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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Water Bob" data-source="post: 5808401" data-attributes="member: 92305">Now....finally....the creepy, creepy....In the larder of the kitchen, just across from where the last battle took place, I have placed a lone Hyperborean. As the PCs strip the bodies, I'll give them a secret Listen check. There's very little light, so as they inspect stuff, they'll have to bring whatever it is closer to the lamp that was laid down on the corridor floor, or bring the lamp with them to each body. Either way, the lamp is right next to the kitchen door (that was splintered during the fight last game session). This is where the Listen check will happen.The howl from the wind in the corridor is harder to hear inside the kitchen, so anytime the PCs enter the kitchen--that I'm sure that they will inspect before moving on--they'll get an easier Listen check.And, even if both PCs fail both Listen checks (unlikely), there's two more doors inside the kitchen. One leads to the pantry, and one leads to the larder.This makes it almost 100% that the PCs will come upon the Hyperborean in the larder.Let me describe this for you...You open the door. It's made of heavy, banded wood. Inside is a natural pocket in the cavern that has been closed off and used as a larder. Cow carcasses hange on chains that are secured into the rock above. Several sacks and crates are stuff into every open space in this small room. And, there, in the center, directly across from you as you open the door, ten feet away, stands a man.He is tall. Lanky, even. He's got a high forehead and a shaved scalp. His ears seem to be too big for his head, and his lips are thick. He wears cloth robes, several layers that overlap. In one hand, he grasps a vial of red. It looks like blood. In his other hand is what looks to be a bloody cloth. At his feet, he's drawn intricate designs all around him. He douses the blood onto the cloth, then squeezes the cloth so that it drips, and with this, he writes strange patterns on the floor, all the while he's speaking, as if in a trance, whispering, strange words--words you don't understand. His eye sockets show white as his eyes are rolled up inside his head.Prominent, at his feat, is a raw piece of meat--it's a tongue! Some tongue that has been cut off out of somebody's head. It lays at the man's feet, circled by the blood drawn runes.As the man whispers, the tongue begins to move, curling back and forth as if licking the air.If the PCs attack, move closer, or in anyway disturb the Hyperborean, he will quickly come out of his trance, drop the vial and rag, and, like lightning, he'll draw a stilletto from his forearm and billowy robe.Completely unknown to the PCs, this Hyperborean is dealing with sorcery that he does not quite understand. The man is scared. He thinks he's going to die. So what he does, he does out of desperation. He heard the fight that took place in the corridor right outside the kitchen, and he knows these two Cimmerians have just prevailed over multiple enemies--including the man's Hyperborean comrades.Because of the girl, he knows that he will die, too.Thus, he attempts sorcery that he does not understand and should study for several more years before attempting the invocation. His circle of blood is meant to protect him and converse directly with the demon, Ollam-Onga, to plead for his life and beg for help against the barbarians.But a demon, especially this demon, is not a forgiving creature. When the spell is interrupted, it angers Ollam-Onga, and he reaches out to destroy that which angers him.From the PC's point of view, what they experience is an invisible force that appears between them. The PCs are shoved back--from what, they know not which. The man in front of them is broken into many unholy positions. Each major bone in his body is snapped, and he is crimpled up into a human ball.Then, the ball of him rises into the air, and the body is thrown, over the heads of the PCs, to slam into the farthest wall, crashing agains the table, tipping over the large cauldron of stew.The contents of the cauldron spread across the stones. They Hyperborean is obviously dead--his eyes stairing widely and his mouth wide open.This steam--mist--smoke starts to rise from the dead man's mouth. A lot of hit. Thick, gaseous, like fog. It's dark amber colored, like dried blood. And, it collects in billows, again like dense fog, hovering between waist and chest height.So much of it issues out of the Hyperborean's mouth. And quickly, too. The room is filled in no time, and the rust colored fog floats out into the corridor and beyond.</blockquote>

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