The gods are fickle. And demanding. Maybe cruel? I'm not sure because I'd never get on their bad side, but boy do they not like Julius.
Our Quested warrior griped his way through a bit of downtime but it was clear that the magic would not let him properly prepare for his journey. After only a little time in town Julius was already growing fatigued and antsy to get moving.
Nicanor tagged in a contemporary of his Zoticus (PC swap due to maiming). They worked to move some of the goods we had recovered prior but it looked to be more of an ordeal than we expected.
A pickpocket tried her hand at Etienne's purse, and then mine, but I caught her and turned her over to the guards. The new mage Zoticus, another in a long line of heathen sorcerers, assumed that my pragmatism would outweigh my honor and negotiated for her release. He was dismayed at my refusal to pull any strings for the thief and she was sentenced to pay an unpayable fine.
When Julius let out for the wilderness to stop the magical punishment he was enduring, we were at a bit of a fork in the road. Zoticus stayed in town to sell off goods and to free the thief from her destiny in the slave mines while the rest of us joined with Julius to escort him on his quest.
We bumbled about in the woods for a while before we found a spire overlooking the terrain. From on high we could see the compound that we suspected was our target. Overcoming disease and magical punishment, we carried on towards the goal.
Meanwhile, Zoticus successfully paid for the release of the thief Eleanor and hired her as a hench. He picked up some other weirdos (PC rerolls and another hench) and hit the road. Their group caught up with ours just outside of the Ruined Monastery.
Flavius discovered some children going down to the nearby river for water and, after watching them a bit and sharing much speculation over how horribly evil and fae they had to be, we approached them. They were just kids. Weird, traumatized kids likely, but they didn't grow fangs or ensorcell us or anything.
It took a little convincing but they agreed to lead us to "The Man Upstairs" about whom we speculated all manner of evil. He lived in a tower on the compound that was separate from the main building, in the belfry. We ascended past some admittedly creepy things like stuffed animals with sewn-in human teeth to meet with him near the large bell. He was cowled and shadowed and stayed that way during the conversation, encouraging us to leave him alone or else. No ally to be found there, but at least no enemy either, so we left.
The main building in the compound had a huge room, likely the original sanctuary, overgrown in strange vines and fungus that we were very careful to avoid. Close inspection revealed a secret compartment on the faded and lost altar to Elion that held actual, real, tangible treasure. We rejoiced and liberated the items to be returned to civilization.
That's when the spectral guardian took umbrage and attacked. Of course none of us really had any silver or magic weaponry, but we did have an oil of sharpness. After a brutal scrap involving military oil, hot potato with the magicked sword, and my getting knocked on my ass, we overcame the spirit and sent him to his rest.
Returning to camp was easy, it wasn't far outside the compound, and we rested up. A scouting party went ahead to investigate the warded stairway and well that we had found. They succumbed to some wicked fumes and were afflicted with visions but we couldn't really do more than guess at what they meant, if anything. They escaped with their lives.
Zoticus blasted away the wards on the stairs with his sorcery and we descended. It didn't take long to meet more guardians of this place, undead creatures of heinous strength and again displaying immunity to our weaponry. Already engaged and not likely to be able to outrun them in a retreat, we desperately threw oil and grappled, trying anything for an upper hand.
Zoticus came through again by wrapping up one of them in a choke hold. We dogpiled it and hogtied it and then repeated the effort with the remaining one. Victory was ours, but we lost our thief Chassick to the monsters. We prepared his body for retrieval on our way out and left the hogtied undead there without much in the way of options for disposal.
We discovered a fountain with little stone imps frolicking, tearing apart a giant frog that we thought we'd heard on entry. Lacking confidence in our mundane weaponry, we avoided them and retraced our steps to find the bound undead and Chassick's body missing.
A crossroads of canals led us to doors painted in silvery riddles. We left that for later and kept looking down unobstructed paths, finding the water wheel mentioned by the Sisters as a landmark in our search. Our rejoicing was cut short as a hydra emerged from the water by the wheel, one by two by three by idk I lost count of how many heads. It gobbled up Julius before we had a chance to do much of anything.
Tharn our explorer covered our retreat with his bow as it didn't seem likely we'd be able to wrestle this beast like we had the prior ones. Etienne and I held the line to give everyone a chance to retreat, but Et got snatched and eaten as well. His heroism will never be forgotten as his sacrifice bought us time to escape.
A clearly laid trap complete with adventurer bait awaited us just outside of our light and just as we were clear of the hydra. A bejeweled scepter matching the description of what we came to seek rested on a pedestal conveniently far enough away to risk being eaten to retrieve.
Tharn knocked it loose with an arrow and Flavius sent one of his dogs to fetch it. We fled before we were killed and thought maybe, just maybe, we'd be able to celebrate something about this place. Nope. The scepter faded into so much dust and we kicked rocks back to camp.
Julius, Chassick, and Et were dead. The holy quest given by the merciful Abbess was over and we dragged the stench of failure with us back towards town. An elf watched us cross the river but caused no trouble, speaking in his weird way and declining to join us.
Flavius and the pups discovered a bit of a crevice leading to a set of doors under the ruined bridge near where we crossed the river. Our retreat to civilization was delayed by the prospect of treasure. We ignored some centipedes in order to make entry, breaking down doors and revealing a bit of a guardhouse or barracks or garrison complete with a kitchen and office. A secret compartment revealed some treasure and a short fight with skeletons ended with a wounded dog and some very fine masterwork swords.
If we were to return to the monastery, then it looked like we at least had a staging ground to launch from. We departed, most of our party suffering from mummy rot due to grappling with undead, and hoped we'd make it to town before everyone but Mikel and Maria lost their skin in sloppy sticky sheets.
After a few close calls with wilderness beasties, we limped into Belvorn. Maria and I were unaffected by the malaise that was killing the rest of the party. I offered to ride to Trenova ahead of the party and hopefully secure some concession against the expected taxes and tariffs and other inconveniences of adventuring. Maria joined me with the group under the care of a hired chirugeon.
The road to Trenova was uneventful and we passed through the gates after the typical security precautions from the guards. I led the young priestess to the Order's chapterhouse to make this report.
Sir Mikel, Knight-Initiate of the First Seal
28th of Rods, 28th Year of King Decius' Reign - Town of Trenova
No comments:
Post a Comment