Previously, in Nightwick Abbey: Ulf was unable to delve into the horrors of Nightwick last week, but at the Medusa's Head he heart the tales of horror, of how the noble cleric Voorhis fell to the piteous worm Balotis, but the party was able to avenge him by killing the foul beast.
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Session 91 - 18th of Elders, 1398
This week's adventurers:
Blossom (Rogue 6)
Mayfly (Magician 5)
Mechtilde (Fighter 5)
Ulf (Magician 4)
Liminal Space (Changeling 4)
Poppy (Fighter 3)
Krupe (Cleric 3)
Thekla (Magician 2)
Lump (Frogling 1)
Hirelings: Niklaus (Fighter 1)
Downtime in the Village
This week in downtime, Thekla learned a new spell. Which one was it, Ulf wasn't paying attention. He spent the week getting caught up on the exploits of the last week - noble Voorhis died slaying Balotis - the piteous, radioactive worm that haunted level 2.
This week, we're going to the other level 2 in the abbey to find the Bleeding Baroness - the other "boss" of level 2 after Balotis.
Boss Hunting
We make it down to the landing of level 2 without incident, stepping out onto the floor in a 30' by 20' room decorated with two columns, carved to depict the Lady of the Church bleeding, with actual, thin blood trickling down the columns.
We go west from here - we don't know where the Baroness is, but we've well explored the eastern part of the level, so west is the obvious choice.
We pass through the room of Law, where we recovered the Shard of God, to the room painted all black (I really need to include more pictures of the map in these posts) and from there, west through a secret door.
The Practical Application of Phantasmal Force
The door opens to reveal 5 robed figures - one has been hitting the heads of the other 4 with a gavel.
They turn to us and combat begins.
Liminal Space uses Phantasmal Force to blast them with a fake Fireball and they all fall from the explosion.
Mechtilde approaches, intending to finish them off with Dhinron, but as she approaches, Lump spots a glint in their eye as the Cadaverites leap up - having faked their deaths.
Two of them land hits on Mechtilde, tearing out a chunk of her cheek.
Lump fires into the melee and avoids hitting Mechtilde to land an arrow into one of the undead.
Mayfly, fed up with this, hurls a Fireball behind the Cadaverites, blowing them all up.
We patch up Mechtilde's wounds and move on.
Liminal Continues to Make Friends
Finding no treasure in the room, we force open the door west - revealing a T-junction with passages north, west, and south.
Through the darkness, Liminal spots large, muscular figures down the hallway ahead of us in the darkness, he thinks they're hiding behind rubble, laying in ambush.
Liminal steps forward and calls out to them, "Hello there, we're seeking to meet with the Bleeding Baroness."
"You seek to meet with our mistress," a response comes from the darkness.
"We bring tidings from Lichgate and the Mistress of Death," Mayfly calls out, remembering out time infiltrating the Brotherhood (of Thieves and Assassins).
"You with to supp?"
"Oh yes a dinner party!"
We approach and we see nine large figures, the physique of body builders, wearing armor made from human leather and with mouths stained red from drinking....something.
They offer to take us to the Baroness, but demand we drop our weapons, which we do not want to do.
Liminal Continues to Escalate the Situation
After some unexpected negotiations, Liminal casts Hypnotism, ordering two of the bodybuilders to hug each other.
This is considered a hostile action and Thekla follows up to puts four to sleep and Ulf casts light on the last awake, unhugged, unhypnotized Berzerker.
We quickly slit the throats of the hypnotized and hugged berzerkers, then the blind and sleeping ones, ending the fight.
Into New Territory
We finally have a chance to look at the room they were it, it's a long hall, stretching to the north and south.
There are three doors out of this room on the western wall, and listening at them all, we hear nothing
Of the three doors, left, center, and right, we opt to take the left door.
There's another door across from us to the west and the hallway stretches to our left, south.
Tri-Dick
It opens to a 20' by 30' door with a statue in the corner. The statue is made of a black iron and depicts a three-pronged phallus with little wings and a halo.
The Bleeding Baroness
There is a door across from us and to our right.
Listening at the door to our right (north) we hear the sound of a woman enjoying herself and several male voices praising as if in worship.
Mechtilde kicks open the door to a room 50' wide and 40' deep with 8 columns and a tapestry of human skin on the northern wall.
To our left is an alcove with a throne. A woman sits on the throne with blood running down her eyes. Two cultists kneel at her feet, suckling at her breasts. Eight other cultists stand before her in worship.
This scene reminds Ulf of when the former cultist of the Bleeding Baroness, Assman, acknowledged that the cult was, "kind of a sex thing."
At least we were forewarned.
"Gross - that's undead milk!" someone from our ranks shouts out, which is enough to start combat.
The Magicians, Again, Do All of the Work
We win initiative and fire a volley of arrows into the cultists, killing 3.
Mayfly fires off a Fireball, killing the remaining 5 cultists, but the Baroness emerges from the fire, floating - we now realize that she doesn't have legs. Thekla casts Light upon her and she fails her roll!
Mechtilde effortlessly slices through her - it feels as if she was just blood floating in the air - and she turns into a glob of blood and falls to the ground, covering Mechtilde with backsplash.
Treasure!
She leaves behind only her shawl, which we take with us.
Liminal has heard rumors of a magical amulet that she held, so he begins searching the throne for any hidden treasure.
The columns in the room depict her receiving pleasure and behind the tapestry, we find a secret door, but with no opening mechanism.
Opening mechanism not needed, Mechtilde forces the door open with her crowbar to reveal a 30' by 30' room with two treasure chests inside!
Traps!
Mayfly reaches into his pocket, whispers something, and then a moment later declares that there is another secret door on the right wall (east) and that the latches of the chest are trapped.
Blossom recognizes powder made from the white lotus covers the latches
Mechtilde uses her bellows attached to a spear contraption to use water to wash off the powder from a distance and then Blossom picks the locks.
We find 2,000sp in silver coins in the first chest and in the second is a magical amulet - rumored to protect one from demons.
We Consistently Make Good Decisions
He immediately puts it on before we check for a curse and Poppy, inspired by the action, puts on the shawl.
Nothing happens.
Exploring the Baroness's Realm
We listen at the door east and hear the trickle of liquid.
Opening it, we find a room 30' by 20', with doors across from us (back to the berzerker room) and to our left (north).
There is a fountain of blood on the right-hand wall with a larger-than-life size statue of the Baroness with blood pouring out of her face.
We open the door north to reveal a 10' corridor that ends in a giant scab - impassible.
We go back and enter the berzerker room and, from this angle, see another door going east.
Liminal also spies, on one of the columns, a carving of St. Gax pulling aside a curtain and making a shushing motion.
Mechtilde pokes the figure and it pops out to reveal a hidden compartment with 50gp.
We Just Explore Some More, Nothing Really Happens
We return to the tri-phallic room and go through the unopened door to the west.
It opens to a 10' corridor opening up to a 20' by 20' room with openings to our left and across from us.
Across from us, there is a 10' corridor ending in a scab and to the left (south) is a large room covered in bat guano.
Returning to the berzerker room, Liminal looks down the corridor to see it runs 50', ending in a T-junction.
Back in the Village
Feeling like we've done enough for the night, we return back to level one and the village, without incident, though we do have to dodge some cadaverites in the process.
Once back, we divide up the treasure - we recovered 2,500sp, for 263sp each. We each also recieve 480xp.
This is enough for Ulf's hireling, Niklaus, to levels up!
We spend the next week studying the shawl and the amulet. The amulet is one of Protection from Demons, the shawl is a Shawl of Protection +3! However, Fighters cannot utilize the shawl so Thekla and Ulf roll off or it and Ulf claims the shawl!
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