The Bandit King's Pets - Caress Melani Journal - Session 9

Moonlit Laughter

Some builds borrowed from the Hero Forge community library with minor alterations: Goblins, Hobgoblin, King Grol, wolf, various paladins, and doppleganger. 

Targor proved slippery than expected, or at least Caress proved to be a poorer guard than expected, as the hobgoblin lieutenant slipped his bonds on the second day back to Phandalin. However, this did give the party a clear trail to follow which led them straight to the place that they had been seeking: Cragmaw Castle. They once again came upon Targor arguing with a guard, but this time they did not politely take him prisoner. Instead as they noticed Caress's noisy approach, an arrow from Mythram removed him permanently from their concern.

At this point, the guards called out an attack and everybody moved forward. Lyra vanished in a swirl of unseasonably red and yellow leaves reappearing within a guard post along with two goblins, one of which was charmed by the sudden appearance of the beautiful fae creature. The other was less impressed. Unfortunately, the guard outside ignored Ravyn's spell, only to be killed by a blast of hellish fire as he struck the Warlock. Caress darted around the corner to support Lyra, though unfortunately her clattering approach warned the bandits and the wily goblin dodged aside of her blessed dagger.

Where'd the grick come from?

 Lyra vanished again, moving to the source of more noise and unleashing a cascade of fire upon the dining room of the goblins, apparently killing the head cook in the process. Though the eladrin did run afoul of a deadfall trap in the process.

Moonlit Laughter - Caress Melani Journal - Session 8

Remnants of Ruin 

 

The shrine is a question that would have to wait for later. No one still lived that knew the whole truth of the matter, save the gods, and they weren't likely to reveal such information upon demand. In the meantime, they had more tasks to look into in this part of the region. More straightforward rumors of unwise ruins explorers and bandits. And that was something that both needed attention and which they could attend to right now. So, after a rest in the hollow remnants of Conyberry, they headed south to Old Owl Well. 

Caress was not much of a student of history, but this well was one that turned up rather frequently in tales of battles both ancient and rather closer to the current time. She wasn't sure why the place was a focus of conflict so often, but it was, and that history apparently went all the way back to the days of the Netherese and their empire of floating cities and magocratic tyranny. The Netherese had made enough of a headache of themselves in recent history, it would be unfortunate if anybody decided to try to renew their efforts to conquer and oppress the Realms.

As they approached the tower, the spell of corpseflesh wafted down from the ruins. Caress and Mythram split in two different directions, moving stealthily along the walls before Ravyn's imp flitted invisibly forward to scout out the situation. Already Caress had a line of sight on a handful of zombies shambling at some task visible through breaks in the crumbling stone walls. Ravyn pantomimed some strange hand signals that Caress took to be a count and something about a hat or hair? The wiggly hands and gestures toward Lyra and raising her arcane focus seemed to indicate that the person with the hat? hair? was some sort of spell caster. Caress nodded and readied her whip and shield for the signal to be given.

Zombies by Moonlight

The signal was the descent of shimmering silver striking down from the sky onto the tent that presumably held the caster. Immediately, the yuan-ti courtesan rushed forward to the entrance of the tower, ignoring the strangled cries of pain that erupted from the tent. Once there, she found a small mob of zombies wielding shovels and picks interrupted their work and slowly turned to face Caress. Behind her, a bald man with a red robe tore out of the tent into the courtyard where his troubles were cut short by an arrow that Mythram had been holding ready.

The Second Round - South through the Wastes - Session Three

Journal Page 

The Jewel of Three Prayers 

The first couple of days travel were fairly relaxed, though the grim nature of the surroundings did damper a lot of the calm. Passing between the spines erupting from the ground here and there with increasing frequency to the east as they approach the sheer mountains looming there. The first encounter of note they had was with a troop of six Aurora Watch soldiers and their scout Devin, a drow woman who also was an exceptional cook. They exchanged news with the patrol about the surroundings. The patrol did seem to think there wasn't that much going on that was above the normal, but Devin pointed out that they'd seen a gloomstalker in the distance. 

Monster of the Week: Anthology

I have started running Monster of the Week one-shots, the idea is to build out a world story by story and I'm currently using this as filler for when other people can't make a game.

Mysteries:

• The Haunting of New Signika
  

Hunters

• Kylie Brown - The Mundane
• Tess "Tinmother" Richter - The Flake

Phenomena

• Cursed Possessions - Items which function as apertures into the mortal world to allow dangerous ghosts influence.
• "Angry Letters" - Purple, eldritch letters cut into objects by the rune awl. They seem to have some level of animation and agency. Can be scooped off objects and trapped in containers.
  

Creatures

• Hunting Ghosts - Puppeted forms of past victims of the Cursed Possessions

 Objects

• Rune Awl - A handle that can produce a subtle supernatural blade which can be used to chisel eldritch writing into things. Used in Big Magic rituals.