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4 Dierdos 1120 Bad Medicine
The new year brought with it an unexpected twist for the party: soon after returning from the Island of Castanamir, Strontium and Aria announced that they were leaving the group to form an adventuring party of their own. The Adventurers' Guild appointed a mediator to divide the group's assets and both new parties went their separate ways. Pendrul, Quinn, Uiq and W'illot interviewed a number of potential companions before selecting two:
Each new recruit brought both spellcasting and combat skills to the table along with a natural affinity for the sea. The first test of the newly-reformed party came on the fourth day of the new year when an elderly man in clerical robes called out to the party from the deck where their ship was moored. He was Bersolus, a man the party knew by repute as a good cleric involved in running the House of Healing, a facility known for providing herbal and holistic cures for the sick and wounded who could not afford magical healing. That morning, Bersolus came running to the heroes for help. Monsters -- horrible, blue-black-tentacled beasts -- had overrun the House and were slaughtering the patients. Bersolus and some of his staff had managed to get themselves and some patients out. He asked the party's aid in saving the remaining patients and staff. The group wasted no time in following Bersolus to the House of Healing in the service sector. They found the House surrounded by people, ordinary citizens using every available resource to keep the doors and windows closed against the monsters inside. At Bersolus's urging the crowd parted and stood back from the main doors. The party opened the doors and found themselves immediately confronted by a number of horrific creatures, basically humanoid in shape, with long writhing tentacles in place of arms, bulging yellow eyes and streams of slobber running from a wide, toothy maw. Tolisa opened by firing a crossbow bolt at the first creature and scored a hit. Pendrul moved in on the doorway but found herself caught around the neck by a slimy, surprisingly strong tentacle. The monster squeezed hard and cut off Pendrul's air supply. Merkator tried a fear spell on one of the monsters but failed to overcome the creature's spell resistance. Another hit from Tolisa felled the first beast as Pendrul lost consciousness. Quinn and W'illot concentrated their missile fire on the monster that held Pendrul in its grasp. Quinn moved inside for a trident strike but was seized by another of the monsters. She broke its grip on her throat and attacked. Uiq and W'illot also moved inside to escape the confines of the doorway, along with Merkator. Tolisa swore when her magic missile spell failed to affect a monster, and again when an errant crossbow shot wounded an already-down Pendrul. With each moment, the party realized that more of these creatures were moving in from the wards. Bersolus, having gotten his first good look at the monsters, was horrified to see that they wore the standard issue pajamas of his patients. He quickly surmised that some sort of curse had turned good people into these monsters and begged the party not to use lethal force. The party heard him but, facing lethal force and a grim battle so far, did not immediately agree. Uiq felled two monsters even as another appeared and closed a tentacle around Merkator's throat. Seeing more of his patients put down by the party brought Bersolus running into the entry hall to entreat the party for mercy. His reward was to be grabbed by one of the creatures he sought to save. The party heard a sharp snap and saw Bersolus fall dead of a broken neck. Any thought of pulling punches left the party then. The Church of Freya had resources to raise the dead, provided the transformation could be reversed; better to deal decisively with these powerful creatures than to die from being too gentle. W'illot killed two with his bow and a revived Pendrul slew another as it tried to choke the life out of Uiq. From outside, someone called out that Bersolus had a wand of remove curse in his quarters. The party withdrew from the House and instructed the bystanders to hold the doors fast while they went for the wand. *** The party ran to the Temple of Freya, where Bersolus lived. A pair of young clerics named Esmond and Ulrich answered the door and, after hearing the party's rapid account of their need, led the way to the room they shared with Bersolus. The room held four beds, each with a nightstand and foot locker. The clerics pointed out Bersolus's locker to W'illot. As he worked on opening the lock, the clerics stepped back and muttered softly to themselves. Only Tolisa noticed the sound. It aroused her suspicions instantly and prompted her to case detect aberration, the spell she had learned from the party themselves. Before she could complete the spell, though, the room filled with thick magical darkness. Tolisa's spell took affect and told her that an aberration lay in her field of view. She announced this immediately and the party acted on the knowledge. First Quinn and then Merkator cast light spells to counter the magical darkness. W'illot stayed on task and retrieved a magic wand from the now-unlocked chest. Uiq grabbed Esmond and held him while Pendrul whipped out her rapier. Suddenly Uiq felt an overwhelming fear grip his mind. He let go of the squirming cleric in his grasp and cowered in the farthest corner of the room. At the same time a set of cold, blue-black tentacles reached out from an empty bed area and lashed at Tolisa and Quinn -- a tsochar, outside of any host, had joined the fray. Quinn stabbed back with her trident and scored a glancing blow. Merkator took the wand from W'illot and tried using it to free Esmond from the creature inside him, but the magic was ineffective. The ambush continued with more magical attacks. Another tentacle flailed at Quinn and delivered a shocking grasp while Ulrich failed to contain Tolisa with a hold person spell. In the corner where Esmond stood taking hits from Pendrul and W'illot, a thick fog came up and veiled the area. W'illot saw the futility of fighting blind and changed tactics. He vaulted over Bersolus's bed and took a position above and behind the tsochar, where he was able to sneak attack the thing. He learned that the tsochar had arcane spells at its disposal and stole one (expeditious retreat) and then another (daze) while still delivering damage to the monster. Within the fog cloud, Esmond screamed and tentacles lashed out into the adjoining spaces. Another tsochar was out of hiding. Uiq recovered from the fear spell and went to work on Ulrich, knowing that his strength would help to overcome the creature's resistance to weapons. Before long the expected tendrils appeared from within the cleric, revealing the third true enemy. Pendrul continued battling with the creature that had been inside Esmond, assisted by Merkator and Tolisa. The close quarters of the bedroom proved advantageous to the monsters. Their long reach allowed each tsochar to attack several party members at once while limiting the heroes' ability to escape their enemies' grasp. Merkator saw that the party was taking more damage than they were dishing out and realized that an emergency medic was needed more than another blade. He healed himself and then spread healing spells among Quinn, Pendrul and Tolisa to keep them on their feet and fighting. Newly invigorated, the party battled on and managed to wear down the tsochari's strength little by little. In the longest combat they'd yet seen, they finally brought down the creatures without losing any of their own. A quick search of the foot lockers turned up enough healing potions to cure the party's many wounds. They took the precious wand and returned at speed to the House of Healing. Inside, they took turns distracting the tentacled horrors while Merkator slipped in to touch each with the wand. One by one the creatures turned back into humans and were left stunned and senseless by the sudden change. In the aftermath of the attack the party questioned bystanders until they had a reasonable grasp of the morning's events. The clerics Esmond and Ulrich had prepared breakfast for the patients and brought it in just at the start of the morning shift. That food was laced with a magical substance akin to a potion that transformed many of the patients into the tentacled aberrations; those cursed souls immediately turned on their friends and nurses with lethal force. None of the survivors remembered anything about their time as a monster, which was likely a mercy to those who had killed friends. The combination of unknown magic and aberrations reminded the party of the Codex Anathema and Chandrakar, but there was no hard evidence to back up the idea. The party destroyed the remaining poisoned food. Sebastian, the senior cleric of the Church of Freya, thanked them for their timely aid and pledged to raise as many of the dead as possible. He started with Bersolus himself, who also thanked the party profusely for the rescue. Sebastian attempted to raise Esmond and Ulrich as well, but the magic failed -- those men had been dead for several weeks and could not be raised so easily. The Church has little extra income, but Sebastian bestowed on the party what material rewards he could. They were given the wand of remove curse, as it seemed they may need it again in the future. Several items in the clerics' room did not belong to Bersolus or his roommates, but to a young mage who had disappeared some days before. The party accepted a magical ring (minor ring of spell storing) and the wizard's spell book but insisted that the Church keep the modest amount of money in the wizard's things. The party returned to their ship not even two hours after leaving it, their resources depleted but their mission accomplished. The bigger questions would keep for now.
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