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"Oh good, yer voice came back! I was worried about ye." Roger breathes a sigh of relief and dusts himself off. It seems the pirate didn't quite realize the voice was in his head rather than his ears yet.
Constantine lifts his brow and looks at Roger with a tad of confusion. "Wait...did you hear that?" Emphasis on the "hear." His lips aren't moving.
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"Aye, why wouldn't- I- ha..." Roger turns to Connie only to eventually see the non-moving lips and yet his still playing voice in his head.
"Must be something funny in the Striges or me nerves, now I'm hearing things!" Now Roger didn't realize that everyone else could hear Connie too, and thought he was the mad one!
Majara continues to eye Constantine a touch warily all through the tangled communication game that he and Hannelia play. She busies herself with moving to Roger and trying to look over his bleeding injuries.
"Bend down so I can reach to staunch that," she informs the tall pirate.
She's accordingly not looking at Constantine when he... speaks. Only when the clarification comes does she gaze with slitted eyes at him, lips pursed.
"I'm pleased you're optimistic. I'll remind you that corruption of body, soul, and mind by an evil external force is what turned Gellion into a threat against Saringallow. I'm sure you'll understand the necessity of keeping an eye on you. Miss Blackford..."
Majara turns a piercing look on Emma. "Doesn't Iomedae grant you the wherewithal to know when evil's present? Perhaps you might, every so often, make sure that Mr. Fioritura-Sarini isn't experiencing some growing taint. That's something E--"
A beat. "--easily done, I would think?"
Majara whistles for Blue now that the stirges are dead, and finds a good spot to tie the mule off that's not too close to the scene of carnage they've left of both mongrelmen and stirges. She fishes an acid flask from the saddlebags to replace the one she used in the town square fight, and after a moment's thought, grabs a bottle of lightning as well. The creepy dead hand goes around her neck, a macabre ornament.
"Moving on: let's check that secret door. Someone went to the trouble to hide it. I agree with Roger's logic that it might contain rewards. I'll let someone else take the point, though."
Still, she does glance at the door warily as they approach.
It takes Hannelia a second as well, so used had she become to the slightly strange method of communication, but she replies, ”No, Roger, I can hear it too.” Turning to Constantine, a look of amazement on her face, she asks ”How are you doing that?!” Hang on, you didn’t even realise you were,” she continues, picking up on his surprise that Roger had heard him. ”Well, it’s an improvement on Abyssal I suppose,” she adds drily, ”though may still take a little getting used to. Depending of course on how temporary this may prove to be.” It’s a different sensation to the spell hearing him speak directly into her mind, but she figures it’s probably just the novelty at the moment which has caught her off guard. ”Can you control this? Are you able to speak… not into our heads?” she asks Constantine, giving him some time to figure out this latest revelation.
* * * * *
When everyone - including Constantine, though Hannelia is still more than a little concerned about him - is ready to head inside the house after the unexpected episode, she joins Majara by the hidden back door. Pushing the nagging fear aside, she focuses on the task at hand and scans it for a lock or any wards that would prevent them entering, violently or otherwise.
The shrill buzzing endures in your ears, a chorus bending and growing in a disturbing pattern. One could say it was musical; melodic even. Despite how annoying it is.
You approach the secret door. It's barely noticeable as something other than a set of wooden panels in the back. But now that you look for it, you can see the outline of the door. Majara and Hannelia check the door for traps, but if there are any, the two don't find them.
With a few tugs on a crossbeam, the door pulls free. Daylight flows through the doorway.
The room inside is dark, save for a scarce few slivers of sunlight that make their way through the boarded up windows.
Inside you find what appears to be a used to be a kitchen, and is now some sort of indoor garden. A workbench cluttered with pottery stills and glass alembics stands below small alcoves filled with vials and beakers. Dozens of clay vessels rest haphazardly on wooden boxes, each sprouting neatly-pruned shrubs or large, exotic mushrooms. They appear surprisingly well-tended, given the state of the rest of the building, through the roots of several have burst through their pots.
To the east there is an open doorway that is too dark to see into without additional light. To the west there is a closed wooden door without an apparent lock.
An examination of the plants growing here reveals a large collection of poisonous mushrooms and other strange fungi, including several containers of pale blue mold that you recognize as blue whinnis.
Eating it in its natural form only causes a mild discomfort (sickened condition). But when its toxins are extracted and concentrated, one can create a powerful poison which weakens the victims constitution and has even been known to knock them unconscious.
You also find a bowl that looks like it belongs in a regular kitchen filled with large black mushrooms that are unlike any you've seen before.
There are also four strange gray, fist-sized puffballs which appear to be spore cases. But none in this world grow to be that big that you know of.
There are four fist-sized gray puffballs that appear to be spore cases, that you recognize as immature cythnigot qlippoth. Among these four rest a fifth empty case of the same size. If planted in a Small dead body, these spore cases grow into newborn cythnigots. Until then, they can be destroyed with ease.
The cythnigot is a foul fungal parasite that grows and thrives within the corpses of small animals. The fungus transforms the host corpse in hideous ways, adding legs or rearranging features—a rat might gain an extra pair of legs and an insectoid visage, while a cat could lose all its legs and fur and gain a snake-like body. The only thing that all cythnigots have in common is a long stalk of fungal material that extends up from the creature’s body, ending in a surprisingly strong set of fanged jaws.
This room contains a Masterwork Alchemy lab worth 200 GP if recovered.
If you listen carefully you can hear a faint and muffled rythmic chant coming from the room to your west. It seems pretty far away or like its behind several walls.
The east room seems to be bare, save for a large lump of earth and discarded foodstuffs stacked all the way to the ceiling in the southeast corner.
Majara's nose wrinkles at pungent scents familiar to her professionally, and her eyes rake the contents of the room with keen intensity, piercing the gloom easier than her human companions.
"--do not touch any of the plants," she says sharply. "There are multiple poisons there, and also.... a... is that--"
With a frown, Majara sidles closer to Roger to look, and after a few seconds of intense study, clicks her tongue sharply against her teeth. "Where on earth-- or outside of it-- did these fools obtain a cythnigot qlippoth? This day develops direly.... although there's several potions here that could be of use to us, at least..."
She peers into the gloom of the eastern room, then looks west, holding up a hand for silence. When she speaks again, her voice is lower, a whisper.
"We're not alone. I hear... chanting, I think. To the west. They may be more than one room away, it's very faint. That dark room to the east-- just piled supplies, but also a lot of displaced earth. Hiding something, perhaps-- another door... or something buried."
Majara edges closer to the tables, muttering to herself too low for the others to hear as she examines the unknown black mushrooms, her sense of the threat and urgency of the other people present at war with her desire to collect samples and play with the fancy alchemy lab.
Hannnelia blinks in the darkness of the room, her eyes taking a while to adjust to the lack of light. Majara's gnomish sight is better suited to the conditions and she swiftly takes the lead, passing on clipped warnings about poisonous plants and something that sounded as alien to her ears as Constantine's Abyssal tongue.
Heeding Majara's warning for quiet, Hannelia too can hear the low chanting in the hush of the house. She whispers back, "What exactly is a... 'cythnigot qlippoth', did you say? And how concerned should we be?" She peers into the gloom where Majara indicates there are supplies but can't make anything out. "Ordinarily I'd prefer to look in there properly first but before I cast a spell to light things up so the rest of us can see properly, I'm thinking we might be better off heading towards the sound now while we have the potential element of surprise?" She indicates the door through which the sound is quietly emanating.
Padding quietly over to it, the door appears a simple one but Hannelia is ever-prudent and gives the wooden portal a quick check over. When she is finished, not having wanted to multitask while carrying out the survey, she whispers, "Oh, Emma. I meant to say earlier but it slipped my mind. Majara's right - I know you might be hesitant to wield someone else's sword, but you're only borrowing it until we find Elias Kyle and you wielding it can only improve our chances, even if only slightly, of finding him alive. Besides, I can't think of anybody more worthy to carry a blade called 'Redemption'."
She takes a step back and waits to see which course of action the others would prefer.
"Wait, we didn't give out the magic sword yet? Blimey, Emma, whip it out and wave it around! Have some fun with it! If nobody wanted the loot, put some hands on it yourself. We're not some wilting wallflowers, we'll speak up if we want it." Roger seems quite surprised it wasn't in her arsenal already.
You keep the room unlit, save for the daylight coming through the door, hoping to maintain the element of surprise. It takes time to sift through the contents of the lab-kitchen, but there is useful booty to be found. Though there is some banter, one could imagine it being in hushed tones as the group cautiously examines the room. Moths, mosquitoes, flies and gnats flit and rest on various surfaces, giving the room an abandoned feeling. The mosquitoes and gnats in particular continue to be a grievous nuisance, but inflict nothing more detrimental than itching and buzzing-in-ears.
Hannelia's efforts to clear the door for traps yield only that the door appears to have no locking mechanism on it. There are no traps or tripwires that she can detect.
At some point after Emma enters the darkened room, a faint glow can be seen from the hilt of Redemption, appearing to come from within its scabbard.
Hannelia whispers back, "What exactly is a... 'cythnigot qlippoth', did you say? And how concerned should we be?"
Majara takes a moment to answer, busy rifling through the bottles on the room's surfaces. The frown on her face might be for that task as much as the question.
"Qlippoths are monstrous entities from outside this reality. Not... quite demons... but just as bad. The cythnigot is fortunately a relatively minor sort of qlippoth... a sort of fungal parasite. Hatches in the corpses of small animals-- rats, cats, that sort of thing. Mutates them. Extra limbs. Or eyes. Or claws. Puppets the body around, bites things. There are four non-incubated spores here and we will be destroying them. A fifth is unaccounted for. Probably already in the body of some unfortunate creature," she rattles off in a low clipped whisper.
Turning from the table Majara starts to hand out potions. "These are defensive. This one is curative. These two will help if you're poisoned. I'm keeping the rest."
She nods the once at Hannelia's words that they should take the chance to surprise the cultists, though her eyes linger on the alchemical setup with a certain desire to stay and poke around. Later, she promises herself.
Majara turns a piercing look on Emma. "Doesn't Iomedae grant you the wherewithal to know when evil's present? Perhaps you might, every so often, make sure that Mr. Fioritura-Sarini isn't experiencing some growing taint. That's something E--"
A beat. "--easily done, I would think?"
Emma catches the pause in Majara's sentence. She assumes the gnome alchemist was about to say it was something that Elias would have done - though she doesn't ask Majara to confirm her suspicions. Either way, she gives a nod to the gnome.
"Iomedae does, in fact, grant me such an ability. I can do that, Majara," she says gravely, casting a wary glance at Constantine. A mix of pity and trepidation fills her gaze. She's glad Hannelia is taking point on helping Constantine - what would they do without her in their party, she wonders not for the first time. "Sorry Constantine - I hope you understand, but it's a good suggestion, and a sensible precaution to take."
It had been bad enough reaching out with her senses to Talon and feeling that awful sensation of evil and corruption coming flooding back towards her. She still occasionally had bad dreams about Talon looking at her with those soulless eyes and the feeling of the arrow that had nearly killed her.
The last thing she wanted was a repeat of that experience. Having a friend turned foe was bad enough to happen once.
-----------
When she is finished, not having wanted to multitask while carrying out the survey, she whispers, "Oh, Emma. I meant to say earlier but it slipped my mind. Majara's right - I know you might be hesitant to wield someone else's sword, but you're only borrowing it until we find Elias Kyle and you wielding it can only improve our chances, even if only slightly, of finding him alive. Besides, I can't think of anybody more worthy to carry a blade called 'Redemption'."
Emma's lips quirk into an almost smile. "Thanks Hannelia. That's a fair point. I suppose--"
"Wait, we didn't give out the magic sword yet? Blimey, Emma, whip it out and wave it around! Have some fun with it! If nobody wanted the loot, put some hands on it yourself. We're not some wilting wallflowers, we'll speak up if we want it." Roger seems quite surprised it wasn't in her arsenal already.
At this, Emma does smile, and lets out a soft laugh. "Alright, alright, point taken Roger. I will admit, I have some reservations about using another person's sword. You have to understand, to many followers of Iomedae, it's not just a weapon, it's an extension of yourself. But you're both right - if it's magical, and if it can help us, there's little point in not using it. But should we find him alive - and I hope we do - I will be giving it back to him."
She adds the sword to her belt, though she doesn't draw it for now. The sword does have a nice weight to it though.
-----------
Emma follows the others as quietly as she can - which, given the fact that she's wearing heavier armor than most of her party, isn't very quiet at all. But it can't be helped.
"Should we wish to sneak up on them, I may not want to be in the lead for that," she whispers to the others. "I'm not exactly the most...." Her voice trails off as she glances down towards her side, where her sword seems to be...glowing? "Hello, what's this?" she asks aloud, her previous thought and attempts at stealth forgotten.
Cautiously, she grips the hilt of Redemption and withdraws it - a soft golden light suddenly fills the space around her in the room, making her eyes widen in surprise as she stands there holding the sword away from her.
Right away, she can tell just how well-made the sword is. It's extremely well balanced, with a decent heft to it yet still being light enough to weave around without trouble. Hesitantly, she takes a moment to experiment with it, and spends the next few moments jiving, shucking, bobbing, and weaving around with it, fighting against an imaginary foe - while also forgetting the fact that the others had been whispering for good reason.
Emma grins at the sight of the glowing sword; in truth, it was the first time she'd really come into contact with such a magical item. She'd seen enchanted weaponry before, of course, but they had always been in the hands of others and had never been offered to train or experiment with.
"Well then," she finally says, still gazing at the blade. "That's certainly something."
Emma attempts to sense the presence of evil in front of her, and she notices...
The presence of Evil.
However, after focusing for a few moments she's able to discern there are two separate auras, however faint.
Thankfully, her friend has not turned. But there is still evil afoot.
One aura is coming from the western room. The other from the south room, toward the southeast. Through walls, its difficult to discern the precise location or whether its moving or not, but you would have heard something by now if it were creeping up on you.
Right?
_______
Per Detect Evil:
3rd Round: The power and location of each aura. If an aura is outside your line of sight, then you discern its direction but not its exact location.
Emma's seeming fascination with the sword falters a bit as her senses begin to tingle - there is, in fact, evil nearby. She lowers the sword a bit, her smile fading as she looks around - first at Constantine, where she is relieved to note that there is no evil emanating from him (at least, not yet, the cynical part of her brain whispers) - then around the area, until settling southward, towards the room beyond that. Though she hasn't heard anything - nor has anyone else seemingly mentioned anything - she's reasonably certain there's something bad in that direction.
She lowers the glowing sword, narrowing her eyes slightly.
"Heads up," she murmurs, whispering once more. "Not sure what exactly, or where exactly, but there's something evil lurking south of us."
"Qlippoths are monstrous entities from outside this reality. Not... quite demons... but just as bad. The cythnigot is fortunately a relatively minor sort of qlippoth... a sort of fungal parasite. Hatches in the corpses of small animals-- rats, cats, that sort of thing. Mutates them. Extra limbs. Or eyes. Or claws. Puppets the body around, bites things. There are four non-incubated spores here and we will be destroying them. A fifth is unaccounted for. Probably already in the body of some unfortunate creature," she rattles off in a low clipped whisper.
She nods the once at Hannelia's words that they should take the chance to surprise the cultists, though her eyes linger on the alchemical setup with a certain desire to stay and poke around. Later, she promises herself.
"Right," Hannelia replies in a low voice. "They sound delightful. And we certainly will be," she agrees, though she's already wondering what has become of the poor being that Majara anticipates has likely been infected by the parasite.
She acknowledges the nod and indicates that as far as she can tell the door is free of danger.
She lowers the glowing sword, narrowing her eyes slightly.
"Heads up," she murmurs, whispering once more. "Not sure what exactly, or where exactly, but there's something evil lurking south of us."
Hannelia also acknowledges Emma's observation, mouthing "Thanks, Emma, in response. "That gives us two targets to find. I think let's start with the one through here?" She gestures towards the door. "Who wants to go first? Be ready as I'm pretty sure there's something nasty just through there." She glances at Emma, Constantine and Roger. All of them have shown their mettle plenty of times and demonstrated their willingness to lead from the front, though she does her best to keep her face neutral - and the lack of light surely helps - to hide her concern about where Constantine's head might currently be at.
The sudden turning of events is unnerving for everyone, but Constantine tries to focus on what's ahead.
"I'll remind you that corruption of body, soul, and mind by an evil external force is what turned Gellion into a threat against Saringallow."
"I'm aware," he projects. "And I do request a closer eye until this can be...figured out."
"How are you doing that?!" Hang on, you didn’t even realise you were."
Constantine shrugs, the gesture accompanied by the mental equivalent of a wordless shrug, felt as much as the up-and-down fluctuation of pitch as the emotion of exasperation.
"Can you control this? Are you able to speak… not into our heads?"
He gathers himself up, keen to try his tongue at the Common speech now and then while trying to figure out how far his newfound telepathy can take him. He opens his mouth to try and murmurs in Abyssal. Shaking his head, he broadcasts once more. "Not yet. But...well, I'll keep trying."
---
Constantine joins Majara's alarm at the sight of the cythnigot spores. "That might be one of the blights that killed the livestock," he posits. "And the cult members might be perpetuating it still."
The buzzing in his ears--real or imagined or worse--is too distracting for him to notice the chanting that Majara and Hannelia point out, but he trusts them even as he helps to sift through the various finds.
Majara's explanation of qlippoths draws a shiver from Constantine, but he nods. She had the exact right bit about it, and seems overall more knowledgeable than he was. Thankfully, it seemed that her knowledge was more academic. Good: keep it that way.
He draws out his trusty cold iron dagger as the gnome says that they would be destroying the spores. "On it." A vision flashes in Constantine's mind of thrusting the dagger into one of his friends. He shudders. Absolutely not. And he stabs the blade into the first of the four foul puffballs.
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Constantine's cold iron makes short work of the puffballs, dissolving them into useless mush with his knife.
You gather near the west door, Emma volunteers to be the one to open it without prodding or convincing. She knows there is evil on the other side and wants to be the first to battle.
The door pushes open easily enough, even if its age causes it to stick and creak a little. The light from the paladins blade and eyes fills the dank room.
This musty room is darker than the previous one. An unlit brass lantern hangs from a rusty nail on the northern wall. Dozens, no, hundreds of moths crawl throughout the ceiling's rotting rafters and on the moldering curtains of boarded windows, the disturbance of their movements causing eerie shadows to wiggle on every surface. Several of the moths lazily wander toward the light of Emma's sword, but otherwise most remain on the walls and ceiling. You wonder if you can hear the blade hum in the presence of evil, or if that's just a trick of the mind.
Old floorboards have been ripped up in the room's corner, allowing a flight of earthen steps to lead down into the ground. You can hear the chanting coming from down the stairs, but the words are hard to make out.
And in the middle of the room a pig lay in a pile of slop feed and grain. It doesn't seem to be breathing. It's hard to tell when it died without further inspection. It is covered in mud, not unusual for a living pig. But the corners of its eyes and mouth and its hooves seem to have something strange about them.
The spur-like growths on the pig’s snout, mouth, eyes, and hooves are fungal in nature.
You only have a moment before you realize the skin and flesh of the creature beneath are wriggling in response to the light. The fungal growths seem to crystalize or harden. And its eyes flash open to reveal empty voids. Three plant-like stalks burst out of the creature's back, ending in toothy maws!
As Emma swings open the door, Hannelia is able to look past her at what seems to be a literal curtain of moths. Hundreds of the creatures line the walls and ceiling. In response to the presence of so many insects she once more pulls up her scarf to cover the lower half of her face. Her eyes dart around the room, picking out a flight of steps hewn out of the ground leading down beneath the floor.
The chanting she had heard from the other side of the door seems to be emanating from down there, though she still can't pick up on what the words are. Perhaps they're in another language, she thinks, shame I don't have another spell scroll. Or perhaps they're not even words at all, just sounds.
Hannelia stops trying to listen and refocuses. The crawling moths and the hushed chant were enough to distract anyone's attention, though the sight in the middle of the room was unpleasant enough that it would require wilful blindness not to draw the eye. Her gaze is met by the corpse of a pig, festering in a pool of feed and who knows what else. In the dim light, she steps into the room to take a closer look as something about it seems unnatural.
There is a strong odour as she approaches, gagging and glad of the filter scarf at least somewhat protecting her nose. Hannelia dreads to think how badly the room must smell without it. She wasn't wrong though - the growths that her sharp eyes had spotted on the unfortunate creature's face and hooves seem to be some kind of fungus.
"I think we might have found what happened to your missing qlippoth spore, Majara," she says, gesturing at the unnatural growths covering its trotters. Barely have the words left her mouth before the pig's eyes snap open to reveal an empty stare and vine-like tentacles burst through the creature's flesh. Following Constantine's decision to use cold iron when destroying the spores, she whips out an arrow tipped in the same metal and fires it at what once had been a pig.
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"That there pig's not quite dead yet, give it some cold iron!"
Constantine tries desperately to separate his senses. His perception had long since bled from this realm to the next, catching the imprints from others separated by either space or time. Sometimes it had come aurally, others visually. His other senses had been involved from time to time, but sight and sound were the dominant conveyors of the sense beyond sense.
But the visions weren't usually constant.
Was the buzz he was hearing entirely false, or were there other animals making the sounds that others could hear? Perhaps it was both the buzzers here and those waiting on the ethereal plane or lurking in Abyssal tendrils. And the whispers? Were they from previous victims and villains, or verifiable current villagers?
"Life -for d-... stren- -for weakn... "
"Does anyone else hear that? It sounds almost familiar..."
He's far too focused on the distant sounds to pay much attention to the smells and sights before him. He jumps at Hannelia's sudden arrow shot.
Even though she ends up leading the way through the door, Emma is nevertheless caught off guard when Hannelia suddenly shoots at what she had assumed were the grotesque remains of a pig. When said remains begin to move about, Emma's nose wrinkles in disgust, and she takes a step back, readying her new weapon for use.
As always, Roger manages to expertly sum up the situation with his observation regarding the pig.
Head cocked to the sounds of the chanting, her brow furrowed as she tries to ascertain the words, Majara is slower to respond to the pig situation. She blinks as Hannelia lets loose with an arrow and Roger moves into the fray....
Hannelia's arrow pierces the pig's hide, leaving a smoking wound.
The pig squeals hideously, as if a chorus of voices erupt from the plant mouths as well as the pig's mouth. It shudders horrifically like some facsimile of a dog shaking itself dry. An equally grotesque smell follows. The creature's terrible countenance makes you feel as if you might lose your breakfast.
"Oh get stuck you old squealer!" Roger ignores the screeching pig and attempts to impale it on his Cold Iron polearm, but fumbles it in the enclosed space.
Majara is no stranger to either horrific sights or accursed smells, yet all the same, she gags a little at the qlippoth's appearance. Moving in, she realizes quickly there are few places to stand in the room that lend themselves well to throwing bombs. Instead, she works to distract the creature and let one of the others do a good job putting it out of its unholy existence.
The possessed animal squeals like, well, a stuck pig as Hannelia's arrow impales its flank. As it shudders horribly, the vision reinforced by a similarly foul smell, Hannelia swallows hard but remains relatively unperturbed.
This time she isn't forced to be so reactive and lines up another arrow, targeting where she expects the pig's heart to be. She's unsure whether the qlippoth functions like a normal creature but figures that it must have a life source somewhere. She is also able to get off a prayer to Desna to put the miserable creature out of its existence. Hannelia's second arrow flies with deadly accuracy and hits the unholy beast exactly where she wanted to.
Roger closes on the cythnigot, but he's unable to get a clean hit on the beast.
Majara moves to flank the demon-infested livestock...
And narrowly avoids its many snapping jaws.
As Majara distracts the creature, Hannelia lines up her shot and manages to hit it deep through its left eye. It makes a terrible wheezing sound in response, but it still tracks Majara as she weaves to the other side of it, half a moment away from pouncing on her.
A sense of revulsion washes through Emma at the sight of the creature, and her stomach churns slightly, but she's able to get a grip on herself quickly.
Brandishing her newly acquired sword, still glowing with the soft golden light, Emma steps around Roger to strike out at the creature before it can try to attack anyone else.
The light of Emma's sword cleaves through pig flesh and plant matter. Though it is bright steel and not cold iron, Emma's strength and effort are enough to cut through the demon's tough skin. The squealing cythnigot falls just as quickly as it arose, it's host's blood slowly overtaking the rotting floorboards. No final words.
Moths continue to flutter about Emma and her new sword, dappling light and shadow across the walls and floor.
And while it's not quite silent, the lack of noise is palpable. You can hear naught but the buzzing of insects.
"Efficiently done," Majara murmurs with a single nod at her traveling companions. She pauses, then cocks her head to the side. "-- I don't hear the chanting now. This... was the source? Hrmn."
She pokes lightly at the disfigured pig innards with her dagger, curiosity still her strongest drive. She'd almost considered saving one of the spores... for study.... but Gellion's recent troubles had stayed her tongue. Perhaps if she'd been here alone. But it was easy to imagine this group would be quick to draw parallels between her and Gellion.
But this is better! Not just a spore but an actual cythnigot, emerged. Dead, now, which is the preferred form for study and dissection... and there's the mushrooms she hadn't identified back in the other room... Majara looks rather pleased with the day (it's improved so much from the recent near-brush with lynching!) as she pushes around flaps of porcine skin with the tip of her blade, examining the fungal tendrils that have obscenely entwined with the base flesh.
"Pig hearts and human hearts are quite similar," she observes aloud, then pauses, and looks up with a frown. "Oh, you're going to want to go find that other 'evil' source, aren't you? I suppose this can wait."
Constantine's heart skips several beats as he watches the cythnigot emerge. As if from a chrysalis, unfolding anew into the world transformed. And how wonderful it would be as its ichor flooded the...
The cold iron dagger quivers in his hand as Hannelia sinks an arrow deep into the pig and Emma finishes it off. "Majara," he says, continuing in an emotionless Taldane. "Do you want it or can I--" He doesn't take his eyes off the foul creature as he makes a slow, deliberate stabbing motion with the dagger.
"Whoever was chanting might have heard us," he adds telepathically, the rational part of his mind still working somewhere in there.
"Right, lead the way Emma, let's follow the evil!" Roger figures if they're aiming to hunt down evil specifically, then Emma's skills as a tracker surpass his own for this case.
Majara glances up at Constantine when he speaks in Taldane, giving him a squint-eyed look from where she is busy poking around near the thing's heart. She pauses a moment, studying him, then says quietly, "It's dead enough, but you'll guarantee certainty on the matter better than me. More strength to your swings."
She wipes her dagger's tip off against the piggoth's leathery hide, then stands up again.
"And yes. They might have heard us and silenced in response. Down the stairs, I think. Active trouble should be dealt with actively. Lead on, Miss Blackford."
Constantine nods, his eyes still on the piggoth, as he strides forward and kneels beside it. He changes his grip on the hilt of his cold iron dagger and drags it across the creature's throat the way a farmer would do.
"B e t t e r s a f e t h a n s o r r y," he intones as he finishes the job and watches the ichor pool out more. Now there was no chance it would come back to life when Majara harvested it.
He looks up, an almost beatific smile on his face. "T o t h e d e p t h s."
More than satisfied with her skewering shot, Hannelia has the opportunity to relax as first Emma puts the pig-beast down again and then Constantine ensure it won't be getting back up again.
She can see both sides but would prefer to go down the stairs first, partly to do things in the correct order and partly because she doesn't like the idea of anything sneaking up behind them. "Agreed, Majara. Carefully, for it may well be aware of our presence now." Hannelia looks around again at the coating of moths on the walls, their sheer numbers overwhelming but they don't seem to have been particularly concerned by the brief combat.
She keeps her bow out and mentally runs through her magics in case it should prove to be a situation where they can be applied. With Emma's sword radiating light, there is less immediate need for her conjure forth her glowing spheres. "Ready when you are," she says, her slight smile a grim reflection of the one on Constantine's face.
To the depths you go.
”Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.” you hear a quiet prayer. As your boots descend into this earth basement, he stops. The same voice coughs, an older man’s, ”Heathens.” there is no force behind the words, though an attempt was made. Emma’s blade and eyes fill the room with light. The man croaks, ”Are you finally here to kill me? Hah! I welcome-” he squints his eyes, then gasps and shudders in pure shock as he sees you.
He begins whimpering and shaking, but no tears well in his eyes. There probably isn’t enough moisture in his emaciated body. The figure before you is chained to the east wall by his feet and his one remaining hand. The other arm, his sword arm, ends in a dirty bandage covering a stump. His skin is ashen and taught against his bones, though his hair and beard are still an unmistakably ruddy red color, peppered with gray by age and stress.
The walls of this low-ceilinged basement are decorated by curtains made of a mix of thick sheets of webs adorned with countless dead insects. Most of these are flies and mosquitoes, some of which are quite large. At the far corner of the room sits a low wooden table upon which a hideous figure crouches - a human-sized effigy of an insectile monster made from corn husks, dry branches, rags, and bones. There appears to be a stash of things beneath the table. The floor is an uneven layer of moist soil, and three shovels, their spades caked with earth, lean against the side of the stairs.
Elias Kyle’s voice quakes and he cries, squinting at Emma’s blazing light, ”A-are you she? I don- I'm... unworthy.” he kneels in reverence as best he can, eyes downcast. His balance is precarious. When he raises his eyes a look of confusion appears on his face. Then hatred. Then resignation. His eyes are fixed upon Majara, you realize. He laughs in a coughing fit and ruefully and looks up at the ceiling. ”Oh Inheritor, truly I deserve this.” He looks at Emma apologetically, I-I don't mean to take the Lady's name in vain. If you'll have me, I'll do what I can to help. I can't see very well and I'm weak, but I have not Betrayed my Heart." He glances at Majara, Not again.
The crude effigy is meant to be a representation of Ghlaunder, the god of parasites.
The uneven earth is covering something beneath the floor. Though there is a fetid smell coming from the man in front of you, rot permeates the room, and is strongest in the center where there is an uneven lump.
A dozen cult robes and masks in the shape of mosquito heads. Closer inspection to the effigy reveals there has been blood splashed with blood.
The buzzing, the buzzing, the buzzing...
Elias!
The buzzing, the buzzing, the buzzing...
The emotional part of Constantine's brain wants to celebrate the discovery of Elias Kyle alive, even in horrendous shape. The rational part is so caught up in the sights and smells and sounds and whether they are real or not that he stands on the steps and just points at the lump of earth before the tortured man. "The rot," he pronounces, "comes from there."
The buzzing, the buzzing, the buzzing...
Welcome, Gossamer--No!
Majara is.... distracted. She stops as the speaker comes into view, eyes widening, an unaccustomed look of blank surprise on her features.
...she really hadn't thought he'd still be alive. Not after finding the sword.
Neither his words nor his look are lost on her but after her moment's shock has passed Majara wordlessly hurries forward, her eyes darting to the manacles and to the bloodied stump. That is going to be infected...
"Hannelia. I've some skill with locks but my tools are on my mule. Do you--?"
The hoarse, whispered, not this time earns a sharp sidelong glance from Majara at Elias's ragged countenance. Majara bites her lower lip a moment, uncertainty as rare a look on her face as startlement. She hesitates as if hunting words that don't come naturally to her.
"Elias. You-- it will be set right."
"Rot comes from there- Aye! Got it! You help the guy, I'll stab!" Roger's reaction to the situation is to immediately stab the lump of earth with his cold iron polearm.
As she follows the others down the stairs the stench of filth and decay grows stronger in spite of the scarf Hannelia has not removed from her face. She catches the words, soft in tone yet harsh in meaning and follows the sound to the fragile remains - it could barely be called a body - of a man chained to the wall. Filthy and sucked dry as he is, the words clearly demonstrate that he is still just about alive, though he scarcely expects to survive much longer.
While she is scrutinising him, potentially matching the description of Elias Kyle with the pitiful creature in front of her, Majara confirms that it is indeed their missing man. Truth be told, Hannelia wasn't sure they were going to find him, even less that he would be alive. She lets out an unexpectedly colourful oath, one that she realises she must have picked up from Roger, and blushes slightly.
"Yes," she replies, stirring into action. "Yes, of course." Slipping off her pack she retrieves her tools and approaches the chained figure slowly. Ignoring the funk of the man - it is hardly his fault, after all - she says gently "Shh, let's get you down from there." Before she starts to work, she shoots a glance at the others. With Roger and Constantine occupied by the apparent source of the rot, she calls to Emma, "Could you help support Mr Kyle and stop him falling as I work please?"
So saying, Hannelia undoes her hair and regathers it back into a tail. Then she examines the lock before selecting a lockpick from a set of half a dozen and inserts it gently into the mechanism.
"Oh," C̷͖̮̲̻̖̺̄̆͊̅͒̿ȍ̸̡̬̬̩̼́͑͒̏̽̀̑͛̅ͅn̵̬̪͑̇́͂̍̉͌s̷̢̛̫̩̪̅̆̓́͘t̶̩͔̭̟̦̭̲̟͐̃́̓̑͝ͅa̵͗ ̧̫̯̦͖̬͓̥̘̩̇́͑͂̃̓͑̔̀̊͐̚ͅͅņ̸͙͉̥͚̹̙̅̉̂͒̈́̑̐̇̈̍͝͠t̴̞͉̉̇͂̍̒i̴͓̗͇͔̦̤͎̠̯͓͗̓̊̋͑̇n̴̄ ̬̬̥̬̥̮̲̯͕̙͛̊̔ḙ̵̳̰̪͓̲͙̃̽̑͋́̆͂̋̋̆͘͠ says, sheathing his sword and coming up towards H̷̟͉̦̜̩͖͚̣̞̞͚̥̋͜͜ǎ̵̡̙̤̞̹̬͎̯̜͓̪͖̺̺n̸͔͉̿̆̐͊̀͗͛̂̕n̸̡̧̺̲̠͒́̈́ë̶̠̝̟͇͚̖̱͆͜l̷͗̓̆͊ ͔͚̹̪͔̤̳͈̤̬̹͗̄̋̉̅̍̂ͅī̸̟̯̼̗͓͖͉͖̣͙̗̽̉à̴̢̡̡̺̪͚̭͗͌̽̀͌͊̿͠. Sorry. Of course. Focus. Try. "I can help, too."
C̷͖̮̲̻̖̺̄̆͊̅͒̿ȍ̸̡̬̬̩̼́͑͒̏̽̀̑͛̅ͅn̵̬̪͑̇́͂̍̉͌s̷̢̛̫̩̪̅̆̓́͘t̶̩͔̭̟̦̭̲̟͐̃́̓̑͝ͅa̵͗ ̧̫̯̦͖̬͓̥̘̩̇́͑͂̃̓͑̔̀̊͐̚ͅͅņ̸͙͉̥͚̹̙̅̉̂͒̈́̑̐̇̈̍͝͠t̴̞͉̉̇͂̍̒i̴͓̗͇͔̦̤͎̠̯͓͗̓̊̋͑̇n̴̄ ̬̬̥̬̥̮̲̯͕̙͛̊̔ḙ̵̳̰̪͓̲͙̃̽̑͋́̆͂̋̋̆͘͠ tries to catch the man's eyes to see if he knew what he knew.
Which he?
Yes.
I could hypnotize him. Convince him he's not in pain. Would that work?
You can't just scramble someone's brains against their will, especially when you're losing it, C̵̡̬̲̓́̆̅ô̵̡̫̘͈͉̱͑̈́̓̀̏͆̚n̸̗͚̣̫̲̤͐̋̚n̷̳͖̣͊̽͗͛̈́̑̄͑̂͑̀̚̚͝ì̴̧̱͇̺̹̀̆͐̀͊̀̓͌́͘͝͝ ̫ě̸̢̩̟̼̰͉̪̖̯̺͜.
I'm not losing it.
Yes I am.
The buzzing, the buzzing, the buzzing.
C̷͖̮̲̻̖̺̄̆͊̅͒̿ȍ̸̡̬̬̩̼́͑͒̏̽̀̑͛̅ͅn̵̬̪͑̇́͂̍̉͌s̷̢̛̫̩̪̅̆̓́͘t̶̩͔̭̟̦̭̲̟͐̃́̓̑͝ͅa̵͗ ̧̫̯̦͖̬͓̥̘̩̇́͑͂̃̓͑̔̀̊͐̚ͅͅņ̸͙͉̥͚̹̙̅̉̂͒̈́̑̐̇̈̍͝͠t̴̞͉̉̇͂̍̒i̴͓̗͇͔̦̤͎̠̯͓͗̓̊̋͑̇n̴̄ ̬̬̥̬̥̮̲̯͕̙͛̊̔ḙ̵̳̰̪͓̲͙̃̽̑͋́̆͂̋̋̆͘͠ helps to support Ę̸̫̯͎̰̺̯̞̣̳̈̈́̎̍͠͠l̷̲̬̪͔̦̯̽̓i̵̢̨̢̧̧̗͚͎̪̮̯̞̯͗͑̀̐̂̓̓͑̈́̑̕͜͠ȃ̴͙͉͚̇̊̓̊̀̈́͛s̵̈́̈̍͠ ̨̡̛̝̞͊͗̀̑͊͗̅̋̚͠ ̸̡̨̪̟̻͈̯̬͖̯̹̳͂͂̔̔̇͠Ķ̵̨̨̣̼͕̹̻̱͖̲͖̟͆̊͂̀ͅy̶̩̅͒̏̋̽́̈́͘l̵̡̼̣̗̥̞̺͙͍͙̆́̂͒̌̏́͊́̈́̍͝͝ ̠e̶̢̧̺͍̞̭͓͕͎̬̣͚̰̟͂̆͆̈́̊̽͛͗͗̕͜͝͠ while H̷̟͉̦̜̩͖͚̣̞̞͚̥̋͜͜ǎ̵̡̙̤̞̹̬͎̯̜͓̪͖̺̺n̸͔͉̿̆̐͊̀͗͛̂̕n̸̡̧̺̲̠͒́̈́ë̶̠̝̟͇͚̖̱͆͜l̷͗̓̆͊ ͔͚̹̪͔̤̳͈̤̬̹͗̄̋̉̅̍̂ͅī̸̟̯̼̗͓͖͉͖̣͙̗̽̉à̴̢̡̡̺̪͚̭͗͌̽̀͌͊̿͠ works and his inner world deteriorates.
"Thank you, Constantine," Hannelia replies as the occultist wraps an arm around Elias' waist. Her friend doesn't look as obviously strong as, say, Roger, whose corded muscles would be the envy of most folk a decade or two younger. Constantine's strength is less showy but his arms look almost comically large in relation to the emaciated man's torso. It's a sobering image but in theory with time there's no reason why his body shouldn't recover. The more concerning thought is about what damage may have been done to his mind and to what extent that may be repairable.
She wriggles the lockpick and pauses a second, hoping to hear the subtle click of cylinders moving. Glancing at Constantine as she does so, she hopes that his mind, too, is where it needs to be right now. The exact nature of the religious trappings in the room are lost on her but given Constantine's fit by the pond in response to the touch of a deity, Hannelia worries that being in the presence of such unholiness may be pressing in on him once more. Still, she needs all of her concentration right now and can't get an easy read on him.
"Is anyone backing up Roger?" she asks. "Just in case."
”Oh Inheritor, truly I deserve this.” He looks at Emma apologetically, "I-I don't mean to take the Lady's name in vain. If you'll have me, I'll do what I can to help. I can't see very well and I'm weak, but I have not Betrayed my Heart." He glances at Majara, "Not again."
Emma stares at the battered man, feeling a wave of sympathy wash through her at the sight of him. It's obvious that Elias has been through quite the ordeal. "No apologies necessary, Mister Kyle." She lowers her - well, Elias's sword, really - a bit, and looks at the man in the dim lighting. "I'm glad we found you."
She can tell that Majara is a bit thrown by the appearance of the man as well - it had been obvious that Majara had been operating under the assumption that Elias Kyle was dead.
A part of Emma wants to thrust the sword at Elias and apologize, but she holds off the urge for now - given his current state, it would be better served in her hands for the time being, though, as she had promised to the others earlier, she will happily hand it back to it's rightful owner once he's better off. Focused on her own thoughts, she misses Hannelia's call for help, but Constantine steps up and helps out - though she frowns a bit as she looks at him. No pings of evil from him, but it's obvious that he's not back to his full strength or mind just yet.
"Is anyone backing up Roger?" Hannelia asks. "Just in case."
Emma nods swiftly. "Oh, of course," she says. She walks over to where Roger is, and positions herself near him, readying for whatever may happen to pop out at them. Given their luck, it seems likely that something will try to do so. "I'm with you, Roger."
"Elias. You-- it will be set right."
"Will it? You always did seem too sure of yourself, Majara." He challenges, tilting his head. He shakes his head and amends, "I'm sorry. Thank you. For finding me."
Emma stares at the battered man, feeling a wave of sympathy wash through her at the sight of him. It's obvious that Elias has been through quite the ordeal. "No apologies necessary, Mister Kyle." She lowers her - well, Elias's sword, really - a bit, and looks at the man in the dim lighting. "I'm glad we found you."
"As am I. " he replies. "How did you find me? Jeminda sent you? he chuckles a bit, but even that seems to bring him pain.
Roger's polearm passes into earth easily. The blade finds something hard inside. Sifting some dirt aside, you quickly realize there is a body beneath. The blade had struck bone.
"They buried him here. Shallow grave. The last one." Elias explains.
He shows you his neck and arms. There are several blooding wounds marking his body. He continues, "They've been draining my blood. Milking it slowly. Some demonic ritual. The last poor soul they had in here they dragged up and killed right after they chained me up. They brought him back and buried him. I think there are more bodies too."
Sure enough, you push aside the dirt and there are multiple bodies in various states of decay. The most recent of which seems to have been slashed open at the belly and stuffed with corn cobs. Some sort of ritual killing?
"They took my hand," he gives another pained laugh, but beaming, "because I killed a few of them. One of them turned out to be some sort of bodysnatcher. It turned back to its true form when I killed it. Slippery bugger though. Strong too."
"Probably could've gotten away if I hadn't been drinking so much." he smiles. "Took that creepy Kreigler's liquor cabinet. Had I known what he was, I would have done more, but I had to be satisfied knowing that I had inconvenienced him."
"Elias. You-- it will be set right.""Will it? You always did seem too sure of yourself, Majara." He challenges, tilting his head. He shakes his head and amends, "I'm sorry. Thank you. For finding me."
Majara opens her mouth as if to argue about which of the two of them has seemed more sure of their acts.... but thinks the better of it, apparently, and closes it again, crouching to look at Elias's mangled hand swathed in the filthy bandages. "I need to disinfect this. Does anyone have clean water with them? Or alcohol? And yes. Jeminda asked I look for you."
Majara's fingers are careful as she tries to pull the dirty cloth with a minimum of further trauma to the flesh beneath. "A shape-shifter. Yes. We surmised such after finding possible progeny outside. Kriegler? The mayor, you mean? I thought something was off about his story. Do you mean he's a shape-shifter, too?"
She leaves the body-uncovering to the others, busy working on Elias's wound.
He groans as you clean his wound. "No. I don't think so. Ach!"
"He leads this cult to worship this thing. " he points at the effigy of Glhaunder, "I don't think all of them know though. They waited until I was outside the town to ambush me. His 'brother' though... he's one of them. He transformed when I killed the other one. It was posing as some sort of druidic advisor."
"Hell's teeth, couldn't be nice simple demon goop what balks at cold iron like before." Roger grimaces at the grim work with bodies.
As she hears the anticipated clicks, Hannelia is able to gently remove the manacle around Elias Kyle's intact wrist and braces to support the man. Gods, he really is little more than flesh and bone, she thinks, finding herself able to do so with ease. She lets Constantine take over, a second pair of hands necessary in order to allow her to work on the locks around the man's feet. They are worn and rusty but with a liberal dash of oil she is able to get the mechanisms to work and release the man's remaining limbs. She helps to lower him slowly down to the ground, laying him down as she doubts he is able to stand.
From her pack she unties the waterskin attached to the side and pushes it to the man's lips. "Take small sips," she says, tipping it so gravity does most of the work. "We'll give you more in a bit but too much at once will probably make you sick." Majara moves in to try and apply aid so Hannelia steps back to give her room to work. "Not beyond what's in my waterskin," she replies, though you are welcome to that if it's sufficient for your purposes,"[/b] laying it down it next to Elias. "And I'll apply magical aid whenever you're satisfied or you think will be most beneficial to him."
At Elias' croaked words, Hannelia slots another couple of pieces into place. "So the mayor is the main source of power, a dark reflection of his official position. And his brother is the faceless stalker we are looking for. That's a formidable pairing." She muses, considering their next moves. "If the whole of Ravenmoor is not in on it then that is at least a relief. Although we're no better off than we were in that without some kind of overwhelming evidence we're really up against it speaking out against the village's authority figure."
She looks over to where Roger and Emma have uncovered a number of bodies, unpleasant work but she mucks in as well until such time as her magical healing is required. As she helps the pirate lift out a heavily decomposed corpse, she asks Elias, "Do you have any idea how many might be in this cult? I'm guessing quite a few given the numbers they were able to muster against you? Also," she continues, "we encountered some kind of giant spider-like creature that was in league with the cultists. I don't suppose you know anything about that? It has access to some magic and was able to flee before we could take it down."
Body snatchers. Faceless stalkers. Human sacrifice. Creepy Ḱ̸̗͓̳r̶̳̓̀̾i̸̱͋̄ȩ̸̙̈́̎̎g̶͖̓̌͠l̷̙͍̔͋e̵͔̾̆̏r̶͙̱̆.
C̶̮͗͑ơ̴͉͑n̸̝̫̉̚s̷̥̮̹̏̆̉t̸̨̏̏͝a̷̢̤͐n̶̲͌t̷̟̣͍̆i̴͉̼̓n̵̗̈́e̷̻̓ͅ shakes his head as M̸̗̫̀̃̔a̷͍͂͂̚j̴͕̐a̷͖̰̩͑r̷̟̂̒̚à̶̛͕͖ asks if he has water or alcohol. The waterskin, though...which H̵̭͝a̴͉͂͑̊ṇ̸̙̌͛n̴̖̿̉è̸̟͙̜l̸̹̆ì̶̝a̷̮̯̋̒͠ was already on.
"I have a curative potion," he offers, reaching for it along with his full waterskin and setting them to the side before he goes back to help R̵͓͙͕̈́ỏ̶̙͘ǧ̴͖̞̰̓̍ę̵͇͛̀r̷̤̈͗ some more.
When H̵̭͝a̴͉͂͑̊ṇ̸̙̌͛n̴̖̿̉è̸̟͙̜l̸̹̆ì̶̝a̷̮̯̋̒͠ talks about the spider creature, C̶̮͗͑ơ̴͉͑n̸̝̫̉̚s̷̥̮̹̏̆̉t̸̨̏̏͝a̷̢̤͐n̶̲͌t̷̟̣͍̆i̴͉̼̓n̵̗̈́e̷̻̓ͅ looks up from yet another decayed face in the ground. Were the faces crying? Screaming? Or was that all in his head? "I could kill the spider," he says, calmly. "To save the butterflies."