DW Session 30: Deep Scions Abound

General Summary

6/4/897

• The party makes it way to the fishing town of Gordigrad to the south of Oblast
• Helena says that it’s Gleb’s hometown, so maybe they’ll find some valuable info about his past and powers
• Flora gambles with the sailors below deck, Jax and Helena spend some time studying together and reading Tarpin Melchor’s Chronicles of the Continent
• Jax mentions that he’s met Medraad, which fascinates Helena since she learned that Medraad died during the Battle of Faouzia in 876.
• Cereus keeps a low profile in the mess hall, helping Finnegan the gnomish chef cook dinner most nights
• Beleren keeps in touch with the Shroud, tries to be vague with Helena when asked if he has any connections to Medraad or the Shroud
• Gordigrad is a small, tired-looking village where everybody in town is either a farmer or fisherman
• There’s one tavern and one general store in town, and the party stops by the tavern to get the lay of the land
• A couple named Kasimir and Efrosenia tell them about Gleb’s history with the place, how he left to work for Tarkov before returning to revitalize the community
• Sure enough, nobody in town has a negative thing to say about Gleb
• Kasimir says that Gleb will be in town in a couple nights if they want to stay and meet him
• Flora and Helena decide to go visit the Mayor to see what he thinks
• The door’s locked and the mayor tells them to go away, but Helena (a bard) uses Knock to open the door and go inside
• The Mayor is covered in scars with skin falling off his body, horribly deformed and in incredible pain
• He says that Gleb forced this on him, gave him the ultimatum of death or assimilation
• Not everything in Gordigrad is as it seems, he says
• Flora and Helena tell the rest of the party about this meeting, and they try to go investigate that night before Kasimir and Efrosenia warn them it’s dangerous to go out into the village in the dark
• They sleep in, hearing ominous howling in the shadows outside
• The next morning the party heads together to the Mayor’s house to check on him
• He looks perfectly normal and healthy, like nothing happened the day before
• Flora tries to press him on their meeting the day before, but he’s completely sedate and nonchalant
• He just needed some rest, Gleb isn’t as bad as he was making it seem yesterday, etc.
• Helena casts Charm Person with her enchanted violin, Jax and Beleren go outside to sneak inside the Mayor’s bedroom
• Beleren finds the place scratched and torn to shreds along with a journal describing the Mayor’s monstrous transformation after Gleb’s previous visit to Gordigrad
• The party regroups at the tavern to share the intel
• Later that day the party decides to look for a good place to meet Gleb face-to-face when he arrives in Gordigrad
• Flora has a spell that might help give them an advantage
• They go over to a nearby farm and speak with the owner Drazhan about camping out and looking around the place
• Cereus even offers to give him his driftglobe in return for the service and Drazhan is about to agree
• But then Jax has his own plan, he decides to douse Drazhan with the Decanter of Endless Water and grapple him into the barn
• Inside, Jax finds sahuagin corpses and a workshop table full of surgical tools and equipment
• With a creepy grin, Drazhan explains how all of these sahuagin were gifts from Gleb, helping them transform into a more powerful creature known as Deep Scions
• It’s what happened to the mayor, and Kasimir and Efrosenia were some of the first supporters
• Meanwhile Beleren is trying to defuse a growing situation with the villagers getting suspicious
• It fails, but not before Cereus can sneak behind the barn right as combat starts
• Jax gets stunned and distracted by some of the Deep Scion’s shrieks, but the party survives the encounter and slaughters the entire village
• Unprepared for combat, Helena struggles to hold her own against the horde of Deep Scions and gets KO’d once
• Kasimir fires off a dark blue flare before he’s killed, forcing the party to retreat back to the Castellan II before Gleb arrives

Report Date

20 Mar 2020

Primary Location

Gordigrad