DFE 5 Notes (Zane)

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The party begins at the face of the cliff path to the upper ruins near the giant’s lighthouses. The party makes remarks and discusses the fact that Rachel and Lt. Colonel Dan have ‘gone’ and ‘come back’ as arrivees multiple times, and that they arrived intentionally. They are provided with spare weapons and Lt. Dan is given Wakinyan’s old set of BL. Wakinyan gives Rachel his Kevlar. The party considers discussing with the band of Israelis and their role in the group/party. Leonus and Merkha go to discuss with Lt. Dan, as well as Ademar who joins shortly thereafter. The conversation opens with Leonus addressing Lt. Dan, asking about how long he and his group are going to stay with Leonus’ group. He says at least until the party gets back to Eberron’s Rest. Lt. Dan says that he has no real goals, seeing as he just came back to life. Lt. Dan defers to Leonus in command. He says that Rachel and Esther will follow his lead. Lt. Dan says that he appears to be in perfect medical condition, aside from a slight amount of fatigue. Lt. Dan says that his group is a strategic level intelligence and sometimes operations agents, but Rachel will chime in and say that they are also designed to employ a great deal of firepower quickly and be allowed to leave. Leonus allows Lt. Dan to equip himself with the Thunderbow. Jacinteleq joins the group, and inquests Rachel as to how she came to Aesira intentionally. Rachel arrived to Aesira on a means that is “classified,” if she can go back and come is “classified,” as is most everything else that Jacinteleq asks about. Lt. Dan says that he can most certainly hit a human at 250m with the Thunderbow. He is given 20 quarrels at first. Wakinyan asks Lt. Dan about if he has memories of things before - they simply vanished.

At this point, the party is able to head out to the ruins atop the cliff face. The party is bringing along Kakra, Anne, Jack, and Gwen. The party begins advancing up the cliff, and first come up to a rather long wall with two notable holes in it. There is a bit of an alley that goes down some ways, which has openings to the right and goes on further than Loic can see. Jack says that he doesn’t see anybody on the walls - it looks “pretty deserted.” There is an open, paved pathway for some ways, but turns straight into foliage. Loic is ordered to investigate that portion of the path, and sees nothing and nobody. The party begins moving into the ruins. Wakinyan goes over to take Loic’s position near the foliage, as Loic returns to scouting ahead. There is some sort of fortification to Loic’s left. Merkha checks the walls, to see if he could ascertain the culture, etc., of the ruins. Merkha doesn’t recognize it, but it reminds him of some work he’s seen at the edge of the desert in a scrapper community. There is lots of fog in the place, and Loic can barely see a passageway going to his left. It begins as stone, then becomes grass rather suddenly. Loic pauses to see if he could hear anything in the area. Loic can hear what sounds like claws on stone to his left. It’s neither aggressive nor frantic, and sounds like people walking around. Deucalion uses Locate Animal to find out about potential animals in the area. There are some in the small cluster of trees, nothing from the first passage with foliage, but to the left there are several types of critters, all of which seem calm. Jacinteleq uses Friendly Forest on the area, and has to make a reflex roll. There is a bit of pushback from the bit of forest, which tried to repel her. Deucalion pulls out his trident and waves it in a circle over his head, which Jack eventually notices, and he comes down to report. He describes what sounds like ruins the rest of the party has seen, and talks of a “dead man on top of stone.” Loic is given herbs to protect from animals, and continues around the corner. He sees ahead of him a bunch of rubble stone blocking the lawn, and when he gets a bit closer, it’s not a hole there, but the remains of the gate. Rachel climbs onto the courtyard wall, and Merkha positions to the front as the party passes towards the courtyard. Merkha hears movement hears movement in the direction opposite the courtyard, but nothing is seen. In front of the courtyard is a something on a raised wall, which is a black circle with something that looks like pink hair on top of it, surrounded by something green. The place seems very dusty and dirty as the party begins to encroach upon the courtyard. Inside the courtyard is overgrown grass, and the opening to the courtyard seems to have been melted into a floe, etc. It looks to have been a stone gate, and one of the hinges is sort of bubbled. It was melted and then pushed by something. The sarcophagus is a different kind of stone than the structures around it, and is carved differently as well. It is different rock altogether. It seems to be an equivalent of marble. Lt. Dan remarks that the fortification is odd - the tower is off to one side, and there’s no place for a garrison to live, etc. A ghost walks from outside the courtyard and through the wall, to inside the courtyard. It’s holding a lantern and something else sort of large. Things are going painfully slow. Loic can see inscriptions in the stone surrounding the sarcophagus. Jacinteleq approaches the sarcophagus and sees lots of curving, flowing lines of written text around it. There’s nothing that looks like Chla Nakran. Kakra goes to check the writing, but doesn’t recognize it - but that it is in fact script. The party is shot at by a barrage of arrows from the tops of each wall. The nine shots that connect are split evenly between Kakra, Jacinteleq, and Jaicinder. Jacinteleq takes 16 total damage after armor. Kakra takes four points of damage. A flood of large rats runs towards the group. Another group comes towards the group, and reaches them, and from the right as well, who go after Loic. From behind, Loic is shot by a sling, but it bounces off the shield strapped to his back. A rat tries to barrel into Loic and knock him off the wall. Loic is knocked over but not off the wall. Jacinteleq is shot by slingers on the walls, and Jaicinder is able to react to one of the rat packs heading towards him. Jacinteleq is struck from behind, but blocks both with the shield on her back. Kakra is also struck, taking seven points of damage, then another six. Lt. Dan is able to get one round off, which sinks into one of the slinger rats, killing it.

The ambush is finally over. Leonus orders a full advance into melee of the party. Ademar climbs over the rubble, advancing towards the rear of the rats. He swings for 4 and 10, becoming  21, dealing 18 damage to the unit. One rat is down. Jacinteleq uses Bladestorm to finish off the two rats around her. Combat stuff now, participating instead of taking notes.

The combat finishes up with most of the party running down the halls of the fort, Lt. Dan and Deucalion up on the wall near the tower, and the rest of the party filing into the courtyard. Jacinteleq suddenly begins to feel woozy. Gwen says that there was something on the arrows. Jaicinder is light-headed, but fine. They can’t find out anything about the poison, but it appears to have a necrotic factor - it eats away at the wounds themselves, killing the flesh. The rat tracks go to a spot in the middle of the area next to the wall, and then disappear. Gwen catches one of the rats, sticks the arrow in it, and begins to observe the effects. The party grabs some of the arrows that missed during combat, and attempt to analyze the poison. Deucalion has plans to float up into the tower.

BREAK FOR LUNCH

While reconvening, the party organize themselves generally in the courtyard, with Wakinyan doing[o1]  his Identify Spirit ritual, Jacinteleq in stasis, and everyone else generally organized around the tower. Ademar goes up the stairs, and Deucalion through the upper window. Deucalion is swiped by the scythe on his way in, and rolls very poorly, getting knocked unconscious by the ghost who the party saw earlier holding the lantern. Ademar charges up the stairs and tries to jam the ghosts weapon, but fails. Jay plays his Plot Twist card, and the ghost drops his lantern - and it shatters on the floor, erupting in a burst of energy that deals D20 damage to those in the room. Right afterwards, Loic and Jaicinder enter the room. Jaicinder recognizes the ghost and its weapon. Jaicinder addresses the ghost in Chla Nakran, asking what the spirit wants. It steps back away from Ademar, and points his scythe at Jacinteleq. The flames begin to die down, and some of the rocks in the room look quite hot. Loic runs over to where Deucalion lies, but he accidentally touches the pearl and begins to glow. Either way, he runs and goes over Deucalion’s body, then slashes at the ghost, who parries both - and a shock is coursed through Loic from the ghost’s sword, which he had drawn, and takes halved shock damage. Jaicinder shouts for people to stand down, and Laura plays a card that prevents the ghost from taking actions that require concentration for one round. Suddenly, a trapdoor from the top of the ceiling pops down, and Jack sticks his head down, asking what’s going on. Jaicinder and the ghost converse, and the ghost suddenly flickers out. Loic then picks up Deucalion and rushes downstairs.

Jaicinder begins to converse with Jack, who says he didn’t know who the ghost was (and remarks about his own reputation). The rest of the group in the room heads down to the basement, which has a storage container, a stone amphora, and a metal amphora, as well as a basket of stone. There are marks on the floor that might suggest other previously present items. The stone amphora has a label that could either mean essence of soul, or spirits, could mean liquor. The metal one is clearly the name of something, but not one recognized. The last one has a label for a kind of food that stores forever and is very high in energy - like lembas bread in LotR. Proceed to have a lot of Jacinteleq-only Chla Nachran stuff going on. Leonas goes back out after Jaicinder tells him it might be possible to talk to the ghost again - and doesn’t want people attacking him. Deucalion wakes up, not remembering anything starting from when he was on the wall next to the tower. Hearing the hammering noise, he establishes TLK and floats up to the ceiling to see jack hammering away at some gold leaf on the tree-like object on the roof. He then establishes TLP with Leonus asking if he should get him to stop - who says yes, eventually, but not before Jack manages to get it free, putting the red gem into his pack, then flying away, saying he’d be back in a few minutes. Merkha guesses that was the object \*was\* was a religious object. He tries to use divination on it, which he has to set up. Jaicinder attempts to contact the ghost again, and Zane plays his plot twist card to give him a +20 on his next applicable Diplomacy roll with the ghost. Kakra is busy trying to figure out how the poison differs in the state of Jacinteleq’s existence and Jaicinder’s (comparing a normal Chla Nachran to Jacinteleq who is poisoned). Kakra rolls a 20 on her check to sing, and Kakra is quite sure she knows how to sing away the bad part. Something in the poison tries to eat your brain. Deucalion knows that the thing that Jack was chipping at was extraordinarily valuable. Wakinyan finishes his ritual, and sees a vision of people like the ghost who are milling about, and the gates are fully intact and made of stone, with huge hinges. There’s lots of trade going on, and someone sits on a chair on the top of the tower, observing the courtyard. There is no sarcophagus in the courtyard in the vision. Jacinteleq wakes up tired, The inscription written around the sarcophagus is an older form of giantish. There are at least three forms of giantish, and it’s in a relatively old one. Kakra makes an inscription. It’s the life story of a great conqueror who put his foot down here, claiming it, and his foot on the neck of those he conquered. He can’t make out more than that, aside from boasting about this particular individual.