"This looks like a job for the incredible Detective Hollybaker! What do you think killed the goats Detective? Was it a horrible attack by bifurcated dire earthworms?"
Simon's exhaustive search of the goats' grazing area does not turn up any sort of clues.
Kip's thorough examination bears fruit, however. The grippli manages to find a few traces of bare humanoid footprints in the field that lead to the shore.
He also gives the goats a thorough examination. Upon review, he discovers multiple circular bite marks resembling those made by a lamprey. They don't look like wounds caused by a chupacabra's bite.
"You're right Detective! The blood seems to be completely gone, and these circular bite marks are somewhat unique. They look very similar to what you would find if a lamprey were to latch on and feed. And these footprints here... did they suddenly grow legs to walk on the land? Or... more sahaugin... wielding lamprey as whips?!"
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Simon considers the image of a sahuagin flinging a lamprey around by its tail and giggles.
"That would certainly be something, but I doubt the lamprey would bite something their head just happened to smack into.
Let me think for a moment... Humanoid... lives in water.... circular teeth... drinks blood..."
Simon is uncertain what sort Iron creature might be responsible for these attacks.
As they began their investigation Ema was startled to find these bites were caused by something else, even more so that Neither Simon nor Kip knew what that something was. She thought through her own knowledge to see if she could come up with any ideas before they went any further.
The creatures of the planes are infinite and varied, and numerous creatures have the ability to drain blood. But as Ema considers the terrestrial monsters that might have perpetrated this crime, one particularly insidious culprit comes to mind in a flash of odd insight. There exist humanoid aberrations known as ugothols, or "faceless stalkers" as they call themselves. Originally designed by aboleths to serve as spies that could walk uncontested among the air-breathing races, faceless stalkers adopt new forms by reshaping their skin and contorting their rubbery bodies. Faceless stalkers cannot digest solid food even when in the form of a creature with a mouth. Instead, they subsist on liquids, including blood. In their natural forms, they have three hollow tongues which they use to penetrate and lap blood from their victims. The bite marks on the goats match the shape of this sort of feeding.
Ema looked at the wounds and then paled as she realized what was the likely culprit. How she knew of these things was beyond her, she didn't remember studying them, but she knew what it was none the less. She looked at her friends and said, "We have to deal with this, now." She took a deep breath and said, "This was done by a creature called a Ugothols or faceless stalker. They mostly serve the aboleths who created them as spies and assassins. They can change their shape into almost anyone and with proper study can mimic them to near perfection. The give away to their presence is when you find bodies with injuries like this." She shuddered, "They can't actually eat solid foods, only liquids, and seem to prefer blood as their liquid of choice. They have three hollow tongues and use them to pierce and drink the blood of their victims."
Victrix remains on guard.
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Simon taps his chin in thought. "So, to kmow if a creature is an... Ugothol... we need to watch it eat.
Hmmm.... hopefully these things haven't infiltrated the villiage yet, they sound almost as bad as dopplegangers. They can't read people's minds can they?"
Simom shudders at the thought of Perrell or Lyra getting replaced by one of these things.
"Agreed, we need to track these things dowm right away. Kip, I hope you can cast that water tracking spell. Maybe Ema should ride on Rupert. I don't think we want to take the time to go get a boat."
Ema shook her head and said, "I don't believe that they can," She considered and then continued with a little bit of cheer, "In fact I think having saved Eliza is going to be a huge benefit to us. These creatures are aberations and as such their minds should be very different from a humanoids. I think that Eliza might be able to quickly scan someone's mind and tell if they are a faceless stalker or not." Her concern returned then as she said, "Still, we'd best find this thing and fast, we need to find out if there are more than one or not as well."
"That's an excellent idea Ema! And I'm not sure that the tracking spell will be necessary. If it's hiding out as a person in town, then it wouldn't make much sense to be slipping off to sea. Now if someone was lost at sea, but rescued days later, that would be a pretty easy way to take someone's place, no? Also, who's ready for a colony wide, investigative barbecue? Get everyone to eat while Eliza uses her awesome mind powers, and we'll flush them out in no time! We can get Eliza and all of us to eat something beforehand just to be sure it hasn't been pretending to be us."
"The prints here lead back towards the shore, but they may have turned elsewhere on land."
You only find the few scattered footprints here, with no clear trail to follow. Heading back down the beach past the colony, though, you find a trail of prints leading out of the surf that heads into Talmandor's Bounty. The trail is quickly obscured by the foot traffic from all the myriad colonists, making it impossible to follow further.
"So... are we heading back now?"
Seeing that the tracks went into the town Ema realized just how bad this was. She nodded in agreement and then said, "I'll go talk with Eliza about the problem and see if she thinks she can help."
Ema finds Eliza at the town library, looking over some of the books you recovered from Spindlelock Tower. She gives the arcanist a shy smile. "Hello, Ema. How are you today?"
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Meanwhile, Simon finds Ramona in her office at the government house. She waves the half-orc in. "I heard you were investigating Irvin's goats. The colonists are pretty spooked about the whole thing. Any good news we can share with them?"
Ema found Eliza with relief and looked around to see if Medrinah was in there as well. She approached Eliza and said quietly, "We have a problem and need your help to solve it." She looked around carefully and said, "We need to find somewhere private to discuss this."
Ramona quirks an eyebrow. "Um, okay..." She chews the handful of berries and swallows them.
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Medrinnah is studying quietly in another room. Eliza follows Ema's look around. "Very well. Shall we go to your house?"
Ema nodded and said, "That's fine Eliza." She looked a little nervous again and said, "Why don't you stay with me." She went to where Medrinnah sat studying and said, "Why don't you come with me for now, I want to be able to keep an eye on you for a bit." With her little party in tow Emalliandra led the way to her place and let them in. Once everyone was seated she looked at Medrinnah and said, "What we talk about doesn't leave this room alright?"
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Simon breathes a long sigh of relief, and releases the grip on his longsword that he didn't realize he had gripped. Flexing his knuckles, he tries to relieve the cramping.
"We did find the bodies of the sheep. Kip examined the area and the wounds, and found distinctive signatures of humanoid creatures with a circular bite pattern.
From the description, Ema deduced that the attackers were Ugothols, creatures created by the Aboleths to serve as assassins and spies. They can alter their appearance and voices to exactly mimic anything they want.
We followed their trail, and it appears that some of them went toward the village. We are worried that they could have replaced anyone by now.
Ugothols are unable to eat solid food, so we have a test. Ema is talking to Eliza to see if she can use her mental powers to help detect them as well.
I suggest that we systematically test all citizens immediately, starting with the guards. I suggested to Kip that it might be a good time for another baking challenge."
Medrinnah nods solemnly. "Got it. What's up?"
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Ramona seems alarmed by the news, but she remains a stoic facade. "Very well. We should keep this quiet. We don't want to cause a panic or tip off any of these 'ugothols' that we are onto them. How may I best help?"
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"Well, organization is not a strong point for any of us. We need a way to systematically identify that we have tested everyone.
The roster in the charter should serve as a good starting point..."
Simon stops suddenly, realizing the flaw in that statement. "The charter! Is this why it was stolen?"
He shakes his head forcefully. "It is irrelevant now. Let's worry about the issue at hand. We need a good reason to gather all of the guard and ask them to eat, we need whatever roster we can come up with, and we need to organize an impromptu bake off.
Possibly we could have a voting booth set up. Each townsperson would enter a building, sample two or three cookies, and then vote on their favorite. Anyone who refuses to participate would need to be quarantined without alerting anyone else.
I'm sure there are lot of holes in that plan. Perhaps you could help to refine it?"
With heir privacy secured Ema looked at her companions and said, "We have a problem, the goats weren't killed by a chupacahbra like we killed before. This was something far more dangerous." She drew in a worried breath and then pressed ahead, "They were made by something called an Ugothols." She took a seat shakily and continued, "They are also called faceless stalkers and serve as spies for the aboleth. They can't eat solid foods, only liquids, and they prefer blood. They are hideous creatures and they can shapeshift and we have evidence that one is in the town now wich means someone has most likely been killed and replaced already." She looked at Eliza, "I know it's a lot to ask of you but we need you to scan the minds of everyone to make sure they are not one of these things. We are planning to have a party tonight and everyone is going to be there. I want you to scan Medrinnah and myself to make sure we're clear then the three of us stay together until this is over."
Victrix's blood runs cold at the mention of the faceless stalkers. "Antona..."
"...have either of you seen her recently?"
Ramona nods. "The booth idea could work. I'll ask Perrell for a full roster of the colonists so that we can make sure that we can check them all of the list. I'm not certain how best to quarantine those we suspect of being shape changers without people noticing, though."
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Eliza's eyes widen. "Scan... All of their minds?" Her hands start to tremble a bit. "That is a lot of voices to sort through. I can only use that ability one time a day, and only for a few minutes. Even if I could scan the whole colony... I don't know what to look for. The last time I came in contact with an aberrant creature..." She bites her lip and shudders.
Medrinnah looks at Victrix. "Your girlfriend is on patrol with my mom tonight."
"I'm going to have to see her, then." Victrix's face pales and she starts to get up to leave...
...assuming--NO. No. Don't think about it. Not yet.
Ema gave Eliza a sympathetic smile and said, "I know that you can handle it, and if you feel that you need to save the ability for now then wait on us until the banquet. I know Victrix and I are clean, and I have to assume that you are as well Eliza." She looked at Medrinnah and said, "I can only hope you are too."
As victrix began to panic Emalliandra called out, "Victrix stop!" She took a deep breath, "Let's go find her together. We need to stay together so that no one can be replaced without us knowing. Anyone who is separated has to be considered replaced until we can prove otherwise."
Victrix forces herself to stop as Ema addresses her. "Y-yes. Please, let's go find her."
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Simon attempts to calm himself down to think the problem through. "Hmmm... Perhaps the exit from the polling station could go through a doorway with two possible paths that are hidden from view.
Based on a signal, a guard could either direct the person exiting to go down one path out into the village again, or down another path into a room set up to securely hold a few people.
Still, everyone who assists us... Perrell, the guards, any other administrators or bakers, need to be tested before the mass tests begin."
Medrinnah snorts. "I'm not a monster," she insists.
The four women leave the library to track down Antona and Sighra. They find the pair of soldiers patrolling the southern border of the colony. Sighra looks at the group with concern.
"Is everything alright? She didn't burn down the library, did she?"
"Mother!" Medrinnah groans.
Antona smiles at Victrix. "You okay, love? You look like you've seen a ghost."
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"That's quite an elaborate setup," Ramona says. "The barracks are one of the few buildings in town with multiple entrances and exits. We could probably have the polling done there."
Victrix is at once relieved and wary when she sees Antona.
"Sighra? The two of you've been together this whole time, right?" She says, glancing at Ema.
"Yes, just the two of us." Sighra says.
Antona frowns a bit. "You're not jealous, are you? Cause Sighra likes guys."
"Obviously," Medrinnah mutters.
Victrix breathes a sigh of relief. "Oh, thank Cayden."
She walks right up to Antona and gives her a quick kiss on the lips. "I was worried something might've replaced you."
"Ema? You want to explain?"
Ema followed Victrix as they went in search of Antona and was amused to see Victrix kiss the woman. She remembered hearing something about the two and decided things were more serious between them than she had thought. When Vic turned the explanation over to her Ema explained the situation, what they had discovered, and that at least one person here might have been killed and replaced as well as their plans to try and weed out the infiltrator. When she finished she said, "Pass the word along that no one should be alone until further notice. Preferably they should stay in groups of three or four and be very familiar with each other. That will help them catch mistakes one of the things might make and help to reveal it. Don't, however, explain it to them. If we let the information spread it will tip the thing off an we'll never find it."
Antona squeezes Victrix's hand, looking worried. Sighra is concerned as well. "Gods. This is bad. We need to tell Ramona. Unless... You don't think she's a shapechanger, do you?"
Ema shook her head and said, "I don't know. Simon and Kip are talking to her right now to arrange the banquet and they have a possible way of testing to see if it's her." Emalliandra thought for a moment and then said, "I doubt that it's Ramona though, she's too public. Depending on how long it has been here I would expect it to be someone of far less importance right now. Someone who would be less likely to be detected." She glanced at Medrinnah them before continuing, "Someone like Medrinnah would make a good initial target, young enough to have few responsibilities, old enough to be any number of places, and unobtrusive enough not to gain any attention unless they messed up." She smiled at Medrinnah then and said, "I'm not saying you're a monster, just that someone like you would make a good victim to replace initially."
"Thanks. I think," Medrinnah says dryly.
"Sighra and I will tell the other soldiers, but we shouldn't let the civilians know what's going on until we have a solid plan in place," Antona says.
Ema nodded and then paused as something dawned on her and said, "Before you do let's all grab something to eat. It doesn't have to be much but we need to do so. These things can't digest solid food at all so they would have to get sick and vomit it up. Anyone who refuses to eat should be regarded with suspicion as should anyone who excuses themselves right afterwards." She looked at Eliza in relief, "It seems we may not need you to scan as many people as we thought." turning back to Antona she said, "When you do make sure they eat and watch them for a reaction then keep them in pairs to trios at all times. If we can eliminate the soldiers then that helps narrow the pool down a lot."
The six women head back to the house Ema and Victrix share with their fellow party members. There, they each partake of a light lunch. Everybody keeps the food down, which seems to indicate neither Antona, Eliza, Medrinnah, nor Sighra are faceless stalkers.