Resting safely in the emperors tomb Eddie had a strange dream (cue creepy music). He dimly saw three figures almost indistinguishable in the dark hunched around a bubbling cauldron. Where his vision was murky the audio was clear as if he was there in person.
Sisters why have you failed? I gathered the first sample the rest should be easy.
There's no sign, no sign at all and our agent in the city is beset by all sides she has lost one of our gifts and the other wishes to return to our side.
What about you sister? What progress have you made?
I was distracted - our puppet among the Terrorfolk is unreachable.
Sisters do you not think think these setback could be related? We should look further afield.
Wait, why does the stone glow? Look sisters, We have a guest. Quick follow the dreamer back through the ether...
Much debate was had but the party then decided to head back to Port Nyanzaru.
On the way the group was blocked by a large dinosaur which made them have to take a different route. Proceeding along this new route they came across a strange clearing with a still and several casks of extremely strong drink. There was also a shimmering path leading into the clearing almost to the stone monolith in its center.
Lindal helped the group avoid spooking a nest of flying snakes and the group noted that the clearing was perfectly circular 30 feet in diameter with a small obsidian monolith in the center of the clearing. A slimy residue leads into the clearing from the forest making the shimmery path but ends abruptly midway through the clearing.
(perception 20) The small obsidian marker was carved with dancing figures hard to see on the black stone. The shadow of the stone points the wrong direction. Eddie and Lindal head into the clearing to investigate while Freya and Kylorin scout the outside using divine sight. Upon entering Eddie and Lindal's shadows separate and start dancing a spiral path towards the monolith. The others in the group have to scream to get their attention but when they do and the others leave their shadows do not come back with them and they feel oddly depleted like something critical is missing. Going back into the clearing Lindal tries to catch his shadow and finds it is far more agile than him but he turns and catches Eddies shadow easily enough. Meanwhile Eddie examines the pillr and finds that he can put his hands into it and the inner monolith is carved with different symbols than the outer one. He takes a quick rubbing but the language is unknown to him and the magic is growing in power and lindal carries out the shadows and Eddie joins him and teh group hurries the hell away and heads to firefinger where they rest for the night. That night they are all beset by nightmares.
The Sewn Sisters pay a visit
Lindal - silently you move in towards your enemies. Your knife in hand. Out numbered you had to wait for them to sleep. Silent as a shadow you don't even need your knife. You lift the items and are gone with no one the wiser. You lift the artifact a necklace and it spins and rolls oddly reminding you of an eye as it looks at you. ("Silent and deadly this is a good start but let's look at what you have done") Your eyes go back to the camp and see the forms of your friends. Throats gashed your blade still dripping. You look at the broken snake amulet clutched in your hand palmed from the vault or Besmira but then it is a coin again and the bodies are just sleeping. You need to get back to your friends, if you could just find them.
Lindal is filled with self doubt afterwards weak and shivery. The others immediately notice.
Freya - Your companions are all badly wounded but you have shaken off the worst of the vault's traps somehow. Where the traps of the tomb have worn them down you find yourself inspired. Invigorated. Trapped in a bubble of force Eddie tells you earnestly "Freya you need to go in and pull the right lever by the suit of armor" It is the only way to get us out. It is in the next room behind a suit of armor. Pull the right one only, the right one.... got it?" You nod and walk though the path you have explored you know the statue walking around and facing back towards the group. You then reach out for the lever with your right hand and pull it. Distant screams fill the air. ("Ah this one will never make it though the labyrinth well she may not have a sense of direction but we can use her as an lodestone all directions point towards her, lovely.")
Freya is left compulsively rubbing her hands and checking left from right repeatedly.
Celadon - The crowd goes wild as you skip past the basilisk its gaze turning the velociraptors at your heels to stone. You hear the coliseum echo with your name. A beautiful lady in the front blows you a kiss and you mime catching it but the kiss burns and your arm withers away as the succabus winks and slips back into the crowd. You knew it was her but couldn't resist. The crowd goes wild again. (Attracted to death, this one. Death can stalk his heels his own desire will reinforce the spell. He cries out for attention, let us give it to him.)
Eddie - You duck behind the counter and snort some of the newly acquired brown dust. Chills run down your body. You feel like insects are running all over your body. Your nose runs and when you touch it it comes away bloody. Pulling out a looking glass you see something sharp poking out of your nose. Grabbing it and pulling you get a loot long centipede slicked with blood as your nose collapses into a rotting hole in your face. The centipede says in impish voice. "Sorry boss business is business and without a pact you are fair game" ("oh deals with a devil but no pact to protect the self? This is perfect, I can use this. We must find this devil and buy off the bargain so we can transfer it to our creation once it is finished.")
Kylorin - you see yourself dressed like your parents cleaning a Dingy cell in the dark, You look up and see yourself the dreamer. "Ahrgh! who are you? You look like me? Why do you look like me?" (Hmm we already have all that we need though her drive to completion might be used to drive the construct, what do you think sisters?) Kylorin wakes up looks at the rest of the group and asks, "Where am I, Who are you?"
There are much discussions. Eddie is for getting rid of the sending stone. Celadon says he will not abandon his link to Dorah even as Eddie points out that the Vespertine Flame must have fallen afoul of the Sewn sisters. Almost mythological figures in their own right. The entire group nod having been truly horrified by those visitations as it merges that Kylorin is NOT kylorin but someone else with different abilities the party is even more weirded out. Eddie in a panic proposes that the group go and use the shadow gate to escape the Sewn sisters. The sisters followed his dreaming form back and now knows where to find them but if they shake them off the sisters may not be able to find them again. The pillar was from an dark spirit, one of Ubtau's sons but both Eddie and Celadon know that the bloodthirsty legends of the dark spirit are colonial inventions and that the night spirit Jobal protected Chultans from the hungry dinosaurs by making them sluggish and blind.
Inspired the group decide to use the shadow gate and so head back to the clearing where they all consume some liquid courage and then dance their way to the center. At the center they a consumed by darkness and appear far away the sun in the wrong position with it the wrong time of day. Exploring nearby the group sees a slime trail out of the clearing. Still fresh despite the heavy rain from before the jump. Even better Kylorin is back and Lindal and Freya feel better as if whatever it was that was haunting them has worn off. Kylorin dons her armor and tells the group that she appeared in a dank cell cleaning the floor and was questioned at length by three hags who were excited that their clone was finally getting back her memories so they could question her effectively. She spent the next few hours being evasive but talking WAY too much about sister Linora to the Hags distress and she learned a bit in the meanwhile just as the party learned some of the hags from Not-Kylorin.
The three sisters serve the great master tending the artifact and to the needs of his pet the Soulmonger as it grows. They are the Sewn sister of legend who carry sacks made of eyelids to carry the souls they have stolen away from the unwary. Kylorin was able to listen for their names and recited their descriptions as follows:
Widow Groat has tarnished gold coins covering her eyes and ants nesting in her skull. She carries a large key ring.
Peggy Deadbells wears a string of chattering children's teeth and thumps about on a heavy peg leg. When she laughs, yellow gas billows out of her nose and ears. Around her neck, she wears a pouch made from gnome skin faces on.
Baggy Nanna has a squirming leather sack sewn over her head. The bag sounds like it contains a cockerel, a viper, and a terrier. One animal at a time emerges from the bag to speak on her behalf.
The party then see a destroyed camp site through the trees. The woods are far too silent. Exploring the campsite they find it only recently abandoned smelling still of woodsmoke. Before the party can search much a creature with multiple arms bursts from the jungle and hurls itself at the group. Lindal see it and Seraph yells a warning but the creature moves explosively arriving before the group before any but lindal can get a weapon out. Lindal skewers the zombified girallon and dodges back but it then steps forward and lays into everyone biting and clawing like a storm of fangs. Lindal is grievously wounded but Celadon urges him, "Stay there, I will use my magic to give an opening". Lindal did not want to but decided to trust Celadon just as Celadon had trusted Eddie on the shadow gate.
Celadon cast a spell and Eddie twists fate to ensure that the Girallon is forced to flee and several blows get in but Lindal takes his rapier, stakes the beasts foot to the floor and as it runs away it basically unravels into shreds of twitching meat.
Soon after another figure steps form the trees from the girallon's direction and n questioning answers with a mix of gesture, scents, and sign language communicates that it was hunting the girallon and that it was from the camp and that allies are nearby. With Seraph translating the group learns that the figure is called Dragonbait and is a paladin of the dragon like Kylorin.
Leading the group back to another much sparser camp the group meet a rag tag bunch. Oona Swordsalve aggressive Chultan swashbuckler happy to see that they have her casks of Kej though oddly weathered, Diviya a Chultan follower of Msukumo, and Skutcha a Chultan wilderness type of some sort, and last was a caucasian who speaks for Dragonbait (the sauron the party met). It comes out that there are two groups The sauron and the Caucasian man with (Byrt and Lugg tattooed on his arm) recently helped drive off the girallons that destroyed the camp of the other three who were caught in the shadow gate a few days back and had camped out here while they tried to figure out a way back. It seems that the shadow gate had a time dilation effect and that multiple months have passed. Also the death curse has strengthened in the meanwhile with any dead raising as evidenced by the Girallon. The group is warned that there is a undead T-Rex nearby that Byrt and Dragonbreath were avoiding as they made their way across the continent towards Orolunga.
The session ends as the group mentions Acererak and Byrt reacts as if he recognizes the name.
Inspiration
Eddie for grabbing the hat from Celadon to give to Not Kylorin
Kylorin and Not Kylorin for awesome roleplay
Freya for playing up her flaws well
Defeated
zombie girallon 750
The party earned 750 xp with 2 allies [Azaka, Seraph] (125 each => 2250 cumulative)
Treasure
2 casks of distilled Kej (extra aged)
Companions (not present):
Captain and Crew of the Brazen pegasus
Captain Ortimay
First Mate Grigg
Bonnie "Sky Turtle" Skytle
Seraph - a Psuedodragon traveling companion and his horde of 3 gp and 3 sp
Undril Silvertusk - A Lightbringer and member of the Order of the Gauntlet bringing relief supplies to Camp Righteousness.
Derrick - former pirate now sworn to Kasisi as temple guardian
Lenny - imp with a troubled history with the party
Hew Hackenstone - tough as the legend would have you believe.