GM Blood's Age of Worms in Golarion #2

Game Master David James Olsen

"Although I think his information is not worth the benefit of taking one necromancer out of circulation with a single stroke, I would allow him to live if the group thinks it is the best move. I would require that Filge agree that if we ever catch him performing the dark arts, his life is forfeit."

Justin speaks to the others quietly, "This is such a bad man, taking him out now probably is the best move. I would hate to feel responsible for any acts he commits after today. We can find information from other sources. I value your opinions--can his information be worth that much?"

Kilthan nods as Aarkess helps him to his feet, feeling the healing energies flowing through him. "This is getting to be far too much of a habit," he mutters as he stands.

Kilthan glares at the necromancer, cleaning the gore from his axe as he does so, keeping his eyes on him while answering Justin's question, "We won't know until we hear it. But if it isn't, then we can let him rot in jail. Seems fair to me."

Rohara answers the lizardman in a hushed tone, "Sometimes letting a lesser evil go to gain something on a greater evil is worth the acrafice. At some point later, when we have the time and you wish to track this one down, it should not be too difficult."

If Justin does agree she turns to Filge, "I suggest you start, it has been a long evening already. Let us start with the danger to the town and work from there. And leave nothing out there are enough of us about to know if you are lying or not."

"You don't understand, he wants my word regardless of what information he has."

Knowledge(arcana): 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (10) + 8 = 18

Justin, you can give him your word, but I want his spellbook. And I want the item he uses for his spells destroyed. We will give him his life, but nothing else. If he is going to start this horrible evil magic again, he will have to do it from the ground up.

"But that is not the agreement I made... " Rohara says to Justin. "It is called changing the terms of the deal, before you make it. His Information pans out as being worth it, he may leave. If not than he does not get to go. If he is so certain it has worth, than there is nothing to worry about. If he wishes to lie, than he faces unpleasantness."

"You make the agreement you want, not the one they want." She says looking back at Filge.

Having somewhat lost interest in Filge, Dryn will begin going through some of the equipment he had set up, looking at notes in particular.

Wasn't sure what to roll, so rolled Perception. Hey, maybe I'll get lucky!

perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (15) + 5 = 20

Justin collects himself and approaches Filge.
"You right now have your life, but that can change."

Casually swinging his sword in a two-handed grip. "If you provide information that is more valuable than your life in the estimation of Lady Rohara, you will allowed to leave with only your life and the understanding that if you are found practicing evil magic again, your life is forfeit."

Large update in the morning

Part one before bed.

Filge begins to speak, "My buddy Balabar called me up here from Magnimar for a bit of study of some weirdness in town. He and I were friends back some 20 years ago in Magnimar. I laugh now to think of how far he's come. How respectful people are. Ha! If only they knew!"

"Anyways he got himself brought down to a hidden part of Dourstone Mine about a month ago. He set up some provisioning deal with the dwarf that runs the place. But he said the mine was crawling with beasts in hooded robes. He said their wild cries made his stomach heave. The cultists, they called themselves the Ebon Triad, said something about the Age of Worms, about strange undead in the hills and swamp to the south. Smenk knew he was over his head, and needed help so he called me! When he said that he was scared, I knew it was something serious and I came right away."

Knowledge (religion) Check about the Ebon Triad

Knowledge (religion) regarding the Ebon Triad 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (3) + 7 = 10

Knowledge(religion): 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (1) + 5 = 6

Woohoo, I know nothing.

After being asked what the Ebon Triad is

"Smenk says they are a cult that follows Urgathoa, Zon-Kuthon, and Lamashtu. If true, that place would be crawling with delicious secrets, I'd love to see it. That's where Balabar nicked that worm in that jar there. That thing is very rare, dead now of course. But once, that worm wriggled with hundreds of others like it in the abscesses and orifices of a powerful undead creature called the spawn of Kyuss. Those are probably the 'unkillable' zombies the cultists mentioned to Smenk. If one of those worms get inside you, you'll be one of them in a day."

"Draw us a map to this hidden part of the Dourstone Mine if you can. I think we may need to find our way there again. So this dwarf that he partnered with that was in with these cultists, where can we find him?"

Justin turns to Rohara,
"Do you think he deserves his freedom?"

"You misunderstand, I have never been there. If you want to find the hidden part of the mine then you would have to talk to Balabar. As to where the owner of the mine is, I imagine he would be in town somewhere, I don't know haven't really been there other than passing through to get here at the observatory."

"Is there anything else you need to share?" Rohara asks. She waves her hands about the observatory, "What was all this about? A statue of yourself as well?"

Sense Motive 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (9) + 8 = 17

And why did you create that morbid scene downstairs with the zombies acting out a supper?

About the dinner party

"They were my friends and dining partners. Everyone needs friends to dine with."

About the statue

"That statue is who I am. And I am proud to have a monument like that to remind me."

The guy isn't clearly all with it.

"The only other thing I have to say is if you are planning to go down into that mine and face that cult you'd better be prepared as whatever Smenk say down there scared him and he is one tough nut to crack."

Kilthan shudders and asks, "Did you know them before they died, or was this as sick as it sounds?"

she thinks to herself
"this guy is nuts, and has an ego."

Justin shakes his head sadly, "Your information is valuable. Do you have anything further to add about these worms?"

Later Justin adds, "Do you want us to take you to someone to help you? I am sure I could convince a temple in town to look after you for a while until you get back on your feet. With necromancy now closed to you, you may want to look for another hobby. You would definitely do better to find something worthwhile to occupy your time. If I catch you doing this dark magic again, you will not get off so easy."

Filge replies, "I do not need any help, and you will not catch me doing this again. Am I allowed to take with me some extra clothes or am I leaving with just what I have on?"

"Didn't they say your life and nothing else? Dignity's something else" Dryn stifles a laugh at the joke she was thinking, believing it not to be an opportune moment for it while continuing to peruse his materials.

Don't suppose I've gotten anything from the notes by chance before he leaves?

"Filge, I am sure you meant you will not be doing this again, not that I won't catch you doing it again. I think if you pick an activity with more human contact, like maybe acting, you will find it is better than making artificial friends that are not really friends."

Justin grabs Filge and looks him in the eye, "Best of luck, you can really do better than this. Human society is mostly good and healthy, do not sell it short. You can take extra clothes after we make sure they are non-magical and some provisions if you have them."

We should get his spellbook which I think you can use for formulas and I might be able to use for spells to my familiar.

Alchemist's can learn from Wizard's spellbooks (but not vice versa for some odd reason). Witch's (well, their familiars) can't learn from spellbooks , but can learn from scrolls (which doesn't make that much sense to me, they should be able to learn from books if they can learn from scrolls).

I think we agree he leaves with nonmagical clothes and food. Hopefully I can try to save a second time and shake the known disease in my system soon :-)

I'll allow a witch to learn from a spellbook as long as they have scribe scroll

Dryn'taka His notes are pretty scatterbrained and lack coherent though most of the time. You get how the syringe works with the tubes and could make more if you have the right components. It uses some aspects of necromancy to make and costs the same as a potion with a brew potion feat, just non magical

Nothing about the spawn or anything like that though?

These worms have a hard time penetrating tough skin (in other words those that have natural armor bonus +5 or more). Also the touch of silver kills them outright. They can only live 1 round outside of a host. It will reach the brain in less than a minute once inside the body and can be removed by a skilled healer (Heal check DC 20) Once inside only a remove curse, remove disease can kill them and a dispel evil or neutralize poison will slow the path to the brain to upwards of an hour. If the creature dies from the worm then it will return as a spawn of Kyuss or a normal zombie is the creature is too big (Huge or bigger)

I do not have the Scribe Scroll feat, might have to take that one. Generally, the familiar learns by burning/sacrificing the scroll. I figured I could rip out pages and use them like scrolls. But if it requires scribing a scroll from the book, that is fine. I will just have to get scribe scroll. Will have to think about it though as there are so many other hexes I need to get - Fortune, Misfortune & Cackle come to mind.

Let's keep the ooc talk in the discussion thread, please.

Allow the use of scribe scroll is a houserule, like Dryn said there isn't a way other than scrolls or other witches.

After sending Filge on his way..."Well, this was definitely an exciting night. I think we earned a well-deserved rest. Shall we search the rest of this observatory, see if there is any more magical items, and return to the inn?"

"It would be good to check the place before we leave."

I search the whole area scanning and using Detect Magic for anything that may be there. Also, I want his spellbook(s) and bonded item before he is allowed to leave. Let me know if I need more checks. I am looking for hidden doors, concealed chests and hiding places, pretty much anything that might be of value or use to us.

Perception: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (19) + 9 = 28

Perception: 1d20 + 13 ⇒ (10) + 13 = 23

with detect magic, and detect secret doors on.

Justin searches in a more direct manner. He picks up the greatclub he saw one of the zombies used and aggressively checks for hidden rooms by banging on walls, hidden drawers (by busting up things), and hidden spaces in closets.

Kilthan joins in the search, though with his more mundane non-magical senses.

Perception: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (4) + 8 = 12

Filge leaves with just the clothes on his back and some food that you gave him. You then start a thorough search of the observatory, and here is what you find after a few hours:

Heading back down to the bedroom in the room below you go through the closet and Filge's clothes and come up with 13gp scattered around in various pockets.

The mummified monkey is wearing a small noble's outfit and the blackened spectacle it is wearing you think could fetch about 75 gp (they are tinted so they block bright light giving anyone wearing it +2 to saves vs daze or similar effects) The silver tray it is holding is worth 50 gp and the head on it has 1 pp on its tongue. When you remove the platinum piece a large sound comes out of it's mouth via a magic mouth spell "INTRUDER INTRUDER INTRUDER" That goes on for a couple minutes making you realize it was a good thing you didn't grab that before heading upstairs.

There is also a Lammasu rug here worth 200gp

(You already took the spellbook, scroll and syringe and injections)

Finally on the first level you find 8 copper candle sticks each worth 5gp, and in the bedrooms as you first walked in there was a bag hidden behind on of the dressers containing 6pp and 5gp

Also the "butler" skeleton Filge had is the fourth body you were looking for. (It has the tell tale signs of disease the others had as well)

"I think we should keep some of these for the home, Allustan gave us."

Did you give us a list of spells from the spellbook? I didn't see one, but I looked quickly.

I do not have Read Magic memorized, so someone else will have to cast it, or we will have to wait until tomorrow when I can memorize it.

Sorry I totally forgot about that! If no read magic today then you will know what is in it tomorrow (but I have no problem letting you know know)

So you now have all of the Land family bodies and they can be buried fulfilling your deal with Alastor. It is mid to late afternoon, will you be burying them today or waiting until tomorrow? Is everyone OK with advancing to tomorrow?

"How about we bury these bodies at first light after bringing our treasures back to our house? I do agree the rug will look nice in a large room of our house. We probably need to set a watch now that we have enemies in town."

I am good with moving ahead. Justin takes a middle watch.

"I would suggest, until the small stead is fixed up, we ask Allustan if we might keep anything we are keeping, there. That home needs a great deal of work yet and as we will not be there most of the time, until it is complete and secured, it would be best not to keep valuables about." Rohaya suggests.

I am good to move on whenever you wish to do so.

Fine with moving ahead.

If we have time, I say we should rebury the bodies today. No reason to let them rot any more. Other than that, I am ready to move on.

I will use healing hex on anyone hurt. I already used it on Kilthan and Justin and myself today.

Justin replies, "Now that I have most of my strength back, let's not let a minute of repose be denied to these poor souls." Justin prepares to help carry the bodies.

You don't encounter any issues with burying the bodies. You have a real sense that you did good after completing the reburying.

Morning comes and you fell refresh and healed up.

Justin make the second Fort save vs the disease.