In the depths of darkness, under the town of Sandpoint, wrath stirs and waits.
Towards the stair, in silent intimation
You may now descend. We do — and end up
In a corridor with no end in view: dead
Line the perspective left and right
Costumed for resurrection. 1
Ambushed by a goblin with three arms and misshapen by some manner of ritual magic, the adventurers present in the catacombs under Sandpoint are caught between a rock and a hard place. Behind them comes rushing in Marco of the companions, chasing a goblin straight into his friends. Merely minutes into this hostility, the companions also realize that something is eerily wrong with this room. The holes covered by planks contain undead humanoids, zombies, and Darius, who charges in gallantly in a show of force, stumbles into the open arms of one such zombie.
Sensing the hostility of the newcomers to the catacombs, the goblin standing guard in this room comes straight at the first target it sees open, Marco. With three weapons in hands, the goblin looked menacing with a handaxe, dagger, and sword. Coming at Marco, the goblin opens his mouth and spews out acidic vomit, singing the clothes and skin of him and Leica. Shots and blades hardly penetrate his body, and it is not so soon after that the goblin goes down. Whatever affected this goblin turned him into a shell of what he used to have been; he hardly seemed aware of his pain and the true horror that was awaiting him at the hands of the Heroes.
The trouble that their friends Conall and Darius had gotten themselves into, however, falling into two respective pits, were still an issue. Conall, lying on the floor of the pit he fell into and being prodded by a dark arm, throws a rope out of the hole in order to try the get the attention of his friends. Darius, up and presenting himself to the strange humanoid in his pit, strikes his fiend down with ease.
Conall does not fare so well. Almost completely strained of his strength and seeing death, this inquisitor is saved by the skin of his teeth by Marco who cinematically jumps onto the back of the zombie attacking Conall and distracting him from his prey. The fiend swiftly goes down soon after and it is from here that the companions are of the decision to get out of the catacombs and back to the surface.
Being late at night, the party was answered by a drowsy acolyte and Father at the Sandpoint Cathedral. However, as soon as the unconscious body of Conall was witnessed, they were swiftly invited in and the party was granted healing and advice to leave the dead where they were. Furthermore, he had very little explanation to provide for the purpose of the catacombs or what happened to the misshapen goblin they faced.
At the Rusty Dragon, Ameiko is quick to approach the party and ask them where they were and what happened. She seemed incredibly frizzled and eager to know what happened with her brother, but not much was offered to her as explanation. Too tired to really explain, the companions redirect her for now but do try and offer an explanation for the misshapen goblin corpse they were holding.
In the morning, the companions went to the smithy not far from the inn where they met an interesting bald and muscular blacksmith that quickly cheers and praises the Heroes for their work during the Festival. Offering a discount, Conall is quick to react to this and purchase an armoured coat for himself. Before leaving, the blacksmith asks them for their help to look for his son at Chopper’s Isle.
A brief encounter was had with the General Store owner from town, Ven Vinder. He was chasing two children who he claimed stole from his store, but soon after gave up as they jumped over a fence and out of view. Recognizing the Heroes, he bade them to visit him sometime and returned to his store.
The party returned to the dungeon, but this time swerved and went in a different direction. Going past the statue of the Runelord of Wrath, they go up a flight of stairs and enter a circular room with a pool in its centre filled with purified water. However, they are ambushed here by a Vargouille, a strange head attached to bat-like wings that immediately goes towards Darius at the front, shrieking and coming up close to him and kissing him on his face.
Hair suddenly falling off of his head, Darius and his party cleave and shoot the strange planar creature down and continue on to a stairwell leading down into rubble. Backtracking, they go up and investigate another room to the north where they find a strange sight. A room lined by red metal awaited them where everything in the room was levitating and in a state of weightlessness. It is here that two bottles of wine are found, one identified as being recent and from Sandpoint and another from Korvosa and was 200 years old. Furthermore, a wand, book, and scroll were found in this room among other objects. Leica also realized that the walls contained many snippets of coalescing and fading Thassilonian literature and words related to anger, wrath, and hate.
Alaznist was a woman of faith — faith in ruin, devastation, and wraith… [s]he drew inspiration from all demon lords [and] encouraged her minions to venerate demons as well — she cared not whom they reversed, as long as they were destructive. The demon queen Lamashtu was a favorite choice, and the Mother of Monsters [appeared to have been venerated in these halls]. 2
The book, which Leica reads and finds, is written partially in Abyssal and partially in Thassilonian. It appears to have been a bestiary of sorts and contained many notes about strange and gruesome creatures. In it is also mention of the Vargouille fought earlier.
The book is… magically preserved but still [an] ancient prayer book dedicated to the worship of Lamashtu. [T]his well-read tome is… [as much a] bestiary of the world’s most horrific and cruel monsters… as it [is] a religious text.
As time has passed since the kiss by the Vargouille, Darius appears to become more afflicted by some strange condition — his skin starts to turn leathery behind his ears and on his chin and strange tentacles begin to form on his person.
Finally, visiting the last part of the catacombs not yet explored, the players find a strange shrine to Lamashtu with murky water. They also find a doorway that opened to a large cathedral of some sort with one large pool and stairs leading up a large triangular pit, identified later as a minor runewell.
While Runelord Alaznist encouraged the veneration of demons, her true faith lay in the purity of wrath. And thus, at each of her most important holdings, she made sure to place a “shrine” to her favored sin in the form of a minor runewell…. [they] allowed communication between these station[s]… [and] were empowered with the capacity to harvest wrath from the souls of the dead.
It is here they face off against a strange spellcasting imp-like fiend and outsider. Extensive study in the bestiary would have made Leica aware that this was a quasit. Disappearing and reappearing again at will, this fiend began to make quick work of party members, entering them into slumber, paralysis, or fear with quick casts of her spells. Finally, however, the outsider is grappled in place by Darius and slain by Leica with a cinematic shot to the face. An unholy symbol on her person identifies this as a cleric or servant of the goddess Lemashtu.
The following are encounters and treasure/loot obtained in this session:
- Goblin (1) — 135 xp. Did not possess any treasure.
- Mutated Goblin — 1000 xp. Possessed a +1 longsword, a silver dagger, 25 gp, and a masterwork handaxe. The combat in the room with the pits also awarded an additional 1200 xp for its execution.
- Zombie (2) — 300 xp each. Did not possess any treasure.
- Vargouille — 1000 xp. Did not possess any treasure.
- The room where there appeared to have been a permanent levitate effect possessed two bottles of wine, a scroll of burning hands, a wand of shocking grasp (28 charges), and Erylium’s prayer book.
- Sinwraith — 600 xp. Did not possess any treasure.
- Fire Elemental — 135 xp. Did not possess any treasure.
- Quasit Witch; study of the prayer book obtained during this session will prove that this was hers and her name was Erylium. 2032 xp. Possessed a +1 cold iron returning dagger, a tiara, a black silk gown, and an obsidian unholy symbol of Lamashtu.
- Complete investigations and discovery of both the Sandpoint Glassworks incident and Catacombs awards all players 3700 xp.
In total, 10400 xp was received and each player would therefore receive 2600 xp. This should place all players at 5000 xp and therefore at level three. All players get one hero point for levelling.
Next session will involve slightly more narration about the Catacombs and then will allow players to decide on their direction from henceforth. The Sheriff is still out-of-town and in Magnimar.