Building Trust - Part 2 - Wagner Abbey Game 2
General Summary
The next morning Ospher and I decided that fencing the items looted from Wagner Abbey was for the best, rather than letting some random thief at the 12 Carrot Tavern or Digby Sparrow himself steal our "wages". Initially, I attempted this but after accidentally drawing attention to the shopkeep's harelip I disguised Ospher and sent him in in order to complete the transactions. We then grab Charity and proceeded back to Bell Haven district.
On the steps of the Abbey, we saw three vagrants who were sharing a meal on the front stoop. As we approached, they attempted to steal money from us by claiming that they have intimate knowledge of what was inside the abbey itself. While I explained that we have been in there ourselves the previous night, this refused to take purchase in their mind and they wanted to sell us an old rusty dagger that he claimed would help us fight ghosts. I couldn't persuade them to leave, so I instead explained that the new Owner of the Abbey is a cantankerous scoundrel who has hurt people for far less than trespassing. As they ran off, Charity added that he's also a cannibal which surprised me.
We re-entered the abbey through the basement and in the intervening 15 hours, the sewers had properly drained. I insisted we comb the aqueducts to determine the cause of the improper drainage and determine what other sorts of creatures dwell down here. After seeing a few dog sized giant rats and as many giant centipedes as someone could ever hope to eat (no names mentioned), we saw a little nook that contained the main access grate was clogged with a very bloated zombie. Assuring the others that Digby will set us to it sooner or later, I take the lead in starting to remove the pieces to return proper function to the sewer. The hard work and the putrefaction ultimately proved too much for Charity and she ended up getting sick from the exposure. We helped her to the Wine cellar to get the smell from her senses and grab a few more bottles to sell off with local sommeliers.
Once she felt better we headed back to where Ospher said he saw the ghost in the Grand hall. In addition to the front door, the tall room with vaulted ceiling and a now broken skylight had doors coming off of it in every way, classrooms, study rooms, a dining hall and one labeled administration. Besides the broken skylight providing a point of egress for prior mercenaries, we saw ruined paintings and vases that had succumbed to the ages, as well as a locked cabinet, with some recent blood on it. Related to that, there's also some entrails that appear somewhat recent that lead into the dining hall. We tried the hawk's headed key on the cabinet and it opened, revealing a small azure gem and two small healing potions. I offered mine to Charity, since she expressed interest in replicating them eventually. I then asked her what she had decided upon for a specialization in her magical arts. She said Digby told her she could study whatever she wanted, so she chose Necromancy to help people and "shape destinies". We told her that we hoped she used it for good, she said her book which came from Baradrad said instead of wasting the body after someone dies someone could use a mask on their face and have it perform manual labor.
I poked my head into the dining hall to see what may be going on with the viscera smear on the ground, assuming one of the missing hobos must have come in here. One of the dining tables looks set with gore, meat and viscera. Also from what must be the nearby prep area on the left side of the door, there's a regular thumping noise. We sent Ospher in to scout out and see if it was vagrants or if the smell of blood and rotten meat meant more zombies. Ospher later reported that the prep area, while a "goddamned shambles", had someone there prepping a corpse's flesh, suggesting a cannibal might be in there. This immediately made me think of Digby which Charity said in his defense he only eats oatmeal.
We agree to go in together, and coming from the kitchen at a much faster rate than normal zombies, 3 zombies dressed as chefs. The head chef is holding a large cleaver (short sword in length) and i decide now is the time to turn them with Nisaba's glory. Additionally, I use her power to summon an illusion of myself in order to confuse the chef. The sous-chefs were turned so we face the chef head on. After scouring his grimy clothes off with magical power, Ospher disgustingly likens him to a bacon wrapped date, but a zombie. Charity hits him with her witchbolt and then sustains the effect to continue electrocuting him. After defeating him, we handle the other two which ran to a side supply door and were scrabbling at it to the point where they've reduced their fingers to nubs. Charity threw another of her ice knives at them both, breaking some crockery in the process and we manage them with little more discomfort.
On the far end of the room, I noticed a very clean sword on the wall as well as a suit of armor while Ospher took a hard look as the zombies, deciding that the three of them had been specially crafted and given extra intelligence. Ospher went to check out the sword and armor while Charity and had a look in the prep area at the side door. He determined they were of New Balmoran creation when the armor tried to reach out and choke him. He then ran into the room we were in and slammed the door and explained what was going on. The sword attempted to plunge itself through the door at us, so I told them we need to run into the back alleyway and not let both of them get us at once. I ushered them out ahead of me, while forcing the sword to focus on me and concentrate on shielding everyone. Both animated objects pursued us in to the alley with the armor trailing behind as it couldn't move as fast the sword.
As we turned the corner to the front yard of the Abbey, Ospher and Charity finally disabled the sword which was safely plunged into the earth. I screamed at the Vagrants to get the hell out of here as the animated armor closed. Charity yelled that it was time for her constant suggestion of the Grease spell to be used. It went off without a hitch and I slid in an manacled its arms and legs together in order to disable it and then we brought it to pieces. We discussed selling the items to make our covetous dreams come true, but Charity reminded us we'd have to turn over anything magical to Digby. We drag the equipment back in and toss it in the corner of the dining room. I noticed the large windows and blinds and open them and realized that there's an enclosed garden here as well. I go out into it tentatively while cutting overgrown vines, and noticed that some of the herbs survived as well as at the far corner at the end of a path of drag marks and discarded clothing in a large puddle, was a carnivorous plant sucking a human foot out of a boot. I back tracked carefully and noticed that Ospher was disposing of the zombie bodies in the grease outside, while Charity was re-reading her spellbook.
We unlock the administration door with the hawk key as well and immediately notice a small group of floating lights that is accompanied by a slight music. Besides that, there's three offices (one with a bookcase turned over in front of it) and a little waiting area. Ospher sneaks in past the floating lights with some magical assistance to begin rifling through the abandoned office. While he was in there, I thought I saw something by one of the other doors that lead to the classrooms, but nothing appeared before he returned so, maybe this place is much less abandoned than we thought. In the corner of the room, there appears to be a very dry corpse in the room, which the lights may or may not have fed on, and Ospher surmised that the overturned bookcase was done deliberately. We found a class registry in the room that was grabbed with mage hand and Ospher also thought the lights may be otherworldly, specifically not from Tairos.
In the offices, Ospher discovered that one of them had been well picked over while the other hadn't. The rummaged room had a few books left regarding animals and a scroll in the desk of Arcane lock. The other room had the corpse of a former professor that committed suicide by the name of Algier Rabinger, Astronomy and Divination were his subject. He's holding a wand of magic missiles, which he appeared to have used upon himself after coming to terms with having created a way to use an apparatus with a telescope in the observatory, to bridge the distance to foreign worlds, which may explain the floating lights in the admin room.
We moved on from here to see the other wings of the Abbey at this point, the Labs being the closest offshoot. It's a large set of doors, but the doors are locked with a snarling bear's face and the keyhole is in the mouth. Sensing an obvious trap, we use Ospher's mage hand to insert the hawk-head key in and turn it. The bear's jaws clamp briefly, but it doesn't damage the key or unlock the door. The afternoon was growing long at this point, so we moved onto the dormitories from here. There was a similar animal head at the lock, but it opened with the key we had, so it didn't try to bite us. There's a staircase that leads up to all the sleeping areas and a hallway that has signs saying it leads to the bath house, lodgings and chapel. We went for the chapel, and noticed some skeletal tracks in the dust of the floors as we traversed.
The chapel doors adorned with Sandor's symbol were ajar, and the room itself looked unmolested, the stained glass pictures of Sandor's precious scenes of hypocrisy were wholly intact. The tabernacle cabinet had 8 vials of holy water that could be used as manacite/applied as poison to a weapon, a key with a ram's head, and a book of Sandor's teachings, Songs of Light. Ospher and I split them, since Charity eschews weapons and Ospher found locked concealed box in a corner. He picked the lock at which point the ghost he saw last night appear and grip his hand. She was glowing a deep blue light and then after a brief bit of confusion she looked as if she wanted to kill us. Sshe muttered "Must kill. Must kill you. Must kill." I stepped in and pleaded with her to find her sense of herself, which bought us a moment to secure the box and we noticed her ancient bones beneath it too. I channeled Nisaba's power again and drove her off and beat retreated directly outside to give it a proper burial in the hopes it would lay the ghost to rest.
Ospher opened the box and found an odd collection of items, likely the student's worldly possessions, money, a quiver of 20 arrows, crossbow, scroll case and used bear trap. Her spellbook, in her robes said her name was Livie.
Charity has figured out what she wants to do with her life. Kudos to that. Hopefully she doesn't end up like Baradradians.
The Abbey still holds many more dangers, even after today's fiascos. It is looking more likely that we will need to enlist Ser Brightshine.
Character(s) interacted with
Adjenna Affreux
Ospher Spurshoe
Charity Sparrow - casting doubts on her ability to keep a secret
Digby Sparrow - an omnipresent reminder to not sell his magical shit if we want to keep our hands
3 Vagrants, selling dubious information and wares
The ghost of a student protecting Sandor's secrets, and the corpse of said student
Ospher Spurshoe
Charity Sparrow - casting doubts on her ability to keep a secret
Digby Sparrow - an omnipresent reminder to not sell his magical shit if we want to keep our hands
3 Vagrants, selling dubious information and wares
The ghost of a student protecting Sandor's secrets, and the corpse of said student
Created Content
See! I told you! You need the ghost knife!
I just don't want anybody else to die for this stupid thing my grandfather is making us do
The new owner is a cannibal! he'll eat you alive!
No! He's not a cannibal! He only eats oatmeal!
Report Date
23 May 2020
Primary Location
"I'm not gonna be able to see anything, I have human eyes. Do hobbit eyes, can you see..."
"That's their word! You can't say that word!"
"It's our word Charity! Our Word!"
"See Ospher is very good at sneaking."
"Yeah, see it's not like a racial thing."
"Right, Ospher is good at what he does."
"I think all hobbits are. Uh Halflings!"
