| Saga : Escape From Farscult : Session 2 | Back to the Escape From Farscult Campaign |
Session/Game: Escape 3e #2 Date:05/14/02
Campaign Date: Vay 19 - Vay 21, IY 485
GM: Andrew Smith
Characters:
Maliki Malfoe, human necromancer-2/cleric-2, Mike Miller
Quintus, half-dragon fighter-1, Toby Miller
Illyiana Jhorn, drastin sorcerer-4, Chuck Tillinghast
Nebakanezzar Bubex, minotaur fighter-1, Justin Fernandez
Log:
Deep within the underworld, a discussion is going on inside the ancient and noble house Jhorn. Long has Jhorn been the pride of the Drastin. From the moment that the damned were shunned from the world of light for their dealings with Ambitrax, the Jhorn have been one of the mightiest and wealthiest families of the forgotten elves. Until now...
Matron Jhorn: Listen maggots! This is serious! Do you think you could go on being pampered babies for this long! Our position is in danger! Our clerics of the great crawler have lost the ability to cast our most powerful magics! If the other families were to find out we could be doomed.
Mhordred: Surely, you gest Matron Mother.
Shrikenight: Silence thrall! The matron speaks.
Matron Jhorn: This is true Mhordred. You must serve your lady, for I have plans for her that will bring her much status in the Underworld.
Shrikenight: What is that, Matron Mother? Shall I slay your enemy Yhulon? Need I take a quest to spy on the dragon Zavier? Am I to be your firstborn now and replace that whore Grevius by your side.
Grevius: (croaked as if parched in the throat) Bitch!
Shrikenight: (laughs)
Matron Jhorn: No. Although I appreciate your determination to become my best servant. Instead the curse on our house is caused by the escape from the underworld of one of our own. One you should have taken care of yourself long ago.
Grevius: (croaked) The pale one.
Shrikenight: (obviously worried) Yes, well. If there is anyone who can track that white-as-brain worm deserter, it is me.
Mhordred: I will help you m'lady.
Shrikenight: Be silent you thoughtless male or prepare to suffer the consequences of castration before your time. I need not your seed forever, slug. And once I have it, you will be speaking to me in a different tenor! Matron Mother. I will do as you command. I will track and retrieve my sister, Illyana Jhorn. Dead or alive.
Meanwhile, the heroes run blind through the misty night of the bog, trying to escape from their former masters motivating from Farscult. After giving close pursuit, joined by Conjunctivitis the Beholder, the Farscult mine guards give up the chase as the heroes escape into a thick copse of rotting and decaying trees. After all, the prisoners are still wearing their control collars.
The group continues to run through the night until in the morning they come upon a sort of abandoned compound that dates back to the Elven Epoch when Ambitrax ruled the land. Although there is nothing left of value in the compound, there is shelter in the abandoned lower floors of the structure. The heroes finally get the rest they have been seeking for over a month in the mine.
Late in the evening as the sun wanes, Nebakanezzar wakes the others. He smells fresh blood in the lower levels of the structure. The group ventures out to investigate. They encounter a puddle of fresh blood. It seems to be dripping from the walls. Nebakanezzar swings his sword at the place on the wall where the blood is dripping, only to draw more blood. The group notes that the dripping blood is getting worse, thickening and dripping from many other places in the complex. The floor is slick with fresh elven blood. Quintus and Nebakanezzar break one of their swords but eventually discover a small diary written by one of the individuals who lived in the complex. Apparently, it used to be an Asylum. He was imprisoned wrongly, but grew to become insane himself. The book, entitled "Diary of a Madman", mystically drips blood. After closing the book, the cover seals over with a thick scab from all the blood the small diary creates. The walls stop bleeding. Maliki finds several well-preserved vials of drugs leftover from the Asylum that he can use. The heroes continue to rest until the morning of Vay 29th.
The heroes waken. They decide to make toward the east to escape the bog that surrounds Farscult and to perhaps make it to the city of Zhukar. As the group argues about which way to travel ten guards with a tracking dog manage to find the heroes in their compound. After a greusome fight, the guards are all dispatched. However, one orc guard manages to escape. The heroes start to make their way toward the East.
That evening, the heroes come upon a village that has gathered their entire townsfolk at the edge of town. The heroes watch as the folk stone a small girl to death. As her body is prepared for ritual burning and burial, the heroes approach and demand to know why she was killed. The townsfolk reply that the girl was a "monster". Maliki convinces the folk that the four of them are representatives of the master of Farscult, Mox Krustal, and that they demand a feast in their honor immediately. As night falls and the full moon rises, the heroes eat their best meal in over a month.
The heroes demand that Jiles, the town blacksmith and most successful member of the village, give up his home for them to rest in and make for them an iron prybar with which they could remove their control collars. Illyiana decides to spend the night with the family of the slain girl instead, and asks her several questions to try and determine why she was killed. All Illyiana can get is that the girl does not have the "affinity for nature" that the other villagers have. Illyiana finally succumbs to her fatigue and falls asleep.
The heroes are awakened by a savage half-wolf half-man beast standing over Quintus. He bites the half-dragon repeatedly. The other heroes jump to his rescue, but many of their attacks seem to not hurt him. Wounds close as they are made, and only the most mightyiest of blows seem to slow him down. Finally, the group manages to slay the monster which immediately turns back into Jiles, the blacksmith. For that matter all the citizens of the village have turned into werewolves and begin to assault the heroes. The defense of Jiles home continues, with Nebakanezzar doing his best to fight the dire beasts off with a weapon enchanted by Maliki. Just when it looks like the beasts are going to overcome the heroes, they all turn into humans and flee. Illyiana hears a voice from her past -- her sister Shrikenight calling to her from the darkness. Apparently, the crawling god is upset by her fleeing the underworld and Matron Jhorn wants her back. In answer to her sister's call, the heroes sneak away into the night in hopes that Shrikenight would not follow.