01: Detectives of Homelt

The mountains that separated the kingdom of Branos and the Evergrove was not a peaceful area. Even though a few trade routes snaked their way through them, only especially daring, desperate or ignorant ever used them, all to aware of the hobgoblin menace that lived high in the mountains. There our heroes found themselves, traveling with a merchant caravan to Emeresia.
There were a few scuffles but nothing much of note, at least until the caravan reached the bottom of the mountain range. There, in the middle of the night the party was awakened to the sounds of battle. They jumped out of their ‘beds’, but at the front they turned around. There was little that they could do in that chaos, and strange ‘thunks’ could be heard behind them. Disappearing into the darkness they soon found the source of the noise. Some hobgoblins had launched themselves behind the frontline and were climbing out of the trees. Arveene Greaycastle began firing arrows as Furin Runeguard stood in front of the enemies trying to draw their attention.
As the battle began the group noticed that there were two abnormally large hobgoblins. They quickly tried focusing them down, only to realize they were doing little damage. One of them was carrying a strange orb that they instead focused. Furin was battered as the large creature which they now recognized was actually a half orc, pummeled him, Furin’s weapons long since fleeing from the dwarves hands. The orcs weapon raised as Arveene shot the hobgoblins orb, finally destroying it. With a roar the weapon descended, barely whizzing passed Furins head and burying itself in the neck of the hobgoblin that had just carried the orb. Snarling the orc turned to the other hobgoblins that looked up at him with fear. They bolted, followed by an enraged half orc hot on their heels.
The group returned to the caravan as they were just getting ready to depart. Mehnaar, the dragonborn of the group, eased the departing of one of the wounded as his wounds were beyond what anyone could do to heal them. In haste the caravan finished packing up and fled, as they soon found a host of goblins on their heels.
To the groups surprise the orc came back before the caravan could leave but despite the caravans hostile reaction, the orc did not attack. The group managed to de-escalate the situation and talked to the orc who had no name. They decided to call him havok for the time being, and allowed him to flee with them, as the orc was obviously forced to attack them against his will.
They fled into the early morning, a small contingent of riders galloping ahead in the search of help as Avelana departed from the group doing her best to distract and delay the goblins, and to the groups surprise, she actually succeeded. It was not enough though as towards noon the goblins were drawing ever closer, even after the caravan had dropped all trade goods.
As the goblins came intro striking distance the caravan prepared for it’s last stand, but fortunately that would never come. As the goblins charged a blinding light filled the sky, burning the front line of the goblins to a crisp. Soon they saw two griffons flying towards them at top speed. They landed in the middle of the goblin lines the two golden clad riders jumping off just before the great beasts landed and tore through the goblins. In less than a minute the goblins were broken and fled back towards the mountains.
The two saviors took the reigns of their beasts and lead them to the caravan but, as friendly as the introduction may have been, the leader of the two, who turned out to be Avelana Roseheart, Avatar of the gods and leader of the paladins was extremely hostile as soon as she saw Mehnar. At first it was thought that she had an extreme distaste for dragonborn, they soon discovered that she could smell the stench of death on him and believed him to be a servant of charnel. Though he could (while Talgirm secretly listened) convince her that he did not server charnel, but a entity called the raven queen, he was unable to simply gain access to Adatia, the destination of the group. Instead she offered them a mission. They were to travel to the small city of Homelt. There had been a series of disappearing priest in the area and Lady Roseheart believed that the Homelt would be next.
The group was escorted by the other paladin, Shameros, as he had given his griffon to the wounded so that they might be cared for sooner, and left the caravan to continue its way. To their displeasure the caravan leader had become friends with Havok and had convinced him to become a fighter in the arena under his tutelage.
In their journey Shameros kept his armour and helm on at all times, but as the group asked why his voice was so raspy he finally lifted his helmet. To their surprise beneath was a tiefling with his horns cut as low as possible. On his neck a terrible burn wound cut deep into his flesh. The group didn't dare ask what the wound was from, as any such wound that remained on such a distinguished member of the paladins must have either significant meaning, or was inflicted by something so powerful that even the high priests of Silvana could not heal it.
As they approached the outskirts of Homlet the paladin gave them a piece of parchment. It would let them call him as soon as they were finished. In Homelt they first entered the tavern where they found a drunken vagabund, but they were able to convince him, without resorting to violence as the city eldest who was there had asked them to, to leave the tavern and return to his camp. The elder later told them that bandits had taken up residence in the old decrepit fort down the road. While the rest of the group continued exploring Mehnar and pebbles disguised themselves and went to the fort. Mehnar was almost instantly recognized as a priest and asked to come inside as two of the members of the bandits were currently dying.
As they entered they found close to two dozen bandits lingering about, but where quickly lead to a section closed of by sheets that were hung up. Inside two bandits lay with countless cuts covering their bodies. As Mehnar spoke the final rites for the men as they passed into the next life the leader took notice of them. Instead of letting them leave he questioned Mehnar. Failing to convince him the leader became more and more suspicious as Mehnar kept trying to lie. Fortunately a crackling of red energy filled the room as a portal opened. A man in red robes stepped out, looking almost bored. He ignored everyone and simply walked to the dead men, until Hades, Mehnars crow began screeching at him. The man in red simply lifted his hand at the familiar blowing him up in a red mist. He inspected them and without a word pulled out a couple of red gold pieces, handing them to the leader of the bandits, giving Mehnar a few red gold piece for his service. Behind him he floated the two bodies as he disappeared through the portal.
As he left the leader quickly kicked Mehnar and Pebbles out, not trusting them. They did manage to find out that that strange man would appear when they lost or killed a man and in exchange for the body, leave them a few gold pieces. In the following months the party would learn that the supposed group of bandits was just a treasure hunting group and the townspeople thought they were bandits simply out of fear.
The other portion of the group had found that there was some sort of corruption, and were able to localize it to the water. They headed out into the forest and after some time found a bag in the stream. Inspecting it they found the decaying remains of an arm. They headed back into town and, after convincing the brewer to destroy his work of the past few months, realized that the gold they had received had infected the rest of their money. It was now completely red.
Finally they decided to reconvene with the priest, but he was nowhere to be found. Talgrim snuck inside and found the remains of a priest the group had never seen before hung and was missing an arm and a leg. Strange writing Talgram chose not to try to read covered the wall behind the murdered priest. He snuck back up, just barely escaping as the fake priest returned. The group entered the church and confronted the priest. He tried to convince them of who he supposedly was, but they would not listen. They offered to take him downstairs to confront him with the evidence.
He smiled as he accepted, knowing that in the darkness he would have to get very close to the body. If he could just touch it he would unleash death and destruction on the infidels.
As they descended the stairs pebbles suddenly cast light, revealing the grotesque image. In his panik the fake priest did not react quickly enough as Furin grappled him. He tried to cast a necrotic nova, but Pebbles felt the spell misfire and warned the group. They dove into cover as the necrotic nova erupted from within the fake priests body, tearing him to pieces. In their confusion only Mehnar noticed the man in read appear behind a pillar, realize there was no body he smiled and disappeared.
The group called Shameros who was horrified when he learned what had happened and quickly flew to them. He demanded he confiscate all the red gold that they had and would pay them back what he could, the rest being paid back when they arrived in Adatia. Everyone except Talgrim gave all their money to him. Shameros would remain in Homlet cleaning up after the group as they finally continued their journey.