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As you take the boots off you realize these things probably do not leave much impression in the ground but are still very cumbersome in these parts and makes no sense why they would be wearing them. The lead guy just shakes his head but doesn't do anything to stop you.
The two men look to Landolf. "We best just get out of here who knows if there is another one of those things lurking about."
Hershel and Landolf you realize after the battle is over and you get a really good look at the beast that the foot tracks you were following and the beasts do not match up. The tracks you were following were three toes this creature has four. You also notice that these men have their feed swaddled in sodden fur wrappings which seems very encumbering out here. The other man appears to be dead from the blow...
I will be going on vacation this weekend and will be gone for a week without any internet access so after friday will be a little hiatus guys.
"We came out of Grausee just this morning, looking to trap some eels in the ‘schlamm. I was told tales of a great beast within the swamp from when I was on my Nanna’s knee, but never once thought there’d be so much as a shred of truth to them. Shallya’s blessings be upon you for your help!"
Alberich, Hershel and Thilo are also able to avoid any serious impact from the creatures whip and strike back! vs 25
All 3 of you strike true! The creature wails, turns and flops over to it's side and lets out a loud sigh and as it twitches a few more times and then finally stops moving! 2 of the 3 guys gets up from the attack rubbing their aches. "That was close! Thank you for the assist friends!
Landolf is struck hard by the tail taking 11 damage as he falls to the ground groaning! Alex is able to bat the tail away just in time before it crushes her like a bug!
Thilo, I believe you were the one who make the original perception check when you entered the camp as well recognize one of the 3 men running from the beast as your allies charge it and also notice they drop something as they are running away. vs 25
Alex rushes in with her comrades and deals a devastating blow to the creature and it howls in pain with an ear piercing shriek! Thilo must of lost his footing or something running toward the beast and swing goes wide. The 3 men see you attacking and wounding the beast badly gather their wits and guts and charge in as well to assist doing a little damage to the fould creature.
The creature whips it's tail around trying to strike as many of you as possible feeling the stink of all your weapons! vs 25
vs 35 The 3 men who were running away get whacked by the tail falling to the ground but don't look to be completely out of it yet...
Hershel strikes true cutting deep into this found creature!
Landolf spring forward assisting his new ally Hershel in pursuit of glory!
The son of the one famous knight springs forward like he was born for this bearing down on the creature with such grace assisting his ally!
The beast looks VERY hurt. Alex are you going to assist your allies?
Round 1!
vs 25
Your group starts to take a breather due to the exhausting hike through the area when there are sudden shouts of alarm close by. Through the gathering mists you can see the indistinct shapes of three figures running in your direction, fleeing from a much larger looming shape. Ahead, the trees thin out around the banks of a large and muddy tarn. There are three foragers by the mountain lakeside, pulling themselves through the mud in a blind panic, dropping their packs and staffs as they attempt to flee the foul monstrosity that stalks them. The creature is massive, nearly 20 feet in length, towering head and shoulders above the foragers. It moves itself forward on 8 filthy legs and gapes open it's cavernous mouth. The creature is clearly ancient and ailing, its palsied movements unsteady and arrhythmic. Many of it's teeth are broken or missing and its pale-green skin hangs in great sagging folds against its scaly withered frame. It squints and snuffles as it moves through the mist, its beady eyes clouded with thick cataracts. Still it's a fearsome sight, for while the beast may be well past its prime a blow from its shaking claws will rip a person in two.
The prints wend their way through honeycombed workings of turfcutters, their spades having dug deep channels through the heathery levels of the land that overflow with a clinging brown mist. The ground is treacherous underfoot — it’s rarely visible through the miasma that hides soft, black, sucking mud. Soon you find themselves skipping between small islands rising above the fog — solid ground with crusts where the sun has baked the peat hard, or mounds where straggly lengths of tough brown bog grass grow. As you progress, the path becomes more overgrown. The unfenced country plays host to stands of tall pale birch, bedecked with stiff, thin branches that whip to and fro as you pass, and that crowd above, blocking what little light remains of the day. Slowly, the land begins to rise, and walking uphill through the boggy landscape is tough going.
Hershel you determine that there is something unnatural about the tracks. The tracks appear deliberate — both heavier and lighter than a normal walking creature would leave, suggesting trickery...
Your merry band of adventures heads out to slay the beast! You cross the river and easily find the tracks the beast left.
Stiegler looks to Landolf and then back to the Thulgrim. "Find Dwarf, you hold onto the key for now until we get things settled with Reuter's family." Thulgrim takes the key and puts it into a pouch on his belt. "Well manlings, there may be some swords in the camp near my cabin. You should get what you need and find this beast if you wish to earn those coints from Stiegler."
When Alberich holds up the key Thulgrim snaps in! "Actually, I think I better hold on to the key. This is a joint operation, after all. I doubt the Reuter’s would be happy with their investment solely in the hands of an outsider. I know how it would make me feel if I saw someone else with my money." Thulgrim gives Stiegler a knowing, hateful look, though she appears not to notice or care. "And what authority, what claim, do you have over the matter, Dwarf? None! Until the Reuters send someone to replace their dear departed Rutger, I’m the only one in charge here!"
Thulgrim and Stiegler arrive at the scene after the Strigany notify them. Stiegler regards the body of Reuter with undisguised contempt. "So now the dotard gets himself killed! I suppose I’m going to have to explain this to his parents, as if he hadn’t already caused me enough problems!" Thulgrim grumbles. "Show a little bloody respect for the dead, damn you." "Respect? What we need here is justice!" Stiegler fishes a heavy purse from her belt. "Ten gold crowns to the brave souls who bring me the head of the monster responsible for this!" She waves the purse in the air. "Ten gold crowns!" She then steps towards the body. "I’ll reimburse myself from the funds, where’s that key?"
Your group as well as some Strigany begin to look around the camp for the missing Reuter.. A younter Strigany begins to yell by the riverbank near a stand of bulrush, the dense, tall stalks waving in the breeze. You make your way over there and you see the body of Rutger Reuter. His corpse is a shocking sight. He is dressed in a white, linen smock drenched through with blood. His right arm is missing. The torn flesh at his shoulder speaks of many sharp and savage incisions. His face, for all the violence wrought upon him, is strangely serene, eyes closed, mouth slightly agape. Large, three-toed footprints can be seen stamped into the mud around the banks. Trails of mist still cling to his cold body, coiling around his arm and legs like wispy tentacles. The Strigany begin muttering to one another in tones of panic. Reiko says to the group "It is true that this place is cursed! The great beast of the Ortschlamm is here!" He gesture to the swamps that lie on the far side of the river. "It has come for blood just as Madam Vadoma said it would! The time to leave has come." At his words, the other Strigany make signs against evil. Some murmur their assent and head for their wagons. Looking at his corpse you see the key to the chest is still around his neck.
Your party heads back to the camp, the strigany are impressed by your work taking down the stones. They offer you all peppery meat stew, which looks MUCH better than what Thulgrim was going to provide you. The mood in the camp seems much lighter. After everyone is done eating the Strigany build a blazing fire and take to song and dance. Reiko comes over to your group and asks you to join them in their fun. If you choose to join them you dance, laugh and have a bit of fun and night quickly approaches. As the light of day begins to fade, Thulgrim will approach "I need Reuter to open the chest of funds in order to pay you but I can't seem to find the manling."
Thulgrim shrugs. "Maybe some old hag who was worshiped as a god buried here long before any of us were a glint in our parents eyes manling. Probably nothing to be worried about."
Thulgrim looks at the golden torcs. "I'll ensure you get 7 silver shillings per torc. Hand them over and head back to camp to eat it's already getting late."
Thulgrim strokes his beard. "I'll ensure your compensated. What did you find down there?"
Thulgrim hurries to the site and look down at what you have discovered. "Hey manling!" Looking at Thilo (who i'm assuming is pulling up the goods) "Any gold found down there belongs to the Reuter-Stiegler concern."
The digging takes some time but in the end it's fruitful as your shovels hit something hard. You find the grave from the depictions! The sarcophagus has flooded with stagnant water from the Grausee. All that remain are hanks of ancient cloth, hair, and a few bones. However, there are six golden torcs in the grave as well. Just as you uncover this Thulgrim makes his way toward your group since it took you so long and starts yelling. "What are you manlings doing! I told you to hurry and you were making a racket back here!"
It doesn't take long to drop the last large center stone and when it falls out of the earth you feel a strange sigh of relief... The fog seems to dissipate and you all just feel overall better unlike when you first entered the camp.
"Nonsense. Finish up and come back to camp for lunch." He scurries off back to the camp as fast as he comes out there.
You hear a familiar voice yell from down the path to the stones. "You manlings almost done down there! yells Thulgrim.
It's only about mid day when you get this far into your work surprisingly working well together. The mist around the stones seems to grow thicker as the day goes on and you linger wiping the sweat from your brows.
Thank the writer of the story not me! :)
As you continue to dig the images become more clear. The creatures are brutish to look upon. Savage and gigantic with bodies shaped like barrels. They have triangular heads within which are set large singular eyes. The creatures are shown living in crude towers built around the edge of a large lake. One of the creatures is much larger than the rest, and seems to feature prominently in the carvings. Judging from the creature’s pendulous breasts she is female. Whilst the other creatures are bald, her own hair hangs in long tatty braids. One scene depicts some sort of war party, raiding a village of small, round huts and carrying loot and prisoners away with them. To the far right of this image the bloated female is shown brandishing the heads of slain prisoners over the waters of the lake. Above the waters, an indistinct impression of a monstrous horned head can be discerned. The next row of images depict further raids and profane rites. A great beast — nearly four times the size of the other creatures — accompanies them, resembling a great lizard with four pairs of legs. Jagged, carved patterns like bolts of lightning emanate from its eyes, striking down hapless hut dwellers. The final row of images depict the death and burial of the bloated female. The one-eyed creatures are gathered about her body, clawing the sky with their outstretched arms. She is then interred in the ground beside a great lake. A tall obelisk is erected to mark the place. The outer rocks are much easier to topple and the final tall one remains...
None of you can really determine what the markings are or their origin. Does your group continue to dig the stones out as requested by Thulgrim? Seems like general hard labor based on what you are seeing being required to get them out.
Some of you begin digging around the big one some question if this should really be done but you do notice as you dig around the big stone that the carvings towards the base of the stone have not been chipped away. As you scrape more earth away from the base of the stone, decorations are revealed. It seems that once the stone bore extensive inscriptions that chronicled a history of strange creatures, but that in the ages since the stone was carved some effort has gone into destroying any evidence of their existence or activities.
You gather up some tools and head down the trail toward the oghams. The oghams are part of a wider megalithic complex that stretches across the meadow. There are six smaller stones arranged in an irregular circle around the main stone. The smaller stones are lumps of black Grey Mountain granite. Each is about four feet in height and covered in a thick growth of green shaggy lichen. I The centre stone is nearly nine-feet tall, shaped as a vaguely hexagonal column from dark-brown basalt. Not so much as a patina of algae grows on its surface, and no scuttling red mites make their home here. Of the centre oghams’s six sides one is wider than the others, and in the past it had been heavily decorated. A swirling pattern of interlacing lines runs around the edge of this facing, horizontal lines divide the interior design into many rows. Whatever was depicted in between these lines is impossible to tell for the rock has been chiselled away.
sorry for delay will post updates tonight! Been crazy at work with the whole Iran/US sanction crap.
You awaken all a bit shook by your restless night and still feel extremely tired. You see outside the Strigany workers bending their backs to muck out water-logged land, lashing scaffolds together haphazardly, and continuing the unskilled construction of the water mill. Thick fog covers the ground and fingers up through the trees, making everything damp and uncomfortable. Thulgrim approaches the group when you all awaken out of the tents handing you each a thin gruel of crushed barley. "As you may have guessed from last night, the pair in charge of this place don’t see eye to eye; they still can’t decide what to pay you for the salvage work you did yesterday. Bloody disgrace if you ask me, as it sounds like all the funds would be sat on the bottom of the river were it not for you. Anyway, one thing they certainly will pay you for is honest work, agreed to with an honest handshake. Stiegler told me to tell you to dig up the old ogham stones that are littered around the place. They’re a right nuisance, and the Strigany refuse to go anywhere near them — they say it’s taboo or some nonsense. A superstitious lot they are! If you could dig around the base of the stones and topple them, I reckon they won’t mind hauling them away. Get it done and there’s a shilling each in it for you a piece, and seven stones in total. And it’s me promising you that money — so you will get it, regardless of what Reuter may or may not owe you."
You awake with a sudden jolt, your heart hammering against your ribs. Your memories of the nightmare begin peeling away as soon as you awaken, but you remember a straw bed, fire consuming a hut, great claws grasping and binding you with twine. You recall the reflection of the Chaos Moon on the waters of the Grausee being consumed by a great and angry eye. Your back was pressed down on a stone slab. Then you remember nothing, save an intense anguish, a sense of having lost everything, forlorn, forever.
The Strigany are happy to accommodate your party by letting you stay in some of their tents due to the fact that you helped save Lady Vodoma. She is bed stricken and still a bit shaken up about the ordeal but overall well. Tired from a long exciting journal to the camp you all finally rest and dream...
With that you leave Stiegler to herself as she looks very exhausted and just wants to rest. The Dwarf grumbles off on his own toward his own tent grumbling about wanting to be left alone and find your own spot comments as he wanders off. Around the camp the Strigany workers are turning in for the night.
"Perhaps we started on the wrong foot here. If so, I ask for your forbearance. I’m not usually like this. Things have been… stressful recently. Let’s all try to get a decent night’s rest and in the morning we can work out a mutually agreeable arrangement, hmm? I assure you, whatever Reuter has promised you, I will double — and unlike him, my promises are always kept." She reaches into a pouch and pulls out 10 shillings for each of you. "For your work today. Rest for now and tomorrow morning you will be given tasks to help around the camp."
Hershel gets a good look at the man as he leaves. He is a rough looking fellow with a scarred face and lank black hair. He wears patched peasant garb in various shades of green and brown.
"Come with me manlings. We are going to see Stiegler. Bring the chest and will see about getting you what Reuter promised you." Reuter nods and heads off toward his tents looking really exhausted. Thulgrim is not a talkative Dwarf as you head toward Stiglers wagon however he does return Landolfs accusations about the operation. "The techniques I would employ had I a good Dwarf work throng would be solid as the Grey Mountains themselves, but things can only go so well with the dearth of talent and funding at my disposal. You think you can get better results from a gang of shiftless Manlings and two clueless squabbling idiots then, I tell you what, be my guest." As you approach the wagon a man is leaving the wagon.
Thulgrim climbs the steps to the door of the great wagon and knocks briskly. Faint sounds, shuffling and sighing, echo from within. Then steps, the sound of hard heels clacking on floorboards, before the door is prized open. Stiegler is a tall woman, dressed in finely tailored trousers and jerkin. Her hair hangs in lightly oiled, golden curls. Her mouth is a disapproving slash of red paint. Her glaring eyes are vibrant blue, bloodshot and rimmed with rubbed, red flesh. She does not talk so much as hiss through her clenched teeth. "I… was… hoping… to get… some sleep. Whatever it is you want, can it not wait until morning?" Thulgrim is completely unfazed by her discomfort. "Boat came a cropper. These folks helped with salvage. Reuter wants them compensated. Well compensated if possible." Stiegler rolls her eyes with a theatrical sigh. "As if my esteemed partner hadn’t already demonstrated his incompetence and profligacy! Dwarf, I already have a site rammed full of so-called assets that stubbornly fail to sweat for me! Bring that chest inside and set it on the floor, but I’ll not authorise the spending of a single brass penny until I see some progress!"
Landolf you get the impression the construction site is slapdash. The site is disorganized; scaffolding has been left in a precarious half-built state; initial excavations are too close to the river’s edge and have become waterlogged. The workers’ tools look cheap and building materials lie in haphazard piles of rope, wood, and brick. You see Reiko take the old lady Vadoma to one of the Strigany tents. As Reuter nears the camp his attitude of upbeat confidence vanishes and his smile slips. He points to the dwarf "Thulgrim, I say hello there, Thulgrim!" Thulgrim is a mature Dwarf with long black hair and a wide, bristly beard. He wears filthy overalls and puffs on a large brown pipe. His face darkens when he makes eye contact with Reuter. He clambers down from his perch to waddle over. Taking the pipe from between his teeth, he burps a gout of thick and tarry smoke directly in Reuter’s face. "Back so soon, Manling?" Reuter coughs. "Well, yes… ah… y’see… well, we had a bit of a… mishap… on the river. These kind people proved very useful in the event… I was hoping we could sort them out with a little compensation. Further, I have hired them to do some of the tasks around camp. You know the ones. The matters the Strigany are… well… reluctant to do." He fishes about inside his jerkin and removes a large brass key on a chain from around his neck. "Perhaps you could take the chest to Stiegler’s caravan and sort out some silver for them?" Thulgrim looks to Alex before responding to Reutger "I think not manling."
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