the Jester
Legend
Dangers in the mist
As they leave the ship, they can feel a strange warmth at their backs. There are hissing noises behind them.
The gloom seems omnipresent. The mist is so thick they can’t see more than a few feet in any direction.
The party finally reaches land, but the mist around them is cloying and disorienting. Clambake, who can see through even magical mist and fog due to the touch of the obelisk in Var, cannot penetrate this. They don’t like it at all. And there’s no sign of either Titus or Anvar.
“Where are we?” wonders Spukoni. Nobody knows.
The move cautiously, trying not to get separated. It could easily happen, and the mist definitely does something funny to everyone’s sense of direction. They move inland a little way, away from the crashing surf and the beach. The island seems to have a fair number of sickly trees, clumps of tall grass all over, and lots of rocks. It gently ascends to a hillock, and though they can’t see with all the mist, they hope for better visibility in the morning. Dark is descending, and so the group camps. It’s all very moist, with the mist leaving a wet scum on everything. By midnight they might as well have spent the night in the rain. They set watches, and although they hear a few strange sounds in the night, they rest unmolested.
In the morning they find the fog allows them to see about 20’, which is better... but still bad. A few spells cast by Horbin verify that it’s magical in nature, but not evil. Not really knowing what to do, the group decides to head back down slope and try to find Anvar and Titus along the beach... if they survived. The party, worried and out of their element, moves back down towards the beach. It’s chilly and still the wet clings in the air. Clearly, this place is not good for them. They follow the coastline around until they come to a shielded lagoon. There, as they trudge along, Spukoni stops and motions for silence. “I hear something,” he squeaks. “It sounds like... a rowboat.”
A shadowy figure, rowing a small boat, emerges from the gloom: a human in a rowboat. It seems he is a fisher. This bizarre sight sets the party on edge. He comes towards them, a quizzical look on his face. “Who’re you?” he calls.
“Who’re you?” the group replies, pretty much all of them at once.
“I asked you first,” the fisherman says, looking more suspicious now.
The party exchanges glances, then: “I’m Krunkshank.”
“I’m the Inexplicable Enigma!” Spukoni exclaims. He can’t say his own name, but he doesn’t admit that.
“What’s your name?”
“Tell him my name!” Spukoni calls to the rest of the party.
“What’s your name?” asks Horbin.
“I’m Turk,” the fisherman answers. “I’m not used to having guests.” A pause, then: “You want some fish?”
“Sure,” says Clambake. “You got any clams?”
“No, just fish.”
“Tell him my name,” Spukoni insists.
“Oh. I like clams. But I like fish too.”
Turk takes the party to his hut. It turns out he’s quite the expert fisherman. He says he’s from the island of Pesh, well-known as one of the big economic powers in the region. Pesh is famous for its spices, silks and strange customs; it’s said that the men wear scarves and makeup, and that the ruler is the oldest member of a huge ruling family. But Turk isn’t in to any of that stuff; he’s into fish. He serves our heroes a big vat of fish stew and cheerfully relates his story. He hasn’t seen another friendly face in months. He’s been here, in the Isles of Gloom (“Aha! Now we know where we are!” Sith whispers to Spukoni), searching for an extremely rare fish he wants to catch. The conversation turns to religion; it seems that Turk is so comfortable here because he’s a cleric of the Sea Queen. The conversation turns long, and Turk invites them to spend the night in his hut. Finding him a trustworthy-seeming individual, the party gratefully agrees. He also offers to see if the Sea Queen might have some advice for them as to how to get away from this place.
The next day, the group heads to the beach. The fog is thick- visibility is again around 10’. Turk seems to contemplate for a while, and then the water starts to bubble and foam. Striding out of the sea comes an immense blue giant! Turk falls to his knees in awe. The rest of the party waits tensely, hoping the giant will be friendly- but it looks angry. Water pours from its brow, and it is covered in a harness of seaweed, shells, starfish and the like.
“You!” it booms out, pointing its finger directly at them. “You have done the sea a great wrong!” Turk’s eyes widen, and he looks at them with a betrayed expression. “Why did you allow the metal ship to descend? Now it rests on the bottom, active and dangerous!”
“We didn’t mean to,” says Horbin. “We turned it on by accident...”
“You ACTIVATED it!” The giant glares, and more water pours from its brow. Its great muscles ripple as its huge fists clench. “Then indeed, you are responsible for it! Very well, then: there is a cove of sacred sand nearby along the beach, but pirates have claimed the cove. The sand is needed for a most holy species of turtle to breed. Without it, their eggs will not mature, and now they cannot reach it is safety to lay their eggs because of the pirate ship!” He pulls a satchel from the webbing of seaweed he wears. “You will take some of the sacred white sand from the beach and bury these eggs somewhere else safe, near the water- or I will crash upon you like waves on a beach!”
“Could you, ah, help us get out of here?” Sith asks, always looking to make a bargain since his time in the Bastion of Law.
The giant’s glare darkens further, and for a moment it seems the huge creature will attack him for his impudence. But finally, he says, “If you succeed I will do what I can for you.” Then it turns and stalks back down into the depths, vanishing into the mist before it’s even waist-deep.
“Well, at least now we might be able to get out of here,” Sith says.
The party moves down the beach, hoping to find this cove. Turk goes to fetch her boat and fishing gear, saying he’ll catch up. “Couldn’t we just take the pirate ship?” Clambake asks. The group seems to like this idea, but Krunkshank points out that none of them know how to sail. Then-
Three creatures emerge from the mist out of nowhere. It seems obvious that they can sense the group without seeing them, because one of them breathes on them before it emerges, and a darker, swirling mist falls around the group. They cry out, feeling their senses dull and their willpower weaken. Spukoni drops back into the mist to try to hide, but the monsters’ superior senses lead them right to him and they move into flanking.
The monsters are horribly unlike anything anyone in the group has ever seen. They are hard to see in the mists but seem to stand about 7’ high. Their flesh on their strange faces churns like the mist itself. Their skin and hair are shades of white and misty grey, and their arms are long and thin. They wear clothes but no weapons, and as they slam at Spukoni he feels his precarious grip on his will slipping to the edge. The other one moves in on Horbin, slamming him with both claws and a savage bite! Horbin’s wisdom sinks below the point of casting spells. Screaming at the edge of his sanity, the cleric of the Light turns and flees into the mist!
Spukoni desperately throws a couple of polymorphs at the two creatures flanking him, and both succeed! The monsters turn into carp, flopping around like the fish in the end of that old Faith No More video. Sith drops after the wisdom-draining attentions of the final creature, and with a chill Spukoni realizes he’s facing it alone with 2 points of Wisdom left. The monster springs at him, biting and knocking him prone, and he desperately scrambles back and up and fires a volley of magic missiles- and it drops.
Carefully, Spukoni drags his fallen comrades to a safe spot, figuring a week or so ought to be enough time to rest and recuperate...
Next time: The party loses someone, and this time they aren't just lost- they die!
By the by, the sea giant is in the homebrew monsters forum right now, and I posted the glumring (the monsters that drain all the wisdom the party's got) about a month or two ago, you can prolly still find it if you want to take a look.
As they leave the ship, they can feel a strange warmth at their backs. There are hissing noises behind them.
The gloom seems omnipresent. The mist is so thick they can’t see more than a few feet in any direction.
The party finally reaches land, but the mist around them is cloying and disorienting. Clambake, who can see through even magical mist and fog due to the touch of the obelisk in Var, cannot penetrate this. They don’t like it at all. And there’s no sign of either Titus or Anvar.
“Where are we?” wonders Spukoni. Nobody knows.
The move cautiously, trying not to get separated. It could easily happen, and the mist definitely does something funny to everyone’s sense of direction. They move inland a little way, away from the crashing surf and the beach. The island seems to have a fair number of sickly trees, clumps of tall grass all over, and lots of rocks. It gently ascends to a hillock, and though they can’t see with all the mist, they hope for better visibility in the morning. Dark is descending, and so the group camps. It’s all very moist, with the mist leaving a wet scum on everything. By midnight they might as well have spent the night in the rain. They set watches, and although they hear a few strange sounds in the night, they rest unmolested.
In the morning they find the fog allows them to see about 20’, which is better... but still bad. A few spells cast by Horbin verify that it’s magical in nature, but not evil. Not really knowing what to do, the group decides to head back down slope and try to find Anvar and Titus along the beach... if they survived. The party, worried and out of their element, moves back down towards the beach. It’s chilly and still the wet clings in the air. Clearly, this place is not good for them. They follow the coastline around until they come to a shielded lagoon. There, as they trudge along, Spukoni stops and motions for silence. “I hear something,” he squeaks. “It sounds like... a rowboat.”
A shadowy figure, rowing a small boat, emerges from the gloom: a human in a rowboat. It seems he is a fisher. This bizarre sight sets the party on edge. He comes towards them, a quizzical look on his face. “Who’re you?” he calls.
“Who’re you?” the group replies, pretty much all of them at once.
“I asked you first,” the fisherman says, looking more suspicious now.
The party exchanges glances, then: “I’m Krunkshank.”
“I’m the Inexplicable Enigma!” Spukoni exclaims. He can’t say his own name, but he doesn’t admit that.
“What’s your name?”
“Tell him my name!” Spukoni calls to the rest of the party.
“What’s your name?” asks Horbin.
“I’m Turk,” the fisherman answers. “I’m not used to having guests.” A pause, then: “You want some fish?”
“Sure,” says Clambake. “You got any clams?”
“No, just fish.”
“Tell him my name,” Spukoni insists.
“Oh. I like clams. But I like fish too.”
Turk takes the party to his hut. It turns out he’s quite the expert fisherman. He says he’s from the island of Pesh, well-known as one of the big economic powers in the region. Pesh is famous for its spices, silks and strange customs; it’s said that the men wear scarves and makeup, and that the ruler is the oldest member of a huge ruling family. But Turk isn’t in to any of that stuff; he’s into fish. He serves our heroes a big vat of fish stew and cheerfully relates his story. He hasn’t seen another friendly face in months. He’s been here, in the Isles of Gloom (“Aha! Now we know where we are!” Sith whispers to Spukoni), searching for an extremely rare fish he wants to catch. The conversation turns to religion; it seems that Turk is so comfortable here because he’s a cleric of the Sea Queen. The conversation turns long, and Turk invites them to spend the night in his hut. Finding him a trustworthy-seeming individual, the party gratefully agrees. He also offers to see if the Sea Queen might have some advice for them as to how to get away from this place.
The next day, the group heads to the beach. The fog is thick- visibility is again around 10’. Turk seems to contemplate for a while, and then the water starts to bubble and foam. Striding out of the sea comes an immense blue giant! Turk falls to his knees in awe. The rest of the party waits tensely, hoping the giant will be friendly- but it looks angry. Water pours from its brow, and it is covered in a harness of seaweed, shells, starfish and the like.
“You!” it booms out, pointing its finger directly at them. “You have done the sea a great wrong!” Turk’s eyes widen, and he looks at them with a betrayed expression. “Why did you allow the metal ship to descend? Now it rests on the bottom, active and dangerous!”
“We didn’t mean to,” says Horbin. “We turned it on by accident...”
“You ACTIVATED it!” The giant glares, and more water pours from its brow. Its great muscles ripple as its huge fists clench. “Then indeed, you are responsible for it! Very well, then: there is a cove of sacred sand nearby along the beach, but pirates have claimed the cove. The sand is needed for a most holy species of turtle to breed. Without it, their eggs will not mature, and now they cannot reach it is safety to lay their eggs because of the pirate ship!” He pulls a satchel from the webbing of seaweed he wears. “You will take some of the sacred white sand from the beach and bury these eggs somewhere else safe, near the water- or I will crash upon you like waves on a beach!”
“Could you, ah, help us get out of here?” Sith asks, always looking to make a bargain since his time in the Bastion of Law.
The giant’s glare darkens further, and for a moment it seems the huge creature will attack him for his impudence. But finally, he says, “If you succeed I will do what I can for you.” Then it turns and stalks back down into the depths, vanishing into the mist before it’s even waist-deep.
“Well, at least now we might be able to get out of here,” Sith says.
The party moves down the beach, hoping to find this cove. Turk goes to fetch her boat and fishing gear, saying he’ll catch up. “Couldn’t we just take the pirate ship?” Clambake asks. The group seems to like this idea, but Krunkshank points out that none of them know how to sail. Then-
Three creatures emerge from the mist out of nowhere. It seems obvious that they can sense the group without seeing them, because one of them breathes on them before it emerges, and a darker, swirling mist falls around the group. They cry out, feeling their senses dull and their willpower weaken. Spukoni drops back into the mist to try to hide, but the monsters’ superior senses lead them right to him and they move into flanking.
The monsters are horribly unlike anything anyone in the group has ever seen. They are hard to see in the mists but seem to stand about 7’ high. Their flesh on their strange faces churns like the mist itself. Their skin and hair are shades of white and misty grey, and their arms are long and thin. They wear clothes but no weapons, and as they slam at Spukoni he feels his precarious grip on his will slipping to the edge. The other one moves in on Horbin, slamming him with both claws and a savage bite! Horbin’s wisdom sinks below the point of casting spells. Screaming at the edge of his sanity, the cleric of the Light turns and flees into the mist!
Spukoni desperately throws a couple of polymorphs at the two creatures flanking him, and both succeed! The monsters turn into carp, flopping around like the fish in the end of that old Faith No More video. Sith drops after the wisdom-draining attentions of the final creature, and with a chill Spukoni realizes he’s facing it alone with 2 points of Wisdom left. The monster springs at him, biting and knocking him prone, and he desperately scrambles back and up and fires a volley of magic missiles- and it drops.
Carefully, Spukoni drags his fallen comrades to a safe spot, figuring a week or so ought to be enough time to rest and recuperate...
Next time: The party loses someone, and this time they aren't just lost- they die!
By the by, the sea giant is in the homebrew monsters forum right now, and I posted the glumring (the monsters that drain all the wisdom the party's got) about a month or two ago, you can prolly still find it if you want to take a look.
