Virethas, The Jade Queen

Virethas, fearsomely known as the Jade Queen, the Jade Serpent, the Green Dragon of yore, Villathas, or Villethas, was a powerful green chromatic dragon whose name and legacy cast a long shadow over the Sword Coast. Linked to ancient lore and forgotten histories, her existence is deeply intertwined with major noble lineages, historical struggles, and modern conspiracies across the region. Recent dark rituals at the Dragon Barrow have shattered her three-century slumber, returning her to the sky as a terrifying, weakened undead threat.

The Dragon War of the North

Three centuries ago, the nascent cities of the Sword Coast—Luskan, Neverwinter, Waterdeep, and Baldur’s Gate—faced a devastating, coordinated assault from an alliance of Chromatic Dragons that laid waste to much of the North. In response, Silverymoon, Waterdeep, Neverwinter, and Baldur’s Gate united with smaller settlements to form the Lord’s Alliance. Luskan, choosing submission over conflict, offered tribute to the draconic invaders rather than fight.

The Dragon Masks and the Fall of the Wyrms

The combined armies of the Lord’s Alliance, bolstered by a legendary band of heroes, successfully drove the dragons back and scattered them across the world. To defeat their massive foes, the heroes constructed five magical Dragon Masks—one of each chromatic color. These masks granted great powers against the dragons and allowed their bearers to influence and control a dragon of the corresponding color.

Using the masks, the heroes successfully convinced the Black, Red, and Blue dragons to fly away and never return to the north of the Sword Coast. The White dragon, Cryovain, was buried in Hrothgar’s empty grave in a tomb by the shores of Lac Dinneshere, the frozen lake near Kuldahar. The locations of these masks were kept strictly secret, even from other members of the alliance, so that no single individual would know where they all lay.

The masks worked perfectly against almost all of the invaders, with one notable exception: the green dragon Virethas. Renowned as the smartest and most wily of the group, Virethas successfully resisted the influence of the Green Dragon Mask. Because she could not be controlled, the heroes had to deal with her directly, leading to a catastrophic battle outside Neverwinter where she was ultimately slain by Lady Tanager Alagondar.

Following the war, her surviving kin were exiled to the far corners of the realm:

The Legendary Heroes of the Alliance

The victory of the Lord’s Alliance was secured by a legendary band of heroes whose appearances, fates, and roles are memorialized in four beautiful carvings within the central chamber of the Dragon Barrow:

  1. First Carving: Depicts five dragons descending headfirst upon the burning cities of Neverwinter and the Sword Coast.
  2. Second Carving: Features the seven heroes standing in a half-circle examining a plan on the ground:
    • Lady Tanager Alagondar of Neverwinter: A noble human warrior in full plate armor holding a sword. She directly confronted and slew Virethas outside Neverwinter, plunging her legendary blade, Dragon Slayer, through the dragon’s heart even as a massive claw burst through her chest, killing them both. She was subsequently buried with her sword in the Dragon Barrow.
    • Elminster Aumar (The Sage of Shadowdale / Sage of Waterdeep): A bearded man in a pointy wizard hat and robes, holding a staff. He survives to this day as a leader of the Harpers.
    • Hrothgar Hillsfar: A tall and bearded Firbolg champion of Kuldahar, Icewind Dale, who went missing and was long believed deceased, but survived into the modern era as the aged adventurer Farwald.
    • Esfaloth Nightbreeze (The Fey Touched): An elven hero holding a longbow with a bird on his shoulder. He ultimately entered a portal to the Feywild.
    • Gorion of Candlekeep: A rotund Zhentarim champion with a lute on his back, holding a scroll, later slain by Sarevok.
    • Kiara Shadowbreaker (Mistress of the Hunt): A half-elf Harper hero from Keoland wearing an eyepatch, leather armor with a Harper pin, and a spyglass on her belt.
    • Uther Vendrock (The Silvered Star): A dwarven representative of the Platinum Dragon (Bahamut) bearing a shield and warhammer, now buried on Stormwreck Isle.
  3. Third Carving: Depicts the climactic profile duel between Lady Alagondar and Virethas, with the great wyrm taking up most of the scene as Lady Alagondar drives her sword through her heart.
  4. Fourth Carving: Shows the four surviving dragons flying away with their backs turned while the heroes disperse to their final fates (Esfaloth entering a Feywild portal on the right, Kiara and Gorion boarding a ship on the left, and Uther and Elminster standing in the middle outside Hrothgar’s empty tomb by the frozen mountain lake with a giant tree).

The Cult’s Dracolich Conspiracy

Though long dead, Virethas remained central to a dark conspiracy orchestrated by the Cult of the Dragon. The Cult actively sought to locate the remains of the fallen dragon, raise her as an undead Dracolich, and crown her anew as the lord of the north.

To advance this agenda, the Cult dispatched a scale-clad emissary known as the “Jade Wyrmspeaker” to parley with Nezznar, the Drider known as the Spider, in the depths of Wave Echo Cave. The Wyrmspeaker offered Nezznar the riches of the legendary Forge of Spells in exchange for transferring its magical item bounty to the Cult. This dark covenant promised the Cult’s draconic allies dominion over the surface world while the followers of Lolth claimed the Underdark.

Noble Bloodlines and Target of the Cult

The Alagondar lineage directly connects the noble Gilmore family (originally of House Stork) to the dragon’s legacy. Generations ago, Gilmore’s great-grandfather defied the High King of the Moonshaes by marrying a woman tied to coastal raiders. Normally a capital offense, the family’s descent from the legendary dragonslayer Lady Tanager Alagondar spared them from execution, leading instead to their exile to Stork’s Rest on the western edge of the Moonshae Isles.

The burial grounds of Lady Alagondar in the Dragon Barrow became a critical target for the Cult of the Dragon. To protect her remains, the sword Dragon Slayer remained fixed in Virethas’s skeletal heart, acting as a magical ward with a plaque reading: ‑Only the blood of Alagondar may lift the sword / May it never need to be used again.‑

Because she could not touch the warded sword herself, the Green Wyrmspeaker, Sidorna, operated at the Dragon Barrow. She set a trap, placing two invisible masked cultists at the entrance and casting a Hold Person spell on the sword. Sidorna orchestrated events so that Gilmore would be lured to the Barrow to retrieve the sword, hoping he would also bring the soulstone containing his deceased sister Elira’s soul to complete her dark resurrection ritual.

The Resurrection at Dragon Barrow

In a climactic confrontation deep beneath the Dragon Barrow, the adventuring party known as the Magnificent Five entered a cavern of bone-white stalagmites and acid pools. Upon Gilmore drawing Dragon Slayer to free it, the ward was shattered, and the true horror of the chamber was revealed: the entire “cavern” was the massive skeletal remains of Virethas herself, with the stalagmites being her bones and the acid pools her venom.

Sidorna began the dark resurrection ritual. Gilmore’s soulstone was torn away, revealing that his sister Elira was actually a willing member of the Cult of the Dragon. Elira taunted Gilmore, declaring there is “no good or evil, only power.”

Despite the party’s desperate attempts to halt the ritual—including Nalini being paralyzed by the trap, Farwald and Nalini unleashing an icy sleet storm, Farwald utilizing a maximized Thunderstep that cracked open Lady Alagondar’s tomb, and a giant frog swallowing Sidorna’s head to stop her chanting—Sidorna, at death’s door, threw the Green Dragon Mask to the last surviving cultist. The cultist donned the mask and willingly sacrificed himself. Combined with a massive blast of necrotic energy that sacrificed Sidorna’s remaining followers, the ritual concluded at 66 out of 100 points.

As a result, Virethas was reborn as a weakened shadow of her former self—an adult, skeletal dragon held together by necromantic energy rather than true life, with her voice combined with Elira’s. The colossal skeletal dragon broke free from the Dragon Barrow, taking flight into the autumn sky. The party managed to leap to safety through a massive escape hole painted into the cavern wall by Farwald’s Marvelous Pigments just as she ascended.

Gilmore’s Folly and the Aftermath

In the smoldering crater of the ruined burial mound, henceforth known as “Gilmore’s Folly,” Gilmore attuned to Dragon Slayer (a +1 greatsword that deals an additional 3d6 damage against dragons), experiencing a vision of the ancient war. Erevyn discovered a cracked blue sending stone in the debris, indicating that the link had been severed from the other end.

Soon after, Griffin Riders led by Lady Arabeth de Tylmarande, right hand of Lord Nasher Alagondar, arrived alongside paladins. Distrustful of the party and accusing them of grave-robbing, Lady Arabeth was temporarily swayed by Sildar Hallwinter’s letter of recommendation, granting them an audience with the Small Council of Neverwinter.

Meanwhile, the surrounding Neverwinter Wood braced itself in defense; the druid Esfaloth Nightbreeze (speaking furiously through the trees as Reidoth) accused the party of assisting “that idiot child” in waking the dragon, and locked the forest away from the outside world. He later revealed to Nalini that while the resurrected dragon has escaped and the threat is severe, the ultimate insult to nature is civilization itself.

Lost and Found Memories

For a time, knowledge of Virethas was intentionally obscured. The adventurer Farwald suffered from severe memory gaps due to a powerful Modify Memory and True Polymorph spell cast by Elminster Aumar, who sought to cloud Farwald’s recollections of his past life as Hrothgar Hillsfar to protect his family and the secret Firbolg community of Kuldahar, as well as the locations of the Dragon Masks. However, after encountering the white dragon Cryovain, the Everfrost, Farwald experienced sudden, vivid flashbacks that restored his deep, scholarly knowledge of chromatic dragons, specifically recalling the Jade Queen alongside her surviving kin and the memory of her death.

The Sorcerer’s Transaction

In the ruins of Conyberry, within an abandoned temple dedicated to Ioun, the Knowing Mistress, the party encountered a mysterious sorcerer adorned with a many-headed dragon tattoo. The group struck a bargain, trading their own gathered knowledge of Virethas to the sorcerer in exchange for 2,500 gold pieces. This payment was delivered in the form of a humongous golden temple bell, which was subsequently melted down by Farwald and Nalini to be transported within their bag of holding, later fenced in Phandalin. Not long after, Gilmore’s connection to the dragon was targeted again when a Green Dragon Wyrmling and three dragonborn attacked him during his watch, showing obsessive interest in his soulstone pendant.