Daemons and Heathens: Into a Fragile Darkness

“Nualia wanted to be one of Lamashtu’s children now. She wanted to become a monster herself.”

Walking down the steps behind the secret door that Merrix found last time, the Heroes find themselves in an interesting place: a substructure in the complex that appeared to be untouched by time and eerily familiar to the Catacombs of Wrath: pillars populate a stone-tiled room in the very first room they encounter.

Something seemed incredibly off and so the party decided to return to the previous floor with the intention to return to this one at a later time.

Going further into the floor where they found and defeated the spellcaster, the party comes across a door where the sound of howls had come from. Opening it, they come to find a pair of Yeth Hounds hovering in the air and growling at them. This combat began to sprawl many of the rooms of the floor until the hounds were finally felled.

The room where the hounds were found in appeared to be a chapel to Lamashtu: a sacred Lamashtu statue wielding a kukris stared back at the party ominously, a continual flame effect on the kukris adding to the eerie atmosphere in this room. An investigation of the altar revealed smears of ash and bits of bone.

It is here that a most peculiar event occurred; shuffling was heard outside the door and when the party went to investigate, they found a white-haired woman quickly running back the way they came from, towards the secret door. Running back, they find Conall, who was left there to guard the mage previously, knocked out, and the mage, Lyrie, having her throat cut. The secret door was slightly ajar, leading them to believe someone had come from there and returned there. The party was tempted to descend again but decided to wait until the floor was absolutely explored.

An adjacent room to the east opened to the outside by a cliff and contained a rather strange creature: a tentamort. Dead bodies littered its lair, most being sea birds and ospreys but six of them appeared to be dead goblins. Literally skin and bones, this room did not ease the Heroes’ minds of the desecration of this place.

It is after this encounter that the party had another that was a great deal more stranger and disgusting: they walk into what appeared to be Ripnugget’s harem in heat and involved in sexual activities with a bugbear which Merrix identified as Bruthazmus. Caught surprised, the bugbear drops the goblin he was anchored to and tried to get his bearings before being quickly taken down. The party sat silently, awkwardness saturated in the air, and tried to avoid the collapsed bugbear who had his groin destroyed by Leica’s rifle.

The goblin wives were slaughtered and left to bleed on the ground as the party left this room and went to explore the rest of the floor; what they found were merely a few bedrooms, one of which contained a mercenary armed with a sword, shield, and bow. This man, Orik Vancaskerkin, was convinced of the treachery of Nualia and her murder of the woman of his affections: Lyrie, the mage that was fought earlier.

The other bedrooms contained some trinkets and items, those of which are catalogued below and some of which was identified as having been possessions of Lyrie or Nualia. A final room contained a goblin nursery where goblin children were left starving in several cells filled with straw.

A goblin art gallery on this floor was the last room the party stopped at to investigate before their move to go to the lower floor.

The lower four feet of the walls in this empty room are covered with crude drawings in mud, blood, and paint. Most of the drawings show goblins engaged in some sort of violence against humans, horses, or dogs. One picture on the north wall is at least three times the size and complexity of the other draws. This images shows Thistletop from the side, the goblin stockade perched atop it like a crown. A cave has been drawn into the centre of the image, and looming inside is what appears to be an immense, muscular goblin with snakelike eyes and a dogslicer in each taloned hand. If the scale compared to the rest of the drawing is to be believed, the goblin must be at least thirty feet tall.

It is at this time the party finally begins the descent to the lower floor. Narrowly escaping a trap of falling portcullis, the party enters a room where they finally meet the widely sought-after aasimar, Nualia.

With the exception of her demonic hand and her scarred belly, the rest of her body is incongruously beautiful. Yet in her madness, Nualia has come to view her silver hair, violet eyes, and shapely figure as a curse, a scar visited upon her by her angelic heritage.

Wide stone ledges of red marble line the curving walls of this room, which is well lit by four burning skulls that sit in each corner. Three chairs rest in the room, and both stone ledges are covered with old books, scrolls, teeth, bones, scrimshaw artwork, jars of deformed creatures soaking in brine, taxidermied animals and limbs, and other strange objects. To the north, a large round fountain filled with frothy blue water fills the room with the gentle sound of bubbling. ¹

In front of this fountain, Nualia grinned and smirked at each of the members of the party. “Welcome. I commend you on your bravery and courage, but you will not succeed in fighting me. I have the power of Malfeshnekor behind me, and raising one of my fingers will have his wrath come down upon all of you. You will not disrupt my plans and hope to get away with it unscathed. Especially you, paladin. Your deity is a shadow to the grand schemes of Lamashtu, and I will succeed in razing Sandpoint to the ground!”

She is investigated at this point by Merrix and Darius, but she is not convinced of anything they say.

“Nobody, not even my past lover,” she grimaces at the word, “Has the ability to stop what is about to happen. What you managed to do here is barely enough to stop the oncoming raid; and this time, your measly efforts will not be there to save the town.”

Orik, at this point, seems to suddenly come under a compulsion as he swiftly rushes to Nualia’s side and readies himself in a stance to protect her. The battle begins, and it is only a minute or two later that the party closely comes out victorious. Nualia’s reign over Thistletop ended and she was left unconscious by the paladin, Darius, who wished to take her in to Sandpoint and have her face justice.

The following items and encounters were made in this session:

• Yeth Hounds (2); awarded 800 XP each.
• Tentamort; awarded 1200 XP. His lair possessed the body of a goblin who wore a suit of +1 hide armor (made from dogs), a ruined horsechopper, and a masterwork short bow.
• Bruthazmus awarded 800 XP and possessed 4 +1 elf bane arrows, a potion of cure moderate wounds, studded leather, a heavy flail, a masterwork composite longbow with 20 arrows, and 4 pp.
• Thistletop Goblin Wives (4); awarded 100 XP each.
• Orik Vancaskerkin was taken in as an ally, later surrounding after the fight with Nualia, and awarded 800 XP.
• Nualia, female aasimar cleric of Lamashtu 4/fighter 2, gave 1600 XP for her defeat. She possessed a +1 breastplate, a +1 bastard sword, a masterwork composite longbow with 20 arrows, a Sihedron medallion, a gold holy symbol (100 gp), 7 pp, and 5 gp.

In total, 6400 XP was awarded in this session. Split amongst 5 party members, each party member received 1280 XP. This places all characters at 9873 XP. Each character should now be level 4. Furthermore, the party has garnered the aid of Orik, a mercenary who is willing to help the party for the right price.