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"All the more reason to take the device as far away from here as possible," Sheila replies. "Besides," she continues, sneering at Filraen, "I do not trust him with it. Who knows what he really intends with all of Karzoug's relics. He continues to amass the deposed Runelord's allies..." she trails off, leaving her audience to infer her meaning.
Sheila considers for only a moment before responding, "The Society should collect this strange device the Denizens of Leng were manufacturing. Also, the artifacts that Karzoug wielded should be secured for study. I believe there was a glowing golden orb, and the gold-armored woman wielded a sentient sword? I'm sure Karzoug himself possessed other magical artifacts on his person."
"If we believe you are too great a risk to remain," Sheila replies, "What makes you think that we would allow you to leave at all?"
Sheila looks at Morgrym and Gabrielle, glancing back intermittently at Ceoptra. "I do not believe we should trust her; her appearance is too... easy? Too well timed. Besides that, what she said makes me uneasy - she would have gladly died for him while he was alive, but now her loyalty has magically evaporated in pragmatism? I cannot say that she is lying, but what she says sounds too convenient by half."
. "Should we expect the same loyalty Karzoug enjoyed, then?" Sheila asks. "To be betrayed at the first opportunity?" to remember titles of ancient Thassilon.
Sheila narrows her eyes. "Convenient how you pop out unbidden now, after Karzoug is defeated. Where were you hiding when your master was slain, then? Will you show us the same loyalty? Or did you plan to abandon him from the start?"
"We should examine the temple area I was held in," Sheila replies, "I am interested in their faith, it does not appear that they worship any of the known Thassilonian gods."
The shaitan takes Gabrielle's hand, grinning lecherously.
Sneering, Sheila joins in Gabrielle's refrain. "Perhaps it would be best if we left him to guide the elementals to the Pinnacle while we go on ahead with magic?"
The Vekkers' journal contains no new hints on what inspired the brothers to mount their ill-fated expedition, only assay points and failed dig sites. The journal contains mostly overoptimistic estimates of what remains in the dig sites that the shaitan has revealed to be exhausted. The pages dropped by Silas Vekker, though, contain something far different. It appears the brothers managed to spite the magical wards around Xin-Shalast and find their way through the Occluding Field's magical wards to the fabled city itself. These pages detail the brothers' hopes of plundering the famed City of Gold - after all, muses one entry, it's easier to tear down a building than pull gold from the ground!
Traveling by night, the tireless band reaches the second assay point in the predawn hours. Unfortunately, the vein holds little more than the first. By nightfall, a third assay point has revealed the same. While these were once rich deposits, the Runelords of Greed exhausted almost all the mineral wealth of the mountainside long ago, leaving only scraps buried so deep, excavating them from the inhospitable mountainside with dwarven labor would cost more than the gold would fetch at market.
After returning to the prime, travel overland to the nearest dig sites takes the better part of the day. Arriving on site, the elementals set to work locating ore deposits while the shaitan, bound to the elementals and the party by telepathic bond, travels between deposits to appraise them. .
After laboring into the night, the genie emerges from the earth to deliver it's report. "This mine is worthless," the genie declares. "All that is here is slag and cheap metals, neither gems nor gold to be found. There were probably rich deposits once, but they have all been played out generations ago, by back-breaking labor or magical means." With it's decree, the shaitan looks around at the three adventurers left to consider their disappointment on the frozen slopes of Mhar Massif.
versus DC 28
versus DC 28
versus DC 28
The elementals do not escape.
This time, the elementals are unable to resist serving the expedition.
versus DC 14. versus DC 9.
All three elementals resist the compulsion to perform service, and will not serve for the next 24 hours.
Planar Binding:
versus DC 28.
versus DC 28.
Greater Planar Binding:
versus DC 21.
With the weather magically cleared, the way back up to the Pinnacle of Avarice is open, as is the way further into the range in search of the dig sites of the Vekker brothers.
"I would like to consider myself practical, so I will accept beneficial magic regardless of its..." Sheila pauses to glance upwards, "Disreputable origins."
Shiela's wounds slowly but surely mend, though they are accompanied by healing magic's usual grinding of bones into place and the wet sound of flesh stitching itself together.
Sheila coughs violently as the curative magic works through her system. Bones begin to knit back together, joints popping back into place and the worst gashes from the fall beginning to close.
"Thank you, Gabrielle," Sheila says weakly. Clearly the potion fixed the worst of the damage, but not all of the damage. Several bite marks from the wendigo's jaws remain visible on her torso and abdomen, and one arm still appears to be broken. With Gabi's assistance, she is able to stand. "I doubt very much I will be able to climb, though."
Sheila still seems disoriented and shaken by the wendigo's mental assault. Rather than stand, she rolls over and, despite her labored breathing through probably punctured lungs, manages to gasp, "The third belt loop!" With a badly broken arm, she points to her right hip where her collection of emergency potions survived the fall mostly intact.
With the wendigo dispatched, the ghostly brothers' grappling again takes center stage. However, with the defeat of the otherworldly apparition Karivek's form begins to shift and change. His mouth retracts, moving from inhuman mandible to humanoid jaw, and his claws wither to long fingernails. The fire burning away the stumps of flesh where his legs once were gutters out, and it appears as if Silas is holding his spectral brother up, rather than wrestling for control. The feral growls of hunger become wracking sobs of guilt. "Shh, brother, it's all right," Silas croons, "It was not all your fault. You did what you had to do..." As Silas speaks, Karivek Vekker begins to disappear. His form becomes hazy, his body melting away into nothing. Only a few moments later, he is gone. Only Silas remains in the shack. "I should thank you by taking these secrets to my grave, adventurers, But you have the same fire in your belly as we did. You will not be swayed. Take heed - there is worse than the Claimer on the Pinnacle of Avarice." With that, the ghost of Silas Vekker goes to his final rest. Where he disappeared, a bundle of balled-up papers falls to the ground, blown into corners by the whispering wind coming through the sundered door.
The wendigo snarls it's rage, then slumps to the ground, asleep.
Sheila finds herself freed of the wendigo, and looks around the room frantically. No longer in the wendigo's presence, she still attempts to flee, this time down the mine shaft.
Sheila manages to climb 10' down the ladder.
Sheila slips on her second Climb attempt and slow falls the next 20' before falling the remaining 70.
With Sheila taken from it's grasp, the frustrated wendigo turns it's attention to the elf who dealt it the most harm...
The wendigo emits a hacking sound that might just be laughter as Morgrym tries to frighten a living embodiment of fear.
The wendigo screams in pain, it's skin flayed by multiple slashes.
The wendigo rushes through the opening, it's wounds already appearing to close over, striking for...
Morgrym! for plus plus and !
Sheila, gripped by the wendigo's fear, can do nothing but cower away from the beast.
for plus plus and !
The room is 30' x 20', with a stairway occupying the southernmost 15' of the west wall. The wendigo has ripped a door open in the northeast corner of the room, and is standing in the 10' gap.
Upon returning to the cabin, Karivek Vekker's remains immediately crumble to dust. Simultaneously, yet another apparition appears within the cavern's environment; a ghostly visage of the dead dwarf who just dissolved, his legs no longer charred stumps but bloody tatters lit aflame, his fingernails curled into long claws and his face contorted into a portrait of anger and hate. However, his wrathful countenance is turned not on the party but on another ghost; the ghost of his brother, Silas. The second dwarf has reappeared, still partially eaten, and the brothers fly at each other, their legs moving as if lunging forward in a sad pantomime of life as they float above the ground. When they meet, Silas reaches to embrace his brother while Karivek lunges with inhumanoid fangs bared for his brother's meaty shoulder, taking a large bite of Silas and chewing with vigor. As the two spectral brothers are locked in their violent embrace, all eyes are forced to turn elsewhere, as the large warehouse door of the cabin is ripped away from it's hinges to the sound of twisting metal and shattering wood. Behind it is revealed the source of the brothers' cruel fate; the sneering goat-faced visage of the wendigo, who howls with unabashed glee.
Despite the blinding snow and wailing wind, Morgrym's Survival skills are able to lead the group towards their destination. After almost an hour in the brutal winds and snow, the band comes upon a startling sight. Lying near the remains of a long-dead campfire, frozen solid, are the remains of a dwarf. The corpse still wears its armor, padded leathers with the heads of wolves mounted to each shoulder, but no other possessions are apparent. The corpse's limbs are badly mangled, many of its bones obviously broken. Most startling, the corpse's legs end in bloody stumps just below the knees, the flesh charred and the bone beneath appearing to be sanded smooth like whalebone ready for scrimshaw.
When the world returns to focus, the company finds itself in the middle of a barren, snow-covered plateau. Snow gently tumbles from the sky, and under other circumstances the vista might be scenic. Rising to the north some seven hundred feet away is a steep peak, the only obvious location for any variety of mine that also matches the final words of Silas Vekker. Just as the band begins to orient, however, the weather takes a sudden and undeniably inconvenient turn for the worse. As if out of nowhere, the wind begins to how and whip the powdered snow into a blinding snowstorm, limiting vision to barely a few feet.
Mogrym also feels the cold grasp of fear clutch his heart, and for a moment, he feels the burning grip of hunger in his belly. However, his willpower quickly overcomes the peculiar urge.
Gabi feels a cold tingle of fear run down her spine, and something worse assault her mind briefly before she shrugs it off.
Sheila shudders at the wendigo's howl. Her eyes briefly glaze over before returning to their normal sharp gaze. "I agree, we should make haste," she says as she nods at Filraen's assertion, "Do we wish to engage this beast? Or can we avoid it entirely?"
With a lurch, the world stops spinning and the cabin stops falling (). The ghosts are, for the first time, silent. The room stands exactly as it did before the supernatural event began, showing no signs of structural damage and nothing out of the ordinary... except another restless spirit. The dwarf is clad in a miner's clothes, with a balding pate and dark brown beard. His facial features are indistinct, excepting that he lacks eyes. As he speaks, his lips barely move. As he speaks, the other ghosts flicker in and out of sight around him, brushing against him, caressing him, licking him. “You… you are alive? You do not hunger? Ah… that is what I sense in your blood. Greed. You seek the City of Greed. You should abandon your quest, lest you end up like me. Cold. Dead. Eaten. But I suspect you cannot be swayed. Know then that I know the way to Xin-Shalast. I can show you the way, but only if you bring me my brother. He died on a ledge in the mountains a mile’s walk north from this cabin. I can feel his soul out there, still hungry, still insane. Bring his bones to me so that I might reconcile with him. Once he is at rest, I will show you the way so that I might rest as well…” Accompanying his words are the incessant sound of smacking lips, and as he speaks, it first appears as if he is disappearing; with every word his image fades as more and more of him is removed. However, the ever-present sound reveals the truth; his ghostly counterparts are consuming him, bit by bit. As each one eats it's share, the ghost disappears, and at the end, only a disembodied voice remains to deliver Silas Vekker's final words. An otherworldly howl pierces the silence...
Sheila makes it to the ore separation room before doubling over, clutching her stomach. nonlethal damage plus Fatigue.
It is a single move for Gabrielle to catch up with Sheila. Morgrym's double move should actually put him partway down the shaft with air walk, while Filraen brings up the rear with his overland flight, still in the hallway between the pantry where it all began and the shaft towards the exit.
The shaking and cracking reaches it's peak, and with a sound like the earth itself being rent asunder, the house appears to list to the east before toppling over the cliff whole!
Sheila leaps down the shaft, foregoing stairs and using the railing to slow her fall to the floor below.
Landing in a roll, Sheila springs up and looks above, watching for Morgrym and Gabi.
Alright. So Morgrym is a move action away from the shaft. Sheila will claim her readied action and single-move down the stairs once she sees Morgrym.
The house continues to thunder and shake, and a jolt runs through the entire structure. The ghosts, once only visible in the shadows and the corners of your vision, now reveal themselves fully. They rush at all the occupants of the house, clawing at eyes, at mouths, and elsewhere, trying to find purchase, to find entrance to your very bodies.
Ready to leap down the stairs herself, Sheila is violently thrown down by the quaking structure. She leaps to her feet but does not make immediately for the stairs, instead looking over her shoulder to see if Morgrym returns.
OK; Morgrym double-moves back to grab the body. Gabi is now 1/3 of the way down the stairs. Sheila is in the sitting room/foyer with the hidden office.
As the house on the cliff continues to [earthquake], the voices of the dead dwarves join in the cacophony of sound. "So... hungry...," "...don't, please...," and "eating... us..." The hammering racket drowns out the rest of their words as the cabin gives one final, violent heave and appears ready to rip asunder.
Barely sustaining her balance, Sheila downs her potion in one swift gulp and begins racing towards the exit at impossible speed. "A fine suggestion!" she calls down the hall as she pursues Morgrym into the shaft. [ooc]Sheila consumes a potion of haste and moves 60' down the hall. She is 10' behind Morgrym, just outside the shaft in the chamber that contained the secret office.
Alright. So, Morgrym is in the shaft leading down to the first level and the mine. Gabi and Sheila have not yet left the pantry, and Sheila has a potion in hand. Filraen is still unaccounted for.
Everyone begins to see the ghostly images of dwarves out of the corners of their eyes. It is impossible to make out features, but all the ghosts seem malnourished and emaciated. The shaking and cracking continues, and the cabin lists further and further towards the perilous descent of the cliff face. The cracking and splintering of wood rings throughout the cabin, though the structure's dwarven builders live up to their race's reputation; for now, the sturdy walls hold.
Sheila assesses the room as quickly as she is able. When she sees no visible threat, she draws a vial and removes the seal.
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