Session 69 - Welcome to the Jungle

General Summary

39 Sov'van - Contd.

After finishing a short rest, the party once more began their trek through the jungle. Jilken took the lead to begin leading them through the jungle. As they walked Denye scanned the nearby flora, making notes and sketching odd looking flowers. Along the way she spotted a number of bushes with large bright pink berries. Picking and squeezing one revealed that it was full of a sticky reddish juice. Cautiously, the wizard touched the juice to her tongue. it was quite sweet, but as the sweetness faded her tongue began to burn.
Dropping the berry, the wizard pulled out a waterskin and quickly washed out her mouth before washing her talons. "Hey Janora," she called, "I'm fairly sure that these berries are poisonous. I'm not sure how useful it would be for you, but they might be interesting to study."
"I am all about new poisons," replied Janora excitedly. Pulling out a larger glass jar, the pair of them harvested as many of the berries they could find. Denye also found several large stands of bloodwort ferns, known to be good for speeding wound healing and drawing out infections, and they collected several bundles.
A few hours past as the party worked their way deeper into the jungle, following stream beds and game trails where they could. Shortly after noon, Jilken had to divert the party to a low overhanging bluff as a torrential downpour began falling out of the sky. It didn't last long, only 10 minutes or so, but it was coming down so hard that it was next to impossible to see more than 10ft out.
The party took the opportunity to had a quick lunch and discussed what they were looking forward to White Gryphon. When the rain cleared the team took up their packs and resumed their journey. Water dripped from leaves as they walked and the sounds of wildlife moving through the jungle echoed around them.
An hour or so after the break, Jilken called the party to a halt when she noted the sounds of something moving through the trees above them. As Jilken peered up into the trees, she used the party radio to ask, "Denye, can you send Helenwye up to take a look, I thought I saw a couple of flashes of orange fur in the trees just to left of us."
The wizard was more than happy to send the pseudodragon up to investigate. Switching her vison to the familiars, Denye let out a shocked chirp before reporting, "There are some sort of ape with long tentacle like limbs and bright orange fur. They definitely look like they are tracking us and I can see three of them clustered near where you pointed."
Before the party could do more than put hands on weapons, one of the primates burst from the trees and flung a couple of tentacles slamming into Ell. He was able to dodge the first blow, but the second came up from behind, slamming into the young man and wrapping around him. Tear let out a shout and fired off a blast from his force pistol, hitting the creature in the face.
Jilken's crossbow was in her hands in a flash and she fired off one bolt before dropping it and bringing up the light crossbow to send a second shot into the monster. As she did so, a second of the creatures dropped out of a tree behind the party before attacking Denye and Ranunkel. The wizard managed to jump and keep herself aloft for a moment or two so the tentacle swept under her feet. Ranunkel wasn't quite so lucky and got himself caught up.
Ell managed to wriggle out of the grapple and pushing a hand toward the beast, shoved it back with telekinetic force and knocking it out of the tree. The shrieks and grunts of the pair had drawn others and two more dropped out of the trees. One lunged at Denye, catching her left forewing in dirty, stained ivory teeth. The other lashed out at Janora, catching her it a pair of limbs. It didn't last long as the witch exploded into a murder of raven and reappeared further away, hissing curses.
Denye took a quick look at her wing, but nodding in resolve, lifted both claws and called up a bead of flame. Over the link, she called, "Nobody move and close your eyes," before lobbing the bead into the center of the fight. As the Fireball exploded, shields of golden light formed around Tear, Ranunkel, Ell and Denye herself while the four grapplers howled in pain as the fires burned fur away. As the inferno cleared, a few small fires could be seen among the nearby brush, but everything seemed too wet to really catch.
Janora growled and plunged one hand into the ground, casting Pillars of the Earth. Five 30ft pillars of stone burst out of the ground in response, each under one of the visible grapplers. Two managed to jump out of the way, two got thrown into the air, and the last got caught under the chin and knocked out. Ranunkel growled and Wildshaped into Rocknunkel to break the grip of the grappler and then turned and tried to slam a both fists into the beast. It had leapt up onto the pillar and it swung up and out of the way, causing both blows to slam into the pillar itself. The grappler trumpeted a challenge as the pillar cracked and began to wobble. 
Tear fired off another shot with his pistol, knocking one of the grapplers off a pillar, but the creature threw out one of it's large limbs and caught the edge. The arboreal grappler howled in either defiance or pain and Tear responded in kind, howling curses in Goblin before ducking under a large leafed plant. 
Jilken, looked up at the nearer hanging grappler and muttered, "I wonder what you'll taste like," as she popped open her lightning spear. The first blow caught the beast in the flank, but it threw itself flat to avoid the second strike. In response, it lashed out with it's "feet." Jilken parried it with her staff easily, but Rocknunkle just took the blow and laughed it tried to wrap itself around one stony arm.
"This is getting us nowhere," mutter Ell, circling the fight to line up the opponents properly. Lifting his hands, he cast Fear, catching four of the grapplers. One of them seemed to resist the spell, but entire demeanor of the other three changed completely. Glancing up at the fifth, still atop the stone pillar, Ell used another Telekinetic Shove to push it off. This one wasn't fast enough to catch itself and it slammed into the ground with a grunt.
The terrified grapplers began running, but the one that had gotten knocked down pushed itself up and hit Ell with two tenacles. The young man saw the first and threw himself backwards to avoid it, but the second caught him by the leg. As it liffed Ell up, a wave of ice-blue fire washed down the limb and over the grapple's body as the young man cast Hellish Rebuke. A moment later, Ell fell to the ground as the beast when limp. He lost his breath, but managed to maintain concentration on the Fear Spell. 
That proved to be the breaking point as the last two grapplers, seeing their brethren flee, began to look uncertain. Rocknunckle howled and beat his chest, taking a step towards them in intimidation. It worked and they leapt up into the trees and vanished. As the sound of the creatures moving further away, the party relaxed and took stock of the situation.
Jilken moved over to one of the creatures and pulled out a knife to begin butchering it. As she was trying to decide how to hang it, Denye came over, pulling out her notebook and said, "Before you start cutting this beast up, I would really love to get some anatomical drawings. I really have no idea how those limbs work, I've never seen such creatures in Ellebore before."
The Aiel elf smilled and nodded, "I don't mind doing a little wet work. I think I'm going to start by skinning it, maybe this orange fur would be valuable." The fur was odd, thick and matted, but surprisingly soft once a patch was cleaned with a bit of Prestidigitation. It also didn't cover the tentacles, ending at what was probably shoulder and hip. The limbs themselves were a sort of rubbery skin covered in a thin layer of short bristles. When Jilken cut one open, there was a central stack of bone plates and joints that allowed free range of movement.
It was a good hour or more of work for the pair, so the others settled in for tea, which Tear started brewing as soon as Jilken had begun. Hit with a sudden inspiration, Janora approached the other corpse. Staring intently for a moment, she began to mutter cast Animate Beast. Her eyes went black and the sounds of crow caws and fluttering wings filled the small small clearing as she lifted one hand and in a voice that echoed, commanded, "Rise and serve me!"  The magic flowed out of the spell and over the dead grappler, but found no purchase on the creature. Squinting her eyes, she kicked the body with one boot as she realized it was an aberration, something created by magic. 
Annoyed, the witch found a spot to settle and began meditating, feeling down into the roots and the system that made up this strange forest. By the time Jilken was wiping down her blade, Janora had found the place where the trees stops and announced, "I think we've seen enough of the local fauna, and if Denye's map is right, we've got another few days of this. I'm familiar enough with the jungle know for my travel spell will work."
That seemed like a great idea to the others so Janora quickly began inscribing the circle around the party to invoke All Forest are One. As the spell reached out to connect with the terminus there was a slight tug at the far end and for a moment, Janora thought she heard a raven caw. It didn't seem to effect the spell and the witch put it out of her mind as she led the party along the game trail they had been following, the magic forming a tunnel around them.
It was only a short walk, 30-40 minutes, and several more times Janora though she heard cawing, but it was only every a single or double cry and none of the others heard anything. Eventually however the spell let them out on the edge of a small swampy area. The edge of the forest was visible to the north about half a mile beyond. It was also clear why this area was so swampy, the land at the far side rose up a fairly steep hill.
"Where are we?" asked Ranunkel
"I'm not sure," replied Janora looking around slowly, "the spell is supposed to take me to the edge of the forest. It brought us close." The witch gestured up the hill, "You can see the treeline and the sun breaking in, but why didn't it take us there?"
"Maybe it's because of the hill," suggested Ell, "if this were the shortest path, but the spell couldn't do the ascent so it got us as close as possible. I see a couple of bridges, we should be able to get there in another 10-15 minutes."
As the team neared the first bridge, Denye pointed to one of the nearer islands, "That looks like ruins of some kind. I wonder if someone built out here before or after this all became a swamp." Lifting the small tree lizard off her neck, she sent Helenwye to take a closer look. Looking through her familiar's eyes, she reported, "I think this was a woodcutter's house...there are several large piles of logs in various states of decomposition." 
"Nobody walk on the bridge yet," said Janora, "I'm going to call up my Husky to scout for us and make sure there are no traps." Pulling out her ritual book she began casting her spell.
"So was this a town that got flooded?" asked Ell.
"I don't think so," replied Jilken, "Other than this island and that one over there, I don't see any other ruins. I'm also fairly sure that this area has been swamp for quite some time, this looks to be the low point in the area. But that begs the question, why build in the swamp in the first place?"
"Possibly some sort of defense?" offered Ranunkel. "It seems like it would be harder to bring wagons full of wood across."
"Maybe," allowed Ell, "but then why build such a sturdy bridge here?"
"This side leads deeper into the jungle," said Denye coming back to herself, " and probably the one most used with wagons full of large logs. There are two more bridges to get to the far side of the swamp, neither are in as good of shape as this one, but they look passable."
Janora's ritual finished at that exact moment, and the Husky leapt from the summoning circle to lick the witch's face. Once he had settled a bit, she sent him across the bridge and over to the ruins. When nothing happened, the party followed cautiously. Ranunkel was most excited to get closer and take a look at the rocks. From his examination, he learned three things. The first was that this structure was less than a hundred years old and the stone hand-quarried. The second was that the destruction was at least 40-50 years ago to judge by the ground cover that grew over tumbled stone. The third was most surprising, the damage was caused by some sort of battering ram or something punching holes in the stone until it collapsed. Circling around the house, Jilken found a pair of axes, both covered in rust but little else of any value appeared to be left. 
Janora spotted some cattails in the nearby shallows that made an excellent sleeping aid, but something told her not to get into the water. The swamp made the witch feel uneasy for some reason, so feeling the need to move on, she sent the dog to the cross the second bridge. The steed got about halfway across before a number of haunts began pushing themselves up and out of the muddy bottom. Clearly undead, these putrid haunts were a mixture of exposed greyish bone and bloated, rotting flesh with nasty looking black and yellow leeches hanging on a few of the corpses. 
Ranunkel yelped in surprise at the rising monsters, pointing his staff he sent a bolt of lightning arcing through three of them. All three zombies stumbled as the electricity ripped through them, melting flesh and blackening bone. Backing away cautiously, the stone druid Wildshaped into his stone elemental form. 
Two of haunts lumbered up to Janora. One tried to slam it's fist into her chest, but the witch knocked it aside with her cudgel. The other simply spit up a half dozen leeches that latched onto Janora.  Tear of Midnight Sorrow ran past, firing two shots at a pair of the haunts. The first one crumbled and fell with a splash but the other continued to lumber forward. The witch looked down at the leeches in disgust and pulled a couple off before pulling out the Mover and rang it, casting Expeditious Retreat on herself and Denye. 
Jilken was a whirlwind with her crossbow, firing off four shots in rapid succession and dropping two more of the haunts. Several more converged on the Aiel as another pair flanked Ell. Both got more of the leeches spit at them and took several slam attacks as well. The young man tried to use a Telekinetic Shove to push one of the monsters away, but the damn thing refused to move. Annoyed, the warlock fired off a trio of Eldritch Blasts toward the ones surrounding Jilken. The first shot went wide, but the second two hit severally weakening the haunt.
Another of the haunts managed to make it to Denye and spit up even more leaches. As they hit the wizard, she let out a squawk of alarm and dashed away, the monster managing to land a slamming fist in the middle of her back. Finding a better position she held both claws out in front of herself as she began casting Sunbeam. A moment later her eyes became incandescent suns and a beam of the same bright light tore through three of the haunts, blinding them and burning away skin.
Rocknunkle lumbered up behind one of the haunts harassing Ell and took two swings at the corpse. The undead creature managed to dodge the first blow, only to run face first into the stone druid's other fist. The sound of snapping bone filled the area for a moment as Rocknunkle crushed the haunt into the dirt. Tear cheered from where he was hiding behind the elemental's thick leg. Scanning the battlefield he fired off another pair of blasts at one the haunts hit by the sunlight, the second blow crushed the zombie's skull. 
Wanting a bit of a height advantage, the small goblin dashed over and jumped onto the Husky's back. A moment later Janora did the same before lifting the Mover once more. Ringing it in a solemn pattern she used to cast Compulsion on most of the surviving haunts commanding them to run."
Ell screamed as one of the haunts vomited up even more of the leeches and another five attached themselves to the young man. Another of the creatures tried the same trick with Rocknunkle and he was quite surprised to see the zombie leeches latch on to his stony form. Two more of the monster tried to slam their fists into Jilken but the Aiel batted them away contemptuously with her spear. Ell fired two Eldritch Blasts from point-black range into the face the haunt that had just spit up on him and the monster's chest exploded. A third blast downed another of the creatures as well. With no more obvious threats, Ell ducked around the corner of the ruined building and put his back against the wall.
Denye, still concentrating on her spell, swung around an unleashed another Sumbeam that tore through four of the unblinded haunts, including one that was trying to run away. The zombie fell into the water with a splash as the other three screamed and began to stumble around.
Rocknunkle looked down at the two haunts harrying him. One of them looked barely able to hold it together while the other looked fairly lively. With two swift blows, the stone druid crushed the healthy one into the dirt and turned to growl menacingly at the other. It tried to run and Rocknunkle hit it from behind and sent it flying out over the swampy water and landing with a huge splash.
From atop her steed, Janora put the bell away before pointing her cudgel and casting Chill Touch, creating a spectral paw that flattened another of the haunts. Jilken meanwhile looked at the pair before her with a grin. In series of flashing blows, she broke the neck of the first and as it dropped she spun around and stabbed the second in the chest with the point of the spear. As it howled and jerked, she whipped the spear shaft around and slammed it into the foe's temple with an audible crack. As it fell to the ground unmoving, Jilken took a quick assessment of the battlefield. 
The remaining haunts clustered around Ranunkel and several of the blows got through, sending rock chips flying. Seeing that they were lined up perfectly, Denye sent another Sunbeam flashing through the pair and they vaporized into dust. That was the last of the haunts and the party all spent a few quick moments pulling off the leeches and throwing them into a pile...which Ell cheerfully set ablaze.
Not wanting to stay here longer than necessary, Janora cast Mass Cure Wounds on everyone and then quickly led the way out of the swamp. It took a bit longer than Ell had originally estimated, but within the hour the party found themselves coming out of the treeline and cresting the hill found a number of farm fields and pastures filled with large, flightless birds. In the distance a handful of structures were visible and assuming that it was a village the party began making their way towards the building.

Report Date

24 Apr 2023