Session 10: Umasked
Activity Log - The Masked Necromancer has been revealed, but who, or what, has been influencing him?
General Summary
After putting the corpse of Trevor DeWitt to rest, we set him upon one of the slabs in the morgue and gather his belongings together. I hide the grimness that has set in from his death; we did not know him well, and the others do not spare more than a brief moment of realization at his death, but Trevor’s demise is partially due to our lack of action against the now apparent desperate attempts at finding and taking the lockboxes by the necromancer. Many lives have been taken for whatever significance these fangs hold. For myself, insight into my “uncle” is lost forever from the only respectable personage associated with him outside of mother. As we prepare to make our way upstairs, Cojitron halts and tells the rest of us that an incoming spell of sending has targeted her. She recites the brief message back to us; Hencil Spash is desperately calling for aid, claiming that a masked assailant has broken into his manse and is attempting to steal his lockbox. The rest of us immediately became distrustful; we had just been pulled into a trap not a day prior by a job posting that sought to neutralize us, and Spash had only just met us. Why contact us specifically? I ask Cojitron to reply back to prove that he is who he says he is and provide more details. They do, and after a moment, a second sending spell informs them that this is their second and last scroll of the spell, giving some details as to our meeting earlier and his job offer to break into the counting house. Our reputation as Dayne’s mercenaries, despite our newness to the role, made him immediately think of us, as his guards have been defeated by the undead breaking into his estate. Though we collectively agree that Spash is likely a loathsome person who would sooner spit on us than treat us as equals, we realize that this is also a good opportunity to stop the magic user that has caused such death and destruction, and if it were a trap, we would deal with that then too. We tell Rellahne and Fez we were needed elsewhere and, taking the wagon we arrived at the hospital on, plotted a course around the devastation at the Counting House. The fires appeared to not have abated at all, and in fact was spreading some, which was an ominous sign. We successfully avoid any obstacles on our way to Echo Marsh and Spash’s large manor. Unlike earlier, we did not encounter any guards at the gate. In fact, examining the area, we found the front gate unlocked and slightly ajar. We approach the front gate of a nearby estate, speaking to the guards on duty. Inquiring as to the whereabouts of the staff to Spash’s home, they could only reply that they’ve been focused on their own employer’s property given the commotion and fire at the counting house. We inform them of the general details of what has happened and warn them against any potential undead that may break through the constabulary’s lines. Nervous, they decide to increase their guard presence. I am glad they readily accepted our story; I barely believe it myself. I examine the gate and, finding that it was not forced open, but was undone with magic, we quietly approach and enter the building. It is dark inside; being as late as it is, this is not surprising. We enter the foyer and past the entryway, we come across the grand piano. There was a copious amount of blood near the instrument, with tracks leading away from it. We head towards Spash’s personal quarters, to see if he has barricaded himself within. We successfully conceal our presence, and discover his apartments turned upside down; many of his personal possessions and furniture have been thrown about. Near the wall hung a large painting, and behind it, a sizable safe that was being worked on by someone in the shadows. I silently approach, and am surprised to find Dayne. I cover his mouth and ask what he’s doing here. Panicking, he replies that he got a sending spell asking for help saving him from the masked necromancer. I reveal myself and tell him we had received the same message. I ask why he was trying to crack the safe, and the not unexpected reply from him that he was attempting to secure the 2,000 aurins he was promised for the job, with our cut coming from that amount. I tell him that we haven’t found Spash yet, nor the necromancer. I refrain from mentioning Trevor’s death for the moment, but share with him our suspicions that Ian Becker was behind everything as the necromancer or at least in cahoots with them. He is genuinely flabbergasted by this assertion; he was just an accountant, and no wizard, he claimed. I give a brief account of the evidence against him, including the handwriting on the job meant to entrap us. He is conflicted; I have rarely seen him like this, so it seems he truly trusted his Black Hearts. We leave him to the safe and move to the garish trophy room in the manor, hoping to find Spash or the Necromancer. Approaching the double doors leading to the showroom, we spot six skeletons armed and ready to intercept us. Horick takes the wave of them, fending them off with his raging swings. We close in and take them out, finding them quite fragile. As Horick burst through the last one with his weapon, we saw the remains begin to crawl towards each other, steadily reforming. Not wanting to remain to find the secret to their regeneration, we burst through the doors and run into the trophy room. Several dozen feet in, we spot footsteps on the floor belonging to someone running barefoot across the trophy hall. Further in, close to the vault area where Spash kept his dragon tooth lockbox, we find six more skeletons blocking our path. Horick crashes into them, swinging and bursting occasional dark magics to shatter the skeletons. These, however, also begin reforming. Before we could find a solution to this ongoing problem, the connecting hall leading to a large chamber filled with the skeletal remains of beasts and demihumans alike, flittered in a figure we were now seeing for the first time but was unmistakable by the description from the Throat Wolves and Bethany at the MacMurdaugh Hotel, the masked necromancer. Dark moths surrounded the necromancer and, rushing to keep him from casting any of his spells, I pulled the wind fan from my pack and cast a gust of wind in an attempt to knock him over. He held his ground though the moths were blown down into the trophy room. Unfortunately, those moths flew into the skeleton of an enormous beast, some kind of ancient lizard, and began to animate it. It stepped off the dais it stood upon and stalked towards me. Try as I might to avoid its giant maw, it snatched me from the ground and I tumbled into its ribcage, banging my head against its skeletal remains and going unconscious. Fortunately, Tea Kettle and Cojitron were on the move. While his construct rushed into the horde of skeletons attacking us to support Horick’s mad battle, he came down the intersecting hallway and launched a piece of loose masonry at the necromancer that struck him squarely in the face. Shaken, his concentration lapsed and it seemed to affect the undead he had called. The ones shambling towards us from the rear that we had previously fought began to shake loose, several of them clattering to the ground. Cojitron followed TK and shot a witch bolt at the villain, electrocuting him and causing several more skeletons to tumble from Horick’s crowd. Even the giant lizard began to lose some of its stability. Horick took advantage of the undead’s wavering magic and struck them all down. The Necromancer, sensing the tide turning with the damage he has taken, attempts to flee down the hallway into the trophy room, possibly to gain some distance to cast a spell to escape from the mansion. Horick turns and hurls a handaxe at his fleeing form, which strikes his side. Clearly in pain, Cojitron’s still enveloping magic ran more electricity through him. This was too much for him and he collapsed before he could round the corner into the trophy room; it turned out we had penned him in with our entrance from the other side his skeletons guarded, as there were no openings or windows to the outside of the building. The remaining skeletons, including the monster I was in, crashed to the ground. I am dropped free and I am treated quickly by TK. I awaken to find the scene under control, such as it was. Horick is contemplating chopping the man’s limbs off, but I persuade him to just tie him up and take his items and manacite for the time being so we can question him. After he is bound, we pull at the mask, finding it surprisingly difficult to take off. It eventually yields. We discover that the wizard’s identity is indeed that of Ian Becker. We bind his wounds just enough to keep him alive. Cojitron and TK examine the mask, finding that it has a malevolent energy surrounding it, though the mana gauge we use on it cannot discern the origin of this magic. Dayne arrives in the hallway a moment later with a sack of gold from the safe, and we show him the form of Ian Becker. He is flabbergasted, reasoning that he must have been controlled somehow. Cojitron and I entered the vault the skeletons were guarding while the other three watched the necromancer while Dayne paced with a troubled look. We follow the barefoot tracks from earlier and find that it stops near a sarcophagus within this chamber. While Cojitron took readings with the mana gauge in the surrounding area for any lingering dark magic, I examined the lid for a lock and, discovering one unprotected by magic but which concealed a dangerous poison trap, I carefully disabled it and picked the lock. The lid slid open and revealed a passage rather than a mummy to a lower level. I called down and Spash’s voice responded, relieved when I told them we have come as promised and dispatched the necromancer. He came upstairs, clutching the lockbox, dressed in his nightgown, looking nonplussed. I’m able to calm him down enough to bring him back to the other room where they were still interrogating Becker. All the while Spash was babbling something about how we should have taken him up on his earlier offer, but that he would reward us handsomely all the same. Fortunately, Dayne had squared that away earlier. We arrived back as Horick held Becker up by his throat, threatening to choke the life from him and demanding to know why he was after the lockboxes with the dragon fangs. Dayne had snapped out of his reverie and was trying to convince our dwarven friend to go easy on him and hear him out. Becker began spewing nonsense about some force that he was listening to, that drove him to collect these fangs, which would help him gain greater power in exchange for this task. It mostly flew over my head. He revealed the name “Sitrix, lord of the grave” in his reverent tone; he seemed not particularly afraid to die, as he spoke of his grand purpose in this being’s name. TK remarked that it may be time to take this discussion elsewhere, as we observe the fire and commotion coming from the city center growing worse. Our fears were coming to pass, and I worried for Lt. Freeleaf’s defensive line having been scattered and the zombies attacking more of the city and infecting people. Becker, for his part, has thus far not revealed how to stop this plague that has been granted him by this Sitrix. We decide to take one of Spash’s carriages to Arcane Bindings, where we might have access to the materials needed to research a way to stop this foul magic. I doubted Isolde would be particularly welcoming, but given the danger from the wave of undead no doubt heading in this direction to, ostensibly, take the lockbox from Spash, she might be more amenable to our presence. It would also not do to keep her or Uncle Dayne in the dark long about Trevor, as they both seemed close to him. What we would continue to keep everyone in the dark, is that beyond the known lockboxes with these fangs, of which at least two were unaccounted for yet, our little band possessed one that was found with Fink’s belongings unlocked. We forced Becker to his feet and Spash, treating this as a sort of holiday and locking up his manor until this blew over, decided slumming with us for the time being might be agreeable. I don’t think he understood the true gravity of the situation, but I was silently grateful his ***bigotry was more ridiculous than destructive, for now. We hurry outside, take one of his carriages, and plot a course for the book store before the zombies that have made it to Echo Marsh reach this area. Fortunately for us, Arcane Bindings was not far from here. I envy my friend Cojitron, as they had no need of sleep. It has been a trying day which refuses to end. The End for Now, ~Bayour S.
Rewards Granted
- Whatever amount Dayne Reed has taken from Spash's wall safe as our fee for his rescue
- Certain items procured from the Masked Necromancer
Missions/Quests Completed
- Hencil Spash has been saved from the Masked Necromancer and his lockbox secured
- The identity of the Masked Necromancer is revealed to be the missing Ian Becker, though his magic is still running rampant
Character(s) interacted with
- Dayne Reed, manager of the Black Hearts
- Hencil Spash, wealthy Locklander and collector of the macabre
- Ian Becker, the Masked Necromancer, former accountant for the Black Hearts
Related Reports
Notes
- Though Ian Becker has been revealed as the villain that has been killing and wrecking havor for the dragon fangs, the undead plague stlll runs rampant
- Who is this Lord of the Grave pulling his strings?
