FINN'S JOURNAL
Finn's Journal #6 – June 19 – 2017
Entry #8 - Day 3
We relaxed and rested, most of us not being tired yet - it was Akkiir who was completely exhausted because he had gotten no sleep the night before. Eventually it was time for us all to get some rest, so guards were posted and to sleep we went. Unfortunately, tonight was the turn for the other three of us to get no sleep as terrifying visions tortured our slumber.
I awoke alone in the den of that cursed house all alone. My friends were nowhere to be found. Why would they leave me behind? As I began to explore the house I heard the staccato sounds of a galloping horse coming down the road outside. My curiosity overcame me as I went into the entryway and opened the front door just a crack to see what was approaching. No sooner had I done so than the door crashed inwards, knocking me back into the main hall.
Standing before me was one of the dark riders, a Knight of Dragon Down. As I scrambled in retreat, his lance struck right through me, sticking me to the wooden floor. I could have prayed that I had died on the spot, but I did not. Somehow, I remained conscious and in incredible pain as the undead knight bound my hands and dragged me outside to where his terrifying black horse stood and I was assailed by the braying sounds of the many hellish ghost hounds that surrounded me.
I was half pulled - half dragged for an indeterminate period of time. It was pure agony as my wound still bled profusely as my body ached all over. It seemed like two eternities before we finally arrived at a dark, looming castle. I was quickly thrust into a dank, dark dungeon and into a rusty barred cell. This portion of the dungeon had flooded at some point and there was a good three feet of water in my cell. This provided a gnome of my stature some discomfort as you can imagine.
I was forced to tread water, barely able to keep my head above water because of exhaustion. I managed to have wit enough to think to take off my belt and use it to lash myself to the bars of the cell. As I was catching my breath and my mind raced thinking upon my less that certain future, a huge, dark figure could be seen in an adjacent cell. As glowing eyes seemed to pierce my soul with their gaze, a deep, guttural voice forcefully demanded that I serve him. I don't exactly remember my response, but I think I said something glib in an attempt at misguided bravado but the words fell from my lips with hollow meaning.
Then the strange creature rushed forward against the bars of its cage and I could see it was a great half man-half wolf and it snarled at my pitiful form in anger, spittle flying from its sharp toothed maw. Just then, exhaustion overcame me as the false security of my belt gave way and I slipped under the water without the strength to resist. The intense horror and pain of drowning was something I could not imagine ever being able to describe, as of course being deceased is somewhat prohibitive to penning the details of your drowning.
I held my breath for as long as I could, which wasn't long, as I had not taken a deep breath. The feeling of terror trying to keep your breath inside you as your lungs beg to dispel this for a fresh breath is impossible to describe. My lungs burned with hot pain and my chest and ribs cramped intolerably. Soon my body began to convulse as I fought off the urge to take a breath. In the end, the inevitable breath came, but rather than sweet life-giving air, my lungs quickly filled with dank, sour water. As I could feel the last, tiny bubbles of air rush past my face and awaited the certainty of death, I awoke gasping for air in the Death House, surrounded by my friends.
Even knowing that this experience was merely some terrifying attempt by the evil of this place to torture and taunt us, the dream was so realistic it was chilling to the core. My heroic friends, Nim and Janlynn, suffered similar night terrors.
<Add details of their nightmares here>
We spent a long time waiting for those of us to catch up on our missed sleep so that we could meet any new challenges of ths house with fresh and rejuvenated vigor. It was, to our best guess, around noon when we set out to continue investigating the dungeon below. We could hear the same eerie, low chanting coming from somewhere deeper in the dungeon and we went right past the crypts and encountered ancient rooms with tables, broken furniture and bones lying about the floors. One room had a central room with sleeping chambers off of it. Our troupe encountered shambling undead creatures (Ghouls, Zombies, we were unsure. Nim calls them "Undead Biters" and that name will do as good as any other).
Janlynn stepped forth and powerful waves of Lathander's morning rays washed forth from her to blast through the approaching creatures, sending all but one reeling in fear before the power of her god. The remaining abomination was dispatched quickly at the blades of our warriors. Before the undead overcame their fear and returned, we searched the bedchambers and found some treasure! Somehow, just finding some sparkly things makes this venture seem more like adventure, rather than just a terrifying haunted house we're stumbling through.
The remaining half dozen or so "Biters" came back and we set up our ranks to defend one entrance against them. Though these undead seemed somewhat free willed, obviously their capacity for tactics and intelligence were left in their graves. We efficiently defeated them as they kept trying to overtake the narrow entrance to the room.
Exploring further through the catacomb-like dungeon, we entered a series of tunnels where the low chanting seemed audibly louder than anywhere else, so we delved deeper into the dank, musty darkness. Suddenly, at a sort of intersection of tunnels, more undead Biters erupted from the very floor in front of us, catching us flat-footed. Nim, Tetsuo and Akkiir met the assaulting creatures with fury while the rest of us were caught jammed in the narrow winding tunnell behind.
Nim suffered terrible wounds early in the melee, from multiple wounds, and began to be dragged away by one of these foul things. In desperation, I ran for all I was worth to take a connecting tunnel and try to help Nim with one of my healing tricks, but even my nightvision did not save me from the crumbling pit that yawned open in front of me, and I fell.
Janlynn, likewise worried about the fate of brave Nim, followed me and thankfully saw the pit, leaped over it like a gazelle and was able to cast a powerful healing spell at Nim as he was being dragged away!!!!
Finn's Journal #7 – June 26 – 2017
Nim was almost lost as, even though he was being healed, he was continuing to suffer horribly in the wretched claws of this ghoul. When all seemed lost, Akkiir went after the monster dragging Nim away, and with a masterful sttack scored a vital hit that dropped the creature, and Nim's life was saved.
I tried to crawl back up out of the pit even as a swarm of biting insects began rushing out from the earthen walls intent on having me for lunch. Janlynn helped me out of the pit just as the most horrific pain wracked my body as hundreds of insects bit into me all over. I swooned from pain as Janlynn began sweeping off and crushing the insects. I am unsure how long I lay there, but soon Janlynn brought her healing skills to bear and I was able to get to my feet.
While my drama was playing out, Akkiir, Uphir and Tetsuo managed to finish off the remaining ghouls. These undead minions of the damned had scored severe blows to many in the troupe, so we decided to retreat to rest for a short while. When we felt our strength renewed we continued our search of the remaining tunnels.
Our exploring soon brought us to a room with shackled skeletons draping the walls and a statue on the far wall of a severe looking man holding a crystal in his hand and a large wolf at his side. Investigating the statues revealed no secret doors or caches. Akkiir volunteered to see if the crystal orb could be removed, and as soon as he lifted it, several shadow-forms peeled away from the walls to attack us all!
The sight of these shadow creatures was enough to strike fear into the hearts of thee bravest human man, but our courageous fellowhip fought through the fear and fought bravely. Two things became quickly apparent - Their touch could drain the energy and strength of a person; and physical weapons seemed to have a lessened effect on them (If any). I knew that we were in a desperate situation.
Since leaving the safe confines of my homey burrow in Glimmerglade, I have been quietly practicing the mental exercises and intonations taught to me by my secret and mysterious patron, Glyndraal the Farwalker. He revealed to me secrets to draw energy directly from the Feywild and form that into a powerful force on Toril. It seems that in desperation I found the success I had been seeking - I called forth from my hands green Fey Blasts that ripped through these shadows with great effect! I was as shocked as everyone else to see this have such success against them.
Soon the shadows were defeated, but all of us felt slightly weaker and with a heavy feeling in our hearts we decided to press on. We came to a stout door that turned out to be so much more. Listening at the door quickly revealed this living door's preditory nature as long, toothed Pseudopods began to emerge from the door to attack. Tetsuo quickly jumped to the attack and soon had his foot stuck in the maw of this impossible beast.
Fighting with all his strength he was able to extricate himself as Akkiir attacked the door with a series of thrusts. A successful strike was perhaps successful in wounding the beast, but it would also cause the weapon to become stuck to the door. Rather than fight to release his weapons, Akkiir just kept switching between his various assortment of weapons, leaving them stuck in the creature. Nim fired his crossbow deeply into the creature and called for me to come forward (Assumedly to use my Fey Blasts upon it).
The combination of attacks from the group, including my Fey attacks, caused the death of the creature as it melted into a pink pool of bubbling acid. All of the weapons stuck into the door were quickly dissolved by the strong acid. After this fight, rather than continue beyond, we fell back to have another rest to catch our breaths. We went back to the room with the large table in it.
Seeing something moving in the corner of his eye, Tetsuo went to investigate a strange rock formation on the ceiling. As he prodded it with his staff, it revealed itself to be a large, toothed worm and struck out at Tetsuo, capturing him in it's maw. The group sprang into action attacking with everything that could. As the creature tried to pull Tetsuo up into it's ceiling lair, ut was amazing to see Uphir rush forth and grab the thing in her mighty arms and not only stop the Worm from taking Tetsuo, but begin pulling it down from the ceiling.
Our mighty attacks soon overcame the giant worm and the rest of its long body slithered out of it's hole and coiled upon the floor, dead. All of our healing being used up and Tetsuo now gravely wounded, we decided to backtrack all the way up through the attic and back down to the Den on the first floor of the house. This time through we noticed that the rest of the house had succumbed to the ancient rot that was respresented in the other levels before. Gone were the library and the finery of the first floor. Any items we had previously taken from these areas of the house were also found to be rotted with centuries of age.
We needed to see another morning for us to be recharged and for Janlynn to receive the full blessings of great Lathander. We settled down to rest, wait, and eventually sleep restlessly once again.
Finn's Journal #8 – July 03 – 2017
Entry #9 - Day 4
Uphir, Tetsuo and Akkiir once again were visited with vicious nightmares, similar to their previous dreams but changed slightly in small ways. As upset as they were by these events, they were quicker to recover this time and soon found themselves returning to slumber.
When we finally stepped outside for Janlynn to do her morning prayers to Lathander it was at best guess - close to noon. As Janlynn went about her morning rituals we could see slowly shambling humanoid figures amongst the thick mist. They were quickly identified as mindless zombies and were moving toward us. Rather than expose ourselves for a fight that could be avoided, we decided to go back into the house. We did stop in the upstairs bedroom and from the balcony I got to have some target practice with my fey magic.
We descended once again from the attic to the dungeon below. Our first area to explore would be to see what was in the room beyond the now dead toothy door. The pink acid of the rancid pool had eaten away at the dirt and stone of the floor where it fell. We avoided that dangerous puddle. Beyond there was a bed chamber with a double bed, a footlocker, an armoire and a crate.
Our expert chest opener, Uphir, was once again called forth to do her delicate work with her axe. She opened the footlocker and as she did so, two of the walls of the chamber exploded outward spraying shards of plaster and debris everywhere. Flying out from behind the shattering walls were two ghastly cloaked figures who resembled the ghouls we had fought yesterday. Our warriors expertly attacked these fell beings, even as they choked from the horrible stench of death and decay filling the room. After a valiant fight we determined that these undead forms were Elizabeth and Gustov Durst.
As the room was searched for anything of value, the bodies of the Dursts were wrapped in ragged blankets so that they could be interred in their tombs should we decide to do so. Nim was passionate in saying that they did not deserve a proper burial, because of their evil deeds in life and especially for their failure to protect their children.
We collected what worthwhile treasure we could from this chamber and then, having no further tunnels or rooms to explore on this level, took the stairs down to the next level. The first room we encountered was a curious one - consisting of several wall niches with a variety of small items displayed within them. I used one of my tricks and was able to discern that some of the items were magical. The description of these items will be written ealwhere. (here)
The sound of the chanting was much louder and more clear on this level. The voices were chanting "He is the ancient. He is the land" over and over again. Exploring one of the two passages leading from this room brought Nim and Tetsuo into a prison area where shackles hung from the walls at regular intervals. A skeleton still lay there shackled to the wall in this area. A gold ring was spied upon it's bony finger and was retrieved after some careful consideration and Tetsuo's decisive staff attack.
The other passageway led to a partially submerged room with a raised dias in the center , a walkway all around the room interspersed with stairs leading into the dark water, and a rough hewn cave on the far wall. Shackles hung from the ceiling were positioned so as to receive some poor victem. As soon as the room was entered, the chanting immediately stopped. It was chilling and jarring to no longer hear the incessant chanting that has been luring us throughout this dungeon.
The general idea that the troupe decided on was that this was some sacrificial room and that some trigger would bring forth a beast or challenge for us to overcome. Ancient human remains were found on the floor beneath the waterline. We decided to take a rest in the niche room while we planned our next move.
The group set themselves along the ledge ready to take on any danger that should arise and Uphir walked through the two foot deep water to stand on the dias. As soon as she did, several apparitions appeared amongst us, right along the edge where we were standing. The began chanting "One must die" in unison. A couple of us moved to stand in the doorway and their chanting changed to "Lorgoth the Decayer, we awaken thee!" and then "The end comes! Death, be praised!" A rumble from across the chamber brought our attention to a large blackened undead thing rising up from the refuse near the cave opening.
Waves of chilling, life draining cold washed out from the creature to assail our group. I locked eyes with the dark voids of his hollowed sockets and I could feel doom. His eyes commanded death and I fell before it without any will to resist.
I thank my friends, especially Janlynn, for giving me the chance to actually continue to chronicle our adventures - for I would have surely been doomed without them all.
The sheer monstrous evil and the waves of pain coming off this creature put us into a retreat almost right away. Some of us were falling from the freezing damage of this creature as it tried to tear our souls from our bodies, and were quickly healed and rushed along towards the stairs up. Akkiir had bravely put himself between the creature and the rest of us, buying us a little time as his blade slashed with good effect, but soon he was overwhelmed as well and fell into darkness.
Tetsuo was the first to make the decision we were all struggling with - to continue to try and outrun the abomination or to turn and fight it. His bravery to be the next to stand against the beast after Akkiir had fallen inspired us all to turn and follow him. He struck the undead creature with his perfectly executed attacks and seemed to have some effect against it. As I prepared to cast a fey bolt at the beast, Janlynn stepped forward and released a massive sunburst of holy energy, destroying the foul thing utterly. I rushed forward and use a healing spell on Akkiir in the hopes that I could save him before he slipped away completely.
The monster was defeated; we all suffered horribly before it's might; but we all survived!! We all felt drained - mentally, physically and spiritually from that colossal battle. We settled down into the niche room to rest. Some of us investigated the more interesting artifacts.
Finn's Journal #9 – July 10 – 2017
As we were resting, we collectively heard a loud rumbling sound from the complex above us. The ancient wooden beams holding the tunnels up groaned and dirt rained upon us from above. We had to think quick and decided that, rested or not, we should get out of these tunnels as soon as possible. We grabbed the items we noted were magical from the niches and Janlynn, with her glowing shield, led the way up the stairs.
It was a very tense race through the tunnels to the cramped spiral stair leading back up to the attic. As we neared the top, we were forced to cover our faces from the choking smoke that was flowing down the stairs. Entering the storage room, we could see a red hot stove billowing fire and belching smoke to fill the room. Barely able to see through the smoke we saw that the door out of this room had been replaced by devilish metal teeth which chomped together to prevent our exit.
Tetsuo and Akkiir reacted quickly and lithely lept through the vicious metal maw into the attic hallway and continued onward. Thinking it was only a terrifying illusion, I called upon my gnomish instincts and soon determined that somehow - this was very real, and very deadly. Nim tried to push some furniture into the jaws, as he miraculously leapt through at the same time, hoping to confound them, but they bit directly through the furniture and narrowly missed him.
I assume brave Uphir was trying to help, as she unceremoniously collected me in her massive arms and tried to - push me through the jaws ahead of her? This tactic proved to be most painful as we both suffered severely for it. Just to be clear, I am quite nimble as a forest gnome and excel at acrobatics. Janlynn was forced to try and heal the two of us as best she could but this delayed us in the room and the smoke almost overwhelmed us.
I lept through and prepared my small amount of healing power to use on my comrades should they fail. After valiant attempts my two friends made it through the chomping door and suffered some wounds and healing was done. Another chomping doorway awaited us heading downstairs. Nim had jumped through and was desperately urging us to follow, concern etched on his face.
Uphir had a different thought and went into the children's bedroom and began to frantically look for an exit. The ghost of young Thornboldt appeared before Uphir and showed her (Through telekenetic means) that the bricked up window could be broken through. With releif, Nim rejoined us and we all moved into that room and began knocking out the bricks and readying rope.
Meanwhile Tetsuo and Akkiir were continuing to deftly dodge through chomping doorways. Tetsuo thought at first to try the second story balcony. but it was not passable. They rushed downstaits towards the front door and were confronted by more chomping doorways. As is the way in life, Tetsuo finally secumbed before the gods of luck and was severely wounded by a misstep through one of the doors, falling into a heap upon the entryway.
With his typical heroism, Akkiir thought nothing of hefting Tetsuo's sorely wounded body and as delicately as possible, tossing him through safely to the other side of the door into the entryway. Calling upon his elvish magic he lept through safely, but he was still daunted by the final doorway leading outside, whose chomping motion seemed even more frantic and quick, as if sensing it's prey was close to escaping it.
Upstairs we had tethered Janlynn's grapnel and rope securely and began to leave. Climbing down the rope was especially difficult for us all - we must have been so exhausted from the battles of the last few days. I suffered rope burns from slipping on the rope as did Nim. Uphir somehow lost grip of the rope entirely and fell almost the whole way. If it wasn't for Uphir's mighty frame, I think anyone else would have died from that fall. We should start packing a ladder I think (or better rope).
Nim and I headed around to the front of the house and Janlynn and Uphir a few moments later after gathering their rope. We quickly learned that those shambling zombies in the mist were still there and had begun to slowly move towards the front of the house. I ran forward and used my final healing word to get Testsuo back upon his feet. He lept through safely, followed shortly thereafter by Akkiir.
Janlynn took charge and yelled for us to make for the barn. The zombies were almost upon us and we moved as quick as we could towards the barn. Nim and Uphir positioned themselves between their friends and the zombies as they began a fighting withdrawal. Unfortunately Uphir was severely wounded by one of the undead creatures and bore to the ground. Akkiir and Tetsuo acted quickly to race out to help in the withdrawal and Janlynn ran out to heal Uphir. I ascended the loft and used a hole in the barn to target the zombies below with my fey blast.
We eventually all made it into the barn and into the loft, except for Akkiir who stayed below amongst the undead, an aura of protection warding off most of the blows from the evil creatures. It was a tense battle but a short one, highlighted by - Uphir's deadly and efficient thrown hand axes, Akkiir's courage and flashing blade and Tetsuo's attacks, a blur before his enemies below.
Breathing deeply and relaxing our tensed muscles, it was noticed that the heavy mists outside were gone. We could see into the distance - around two or three miles away, in the foothills of a mountain, the tops of houses could be seen. Towering above it all, upon a high precipise, a dark castle stood almost glaring down upon the village below. I shuttered as it reminded me somewhat of the castle from my nightmares.
We decided that we could probably make the village in an hour or two, but with our wounds and the uncertainty of what awaited us ahead, we decided to bunk down in the barn again. During the course of the evening I tried to lighten the mood with some soft music and song - Uphir even joined in keeping a beat on the drum. We could hear creatures shambling by in the forest unseen, and before long wolves seemed to be collecting outside as the night grew darker. Some of the largest rats I have ever seen had made their way into our flimsy fortress and were quickly exterminated. It was suggested that we have some rat for supper and some of us did just that. I used some minor cantrips to make the meat more palatable.
FINN'S JOURNAL
FINN'S JOURNAL
