The group move their way through the western tunnel.
Wyam's keen eyes spot a ghoul clinging to the shadows of the southern wall. Their eyes meet and it lets loose a powerful scream, as does two more.
Isme answers the ghoul's cry with her own caw, swiftly picking out a piece of spider web from the component pouch she carries and using it to summon a larger, more durable web to trap the ghoul and line the walls to prevent the other ghouls from rushing them.
One ghoul is entrapped, the other two try to push through it.
One of them manages to lash out at Wyam.
Wyam steps back and readies his new longsword, cutting at his immediate attacker. "We've been fighting your kind all day, you have no chance of winning here."
"I do not believe they care." Spectrum said retrieving his wand of Magic Missile and firing off a bolt.
How do those things work? Glimmer asked about the wand, keeping her distance from the fight.
"I'll show you later when there is less peril."
Array shook off the last of the bat's paralysis and took to the air again, feeling angry that he hadn't been strong enough to fight back against the creature. He wanted to dive back into the battle, but he didn't like how close the quarters were. He hung back and waited for an opening.
Having finished her spell, Isme cocks her head at the nearest ghoul, placing the evil eye on it before letting out her customary unsettling caw during battles.
A weapon blow and a set of Spectrum's missiles are enough to drop the first ghoul to the floor, collapsing it into dust. The remaining two struggle through it, trying to fling themselves at Wyam.
Spectrum tosses off another missile from the wand.
Wyam checked one of the ghouls with his shield, but forcing it back into the other one put him off balance before following up with a clumsy sword strike.
Isme continued to disrupt the ghouls' movements, her caw echoing in the tunnels.
Weakened by Isme's cursing gaze, the ghouls are swiftly cut down by Wyam's practiced swordblows.
Wyam looks down at the fallen ghouls. From what he knew, Ghouls still retained something of their intelligence of their former lives. Unlike with the Giant bat they'd fought, it was unlikely they would have attacked the Revenant if it had passed this way.
"Let's go." he said, not sparing the ghouls any more thought.
Isme keeps a look-out while Wyam takes the lead.
As they moved, Spectrum again charged the dragons with energy from the wand.
Moving deeper into the cave, the group finds themselves at a crossroads between a dark cave and an enormous glistening pool. Silently, they move towards the cave.
The western half of this foul-smelling cavern is heaped with bones, each scarred by the scraping of teeth. Most of the bones have been cracked open for the marrow within. The horrific stink of the place seems to mostly come from a wretched pile of body parts— some animal, some humanoid—heaped in a dismaying mound to the east.
On closer inspection< you see four bodies_ rotten< but a fresh rotten: once-ghouls. Huge and horrible bat bite and claw marks cover their frames, indicating their downfall.
The cramped tunnel opens into a vertiginous gulf here, a cathedral-like cavern with a roof arching thirty feet overhead and dropping into a sloshing pool of foamy seawater fifty feet below. A steep stone ledge winds down to these surging depths, its slope glistening with moisture and mold. Narrow fissures wind into the rock face to the northwest, rivulets of water dripping down from them across the sloping ledge into the pool below. A stone door stands in the northern wall about halfway down the slope.
Isme's keen eyes spot four still bodies face-down in the water. They are goblin, and covered with dire bat bites.
Wyam's eyes were almost immediately drawn to the stone door in the northern wall. He was curious about the pool below, but his first instinct was to head for the door as he didn't fancy the idea about swimming in the ocean.
"Strange, no sign of the Revenant's passing. Let's head for that door."
"There's goblin bodeis in the water," Isme informs Wyam. "Not the revenant but keep warned for more of those bats. We had enough trouble with just one."
"Hold." Spectrum said, as Isme noted the bodies in the water. He drew his bow and fired an arrow into one.
At Spectrum's bowshot, an unearthly spasm racks the 'corpse'. Its head rises from the water and dead blue eyes stare at the four of you; three more pairs of eyes rise in turn.
The water splashes as the four fallen goblins explode out, scrabbling across the ground to lash out at Wyam.
"Good guess, Spectrum." Wyam says a moment before the group is rushed by the Goblins.
Wyam swung his blade down at the immediate Goblin to his left.
"Back up, Wyam. Bottleneck them." Spectrum said as he fired again and backed up down the passage.
Isme stays at the back, keen eyes exposing the weaknesses of the goblin corpses.
Behind a door set into the stone walls ahead, a new sound resounds through the cave- a man crying, great wracking sobs splitting the air. The goblins ignore the noise.
Wyam lands a nasty blow, one enough to leave the goblin barely standing.
The ghouls swarm forwards onto Wyam.
Wyam wasn't ready for the Goblins rush forward, the one he struck barely slowed at his blades slash and moved in under his guard biting his arm at the joints in his armor.
And Wyam locked up. The paralytic venom coursed through his veins faster than he had been ready for and he could no longer defend himself as the other Ghouls found their mark. His blood splattering all over the ground.
Spectrum cursed and moved forward again to haul Wyam out of harm's way. "Guard me!"
The little dragons flapped around above spectrum's head, warding with their electrically charged tails and hissing fiercely.
Isme flaps her wings and, instead of an ominous caw, an alluring melody rises from her beak, the sound filled with magic that strengthens Wyam for just a moment.
Isme's music reverberated throughout Wyam's body, shaking him with just enough force that he was able to shake off the paralytic venom.
The remaining ghouls gave a flurry of slashing bites and claws. Most glancing off his armor but one particularly grizzly claw found its mark.
more venom coursed through his veins but was mostly bled out.
Wyam then returned the favor with attacks of his own.
Wyam's tearing blade downs a goblin. Spectrum launches an arrow, managing to finish off another wounded ghoul. Two rasping threats remain.
The remaining two ghouls howl terrible howls and circle closer.
From beyond the cave ahead, that terrible human wailing continues.
"Geh... mmmmhh." Wyam grunted in pain as the ghouls bit and clawed their way past his defenses again.
but he did not become paralyzed. He took half a step back and swung back at the second ghoul.
A third ghoul is downed; between them, Spectrum and Isme quickly dispatch the final foe.
Their bodies contain only rotted leather. The door ahead awaits.
"That could have gone better. Are you alright?" Spectrum asked.
Isme sings a cautious, creeping melody, reminding the party to keep alert as her magic settles into aiding their perceptions.
She then flaps onto Wyam's shoulder and tweets a more calming tune, redirecting magic to patch Wyam's injuries.
"Thank you, Isme." Wyam said, breathing more heavily from the recent fight against the ghouls. He glanced at the door as the wailing continued. "Let's go deal with what is making that sound."
United with Isme's melody, the trio and the draconic duo move forwards through the threshold.
This damp cavern contains several items of furniture. A rickety table sits in the middle of the cave, its damp surface cluttered with all manner of what appears to be garbage: empty bottles, bits of clothing, crumpled bits of paper, and more, lying in neatly organized rows. A painting leans against the far side of the table, facing a large leather chair that sits nearby. This chair’s high back and cushion are horribly stained by smears of rotten meat and its arms are sticky with blood. A smaller table sits against the southern wall, its surface heaped with silver platters, fine porcelain plates, and crystalware. The “food” on these plates and platters is rotten meat, in some cases humanoid in source, and in all cases writhing with maggots. Thick, rotting blood gels in the crystal.
Yet the horrific stench of the room seems somehow even thicker and more overwhelming than this gruesome display can account for on its own. The stench seems strongest to the west, where the cave’s wall has been overtaken by a horrific growth of dark green mold and dripping fungi. At the center, a patch of black tumescent fungus grows, its horny ridges and tumor-like bulbs forming what could almost be taken to be a humanoid outline. What appears to have once been an exquisite puzzlebox the size of a man’s fist lies smashed on the ground at the fungoid shape’s feet.
The candlelight dramatically frames and table and its contents. Perfectly arranged and organized lie several items. Wyam recognizes the remains of a chicken he ate for dinner two weeks ago, a clump of his long cut-off hair, a pair of boots he cast off as too small last month. Surrounding these trinkets are a series of charcoal drawings on water-damaged parchment. All feature Wyam, holy symbol prominent, being gruesomely murdered- by burning, boiling, bifurcating. The background is an old portrait, obscured by blood and rotten flesh into a terrifyingly crude caricature of the errant paladin. A small envelope is the final feature.
Two figures are in the room.
The first is the revenant Iesha- fallen, prone and with a long thin hole through her chest. Her face is frozen in her final expression- anger and hatred- though its stillness gives it an oddly peaceful quality.
The second sits on a large leather chair stained by rotten meat and blood. The first your eyes spot is the long coat he sports. Shaded a blue brilliant despite the dankness of the cave, its golden embroidery gives it a regal air which contrasts all the more horribly with the dried blood caked into it and its shredded edges. The second is the long weapon held in the figure's right hand; a barber's shaving razor, but one nearly two feet long, dirtied yet cut to a terrible infectious point. Dried blood and Iesha's rotted flesh cover it. Finally, the bent head wracked with sobs. It is hard to understand what you are looking at. You see rotted green flesh and slits for eyes, but also pink skin and a head of human hair. No tears drop from its eyes. Finally, it throws its head back and stares at you all, and you understand.
You see the face of Aldern Foxglove. Rotten, long-since discarded and currently worn as a mask by the head of Aldern Foxglove, now afflicted with the paleness and unearthly blue glow of the ghast. The creature blinks, and speaks in a disconcertingly normal and human tone. "Oh... oh. Hello. I am His Lordship. I... I've been here for so long. Trying to fight him off. Trying to fight off what comes after him." His free hand gestures at the corpse in front of him, as his razor-wielding hand taps against the chair in an irregular woman. "I killed this... this woman. This thing. I don't know why she came at me, or why... or why I suddenly feel so sad. 'tis a strange thing... to feel sad for someone else, after feeling so sad for myself for so long..." He sighs, then reaches for a candle. He moves it a little closer to you all, then starts back in shock, staring at Wyam. "Oh... oh no. It's you. The one h-he loves. The one he hates, he admires. He'll come for you, soon. V-very soon. And I'll be gone. Oh no."
Isme eyes the portraits of Wyam's gruesome deaths, unsure how to feel about someone she knows well being obsessively depicted murdered in various ways. "Well, that's... disturbing."
She turns her attention to Aldern, taking in his appearance and the subtle clues in the room. She doesn't say anything, not yet, nor does she ask what Aldern means. She lets Wyam handle it, curious what would happen next.
Wyam was clearly disturbed and very near sickened by the scene in front of them.
"What... Do you mean to say that you are... no, that you were Aldern Foxglove? What happened to you? And... What do you mean fight him off? Where will he come from?"
"I... for now, I am Aldern. He... he will come from within me. He will... become me. And then the one who comes after, will become him." He coughs wetly.
"I... I am His Lordship. He, the first he, is... the Hurter. The second he, the final he... the Skinsaw Man. There is so little I fear more."
"What... what happened to me? D-do you want my tale? I-I may have little time; you are..." he mouths Wyam's name. "He will come soon for you. What do you already know? What do I need not tell?"
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Wyam glanced at the other two before looking back at the partly removed face of "Aldern Foxglove" or rather His Lordship. "Rumor has it that two decades ago, you and your sisters Sendeli and Zeeva, survived the tragedy that occurred here at Foxglove manor and were sent to relatives with Korvosa. You alone returned recently and tried to restore the estate. You had no luck in hiring staff what with the rumors of haunting's surrounding your house and a devil bat living in the catacombs.
How Rogors Craesby came three times a week to be the caretaker of the manor I will never know.
You seemed to enjoy things like boar hunting and supposedly have a townhouse in Magnimar. You also had a wistful and boyish air about being heroic. But it was all just an act. And I can't believe that's when all the trouble started.
Since we've arrived at the Manor, we've discovered much of your family's past fates through a series of Haunts we encountered. Your Father, Vorel, was obsessed with dark arcane secrets about becoming a Lich. He was easily angered by your mother, Kasanda, for questioning him on what he was doing inside his laboratory and would often abuse her. But something went wrong with his research and he became something awful infested with Tumors. He then killed your Kasanda and your sister Lori. Someone, I'm not sure who, slit your brother Traver's throat. Your sister Cyralie caught fire, presumably when the servants quarters burned down, and was dashed down on the rocks below the house.
You would have been a child at the time. I believe saw your mother and father fighting, hidden inside a fireplace. Your father was moss-like and tumor ridden."
Wyam paused. He collected his thoughts and then continued speaking his voice hardening.
"How you became as you are... Your Lordship... I don't know. But you are going to tell us what we don't. You, or the hurter, or the Skinsaw man have caused the death of many. You turned Rogors Craesby into a Ghoul and unleashed him and others on nearby farms. They killed more nearby in the town of Sandpoint Harker and Katrinne. You've driven a man named Grayst Sevilla insane. And the woman at your feet it was Iesha Foxglove. Your wife, whom you told us was visiting friends in Absalom. But who was now a Revenant come to claim vengeance against her murderer."