The Madness of Men in a World of Monsters (D&D 5e IC)

[purepolarpanzer]

Northwest of Dam'ess- Along the Delvus River

The lieutenant, looking between Mal and Ulu, swallows heavily, some of her actual emotion coming to the forefront and pushing aside her confident and authoritative mask. "Well... you can't hurt, at the very least. The mummers aren't getting any more dead." She motions to her men, who begin hefting the stones and hauling them out of the way of the road. When she turns back to you all, her demeanor is almost pleading. "It's... a mess up there. Blood and guts strewn about, bodies desecrated, and the damn smiles... prepare yourself. It's not for the faint of heart... if you can help, you help. Whatever... or whoever did this needs to be caught and slain." The small boulders moved aside, she moves to the side of the road and waves you onward. Kagiso pulls the stagecoach up the road to pick you all up, then drives the horses up the road, the steadily growing incline slowing your pace, and the mounting rain making the journey all the more miserable for the driver and the former village elder.

In the Foothills of Mount Beldrin, Along the Delvus River

It is a twenty minute journey to arrive at the scene. First you spot the horses and their mounted riders, circling the area nervously. One of these riders comes out to meet you, but a few shouted words from Maus and he wheels his horse and leads you closer. You smell the murder before you see it, with the rich, sweet smell of rot slipping into the cab of the stagecoach like a burglar, assaulting your noses with a foul preview of the carnage to come. Before long, Kagiso has halted the coach, shouting back to Ulu, who immediately opens the door and slides out. She turns, and a single curse of Nguni escapes her lips as her eyes go wide in surprise. "You... are going to want to get out and see this." She murmurs uncertainly before moving forward.

Any who follow her are presented with a fresh assault on their sanity. To your left, a steep embankment rolls off into the darkened wood. To your right there is an even steeper rise upward, forming a small cliff. Directly in front of you is a massacre. Twenty seven corpses are scattered across a small clearing in the road, a rest stop that Set recognizes from his journey to Dam'ess where he slept the night before arriving. Standing over several of them are grey robed Harumite priests, all of them with lit candles, chanting prayers, though some do it through a rag or handkerchief to keep out some of the powerful scent of decay. One of them pauses his chanting and approaches all of you, easing around a tipped over cart and the bodies of four horses that must have died in their traces, faithful to the last. The priest is a middle aged man with a balding scalp and pock marked skin, and when Maus and Ulu explain that you are all here to help he sags with relief. "Thank you all. I am Father Ilim, of the faith of Harum, Lord of the Vale. I honestly prayed that someone would come to help us shoulder the burden of this unseemly task, and I am not foolish enough to turn down the Lord's blessing just because it comes in the form of strangers. Lord of Mountains and Valleys be praised that you've arrived. Come, I will tell you what we know... and show you what we've seen." The man's eyes bulge slightly from the sockets, and they do little to hide the fear and disgust he feels at this moment. Turning around, he leads you to the closest body to examine it.

The body is decayed, but still recognizable, skin going grey with dark lines where the major veins and arteries run. Or, to be more accurate, what is left of it. All four limbs have been wrenched from the sockets, three of them hanging limply like the limbs of a broken doll, while one has been torn away and rests several feet away. Though this could be the arm of another corpse, as closer inspection reveals them all to be similarly broken into pieces. Their stomachs are all torn open, and the majority of their organs have been tossed to one side or another. Dr. Madaras can make out the remains of lungs, hearts, intestine, and kidneys amongst the wreckage of humanity. Each body also has scratches, scrapes, and gouges around their eyes, and those with keen eyes can see there is flesh and blood caked around the fingernails of the dead. Some managed to claw their own eyes out, but most did not live long enough to purge the horror from their eyes. Most unsettlingly, each corpse bears a small, serene smile, akin to the look of someone waking from a long, restful sleep when they reach over and blindly find their lover next to them. Selissa notes that there is a crow sitting in a nearby tree, but it waits vigil, cawing softly now and then, but not flying down to eat the unattended bodies, as would be the norm for scavengers. This sends a tingle up Selissa's spine as repressed memories start to float up through her consciousness unwillingly.

Father Ilim kneels down to the corpse and places coins on they ragged eye sockets. "I have studied some physiker books. It seems that all the organs have been discarded and destroyed except for

A Memory of Selissa

"the liver. Just like the others, the liver is gone, and everything else is shredded." Gnarl stood up and whispered a rite of the Green Faith, while Sara was quietly sick in the nearby bushes. Selissa felt an urge to go comfort her, but she could not take her eyes of the corpse of the young man. Jonath also stared, though his determination came more from stubbornness and refusal to turn away from that which Gnarl handled with stoicism. He spit out a curse and finally looked away, fingers on his greatsword. The abdomen had been ravished by claws, the purple and pink of organ meat splattered across the trees and rocks of the path. The young man smiled as though he had just come to some great truth, a stark contrast to his savaged eyes and visceral death. Jonath spoke up, as Sara returned to the group, looking ashen pale. "Village elder back in Yurl said they are all found like this. Sneaking through the woods to meet a jilly girl, out in the forest to pray to spirits. Even if they stray too far to take a piss. Limbs broken. Guts played with. Eyes scratched out. Creepy smiles. This is the third one this month." Sara's voice, soft and airy like a cloud, spoke up next. "Then it is an ambush predator. It only strikes when people are alone in remote areas. Perhaps we can somehow bait it?" Gnarl shook his head. "Too risky. This could happen to whoever we used. Selissa, can you track what did this?" The forest elf nodded and finally tore her eyes from the corpse, looking to the ground to see

Rest Spot in the Road, Along the Delvus River

"Odd tracks. Some of them look almost avian, others like they were made by paws, some that even look like hooves, though with all these horses around, those might be ours." Father Ilim gestured toward a set of tracks. "See how on this side you have what look like a massive dog paw print, and here you have some sort of claws? And this wavy line... our tracker says that's like the tail of a great reptile. But it's not present in the bird-like tracks right over here! It's almost as though they were attacked by the population of

A Memory of Selissa

"some sort of zoo?" Jonath snorted after Selissa reported her findings. The wood elf shook her head. One set of tracks. Different feet. Sometimes tail, sometimes not. Sometimes close together, sometimes long stride. Even a sweeping track you get from turkey tail feathers. Not natural. In any way. Shapeshifter? Gnarl shrugged and looked into the forest for his own counsel, while Sara tried to read the tracks herself. "So it doesn't have a constant form. No wonder we've heard so many different descriptions from the villagers who caught glimpses of it. But we are on the right track. I sense great evil before us. Ready your weapons, and let the light

Rest Spot in the Road, Along the Delvus River

bless us in our task, shepherd these poor souls to the afterlife, and helps us find whatever is responsible." Father Ilim ended his short prayer, the fourth one he had rendered since beginning to show you the dead. "They were a mummers troupe. Witnesses at the village at the other side of the mountain say they put on a show, then asked for directions to the next village. They were heading to Dam'ess to ply their trade, when... this... happened." He looked to each of you in turn. "So, do any of you know what could have done this?

Selissa knew. As cold began to spread from her heart and fill her body like freezing water, she knew precisely what had done this. The Horror of Yurl. But it had never attacked more than one person at a time before. If whatever did this was some kin of the Horror's, it must be much larger. And much hungrier. Suddenly Selissa felt very alone, with no Sara, Gnarl, or Jonath here with her to face this aberrant spawn of chaos for a second time. Doubt and fear raked at her mind, and her normally stony composure was challenged by the terrors of the past.

Spoiler: Insight DC 5

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The quavering tone of Father Ilim holds so deception, only an attempt and summoning inner strength to do battle with the fear that threatens to destroy his mind.

Spoiler: Investigation DC 5

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The corpses are all wearing bright colors and flamboyant costumes. The claim that they were mummers holds water. Too repulsively rotting to get very close, though.

Spoiler: Investigation DC 10

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The priest's assertion that the liver is missing from the carnage is true, as well. Either you've cleaned an animal or eviscerated a man, but the large telltale organ is missing, while the other organs of the body are smeared and splattered about the landscape.

Spoiler: DC 15

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Despite their decaying state, the muscles of the body are relaxed and loose. Normally, even with broken limbs, the body's muscles would be tense right now. The only tensed muscles are the ones causing those eerie, serene smiles.

Spoiler: DC 20

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Each of these mummers, whether it be on an anklet, a necklace, a bracelet, or a piercing is wearing an identical charm. It is tough to find them all, with the muck and the blood and the gore, but when all are accounted for there are 27, one for each body.

Spoiler: DC 15 Religion, Advantage for Members of the Green Faith

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This charm is a bit of rabbit fur tied around a thorn in a circle of horn. It is meant to invoke the favor of Brother Jackalope, a fictional comic hero in many nursery tales of the Green Faith. He is the patron spirit of children, entertainers, wanderers, and vagabonds.

Spoiler: History DC 15

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A series of attacks similar to this happened in a village named Yurl in the eastern part of the Vale.

Spoiler: DC 20

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A group of heroes did battle with some sort of monster, but not all of them survived.

Spoiler: DC 25

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One of the heroes was supposedly a elven archer who never missed, could track a falcon in flight on a cloudy day, and fought the beast with a strong, stoic spirit, said to be green of hair and fair of skin.

Spoiler: Set's Magic Vision

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This places is steeped in powerful energies, as though many middling powered spells were cast in the immediate area that had not faded yet. But underneath the haze of divinations and consecrations, there is something more.

Spoiler: Set DC 15 Arcana Check

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Like craters from a catapult's boulder, there are areas of magic that have been near permanently stained on the metaphysical landscape of this place. Clouds of residual enchantment magic rise from each body like the soul escaping the tortured form, and powerful auras of necromancy radiate like bruises in your vision. There is potential that if this place is not properly consecrated undead will rise in the area. In fact, there is no assurance as of yet that these mummers aren't about to step up and kill you right now.

Spoiler: DC 20

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The nature of these spells are psychic in nature, which is a spectrum of energy that is very difficult to detect normally. No actual spells were cast, whatever used magic here could render fearful magic with merely a though.

Spoiler: OOC

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Everyone who gets out of the carriage and looks at the scene needs to make a DC 13 Madness Save, except for Selissa, who needs to make a DC 15 Save due to the personal nature of the scene.