Cult of the Centipede

Written by Chrundle_the_Great

General Summary

Overview

During their quest to fell the fearsome King Crab, the guild's hunters defended the Mouth of the King from two duergar psionics and the monstrous centipedes they commanded. Before dying, one of them wheezed, "The Lord of Centipedes will devour your King Crab..."
Azrael, well-versed in the convoluted politics of the Nine Hells, did not recall any fiends known as the Lord of Centipedes; the illrigger theorized either the duergar had been tricked or a troubling new entity had emerged in the swamps and, worse still, near Kapital's fledgeling keep. Accompanied by founders Chuma and Mizzryn and hunter Pad Tole, Azrael leads this group to put the cult to the sword and recover loot, especially those hellish in nature.
Will Kapital overthrow the Cult of the Centipede, or will they fall victim to its crawling monstrosities?

Those Tadpoles Ain't Right

Following the guild's first established trade route, Pad Tole led the party to the grippoli village. However, where once the air was full with the sounds of lively villagers and the clicking of diverse species of crabs, the atmosphere was deathly quiet and unnerving. Their guard raised, the party crept through the village and soon found villagers. Glassy-eyed and slackjawed, the grippoli stood still and faced the shores of the Breakwater.
Like an inky mass, thousands of tadpoles squirmed onto land, all of them mindlessly inching towards the Pondmother's home. The party trudged through, around, but mostly on the writhing tadpole swarm which now blanketed the entire village. Swinging the door open, the party saw the Pondmother sitting wide-eyed and a massive bullfrog wearing her feathered headdress, a massive emerald fused between its eyes.
A bulbous lamprey (later identified as a slaad tadpole) latched hungrily to the bullfrog's neck. The tadpoles nearest to the emerald squirmed more violently, some of them mutating into tiny aberrations. Sensing danger, the "lamprey" slashed the party's minds with psychic waves and compelled the tadpoles to swell and crash like a wave upon them.
While Azrael and Pad Tole cut through the aberrant swarm and Mizzryn cleaved through the slaad tadpole, a hidden creature fell from the ceiling and burrowed under Chuma's skin. As the Acquisitions Expert screeched in pain, panicked Pad Tole skewered Chuma with his coral katana to remove the parasite within him; the samurai succeeded, but spilled much of the Brass Banker's blood. Not entirely sure what to make of these strange creatures, the party stuffed two smaller ones into glass jars for Tobias Morden to investigate at a later time.
Grateful, the Pondmother thanked the party for saving them from "having [their] minds devoured." She didn't know where the creatures had come from or what they were but happily answered the party's questions about duergar and the mysterious Cult of the Centipede. She recalled seeing "gray-skinned dwarves" leaving nearby dark caverns, which the grippoli called "the Underdark."

Hellish Hallucinations

The chittering and crawling of insects echoed from the cave's mouth. As the party delved deeper, the passage grew narrower, until Mizzryn, in her heavy armor, could move no further. While Chuma and Pad Tole helped her carry her precious plate mail piece by piece, stealthy Azrael melded into shadows and scouted ahead.
The illrigger stumbled upon stone carved with old, old icons of the Hells. Suddenly, his vision narrowed onto a particular symbol, the mark of "the master of the masters" — Asmodeus. Shrieks hammered Azrael's mind, and the illrigger fell to his knees as devilish voices condemned him.

How could you think to destroy His order from within?
How could you lie to He who invented lying?
You are not enough.

— Azrael's Paranoia

When the others arrived, they found Azrael convulsing on the floor. After being healed by fellow illrigger Chuma, Azrael still shook with the fear of greater powers watching him. Working together, the illriggers verified that the carved stone depicted worship of archdevils, particularly Asmodeus, the Prince of the Hells; it remained a mystery how the "Lord of Centipedes" came to be worshipped instead.

Killing Cultists, Taking Names

In a nearby room, the party found hanging cages holding the dessicated corpses of dwarves and grippoli. A mad-eyed cultist tortured a half-elven woman and poured centipedes into her mouth, cackling and chanting to his lord. As the party rushed to her aid, two monstrous centipedes leapt from the ceiling and ambushed them. Armed with magical cold iron bracelets, the cultist blasted the party with waves of intense pain and fire, but Azrael lopped off his head; unfortunately, still shaking with paranoia, he did the same to the prisoner who was driven mad by the cultist's spells.
Among the bodies of cultists and sacrifices, the party found a dark altar, which the illriggers quickly recognized; by sacrificing souls, it could summon a devil from the Hells for an audience. Meanwhile, Pad Tole investigated the slain centipedes' maws and identified their poison as powerful hallucinogens. Piecing the clues together, the party now theorized that this new cult were being manipulated by some devil summoned by the long-forgotten altar.
Mizzryn inspected the stone walls and found a hidden tunnel. A dozen statues of duergar halberdiers guarded the tunnel. As the party ventured forth, the statues came alive and the walls shut behind them. Ancient, one of the statues rasped, "Speak the name of the one true god and pass."
The statues shook with anger when Mizzryn answered Deep Duerra, but fearful Azrael whispered the name of Asmodeus. Immediately, the statues stood still as stone, and all the party felt themselves branded with infernal seals.

It's a Trick!

As the party rushed into the final chamber, they saw various cultists kneeled before their leader Glint, who chanted feverishly. Aided by their hellsight, Azrael and Chuma saw an invisible imp handing a venom-dripping blade to the cult leader. Seeing the weapon appear out of nothingness, all cultists believed their sage leader blessed by their Lord of Centipedes. All of them rose to meet the party's charge.
Swinging her chain-sword and covered in vicious spiked armor, Mizzryn grappled with the giant centipedes. Pad Tole, disciple of the samurai crabs, became a cyclone of coral and steel among the mad-eyed cultists. Chuma summoned the full might of the torturer's bracelets and used their "lord's" magicks against them. Finally, Azrael, the executioner, sprouted his wings of light and dueled with the leader Glint; the surviving cultists fled fearfully, some of them leaping into the dark pits below.
While Glint commanded powerful magic, he met his end by Pad Tole's coral katana; as his neck streamed blood, he recognized the lies he had been told. Terrified, the invisible imp flitted through the tunnels, desperate to escape through the altar, but Azrael invoked the rites of the Shadowmasters to appear before him, his wicked longsword drawn.
Immediately giving up, the imp explained that duergar had built the temple for Asmodeus, but it had been long abandoned. Once an adventurer, Glint was exploring the caves and hallucinated from the centipede bites. When the imp was summoned from the altar, he saw an opportunity for riches and decieved the cult for nearly a decade, even hiring some duergar psionics to help him manipulate them. Barely able to conceal his smile, the imp said he had become quite rich in the Hells from the many souls sacrificed by the cult.
Although Chuma saw an opportunity for further riches by sending the imp to prey on Kapital's enemies, Mizzryn and Pad Tole were uncomfortable with condemning anyone's souls; Azrael and Chuma eventually agreed. Petrified with fear, the imp only relaxed when Azrael merely snapped his neck, sending him back to live in the Hells.
Imbued with strange powers as a nephalem, Azrael now realized he could permanently destroy devils outside of the Hells; he would have to investigate these powers later. The mystery solved and their allies threatened by one less organization, the party gathered what supplies they could carry and returned to their keep.

Rewards Granted

Cold Iron Bracelet of Pain Amplification
Cold Iron Bracelet of Pain Transference
Ring of Centipede Summoning

Looted from Cult Treasury

Various Spell Scrolls
500 gp of coins, jewelry, and treasure

Harvested from Giant Centipedes

3 x Giant Centipede Chitin
3 x Giant Centipede Mandibles

Report Date

25 Mar 2023

Primary Location

Zunker River

Related Characters

• Azrael
• Chuma
• Mizzryn Ironheart
• Pad Tole