The peasants continue streaming out the door, albeit slower without Steef's direction.
It is a good thing they do, because the fire expands again. Steef, within range of the expansion, is just able to shield the woman he saved from the fire's encroachment, at the cost of being set ablaze himself.
Steef's clothing catches fire, and begins burning him.
The woman left in the fire lets out a bloodcurdling shriek as the fire consumes her unnaturally quickly. She is left a burning husk, whimpering as everything recognizable about her is swept away, then going silent completely, consumed by the flames.
Two more peasants are caught by the enlarging fire, being dropped to the ground screaming in fear and pain as the flames begin to bite them as well.
Unfortunately, neither Steef nor Azrin will be able to help them. The smoke flows into their lungs, almost as though it had a mind of its own, and begins choking them.
Steef shrieks in pain as his clothes ignite. "'SNOT MY TIME YET, ASMO! NOT YET!" He gets out of the way of the fire and heads towards the door, trying desperately to not look back at the woman he's abandoning.
Azrin stumbles out of the building.
More of the peasants stumble out. Almost all have escaped besides the council members. One of the councilwomen scoops up one of the newly engulfed women, hissing with pain but pulling her to safety regardless.
Sheriff Caeller likewise grabs a nearby man and finally retreats through the door, carrying him to safety. He stands poised to go back in after any others.
The fires grow again, the Town Hall now completely engulfed save for a narrow strip in the middle of the hall, where the council members still reside. You hear another bloodcurdling shriek as the woman Steef tried to save meets the same fate as the first.
A few moments later, you hear a chattering of teeth. Two skulls, ablaze but unharmed, burst out of the windows and start harassing the villagers. They appear to be women's skulls.
Sheriff Caeller
Steef
Azrin
Ezekiel
Skulls
The Sheriff reacts with astounding speed, whipping one of the contraptions off his belt and pointing it at the nearest skull. It barks once, a round hole appearing in the middle of its forehead. It drops to the round, inert.
He whips around, lightning fast, and the contraption barks again, the second tube flashing this time, and the second skull drops as well.
Caeller twirls the thing, blowing the smoke from the barrel, and sticks it back on his belt.
The council members all stumble out of the building, one lady carrying one of the peasant women slung over her shoulder.
As the last council member escapes, the Town Hall burns to the ground behind them.
There is a moment of silence, and one of the peasant men speaks up.
"YOU." he cries, pointing at Ezekiel.
"YOU DID THIS!"
"Nope."
"Care to explain how you reached that conclusion?"
"Do not lie, hellspawn! This destruction has the hand of your kin written all over it! If it wasn't you directly, you still caused all this! My beloved Alicia, lost to your FOULNESS." he spits on the ground at your feet.
The rest of the town moves in on you, forming a mob. Others, who weren't attending the meeting but were drawn by the fire and screaming come to join as as well.
Not again...I hope when they start chasing us out, we can swing by Kendra's real fast so I can grab Moose.
Noticing that he's still ablaze, he slaps at his cloak, trying to put it out.
"Please, calm down! Ezekiel is not your enemy! He's been helping us to clear out Harrowstone!"
Sheriff Caeller thinks things over, thinking back to how Steef tried to save that woman and directed the crowd (the only reason many are alive now), and Azrin who selflessly ran in to fight the fire, if ineffectually.
"People, calm down. These men might be troublemakers, but they're not arsonists. I've been through my share of crises and I can say that without their help, even as little as some of it was...there might have been a good bit more tragedy tonight. A lot of you were too busy running to see, but that fire was spreading QUICK. A lot of you have scorched behinds you'll be feeling tomorrow, I'm sure. These men aren't responsible for this. Go back to your homes, calm down, and you'll see that for yourselves."
The crowd grumbles a bit at least, but the ringleader breaks down in tears and the anger seems to flow out of each after a short time. Quite a few look suitably chastised, and begin heading to their homes.
"Thank you, Sheriff. Now, if you'll excuse me..."
Steef flops down on the ground and starts rolling around, trying desperately to stop the fire and hoping that his robe wasn't burned too badly, as he hasn't been able to afford underpants in about half a century.
The council members come up to Azrin once everything has settled down.
Hearthmount sighs, but seems resigned to whatever he's going to say.
"We know you're poking around Harrowstone. Whether for your own curiosity or for our protection (though god knows why you'd do it for that, given how we've treated you), it's irrelevant now. This problem needs to be dealt with immediately, or there won't be a town left. We need you to focus your efforts, if you can. We're prepared to pay you a tidy sum of money if you succeed. It's all we had saved up for this emergency, and it's becoming ever clearer that you're the only group capable enough to end this nightmare."
"I can't speak for the rest of the town, and I doubt they feel the same way...but thank you. For trying, at least."
"Ok.
As if this night wasn't enough, not long after the crowd has drifted away and, and most have returned to their homes, a piercing scream cuts through the night. It appears to be coming from the direction of the monument.
Ezekiel runs there.
The scream cuts off abruptly before Ezekiel can get there.
When he finally does arrive, he sees someone holding a woman by the hair, bloody knife in the other hand.
The woman's eyes stare lifelessly, and blood flows slowly from a deep gash in her neck.
The figure has just finished painting a letter "E" on the monument.
It turns around to face Ezekiel, and it becomes clear that this is no man, but a shambling corpse, a rictus grin drawn across its face.
Though the head is smashed, Ezekiel recognizes the face of his old mentor, Professor Lorrimor.
"I told you you couldn't stop me." it intones, in the same voice Gibs Hephenus was speaking in when you caught him before.
"E... Ezekiel?"
His expression grim, Ezekiel begins stalking up to the man.
"No... V-E. I am not the best at the common language, but I know where this is going: vengeance."
Chuckling softly, Ezekiel says, "I do not know the common word for it, but in abyssal, you are a very cliche villain. And maybe I can't stop you, but I can still kill you."
As berserk rage begins to fill his veins, Ezekiel snarls in Abyssal. "And if you think using the body of a man I respected will stop me, you are sorely mistaken. I know full well that bodies are merely a vessel - terrifyingly fragile ones, at that."
With a thunderous roar, Ezekiel steps forward, snaps at the undead abomination and tearing flesh with his fangs before whirling back and bringing the hammer down.
Steef rounds the corner just in time to see Ezekiel smashing the undead Lorrimor. He readies his bow, preparing to shoot if he gets back up.
Seke git him.
He zombie laughs as it re-dies.
"Vengeance? You really are clueless."
Azrin catches up with Zeke just in time to watch the Professor's body fall limp as it taunts him.
"Hey, wait! What is it you want? Why are you doing this?!"
He kicks the ground in frustration as he realizes the presence controlling the corpse has already vanished.
He then gathers up the Professor's remains and, with at least one other person's help, takes him back to the Restlands to be returned to rest.
"We're putting an end to this starting tomorrow."
"If you say so."
Steef helps Azrin with the Professor's remains.
"Zeke, you alright?"
"I'm fine."
Azrin heads home to get some sleep, hoping that no other spooky incidents demand his attention.
Steef heads home to play with Moose.
Ezekiel heads home to get some sleep as well.
The night passes without incident.
"Right then boys, looks like we've got some work to do, eh?"
"Well guys, I think we should go check out the Restlands. As I recall from Lorrimor's journal, there is a secret cache of tools to help with hunting the undead there."
The group heads back to the graveyard. Two freshly covered graves lay near the entrance, reading "Cassiel Cojito" and "Showkichi He-Say" on crudely carved wooden headstones.
Due to you traipsing about in broad daylight, a bunch of villagers see you entering the graveyard unauthorized. They head off, presumably to tell the church of your presence.
But for now, you are unhindered in your investigation.
The crypt mentioned in Lorrimor's journal is located toward the northeast corner of the Restlands. It's a freestanding granite mausoleum, adorned with a pair of gargoyle statues which leer at you from either side of the door.
The rusted lock of the door has been melted off with some sort of acid and arranged to look as though it were intact. Best as you can deduce, it was Lorrimor himself that broke it.
Once inside the mausoleum, it becomes apparent that it has lain mostly undisturbed for several decades, only one set of footprints can be seen tracking through the thick layers of dust on the floor, leading up to a sarcophagus seated in the deepest part of the crypt, which contains the tools you have come to collect.
And what a collection of tools it is. Though it is obvious that much of what remained here has been taken, an impressive array of things still remains.
- 4 Sun Rods
- 6 flasks of Holy Water
- 10 +1 Arrows
- 5 +1 Ghost Touch arrows
- 2 +1 Undead Bane arrows
- 5 potions of Cure Light Wounds
- 2 potions of Lesser Restoration
- A scroll of Detect Undead
- 2 scrolls of Hide From Undead
- 1 scroll of Protection From Evil
Finally, the sarcophagus contains a thin darkwood case, adorned with a scarab and an eye, identical to the one on one of Professor Lorrimor's books (the Manual of the Order of the Palatine Eye). The case itself is valuable (worth 50 gp), but inside are a Spirit Planchette, with a board, and four vials filled with a smoky green vapor, constantly churning.
Azrin has no idea what the vials are.
Guys?
Ezekiel searches his brain for anything his shaman may have mentioned that might be useful in such a scenario.
"We should probably get out of here soon, by the way...I have a feeling those villagers that ran off weren't too happy with us being here."
Steef fumbles around with the vials for a bit and Azrin suddenly remembers hearing of such things.
He identifies them as Haunt Siphons, magical tools designed to destroy and entrap the energies of Haunts.
To capture a haunt’s energies within a haunt siphon, you need only twist the metal casing to open the vial in the same round that the haunt manifests (a standard action)—this can be before or after the haunt has acted. You must be within the haunt’s area of influence to use a haunt siphon. When you activate a haunt siphon, it deals 3d6 points of positive energy damage to a single haunt.
If it deals enough damage to the haunt to reduce the haunt’s hit points to 0, the mist inside the haunt siphon glows green—if it does not reduce the haunt to 0 hit points, the haunt siphon is still expended and becomes nonmagical. It may take multiple haunt siphons to destroy powerful haunts. A haunt that is neutralized
by a haunt siphon takes a –5 penalty on its caster level check to manifest again after its reset time passes.
A haunt siphon that neutralizes a haunt can no longer be used to harm haunts, but it can be used as a grenadelike splash
weapon that deals 1d6 points of negative energy damage with a direct hit. Every creature within 5 feet of the point
where the haunt siphon hits takes 1 point of negative energy damage from the splash.
"Ok, let's go."
The group heads out of the crypt, smashing a pair of oh so spooky giant centipedes on the way out.