Session 14

General Summary

Through the Dark Wood

The party came to a crossroads as they moved down south towards Yester Hill. The arrow pointed towards a vineyard, while an unmarked path continued south. Moving through, they came to an immensely thick wall of foliage. Venturing into the forest, most of the party lost their bearings. While Nova and Ahrieya made it through the woods relatively unscathed within a few hours, the remainder of the party got lost. Idris came across a corpse with a boot through the chest, caving in the body. Gio found a corpse pinned against the tree, missing its bottom half, and roots pumping blood and flesh out of the corpse. Ariadne ran into a long abandoned camp with a skeletal figure who was once carving a piece of wood. Ireena came across a corpse with multiple slash wounds in addition to being decapitated. The party eventually, after an additional two hours, as they discussed what they saw. Ahead, they saw a massive hill with lightning striking the top of the hill.

Climb the Terrace

The party approached a shrine at the bottom of the hill. As they observed the stones, they saw a familiar quartet of depictions of seasons. In the center, a reading...

“Here lies Kavan the Bloodsinger. May his spirit guide us through the trials of the Ladies Three.”

Continuing around the shrine, Nova's vein began to act up and fill her with power and confidence. A sprit then began to speak out to her. After some time, the spirit manifested itself as a wounded man draped in a bear pelt. He explained he has been waiting for a person such as her to take up his legacy, as the raven with blue-tipped feathers told him all about her. He was glad to see that Ursor has not abandoned her as he did his own people, and perhaps she is a sign sent by the bear god himself.  He explained that a schism occurred within his people, where half turned to worship the Ladies Three after Ursor left, where the others turned to worship the Great Shadow himself, venerating him as a god. The people who chose Strahd became known as the Faithless. Recently, they've gotten ahold of a powerful artifact, and they plan on using it to strike against an old ally to his people; The Martikov Clan. By the clouds above and the whisperings of ravens, he surmises the ritual has already begun. Before disappearing, the party agreed to help, and Nova got a brief vision of a blood red axe embedded in a black tree, adorned with bear and wolf claws. The terrace, known as Yester Hill, is filled with Faithless who will try to attack them. Moving towards the first of four layers of the terrace, the party circumvented some watchmen by climbing up the side of the first terrace. Moving up the second, however, they could hear a patrol approaching behind them. Setting up an ambush, the party dispatched the patrol with relative ease, and made the decision to take their clothing and bypass some of the other patrols, while the others scouted ahead or hid behind. As Ahrieya and Ariadne went ahead to scout, Idris, Gio and Ireena disguised themselves as some of the forest folk, and Nova poured her heart out to the wind, hoping Ariadne was there to listen.  As the disguised party approached a patrol, Idris and Gio adopted the universal gesture for "don't bother me" and grunted their way out of any conversation, passing the patrol by. Ariadne and Ahrieya both discerned that they seemed concerned about the disguised party members. Moving further ahead, across black stone cairns all along the hill, they came up to an entrance to a massive ring where a ritual seemed to be taking place with a wooden statue of Strahd. Idris, Gio, and Ireena pretended to be wounded, as Gio dug into his own wound to spew out blood, and Idris collapsed on the ground a few feet away from the other Faithless. Ahrieya shouted for help in their language, as Nova and Ariadne looked on and watched. A bulky man tried to stem Gio's bleeding, and one of the druidic forest folk tried to heal Idris' wounded. Worried the gig might be up as the druid addressed Idris' horns, the edgy music man pretended to be possessed, grabbing and holding on the druid in a sporadic manner. Claiming to be there to help him, as he was "A close personal friend of his mother," the druid employed the help of a bulky man to restrain Idris as a part of the guard moved down the hill to address the horn that was blown.  As the worried druid tried to exorcize Idris, the party sprang into action and dispatched the newly downsized guard. As the fight broke out, a voice from inside the ring taunted the group, calling them meddlers and that they should declare themselves to the Great Shadow to be spared. Moving into the center of the ring, they saw a multitude of druids enacting some sort of ritual with a wooden statue of Strahd. Additionally, they saw a pale woman in an elegant red dress looking on with a glass of wine. As the party moved to try and stop the ritual, the woman turned and tried to stop Nova from stopping the ritual by offering her a glass of wine. Dodging walls of fire, sniping druids left and right, and cleaving, beaming, and bashing druids away, the party weakened the druids little by little.  As the ritual progressed, the sky grew darker, lightning crackled more frequently, and a dark figure began to form inside the wooden statue of Strahd. Trying to destroy the statue, Idris fired bolts of fire at the statue as Ahrieya threw alchemist fire and Ariadne let down a moonbeam on the dark statue. However, despite this, a massive, twisted treant emerged from the statue and began to wreak havoc.

We're Gonna Need A Bigger Axe

As the tree beast fought the party, blow after blow, the creature seemed unfazed. With a glowing green gem in the face of this creature, Ahrieya tried to pry it from the creature. After being grabbed, bashed, and bitten by the massive beast, she realized the gem could not be removed. As the jaws dug back into her, a chunk of Ahrieya's torso was torn away as her lifeless corpse was thrown aside. Struggling to defeat this creature, the party emboldened their fight to make it out alive as Ireena faltered only for a moment. Idris fell after many blows from the creature, but not before asking the mysterious entity that has helped him before once again for aid. As his consciousness faded, he found himself on a stage, playing the same somber tune over and over and over and over again for what felt like years. He eventually found himself burning from within, a familiar but somber feeling that coursed through his body. Tendrils of flame snaked around his body, originating from his eyes as they lashed out at the treant. In conjunction with Nova's powerful strikes at the base of the creature, the base of the creature was torn apart by Nova as Idris' flames embedded into the creature's head, causing it to implode from within as its branches were torn asunder.
In the aftermath of what happened, Idris continues to burn with this unknown power as Ahrieya's body lays bleeding on the cold, wet dirt.

Report Date

09 Nov 2022

Primary Location

Yester Hill

Related Characters

• Anastrasya Karelova
• Flameo Hotman