Faerie Tales Grim

General Summary

Procella, MJ, C351SL, Zaketh, Rak
Master Eregast, now restored to consciousness, wished to embark on research into The Narrative Device, especially as it related to the intrusion of external threats into the books, as experienced with the encounter with the lich Torwix. He chose what he believed to be a safe and harmless book of children's fairy tales, and would stand by and observe as the party explored it.
As the party entered the book, each took on the form of a simple-minded goat, which proved quite disorienting. The goats escaped their pen and encountered a bridge troll, with deadly results. But instead of being harmed when their goat forms were destroyed, they each regained their true form, mind, and memories. Allowing them to defeat the troll and move on.
They found themselves exploring a forest where characters and events from the children's tales played out:

• A wolf with a powerful breath occupied a brick house, having demolished the neighbouring straw and wood houses and devouring the occupants.
• A household of bears complained of a break-in by a blonde child.
• An elderly woman awaited her granddaughter's visit, though it transpired that she was actually a murderous lycanthrope in the guise of a kindly woman.
• A gem-miner's lodge was the grisly scene of a septuple murder, the victims all dwarves. The lodge was trapped with mining explosives.

Finally, following a trail of breadcrumbs, they came to a house built from confectionary, where a young girl pleaded for her release from a cage. An evil old witch stoked the fires of the oven, her back turned, seemingly deaf from old age. At the girl's insistence, Cecil pushed the witch into the fires. Cackling, the child revealed itself to be the witch, the second coven hag Agatha Dashe. She had used her powers of illusion to disguise herself as the girl, and the bound and gagged girl as the witch to trick the heroes into committing a terrible act. Cecil's logical artificial mind was unfazed, as, he reasoned, the girl was nothing but a fictional character in a book. He and the others attacked the hag, defeating her, though they were uncertain if that meant for good, or had only expelled her from the story world. Their book journey ended and the fictional world faded.
When they awoke in the Device room, Eregast was gone. Searching for him they found Master Goblin dead, killed in his bed by magical means, and the manor door unlocked and ajar. The hag's manipulations had extended beyond the book, and while the party was distracted, she had made her move.

Related Reports

Followed directly by: Agatha Pulls the Strings

Report Date

07 Feb 2022

Primary Location

Book Worlds

Secondary Location

Goblin Manor