Session 11 & 12: Unforgiven

Activity Log - Ian Becker is gone, the one that he sought to replace, and the ancient evil behind it all…

General Summary

We take great care to board Spash’s luxury carriage, making sure to stay ahead of the undead that had broken through into Echo March. Taking the reins, Horick blazes a path towards Arcane Bindings, which is not far from the estate. While bound, Becker began to beg for the dragon fang, saying that with it he could bring us into the fold of the Grave Lord Stryxis. His ranting and grand promises of a new world built on the destroyed ashes of the current one, such as it was, fell largely on deaf ears. He claimed not to have the ability to stop the undead plague spreading through the fire as he was without the fangs to offer up to this dread deity.

As we pull to the front door of Arcane Bindings, a streak of dark magic shot past us and struck Cojitron in the back of their head. They sputter briefly before deactivating from the damage. We whirl around to find that the caster was heading towards us from down the street; a shadowy, masked, scythe wielding fiend of some kind surrounded by the necrotic moths Becker himself commanded before in our battle. Jumping from the carriage, I pound on the door, yelling our identities and to be let in before our attacker could cut us down. A moment later Isolde opens up, looking flustered and understandably upset. The commotion in the city had not gone unnoticed as it steadily worsened. I try explaining the situation as quickly as I can while the others, with Ian Becker in tow, try to filter into the shop. Looking behind us, Isolde panics and says she had magic defenses but she would need to activate them.
This would prove difficult as she admitted she had not done so in a long time. The shadowy figure, though, moved swiftly and, ignoring Horick as if it couldn’t see him, likely due to the protection from the magic coin, began to assault us, expelling some sort of deathly aura in its wake. Dayne took a cut or two, along with Tea Kettle, while the sickening energy from this creature knocked me out completely. My injuries had hardly had any time to heal from all the previous battles of the night. The others drag Cojitron and me inside the building but the shade follows us in, intent on continuing the attack. It succeeds in cutting TK’s bird device in half. Dayne and Horick draw weapons and keep the thing at bay while Tea Kettle follows Isolde downstairs, finding some arcane runes inscribed on some strange devices within the building. Isolde needs manacite to power the protection spells within, and, providing one, they manage to decipher the device and it hums to life, albeit with some trouble given the worn down and unmaintained state of her defense system. Upstairs, the others report that once the magic defenses had been activated, our attacker was expelled from the building. They come back upstairs, and TK administers some aid to my wounds. I wake and, assessing the situation, inform Isolde on what has been happening in the city. Because she seems like a friend of Trevor DeWitt’s, we decided she could be trusted. Notably, her demeanor around Dayne is rather sour, which is a reaction I am no stranger to. Given that we had a moment to collect ourselves, I break the news to both of them of Trevor’s death during the fire at the Counting House while he attended the Flower Festival. Both of them are momentarily in disbelief; we confirm his body is in the hospital morgue, and I give Isolde the items we had taken from him. Even my uncle takes the news hard, saying that he was his companion from the original iteration of theri adventuring troupe. It had been a hard day for him, having found out his people had been murdered by someone he thought he trusted and an old friend having perished in this uniquely brazen attack. Isolde especially looked distraught, only telling us that he and his mother were extremely close and that he was likely the only person she trusted now that she was gone. The admission was unexpected and troubling to hear. The emergency had far from abated; our attacker, finding they could not get in while the magic was active in the store, disappeared from the street. Isolde, breaking out of her brief moment of mourning, said that her store’s magic defenses would require manacite at an alarming rate to keep going, because they had not been properly used and maintained in a long time. Her mother seemed like she had created the design in this and Trevor’s property too; she surmised that unlike her, who had little need of it due to her lack of customers, Trevor’s likely was working at peak efficiency. Tea Kettle, liking the challenge, offered to help her work their way to making the runes function as optimally as possible. Before they start their work, TK, fussing over Cojitron’s damaged form, inquired as to whether she had equipment to help in their repair. Isolde only kept books, scrolls and a few potions on hand, and those she did not even bother to have identified. I suggested the gnome, Klume, from around the corner, knowing his repair shop would definitely have the Clanker tools and parts needed. I felt some guilt in having to accost the poor, if unhinged, man once more, but this was truly an emergency the likes none of us have ever experienced. TK wrote down what was required and handed it to Horick as he could traverse the streets without the undead noticing him. The rest of us in the meantime get to work on making a plan of action. Knowing that we couldn’t allow the undead and the fire continue to spread while we had one of its perpetrators with us, we begin interrogating Becker. Dayne is not gentle, his anger having boiled over at this betrayal. He strikes him several times, and it was during one of Ian’s many rants and attempts to convince us over to his side, with promises to TK and myself of having a place in this new world his Grave Lord Stryxis would create, that I noticed his skin was starting to pale greatly, his body suffering the effects of rigor mortis, his whole being becoming more desiccated as time passed. Our disdain at his attempts to flatter us notwithstanding, we press him for more information on Stryxis and how to stop the plague. He claims that with the fangs, he could make an offering to his lord, some sort of draconic creature from the ancient past of Tairos, and he would become the new favored servant and throw down the current “Bishop”, who was even now orchestrating the horror the city was now suffering. Concerned over this heretofore unknown player, we demand to be taken to him; I coyly suggest that we could help defeat him directly before allowing Becker the chance to rectify his failure with Stryxis, nodding to Spash, who had to this point kept Fink’s lockbox hugged to his chest. If nothing else, I applaud his dedication to being an antiquarian, if a loathsome one at that. Becker, desperation seeping into his decaying form, agrees to this, noting that his punishment for failing is literally killing him as time passes. It seems whatever pact he made with this dragon beast, we must now take this lesson and apply it to Horick should the need arise to free him from a similar contract with the MacMurdaugh Hotel's Night Manager. This could easily be his fate, as I doubted there was much difference in these infernal contracts. I could tell TK had the same thought as I did. Isolde took her mind off the death of her dear friend by helping us identify a number of items we had taken off of Becker. Of note, his story about Sytirix being a dragon of some kind in the far past was at least true, as the fangs were indeed that of a fossilized dragon’s. Necromantic energy seeped out of it continually. The mask itself, which Becker had been begging to be returned to him so he could speak to his master and let them know that he was still able to accomplish his mission, was very much a direct conduit to whatever being made the contract with him. It also was a channel of dark magic, and it took much willpower to not immediately destroy it given its nature. It was seemingly possible to use it to “talk” to Stryxis without putting it on, but Becker was insistent that only while wearing it would his punishment cease and his ability to defeat the Bishop return. Horick eventually returned with the proper tools and, grinning, let us know that as “deputies” of the constabulary, the city now owed Klume compensation for the equipment he just commandeered from the hapless gnome engineer. While I applauded Horick for using his words, promising the man that this emergency would be the last he’d see of him coming into his life and causing chaos, I somehow felt that would not be the case. TK immediately set to work on fixing Cojitron, and after several minutes, restored them to working order. However, their personality had not returned and it was nothing more than an automaton. TK explained that more work was needed, but that would have to wait until we could settle in somewhere, as the charge from the manacite was running low, so he and Isolde went to work on the runes. They manage to successfully fix any lingering issues and the magic hummed ever stronger; each manacite fed into it could now last for over a day instead of barely one hour. As well, the magic would protect against all manner of hostile attackers and detect any danger against the domicile. It was impressive work by her mother. We took stock of our situation, and all agreed that even though we had secured her store against undead attack, we needed to make our way back to Raven’s Perch to find the ultimate source and stop the flames from infecting more people. It was clear that the constabulary and town guard was being pushed back and the barricade was leaking undead into other parts of the city. Trevor’s was a base we could work out of considering it bordered the two districts and was well stocked and empowered by the same magic defenses as Arcane Bindings. Horick, while retrieving the tools for Cojitron’s repair, informed us that the streets had gotten more choked with zombies filtering into Echo March and, though the larger estates were well defended for now, this area of the district was crawling with the undead. As well, we were cut off from our carriage. Horick then volunteered, almost gleefully, to make a distraction so that we could break away from the undead and travel to Trevor’s shop. He was confident in his protective charm and his ability to find his way to Trevor’s on foot alone. We had no option but to give in to that very risky plan. Horick leads us outside and he begins walking towards the largest group of shambling undead. Drawing his weapon, he immediately attacks several of them, and it is only this violent action that spurs them to react, as if realizing for the first time that there is an enemy among them. They start moving in the direction of the attacks, but Horick nimbly moves ahead of them. It seems that they still cannot see him even as he antagonized them. He continues harrying them as he leads the lot of them further down the street and away from us. We make a break for it and successfully escape this area. We eventually made our way to Trevor’s shop some time later, having taken a wide berth around the major streets. The fires and the commotion from Raven’s Perch continue to rage, and it is now very obvious this close to that area that the barricades were not holding. Inside, TK and Isolde activate Trevor’s magical defenses, and, fortunately, they hum to life fully. We set Becker on a chair, noting that he continued to become more and more frail and deathly. He looked like he was falling apart before our eyes. TK set to work on Cojitron while we took stock of the situation. Eventually, he was successful and our friend returned to full life, and he proceeded to attempt to restore the pieces of his construct after making sure Cojitron was ok. We fill them in on the events of the last hour or so since they were struck down at Arcane Bindings. Before long, Horick walks through the door, brandishing the scythe of that very attacker. He proudly announced that he tracked it down and killed it himself. He also let slip when I asked what possessed him to put himself in danger like that that it was a job the Hotel’s familiar asked of him, and that it was light work on the whole. Concerning, but he was seemingly unharmed, so the problem would hold for another day. We then continue interrogating Becker, who, weakly, cooperates when we promise to give him back his mask and help with defeating the Bishop and turning over the fangs to his fell master. He says that the bishop was underneath the counting house in the sewer, with some sort of cauldron that was producing the corrupting power of the fires turning people to undeath. He could lead us there, but before he could get much further, Dayne strikes him in frustration once more and this turns out to be the last threshold to Ian Becker’s hold on life. The power that had flowed through him left entirely and all that remained was death. He crumpled into nothing, only to immediately begin rising as a shade, similar to the one that attacked us earlier. Fortunately for us, we were ready for this possibility and assaulted his remains quickly and savagely. Though the magic protecting Trevor’s shop would expel him, we did not want it loose in the city, among the other horrors. Before it could fight back, our combined attacks destroyed its form and it shrank back from whatever realm it emerged from. Horick attempted to reach out and snatch the scythe like he did for the one he hunted down, but was unsuccessful this time as it was sucked into an inky darkness. We knew that we had to defeat the bishop and save the city from further harm. That meant we needed to make our way back to Raven’s Perch and the counting house. Isolde and Dayne Reed volunteered to go with us, wanting to avenge Trevor and do their part to stop this madness. Hencil Spash, still fawning over the lockbox, resolves to take refuge here for the time being. We arm ourselves and leave Trevor’s shop. As we approach the street where the terror began tonight, we find that the constabulary have been stretched thin and are holding back the tide as best they can, but pockets of weakness in the barricade allowed zombies to escape into the rest of the city. We pass through, and stealthily make our way back to the counting house. There, we find an access point to the sewer, and, holding our noses, descend into the fetid darkness, using our mana gauge to track this bishop and this cauldron’s death magic. By this point, we had become near to experts in recognizing the readings of this terrible energy. A short trek into the sewers later, led by the gauge’s signal, we find ourselves at an iron gate in front of the pumping station underneath the Counting House. The others prepare themselves while I examine the area for any traps left behind. As usual, these actions turned out to be moot as Horick, without skipping a beat, cocked his booted foot back and slammed it into the gate, throwing it wide open. His satisfaction was short-lived as some masonry above us, weakened by the inferno still raging in the Counting House above, tumbled from the shock of the impact and struck him. We quickly dug him out of it, and, though he had taken some injuries senselessly, was more than prepared to continue. We this time cautiously entered, which turned out to be a needless precaution as, predictably, a group of zombies shambled towards us having been alerted by the noise. The circular chamber was awash with fire, though not, fortunately, to the extent that it made it unnavigable. Beyond, we could see yet another door leading to the station and, we surmised, the Bishop working his ritual. Horick charges in, leaping with great strength over one wall of flame and egging a few of them on towards him. The rest of us filtered in steadily, sniping at whatever open targets we found with our spells and weapons. More of these death moths materialize and surround Dayne as he waltzes in with his blunderbuss and, beset by them, shoots recklessly at them to surprisingly great effect, though not without taking some wounds of his own. A few zombies perished in the flames, foolishly walking through them to get at Horick. Pleased at his cunning, he finishes the ones that survived the fire. A loud groan is heard behind him and, trudging into view is an enormous zombie ogre, not unlike the ones fighting in Mr. Noble’s arena. a few more zombies filtered into the chamber near him. Horick hurls a handaxe into the chest of this great behemoth while Cojitron and TK fires their respective spells and bolts at it. Dancing between the fires, Horick keeps its attention on him. I then skirt around and keep the other zombies from flanking our position by stabbing them from the shadows. Dayne’s wild shooting surprisingly proves effective and he soon dispatched the moths harassing him. Isolde enters and, unfurling a scroll from her large case, fires several magic missiles that strike the ogre. Eventually, our firepower bring it down and we mop up the remaining zombies, with none of us having suffered any bites. We take a brief pause to restore ourselves and put out some of the fires in this chamber. Horick, who had suffered several deep wounds from battling the ogre, patches his wounds and drinks from the healing potions Isolde brought with her. TK comes up with an idea to use the mask Becker once wore to fool the Bishop into thinking he had returned with the fangs and allow us to get the drop on him. While Cojitron, TK and Isolde examined the mask to find a way to sever the connection to Stryxis, as it could see through the eyes of whomever wore it in addition to communicating with said wearer, I conjured the clothes with the glamor enchanting my armor to match Becker’s own ostentatious garb and volunteered to play the role. Having observed him for some time before his ultimate betrayal, I was well aware of his mannerisms. The three eventually manage to temporarily disable the enchantments on the mask and, donning it, instruct the others to wait for a signal before we launch the attack on the Bishop. I then open the door and enter. Within the pumping station chamber I witnessed an incredible sight. A large group of skeletal warriors armed and armored milled about while a pair of scythe wielding shades flanked the room. Two large, burning braziers stood to the sides of a raging, terrible tornado made of what looked like the tormented souls of the dead. It swirled between these braziers, and beside it was another faceless masked figure, similar to what Becker had worn. There were enemies aplenty, though they stayed their hand as I strolled in. Noticing my arrival, the Bishop asks what I am doing here, having been fooled into believing that I am Becker. I claim that I had found the other dragon fangs they had been searching for, and the Bishop congratulates me, ordering they be handed over. I play the part of usurper, demanding that my role as leader of this cult be recognized. The Bishop rebukes Becker, not for the first time, I noted. This Faceless Court, as they call themselves, surrendered their identities and sought no greater glory amongst themselves, serving only their fell Grave Lord. All the while they worked towards something the Bishop called the “New Day”, and the return of Stryxis herself. All of it made little sense to me, but it seemed that there was a larger plot at play here in this dangerous group. I refuse to submit to the Bishop and, exasperated, orders his minions to kill “Becker” and make him into one of their shades. Unbeknownst to him, that had already happened. It appeared their lord didn’t give them up to the minute information. I pulled out the fang we had found seemingly so long ago alongside the lockbox in Fink’s room and threatened to destroy it if they didn’t back off. Unfortunately, after a short time to consider this, the Bishop retorts that he didn’t believe I had a way to do so and the horde pressed on. I immediately escaped through the door where my friends waited, and the mass of undead rushed to follow. The cue having been received, Cojitron and TK emerged at the doorway and fired off two devastating spells. A fireball erupted in the chamber, catching all of the monsters within including the Bishop, damaging them badly. This was followed by TK’s commandeered rainbow cube shooting its terrifying prismatic spray, delivering fire, ice and lightning into the chamber. Most were destroyed by this barrage, while several escaped immediate destruction but were badly wounded in the process, including the Bishop. However, amazingly, before the rainbow spray could reach the braziers, two unearthly claws came from the soulnado and dragged them back away from the harmful rays. Horick charged in, hacking and killing his way to the Bishop. Isolde and Dayne remained in the back, with the moths in the room going after Dayne once more. There were many more than the previous chamber and he nearly was overwhelmed by them. Isolde used several of her scrolls to fire spells at the enemies within while I quaffed a potion of fire breathing and, taking off my mask, launched a stream of fire at the undead. The Bishop is enraged at my deception and, with his minions dying off, summons a powerful cloud of death to engulf half the chamber. It is enough to nearly bring us to our knees. It is at this juncture that from the soulnado, a large, frightening form emerges, a wispy and etheric dragon. Towering over us, it begins swiping at Horick, who manages to dodge many of the attacks but not all. Realizing the power required by Stryxis to remain in this form and that every action made her fainter given how toxic Tairos was to her “kind”, TK instructs Horick to deal with the braziers. Stryxis’s voice rings out through the chamber, claiming that this was her day come at last. Horick manages out maneuver the draconic being and reach one of the braziers. Cojitron’s lightning bolt puts paid to the remaining undead, as well as damaging Stryxis herself somewhat. Horick launches an attack on the brazier, but finds that even his weapon would have difficulty in destroying it in time. Isolde casts a spell from a scroll to enlarge his form and, now larger than us for the first time, he opts to use the fullness of his rage and size to hurl the brazier over. The unnatural fires do great harm to him as he touches the brazier but he succeeds with great effort of overturn it. The dragon’s form wavers greatly, and in desperation, she wields back and throws a breath weapon into us, catching even the Bishop who, in his dismay, is wounded badly by it.

Most of us manage to escape this move and avoid certain death, having retreated into the previous chamber to avoid the Bishop’s cloud kill, but Horick is caught and is felled to near death by it. With the breath of the dragon dying down, I reemerge and retaliate with fiery breath of my own at the Bishop, who loses control of his spell, and not a moment too soon; I was near to fainting from the exertion and wounds. TK takes the chance to shoot his crossbow, and it strikes the Bishop and takes him off his feet, throwing him mask first into the smoldering fires of the knocked over brazier. Isolde, seeing Horick knocked down, sneaks past the dragon and pulls out a scroll that she uses to transfer her remaining life essence into Horick to partially heal him. She collapses as Horick collects himself, and whips into action, running at the second brazier. Dayne manages to finish off this second swarm of moths, and we brace ourselves as Stryxis prepares to fire another burst of her breath into the second chamber we’ve been hiding in. Horick, however, manages to once again summon the strength to hurl the second brazier over, even without the size upgrade with Isolde having lost consciousness. The destruction of the fires puts paid to the dragon’s hold on Tairos and she fades from here, her rage fearsome at this affront. We rush inside to aid Isolde, who wonders aloud when TK restores some life to her if this is the afterlife. It wasn’t, but neither was it the hell that she had left when she fell unconscious moments ago as with the ritual ended the undead plague ceased its spread and the fires began dying down. The rumbling and blasting we were hearing above us began to turn to an eerie silence replaced by the shuffling of feet, no doubt the fire brigade and constabulary working to put out the remains of the fire and the dead. The zombies created by the flames remained, but no longer did the infection spread through their bites. Small victories, but welcome ones. Dayne is his usual nonchalant attitude towards this, but I oddly felt that his normal behavior showed some cracks at the disasters that had befallen the city, especially when they were so personal to him in particular. We rolled the Bishop over and discovered he was alive but the fire had heated his mask and badly burnt his face. Horick wanted him executed, which I had no issue with, but I desired more information on this Faceless Court and if there were anymore members. I rarely recalled ever feeling such rage in my life, or much of anything to be honest, but something about the actions of this past night truly set my blood to boil. The others had similar reactions, I could tell, and Isolde for all her sour attitude revealed a side that valued this city as well in spite of all that she has suffered. We bound the Bishop and left the sewer. I planned to inform Lt. Freeleaf of some of what has transpired tonight; not all, for who would believe it? But they must be made to know that Ghal Pelor had dangerous villains such as these afoot. Perhaps the other dragon fangs would turn up; rumor was one of them belonged to the Black Thorn Society here in the city. Was this to be our purpose then? I worked for my uncle only to serve my own self discovery and now I was dragged into something even my well traveled mother had likely never encountered. Time would tell. For now, rebuilding would have to begin. The End for Now, ~Bayour S.

Rewards Granted

The dragon tooth that was in Becker's possession is now ours
A number of wretched artificats taken from Becker and The Bishop

Missions/Quests Completed

The Bishop and Ian Becker's demises
The Faceless Court's plan for Stryxis's return, this "New Day", has been foiled for now
The plauge of undeath has ended and the fires cease, though the zombies remain

Character(s) interacted with

Isolde Tremaris
Ian Becker, the Masked Necromancer
Hencil Spash
Dayne Reed
The Bishop of the Faceless Court

Related Reports

Session 10: Umasked

Notes

The Faceless Court may still remain in the city, plotting more disaster. The Ghal Pelor Constabulary Department must be alerted to root them out
Undead still roam the streets that were created by the fires.
The other fangs, including the ones we possess, should be destroyed to prevent Stryxis's return

Report Date

22 Jun 2024

Primary Location

Ghal Pelor

Secondary Location

Arcane Bindings

Related Characters

Bayour Lake

Topaz Ghost by Steven Bellshaw