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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jack7" data-source="post: 5633163" data-attributes="member: 54707">The Dwarves, the Giants, and the Folly MenThe Dwarves, the Giants, and the Folly Men - this  adventure is a follow on to the Wreaking Crypt. Part 2 you might  say.   While the party is inside the Barrow of the Undead  a group of 12 men (no one knows who they are or where they come from, but they  speak the local language - Greek in this case - in a strange dialect and accent)  move into the local area and start buying up materials. At first they appear to  be miners or builders.   They then set up a large Tent City not far from  the Barrow, along the bald rock face of a frontier's mountain range, and declare  that they intend to populate their tent city with clans of local Dwarves and a  group of Giants. The locals know that these Dwarves and Giants are hostile  towards one another and would never work together and so they take to calling  this expedition of men the "Folly Men."   The Folly Men persist in their claims however and  within a week a large group of Giants appear, about 200 (ranging in height from  between 12 and 15 feet tall) and shortly after they arrive clans of Dwarves  arrive. The local population is terrified of the Giants but the Folly Men insist  they are not hostile, but there to work. And soon they do just  that.   The Dwarves and Giants set out on the rock face  and apparently start to carve it into a huge Face, but not one anyone locally  recognizes. The Dwarves do the fine work, the Giants most of the heavy labor,  and apparently the Folly Men are handling the engineering and design. At first  the locals are very afraid, then suspicious, and then eventually warm to the  expedition as it spends a lot of money in the local economy, and people start to  visit the tent city to provide food and goods to the expedition. The Dwarves and  Giants seem to get along peaceably, and all of the groups seem to respect local  laws and customs and to behave well.   Seen from a distance the face is very impressive,  but as one approaches it seems to move or shift position depending upon how one  is looking at it. It also seems to glow weirdly at night sometimes and observers  at nightfall and dawn swear they can sometimes hear it speaking, but not in any  recognizable language. As it is being built and properly shaped the Giants and  Dwarves also appear to be painting it in bright, sometimes glittering  colors.   As it further develops (far too rapidly it  seems) the locals begin to have odd dreams and some people see weird or even  terrifying visions. Most disturbing of all important men in the nearby areas  - political leaders, military men, tradesmen and merchants, religious elders,  and wealthy men begin disappearing. One moment they appear to be normal, the  next they vanish. After 13 such men vanish, the local population, in a state of  panic, forms a group of representatives, accompanied by a local militia and some  professional garrison troops, to go speak to the expedition about these matters.  When the representatives and the soldiers arrive at the tent city they find it  completely deserted. Stripped clean except for the tents and camp debris.     The face appears to have been completed (far to  quickly in the short span of time it was worked upon) but now it is chalk white  and there is no paint or color on it at all, yet the whole rock face appears to  shimmer and glow at times.   If any party members survive the Wreaking Crypt  (the party members think they have been gone a very short period of time, in  actuality they have been missing for months) then on the way back to the local  village they hear the reports and history about what has happened to the rock  face on the mountain and about the expedition of the Dwarves and the  Giants.   When the party reaches the village both the  citizens there and the local government want to hire them to go and investigate  the abandoned Tent City and the carved Rock Face.   When the party reprovisions and goes to the Tent  City it is already in ruins. Only tatters remain and left over debris. Beneath  the rock Face is a large work area with tools built for both Giants and Dwarves.  But there is no other sign of either.   When the party climbs the carving area and  actually reaches the Rock Face they discover that the Face is not a carving at  all, the Face had apparently been some sort of illusion, visible only at a  distance. The "Face" is actually a series of caves. 12 of the caves go back no  farther than 20 feet into the rock and all contain the body of a man. Each body  looks as if it were actually ripped apart, the limbs and head having been torn  from the corpses, and then the remains apparently ritually arranged in a  pattern. (If the players make sketches of the corpses they will discover that  each set of remains are arranged in such a way as to form letters or possibly  glyphs of some kind).   There is a 13th cave which recedes deep into the  mountain. The sides of the cave are well constructed and intricately ornamented.  Small holes are drilled at weird angles in the cave walls, floor, and ceiling,  and some of the walls contain small tubes sticking out from them. It seems very  unlikely that it could have possibly been built while the party was away in the  Wreaking Crypt.    Whenever a breeze passes through this cave, from  either outside, or from deeper down the passage, the air passing through the  holes or the tubes/pipes causes what sound like voices to be heard, and  sometimes actual words and phrases to be spoken. These sounds are apparently in  an unknown language however and no-one can recognize exactly what is being  said.   Down the passage of the 13th Cave will be the  actual adventure itself. And facing them will be Dwarves, Giants, the traps and  ambushes they have set, the constructions they have created, the vengeance of  the Folly Men, and several other things that have been set loose or set in  motion by the events surrounding the Wreaking Crypt.</blockquote>

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