NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 9608230" data-attributes="member: 508">ADVENTURE 91: MESSAGE FROM THE DEADPC Roster:Alewyth Putterpye, dwarf priestess of Aerik 19             Thurloe Pulver, human fighter 3/wizard 3/spellsword 10/eldritch knight 3             Wakuren, half-orc cleric of Cal 9/paladin 10             Xandro Silverstrings, human bard 6/rogue 13             Zander Quilson, elf sorcerer 19NPC Roster:Beetle Darkcloud, halfling ranger 6             Robin the Balladeer, human bard 6Game Session Date: 1 March 2025 - - -"This is going to be a problem," admitted Beetle, frowning at the road before them.  Trees had been popping up on either side of the road as they traveled west to Spiraclast, but now they had formed a full-fledged forest.  "Andrea and I went this way with no problem," he said, "but we were just riding on our mounts.  We didn't have to deal with anything like that."  He ended his sentence looking up at Wakuren, whose face could be seen poking out of the "attic-head" control room of the 60-foot-tall wood colossus he was piloting."I could pluck the trees out as I went," the half-orc suggested, only half kidding."I think we'll skirt north around the forest," suggested Beetle.  "Spiraclast is on the other side, and we'll never get there with you uprooting trees as you go to get your wooden house-man through.""Sounds like a plan," agreed Thurloe, eager to get on the road again instead of standing here arguing.  The sooner they found Andrea Jandoval's body and returned it to Armaturia, the sooner he'd inherit all of her worldly goods.  The others all agreed, and Beetle set his borrowed pachycephalosaurus mount northward, around the edge of the forest, with the other mounts and the wood colossus trudging behind.And that's how half of their number ended up dead a mere few hours later.As twilight crossed the land, and the sun had its last few moments brightening the ever-darkening sky, the collected group of heroes approached a small lake just ahead.  There was a young woman sitting on a rock, her back to the group, staring wistfully ahead, watching the sun begin to drop down behind the horizon.  She didn't seem to notice the group's approach, which was somewhat surprising given they were making no attempts to be stealthy and the wood colossus caused the ground nearby to tremble with each massive footstep.  But Zander and Petey noticed something the others hadn't yet discovered on their own: they could see the rocks through the space where her body sat.<She's a ghost!> Petey warned the group telepathically.Alewyth drove her bonehead mount Lapis ahead of the others, fully aware that even if this was a ghost, it didn't necessarily mean she was evil; many ghosts were mere victims rather than monsters, trapped in undeath and unable to cross over to their next lives.  Still, this could also be nothing more than an illusion, although for what purpose the dwarven priestess could not imagine.  But to be sure, she cast a detect magic spell as she approached, the negative findings indicating that this was, in all probability, a ghost after all."Excuse me," Alewyth began, but she didn't get to finish - the interruption broke the ghost out of her reverie and she snapped her attention behind her, taking in the riders on their bonehead mounts and the wood colossus towering behind them.  But while her face - her dark coloration and pointed ears marking her as a drow - expressed shock and fear, it wasn't for herself she was afraid."You are alive!" she gasped aloud.  "You must all leave, immediately - before Eldoranda appears, or she will surely try to kill you all!""Whoa, now, settle down," advised Thurloe.  "Who exactly is this Eldoranda, and why should she wish to attack us?"The ghost looked behind her worriedly at the fading sun, and apparently decided she had time for a brief - a very brief - explanation.  "She hates all living things, after her life was taken from her, as it was for the rest of us."  As she spoke, certain dim, glowing lights began manifesting all around the shore of the lake, slowly taking on the forms of young drow women."Someone killed you?  All of you?" Alewyth asked.  "Was it the same person?""We do not know," the ghost replied.  "Each of us was attacked from behind in the shrine, with no one able to see their attacker.  Father Quentin had escorted us all there, but he cannot have seen anything - he was born blind.""If he was on site at each of the killings, I wouldn't be surprised if he was the one behind it all," scoffed Alewyth."Father Quentin has been nothing but kind to we trainees," the ghost argued.  Then, worriedly seeing the last of the sun's rays going out, she returned to her warning.  "Now you must flee!" she pleaded.  "Please, for your own sakes!  Eldoranda--""I think we can handle an uppity ghost," replied Thurloe.  He and the other spellcasters started preparing attack spells, just in case, as the ghostly shapes started taking on fuller form now that the sun had gone down.  Many were like the first ghost, looking very much like they had while alive, while a few others never manifested more than a nebulous, glowing, partially-humanoid form.  Alewyth and Wakuren, the two heroes with clerical training, assumed these were likely apparitions - mindless souls with little memory of their previous lives, just a glaring hatred for what had been done to them.  Was one of these shapeless forms the Eldoranda that so worried their fearful ghost?As it turned out, no - as became apparent when another figure manifested, this one quite visibly a young drow maiden like the other ghosts, but wearing an expression of outrage, hatred, and horror.  "Oh, crap!" called out Thurloe, realizing this was quite possibly a banshee they were facing, not some mere ghost.Fortunately, Wakuren had come to the same realization when deciding on which spell to have at the ready and, from his high perch in the control room of the wood colossus' head, he cast a blade barrier spell right where Eldoranda had manifested, causing the flying blades of force energy to swirl around in a tight circle.  Incorporeal she might be, but the whirling blades would hurt her as easily as they would a fleshly foe.At the same time, Zander unleashed a simple magic missile spell; he had more powerful spells, but as the missiles were likewise composed of force energy, they were sure to cause the incorporeal banshee harm.  Alewyth cast a quickened flame strike down upon Eldoranda, bathing her in a shower of holy flames from directly overhead.But none of that was enough to slay the banshee.  Floating out of the confines of the blade barrier spell, she moved forward, towards the riders and their mounts, and then gave forth a wail of such power that four of the dinosaurs and their riders collapsed to the ground: Alewyth upon Lapis, Thurloe upon Boney, Robin upon Alosaurus, and Beetle upon the borrowed Persistence.  Upon landing hard on their sides, none moved so much as a muscle, for each of the eight was dead.Seeing this, the assembled ghosts - there were six of them now, each fully formed - gave a collective gasp of horror as the five shapeless apparitions glided forward.  "Eldoranda, stop!" cried Alamandra Jessertaine, the first ghost to have manifested.  "They have done you no harm!"  But the banshee was unmoved by the plea, and looked about her for more victims.Xandro leaped down from his mount, Ceph (both had been subject to the banshee's sonic attack but each had survived), and slashed out at the banshee with his enchanted rapier Deathwhisper, to no avail - the blade passed harmlessly through her insubstantial body.  Zander guided his bonehead Pachy off to the side - they'd been fortunate enough to have been out of range of the banshee's deathly cry - and made a quick estimate as to where to focus a sunburst spell so as to definitely catch Eldoranda in its area of effect but not Xandro.  He was, unfortunately, a bit off in his calculations, and thus Xandro and Ceph were both subjected to the blinding light of the spell cast by the elf sorcerer.  On the plus side, the sunburst spell obliterated Eldoranda before she could wail again, but it cost both Xandro and Ceph their vision - each was now blind."Sorry!" replied Zander, turning to Alewyth to ask if she had a spell to restore the rogue's vision on hand, only to discover her unmoving and lifeless form.The wood colossus ambled forward, stepping around the bodies of the slain heroes and their dead mounts, and then Wakuren cast himself out of the attic-head's window, allowing his shield of Cal to feather fall him safely to the ground.  Zander was about to ask what the problem was, for he'd taken care of the banshee, until he noticed the five apparitions all zeroing in on the half-orc, who was preparing a holy word spell for use in the immediate future.  Wakuren waited until they were almost upon him - they reached out at him with their hands, as if trying to strangle him from afar, but the heroes' feast he'd partaken of that morning protected him from such fear-based attacks - and then let fly with his spell.  The apparitions, who had all moved closer to attack, were suddenly deaf, blind, and paralyzed in place; the ghosts had wisely held back and were out of range.  But against such helpless targets, Zander's magic missile spells and Wakuren's blasts of positive energy through his holy symbol of Cal soon took care of the apparitions, leaving the two spellcasters and the blinded Xandro standing alone with their two bonehead mounts as the sole survivors of the ghostly attack.Alamandra stepped forward and introduced herself and the other ghosts to the trio.  "I am sorry about your friends," she told them.  But Wakuren held up a calloused hand.  "We have the means to restore them back to life," he assured her.  "Not today, though - we'll need to place them in stasis inside the wood colossus for the time being, and tomorrow I will pray to Cal for resurrection and raise dead spells to restore life to our four companions.""What of your riding lizards?" asked the ghost."Those," Wakuren assured her, "will not go to waste either.  Our halfling guide, Beetle, can turn their flesh into jerky as travel rations."Alamandra and the other ghosts finished what they could of their individual tales.  Each had, in life, been a novitiate in a clerical training temple for young female drow, where they had studied the gods of the pantheon and each decided upon a patron deity on whom to focus their attentions.  Alamandra was a devotee to Telgrane, God of Knowledge, but as He was also the God of the Sun, she often manifested a few minutes before the other ghosts so she could watch the sun's final rays fade away.  The other ghosts, like most drow, found the bright light of the sun off-putting and awaited full night before manifesting.As for their deaths, their stories were remarkably similar: upon graduating from the temple, they had each been escorted through the forest by Father Quentin to the Shrine of Delphyne, where they were to have placed the magical statuette of the god or goddess of their choice upon the small plinth in the shrine and intone the phrase that would then teleport them to their destination, a temple of that deity in a city allied with the training temple.  But none of them made it that far, being attacked from behind by an unknown assailant who strangled the words from their throats before they could teleport to their new locations."And none of you have any idea who it was that attacked you?" Xandro asked."None," admitted Alamandra.  Then her face brightened.  "Except perhaps Jorybeal!" she exclaimed.  "She escaped her attacker and fled, but she was caught and drowned in the lake."  The ghost indicated the still, dark waters before them.  "When Jorybeal was slain, the waters were much shallower that they are now, and so she manifests where she died - a place now fully submerged," she added sadly."That won't be a problem," Wakuren assured her.  He started wading into the cold waters of the lake, confident that when his head was submerged beneath the water, his headband of Cal would keep a bubble of breathable air around his head.  And with his orcish darkvision, finding the underwater ghost was not an issue.  He approached the dead girl, noting her white dress floated around her as if affected by the water's currents.  But Jorybeal didn't have much more to add, for her attacker caught up with her at the edge of the lake and tackled her, holding her head underwater until she drowned.  She didn't get a good look at his features, for he wore a grayish cloak with a hood that hid his face in shadows, but she could see the flesh of his arms and he was a male drow.  This, Wakuren thought to himself, only furthered Alewyth's supposition that the blind Father Quentin had been the slayers of these graduating novitiates.Returning to the shore, Wakuren warmed himself by turning the wood colossus into its house configuration and lugging - with the help of Zander and Xandro - the dead bodies of their slain friends and their mounts inside.  They were laid out on the floor of the study, down on the ground floor, so that when Wakuren restored the colossus to its humanoid form, the bodies of the slain were placed into temporary stasis - it was part of the magic of the construct, for otherwise the furniture and inhabitants would be battered incessantly as the massive figure trundled across the landscape.Following Alamandra's instructions, they headed to the training temple, this time the wood colossus in the lead with Zander and Pachy following, leading the blinded Ceph and Xandro behind by means of a guide rope.  Once there, Wakuren leapt out of the colossus' front window again and approached the front doors of the temple with Zander and Xandro at his side, hoping the readily-visible holy symbol of Cal he wore around his neck would overcome any concerns the nuns might have about his half-orcish features; he could easily have magically disguised himself with his cloak, but it didn't feel right pulling a fast one on the people he was turning to for help.The novitiate who answered the door - again, it was unlocked but Wakuren didn't want to impose by having three strange men enter a training temple devoted to female drow - listened attentively to the half-orc's story and then invited them into the temple, leading them to the cloister in the back where they met with the temple's leader, the Abbottess Hethryn, and her two aides, Sister Sharilynn and Sister Belinkka.  They were aghast at hearing the last dozen or more graduates had never made it to their follow-on assignments elsewhere in Talonia, and vowed to do whatever they could do to aid the heroes in finding the killer, or killers, of the novitiates who had completed their training.  Sister Belinkka was an adherent of Cal, God of Healing, and had a remove blindness/deafness spell on hand to cure Xandro's damaged vision, much to his relief."What can we do to aid you?" asked the Abbottess.  When told they wished to talk to Father Quentin, she sent a novitiate out to his hut - he lived in a simple wooden structure, 10 feet to a side, on the other side of a stream from the temple - but she returned shortly thereafter with news that the good Father was away, likely gathering firewood in the forest.  "He reveres Feron," the Abbottess explained.  "He spends much of his time in the forest.  I will have him sent to you when he returns, although that might not be until tomorrow."In the meantime, she gave the visitors a quick tour of their facilities, the better to give them a background of the slain graduates.  Each drow novitiate slept in a simple cell in the student dorm area, while the three nuns each had their own rooms over by the cloister and the Abbottess' office.  The temple itself consisted of rows of pews facing a platform, upon which stood one of the gods or goddesses of the pantheon; currently, a wooden carving of Feron - depicted as a drow - stood in the place of honor, with the statues of the other deities tucked away in cabinets along the platform.  "Father Quentin carved these for us," the Abbottess confided, and when Xandro pointed out they were quite well done by a person without sight, she responded with, "Yes, it is often the case that when one sense is taken away, the others are enhanced to some degree."  There was also a full garden in the middle of the temple, with no roof above it; a wooden walkway surrounded it, so the nuns could walk around it without getting their shoes dirty in the garden loam.  Throughout the day, several novitiates tended to the garden, which provided the drow with much of their vegetables.The following morning, Wakuren entered the study of the wooden construct - he'd had it converted to its house construction long enough for the three to get some sleep, for they'd had a long day and they preferred sleeping through the night hours, unlike the drow - and prayed for his morning spells, then began the process of reverting his slain friends to life.  Alewyth and Thurloe each received a resurrection spell, while Robin and Beetle were returned to life with raise dead spells; Wakuren, splitting his focus between the life of a cleric and that of a paladin, was not as powerful a spellcaster as was Alewyth, who would have been able to use resurrection spells upon all four.  But by the end of the half-orc's spellcasting, the four slain heroes were back to life, and the three who had survived the banshee's attacks filled the others in on what had happened since their regrettable deaths.  And, since Alewyth had not been alive to prepare a new day's worth of spells, Wakuren cast a heroes' feast in the temple, inviting the nuns and novitiates to join them in their meal.  He could tell by their expressions that this was magic of a type none of them had ever experienced before, and he mentally assessed their spellcasting abilities to be quite far behind what he and Alewyth could do.Shortly after the completion of their meal, a novitiate who'd been stationed outside came running in to say that Father Quentin was back from the forest, with a bundle of firewood slung on his back for the temple.  She'd informed him of the heroes wishing to talk to him, and he'd promised to come join them inside once he'd dropped his load of firewood in the receptacle just outside the temple's kitchen.In the meantime, Wakuren introduced the newly-restored heroes to the nuns and gained the Abbottess' permission to use the cloister - a large room where temple discussions took place - as their inquiry room.  Permission was given, and Wakuren cast another spell he'd prayed for that morning: a zone of truth covering the entirety of the cloister.  He was up-front about what he was doing, again not wanting to insult their hosts, and the Abbottess was fine with allowing him to cast the spell.  Everyone in the room could feel the compulsion to tell only the truth as the spell was cast, and only Thurloe fought off the effect, wanting to be able to speak falsely if it became necessary.  Then the spellcasters among them cast a few spells, just in case: Thurloe cast a protection from evil spell and Xandro cast a tongues spell so he could better understand the drow language being spoken.  (He was gradually picking up the language, but it was slow going.)  Alewyth covered herself in a protection from evil and a true seeing spell, while Zander granted himself the same latter ability with his scout's headband.  He also activated his jade cooshee, which caused the novitiates to coo and gurgle and attempt to pet the elven dog to death; at the Abbottess' suggestion they took the cooshee out by the gardens so as not to be distracting.  Robin chose to join them, as the cloister was only so big.Not long thereafter, there was a clack-clack-clacking sound as Father Quentin tapped his cane along the wooden walkway around the indoor garden on his way to the cloister.  Stepping through the doorway, he jolted in surprise for a brief moment - no doubt feeling the sudden compulsion to speak only the truth - but gave no indication he found the presence of the effect insulting.  "You wished to see me, Abbottess Hethryn?" he inquired.Father Quentin was a lean man, somewhat tall for a drow, with skin almost fully black and thick white hair in stark contrast.  He wore a simple robe of tan held closed by a brown belt, and wore a pair of dark-tinted spectacles, apparently to protect those looking at him from seeing the empty eye sockets which many found upsetting.  The Abbottess introduced the blind cleric to the heroes, and then explained that they'd discovered the ghosts of the temple graduates going back many months, if not years.  Father Quentin's dark face lightened in shock as he heard the news, and his mouth opened in surprise, although no words came out.  "These visitors would like to ask you a few questions about the girls," the Abbottess said."Of course, ask away."  Father Quentin leaned heavily on his cane, as if using it to stop him from falling over."I understand you escorted the graduates to the Shrine of Delphyne," Wakuren began.  As he spoke, he was looking at the cleric's aura, seeking the telltale signs of evil, but he was clean."Yes.""Why was that?  I mean, no offense, but what assistance could you provide in the case of an attack, being blind?""I cannot see," Father Quentin admitted, "but, being born blind, I have never been able to.  I am therefore no worse off than I have ever been, and I have made it through life to a somewhat advanced age without incident.  Plus, blind or not, many forest creatures will not attack a pair of travelers when they might very well take their chances against a sole victim.  Safety in numbers, you see.""Did you escort the graduates into the shrine?" Wakuren pressed."Not inside the shrine, no.  I took them to the shrine, then they entered to teleport to their new destinations.""So you didn't see if-- sorry; you weren't able to tell if there was anyone inside lying in wait for the graduate?""The shrine is not very big.  I believe the girls would have seen if anyone was inside the shrine before they entered.""Do you have any idea who might have attacked and killed the girls?"At that, Father Quentin made a good show of thinking it over before answering.  "I don't know of anyone wanting to kill the novitiates here," he began, "...although there are rumors of bugbears roaming in the forest.  I suppose it could have been a bugbear, slaying just for the sport of it."  At these words, the nuns looked at each other with worrisome faces; this was the first they'd heard of such rumors."Where have you heard such tales?" demanded the Abbottess."From wandering woodsmen I've met in the forest on occasion," Father Quentin replied.  Alewyth and Wakuren, who had been watching the cleric like hawks, both noticed he was swallowing quite a bit, as if he were nervous about this line of questioning."Can we look inside your hut?" Thurloe demanded out of the blue, with thoughts that there might be some incriminating evidence of his being the murderer hidden there."I don't see why, but certainly - I have nothing to hide."  The questions were coming to an end in any case, so the heroes followed Father Quentin to his hut, crossing a little wooden bridge across the stream to get to it.  Once there, Thurloe gave it the once-over with a detect magic spell, and Zander used his elven senses to give the interior a good search, but both came up with nothing."Okay, how about you lead us to this Shrine of Delphyne, where the murders took place?" demanded Thurloe.  He got close enough to the cleric that he could see past his spectacles, and sure enough, there were empty holes where his eyes should be.  That ruined one theory: that Father Quentin was faking being blind, on top of lying about being the murderer.  Father Quentin agreed at once, and, tapping with his cane, started down the path into the forest.  Beetle opted to stay behind and start smoking the dinosaur flesh from their slain boneheads, doing so behind the wooden colossus house and out of view of the temple, so as not to offend their sensibilities.Once they reached the shrine - not far from the lake, but tucked away inside the trees of the forest, such that none of the heroes had seen it when interacting with the spirits by the lake - Alewyth and Zander searched it for secret passageways, while Wakuren cast a detect magic spell and gave the whole place a once-over.  Inside the shrine, which was indeed small enough (and a single room to boot) that nobody could have hidden inside without being immediately spotted, he saw an odd thing: the plinth upon which the statuette of the deity of the temple where one wished to be teleported was magical, but none of the small carvings of the deities had an aura of magic about it.  And the carving style seemed awfully familiar...."Did you carve these?" the half-orc asked the blind cleric."Carve what?" asked Father Quentin, staring straight ahead as if not knowing what Wakuren was asking of him."These statues of the pantheon.  They look like smaller versions of the statues back at the temple.""No, I'm afraid these were all here long before I started helping out at the training temple."  Wakuren frowned, for the carving styles were almost identical; he was almost positive that the blind cleric was lying to him.  But that would mean he had to have been lying in the zone of truth spell, which would mean he was likely a much more powerful cleric than he was letting on....Thurloe saw the half-orc's doubtful expression and, tired of playing games, came right out with: "Quentin, admit it: did you kill all those girls?"The blind cleric's face frowned, and he sputtered in indignation.  Then he did something rather strange: he backed away from Wakuren and started casting a spell.  There was a sudden pop of displaced air, and in an instant a night hag stood off to the blind cleric's left.  "Kill them!" demanded Father Quentin, no longer pretending to be a mild-mannered cleric of low spellcasting power but generally friendly demeanor.  The night hag responded by casting a magic missile spell directly at Zander, who had just stepped out of the shrine; the power of the spell was instantly absorbed by the brooch of shielding the elf wore upon his cloak.  "Amazing!" he cried out in delight.  "That thing finally saw some use!"Robin immediately stepped back out of reach and began strumming her lute, playing the song of inspirational courage.  Alewyth cast an implosion spell at the night hag, but when she failed to overcome the fiend's inherent resistance to spell energy she ducked back out of sight behind the wooden shrine, fearing retaliation.  Xandro, who had surreptitiously activated his ring of invisibility while the others were checking out the shrine, quietly stepped behind the blind cleric, ready to strike with Deathwhisper when the opportunity presented itself.But Father Quentin was overcome by emotion, now that the accusation was there in the open.  "It's their own fault!" he declared.  "Prancing around in their chaste outfits, only to bathe nude before me in the pond!  Filling the air with their giggles and whispers!  I have tried to remain on the path of righteousness, but a man can only take so much temptation!  These whores have gone out of their way to disrupt my meditations with their young, ripe bodies!  And then, after tormenting me for the duration of their training, to try to escape without punishment!  No, this I will not permit!  They had to be punished for their constant flirting and teasing!"  And, his little rant over with, he followed up with an implosion spell of his own - putting him on an even level with Alewyth, as far as casting spells went - directly at Zander.  But the elf, despite an involuntary squeal of fear as the spell hit home, managed to overcome the worst of its effects, surprising even himself.But with the cleric's focus on the elf, Xandro sent Deathwhisper's blade directly into Father Quentin's back, to stick out from his belly, covered in the drow's blood.  The night hag, eager for payback at Alewyth, stalked her around to the back of the shrine and cast another magic missile spell; Alewyth, lacking the elf's protection, took the magical assault with a grunt.  But then Zander retaliated against the murderous cleric with a horrid wilting spell that sapped him of all of his remaining strength.  He fell to the ground, cane falling one way and spectacles flying in another direction; with the dark-tinted glasses no longer in place, the illusion of empty eye sockets vanished, showing Father Quentin was no more blind than anyone else present.Zander's cooshee, who had accompanied the group on their trek to the shrine, leapt out at the night hag, hoping to snag a limb and drag her to the ground, with no success.  Petey likewise flew from his master's shoulder and attacked the night hag with a venomous stinger at the end of his reptilian tail, but he too was unsuccessful in his attack.  Thurloe cast a quickened true strike spell as he charged at the hag - he had no love for the things after becoming a nightly victim years ago - and brought Spellslicer cutting deep into her torso.  But then Wakuren cast a dispel magic spell on the hag, overcoming the summoning spell that had brought her to this plane of existence in the first place - and just like that, she was gone, ripped back through the dimensions to her own Hellish plane."Tie up this piece of crap," commanded Thurloe, and Xandro put away his rapier and set himself to the task.  Then Wakuren cast just enough healing to bring Father Quentin to full consciousness, after which he was subsequently frog-marched back to the training temple for a full confession before the Abbottess and her two started aides.  With his glasses confiscated, and his suddenly present and fully working eyeballs in place, there was no point in trying to continue with his deceptions; he confessed to the killings with a snarl, repeating his accusations against his "tormentors.""That's no defense at all!" snarled Alewyth.  "Your whole 'I'm an innocent blind man' ploy - that's proof you were planning on spying on the novitiates all along!  You're just a creep - a sad, pathetic creep!""What do you propose be done with him?" asked the Abbottess.  "I will not countenance an execution on the temple grounds!""I don't believe that will be necessary," Wakuren assured her.  "It will be dark soon; I suggest we return Father Quentin to the scene of his crimes, and let the ghosts of his past victims decide his fate.  Bringing their killer to a just end will likely be exactly what they need to pass on to the next life."  The Abbottess was obviously not happy with the thought of her slain former students being used as executioners, but she saw the reasoning behind the decision and allowed the heroes to take Father Quentin away to the lake.He didn't survive very long once the ghosts manifested by the lake, to find their trussed-up killer at their mercy after having the events explained to them. - - -That night, in the Dreamlands, the five dreamwalkers were herded to their dream instructor by their individual moogle guides, but there was another moogle there as well - one they'd never seen before.  "This is Maystra. kupo," announced Mogo, obviously a bit peeved at having his nightly training session interrupted."Hey, kupo," said Maystra, a female with even fluffier fur than the average kittenish moogle.  "I have a message for the five of you, kupo," she said, then explained that her dreamwalker needed to talk to them in person.  With Mogo's begrudging permission, she led them out of the Corridor of Dreams and to the back way into the Dreamlands, a place of forgotten ruins being overgrown with vines.  Bloodthirsty zoogs watched their passage with interest, but dared not attack dreamwalkers in such numbers and of such power.Maystra led the group down twisting alleyways, stopping finally before a pile of collapsed stone.  "I brought them, kupo!" she called out.A slab of stone slowly slid sideways, revealing a hole beneath it.  Stepping up out of the hole was a middle-aged woman, wiping the dust from her clothes.  None of the others had ever seen her before, but Thurloe Pulver recognized her at once: it was Andrea Jandoval, the woman whose presumed death had brought them all the way across the continent of Talonia from Armaturia."Hello, Thurloe," said Andrea.  "I suppose I owe you and your friends some explanations."She sat down on a chunk of rock, making herself comfortable, and began explaining herself."As you well know, I am a wizard - a diviner, in fact.  You may not have guessed I was a dreamwalker, like yourselves - hence Maystra, my moogle guide.  But my divinations led me to feel the need to explore the Forbidden Lands, for I sensed a growing danger there that would eventually threaten the entire world.  The only reason I took Thurloe on as an arcane student was because my divinations told me he and the friends he'd eventually start hanging out with would become very important in taking down this world-ending threat."As you might have guessed, I have made it to the Forbidden Lands.  As I suspected, it's a land of the undead, led by a group of immortal liches.  They welcomed me into their midst when I convinced them I was interested in joining their ranks as an undead lich.  I've spent the last few months working upon the completion of my phylactery, after which time I'll be expected to go through with the procedure, ending my life and joining the ranks of the undead."Unfortunately, I still haven't determined the exact nature of the world-ending threat, but I'm certain the answer lies with the Conclave of Skulls – the ruling entity behind the Forbidden Lands.  But even worse, no living thing can approach the area where the Conclave is housed – I'll need to become an undead creature if I wish to get that far, and hopefully unearth their plans."She looked at each of the dreamwalkers in turn.  "I'm sorry for tricking you into following me into the Forbidden Lands under false pretenses, but my divinations indicated it is absolutely necessary that you be in the Forbidden Lands if there is any chance of avoiding the dire fate the Conclave of Skulls has planned for the Erthe."I've been holding off on the lichdom ceremony as long as I can, hoping you would arrive in the Forbidden Lands, but some of the liches are starting to get suspicious, so I don't dare tarry any longer.  This is likely the last night of my life, and I fear as a lich, I'll no longer have access to the Dreamlands, as the undead have no ability to dream.  As a result, this is the last opportunity I have to reach out to you, and offer any advice I can give you.  Just where exactly are you, anyway?""We're to the north of the forest just to the east of Spiraclast," Thurloe replied.  "Beetle says that's the city where he left you to go find the Forbidden Lands.""It's taken you much longer than I would have thought. Oh well, it can't be helped.""What can you tell us of the Forbidden Lands?" asked Wakuren."The guardian of the Forbidden Lands is a massive, stone statue of a sphinx.  It asks a different riddle of anyone seeking entry into the Forbidden Lands.  Once you answer the riddle successfully, you'll enter through its mouth and gain access to the Forbidden Lands.  You'll have to leave any mounts behind, but the liches can fetch them later if desired.  Once you make it into the Forbidden Lands, you'll need to try to pass yourselves off as pilgrims wishing to become undead.  I hope you won't have to actually become undead like I'm about to, and if possible, I'll find out the world-ending plan of the Conclave of Skulls and find a way to pass that information on to you.  But if anything happens to me in the meantime, you should be prepared to become undead yourselves if necessary to gain access to the Conclave."Andrea spent a moment in thought, and then continued.  "If you end up working to become undead, I'm afraid you no longer have enough time to construct phylacteries to protect your life forces, so you won't be able to become liches.  You might need to pretend to wish to become a form of undead that's quicker to become, like a vampire or necropolitan, or even a mummy lord.  In any case, it would be for the best if you pretend not to have ever met me once you enter the Forbidden Lands, so the liches there won't transfer their suspicions about me over to you."During their discussions in the Dreamlands (Andrea inhabited a dream pocket created by a night hag she slew some years ago, to hide from the moogles, who would otherwise know she was still alive and be able to spill the beans to the five dreamwalkers about the falseness of their quest to bring back her body to Armaturia), she expressed some disappointment at how relatively low-powered of a wizard Thurloe was.  Still, she admitted the divinations didn't say they required him to be of any particular level, she just assumed he'd have spent more time on his arcane studies and less time waving around a stupid sword."Hey!" interjected Thurloe.  "I've managed to find a way to channel spells through my blade, and successfully cast spells while wearing armor!  Can you do any of that?""I don't need to, dearie," she said, patting his cheek.  "Wizards don't concern themselves with such things.  Now then, is there anything else I can answer for you before we all wake?""Yes," replied Wakuren instantly.  "What's a 'deathborn'?""Oh, dear," replied Andrea, giving it some thought.  Finally, she admitted, "I know the answer, and I found it out here in the Forbidden Lands.  But I think I'll let you find out on your own once you're here.  I'm not holding out to be mean, but I think it would be better for you all if your reactions when you find out are genuine.  If the liches think you already know...well, it wouldn't be very good, and it would be an indicator that you had been in contact with someone inside the Forbidden Lands.  No, I think you'll have to wait for that answer.  But I wouldn't volunteer that term to anyone inside the Forbidden Lands, if I were you.""Shucks," sighed Wakuren.  He'd been wondering for months what the term might mean. - - -Joe was about an hour late for this session, so we spent some of the time waiting for him in rolling up the stats for our new PCs for two new campaigns.  My follow-on campaign to this one will take place in the same game world, 20 years later, and Logan had been champing at the bit to roll up his new character, a female snow fox hengeyokai wu-jen.  Dan rolled up the stats for his human monk, and Vicki did likewise for her PC, a human/mermaid (therein lies a tale) scout.  Then we rolled up the stats for the new PCs in Logan's new campaign (to start up once Dan finishes up the last three adventures in his campaign): my fiendish human cleric of Boccob, Dan's shadow human druid, and Vicki's celestial elf druid.  Harry opted not to roll up any stats, since he's still deciding if he wants to even join in our new campaigns, as he should be entering college this fall and will likely be away for most of the game sessions.Incidentally, Father Quentin wore a ring of mind shielding that masked his alignment, and cast a Nindeval's magic aura spell on it daily to hide the fact it was magical.  That, and the eyes of the eagle (in spectacles form) that he used to watch the novitiates bathing from afar, were the only bits of treasure in this adventure, but the players did get another bit of treasure (of a sort) by way of an info dump on the Forbidden Lands. - - -T-shirt worn: My white "Walking Dead" T-shirt, to represent the ghosts, apparitions, and banshee the PCs met up with in their initial encounter.</blockquote>

Verification