Chapter 2 Session 4: Persicorum Raising Cain

General Summary

The party returned with the sight of a tower in the distance. An upsetting silhouette against the perfect stillness of the empty sky and oceans. Lyren was quite clearly deeply curious to see what was going on with the Spire but was trying to masquerade it behind his concerns for ship safety. The party all saw through him and agreed to check out the strange tower to sate Lyren's curiousity for him.
Eventually, Kodo and Olympia took one of the Mistwalker's rowboats whilst Barallas, Gwydion, Pawcaw, Mimsi and Thordak took the other rowboat. A one sided competition started in which Thordak rowed at maximum speed with Mimsi tucked under his arm whilst Barallas commanded him to Stroke! Stroke!
Despite refusing to race, Kodo and Olympia managed to stay neck and neck with the decidedly disappointing efforts of Thordak.
As they were rowing, Olympia asked Kodo why that was his name, Kodo revealed a group of Halfling children cheekily began calling him Kodo as they thought it was a cute name for him. The name stuck since then. Kodo then explained to Olympia that his name was 'Rook' when he was in the monastery of flowers.
The party reached the base of the spire relatively quickly and, moving as a cohesive unit, easily scaled the sharp, coral base of the landmass to reach the front of the spire. Mimsi decided to touch the wall of spire and realised it was made of black iron with salt infused INSIDE the structure of the walls throughout, something the party attributed to the structure apparently recently rising from the deep ocean.
The party then moved to the door of the building and heard a voice within cry 'Is someone there? Oh gods above it's been so long since I've had some good conversation!'
The figure told the party that his name was Cain and that his tale was one of betrayal, unfairness and innocence... as well as the fact he'd killed six people that he could not care less about.
At this point the party saw a calligraphic inscription on the door that shifted to be in all of their native languages as needed:

Here resides Cain The Immortal. He has been gifted by our Lady of Pain. A neverending life in never ending torment. To ask your questions lift and twist the knocker… free Cain and you will be set upon by me… and the last thing that you want is the avatar of the lady of pain to be set upon you for stupidity.

The party moved 40 feet away from Cain to have a sidebar and discussed what this inscription could mean whilst Cain continued to ask for attention from within the spire.
Kodo revealed that he did not wish to have any interaction with the avatar of the lady of pain as the lady of pain represents punishment and was the god in charge of limbo and hell in Alturis.
At this point Olympia discovered that the Avatar of the Lady of Pain was a folktale involving the legend and myth around Drahz Grymhook, the now dead former true hero and champion of the lady of pain. According to myth and rumour Drahz chose to become a revenant of the lady of pain and continue to do her will across Alturis and he has since become a horror story, that those who cheat death, chase immortality or are reprehensible in their actions will be chased down and pursued by Drahz where he will manually drag them to hell (it brought Ryan immeasurable joy knowing that Drahz became a figure of horror stories to scare children at night.
From that realisation the party worked out that this strange spire was likely one of the Lady of Pain's prisons reserved for Cain as punishment for his misdeeds.
At this point the party chose to leave, they did not wish to interfere in Cain's punishment or the business of Drahz Grymhook. Cain started to hurl abuse at them at this point, VERY convincingly trying to persuade the party that he was a nice guy who'd just fell on some bad luck, he promised vengeance on the party at that point and explained that they are all just like the woman that sent him here, a Moonbrook bitch. This drew Thordak's anger and made the party departed more quickly, apart from Mimsi, who was incredibly curious and felt rebellious at the time.
She explained to Cain that he had 2 minutes to tell her his story and she MIGHT MAYBE CONSIDER opening the door.
Cain revealed, with overly eager relish, that he was the 'Partner, Friend, Bordering on Lover' with Drahz Grymhook. He worked in the hells for the Lady of Pain as a record keeper and 'researcher' who would then hand over their research to Drahz so he could bring in the target.
He was sent on a recent job in Lakefort and decided to look into the immoral creature known as 'The Lady in the Woods' and send her to hell for her actions.
He tracked down the woman and they had a 'Fair, even fight' in which she stabbed him 76 times. As Cain was dying on the ground, The Lady of the Woods clawed into his chest with her nails and marked him as a creature of the Hunt. She revealed her name was Nirya Moonbrook and she was the alpha of their pack.
Cain, in response to this, ran away from her and hid in Lakefort. Within two days, he experienced the hunters bloodlust and went berserk in the town, butchering six people. At that point, Drahz came to 'clean up Cain's mess' and drag him to be punished by the Lady of Pain.
It became very clear to Mimsi by this time that Cain had completely failed to see where he was in the wrong despite being a self proclaimed 'Nice Guy'. Mimsi then asked Cain if he knew things at which Cain claimed he was a genius who knew and saw all... or at least will act that way if it makes Mimsi stay to continue to interact with him.
By this point the party reached Mimsi and Cain saw another chance to free himself. Mimsi asked him what the sea of Chaos was, Cain responded by claiming that a 'sea of chaos' is when the entity known as the chaos chooses to stare at you and drive you mad. His advice was to either challenge the sea of chaos to a duel or to run away as fast as possible. He also claimed that if you are drowning in the sea of chaos, you should close your eyes and plug your ears, lest you look into the eyes of chaos and hear it's many voices.
After that Thordak asked Cain how he knew the Moonbrooks at which point Cain revealed that Thordak's grandmother Nirya Moonbrook was suffering from loneliness after her daughter died, dangerous for a hunter, and so she isolated herself in the woods every night hoping to build a 'pack'. Cain attributed his downfall to Nirya.
Olympia then asked if Cain had alcohol at which point he revealed he had endless quantities but he could not drink, Olympia asked Cain to give her drink at which point he revealed that he couldn't pass over alcohol without opening the door. Olympia got mad at this and Cain began to show off his endless liquor quantities in an attempt to entice Mimsi to open the door. The party dragged Mimsi down to the boats. Enraging Cain. As they left, Olympia and Kodo brought Mimsi on their rowboat and explained that they still saw her as a good friend sober or drunk and saw her as an important part of their group. They did not feel Mimsi needed to be drunk to have friends.
Meanwhile, Thordak and the rest of the Jocks raced their boat back to the Mistwalker and received scattered applause from the crew and mercenaries. The party reconvened and went about their business, at which point Baralas revealed that he had a flask of whiskey if Mimsi needed some.
Mimsi found this flask left for her as Baralas was meditating/training on top deck and drank from it. Learning it was an endless flask of whiskey, Mimsi became enraged by this, seeing the fact that Baralas did not give this to flask to her as bad friendship on his part. She chose to take ownership of the flask at this point.
At this point Maria Cartwright agreed to write a song for Mimsi in exchange for returning her peach schnapps from Thordak. Mimsi requested that the song be 'Romantic, heroic and hilarious'.
Thordak visited Lyren Killian (while the Tiefling was mid 'romance' with Olond) to borrow some books from him. Specifically a book on how to teach sword fighting to others and a dossier Lyren had compiled on the Inquisitors order. Thordak then gave Maria her peach schnapps back. Gwydion completed an incredible acrobatic display of knife throwing and shooting, inspired by his observations of Kodo and Mimsi. The display drew a crowd of VERY impressed onlookers.
After that, Maria found Olympia to request help as Olympia was a skilled writer and musician whilst Maria was only capable of doing remixes and requested songs.
With that, another day passed and the party woke up the next morning to start training. Thordak took Olympia aside and began to show her the basics of sword fighting, as well as gifting her the inquisitors blade, he expressed that he didn't want her to feel weak and so wanted to help her learn to defend herself with a weapon. He realised his work was cut out for him when Olympia began to wildly flail her arms around and seemed to lack basic discipline or understanding of sword fighting techniques.
As they were practising, Mimsi, Kodo and Olympia all spotted strange shapes in the water. Beautiful women with porcelain masks, as the women began to sing, all three of them were charmed and fell into the sea to embrace the women, now revealed to be Harpy's that could charm a target by giving them a vision or sensation that gives them overwhelming joy.

• Mimsi felt the image of her parents accepting her and the appreciation of everyone taking her as she is.
• Olympia felt the warmth and sensation of having a family with her, people who wanted her around and were willing to care for her.
• Kodo felt the embrace and image of his former firbolg companion, despite her leaving him to go to Fallrock many years ago.

As they were charmed initiative was rolled. Kodo and Olympia both realised the flaws in their charms, Kodo realised his 'companion' never sang to him and forced himself to once more come to terms with the fact that his companion had left. Olympia remembered she did not know her parents and angrily told the siren that the party around her were family.
Gwydion gave Thordak his pepperbox and took some rope before diving into the ocean to save his friends, dragging Mimsi away from the siren that tried to swipe at Gwydion as he left. He then made his way to Olympia so that they could climb the rope to escape.
Thordak noticed that, on the other side of the ship, 4 sirens had taken flight, having disgusting slug like bodies with insect claws and feet with bloodied wings and porcelain masks for faces as soon as they left the water.
Mimsi tried to get away from Gwydion and Olympia though lost her charm when Olympia kicked her hard in the ribs. No longer charmed, Mimsi pulled out her spear and went after the siren that sang to her.
The sirens then tried to sing to Thordak and Gwydion who both passed their saves, they conjured the image of Gwydion standing on the top deck of an airship that belongs to him, his lifelong dream. They then conjured the image for Thordak of Mimsi... deeply confusing the barbarian who was expecting to see the picture of Temptation.
After this, the battle very quickly turned into a massacre as the party put the sirens to the sword and staff and gun. Notably, by the end of the fight Archania was looking deeply concerned watching Gwydion.
After this, Mimsi took the time to rebrand Barallas' flask, rubbing out his name and writing a lopsided 'M' on it with her pointy stick instead.
The party rested for a time after that, Maria continued to work on her song and everyone else rested. Olympia and Gwydion went searching for Archania, who had disappeared, Olympia found her preparing weapons in the crows nest. Archania had a feeling the time was coming for her to deal with Gwydion as she had underestimated him, she didn't believe he was stronger than her but, rather, she believed he was hard to read and cunning, surprisingly efficient as well. She was deeply upset and guilty as she liked Gwydion and didn't truly want to kill him... in short, she was punishing herself with guilt.
Olympia asked Archania WHY she does what she does to which Archania replies that she works for the Woven Providence because she believes it's the right thing to do. But she also believes her way is better than the other members who are dark cultists and violently efficient. Archania expresses that she would like to be friends with the party no matter what happens but that she is used to losing friends because of what she does. She finished the conversation by expressing that she took a liking to Gwydion and could have seen them together had things been different.
The party continued to relax and dinner soon was enjoyed across the ship. Once finished, Olympia heard whispers across the ship, calling for her. She followed the whispers to see the ocean had become a thick, almost solid mass that was splitting, an eye was opening on the surface of the ocean.

The whispers then rose up from the sea, to which Olympia closed her eyes and covered her ears. Mimsi moved close to Olympia to see her being bombarded by whispers. As Mimsi grabbed and dragged away Olympia the whispers moved across the ship like air, an invisible force that reverberated across the vessel. At this point, the party saw that eyes were opening across the ocean around their ship. The sea became solid and seemed to seep into and 'penetrate' the hull of the ship, breaking wood and travelling up it onto the top deck. At this point the sea water formed semi solid puddle like shapes and monsters began to scream from the depths as more and more eyes opened.
Next session will be the end of this chapter: A Sea of Chaos.

Rewards Granted

Olympia was given the Inquisitor's blade by Thordak. 
Thordak was given a book on basic sword training and an inquisitor dossier by Lyren Killian.

Missions/Quests Completed

Finding Mimsi alcohol.

Character(s) interacted with

• Cain the Immortal 
• Lyren Killian
• Archania
• Maria Cartwright
• Olond
• Havoc
• The Sirens of the Umalla Coast. 

Report Date

01 Nov 2020