Session 10

 It goes:

Party:

The Plumage of Spring (Sorcerer 1) - Grey Woman

The Meek Sun (Thief 1) - Grey Woman 

The Eyes of True Men (Fighting-man 1) - Grey Man

Slough (Halfling 1) - Mutant Man

The Last Walker (Fighting-man 1) [Retainer] - Ulfire Man

SESSION 10

In the evening Slough, who had taken to being among his fellows in the fields when not adventuring, was approached by the bailiff. With the river at his back and his fellows sent away, he acquiesced to talk.

He was questioned if he still had loyalty to the settlement, and if his companions were treacherous and devious, and why they had skipped town in the dark and returned none the richer. Slough was circumspect and said his loyalties lay true, and the the party were unusual but effective, and that through diplomacy a band of tested fighters would be brought to help against the Gold pirates.

Also, he added quickly, the party did not come without tribute to The Judge. A terrible Spawn had been slain, and they had thought the pelt a fair tribute—better still if those sourceless chill winds still lingered in the pelt. For the swamp was humid and muggy at the best of times, and on and on and on. It seemed that Slough’s serene wisdom and social manner gave way to gift-giving when under pressure.

The bailiff, suspicious, accepted the tribute and said to bring it to the Tower of Judgement. So it was.

Slough returned to the drinking-pit and informed the others about this promise. Meek Sun briefly thought of passing off her own furs as the tribute, but figured the Judge had seen them all too frequently for that to work. So Slough was told to do it for it was his promise, and he took a fine-edged flint chopper and set to work separating pelt from flesh.

The work was fine, treated with mashed brain and river brine to keep it supple—and better yet, when the mutant slung it over his shoulders to feel its weight, he felt that a coolness kept away the day’s thick heat.

A victory then. Crossing the river’s surface like solid ground and draped in brilliant Red, the mutant made a strong impression among his fellows and he spent his day in talk instead of work.

The others lay in repose save for Plumage of Spring, whose dreams were troubled and whose wants had risen to a frenzy. She wanted her moonlight-pale sword and she wanted it immediately. Taking the maps and rubbings and notes from prior delves, she reasoned out that travel through the southern caves would bypass all their struggles and leave them west of the alcoves of the hundred gods.

But the rubbings still were a mystery, and their import lay heavy on the sorcerer; study left her nowhere closer to divining their meaning. So she roused her companions and demanded they head out to the dungeon at first light.

Slough, kept from his planned meeting with the Judge, instead left the pelt draped at the front of her door in the morning.

So they trekked south, and knew their trail well enough. They heaved aside the boulder blocking off the entrance and headed inside with torches ablaze to cut a swathe through the caves.

A level down they came to that same bone-strewn room and its waiting statue, and saw that a pair of strange, foot-high piles of fungi had dragged themselves across the floor. And still their mycelia grasped among the bones to move further. When the light and heat of the party’s torches touched the fungal creations, each let out a shriek so terrible it seemed to drive right into the mind itself. Nosebleeds and bloodshot eyes were universal, and the party’s swift action slew one with arrow and javelin and axe.

All kept away from the animate statue, forcing them to split ranks and only watch how the screaming fungus could pull broken stone from the very wall and shunt it at Last Walker, hitting him square in the chest! They slew it and the horrible noise cut out, but they had gained nothing and knew instinctively that such noise would draw the attention of other dungeon dwellers.

So they made a choice to delve deeper and cut their way out, thinking two routes to the surface would give them options.

Deeper still the hand-carved caves gave way to tool-carved caves. A great excavation had evidently taken place, for the floor beneath was flagstones and their maps showed they were near those alcoves of the gods. Heading north they came upon a fountain half-freed from collapsed earth. It flowed from a sourceless spring through a bowl held aloft by a weird kind of god: body like a wasp made from many smaller forms, and a head like a human skull twisted backwards on the neck. While they rested they heard sounds coming from above, and suspected they were being tracked.

The Eyes of True Men wanted to drink from the fountain but the others begged him not to, for if he died then and there they were all dead too. So they moved on, to deeper layers still. Excavated caves turned to set masonry, cyclopean and mortarless, and the party were in a kind of antechamber lit by scattered candles stuck on the floor. Another staircase to the south led immediately down, and a dark hallway to the east.

They sent their thief and mutant ahead, and while their steps were careful it was too late for Meek Sun to hiss to Slough that the light caught on a silvery wire right in front of them. So he broke the tripwire, and a muffled thump from the southwest hit The Eyes, who gasped at the dart now in the middle of his back, and hissed that it burned his flesh. He fell on his face, and was helped up by Meek Sun who removed the dart and sniffed it and claimed poison and told him to stand up and not fall again.

So they stood and marched eastward until they came to a door set in the stone, and throwing caution away to boldness shoved the door open to find a room with a tiled labyrinth on the floor. This labyrinth led them by winding ways to a kind of shrine in the corner, built of porphyry and depicting something formless and twisting to the very eye. The sorcerous Plumage and psychic Walker both received an impression, and that impression was “pray.”

They said so, and The Eyes strode forth, every muscle trembling and soaked in sweat and pallid from the poison, and prayed that the Old Ones should cure him of his wounds lest he climb up the cosmos and personally wring their necks.

And for a moment his wounds knit together and he turned and grinned at the party in the torchlight.

And then he fell, for the poison had putrefied him from within, and the bold man died.

Meek Sun swore she would kill a dozen for every moment her companion suffered, and was racked in sorrow. They placed his body against one wall and swore to bring it home, and looked south to see another door, and heard low speech beyond it. Comprehensible speech, not dungeon-dweller gurgles. The party dealt no mercy, and Plumage called up from the cosmic void a dodecahedron made of boiling blood, so large it brushed up against every wall, ceiling, and floor of the corridor.

Plumage sent it ahead to kill, and it did. It slid forward and there were screams of the foes beyond before itself was cut down. Slough sent forth a javelin that struck true into the head of one of the foes, now but a trio of men in acid-etched gear.

The trio’s morale broke from the sudden assault, and they fled north. The party hunted them down, catching all at a t-shaped intersection to the north with axe and javelin and dagger. On the bodies they found a hooked-shaped blade and much coin like they themselves had found in the dungeon, and took it. Plumage, excited by a new sword, took it in hand but found even holding it was inimical to her—like the material itself was not meant to be held—and gave it to Last Walker.

So they returned to the place where the veterans had been before ambush, and saw that again there were candles scattered across the floor, and an x-shape in gore painted across the northern corridor, and iron pitons driven in the southward door. More cautious about any place marked with candles, they listened at the south door but heard nothing.

Suspicious, they instead headed west and south and west, into a room laid to ruin. It had once been something like a throne room, for three throne sat half-shattered and splinters were everywhere. Great impacts to the walls and floor too, so the party headed once again to the candle room and, thinking a shrine of healing would save them, resolved to make one last brave rush for treasure.

They removed the pitons, prepared grog to be lit and thrown, and prepared their weapons. Kicking the door down and setting the place ablaze proved the space to be vast, columned, and reeking with the smell of the dead. Fire spread and backlit several shambling figures who did not flinch when struck!

The threshold of the two rooms was their battlefield, and only after multiple arrows was even one of the monsters slain. Last Walker was struck down by a hammer-strong blow and his prior wounds, and the remaining sorcerer, thief, and mutant were hard pressed by the unexpected tenacity of the restless dead.

But fire acted on the party’s side, and the dead burned silently when their ragged robes caught flame as they stood on the tinder of wrecked furniture. Smoke had filled the dungeon, breathing grew rough and ragged, but the party proved more vicious. Last Walker, too, must have grown so used to dancing on death’s door that he sprung up again as though he were never downed.

The fire was smoky but short, and embers filled that new room ankle-high. Meek Sun and Slough (at dagger point) plunged into its mess to see what could be seen. For their burns they found gold and silver aplenty, and dared another run to find more and more. Of the corpses they found a ring so bitten into dead flesh they chopped off the hand rather than delay any longer.

Each of them prayed at the alter; Slough with disquiet and a personal vow against Chaos, Meek Sun with the same threats to wring cosmic necks, Plumage of Spring with the gravity of a sorcerer consorting with greater powers, Last Walker with the rictus cheer of one who considers death a good friend. And they were all healed, and hoisted The Eyes of True Men’s corpse and departed with smoke at their feet.

The fire had driven more than just them from the dungeon; by the time they reached fresher air near an hour later, smoke had already drifted from every entrance. And better for them, for they heard mutants and monsters gathering atop the hill ruins, and there were sounds of bloodshed.

So they left. And when they left into the swamps the trail of blood and smoke that followed them drew the attention of a patient clutch of crocodiles, who rushed at them in a flurry of water so fine a target were they—so they left again, running and bobbing among the muck and trailing roots. But fleeing left them in territory they had not seen before, and night fell as they were left among the gigantic fruiting bodies of Lahag, the fungal forest.

Where once smoke filled their lungs spores took that place, and in the air thick as fog the party pushed forward. Not wanting to sleep in such a place the party pushed a reckoned north until, blessedly, they found a river.

Slough was set to stand with a torch atop the waters, and guide them. So it was, and with exhaustion set in they came upon the swamp village heavy with death, gold, and mistrust for each other.

Kills : 2x shriekers (70xp), 5x zombies (100xp), 5x veterans (50xp)
Gains : 1700 gp, 300 sp, ring of fire resistance, sword +1(+2 against Spell-users)

Book of The Dead

Boss - Abandoned in a temple

The Lurking Minion - Sacrificed for power

The Quiet Breath - Struck down by a ghoul

Rattlebones  - Killed by a vengeful acolyte

The Burrowing Excellence  - Frozen in place by a Spawn

The Eyes of True Men - Putrefied from within by delayed poison