2024/07/24: Avenging Anastasia Part 3 Report
General Summary
Terana, Knight, Kal'vus, Buzz
We return to the party as they regroup over Kal'vus's unconscious form. He was still glowing and shifting slightly. Trying to siphon off the magic mostly resulted in Kal'vus losing some color, which didn't look healthy. Nothing else they had on hand seemed to help.
Spyglass: Thin, skeletal lich or vampire. A number of other vampire enforcers, all surrounding a gigantic blood ritual. They're bringing a cage of citizens over the pool. This was almost certainly happening in the next room.
The conscious members of the party dashed for the big doors that were made accessible by the end of the ritual. They dragged them open. The next room held the blood sacrifice room, with eight burly vampire toughs led by a "lich" who was covered in blood. The center of the room held a giant cauldron that held hot, boiling, supercharged blood. A cage of civilians was dangling over the cauldron, with more lined up.
The fight began immediately. Knight unloaded a barrage of attacks into the lich, but it had no visible effect. In return, the lich gestured and drew a streamer of Void out of Knight and into the cauldron.
Then Terana hit him with gift of life. This would normally have a very low chance of succeeding against such a venerable enemy. But he was rather distracted.
The lich started turning alive. Then the ritual, built specifically for his undead state over centuries, backfired. The boiling blood lunged for him. Knight and Terana reached for each other like they'd practiced it and Knight blackblinked the two of them out of the way. The increasingly living villain was buried under blood and began to mutate. Tumorous growths, multiple screaming faces, malformed limbs.
The vampire thugs came for the two groups of adventurers. Half of the thugs, arranged roughly in a line, suddenly vanished. Humphery had body-checked and shield-bashed the four of them at hyperflight through a window and into a nearby hill.
Two vampires, a big thug with a meat cleaver and a sneakier one with a jagged katana, ganged up on Buzz. Buzz dodged and deflected the first, but the second managed to gut-shot him from behind.
The other two vampires went for Knight and Terana. The first was ineffective. The second seemed to style himself a viking (or possibly discount Thor) and tried to sunder Lume with dual warhammers. Though the two thunderclaps were deafening (to Terana, at least, since Knight doesn't have eardrums), Lume held strong. More than anything it just made him mad.
Knight left the vampires to Terana, turning to shade form and abandoning the melee. Instead, he lashed out at the growing abomination and rended its life force. It went from a pile of energetic red flesh to an unhealthy grey, though it did keep moving.
Then Buzz pulled out the light grenade he had summoned several seconds earlier, blew a kiss through it at the vampire in front of him, cast ray of salvation at the abomination, and then let the grenade go off.
With the vampires suddenly vanished, Terana lunged for the abomination with her ability-draining wakizashi. She finished what Knight had started. The abomination collapsed like a noxious balloon.
The party healed up and rescued the civilians. Then Buzz heard a baby crying from within the pile of abominable flesh.
Under the blankets of skin, he found a baby. It was humanoid, with pointy ears, teeth, and fair white skin. He tried out his very limited paternal instincts on the baby boy. It didn't work very well. Azhar tried out her completely nonexistent maternal instincts (i.e. "Listen here you little shit."), which did make it stop crying but in the least helpful way possible. Buzz took the baby back. Since Terana and Humphery were very clear about how they weren't taking any more kids, Buzz suspected he could pawn the dhampir/demon baby on Blythe back at the Isle of Necromancy.
Meanwhile, Knight and Terana got the prisoners down. There were 120 survivors in the room. All sorts of villagers.
Orders and notes suggested the vampires were being sent out to find dirt from demon lord's grave, favorite weapon, bits of clothing, favorite food. They were evidently trying to bring the demon lord back.
Way back in the building the party blendered a lot of the minions in, Order of the Silver Fang. They were trying to bring back a gentleman by the name of Sir Hellfang. Little boy who found the records said that was the former lord of this area. The Order was probably all here, but there could possibly be some others out there in caves or something. Knight said the party might go check later if they have time, or will at least tell the government about the possibility.
Old lady telling stories about how awful the old lord was. Tortured and ritually killed the daughter of the lord who built the castle. (In other words, Anastasia.) To "make sure she never lived again".
While Knight regaled the newly awakened (but still very uncomfortable) Kal'vus with the story of what happened and what they'd found, Terana finished memorizing commune. She asked how to help Anastasia. The response was "reverse". Further questioning revealed that there was a secret library somewhere in the castle, to which the transmutation artifact sword was the key.
The goddess also pointed the party toward the local Silverton's Gully. Apparently there were local UWG-affiliated adventurers who might be able to help with the concert.
The goddess also suggested the shadow birds from before would be helpful. She said they were located in scary dreams, and pointed Knight towards a "big tree" outside.
The ~10 year old boy with the 200-yard stare kept being surprisingly lucky at finding things. Though when asked, he replied that he "wasn't lucky".
The red demon knight outside is apparently a local boogeyman, wandering the local area, challenging people, then eating them. Not a nice guy. Was willing to do anything for power, including becoming a vampire and selling his soul to demons. There were drawbacks.
From what the party and the villagers could gather, the demon lord and his minions were kicked out of power about six years ago. The minions have been planning this return and the summoning of their master ever since.
Anastasia's father was sort of an obsessive-compulsive nutcase. Also horribly, horribly cursed, or accursed, or cursed those around him. Not the most popular man. The transmutation sword was apparently his preferred instrument.
Terana carved her way through to the secret library. Knight, in the meantime, entered the scary dreams at the tree. It led to a very creepy forest next to a suicide cliff. Knight wandered the forest for a bit and found two of the shadow birds, which gladly perched on his head and promptly went to sleep.
Figuring out what they were and why they were here was a problem for later, though, since Terana had almost reached the library. She stabilized the tunnel with rope and breached the last distance. The adventurers found themselves in a 50'x50' underground library. Aside from books, rubble, and some rotting tables, the party found skeletons of humans or demons. Terana's investigation suggested they had been killed quickly and likely from stealth and without ceremony.
Many of the books in the library were about horrifying curses in bewildering variety. Apparently Anastasia's father had a thing for curses. He may have been a nonstandard spellcaster. A hexmaster? A curselord? Who knows.
Kal'vus searched for and found a secret library in the secret library. The books in this one were leatherbound, and the leather is... unusual. Demon, in some cases. In others, almost certainly human.
From the arrangement, it looked like someone had been referencing books in here sometime in the last five years.
Some of the adventurers inspected the books more closely. Humphery was appalled at what he found. The curse rituals, including those likely used by the demons that cursed Anastasia, were so cruel and disgusting that he didn't feel comfortable with the rest of the party even looking at the books, let alone getting information about them.
Rewards Granted
2 xp
Missions/Quests Completed
Defeat the villains inside Schloss Lichtenstien II.
Character(s) interacted with
Azhar, Elias DelGarrod, old lady, young boy who's good at finding things, Terana's temporary goddess
Kal'vus
Buzz Gizmo
Terana DelGarrod
Knight of Darkhome
Report Date
26 Jul 2024
Primary Location
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