November 6th, 2019
Players
- Grrg the Kenku Fighter (Matt)
- Ursula the Tiefling Bard (Liz)
- Kodos the Triton Paladin (Irving)
It is night. You are in a dark forest. Around you the trunks of birch trees recede into a thin gray mist in all directions, their white bark peeling back like a shedding skin. It is quiet, no creature dares to wander the wood at this ungodly hour…. except you. An outcast from society, or maybe society’s enemy, you stalk among the trees each night in search of nothing more or less than the fulfillment of your most base desires. Desires that so called civilized society has denied you. You do not know how many nights you have hunted in this wood. One night blurs into the next, the time passes without mark as you cannot see the moon through the dense, impenetrable canopy above you. You are alone. You place each foot carefully, one in front of the other, one at a time – careful not to snap a twig or rustle the leaves so as to not alert your prey. For in front of you is a clearing in the wood. A small open space, giving respite from the gloom and claustrophobia of the reaching branches and the wicked thorns that cling to you as you pass. Tonight your hunt has come to it’s end. In this clearing, you catch just barely a glimpse, almost not even believing your eyes. As you peer carefully from the safety of the darkness, low to the ground to conceal yourself in the fog, you see an ancient altar, made of glass, glittering in the dim moonlight. Upon the altar is a human baby, naked, alone – it’s cries rising up, futile, into the mist that gives no answer.
THE BLACK COMMUNION
Three evil adventurers come out of the wood to investigate. Grrg the kenku first approaches. He sees that although the night is cold and damp, the baby does not seem bothered by the temperature. Ursula emerges and throws a dagger at him, missing, as they bicker over why this human baby is here and what they should do about it. Kodos does not know why the three have been drawn here either, or for what purpose.
Grrg finally gets up the nerve to touch the babe, and his hand passes straight through it – an illusion. Thick smoke billows from the altar, and a large bone naga slowly slithers from the spot the babe once was. It uncoils itself, raising it’s fleshless body high, and begins to cast a spell on Kodos, which he resists. Then the great beast strikes and a battle begins.
Grrg immediately takes heavy damage in close proximity to the snake. Ursula runs up a ruined pillar and fires her crossbow, while Kodos fends off several Hell Hounds that have also emerged from the wood and attacked. One hound unleashes it’s fiendish fire breath, almost killing the party in the first round.
As the bone naga takes damage, a voice calls out from the wood “HALT – THAT IS ENOUGH”. A hooded female figure walks slowly into the clearing. The naga and hounds come to her side and lay at her feet.
She tells the 3 adventurers she requires their assistance in restoring the naga to life for her ultimate master, Talona, the Lady of Poison. The blood of a virgin is required as sacrifice for the ritual. If they will help her, she will grant them power beyond their wildest dreams.
They agree. She takes bread and wine and blesses them in an unholy communion to the goddess Talona. They feel the wine course through their veins, the power of the blessing obvious.
The Mistress points them toward the nearest town, a farming community two days walk. As she walks away into the forest, the trees seem to pull back from her approach, and under her foot the plants wither and die and mushrooms spring up.
THROUGH THE WOODS
The party sets off into the night and eventually the trail begins to rise and climb a hill, and then to cross a small mountain range. As they travel higher the landscape becomes rocky and they find the path leading them through a canyon between two hills.
They smell it before they see it. The stench of rotting flesh fills the night air. As they follow the trail deeper into the canyon, they come across the rotting corpse of a hill giant. Smashed into pieces scattered around they see the remains of a wagon and barrels, seemingly of beer from the smell. The corpse is being picked apart ravenously by a pack of gnolls.
Ursula climbs a tree and takes a potshot with her crossbow at the gnoll who appears to be the leader. She misses, and the gnoll calls out in a rough, barked language none of the adventurers understand. The other gnolls raise their bloody maws from the corpse and watch.
The gnoll leader sheaths his sword and beckons toward the corpse with a smile. The party approaches aggressively but he calmly holds out his hand as if to say ‘stop’ and again beckons toward the corpse with a smile. His minions resume their frenzied blood feast, gorging themselves on the abundant flesh.
Seeing no threat from the gnolls the adventurers put away their weapons and search the area. They find smashed barrels of beer, and a giant’s sack – containing one enormous smoking pipe, which only Grrg has the strength to drag out. Seeing that the gnolls intend to gorge themselves on flesh for the forseeable future, the party slips away and attempts to find shelter before the night is over.
THE RAID
As the sun beings to rise over the horizon, the party see a town spread out in the valley below them. Lights in the windows begin to turn on one by one as people begin their day. Farms on the outskirts of the town back up to the mountain, and it is these that draw the parties attention.
First, they find a cave and Ursula casts Darkness to hide them, as Grrg takes lookout. He notices a family tending their apple farm down below, two men out front of the simple farmhouse mulching grass with scythes under the fruit trees. Two children emerge to play in the backyard facing the mountain.
Ursula disguises her tiefling features and appears before them. Grrg uses his Mimicry to copy the voice of the mother they just heard calling out to the kids. They approach, the little girl screams and runs but the adventurers charm the young boy magically. Grrg picks him and attempts to make a dash for it up the hill, as the old farmer and his son run toward them with scythes raised.
The party magically frightens the old man, who is forced to run away. He runs toward the road screaming for help. The young man stays and fights and is murdered for his troubles. The party makes a quick escape over the ridge.
THE GETAWAY
Grrg makes a beeline for the treeline of the woods, charmed little boy in his hands, with Ursula close behind, while Kodos runs back toward the canyon. Two mounted riders, both wearing red sashes with numbers on them, appear at the top of the hill. They also hear the distant baying of hunting dogs on the other side of the ridge they just left behind.
Ursula sings into being a nauseous cloud of gas, one of the riders falls victim to it and falls from his horse, vomiting. Grrg uses Mimicry again to make the call of the gnolls, and Kodos attacks the rider still mounted.
They make a break for the woods to meet Grrg as the hunting dogs clear the ridge and begin to turn toward Kodos. But just as this happens, they hear a different kind of hound bay – the sound of the gnolls, coming from the canyon. As the party slips into wood, the blood frenzied gnolls run toward the hounds and riders, tearing them to shreds with their fangs.
The party returns to the dark wood, and the Mistress again appears with her face concealed with her black hood. She places her hand upon the glass altar, and it magically disintegrates, revealing a stairway leading down into the dark earth. She takes the boy from Grrg, and they follow her into the black depths.