Session 17 - "Bog Waters Rise" Report

General Summary

Kona 36, 1246

Still standing on the side of the road where they ended last week's session, the party discusses for a while the nature of the crane person. Eventually, however, it is decided that they don't need to understand everything about everything in the world and so they continue on.

As the party continues to walk, Foenix Stolnent and Thais Argyri notice some lights in the distance, bobbing in the gathering dark. Foenix slips off Arkeo and sneaks closer, eventually being able to see that the things in front of him are, in fact, will o' wisps. There are six of them in total, and Foenix cautiously takes the materials out of his bag to message back to Thais what he's found.

Micaiah Louvre, upon Thais informing the group that there are wisps in the forest, immediately runs off to have a closer look , excited to see these apparitions. She creates a minor illusion to mimic the wisps, and they seem to be interested, beckoning the tiefling further into the forest.

While Micaiah eagerly follows, she's also cautious to watch her step, and notices a quagmire that could suck her down with no problem at all. She of course avoids it, aggravating the wisps. They begin to swirl around her and soon begin trying to attack her. The party runs after Micaiah, and the wisps begin to attack them as well.

Two of the wisps immediately go invisible, and the other three attack Thais, Micaiah, and Olena. Thankfully, only Micaiah takes a zapping strike from the wisps.

Thais takes the opportunity to grasp her holy symbol and bless Olena, Foenix (still hiding in the woods unbeknownst to the wisps), and herself. Jacob, further back into the woods than the others, casts out a chromatic orb at a wisp, but misses it.

Meanwhile, Micaiah covers herself in the armor of Agathys before stepping back and baiting the wisps into attacking her. They do try to shock her, and both manage to hit, but as the lightning arcs through her body, the arcane rime coats across the undead motes and dealing damage in kind to them. Jonquil, for their part, flies back and up into the trees and takes a shot at the wisps, but misses.

Olena rages, and then takes a step back from the one wisp she can see. Unfortunately, the two invisible wisps were also nearby and as she steps back, they come out of hiding to also attempt to shock her (and the wisp that she could see). They all manage to hit, but she grits her teeth and swings out her lance to attack the one she could see. The first swing doesn't hit, but the second does connect.

Foenix decides to get involved at this point, running forward and stabbing at a wisp with the pearler's blade, and his sneak attack hits.

The undead creatures hum, and begin to fade from sight. They all turn invisible, and as the party has a chance to breath, Thais places a sanctuary on Micaiah, as well as laying her hands on Micaiah to heal him up a bit.

Jacob, not being able to see the wisps, takes a stab in the dark and attempts to shatter the air in a random area. Thankfully, his attempt is not fruitless, and he sees the wisp's form shudder slightly as it takes the damage from the spell.

Micaiah tries to create another minor illusion of a friendly wisp to draw the others out, while Olena tries the same move as last time: moving backwards to bait these invisible motes into attacking her. It works, and as it drops it's invisibility to shock her she attacks back. The lightning jolts her body, and she misses her first strike, but the second attack hits. The wisp begins to stutter, and the light it casts flickers uncertainly. Realizing it's almost dead, Olena shifts into her wolf form and bites into the wisp, scattering its essence as she swallows a mouthful of light.

Foenix moves out from the others of the party, making himself a target and readying an attack for whenever an invisible wisp reappears near to him. Thankfully, he doesn't have to wait long. The wisp's shock scorches his eyebrows as it reappears (critical hit), but he retaliates and kills it with a solid blow with the pearler's blade. The other wisps attack Micaiah (overcoming his sanctuary), Thais, and Jacob, successfully shocking each.

Thais runs over to Jacob, leaving herself open to a shock from a wisp as she gets close enough to attack the one menacing the sorcerer, and her sword cleaves that wisp in two.

Jacob gives her a nod of thanks before moving to line up two wisps and shoot a lightning bolt through them both. Unfortunately, these creatures that can harness the same type of energy to attack the party is immune to lightning, and so the magical bolt does nothing.

Meanwhile, Micaiah has Jonquil attack, and it hits the same wisp that Micaiah attempts to hit with his eldritch blast. Both bursts hit, and the wisp is scattered to the wind.

The last wisp is left to Olena, who swings once, twice, and hits the second time. She runs up to it, closing the distance to bite the wisp and gets her fangs around it. Foenix runs up to Olena and her hard-won quarry, swinging his blade down and killing the last of the wisps.

Arvandara SwampArvandara SwampArvandara SwampAs they take a moment to rest, Olena notices a bridge nearby over a shallow, nearly-sedentary body of water. It bridges over the gap to another small strip of dry land, which leads to another, and another, and another. They have reached Arvandara Swamp. The party decides to take a short rest here before continuing on, but once they do, they lead the cart (pulled by Matty and Patty) over the bridges.

At a certain point, Jacob notices an abandoned canoe along the side of the swamp, and begins to investigate. At first, he gets jump scared by a wolf spider in the canoe, but under a pile of four tanned deer hides, he finds a thin dagger with an obsidian spike in place of a pommel stone, a delicately carved wooden statuette of a rearing stag with hematite eyes, and some loose coins.

He shows it to the others, and Foenix begins to investigate as well. He finds (in addition to Jacob's items) a bag of holding, and a sack with a large, half-burned yellow candle, two thin gray blankets wool, a heavy black skillet iron, an old, large wooden spoon, a mink pelt, a rabbit pelt, and a black leather belt.

The belt is carefully made, with inconspicuous, very fine tooling along its length. However, the buckle is missing and was very sloppily cut off. The sack also holds a coil of coarse rope, a pair of gauntlets of heavy cowhide dyed black, held by solid iron rivets reworked to look like stars, and a silver key. At the bottom of the bag, Foenix also finds some various coins and black and white stones.

The thought is put out to take the time to repair the canoe, should it be needed, but this is eventually discarded as it would take too long and be too unwieldy of an item to continue to carry with them.

As the party continues through the swamp, they eventually come for a rest.

Foenix takes his watch to identify the items collected. Nothing is magical, save for the aforementioned bag of holding, which he immediately dumps out.

Amongst the items that come tumbling out is a longbow requiring a person of incredible strength to utilize, with a green leather grip and black leather quiver that has a design of thorny vines cut out, the design is cut in the black leather to reveal a green leather underneath in a masterful work of art. The quiver for the longbow contains a dozen arrows sporting black shafts with green fletching. It is accompanied by a silver and leather archer's armguard, with the silver piece inset into the leather and engraved with flowers and thorny vines.

In addition, there are two very well-made longswords and one shortsword. The swords have leather scabbards matching the color of the leather used to make the grip of the hilt; black, brown, and green. There is an ash spear, perfectly balanced for throwing and with a keen blade. The spear bears the name Far-biter, enscribed upon it in Elvish.

Foenix searches around in the pile, finding four daggers that have fallen among some bags with shoulder straps. The three shoulder bags are of a heavy canvas that appears to be quite durable. The contents of all the shoulder bags include three bedrolls of a very fine and unusually lightweight construction. There is also an iron pot and a total of three wooden bowls and spoons finely carved with leaf designs on the spoon handles and rims of the bowls within these shoulder bags.

There are also three smaller bags tied with cord worked into the bag in such a way that it can be drawn shut. The smaller bags are made from fine twill weave designs of red-and-black, green-and-black, and gray-and-green and contain a mixture of coins.

Foenix takes the time to also identify these items, revealing the bow is a +1 longbow.

Seeing as how these items are far beyond what the initial content of the canoe seemed to indicate, the conclusion that Foenix comes to is that, perhaps, the owner of the canoe was a hunter or trapper of some kind within Arvandara Swamp. But as for the items within the bag of holding, well, he supposes that the owner of the bag of holding was not the first to own it and had perhaps stumbled upon it and never thought to check the contents stored there by the previous owner, simply using it for his own purposes and never investigating it further.

He gifts the longbow to Olena, and the two of them sit and talk for a bit about food and drink, purposing between the two of them that they should attempt to make a mead (instead of a rum) cake at some point, utilizing the mead from Olena's homeland.

After the two of them head to bed, Thias takes up a watch with Jacob. She saves Olena from a harrowing experience of having a stag beetle crawl into her mouth while she slept, crushing the bug in her hands. Jacob comments about how protective Thais is of Olena, implying that there is some romantic tension there and even going as far as to call Olena Thais's "girlfriend." Thais is offended by the implication, and Jacob backs off immediately, apologizing for the misinterpretation.

Micaiah is the last one to take a watch, and does it on her own, so no one is around to see when Alimony Symphero's mother's message returns to the party and Micaiah attempts to read it without any of them knowing she had snuck a peak. Unfortunately, a fumble with the paper (critical fail) leads to an irreparable tear, and while Micaiah is able to fib that she had nothing to do with the damage, the message is only partially readable.

It reads as follows, as best as the party can make out:

To the adventurers who travelled with my child: I thank you for your letter, though it grieves me that it could be under such tragic circumstances.

It ----that Alimony would not return to me, but a mother must pray for the best for her own ----. Please, return our Alimony to us with as much haste you are able. ---- may incur. I could not sleep knowing that my child was resting with strangers.

You can find our home in Vakwari, in the district of Devak. The house is white, with copper outfittings and a blue roof. I hope to see you before the Festival of Still Sands.

With much gratitude,

— Serenity Symphero

Rewards Granted

• 4 tanned deer hides (2 gp each)
• A thin dagger with an obsidian spike in place of a pommel stone (12 gp)
• A delicately carved wooden statuette of a rearing stag with hematite eyes (28 gp)
• 18 sp, 20 cp

• Sack (1 sp)
• A large, half-burned yellow candle (3 cp)
• 2 thin gray blankets wool (2 sp each)
• A heavy black skillet iron (2 sp)
• An old, large wooden spoon (2 cp)
• A mink pelt (20 gp)
• A rabbit pelt (2 gp)
• A black leather belt, carefully made with inconspicuous, very fine tooling along its length. The buckle is missing (3 gp)
• A coil of coarse rope (1 gp)
• A pair of gauntlets of heavy cowhide dyed black, held by solid iron rivets reworked to look like stars (5 gp)
• A silver key (1 gp)
• 2 pieces of obsidian (10 gp each)
• 1 small piece of onyx (20 gp)
• 2 pieces of quartz (10 gp each)
• 7 gp, 19 sp, 33 cp
• A bag of holding

• A +1 longbow with a green leather grip and black leather quiver that has a design of thorny vines cut out in a masterful work of art; the design is cut in the black leather to reveal a green leather underneath (300 gp)
• A quiver contains a dozen arrows sporting black shafts with green fletching (73 gp)
• A silver and leather archer's armguard. The silver is inset into the leather and engraved with flowers and thorny vines (12 gp)
• 2 well-made longswords (12 gp each)
• 1 shortsword (7 gp)
• 3 leather scabbards matching the color of the leather used to make the grip of the sword hilts: black, brown, and green
• An ash spear, perfectly balanced for throwing and with a keen blade with the name Far-biter inscribed in Elvish (302 gp)
• 4 daggers (2 gp each)
• 3 shoulder bags made up of durable, heavy canvas (2 sp each)
• 3 bedrolls of a very fine and unusually lightweight construction (5 sp each)
• An iron pot (5 sp)
• 3 wooden bowls and spoons, finely carved with leaf designs on the spoon handles and rims of the bowls (42 cp)
• 3 smaller bags made from fine twill weave with designs of red-and-black, green-and-black, and gray-and-green, tied with cord worked into the bag in such a way that it can be drawn shut (3 sp each)
• 30 pp, 59 gp, 29 sp, 26 cp