Through the Mists

Session 4: The House Beyond the Mists

At a glance

Summary

The party resumed its investigation in the fields south of Rivalis, standing over a cow claimed by the returning plague. Its red boils sloughed from the carcass in glistening clumps. The substance was mottled red and black, like corrupted blood, and moved with a purpose of its own.

Rage prodded it with a stick. Then, abandoning the stick and every instinct of self-preservation, he seized the crawling matter in his bare hand. It clung to him, resisted his attempt to shake it loose, and sank into his flesh until the infection—or creature—seemed to become part of his skin.

When the town clock chimed seven, crowds began streaming toward the Coachman’s Rest for Rivalis’s celebrated pie-eating contest. The party joined them. Along the road, they encountered Plute, a traveler with a towel or shawl wrapped around his head and an accent from beyond Darkon. When he spoke, his words seemed to arrive directly in the mind. Plute complained that he had been forced to spend the previous night at the town’s shadier inn, the Traveler’s End.

Inside the Coachman’s Rest, Carver noticed an older, bespectacled human studying a pocket watch. Professor Aldrich Shale explained that the device had been designed to help sailors keep accurate time. He shared Carver’s interest in the thirteenth midnight chime, treating it as a measurable anomaly rather than mere superstition. Their discussion turned to the seasonal cycle during which the moon itself disappears. Shale was traveling toward the Brautslava Institute and suggested that he might collaborate with Carver—or even sponsor the artificer’s research.

The contest soon began. Ignatius abstained, but Rage paid the one-gold entry fee and took his place before the crowd. Ewing introduced the reigning champion: a frail old woman greeted by a chorus of boos. She won every year.

Rage answered her reputation by roaring himself into a battle rage. During the frantic feast, the old woman’s mouth seemed to stretch into something canine, lined with sharp teeth. Yet Rage ate on and, against every local expectation, defeated her. When she rose, she appeared once again to be nothing more than a fragile old woman. Ignatius offered Rage a solemn nod, and Ewing awarded the new champion ten gold pieces.

The victory drew Ooru, an olive-skinned spice merchant with a heavy accent and an eye for opportunity. He asked Rage to sell his beautiful wares on commission. Rage negotiated a sixty-percent share and proved alarmingly effective. Across two rounds of sales, he moved two hundred gold pieces’ worth of spices, returned eighty gold to Ooru, and retained one hundred twenty.

Twelve of those coins were unusual. Where ordinary Darkonian gold bore a skull, these displayed the face of Azalin. Carver recognized what that meant: the coins had once passed through the Darklord’s personal coffers.

The party retired for the night. By morning, Ewing was struggling to manage the inn after one of his employees died during the night. Ignatius asked him about the hidden house Vidic had mentioned. Ewing knew the story: somewhere within the Shroud, veiled by Darkon’s Mists, stood an abandoned house touched by occult happenings.

The party chose to find it.

Ignatius led them uphill through the fields. Suspicious trees crowded the path, and a sudden crash from above announced an ambush. Four hobgoblins armed with greatswords descended upon them.

Ignatius opened with a line of acid that burned two attackers before he drove into the nearest with a flurry of strikes. Rage split one opponent apart with his infused greataxe. Carver shocked a pursuer and used his feline speed to escape before hurling an acid orb powerful enough to melt two hobgoblins together. Briefly shaken that he was no longer the party’s most accomplished wielder of acid, Ignatius lost his rhythm. Rage answered with a devastating charge, and Carver’s radiant crossbow bolt ended the final survivor.

An owl watched from the branches throughout the violence. It appeared entirely ordinary.

The dead carried only five silver pieces. The party rested beneath the trees while Carver reached into the gray Bag of Tricks and summoned a boar. When they resumed the march, two crows followed overhead. One descended and unfolded into the familiar humanoid shape of Vidic.

Vidic gave them a small nugget of silver: a Mist talisman that could guide its bearer through the Shroud and into the hidden house. Ignatius accepted it. Vidic asked the party to return with a report; the unnamed order he served did not tolerate occult evil or its atrocities.

Following the talisman, the party entered blinding white mist. A cobblestone lane emerged beneath their feet, and they understood that they had crossed the border of a separate mini-domain. Ahead stood a beautiful and impeccably maintained estate. As their investigation unfolded, its identity became clear: this was Richten House, the former home of Dr. Rudolph van Richten.

Ignatius guides the party toward Richten House as it emerges beyond the Mists.

A road through the Shroud leads to an immaculate house in a domain of its own. See the image record.

Rage entered its grand foyer and shouted a greeting into the silence. A faint answer seemed to come from the drawing room. There, a woman in a torn nightgown sat applying makeup while staring directly at the intruders. She asked whether they were Van Richten. When they admitted they were not, she wailed in despair.

Carver examined an ivory urn nearby. The name Ingrid van Richten was etched into its base. He took the vessel with him.

In the dining hall, Rage tried to break a chair. The chair opened a mouth full of teeth.

A chair mimic traps Rage while Ignatius heals him and Carver readies fire magic.

Rage’s quarrel with the furniture becomes a team rescue. See the image record.

Carver’s fire bolt struck the mimic with explosive precision, but it wrapped itself around Rage and tore deeply into him. Ignatius pressed the spellwrought tattoo Carver had made and released its single charge of cure wounds, restoring the barbarian before joining the fight with a flurry of blows. Rage hacked at the creature while Carver scorched it with a flaming orb. When the mimic bit Rage again, Ignatius closed the distance and battered it into stillness.

The portraits lining the dining room bore no dust. Someone—or something—maintained this house.

The party continued into a chapel filled with religious objects drawn from many faiths rather than devoted to any single deity. Upstairs, they found a comfortable circular stone chamber and a desk stocked for a monster hunter: two silvered shortswords, silvered crossbow bolts, a pouch of silver dust, and spell scrolls containing dispel evil and good and raise dead. Ignatius claimed the swords; the remaining equipment entered the party’s communal collection.

Somewhere above, an old woman cried, “Baron, no,” and begged to be spared.

At the top of the tower, Rage saw ravens circling far away but still within the enclosing wall of mist. In an upper parlor, another ghost sat smiling. She welcomed the party, asked whether they knew where Van Richten was, and dissolved into vapor.

The next room was the first to show true abandonment: a dark child’s chamber thick with cobwebs. A little girl’s ghost stood within it, clutching a doll. Nearby lay a boy’s room, where the name Erasmus had been engraved upon an object.

Beyond the bedrooms, the party discovered a laboratory equipped with herbalist’s, poisoner’s, and alchemist’s tools. Its books ranged across the study of undead, lycanthropes, vampires, and the collected work of Van Richten. An open journal waited upon the desk.

Its author addressed whoever might someday find it. He wrote that they might never know one another, but that they shared a singular purpose. He feared he might never return from his last and greatest hunt. What remained here, he bequeathed to the reader with one final instruction: shelter it.

The journal was signed Dr. Rudolph van Richten.

Key events

  1. The red-and-black plague matter merged into Rage’s skin.
  2. The party met Plute and Professor Aldrich Shale.
  3. Shale connected the thirteen chimes to a broader timekeeping anomaly and the seasonal disappearance of the moon.
  4. Rage defeated Rivalis’s perennial pie-eating champion and won 10 gp.
  5. Rage earned 120 gp selling Ooru’s spices; twelve coins bore Azalin’s face.
  6. One of Ewing’s employees died during the night.
  7. The party defeated four hobgoblins while seeking the hidden house.
  8. Vidic revealed that he serves an order opposed to occult atrocities and supplied a Mist talisman.
  9. The party crossed into Richten House’s separate mist-bound mini-domain.
  10. Carver took an urn bearing Ingrid van Richten’s name.
  11. Ignatius expended his cure wounds spellwrought tattoo during the mimic battle.
  12. The party discovered Van Richten’s armory, laboratory, monster lore, and final journal.

Decisions and consequences

  • Rage grabbed the crawling plague matter with his bare hand.
    • It adhered to him and merged into his skin; the consequences remain unknown.
  • Rage entered the pie-eating contest.
    • He broke the old champion’s winning streak and earned 10 gp.
  • Rage agreed to sell Ooru’s spices.
    • He earned 120 gp and acquired twelve coins linked to Azalin’s personal coffers.
  • The party followed Vidic’s talisman into the Shroud.
    • They crossed into a separate mini-domain and gained access to Richten House.
  • Carver took Ingrid van Richten’s urn.
    • He now carries an object potentially connected to the house’s ghosts.
  • Ignatius activated the spellwrought tattoo.
    • Its single casting of cure wounds was consumed while saving Rage from the mimic.

People

  • Plute: Foreign-accented traveler whose speech felt almost telepathic.
  • Professor Aldrich Shale: Scholar of the thirteen-chime anomaly and potential sponsor for Carver.
  • Ooru: Spice merchant who employed Rage as a remarkably successful salesman.
  • Vidic: Supplied the house talisman and revealed his connection to an unnamed order.
  • Ingrid van Richten: Name engraved on the ivory urn; possible connection to the torn-nightgown ghost.
  • Dr. Rudolph van Richten: Monster hunter whose journal and research remain in the house.
  • Unnamed pie champion: Frail old woman whose mouth briefly appeared canine and sharp-toothed.

Places

  • Traveler’s End: Shadier Rivalis inn where Plute spent the night.
  • Brautslava Institute: Aldrich Shale’s destination and possible future research connection for Carver.
  • Richten House: Haunted estate concealed inside its own mist-bound domain.

Clues, lore, and notable items

  • The plague matter can move independently and merge into living skin.
  • Professor Shale considers the thirteenth chime a temporal anomaly.
  • The moon disappears during a recurring seasonal cycle.
  • Azalin-faced coins have passed through the Darklord’s personal coffers.
  • Vidic belongs to an unnamed order that opposes occult atrocities.
  • The Mist talisman opened a route through the Shroud and across a domain border.
  • Multiple ghosts within Richten House search for Van Richten.
  • The house appears maintained despite its ghosts, cobwebbed upper rooms, and hostile mimic.
  • Van Richten collected weapons, tools, and extensive research for hunting supernatural creatures.
  • His journal suggests he departed on a final hunt and did not expect to return.

Story threads

Rewards, expenses, and character changes

  • Rage paid 1 gp to enter the pie contest and won 10 gp.
  • Rage earned 120 gp selling spices for Ooru.
  • The party recovered 5 sp from the hobgoblins.
  • Ignatius received and carries Vidic’s silver Mist talisman.
  • Carver carries the ivory urn marked Ingrid van Richten.
  • Ignatius claimed two silvered shortswords.
  • Carver took custody of silvered crossbow bolts, a pouch of silver dust, and scrolls of dispel evil and good and raise dead on behalf of the party. Exact quantities of the ammunition and dust were not recorded.
  • Ignatius’s cure wounds spellwrought tattoo was expended.
  • Rage now carries or hosts an unidentified red-and-black growth beneath his skin.

Memorable moments

  • Rage responded to ambulatory plague matter by grabbing it bare-handed.
  • Rage entered a barbarian rage to improve his pie-eating performance.
  • Carver’s acid orb briefly challenged Ignatius’s identity as the party’s premier acid wielder.
  • The gray Bag of Tricks supplied a boar for the journey.
  • Rage’s attempt to break a chair led directly to being eaten by it.
  • The session ended with the discovery of Rudolph van Richten’s final journal.

Open questions

  • What merged into Rage’s skin, and what effect does it have?
  • Who was the old pie champion, and what caused her doglike transformation?
  • Why does the moon disappear, and how is it connected to the thirteen chimes?
  • What does Professor Shale know about the anomaly, and can he be trusted as a sponsor?
  • Why do some coins from Azalin’s coffers circulate with his face rather than a skull?
  • Was the owl merely an ordinary animal, or another watcher?
  • Who is Vidic’s order?
  • Is the torn-nightgown ghost Ingrid van Richten?
  • Who is the old woman begging the Baron for mercy?
  • Who is the smiling ghost searching for Van Richten?
  • Who is the ghostly girl, and what is the significance of Erasmus’s engraved name?
  • What exactly did Rudolph van Richten bequeath, and what must be sheltered?
  • Where did Van Richten go on his final hunt?

Next session

  • Immediate situation: The party stands in Van Richten’s laboratory with his journal, research, and tools before them.
  • Likely goals: Examine the journal and house more thoroughly, identify its ghosts, determine what Van Richten left behind, and report to Vidic if they can escape the domain.

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