Our heroes descended deeper into the duergar fortress. The found a temple of Deep Duerra, to which was chained an emaciated Illithid. The Illithid had it’s tentacles surgically removed, and a metal plate on its head. It could communicate telepathically, but seemed to lack the more sinister abilities of a typical Illithid.
Yrso freed it, and our heroes promised to return when it was safe.
Finally, our heroes emerged in the great Duergar forge, powered by a beating heart, and found Xardorok and a foreman issuing commands to a Quaggoth clean up crew. The construct seen in the vision of this place was nowhere to be found.
A battle ensued, Duergar in the watchtowers turned on each other, and the fierce Quaggoths formed a front line while Xardorok sprayed eldritch beams from his guantlet and rebuked melee attacks with green fire.
When the tables turned against Xardorok, the foreman became invisible and retreated, while a group of Duergar aligned with Grandolpha emerged from another section of the fortress. Xardorok was smoited and left only a pile of ashes and his guantlet. As he died he said his sons would continue his work. He didn’t even realize both his remaining sons were dead.
The Duergar herded the remaining Quagoths away from our heroes, and Grandolpha approached from the throne room. She was intent on reaching the guantlet when Yrso picked it up, became engulfed in flames, and threw it into the forge.
The guantlet bubbled and hissed as it was disintegrated. Grandolpha revealed the guantlet is what Xardorok used to program the Construct. She told our heroes that the construct would complete its tasks with relentless focus.
She also informed our heroes that the flight path of the construct could be manipulated in the war room, but that it will always have 10 targets which it would raze completely to the ground before returning to sunblight.
When asked for aid, Grandolpha mentioned the citadel’s vault was locked, and that the key was the guantlet. The vault would take days to open without it.
Grandolpha encouraged our heroes to leave Sunblight while the Duergar close shop and return to the underdark.