Yanko’s skeleton clatters and rattles as it hears his command and hobbles over the clearing in the woods in order to get a cleaner shot at the hag. Silently it knocks another arrow and fires its shortbow. The skeletons jaw clatters in excitement after releasing the arrow.
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The elf tries to steady himself as he succumbs to the hag's rotten gas. "Ugh, the smell! I think I just lost my afternoon tea!"
Erevan, with wobbly knees, aims at the helpless-looking hag and takes a few steps away from her. "Well, what say you? We can spare your life if you surrender now. You will not be entitled to this fortune again if you decline."
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Snarlfist ignores the toxic mist, used to much worse from the smokeworkers of his old tribe.
Snarlfist considers moving back and repositioning instead glances at Erevan before encouraging the hag to surrender with a stab from between Ronnie's legs.
Snarlfist then feints to his left as he stabs around Ronnie's side while repositioning.
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The melodious droning sound of the shawm is no more.
Many of Myra's fellow Pathfinders look back toward her, wondering what has become of the ubiquitous sounds of her instrument.
When they do, you see Myra has stepped to side where she has a clear view to where she believes the hag is. She holds out her hand, which begins to exude a twisting, shadowy substance. Very quickly, and somewhat violently, this shadow extends from her arm in a long line enveloping the hag as it does.
Success The creature takes half the negative damage and no persistent bleed damage.
Failure The creature takes full damage.
Critical Failure The creature takes double negative damage and double persistent bleed damage.
Lough fights off the vapors and slashes the hag again.
Yanko casts a spell.
extra +1 vs magic
The hag cackles as she shrugs off the damage entirely, but catches an arrow in the face from Yanko's skeleton.
Ronnie steps in with the cold iron katana, slashing the hag twice.
Myra casts a spell.
extra +1 vs magic
The hag cackles as she shrugs off the damage from the spell. But then, she suddenly stops cackling, and looks down at her body. Ronnie's cold iron katana has severed her upper body from her lower body, and her eyes go wide as the top half of her body slowly slides to the ground.
When the hag falls, so does the last spiritual barrier keeping the kami caged inside the relic. With a warm green light, the relic smoothly ejects a small humanoid figure with moss-like skin and a conical hat.
The kodama bows to the Pathfinders and thanks them for both returning it to its home and dispatching the usurpers that had profaned its grove while it was imprisoned. It gifts the now non-magical scarf to the PCs and affirms that they will forever be welcome in its stretch of the Forest of Spirits.
The spirit within Yanko leaves, bidding farewell to their Departing Host.
With the kodama returned home, the Pathfinders lead the caravan safely along the remainder of the Spirit Road into Minkai. There they reunite with Amara Li and present her with the scarf. She is relieved to see everyone returning safely, including Lin Po and Ti Lan. She listens keenly to the tale of their exploits in the Forest of Spirits, fascinated that the relic housed a trapped kami all this time and that neither she nor her benefactor had any idea. Finally, she suggests that all of the agents take a well-earned rest before embarking on new adventures, and brings out an Abundant Feast for the Pathfinders
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Still holding the Hag by the hair as...
...her lower body half collapses at the knee, spilling her guts onto the grass. Dropping his shield here, he makes a pincer form with two of his fingers, and plucks one of her eyes from the socket...
...and drops what is left.
With Myra's shawm stopped, the quiet is eerie, and Lough revels here in the momentary silence...
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As The hag's body separates into two separate pieces, Ronnie holds out the katana to get a good look at it. "Hungh.". In his peripheral vision he sees Lough at his grizzly task and direct his attention from the blade to the Pathfinder and just stairs for a moment before finally breaking his gaze.
Back at the lodge
Patting all of the pathfinders on the back, "It is always good to bring a friend out of the dark forest and return them home!"
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With the hag split in two, Yanko walks over to his skeleton and taps his index finger gently on its forehead. ”Thank you, my child. Rest.” As soon as the finger touches the bone, the skeleton turns to ash and crumbles like burned parchment. First its feet, then its legs, torso and eventually its head. None of the black flakes hit the ground the simply crumble further and further and are caried away by the wind.
Yanko does not watch his ‘child’ disintegrate and rather turns to the rest of the group. He raises an eyebrow at Lough’s souvenir, but is distracted by the kodama.
Yanko has developed quite a penchant for chatting with Lough during the miles of travels along the Spirit Road. It is no surprise that before the group returns to Minkai he takes his chance and asks about the hag’s eyes. ”What are you going to do with it?” Lough has no chance of knowing what Yanko is talking about until he adds ”The eye, I mean”.
...crawls out of Lough's mouth, sporting a single larger Eye centered around it's smaller cluster of eyes - ...
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Lough just laughs "I didn't want to do it, but my little friend begged me!" and with that he taps the occu-spider on the thorax, and it scuttles back into his mouth.
"He said he wanted to see as she did" he pauses in thought here "Or maybe he - or She? - wants to keep an eye on..." he shoots Yanko a paranoid look!
"Best I not think on such matters" changing the subject abruptly "Your "children" - do you watch over them then?"...
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Yanko smiles mildly when Lough abruptly changes the subject. It is obvious that Lough still must fathom the extent of his powers and Yanko is not pushing him anywhere he does not want to go. As the conversation shifts to Yanko’s ‘children’ the dhampir grows quiet, but after a nod that seemingly ends an internal monologue debating if he wants to share or not, Yanko begins to talk.
”It is complicated. Again. I know.” He begins an grins briefly, before he continues. ”I told you about my father and how I was simply a tool for him. I also began speaking of…Her. Mother Vulture. She’s a psychopomp, powerful enough to rise to godhood – a Monitor Demigod residing in Pharasma’s realm. She saw something, sensed something in me.” At this point he chuckles ”I know how absurd this sounds. Sensing something in an infant that maybe never took its first breath before being drained.”
Yanko shakes his head and stares down the Spirit Road lined by sheer endless rows of pine trees. ”She argued for a century, I believe, before I was allowed to return to ‘prove my worthiness’.” He almost spits out the last words. ”At first, I tried. I worked as a midwife and a gravedigger in Ustalav to please her. Bringing life into this world and guiding it out of it. It was the former occupation that stung more and more over the years. Seeing happy families, knowing that this was something out of reach.” Yanko adjusts his glasses and glances over at Lough. ”My kind can’t sire children. In case you didn’t know.”
After a bit of silence he continues his tale. ”I don’t want to way you down with details, but I left Ustalav. I stopped working as a midwife and sought a more liberal place. I ended up in Kaer Maga, where I saw the Twice Born - or undead, as most folks call them – for the first time, simply roaming the streets living side by side with ‘us’. I was immediately intrigued, you need to know at this point I haven’t tapped into my powers, but now I think I was drawn to them due to my abilities.” He smiles widely at this point. ”I’m still not calling it a curse. Anyways, I began unlocking said powers with the help of a dear friend in Kaer Maga. I knew I violated the beliefs of Her, but to become one of her servants in the Graveyard, I was sure that I could show her my worthiness by guiding the Twice-Born. She objected. She abandoned me. She grew silent.”
A heavy sigh escapes Yanko before he looks straight at Lough. ”I know this wasn’t your question at all, but it important to know for you to understand my answer. I care for the Twice-Born. They are my children. I started to care for them for selfish reasons, trying to prove worthiness. I haven’t abandoned that path, however, for it is worthiness I want to prove to the world. After losing the only person.” He chuckles again. ”You can’t even call Her that. After losing the only that came close to resemble family for doing what believed was right and not following someone’s ideal, or path, or chasing some destiny; I stuck with my decision. It was the only thing I had left at this point. So to make a very long story short: Yes. Yes, I care for them for their sake. The world needs to learn that being born again is not a stigma, not a brand mark that makes you inherently evil. It is the guidance you receive which dictates that.”
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Far less eloquently had Lough held similar beliefs - not beliefs; feelings really, feeling as towards spurning actions - for those who had run him out of his village. His own Condition simultaneously the root of the reason for his exile, yet too his burden to forgive those who had done so out of fear.
Yanko's story draws a tear now from his "human" (brown) eye, and a long time passes in silence after he listens to the story about his worthiness, his eagerness to please, his change, his abandonment, his children, his choice.
...
Back at the Tea Shoppe, at the suggestion of Amara Li that he "rest", Lough decides that her advice is such that he will heed. He asks Yanko "Let me know if there is an address in Kaer Maga or elsewhere that you can receive mail" and promises to write.
With a heavy heart, and much to still think about, he gathers his things, and decides to skip the ship that was supposed to take him home. Instead, he disappears straight back into the forest...