"Well...it's gotta be something amphibious, at least..." Gideon thinks aloud as he stands at the water's edge. "Aside from that, I'm at a loss. Best I can think to do right now is to recommend a watch be set over the flock, plant some lanterns out here. Y'know, this ioun torch I found is immensely useful...I think we should get in touch with our new neighbors and see if they might have some of them that we can keep a supply of on hand for anyone on night watch."
Terana is delighted by the prospect of a walk, she spends most of her time at the 'crime scene' pacing back and forth - clearly irritated at not being more helpful.
Once the tracks lead into the water she leaps into the sea herself, swimming some way out from the shore before admitting that there really is no way to trace the creature out in the ocean depths.
"Setting a watch is good, but perhaps we should set a small one, and have an ambush party nearby - if we can draw whatever it was in then we can deal with it, rather than simply scaring it off."
"What the heck is it though? I don't know what a 'curious bite mark' means," grumbles Tobar.
"More swimmin', it looks like."
"If it's coming out of the water, then perhaps a pasture further inland would be better. I don't recognize the bite mark, but it looks like that of an eel or leech. As to what might make a bite like that and yet walk on two humanoid feet... well, you've got me."
"But perhaps we ought to patrol the waters around here."
"Well...it's kind of circular. Ever seen the kind of mark a sea lamprey makes when it attaches to something? It looked sorta like that. And yeah, I'm with Weyve. No idea what could make a mark like that and go back and forth from land to sea. Patrols are a good idea, too. I can practice with this new cloak!"
You talk to the colony's soldiers about setting up patrols around the pastures to watch for more creatures preying upon the livestock. Still, many of the other colonists are worried about monsters lurking in the surf. A few murmur that the creatures might be allies of the sahuagin you fought--or worse, the locathahs who they still don't fully trust!
"Now, now, folks... your troubleshooters are on it. We'll find the trouble... and Tobar will shoot it." Weyve smiles, trying to make light of the situation.
Tobar points his finger and brings down his thumb as if to pantomime shooting.
Weyve's joke is simple but effective, reminding everybody of all the dangers you have already overcome since arriving on Ancorato. The dissenters chuckle and cease their worrying, at least for the time being.
"Nice going." Gideon says to his allies, patting them on the back.
After calming down the colonists, the four of you begin patrolling the coast south of Talmandor's Bounty near the livestock fields, keeping an eye out for the creature that exsanguinated the goats. You head out a ways into the surf as well, checking under the waves for any lurking menaces.
Late in the afternoon, Tobar spots a disturbance in the water--something large is making its way towards you under the surface. As he shouts a warning, a vicious beast emerges from the surf. Not quite sea serpent or dragon, the 14-foot-long creature is covered with shiny blue-green scales. Its arms serve as both wings and flippers.
Before you can react, the creature opens its mouth and spits forth a crackling ball of electricity! It strikes Terana before arcing to the rest of you!
"What the what!"
Tobar twists partly out of the way of the blast. When he finishes spinning around, his crossbow is incongruously loaded and already coming up for a shot.
"Aaagh! What?" Weyve says as he is surprised by the burst of electricity.
Terana takes the blast full on her chest which leaves her writhing for a second before she kicks into full speed, arrowing towards the creature - glaive first. As she swims she curses the creature fluently in Azlanti.
Terana charges in and smites the drake, her glaive tearing through its chest as she scores a critical hit. It shrieks in pain, blood pouring from the horrid wound, the edges of which sizzle with holy energies.
Terribly injured, the monster turns and flees, withdrawing from the paladin's ire. With a surge of speed, it swims away as fast as it can manage!
Gideon cries aloud in pain when the electricity hits him...and then, before he even has an opportunity to react to the thing, Terana has already nearly killed it and caused it to flee. Breathing heavily beneath his new cloak, the archaeologist releases the edges of it, the illusion of the manta ray disappearing and leaving him in its place.
"That was a sea drake...very quick in the water. And they can breath lightning...not that we didn't figure that part out already."
"Coward!" Terana roars after the creature as it flees, before returning to the group. "Are you all alright? Sorry I couldn't finish it off."
"Yeah, little bit singed, but I'm all right," says Tobar as he finishes reloading. "But that wasn't sucker-head. Just an angry neighbor. We gotta get back into fightin' trim and keep lookin'."
"So that's not our culprit..." Terana muses. "I wonder what we did to rile it? Anyway - you're right Tobar. Weyve, can you deal with this or shall I?"
Regardless of who does the healing Terana will keep patrolling into the night. :)
You continue patrolling late into the night, Terana's blessings helping to alleviate the fatigue from staying awake. However, you encounter no other creatures, and eventually the sun begins to rise on another morning. There's no sign of your blood-sucking quarry.
"Dang it! We should check back at the colony to see if any more goats were eaten while we were out. This one might be tricky."
No goats or other livestock were harmed the previous night.
"Well, there's that to be thankful for, at least...should we hang out one more night or keep exploring the island?" Gideon asks of the others.
Weyve works on healing the group.
"I suppose that mush have been that dragon's territory? But I agree, it can't possibly be the thing we are looking for. We should keep looking."
After resting through the morning, you head back out to patrol around the colony for a second day. Most of the afternoon passes by without any sign of creatures lurking about. Just before sunset, though, you spot a small fishing boat approaching the shore. As it gets closer, you can see its occupant is Soran Vigaldo, who has been missing for several days! He appears to be sun-burnt and slightly dehydrated, but overall is in pretty good shape.
"At last, I made it!" he says when he reaches land. "It's quite embarrassing, really. I was out fishing after dusk and I must have been more tired than I realized. I fell asleep in my boat, and the currents dragged me out to sea! It took me a few days to find my bearings and make my way back home. I apologize if I worried you all."
Terana slides out into the water to meet the fisherman and aids in propelling the boat to shore. Not knowing the man she isn't sure whether or not to take his story at face value, but contents herself with a questioning look at her companions - rather than saying anything.
Upon seeing the approaching boat, Gideon anxiously waits for it to get close enough to see the vessel's pilot. When it does, and he realizes who it is, he seems at once relieved and joyful.
"Soran! By the gods, man! We thought you'd been eaten by a buncha chupacabras! I'm sure it will be a great relief to everyone to see you here, alive after all!" Gideon says to the man. Still...though outwardly expresses gladness, experience has taught him that things on this island are seldom what they first appear to be.
"Chupa-whats? Nope, nothing ate me!" Soran laughs. Gideon doesn't sense anything from the fisherman other than relief at finding his way home.
"Well c'mon then, let's get you home and get you some water. Don't go gluging it down, now! Take it slow or your stomach'll send back up whatever you put in it." he advises.
The other colonists are quite happy to see Soran return home safe and sound. They gather around him at the Plum Tree tavern as he drinks copious amounts of water and shares his harrowing tale with eager listeners, though he embellishes quite a bit. You're pretty sure he didn't have to fight off an army of sea serpents to make it back home!
"Well, it's good to hear how you made it back. We'll be glad to let you deal with any sea serpents we encounter from now on!" Weyve chuckles.
"Yeah, we've done our fair share of fighting; you can come out with us on our exploring from now on if you want." Gideon offers, elbowing Soran good-naturedly.
"That's alright. I think I'll just stick to fishing from now on. And I'll get a good nap in before I'm out in my boat!" Soran laughs.
"Now that is a plan we can all agree on." he answers with a grin to their rescued companion.
After seeing him off, Gideon looks to the others. "So...it was good that we were here to see Soran's return, but I'm not sure we need to keep spending time just waiting for some mysterious goat-slurping thing to crawl out of the water. I'm gettin' the itch to go back out and keep following that Pathfinder trail we were on a few days ago. We're already back here, it shouldn't take that long to go further south to pick the trail back up."
"Assuming the goat-slurping thing isn't some horrible parasite living inside of Soran and crawling out to eat stuff, and he doesn't even know," says Tobar. "Y'know, if you wanna talk worst-case scenarios."
Weyve's eyes turn black for a moment as he scans Soran with detect magic.
"We're just glad you're all right," he says to Soran.
He turns back to the others.
"I'm still concerned with whatever the creature was, but we can't be everywhere at once. Let's see what is up this trail, but we should try not to stray too far from the colony."
"I don't think it's over a day's journey to the place where the next marker is. I guess we'll see though!"
You travel south from Talmandor's Bounty, circumnavigating the mountain that stands on the island's southern cape. It only takes about three hours for you to reach the Pathfinder coordinates.
Here, an impact crater more than a hundred feet across punches into the mountainside, shrouded in dense vegetation and surrounded by toppled stone blocks, crumbling pillars, and shattered statues obscured by the island's lush flora. Small streams flow down from the mountainside into the yawning crater that descends into the earth.
As you look around the site, you notice old carvings on an ancient, mossy pillar near the opening of the chasm--more cipher glyphs.
"One of the original fragments must have hit here." Terana says, looking around. "Shall we go in?"
Gideon frowns as he translates the runes. "Don't really want to, but I think we should. The glyphs pointing into the chasm say 'Danger - Undead.' There are others that give the location of a small island off the northwest coast of the island, but I'm very uncomfortable just leavin' behind something as potentially dangerous as undead three hours from the colony."
"Let's clear this out first then." Terana offers. "We can head out to this island another time as we need to."
"Yeah... undead don't do anyone any good. Let's have a look."
As you reach the edge of the crater, you suddenly spot moving humanoid silhouettes cast against the ruins. A feeling of dread fills you and you get the sense something bad is about to happen.
Terana suddenly glows and a wave of azure blue light washes out from her, leaving behind the strong smell of salt water.
The blue light seems to erode the shadows somewhat, but not enough to destroy the haunt yet...
Weyve reaches out with his hand, which becomes surrounded by a dark cloud, though beams of light seem to burst from within.
Weyve reaches out and tries to grasp at the shifting shadows, but they evade his touch. The cure spell remains in his hands. The sky begins to darken...