Session 14 - "Southfeld Follies" Report
General Summary
Kona 33, 1246
As Foenix creeps towards the fire in the woods, he spots a group of goblins, sitting around a couple of tents with some worgs sleeping. He sits, watching for a moment without anyone noticing before turning to creep back and report to the others.
That is when he unfortunately falls into one of the goblins' pit traps, but manages to keep quite enough that the rustling of his body falling into the earth is not enough to rouse the goblins to investigate. He hoists himself out of the trap and sneaks back.
When he wakes Jacob and Olena for their watch, he tells them about the goblins (though his reconnaissance leads him to drastically underestimate their numbers). The two thank him for the warning, and Foenix and Aglaia head to bed.
While on watch, Jacob asks Olena why she wishes to visit Karasi, and Olena vaguely states she's looking for "a flower" to help her with a "condition" she developed.
Though in return Olena asks about Jacob's hometown, he is very reluctant to talk about it - and Olena does not press. When he asks in turn about her home, she gladly speaks of a town at the base of a mountain, with a nearby river to fish and swim in.
As the sun rises, Micaiah gets some help stretching from Thais before another long day of travel, and Foenix makes some padfoot pastries. Jacob makes the rest of the meal.
The day is rather cold with a moderate wind, and so Foenix takes the red cloak stolen from the Roche house and cuts it down to a manageable length before bundling himself in it.
He and Thais ride ahead of the rest of the group, scouting ahead. He spots an adventuring pack, trapped in the brambles. In it, there are two potions of healing, 66 gold pieces, a single gem, and a letter. The letter has a wax seal on it of a staff in a circle. Thais recognizes it as the symbol of the god Reka.
The actual letter, which Foenix opens carefully so as to not damage the seal, has a very simple message in it.
Holden:
Our deal is now complete. My debt is paid.
The letter itself is flecked with blood. Foenix begins to search around, eventually uncovering a burial mound a short ways away, the stone doors broken inward. He calls over Olena and the others to take a look.
Upon approaching and stepping into the burial mound, they find the crypt is empty, save for some blood droplets on the ground in the singular room; still fresh.
Foenix looks along the shelves on the wall and finds an imprint in the dust that perfectly matches the gem within the pack they found.
As this is all going on, Micaiah moves to test a theory, cutting her hand and letting the blood drip upon the empty burial slab. Thankfully, Thais is able to stop her. She herself reaches out with her divine senses, looking for any sign of what occurred here. While she does not feel any undead or holiness or desecration within this space, she does get a twinge of necromancy.
The conclusion is very quickly drawn that whomever this tomb belonged to has been raised from the dead, and so the party exits the burial mound and splits up to look for the undead.
It is Thais and Olena who find it on a dwarven farmer's land, bent over the body of the farmer. They wave the others over, and Foenix sneaks into the garden proper to strike out at the creature. He strikes true, and then disengages and runs back towards the stone fence.
The creature whirls to face its attacker, and Thais can now see it. She recognizes it as a bodak - an undead creature that is made by stripping the identity of a humanoid after death. The more of an identity given to the undead (a prominent burial place, ceremonies and sacrificial objects, a name inscribed upon their resting place), the more potent they are. A body in a mass grave would be far less potent of a bodak than a corpse like the one used to create this one: laid to rest in a burial mound with objects of great value left to rot with the body.
Micaiah calls forth Jonquil to attack the bodak, and while it's darts can do nothing to poison dead flesh, the barbs still stick in its skin. Micaiah herself, staring at the creature's face, is gripped by a terror deep in her bones that she is only able to fight through by the skin of her teeth. She unleashes two bolts of eldritch blast, with one striking true and the other scoring the ground by its feet.
The bodak lurches forward, turning its gaze upon Foenix. Foenix stares back, and his flesh begins to wither - the skin becoming loose and translucent, muscles hanging slack on the bone. It staggers towards him, looming over the halfling. Foenix's mind is gripped with the same terror as Micaiah, but like her he fights through it and stabs at the creature. The shakes in his hands make him miss, so he disengages once again, leaping over the short garden wall and running past Thais, out of the bodak's reach.
Jacob, having stayed the furthest back from the creature and therefore unable to view it's terrible face with any amount of detail that would leave him vulnerable to the same fear as the others, claps his hands together vertically. As he pulls them apart, like drawing a rubber band taut, an orb of chaotic energy spirals within his grasp. He releases it, and a resounding clap of thunder staggers the undead.
Olena, for her part, is unable to keep her fear under control, and a trickle of blood running out of her ear as the terror manifests physically, tearing her mind asunder. But she lets out a yell, thrusting herself into a rage - better to be angry than frightened on the battlefield - and rushes the thing. Her keen animalistic senses had already tuned her into the fact that the creature was burning. Everywhere its skin was exposed to the sun was sizzling and smoking. So her hand grips onto the burial cloths still wrapped around its body and she tears it off. Then, as it shrieks in pain, her hammer swings for it with her free hand, but unfortunately the attack goes wide.
Thais pulls out her holy symbol and sends out a prayer to Syria, asking the goddess to bless Olena, Foenix, and herself. Then she steels herself. The sight of the creature's face does not phase her even as the fright claws at her heart, and she leaps over the garden wall, running to stand opposite Olena and give them both an advantage in this fight.
Meanwhile, Jonquil strikes true with another arrow (critical hit), and Micaiah has backed up enough to save himself from the visage of this creature. One of his eldritch blasts hits, and as the creature stumbles, there's a moment where it looks like it might be dead. But then it stands back up to it's full height (critical success to keep on fighting) and sets its sights on Olena, who's hair begins to fall out in clumps and age spots cluster on her body as its withering gaze grips her body in rotting necromantic magic. She manages to steel herself against more sickness than what already ravages her body.
The bodak turns and claws at Thais, but the sunlight searing its body and the lack of control over a body nearly torn apart already cause it to miss (critical fail). Thais seizes the opportunity, and her sword comes down in a flash of light, instantly vaporizing the beast.
The party takes a moment to breathe and recover, then Foenix searches the body of the dwarven farmer. He finds in his pockets a number of coins (three gold pieces, six silver, and two copper to be exact), a piece of red cloth, and an oval, brass-colored metal box the size of Foenix's thumb. Upon opening it, inside are a small pile of fragrant leaves: snuff.
A house in the distance leads the party to seek it out. Inside is the dwarf's wife, an elven woman. She is quite distraught to hear of her husband's demise, and the party's suspicion that she had something to do with it doesn't help. Still, Foenix gives her the items found on Jonas's (the dwarf's) body, and she directs them to the next town: Belamaria.
The party leaves her alone to grieve...
Rewards Granted
- star ruby (1,000 gp)
- 2 potions of healing
- 66 gp
Notes
Quotes of the Session
Olena: "You're bleeding! Are you okay?"
Foenix: "Yeah, I just found one of their traps."
Jacob: "All Cacstians are bastards? ACAB?"
Thais Argyri
Paladin (Oath of Redemption) 7
18
13
16
10
11
18
Foenix Stolnent
Rogue 3
Arcane Trickster 4
14
18
19
18
13
13
Micaiah Louvre
Warlock 7
7
18
14
12
15
20
Aglaia Karagiannis
Jacob Sterling
Sorcerer 7
9
8
16
12
12
19
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