Meet 46, Adv 3, 9/28/13

The group has been diligent in checking out possible leads and have done a great job in finding out what tidbits have come there way to date. But they are getting a bit frustrated as they are "reacting" and no "pro-acting" to the situations as they are being presented.

So they have made two decisions - one, the check the local caves themselves and two, to go back to Mahr's Tower on the morrow and see if they can find something there.

Both are excellent ideas.

As for the Lamia - that was a "WTF?" situation when a bad roll in the wandering monster chart had one popping up. We talked our way our (and gave up a horse!) and went on our way. Just for fun, when the meetin was done we wanted to see how we would have fared against the Lamia - and after 20-odd points of damage to it, it was pretty much a TPK.

Write-up follows:

The group went to the Rescent homestead where they gained access by quoting the Marshal’s decree. Mac Rescent was not happy at this and told the group they would have to leave their weaponry behind. His goodwife brought them to the house where the party got a feeling that Master Rescent was a bit of a brute and definitely in control of the family and its people. A surreptitious investigation of the home itself didn’t reveal anything to the group so they went out to the fence line and began their investigation.

 

The fences themselves were badly rusted, not entirely through but enough so that they were not going to last or provide any strength. It also covered the entire northern length of the Homestead, from the Mekarin fence @ the eastern side, across the 800 feet to the western side and the bars of the cemetery.

 

Magic showed nothing and there were few if any signs of passage. We did stumble across a single print, bare foot and slighter and smaller than human sized. A search for evil did result in spotting a faint aura which we traced – it went BACK into the farm from the fence maybe 30 odd feet and then…ended. We searched diligently and did find a few ragged remains of fool’s cap mushrooms. The same fugus that appears in toadstool rings.

 

We spent a few hours seriously plotting out the areas in question and deduced that some dozen and a half toadstool rings were opened up and the goblin’s (again – assuming) dragged something across the fence line –causing it to rest. We also drew a line and noted that it missed the Mekarin Homestead and did seem to lead to the collapsed barrow in the cemetery.

 

From there we had lunch and went back to the land north of the Rescent and Mekarin Homesteads where we verified our findings so far to date. We took our findings to the Baron and noted that there was a surprising LACK of youthful adults on the streets. Those that we did encounter were fairly normal and all we spoke to stated that the other had been sort of scarce since yesterday.

 

On word of the Baron and the Marshal we rode out to investigate some of the local caves to see if the goblins were nearby once again and using them as staging grounds to either encounter Shakun, influence the youths, or portal in and out via the toadstool rings. We had Zarik loan us both Codron and Groon for the trip and investigate the closest cave first.

 

It was a simple hole in the ground and mostly packed earth – but it was when it began to narrow and the bats within scattered that we decided to leave and avoid getting caught in the possible cave-in. We then checked another one, the one that Fergus had tossed the Hadesnium in a short earlier. It was still undisturbed and there was no sign of anyone here. We left and was heading back to Shakun.

 

It was here that we were caught in the open by a 10’ tall chimeric form of a large lioness with the upper portion and body of a comely naked woman. Her obvious canines, great size, and off-putting appearance and demeanor had us on the defensive as she introduced herself as “Maach” and wanted one of our horses to eat.

 

It was not much of a stretch for us to give her one of the geldings and departed swiftly with one pack animal down, Fergus complaining bitterly of giant spiders, trolls, and now, “What the hell was that? A Sphinx? Lammasu? Lamia? I mean – what’s going on out here?”

 

Where returned to town and had to answer the “lost horse”problem before we were called to the cemetery for another investigation. The two graves closest to the barrow that hall collapsed, had also sunk in like a sink hole. More dead rats abounded. It was investigated and one of the bodies was missing.

 

We went back to the hall exhausted and talked about what to do next. The lack of kid’s was bothersome and we voted on taking a trip to Mahr’s Tower in the interest of hunting down the youths of the town and see if they are gathering there. @ the same time, Fergus had a vision from Poseidon of some horses @ a similar location that needed his help. We hoped to ride out in the morning, maybe be gone by 9ish.