the session ends with the party trying to figure out how to stop this Blue Dragon and then they will refocus on finding their bodies, which they believe to be in the soul society - or at least those who know are in the soul society.

I didn't feel like I did a great job with running the Deity NPC's it's always hard find excuses to only reveal a little and not the whole plot when potentially the NPC could have all of that information - I'll try to do better next time, have to forgive me this one, didn't expect the guys would get that far last session.