Into the Wild

Frial is five days behind the heroes and with it the roads, walls and protection it offered. The magnitude of Tairos' lonely vastness starts to set in as they set camp and watch the sun sink quietly beneath the horizon.

Aelfric awakens to the crackle of the camp fire, wondering how much longer until the first watch ends and it's his turn to take over. Peeking out from his tent he can already see the moon is more than halfway through its journey and the campfire hasn't been stoked in some time. There's no sign of the first watch team either, Berenger and Erik. He quickly searches the area and finds no sign of either of them before deciding to start waking the others ( Caellana very reluctantly)

A quick search of the area reveals a pair of footprints leading from the fire toward the woods. As they follow the tracks they see Erik and Berenger's discarded weapons simply laying on the ground. The tracks seem to end only a few paces into the thick of the trees. Their dense canopy prevents much of the moonlight from reaching the ground and creates a perfect darkness that only lanterns and dark sight can pierce. Aelfric, Riken, Caellana and Cordelia head in while the rest guard the camp and the wagons.

Immediately Caellana feels a strange sense of disquiet about this section of woods. Something feels very off, very sick and sad. The others quickly spot the scattered debris of dozens of travelers, all of it rotted, old and reclaimed by the forest. It looks to them to have been carelessly dropped just as their friends dropped their weapons. They decide to investigate and among all the cast-away belongings there is a large wagon that looks relatively new and untouched by decay. At the wagon they find more belongings left behind including a few usable trinkets and even a whole barrel of salt that the caravan might make use of. They also hear noises coming from within the wagon, something that sounds like the breaking of wet branches. Cautiously, they open the wagon and inside they see a thing made of vines, tree limbs and rotted vegetation hunched over the convulsing remains of a man. The tree-thing's wooden hands are clasped around the dead man's head and crushing it slowly while whip-like vines snake into his eyes, throat and nostrils. It drops the broken body and begins toward them now.

Caellana can feel that same sense of wrongness radiating off this thing. She's hears its voice spoken on the wind blown through the tree leaves and it sounds like a monotone litany of strange prayers she's never heard before. Every word of it is steeped in depression, malaise and sorrow. The blighted twigling attacks, trying to rip and rend them open but it's outnumbered and outmatched. Once defeated they heroes begin examining the area more closely for any clues they can find. The deeper they move the more strange sights they begin to see. Wicked symbols of branches and bones hanging from trees and fat-bodied moths fluttering about on wings colored with murky blues, browns and purples. The more Caellana sees the more she is certain that this is a place of power belonging to one of the totem spirits, but one of the Corrupted Ones. Even more alarmingly, it has only recently been claimed. Such places have always been rare and only found deep in the forests far from the civilized world. This is bold and unprecedented as it is only a week's walk from Frial. It pains her to have to share with her friends that this place belongs to the totemic entity known as the Old Crone, the Gloomwing Moth. And surely, the Crone's servants will be here as well.

They keep on the trail of their missing comrades's tracks which meander deeper into the forest. The soundof distant moaning draws their attention, fearing it could be Berenger or Erik. Instead, they find one of the survivors of the wagon from earlier and another Twig Blight hunched over him. The creature is digging its wooden claws into him while swarms of moths flutter from the dying man's mouth. It's not sound of pain that echoes from the man any more but one of elation. They quickly rush the blight and defeat it while making sure to stabilize the victim. Once they clear away the infesting moths and treat his wounds he becomes lucid again. He says his name is Henrik and that he's a textile merchant from Frial who was bound for Melanthris . His wagon made camp outside the forest for the night and he remembers seeing a strange, ghostly, lantern light from within the forest that gripped their minds and pulled them in. He remembers nothing else till now. After hearing this and seeing the fate this man was headed toward they decide to act quickly and split up. Cordelia breaks off on her own to search from the shadows while the others move deeper into the heart of the corruption.

While concealing her every step through the woods Cordelia begins hearing a strange, gutteral, murmuring noise that ripples through the night. It's not long after that before she starts seeing a pale white light glimmering from between the trees. Carefully, she crept up upon the source of the noise. A thing the size of a fully-grown mammoth with its body resembling a bloated cross between caterpillar and maggot. The flesh of the beast was as translucent as moonlight and inside among its organs and viscera were both her missing friends, slowly digesting. The creature craned its head toward her and it was little more that a set of insect eyes and a wide mouth filled with sticky sharp teeth. A long tendril dangled from between the eyes and bobbing at the end of it was the light. A lantern-like organ that cloyed at the mind with a sleepy grip. Cordelia's consciousness slowly slipped away in the face of this decrepit, lantern light.

She's forced back into awareness suddenly and without explanation. For the others the transfixing seemed permanent but for Cordelia something shook her awake. She doesn't have much time to contemplate the why. Instead she follows the acidic slime trail left behind by the awful beast.

The others move deeper till they happen upon a stagnant, fetid, pond nestled within the wood. It's covered in moss, rotting debris and scattered bones. The skeletons here are all meshed within tangles of plant matter as if these hideous roots were planted within the carcasses they now sprout from. Moths clog the area, lazily floating through the air or clinging to old branches. Twig Blights creep through the shadows here, some of them still slick with blood and ragged tatters of flesh. Nestled atop a long dead tree stump that sticks out of the water is a massive moth easily the size of their wagon. It looks like its smaller kin aside the size and the strange, hypnotic sparkling light in its otherwise inky black eyes.

Riken and Aelfric hear a distant murmuring noise growing louder and louder. Yet, for Caellana, she can feel something else that blots out everything else. This place, this pond, it casts an oppressive shadow upon the area unlike anything she's ever felt before. Its a cruel presence that smothers her with languid fatigue and confusion. It's only then, in that moment that she understands the truth. Gloomwing herself is here, lurking in the ether between the spirit world and the living. The Twig Blights are her acolytes and the murmuring thing her high priest. This place... her new church.

The lantern glow of Moth's high priest begins to shine through the trees as it slithers toward the pond. Riken, Aelfric and Caellana decide to head toward it first, hoping to find their missing friends before dealing with the pond. They find the horror, fat with the bodies of Berenger and Erik, as well as other recently consumed travelers. Cordelia is there as well, groggy from resisting the priest's lantern, but running up the beast's back and slashing at its head and light organ. Together, they take the fight to Moth's priest. During the battle they realize both Berenger and Erik are still alive, trapped in a stupor as they digest. Berenger is freed first as they slice open the thing's flank to reach him. Cordelia manages to hack off the light organ as well but only a few moments later it quickly regenerates and transfixes Riken before swallowing him as well.

Together they managed to hack away at the creature still its regenerative abilities failed and the priest-thing's body dissolved into a pool of vile fluid and deflated flesh. With all of their friends freed they then returned to the pond ready to deal with the rest of the corruption. As they arrive at the stagnant water they find the twig blights wilting and the thousands of moths dead; spiraling to the ground like flakes of snow. The giant moth is here still here though even it is withering and becoming brittle like an autumn leaf. Caellana can feel Gloomwing's presence fading, her corruption here was too knew and fragile. Without the priest, Moth's barbs in these woods were cast off.

Caellana can hear something speaking through the final embers of the giant moth and the blizzard of dead insects around them. A voice from somewhere distant in the ether speaking through a quickly closing door.