My psychotic party attacked my vatican!

So I recently created a post about one of my party members, a half-tabaxi sorcerer who tries to steal everything that isn't nailed down... This particular incident happened just recently in the same world that Alaura Populates.

The Heroes had arrived in The Guardian City of Aarden, which is the religious center of the continent. There is a circle of high-Paladins that belong to every temple dedicated to a god or goddess in the city, about 30 dieties or so. This means that the city is highly religious and instead of the usual run-of-the-mill town guard, you have Paladins of various faiths and levels patrolling the city. My party had just recently deterred some cultist activities in the city's underbelly. It turned out they were closely connected to a group of magically inclined individuals that have something to do with Alaura's backstory. As such, they found some evidence of other beings of high power within the city that had ties to the cultist leader. The next session was planned to be a relaxing shopping day since the party had just defeated my boss, a 5e variant of the 3.5 monstrosity a Coven Horror. My BardBarian wasn't gonna make this session so I thought I'd divvy up some coin and let them go on a shopping spree to celebrate their success... I should have known it wouldn't have been that simple.

The last thing I told my BardBarian before the session started was "Don't worry... I doubt anything pivotal to the story will happen this session." Then we began...
Alaura broke off from the party as soon as she woke up at the inn, leaving them to peruse the market for anything worth buying. They discovered more magical items than they could even afford but were happy with their selections... but we're not talking about that... we're talking about Alaura again...

First thing Alaura did was head straight to the Merchant's Guild, in the Guild districts, and I described that once she got into this part of the city, the paladins that were frequently seen patrolling the rest of the city were less present here, replaced by a more private security force. They were specifically centered around the Merchant Guild's Hall, with a single front door, and a lone guard standing there. Alaura approached but was informed that if she did not have official papers allowing her access to the guild hall, or accompaniment by a guild member, she could not come in. Alaura pressed further but couldn't find a way in that way, so she wandered off, cast invisibility on herself, and went to the back of the building, finding another door, guarded by another guard. She cased it till her spell wore off but didn't leave or take cover after the hour passed and *POOF* appeared mere feet from the guard, startling him. He was understandably shaken, but didn't attack. I was trying to give them every opportunity to explore their options before setting my party down a path that might get them in trouble with the law.

Alaura eventually left, wandering instead toward the market, where she ran into the familiar face of Tavos Uthres, the traveling exotic goods merchant that had been with them for the first half of their journey. She asked if he had any friends in the merchant's guild and he replied that he did not have any personal acquaintances, but that she may find luck approaching the shop-tent sign-up that was in the Bazaare, as two merchants' guild representatives were helping up-and-coming entrepreneurs set up market stalls to front their businesses. They offered temporary contracts through the merchant's guild with potential to further business with proof of success and fair-trade.

She didn't bother following the lead, even though I went through the length of even showing her that one representative had a copy of a badge that would probably (when shown) allow her access to the guild hall. She is rather keen at stealing things, after all.

Eventually, Alaura met up with the rest of the group, all adorned with their magical items they had purchased. She explained that she needed to get into the Merchants' Guild, but wasn't allowed entree. I gave one of my players a set of studded leather armor that, when spoken a command word to, would change their appearance to match any other armor or clothing. An idea began to form. A surprisingly good one, had it gone right.

Vince, my Dwarf Shaman, who's armor was enchanted as I'd described, was taken to the Merchants' Guild Hall, where he observed the armor of one of the guards. They then left the street and he changed his clothes to match the guards. He walked back onto the street, heading towards the Hall with the rest of the party in tow. My Elf Rogue, Lia, had also cast disguise person on herself to match the guards so that there would be someone with a decent charisma score able to speak for the group... however, while the armor had no cooldown or time limit to its abilities, Disguise self lasted a finite amount of time... and that's when everything started to go wrong.

Rather than case the complex to watch for changing of guards and the like, they immediately approached the front door. Vince's brilliant idea:

Vince: "Hey I'm here for my shift..."

Guard: "But... I've only been here for an hour."

Vince: (To me) what time is it?

Me: it's like... 5:30ish... like... its approaching dusk.

Vince: (4 deception) "Guess I got here early."

Guard: *knocks on door* captain?

Captain from inside: *leans out the door* what's all this? *Looks at dwarf in guard armor* who's he?

Vince: Guess I should just leave...

Captain: *Looks at Lia, who's disguised as a guard* You, take him to the Temple of Atheria, they'll keep him secured till we can sort this out. Meanwhile, who're you two?

Alaura and Alistair (My human gunslinger) are dressed in their normal clothes, but speaking in silly posh accents about a meeting with the character Alaura thinks is connected to the cult. They get turned away at the door, after Alaura starts fake sobbing about not being able to be seen for the meeting. And they are being escorted out of the guild district, shortly behind Lia and Vince, who are also being tailed by another guard who had witnessed the situation from the street......... and this is where things got hairy kids...

Alaura and Alistair know there's a guard following Lia, who's trying to lose him. She Sleight of Hands casts sleep at the guard, hoping to sneakily remove the problem, but she didn't realize he wasn't your average guard, these are elite paid guards, and his health was just too high to be knocked out like that. Seeing that that hadn't worked, Alaura decided it was her turn to try to get the guard away. She cast Prestidigitation to make the smell of smoke waft through the street. Then she shouted "Is something on fire?!?" The guard was momentarily distracted, but there were other guards around now and they were paladins, the party was getting into the more populated part of town and the higher level guards were starting to show up to the commotion... Alaura thought she could help by setting a nearby bush on fire with her magic, but was seen and immediately apprehended by two paladins behind her. Alaura was now in custody and being led to the dungeons under the temple of Atheria...

Lia took this "distraction" as an opportunity to duck into an alleyway with Vince in Tow so they could change their appearances again... But they both failed their rolls... so the guard saw them and began pursuing...

Vince gets a crazy look in his eye and then did something he knew he couldn't go back from... Vince began casting a spell... The guard rushed to the entrance of the alleyway to pursue Lia and Vince..... and was immediately trampled by FOUR CAVE BEARS. Vince had decided that the little stuff wasn't working so he decided to summon woodland creatures and sent the bears on... "as non-lethal a city run as they could manage".

In the commotion, they both decided to sneak back out of the alley into the street, that was covered in flaming bushes, the smell of smoke, and several bears doing battle with paladins. Vince decided to cast minor illusion while he was at it and make there be even more bear sounds overhead in the flaming city streets. Bystanders were being corralled away by paladins who were fighting off the bears, but Lia and Vince came back to a small group of guards who saw them leave the alleyway. They start cornering the two, at which point, Lia channeled her true rogue and said "I'll come back for you!" and cast Jump on herself. Vince wasn't about to be left behind though, as he cast Reduce on himself, shrinking him down to 2 feet tall and weighing a little over 20 lb., he shouted "Take me with you!" and they took to the rooftops high above to escape.

Alistair had the Boots of Spider Climbing and ran up a building as well, trying to keep an eye on the two paladins that had Alaura. He ran along side them on the wall of the building they were near. He jumped off the roof and cast Thunderwave upon impact, trying to knock them away from alaura to free her from their grasp. But one saved, so only one fell to the thunderwave, and was already getting ready to get back up. Alaura took this opportunity to try to get away, but rolled a 1 when trying to punch the other Paladin in the face. She felt a few ligaments in her hand crunch under the full-plate helmet, and the Paladin cast hold person on her to keep her from attacking him. She was now stuck in position being drug through the street away from the chaos by the last paladin. Alistair ran off into the crowd and was doubling back to try again. Vince shouted "Throw me!" to Lia and she tossed him. As he left her grasp, Vince revoked Reduce, going back to his full height and weight, and then he channeled the attack power of a Giant Elk, and essentially GORED my Paladin into the ground as phantom antlers attacked the busy paladin. Alaura finally ended the effect of the spell and they all took off running.

Alistair told Vince what to say and spoke in Thieve's Cant. "Lia, Leave the city!" which he shouted with Minor Illusion. They then decided to escape through the sewers since all they could see of the front gates of Aarden was about 20 Paladins preparing a wall of shields and magic. Lia came to the same conclusion, but they were separated at the time. Lia found a sewer grate and dove in no problem, now alone in the sewer...

Alaura saw her opportunity in a sewer grate that was circled by three guards on the lookout for the players. (At this point I had mentioned that there were a lot of random civilians running around them) Alaura decided to flex her magic muscles and cast Tidal Wave to knock the guards far enough away from the grate that they could get inside. She forgot that I had just mentioned the number of civilians around them and she unfortunately killed seven random passersby before they could make their escape.

Now this all happened while one of my players wasn't at the table, and he had already made it clear he was gonna be doing things in town all day probably separate from the party, which is why I never bothered to bring his character back into this. SOOOO when he gets back next week, I get to recount how all of his comrades became fugitives of the law and murderers! This being the case, I decided to introduce a... failsafe... of sorts...  I'm going to see if the party wishes to... "Reload their save file" if you will, to before the events that caused everything to go so far south.

Typically, I would never allow this and what happens at the table (things that are said, even jokingly) happens in game... but one of the party wasn't present for this turn of events since none of us expected something so huge to happen. And that's where I stand. If my party wishes to allow the events to fold out, this may lead to a TPK, since they are now left with the option to leave the province they're in, through the sewers, which I had already made known to them that there were crazy bad monsters roaming around in there... so... that's where I stand... I have 4 days to come up with what may be the biggest session yet. Wish me luck!