The group walks up to the fort. The wind, sand, and storms have scoured away anything organic, such as wood or rope, leaving behind a sandblasted set of interconnected walls that now form a sort of ruined maze. In the center you can see the remains of a partially collapsed tower poking up above the walls, its sides riddled with arm-thick strands of ivy. The western side of the building has piles of sand blown by the wind coming off the lake, some nearly 30 feet tall. Not too far inside the building you find the remnants of a fire pit as well as what appears to be two graves ringed with stones near one wall.
Further inland of the fort, the sand and gravel starts to turn to green vegetation. The land is mostly flat with the occasional tree tree dotting the landscape.
Marzela examines the building. Are these just surface ruins, or is there a way into a lower level? Also, are the graves marked in some way as far as indicating who died here?
<--+2 invisible/incorporeal, +4 hidden/concealed
Jaed, who has been awkwardly silent as the group approached the island, tries to figure out how long ago the fire went out
before inspecting the graves.
"Should we dig up these two and check if they are cultists? It may be good to know if they are already here and how did they die."
The graves do not appear trapped nor are there any indications of who might be buried there.
Based on the lack of scattering of the ashes, Jaed estimates that the fire pit is no more than 3 days old.
Wow, this looks like a large building. I think we should search it thoroughly, and use it as a base until we find something better. What do you guys think?
In response to Jaed's question: I don't think that's necessary. Those two aren't a threat, unless they've turned undead or something. The fact that they died here though means that there might be something in these ruins that is dangerous. We should probably find out what.
Marzela spends some time thoroughly searching the room. There are a variety of rock pile debris here and there, all of which seem to be from chunks that fell out of the ceiling, though the ceiling itself still looks fairly solid. The floor is mostly stone, though between fallen debris and some vegetation sneaking in, there are numerous open spaces where the dirt below can be seen. In one corner a small trash pile where a few flies gather. On the walls are empty torch scones and a few places that look like they used to have tapestries hanging from them. There are 3 exits other than the main entrance you already walked through, one in each main direction. You do not find any ways down to a lower level here nor any secret doors.
While Marzela searches the rooms Finnrick looks for his newly purchased knuckle bones. "Now here is a trick that Olmira taught me long ago but I never had a set of bones of my own until now, " Finnrick crouches down and casts out the knuckle bones and inspects them for a time.
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Jaed advances towards
the exit straight ahead.
He carefully examines the path, watching for traps.
Marzela accompanies Jaed, searching as they go.
<--+2 invisible/incorporeal, +4 hidden/concealed
Walking through the door to the right/East you find a relatively long room with the length heading further into the fort. Scattered across different areas on the floor seem to be a mix of old, rusted, broken metal ranging in size from the size of a hand up to half the size of someone's torso. A closer inspection reveals that these were likely once weapons, though they're all completely useless by now. Any wood or leather once attached to them has long since rotted away.
There continues another exit to the east as well as one on the back wall to the north. Once again, no traps, secret doors, or stairs down are found.
Marzela pulls up detect magic just in case something in the scattered metal isn't useless. If there is nothing, she'll continue through the east exit.
(+2 vs being surprised or things that are invisible, and +4 vs things that are disguised or hidden)
Lily follows close to Marzela, bow in hand. "It's a little eerie, this place being here and being deserted," she whispers.
Yeah, it is sort of creepy, isn't it? Especially seeing those two graves out there.
Jaed scouts a few feet ahead Lily and Marzela, looking out for traps, as he always does.
Spooky, yeah, he thinks trying to hide his unease.
Lily whispers to Marzela, "Raises the question, who buried them? And where did that person go?"
Spending a few seconds to concentrate, Marzela discovers the only magical things in the room seem to be her companions' gear. Moving on to the next room, the group finds it almost identical to the previous one. The main except seems to be that the broken, rusted metal fragments are overall much larger and appear to be from old armor rather than weapons.
Once again there's an exit to the east and north with no traps, secret doors, or stairs down discovered.
After being unable to find any obvious tracks away from the fire, the group spends another 45 minutes searching the ruins, stopping to carefully search for traps, secret doors, or magical auras. They make their way through the empty halls, the only sound being the shuffling of their feet and the concessional gust of wind through the halls. Many of the rooms look eerily similar to each other, the complete lack of furniture often making it impossible to discern the what function it once served.
There's the occasional fireplace in a few rooms and the center of the fort seems to have a large, open-air courtyard. The group sees a few sets of stairs leading to upper floors as well as a couple of places where stairs used to be before they collapsed. However, you don't find any stairs down until you reach the back of the fort where there seems to be a kitchen overlooking another open area. A quick look in the lower level seems reveals a large, open area, one area of which seems to have broken glass from what used to be tinted bottles of some sort. Near that is an area with a fair amount of moss and a few mushrooms. Finding no way down further or secret doors, the group heads back up to the kitchen area.
(plus other things if applicable, as below)
+Perception +13 |+3 Wis +5 ranks +3 cs +2 racial
Perception +15 |+2 trait to avoid being surprised and to detect invisible or incorporeal creatures (Spirit Sense)
Perception +17 |+4 sacred to see through a disguise or find something that is hidden or concealed (Guided Eyes)
Uh, guys... looks like we have some wolves, or something similar, watching us. Heads up.
"We have about three hours until it will start raining. This storm however seems like it could strike any time." Finnrick says as the finish scouting the ruins. "I saw it too," he adds "perhaps it's friendly" Finnrick moves cautiously towards where he last saw the gleaming eyes.
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On *this* island? That seems unlikely, but I hope you're right.
Carrakas casts his eyes about, suddenly looking nervous. "I don't like wolves - they used to make us fight wolves, without giving us any armor. They couldn't take away my thick skin, luckily for me, or give me a subpar weapon, but I lost a lot of friends that way." He shudders visibly. He looks around with a slight frown. "I don't know what it is about this place, but it seems to dredge up bad memories more easily than normal..."
"I am sorry to hear that" Finnrick says with a frown to Carrakas. "I can only imagine how horrible it was for you, and you are probably right" he adds turning to Marzella. "this island does seem dangerous. "
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"I doubt there is anything friendly in this island," Jaed says as he squishes the hilts of his swords. "Doggy... come here... let's play fetch."
"Well, we should deal with it quickly and fortify an indoor or underground area, so we're not at risk of getting hit by awful nega-lightning out in the open," Lily suggests (probably redundantly).
Moving into the neighboring room allows the group to get a better look at their stalkers. They do indeed seem to be slightly larger than normal wolves, though some of their forms seem twisted. There are four of them that you see, all with pitch black fur. One seems to have humps on its back that are slowly oozing a clear pus. Another seems to be drooling some kind of black ichor while a third seems to have a third pair of small, useless legs in between where its normal ones are. As soon as the group approaches, they all take off running away.
Hmm. So, three hours before the storm hits, eh? Should we scout inland for an hour or so, and then return here if we don't find any other shelter?
"I hope all the creatures in this island are as easily fightened as these... wolves. Anyways, it doesn't look like there is anything interesting in this fort, so let's go for a walk."
Jaed tries once again to find tracks left by the cultist and once again fails to find anything. Clearly, they're doing a fantastic job covering there tracks. Perhaps they anticipated this?
Let's just continue inland.
"Yes I do agree. Inland, while the weather is, well, at least not raining."
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The armored tiefling shrugs and follows along with the group.
The group heads inland to the north-east for about an hour. The land is mostly flat glassland with the occasional tree sprouting up. Every once in a while the sky is ripped apart by a negative energy lightning bolt from the storm above. One happens to strike a couple of hundred feet away, splitting one of the few trees in half. The terrain seems to continue like this for as far as the group can see.
Four wolves behind us says Marzela. And we've seen that the lightning can strike even without rain. I'm wondering if we shouldn't just press on... quickly. If we hole up in the fort, we could be there for days trying to avoid these storms, with no guarantee that they won't just get worse, and we're going to need as much time as possible to deal with the cultists. What do you guys think?
Carrakas nods. "Agreed - speed is important"
"Then by all means, let's keep moving," says Lily. She spares a glance back over her shoulder for the wolves.
"The sooner we find the cultists, the sooner we can leave this island. We just have to be careful to find cover before it starts raining. We should keep an eye for caves or any other places where we can find shelter," Jaed makes a small pause and takes a look back. "And, of course we should also watch our new friends. They seem to be waiting for an opportunity to attack us."
The group continues onward for another hour. After the first 30 minutes of more of the same empty grasslands, you start to see a white blip on the horizon. As you continue forward, the blip grows in size, creating a long, low white area that takes up much of the horizon. Towards the end of the hour long journey, the more keen-eyed of the group are able to make out that it appears to be a forest. It took a while to identify because there was no telltale green and brown. The entire thing appears to be bleached white. At times it's almost painful to look at in its starkness.
Those keeping a look out behind continue to see the darting figures of the wolves following along several hundred feet behind.
Maybe we should speed up a little.
Carrakas grunts in agreement and picks up the pace as much as he can.
Lily hikes up her skirts and moves quickly with the team. "I agree," she says, slightly out of breath, "We have to get under cover as soon as we can!"
As swiftly as his half elf legs will carry him Finnrick runs with the group and resists the urge to wildshape into something faster just yet. Millsy runs at Finnrick's heels seeming not to be exerting as much energy.
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"I'll race you the forest!" Jaed says before he starts running.
Picking up their speed the group reaches the edge of the forest in 30 minutes. Its border stretches along as far as the group can see east and to the west it looks like it stops shortly before reaching the cliffs of the coastline. The grass in the several hundred feet leading up to the edge of the forest starts off its regular green but slowly fades to white. In fact, none of the typical greens and browns can be seen anywhere in the area. Trees, bushes, vines, leaves, grass-- all look as though the color has been completely drained from them. Other than that, they appear to be perfectly ordinary trees reaching up to 30 or 40 feet tall.
Marzela looks around to see if there is any sign of the Cultists coming this way.
Those trees seem kind of creepy. It does look a little more sheltered in there though. Also might be easier for the wolves to sneak up on us.
If there is no sign of the cultists, and no one has objections, Marzela heads into the creepy forest, in the same direction they have been going (North-east, right?). She'll mark the trees with her scimitar as they go so they don't get turned around and keep going the same direction.
"Creepy indeed. Let me take a quick look around. Those cultists may have taken the same path than us from the fort and it should be easier to find their tracks in the forest."
"That's... very odd," says Lily. "Like all the life was leached out of them. Negative energy field? Or some kind of plant feeding on everything in here? Or a ghost?"
You do not find any signs that people have been in this area recently.
Finnrick takes a look at the grassland and finds it very strange. "Very strange indeed," He states "I agree Lily I get an eerie feeling about this place" He Looks around and says [b]"Let us get inside those trees it should be raining soon, and besides I feel overly exposed out here"
[ooc]Is it around 12:30? I know I keep asking about the time but I need to keep track for wildshape purposes